The Evening Star FRIDAY, JULY 3, 1874

Evening Star, Issue 3545, 3 July 1874, Page 2

The Evening Star FRIDAY, JULY 3, 1874

We are glad to see that there is at last a fair prospect of something being done in the way of placing the High School of Otago in a satisfactory position. A Board of Advice is to be appointed “to recommend to the Education Board such steps ” —with regard to the subjects of study, and the arrangements of the school— “ as it may consider necessary ; such Board to consist of seven members, to bo appointed by the Government, and to hold office for a term of one year.” A great deal will, of course, depend on the constitution of the Board, but if this can be so arranged that it will fairly reflect intelligent public opinion, there is little doubt that, as Mr Hawthorne said, the appointment of such a Board will meet the case exactly. The main difficulty with which the High School has hitherto had to contend has been that its position in the educational scheme of the Province, and the work expected from it hare never been clearly defined.

Different classes of educational theorists have desired it to be managed in accordance with their own peculiar views ; the authorities of the school have been naturally anxious to give satisfaction as far as possible to everybody, and by trying to please everybody they have pleased nobody. If we may judge from the steps originally taken to establish the school, and from the men who were first appointed on the staff, it was intended that the High School should, as far as possible, resemble the English endowed Grammar Schools. Men thoroughly versed in all the traditional learning of the English Universities were brought

from Home, and in a few years they had succeeded in producing a by no means bad imitation; though on a smaller scale, of such schools as those at Rugby, Eton, and Harrow. At the same time, however, it began to be discovered by the people of Dunedin that this was not at all the sort of thing required here. It was found that other things than Latin and Greek were required by young men in this Colony, and that the education given at the High School was, though good enough in its way, not of the kind needed by those who had to earn their living in the office, on the farm, or in the workshop. If we remember rightly, towards the close of the late Rector’s tenure of office there existed among nearly all classes of the community a strong feeling in favor of a thorough change in the curriculum of the school. There existed, in short, almost general dissa-

tisfaction ■with the instruction given there. It could hardly be expected that the staff would escape blame for haring pursued the. course referred to. Though they had done exactly the work they had been sent for to do, and had done it well, they were very sharply criticised for producing results which could be considered of little practical use to the community. When Mr Hawthorne arrived he initiated many useful reforms ; amongst other things he determined that less attention should be devoted to ( lassies and more to Practical Mathematics, Knglish, and Natural Science. The school became more ; suited to the actual requirements of the Colony, but as a mere matter of course it also became more and more unlike an English Grammar School. Unfortunately, however, many people thought that they ought tb be able to eat the cake and to have it too—that less attention should be devoted to Classics, and that nevertheless the classical attainments of the pupils should be quite equal to what they had previously been. Accordingly, when the High School boys were comparatively unsuccessful in the examination for the New Zealand scholarships, in which classical attainments were virtually everything, these people immediately discovered that the High School had degenerated. It is true that merchants, lawyers, surveyors, and others who have had occasion to employ boys who have completed the High School curriculum find them thoroughly well fitted for the practical business of Colonial life; but what of that, these people in effect say, if they, cannot write Latin elegiacs or Greek iambics 1 Here again, then, it appears that the High School has “ got into hot water ” uhrough the efforts of its staff to give satisfaction to the public generally—to find out the work that the public wants done and to do it. Now, it appears to us that there is only one plan that will prevent this dissatisfaction with the High School from recurring again and again, and that is to relieve the authorities of the school of the task of tinding what ought to be done. It is for public opinion to decide as to what the nature of the secondary education of the Province should be. The people it large must, in the long run, be far more capable of determining what sort of knowledge and what kind of culture are needed by the rising generation that any teacher or body of teachers possibly can be. If the High School had from the very first been placed under the supervision of some such Board as it is now proposed to form, there can be little doubt that it would have been thoroughly successful. Instead of being subject to periodical and violent attacks, it would have been constantly under thedirectinfluence of public opinion, and its curriculum would have been almost insensibly modified by this influence. It would at this day have reflected the opinions of the intelligent classes of the community in a way that it cannot possibly do under its present constitution, when every change made in it is the result of no well-devised plan, but rather of the nature of an attempt to gratify some passing popular fancy. One of the very first matters, we presume, that the new Board will have to consider will be whether the school is to do, as it does now to a certain extent, the same work as that done at the University; or whether its curriculum cannot be so

adjusted that none of the work done by it shall u overlap ” the University coarse. That the High School should be a feeder to the University is only right and proper : that it should be in any sense its rival is extremely undesirable. In our opinion the course of study at the High School should include just enough of Classics and Theoretical Mathematics to enable boys who have just gone through it to pass the matriculation examination, and no more. But there are very many boys who do not require a University edu- a cation at all. For these there might well be a high “ modern class ” in

the High School, in which the principal subjects would be Modern Languages, Practical Mathematics, and some one of the Natural Sciences. We repeat that the appointment of the Board of Advice for the High School will probably put an end to the unsatisfactory circumstances by which that institution has so long been surrounded ; we hope, however, that the Education Board will act upon the “ advice ” offered to them by the new body—at all events that they will not deal with it as they have done with the recommendations made by the examiners for the Provincial Scholarships.