796 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTIOX J. 



The prohibitive cost of the former would be fatal to its adoption 

 in this State, but even though our taxpayers were willing to face the 

 great expense involved, it is open to question whether the result 

 would justify it. 



The latter is open to the objection that the practical man and the 

 employer are not, in this country, well-disposed towards the lad who 

 coines to them holding an exaggerated idea of the sufficiency of 

 theoretical knowledge while absolutely lacking in skill. As our in- 

 spector of technical colleges writes in his report of 1906, " The 

 dissemination of technical knowledge depends upon the appreciation 

 of its value by parents and employers." I am of opinion that our 

 technical colleges should provide means for imparting a certain degree 

 of skill to every youth who intends following industrial pursuits, but 

 it should not be specialised. Although some class of work must be 

 chosen for the pui-pose of teaching, skill should be taught to all by 

 nearly the same processes. Every industrial student should attend 

 wood-working classes, even though he intends afterwards to be a 

 brassfinisher, an electrical engineer, or a housepainter. In wood- 

 work he has an opportunity of acquii'ing command over the muscles of 

 his hands, while learning to interpret drawings and other instructions. 

 He should leara familiarity with the every-day applications of 

 chemicals as exemplified by the use of fluxes in soldering and welding, 

 acids in dissolving metals, alkalies in dissolving fats and oils. 



He should become familiar with the electric current sufficiently 

 to realise that cuiTent flows in a circuit, and that a broken circuit 

 interrupts the current, while a short circuit increases it. He should 

 learn physics to the extent of becoming familiar with the properties of 

 ordinary solids, liquids, and gases. He should know enough concera- 

 ing algebraic and trigonometrical symbolic methods of expression to be 

 able to use any ordinary text-book formulae. He should already 

 possess, op should acquire at the technical college, a knowledge of 

 arithmetic, and this knowledge should be of such a kind as to enable 

 him to think clearly iin figuresi, without being over-loaded with 

 niceties of the recurring decimal type. This brings us to a considera- 

 tion of the primary school education in so far as it fits or unfits the 

 future technical college student for his work. (But this matter I shall 

 deal with at the close of the paper.) He should learn to use a file on 

 brass and iron, but only for the pui'pose of easing a fit, or nicking 

 and breaking a rod. He should learn to use pliers in a reasonable 

 manner to cut wire or to hold it. He should learn to tin a soldering 

 bolt, and to prepare surfaces for soldering, and know what flux to 

 use for lead, brass, copper, /;inc, or iron. He should be able to dis- 

 mantle a common lock and put it together again. He should be able 

 to cut a screw thread on a f-in. or -^-in. pipe or iron rod with stocks 

 and dies. He should leani mechanical drawing of a rough and ready 

 kind, without much use of instruments, and above all he should be able 

 to interpret drawings. 



A course in carpentry and wood-working is especially valuable 

 even to the future worker in metals, because he can in wood-working 

 obtain a familiarity with accuracy of measiu-ements, interpretation of 

 drawings, appearance of true planes, correct angles, neat fits, and the 

 holding of tools, which could not be acquired in metal work without 

 an excessive expenditure of time. 



