The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) TUESDAY, AUGUST 27, 1878.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXIII, Issue 5434, 27 August 1878, Page 2

The New Zealand Times (PUBLISHED DAILY.) TUESDAY, AUGUST 27, 1878.

When the Education Act of 1877 was first introduced it was intended and proposed to devote the whole of the educational reserves in each provincial district to the purpose of primary education. Otago wanted an endowment for the Dunedin High School, and it was found therefore to be necessary, by way of compromise, to agroo to the appropriation of one-fourth of the school reserves in nil the districts respectively to the promotion of secondary education —that is, tho maintenance of High or Grammar Schools within each district.

The Education Reserves Act, passed to provide for the general management of the reserves, vests the estates in School Commissioners, five for each provincial district, three of whom are to be appointed by the Governor and two by the Education Board or Boards. Clause 4of the Public Reserves Act provides that—•

One-fourth part of all education reserves which have been heretofore made in and for any province or provincial district, and vested in any Education Board or other body, and of all other such reserves heretofore made in and for any province or provincial district, but which have not been granted to or vested in any such Board or other body, shall bo set apart specially as an endowment for secondary education within the provincial district tor which such reserves and lands were originally made and set apart, and the remainder of such reserves and lands shall bo set apart specially as an endowment for primary education within such district.

Two arbitrators —viz., the chairman of the Education Board and the Commissioner of Crown Lands of the district—are to apportion the education reserves as above provided in each case. This has already been done in several of the districts, and tho awards were published in the “Gazette” on the 12th June last. The figures for Otago are of course largo ; including the Southland appropriations, there are about 17 town acres, over 6000 acres of rural land, and nearly 114,000 acres reserved in runs ; a munificent endowment for the wants of the future in the matter of secondary education. In the last session there was passed the Otago Boys’ and Girls’ High Schools Act. It provides for the establishment of a board of seven persons, one of whom shall be the Mayor of Dunedin, two to be elected annually by tho Education Board, two by tho council of the University, and two to bo appointed by the Governor. In this Board is vested the entire control and management of the school, and of tho property, consisting of two and a-half acres in the city of Dunedin, upon which tho High School stands. The Act provides also that out of the reserves allocated to primary education by the arbitrators, as before-mentioned, so much land shall be set apart as will give “at present” an income of £1250 a year to the school. The force of the “at present” is very remarkable. In the same “Gazette,” of June 12, we find that in order to give the required rental “at present” it takes 91,825 acres of pastoral land, sixteen town lots at Oamaru, and 179 acres of rural land in that neighborhood. This little property is absolutely vested iu the school. In this game of grab Southland naturally took a hand. There was no high school in Southland, but there were possibilities. Southland had an Act last year securing to her Board as much of the allocated reserves as will give an income, at present, of five hundred a year. The land lias not yet been taken, but it may be regarded as disposed of. This year we have another BUI, for the Waitaki High School, which purports to give as much land to the Wataki Board as shall produce “at present” an income of £SOO a year. That will probably absorb the remainder of the reserves, and, unless further provision be made, the future of Otago in the matter of secondary education must be confided to the three schools, viz., one at Dunedin, one at Invercargill, and one at Oamaru.

There are even now many centres of population within the Provincial Districts of Otago in which the establishment of high schools may be desirable; and there are the countless millions of the future who will have educational needs that may not be conveniently met by the three fountains of learning which we have named. Whether it is the duty of the State to do more than provide the machinery for giving primary instruction is a question about which much can bo said on both aides ; there is, we are glad to believe, a growing opinion that State encouragement for higher education is crushing outprivate enterprise, and is doing for the wealthier classes, at the public expense, that which they would gladly do for themselves if a paternal Government would allow them, viz., educate their own children at their own charge. But there can hardly, we imagine, bo much difference of opinion as to the character of the operations now under review. The colony is pleased to set apart valuable reserves as an endowment for the promotion of what is called, secondary education, in the present as well as in the future. These reserves are set apart not for the use of the inhabitants of one or two cities, but for all the people of the Provincial District of Otago. The income derived from the- endowment is at present small, but will, in a very short time, as the leases of the land fall in, be immensely increased. Having passed an Act to provide for the management of this estate, so that the revenue might bo fairly distributed, we allow Dunedin localism to step in, and under the specious pretence of wanting a fixed rental of £1250 for its high school to take property which, if sold to-day, would bring £IOO,OOO ; that sum would give at six per cent, nearly five times as much income as is now required. Land of great value in the township of Oamaru itself, and in its neighborhood, has actually been taken for the support of this school in Dunedin, and now when Oamaru, a rising and prosperous district, wants help for itself it must follow the example of its elder sister and grab the little that remains, or go without. The centres will have got all between them, and then, after the manner of provincialism, all the rest of the districts may starve. The log will of course bo rolled now, as it was rolled before. We can only call attention to the facts.