24 Belfast Municipal Technical Institute: 



was glad to find that it seemed likely that what would be, in 

 effect, such a system, was now under consideration. 



Sir James Henderson endorsed all that had been said by Mr. 

 Forth, who, he thought, had hit the weak spot in our 

 educational system. Something was required between the 

 national school and the higher educational establishments 

 in the future. With regard to the Technical School in 

 Belfast, the large sum of X 8 5»° 00 would be necessary 

 to put the building into the from which had been so 

 admirably described by Mr. Forth, therefore the Committee 

 were compelled to ask the ratepayers for id in the £i, which 

 would bring them ^"5,000. At the present time this sum, 

 together with the ^*io,ooo which they were receiving from the 

 Department of Technical Instruction in Dublin, was the annual 

 amount available for technical education in Belfast. The 

 Belfast Natural History and Philosophical Society was deserving 

 of the highest praise for allowing them the privilege of hearing 

 that lecture, which would be of great assistance in spreading 

 technical instruction in Belfast. 



Sir Otto Jaffe considered that at an early period they would 

 see a fair amount of progress in Belfast as a result of their 

 efforts. The Corporation in selecting Mr. Forth as the 

 principal of the new school had got one of the best officers they 

 could have obtained for this department. 



Dr. M'Keown said in the matter of primary education he 

 saw little hope of any great improvement so long as they had 

 such a Board of National Education as existed at the present 

 in Dublin. It was his firm conviction that until the people 

 took the control of education into their own hands it would never 

 be right. They wanted in a city like Belfast a board representing 

 the people for the purpose of regulating this primary education. 

 Now, many of the schools from a sanitary point were unfit for 

 occupation by children. He believed that the time would 

 come when the Corporation would have to build schools of 

 their own, and not allow them to be appendages to any Church 

 whatever. A teacher in a primary school was an important 



