Manawatu Herald TUESDAY, AUGUST 20, 1918. EDUCATION CRITICISM.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XL, Issue 1866, 20 August 1918, Page 2

Manawatu Herald TUESDAY, AUGUST 20, 1918. EDUCATION CRITICISM.

THE Dominion, in an editorial criticising the need for educational reform', says; —The demand for a thorough reform of our national education, system is becoming widespread and increasingly emphatic, and the Minister of Education and his Department are unable to produce a valid excuse for their continual inaction. They practically admit that the critics have presented a strong case; but little or nothing is done. The most obvious and urgent reforms are indefinitely postponed. The Minister is always sympathetic. He lias painted some glowing word-pictures of what he, intends to do, and for a time many people thought he was going to be the big strong man who would sweep all obstacles aside and march boldly along the way of progress. If his deeds had been as many or as great as his words the present agitation for urgently-needed improvements would not have been necessary. The Minister now seems to have lost

faith in his powers of leadership. Instead of leading the reform movement, he appeals to the teachers to push him along Now the demand for reform has become louder and more imperative. The system is assailed on all sides. The parents are dissatisfied, the business men are dissatisfied, the farmers are dissatisfied, the teachers are dissatisfied. The ■ school buildings, are out of date, the playgrounds are unsuitable, the classes are too large, the syllabus is defective, the examination system is wrong, the salaries of the teachers are too low, the profession is unable to attract a sufficient number of the required type of men and women. The Departi merit has attempted to show that some progress has been made during recent years. But its apologia is weak and unconvincing. Our schools have fallen far behind the requirements of the science of education. Take, for instance, the complaints that arc being made of under-staff - ing and overcrowding. At a conference of teachers recently held at Auckland the following examples were cited: 11)5 children (aught by one young pupil-teacher; 130 pupils being kept in a room 4()f( by 22ft; 70 pupils in a room built to accommodate 55; 100 in a room 26ft by 24ft. It was also stated that at thq Parnell School the shelter-shed accommodation was 500 short of the total number of pupils; and that at, Beresford Street School the boys, numbering more than 350, were entirely without shelter-shed accommodation. These are staring facts which no Departmental sophistry can explain away, and things in 'Wellington are quite as bad. . . . Things are going from bad to worse, while the Ministry of Education, and his Department, look on hopeless and helpless. In the matter of State education New Zealand is lagging behind Britain. There is a deplorable lack of strong and wise leadership. There is no sureness as to what is wanted, hul there is a consensus of (»pinion that the present position is extremely unsatisfactory, and will soon lie intolerable. It is high lime the policy of drift and procrastination was abandoned. Wo have had more than enough of talking, and trifling, and tinkering. Never before has the average man realised so fully the value of education. He understands the education of the right kind moans physical fitness, industrial efficiency, mental alertness, intelligent citizenship, and strong moral character, and he knows that these are (he things which will be supremely imparl ant in the new era which will open when the war is over.