152 



NATURE 



[April i, 1920 



Education of Engineers.^ 



THE report on the education and training of elec- 

 trical engineers is. a really important and 

 instructive pronouncement. The industry is a com- 

 paratively new one, and the committee has 

 been able to formulate recommendations in advance 

 of the prejudices and customs of older branches 

 of engineering. An attempt is made to lay down a 

 uniform system for manual and technical workers of 

 various grades, and it is pointed out that industry 

 should be represented on all committees concerned 

 with primary, higher, and technical education and 

 with after-care and juvenile employment. The com- 

 mittee recognises four classes of apprentices, namely : 



(i) Trade Apprentices, who enter works between 

 fourteen and sixteen and are to be trained to become 

 skilled workmen. They should be selected at an inter- 

 view and given a trial period. The committee sug- 

 gests that they should be placed under the super- 

 vision of a trained officer responsible for their selec- 

 tion, who should keep records of their progress. 



(2) Engineering Apprentices, who enter works 

 between the ages of sixteen and eighteen, chiefly 

 from the higher secondary schools. These should be 

 trained by practical experience and technical educa- 

 tion, up to the age of twenty-one, for junior staff posi- 

 tions. Before entering works they should have 

 attained a standard equivalent to that of a university 

 matriculation examination. They should be selected 

 after an interview and examination of school records, 

 and appointed for a probationary period. Their prac- 

 tical training should be directed not so much to 

 making them skilled workmen as to giving them a 

 knowledge of various manufacturing processes and of 

 design, testing, and workshop organisation. Their 

 technical education should be continued during appren- 

 ticeship by part-time courses. 



(3)' Student Apprentices, preferably graduates in 

 engineering, who enter the works between the 

 ages of nineteen and twenty-two, and should be 

 definitely trained for senior positions on the staff. 

 The committee has reached the conclusion that the 

 need for attracting men of ability makes it imperative, 

 not onlv to abolish the premium system, but also to 

 give during apprenticeship a maintenance allowance. 

 Student apprentices should, if possible, have graduated 

 in honours in engineering, and be taken systeriiatically 

 through a group of related departments. 



(4) Research Apprentices. — Research is now . an 

 essential factor in industrial progress, and it is neces- 

 sary to make definite provision for the training of 

 research workers. University graduates who have 

 shown special aptitude for scientific investigation 

 should be selected, preferably from those who enter as 

 student apprentices. In the 'last year of apprenticeship 

 they should devote attention to investigations arising 

 in practice, and then return to the university for a 

 year of post-graduate work or obtain equivalent 

 experience In a works laboratory. 



The report concludes with a discussion of the need 

 for more scholarships from primary to junior technical 

 and secondary schools, and from these to the techno- 

 logical faculties of the universities ; also for post- 

 graduate research. 



The report of the Institution of Naval_ Architects is 

 briefer and less systematic. So far as it goes, it is 

 on the same lines as the electrical report. It states 



1 "Education and Training for the Electriral snd Allied Industries." 

 Being a Report ofa Comm'ttee of the Brin-h Electrical and Allied Manu- 

 facturers' A«socintion. 64 pp. (London: Edward Arnold.) 



Institution of Naval Architects. Report of the Co "m'ttee on the Educa- 

 tion and Training of Apprentices in Shipyards and Marine Engineering 



Works. 



that an apprenticeship, or at least a clear understand- 

 ing binding on both sides between employer and lads 

 entering works. Is desirable. It suggests selection on 

 results of school work and the need for a supervisor 

 of lads learning- their business. An appendix contains 

 Information obtained from the principal shipbuilding 

 firms as to the opportunities afforded by them to lads 

 entering the works, and especially as to the induce- 

 ments held out to them to Improve their educational 

 equipment. An interesting part of the report is an 

 account of the admirable system of training estab- 

 lished bv the Admiralty in H.M. Dockyards. 



w. c. u. 



NO. 2631, VOL. 105] 



Tropical Control of Australian Rainfall. 



IT would appear probable that the Australian con- 

 tinent, extending well within the tropical belt, of 

 approximately symmetrical shape, and free from dis- 

 turbance by large land masses, especially to the east 

 and west, is the very best place to study the 

 mechanism of tropical rain control. Certainly such 

 a control. If proved and reduced to a system, should 

 very greatly assist the forecasting of the all-important 

 Australian 'rainfall. Bulletin No. 15 of the Common- 

 wealth Bureau of Meteorology Is devoted to a study 

 of this subject by Mr. E. T. Quayle, Supervising 

 Meteorologist of the Melbourne Bureau. 



It must be admitted that the period dealt with, 

 largely confined to the six years 1911-16, seems to 

 demand very strong evidence to justify a general con- 

 clusion. This objection is partly met by an addendum 

 dealing to some extent with longer periods^up to 

 twenty-four years in one instance — but one would be 

 inclined to wait for confirmation of the great im- 

 provement in rain-forecasting claimed by Mr. Quayle. 

 His chosen "argument" is the minimum temperature 

 in the tropical regions of Australia. If this is_ high. 

 It may be attributed to cloudiness, extra humidity, or 

 north-east wind, and of these three the second is 

 suggested as the most important. In any case, the 

 idea is that this high minimum, which Is usually 

 persistent for a few weeks at a time, causes such a 

 flow of air to the southern parts of the continent 

 that the approaching cyclonic " lows " are compelled to 

 part with rain. 



The stations on which Mr. Quayle lavs most stress 

 for his prediction are Darwin and Mein, the latter 

 being on the north-east coast of Queensland. The 

 Influence does not travel directly southward, but Mein 

 corresponds more closelv with the Darling district of 

 New South Wales and North Victoria ; while Darwin 

 corresponds with South Australia and, to a much less 

 extent, with Western Australia. Inasmuch as the 

 Darwin temperatures, are inclined to follow those of 

 Mein after about three days, the inference is that a 

 longer forecast can be made from the Mein figures, 

 or possibly from figures further eastwards In New 

 Guinea. 



Mr. Quavle gives figures to show that the average 

 daily rainfall over the southern Inland areas during 

 the ' months April to October (the wheat-growing 

 period) is more 'than twice as great during periods of 

 hich minimum at Darwin as during periods of low 

 minimum. He considers that the slowness of the 

 chan£?es at Darwin Justifies forecasts twenty days 

 ahead. He discredits barometer readings as quite un- 

 trustworthy for this purpose. The behaviour of the 

 lines of Influence is not the same in drv years, but Is 

 nearly north to south In wet years. The exceptional 

 years 1014 and iqi6 happen to be included in the 

 short period under consideration, and these certainly 



