EDUCATION

Hokitika Guardian, 21 October 1932, Page 2

EDUCATION

effects of economies. INSTITUTE REPLIES. WELLINGTON, October 19. The following statement has been issued by the New Zealand Educational Institute:— “In a speech in the Legislative on Wednesday, October 5, the Minister of Education, the Hon. R. Masters, is reported to have said: ‘At the end of the present year New Zealand would be spending on education £1,200,000 less than was spent last year and the same results would have been achieved.’ “While not disputing that there is need for economy and that 'savings must be made, the executive of the New Zeaalnd Educational Institute is of the opinion that it is quite impossible under present conditions that the same results can bo achieved. It may be that this year the same number of proficiency certificates will he awarded and the same number of free places gained; but there is much more in education than the passing of examinations. The thirty or forty thousand parents who formerly sent their children to school at the age of five and whose five-year-old children are now debarred from school will not agree that their exclusion is all to the good. TLe Education Department’s own statistics show that starting school at a late age is one of the main causes of retardation.

“Apart from the effect on the children themselves, the disorganisation resulting from the exclusion of the five-year-olds on a system based since its inception on a commencing age of five must .e considered. The loss of upwards of 20,000 pupils will moan the dismissal of some 500 teachers and the rearrangement of the classes prejudicial to the children.”