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Education in Fiji Education in Fiji Pacific Research Monograph Number Six Education in Fiji Policy, Problems and Progress in Primary and Secondary Education, 1939-1973 C. Whitehead Series editor E.K. Fisk The Australian National University Canberra 1981 LC, • Clive Whitehead 1981 This work is copyright. Apart from any fair dealing for the purpose of private study, research, criticism or review, as permitted under the Copyright Act, no part may be reproduced by any process without written permission. Inquiries may be made to the publisher. National Library of Australia Cataloguing-in-publication entry Whitehead, Clive Education in Fiji. ISBN 0 909150 33 8. 1. Education and state — Fiji — History. I. Australian National University. Development Studies Centre. II. Title. (Series : Pacific research monograph, ISSN 0155-9060 ; no. 6). 379.96 '11 Printed and manufactured in Australia by The Australian National University Clive Whitehead was born in Croydon, England, and educated at Christchurch Boys' High School, New Zealand, and the Universities of Canterbury and Otago. He has taught in secondary schools in England and New Zealand, and at the University of Otago, and now lectures in education in developing countries at the University of Western Australia. He is currently studying British colonial education policy since 1918. Cover illustration from Cook, James. Captain Cook's Voyages around the World, printed for Miller, Law and Carter, Vol. 4, London, 1790. V. .105 Summary This study analyses government education policy in Fiji since 1939, within the context of the develop ment of primary and secondary schooling. It shows how policy has been influenced primarily by the rising tide of social demand for schooling and by the economic importance attached to education as a source of skilled manpower. Throughout the period under review there has been a constant imbalance between the quantity and quality of education, which as been accentuated by the Government's lack of effective control over the growth of schools. Consequently, until recently, educational planning at government level has been characterized by a piecemeal approach. It is the author's contention that the voluntary school principle, the keystone of former British colonial education policy, has out lived its usefulness as the basis on which to build an education system designed to meet Fiji's current and future social and economic needs. Instead, a state or public school system would be more appropriate. Contents xi Preface xix Abbreviations Chapter 1 Introduction — The post-war setting Chapter 2 British colonial education policy between the two world wars Chapter 3 The development of education in Fiji prior to 1939 20 Chapter 4 The Stephens Report 31 Chapter 5 Reaction to the Stephens Report 44 Chapter 6 The Ten Year Plan 55 Chapter 7 The austere years 70 Chapter 8 The Lewis-Jones Report and its aftermath 80 Chapter 9 The early sixties and the Fifth Development Plan 99 Chapter 10 The Education Commission and the Sixth Development Plan 127 Chapter 11 Independence and the early seventies 167 Chapter 12 Conclusion 190 Appendices 210 References 216 vii viii Tables Table 1 Secondary school enrolments in Fiji in 1944 38 2 Girls in Indian enrolments in classes 6, 7 and 8 in 1947, 1955 and 1960 88 3 Primary school wastage 1953-60 89 4 Third form intakes 1954-60 91 5 Successes in external secondary school examinations 1956, 1960 93 6 Proportion of untrained teachers in Fiji in the 1950s 93 7 Growth in the number of untrained teachers in Fiji's secondary schools in the 1950s 94 8 Academic standards of entrants accepted for teachers' college 1954, 1957, 1960 94 9 Crude wastage rates in classes 5 to 8, during the period 1956-66 103 10 Pupils enrolled in each form of the secondary schools 1963, 1966 104 11 Fiji Junior Certificate examination results 1963-66 107 12 School Certificate (Cambridge Overseas and New Zealand Combined) examination results 1963-66 107 13 University Entrance examination results 1963-66 107 14 Qualifications of student teachers at Nasinu Training College 1960-68 132 15 Forms 1-4 rolls, 1959-84 161 16 Expansion of academic secondary schooling 1966-73 169 17 Educational agencies and types of schools operating in Fiji in 1973 170 18 Government financial aid aimed at reducing the cost of education to parents 1966-72 172 Table 19 Trained and untrained teachers in Fiji's schools 1973 174 20 Crude primary school wastage rates 1966-73 174 21 New Zealand School Certificate results for Fiji students 1966-73 178 22 New Zealand University Entrance examination results for Fiji students 1966-73 178 23 Fiji Junior Certificate results 1969-73 180 Preface Since World War II educational planning has emerged as a challenging subject for scholarly analysis principally because of the world-wide preoccupation with the promotion of economic growth and social improvement. Education is now universally regarded as a basic human right and as an essential component in the process of national development. Moreover, especially in the so-called developing countries of the Third World, the demand for education constitutes an explosive political force, as Dr C.E. Beeby emphasized in his address to the Eleventh Unesco General Conference in 1960. 1 He claimed that the demand for education stemmed from the love of parents for their children and that no democratic government could resist it. Furthermore, no government of any kind could remain stable for very long unless it made serious plans to meet the social demand for schooling. During the past twenty-five years remarkable progress has been achieved in promoting education throughout the world, particularly in the poorer countries of South America, Asia, Africa and the Pacific, but its rapid growth has created a host of problems. Even now, our knowledge about how education systems develop and the relationships that exist between education and the various aspects of national development is still in that amorphous state in which there is little general consensus of viewpoint. Beeby and L.J. Lewis stressed this fact in a recent joint statement.2 They pointed out that educational planners lack a body of theory that takes account of all that has happened in education ^.E. Beeby, statement made on 23 November 1960 as leader of the New Zealand Delegation to the Eleventh Session of the General Conference of Unesco during General Discussion of Reports of Director General on activities of the Organization, p. 3. 2C.E. Beeby and L.J. Lewis, 'Introduction' to the special review number on Eduction in Developing Countries, Inter national Review of Education, vol.8, 1971, pp. 13 1-7. xi xii throughout the world in the last twenty years 'during which educational events have far outstripped our capacity to think about them'. Given the current incomplete state of our knowledge about how education systems develop, it seems important at the present time to bring into sharper focus a variety of key questions and problems which appear to be of universal concern, rather than to seek any final answers. This can seemingly best be done not by abstract theorizing, but by examining the actual experiences and conditions of education systems in a variety of areas. Comparative de tailed case studies of this sort may then enable the educa tional theorists to arrive at a better understanding of the persistent difficulties that have been experienced by educational administrators in developing countries since the early 1950s. Such a view is also supported by P.H. Coombs, the former Director of the International Institute for Educational Planning.3 It was against the broader background of research needs that this study was undertaken. My interest in the development of education, especially in the poorer countries of the world, stemmed initially from studies of the work of Coombs1* and Beeby5 and later from writing a Master's thesis on the subject.6 Fiji was chosen as the topic of this study for several reasons. No comparable study had been made of the post-war development of education in Fiji, and much of the printed primary source material was readily available in New Zealand libraries. Fiji was also close enough to visit in order to consult the records of its Department of Education and to interview several people in Suva who had played leading administrative roles in the period under review. The terri tory has also enjoyed long-standing educational contacts with New Zealand. Finally, the choice of subject was also motivated by a personal belief in the need to focus greater attention on the educational progress and problems of the 3P.H. Coombs, 'The Adjustment of the Educational Structure to the Requirements of Economic Development', International Review of Education, 1964, p. 61. ^P.H. Coombs, The World Educational Crisis. 5C.E. Beeby, The Quality of Education in Developing Countries. ^C. Whitehead, Problems of educational growth in under developed countries. XLli South Pacific, which, as Howard Hayden has suggested, has hitherto been an almost forgotten corner of the globe.7 The neglect is undeserved, for during the past two decades there has been a rapid growth in education throughout the various territories of the region. The subject of this study is the development of primary and secondary education in Fiji since World War II. No attempt is made to relate or assess the growth of tertiary education, and mention of it is made only in so far as it has a bearing on formal schooling. The general aim is to examine and account for the nature of Government education policy, and to highlight the difficulties that have been experienced over the post-war years. In any work of this nature it can justifiably be argued that there is a debatable value judgment written into the entire exercise.
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