MAORI GIRLS' SCHOOL.

Taranaki Daily News, 24 April 1919, Page 6

MAORI GIRLS' SCHOOL.

TO-DAY'S GARDEN PARTY. In a pastoral letter from the Right Rev, Dr. Averill, in reference to the Queen Victoria School for Maori girls, in aid of which a garden party is to be' held at the residences of Archdeacon Evans and Mrs. S. Percy-Smith this afternoon, the Bishop of Auckland says: "In spite of the fact that the school was founded as a Provincial Institution, it has fallen to the diocese of Auckland to take full responsibility for its upkeep, inasmuch as the province generally has ceased to provide any financial help for some years past. The school is not diocesan, but provides a sound education for Maori girls generally, and reports regularly to the General Synod. The whole province is ;norally responsible for the work of tlio Maori Mission, and I confidently appeal to church people throughout the province to come to the aid of their own institution in its hour of need. The primary duty of the white people who live in this favored country is to uplift and elevate the Maori race, which they have largely supplanted, and in what better way can they do it than by uplifting and elevating the Maori girls? All honor to the diocese of Auckland for shouldering the responsibility of the province, and had it not been for the 'present distress,' arising entirely from the greatly increased cost of living, no doubt the diocese would have continued to carry silently the province's burden."

Formerly the scholarship for one Maori girl was 20 per annum. It is now £3O. Several girls from Tarauaki have been at the school, though latterly no scholarship lifts*becn raised to pay for their education. Unfortunately thn Maoris of this district have be.cn much neglected; also they have been under the influence of Te Wliiti, and to these causes chiefly we must look as reasons wliv Ihey do not, like the Maoris of Tlawks's Bay, realise, their responsibilities, so that until we white people help them they will never help themselves. It is hoped the garden party will raise the sum of £3O and so provide a scholarship for at least one Tarauaki Maori girl.