PREFACE

At the Mobile meeting of the National Society for the Study of Education, it was decided that one of the 1912 Yearbooks of the Society should be devoted to a discussion of the actual progress that is being made in organizing schools for industrial education, and to an interpretation of the various lines of experimentation which are being undertaken. In recent years there have been many notable discussions of the social and theoretical justification for industrial education. Perhaps the best known of these discussions, because of its wide circulation, as well as its thoroughness, is the report of the Committee on the Place of Industries in Public Education, made to the National Education Association in 1910. In spite of this widespread general discussion, however, there are many educators (who are not specialists in industrial education) who are not aware of what is actually being done to solve the problems which have been so thoroughly analyzed in print. Even among the leaders in industrial education, some of those in New England are not informed concerning the work being done in the Mississippi Valley, and vice versa; and many are totally ignorant of what is being done on the Pacific Coast. Some of the contributors to this Yearbook, who are firm believers in the special plans which they describe and have been successfully engaged in organizing, have expressed their surprise at their failure to locate other examples of the same type of undertaking. Further evidence of this overplus of theorizing, coupled with a dearth of concrete evidence, is found in some of the books on industrial education which exhibit considerable ignorance of real experiments while they elaborate at length on purely paper schemes for industrial education.

To carry out the plan adopted at Mobile, the Secretary secured the assistance of Professor F. M. Leavitt, of the department of Fine and Industrial Arts of the University of Chicago. Professor Leavitt kindly classified the experiments which are being tried, as shown in the Table of Contents, suggested as many examples as he knew, and assisted in securing contributors. Each contributor was requested, first, to describe in some detail the history, organization, and results of the particular school with which he is connected as the best example of the type; second, to compare it with other schools of the same type; and

third, to show how his particular type of undertaking contributes to a solution of the problem of industrial education. The various contributors have carried out these suggestions with different degrees of emphasis; some have described their own undertaking primarily, others have described and compared other examples at length, while some have emphasized primarily the element of interpretation. In all cases, however, the contributions carry out the plan of demonstrating practical possibilities instead of merely advancing theoretical suggestions.

I. CLASSIFICATION OF PLANS FOR INDUSTRIAL TRAINING

FRANK MITCHELL LEAVITT

Associate Professor of Industrial Education, The University of Chicago

When one attempts to interpret the significance of the numerous industrial or other so-called vocational schools which have been organized in the past decade, he encounters the difficulty of clearly differentiating the several examples studied. The names of the various schools do not serve to classify them as do the terms "Elementary School," "High School," "College," "University," or even "Commercial School," "Agricultural College," "Engineering School," and the like.

We find these schools variously named; for example, Elementary Industrial School, Elementary Technical School, Semi-Industrial School, Independent Industrial School, Trade School, Pre-Apprentice School, Vocational School, Special Industrial School, Technical High School, etc.

An examination of the courses of study and plans of organization of these schools shows that they merge and overlap in a way which defies absolute certainty in classification. Classification, however, there must be, and a brief description or defense of the one employed in this volume is here given.

In attempting to differentiate these schools, one comes to realize that most of them are dominated or controlled by a very definite purpose. Perhaps nothing serves better to distinguish all of these schools from our traditional educational institutions than the singleness of purpose with which they are administered, and the classification here made is based on the fundamental purposes of the different types of schools studied.

One further generalization may be made, namely, that in attempting to meet the very definite demand for training which is motivated by vocational purpose, two rather distinct types of endeavor are to be observed, one within the present school system and the other in a measure outside of, if parallel to, the existing schools. Generally speaking, the prevocational schools, and vocational high schools fall under the first classification, while the separate industrial schools and the trade schools come under the second.

PREVOCATIONAL INDUSTRIAL TRAINING IN THE SEVENTH AND

EIGHTH GRADES

The purpose of prevocational work seems to be to secure the revision of the course of study in the upper elementary grades, both as to content and method, in order that the work given therein may appeal to those children whose vocational interests are drawing them away from the school altogether, and at a time when their education is extremely limited and fragmentary.

The schools employ the vocational motive as a strong incentive to hold the children in school, and secondarily as a vitalizing principle in determining the subject-matter of the course of study. These courses of study are not intended to deprive boys and girls of further education in the higher schools, but, on the contrary, they are intended to prolong the school life of the pupils and possibly to furnish another approach to the high school.

In order fully to understand the schools of this type, it is necessary for one to appreciate this double purpose of prevocational work. The word "vocational" serves in one case to describe the end of the education given, and in the other to indicate the interest which is utilized as an impelling force. These schools have invariably been an integral part of the school system, articulating with it in the most natural way, and they have eliminated nothing of the general culture which is commonly included in the work of the upper elementary grades.

INTERMEDIATE, INDEPENDENT, OR SEPARATE INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS While these schools have much in common with the prevocational schools, there is one radical difference. They do not commonly prepare their pupils for high schools. They are intended particularly for boys and girls who, having arrived at the age of fourteen, find themselves out of harmony with schools and school purposes, as they see them, and who would, failing this opportunity, probably enter immediately into industrial life. They are to a degree separate from both elementary and secondary schools, and independent of their domination. While these schools occasionally offer four years of work, few children entering them desire more than a short-term trade course. The work of the school, therefore, is made to appeal directly and immediately to the vocational interests of the children, and this interest is made the central and pre

dominant factor in the school. Cultural work is given, but the proportion of time devoted to it is generally less than in prevocational schools. No scholastic requirements for admission are made in most instances, the age of fourteen years constituting the only necessary qualification. Schools of this type have been most needed where traditional education has been strongly intrenched and is unyielding to the needs of the future industrial workers. In some instances, where the economic needs of the pupils have been great, the bookwork has been reduced to a minimum, and the preparation for immediate industrial efficiency has been made the first consideration. Generally, however, every possible effort is made to include something of an inspirational and refining nature in the course of study.

THE VOCATIONAL HIGH SCHOOL

The vocational high school retains many if not most of the features of the traditional high school. It admits pupils only after the completion of the work of the eight elementary grades, and seeks to advance them along general educational lines, giving, however, the maximum amount of training in vocational subjects possible without jeopardizing the pupil's opportunity for advanced training in higher institutions of learning.

The vocational high school differs from the traditional high school in its attitude toward the pupil who cannot take the complete course but who desires to specialize in one of the practical arts and to prepare for early entry into vocational life. The work is therefore carefully adapted to those who can spend but two years in the high school. Four-year courses are offered, however, and very commonly followed by the pupils. In the last year intensive work in the technique of one trade or vocation is often permitted.

Thus the important characteristics of these schools are: early attention to vocational subjects, opportunity for immediate differentiation, for specialization, and, when elected, for considerable practice in trade technique. More attention to the related science and art of the trade or vocation is given in the vocational high school than in the prevocational work of the grades or in the separate industrial school, and, quite naturally, greater stress is laid on the value of the so-called cultural studies.