HIGH SCHOOL PARTY.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXV, Issue 10713, 14 May 1913, Page 5

HIGH SCHOOL PARTY.

MEETING AT LANSDOWNE.

The High Sohool Party held a meeting in the Lansdowne school last evening, when the speakers were Messrs H. Evans, D. A. Pickering, and H, 0. Robinson, candidates at the forthcoming Trust election. The attendance was very small, about sixteen being present. ■Mr E. Hale occupied the chair, and introduced the speaker, explaining \ the object of the meeting. Mr Evans, the first speaker, said his party was out in the (interests of higher education. He would urge the value of children receiving the education they required, and advance the necessity of a High School in tlilis district, which he wag sure would be of the greatest' value to the community. Ho had been ci member of a school committee for twenty years, and was convinced of the necessity for higher education. Mr Pickering, to a great extent, endorsed the remarks of Mr Evans, with which he was entirely in accord. He considered it high time that a town of Masterton's importance had a system of higher education. Referring to the retirement of Miss Williams, from the Masterton District High School, Mr Pickering thought that <Miss Williams was enentiitled to the highest consideration for hep excellent work in connection with the secondary department of the Masterton District High School. Mr H. C. Robinson, the next speaker, said that quite a number of people appear to have failed to realise why he resigned. They seemed to tlilink he had thrown up the sponge. This was the final round of what had been a long, lonely and arduous battle. He w.as sent in last year with a mandate to carry out a particular policy. He tried to get his co-trustees to work with him. but soon found he was in a hopelessly hostrle camp. He accordingly called the public together and explained the position. The public responded by asking the Trustees all to resign, so as to enable the question of •'a Free Place High School to be settled once and for all.* Before putting in litis resolution to the Trustees, he gave them another chance. On December -13 th (five months ago) he moved: "That Masterton has become of a sufficient size and importance to require a free place High ■School instead of the existing D!istrict . High School." Only Mir W.agg voted with him. Mr Hogg was absent, ,but he wrote one of his . characteristic bitter letters, in which lie damned the institution as a class institution. Mr Jackson, to whom everybo3y . looked by virtue of his position, as chief educntionalnst, to protect the interests of the children, evaded voting by walking out. The others all voted against him. The obvious position thus was that Mr Wagg was the only High School mnn in the Trust to-day, and he must get all four of the High School party back to have a majority of one. It was solely with the object of impressing this upon them that he had come out. He had no doubt the antiHigh School Party would try' to hedge. He did not see. however, how Messrs Jackson and Krahagen could hedge. These two gentlemen, at the meeting before last, put in a motion defining their policy. When they nut it in ,they had no iden that he (Mr Robinson) intended to take the field. At last meeting, when they'found he was ai the field, tbev postponed discussion of their policy until after the election. What wou'd the public have thought if the late Mr Seddon or Mr Massey, on ihe eve of a gener.il election, coolly said to the public:. "J have a policy, but I won't- drscuss it until after the election"? What, he asked, would the public have saicT? What would the public have done? Up till recently his opponents hid, by virtue of long possession of power, held the public confidence. He had been an outsider. To-day, however, in the maid of everybody of ordinary horse sense, the position ""was entirely reversed. The anti-High School party had issued false coin. Their planks hid been: —(1) Masterton is not big enough for a High School; (2) anyhow, a High, School :is a "class institution," and a bad thing. Mr Evans' explanation would have opened all eyes. From now on it was the antiHigh School party that had to do the explaining. Mr Jackson, who works under the Education Act and knew all about it, was required to explain:—(l) Why, if he had the interests of the children at heart, he did not battle for a Free Place High School with its accompanying teaching power of Rector, gowned teachers, etc., instead of the District High School? (2) Why did not he, at any rate, house the District High School in temporary and inexpensive premises against the time when che High School proper was established, instead of letting an immense amount of. money be spent in useless -bricks and mortar? Finally, let him say a word as to the tone in which he hoped to see this election fought. It w.ss his determination, at all costs, to keep a courteous and friendly tone to his opponents. Messrs Krahagen and Caselberg were all right. _ They would take tea together all along the line, and afterwards. Mr Jackson, however, presented difficulties. He should never have sought the position. Having sought it. the public should have befriended him by refusing it. He (Mr Jackson) would, however, while acting an accordance with his duty to the children, bear in mind, and he hoped the public would each and iffi bear in mind, that Mr Jackson had been actuated by no desire for vulgar personal gain, but by an honest, though mistaken enthusiasm for the institution he controlled. His fault had been a fault Iso common to earnest men. The fault was diagnosed by Tallyrand— Too much seal.

At the conclusion of Mr Robinson's address, motions of thanks were passed to the speakers, and to the chairman.