THE EDUCATION CAMPAIGN

Dominion, Volume 11, Issue 181, 20 April 1918, Page 8

THE EDUCATION CAMPAIGN

Sir-The Educational Institutes campaign on behalf of the cause of national education proceeds apace, and is meeting with gratifving support. This was to be <*pecte"d It only needs to be brought home to the people that education is the deciding factor in the well-being of their children and of the nation of which these children will be the units, and they will, with few exceptions, give their adherence to the gospel the institute is preaching. The value of the child is the foundation of this gospel, and all other considerations have weight only in relation to that value. We want smaller classes. Why? In order that children may be educated, not drilled; in order that each pupil may have an opportunity to hnd out and develop the good that is in him; in order that the State may be enriched bv the powers of his educated mind employed in the service he is best ntted to give. _, , We want better class-rooms. Yvhyr Tn order that, while the minds are being trained, the bodies may have opportunity to grow in health and strength; in order that incipient disease may be outgrown in youth, and resisted in later years; hi order that a sense of brightness and vitality may replace the depression ot drab dinginess which is the school environment of too many of our young people. Wo want more teachers and better teachers. Why? In ordor that the priceless material of which the nation is. to be made may not be marred in the making; in order that those who are entrusted with the work of educating may really be enabled to educate. We want continuation classes. Why. In order that the growing generation of the nation's citizens may have some chance of acquiring the knowledge pii'l the spirit: that will enable them to discharge the onerous duties- of citizenship in a free democracy; in order that the future workers shall acquire a nmntal (raining that will enable them to cope with the complexities and monotonies of modern industrial life, and still maintain their souls alive. And so on through want of playing spaces, want of medical and denial treatment, want of sufficient and efficient inspection, nnd the rest. . Why do we want all these? Because if they are not supplied our nation will fell out of the Tanks of the nations of the world, as these make progress while we stand still. The. future belongs to those nations which will have taken careto cultivate their natural talents; that is to say, to liain youth to give of its best instead of al'nwinir its powers to beccmio atrophied through neglect. We arc told that all this will cost money. So it will; but the neglect of it will cost the waste of many lives, will p'nst the loss of the product of many brilliant brains; will cost the pnfecblement of many families of enfeebled parents; will cost tho stunting of moral growth and the undermining of social stomina; will cost social dislurbam-ws and the instability of the public mind Hint waits upon ignoranre; will almost certainly cost the breakdown of the liberty that our ancestors fought for and won; for there is nothing more certain than that democracy and ignorance cannot exist together. What monetary cost is worth weighing against such other costs as thwe? ' : ~ ~ Other countries are finding; the necessary money, even in the midst or the turmoil nnd disaster of war. Tn Britain the TTouee of Commons last year voted, without question, all addition of ponrlv four million pounds to the Education Estimates, and this only the introduction of a. scheme which will eventually entail the expenditure of eleven millions more; Trance, during the _ war, has expended the period of education in some directions tn tho eighteenth year, the United States to. the. eighteenth ypjr Germany to Hie twentv-first year. Will the people of Now Zealand-tin* richest country per capita in the world —say that tliey cannot afford it? If they are told the plain truth they wilj not; say it, and the plain truth is that (lie welfare of their own children demands imnrovwl education. For their own »rowth. their own health, their own hapniness, their own usefulness, they need it; and not Ip°s do thev need it for the future industrial development and cHc. peace of Hie nation. Let the people be clearly and insisfnnlly told that this is tho greatest need of all. and they will not say it will cost too much.—l am, etc., H. A. PAKTCTNPnv Secretin- N.Z.E.I.