CLOSING THE GAPS

Sun (Auckland), Volume 1, Issue 3, 25 March 1927, Page 13

CLOSING THE GAPS

EDUCATION PROBLEMS TECHNICAL AND SECONDARY SCHOOLS DUNEDIN, Thursday. Interviewed. Mr. F. B. Strong, Director of Education, said it was too early to make any general statement on policy, but no doubt the Department had many difficult problems to solve in connection with the relation of primary to post-primary education, particularly the relation of technical schools to secondary schools of the ordinary type. He said it was the desire of the Department to avoid misfits in postprimary schools, and provide a means by which there would be the transfer of a pupil from one type of institution to another, if the pupil should discover that he had embarked <»n a course of education which was either beyond his capacity, or, though not beyond capacity, not of vital interest to him. Mr. Strong explained that this meant that clever, intellectual children, who found greater interest in technical subjects of instruction than in more academic subjects, should have the opportunity of transferring from a purely secondary school to the technical school department. Realising the necessity of there being no gap in the education scheme, they had instituted a system by which primary school teachers should keep a comprehensive record of their pupils academic attainments, general characteristics, and capacity. When the pupil finished the primary course, this record would be sent on to the postprimary institution which the pupil was entering.