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SIR, AS requested in C. S. O. 4452/03, we inspected Queen's College during the last fortnight of the summer term, and have now the honour to submit the following report.
METHOD OF CONDUCTING THE EXAMINATION.
The examination was held, by the desire of the Government, in a different way from usual. It has hitherto been an examination of the Upper School only (Classes I, II, and III,) and has been held at the end of the winter term in con- nection with the Christmas examinations; prizes and promotions depending upon it. It thus involved the examination of every individual scholar in every one of the subjects studied by him, and an exact comparison of the papers in each subject, in order that the order of merit in each subject and in each Class might be ascer- tained. The labour of such an undertaking, dealing as it must with more than a thousand papers, is considerable. It does not leave much time to the examiners for such considerations as the efficiency of the Staff, the discipline, or the nature or the methods of instruction. Indeed, the nature of the examination tended to prevent the examiners from easily considering these vital points. Their first duty was to declare which boy had best assimilated the educational diet provided for him. That diet might be unwholesome; and the healthier instinct the one that turned from it. But, however unwillingly, the examiners were compelled to award praise and blame on the results before them, after which any criticism in a contrary sense that they might make, would be apt to fall unheeded."
Further the system was objectionable, in that, while the examiners were not put in the best position for doing that which they were best qualified to do, they were not the persons best qualified for the task actually given them. However painstaking and skilful an outside examiner may be, the best judge to decide who deserves prizes and promotions will still be the master who has had the Class under his eye day after day throughout the year, And it will often happen that the decision of the examiners will stultify the predictions of the master, and so inevitably disable his judgment in the eyes of his scholars.
The examiners have in fact hitherto attempted to draw up the school in a graduated order of merit. The duty is analogous to that of arranging troops in review order, first the taller and then the shorter. Such a duty in the latter case is best performed by those who are closest in touch with the men, and not by the Inspecting Officer. He has other and more widely important duties to fulfil. He has to see that such exercises as are performed are smartly performed : but he also considers the intrinsic value of the exercises, and it is his business to make sure that they are the most useful that can be devised.
Impressed by these views the examiners have paid little attention to 'places and marks,' but have set themselves to enquire whether the work of the school is laid upon the soundest possible lines, and whether what is in fact being done, is being done in the best possible way.
From this altered view of their task, it followed that the examination could no longer be limited to the Upper School. Not all boys in the Lower School will rise to the Upper; but the Upper has with few exceptions passed through the Lower School. And it is found that the effects of bad teaching in the lower Classes are not easily got rid of. Moreover the Lower School is, speaking broadly, staffed by Chinese masters, and the Upper School by English masters; and, further, there seems a tendency to place the least experienced Chinese masters in the lowest Classes. It seemed to the Examiners that if it came to a choice between inspecting the Upper and Lower Schools, the latter could less safely be neglected. In order to cope with the extra work thus imposed upon them, their number has been in- creased from two to three.
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To
THE CHAIRMAN, The Governing Body, Queen's College.
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