COST OF EDUCATION

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume LXXXI, Issue 18784, 18 May 1923, Page 7

COST OF EDUCATION

DOES THE TAXPAYER GET VALUE? HON. C. J. PARR ANSWERS HIS OWN QUESTION. (Per Press Association.) WELLINGTON, May 16. Hon. C. J. Parr, Minister of Education, in an address to the New Zealand Educational Institute, put sonic pointed questions to the conference. Mi- Parr said educational expendituie had increased 150 per cent, since 1913, and now totalled about £3,300,000 per annum. Of this sum, over £2,000,000 went out in salaries and wages to teachers, inspectors, and officials. The sum was large, but. he thought not too largo at all. Critics, however, frequently asked him whether the taxpayer wak getting value for his money. Addressing the teachers, Mr Panasked: “Are our primary schools efficient? Is the teaching sound? Is

’the product of to-day as satisfactory as the product of 20 or 30 years ago? The answer,” said the Minister, “is that on the whole we have made progress. I believe the pupil as evolved from the primary school to-day is more intelligent, more resourceful, more self-reliant, than the pupil of 30 years ago, but there are some undoubted weaknesses, to which 1 would call your attention. A little self-examination will do us all good,” he added, “and I am bound to say that I am not satisfied with what is being done in some subjects.” The Minister said, answering his own question, that he thought sound progress had been made, and that teaching on the whole was satisfactory. There were, however, blemishes. It was his and their duty to get together and improve the weak spots. He asked for the coming year that a special effort might be made, the first for more mechanical accuracy in arithmetic, secondly for more thorough instruction in history, and thirdly he hoped to place before tho institute proposals for improvement of singing, which was not satisfactory in the majority of schools.