, 1881-05-22

The President Of the Chicago Board o1
| Education, in Ills report for 1878, says:
-''Warden McLaughry, of the Illinois Peni-
Tertiary, states that of l, 1877 conyicts In his
charge last September 50 per cent could read
and write, but only IL per cent knew any
thing about any useful branch OF labor ~
Commenting upon this fact, President Sui
Ivan well remarks: "a system Of educa-
ton which confers the power of knowledge
for good OF for evil, but nogleets to direct
that knowledge into some useful channel, is
Incomplete, because it fails to accomplish
one Of the prime objects Of Instruction." 4
prime object Of our public schools is ID to
make Of tile puplla good citizen, aud (a) to
fit him to win fair success in life; but, az
cording to the statistics of the Illinois
Penitentlary, they fail of tho desired
result in both particulars. These statistics,
however, furnish a hint Of the nature of the
defect IN the methods Of public instruction.
OF the 1,167 conyicts, o}3 "could read and
write" It is plain that simply knowing how
to read and write does not save lnen from the
Penitcntiary. But among these 1857 con-
yicts there were only 140 men of trades
skilled mechanics. It is plain that skilled
worklnoll, men who are practically ac--
quainted with the use Of the few universal
tools.-the hammer, plane, saw, chisel, file,
and square,-are not nearly SO likely to get
into the Penitcntiary as their fellows who,
although they: may know how to read, write
and cipher, cannot tell the size Of a brick.''
# we assume that l,073 out Of the
1857 conyicts (the o33 who .t:scould
read and write" but knew nothing of any
branch OF useful labor, and the 140 who pre-
sunably could read and write as well MS earn
good wages in machine shop,-if we as-
sumo that these all attended the public
schools, we find the chief defect in the sys-
tenn to be its entire lack of provision for
practical instruction-manual training. To
put it strongly: knowing how to drive nail
or shove plane is better protection against
vice and the Penitentlary than knowing how
to read and write. In other words, the
graduate of the public school is in danger OF d
falling into vicious ways and criminal II
practices until he hardens his palms
with honest work. Let us not be under
stood rs condemning the public schools. t
It is a splendid thing to know how to read
and write, and the public schools teach these
accomplishments, and many more. What !
we want the public schools to do is to teach |
their pupils to apply their intellectual ac-
quirements to practical: uses, The higher I
schools Of learning the colleges and uniyer- |
sities-are as deficient III this regard as the !
common schools. "a Chicago practical bust |
ness man WHO tnkes a deep Interest in edu-
:ational matters says the most utterly help
less class Of persons with whom he is
orought i'll contact are college grad,l-
1tcs;. Full !: of culture to the brin,
hey possess, he says, not : single i
:equisit to a successful career in life out
;ide the learned professions, Which are t
'Yercrowded. In face Of the simplest busi-
less proposition, or most ordinary, practical
question, they are rs helpless as infants. =:
This is the age Of great practical achieve
llents: III the van of tile progress that has
'een made during the Inst one hundred and
fifty years stands the Anglo-Saxon.* It is uu-
eniahle, however, tllat to the English be-
pngs the honor Of having taken the first
teps in advance IN the practical arts, which
ave reyolutionized the world; and these
teps were taken in the workshops Of Great
'ritain during the apprentieeshlp era. But
he apprenticeship system is in its decay in
'ngland, and itcan scarcely be said ever to
ave had an existence here. Some system
lust be devised: to take the place Of the
cllonl Of mechanics, which has existed in the
but no longer exists anywhere:
or the law Of l1eredlty4 4wjll control: in me-
lanics as in everything else, Says an able
'rlter:: :: ACQUIRED as. well a as natural quail