170 SCIENCE TEACHING. 



" the Department shall be treated as if the examination in these subjects 

 " had been held by the Board. 



" In the year 1902 the course in Experimental Science and Drawings for 

 " all Grades shall be the First Year's Course, as set out in the Programme 

 " of the Department. In the year 1903, the course for the Preparatory 

 " Grade shall be the First Year's Course of the Department, and for the 

 " other Grades the Second Year's Course of the Department. 



'' In the years 1902 and 1903 the examination and inspection of the higher 

 " Grades will be more searching-, in consideration of the students having 

 "reached a more advanced stage. 



"The subjects of Domestic Economy and Botany will be ultimately 

 "included in the Programme; but in the year 1902, pending the com- 

 " pletion of arrangements with the Department of Agriculture and Technical 

 " Instruction, and the establishment of a system of inspection, the Board 

 " will not examine in these subjects, except as provided in Rule 53." 



By this arrangement between the Intermediate Board and the Department 

 a strong reinforcement of the new reform has been secured, and a close co- 

 operation, which must prove of the greatest value to the interest of educational 

 progress, has been established between the two authorities. 



This arrangement has one great advantage for the schools. It provides 



that the rules and regulations governing the adminis- 



Aid to the Schools, tration and distribution of Science and Art grants, and 



also the inspection of all science and art instruction in 



Secondary Schools in Ireland, are, for the time being, entirely under the care 



of one authority. The Department took the earliest steps to facilitate the 



introduction of the Programme into the schools. It was clear that as the 



natural result of the previously existing situation of science and art instruction 



the schools were ill prepared for the change proposed. They suffered from 



three serious drawbacks : — 



(i) They were without definite aims in such Science and Art instruction 

 as they had been giving; 



(2) They had, as a rule, neither laboratories nor specialised art rooms ; 



(3) There was, on the whole, a dearth of science teachers with experience 



of experimental work. 



The Department endeavoured to meet the first of these drawbacks by 

 publishing with their Programme a pamphlet setting forth the aims of the 

 instruction, and suggested syllabuses of the first two years' work ; and at the 

 same time, by taking the heads of schools into direct conference on the subject. 

 This latter was a new and, it is believed, a useful, step in the action of an 

 educational Department of the State in these countries towards the schools 

 with which its work is concerned. A conference of some thirty representatives 

 of the more important day schools was arranged at the offices of the Depart- 

 ment. The members of the Sub-Committee of the Intermediate Education 

 Board and the chief officers of the Department attended. A day or two before 

 the conference the pamphlet referred to was in the hands of the members ; at 

 the conference, lasting some three hours, the contents were submitted to 

 criticism ; and to ease down the difficulties of introducing the system, several 

 important details were altered. 



With regard to apparatus and equipment, the Department propose to help 

 the schools on the one hand by means of financial grants, and on the other 



