REPRESENTATIVE PROBLEMS[B]
The organizing of a girls' trade school in any given locality
necessitates the meeting of many problems of a serious nature. Some of
these appear immediately and require consideration before a satisfactory
curriculum can be developed, but most of them are hydra-headed, and one
phase is no sooner settled than another arises. Attention must be given
to them whenever they come if any progress is to be made in solving the
question of the broadest and yet most practical education for the girl
who must earn her living in trade. These problems are so connected with
the keenest yet most obscure social and industrial questions of the day
on one hand, and, on the other, with the future of the race, that they
are often very puzzling. Some of them can never be entirely settled,
though they can be temporarily adjusted to immediate needs. The
following are selected as representative.
Direct Trade Training
Many schools of a domestic or technical nature have been opened in the
United States, but the instruction in them is for the home or for
educational purposes rather than for business. The trades, if they are
represented at all in these schools, are general in character, covering
often many branches of an industry in a short series of lessons, and
not having the particular subdivisions and special equipment which are
found at present in the regular market. Employers of labor have not been
favorably impressed with the practical usefulness of the graduates in
their workrooms. As the sole reason for the existence of the Manhattan
Trade School is to meet this requirement of employers, and therefore to
develop a better class of wage-earners directly adapted to trade needs,
the instruction must be in accord with methods in the shops and
factories of New York City. Such specific trade education for
fourteen-year-old girls was new, and therefore the problem of
organization had to be faced for the first time in America. Careful
study of the workrooms and the industrial conditions of New York City
was essential before the aims or the curriculum could be decided upon
and the school could be opened for instruction. Furthermore, if the
training is to be kept up to date this study of trade conditions must
not cease, and readjustments of the curriculum must equal the changes
taking place in the outside workrooms. Consequently these problems must
be met repeatedly.
Need of Preliminary Training
On beginning the trade courses at the school a difficulty was discovered
immediately which brought home the truth of the complaint made by trade
that young workers are utterly incompetent. The students coming to the
school were allowed by law to enter trade, as they had met all
requirements for obtaining their working papers, but they were not found
to have sufficient foundation to begin the first simple steps at the
school without some preliminary training. The defects which were
especially evident were: (1) lack of sufficient skill with the hand; (2)
inability to utilize their public school academic work in practical
trade problems; (3) dullness in taking orders and in thinking clearly of
the needs which arise; (4) absence of ideals; and (5) need of knowledge
of the laws of health and how to apply them. Preliminary, elementary
instruction in all of these subjects had, therefore, to be organized and
given to the entering students before they could begin upon their true
trade work. Such instruction is and will continue to be necessary unless
the public elementary school arranges to give, between the fifth and
eighth grades, a more satisfactory preparation to those who must earn
their living. The Manhattan Trade School has been obliged to give from
two to eight months to elementary branches of instruction alone. The
kind of work needed varies constantly with the condition of the
students. Every one requires some of it, but many must take months of
tutoring. Public instruction could readily give the practical academic
work which the school has organized. Such instruction would not only
directly help the pupils who must leave early to work, but would lay a
good foundation for the vocational education which is being planned for
the early years of the public secondary schools.
Vocational Training
As the courses at the Manhattan Trade School developed, an intermediate
phase between the preparatory work and the direct trade training took
definite shape. This middle ground partakes in many ways of trade
processes and lays a good foundation for shop work. It utilizes the
early education, gives point to it, awakens in the student enthusiasm
for her chosen trade, and shows her that it is worth her while to work
hard if she would succeed. It takes from four to eight months, according
to the student's ability to meet the requirements. Public instruction
could also develop this intermediate field to advantage for those who,
not wishing to enter the regular high school course, would be glad to
avail themselves of further practical education. Such occupations for
women as cooking, sewing, garment and dressmaking, millinery, laundry
work, home nursing, household administration, care of children, novelty
work, electric power operating, salesmanship, and other interesting
activities can well be offered in Vocational Education. As the student
in her chosen field plans, considers expenses, and contrives to utilize
her material she gains skill, adaptability, judgment, and the true basis
of criticism. The world's work interests her as its meaning becomes
clear through her own experiences, and she begins to see ways to better
her condition and to be a factor in the improvement of her home. She
appreciates the value of her early education, and finds it worth while
to think clearly and to act wisely; she listens to instructions, asks
sensible directions, and goes to work without waste of time. The
elementary and intermediate training just described, which the school
found it must give preparatory to its real trade instruction, has proved
advantageous as an introduction, for the student can now quickly adapt
herself to the work in the school shops, as she possesses the foundation
qualities needed to make the best worker. She has to begin at the
simplest trade work, to be sure, but can rise as rapidly as she shows
ability. She has been carefully watched by her instructors and turned
gradually in the direction best fitted to her.
Trade Shops
Offering courses in many varieties of trade work exactly as they are
found in a city like New York has many recurring difficulties, as has
been before stated. The constant and rapid adaptations to fashion, the
new mechanical devices introduced, and the labor situations are factors
to be considered. The management must be ready at a moment's notice to
change, increase, or drop work according to the demands of a fickle
market. It would seem, therefore, that at present the problems of the
school trade shops are of too serious and unsettled a character for
adequate solution by public instruction as at present organized, for (1)
it would be difficult to persuade the mass of taxpayers that added tax
rates are advisable for beginning a continually altering form of
education which has not yet commended itself to all employers or to all
wage-earners, and which must be more or less expensive; (2) the usual
public school committee man knows little of trade conditions, and would
probably be averse to allowing a school the freedom to change at will
its course of study and even the very trades it teaches; yet, on the
other hand, if the trade school must wait for board action before
altering its plans, it would prejudice the value of its instruction,
which must be flexible if it would train its students directly for the
market; (3) the impossibility of obtaining its teachers from the usual
"waiting list" and the difficulties attending the selection of a
satisfactory teaching force.
The possibilities for offering highly specialized, skilled work are
great, but the poverty of the students limits their time at the day
school. To help all girls who work, and who wish to get ahead, night
classes have been organized from time to time, and during the day also
temporary instruction is offered to any one who has a slack time in her
trade. As the school is organized into trade shops, with the same
specialization as in the market, a student can enter or be placed from
almost any point. This increases its usefulness but complicates its
management.
Obtaining and Training Teachers
As trade instruction is new in education, the normal schools have not
begun training teachers regularly for these positions, nor, indeed, are
they yet prepared to do so. The organizer of a trade school faces,
therefore, a serious difficulty in obtaining instructors who are
adequate to the task before them.
The following trade teaching staff is needed: supervisors of the various
trades; forewomen to direct the school shops; trade instructors to teach
the various groups of students the specialized processes; assistants to
attend to minor matters in the workrooms; art teachers, who have had
experience in designing for the various trades represented; academic
instructors who know the working world practically and can give the
students a training which, while helping them in their trades, will
broaden their knowledge of and sympathy in the world's work. All of
these teachers must not only have had experience in trade, but must
continually keep in touch with the methods of the outside market.
Unsuccessful trade workers, who often wish to teach, or teachers who
know nothing of the needs of trade workrooms, cannot adequately prepare
students for specific trade positions. Trade knows what it wants, is a
severe critic and an unsparing judge. The trade school, therefore,
cannot afford to rely on instructors who would be themselves
unsuccessful in the market, for the result would be certain failure in
the students. Such specific training requires exceptional knowledge in
its teaching force. The usual teacher of manual training knows too
little of the ways of the workrooms and is too theoretical in her
instruction to be trusted to train workers who must satisfy trade
demands. On the other hand, the trade worker, good as she may be in her
specialty, seldom knows how to teach. She can drive her group of
workers, but she cannot train the green hands to do more than work
quickly at one thing. She can make them work, but she cannot make them
better workers. When she has orders to turn out, her lifelong training
makes her think of the rapid completion of the articles rather than the
careful development of the students who are making them. If she is not
watched she will choose the girl to do a piece of work who can do it
well and quickly (but who does not need this experience), rather than
the one who should do it in order to have practice in it.
The problem is to find a way to unite the good teacher and the
successful worker. Such a combination appears at rare intervals. At the
present time the teacher who can adequately prepare young workers for
trade has to be taught while she is herself teaching. She may be chosen
from either the industrial or the educational field, if she has certain
qualities of mind and spirit, but she must now make up the points she
lacks, be it experience in trade or ability to teach. Supervisors need
special insight and capability, as they are called upon to investigate a
new and difficult field, to select from it the subjects needed, and
after that to organize education of a most practical kind. They combine
the duties of school principal, teacher, forewoman, factory
superintendent, and business manager. They must be willing to give
themselves to the cause, as they are responsible for the conduct of
their departments throughout the year, at night as well as during the
day, at least until they can train some one to whom they can delegate
some of their responsibility. They need a broad, cultural education and,
at the same time, interest and knowledge of the industrial problems of
the time, as well as experience in their particular trade. They must
have sympathy with the working people and their lives. It is evident
that such women are hard to find, and when found or when trained are in
demand by other institutions or in business life, in which places they
can command high salaries. All efficient trade teachers also are equally
in demand in workrooms, hence the school must compete with good business
salaries in place of the usual underpay of educational institutions.
In addition to the trade teachers, practical instructors in healthful
living and special secretaries needing social knowledge of various kinds
are also essential in the modern trade school for girls. Their training
adds to the director's responsibilities, for no one at present has the
knowledge and experience necessary.
The many problems connected with obtaining an adequate teaching staff
seem at present to have but one solution, _i. e._, the school has to be
its own training school for its faculty to a greater or less extent. One
source of assistant teachers has been found in students who have made
good in trade. Pupils of fair education who show skill and executive
ability in their department work and who later succeed in their trade
positions have already proved helpful when brought back to the school.
Such girls know the courses of instruction, their needs and
difficulties, and also the outside workroom demands. If they are given
some hints in methods of teaching, their success is greater. European
trade schools for girls have drawn many of the best teachers from the
student body and have organized teachers' training classes for them. A
course of regular training for trade pupil teachers should be given
later in American training schools to meet this situation.
Courses of Study
As the changes about to occur in the market must be recognized and
inserted in the curriculum in time for the students to be prepared for
the new work when they are placed, set courses of study cannot be
followed without endangering the practical value of the teaching.
Furthermore, the pupils must be advanced as they show ability, and their
different characteristics should have consideration; hence the work must
be sufficiently flexible and adaptable to allow for increasing one kind
of training and decreasing another, in order to develop a girl's best
ability. It is not the trade courses only which should be fitted to the
need, but the trade-art, trade-academic, and physical education must
also shift and introduce needed material as quickly as would the market
grasp at new plans for the workrooms. Nor is it sufficient that the
curriculum should adapt itself merely to training girls for trade
positions. It is never to be forgotten that these students are to be
made into higher grade workers and citizens, and that the greater number
of them will marry. In general, it can be said that woman's entrance
into industry is more or less temporary in that it is apt to precede or
to follow marriage, and, as a rule, is not continuous. Good citizenship
for these young wage-earners should mean the better home as well as the
broader views of industrial life. The inserting into an already too
brief training the important factors for making the better home-keeper
requires study of the ethics and economics of home and social life in
addition to the study of the industrial situation, and places continuous
problems before the faculty.
Investigations
In order to be in vital touch with the practical needs and changes of
the market, special investigations of trade have been and are
continually conducted by the faculty of the school. Effort is made by
them also to keep in close contact with industrial and social
organizations of workers in settlements, clubs, societies, and unions,
that all phases of the wage-earner's life, pleasures, aims, and needs,
may be appreciated. The pupils in attendance are studied to know their
conditions of health, their tendencies, their needs, their improvement.
After their entry into trade they are kept in touch with the school
through the Placement Bureau, clubs, graduate associations, and also by
visits from the school's investigator, in order to note the effect of
their training on their self-support, their workrooms, and their homes.
Groups of trained and untrained girls are compared, that differences and
benefits may be noted and the true situation may be clearly understood.
That the essentials of this class of education might be grasped as far
as possible, the director of the school made a six months' investigation
of the professional schools for girls on the continent of Europe. This
study was made after the Manhattan Trade School had been organized and
was running successfully. The problems were then well in hand, and
advantage could be taken the better of differing standpoints. In some
European countries such practical instruction has been established for
half a century. Each country has organized the work according to its own
view of woman's position in industrial and domestic life. Many aspects
of the problem can therefore be studied and various courses of
instruction consulted. This investigation covered three interesting
fields. First, the organization of the schools, including the equipment;
the teachers and their training; the budget; the order work; the
relation of the school to employers; the placing of the girls in
positions; the wages; the schemes for financial aid, and the work of the
alumnæ associations. Second, the trades taught and the courses of
instruction; the general education required at entrance and that given
as an integral part of trade; the trade-art courses; the housekeeping
and training of servants; the development of ideas of better living and
the training for responsibility in home and trade life. Third, the
visiting of workrooms employing women; the obtaining information on the
effect of trade schools; the students' usefulness and ability to
advance, and a survey of the crafts conducted in the homes of the
people.
Trade Order Administration
A trade school must do its skilled handwork in the fashion of the day
and on correct materials, yet the students are too poor to work for
themselves. A school budget cannot supply such large quantities of
valuable materials unless it can get some return for them. The school
shop in each department, where orders both private and custom are taken,
has proved advantageous, but involves great problems of administration:
(1) the actual business methods and management connected with the
invoices, sales, and delivery of goods; (2) the obtaining of orders
needed and of the quantity desirable; (3) the taking of custom orders,
fitting the customer, and delivery of orders on time; (4) a satisfactory
apportionment of the order work so that the students may profit by it
and not be expected to continue it after they have had sufficient
experience of one kind, or if they are not yet able to do the elaborate
work involved; (5) the finding of operatives who will do what the
students cannot or should not do; (6) the expense involved in employing
workers at trade prices and for shorter hours; (7) the cost of articles,
and other details which are involved in entering into competition with
trade. It may be stated that no trade school should underbid the market,
but should charge the full prices and expect to give equivalent returns.
A trade school cannot afford to be an amateur supported by a
philanthropic public, but must have a recognized business standard.
Placement
Problems of varied kinds meet the school in placing its students. Each
new enactment of child labor or industrial laws has its influence. Even
a good law will sometimes have a temporary serious effect in lowering
wages or turning capable girls out of satisfactory positions. Care must
be exercised that students are not placed where there is a possibility
of running counter to the best interests of labor. The desire to place
each pupil where she can develop to her highest condition requires
continual knowledge of the market needs and of the characteristics of
the many girls. Records of students entering, studying, and placed, the
kinds of positions open, and industrial and labor information must be
kept up to date, yet such data are often hard to secure.
Trade Union Attitude
An important question that is always before a trade school is the effect
the instruction may have on the working people. It is difficult for one
not continually in the midst of the pressure of the actual trade to
know the many ways that thoughtless advance in trade teaching may react
to the disadvantage of the very ones that the school wishes to help.
Injury may be done by preparing too many for certain occupations,
filling places where a strike is on, replacing well-paid positions with
trade school girls at a less price, placing the girls at too small a
wage for their skill, doing order work at too low a price or when a
strike is on, considering too closely the fitting of a worker for the
employer's benefit rather than for the broadening of her own life, and
like thoughtless actions. The difficulties of the situation are great
and the solution frequently obscure, but a fair-minded school must be in
touch with the effort the working woman herself has inaugurated to
better her condition. The apparently unnecessary suspicion with which
the laboring class regards the organization of trade instruction would
have foundation if no thought were given to the trade conditions as the
working girl sees them. A trade school for fourteen-year-old girls need
not make a point of their immediate entrance into unions, but it should
consider the subject simply and wisely in all its bearings, that the
students may know the full aims and advantages of coöperation as well as
the point of view and many difficulties of the employers.
Contact with Trade
The faculty of a trade school needs the coöperation and assistance of
the working people and the employers of labor. Only through intimate
interrelation with them can the best and most practical results be
obtained. Auxiliaries and committees of employers and of wage-earners;
visits of the staff of the school to trade, and of employers, forewomen,
and workers to the school; the carrying out of orders for workrooms and
assisting them at busy seasons, are some of the ways by which the
Manhattan Trade School has tried to gain the help of the busy industrial
world.
Problems of Financial Aid
The aid given to enable the poorest students to attend the school has
brought its own questions, such as: the danger of pauperizing the
recipients; the methods of selecting the beneficiaries; the best way to
give the weekly aid; the development of a spirit of earnest work and
regular attendance in the girls thus aided; the stimulation of a desire
to return some equivalent in special helpfulness to the Manhattan Trade
School or to its students, and the eliminating of this philanthropic
effort from any apparent relation to school work.
FOOTNOTES:
[B] In order to explain these problems, it will be necessary to repeat
some of the data in Part I.