Sessional_Paper_1896 — Page 74

71

No. 9/8

3

96

No. 7.

HONGKONG.

REPORTS OF THE HEAD MASTER OF QUEEN'S COLLEGE AND OF THE EXAMINERS APPOINTED BY THE GOVERNING BODY FOR 1895.

Laid before the Legislative Council by Command of

His Excellency the Governor.

QUEEN'S COLLEGE, HONGKONG, 28th January, 1896.

SIR-I have the honour to forward the Annual Report on Queen's College for the year 1895.

1. The total number on the Roll for the year was 1,024. As the attendance in January was 577, the admissions reached the high figure 447; of these, 350 were new boys, there therefore remain 97 names of boys who returned from the 1894 Roll. In the last four months, no fewer than 89 new boys were admitted, nearly double the usual number, for the same period. After allowance has been made for the four days during which, with His Excellency the Governor's approval, the college was closed for the Oxford Local Examinations, the number of school days, 233, is normal.

2. In the past year, over 100 boys, on leaving this college, obtained situations; 3 in the local Civil Service, 43 in local Mercantile and Professional offices, 38 in the Chinese Service, and 33 at the Coast Ports and abroad generally.

3. $12,667 fees were collected in the course of the year. This is not only the largest amount thus paid into the Treasury as yet, but is so in spite of the facts, that the monthly averages in the first half of the year were nearly 100 attendances less than in 1894, and that a loss of $162 was incurred by the departure in October of 35 boys for Tientsin. Expenditure is apparently larger than last year, but this is due to the appearance in 1895 accounts of Arrears of Exchange Compensation, chargeable against 1894.

4. Three years ago (Gazette 1893, p. 165, par. 3) I pointed out that the normal conditions of the Central School were not ideal and that the continuance of these in a building with twice the attendances increases the difficulty fourfold; for it is evident that the consequences, attendant upon the annual change of one third of the total number of boys, grow more serious in a ratio which rapidly increases out of proportion to the mere access of numbers. If ordinary principles of promotion were under these circumstances adhered to, the natural result would be an annual reduction of the attend- ance in the Upper School, and a corresponding expansion of the Lower sections of the College including the Preparatory School. The fees in the Upper School being highest, there would be entailed a serious reduction in the revenue. Further the number of boys leaving annually would be doubtless augmented, as the present method of rapid promotion is welcome to them, at their age, as curtailing the length of their school career. As a typical instance I may cite the component parts of Class IV. C. where, in November last, 7 boys had in 1894 been in Class V, 11 in Class VI, 11 in Class VII and I in Class VIII; several of them having been promoted through intermediate classes in the previous half of 1895. No ideal education can thrive under such circumstances. What is to be noted is, that the system combines and harmonises the demand for fees, and the eagerness of boys to complete their education with the utmost speed. Any estimate of the value of the education given at this college, that ignores the above conditions, and makes no allowance for the fact that, in four or five years, the majority of our boys pass through eight standards, must arrive at erroneous conclusions.

5. A cry is heard from Wales, that it is impossible for boys, attending day-schools, who hear and speak nothing but Welsh out of school-hours, to attain to anything like ease and accuracy in speaking and writing the English language. As I do not think that sufficient allowance is generally made for the difficulties attendant upon the study of English by boys of Mongolian race, I was glad to find in "Things Japanese," in the article on Education by Professor MASON, the expression of the same. argument I have often employed, which is to the following effect. If in England the examination in