Saltus Grammar School - Yearbook (Hamilton, Bermuda)

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18 GOVERNING BODY Chairman: H. C. BUTTERFIELD, Esq. J. V. MURDOCH, Esq. S. GASCOIGNE, Esq. H. C. E. MASTERS, Esq. D. C. SELLEY, Esq. F. J. GOSLING, Esq., D.F.C. W. F. HAYWARD, Esq., M.B.E. Headmaster: H. J. HALLETT, Esq., M.A. (Oxon.) Secretary-Treasurer: MRS. J. J. SHEEHY F. L. STEPHENSON, Esq. (Senior Master) STAFF F. CAPSTICK, Esq. R. S. ALGER, Esq., D.P.E. C. S. MADDERN, Esq. C. J. ENOCH, Esq. E. R. ROTH WELL, Esq. B.Sc. (Lend.) J. R. BRIDGE, Esq. MISS C. RIDEOUT S. F. J. FARROW, Esq., B.A. (Keele) J. F. R. CRAVEN, Esq., B.A. (Dublin) R. PERKINS, Esq., B.A. A. M. BESTFORD, Esq., B.A. (Sheffield) R. J. SAYLES, Esq., B.Sc. (Durham) A. L. PETTIT, Esq., B.A. (Dublin) M. HUNTER, Esq., B.A. (Cantab) P. S. WELCH, Esq. MISS L. VITY PREPARATORY SCHOOL Headmistress: MISS M. V. EDE MRS. S. SMITH

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17 With the Compliments of J. E. Lightboum Co., Ltd. Wine Spirit Merchants

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19 EDITORIAL The 1 1 + has come to Bermuda. Free education will be supplied in one or other of the schools in the Island which run academic courses to G.C.E. level, to those students who pass the Board of Education ' s examination. The Board has been reticent about the form and content of this examination, but all the primary school children in Bermuda have now taken it and presumably places will be awarded to children who show sufficient promise to lead the Board to hope they may pass a number of subjects at ' O ' level in four years time. A good deal can happen in four years. But there has to be some sort of test if the good are to be separated from the not-so-good, and for many years an 1 1 -|- examination was used in England. This examination, incidentally, is now being replaced in England by a system which is less mechanical and less of a sudden. death play-off. It was felt that it was unfair and inaccurate to judge a child permanently on his performance on two days out of the year, and it was also felt that although an impersonal and stereo- typed test might effectively sort eggs or tins of tomato sauce it was less reliable in sorting human beings. Naturally, most of the pressure to do away with the English 1 1 + came from the parents of those who failed it, but be that as it may an increasing number of Local Education Authorities (equivalent to the Board of Education in Bermuda) now use a series of smaller tests set at intervals over a year or more of each child ' s schooling, the results of which are taken in conjunction with a report from the head teacher of the child ' s primary school. Undoubtedly this kind of assessment will hove completely replaced the old method in England by 1970, and few can doubt that the change will be for the better. However, a move in Bermudian education which aims to make secondary education to G.C.E. levels available to more boys and girls is clearly to be welcomed. It is in the Island ' s interest thot fewer expatriates be imported to do work Bermudians are not qualified to do, and free education for the able but poor should result in a larger reserve of brainpower in the future. Thus the now embarrassingly pressing need to bring in qualified people to teach or administrate will become less acute. The proof of the pudding, though, is in the eating: we shall have to wait and see how the scheme works out. No doubt the Board will find that many adjustments ore needed before they can consider the recipe for this pudding proved.