The Globe. TUESDAY, JUNE 26, 1877

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 937, 26 June 1877, Page 2

The Globe. TUESDAY, JUNE 26, 1877

The proposal made by the Professorial Board of the Canterbury College, that a High School for boys should _ be established in this city, is one which will we hope be warmly supported by the general public. Thanks to the exertions of the friends of higher education in Canterbury, our College has been successfully established, and funds placed at its disposal. Its teaching is within the reach of all who have been trained sufficiently to avail themselves of it, and its fees are low enough to satisfy the requirements of its poorest students. But if it is to perform the work required of it, its professors must have students sent there properly grounded, otherwise _ the powers of its teaching staff will be wasted in giving elementary instruction. What is wanted is a High School, where advanced boys can receive the necessary preliminary training required for successfully pursuing their studies at the College. No such institution at present exists. It is true that we have Christ's College Grammar School; I)ut Christ's College is not a national institution. It is in the hands of one denomination, and however liberally it is managed, it is still a sectarian school. Besides—and this is the greatest objection we have to it —it is far too expen-

sive to be availed of by any but the wealthy. As a correspondent of one of the morning papers justly points out, parents with a less income than c£soo a year cannot afford to send two or three of their sons to such an instition as the Grammar School. They must be content to deprive their boys of the advantages which the College holds out, from inability to give them the preliminary training needed to enter it. Such a state of things ought not to continue. It is a blot on our otherwise splendid scheme, and should be removed at once. This is essentially a people's question. The College has been established by grants from the public purse, and by reserves from the public estate, and ought to be placed within the reach of all. This can only be done by the establishment of a High School, which at a small cost shall give to every lad who cares for it, the training necessary to enter the College. We are sorry to observe, in some quarters, indications of ©imposition on the part of the Grammar School.™ As long as that school charges such fees as permits of it being attended by the sons of the wealthy o dy, its governing body need not fear tlie competition of a High School established by the Government. Unless we greatly mistake the character of our colonial aristocracy, the Grammar School need not be at all afraid of the competition of a school whose object is to impart high class instruction, for a small fee, to all who seek it. In other and older countries, where social distinctions do not require to be asserted with the same strictness with which it is necessary to maintain them here, it might be different. There, the best school, would probably receive the largest number of pupils. Here, there is no such danger. But in any case it will be exceedingly discreditable to the partisans of Christ's College Grammar School if they oppose the scheme of the professors from purely selfish motives, and we hope the report that they are about to do so is untrue. There is a strong feeling abroad, however, that the constitution of the Board of Governors of the Canterbury College requires reforming. However eminently qualified some of its members are for a seat there, there are others who have never given any indications of warm sympathy with its objects. Indeed, if the truth were known, there is another, and to some extent a rival institution, whose interest they have far more at heart. They in no way represent the general public, but Christ's College, and, however averse we are in some respects to the plans, we would be inclined to urge some form of popular election, as a remedy for the growingevil. By this plan we might lose some of the present Board whose eminent qualifications are unknown to the electors, but we Avould, on the other hand, get rid of a body of men whose only claim to a seat there is the fact that they represent a rival institution.