FANCY SUBJECTS ARE GIVEN TOO MUCH WEIGHT.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 18643, 21 December 1928, Page 10

FANCY SUBJECTS ARE GIVEN TOO MUCH WEIGHT.

SECONDARY SCHOOL TEACHING CRITICISED. “ The secondary schools are giving too much weight to fancy subjects and the essential ones are suffering. I have protested against it for years.” This statement was made by the lion D. Buddo, at a meeting of the Lincoln College Board of Governors yesterday. The same opinion was expressed by other members, and the board will consider asking the Minister of Education to appoint a Commission to investigate. The remarks arose from discussion on the report of the Education Committee, which stated that, with the innovation of the two-year diploma course, mathematics would cease to be taught at the college, and that if students entered the college with an insufficient working knowledge of the subjects, they would have to be coached at their own expense. “ If boys were taught the principal subjects properly in a secondary school there would be no need for us to teach mathematics here,” said the director. The standard of the secondary schools was not what it was, he added. The so-called best secondary schools were not giving proper attention to the subjects which were indispensable. He gave an instance of a student presenting a thesis for honours, which was seriously hampered by his inability to write decent English. Mr W. A. Banks: We are not getting value for the money we spend. High schools teaching agriculture should give students the necessary instruction, so that they only need to come to a college like this to be finished off. I think we should ask Mr Forbes to go into the whole question of secondary education, especially pertaining to agriculture. We should have a Commission appointed. Mr J. Deans: How do they get through matriculation? Members agreed that there were ways and means of passing an examination, which was not always an index of the knowledge of the pupil.

Further discussion was deferred till next board meeting.