RISE OF A FORCE

Taranaki Daily News, 14 January 1935, Page 9

RISE OF A FORCE

SUMMER SCHOOL MOVEMENT. RMATJ. BEGINNINGS IN 1924. The summer ■ school movement as it stands to-day - is well-known throughout New Zealand, and attracts to its annual sessions - teachers from all grades of schools in New' Zealand and from every province .throiighout the Dominion. The movement ■ was due in the first place to the• enthusiasm of, Professor James Shelley, of Canterbury College, who came to New Zealand fresh from his association with such movements in England. He applied the principle to the Workers’ Educational Association in which in Christchurch he took a lively interest, holding in that province in 1921, at Oxford, the first summer school held in New Zealand. It was not until 1923 that the principle of summer schools came under the notice of the teaching profession. That it did was due to the fact that one of the students at Professor Shelley’s school was a teacher who returned to Southland convinced that the movement would be of .immense value if applied to the teaching service, and convinced, too, that if lecturers of brilliance could be attracted there would develop a more than ordinary interest in subjects related to school-room procedure. Tn 1923 the Southland Educational Institute held the first teachers’ summer school at Riverton. The financial obligations were heavy, but with a grant of £lOO from the Education Department the small yet active institute faced the problems, and was rewarded by an enthusiastic response! Some 120 teachers assembled at Riverton and spent ten days of real inspirational adventure under the direction of Professor Shelley,' Dr. Marshall, Dr. Condliffe and others. Southland continued to hold the school on a provincial basis for a number of years, while the movement was further extended by the organisation at Auckland of a provincial summer school, the first annual session being held at Cambridge in 1926. The northern venture owed a great deal to Mr. D. M. Rae, M.A., the organiser of the Southland original school, whose indefatigable energy has caused the school to grow in importance and benefit year by year. In the north the school widened its activities considerably, had a larger staff, and was fortunate in attracting to its work. Mr. Frank Milner, C.M.G., M.A., of Waitaki Boys’ High School. . Mr. Milner has attracted to the movement many men of eminence in all walks of life and was responsible also for interesting in the summer school firstly Sir Charles Fergusson, Governor-General, as patron of the movement. Lord Bledisloe is the present patron. This Vice-Regal interest has been of very real benefit to teachers

generally, and has advanced the cause of education in New Zealand in no small measure. It was the original aim of the school to study educational problems on a high plane, believing that if teachers could be brought into touch with men. and women of high vision, they would return to their schools with a new ideal and purpose towards education. The school has insisted on excluding matters. of class-room procedure from its curriculum and has boldly aimed at the stimulation of enthusiasm amongst its humblest members on the whetstone of the inspiration of its lecturers. From this brief survey of the history of the movement it will be seen that the organisation looks upon education in no narrow sense, but regards its field as the community, and its aims as true culture. Like all organised work, the school movement has suffered in numbers though not in enthusiasm, in the past years of depression. The movement is

well established, however, and, from each succeeding session there go out as missionaries, students, who in the atmosphere of friendliness, culture and scholarship see ■ the bigger things that he behind the daily grind, and return to their ■ scattered areas to carry into their own- respective spheres an inspiration that stimulates intellectual advancement in the truest sense.