EDUCATION REFORM

Southland Times, Issue 18823, 17 May 1920, Page 5

EDUCATION REFORM

TEACHERS AND THE MINISTER. SALARIES AND SUPERANNUATION. (Per United Press Association.) WELLINGTON, May 16. The executive of the New Zealand Educational Institute met the Minister of Education to-day and suggested that there should be compulsion to sixteen, up to which age the aims should be education and citizenship. They approved of the Minister’s proposal to separate children at twelve years. The deputation said that the National Education’s Board scheme would make for greater unity and progress, and contended that teachers should be under the control of that Board. They urged that superannuation should be altered to provide an increase in the widows’ allowance, and the inclusion of training college service for superannuation purposes, that annuitants re-employed should be allowed to earn up to £240 without deduction, and increased provision for teachers who retired under the Act of 1905. It was also urged that the standard for the cleaning, sanitation, and heating of schools should bo laid down, that allowances should be granted to teachers to meet removal expenses and the house allowance should be increased. Better salaries on the basis ol efficiency were needed if the profession wai to secure recruits. What was wanted was a national service nationally controlled and locally administrated. Mr Parr, in replying, said he recognised that the education system must be extended and reformed, and ho was inclined to agree that the raising of the compulsory age must be done. The country was behind the teachers and their advocacy of reform, and he believed the people were ahead of their leaders in this respect. He emphasised that much of the social unrest was due to inadequate education, and that better and fuller training in schools was essential if peace was to be assured in the future. He spoke sympathetically in regard to the representations for higher salaries, which he would put before the Cabinet as forcibly as he could. He would endeavour to open up avenues for promotion by increasing ths status of small schools immediately, and remove the reproach that the smaller country schools could not get the best teachers.