Educational reconstruction

CONSIDERABLE importance attaches to some of the schemes which various provinces in India are formulating tentatively or as permanent reforms in their systems of education. Bihar, as we saw the other day, has started an important experiment in the direction of making the vernacular the medium of instruction in schools. A few government schools have been selected in which the secondary classes have been duplicated, instruction in one section being through the medium of the vernacular and in the other through English as at present. The experiment is to run for three years, results for which period are to be compared to form a basis for conclusions. No doubt, the shortness of the period and the admitted handicap due to the absence of simple textbooks in the vernacular may, it is feared, detract greatly from the value of the experiment. But the Bihar Government certainly deserves credit for launching the experiment, although a system which is universally recognised to be the most natural system of instruction is far too clear in its usefulness to be dragged through the experimental stage. According to the report of the special officer appointed by the Madras Government in connection with the Andhra University Scheme, in that university also, “vernacular is to be the medium of instruction for arts up to the degree course.” The necessity of the inclusions of some sort of vocational training in the curriculum of studies is also felt in some parts of the country. The Madras Education Department has already recognised it and is contemplating schemes for introducing it at suitable stages of school education.