CHANCES FOR YOUTH

Wairarapa Times-Age, 25 May 1942, Page 4

CHANCES FOR YOUTH

THE WORK OF VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE. BROADCAST BY MINISTER. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) WELLINGTON, May 25. A total of 9148 bovs and 7006 girls has been placed <in employment recommended by vocational guidance officers under the Youth Centre scheme established by the Government two and a half years ago, said the Minister of Internal Affairs, Mr Parry, in an address, entitled “Youth Given a Chance.”

Mi’ Parry said that three youth centres, one each in. Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch, had been set up under the control of the employment division of the Labour Department. In Dunedin there was the Dunedin Vocational Association, which cooperated with the Youth Centre system. In each city the work was divided into two sections. The first gave vocational guidance and a, knowledge of occupational civics to young people, and the second section placed them in suitable employment. The vocational guidance officers had developed a thorough liaison with the careers masters and mistresses of the secondary and technical schools in the four main centres. In addition, the co-operation of primary school headmasters had been widely obtained. The Government Youth Centres and the Dunedin Vocational Guidance Association catered for school and other youths—boys up to 18 years and girls up to 21. Beyond these ages the responsibility of guidance and of placement was except in special circumstances, that of the placement officer. In each of the four centres the work was now extensively accepted by parents, school teachers and the children themselves. Many hundreds of school children were receiving vocational advice filtering down from the vocational guidance officers in the centres through the careers masters and mistresses at the schools. Hundreds, also, went to the centres for further vocational advice and for enrolment for placbment in terms of the advice already given. A new departure to give the young people a start would shortly be put into operation at Christchurch, said the Minister. Boys and girls still at school would be allotted the work of collecting material for a survey of land uses in relation to the town-planning scheme for Christchurch city, and each pupil would have a specific area to map. This was the first time that scholars of colleges and secondary schools had been chosen for work of such a kind under a government department, local authorities and educational'" anffi geographical institutions.