EARLY PUBLIC LIFE.

Press, Volume LX, Issue 11504, 10 February 1903, Page 5

EARLY PUBLIC LIFE.

Mr Rolleeton'a first entrance into public life wae in connection with educational reform. He will be remembered as one of the earliest pioneers ki {he work of preparing the way for the genexul national system of education now in force in New Zealand. In 1863 he wae appointed a member of a commission to investigate the condition of education in the province, and make suggestions as to the future system tf> be adopted, the period , for which the appropriation to the religious denominations lasted, under the Education Ordinance of 1857, having then expired. The othier members of the Oommiesion wen Mr H. J. Tancred, Dr. Lillie, of the Presbyterian Church, and Mr Saundent, of the Wesleyan Church. Mr Rolleeton woe the youngiest member. Between thorn they viaited aJi the existing schools in the province, and presented an interim report to the Council during t'lw sessiion of 1863. A Bill constituting a Board of Education in accordance with their recommendations wu passed that eeseioß, and the members of the Coramiasion; being appointed members of the Board, took over the administration of the funds voted for education, and completed the details of the echeme they had recommended. That interim BUI of 1863, substituting a Board for the heads of religious denominations, was the first .*tep towards a national system of education. It was more fully elaborated in an Ordinance passed the following year, by the establishment of education districts, the provision for the election of school committees, the definition of their powers in relation to the Board, and for their control of the funds locally raised or allocated to them. Aβ Mr Rolleston pointed out in an article in "The Press" in 1900, "the Ordinance of 1864, without abolishing denominational schools, fostered the establishment of national schools unattached to any particular denomination. In these undenominational schools religious teaching woe 'prescribed and provided for through the teachers, and the committees might set apart daye op which ministers might impart religious instruction to children of their own This Ordinance remained in force until the year 1875, just before the abolition of the provinces, and in 1877 the General Assembly passed Mr Bowen's celebrated Education Act, under which the present national system of free education oame into existence. This system, it ie interesting to note, was clearly foreshadowed by Mr Rolleston in a message to the Provincial Council in 1875. "Our beet policy," he said, "would be, I believe, to make education free in all Government schools, and such a result is, ■as I think, but a' corollary upon the adoption of any responsibility by tlie State in the matter of education." It Wan not till after the system came into force however, that 'Mr ißolleston became convinced of the necessity of making primary education." so far as the State was concerned, secular. In 1864 Mr Rollesrton became Provincial Secretary, and a member of the Canterbury Board of Education. On the discovery of the goldfields on the west coast of the Middle Island, in 1865, .he went as a member of the Provincial Government to Hokitika, with Mr Seed, Mr John Rochfort, and other officers, to organise the several departmente of government there. Upon his return he was pressed to become a candidate for the Superintendency, which was shortly to be vacated , by Mr Bealev. He declined, and soon afterwards, at the request of , Mr Weld, then Premier of the colony, .Mr Rolleaton took the offices of Under-Secretary for Native- Affairs and 'Inspector of Native schools under the General Government. In 1868, however, he entered on a- new and more important/ phase of his career.