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ON THE FIRING LINE
IN EDUCATION
BY
A. J. LADD
_Professor of Education, State University of North Dakota_
BOSTON
RICHARD G. BADGER
THE GORHAM PRESS
COPYRIGHT, 1919, BY RICHARD G. BADGER
All Rights Reserved
Made in the United States of America
The Gorham Press, Boston, U. S. A.
PREFACE
Of the ten studies making up this little volume only one, the last,
aside from the Introduction, was designed primarily for publication.
Each of the others had a definite personal audience in mind while being
prepared. Still, nearly all have later found their way into print, and
some have been reprinted in other periodicals and quoted quite
extensively in still others. Many letters of appreciation, too, from
strangers who have chanced to read this address or that, have come to
the writer. These facts, together with expressions of appreciation upon
delivery and with definite suggestions from many for publication, have
finally led the writer to feel that possibly their gathering together
might be worth while. But in fairness to himself, as well as to others,
also in the interests of accuracy, he is prompted to give an additional
reason for venturing upon the hazardous undertaking of offering "cold
meats" to people not overly hungry. Not words of praise alone, no matter
how warm, would justify such a decision, for one can never take such
expressions at quite their face value--'tis so easy to make pleasant
remarks! So the matter was thrown back to where it belonged all the
time--upon the writer to decide the case on the merits of the various
discussions as dealing with present-day educational problems.
While separate addresses, upon different topics, given at different
times, and with no thought of connection, they all do bear upon one
great matter of universal interest--that of education. The title, "On
the Firing Line in Education," belongs specifically to but the first of
the topics discust. Still, it is appropriate to the entire group since
the various matters handled are fundamental and the positions taken
considerably in advance of common use. But we are clearly moving in the
general direction indicated--'twill not be long now before the main army
has caught up, and then the firing line will be still further advanced.
I have a very definite conviction that, at any financial cost, we should
provide thru the school for the physical as well as for the psychical
and the moral development of the child. This is not to take the place of
the home--merely to supplement the work of the majority of homes. Only
thus can we adequately educate all. I believe, too, that in any
scientific view of the educational process the sense organs are
paramount in importance, and therefore urge their care and training.
That the positions taken in the various addresses upon these and other
matters are sound has been pretty well demonstrated during the last two
years when the demands of war have faced us. This is made clear in the
Introduction that follows.
I am under obligations to the various periodicals in which these studies
have appeared for permission to use them again in this form. I also
appreciate the courtesy of Mr. Badger, the publisher, in allowing me to
use certain simplified forms of spelling, thus departing from the usual
over-conservative practise of publishers. Is not this, too, one of the
firing-line activities?
A. J. LADD
Grand Forks, North Dakota,
March, 1919
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
INTRODUCTION--HAVE THE SCHOOLS BEEN DISCREDITED
BY THE REVELATIONS OF THE WAR 13
I. ON THE FIRING LINE IN EDUCATION 37
Social Betterment, the Dominant Motive in
Education 38
Child Study 43
Physical Education 50
The Educational Survey 51
Vocational Guidance 53
The Educational Psychologist 56
II. THE RELATION OF THE STATE UNIVERSITY TO THE HIGH
SCHOOLS OF THE STATE 63
The Elementary School 65
The High School 67
The State University 75
III. THE UNIVERSITY AND THE TEACHER 89
The Kind of Teachers the University Should
Employ 91
The University Teacher in his Classroom 94
The University's Attitude Toward the Preparation
of Teachers for the Schools of the State 105
IV. THE EYE PROBLEM IN THE SCHOOLS 115
V. THE HOME, THE CHURCH, AND THE SCHOOL 133
The Home 134
The Church 141
The School 150
VI. NOBLESSE OBLIGE 163
VII. IMPROVEMENTS IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS 185
VIII. LOCAL WINTER SPORTS 203
IX. THE FUNCTION OF TEACHERS COLLEGE 217
X. CREDIT FOR QUALITY IN SECONDARY AND HIGHER
EDUCATION 243
INDEX 261
INTRODUCTION
HAVE THE SCHOOLS BEEN DISCREDITED BY THE REVELATIONS OF THE WAR?
_From School and Society, April 5, 1919_
Knowing that I was about to publish a book on education in which the
Great War, now happily closed, was not taken as the point of departure,
a friend said to me one day, in substance, "Aren't you taking undue
risks just now in putting out a book on education that isn't based upon
a program of reconstruction? Haven't all our so-called educational
principles been dis-credited? Shall you get any readers if you do not
admit educational failure thus far, and proceed to discuss a change of
front, made imperative by recent revelations?" And the editor of a well
known educational journal, in asking me for an article, recently, said,
among other things, "I should be glad to have an article upon some phase
of reconstruction after the war, educational, social, philosophical, as
you may like. Here is the next great battlefield of the future, and if
the educational forces do not redeem themselves here, it is my opinion
that we shall become a greater laughing stock than we have ever been
before."
To both of these statements I desire to take exception. To be sure, the
war has taught us many lessons bearing upon education; to be sure, it
has revealed shortcomings, limitations, and weaknesses. But it seems to
me that it has also made clear that we have been working along right
lines. Our fundamental educational principles have not been
dis-credited. There is no far-reaching educational failure to admit, nor
is there any serious shortcoming from which the educational forces of
the country have to redeem themselves. "Laughing stock," does the
gentleman say? Oh no! Far from it! Let us not get panicky! Some
weaknesses brought to light? Certainly. But in the analysis, later to be
made, let us see if, for the most part, they do not but demonstrate the
soundness of our educational principles and the far-sightedness of our
educational leaders together with the short-sightedness of the present
critics, in that had suggested recommendations been followed these
weaknesses would not have existed. Let us give here but one
illustration, and that briefly. We all admit that the medical
examinations for the war found too many physical defects, and too many
men thereby incapacitated for efficient military service. But would not
the results have been very different if, during the last generation, the
suggestions and strong recommendations of educators relative to physical
education in our schools been acted upon by the public? Ah! The fault
was not with educational principles; they were sound. The educational
forces of the country knew what was needed, but a parsimonious public
would not follow intelligent leadership. We could say, all along the
line, "I told you so," if we felt so inclined. Instead of being the
"laughing stock" we could--if the matter were not too serious--throw the
laugh upon the other fellow. The purpose of our schools has never been
to produce soldiers at the drop of the hat, and so they have never been
blighted by military training. (May it never come!) Their task has been
to produce men and women of character and purpose and ideals--men and
women of initiative who could become anything called for by an
emergency. And nobly have they succeeded, as evidenced by the successful
prosecution of the war.
In view of all that the United States has done to assist in bringing the
war to its successful close, from the adoption of the selective draft
down thru the management of the training camps, the operation of the
railroads, conservation of food and fuel, to the knitting of a pair of
socks and the sale of a thrift stamp, what shall be said of the success
or failure of our schools? Every man, woman, and child in this gigantic
work, from President Wilson down to the colored bootblack who saved his
nickels to buy a stamp, or to the little girl who voluntarily went
without her sugar, has been a product of the schools. Thru the
instruction, the discipline, and the training given in those schools,
they became the men and women who could rise to the emergency and do the
things needed. And they did.
No college or university or professional school ever taught Mr. Wilson
how to be President of the United States during these troublous days;
nor Mr. McAdoo how to manage the railroads; nor Mr. Pershing all about
war; nor any local worker how to lead the Red Cross work, any more than
the lower schools have taught the boys who went into the trenches how to
use the gas mask and how to go without food; how to shoulder arms and
how to march. But the schools all along the line did help to give them
ideals, did train them in team-play; did instil into them the
principles of democracy and the love of country, so that when the need
came they arose as one man to repel the foe. And the study of
arithmetic, geography, and grammar; of chemistry, physics, and medicine;
of Latin, Greek, and history has, in each case, made its contribution to
the preparation of home workers, soldiers, scientific experts, financial
managers, and statesmen--has helped to make each an individual of
initiative.
Under the guidance of our educational leaders, following principles that
they had workt out, the schools of the country were moving quietly
along, each one of the 750,000 teachers doing faithfully the work at
hand day by day. We had never thought of war as a possibility for us,
and of course preparation for it had not been made, in the slightest
degree, a part of the work of the schools. But when war, with all its
horrors, was finally forced upon us and we needed statesmen and
scientists and military leaders to guide and direct, they were at hand
in the graduates of our colleges and universities--broadly trained men
capable of assimilating, or learning, or in other ways gaining quickly,
the specific form of efficiency needed in the particular activity
assigned. And when we needed soldiers they were at hand in the person of
our boys of the schools, both common and high, from every nook and
corner of the land--boys and men who merely needed direction and
leadership, capable of at once falling into line and quickly taking on
the professional phase of their training. Could we have asked our
schools to do more? The supreme test had come, and it was being met in a
manner gratifying to all. The boys and the girls, the men and the women,
on the farm, in the store, in the home, in the workshop, in the schools
and colleges, have responded "Here am I. Show me what you want me to do,
and I will do it even unto death." It was done, and they did it. The
schools had nobly demonstrated their efficiency.
To be sure, all this was not done without making mistakes. Not all the
products of all the schools were able to rise to the occasion and to be
depended upon in our hour of need. When the great national search-light
was trained upon the product of the schools, seeking leaders of infinite
variety and number, and likewise hosts of followers to do definite and
difficult things, many deficient ones were discovered--some deficient in
mental caliber, some weak in moral fiber, some lacking in physical
stamina. And right here is to be seen the only serious failure of our
schools. Not every boy, not every girl, had been made as efficient as
could have been desired. But, happily, in our great numbers enough were
found to do even the stupendous work at hand, and to do it well. In
spite of moral lapses, not a few, in spite of instances of mental
incompetence, far too many, and in spite of physical handicaps,
distressingly large--in spite of all this, I say, the United States
surprised the world with the quickness with which we pulled ourselves
together, and with the marvelous efficiency with which we mobilized all
our resources. Many losses of course there were--losses of men, losses
of days, losses of dollars. But when all is said and done, the losses
were slight when compared with the accomplishments. Credit to whom
credit is due! But because of these losses unthinking men immediately
began to criticise the schools. They should have been trade schools, or
industrial schools or military schools--any kind of schools that they
were not. And how clearly it was being demonstrated, we were told, that
the time formerly spent on music and drawing, art and literature,
algebra and geometry, history and Latin, had all been wasted! How much
better it would have been if, instead of these "frills," the children
had been given "practical subjects"! (Practical. Save the mark. One is
tempted here to go off on a by-path and discuss the topic, "What is
Practical?") Thus the criticism of the unthinking--of the laymen who
went off at half-cock.
And this criticism was deepened and strengthened and extended and made
more vehement, again by the unthinking, when the fine results of the
Plattsburgh experiment were revealed, in which, thru the processes of
intensive training, men were quickly whipt into shape for new, and
difficult, and responsible undertakings. And the equally good results
that came from the officers' training schools, in which college boys by
a similar program were metamorphosed, almost at over-night, into capable
army officers, had the same effect. How signally had the schools failed!
And these long years spent in school and college, "dawdling over the
frills," had been to no effect, whereas "a few weeks under _intelligent_
educational direction accomplishes marvels."
And the same has further illustration. Ministers of the Gospel selected
for chaplains, physicians and surgeons chosen for medical service,
nurses for the Red Cross, engineers for various forms of engineering,
and many others have all been given this short period of intensive
training and, to their credit and ours be it said, all responded
quickly. But the conclusion drawn by the unthinking has been, all along
the line, that the later efficiency of these men which has gained for us
the plaudits and the gratitude of the world was due to this short period
of intensive training, "under men who were intelligent enough to know
just what was needed and just how to go about to secure it"--men not
hampered by any pedagogical nonsense or grown stale over a long attempt
to discriminate between the "infinity of nothingness and the nothingness
of infinity" (as one might summarize a rather common criticism), rather
than to the former years of patient toil, and discipline, and
accomplishment which had really laid the foundation so well that all
were able thus to respond. The common school, the high school, the
college, and the professional school was dis-credited, one and all, in
favor of a short-cut method analogous to the so-called "Business
College,"--a short-cut method that could result only in disaster if
applied without the appropriate preparation.
How long it does take people to realize that real education is a slow
process! that it takes years and years and years of varied experiences
for the processes of assimilation and development to bring about the
fine fruitage of stable character!
And the Government, too (I suppose we can criticize Washington just a
little now without serious danger of being sent to jail), must have had
the same point of view in regard to the general management of education
since, during the war, it did not entrust its educational war program
into the hands of the National Bureau of Education. It did have the War
Department and the Navy Department and the Treasury Department manage
their respective phases of war activities. Why was not the Department of
Education called on to direct the educational work? Had it been, the S.
A. T. C. fiasco, as well as some other blunders, would doubtless have
been avoided. But the thought (or was it the lack of thought?) must have
been that most anybody outside of the teaching profession would know
better how to get educational results than any one from within. A
similar point of view is generally discernible in the election of boards
of education in towns and cities thruout the country--any one is
satisfactory save those who know definitely what should be going on
inside of the school house.
Perhaps all this was to be expected. I rather think so. But I confess to
surprise when I find such criticism being echoed from within--from men
who should know better, as, for example, the two quoted at the beginning
of this article. The explanation, I suppose, is that, timid in nature,
they have become panicky and lost their bearings. Perhaps they were
suffering from a mild form of brain-storm, and have temporarily slipt
back into the ranks of the unthinking.
Let us analyze the situation and see if we can discover just what the
war did reveal as to the short-*comings of our educational system. Let
us then try to locate the responsibility.
One of the most serious of the educational shortcomings thus revealed is
a high percentage of illiteracy--nearly eight per cent, I understand,
the country over. The seriousness of such a situation can scarcely be
overestimated. It was serious in time of war--the inability of a
soldier to read orders, or to follow written directions, or to make
written reports, especially when one takes into consideration the myriad
forms of war service just recently used, would limit his possibilities
of service and cripple himself and all his companions. But illiteracy is
even more serious in times of peace, for then such individuals are not
immediately under the direction of intelligent officers and thus
prevented from the disastrous results of their own ignorant actions.
Think for a moment of what it means in a democracy and for a democracy
to have one out of every ten (disregarding children) of the possible
directing forces of the government unable to read or write!
But when we add to this statement of mere illiteracy the fact that a
large percentage of these illiterates are of foreign birth or extraction
and have never learned either to speak or understand the language of
their adopted country, the situation is seen to be even more serious in
potentiality, both in peace and war. Our authorities have been too lax,
it seems, in not requiring that all children of foreign extraction,
whether foreign or American born, be educated in the English language.
In communities thickly settled by alien peoples they have too often
allowed the schools to be conducted in the vernaculars of the people--a
German school here, an Austrian school there, and an Italian school over
yonder, and so on. And it goes without saying that in schools in which
children are instructed in alien tongues 'tis not the American spirit
that is inculcated nor American ideals that take root. No one would
challenge the statement that here is a defect in the execution of our
educational program, and one that must be remedied at any cost.
Still another serious weakness as revealed by the merciless hand of war
is that of physical shortcoming. A large number of men were rejected for
service and a still larger number accepted only for limited service
because of physical disability as shown by the medical examinations. I
have not the figures at hand, but 'tis common knowledge that the
situation is considered grave. Eye defects, ear defects, defective
teeth, weak lungs, flat feet, round shoulders, spinal curvature,
unsymmetrical development, and many other defects were discovered in
great numbers. Perhaps nothing but a rigid medical examination by a
military officer would ever have opened our eyes to the real situation.
But this did. The revelations came as a surprise to nearly all except
the educational leaders of the country. They have known, all the time,
what the situation has been and, for a generation, have been trying to
combat it.
Again the question is raised as to whether these defects, or weaknesses,
of American education, in both fields mentioned, as serious as they have
been seen to be for war, are not even a more serious menace when looked
upon from the point of view of peace, and therefore, even tho the war
has been won, of such commanding importance as to demand our immediate
and continued attention.
One might go on and name other shortcomings in the working out of our
educational program that have been more clearly brought to the surface
during the critical days of our warfare. But this article is not
intended to be a catalog. The two mentioned are fundamental and
far-reaching. Illiteracy and physical disability! Weakness along these
lines strikes at the very roots of national life and of individual
well-being. And if, as a nation and as individuals, we are ever going to
enter into our inheritance, these defects must be remedied. But before
trying to discuss remedies, it will be well to locate responsibility.
Are our basic educational principles unsound, or merely our educational
practises unsatisfactory? Are the educational leaders of the country all
wrong in theory? Have their heads been so high among the clouds that
they have not seen the real boy and his homely task? Or have they seen
clearly and mapt out wisely, whereas the public, relatively unthinking
upon technical matters and always slow to act in new fields, has not
been ready to follow? Is it in theory or in practise where the real
shortcoming is to be found? The answer to the question is vital. If in
theory, then is the situation serious indeed for that would mean that
our psychology is wrong--that our whole philosophy of life and of
government has been built upon error. Truly, then, after all these
years, the "educational forces" would need to "redeem" themselves so as
not to be "a greater laughing stock than we have ever been before." But
if the weakness lies merely in our practise, not yet having been able to
attain to our ideals, then, tho serious, it would be but child's play,
comparatively speaking, to put ourselves right. We should need to take
courage, redouble our efforts, and all that, but should not need to
start all over again.
How shall we account for the illiteracy revealed among both alien and
native born? Not by faulty methods of teaching can it be explained, nor
by anything else that teachers have done or have not done. Illiterates
have not attended the schools. It is due either to insufficient
legislation or to non-enforcement of laws, doubtless more the latter
save in the case of adult aliens.
From the very beginning of our colonial life, early in the 17th century,
universal education has been a part of both our educational and our
governmental creeds. A program of compulsory education was early found
necessary, early adopted, and never abandoned. Beginning in
Massachusetts and going south and west, following considerably behind
but then keeping almost even pace with settlement and development after
statehood had come, legislation has decreed that every child born into
the land or coming into it by immigration shall enjoy the advantages of
education, at least to the extent of knowing how to read and write the
English language. Every state in the Union has compulsory attendance
laws upon its statute books. These laws are not as thorogoing as they
should be in many cases but yet, even as they are, if enforced, they
should leave almost no illiteracy among people whose childhood has been
spent in this country. For the least satisfactory laws--those of some of
the Southern states, Georgia, for example, require school attendance for
at least four months of each year between the ages of eight and
fourteen. But illiteracy, even among our own people, has been
revealed--too much of it. The laws have not been enforced. There is the
sore spot. Why have they not been enforced? But of that later.
The education of adult aliens is another matter, and a very different
one. As a problem it is almost new. That is, it has been only in
relatively recent years that it has been recognized as such. True, for
several years some of the states most largely affected, such as
Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Pennsylvania, and others have been
wrestling with it, but not very much has yet been attempted toward
introducing the compulsory features. And private agencies,
philanthropic, industrial, religious, political, and others have also
done good work. But all that had thus far been done had accomplisht
little more, at the outbreak of the war, than to open our eyes to the
existence of a problem. And in our leisurely way we were going about its
solution. But war came. The European nations were aflame. We had many
Europeans in our midst. Investigations were made. The universal draft
was adopted. The revelations were startling. It was discovered that in
1910 there were in the United States 2,953,011 white persons of foreign
birth, 10 years of age and over, unable to speak the English language.
Of these 56,805 were from ten to fifteen years of age, 330,994 between
fifteen and twenty-one, and 2,565,212 twenty-one and over. Note the
number, _more than two and a half millions, twenty-one years of age and
over--men grown, fathers of families, many of them_--unable to speak the
language of their adopted country! And of these 788,631 were
illiterate--unable to read or write in any language!
Nothing short of legal requirements on a large scale, and rigidly
enforced, absolutely free of cost to the immigrant, can ever remove the
menace. The law-making bodies of the country, both State and Federal,
must act and act quickly or this growing menace will get beyond our
control.
And the long catalog of physical defects--what shall be said of them?
Shall they be charged against the "educational forces" of the country?
Are they a disgrace from which we must "redeem" ourselves so that we
shall not become the "greater laughing stock"? It is perfectly evident
that somebody has blundered because the whole sad list of defects is,
speaking broadly, preventive and, for the most part, also remediable.
But where lies the responsibility--upon the home, the school, or
society? Of course, primarily, upon the home; the child comes from the
home, goes to the home, is a part of the home, is under the immediate
control of the home. But yet, many homes, especially homes of alien
peoples, are not sufficiently intelligent to have entrusted to them
matters of such far-reaching importance. And many others are not
financially able to have proper attention given.
But the school does know. And it, or what it represents, is abundantly
able financially to handle the matter. It knows clearly how the child
with physical defects is hampered in trying to perform its school work;
it knows, too, how seriously the entire work of the school is interfered
with when there are many such in the room; and it also knows the
handicap under which such unfortunate children face life when school
days are over. And the school knows, too, the preventive and remediable
natures of these defects. Possessing all this knowledge, why has it not
acted? To make a long story short, it has acted. To the extent of its
authority and with all the influence and power at its command it has
acted, has been acting for many years, and is still acting. For more
than a generation the educational forces of the country have been
engaged in a nation-wide educational campaign designed to make clear to
the homes of the country and to the voters of the country the growing
seriousness of the situation. On the lecture platform and from the
Gospel pulpit, in the educational press and in the popular magazine,
aye, in the daily newspaper, in private conversation and in public
discussion, in season and out of season, they have labored unceasingly
to acquaint the public with the facts and to urge preventive and
remedial action. To the unselfish work of these leaders of educational
thought and action, supplemented by the generous assistance of the
medical profession, is due the fact of our present-day intelligence in
regard to the matter. Educators have been deeply interested, thoroly
alive, and intelligently at work. How they have agitated the matter of
better ventilation and better lighting of schoolhouses! How they have
pleaded for medical inspection and appropriate medical treatment of
school children! How they have urged the employment of the school nurse!
How they have workt for the playground and the gymnasium and for sane
methods of handling the same!
But they do not form the court of last appeal. They have no authority.
They all stand in about the same anomalous position as does the man
nominally at the head of the educational activities of the country--the
United States Commissioner of Education. They may gather statistics,
make reports, and suggest action. But that is all. Tho possessing full
knowledge of the situation, tho knowing just how to proceed to usher in
a better day, they are not permitted to take any action. Responsible? Of
course they are not responsible. "Redeem" themselves? From what, pray?
"Laughing stock"? How long, oh! how long, will our great army of
teachers, three-fourths of a million strong, be unappreciated,
belittled, and maligned!
Who, then, is responsible? In the last analysis there is but one
answer--the public itself. Since the community at large as well as the
individual afflicted is, in the final outcome, a sufferer in every case
of physical disability, as also in that of illiteracy, it is its duty,
as a mesure of self-protection, at least, to assume direction. Adequate
information is at hand as to desirable methods of procedure.
Demonstrations a-plenty have been given to prove that the program
suggested is feasible, inexpensive, and beneficial. This has been
brought about thru the action of a few small groups who have thus
presented clear and convincing object lessons. But why must we say "a
few"? Why is not such work nation-wide? That is a longer story. It
follows.
The United States of America is a Republic--a representative
democracy--a government in which all the people participate. And the
government of the United States is a Federal government. It is made up
of a group of States, each one exercising supervision and control over
its local matters. And education has thus far been considered a local
matter. And in many ways that soverenty has been still further divided.
We have as a smaller unit of school organization the county, and a
smaller one yet, the township, and, in many states, a still smaller one,
the school district, containing, in many instances, only a few square
miles of territory and, of course, a very limited population. But in
some respects, within certain limits, each of these small units is a law
unto itself, having much to say as to the length of the school term, the
character of the teaching, and many other phases including such as the
one under consideration.
For these reasons it frequently happens that side by side are school
districts, or townships, or counties, with widely differing educational
programs. Here is one with attractive buildings, well ventilated and
well lighted, well equipt in every way, in the hands of competent
teachers, with physician and nurses subject to call. But just over the
imaginary line is another with nothing quite satisfactory. They are just
living up to the strict letter of the State's requirement and that is
all. Not one dollar is being spent that represents the community's
voluntary contribution to the welfare of its child life or to the future
well-being of humanity.
And why? Just because we are a Democracy. Just because our action must
be the united action of many, representing the average intelligence of
the entire governmental unit and not that of its most intelligent
members. For this reason a democracy is always slow to act along new
lines. The majority of the people have to be convinced of the wisdom of
the new mesure. And education is itself always a slow process. People
change their minds slowly. Slowness of action is one of the prices we
have to pay for our democracy. On the other hand, an absolute monarchy
can act quickly, for there may be but one individual to assimilate the
new idea or to be convinced of the wisdom of the proposed change.
These facts are easily made clear by historical references, and,
happily, in the very matter under discussion--educational procedure. In
the eighteenth century Prussia, under the two great Hohenzollern kings,
Frederick William I and his son, Frederick the Great, the two ruling
from 1713 to 1786, made most rapid strides in education. Both were
practically absolute rulers, but they were benevolent and far-sighted,
and the educational reforms that they inaugurated were basic and
far-reaching, such as state-control and support, compulsory attendance,
and the professional education of teachers. Being absolute in authority,
all they needed to do was to promulgate the decrees and order their
execution. The result was that, educationally, Prussia immediately
forged ahead of all the other European countries.
England, on the other hand, was a limited monarchy. Her king could not
have acted thus even if he so desired. Such mesures had to have the
sanction of Parliament, which would have to hark back to an enlightened
public opinion since Parliament was a representative body. And public
opinion, especially in matters of education, is slow of creation. As a
matter of fact, even tho the English people were much in advance of the
Germans in civilization and in all the refinements of life, it was not
till 1833 that England as a government took her first step looking
toward the education of her children thru appropriating money. And the
grant of that Act was only a paltry £20,000 a year to be used by two
religious societies for the erection of school houses. And it was an
entire generation later, even 1870, before they adopted the necessary
principles of compulsory attendance and local taxation. More than a
hundred years behind Prussia, England was, in the management of
educational affairs!
Another illustration of the slow action of democracy is nearer at hand
both in time and space, even in our own country. For one reason or
another, rather, for many reasons, education was at a low-water mark in
the United States the latter part of the eighteenth and the first part
of the nineteenth centuries. Thoughtful men, progressive educators,
prominent statesmen, searching for the cause and for the remedy, found
the one in the poor character of the teaching being done and the other
in the establishment of the State Normal School patterned after those of
Germany. This was first suggested in 1816 in Connecticut and pretty
faithfully kept before the people of New England thereafter. But in
spite of every effort, including a campaign of education and the
establishment of private normal schools for the purposes of
demonstration, it was not till 1838 that the Massachusetts legislature
could be induced to act. And she would not have done so then had it not
been that a very prominent man of Boston, a friend of the cause, Mr.
Edmund Dwight, showed his faith in the movement by making a generous
contribution out of his private funds. Note, too, this action from
another point of view--the amount of Democracy's initial contribution
toward this new great movement in America: Mr. Dwight's gift of $10,000
was evenly matched by that of the wealthy state of Massachusetts! And
the $20,000 was the amount planned for the establishment of _three new
normal schools_ and their maintenance _for three years!_ That amount
to-day would scarcely build a coal shed for each of three new normal
schools!
But I am not advocating monarchical methods even to hasten so good a
cause as educational improvement. I am merely accounting for our
slowness of action in needed reform. For several reasons I should be
decidedly opposed to adopting such a program of centralization even if
we could. In the first place, not every absolute monarch would act as
did Frederick the Great. There are few benevolent despots. In France
during the seventeenth centuries the Louises were just as absolute as
were the Fredericks in Germany. But they were not interested in
education for the people. Again, Germany's system of education, tho
objectively efficient, has been far from satisfactory because not based
on sane moral principles. And that fact, by the way, has finally been
Germany's undoing. Now, we can scarcely conceive of Democracy erecting
an educational structure on an unsatisfactory moral foundation.
And still again, the action of an absolute monarch, in all such matters
as education, tho perhaps temporarily rapid, is not permanent. Remove
the guiding spirit and it slips back. An illustration will assist. Again
Germany furnishes it. The little duchy of Gotha, just south of Prussia,
serves us. During the Thirty Years' War Gotha had suffered greatly. Near
its close, in 1640, Duke Ernest the Pious became its ruler. He had at
heart the good of his people. He believed that education could be a very
important factor in their upbuilding, and at once put into effect a
progressive program. His people were greatly bettered and his duchy
became a fine object lesson for other German States. But Duke Ernest
died. And his educational reforms, not springing from the people
themselves, followed him not long after.
A few years ago President Diaz, Mexico's benevolent despot of nearly
half a century, died. And his people, never having been taught how to
rule themselves nor practised in the art, went to pieces.
Democracy is slow but she is apt to be sure. Her action in educational
matters is often provokingly dilatory, but she holds what she gains and
thus continues to progress. She does not take a step forward until she
is sure of her ground, but then she stands firm. Her actions are the
results of deliberate thought based on adequate data gathered from
actual experiments and not to be shaken. Democracy would not give up
universal education nor take one step backward in the matter of
compulsory attendance to secure it. She would not part with her
elementary normal schools for anything in the world. And when once she
sees her duty clear she will add to her school workers, in every
community, the physician, the nurse, and the playground director. She
will do it and, quickly noting improvements, soon wonder why she had not
done it long before.
Since so much emphasis has been placed on the conservative nature of
Democracy and on its consequent slowness of action, a word should be
added as to its possibilities in emergency. Tho we were slow in entering
the Great War, once our duty was clear we acted with a promptness, a
unanimity, and an efficiency that surprised both friend and foe, giving
heart to the one and consternation to the other. Tho a democracy, we
invested our chief executive with a power and an authority beyond that
possest by any monarch in the world.
So let us not be discouraged. The situation is not as bad as it might
be. Our fundamental principles are sound. We are working along right
lines and accomplishing good results. Our shortcomings, our weaknesses,
our failures, if you wish to call them such, are seen only when our
record is compared with a perfect score. The schools have not yet
attained to 100 per cent efficiency; that is, the country over. Here and
there, under the favorable conditions of an intelligent citizenry
willing to follow expert leadership even to the extent of providing
adequate funds, are schools and departments of schools of approximately
100 per cent efficiency. And these, as Democracy's experiments, assure
us of other advance steps. They are object lessons. Thus Democracy
always advances.
Finally, what shall we say? What shall we do? Not to "redeem" ourselves,
oh, no! not that! but to approximate the 100 per cent efficiency all
along the line? What? Why, knowing that we are headed aright, keep
steadily forward with our eyes on the goal, refusing to be stampeded by
the unthinking critic of whom Democracy always has a plenty. Take
courage! Speed up!
I
ON THE FIRING LINE IN EDUCATION
_President's Address delivered at the Annual Banquet of the Fortnightly
Club, Grand Forks, North Dakota, June 4, 1917_
The plan of the military campaign is worked out in the quiet, away back
in the rear, sometimes at considerable distance from the place of actual
hostilities. It is worked out quietly, usually slowly, and attracts but
little attention. But when worked out and ready to be put into
operation, the plan is taken forward and activities begin. Supplies are
gotten ready, men stationed, guns loaded, the firing line is formed.
Here is where the battle is to be fought, where an attempt is to be made
to carry out the plans formed in the quiet, back there in the rear.
Activity characterizes the scene. Advances are being made, new things
being done. Every effort is put forth to realize the plans.
It is not different in education. In the quiet of the laboratories and
the study, thoughtful men consider conditions, form plans, and develop
theories of educational betterment that have to be tried out, out in the
open. A firing line has to be formed, a place where new things are to be
done different from the regular conventional activities. The humdrum,
prosaic, traditional, everyday work goes on, in the main, all around but
at these points where some advances are being tried, a new and it is
hoped better program tested. All eyes are centered, all minds eager. The
analogy is not inapt.
It is my purpose to discuss briefly some of the things that are
happening on our educational firing lines. I want to bring to your
attention first, however, the plan of the great educational campaign
upon which we have entered, the goal before us at the present time, and
then take up a few of the relatively new and typical positions being
taken by leaders of educational thought, having the realization of that
goal in view. This will present to you some of the things that are
actually being done in a few progressive communities and point out
possibilities for others.
SOCIAL BETTERMENT, THE DOMINANT MOTIVE IN EDUCATION
If I interpret aright the present-day educational thought, the dominant
motive in it all is social in character. That is to say, in all of our
plans for the education of children we keep them in mind as future
members of society, acting with one another and all working together for
the common good and for the betterment of the race. And around this
motive, or back of it, or being used by it as a means, can be grouped
all the significant educational practises of the time.
Formerly the motive was largely psychological. That is, the school
effected its organization, chose its curriculum, worked out its program,
and decided upon its methods in order that it might assist the child in
the development of its instincts and capacities, thus enabling him to
realize his own personality. The great French educator, Rousseau, living
in the eighteenth century, was responsible for this movement and it was
a notable advance beyond the haphazard and aimless practise of the time.
Pestalozzi, the great Swiss educational reformer, Froebel, the German
apostle of childhood, and Herbart, the psychological genius of the
Fatherland, were disciples of Rousseau and worked out from his point of
view, trying to put it into practise in the school-rooms.
And here was the firing line in education for many a long day. True,
none of these later men ignored social relationships as did Rousseau.
True, a strong case could be made out, if one should wish to defend the
thesis, that these distinguished followers of Rousseau, even tho
carrying out his program in the main, were likewise inaugurating the new
sociological movement. But yet it was not sufficiently clear to dominate
even in their own minds. The individual stood out beyond the mass. He
filled the stage. Nor did they clearly pass it on to others. As a matter
of fact, what the immediate followers of these men got from them was the
theory of individualism in its better form.
The best definition of education that can be given from this point of
view is _the development of an inner life_. That is what Rousseau wanted
to bring about and Pestalozzi and Froebel, and our own Colonel Parker of
more recent times, the modern apostle of childhood, had the same vision.
And so to Froebel and these others, likewise, the school was an
institution in which each child should discover his own individuality,
work out his own personality, and develop harmoniously all his powers.
True, in that environment and doing all that, the child is going to
learn the relationships of society, and thus the school might become a
means for social progress as well as the instrument of individual
development. But this was incidental. The development of the inner life
was the goal. Fashioned in the quiet, in the study, away from the haunts
of man, this became the program and the rallying cry, and out on the
firing line it was striven for. On the educational battlefields of both
Europe and America, where redoubts were being stormed and advance
positions taken, this was the one great end in view. It eventuated in
the child study movement of the present generation that is now at its
height and that has done so much to mitigate the severities of the old
time school room practises and likewise greatly aided in putting
education on a scientific basis.
The immediate followers, I say, of the great European quartet of
educators had the above worthy goal in view; but with their followers,
many of them, especially the noisy ones, the modern sophists, it
degenerated into a theory of pure individualism of the most selfish
type. The theory of getting on in the world, every man for himself,
became rampant. The school came to be looked upon as an institution in
which children could learn how to get ahead of the rest of the
community, and education as merely another weapon to use in making
society contribute more to purse and pleasure. And on the firing line,
formed by these noisy agitators, mistaken by many as educational
leaders, these were the things striven for. But this aberration was only
temporary. The real educational leaders, in trying to realize the goal
of Rousseau and Pestalozzi and to do it having to combat this movement
of wildcat educational speculation, gradually came to see a more
important truth even than the one they were seeking. As on many another
firing line, victories by the wayside have clarified our vision and
given us new perspectives, and a goal, not at first recognized, looms
large upon the horizon.
For thru all this struggle we have learned that the first business of
the public school is to teach the child to live in the world in which he
finds himself, to understand his share in it and to perform it because,
after all, unless people learn to adapt themselves to other individuals
and communities, disorder and chaos follow. In it all we have come to
see that education is the best instrument for regenerating society.