NEW SCHOOL AGE

Waipa Post, Volume 44, Issue 3180, 21 May 1932, Page 8

NEW SCHOOL AGE

EFFECT OF RAISING. DISLOCATION FEARED. Conceiln at the effect next year on the schools, school committees, teachers, and education boards, as a result of the raising of the school-commenc-ing age to six years, was expressed by Mr A. C. Blake, when speaking at this week's meeting of the Wellington Education Board. Mr Blake considered that provision should be made whereby pupils could stay on at school another year in a seventh standard. If the schools were going to be depleted at both ends, he said, what was going to happen to the primary schools ? They had to consider the interests of the child, but they could not forget the interests of the school. Although he was not stressing the interests of the teachers, the fact remained that a great many were going to be thrown out of work next year. He thought that the Board should take steps, if possible, to minimise the difficulty. It was going to have a very serious effect on the schools, he said. The move had been made in the interests of economy, but if some provision were made to keep the children longer at school he thought that that would overcome a great deal of the dislocation that would eventuate. The chairman (Mr T. Forsyth): We are up in the clouds when we discuss this. I do not know whether they are going to enforce the raising of the school-commencing age. If it is so, however, not only the school committees, by way of capitation, but also this Board, will suffer. Voices: It has been passed in the Finance Bill. The chairman: There are several things there which have not been put into operation. It is no use meeting trouble half way.. I think it is premature to discuss it just now. Mr T. W. McDonald pointed out the effect on low-grade country schools if the school age were raised. The grade would be still further .owered, he said, which would consequently mean a lowered standard of efficiency. EDUCATION INSTITUTE'S VIEW. At its annual meeting in Wellington the New Zealand Educational Institute passed the following resolution on the raising of the age of admission to school from five to six yeans:— That this meeting of the New Zealand Educationallnstitute (1) regrets the decision of the Government to exclude the five-year-olds from schools, believing (a) that our present modern infant departments cater fully for the physical and mental requirements of young children; (b) that the resulting redistribution of staffs will cause, for many years, grave disorganisation of schools to the detriment of the children; and (c) that the considerable reductions of staffs of the schools will add to the present depressed economic conditions; and (2) directs the incoming executive to give careful consideration to the effects oi? the exclusion of the five-year-olds with a view to submitting evidence to the Minister in support of a claim for the repeal of the clause in the Act concerned.