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Kong & Whampoa Dock Co., reports that some of the boys go on with free scholar- ships to the Yaumati District School and that many of the boys who have been pupils of the Lower Primary School near Kowloon Docks find their way into the Company's works as soon as they are able to enter them. The question, what becomes of the boys who get their elementary vernacular education at the Quarry Bay School (they are almost entirely the sons of the Taikoo Dockyard & Engineering Co.'s workers) and the allied question whence come the apprentices of the Taikoo Docks have been carefully investigated. The facts appear to be (1) that a considerable number of the boys who have been pupils in the Company's Quarry Bay School are not finding their way into the apprentice system of the Taikoo Dockyard, and (2) that the boys who actually become apprentices in the Taikoo Dockyard come from a variety of schools (mostly private schools) and that one apprentice has recently been admitted from King's College. The fact that many of the boys who have been pupils of the Company's Quarry Bay School are not finding their way into the Taikoo Dockyard Apprentice System is due to the time which must elapse between their leaving school and the age at which a boy is physically capable to work as an apprentice. That age is not less than 16.
23. In addition to these lower primary schools which, as they give a general and not a technical education, are not strictly within the Committee's purview there is conducted in connection with the Hong Kong & Whampoa Dock Co.'s Yard in Kowloon a night school called the Hop Ying English Evening Free School. All pupils at this school are employees of the Hong Kong & Whampoa Dock Co. Attendance at this school is not obligatory on the apprentices of the Company, nor is it in fact an institution which the Company either started or is maintaining. The school represents a voluntary effort on the part of the Company's workers and it receives a recurring grant from the Company. There is room in the school for 136 pupils and it is always full. The curriculum of the school includes English (with special refer- ence to the English names for tools and parts of machinery) also drawing and some simple mathematics. The apprentices get away from the works at 5 p.m. school opens at 7 p.m. and closes at 9 p.m. The Headmaster assured our Chairman that it was not the case that the boys are too tired to study intelligently. The school does not meet during the hottest part of the summer.
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24. The Taikoo Dockyard started a technical class for apprentices in 1925 but this class was not continued after the general strike in the Colony which took place in that year. This class was reopened in October 1930. When the reopening of this class was being mooted, the firm arranged with the Director of the Technical Institute that the firm would provide the necessary accommodation, furniture, equipment, light, etc., but that the Education Department should pay the teachers, the firm agreeing, to start with, to pay the fees of the apprentices attending the class. The Acting Manager of the Taikoo Docks was, however, subsequently told by the Education Department that no funds were available. Rather than let the op- portunity lapse the firm has for the time being undertaken the remuneration of the teachers and interpreters who work this class. This class is attended by 50 appren- tices. Its curriculum includes arithmetic, mensuration, solid geometry and model drawing. The teaching of these subjects which is in the hands of the members of the Dockyard Staff, is closely connected with the work which the apprentices are actually doing in the shops. The members of the Dockyard Staff are paid for this work at the rate adopted by the Technical Institute.
25. There is also an English class conducted at the Taikoo Docks for the apprentices of the Company. This class was started early last year. The class is conducted by one of the Assistant Masters of King's College, assisted by an inter- preter. Our Chairman visited this class on 3rd December, 1930, and found some 30 apprentices being instructed in it. Our Chairman was favourably impressed by the work of the class but found that some of the apprentices were unable to read the Chinese translations of the simple English sentences set out in the Anglo Chinese reader which was in use. It transpired that some of the boys start on their apprenticeships practically, if not wholly illiterate. Possibly some of the boys who appear to be illiterate would be found to have spent some time in a Chinese verna- cular school, but whatever capacity to read and write they may have secured there they have apparently lost in the interval between leaving school and starting as apprentices. This class which meets twice a week from 6 p.m. to 8 p.m. is organised