E.—s.

No. 2. Ebpobt of the Inspector-General of Schools. Eight Hon. the Minister of Education. The special reports of the Inspectors of Technical Instruction deal with the principal aspects of the work of manual and technical instruction in the colony during the past year, and little remains for me to do except to emphasize one or two of the points mentioned by them. There are people who manifest disappointment because the passing of the Manual and Technical Instruction Act of 1900 has not been followed within the space of one or two years by the complete establishment of a fully developed system of technical instruction in every part of the colony. It would have been an extremely unnatural feature of the movement had there been such a sudden and rapid growth as to satisfy such expectations. In the first place, a small army of qualified instructors would have had to spring up from somewhere or other ; secondly, the minds of those whom it was sought to instruct would have had to be ready almost in a moment to receive the instruction. Besides, the inevitable result of attempting to force the movement in districts not prepared for it would have been a lamentable waste of public money. It has been estimated that, by reason of zeal untempered by knowledge, at least half the money devoted by County Councils in England during the last ten years to technical education has been expended in a useless manner. It would, however, be altogether a fallacy to suppose that there does not exist in several parts of the colony at the present time a substantial amount of provision for what is in the truest sense technical education, and in one or two cases technical education of a high order. I need only quote the Canterbury College School of Engineering and the Otago School of Mines as two instances. The number of classes under the Act has increased in two years (from August, 1901, to August, 1903) from 425 to over 1800. It is by no means an unhealthy sign that the greatest increase has been in the number of school classes, especially in the number of classes doing handwork in classes P. to S2. If the foundation be well laid, the rest of the structure will be sound. The number of technical classes, properly so called, has also increased, although not in so rapid a ratio as the number of school classes ; and there is an equally marked advance in the character of the work that is being done in these classes. Two or three years ago comparatively few of the technical classes so called were doing work that was strictly technical; now, although most of the work is still elementary in character, it deserves more and more the name of " technical education." Another hopeful sign is the large number of teachers who during the last two or three years have received training in subjects of manual instruction. The result is that, now that the new syllabus gives opportunity and encouragement for the introduction of manual instruction of various kinds into all the classes of our primary schools, and other regulations encourage its introduction into secondary schools, there exists a considerable body of teachers able to impart such instruction with knowledge and intelligence. The number of continuation classes is still much smaller than it ought to be : technical education to be sound must have for its basis a reasonable standard of general education, and the way would be prepared for a larger and fuller measure of technical education in the near future if in connection with all our schools, primary and secondary, there were established continuation classes giving to those who have left the day schools the opportunity of continuing their general education at evening classes, and of beginning at the same time the technical education suited to the trade or profession in which they are engaged during the day. It is with the local authorities that the initiative must rest. There is no reason why every school except the very smallest should not have its continuation classes. I would earnestly impress upon the Committees and teachers of country schools the immense benefit they would confer upon the youth in their respective districts by establishing without delay classes in such subjects as English, arithmetic and elementary mensuration, and book-keeping, adding thereto elementary agriculture taken in a practical way so as to give their pupils some idea of the nature of plant-life and of plant-growth, and of the structure and lifehistory of the animals useful or otherwise to the farmer. In mining districts elementary practical geology, mechanics, and surveying might be substituted for agriculture; and in most cases some drawing should be added, especially drawing to scale of a more advanced character than that done in the classes of the primary schools. No expensive apparatus would be required ; grants are available to meet the cost of the necessary outfit for such instruction, and the capitation payable under the Act would be sufficient not only to meet the expenditure upon the maintenance of the classes, but, if a small fee were charged, sufficient to provide very fair remuneration for the instructor. If, indeed, courses were established complying with the very moderate requirements of the regulations for junior and senior technical scholarships, sufficient funds would be provided for all these purposes without charging any fees at all. It appears to be in some quarters the fashion to sit down and rail at the central Department because it does not establish classes for agricultural instruction in various parts of the country. Now, it is not the function of the Department to establish such classes, and the Act does not even give it the power to do so. I am not sure, indeed, that if it had been otherwise—that is, if the Act had removed the power of initiative and control from the local authorities and had conferred it upon a central authority—anything whatever would have been gained; and I am quite sure that much of the benefit that follows from spontaneous growth and from healthy local control would be lost. If local authorities—by which I mean not only School Committees and Education Boards, but also agricultural and pastoral associations, County Councils, and Eoad Boards (which are all recognised under the Act) —would realise the immense benefits that would result from the general establishment of continuation classes and elementary agricultural, technical, or commercial classes in their respective districts, and would set to work in real earnest to establish such classes where they do not exist, they would find the first steps very much easier than they anticipated, and, although it does not follow that success would be assured everywhere, failure (which would

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