The West Coast Times WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 18, 1914. CIVICS AND SCHOOL LIFE.

West Coast Times, 18 February 1914, Page 2

The West Coast Times WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 18, 1914. CIVICS AND SCHOOL LIFE.

The Headmaster of Christ’s College (Mr. E', A. Belcher) made several very weighty pronouncements in his speech on Commemoration Day. He touched upon many subjects but among the most interesting was the question of the introductions of the inculcation of what he termed “Civics,” Mr. Belcher said that in these days of overloaded curricula he hesitated very much before deciding to introduce a new subject, but he was convinced that there had been one thing lacking in many public schools both at Home and out here, which it is within there power to remedy, He- was anxiotm that

boys at Christ's College should not only be alive to the Civic and Imperial responsibilities which .would soon tbers, but should leave school with, at all. events, an elementary knowledge of I what these responsibilities mean. Me saio he need hardly say this was not a 1 question of polities; honest and able men would be found with all shades of political opinions, and it would bo a bad day for this Dominion when any party could claim a monopoly of wisdom and patriotism ; but be wanted the boys to learn something of how their country was governed, and he wnatcd them to .realise that whatever their future careers may be, it was a positive duty which devolves on them when they left school to take some part, however humble, in the government of the country. I hey could not, ail be . members of. Parliament—perhaps they did not all want to be members of parliament but there was a vast field for honest and unselfish work in local government. They would be entirely failing in their duty if they did not try to prepare oar boys to to meet some of th ecomplex problems of modern life which the next generation have to solve. During his holidays lie was fishing one day in a North Island stream in company with a boy of eleven. Mr, Belcher said be asked the boy what he wanted to be, and the boy replied without tho slightest trace of self-consciousness, “1 wnnt’to be a farmer, but I would like to do something for my country.” That was the true spirit of an Imperial rare. Scholarships and games were both good, but just in so far as they could inculcate that spirit in the school, so ought their ultimate success or failure to be judged. A systematic course of instructions in what, for want of a betterm, be would call "Civics” would he giien throughout the school this year, !o the educational stage they wanted facts far more than theories. Boys were not interested in tho practical problems of local government and social organisation because of their ignorance. They do not care, because they do not know. He believed it was quite possible, by a systematic insti notion to stir them to a real intelligent interest in these questions. He believed that the greatest and most pressing public duty was that tliev should do so, and lie believed that until they inculcated them they would never got thorn to take an active part m the solution of the great social ami political question of the day.