South Canterbury Times, FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1882.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 2825, 14 April 1882, Page 2

South Canterbury Times, FRIDAY, APRIL 14, 1882.

The Education Board, at its last meeting, appointed a committee to deal with that ever recurring difficulty the Scholarships Regulations. .Such action is a confession on the part of the Board that things do not work well. This, however, has been long manifest to. everybody, though it would be extremely unfair to charge the Board with that, as the matter is a difficult one to deal with, and the mention of it opens the door to end less discussion. The question is not merely one of local interest, it is of national interest/ for scholarships are obtained and held under an Act of Parliament which applies to the whole colony. The fundamental provision of the Act referring to scholarships is as follows:—(51) “ The Board may, with the concurrence of the Minister, from time to time, put of funds made specially applicable for the purpose, establish scholarships to be competed for by the pupils attending any public school, and also scholarships open to all children of school age, in such manner and at such times as shall be fixed by regulations to be made under this Act. The successful competitor for any-snch scholarship shall .receive the amount of his or her scholarship only so long as he or she shall continue his or her education at any school or educational institution under the control of the Board at which the higher . branches of education are taught, but, if there be no such school or institution in the district where the holder of the scholarship resides, then at such school, subject to inspection by a Public School Inspector, as the Board may approve of,” The interpretation of this clause seems to be that the Board is endowed with the right to provide scholarships for competition by the pupils of schools under its own control, with a view to drafting off the most promising of them to higher schools. The Board’s regulations 4 and 5, read thus : (4) “ Successful competitors of one year shall be allowed to compete in subsequent years, in the classes corresponding to their ages. (5) Each candidate shall produce a certificate showing that he or she has been a pupil of some public school or schools for at least three months prior to the date of his or her notification to compete.” It was objected, at last meeting of the Board, that there was a certain difficulty in the way of carrying out these regulations. The Board’s scholarships are open to public school children. The winners are required to attend a High school (and a High School is not a Public School within the meaning of the Act), and are thus cut off from competing for scholarships of the higher grades, since they will then be no longer pupils of “ public schools.” The only remedy that suggested itself was the erection of a public school to the status of a “District High School,” as provided by the Act. This question seems a difficult one to settle, and the only way out of the difficulty that presents itself is to accept the interpretation suggested, viz., that the scholarships shall be confined entirely to pupils of public schools. A scholar having gained a scholarship should pass to the High School and thereafter be deemed to have no further claim on the public schools. His future career should be the care of the authorities ot the higher school to which he goes, and he should not be permitted to compete for any further scholarship within the gift of the Board. The High Schools arc richly endowed and abundantly supplied with teachers and are quite able to establish

scholarships for their own pupils, or to pass them on by similar process to the University. It seems to us to be scarcely fair ' that the same individual pupil should continue, after he has passed out of the public schools, to receive emoluments properly belonging to those schools alone. The intention of the legislature seems to be what we have always advocated, viz :—to make the public school the feeder of the High School, and the High School that of the University. If this be so, then, the Board should institute regulations in conformity with this, as a governing principle. The South Canterbury Board of Education shows no disposition to take advantage of the permission the Act gives them to establish (s District High Schools.” Why the Timaru School was not, long ago, formed into a District High School, is more than anybody seems to be able to explain. By erecting one of its principal schools into District a High School, as provided by Section 55 of the Act, which reads thus :—“ Any Board, on receiving an application in writing from the Committee, may, with the express sanction of the Minister previously obtained, convert any public school in the district into and establish the same as a District High School,” the Board- would get over the difficulty at once, and be able to allow pupils of extraordinary merit to pass from class to class of scholarships. A pupil winning a scholarship in Class A. might immediately enter upon the study of the higher branches in a District High School and, being still under the supervision of the Board, be eligible to hold an advanced scholarship. Teachers holding the higher certificates are competent to impart instruction in secondary subjects. Why, then, not utilize such competency by converting the more important schools (say for example in South Canterbury ; Timaru, Waimate, Temuka, Geraldine) into District High Schools. : This appears to us to be daily becoming more advisable, since (rightly or wrongly) there is growing in the community an impression that certain social qualifications are requisite for children attending the High Schools, if they are to be comfortable there. The establishment of District High Schools would, it appears to us, immediately remove any difficulty of this kind, and to this course we would strongly urge the Board, As for a money payment to scholarship holders, we are of opinion that this ought to bo very carefully regulated by the Board in order that it may be beyond a doubt that the money so paid over goes, every fraction of it, towards the advancement of the winner’s education.