EDUCATION BOARD JOTTINGS

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LI, Issue 232, 24 September 1908, Page 3

EDUCATION BOARD JOTTINGS

Okau is a little place up in j>forth, Taranaki, and it in cJiielly noted for, the persistency of some of rt3 s=sllers. fa agitating for a school. The Education Board inquired if any buildiHg were at present available, and a settlen has now written, to the Board stating that the only building available is one belonging to him, and he offers to lei, this hi the cause of education at the low rate of six shillings per week. The building—pause and consider—has dis

men9ions 20ft by 12ft, has an iron roof, a tin chimney, Bft stud, and unlinedi, Ola owner wants an iinmettiate reply, ftr he has other objects in view for the building. ' Yesterday the Education Board decided to forward a circular to teachers drawing their attention to the lack of promptitude too often displayed by, them in replying to correspondence, and to the want of care and exactness in filling in returns in accordance with instructions issued from the office. The Cardiff school children have latterly Improved their schoolgrouud. planting a ledge and shrubs, with a' view of establishing gardening classes'. In the course of a discussion at the .Education Board meeting yesterday it ■was stated that there was a tendency in some districts to persecute the teacher, and the more illiterate the parents the more was ..Apecled from tie teacher. Parents should, it was urged, ibe brought to recognise that the. ■best results would lie obtained by the parents working in harmony with the teachers for the benefit of the children.

"Birds in their little nests agree," out it does not follow that the Bird school committee should follow this ex-, ample. The Bird school is becoming as, notorious as the Moa Dairy Company, Teacher after teacher has, on account Of unhappy relations with some' of the. settlers, found distant fields atiraeute-! ly they've left. One teacher a woman, set herself doggedly to beat down the opposition, and she stuck to ker guns manfully. But what could »»e girl dot Eventually she left. And now another teacher is in the maelstrom. There are prospects of heaps of fna, and big lawyers' fees to be pocketed, before the curtain is rung down upon the present melodrama, the correspondence concerning wnich reveals "situations worthy of a Gilbertian opera. A couple of days ago we published a. paragraph concerning the unbusinesslike methods of school teachers so far as correspondence is concerned. Another .phase of it came under the. notice of the Board yesterday, when a localcommission agent objected to .being addressed by a lady school teacher as! l>Jain Brown Jones,-agent Blank Assur-! »nce Co. He signified his displeasure! by inquiring, "Is Miss • a member. of the Society of Friends?' There's a,' good deal of weight attached nowadays, to plain "Mister."