the interest of labor and of Government authorities in adult education has persisted and increased.

Arthur Greenwood states that the British committee of the ministry of reconstruction on adult education, which reported in 1918found it impossible to consider adult education apart from those social and industrial conditions which determine to a large extent the educational opportunities, the interests, and the general outlook of men and women. The committee pleads that "adult education and, indeed, good citizenship depend in no small degree upon a new orientation of our industrial outlook and activities."

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Instead of neglect of the worker, and a tacit admission of his inferiority, there is a recognition of the rightful claims of the personality of the worker in industry and of the justice of his plea for "industrial democracy." 1

British and American progress.-Commenting on the program of the British Labor Party and on the American labor programs, Robert W. Bruere says:

The relevance of these programs of political and industrial reconstruction is that they express the judgment of the most influential body of workers in England and America as to the practical means that must be adopted to make the realization of their program for the democratization of educational opportunity possible. The growing prestige of the fourth estate is the characteristic fact of our generation.

He discusses the claim that labor is too radical, and concludes: Men who dream of the democratization of knowledge, of science and the liberal arts, as the chief end of civilized government will not ruthlessly destroy the recognized material foundations of civilized life. Rather they will seek to strengthen those foundations and broaden them. For it is their eager and instinctive hunger for the spiritual values of life that principally accounts for their growing insistence upon the democratic principle of industry, for the humanization of industrial processes, for the more equal distribution of the benefits that accrue from the national surplus. Their programs of political and social reconstruction are inspired by their realization that it is only when men are guaranteed equality of educational opportunity that any man can be certain of access to the spiritual banquet of life.

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The test of governmental capacity will increasingly be the ability of those in positions of authority to find ways and means for the democratization of educational opportunity.2

Interest in cultural education. In the United States it has frequently been assumed that the workman's interest in education was largely utilitarian; indeed, it has been considered desirable that school, college, and university curricula should be "more practical"; that the teacher, the clerk, the business man would take extension courses only when they would prove of advantage in "getting on," of immediate pecuniary use, or at least capable of eventual translation into material success. An opposite conclusion may be the right one. It may be that the average man and woman in this country, even the so-called uneducated workingman, may be desirous of educational opportunity of quite another kind. In England such

1 Development of British Industrial Thought, Atlantic Monthly, July, 1919.

2 The New Nationalism and Education, p. 181, by Robert W. Bruere, Harper's, July, 1919

seems to be the fact, for that is the observation of Mr. Fisher, father of the English education bill, who says:

I notice also that a new way of thinking about education has sprung up among more reflecting members of our industrial army. They do not want education in order that they may rise out of their own class, always a vulgar ambition; they want it because they know that, in the treasures of the mind, they can find an aid to good citizenship, a source of pure enjoyment, and a refuge from the necessary hardships of a life spent in the midst of clanging machinery in our hideous cities of toil.1

No doubt Americans owe their interest in cultural education to much the same causes as do the English, but certainly not to class contentedness. American workmen do have the "vulgar ambition" to rise, and they are recognizing the importance of both practical and cultural education as aids to their individual enterprise.

Mr. Fisher adds, with reference to the features of the English education act which fix certain attendance limits and educational standards:

We argue that the compulsion proposed in this bill will be no sterilizing restriction of wholesome liberty, but an essential condition in a larger and more enlightened freedom, which will tend to stimulate civic spirit, to promote general culture and technical knowledge, and to diffuse a steadier judgment and a better informed opinion through the whole body of the community.

Herbert W. Horwill states that there is unanimous testimony that the Workers' Educational Association presents a spectacle of intellectual energy and enthusiasm which finds no parallel among the leisure classes.2 The association aims at the satisfaction of the intellectual, esthetic, and spiritual needs of the workman student and thus gives him a fuller life.

George Edwin MacLean wrote, in 1917, with reference to both the English and American attitude toward education:

To-day the demand of the workingman, which can but perpetuate university extension and which is full of hope for democracy, is for something more than “bread and butter" education. It is a call for a liberal or human education, which is not so much "a means of livelihood as a means of life."3

He appends to his discussion of the English movement some pertinent questions:

The American workingman has had faith in his schools and has trusted especially the colleges and universities. Has not the time come for the labor organizations to strengthen their membership, and particularly their leadership, by courses of study conducted in connection with these institutions with the impartial spirit of truth believed to be preserved in them? May not these organizations assure the perpetuation of the federation of labor and of higher learning in America?

1 From quotation, p. 79, Bull. Bu. of Educ., 1919, No. 9, Education in Great Britain and Ireland, by I. L. Kandel.

2 The Nation, May 10, 1919.

3 Studies in Higher Education in England and Scotland, by George E. MacLean, U. S. Bu. of Educ., No. 16, 1917.

Nietzsche. It would be instructive to compare with the liberal estimates of education now prevalent in Europe and America some of the pre-war opinions of continental statesmen and educators. It is perhaps unfair to quote from Nietzsche, but some of his startlingly wild and bizarre statements afford by contrast an illuminating opportunity for securing perspective in estimating the significance of present-day conceptions of education and democratic university extension. J. M. Kennedy, in the introduction to a translation of Nietzsche's "The Future of Our Educational Institutions," says:

Nietzsche's idea was "that a bread-winning education is necessary for the majority," but "true culture is only for a few select minds which it is necessary to bring together under the protecting roof of an institution that shall prepare them for culture, and for culture only."

Nietzsche says:

Why this education of the masses on such an extended scale? Because the true German spirit is hated, because the aristocratic nation of true culture is feared, because the people endeavor in this way to drive single great individuals into selfexile, so that the claims of the masses to education may be, so to speak, planted down and carefully tended, in order that the many may in this way endeavor to escape the rigid and strict discipline of the few great leaders, so that the masses may be persuaded that they can easily find the path for themselves-following the guiding star of the States.1

The philosopher writes:

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I have long accustomed myself to look with caution upon those who are ardent in the cause of the so-called "education of the people" in the common meaning of the phrase. * They were born to serve and to obey; and every moment in which the limping or crawling or broken-winded thoughts are at work shows us clearly out of which clay nature molded them and what trade-mark she branded thereon.2 He talks about "a natural hierarchy in the realm of the intellect." His conclusion is:

The education of the masses can not therefore be our aim, but rather the education of a few selected men for great and lasting works.3

THE WAR AND EDUCATIONAL EXTENSION.

The war has profoundly affected liberal opinion in every country. People have come to think less provincially. Not only have Americans been introduced to the international point of view-an introduction that has not yet ripened into thorough familiarity-but more significantly, as far as education is concerned, they have acquired a deeper realization of national unity. Proposals for reorganization of our educational system are no longer mere suggestions; they bid fair to find increasingly substantial expression and to shape legislation for the purpose of vitalizing local administration and re

1 Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Future of Our Educational Institutions, translated, wita introduction, by J. M. Kennedy. T. N. Foulis, Edinburgh, 1909

2 Ibid., p. 74.

8 Ibid.,

p. 75.

moving the inequalities of educational opportunity in the various sections of the country.

During the war the idea that the whole nation spiritually, physically, industrially was on the firing line, rather than the soldiers alone, was thoroughly driven home. It has not, however, been widely recognized that the means of enforcing this idea, that the propaganda to win the war, was actually a wholesale adoption of educational extension methods. All the instruments and devices laboriously created or appropriated by the university extension movement during the last decade were utilized to mobilize public opinion and to teach the soldiers, sailors, and industrial fighters, and to train them in the practical technique necessary to make their blows effective against the opposing forces.

War-time education.-The war emergency revealed the necessity for the education of the people of the United States in the purposes, causes, and results of various policies of the Federal Government and of our allies and enemies as well. Some of the Federal bodies created for war purposes, such as the War Industries Board, the War Trade Board, the Fuel Administration, the Food Administration, and the Committee on Public Information, undertook and carried on through their own organizations in the States, through cooperating State agencies which they found in existence, and through private organizations, energetic and more or less effective campaigns of education along the lines of political and economic theory and practice. The War and Navy Departments, the Emergency Fleet Corporation and other Federal agencies planned, created, and conducted special training schools along industrial and vocational lines. In the educational war work of all kinds the State educational systems and the institutions of higher learning, both technical and academic, contributed equipment, direction, and a large proportion of the experienced teaching personnel.

New educational projects.-Dr. A. J. Klein says:

During the war the permanent educational institutions merged their efforts with those of less experienced persons and organizations which entered the field temporarily and in many cases without distinct consciousness of the real educational value of the work to be done. The result has been a very greatly increased interest in and knowledge on the part of the public of educational extension needs in the United States. From the realization of these needs, some important projects and proposals for Federal aid and encouragement to various lines of educational work have come from permanent educational forces with technical experience and knowledge of educational administration and methods. But many of the projects proposed have come also from persons and organizations with little understanding of the practical questions involved and with still less experience in continuous educational work. Some of those educational projects have already been started by departments of the Federal Government, and estimates looking to the continuance of the new work have been embodied in their appropriation bills or in special laws.

Confusion. In some lines work has been undertaken and is being carried on independently by several departments of the Government. This has brought confusion and uncertainty to the permanently established State educational agencies. As one State superintendent of education expressed it, "I should welcome any kind of assistance and aid, as would every school officer, providing we may know 'Who is Who,' and not be compelled to be looking now to this authority and now to that authority for advice and counsel." This confusion has arisen from the eagerness of Federal departments to serve the country, from the great demand and urgent necessity for educational work, and from failure to form the educational program in cooperation with and to meet the needs of those who are in the States now charged with the responsibility of educating the boys and girls and adults whom Federal educational enterprises wish to reach.

Many of those educational projects have for their purpose the instruction and assistance to better citizenship of persons, minors and adults, not regular attendants at the public schools or institutions of higher education. The war educational program was most concerned with this class of persons. In peace time the university extension divisions of the States had been formed for this very purpose and when the war came they had had years of experience, much material and many practical, well-developed methods to meet the new pressure.

Demand for a Federal program.—It was natural, therefore, that the State extension divisions should take a most prominent part in educational war work. A review of the extent to which their resources were thrown into the work and a list of the leaders whom they contributed would show how important the expert service of the university extension divisions in the States was in furthering the war program.

It is also natural that the university extension divisions of the States should be interested in the steps that are taken to make certain features of this war work permanent, and that they should insist on a Federal program for after-the-war educational activities among the persons whom it was their business to instruct during peace times. The university extension divisions have the experience and knowledge needed to carry on such work, and, since they are permanently established in the State educational systems, the burden of carrying on the labor of the programs inaugurated by enthusiastic and well-meaning persons will ultimately fall upon the extension divisions in large part, or require the setting up of duplicate administrative machinery. If it is impossible in the present situation for them to have a determining voice in choosing which of those educational burdens shall be prepared for their shoulders, the minimum of assistance and knowledge which they demand is that the Federal Government establish some agency for keeping them informed of educational extension activities in other States and of the resources, aids, and agencies in the Federal Government itself which are at their disposal.

Federal aid.-For agricultural extension Federal aid has been provided most liberally, but no provision has been made for other important fields of extension work. Training and instruction of adults and others in subjects of civic and cultural value, in their professions, trades, and vocations, must not be neglected if we are to maintain intelligent Americanism. Proficiency in their work, knowledge of the latest advances in their lines of endeavor, understanding of the constantly fresh National and State and community problems, training for good citizenship of town and city inhabitants are as essential to the preservation of the prosperity and well-being of the agricultural classes and of all other classes in the Nation as is the education of the farmer himself. For vocational education Federal aid has been provided through the Board of Vocational Education, and the board desires to utilize the university extension agencies in the States in the promotion of certain phases of vocational training.1

1 Excerpts from mimeograph bulletin, "Summary Statement of Educational Extension," by Dr. A. J. Klein.