“NO BED OF ROSES"

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 541, 19 December 1928, Page 6

“NO BED OF ROSES"

LOT OF A MASTER GRAMMAR HEAD’S OPINION The lot of a school teacher —or at least a secondary school teacher —is no bed of roses, to judge from the remarks of the headmaster of the Mount Albert Grammar School, Mr. F. W. Gamble, M.A., in his annual report at the school's prizegiving ceremony last evening. "At times it is apparent that not only the general public, but also the very department, from whom a full understanding might bo expected fails to realise the exacting nature of the tasks of secondary school teachers,” said Mr. Gamble. The headmaster devoted a large part of his report to this question, and paid tribute to the loyalty and energy of his own staff. He had too clear a recollection of his own service as an assistant, he and too great an appreciation of the work done by the staff of his school, not to challenge tho belief that in our secondary schools tho lot of a teacher is an easy and privileged one. An average case of a master’s work was investigated, and the time spent by him at work which it was definitely his duty to carry out amounted to 53 hours weekly averaged over a term, and this left out of reckoning time given up by him in directions where no actual responsibility rested. Fortyeight hours a week is a perfectly reasonable estimate of what any assistant master must do in the way of regular work. PUBLIC SERVICE COMPARED Mr. Gamble continued that, in the endeavour to show that secondary school staffs are highly privileged bodies, the department had made surprising comparisons between them and members of the Civil Service. “The university degree, which to the department is a sine qua non, gives an agreeable appearance to the teacher’s name by the appending of a handle of letters to which he has gained title, and suggests that at least the first tax upon his time and vitality is at an end. In reality this is the point at which begins an endless course of work properly directed to the requirements of the profession. “A teacher’s work, besides the one phase prominent to the outside eye—preparation for examinations—included campaign of discipline, meptal training, moral guidance, physical welfare, control of mass propensities, fostering of individuals’ strengths, inculca-tion of personal dignity and respects and indication of the call for true citizenship,” he said. Mr. Gamble concluded a vigorous defence of the secondary school teacher by noting in passing that those fortunate people who, by becoming inspectors, are severed from the strain of direct teaching work, are really good “lives,” for while 60 inspectors are in active work, there are 29 drawing handsome pensions. “Some more competent authority,” he said, “may try to explain away the various disabilities I have mentioned connected with secondary school teaching, but I have sought this opportunity to give recognition to the readiness with which the masters of this school respond to the many calls upon their time and energy.”