E.—s

1881. NEW ZEALAND.

EDUCATION. REPORTS OF SECONDARY SCHOOLS.

Presented to loth Houses of the General Assembly by Command of Sis Excellency.

[Note. —A summary of the operations of the Secondary Schools for the year 1880 will be found at pages 30-32 of the Fourth Annual Report of the Minister of Education (Appendix to Journals of the House of Representatives) 1881, E.-l).]

AUCKLAND COLLEGE AND GRAMMAR SCHOOL The Board of Governors of the Auckland College and Grammar School beg to report that they have; during the year ended 31st December, 1880, held twenty-seven regular and six special meetings for the despatch of business. The erection of the new and extensive building on the school reserve in Symonds Street, towards which a sum of £5,000 had, during the year 1879, been granted by the General Government, was completed in the early part of the year, at a total cost of £6,939 135., and the school was publicly opened by Sir George Grey, X.C.8., who delivered an inaugural address on the occasion, on the sth February. A great want has been supplied by the fitting up of a laboratory in this building for the use of the students of chemistry, but the Governors regret to state that they have been unable to procure a sufficient and suitable playground for the use of the boys attending the school. The important question of the best system of classification of the pupils of the Grammar School claimed the attention of the Board iv the early part of the year, and it was considered desirable to procure reliable information in regard to the system obtaining in the higher English schools ; with this view the Board put itself into communication with the Agent-General, Sir Julius Vogel, who forwarded a reply to the Board, affording very valuable information on the subject. A copy of the correspondence is appeuded. The Board reported last year that they had considered it their duty to address the Hon. the Minister of Education upon the subject of the appointments made to the Senate of the University of New Zealand, in which the claims of Auckland had not been considered. The Board has now to report that those claims have been, to some extent, admitted, and that two vacancies in the Senate have been filled by the appointment of the Right Rev. the Bishop of Auckland and Sir George Maurice O'Rorke, M.H.R. Two changes have taken place in the personnel of the educational staff during the year, caused by the resignation of the first master of the Lower School, Mr. F. de Lisle Hammond, appointed to the head mastership of the Church of England Grammar School, Parnell, and of Mr Alexander McArthur, appointed to the Auckland Training College ; these gentlemen have been succeeded by Mr. J. H. Tompson, late junior master at Christ's Hospital School, London, and by the Rev. E. H. Gulliver, M.A. of Cambridge University. A singing-master has also been appointed in the person of Mr. H. Gordon Gooch, Associate of the Royal Academy of Music, who entered upon his duties during the first quarter. The evening classes were resumed at the commencement of the year, with an average attendance of sixty pupils in all the branches of study, viz., Latin, mathematics, English, arithmetic, and Maori. Owing to the Maori teacher, Mr. W. St. Clair Tisdall, having removed to an appointment at Dunedin, the class was discontinued, and a class for French substituted. The average attendance at this class in the fourth quarter was 9, while that of the other four classes was reduced to 38. The Governors are led to believe that at the commencement many of the students of these classes joined from a love of novelty, became weary, and ceased to attend ; that some who ought to be at school were sent by parents or other guardians ; and that those who have attended with a certain degree of regularity are preparing for public examination, and will cease to belong to the classes when their object is attained. Tlie annual examination of the school in December was conducted by the Rev. W, E. Mulgan, M.A., and the Rev. D. W. Runciman ; Mr. Mulgan examining the boys in Greek, Latin, French, and geography ; Mr. Runciman in history, composition, grammar, arithmetic, geometry, and logic. The reports of the examiners are appended. I—E. 6.