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school, and who in general are qualified in attainment to receive a senior free place. The lower leaving-certificate may be issued to pupils who have satisfactorily completed a three-years course of secondary instruction, including not less than one year of a senior course in which the standard of work is sufficiently advanced in character to meet the requirements of the examination for a teacher's certificate of Class D, or of the Matriculation Examination. Likewise the higher leavingcertificate may be granted to pupils having satisfactorily completed at least a fouryears course of secondary instruction and having satisfied the requirements of the lower leaving-certificate, and, in addition, having completed to good advantage and under certain conditions a further secondary course of not less than one year. Staffs of Secondary Schools. (Table K3.) The number of teachers on the staffs of secondary schools, excluding lower departments, was for the last three years as follows : — , 1917. i, , 1918. 1 , 1919. , Males. Females. Total. Males. Females. Tola). Males. Females. Total. Regular staff .. ..174 175 349 175 195 370 186 195 381 Part time .. ..37 43 80 42 43 85 74 74 The staffs of Wanganui Collegiate and Christ's College Grammar Schools, totalling twenty-nine teachers, have been excluded from the figures for 1919 ; the number of male teachers in 1919 was thus forty more than in the previous year, the number of women teachers remaining the same. The return to duty of teachers who had been on active service accounts for the unusual increase in the number of men teachers, the positions of many of whom had been held temporarily by women. Included in the regular staff for 1919 are thirty-two Principals and 349 assistant teachers. The average number of pupils per full-time assistant was twenty-four, the number ranging in the various schools from twenty-one to twenty-nine; including the Principals, the average number of pupils per teacher was twenty-two. The head teacher of a district high school generally takes some part in the secondary instruction, and now receives in addition to his ordinary salary the sum of £30 per annum if the average attendance of the secondary department does not exceed 120, and £50 per annum if it. does exceed that number. In 1919 there were in the secondary departments of district high schools 105 special secondary assistants —thirty-four men and seventy-one women-—the increase in the number of male assistants being thirteen, and the women assistants being one less in number than in the previous year. The average number of pupils per assistant teacher was twenty-one, as compared with twenty-four in the previous year. Salaries and Status of Secondary-school Teachers. (Table K3.) The total annual amount of salaries of teachers in secondary schools (excluding Wanganui. Collegiate and Christ's College Grammar Schools) as at the rate payable in December, 1919, was £126,694, as compared with £95,137 in 1918. The value of residences and of board and residence provided in a large number of cases is not included in this figure. The cost of the salaries works out at £14*8 per head of the average attendance, ranging in the various schools from £11-8 to £19-5. The cost in boys' schools was £15-4 per head, in girls' schools £13-6 per head, and in mixed schools, £15-9 per head. The following figures indicate the average rates of salary prevailing n 1914, 1918, and 1919. The exc'usion of the two schools referred to above (where the salaries are high) from the 1919 figures places that year at a slight disadvantage in the comparison. Average Salaries of Full-time Teachers in Secondary Schools , —1914.- , 1918. , , 1919. , M. F, All. M. F. All. M. F. All. £ £ £ £££ £££ Principals .. .. 524 397 482 615 434 568 647 509 596 Assistants .. ..248 163 211 300 201 246 332 252 290 Whole staff .. .. 283 183 241 340 215 274 366 268 316 The value of residences, or of board and residence, where provided, is entirely excluded from these figures. The average salaries of Principals, and of male Principals especially, would be considerably higher if allowance were made for these