SMALLER ROLL

Waikato Times, Volume 129, Issue 21600, 10 December 1941, Page 4

SMALLER ROLL

TECHNICAL HIGH SCHOOL UNSETTLING EFFECT OF WAR DEMANDS OF INDUSTRY “As was expected, the exigencies of the times have resulted in a considerable shrinkage of our roll,” said Mr W. Fraser, principal of the Hamilton Technical High School, in his annual report presented at the school break-up ceremony today. “Approximately 300 of our 1940 pupils did not return to school owing to the calls of industry. Our total enrolments for the year were 528, the average attendance was 419 and the number now on the roll is 370.”

Continuing, Mr Fraser said: “A period of continuous war such as the present has a most unsettling effect on pupils, and particularly the older boys who are uncertain as to what their future may be. Every endeavour has been made to counteract this by keeping as rigidly as possible to the ordinary routine of normal times but this does not always succeed. Well-known masters are gone, elder brothers are overseas, old boys whose names were familiar are absent from their usual work and recreations, while two of the boys themselves simply remained at school till they were old enough to join the armed forces. Such happenings as these are not conducive to stability. Blind Alley Positions

“Then some perforce are compelled to leave through shortage of labour on the home farm, others are taken away by foolish parents to fill some blind alley position which has become vacant and which may provide a few shillings, which in these days are less needed than formerly. Others, I regret to say, are enticed away by employers to fill positions which are temporarily vacant and which have no permanency. “To say that the State should not spend money on a child because he cannot go through a series of mental gymnastics is setting a false standard of values. The fact that an individual has had higher education does not necessarily make him a better citizen. Many people who have received a so-called higher education are incapable of carrying their education, and we see such a state of affairs existing in India, but it is not absent here. What the State wants in these times is men of good moral fibre educated according to their capacity. Total of 4500 Pupils “Some 4500 pupils have now passed through this school. The majority of them are making good in useful occupations. Initiative saved many of our boys during the depression years and it has led others into positions of distinction which they little dreamed of holding as schoolboys. It, too, has led hundreds of them into the forces of the Empire, where they are finding scope for their skill and training in all sorts of units.”

That justice had never been done to the staff or the pupils in the matter of accommodation, from the time the school had 20 pupils to the time it had 600, was claimed by Mr Fraser. In reference to technical classes he said that the number of students attending was 456, of whom 389 were free place holders. That was their “high water mark,” and it was all the more remarkable considering that nearly all the senior students had joined the armed forces.