SCHOOLS IN CANADA

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume 75, Issue 12, 15 January 1932, Page 5

SCHOOLS IN CANADA

‘ ‘ CONSOLIDATED’ ’ SYSTEM. EFFICIENCY AND ECONOMY. VANCOUVER, Dec. 9. The consolidated school—the union of schools of neighbouring towns or villages, or rural settlements —is likely to be extended in Western Canada, owing to its efficiency and economy of cost. The prospect is enhanced by the fact that the greatest success of the “consolidated” has been achieved in Saskatchewan, where a succession of dry seasons has caused a shrinkage of public revenues, attended by a general policy of retrenchment. For each of the eight years, seven to fourteen, inclusive, Saskatchewan leads in the average grade attained by pupils in both classes of schools and has the best “consolidated” results, compared with Manitoba, where the latter system has gone to the greatest lengths in Western Canada. After starting together at the age of seven, each year produces a wider gap between the average pupil in tho and consolidated school, until at the age of 14 the pupil in the latter ie well advanced in the work of gradb h and the pupil of the one-room school has not completed grade 6. Apart from this, there is a much stronger incentive to remain at school and complete the entrance grade. The figures indicate 85 per cent., compared with 45 per cent.