28 APRIL 1917, Page 2

Mr. Fisher went on to ask for a grant of

£133,000 for the secondary schools, which are the key of the situation." He lamented, as every true patriot must lenient, the small proportion of children who proceed to the secondary schools, although so many free places are now reserved for elementary-school childrOn. Our highway from Council school to University is the widest in the great European coantries—far wider than in Germany, wheree-the masses are kept down—but it is not nearly wide -enough. Mr. Fisher declared, too, that the calling of the secondary-school master "has yet to be made reasonably attractive to a really able man." He mast be better paid—or less ill paid—and he must be enabled to contribute to a pension fund. The new grant will be distributed so that approved schools shall receive at least £4 per pupil, and the teachers' salaries will be raised by about fourteen per cents—little enough, but still a step in the right direction. A Pension Bill for secondary- school teachers is to be introduced shortly, and will be an immense boon- to -this sorely tried branch of the. prefessiwn • -