SCHOOLS’ BREAKUP DAY

Southland Times, Issue 23988, 1 December 1939, Page 4

SCHOOLS’ BREAKUP DAY

To The Editor Sir,—Surely the Southland Education Board is barren of ideas if the best it can do to celebrate New Zealand’s centennial year is to make the primary Schools of our province carry on till they have been open for 400 half days. On making inquiries, I find that during the last five years only two boards ever attained this total. Why, then, the sudden zeal for observance of the regulations that characterizes the board’s attitude? Few Southland schools have had tiine off for snow or sickness this year, as compared with those in northern centres. It can be borne in mind also that the power the local board has to start the first term on the Tuesday instead of the Monday is never used, although it is the practice of other parts of the Dominion to do so. It is well known that committees are allowed tliree days for holidays for special occasions, but these are seldom taken advantage of. It certainly seems strange that while all the rest of the schools in the Dominion are to close on December 15, the Southland primary schools have the honour of carrying the torch of educational progress, alone and uncomforted.

Keeping all these facts In mind, it seems that the Southland board, the members of which so often laud the abilities, morale and co-operation of its teachers, and the tone and high standard of its schools, nevertheless thinks h necessary to make children and teachers work longer than is the case elsewhere in New Zealand. Once again it seems that Southland wins the “wooden spoon.”—Yours, etc., EQUALITY. November 30, 1939. '