Appendix C]

E.—2

Out of a total roll-number of 717 pupils in Standard VI, 625 (or 87 per cent.) presented themselves at the examination for proficiency certificates, as compared with 665, 615 (92 petcent.) respectively last year. Two causes may be assigned for this decrease —greater caution on the part of teachers in sending up poorly prepared candidates, and greater indifference of parents to the ilireel value of the certificate. The results of the examination are appended:

During the year we paid unannounced visits to 112 oui of 170 schools in our district, and announced visits to all schools save Birchwood (closed at time suitable for visit), Waikawa Valley (half-time), Manapouri, and Ruapuke (both small and remote). In addition to this, we visited many districts for the purpose of eupplying the Board with reports on special subjects. More we could nut well have clone. Unfortunately, although it is evident that to conform to the Regulations for the Inspection and Examination of Schools is impossible without an increase of the inspectorial staff, it would seem that such an increase is precluded in the meantime by the stringency of the Board's financial position. the buildings occupied as schools under the jurisdiction of the Hoard are, all things considered, in a satisfactory condition, and fairly suitable for the uses to which they are put. No doubt there is considerable room for improvement. We should like to see our pupils as comfortably accommodated in our schools as they would lie in homes constructed on liberal hygienic principles. The difficulty in the way is a financial one -one, moreover, the magnitude of which is not appreciated by critics. After all, our Dominion is a comparatively new country, with innumerable calls on its public purs.? Roads and railways necessary for the progress of public settlement make huge inroads on the exchequer, and are likely to do so lor some considerable time to come. Other wants of a public nature are no less claimant. The large proportion of small schools, too, demanded with ever-increasing insistence, is a bar to improvement in this matter. Neither comfort nor oommodiousness can '»• expected when a building grant, limited of necessity by the financial circumstances of the Dominion, has to be spread in large part, at least, over a vast number "I , petty schools. The application of the system of central schools, to which the children of outlying districts could lie driven daily, would not only greatly increase the efficiency of the instruction in our schools, but would set free funds which would go far to render our schools much more acceptable than they are at present from a hygienic standpoint. The genera] question of attendance at the Hoard's schools having been already dealt with in the Board's report, it remains with us to deal with two of its special aspects. During the year, chiefly at the instance of the local branch of the Education Institute, a new set of Holiday Regulations was drawn up for enforcement in the district. Though these regulations have met with some measure of opposition on the part of some School Committees, they have been found tci work very satisfactorily, and have commended themselves, generally speaking, to the public- as much by their fairness as by their liberality. W regret to state, therefore, that, a considerable number of teach* rs have departed from them without, in some instances, the sanction of the Board. In the lace of even the limited opposition mentioned, it is the clear d"uty of every teacher in the Board's service to support the new regulations with the most unfailing loyalty. If they fail to do so. there is reason to fear the Institute's efforts on their behalf may prove to have been unavailing. It is to be hoped that during the coming year some finality may be reached on this vexed question. It does not seem to us at all impossible to reconcile the interests of teacher,-- and Committees in this matter with the interests of those most vitally concerned in it—the children attending our schools. With a little patience and forbearance on all hands, complete harmony "ii this subject should be easily attained. It is a strange fact, to which reference has been made before, that on a day when the weather condition- are adverse one school may show a gratifyingly large attendance, while at an adjacent school, the circumstances of which may lie almost precisely similar, the Inspector may find either a closed door or a mere handful of pupils, who will be kept at school for an hour or so and then dismissed to their homes. We cannot help thinking that teachers are very largely to blame for the conditions here indicated. The practice seems to be traditional from the days when the teacher's salary varied from quarter to quarter with the fluctuations of the local barometric curve, and to have had some reference to the maintenance of the teacher's salary on a reasonably uniform scale. Under present conditions, however, there is little or no justification for it. Most parents would have no scruple in sending out their children in inclement weather (the delicate ones excepted) if they had the assurance that an approximately full day's schooling would be given, and that adequate consideration would lie made for securing the comfort of the little ones.

viii—E. 2 (App. C).

II

Candidates from— Total'Present. f i [ Proficiency Certificate. Obtained Competency Certificate. Failed. (a.) Public schools (b.) Private schools 625 47 387 28 80 6 80 6 158 13 Totals 672 415 86 171 Percentage, all schools, 1910 1909 100 100 62 59 13 l<1 25 27