§ MR. M. HEALY (Cork)I beg to ask the Chief Secretary to the Lord Lieutenant of Ireland if he will state, as bearing on the effect of the new rule (No. 8) of the Board of Intermediate Education in Ireland, the number of junior grade students who passed in June, 1890, being in their 13th year on the 1st June, 1890; the number in their 14th year on the date mentioned; the number of junior grade students who have sent in their names for the forthcoming examination in June, 1891, and who will be in their 13th year on the 1st June, 1891; those who will be in their 14th year on said date; the number of middle grade students who passed in June, 1890, and who had either attained or were under 15 years of age on the 1st June, 1890; and the number of middle grade students who have sent in their names for the forthcoming examination in June, 1891, and who will either attain or be under the age of 16 years on the 1st June, 1891? I beg also to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether it has hitherto been customary for students in the junior grade at the Irish Intermediate Examinations to make it a four years' course by increasing the number of subjects each year; whether, by No. 8 of the new rules of the Board of Intermediate Education in Ireland, teachers, and second year students in the junior grade, have been compelled, at six weeks' notice, to choose between entering for this year's examination, and thereby surrendering the chance of passing with honours in a future year, or to forfeit the whole results of last year's study by postponing their examination till next year; whether the rule operates with similar hardship in the middle and senior grades; and whether the operation of the rule will be postponed for two years, until it can only affect students who have had the benefit of a two years' course in the new preparatory grade? Whether the right hon. Gentleman is aware that No. 8 of the new rules issued by the Board of Intermediate Education 495 in Ireland has caused great dissatisfaction amongst the teachers and pupils concerned, and is likely to work great mischief and injustice; whether the rule in question is the result of, and the necessary consequence of, the new "preparatory grade," now for the first time introduced, and which is intended to take the place of the junior grade for the youngest class of students; whether as it now stands the rule will next year and afterwards affect students who this year pass a second time in the junior grade, who though they never got the benefit of the "preparatory grade," will thus be treated as if they had; and whether the Board will, by postponing the enforcement of the rule, for at least two years, prevent it from affecting retrospectively students so situate? I also beg to ask the right hon. Gentleman whether, under No. 8 of the new rules of the Board of Intermediate Education in Ireland, a student who passes this year a second time in the junior grade will be precluded from afterwards passing in that grade, though hitherto he might have passed in that grade four times; whether, accordingly, a student in his 14th year who this year passes in the junior grade for the second time will next year, though then only in his 15th year, be compelled to enter for the middle grade, which is intended for students in their 17th year; whether the rule operates in an analogous way on students for the middle and senior grades; and whether, owing to this, teachers and students are placed in a position of great embarrassment, their plan of study for the past year having been based on the assumption that the existing rules would not be altered, and this rule being now pub-ished for the first time six weeks before the coming examination?
§ MR. A. J. BALFOURThe Assistant Commissioners of Intermediate Education report that the number of junior grade students who have sent in their names for the June, 1891, examination, and who will be in their 13th year, are as follows:—Boys, 312; girls, 66. Those in their 14th year are as follows:—Boys, 687; girls, 181. By Rule 8 (1892), students who may pass the examination in the present year in the junior grade, 496 and who have previously passed, are precluded from presenting for examination again in that grade. By the same rule a student who has passed in the middle or senior grade prior to 1892 cannot present for examination again in the grade in which he has passed. Petitions for the postponement of the operation of the rule will be before the Board at their next meeting. The Assistant Commissioners of Intermediate Education report that from letters which have been received by the Board it would appear that some teachers and students are dissatisfied with the date at which Rule 8 will come into operation. The rule in question is not the result of, and the necessary consequence of, the new preparatory grade. It was adopted by the Board independently of consideration of a preparatory grade. Students who may pass the examination this year a second time in the junior grade cannot, under the rule referred to, afterwards present for examination in that grade. Petitions for the postponement of the operation of the rule will be submitted to the Board at their next meeting. A student who has completed his course in the junior grade in his 14th year, and has not obtained an exhibition, is not compelled to proceed at once to the middle grade. Neither, under similar circumstances, is a student who has passed the examination in the middle grade compelled to proceed in the following year to the senior grade.