Page 1 Advertisements Column 5

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 1976, 11 January 1907, Page 1

A boy, named Julius Tockor, bas attended tlio Stratford District High School over 13 years without missing a single attendance, says the Wanganui Herald, notwithstanding during that time ho has had a broken arm, a wound in his foot, caused by a broken bottle, which required several stitches, and the usual sickness to which childhood is heir. In his .opening address the President of the Educational Institute, said: “1 would here plead on behalf of our pupils, that their rights he respected by us, all. What rights V The right to be considered individually and constitutionally; the right to be led along those lines that shall best develop their originality, their individuality, their gifts, their character. Delivered as they arc into our hands for at least five hours a day, what shall we do with them? The hours pass, and I fear that, too often, under the stress and strain of our system .our duller pupils come through, as it were, through a mill. For these hoys and girls the long day closes, and they may be hardened, embittered, dwarfed. They are travelling. a hard road. Our efforts, our aims, are often entirely influenced by the inspectors’ reports. Those reports, tlio.se adjectives in them 1 Years ago it was the figures, showing how many pupils had passed or failed, and in watching the figures we lost sight of the pupils. To-day it indicates his judgment as to the quality of our work, and we lose the pupil behind the adjectives. No sooner do we read one report than wo are eager to ho at work again, determined to get, if possible, a better set of adjectives next year. The peculiarities, the needs, the natures of our pupils may he as nothing. They are, poor wretches, only the means whereby wo get good adjectives—or had ones- —from those persons who can, in a few minutes ,so accurately index the quality of our work during the year. Thus our school life and procedure may lie reduced to a performance wherein we so conduct our work that it meets with our inspectors’ approval. Accordingly our inspectors and our text-books may become the chief factors in determining the kind of education that our pupils receive.”