SCHOOLS FOR BACKBLOCKS.

Taranaki Daily News, 24 November 1916, Page 2

SCHOOLS FOR BACKBLOCKS.

BOARD'S STRONG PROTEST, The Education Department's action in refusing applications for grants for new schools was trenchantly criticised at Wednesday's meeting of the Turanaki Education Hoard. The Education Department wrote, in response to a request made by the Board for a grant of £IOO for the provision of a new school at Omoana, that, it could not see its way clear to make the grant. The Rev. A. B. Chappell expressed the opinion that the Department, by refusing grants for schools in the backblocks, was proceeding along lines that were inimical to the best interests of the country. Both settlement and the financial interests of the country were being detrimentally affected. Tlie chairman said Parliament had provided for increased expenditure in education, but tiie administration was of a checse-parins mature. Mr. Chappell: The provision was not in proportion to the growing needs. Mr. E. Dixon said he would like the Board to enter a strong protest against the Department's action. Applications for schools in the baekbloeks had been turned down again and again. The chairman pointed out that the Department had made a grant of £2OO for Mt. Messenger without being urged to any extent. Mr. C. A. Wilkinson said he had a personal knowledge of the Omoana district. and it was true many of the settler.-, had left the place and had come to reside in towns owing to the lack of educational facilities for their children. Mr. S. G. Smith observed that the departmental officials must act without a knowledge of the circumstances.' It was resolved, on the motion of Mr. Chappell—"That this Board expresses its conviction that the provision of adequate educational facilities is as essention to the encouragement of backblocks settlement as it is to the securing of good citizenship, and ' earnestly urges upon the Government, and the Education Department, the folly of niggardly expenditure upon education. It emphatically protests against the continuance of a policy of exaggerated economy, believing that the existence of a state of war, so often pleaded as ' an excuse for refusal of applications for grants for new schools, especially on the frontiers of settlement, really provides a cogent reason for enthusiastic attention to the education of the rising generation." It was also resolved —"That other Education Boards be asked to make representations to the Government, and the Department on this matter."