INFLUENCE OF TEACHERS

Taranaki Daily News, 6 December 1930, Page 6

INFLUENCE OF TEACHERS

LORD BLEDISLOE’S ADVICE. ADDRESS AT TRAINING COLLEGE. By Telegraph.—Press Association. Wellington, Last Night. A very enthusiastic gathering marked the closing until next 'year of the Teachers’ Training College at Kelburn. The Governor-General and Lady Bledisloe attended and were given a rousing reception. His Excellency said it was a particularly congenial task to address them, for in the days of his childhood his great ambition was to be a teacher. He agreed with Mr. Lomas, the principal, that teachers required to be trained. Their principal had also said “Do not be tied overmuch to tradition.” With that also he agreed, except in such matters as loyalty z and patriotism. “I have never addressed a potentially more influential audience than this,” continued Lord Bledisloe. “There is DO; nobler profession than yours and none more designed to have a more certain or powerful influence on your country and your Empire. It is. not merely an occupation to which anyone might put his hand with a fair measure of success. Teaching: has become an art in every sense of the word and requires a considerable amount of preparation and examination in order to excel. It is not only a profession, but it is also a grpat Imperial trust. There is no greater trust. You are in what lawyers call a fiduciary position rather than that of a beneficiary. If anyone is entering the profession of teaching to-day moved by motives of selfrinterest only I suggest he sliould seek some other occupation. “If you do not teach religion (and most of you will not),” said His Excellency, “at least show you are inspired by religious faith and religious conviction; by so doing you will carry much greater conviction as regards the ideals of life with those plastic and impressionable young minds which it is your privilege to mould for their own and their country’s good.”