THE ROAD TO NOWHERE

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 114, 4 August 1927, Page 10

THE ROAD TO NOWHERE

ONE of the humours of the conference of the Technical Education Association of New Zealand, which is now sitting at V ellington, was the appeal by Mr. J. R. Kirk to members to “refrain from harassing the department by requests for iron railings to put round their magnificent buildings.’’ Mr. Kirk must have been in satirical mood. What is required is not iron railings around existing buildings, but the building and equipment of additional technical colleges, and the removal of the iron railings around the area of retrenchment into which those who are asked for money for technical education have retreated. The enormous sum spent on education in this country, creeping higher year by year, may well be an excuse for retrenchment. But is it a wise form of economy on the part of the Education Department to continue spending money on the same old routine in the primary schools and to stint that very essential technical education, the products of which will be of such infinite value in the future development of the country? Inasmuch as there are so many pupils from the primary schools entering into blind-alley occupations, it may reasonably be asked if much of the expenditure on primary education is not, to a certain extent, wasted. The principal provision of whole-time technical education in England and Wales is now made, firstly, in junior technical schools for boys who have attended public elementary schools up to the age of 12 (or sometimes longer, though this is held to be a bad plan), and who intend to enter industrial employment about the age of 16; secondly, in senior technical schools for boys who have received secondary education up to 16 years of age and intend to enter industry two years later; and, thirdly, in universities and colleges of university rank for young men'who have been at school until the age of 18. In a country such as New Zealand, that has yet so far to go toward the attainment of industrial prestige, technical education of the widest range may be claimed as a pressing necessity. Undue parsimony in this direction is to obscure the distant pound with the near shilling. Some time ago, and at very considerable expense, the Government secured the services of a special commission, which included Mr. Frank Tate, Director of Education in Victoria, and one of the world’s foremost educational experts, to investigate and report on post-primary education in the Dominion. Mr. Tate recommended the setting up of a technical schools’ board, and this was heartily approved by Sir James Parr, who was probably the keenest and soundest Minister of Education who ever held the portfolio. But his successor, Mr. R. A. Wright (the astonishment concerning whose appointment has not yet faded), has intimated that he does not intend to go on with the proposal. He suggests that the University Entrance Board can fulfil the same purpose! The Government has obligations to the youth of the Dominion which is in danger of walking the road to Nowhere. The present administration needs to frame an adequate policy for technical education and the Technical Education Association is the body to which the public will look to apply the necessary stimulus.