The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. THURSDAY, APRIL 8, 1880.

Kumara Times, Issue 1099, 8 April 1880, Page 2

The Kumara Times. Published Every Evening. THURSDAY, APRIL 8, 1880.

One of the first things that struck the Hon. the Minister of Public Works wlien inspecting the State School here on the occasion of his late visit was the want of accommodation and ventilation in the infant room, and he expressed his opinion thereon in terms that were far from complimentary to the Education Board. That this unfortunate stato of affairs exists no one who has visited the building during the late warm weather will for one moment deny, as the infant room is not only crowded to excess, but, through the insufficient ventilation provided, the atmosphere is actually reeking from the effect of children being as closely packed together as herrings in a barrel. The Local School Committee, however are not to blame for this unsatisfactory and unhealthy system of imparting education, as representations have been repeatedly made on the subject by that body to the Central Board, the outcrop of which was the calling for tenders for an addition to this wing of the building, all of which tenders the buildin* committee have refused to accept, on the ground that the price named exceeded their ideas of the estimate of the cost of construotion. Now, the question naturally arises, Is the value of a few pounds of more paramount importance to the Board of Education than the health of some scores of children to their parents 1 or are the parents to he compelled by the dilatory proceedings of the Board to remove their offspring, or otherwise to allow them to attend the school at the risk of their bodily health? In connection with this fact it appears, to say the least, remarkable that the Inspector of Schools, in his

recent report to the Board of Education, in no way alludes to the want of accomodation or. the insufficiency 'of ventilation provided in the infant room of the Kumam State {school. We take it that although, the duties of this ■ well-paid official.are ostensibly to examine and report on the progress made in education by the various schools, it is even more necessary that the Central Board should be made cognisant of matters affecting r the health and well being of the children through the agency of their Inspector. When a few months ago the Local School Committee applied for some window blinds for the school at Greenstone, the cost of which were a few shillings, the Board, though their Secretary, officially informed the Committee that the Inspector would visit, and report on the matter before the application could be acceded to, artel yet, forsooth, this very same individual, in a case in which a number of children are half-stifled under his very nose, brings up an elaborate report on the" strides they have made in educational matters, without one word of the disadvantages they labored under in effecting that progress. So much for official redtapeism. We say that in the present juncture, the Board, haying refused to accept any tenders for the alterations required, it is the manifest duty of the the Local School Committee to immediately take steps to again bring the matter promptly before the Board, and, in the interests of the children attending the State School, to see that their health is not made a secondary consideration to Education.