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Children's Courts. Particulars regarding the work of the Children's Courts for the year are contained in the report of the Superintendent of Child Welfare, but I wish to acknowledge here the co-operation and assistance given to the Department by Stipendiary Magistrates, Associates, Special Justices, and honorary officers throughout the Dominion. There are now two hundred honorary Child Welfare Officers, men and women, who give their time and energy unsparingly to the children in the districts where professional officers are not in constant attendance. Training. The provision of some system of training for field and institution officers will have to be considered in the near future. MISCELLANEOUS. Appointment or Assistant Director of Education. As from the Ist September, 1938, Dr. C. E. Beeby was appointed Assistant Director of Education. Dr. Beeby was the first Director of the New Zealand Council for Educational Research and brings to his new position a wealth of experience in the field of education. Vocational Guidance. As stated earlier in this report, the provision of a highly differentiated system of post-primary education for all who wish to take advantage of it necessarily involves some attempt to help children to choose the schools and courses, and ultimately the occupations, for which their natural abilities best fit them. Educational and vocational guidance must be thought of as one of the basic functions of such an educational system, and not as something added to it as an external luxury. Guidance must necessarily take place in every school, whether consciously or unconsciously. It was decided to start at the beginning of 1938 an experiment in a more explicit and formal type of guidance. The structure of the Youth Centres and the functions of vocational guidance officers and careers advisers were discussed m my last report. The system has not yet been extended beyond the four mam cities, in spite of many applications from schools to be allowed to appoint careers advisers. It is felt that it would be wiser to allow the work to proceed experimentally for a year and to review the whole situation some time in 1939. Acknowledgments. The advances outlined in this report could never have been made without the fullest co-operation from a multitude of individuals and organizations. The Director and officers of the Department have continued to give loyal and enlightened service to the cause of education. With the controlling authorities relations could not be bettered ; the Education Boards, the Boards controlling post-primary schools, the Senate of the University of New Zealand, the University College Councils, the School Committees, and the bodies controlling the non-State schools have worked in the closest possible harmony with the Department and with me. The teachers, both individually and in their associations, the New Zealand Educational Institute, the Secondary Schools' Association, the Technical School Teachers' Association, the Women Teachers' Association, the Men Teachers' Guild, and the Eegistered Private School Teachers' Association, have given the generous assistance that one has come to expect of their profession. Less formal organizations such as Parents' Associations and Home and School Associations have performed very useful functions that fall outside the sphere of the more official bodies. The work of adult education has been energetically conducted by the Workers' Educational Association, the Association for Country Education" the New Zealand Library Association, the Women's Institutes, the Women's Division of the Farmers' Union, the Drama League, and numerous other organizations. The New Zealand Council for Educational Eesearch has continued its valuable survey of New Zealand education. I should like here to give official acknowledgment to these institutions and individuals and to all the people, paid and unpaid, who have been so often happy to place the welfare of the children before their own immediate personal interests or convenience.

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