THE PECUNIARY WORKING OF THE NEW EDUCATION CODE.

THE following careful calculation of the practical difference be- tween the Revised Code, the Re-revised Code, and the pre- sent system to the managers of schools, which has been kindly placed at our disposal, will be interesting to our readers. According to the new Code, in its original form, the highest possible receipts of the managers, for every 100 children on the books, would have been as follows (it will be remembered that 440 are the whole number of pos- sible attendances, and that no capitation grant was made on the first hundred attendances) : 18-9 per -cent attending between 100 and 200 times, arid re-

ceiving payment on, say 50 at Id., 4s. 2d. £318 9 201 per cent. attending between 200 and 300 times, and re- ceiving payment on, say 150, at Id., 12s. 6d. 12 18 9

24.4 per cent, attending between 300 and 400 times, and re-

ceiving payment on, say 250 at id., 1/. Os. 10d. 25 8 4 18.6 per cent attending between 400 and 440 times, and re- ceiving payment on, say 320 at id., 11. 6s. 8d, 24 16 0 Total for 100 children £67 1 10 If one-tenth of these were prohibited by ill-health or any cause from examination, we must deduct 6 14 2

£60 7 8 So that under that system the managers might possibly have received 60/. 7s. 8d. per annum per 100 children on the books, if all passed the examination-or as 76 per cent. is the average attendance, at the rate of 15s. 10d. per head per annum on the average attendance.

If we suppose one-third to fail in the examination, the sum would be 10s. 6d. per head; if two-fifths to fail, the sum would he 98.6d. per head; if one-half fail, then not quite 8s. On this system, then, the sum per head per annum on the average attendance would have varied from 15s. 10d. in good schools, to about 8s. in bad. Now, on the Re-revised Code we shall have for every 100 children on the books : 76 per cent, average attendance At 4s. . . .

£15 4 0 631 „ attendance above 200 times at 8s.. £25 9 7

Deduct 1-10th for absence . . . 2 10 11

22 18 8 •

.£38 2 8

or the highest possible payment of Government for every 100 children on the books per annum will be 38/. 2s. 8d. If all present pass the examination this would be at the rate of 10s. per head per annum on the average attendance, and if one-tenth fail, which is about as large a proportion as ought to fail under the proposed regulations, then the sum would be reduced by one-tenth of 22/. 18s. 8d., or 2/. 5s. 10d., which would leave 251. 16s. 10d., or about 9s. 5d. per head on the average attendance. Hence the real difference between the two schemes is that there is much less variation between the grants to the poor and the well-managed schools on the re-revised system than in the reformed Code as it was first drawn up. The poor and needy schools are in less danger, the goo_cl ones have less to hope. Lastly, on our present system, the grant is about us. 6d. per head per annum on the average attendance, so that a material saving is expected from the new system.