✨ Educational Legislation Analysis
202
In the second place it prescribes detailed rules for
the management of the schools, a function which by
the former Act was left to the Board. At the same
time, however, it gives to the Board the power of
supplementing these rules by regulations, which
after being approved by the Governor in Council
acquire apparently the same validity as the provisions of the Act itself.
The Board constituted by the present Act is incorporated, and possesses the ordinary powers of a corporation. This corporation consists of five laymen,
appointed by the Governor in Council, no two of
whom are to be of the same religious denomination,
and the duration of whose tenure of office is limited
to five years unless re-appointed.
The powers of the Board are:—
I. To frame general regulations subject to the
Act.
(a.) For the distribution of funds granted by the
Legislature.
(b.) To determine, subject to the Act, the localities in which schools shall be established or
maintained.
(c.) For the inspection of schools.
(d.) For the examination and classification of
teachers.
II. To determine the course of secular instruction.
III. To fix and from time to time to alter the
school fees.
IV. To appoint and remove local committees with
the consent of the Governor in Council.
V. To prescribe the conditions under which
children whose parents are either altogether
destitute or too poor to pay the whole of the
required school fees, shall be admitted into
any school.
VI. To sanction the appointment or dismissal of
any teacher.
VII. Generally to perform all such acts as may be
necessary for carrying into effect the intentions of the Legislature.
The limitations to the power of the Board to
grant aid to any school are:—
I. No school may receive aid unless it is under the
management of at least five persons approved
of by the Board.
II. No school may receive aid (except a school
for the deaf and dumb), unless during the
preceding twelve months there shall have
been an average daily attendance of at least
twenty children.
III. No school situated within a municipal district, in which the average attendance is less
than sixty, may receive aid, unless it be at a
distance of at least two miles from the nearest
school receiving aid, or unless some natural
obstacle shall intervene between the two
schools, or unless one of the two schools be
for boys alone and the other for girls alone,
or unless one of the two schools shall be an
infant school.
IV. Subject to the same provisos, no school
situated outside a municipal district, within
a distance of two miles from another school
receiving aid, may receive aid, at which the
average attendance is less than forty.
V. No aid may be granted towards the establishment of a new school within two miles of a
school already receiving aid, unless the
parents of such a number of children, as
together with the children attending the
school already established, make an aggregate
of two hundred, shall undertake in writing to
send their children to the proposed new
school, unless some natural obstacle intervenes, or unless one of the schools is for boys
alone, and the other for girls alone, or unless one of the two schools shall be an infant
school.
VI. No money may be given in aid of buildings,
or repairs of any school, unless the site has
been previously vested in the Board.
The Board constituted under this Act have, it
appears, been engaged in framing the regulations
the therein contemplated, and though no official copy has
come to the hands of the Commission, a draft has
been obtained from the newspapers, which may be
considered as representing the general features of
the plan, which is likely to be finally adopted.
These regulations establish the following additional
provisions:—
Sites and Buildings.
No aid will be granted to any school until the site
has been vested in the Board. In the case of new
buildings, the Board will require—
(a) That the school-room contains at least a space
of eight square feet for every child in average
attendance.
(b) The walls to be of a height of at least ten
feet to the eaves.
(c) The room to be properly warmed and ventilated.
(d) Provisions to be made for separate offices for
both sexes.
(e) That there be a play-ground or other sufficient provision for physical exercise.
(f) That the room be sufficiently supplied with
school furniture, apparatus, books, maps, &c.
Local Committees.
The following are to be the duties of local committees, as constituted under the act:—
(a.) To appoint the necessary number of teachers
required for the schools, to enter into agreements with them, and when necessary to
remove them, subject, however, to the condition that before a teacher can be appointed
his qualification must have been approved by
the Board, and before he can be finally dismissed, his dismissal must receive the sanction
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Analysis of Victoria's Legislative Enactments on Education
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🎓 Education, Culture & ScienceLegislative Enactments, Education, Victoria, Governing Body, Board Powers, School Management
Canterbury Provincial Gazette 1863, No 21