WORKERS’ EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION.

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLI, Issue 1947, 4 March 1919, Page 3

WORKERS’ EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATION.

In 'another column of this issue a public meeting is advertised under the auspices of the Workers’ Educational Association. Professor Hunter, of Victoria College University, Wellington, is the lecturer, and will explain the aims and objects of the Association.

It is the aim of the movers to form a tutorial class at Foxton, Shannon, and other places in the neighbourhood. Classes in economics, sociology science, hygiene, electricity, etc., arc being conducted in all tire targe centres, and the activities of the Association are spreading into every provincial town in the Dominion. It is sought in the present instance to extend the benefits of what is really a university training for the democracy to every town and township. The spread of education is a matter of vital moment to everyone in the community, and the movement is worthy of every support. A few words on what the Association is will not be out of place. It is a voluntary organisation of men and women, united by the desire lo bring the opportunities of higher education within the reach of all working people, 'under conditions such as to render the work reasonable and interesting. This work is carried out by means of lectures and tutorial classes. The Association was founded in England in 1903 by a small group of working men and women, who believed that a higher level of genera! education was an essential condition of any far-reaebiug scheme of social advance, and that such education could be secured only by a joint effort on the part of scholars and working men and women. The work of I lie Association, supported not only bv the Trades Unions, but also 1/V (he Universities, made vapid and steady growth. In the United Kingdom (he Federation consisted in 1914 of 2,555 organisations, including 953 Trade Unions, Trades Councils and branches, 388 co-op-eralive committees, 311 adult schools and classes, 15 University bodies, Hi local education authorities, 175 working men’s clubs and institutes, (15 (enclHTs‘ associations, 151. Educational and Literary Societies, ami 151. various societies, mainly of workpeople. The Association is non-partisan in politics, unsectarian and democratic: it docs not merely tolerale differences of opinion, i! welcomes and respects (hem.

The-best results iu this work are obtained by (ho sympathetic co-op-eration of three different organisations — (1) The workers, who desire higher education and who an* prepared to make reasonable saeri(ices to obtain it; (2) the University, which, provides competent lecturers and tutors for (lie classes; (3) the Government and the municipal authorities, which, through their existing libraries, provide adequate books and literature for the use of the students. All these bodies contribute also to the funds necessary to carry out the work.