His previous appointment had been at the time of World War I and now elevation to the directorship coincided with the outbreak of World War II, a conflict which ended less than a year before his premature retirement in 1946. He was able to proceed immediately with a scheme he had long favoured, replacement of the boys' Central Schools by junior technical schools. The Central Schools…were not physically separate schools, but merely the upper divisions of large primary schools and under the mixed supervision of the superintendents of technical, secondary and primary divisions of the State Education Department. What was needed were separate entities, and these emerged in 1940 as junior technical schools, acknowledged secondary establishments. To help them along, Fenner secured government acceptance of the principle of housing them in separate buildings, of inclusion of machine shops in their facilities and of an eventual extension of schooling, compulsory and non-fee paying, to the age of 16.

However, his final years of high office were scarcely opportune for the fulfilment of any comprehensive educational philosophy that he might have developed. As Director he was immediately beset by shortages of physical resources for education, by loss of personnel to the military services and by a necessary preoccupation with patriotic exercises and voluntary fund-raising campaigns in the schools. Yet even given such extenuating circumstances, it cannot be said with confidence that he had developed any distinctive educational credo, apart from his strong bias towards technical education. In effect, then, his stance and role on educational directions and educational reforms was not remarkable; he appears to have been neither much ahead nor much behind most Australian educational administrators of that era.

For example, leading educationalists across Australia had been pleading for an upward extension of the school age, and Fenner was one of a number of them. As a consistently enthusiastic advocate of that reform, he was not particularly influential in its local realization. Late in 1939 he urged Shirley Jeffries, South Australian Minister of Education, to make a gesture towards raising the school-leaving age by dropping fees at the end of the term in which children reached the age of 15. This, he felt, would particularly stimulate attendance at the vocational type schools. The ministerial reply came promptly and in terms of the prevailing philosophy of a conservative government: 'To approve of the above recommendation would involve a complete reversal of all that I have stood for in connection with these matters: namely that where State services may be availed of by citizens and they can afford to pay some portion of the cost and take advantage of the service, they should be required to do so according to their financial resources.'

Fenner let the matter rest there. Nearly six years later he was able to secure acceptance in principle of 16 as the school-leaving age. But this was a pipe dream; the government had decided in 1942 to raise it to 15 in two stages, and even this modest goal would take years to realize. The move was simply part of a nationwide drive towards extended schooling, and South Australia in this respect was in advance of some States and behind others.

Talk of educational reform in general was very much in the air at that stage, especially in terms of its anticipated pivotal role in the forthcoming era of postwar reconstruction. Fenner moved very much with the times by arguing in 1941 that the moment had arrived for South Australia to adjust to the needs of an increasingly complex civilization, especially by overhauling its old educational structure. His sense of the intellectual and political climate for such an issue was accurate; in the next year as a result of some pressures within the legislature the government established a commission of enquiry into the State's educational system. Although it yielded few immediate important and practical results, the enquiry canvassed vital educational issues in its lengthy existence to 1949, most of them addressed in later times. Asked in 1945 to respond to some of the recommendations of the committee, Fenner lent support to many of its arguments directed towards raising the quality of the State's teaching service, and especially the case for improved salary structures. But he demurred on some of the proposals affecting criteria for recruitment. These included the notion of intelligence tests for entrants and the suggestion that all teacher recruits should reach the level of university matriculation in their general education. Both provisions, he countered, would unduly emphasize intellectual aspects at the expense of the natural talent for teaching. In this stance he reflected the conventional thinking of the education hierarchy. Such a conservative policy on teacher recruitment was consistent with his earlier view on the appropriate priorities in teacher preparation. In his disapproval of some of the training directions favoured by the Principal of the Adelaide Teachers College, in 1941 he had pronounced that too much emphasis was being placed on the university aspect of student teacher training and ordered removal of that emphasis from the departmental circular.

He strongly supported Area Schools. Not only were they the product of the now much favoured rural consolidation of schools, but for him they had the added attraction of offering secondary education not based on the traditional model of the state high schools. Even these later institutions were the target of his attention and he was able to secure for them curricular modifications to temper their academic emphasis; their programs were to include art, craft and manual training 'without loss of their present prestige as gathering grounds for potential university students'. While diluting a little the academic schools, he was able to raise the status of the junior technical schools by supporting the claim to bring their teachers' salaries into line with the levels paid to high school staff.

Staunch technical education advocates such as Fenner were obliged in Australia to come to terms with the increasingly fashionable case against early specialization. His attitude was put to the test in 1941 in the concern which had arisen over secondary school students commencing commercial courses in their first year. Fenner argued that sound educational practice required the delay of specialization until after the first two years of secondary schooling. If this was not practicably possible in all cases, then the department should stand firm at least on delaying subjects such as shorthand, typing and bookkeeping until after the first year. These subjects he regarded as purely vocational training. Such a category did not include, in his opinion, domestic arts, manual work and art and craft, all of which, he had always maintained, possessed pedagogical rather than merely vocational merit.

The decision accordingly to drop the avowedly vocational subjects at the early secondary school stage met with opposition. The Superintendent of Secondary Education argued against the change and representatives of school parent committees gave it a hostile reaction. Their principal objection to the move was that it would tempt parents to transfer them to non-government commercial colleges to secure the two years of vocational training they wanted. The alternative, to spend more than two years at secondary schools to include such training, would impose an unfair burden on poorer families. Fenner stood firm in resisting all counter contentions. Nor did he flinch at the irony of rejecting the argument of the Superintendent of Secondary Education that the commercial subjects in question could be regarded as having intrinsic educational value—a case strikingly similar to his own much reiterated view of technical subjects. In his stance he cited the worldwide trend to postpone specialization in education. But he also addressed the socioeconomic issue underlying the dispute. The financial burden on parents, he insisted, would now be greatly alleviated by the federal government's scheme of child endowment, thus making it economically possible for parents to keep children longer at school. Moreover, the children themselves had to be protected; it was 'little more than exploitation on the part of parents and employers to subject children of such tender age to vocational subjects in order that they may commence to earn money at an early date'. In his resolve not to be diverted from the change Fenner had the strongest encouragement from his minister, who had frequently discussed the policy with him, had independent and firm views on the matter, and took the sole responsibility for its implementation.

Such victories were not frequent during Fenner's directorship. As far as administrative leadership there was added to successes a mix of frustration and failure. In terms of organizational affairs he made some advances, especially with the inspectorate, a body which was the key element in operating all the Australian State educational bureaucracies. Fenner concentrated on ushering his school inspectors into a role of inspirers rather than examiners, as in the past. He led them on a deeper and wider thrust into professional reading to suit this preferred emphasis, and utilized their talents to a unprecedented extent by including them on newly created departmental curriculum boards. Yet there were flaws and contradictions in the changes. He involved inspectors in examination of school financial accounts, thus emphasizing their police role in another direction. He also failed to delegate to them sufficient authority to assume effectively the function of local district leadership in education.

Obviously he did not greatly relish much of the administrative burden thrust upon him. He was oppressed by the multiplicity of routine duties which could not be delegated even though they encroached severely on his scope for planning and broader policy making. He was also restricted in doing what he liked most in the job, visiting schools and discussing with teachers matters of everyday conduct of their affairs; only half a dozen such visits could be managed in his first two years as Director. Compared with his counterparts in other States and countries, Fenner felt clearly disadvantaged; they had, he complained, considerable freedom for reading, discussion, visiting schools and planning developments. This was because many school systems, unlike that in South Australia, had the added position of a Deputy Director, to handle in general numerous administrative chores and to manage affairs during the Director's overseas visits. At first the government was not prepared to accede to Fenner's plea for help. It finally listened when the Public Service Commissioner commented that the burden on the Director was too great to enable him sufficient opportunity to study educational developments, especially those occurring overseas, and that this handicap would best be eliminated by creating a Deputy Director's post. The government acquiesced and made provision for it in an Education Act in 1946, unfortunately too late to be of any benefit to Fenner.

Fenner had complained that the burden was so onerous as to absorb much of his time at home, both evenings and weekends. This, it was claimed, was also detrimental to his health. Indeed he had never been particularly robust, and his doctor was able to certify that he had suffered from a 'deficiency' since childhood [now, in 2006, I (FF) believe that his illness was due to infection with Helicobacter pylori]. The strains of office from 1940 onwards had adversely affected his nerves and his blood pressure. In 1945 he had required hospitalization and a three-month period of leave from work. Hence it was hardly surprising that in May 1946 he should request and receive early retirement. Ill health was a major determinant in his decision to quit, but unhappiness also figured in the resignation. The cordial relationship with his political master which Fenner had enjoyed during the Jeffries regime was not to be repeated with R. J. Rudall as Minister of Education at the end of Fenner's administration. Rudall was inclined to want a more direct hand in running the Education Department and asserted his inclination strongly. The result was that the two men often crossed swords. Fenner finally concluded that it was better to retire at 62 than to carry on in that way for a further three years.

In summary, this brief account of the career of Charles Fenner [as an educational administrator] tells us a little about public life in an era in Australian history. In the dichotomous control of government departments shared by the political head and chief professional officer, there was always considerable potential for the professional to exert an important influence on the evolution of policy…He occupied the top position only briefly and during an international war; he was neither shrewd nor charismatic; and this was not a period in which South Australia could be characterised as a progressive State in matters of public schooling. More than in administration, more than in technical education policy, Fenner enjoyed success and satisfaction in the scholarly world of science. Perhaps the final judgement should be that fate had dealt him an unkind hand; he was a public figure who missed his true vocation.