Extract from Hansard Report of 13/10/38
The Social Services. II. Education.
TEACHER-TRAINING.-The committee appointed to advise upon the training of teachers has produced a very useful report. I have not been able to discuss it as yet with the Executive Council, so what
I say on the subject to-day must be regarded as my personal view. Teacher', That view is, briefly, that the committee's advice should be implemented as soon as is practicable. Not all their recommendations are capable Tr of immediate fulfilment: indeed it is clear that some of them were
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put forward as schemes intended for gradual implementation circumstances allow: all of them, however, appear to me to be acceptable on that understanding.
I consider that Government should initiate action recommendations of the report as follows:-
upon the
(1) Post-graduate teachers. The post-graduate course which is advised for Anglo-Chinese school teachers would be held at the Hong Kong University and therefore presents no immediate problem. The average number in the class probably would be about twelve, six with and six without scholarships, and, for the first year or two at any rate, its cost would be unlikely largely to exceed that of the existing system.
(2) Non-graduate
Anglo-Chinese and Vernacular School Teachers.—(a) The nursing sisters' quarters belonging to the old Government Civil Hospital are being examined with a view to converting them into hostel accommodation and lecture and other rooms for the students taking the two two-year courses. If that proves to be impracticable it would be necessary to make some temporary arrangement and to give further consideration to the whole question of housing the Training Institute.
as
(b) The teacher-training staff should be drawn far as is possible from the staff of the Education Department, they being replaced by the engagement of University graduates as masters on the department's staff.
It will be advisable to proceed tentatively with whatever scheme is ultimately approved and it is not possible, therefore, to make any firm estimate of expenditure: but the following gives a reasonable forecast of what the recurrent cost to the taxpayer would be if action were to be taken in accordance with my ideas on the subject, formed as they are in consultation with the Vice-Chancellor of the University and the Acting Director of Education.
The assumptions on which the calculation is based are that— (1) the Institute will train twice as many teachers for the
vernacular schools as for the Anglo-Chinese schools;
(2) in each of the first two years of the Institute's existence
24 teachers-in-training of each type will be accepted. third year and thereafter 24 will be accepted for the Anglo- In the Chinese schools and 48 for the vernacular schools;
(3) by the beginning of its second year normal wastage will have reduced each year's new entry by one-sixth: this process would in its fourth year give the Institute a pupil population of 132:
(4) 132 pupils in six classes would require as teaching staff 1
Principal and 7 masters.
On this basis the cost of the Institute in the fourth year is put at $60,000, against which may be set the saving of $20,000 which is the amount presently expended on evening and normal classes for teachers. Two tables are appended showing how these figures are reduced.
If these courses begin in accordance with the foregoing outlines at the beginning of the next academic year, viz., in September, the recurrent cost for 1939 will be in the neighbourhood of $8,000.
Trimmy
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