E—lβ

1898. NEW ZEALAND.

EDUCATION: REPORTS OF INSPECTORS OF SCHOOLS. [In continuation of E.-1b, Sess. II., 1897.]

Presented to both Houses of the General Assembly by Command of His Excellency.

AUCKLAND. q IBj Education Office, Auckland, 12th March, 1898. I have the honour to submit the usual report for the year 1897. At the close of the year there were 359 public schools in the Auckland District, being eleven more than at the end of last year. Of this number, 354 were examined. The remaining five were opened after the examinations of the neighbouring schools were completed. Three hundred and thirty-one schools were inspected, mostly in the earlier part of the year. This number includes nineteen half-time schools, in which only one of the pair of grouped schools was visited for inspection. Of the remaining schools, four were closed when the inspection of the neighbouring schools was taken, and could not be revisited later; five were opened after the usual time of inspection; and three small schools could not be inspected from want of time to overtake the work. At the beginning of the year 1894, when 308 schools were in operation, an additional Inspector was added to the staff. Since that date the number of schools has risen to 359. The new schools are almost without exception small rural schools, which have not added largely to the number of pupils in attendance, though from their situation they have taken up a large amount of the Inspectors' time in visiting and examining them. In addition to this, the last three years have witnessed a notable increase in the size of a number of the schools in the suburbs of the City of Auckland, and especially in the goldfields of the Goromandel Peninsula and of the Upper Thames district. Through this expansion the number of pupils presented for examination during the year is greater by 3,614 than the corresponding number at the beginning of 1894. With these facts in view the Board will readily understand that the burden laid on the Inspectors is again growing heavy, and that it has taxed their energies and industry to the utmost to overtake the work of the year. The following table shows in summary the chief examination results for the year:—

Table I.

These figures show for the year an increase of 1,252 in the number of pupils presented, and an increase of 901 in the number of pupils that passed in one or other of the standards. Approximately 84 per cent, of the pupils examined in standards passed, a result that is to. be regarded in the gross as satisfactory. In all the classes in which the passes have been determined by the Inspectors there has been an advance in the percentage of passes, and in Standard V. the advance has been considerable.

I—E. Iβ.

Classes. Presented. Examined in Standards. Passed. Average Age of those that passed. Yrs. mos. Above Standard VI. Standard VI. V. IV. III. lPreparatory 234 1,427 2,468 3,681 3,899 3,539 3,345 9,433 1,385 2,360 3,513 3,727 3,421 3,251 1,106 1,813 2,498 3,086 3,146 3,141 14 2 13 2 12 5 11 3 10 2 9 0 Totals 28,026 17,657 14,790 11 8* * Mean of average age.