The Maori Education Foundation

Te Ao Hou, June 1962, Page 6

The Maori Education Foundation The appeal for funds for the Maori Education Foundation is still in full swing; it is much too early yet to be able to say what the appeal will finally achieve. But a progress report can be given. When this issue of Te Ao Hou went to press in the middle of May, almost £400,000 was already available for the Foundation. The Government gave an initial £125,000, and by the time the official appeal for funds was launched on March 26, early donations to the appeal had turned this sum to £250,000. Since then £70,000 has been given; so when this amount receives the £1 for £1 subsidy which the Government has promised to give in the case of all private donations, the total will come to almost £400,000. This is a great deal of money, but there is a long way to go yet, for Mr Hunn has said that a fund of £2,000,000 would be necessary to perform the Foundation's task adequately, and that a sum very much larger than this would really be desirable for the purpose. The exact total which has so far been collected is not yet known, however, because throughout the country people are vigorously continuing -raising activities and a considerable amount of the money which they have collected has not yet been paid into the Foundation, and thus added to the total. This is the first instance where, on a national scale, Europeans and Maoris have worked together for a concern which is designed purely to help the Maori. The goodwill and better understanding on both sides which have come of this is one of the most important things of all.