“HALF EMPTY.”

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17573, 25 June 1925, Page 8

“HALF EMPTY.”

AN AMBIGUOUS TRUTH. EAST CHRISTCHURCH SCHOOL. Schools that might have met every requirement a decade ago do not fulfil the demands of the present day educational system. Among the many old buildings that are far behind the t ( imes is the East Christchurch School. “Christchurch East.” said Sir James Parr last Saturday, “is half empty.” Christchurch East, sav those who are familiar with it. will never be full—never can be full. This does not mean that the school has limitless accommodation. but it means that bv reason of the peculiar lay-out of the building all the space can never be utilised. If "'hen referring to the school being half empty Sir James Parr spoke with reference to the number of school children in relation to floor space, his statement was well within the limit of rhetorical exaggeration. There even exists in the school an entire room that is empty. The reason is not that the room is not needed, but that it is of a sizo that cannot permit, it to he used. It is too small to put a class into. Most of the other rooms err in the other direction—-they arc too large. The result is that there is a class at one end of the room and empty space at the other. In the days when those rooms were built “the more the merrier” applied as an axiom to school classes. Now-a-days, fifty i s regarded as nearly the maximum allowed in a class. Thus these great echoing rooms are only half full and unless the architects of to-day can outwit those of the past, there seems to be overv likelihood that they will remain «.o until they are pulled down. If they were divided into two, each section would he large enough for a class room, but one room would have no light and no ventilation. The construction of the building makes it an apparently impossible task to subdivide the rooms on the ground floor. On the first floor the sub-division lias been carried out and has been made fairly practicable by mean s of placing skylights in the roof. For'the ground floor rooms however, there is no such simple way out. As things arc at present East Christchurch could accommodate about another hundred children : if it were possible to sub-divide the large rooms that number could he added to by another hundred. But so far no feasible plan has been approved of for sub-dividing the rooms, and there seems to be every chance that tliev will remain half empty, and that, in other respects, the school Avi 11 remain something of an educational curiosity shop. There are schools at which fire drill is not a part of the general routine, hut at East Christchurch it is still necessary to carry out fire drill. The reason is that there are about ‘230 children on the top floor from which the only egress is by way of two narrow, winding stairways at each extreme of the long passageway. There are four turns in each of these stairways, and the width of each stairway is something under four feet. Five of the rooms in the school are still fitted with the old type of desks, desks so old that when the Director of Education saw them recently he said that he had not seen such desks for thirty years. The heating in many of the rooms is still bv means of fireplaces, most of Avliich, it is stated, arc too