The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. Tuesday, may 31, 1932. EXAMINATION SYSTEM.

Hokitika Guardian, 31 May 1932, Page 4

The Guardian And Evening Star, with which is incorporated the West Coast Times. Tuesday, may 31, 1932. EXAMINATION SYSTEM.

In a. report by Mr R. G. RidJing, principal of Wellington Technical College, presented to the Governors, he stated, that athougn no official announcement has been made since the statement from the Minister, in which examinations for senior free place awards • were mentioned, arrangements for holding the examination aie in train. It seems, therefore, that the very retrograde step of designing the work of tii© school to meet examination requirements instead of making all examinations' > follow the work of the school is to be reinstituted. This brings a. very great danger in that the work will tend to be standardised in all technical colleges and will also tend to be dissociated from industry. 11l the past very careful records of the pupils’ work have been kept in all schools and an efficient system of testing- the fitness of the pupils to proceed to more advanced work has 1 been in operation. The proposed examination will not assist in determining the fitness of pupi.s for senior free place awards, and may materially injure the untrammelled system which has enabled the technical high schools to be so closely nssooiated with the facts of life. Following the presentation of the report the principal said one of the things which had made technical work so important was the freedom in the formation of the syllabus which was so desirable in order that colleges could keep in close touch with industry. Pupils j 111 different .subjects expressed themselves in different ways. A boy in engineering would express 1 himself better in drawings and workmanship than in written English, and the same applied to art pupils. If they had to sit down and do a. written examination some of them would crash, as they would suffer a handicap on the marks in English, which were 500, against 300 for other subjects. If the examination was held, teaching would be on the lines of the syllabus laid down by the Department, and if anything could be done to step the examination it should be done. The pupils wore tested by the principal each halfyear, which was the best method of finding out if the pupils were fit to go on. The examination would not do so. Since the Minister had decided on the examinaton, assistant masters had asked to be allowed to alter the courses. He thought this country has gone examination mad, and asked whether it would be wiser to ‘‘buck’’ against the Department or to try to get the Department to set an examination suited to the conditions of the college. He thought it would be hotter to fight for an examination set by the Department which would suit their needs rather than for an internal examination to which the Department was opposed. Mr Ridling said he had suggested that the. examination should be set by the teachers in the college and submitted fcfr the approval of the Department’s inspectors. The teachers should mark the papers and send the results to the Department. The Department could standardise the results and get a comparison with the. work done in other schools. The Department would not accept that. The reason given by the Minister was that the holding of the ■examination would test the accrediting system of the principals, hut that would not he the case. The papers should be accredited by the men who set them, but the teachers would bo. asked to accredit the Department's examination papers and scud the rcisults to the Department.