Welsh Journals

THE EDUCATIONAL OUTLOOK IN WALES THE education of its future adult citizens is a permanent problem in every modern state. There can be no abiding and final solution of it. Young minds are ever entering into an old world and discovering it anew. And the old world is itself changing. The arrival of the child disturbs every social and econo- mic institution. Education is the perma- nent process of adjusting the inner mind of the child to the outer reality of nature and society. To this end the State uses the clergyman, the schoolmaster and the policeman. They conspire to convert the child into a respectable, intelligent and good citizen. With the production of respectability they have their most wide- spread and conspicuous success. The majority of the citizens are, however, only moderately intelligent and narrowly good. Wales, in spite of illusions to the con- trary, is no exception to the rule. The activities of the triumvirate have been persistent and ubiquitous. There has undoubtedly been considerable advance in the last half century, but are we satisfied ? The old are timorous and do not wish to raise troublesome issues afresh. The platitudinous complacency of the middle-aged is characteristic of all persons in power. Happily there is a young and discontented generation knocking-not yet very loudly-at the door. They are not quite sure what they want or they would be more articulate. We shall set out some of the questions which they are trying to put about the schoolmaster and his world, leaving the clergyman and the policeman for another day. They are indeed old questions which are clamouring for new answers. No. I Let us begin with a very old one. Is Welsh education in every stage of it shadowed by the examination spectre? Is it difficult for teachers and taught to escape from its dominion, and are they rarely found pursuing learning for the sheer joy of it ? Are time-tables framed with an eye on the needs of a small selected class of promising children ? Is the scholarship child stale ? Is special preparation" a cloak for cram**? Let it be granted that the complete abolition of written examinations is not desirable, because they test useful qualities. Can their number not be reduced and other tests be exalted to at least equal influence ? "In no part of the United Kingdom-except it be in Ireland-is such value set upon examinational success as in Wales," wrote Mr. J. C.Smith, H.M.I., in 1911, in his Special Report to the Carnarvon County Council. This was perhaps inevitable in the early stages of our revival, and we observe signs of change. Congregations are discovering that some B.D's cannot preach pupils are finding that some M.A's and D.Phil's cannot teach and the name of every matriculant is no longer lauded in the appropriate denominational print. But the deeper damage done to the nation by the prevalence of false or imperfect stan- dards is not fully realised. The passer of examinations is praised, prized, painted on the Honours Board. He has defeated his rivals. Possessing certain examinable gifts of memory or expression or what not, he has achieved success. Such is the decree of the examiner, anonymous and awful in the child's eye, but really an industrious family man who has dedicated