recognized as so important a personality in the national life that in this time of stress and strain she has been called to share in the arduous duties of war; she has her place alike in high counsels of National Defense, and with the Red Cross nurses along the far off lines of battle.

From these sure proofs of things done, we draw unhesitating conclusions of things to come. The enfranchised woman teacher will always hold her place in the forefront of every liberation war of humanity, and whether the powers that control human destiny grant her a victory or demand of her a sacrifice through a defeat, she will never fail in the face of opportunity to fight the good fight and keep the faith.

THE CLAIMS OF SCHOLARSHIP UPON THE NORMAL SCHOOL

BY WILLIAM T. FOSTER President of Reed College

The war has brought out in sharp relief the characteristic short-comings of the schools of the United States. Our people, as a whole, are prone to contentment with mediocrity and avoidance of the discipline of prompt, thorough and exact achievement. In these respects, the schools of the United States reflect the people. Our schools, as a rule, do not make necessary the prompt and complete performance of duty. They do not cultivate the habit of "being there." As challenges to the powers of the majority of the girls and boys of the United States, they are absurdly inadequate. The high school diploma is no guarantee to the employer or to the college that the graduate has ever been required to do his best at anything. In this respect, a college degree is no better. Indeed, it may stand for four years of irresponsible and head-long pursuit of the joys of college life, during which the youth has formed the habit of "getting by" with a minimum of effort.

Thousands of boys in our training camps are experiencing for the first time the necessity of performing assigned tasks promptly and exactly, day in and day out. Thus they are having the benefits, for the first time, of a discipline from which there is no escape. All of them know it; and most of them enjoy it. They would be the first to acknowledge that they would be far better off now, had they been obliged, throughout their school days, to toe the mark.

The teachers of the schools and colleges of the United States, themselves, as a rule, products of easy-going institutions, are not likely to make the rigorous demands that are neecssary for the cultivation of character. When they do begin to tighten the screws, objections are raised at once by parents and politicians. Students themselves do not offer serious difficulties. In the long run, they prefer the hardest task-masters.

con

This school contentment with work half done is reflected in cur industrial world. What sternation there was in all our laboratories where accuracy is imperative as soon as the supply of instruments from Germany was cut off.

SHALL THIS COUNTRY ECONOMIZE FOR OR AGAINST ITS CHILDREN?

BY JULIA C. LATHROP

Children's Bureau, Department of Labor, Washington, D. C. The ultimate treasure and resource of any people is its young life-the only surety of the continuance of the race. Slowly we have arrived at certain measures of protection for those under sixteen by compulsory education laws, by child labor laws, by mothers' pension laws, and now by a national child labor law.

Ad

It is not too much to say that the first effect of war is to threaten all such standards; it may suspend or destroy them all, so that now in the beginning it is exceedingly important that we should face squarely the risk before us. mittedly our standards of life, including those of child protection, are higher than those of Europe. The important consideration is the attitude of the public mind toward the preservation or loss of these standards.

It is especially noteworthy that England has not permitted any lowering of the age limits for factory work. Its exemptions for farm labor by children have been considerable in certain localities, yet continually opposed in others and in some districts no exemptions have been allowed.

The countries which have borne the brunt of the war have indeed sacrificed the schooling of children to their evident injury. This year, however, notwithstanding the increasing exhaustion of the war, England and France have taken determined measures to restore or to improve their old standards. In England, the Board of Education has demanded a budget, the largest in the history of English education, with the purpose of raising teachers' salaries, restoring school buildings to school use, and increasing school efficiency.

It is inspiring to know that certain younger countries have from the first refused any sacrifice of children's rights to education. This heroic struggle to protect the schooling of children.

in countries so desperately involved in war as are France and England, this brave insistence upon no reduction by the colonies which have sent men so freely and generously to the aid of England are in strange contrast with the spirit of the law passed by the largest state in this country permitting the school year to be curtailed five months; in strange contrast to the specious willingness to let children do their bit; in strange contrast with the suggestion that the Federal child labor law shall

be suspended or repealed before it goes into op

eration.

Today as never before, it is certain that the public school teachers of America have an unparalleled power to guard the nation's children and to mold public opinion so that this country will insist that the schools shall gather momentum during this period of war in order that they may better cope with the inevitable disturbance of orderly life which war entails.

Secondary agriculture has had a remarkable development in the last decade. While in 1901 there were only 19 high schools teaching agriculture, recent reports show 4,665 such schools with over 90,000 pupils. There are now 68 special secondary schools of agriculture with 6,301 pupils. State aid is given to high school agricultural departments in about fifteen states.

Two viewpoints have been emphasized, the informational or cultural and the vocational. The latter has gained in relative importance. The informational idea lacks sufficient motive and fails. to give vocational training.

Some leaders insist upon special vocational schools as necessary for this work, and these have been established in several states. However, there has been growing tendency to regard the public high schools as best fitted to develop such work. Special schools tend to set up a double system of education which should be opposed in the secondary schools. Academic or general training and vocational or special education tend to strengthen each other when organized in the same school for the same pupils. Democracy demands a unified. plan of universal education.

In secondary agriculture several things have come to be fairly well agreed upon as to the character of the work. As the vocational view has gained favor, the project has come to be demanded as the most essential feature. Successful project work demands that the agricultural teacher should be employed for an eleven-months year.

There

has also been an increasing demand that teachers. of this work should have the équivalent of a fouryears' agricultural college course with adequate professional training. Twelve states now require this. There is further a tendency to demand that pupils shall give approximately half of their time to distinctly vocational work.

Two classes of projects have developed-school

or group projects and home or individual projects. The home project is more essential, but this is greatly stimulated by the school project. The school plot is a valuable school project. It should not, however, be undertaken without certainty of good summer care, and it should not be made too large. Thirty-eight out of ninety departments in Wisconsin operated school plots last year. The school farm offers many difficulties and should not usually be undertaken in high school departments.

Among successful school projects aside from the school plot, are the following: Steer fattening, keeping dairy cows, cow testing, poultry work, shop work and construction of all kinds of farm buildings. The school plot should be used for crop production, demonstrations, illustrative material and out-of-door experiments.

Home projects have included practically every phase of farm practice that can be carried out on the home farm or garden.

Exhibits and contests have been very generally carried out in connection with rounding up the projects. A state stock judging contest has become an annual event in Wisconsin. Young People's Agricultural Departments are maintained in several state fairs, including Wisconsin and Minnesota. The annual school fair is most important of all.

Considerable extension work has been carried on, but experience has shown it must be very tactfully done. It is best to develop this work first through the practical work of the pupils in school. Systematic class-room instruction and teaching in the laboratory and the field are being linked up with the practical work.

There is great need of improvement in all the lines, but this work in the secondary schools is, nevertheless, doing more to help in the rural problem than perhaps any other agency.

THE DEMOCRATIC TREND IN SCHOOL
ADMINISTRATION

BY MARY D. BRADFORD
Superintendent, Kenosha, Wisconsin

It has been said that the cure for the evils of democracy is more democracy. The popular definition of democracy suggests how "more democracy" may be secured: First, by making the government of the people a government by more of the people; and, second, by making it a government for more of the people.

The trend in educational affairs parallels this two-fold trend in civic affairs. First, the administration of the school system in many cities is being actively shared by more and more people. Superintendents, while realizing the importance of leadership, and the necessity of organization and system, are wisely allowing school principals to exercise initiative in the administration of the affairs of their respective school centres; principals pass this freedom on to the teachers; and, finally, through the school city, and through the use of the socialized recitation, we get the culmination of this trend and the most vital illustration of "democracy in the making."

The second trend, analogous to the second one noted in civil administration, is to make the schools really "for all the people." They must minister not only to the needs of the normal children, but to the special needs of the sickly, the blind, the deaf, the morally and the mentally defective, and must not forget to continue the educational chances of the child-laborer, and the foreign born.

This trend is also seen in the modified courses of study, which break from the grip of tradition and are shaped on truly democratic lines.

THE DEMOCRATIC SIGNIFICANCE OF RECENT EDUCATIONAL MOVEMENTS IN THE COMMUNITY

BY HORACE ELLIS

State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Indiana Movements are more than mere disturbances;

they are deep, grand, irresistible, and look toward efficiency. The Parent-Teachers' Associations furnish a splendid example of the subtle influence at work in this country to break down the barriers that have so long kept home and school apart.

The Little Theatre movement, now so generously protected, guarantees to isolated communities that form of self-expression, and therefore of self-gratification, which the race has always demanded. In semi-religious circles the Chautauqua possesses more than local significance and may well be classed as an educational movement trending strongly toward democracy. Men once permitted nothing to interfere with the creed bias. Today devotion to creed is minimized, and broad charity substituted therefor.

It has ever been, perhaps shall ever be, that the heroic and chivalric occupy large corners in the heart chambers of boys and girls. The Boy Scout movement and the Camp-Fire Girls movement ought to be recognized as among our most val

uable outside assets of the school. Howsoever much these organizations may be decried they furnish, nevertheless, ample guarantee of their permanency by their growing popularity.

Women's clubs, and their attendant literary expression, suggest strongly the advent of real democracy into every American community.

BUSINESS CO-OPERATION WITH EXTEN. SION WORK

BY O. M. PLUMMER Secretary Portland Union Stock Yards Company, Portland, Oregon When the Stock Yards Company appropriated sufficient funds, which was spent through the Oregon Agricultural College, to pay an industrial worker for one year to go out over the state of Oregon and encourage the boys and girls to become interested in club projects, particularly the raising of livestock, it builded better than it knew. This action took place about five years ago. One year later the State Legislature saw the value of this work and made an appropriation which put this extension worker on a general appropriation, handled by the state superintendent of public instruction. This was the beginning of the work in this state, and how well it has been carried on was shown in the recent call made by the President for conservation in connection with the present war. No state responded more quickly than our Own Oregon and none were better prepared.

Hand in hand with this boys' and girls' club work is the activity of the county agricultural agents. Without their organization it would have been almost impossible to get the results in the recent conservation campaign. Only a little over half the counties of the United States now have county agriculturists-five years from now at the furthest will see every county so organized and in most of these assistants will be in evidence. No business house can do itself so much lasting good and so quickly build up the prosperity of their territory as by backing, in every way possible, morally and financially, the activities of the boys and girls and of the county agents. Results may seem to be very indirect, but they are, nevertheless, absolutely sure.

DEMOCRACY-COLLEGE-WAR. KEEPING DEMOCRACY SAFE FOR THE WORLD

BY RHODA M. WHITE

Dean of Women, State College of Washington, Pullman President Wilson has said we are in the war to make the world safe for democracy. This is true and it is well, but the fact remains that a paramount duty confronts us, that of keeping democracy safe for the world. This is where the work of the colleges comes in. If democracy of a kind which should persist and be extended in the world is to exist during and after this great world spasm, then it will be because the fires of idealism have not been allowed to be quenched by blood or money bags.

The spiritual altars of social, economic, intellectual progress must have their fires kept alight, and education must see to it that no torch of idealism,

of vision for the people, shall be thrust for rekindling into spent ashes.

The efforts made by colleges both for their men and for their women at the first great shock of call, were naturally in the direction of the obvious, cooking and knitting for the women, drilling and enlisting for the men. This was necessary and well, but not enough. The great contribution of the college is yet to be made, it is not of leaders in bloodshed, nor yet as martyrs for the salvage of human wrecks, but as staunch resisters of the subtle inroads of sordid and materialistic thinking,

as guardians of the social and industrial gains of years, saviors of the souls of the people through clear vision.

The colleges of the nation are custodians of democracy in a peculiar sense of this wartime. Administrations and students must recognize this, must give democracy such interpretation as shall guarantee that democracy shall be safe for the world. Other institutions there are whose oppcrtunity it is to steady a dizzy world, but colleges are unique in their advantage and in their responsibility.

Because of this worst of world wars, it has been repeatedly asserted that religion has failed. Everything has failed to prevent this war. Up to this hour everything has failed to stop it. Why has religion been singled out as the great failure? Because it had been hoped that faith and hope and love would rid men and nations of the selfishness and hate that causes war.

Out of this terrible struggle one issue clearly appears-War and religion are incompatible. They are at war. Better than this, the intelligent religious forces of the world have not lost heart. They are steadily gaining in faith and power and consciousness of brotherhood.

The horrors, the insanity of war is being hammered into the minds and hearts of the world. The possibility of alliance-world alliance-the actuality of world co-operation in human efforthas prepared.

There is no more frontier anywhere. Pioneer homes are past. Individual and community standards can no longer be maintained. Steam, electricity, increasing intelligence along with increasing wants, force us to become citizens of the world. Under these circumstances nothing short of universal standards make the world a safe place in which to live. Life is our great interest. The abundant life ought to be our supreme con

cern.

Self-preservation is the first law of nations as well as of nature. The causes of the conflicts between men and nations are differing and changing conceptions of the nature of the self to be preserved.

The fundamental likenesses among men and nations is their ability and disposition to purpose, to aim to project themselves into the future. The fundamental difference between men and nations is the difference between the kinds of selves they project into the future.

Preparedness means getting ready to achieve the self projected into the future.

National preparedness for war or peace implies material resources-food, clothing, shelter; other sources of power than our bodies-steam,

electricity, dynamite; machines to direct and employ these powers quickly and efficiently.

Material resources are not enough-these must be in the hands of intelligent persons. But intelligence is not enough. Intelligent persons may use material resources for destruction as well as for life.

It is perfectly evident that there can be no national preparedness without a clear consciousness of national aims and loyalty to these aims. But patriotism is not enough. This was the last vision of Edith Cavell. She said: "Standing in the presence of my God and of Eternity I realize that patriotism is not enough. I must not have hate or spite against any person."

In a world composed of isolated communities. practically sufficient unto themselves, religious, racial or national hate and spite did not destroy the community; but in the present world nothing short of world standards of thought and action. can "make democracy safe."

The fatherhood of God and the brotherhood of all men is the only formula that can insure world peace, but this is the formula of thinking believers. To most people it is as President Wilson said: "a fair but empty phrase." To the poor, sick, suffering strugglers for the bare subsistence of life, this is hollow mockery. It must be translated into the working principles that insure the rights due persons. On this proposition there is substantial agreement. The supreme problem facing democracy is how to make these world life aims conscious, clear and effective.

Education is the only means known. Childhood and youth is the time when this can be done most easily and most effectively. Schools are the present means of doing this.

The problem facing parents, teachers, churchmen and statesmen is how to co-operate in working out economic, effective and complete means and methods for developing the kind of character that will make citizens that will insure a safe democracy.

The public schools of the United States are well on the way. Brotherhood is a fact in most public

schools. Children of different sects, of different races and different nationalities play, eat and work together in peace and harmony. They submit and employ the same standards. If the teachers, parents and statesmen see to it that these standards are moral religious the task is accomplished.

The task is of supreme importance for two rea

sons:

(1) To insure against the pride that goeth before destruction, which is likely to be developed because of our commanding position after this

war.

(2) To help us live in peace and comfort with people of all races. They will be here in America and America will be a world power. For a world power there must be a universal system of values. Only religion can provide such a system of values. WHY VOCATIONAL EDUCATION?

BY MARY SCHENCK WOOLMAN Specialist in Vocational Education, Boston Vocational education is a step forward in democracy, for rightly given, it leads to efficient selfdirected industry. Democracy is not real, however, until everyone has his chance in life. A child is a dynamo of energy when his interest is aroused, as one can see when watching him at a game he has invented. The problem of the school is how to get hold of the latent energy and direct it into worth while channels. "Education is teaching a fellow to work or it is no good." The ranks of the unemployed are filled with those who have had no training for wage earning and who have drifted from job to job until becoming weary of the dull round of work followed by slack seasons without occupation, gradually gave up all effort. Everyone has his niche in which he may become an asset and not a liability. Vocational education finds this ability, trains it, places the worker in a position where he can use it, and follows him up to see if his chance has come, or to show him how to get it.

The youth of the nation feel the urge to participate in active life. Some leave school on account of the economic condition of the family; many go because the school has ceased to attract. Only one-half of the boys and girls who enter the elementary school remain to graduate and 85 per cent. of them leave before they are sixteen years of age. If they go to work they crowd into the unskilled trades and find difficulty in getting ahead. Employers complain of them, not only because they lack skill, but because they have not the qualities which make for success. If they do not work, they crowd the streets, frequent the cheap amusements and soon the home sees that they are no longer of use to it.

The Smith-Hughes Act for Federal aid for vocational education will this year begin to give money to train the boys and girls of the nation for vocational life. The urge of war conditions makes it necessary to use every resource of the nation, and the need of boys and girls in military or civil service makes a special demand upon us at present to develop vocational education in cities and rural communities that our vast number of young

people may be able to give sufficient help to the country.

REED COLLEGE

BY DR. EDWARD O. SISSON Ex-Commissioner of Education of State of Idaho and President-elec of the State University of Montana

All over the country people interested in education are watching Reed College. It is a small college, with less than 200 students; it is far from the supposed centers of science and learning; it is new, having been founded in 1911. Yet everywhere it is talked about by those who are up on educational movements.

As in all such cases false ideas get into people's minds; let us correct a few of the prevalent errors concerning the college. First, it is not a sectarian college; the will of the founder explicitly provides that it shall be forever non-sectarian, permitting all connected with it to affiliate with such religious societies as their consciences may dictate. No sectarian considerations enter into the election of trustees or faculty or the admission of students.

Religion, however, is held to be a normal and wholesome part of human life, hence the college maintains regular religious services-daily chapel and Sunday vesper service-in which all may participate without compulsion, on a broad human

basis.

In the second place, it does not frown on athletic sports; on the contrary, there is probably not another college in the country in which students and faculty so unanimously favor and practice athletic exercises. Everybody plays-from the president,-who is something of a tennis “shark,” down to the youngest freshman. And girls play as well as boys.

It is true the college does not engage in intercollegiate athletic contests, for the reason that experience has shown all over the land that such contests exploit the few and cause the many to be neglected; the athlete gets too much training and exercise; the great majority are encouraged to take their exercise on the bleachers-developing mainly their vocal chords. Contests the college has in plenty, between classes, groups and individuals. There are baseball and football matches, tennis and handball tournaments, field days, cross country runs, and so on through the list.

No one is finally admitted to the college until he has passed the physical examinations to the satisfaction of the college physicians and the director of physical education. Physical health and condition are constantly watched by the college authorities.

Generous provision is made for social life. The residence halls and the hall of arts and sciences are provided with social rooms for all sorts of gatherings of students and teachers and their friends; and these opportunities are used in various ways, for true recreation, but always subordinate to the main purposes of the college. The writer knows of no institution where the relations of the whole college, students and teachers alike, is more human and friendly than at Reed.