MASSEY COLLEGE HAS GROWN REMARKABLY IN 21 YEARS

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 12, Issue 39, 20 April 1948, Page 3

MASSEY COLLEGE HAS GROWN REMARKABLY IN 21 YEARS

The graduation ceremonies at Massey Agricultural College this week will hold more than usual interest for the public and for present and past students, in that the College has now reached its majority. It has “grown up” so vigorously that it has earned a well-recognised position in the ranks of agricultural colleges in the British Commonwealth for number of student enrolments and the great variety and extent of research 'work undertaken. Though institutions mark their milestones in centuries and their fractions, the attainment of 21 years of age (which, incidentally, is approximately the average age of the 400 students now at the College) will not be allowed to pass without some official recognition from the authorities, staff and students. A great number of ex-students will attend this week, and the ExStudents’ Association is making a determined effort to enlarge its membership. Britain, the United States, India, Kenya, China, Australia and the Pacific Islands are all represented by students now attending the College. Others who have already returned to their native lands have taken with them a knowledge of modern sheepfarming, dairyfarming and horticultural practices, an appreciation of the New Zealand type of farming which has great possibilities for raising a country’s general standard of living, and an abiding love for the quiet serenity, orderliness, and upsurging growth on the farms and around the stately buildings called Massey. It is a university on a farm, in a farm, and indissolubly belonging to the world and to its own New Zealand and Manawatu countryside. This 21-year-old instittuion, besides giving back to the world its own visiting students, has fitted New Zealanders, including two Rhodes scholars, to take important positions in its own country and overseas. Teaching and research work go hand in hand along avenues, not only of primary production, but also of wholesale manufacture and processing of butter, cheese, and of milk for the liquid trade. All these, and more, combine to make up New Zealand’s primary industries, which are responsible for some 90 per cent of the total value of its exports.