School Letter

THE PETERITE. VoL. XVIII. OCTOBER, 1903. No. 16z. SCHOOL LETTER. NEW School Year has commenced, with old faces missing and new ones in their places. We welcome Mr. Grigson, who has come to take in hand the music of the School, which post Mr. Senior, who left us at the end of last Easter. Term, filled so adequately. We regret the departure of R. Baldwin, M. H. T. Roy, J, E. Farrow, L. M. Cadle, and P. H. Yeld, whose absence will be especially felt in all School games and matches. The new Carpenter's Shop in the Science Block is now ready for use, and should be greatly appreciated ; there is plenty of accommodation. There are three long benches, each of a different height. so that pupils of all sizes may learn ; there is also a lathe. An instructor comes three nights a week, and on the other nights the shop is always open. A Natural History Society has been started this term, of which there is a short account in these pages. We have also played and won our first match, against Ripon Grammar School, by IS pts. (3 goals and i try) to 5 pts. An account of this match will be seen in our next number. 7 6 PRIZE-GIVING. PRIZE-GIVING. (Taken partly from the "Yorkshire Herald.") The Prizes were distributed this year on July zoth, by the Dean of York. In spite of the inclemency of the weather there was a large gathering of parents and friends. Amongst those present were the Bishop of Beverley, the Rev. Canon Argles, the Rev. Canon Greenwood, the Rev. E. C. Owen, Mr. G. Yeld, and the other members of the Staff. The Dean, in the course of his speech, said it was something to belong to a School which had a past, and that of St Peter's reached back to Saxon times. His own early education took place in a proprietory school, which, like so many more schools of its class, had passed away. They were generally got up by people who took a superficial interest in education, and who knew practically nothing about schools. The influence of teachers and masters was never thought of, and in his school days he never saw a master in the playground. The masters never seemed to have any influence or intercourse with the boys except in school. Such a system was not likely to last, and one was happy to think that a better state of things now existed, and that the public schools and grammar schools throughout the country had taken a fresh lease of life; that a good many of the old abuses had been got rid of, and that the schools were waking up to the necessities of the times. It was gratifying to know that a school like St. Peter's, which was one of the oldest in England, had all the vigour of youth, and the other qualities calculated to place it more and more in the forefront of the schools of England. Those attending that school had a great advantage in the comprehensive education which they were getting. It was a great pleasure to him to take any part in promoting the interests of the school. Although he was not educated there, he thought he might call himself an old Peterite, for his intercourse with the school had been a very close one for twenty-three years. He had been permitted to take part PRIZE•GIVING. 77 in a great deal that had affected the welfare of the school, and if he were not entitled to call himself an old Peterite, he did not know who was. Speaking more directly to the boys, the Dean, alluding to the prizes, said, every one should be stepping stones to some future distinction, and should be spurs, as it were, for the future, and not merely laurels that you have gathered from the past. There are more boys than prizes, but I would say to those who have not got a prize, do not be disappointed or discouraged. No man ever succeeded who did not fail, and if we have not the pluck to bear failure successfully then you may depend upon it we shall never go on to win any successes that are worth the having." Referring to University life, the Dean said he would like to remind them that it had its dangers. Many looked back on it with rleasure and satisfaction, and many with unfeigned regret. He would say to those going up to the University, read the 139th Psalm, which told of the sense of the abiding presence of God with us. "You may depend upon it," added the Dean, " it is needful through life, but in no place more needful than in University life, and •especially in undergraduate life, with all its difficulties and temptations." In Acts xxviii. is, we are told how St. Paul was met by certain brethren, and how he thanked God and took courage He hoped that would be the case with those going from St. Peter's to the University. He looked back with the greatest possible thankfulness that such happy influences were given to him in his own University life. His old friend Chancellor Temple was at the same University. When he went to Oxford as a young man it was a great advantage, though he did not see it then as clearly as he did now, to be received by such a brother as Chancellor Temple, who was in the same college. They rowed together in the college racing boat, and saw a good deal of each other during the whole of their college life, and it was very much by Chancellor Temple's good influence and good example that one was encouraged and helped to meet the temptations and difficulties of undergraduate life. " And so I would say to you," concluded the Dean, " don't be too hasty in making friends and acquaintances ; see that they are brethren in the best sense of the 78 PRIZE-GIVING. word, men who are of a thoughtful and studious character. Don't be alarmed. You won't find they are dull. I never found Chancellor Temple dull. He was a very gentle, quid individual, just as he is now, and there are many others besides." The Rev. E. C. Owen prefaced an outline of the work of the school during the year by saying that the Dean had added another to a long list of kindnesses to the school in consenting to give away the prizes. He regarded that as a family gathering, and who so proper on such an occasion to take a prominent position as the one who had shown himself in a very real sense the true father of the institution ? Having referred to the opening of the science block, the opening of the Morris tube range, which he hoped was the first step towards the formation of a rifle corps, and the scheme for extending the cricket ground, Mr. Owen said the event of the greatest significance in the history of the year had been the inspection of the school by four Inspectors sent down by the Board of Education. There was a sort of impression that the school was coming under Whitehall, and going to be visited by elementary school inspectors. But it was' an entirely different thing to that. About two years ago the Board of Education received from the Privy Council powers to inspect secondary schools, and so far as science teaching went the school would receive fairly continuous visits from inspectors. But the inspection such as they had had during the past term was what was called administrative inspection. Some people might ask why the school was inspected, and what was the good of its being inspected. Well, they could not point to a large cheque as the result. There was no financial and tangible outcome, but he be- lieved it was a most valuable thing. The inspection of secondary schools was going to spread, whether they liked it or not. It might be said they were going to Germanise their education, but he did not think they were. Sooner or later almost all, except perhaps the twenty-five biggest and strongest schools in England, would have to be inspected, and it was better to come in at the beginning, as St. Peter's had done, than to be forced in at the end. Everything depended on what sort of men the inspectors PRIZE-GIVING. 79 were. They were men who had been trained outside the Board of Education as a rule, men of the widest sympathy and education themselves, and they came down, not with cut and dried notions that that school must be forced into a certain groove, but they came to see what work it was doing, what work it ought to do, and to suggest the best ways in which it could adapt itself to the work required of it. They had no idea of assimilating the public schools to the grammar school, nor the grammar school to the higher grade Board School, nor the higher grade Board School to the lower grade Board School. The Inspectors had given their imprimatur on the policy the school had been pursuing, and said it was right to retain the school as only a first grade one, and that there must be no question of attempting to combine first grade and second grade education in one school, because they said in their experience it had always failed, They had not yet received the official report, but they were given to understand they were on right lines, and that the education given was satisfactory and efficient.

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