THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1935. SHAKING UP EDUCATION.

Wairarapa Age, 14 December 1935, Page 4

THE Wairarapa Age MORNING DAILY. SATURDAY, DECEMBER 14, 1935. SHAKING UP EDUCATION.

Our newly-installed Labour Ministry includes' at least one very bold and venturesome member in the Hon. IV. Nash, Minister of Finance. This was made plain when Mr. Nash spoke at the breaking-up ceremony of the Petone Technical School. One or two extracts from his opening observations may suffice:— Our educational system is to a large extent a carry-over from the system in vogue in England in the last century, but now we are behind the time (he said). ... I should like to see a more extensive general education before the period of specialisation begins. This will involve, raising the school leaving age, training more teachers and erecting more school buildings. All this cannot be done in a day! It is not of mneh use to raise the school-leaving age without reorganising the system. It may be hoped that Mr. Nash and the new Minister of Education (the Hon. P, Fraser) will find themselves entirely of one mind in a determination to make an end at least of the more obvious disabilities under which our primary schools are at present labouring—disabilities of inadequate staffing, unduly large classes, a lack of equipment and insufficient grants for the cleaning and maintenance of sehool buildings. The standards that ought to obtain in. these respeets in our primary schools—the all-important foundation 0f.,. our whole educational system and the only schools that a considerable proportion of young New Zealanders ever attend—have already been established in the primary departments of a number of intermediate and ether schools maintained by the same Department and paid for by the same body of taxpayers as are responsible for the numerous primary schools of which as a country we have, in the particulars mentioned, so little reason to be proud. Without prejudice to the claims of other educational institutions, it is undoubtedly on the primary schools of the Dominion that educational reformers of true vision and purpose ought Ito concentrate first and foremost. —

If the striking of a more or less’ parochial note' may be forgiven in dealing with a subject of this breadth and magnitude, one suggestion was made by Mr. Nash which the Wairarapa very reasonably may feel inclined to challenge. Observing that the Hutt Valley was already well known for its educational facilities, Mr. Nash said he would like t<> see it leading the Dominion in education. At a reasonably long view, the Wairarapa may hope to do even better than the Hutt Valley in the ■ development of educational establishments. Experience in older countries, notably Great Britain, has shown that it is not under the immediate, shadow of crowded centres of population that educational institutions achieve their finest and noblest growth. Geographically, in the indicated lines of its destined growth and in other respects, the Wairarapa holds magnificent possibilities from the standpoint of educational development. It is possessed already of an exceptionally fine range of educational foundations both public and private. In its actual conduct and in the success of its old pupils, the Wairarapa High School has set and is setting such standards as demonstrate that it needs only continued growth to become second to nothing of its kind. With its own special organisation and aims, the Masterton Technical School is doing splendidly practical and useful work in its day and evening classes. Very high standards are being set also by private schools in this district, both primary and secondary. The district possesses another very valuable. educational asset in the Penrose Training Farm, and the -Small Earm Area is exceedingly fortunate is being able to draw for educational and other purposes upon thg’ enddwnient revenues of the Trust. Lands Trust. The people of the Wairarapa will have themseves to. blame if they allow their district, as time goes on, to be outstripped in educational development by any other part of the Dominion.