RURAL EDUCATION

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2496, 24 June 1915, Page 6

RURAL EDUCATION

SPEECH BY MR. E. NEWMAN, M.P (By Telegraph.—Special Bcporter.) Palmerston North, June 23. Jlr E. Newman, M.P., addressed _tji Dairy Conference to-day oil the subject of agricultural education. Mr. Newman said that he was an advocate of agricultural education partly because he had had none himself when he commenced farming. Oil that account, he realised the value of education because ho had to leaxn by bitter experience how to make his farm pay. A while ago he had visited New South Wales, and having seen* what was being done there in the way of educating young men for farming pursuits he determined to devote the remainder of his publio life to the promotion of agricultural education. Ho had visited England not long ago to gain information on . this subject, and had also gone to. Canada for the same purpose. One thing that made agricultural education necessary was the rise in the value of rural laud. For instance, twenty-five years ago land about Palmerston. North could bo obtained for £i or £5 per acre. Now land in the same locality cost up to £70 per acre. He had predicted in the past that land about Rongotea would rise to a value of £100 per acre, and he was satisfied now that that figure was going to be reached. Further, the cost of living and of material had increased. Where should agricultural education commence ? It must start in the schools with nature study. City children must be given a rural bias through a love or nature being instilled into them. Mr. Newman approved the Hawkesbury College (New South Wales) system, where practical work was added to theoretical study. A lad would spend some time in the laboratory and the remainder of his time in the open, ploughing, killing and dressing (sheep, fencing, milking, and so on. Something was being done in the Wanganui education district in the way of teaching the farmers of the future, and in this respect a great deal of credit was due to those two enthusiasts in rural education, Sir James Wilson and Mr. F. Pirani. _ One of the problems for New Zealand was how to graft agricultural education on to our present system of education, for the grants for education could not very well be increasod, especially during the war.