EDUCATIONAL RESERVES.
5
A.—No. 3;
Grant, 500 acres, Porirua. No. 1. —I know the land comprised in the grant (page 10, N.M., vol. 5, area 500 acres). Attempts were made to raise funds to erect a building upon it for a school-house, which failed. It has been let to Mr. Richards for some years for a term, which has about a year to run. The rent, I believe, is about £100 a year, payable half-yearly. The Otaki school at present receives £75 a year (Miss McWilliam £50 for teaching the girls, and the Rev. James McWilliam £25 out of the above). The remaining balance is accumulating. The accounts can be had in about a fortnight. Ido not think the tenant has made any improvements on the property. Grass has spread upon it, and tho brushwood has been broken down, but I do not think that the tenant is under any covenant to improve. Memorandum handed in by Archdeacon Hadjteld. For several years tho Porirua estate was let to Mr. Richards for £50 per annum. From October, 1865, the rent paid by him has been £75 per annum. From July 1, 1865, till the present time, £25 has been annually paid to the master of the Otaki Industrial School; that is to say, up to July 1, 1869, £100. From September, 1868, till September, 1869, has been paid (one year) to Miss McWilliam, £50. Grants to Otaki School (special), 1867 and 1868, £200. June 30, 1868, the sum of £800 was lent to the Rev. li. W. St. Hill, master of the Church of England Grammar School, on mortgage at 6 per cent. There is now a balance of £183 lis. 6d. to the credit of the estate at the Union Bank of Australia. To the best of my belief the above is a correct statement of the state of the accounts. Octavius Hadeield. Grant, 396 acres 2 roods 30 perches, Otaki. No. 2. —What I have to say respecting the grant (No. 32, N.M., vol. 5, Miscellaneous, area 396 acres 2 roods 30 perches) applies to several others in that locality. I know the land therein recorded. It has been all fenced in,and improved to a very great extent, and it has been farmed, and the proceeds devoted to the support of a boarding-school, from about January, 1854, up to the end of July, 1868. Since then it has not been a boarding-school. The number of children varied; from 1854 to July, 1868, the average number (boys and girls) I should say, roughly, was 40. There were two-thirds boys. The ages of the boys were from eight 3 rears to fifteen, after which they generally left us ; the girls about the same ages. Some of the parents resided in the neighbourhood, but more than half came from a distance —Manawatu, &c. For many years it worked very satisfactorily indeed. They were taught English—which many of them knew very fairly ; arithmetic —in which many made good progress. They wrote fairly. They were also taught singing. The industrial training of the boys was for agricultural pursuits. The boys were taught ploughing, and the management of cattle and sheep. There was always a good farming man, an Englishman, on the establishment. Many boys would not have come without this. Tho girls were taught sewing and household matters. I do not think there was much difference in steadiness at work between pupils from the neighbourhood and those from a distance. I have never had any particular difficulty with the children of Natives in the neighbourhood. From the Ist January, 1858, to Ist July, 1868, I think there was no assistance from Government at all. It was certainly about ten years. For the four years previous to 1858, there was considerable Government assistance ; —without it I should not have been able to fence the land, or start the institution. The boys worked better at that time also. Returns were regularly furnished to the Government of the expenditure of the funds. For one year from same date in 1867, I received a capitation, fixed, of £5 per head for the boys and girls, and a bonus of £100. I found, with the greatest economy, that the expense of each pupil was £18 or £19 a year. This was exclusive of the master's salary. For ten years the institution supported itself, with extraneous aid from England and elsewhere. The schoolmaster was generally paid from these sources. The financial means of the institution were mainly due to an exceptional course of management of the farm, viz., by raising choice stock, which was sold at high prices up to a recent period. We are now and for the last year we have been carrying on a day-school only. The principal cause of the declension of the institution was the deficiency of funds. I consider as another cause the establishment of two public-houses adjoining the school land. Occasionally a pupil has been made to drink. As an instance, I heard from the Rev. Mr. McWilliam, only last week, that the pupils were singing in the church when a party of drunken men entered, broke a brandy bottle in the church, and the singing of course had to cease. I have never been able to make the parents of the pupils pay anything. I counted thirtytwo scholars the last time that I attended ; about equal numbers of boys and girls. They both write very well. The Rev. Mr. and Miss McWilliam are still being paid. The land is now very valuable. Tho value has been gained by a large outlay of monejr and labour, several miles of ditches and drains having been made. lam now advertising to let the land, with the buildings ;it ought to let for £250. The buildings consist of three labourer's cottages, a good barn, and out-buildings. I have explained, in a report to the Government, the cause of the falling off of the schools better than I could off-hand at present. What made it break up as a boarding-school was not the falling off of funds. This was the chief cause. Ido not know that had I had funds it would not have broken down. There has, no doubt, been a considerable change during the last two years in the state of the Natives. There is less inclination to send children to school than there was amongst them two years ago. At present I am obliged to give up the industrial and boarding part of the educational trusts, and do what I can in the matter. Those might, however, be revived again. The difficulty of teaching English is, that it is almost a dead language to many of the Natives in the outlying districts, and they cannot hear it spoken commonly. It requires tact and peculiar talent in a teacher to succeed in this object. It is very difficult to find the capacity for teaching language and industrial pursuits combined in the same individual. 2
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