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ported as required of the girls by the number of schools respectively indicated: Cooking, 32; table service, 34; care of rooms, 35; care of floors and woodwork, 34; laundry, 33; plain sewing, 32; dressmaking, 28; millinery, 7; fancy cooking, 1; preserving food, 1; child care, 1; embroidery, 2; model sewing, 1; art sewing, 4; power sewing-machine work, 1; basketry, 3; knitting, 1; rug or carpet making, 5.

Another measure of the household-arts training of the industrial schools was sought in a statement of the vocations for which the training fitted the girls. Twenty-nine schools reported that the training equipped their students to earn their living as seamstresses, 28 as general houseworkers, 27 as waitresses, 19 as cooks, 19 as dressmakers, 6 as nurses, 5 as laundresses, and 3 as milliners. One school reports that it has provided training in a hospital in child care, so that several of its former students now earn $11 a week as children's nurses.

The general conclusion from the inquiry is that in practically every case the girls who are sent to these so-called reform schools or industrial schools are given an extended practical experience in housework under direction. In two-thirds of the schools some formal instruction in household arts is given, though this "formal training" is not to be interpreted too literally. There are indications of better standards, and what was originally doubtless largely a method of getting the housework of the institution done is coming to be regarded as educational subject matter with important possibilities. One school has recently instituted a graded series of three courses in sewing and dressmaking under a special supervisor. The general practice work in the same school provides one month's work in each of these departments: Cellar, girls' dishes, officers' dishes, wash room, ironing room, girls' cookroom, and officers' cookroom. Another school states the purpose of its training "to make a good homemaker" and knowledge of "some one art sufficiently well to be self-supporting." This school provides a commercial training for girls who are of high-school grade, but all girls take the household arts. The danger in the industrial school is a severe prescription of housework without instruction or inspiration. What is really called for is a curriculum in which the academic elements are given adequate recognition and in which the household arts are approached educationally. The organization of such schools on the cottage system, whereby small groups live in cottages and do the housekeeping much in the spirit of family life, is a related reform. The New York State Reformatory, at Bedford Hills, is typical of the progressive institutions of this latter type.

VII. THE AGENCIES AND ORGANIZATIONS CON

CERNED WITH HOME BETTERMENT.

This division presents the various agencies, other than schools, that are working for popular education and betterment as regards the home; the activities of the Government. Federal and State, in this field; and the various organizations directly or indirectly concerned with home. These include certain agencies that have operated especially in the country, such as the farmers' institute for women, the grange, and rural household demonstrators, as well as other agencies which, originating in cities, are nearly all finding application in rural communities.

Among the chief topics in this section of the report are: The Young Women's Christian Association, settlement work, visiting housekeepers, housekeeping centers or model flats, visiting nurses, the day nurseries, home betterment in industrial communities, vacation training in household arts in summer camps and camp schools, training for the home by the Camp Fire Girls and Boy Scouts, correspondence schools of home economics, libraries and home betterment, journalism for the home, and exhibits and the home. Additional sections discuss the special activities of the Federal Government which concern home betterment-the Department of Agriculture, with its nutrition investigations and food-control work, and the Children's Bureau. The possibilities of scientific study of household problems are outlined in connection with the proposal to have the Government endow the study of household problems in the State agricultural experiment stations.

The last section deals with organizations which directly or indirectly are concerned with home betterment. These include the American Home Economics Association, the League for the Protection of the Family, the International Congress on Home Education and the International Congress for Teaching Domestic Economy, the Mothers' Congress and Parent-Teachers' Associations, National Housewives' League, Associated Clubs of Domestic Science, the International Congress of Farm Women, the Society for the Promotion of Industrial Education, the Society for the Study and Prevention of Infant Mortality, the committee of American Medical Association on public health education among women, National Housing Association. National Consumers' League, National Child.

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Labor Committee, Child Helping Department of the Russell Sage Foundation, the recreation movement, and other organizations. Special mention is made of the Federated Women's Clubs, an organization which is rendering a nation-wide service for home betterment.

This list, it is believed, includes the main organizations and agencies, outside of the work of the schools, which are participating in the home-education movement. In consulting this division, one should bear in mind the fact that in getting a complete view of any field-as, for example, that of the rural home-one must add to the agencies here described the work of the schools, the normal schools, technical schools, and the colleges and the extension work of the latter. Similarly, for any other aspect of home education.

Section 1. WOMEN'S WORK IN FARMERS' INSTITUTES.

The farmers' institute is a one, two, or three day forum or informal local school for farmers, usually organized through some State agency—the agricultural college, experiment station, or State department of agriculture. Women have often attended the institutes, and naturally enough programs for women, either for part time or entirely paralleling the sessions for men, have come to be organized. In 1912-13, the 12 States listed below held separate institutes for women. Institute meetings for women were held in many other States.

TABLE 20.-Farmers' institutes for women.

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In all, in 1912-13, 1,098 separate women's institutes were held, with a total attendance of 84,039, which is a striking advance over the year 1910-11, with 418 institutes with 30,814 in attendance. In addition to these separate institutes for women, separate meetings for women within the farmers' institutes are definitely reported from the following States: Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Montana, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Texas, and West Virginia. In 22 States

at least, therefore, provision for women's meetings in farmers' institutes is made, 12 separately and 10 jointly.

In all, 7,926 farmers' institutes were held in 1913, with an aggregate attendance of 2,897,391; the women's separate institutes were therefore about 13 per cent of the total number, though the attendance comparison is less favorable. Related to the institute work are these other agencies: (1) The movable schools of agriculture and home economics, of which 187 were held in 1913 in 13 States, with an attendance of 85,637; (2) educational trains, of which 25 were run in 1913 in 15 different States, with an attendance of 501,523; (3) fairs, picnics, and conventions, 346 of which, with an attendance of 95,209, were addressed by institute lecturers; (4) institutes for young people from 14 to 18 years of age, which were held in 5 States, with an attendance of 22,100; and movable schools for young people, of which 14 were held, with an attendance of 1,344. These statistics are scarcely complete, since, for example, many institutes and movable schools are held under other auspices than the official institute movement; yet the outlines of this great popular effort to reach farm communities are very evident. In all these enterprises, instruction for the women and girls of the farm is included. Of the 187 movable schools, for example, 50 were for women, and these extended over 362 days, an average of about 7 days each, with an attendance of 11,502. The extension work of the State colleges and universities in their field is described elsewhere. (See Part III of this report, Bulletin, 1914, No. 38.)

The institute itself is generally regarded as a pioneer educational effort, which is to arouse an interest in better methods and in progress. The instructional train, the demonstration, and the movable school, on the other hand, are regarded as agencies for more intensive instruction; especially so the movable school, which provides a week's study of some specific subject, or, as in certain foreign countries, several months' study, then moves on to another community where the course of instruction is repeated. The school requires advance registration, regular attendance, and study; the institute is a mass meeting. The two serve different purposes; both will be needed in the effort to reach the women of the country for better housekeeping, the one to arouse interest, the other to give instruction more definite in character.

Facts as to a few States may be given. The women's institutes of Michigan were begun in 1895, under Mrs. Mary A. Mayo's direction. Her lecture topics will illustrate the scope of early work: Mother and daughter: Making farm work easier; The well-bred child; Home life on the farm; Poultry raising for the farmer's wife;

1 See "One Woman's Work for Farm Women," Buell, Whitcomb & Barrows, Boston,

How to keep the boys on the farm; Mother and the school; The house we live in; The unappreciated side of farm life; The mothers greatest need; Wifehood and motherhood; and Mother and children. The emphasis on the personal and ethical is obvious. Recent programs in institutes have put more emphasis on the technical side of housework and management-food, clothing, and shelter. There is a gain in this in imparting skill in the household arts and popularizing scientific facts as first aids to the housewife. There are evidences, too, of a new emphasis on the ethical, or, as we are likely to say to-day, the social, civic, and personal in home and community relations.

In Illinois there is a very effective "Department of household science" in the farmers' institutes, which has its own officers (Mrs. H. M. Dunlap, Savoy, Ill., president), conducts the institutes' sessions for women, and publishes a yearbook; the University of Illinois cooperates by supplying speakers for from 50 to 80 meetings. The "Yearbook" includes, besides reports, valuable articles, such as the following in 1912: Educating girls for the home; Household economics; Household appliances and conveniences; A balanced ration; The social efficiency of the home; How school work can be more closely related to home needs; and Training the girl to help in the home. A number of menu suggestions are presented, and a study of food values, published by the Illinois State Food Commission, is reprinted. Related to the Illinois institutes is the Illinois Girls' State Fair School of Domestic Science, established in 1898, which is held as a temporary two weeks' school in the women's building at the State fair grounds, Springfield, erected and equipped at a cost of about $30,000 in 1903. Each county sends one representative, or more if there are vacancies; a fee of $10 is charged for board; the students live in the women's building and are divided into groups for its servicemeals, dish wiping, dining-room work, baking. Mrs. S. T. Rorer was the first principal of the school, and Mrs. Nellie Kedzie Jones is the present principal. The building accommodates 102 students, and 101 students were in attendance in 1913. The program provides a lecture daily by a nurse and two food lessons with demonstrations by the principal. The three best students are given scholarships at the State university, and each student is expected to report at her county farmers' institute.

In Oklahoma separate women's institutes are organized under State direction. A course of study covering nine months is provided, and monthly meetings are expected; local leaders are developed; half a hundred circulating libraries of home economics are sent about.

In Florida institutes for women began in 1912-13. They are arranged in various localities by the superintendent of institutes at the State agricultural experiment station; joint sessions for men and

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