The Daily Telegraph. MONDAY, MAY 16, 1881.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3084, 16 May 1881, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph. MONDAY, MAY 16, 1881.

Reference has been repeatedly made to the costliness of our educational system, and various proposals ha*o been made with the object of bringing the scheme within tbe mean? of the colony to maintain. That some alteration is necessary by which the cost may be reduced nobody denies; but in what direction this alteration is to take so as not to destroy the efficiency of the system puzzles everyone. Politicians are consequently timid at touching the scheme for fear of destroying it, although they are fully aware that to leave it alone is to allow it to break down with its own weight. Nevertheless it is one of the commonest expressions in the speeches of members of the House of Representatives that the existing system of education should not be impaired, but they suggest nothing that will help to maintain it. Let it for once and for all be thoroughly understood that without this educational scheme direct taxation would be unnecessary, and the sense of the country will appreciate its cost. The property tax, in fact, does not realise a sum sufficient to cover the cost of the system. This, perhaps, would not be of so much importance if, throughout the colony property was equal to the demand of such a call upon its duty. For we hold that it is the duty of property to provide the means for educating the children of those who otherwise would obtain no education, but we do not think it should be called upon to do more than that. Ihe existing scheme embraces much more than this, aDd requires extensive and expensive departmental machinery to carry out. Stripped ot the sentimentality that has been made to surround the whole subject, tbe question might be brought within extremely manageable limits; but so long as enthusiasts on the one side, and scholastic professors on the other, are alone listened to in respect to the difficulties overhanging proposals for administrative economy, there will be little chance for reform. Iv that case the evil must work its own cure. The real supporters of a system that shall be " free, Becular, and compulsory,'' are they who would reduce it to within the means of the colony to support. The enemies of the system are they who would not have it touched for fear of spoiling it. Latterly the Government have done something to reduce its cost by refusing to pay capitation allowance on children below the age of five years. It is monstrous to think that for two years this wilful infringement of the Act has been openly permitted, and that this permission has only now been withdrawn through the poverty of the exchequer. The school age of children is defined by the Act to be between the ages of five and fourteen, but it waß with the object of increasing the funds of the Education Boards that those ages were disregarded. It was not in the least done in the cause of education itself ; it was iust a clumsy method ot bolstering an undertaking that was hastily entered into before the cost was calculated. The Government having resolved to enforce the Act with respect to children below five years of age, tbe way is in some measure prepared to still further reduce the limits of the school ages. We have it on medical and other authority that little is gained by sending children to Bchool before they are seven years old. Here then is at once a valuable suggestion that might be acted upon without in any sense impairing the educational system. The saving that would be effected would be of the greatest value to the support of the whole scheme. In this one district of Hawke's Bay nearly one-third of the total number of children attending the public schools is under seven years of age. In the larger districts of Auckland, Wellington, Otago, and Canterbury, the proportion would doubtless be much the same. But in this district, if tbe Act were amended in the direction indicated, 932 children would be removed from our crowded schools, to the very great advantage of those capable of learning. There is another point to which reference has been made in these columns with a view to the introduction of economy in the administration of the system. We allude to the maintenance of the sixth standard at the schools. In the Napier school we are informed that the head master complains that pupils are removed before they have passed the sixth standard ; they therefore do not pass the inspection, and the time bestowed on their education in that class is not, nor can it be, credited to the teacher. In other words the master's time, that might have been profitably spent on the lower standards, has been tbrown away on pupils who are merely making use of the school until they can be launched into business life. If, then, passing tbe fifth standard fits a boy to earn his own living there is no need for anything higher ; but should it be demanded it should be paid for.