TECHNICAL EDUCATION.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2557, 19 July 1909, Page 3

TECHNICAL EDUCATION.

RESULTS OF THE CONFERENCE. SPOONFEEDING APPRENTICES. Mr. W. T. Fossey, the newly-appoint-ed director of the Napier Technical School, has arrived in Napier. The new director resigned the control of the Fcilding Technical School to take up' his position there, arid is fresh from the conference-of technical instructors recently held in Wellington, Upon the results of- which lid was good enough to express an opinion to a "Daily Telegraph” reporter. Mr. Fossey is a younglooking man and evidently a keen enthusiast in the work to which lie has devoted Iris career. Asked as to what had been achieved at the conference, Mr. Fossey said that as a result of the exchange of ideas he thought an endeavor would be made to secure greater unification in the general scheme of technical education throughout the Dominion. This was one of the. principal matters discussed at the conference. At the present each district held its own scheme of- technical education and its own little pet way of doing things, but by the meeting of men of experience able to compare notes he thought in the course of a year or two a system of exchange might be devised. A pupil now transferring from Auckland to Wellington or Ohristchurch had to disconnect himself with his class and his subject, but he should be able to exchange from one technical school to the other without loss of time to himself or loss of his place in the class. Nothing could he better, said Mr. Fossey, than that a pupil at a technical school should receive a certificate on leaving the same as that issued by teachers of the primary schools. Another matter which received the earnest consideration of the conference was a proposal that the capitation for cookery and woodwork should he £1 for a full year’s course of lessons.. Under the present system capitation was earned in the cookery classes for a course of 20 weeks. This was apt to make a pupil lose a great deal of educational value and it was considered that a longer course was necessary. Tile reporter advanced the view that the opinion was held in some quarters that the conference was inclined to ask too much from the employers in regard to their apprentices. “The difficulty seems to be,” Mr. Fossey replied, “that apprentices now have to work a full day at their trade and they have to work so hard that they complain they are not able to attend technical classes at night. Mr. Howell (Christchurch) and Mr. George George (Auckland) held this view, and the idea of the conference seemed to run in that direction. The suggestion was that employers should allow their _ apprentices time off to attend technical classes, but not necessarily day classes. It was thought that if a pupil attended a class at night he should be allowed off some time on that day. The employer of to-day does not teach his apprentice anything. He specialises, and the apprentice is ai wage-earning machine. The idea of the conference was itbat as the employer failed to teach what was necessary it fell to the technical schools to do it, and the apprentice should be allowed time to learn. Personally I do not agree with that. 1. think it is rather going in the direction of what we are doing with the youth of to-day —spoon-feeding him. When I was an apprentice in England we began work at 6 o’clock in the morning and finished the day between .5 and 6 at night. After that the technical classes were always full at night, and I do not think we were very much overworked in that respect. However, New Zealand is a different place. Neiv Zealend practises an eight-liour day, but I think the apprentice is worked harder here than he is at Hpme. I think the best thing that could possibly be done in this connection would be a conference- between the employers and the representatives of technical education to see whether some arrangement could not- be come to. This proposal Was made by Mr: Varney, of Wanganui, and to my mind it is the most practical solution we 'could get. I should distinctly like to see some such arrangement in force here. “What do you think of the prospects of technical education in Napier?” i “I think they are decidedly favorable. This is the most important town on the East Coast and it is a busi-ness-like town. Ido not mean' this in any sense of flattery, nut as far as I am able to judge from a short visit here last Christmas I was struck with the business-like air of the town and the amount of work that went on. I was very pleased to see it.” Asked if he had decided on any course in regard to his work here, Mr. Fossey said it was too early to spea'k of that yet. He would .adapt- himself to circumstances. “For one thing,'” he concluded, “I do not believe in booms in education. Steady, solid work is the best solution of all educational difficulties, and I must say I do believe in work.”