Disgraceful Overcrowding.

Levin Daily Chronicle, 20 April 1918, Page 3

Disgraceful Overcrowding.

I Contributed. j "After the War" is a problem which is exercising the minds of all the thinkers of the world. Iho terific waste of men and material and what will be needed to bring matters to some stability is almost beyond the comprehension. One thing is a certainty and that is that Education will play a very great part in the re-adjustment. And what are we in New Zealand doing towards furthering it ■ Shall we, as our nation as a whole has always been credited, shall we "do nothing," and trust to matters to .right themselves. If so, God help us. It behoves us to at once commence to set our house in order, and one of the earliest reforms should be that of attending to our overworked and underpaid teachers and the classes of which they have control. In Levin we have a public school which is as large as any school in any of the large centres, containing as it does more than GOO children on the roll, and what do we find? The school contains nine rooms in its primary department. The recognised amount of floor space per child in scholastic circles is 12 feet., but the Government as a war economy, cut this down to 10 feet. The following table shows the position at the Levin school together with the accommodation available at the 10 and 12 feet allowance: Atten12ft. 10ft. dance Primer 1 60 72 84 Primer 2 44 52 29 Primer 3 44 52 61 Standard 1 50 60 49 Standard 2 50 60 77 Standard 3 50 60 77 Standard 4 50 60 73 . Standard 5 50 60 53 Standard 6 50 60 70 < So that only two rooms contain anything near their capacity. The one with the 29 is m charge of a pupil teacher, hence the small number. There is also a secondary department, which last year had nearly 50 on the roll and the number of rooms for this department is nil. How, when and where are they taught? One class occupied the science room and the other the cookery room and when the cookery room was engaged on two days a week, this class had to do the best it could. The big school is now being altered for the secondary department, but this will only accentuate the crowding in the primary division. Little infants have to be taught in the corridor with the floor for seats and their knees for desks. This then is one of the crying evils of our time. Education is a vital necessity and education needs no makeshifts and yet our school buildings and equipment are one huge makeshift. V\ e have eight trained teachers in the primary department and pei cent at the least of our children do not get past the primary division—and those eight teachers have to fit for the battle of life an average of 72 children orov- upd into rooms built for 50, though under the amended regulations these rooms are supposed to contain 60, as 10 square feet is the amount of space allowed by the N.Z. Education Department. Educationalists say it. is a physical impossibility, and an educational impossibility as well, for the most competent teacher to instruct more than 40 pupils while the local average is twice that. What are the people of New Zealand going to do about it?