Mataura Ensign WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE WAIKAIA HERALD. GORE, TUESDAY, MAY 22ND, 1883. COUNTRY SCHOOL COMMITTEES.

Mataura Ensign, Volume VI, Issue 257, 22 May 1883, Page 2

Mataura Ensign WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE WAIKAIA HERALD. GORE, TUESDAY, MAY 22ND, 1883. COUNTRY SCHOOL COMMITTEES.

COUNTRY We proceed now to redeem the promise we gave our readers some time ago that we would discuss the question > which forms the title of this article.. 1 We cannot say that the subject is a «' pleasant one to our mind, and would [ just as soon shirk it altogether, were it i not for our promise; and an editorial promise is sacred hrour eyes, and al* ' ways redeemed. Besides, after all, this article may be considered as the concluding portion of our former ayL tides on Country Teachers, and as therefore necessary to make up a com- ( plete whole of the subject of country" schools as viewed from the standpoint I of our experience. The Colony does not suffer from I the want of committees either . for the transaction of public or private business —rather the i-everse, J one would say. Public committees are supposed to depend on the exigencies of public bußiness,and where this is the case public interest is generally more or less taken in the duties and performances of these bodies. This is natural, because the object for which they exist . has a rational and useful bearing on ■ some part or other of our social polity. 1 But who takes any interest in the doings, or even in the very existence of country school committtes? In many districts it is not an uncommon thing i by any means to meet residents unable to say which of their neighbors form ' the school committee pf their district. Jt is felt that our school committees have no real need for their existence, and therefore no interest is taken in their proceedings. The annual cleg- , tions, for the same reason, are frequently a hole and comer affair, with the result, in such cases, that self and not independent election is the general rule, under the system which allows a candidate to plump for himself. This system may do m populous centres, but in country places where it is not unusual only to tind seven electors present, who simply elect themselves, the whole thing" is a delusion and a snare. Not enough of means ia taken to ensure due

publicity of the annual elections in these country districts, where postal and advertising facilities are scarce. We think it would help matters in this respect if it were made an instruction to country teachers to publish the date of the yearly election by the aid of the scholars. In this way the parents, who are very directly interested in school matters, would have what they often lose at present, viz., timely opportunity given them of attending and electing suitable men for such work as the Boards of Education have left the com mittees to perform, But why should a committee be elected to do that which might very properly be delegated to the teacher ? * Eepairs to the school property, with such like work, which forms the bulk of the proper duties of the school committees, are surely not above the capacity of the teacher, and might very properly be left to his discretion, subject of course to the approval of the Board. Scholastic matters purely are beyond the range of the committees, just as the practice of farming may be supposed to be outside the teacher's sphere. These matters belong to tbe Board of Education and the Inspectors, who very properly practically ignore the committees in them. Where then is "the use of school committees in country districts ? We can see none, and the same answer is given by districts when they refuse or decline to make any elec^ tion. [f ail country committees in the Colony were to cease their functions to-morrow, educational matters would not suffer one whit, while much unseemly wrangling and discomfort, of which the public is generally ignorant, would be removed by their removal. Our remarks apply to purely rural districts ; and our idea is that in such parts, unless three-fourths of the residents attended at the annual election, no election should take place, the duties of the committee devolving upon the Boards, or the teacher, in these circumstances. We think a goodly number of country districts would then be found without a committee. There seems to us to have been a mistake made in working out the Education Act under the same mode in populous and non-populous districts. A distinction should have been made between the towns and the rural parts, and we think the plan we have sugf ested of preventing elections unless three-fourths of the electors attended, would do away with most of the objections that have been urged against rural committees j though we confess to a predeliction for their abolition altogether. Instances might easily be given in support of our plea for their modification^or abolition, but we think such will occur readily to those interested, without our help. The remedy we have proposed for a modification of the administration of the Act would have one result. It is .common, at f present to find- school committees of the settlers nearest the school — the more distant settlers are virtually ignored — and they, the nearest settlers, monopolise the membership year after year without regard to their fitness or unfitness to act. We think it would be wise to exclude setlers who are simply bachelor birds of passage, or those who are not parents, from acting on the committees. It seems but reasonable to say that only such settlers as have an abiding place in their school district and who ha\e children of their own should become members of a school committee. In conclusion, we have no hesitation whatever in asserting, from what has come to our knowledge, that if the real wishes of the rural portion of this Education District had been properly arrived at at the annual elections last January, a surprising number of those who became members of our country school committees then, would not now be acting as such.