Our Schools in War Time—and After

INSTRUCTIONS TO FARM CADETS ENLISTED FOR CAMP-SQUAD SERVICE IN NEW YORK STATE INSTRUCTIONS TO FARM CADETS ENLISTED FOR CAMP-SQUAD SERVICE IN NEW YORK STATE WHAT TO TAKE NECESSARY ARTICLES Bed sack 75 × 30 inches (to be stuffed with straw at camp) or cot mattress; enamel-ware plate, cup, saucer, sauce dish, also knife, fork, and spoon; dinner pail or box, two heavy blankets, small pillow, working clothes, sweater, gymnasium shirt, raincoat or old overcoat, heavy shoes, toothbrush, tooth powder, small mirror, towels, extra socks, rubbers or rubber boots, extra underwear, hairbrush, comb, soap, handkerchiefs, pajamas, a good disposition, and a spirit of loyalty to the camp and its aims. DESIRABLE ARTICLES Musical instruments, camera, baseball, glove, bat, needles, thread, safety pins, notebook, pencils, writing paper, envelopes, good books, magazines. The methods of housing the boys differ widely. Ordinarily one thinks of tents as being the most feasible, but the scarcity and high cost of such equipment during the past year prevented the boys from living under canvas. Generally speaking, it would be better to think in terms of something more permanent than tents, as these do not last more than three years, and if the camp idea of harvesting crops by the use of boys is to continue,—and many believe it will,—it is advisable to plan for a permanent and inexpensive type of building. A rough board shack with a good roof is highly desirable in the early spring days and in the late fall. Many of the cadets in New York State camps were quartered in berry houses (which are really packing and storage houses located in the berry fields), in vacant houses, in schoolhouses, in grange halls, and in buildings located on the fair grounds. Most of these berry houses were two stories high, the first floor being used for the commissary department and the second floor for dormitories. In such cases the berries were packed in temporary shacks adjoining the berry houses. In other cases the boys have used the first floor for a sitting room and built a rough shack back of the berry or storage house for kitchen and dining room. One of the most significant camping places was that of a two-room schoolhouse, where cots for fifty boys were put into the rooms, and the basement was used as a kitchen. The boys built a table outside and put up a canopy over it for a dining room. They next dammed up a brook which ran back of the schoolhouse and made what they termed a "bathtub," which was capable of holding about six boys at a time. They also put into fine condition the rather disreputable schoolhouse latrines. These boys made the schoolhouse ring at night with their popular school songs; the old piano did its best to bring together the heritages of the East Side and of the Highlands of the Hudson. There are several ways of making provision for camp equipment. One is to develop, under state, county, or local auspices, a series of permanent camp quarters located in small-fruit, large-fruit, and muck-land districts. This equipment need not be expensive. It will be located very near the source of labor demand and can always be used, whether boy or adult labor is employed. Fruit and produce growers and kindred establishments have in the past provided, more or less, for such an equipment. Another plan is to use schoolhouses, grange halls, vacant farm buildings, and agricultural-fair equipment. It is unfortunate that so much property ordinarily used for public purposes lies idle for long periods of time. Some may say that the city boy will not leave country property in good shape, but experience so far has shown that the city boys have left things better than they found them. Still another type already spoken of is tentage, and perhaps the best way to provide such an equipment is to have the state furnish it through the adjutant general's office. The sanitary aspects of any type of camp are highly important. In Massachusetts the committee of public safety, which established boy camps, required that the sanitary conditions of these camps should be inspected by the board of health, and the committee furnished full directions and a blue print for the building of a sanitary latrine. Some of the camps burn their garbage in home-made incineration plants. Ordinary garden hose with a watering-pot sprinkler attachment, or an elevated barrel with a sprayer attached, and filled by the use of a pail and ladder, were shower-bath devices worked out by the boys in various camps. All the camps devised some method of keeping food cool, ranging from those that had a real city ice chest down to those that cleaned out a spring and set in it a bottomless, covered box. The job of feeding boys in camp is not a sinecure. Every scheme has been tried, from engaging at a salary of one hundred dollars a month a Pullman dining-car chef down to, or shall it be said up to, a boy cook. The cook problem in a labor camp is as difficult to handle as is the so-called "servant" problem of the city. The average cook knows more about cooking than he does about dietetics. He is very likely to lack adaptability. He is usually untrained for camp cooking and is not particularly open to suggestions. Experience seems to show that the best cook is the one who has done work in a Y.M.C.A. camp or in a Boy Scout camp. Of course, this year there was a great scarcity of the latter class to be found, as they were needed in their own organizations, and therefore many camps were obliged to employ a local woman of the matronly type to cook for the boys; sometimes an experienced camp leader has developed some good cooks among the boys in camp. Perhaps the best results, however, were obtained from boys who before the opening of camps were given from two to four weeks of camp-cooking instruction in the school system from which they came. These boys were ready to use the products of the localities, such as peas, beans, tomatoes, radishes, lettuce, and corn, while the professional cook often seemed more familiar with the use of the can opener. The quantity and variety of food was practically in the hands of the boys themselves, assuming that the cook was a good one. If the allowance of fruit for breakfast, for example, consisted of four prunes or one banana or half an orange, and the group as a whole desired a larger portion, it was perfectly possible for them to secure it by so voting, for it must be remembered that the food expense of the camps was divided pro rata among the boys. Under these conditions, however, it was found that the boys were very economical and frowned upon the few malcontents who wanted to gorge themselves. The cafeteria style of serving prevailed generally. Providing amusements in recreation camps is always a problem, but farm cadets require little in the way of entertainment after eight or ten hours of field service. Camp-fire talks on agriculture, corn roasts, toasting marshmallows, giving musical entertainments and minstrel shows, holding mock trials, playing baseball on Saturday afternoons or Sundays, constitute the chief forms of recreation. In every instance the lads have been well received in the local communities. They were popular features at church entertainments, Red Cross benefits, and country sociables. Often the boys, especially in the berry-picking regions, went swimming about 4 P.M. , after the crates had been sent by the afternoon express. In every instance the village church and the county Y.M.C.A. took an active interest in the farm cadets. Many of the boys played musical instruments, and their confidence in themselves was contributory to many supplementary boy choirs. The country pastors evidently made it a point to do what they could for the pleasure of all the boys, and without exception there seemed to be no religious distinctions. In some camps the Catholic priest expressed his fatherly feeling for the lads. In others the Jewish and Catholic boys attended the union village church. In brief, the boys entered into the spirit of the rural life, and both the country folk and the youth of the city were the better for it. A study of the different camps in operation in various parts of the country seems to indicate that they might be grouped under six heads as follows. I. Concentration, or training, camps. These are usually located in agriculturally strategic sections of the state, where boys may receive preliminary training in camp life and in farm work under disciplinary and instructional conditions. Of course such a camp can do nothing more than give the boys a training in the elements of farm activities (such as harnessing a horse, running a hand cultivator, using a hoe, driving a team) and serve as a trying-out period for weeding out boys who are unsatisfactory. These camps cannot be considered places which will give a preliminary agricultural education, for that is very different from giving a preliminary idea of farm operations. After these boys have received a course of such training, they are sent out under leadership to work in a section of the state where a group may work for one farmer and live at the camp meanwhile or may work for individual farmers and live with the employer. Obviously it is taken for granted that such a camp is located in a good agricultural section and that its surroundings have something more than fine swimming holes or beautiful scenery. These boys must be trained in an environment and under conditions similar to the farm life in which they are to participate later. It would seem that the agricultural colleges of the country and the secondary schools of agriculture would, generally speaking, offer splendid locations for establishing training camps. Here would be found, or ought to be found, good land. This is not always true, because occasionally an agricultural college has been located irrespective of good land. The technical and dormitory facilities, however, would be available for the boys in training. II. Farm-working, or labor-distributing, camps. These are concentration camps in a certain sense, but they are located directly in the farm district where the boys, after receiving their preliminary training, are to find work in the community adjoining the camp. Several camps of this order have started out with the idea of giving a preliminary training in agriculture in the camp itself, and have borrowed or bought farming implements and teams and leased land in order to give the training. But in the majority of cases this idea was abandoned, for it was found that these boys could receive all their preliminary training with the farmers, provided the leader of the camp could establish helpful relations between the boy and the employing farmer and could, out of his wisdom and experience, protect the boy in the early stages of the work and guide him in all its stages. In other words, in this type of camp a city man, acting as leader, comes into a community with a group of boys who live at the camp but receive their training with the near-by farmers. A labor-supply camp, composed of able-bodied boys, is a type which adequately meets the need at small expense. III. Military farm-training camp. This is a type of camp where city boys, under the direction of a school or some organization, go into a farming community and open up new land which otherwise would not have been put under cultivation. These boys stay at the camp during the season. They do not work for the farmers near by, or, at least, not ordinarily,—the intention being to establish a self-supporting and self-maintaining camp for the use of the boys who attend. The land is tilled, the seed planted, and the harvest gathered for the benefit of the boys. Any profits are given to the boys or to the school, and any expenses for conducting the camp, or overhead charges, usually come out of the organization or school represented. It is questionable whether, generally speaking, this type of camp is on a sound economic and agricultural basis. If such a camp could be carried on for a number of years with a strong school or other organization behind it, and plenty of capital, it is very likely that it would succeed. It takes capital to establish good soil conditions and purchase tools, farm machinery, and stock, and to put up buildings. It is a highly desirable type of camp to consider in terms of many years or where a school wishes to give its boys a military and farm experience. But in the food emergency through which the country is now passing, it is doubtful if this type of camp should ever have been started. It is, however, an excellent type to establish as a permanent adjunct to a city school system. IV. Coöperative camp where the boys share in proceeds. This type of camp is practically like III, and if the farm land is new and the camp leader is untrained in agricultural operations and the boys are unskilled, it is about as likely to be doomed to failure as is the other. V. The village- or country-school type of camp. This is a camp where the schoolboys, under the leadership of a teacher, go to the outskirts of the village and develop a garden. If the land is good and the teacher knows agriculture and the boys attend to business, they will most certainly receive an excellent practical training useful to them in life. They will have learned how to work in the soil, how to work together for a common purpose, how to stick to a job until it is finished, how to look ahead from the time seed is purchased until the crop is placed in the hands of the customer. All these things are good and they are useful to any boy, but, of course, from the standpoint of increasing the food supply in any large way through the growing of wheat, feed corn, oats, rye, buckwheat, potatoes, and large fruits there is little to be said. The work is to be commended on the basis of its value to the individual boy. VI. Short-term camp, sometimes called "flying squadron". This type of camp is advisable only in an intensive-farming region where quick service for the harvesting period is needed. The squad itself will serve to keep a balance between the demand for labor and the supply. It is easy to picture a fruit region around and through which are a number of camps. Each one ought to be working to the limit, but, of course, as a matter of fact in one section there would be a greater demand for boys than could be met by the local camp. It is at this time that the flying squadron comes in, when, in response to the SOS call, a group of temporarily idle boys from one camp may be sent to another camp which is short of help. CHAPTER XII A SUMMARIZED PROGRAM OF ACTION Out of this war we are going to have a new spirit and method in education. England has already begun to evaluate its present system. It has issued a report on the assistance which education, if properly directed, can give to industry and commerce after the war. The results of a recent investigation afford—so the report states—a convincing proof of the necessity of improving and extending the provisions hitherto made for instruction and training in scientific studies as a necessary foundation for fruitful research. The report goes on to say that, in a sense unknown to former generations, England has become a part of Europe; and in the interest not merely of commerce but of the intelligent conduct of national affairs an adequate knowledge of the languages—and, through the languages, of the literatures, histories, and civilizations of European countries—should be in the possession of a far larger proportion of its population than in the past. It states that particular subjects of instruction in the high schools and institutes cannot be divorced from the consideration of their organization and of their curricula as a whole, if a proper balance of studies is to be secured and if higher education is to be truly liberal and humane in its spirit and influence. It insists that access to the schools must be rendered easier for native ability wherever it is found, and affirms again and again that the needs of the nation cannot be satisfied merely by changes affecting higher education or by a provision of educational facilities confined to scholars of special gifts and abilities. It closes by saying that the future will make new and increased demands, especially in a democratic community, on the health, character, and intelligence of every citizen; and these demands can only be met by comprehensive and far-reaching improvements and developments of elementary education. Military engineering will become a popular and necessary part of the curricula of our colleges and technical institutes. A class in suspension-bridge work at Wentworth Institute, Boston, Massachusetts. Military preparedness of college boys and schoolboys includes other activities than merely drilling. Trench drainage, one of a score of war emergency courses, at Wentworth Institute, Boston, Massachusetts. Returned convalescent soldiers, who would be idle but for the opportunity offered to brush up their education. Ogden Military Convalescent Hospital. A corner of the printing and photo-engraving shop at Manitoba Military Convalescent Hospital, Winnipeg. These men have been assigned to courses of reëducation because of inability to return to their former occupations. The individual-industrial-efficiency idea which we obtained from Germany will have to be interpreted in America not for military purposes, but in terms of personal and vocational service for the nation. Just as the academic militarism of the Old World has been found wanting and has been gradually transformed into the mobilization of all forces behind the lines on an entirely new basis and conception of what may be done by a people in time of war, so we in this country shall learn that we may in times of peace, through efficient and effective living, prepare for defense. In this preparation we may learn that improved elementary education, that vocational training, that bringing into the schools the Boy Scout spirit, that teaching of sanitation and personal hygiene, that organizing our courses on a unit and project basis, that developing systems of student service in school life, that extending school facilities to adults, and a hundred other things which have been thought of as fads and pedagogical idiosyncrasies will, to quote the New York State law relative to military equivalents, "specifically prepare for service useful to the state in the maintenance of defense, in the promotion of public safety, in the conservation and development of the state's resources, or in the construction and maintenance of public improvements." Truly, a program for peace as well as for war. The school board and its executive officer, the superintendent, should do everything to save the school buildings for school purposes. They are literally factories turning out, it is hoped, handmade products; and in time of war their service should be increased rather than diminished. To use them as hospitals will be a mistake,—better by far confiscate department stores. Bring the war into the schools in the spirit already interpreted in preceding chapters, but do not take the schools into the war. Do not eliminate studies indiscriminately. Evaluate if you will,—and this is always well,—but wholesale cutting out is to be avoided. It may be that the cost and value of instruction in freehand drawing will have to be compared with the permanent value of the study of Latin. It may be that instead of adding to the vocational department a machine-shop equipment, which is always expensive, it will be discovered that a coöperative course can be developed, employing the equipment of a neighboring factory, and that all the school need furnish is a teacher for blackboard work in mathematics, drawing, and science. It is likely that a longer school day will be advisable and also a longer school year. It is quite probable that the introduction of the methods of the Boy Scout movement into the public schools will be found superior to some of the present teaching of nature study, recreational work, civics, and conduct. Provision must be made for filling the places of the male teachers who will be drafted. Many of these will be instructors in science and mathematics. It ought to be possible to secure the services of retired civil or mechanical engineers for teaching these subjects. It is feasible to draft into service married women who have once taught. It is to be hoped that the government will eventually recognize that educational enterprise as well as industrial enterprise ought to furnish grounds for exemption. As war comes closer to us provision must be made for keeping the schools open twelve months in the year, and from eight in the morning until ten at night for six days in the week. Every child up to the age of 14 must be kept in school. It is the best place for him, provided, of course, the school rises to its full height,—and it is taken for granted that it will. The physical condition of the younger children especially should be watched very carefully. The teacher should discover the conditions at home. It may be that some pupils have had no breakfast and are not likely to have a suitable lunch or even a supper. Some will have to be fed in the schools, and here is an opportunity for the older girls in domestic-science classes. Some will report certain home conditions that will require that the school make a report to the local Red Cross chapter or some other relief agency. Again there is opportunity for the older girls to serve through their knowledge of home nursing, infant feeding, and first aid. If the war strikes us hard, we may have to think of part-time work for children above 14, but we must never let the children get away from us as they have in England. We must control the exodus. We must not abrogate the existing compulsory-attendance laws and the existing labor laws. We must not interpret these laws with laxity and shut our eyes while the children go by us on their way to work. We may do well to amend these laws if in so doing we can incorporate useful labor into the educative process. In other words, we must be constructive in any part-time measures which are adopted. The educative value of profitable labor need not be lost. It will be well for us to look into the real value of military training for schoolboys before we adopt in a wholesale fashion obsolete militarism. The value of wooden-gunism is questionable. Physical training, vocational training, athletics, Boy Scout work, team play, and discipline are far more valuable. Military drill given in addition to these activities may be advisable. However, on this point there is still a difference of opinion. But to give formal military instruction without considering its adaptability to the methods used in modern warfare and the training incident to effective preparation for them is neither military preparedness on the one hand nor sensible educational procedure on the other. School boards ought to organize at once vocational courses to secure state and national aid, and seek from the legislature state aid for directors of community gardens, as, from now on, these will be a permanent feature of community life. Some sort of provision ought to be made relative to bringing agriculture into the city school or taking the city boy to agriculture. A country branch of a city school is possible. Play and recreation centers must be developed. The increase of juvenile offenses in both England and France during this war has been tremendous. Many of these offenses are committed by children who are still at school. There is much evidence that owing to the absence of military service of their fathers,—and, perhaps even more, of their elder brothers,—the industrial employment of their mothers, the darkened streets, and other circumstances, many school children are suffering from the lack of proper care and discipline and are exposed to serious risks of deterioration. These conditions have been mitigated through the establishment of evening play centers, which provide the children with suitable occupation and amusement after school hours. The principal of a school can play a large part in a war-emergency program. He can develop the idea of War Savings among the children in his school. Announcement has been made that the government intends to develop the War Savings Certificate plan of England. These certificates are perhaps better adapted to persons of small means than a Liberty Bond. The United States Treasury Department has set forth a plan for advertising and selling these certificates through the public schools of the nation. The aim is to have every pupil an owner of a "little baby bond" and a participant in a democratic plan of government security. A campaign for thrift has been started. The schools must do their part. The principal can organize patriotic meetings at which he can explain the purposes of the Red Cross, the Liberty Loan, and the garden and conservation movements. He can distribute pamphlets relating to war service. In a small community he can be the leader of the Red Cross movement, only he must always remember that he is to work with state and national organizations and is not to write to Washington when he can perhaps step across the street to local headquarters or write directly to state headquarters. Of course, he will follow closely the printed directions with reference to bandages, shipping, etc., for the general organization has put more thought into it and gained more experience than he could possibly gather. Obviously the principal ought to allow no competition between school organizations and local organizations. If the local organization is strong and effective, he ought to work under it. If it is not, he may well work over it. By all means he should inform pupils of the meaning of the war, that they in turn may carry word to their parents; and such work is not always limited to districts where people are foreign born. There may be as much need for such work in the West as in New York City. A Western farmer is reported as saying that he did not care who owned the country or whether the Germans took it or not so long as he sold his wheat crop. The principal may direct a state census on some particular data for which state authorities may call. He should bring together various bulletins issued by state and national governments which concern food production and conservation, sanitation, public health, nursing, dietetics, etc., and by publishing lists of such material in newspapers and posting them on school bulletin boards, bring the information within them to the people who need it most. He should make the hall exercises in the school mean more than ever. Let us hope that "America" may be sung with more vim, and that the principal will know the second stanza. The "Marseillaise" and other national songs of our allies may be sung. Of course a service flag made by the girls in the school hangs prominently in the assembly hall, and each of its stars speaks for a teacher, a student, or a graduate who represents the life-giving contribution of the school to the cause of democracy. The country-school principal has a great deal to do. His work differs from that of the city principal in that he may be a recognized leader in almost everything, while the city principal must necessarily coöperate with individuals and organizations. The principal in the open country can be the local agent for seed and fertilizer and for the distribution of farmers' bulletins. In fact, he may be the local representative for the state departments of education, of agriculture, of labor, and of health. He ought to use judgment in excusing boys from school for farm work. He will know the exact circumstances under which a boy goes to work. He will know whether he is working on his father's farm or that of a neighbor. He can help that boy with his lessons so that he can do some studying at home and keep up with his classes. And in the late fall, when the boys return to school from their farm work, he can organize a special class in order that they may satisfactorily make up their studies. This extra work on his part and that of his coworkers will make one of the answers to the call to the colors which comes to every man and woman in this country. A city principal can organize an agricultural course in his city school, and obtain a state-aided teacher for giving agricultural theory in the winter in connection with biological science, and have this teacher take a group of boys into the country in the spring. He can always think of his boys as going out to farm work on the basis of an organized group, and on that basis only. A teacher from his school might go with these boys and serve as their leader. It is probable that educational experiments of this nature will lead eventually to country branches of city schools. It is clear that the industrial and trade schools, because of the very nature of their purpose, may render unusual service, but they must start out with the idea that they are to take their directions from the state boards of control of vocational education rather than go off at a tangent independent of any state or national movement. It must be remembered that provision has been made for a national system of vocational education with a Federal Board of Vocational Education guiding it, and that every state board having charge of vocational education is working in conjunction with the national board. We must keep in mind that the Federal Board of Vocational Education is in close touch with the National Council of Defense at Washington, and consequently with all departments of the national government which concern war measures. For a local school to jeopardize its chances for national and state aid through failure to follow a program provided by these authorities, or to develop types of work which are out of accord with national needs, will not be the part of wisdom or common sense. These schools must not forget that their primary function is to make mechanics and not army supplies, but if they are called upon to do the latter work, or if they can do it effectively, they must make it educational in its aim and not merely productive work. State officials ought to have inventories made of the equipment of the vocational schools, with a census of the experience and training of the instructors, and a state study ought to be made of plans to train workers for the different branches needed. Such a study would point out how the semiskilled may become skilled, how the unskilled may become semiskilled, how the necessary training may be given to specialist tool makers, and how there can be developed a type of industrial work suitable for women and girls. The directors of trade schools will provide opportunities for the training of foremen in evening classes, or at other times if necessary, using methods of instruction which will increase their skill in dealing with green help or unskilled laborers. These men will adjust the evening schools to run the year round, and also provide for off-time classes. In vocational schools of the commercial order, of which we have very few in the country, provision will be made for short-unit courses in commercial practice for women and girls to fit them to take the place of men drafted. As has already been stated, it is very likely that the day vocational schools will have comparatively few pupils during the war period, as young persons who ordinarily go to these schools will have readily obtained work in factories. However, such youth can still be instructed if the school will go to the factory and there establish training courses. The present is a good time to develop commercial courses which have a vocational purpose, and which have methods more in accord with the definition of vocational training. The commercial departments in the majority of our high schools rather indifferently train stenographers, typists, and clerks. They do not even attempt to train salesmen and saleswomen, index and statistical clerks, comptometer operators, etc. Very few of the commercial courses have either the definiteness of aim of the industrial and trade schools or the practical contact with actual commercial practice which will be necessary if they are to meet the requirements of modern business. Commercial schools have not yet caught the spirit of part-time, off-time, or short-unit programs. The manual-training teacher will find plenty to do; that is, if the state departments of education furnish him definite data and specifications for war-emergency work. It will be practically useless for him to carry on special work in any large way unless the field of service of the boy workers is organized in some such way as is the Red Cross work. If boxes are needed for packing supplies, a working drawing of the same ought to be furnished by the state department. If hospital furniture, such as bed racks and tables, is needed, the articles should be standardized in order that they may be made in quantities and may be serviceable when they reach the source of need. The same is true of splints. The reason for the great accomplishment of the French and Canadian boys in the making of splints used temporarily on the field of service is that they have been furnished with very definite directions as to size, material, and method of making. It cannot be too emphatically stated that the war-service work of the elementary and secondary schools needs definite direction from the state departments of education if the unity of effort based upon directions common to all are to result not only in effective work but also in fulfilling the social and civic purposes which are behind the service. This is an opportune time for the manual-training teacher to abandon his set of models. They should have been set aside long ago. His war-service duties will give an additional motive for socializing his work. In small cities and villages where there is plenty of land available for cultivation the director of manual training, on the first of May, ought to change his title and assume his duties as director of community gardens. He should have been preparing for this work by giving instruction in garden work in the manual-training room during March and April. Meanwhile he should have interested adults of the community in the plan of a garden where both old and young might work, and should have brought together civic forces to accomplish the purpose—a purpose which is educational, social, recreational, and useful. Dealing with boys under fifteen, as the average manual-training teacher will, it is possible for him to develop a type of manual arts which will serve to create or arouse a set of industrial interests helpful to the boy in determining his life career. With every temptation to a pupil to leave school, the manual-training teacher will now have an unusual opportunity to make his work so attractive and economically so helpful that the boy may see the advantage of paying no attention to industrial-service inducements. This is a time for increasing the field of usefulness of the industrial arts in connection with the problems involved in the junior high school. This type of school is certain to meet with increased favor during and after the war, and the reasons are both educational and administrative. So much has already been said in several places in this book about the service which cooking and sewing teachers may render, that it is hardly necessary in this place to do more than give a very brief summary. As supplies for cooking lessons become more expensive, the cooking teacher must make more of demonstrations to pupils, and less, perhaps, of actual practice. The war recipes which she uses must be mimeographed or printed and given the pupils to take home. She must organize classes for adults in unit courses and hold them afternoons and evenings. In fact, she might well have the mothers come with the children during the regular session and receive some special instructions which the children receive. She will be busy the year round; her larger work will begin when the schools close, in that she will start her canning and community-club work. A situation can easily be conceived wherein she will have in reality very little teaching responsibility in the classroom. She will be looked upon as the community organizer for all types of food conservation, and some of her older girls will, in all probability, be teaching in the regular classes. Of course, she will interest all the children in the school in saving bottles, jars, crocks, large-mouthed bottles, tumblers, small wooden pails, etc. for containers for the jams, preserves, and fruit juices which will be put up. She will obtain all the new bulletins on processes of drying and dehydrating. Perhaps she may have initiative enough to discover a fruit crop which will not be picked except through her efforts. Perhaps she will find an orphan asylum in the community filled with boys and girls who can pick this fruit crop. The sewing teacher has more than enough to do. If the Red Cross chapter does not keep her busy, then she can keep the chapter active. With the price of materials as high as it is now and the quality as poor, there is plenty of opportunity to look over, in every home, the last year's wardrobe. She might organize a Thrift Club. Enthusiastic youth will do almost anything under the name of "club." It is to be hoped that every girl in the school above the age of ten will enroll in the sewing class and not sit idly by while a few do all the work. Very likely the household-arts teacher will organize a home-cadet unit, just as the boys will be organized into farm-cadet units. The girls will have their pledge of loyalty and perhaps will wear their chevrons, badges, or buttons, and will enroll for specific work in food, clothing, or shelter projects. The agricultural teacher will have more than he can do. An effective teacher in normal periods is always busy with his supervision of home-project work, preparation of material for classroom teaching, gathering of laboratory exhibits, etc. But in war time he must carry on his shoulders still larger burdens. In the early spring he will discontinue his formal agricultural teaching to the special vocational group and broaden his work to include those who have not regularly enrolled in the agricultural course. To the latter he will give some very definite suggestions for immediate use on the farm; while the boys who have been with him all winter will be excused from school to give their entire time to their home projects. To those who have recently come into the class there will be given special work in the classroom which they may practice outside of school hours and which they can follow for full time during the summer. He will have a good deal to do with the farm-cadet idea, and in the winter he will doubtless be thinking of the type of camp which he will establish or with which he will be connected. He may decide that he can do best by organizing a labor-distributing camp on his own initiative, or that he will serve as an assistant at the state-farm training camp, or that he will take his boys, if they are village boys, to the outskirts of the village and establish a coöperative camp; or he may get in touch with the teacher of biology in a city school and offer the country schoolhouse and his services for a training camp made up of city boys. It is assumed that he is in close touch with the county farm agent; perhaps he is the local representative of the club work which the United States Department of Agriculture is promoting; and, of course, he is taking the responsibility of acting as agent in his territory for the United States Boys' Working Reserve,—a really wonderful organization full of immense possibilities. This Boys' Working Reserve movement started under the auspices of the United States Department of Labor in coöperation with the Council of National Defense, for the purpose of mobilizing young men between the ages of 16 and 21 for productive labor in the war emergency. During the summer of 1917 the Reserve confined its activities principally to giving federal recognition to those youths who, as members of state organizations, had worked at least three weeks on farms or in food production. At present it is organized in 40 states and in the District of Columbia. Recently it has extended its activities to include industrial occupations. Each boy who is physically fit and who, with the consent of his parents, has taken the oath of service, is enrolled as a recruit and given an enrollment button and a certificate bearing the great seal of the United States. When he has worked faithfully and capably for the stated period, he is awarded a federal bronze badge of honor. After January 1, 1918, thirty-six days of eight hours each are to be required on the farm or in food production in order to earn the badge. In industrial occupations the boy will be required to work at least sixty days of eight hours in some occupation considered essential in helping the nation in the conduct of the war, in order to receive recognition. The national director, Mr. William E. Hall, encourages every boy to remain in school and in spare time to pursue some vocational training to make himself capable of performing a productive war service, in the expectation that he will be awarded a badge of honor when he has actually entered an essential occupation. It is expected that we shall soon see a registered army of young men ordinarily not available, which may be used to fill the gaps in the labor ranks caused by war activities. The Reserve has been indorsed by President Wilson in the following language: Permit me to express my great appreciation of the work undertaken by the United States Boys' Working Reserve of the Employment Service of Department of Labor. To give to the young men between the ages of 16 and 21 the privilege of spending their spare time in productive enterprise without interrupting their studies at school, while their older brothers are battling in the trenches and on the seas, must greatly increase the means of providing for the forces at the front and the maintenance of those whose services are needed here. It is a high privilege, no less than a patriotic duty, to help support the nation by devoted and intelligent work in this great crisis. Theodore Roosevelt, in writing of the good work which the Reserve is doing, says, in part: I am glad that you intend to encourage the training of the boys to prepare for some essential industry where they can take the place of a man called to the front. One of the great benefits you confer is that of making the boy realize that he is part of Uncle Sam's team; that he is doing his share in this great war; that he holds his services in trust for the nation; and that though it is proper to consider the question of material gain and the question of his own desires, yet that what he must most strongly consider at this time is where his services will do most good to our people as a whole. The teachers of America, as well as the boys, are making themselves a part of Uncle Sam's team; and they too hold their services in trust for the nation. The Junior Red Cross movement in the schools has swept the country. The school children have advertised and sold bonds of the second Liberty Loan. 12 The teachers of cooking are serving as local representatives for the food administrator at Washington. Agricultural teachers have pledged themselves as community workers for the summer of 1918. Manual-training teachers are developing plans for substituting garden projects in the spring for the manual-training models of the schoolroom. Technical colleges and institutes are filled with students in uniform. Industrial and trade schools on the seacoast are planning to discard their house carpentry for shipbuilding courses. County superintendents of schools are studying government bulletins for the last word in preserving and drying farm products on a large scale, in order that they may give directions to the schools. Teachers in academic schools have enlisted for service on relief, loan, garden, thrift, and conservation committees. Men who were leaders and supervisors of farm-cadet camps in 1917 are planning for similar work in the future on a larger and improved basis. Programs for teachers' institutes and state associations of teachers now include the topics: "What can our schools do in war time?" and "Our schools after the war." These efforts of the teachers and the pupils respond to our President's appeal that each of us must do his share in making the world safe for democracy. At present, to be sure, we center our thoughts on how to make the world safe for democracy. But what of the future? What of the contribution of the schools after the war? Should not the schools then center their aims and methods on making democracy safe for the world ? If the people themselves are to be masters, must they not be provided with an education making for mastership? Is it not well for us to examine our present schools to determine whether they are making a democracy which will be safe for the world? Have we a system of education which actually gives an opportunity for every child to make the most of himself? Have we a liberalized course of study which actually stimulates and develops intellectual and aesthetic interests in music, art, literature, science, travel, and history? Have we evolved a socialized education developing moral habits, civic incentives, possession and use of ethical ideals and standards for a successful group life? Has our formative process been able to bring about refinements of social behavior beyond the point required for group participation? Have we arrived at the point where we can say that our people have even the common culture which it is expected all members of a democracy shall possess, to say nothing about the development of individual culture, which is a possession of the interested individual and his congenial fellows? How far have we gone in recognizing that "by-education" which comes through a child's self-direction of his natural or spontaneous learning instincts and impulses? How much have we accomplished in giving educational and vocational guidance to children between the ages of 12 and 16? What has been done in the way of fulfilling the national obligation to teach the strangers within our gates our language and the principles and forms of our civic life? What has been our program for subnormals in order that they may be prepared for independent living in the competitive social order? Have we established clear-cut distinctions between subnormal and crippled cases that must remain custodial and those that can be prepared for independent existence? What are we doing in the way of education for delinquents? To what extent have we utilized the discovery that these antisocial manifestations of youth are results of heredity, or of inferior homes, or of a lack of playgrounds, or of poor schools? Have the schools missed a great opportunity for giving moral, civic, and physical training to youth by failing to absorb the Boy Scout and Camp Fire Girl movements and thus failing to grasp the full educational significance of the methods adopted by those who so well understand adolescent youth? Are the disciplinary methods of the teachers and the general internal management of the schools such as will develop among pupils a democracy which is safe even in the schoolroom? What have we done in determining what is desirable and feasible for extending general education to average adults who have early entered upon specialized occupations? How far have we gone in our program of vocational education to recognize and to provide for the influence of automatic machinery upon the physical, mental, and vocational welfare of workers? Have we so thoroughly grasped the idea of an educational democracy that no child in our schools is disadvantaged by the section of the state or of the country in which he happens to be born? Have we in our vocational training set up any program for the industrial training of women which recognizes that the modern problem of women's work concerns the following of some productive vocation away from home? Have we even begun to realize that every person should have definite vocational training with such distinctive purpose back of it that it will produce the skill, knowledge, ideals, and general experience that function in distinct callings? Have we even thought of a program of education for leisure which will develop enduring tastes and interests established toward the enrichment of the individual and indirectly of social life? Do we fully understand that to make democracy safe for the world all people should have some leisure or time apart from vocational, civic, and physical necessities of life, that such leisure should be filled with sociability, amusement, recreation, and satisfaction of the aesthetic and physical desires, and that the public schools must in some measure provide for these? Will a democracy proclaiming equality of opportunity as its ideal require an education which unites from the beginning of the child's school life, and for all pupils of the school, learning and social application, ideas and practice, work and recognition of the meaning of what is done? Or can a democracy be developed by dividing the public-school system into parts, one of which pursues traditional methods with incidental improvements, and another in which children "learn through their hands" and are given only the "essential features" of the traditional bookwork? All that the schools are now doing in war time, and much more which they are not yet doing, to make the world safe for democracy, may be effectively used after war time to make democracy safe for the world. INDEX Agricultural education, establishment of, in city schools, 156 , 314 home-project work, 321 relation of, to farm-cadet service, 322 Agricultural labor, resolutions of New York State Board of Regents in regard to, 95 shortage of, 136 farm-garden permits for, 159 release of schoolboys for, 161 - 163 justification for employment of boys for, 164 German women and children in, 236 , 242 , 243 English children in farm work, 236 - 240 organizing boys for, 246 - 256 example of distribution of, 255 - 256 social significance of boys in, 270 - 271 age distinctions of boys, 274 types of farm employers, 280 - 282 Attendance laws, abrogating of, in England, 135 types of action possible in regard to, 138 - 139 action of various states in regard to, 140 - 143 lessons to be learned from England, 144 - 146 modification of, 155 changes in New York State, 157 - 159 enlistment for farm service in New York State and relation to, 160 - 161 relaxing, for agricultural work, 237 - 239 constructive policy in amending, 309 Aviation schools, 98 Blind, the, reëducating, 211 - 213 , 215 Boy Scouts, 87 , 130 , 140 , 172 , 306 , 309 , 328 Camp Fire Girls, 328 Canada, convalescent homes for disabled soldiers in, 215 work of Military Hospitals Commission in, 228 - 231 boys for farm work in, 247 Census, agricultural, by schools of New York State, 24 , 277 school principal may direct, 312 Claxton, P. P., 92 , 146 - 150 Colleges, continuance of, during war time, 80 - 83 , 92 spirit of mobilization of, 83 - 86 war-emergency courses in, 86 - 90 , 96 - 103 maintenance of academic status of, 91 , 93 - 94 field of service for departments of psychology in, 101 - 103 contribution of geological departments of, 105 effect of war on curricula of, 111 demand for graduates of, 147 - 148 Commercial schools, indefiniteness of aim in, 316 - 317 short-unit and part-time courses in, 317 Community canning clubs. See Conservation of food Conservation of food, need of, 25 - 28 saving of waste in New York City, 29 - 31 Columbia lectures on, 87 - 88 canning clubs, 125 - 127 , 320 drying and evaporating, 126 - 127 , 320 county superintendents' duties, 326 Continuation schools, enacting of laws for, 155 Council for National Defense, 94 , 96 , 315 Cripples, reëducating the, 211 - 233 Democracy, teaching of, 149 - 150 making safe for the world, 326 leisure necessary for, 329 Disabled soldiers, reëducating the, 211 - 233 Domestic arts, new spirit of teaching, 118 criticism of existing teaching of, 192 improvements in teaching, 193 - 194 Thrift Club, 321 Domestic science, new spirit of teaching, 119 teaching adults, 122 , 319 traveling kitchens, 124 demonstration train, 124 war recipes, 319 home cadets, 321 Education, effect of war on, 113 - 114 equal opportunity for, 327 socialized, 327 vocational guidance in, 327 for subnormals and cripples, 328 . See also Colleges, Commercial Schools, Schools, etc. Employment of children, care exercised in, 146 out of school hours, 149 divergent points of view in regard to, 150 - 151 recognizing work impulses in, 151 - 152 occupational study of a group of boys, 186 - 190 "blind-alley occupations," 190 - 191 waste of boy power, 191 England's schools, use of buildings in war, 18 - 20 as distributing agencies for information, 23 - 24 compiling of National Register by, 24 open days for parents, 28 traveling kitchens in, 29 , 124 thrift teaching in, 31 - 32 training semiskilled workers in, 59 - 60 , 66 , 75 - 76 productive work of technical schools, 60 - 61 courses in cantonments, 101 - 102 garden work as substitute for manual training in, 121 - 122 short courses in cookery in, 123 training cooks for army, 128 furnishing meals to children in, 129 furnishing soldiers' kits and hospital equipment, 132 - 134 abrogating attendance laws, 135 , 137 - 138 restricting labor of school children, 144 - 146 children for farm work, 236 - 240 plans for supervision of schoolboy farm labor, 240 - 242 reorganization of, 304 Evening schools, trade-extension work in, 72 training of foremen in, 316 Farm cadets, organization of, in New York State, 172 reason for organizing, 234 - 245 plan for use of, 246 , 272 - 274 rearrangement of school program for, 247 - 248 , 313 - 314 wages of, 249 , 250 , 253 , 261 , 262 , 265 , 267 , 278 agreements and contracts, 251 - 252 , 279 - 280 , 282 - 287 New York State plan, 253 - 254 physical examination, 264 , 274 - 275 enlistment blanks, 276 Farm-labor camps, explanation of, 245 Massachusetts plan, 248 - 253 agreements and contracts, 251 - 252 , 265 illustration of different types of, 256 - 261 food cost and preparation, 258 , 295 - 297 menus, 259 recreation, 260 , 297 wages, 261 , 262 , 265 , 267 - 269 labor distribution, 261 - 262 , 266 - 268 personal equipment, 262 , 292 camp equipment, 262 , 264 , 268 illustration of training type, 263 - 266 agricultural instruction in, 267 , 297 - 299 flying-squadron type, 267 - 268 , 302 - 303 leadership, 273 , 287 - 292 sanitation, 295 definitions of various types, 298 - 303 Federal Board of Vocational Education, 54 - 55 , 314 - 315 France, reëducation of disabled soldiers in, 214 - 225 French schools, use of buildings in war, 20 - 21 war financing helped by teachers of, 39 - 40 teaching the meaning of the war in, 41 , 44 - 46 changing aspects of, due to war, 41 , 51 - 52 sewing for soldiers in, 133 part-time, 155 normal schools' contribution to war service, 199 Red Cross work, 208 German schools, efficiency spirit of, 17 , 104 contribution to agricultural labor, 242 - 243 conservation of natural resources in, 243 - 244 industrial-efficiency idea in, 305 History, teaching of, 46 - 47 Industrial and trade schools, contribution of, to manufacturing needs, 60 war-emergency courses in, 63 , 314 - 315 question of production in, 66 - 67 readjustment in war time, 71 open in summer, 72 - 73 part-time classes in, 74 - 76 teaching of hygiene in, 77 producing farm-camp equipment, 252 inventories of equipment, 315 state study of possible war uses of, 315 Junior Red Cross, 207 , 209 - 210 Labor, war demands for, 58 industrial schools meeting shortage of, 61 , 68 - 69 one method of training, 61 - 64 educative value of, 152 - 153 Liberty Loan bonds, and the schools, 37 - 39 , 311 , 325 Library, service of, in war time, 104 - 105 Manual training, garden work in place of, 130 - 131 war-service work in, 131 - 132 , 317 - 319 making Red Cross splints, 206 , 317 abandoning models, 318 in connection with junior high schools, 319 Military equivalents, recognition of, in New York State, 171 , 305 experience in England, France, and Germany, 173 necessity of conscious service, 174 , 177 - 180 types of occupations having, 175 - 176 "Moral Equivalent of War," 176 an example of, in agriculture, 181 - 185 an example of, in industry, 186 - 189 farm labor as a military equivalent, 254 Military training, exemptions from, 165 , 167 compulsory in New York State, 166 in high schools, 167 - 170 including employed boys, 168 , 170 - 171 vocational training in relation to, 173 adaptability of, 309 "Moral Equivalent of War," 176 National Board for Historical Service, 46 National Council of Defense, 94 , 96 , 315 National Security League, 49 - 50 , 140 National Society for the Promotion of Industrial Education, 64 Naval schools, description of, 77 - 79 Off-time classes, importance of, 72 Part-time education, opportunity for, 74 - 75 war-emergency courses in, 154 - 155 enacting laws for, 155 farm work and, 240 as an economy measure, 308 - 309 Patriotism, teaching meaning of the war, 42 necessity for teaching, 42 - 44 , 48 - 49 topics in relation to, 50 - 51 Physical training, compulsory in New York State, 166 recommendations of New Jersey Commission in regard to, 167 - 170 importance of, from military standpoint, 168 - 169 advantages of, over military training, 309 Posters, war, 129 - 130 Practical arts, definition of, 116 project plan of teaching, 117 - 118 influence of war-service work on, 117 Principal, war duties of, 33 - 34 , 310 - 314 Red Cross, work for, in schools, 194 , 196 - 198 , 311 a state plan of school service to, 200 - 201 use of knitting machines, 202 work for, in Troy, N.Y., 202 - 205 making splints, 206 Home Service division of, 207 - 208 Junior Red Cross, 207 , 209 - 210 what can be done in schools for, 207 reporting home conditions to, 308 Reëducation, the problem of the physically handicapped, 211 - 213 relation to federal insurance, 213 a government problem, 214 instruction for the blind in France, 215 L'École Joffre, 216 - 219 instruction in vocational subjects in France, 218 - 221 , 224 - 225 percentage capable of, in France, 222 the problem in the United States, 225 - 228 industrial accidents and, 232 Roosevelt, Theodore, 11 , 324 - 325 Rural schools, agricultural labor under direction of, 153 - 154 camp in connection with, 302 School boards, in relation to war service, 306 - 307 provisions of, for drafted teachers, 307 - 308 organization of vocational courses by, 310 planning for agriculture by, 310 work of, for avoiding juvenile delinquency, 310 School principals, 33 - 34 , 310 - 314 Schools, as distributing centers for pamphlets, etc., 22 , 311 furnishing lunches to children in, 128 - 129 , 308 opportunity for poster work in, 129 - 130 maintaining efficiency of, 146 keeping children in, 147 , 308 postponement of construction work for, 149 agricultural activities in rural, 153 lengthening terms and hours of, 308 . See also Commercial schools, French schools, etc. Smith-Hughes Bill, 54 , 57 Teachers, work of, in promoting French government loans, 39 - 40 opportunities of, to teach history, 46 - 49 New York State directions to, 119 - 121 service of, on committees, 326 war-service programs of, 326 Technical institutes: war-service courses in Wentworth Institute, Boston, 106 - 107 Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, 107 - 108 Dunwoody Institute, Minneapolis, 108 - 111 Thrift, necessity for, 31 - 33 practice of, in England, 31 - 32 , 36 - 37 teaching of, 35 campaign for, 311 Thrift Club, 321 Trade schools. See Industrial and trade schools Traveling kitchens, 29 , 124 Unit courses, organization of, 73 - 74 utility of, 306 United States Boys' Working Reserve, 163 - 164 , 322 - 324 Vocational education, definition of, 53 federal grants for, 54 - 55 federal requirements of, 56 adjustment of, to industrial needs, 59 standardization of products, 195 "safety-first" instruction in, 212 opportunity for teachers in, 233 influence of automatic machinery on, 329 for distinct callings, 329 War Savings certificates, in England, 36 - 37 in the United States, 311 Wilson, Woodrow, 1 , 54 , 72 - 73 , 81 - 82 , 209 , 324

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