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H.—l

examination would promote the efficiency of the secondary schools, and that such a system ought to be established. The evidence on this subject is generally in favour of intrusting the examinations to the University of New Zealand; but it may be doubted whether the University, as at present constituted, is well qualified to initiate and carry out the arrangements necessary for this work. We recommend, therefore, that the secondary schools should be regularly inspected and examined under the authority of the Minister of Education; and that the University Senate should be constituted a Council of Advice to the Minister with regard not only to the inspection and examination of the schools, but to all matters affecting secondary ediication. An opinion lias been expressed in favour of the examiners undertaking the detailed examinations of all the classes at the end of the school-year ; but the necessity for holding all the examinations in the closing weeks of the session, and the limited number of examiners available, seem to render this arrangement impracticable. We think, however, that an examination on a more limited scale, in which a selection both of classes and of portions of subjects might be made by the examiners, would form a satisfactory basis for a report on the general condition of the schools. With regard to the Civil Service examinations, the character of the papers, combined with the low minimum required for passing, has in our judgment rendered these examinations valueless as a test of secondary-schcol work. It is a matter of regret that several of the secondary schools look upon success in these examinations as the principal aim of their most advanced pupils. The junior scholarship examinations do afford a valuable means of ascertaining' the quality of the best work done in the schools. The first examination for .. i i " i ■ j_i t • -ir -ini~r> i j_ !• o i junior scholarships took place in May, 18/6; but tor tour years previously scholarship examinations had been annually held, the candidates for the most part coming from secondary schools affiliated to the University. So far as these earlier scholarships are concerned, the examinations did not furnish a sufficient test of the condition of the schools; chiefly because the examinations in languages were upon prescribed portions of authors carefully prepared beforehand, and in science a very meagre acquaintance with elementary text-books was all that was required. The examinations, in fact, though they furnished evidence of the cultivation of memory applied to a limited range of work, afforded little or no scope for the exercise of the thinking powers. During the three years in which junior scholarship examinations have been held, there have been only twelve junior scholars elected out of 101 candidates; while in the examinations of the previous four years, out of 106 candidates fortyfour were successful. It might be thought, and several witnesses seem to have been under the impression, that the examinations during the three years from 1876 to 1879 have been unduly severe. Judging, however, from the reports of the examiners, this does not seem to have been the case. The classical examiners for 1876 state that the papers in Greek and Latin were "not of undue difficulty, and ought to have been within the rea£h of a candidate, say, of sixteen years of age who has studied Latin or Greek as a language;" and yet " the candidate who stood highest failed to obtain even a third of the total number of marks." The examiner for 1877-78 says : "The papers are, 1 believe, as nearly as possible of the same character as would be set at an examination for an open scholarship with limitation of age at an Oxford college. Only one candidate has shown a knowledge of Latin at all approaching what would be required for success in such a competition." The results of the examination for 1879 seem to show that some improvement had taken place; but the examiner for that year, who was also the examiner for 1877-78, says : " The Latin composition sent in by the candidates for junior scholarships was, almost Avithout exception, of a very inferior quality." In other subjects the examiners do not make any remarks calling for special notice; but it would seem from the awards that the work in other subjects, especially in mathematics, was more satisfactory. We have little doubt that the deficiencies in our secondary-school instruction which have been brought to light by these examinations will gradually be remedied. They are such as would naturally be encouraged by the style of examinations which prevailed in the earlier years of the University, and they will naturally disappear under the influence of sounder methods of instruction and examination.

I - Government ! inspection and examiflation ) recommended. L I

I, 5 Civil Service examinations.

university junior scholarship examinations as a test of the g^°^ oy of the

int. Kep., Appx., p-63-

int. Eep., Appr.. iJ- 72-

ibid., p. 78.