TECHNICAL EDUCATION.

Timaru Herald, Volume XC, Issue 13243, 25 March 1907, Page 7

TECHNICAL EDUCATION.

ADVICK TO WOKKKRK. When Mr Jnhn Bunis liist became a govei nor f>f Battersea Polytechnic, in 1891. lliete was no institution to govern; now iheie aic buildings which cost nearly £9O. 000. standing upon freehold ground, and without a penny of debt against them. In,the liist session of the Polytechnic (lie number of day students ir.is ninetytwo: last session the roll contained nearly 800 names. Foi- the first year the grants from the Hoard of Kducation for work done amount ed to only £659; last year £3,600 was the total. In the same period the income was trebled—last year it was £23.000 and the expenditure has always been within the leceipts. . These and other interesting facts were brought out by Mr Fdwin Tate, chairman of w t lr;«~-governers of the Polytechnic, in a. speech which hedelivered on February 6th. wheu'Mf Burns'presented prizes and cerjifT&ates to seventy representative students' selected from the' 750 who gained awards during the session. . •■; " =Mr Burns, after the presentation, deliver■etV»sJin interesting and thoughtful address. TleJVentured to say that, the polytechnics, sifsp'ected as they were at first, had amply justified, theit, creation, and the money jl^rliiji\? ; beeu'spent on them. r l hey were aiot a remunerative, undertaking in a cash sense; hut in moral health, mental vigour, and industrial aptitude, domestic comfort, and social well-being they were one of the most useful factors of modem London social life.

Secondary education, although only in its beginnings." had justified itself, but he trusted that those responsible for it would do what the gorernors of polytechnics had done/. They had decided .that these institutions should not. be a rendezvous for festive young ladies or cavalier young men. that "they would not be wholly devoted to the social, gymnastic, and pleasant side of life. The so'cial object of Batte*rsea Polytechnic was technical education, and technical education was more necessary now than when the institution was established. Apprenticeship was declining in many trades and had disappeared in many others. Our methods of production had to a great, extent destroyed apprenticeship, but he believed a substitute was to be found in the polytechnics, plus the workshop. Tf these could combine, they might jevive in some form or other much that was good in the old form of apprenticeship, and the sooner it ivas done the better. , : Mr Burns passed on to praise British industrial and commercial methods, and deprecated what he called the "wave of self-depreciation." .which he had noticed passing over the country, during the past tea years. Tliey had been told ad nauseam bjircommercial \jeremiahs that we were,.a. vanishing race, that our i'ndus ries wwe dranjr and our trades disappearing. ! AVhat ln&been the result of this outcry after tepvears? Last' year we turned out not orify the largest number of. >hips, but the bait ships of the world. In iron and steel anVeotton, and in all our staple industries, trade as measured •by output was "ever so crowl as at the end of these ten years m Fhl wilderness of self-depreciatton. \nd a remarkable fact, also, was that ner trades,- for which polytechnics were specially,' created—namely—the electric and allied industries—wen? growrngX Six years ago this- country prod- e onlr, £70,000 wortlTof motor-cars. Last year this, had grown .to five millions. In hi«! department, h was his. duty to take cognisance of how trades were developing, and he' had noticed that in some traces it was-;difficult to get trained and skilled men as operatives. .That was because the average Knglish'workman was apt to become a little "groovy." But in these days men had to become adaptable, and he' hoped workmen 'as well as employers would have sufficient initiative, without rashness,. ,to n.da.pt : . themselves .to new methods. -In But technical education was necessary. We had too many casual labourers in this country ;• mainly," no doubt, because they were "unskilledl and just as the Act of 1870 elevated : education of the masses of the people, so secondary education must now help'tile best of the craftsmen. He emphasised this, because ,'in,; the recent, -unemployed movement, winch came within -his purview, he. not iced that men were often,wiihout work, not through deficiency of employment, but because of insufficiency of skill. It* was noti\true that a man was too old" at forty: She would rather have the average man bejween forty and sixty than the average man, bet ween twenty and thirty The former had settled convictions, and, if he had .'not, then some one else;, at home had. Sixty 'per cent.. of the jnen who applied'for work at labour bureaux were under forty, whilst eighty: .to ninety per cent; of the total ■number who. applied were unskilled. ' •".' t . > '.--'.- "I; -venture to say.'' added Mr Burns, "that it is not only tjie duty of statesmen, it Is the responsibilities of schoolmasters and of polytechnics id see that no miin, willing to itvork in aiiycalling or trade, can throw upon"'society the responsibility of proving the charge that while he was willing to work as a boy or young man he was denied the opportunity of equipping himself with the means by which he could work and- live.".: • ■• .-.-;■-