XN000022-1972-11-15 — Page 8

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Wednesday, November 15, 1972

SCHOOLS CAN BE MADE BETTER

The year 1973 will see an average of a new secondary school,

completed every fortnight, and the Government will thus be able to

provide aided secondary education to an even greater proportion of primary

school leavers.

The Director of Education, the Hon. J. Canning, told the

Legislative Council today that this year, it was possible to allocate

places in government and aided schools and places purchased in private

schools to 44 per cent of the pupils who entered the Secondary Schools

Entrance Examination.

We shall do even better next year as we can reasonably expect

that 26 new secondary schools will be completed in 1973," he said.

He said he has every confidence that it will be possible to

achieve the interim target of three years post-primary education for

50 per cent of all children in the 12-14 age group by 1976.

Mr. Canning said urgent steps are being taken to reconstitute the

Board of Education, and it is hoped that a full and detailed paper will

soon be presented to the Board outlining the programme for secondary

expansion.

The targets which the Government is setting itself would need huge

capital and recurrent expenditures and it will be necessary for voluntary

agencies engaged in education to extend their efforts considerably if

the great tasks lying ahead are to be accomplished, he added.

/On the