✨ Provincial Education Report
NEW ZEALAND
GOVERNMENT GAZETTE
(PROVINCE OF NELSON).
Published by Authority.
All Public Notifications which appear in this Gazette, with any Official Signature thereunto annexed, are to be considered as Official Communications made to those Persons to whom they may relate, and are to be obeyed accordingly.
By His Honor's command,
J. C. RICHMOND, Provincial Secretary.
VOL. XI. NELSON, TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 1863. No. 29.
Provincial Secretary's Office, Nelson,
September 22, 1863.
HIS Honor the Superintendent directs the publication of the following Report and Returns, for general information.
J. C. RICHMOND,
Provincial Secretary.
REPORT of the INSPECTOR of PUBLIC SCHOOLS.
To DONALD SINCLAIR, Esq.,
Chairman of the Central Board of Education.
SIR,—I have deferred laying before the Board my annual report of the state and progress of the Provincial Schools, until the completion of my second tour of Inspection had given me the opportunity of confirming or modifying the conclusions formed on my first visit.
The accompanying returns show that if the numbers attending our Schools are to be taken as a test of their usefulness, there is little to be desired in this respect, the numbers for comparison in the two years 1862 and 1863, being respectively 1657 and 1877, giving an increase of 220 during the past year.
I regret that I cannot speak in terms of equal approval of the quality of the instruction given to this mass of children, now comprising more than a sixth of the population of the Province.
It is true that the returns show a goodly array of 842 pupils learning geography, and 795 learning grammar; that in 5 of our schools geometry is taught, and that a large addition has been made to the list of those learning history, but the fact remains that in the three essentials of good reading, good writing, and arithmetic, our schools, as a whole, still fall far short of what might fairly be expected from them.
This deficiency is the more noteworthy as these returns are at present filled up not (as I conceive they ought to be) by the Inspector, but by the teachers, and cannot, therefore, be suspected of an unfavorable bias, being, as far as they go, pictures of the schools drawn by the teachers.
Feeling that but little good is likely to be effected by general expressions of dissatisfaction, I give a short outline of what I think
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Nelson Provincial Gazette 1863, No 29
✨ LLM interpretation of page content
🎓 Publication of Report and Returns of the Inspector of Public Schools
🎓 Education, Culture & Science22 September 1863
Education, Schools, Report, Nelson, Provincial Government
- J. C. Richmond, Provincial Secretary
🎓 Annual Report of the Inspector of Public Schools
🎓 Education, Culture & ScienceEducation, Schools, Statistics, Nelson, Inspector of Schools
- Donald Sinclair (Esquire), Chairman of the Central Board of Education