Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1903-01-01
STATE PUBLIC SCHOOL TEACHERS
AgS0CTATTnN

The forty eighth annual meeting Of the
N. j. State Teachers Association was held
in Trenton on Monday, Tuesday and We'd
nesday Of the present week. Space will
not permit a full report Of the interesting
proceeding, but we quote portions OF the
address Of State Superintendent Baxter and
President Taylor, Of Vassar College =:
After declaring that child study in the
past all points to manual training as an
indispensable factor in symmetrical edu-
cation, Mr.. Baxter said -
Manual training correlated with aca-
demic work not only furnishes better
and far more rational development for all
students and scholars, but is a profound
blessing to those who must engage in
manual labor, and may easily be SO di
versiied as to meet the needs Of all grow
ing minds
Furthermore, those who are taken
early from school to learn trades or to
work their uncertain and difficult way up
in some other line of employment, would
remain longer in school if they were re-
ceiving the kind of instruction that most
appealed to them, and the broader mental
development thus gained would tell in
their favor through life. To justify tax
upon the State for their support, the schools
maintained under its supervision should
meet the needs of the masses This they
cannot do and remain exclusively academic.
1.-THE great inventions of the past two or
three decades and the consequent division
of labor have greatly modified the old sys-
tenn of apprenticeship and to-day many
boys start with the lowest forms of service
required in an industry and struggle slowly
and iaboriously upward to greater skill
and higher forms of work. 1t is very
difficult for those who have received only
the rudiments of a strictly academic educa-
ton thus to master the successive processes
in any line of work and gain the skill that
will make promotion and ultimate success
certain. Their lack of early training will,
barring the few exceptional cases, condemn
them to mediocrity."
After asserting that "the only satisfac-
tory and effective solution of the social md
industrial problem Of the day must come
through the agency of the Schools" Mr..
Baxter continued =:
''When they shall turn out embryo citi-
zens whose attitude toward the world Of
work and drought is correct, shall graduate
boys and girls who have been taught to
love work and honor it, and when the
schools shall recruit the industrial ranks
with those who have the dexterity of hand
and development of mind required to meet
fully the demand for reasonable, intelligent,
self-respecting and self-directing labor,
then will be ushered in an era of industrial
prosperity and content, such as the past
has never known"
Continuing, Mr.. Baxter said Manual
training co-ordinated with liberal academic
education and the development thus attain
ed supplemented by technical training
adapted to local industries, will meet the
needs Of both employer and employed.
European countries discovered this long
ago and their technical schools are the re-
suit. France has many cities in which
pupils are trained in line with their local
industries and thus prepared for their life
work. Sevres, for example, has schools
which supply its justly celebrated porce
lain factories with competent workmen.
Nearly all are prepared to engage in skilled
labor when first employed and those whose
originality, genius and executive ability are
unusual, soon become superintendent and
managers. Why would not Trenton do
we'll to follow the example of Sewers? Bes-
ancon has such schools for her future watch
makers, which are supported at the city's
expense Why should not Newark in adj
dition to the excellent technical school now
maintained have another in which to train
her future jewellers and silversmith's :?
Lyons has schools which provide trained
workmen for her textile industries. Why
should not Paterson have the same !?
Bohemia trains artistic workers for her glass
industries have become world-renowned.
Why should not the same enlightened
policy prove beneficial to the great glass
industry established in several Of our south
ern counties ? Why should the United
States, which now includes New Jersey,
continue to be Bohemia's most valuable
customer?
s'No other State is so favorably located
both commercially and geographically as
New Jersey The destined commercial CEN
ter of the world is at our doors, and we
command the great highways to the we'll
nigh boundless west. Both materials and
markets are easily accessible and capital
and enterprise are rapidly recognizing their
advantages. The growth of our manufac-
turing interests during the past decade has
been phenomenal. The following table,
prepared by James 7. Morgan, of the New
Jersey bureau of statistics, is eloquently
suggestive =