The Wanganui Chronicle. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1950. A UNIVERSITY IN WANGANUI

Wanganui Chronicle, 6 November 1950, Page 4

The Wanganui Chronicle. MONDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 1950. A UNIVERSITY IN WANGANUI

'T'HE suggestion that Wanganui could be made into the Oxford or Cambridge of New Zealand by the establishing of a university in this city has been revived once again. The history of this subject is of interest. When the Great Depression reduced the openings for youngsters of school-age a number of them remained on at the Wanganui Technical College and being able to take a section of their degree at their own school they laid the foundation of their higher education in this City. This period was productive of a highly successful group of students and proved that the facilities are available in Wanganui already, or were at that time, for the conduct of some university work. This led the ‘•Chronicle” to advocate that the taking of the first section of the university degrees should not be confined as it was then to resident students of Wanganui but should extend to all students who had attended schools here or who desired to attend such institutions as made provision for this higher level of learning. Such a facility would minimise the expense to which the parents of such scholars would be put and the students would have the benefit of a good and intimate tuition plus the comforts of home life. Mr. Cotterill was asked to advance this view in the House of Representatives, which he did, but it was not to be expected that he alone would be able to take up the task of carrying the scheme through in a field in which he possessed no equipment. He failed to enlist anyone in this project and the members of Parliament for Patea and Rangitikei at the time had no interest in the matter. The result was that in Parliament the idea languished for want of support and the inability to enlist the support. The university colleges were against the scheme because they were afraid that for another institution to be developed their own grants would be reduced. It was claimed that there were benefits to be obtained from attending an overcrowded university college in a population centre where expenses were high, accommodation expensive and usually at a distance from the college and that these advantages outweighed any benefit to be obtained from a more profitable situation, a pleasanter environment, easier accommodation both inside the college and outside of it. The argument was unconvincing and did not disturb the fact that during the depression the results from the temporary implementing of the scheme had been very good. Had the proposal been accepted by the university and educational authorities the situation in the university colleges would not today be as uncomfortable as it is. To that extent then the intervening period represents years of lost opportunity.

The proposal is not to establish a new university college in Wanganui, but to extend the secondary schools to carry the first years of the Arts and the Science courses. This would immediately relieve the university colleges for the time being and make for their greater efficiency. Today the complaint is made that laboratory work at the Victoria University College must be subjected to a rationing and relaying system which makes for considerable inconvenience to both college authorities and to the students. On the other hand, but little organisation would be needed to accommodate the first year students at the secondary schools in Wanganui. But evidently the concentration of the university education must be continued at the four colleges and alternative courses left unexplored. 'With a change of Government and a greater concern for economy in the administration of education—which term “economy” is to te interpreted as getting more value for each pound spent—it is to be hoped that the rearranging of the educational system to spread university education from the existing narrow ends of the four funnels over a wider field will be sought by more energetic minds than have hitherto addressed themselves to this subject. Here is an opportunity for the present members for Rangitikei and Patea to take an interest in a worthwhile subject.