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might be no possibility of sufficient improvement and no better premises to be found.* A certain number of children might thus be turned out of school into the streets. It has already been suggested that this would be beneficial rather than harmful to them; nevertheless, it is hardly the best conceivable solution of the problem. The Government might well consider the possibility whenever sites become available (and this, it is believed, happens rather frequently), of building school premises in these slum areas and staffing them as Government schools. It would be necessary, of course, to put the schools where the population needs them and is likely to continue to need them. Besides the benefit conferred upon the health of the Colony, this reform would increase the Government's now somewhat modest contribution to primary education.
2. As already suggested by the use of the term Medical Officer for Schools," there is a school medical service. The present Medical Officer for Schools arrived in the Colony in April, 1934. There are two Chinese Medical Officers and four nurses. All the members of this medical staff were engaged in other than school duties during the summer holidays and on other occasions. There are routine inspections and re-inspections in schools of all categories, and, in Government schools, a scheme of insurance which entitles the pupils, in return for a small annual fee, to have hospital charges paid, if incurred, and to be provided with spectacles whenever necessary. The fee varied from $9 to 50 cents, or about 58. 8d. to 101d. in English money at the rate of exchange recently prevailing. The amount collected in this way in 1934 was about $9,500, whilst only $4,000 was provided for expenditure.
There is no scheme for dental treatment, though the incidence of dental disease is undoubtedly heavy. This is a defect which should be remedied, and the services of a school dentist are badly needed. The proper inspection of private Vernacular schools could probably be carried out more effectively if a Sanitary Inspector or Sub-inspector were added to the staff. 3. It has already been stated that some schools in the Colony, including some of the most important, give no time to Physical Training at all. Games are encouraged, out of school hours, in the Government schools, but are not played by all, though it is true that Chinese boys and girls take far more exercise than they used to take, swimming being especially popular. Defects of a kind that can be remedied or at least mitigated by a properly planned system of physical culture are frequent-e.g., wrong postures, malformation of the chest, poor lung expansion. Considering that many of the boys and some of the girls go straight from school desks to office desks, being thus sedentary workers from childhood onwards, it is of the first importance that their education should do all that it can do for their physical health. The fact that many of the parents demand examination successes and are not much interested in anything else should certainly not be allowed to decide the matter. It is highly probable that no other single reform would accomplish as much good as the introduction of a daily period of physical training for all pupils, except the few who would properly be excused on adequate medical grounds. In Government schools this innovation could be made without much difficulty. Some of the younger teachers are already competent to do this work recruits come to the Government's teaching establishment from two chief sources, Great Britain and Hong Kong University (Chinese graduates). For those from the former source, the ability to take a class through a course of physical training competently could and should be made an indispensable qualification in all future appointments. For the latter, the part-time services of an instructor borrowed from the Army should be sufficient for the needs of the students who are being trained to be teachers.
The Grant-Aided schools should be given reasonable time, where they need it, to make their own arrangements (they engage and pay their own staffs), after which time the inclusion of adequate physical training in the time-table should be a condition of grant payment. Com- pulsion is probably necessary here, for otherwise the schools which make this hole in the time devoted to examination work will lose pupils to those schools which refuse to comply.
4. Hygiene is taught in the Vernacular schools, but the teaching cannot be very effective in premises such as those that have been described, or from teachers who are themselves by no means always respectable examples of what they preach. The teaching is often exclusively theoretical, and appears to be carried on with very little interest on the part either of teachers or pupils. It is to be feared that this is partly due to the fact that the School Certificate syllabus does not include Hygiene in the syllabus for boys, though girls can be examined in it. 5. A voluntary association is doing something for the welfare of the children by providing a number of open spaces as playgrounds. There are paid instructors who coach the children in various games; their services and the playgrounds seem to be well used.
"It is understood that housing conditions in the Colony are being investigated by a Commission appointed by His Excellency the Governor.
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V.-TEACHERS RECRUITMENT AND CONDITIONS OF SERVICE.
Teachers in Hong Kong are recruited from the following sources:-
of
(a) In Government schools the teachers are on the
permanent establishment the Civil Service. The Europeana are usually graduates of English or Scottish Universities and have received their training at home. The Chinese are graduates of Hong Kong University and have been trained there, though there are older teachers whose service began before the existence of the University's Training Department.
(b) In the Grant-Aided schools the staff consists of Certificated Teachers, Passed Student Teachers, and Student Teachers. The Grant Code lays it down that a "Certificated Teacher" means one who is recognised as such by the English Board of Education, or who has qualifications which, in the opinion of the Director, are practically equivalent. A Student Teacher is defined as a Teacher who is studying at one of the Teachers' Classes at the Technical Institute, or at any similar Class approved by the Director," and a Passed Student Teacher as, a Teacher who has passed the final examination there, or who has qualifications which, in the opinion of the Director, are practically equivalent." The Student Teachers and Passed Student Teachers are almost invariably ex-pupils of Government or Grant-in-Aid schools who have matriculated but have not studied at any University; in other words, their status is that of Uncertificated Teachers at home. The Certificated Teachers, most of whom naturally are Europeans, have varied qualifications and experience behind them; many of them are members of religious orders.
(c) The teachers in private Vernacular schools, like those in private preparatory schools at home, may have been trained anywhere or nowhere, may have much culture or very little, and long experience or none. Their earnings are sometimes less than those of a coolie. In the New Territories a good many private schools are conducted by Chinese men who have been trained free of charge at the Government's Vernacular Normal School at Taipo. There is also a Vernacular Normal School for Women at which the fees are only $2 (about 38. 6d.) per month.
Taking these several categories of teachers in turn, European male graduates employed in Government schools are on a sterling salary scale rising in 18 years from £500 to £950. In addition, they and their families receive certain medical privileges and are allowed home leave, with free first-class passages, at a rate which, under present regulations, amounts to about nine months, including the time occupied in travelling to and from England, at the end of four years' service. Their hours of work and length of holidays are substantially the same as those in elementary schools at home. They pay no direct taxes. Clearly such terms of service are attractive, but there are disadvantages. The climate of Hong Kong in the summer months can be extremely unpleasant and trying to nerves and health. The cost of living is high in some respects, especially in rent, though senior teachers can usually secure Government houses at a rent of six per cent. of their salaries, and service is cheap. Children cannot be kept in the Colony after the age of about nine without risk of detriment to their health; this inevitably means expense for the parents in making provision for them in England. The purchasing power of their salaries decreases when the value of sterling falls in terms of dollars, as has been happening recently. Whenever this happens, the risk of succumbing to the dangers inherent in the "' chit "* system, which prevails in India, in Ceylon, and in all British communities in the Far East, is obviously increased.
European women teachers are on a salary scale of £360 to £700, with the same leave rights as men. For both sexes the scales seem ample and make it reasonable to require of the teachers a high standard of efficiency and of devotion to duty.
The Chinese male teachers in Government service start at $900, or $1,800 if they are University trained graduates, rising in either case to $6,000. The women teachers start at $720 or $1,82 and rise in either case to $8,000. It being certainly true that any given salary in Hong Kong is worth more to a Chinese than to a European, these scales of pay are high enough, and could probably have been put somewhat lower without any consequent falling off in the quality of recruits. There are Government scholarships given annually to intending teachers to maintain them at the University-their amount is sufficient for that purpose. On the whole the training given to these Chinese graduate teachers is satisfactory, but in certain
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