pple TRANSACTIONS OF SECTION L. 
one with 55:8 per cent. is ‘ just out of it.’ Surely the fact only needs stating to 
show its absurdity. 
The principle, too, is wrong, remembering the new conception of the scope and 
aim of primary education. Secondary school teachers frequently lament the 
~‘ falling-off’ of scholarship children, despite the fact that a fair number of such 
have done well. Ifthere must be a competitive examination, it would be pre- 
ferable to give the candidates some new work to prepare in the examination room, 
and judge their capacity and intelligence by their power to get knowledge for 
themselves, rather than by their power to yield up what has often been so 
laboriously crammed into their heads. 
e. Nomination and Consultation better than Examination.—It would be well 
if all special preparation could be avoided. It should be possible at the end of 
the educational year to ask the teachers in primary schools what children desire 
and deserve to go forward to a secondary school, and, after nomination, the 
secondary school teacher should meet the candidates face to face; then, by 
a few skilful questions and by consultation between the primary school and 
secondary school teachers, a wise selection could be made, a selection based, 
not upon the throw of a single examination—often too much of a lottery— 
but upon the child’s school record and upon the secondary school teacher's 
personal opinion of those latent powers which are at this time just beginning to 
make their presence evident. 
J. Desirability of varying Number of Scholarships.—There seems no reason 
why these scholarships should not vary according to the number of suitable 
applications. The list of children who may ‘ desire and deserve’ scholarships is 
not constant, but varies from year to year. There should be no poverty barrier. 
Maintenance allowances should be awarded where necessary, but no child ought 
to be transferred to a secondary school unless the parents are prepared to allow 
attendance for a full four-years’ course. For those who cannot do this the tops 
of the elementary schools should be strengthened in order to give an extended 
education for a year or two, of a type useful both for a livelihood and for life. 
That hybrid institution, the so-called higher elementary school, is a needless 
excrescence. 
g. The Future of Bright Children from Poor Homes.—As public money is 
spent to benefit the State as well as to help on the child, it would appear desirable 
that much more care should be taken to secure suitable employment for these 
children at the termination of the secondary school course than is generally 
taken at present. It seems in one sense a waste of public money to give an 
efficient higher education to a promising lad, and then find him at fifteen or 
sixteen years of age starting work as an errand-boy, and even in some cases 
entering the ranks of unskilled Jabour. Not but that the errand-boy is al) the 
better citizen for his education; yet it is disheartening to many a bright lad to 
find the doors bolted against him in the walk of life he would select, because he 
lacks influence. He should find it possible to serve his town and his country in 
that station in life for which his capacity and intelligence fit him, remembering 
Plato’s rule, ‘that children should be placed not according to their father’s con- 
ditions, but according to the faculties of their mind.’ 
h. Correlation of Aim and Co-ordination of Curricula.—It is obvious that 
the more natural and easy the transition is made from the primary to the secondary 
school, the less will be the wastage of time and effort in settling down in the 
new school. To this end there should be periodical conferences on questions of 
curricula, and, so far as is practicable, a continuity in the scope and aim of the 
instruction, with the object of rendering easy the passage of intelligent pupils 
from the primary to the secondary school. 
4. The Scholarship System. By Miss 8. Heron. 
In this paper the scholarship system was considered from the point of view of 
the secondary school into which girls are received from the elementary school. 
