The San Francisco call., 1906-07-08
THE SIMPLE LIFE IN HIGH SCHOOLS.
BY FRANKLIN HICHBORN.

peared in swalloWtail he would not
have got off with merely tilted nose
tolerance, as did the sack-coat boy of
the other evening. He'd have been
lucky to escape with nothing more Sc
rious than, a ducking.~ the class IN
question had just completed the course
provided for Humboldt County schools.
James B. Brown principal-guide phil
osopher and friend of every boy and
girl of his classes.
Somehow that class had managed to
get along without class pins or class
photographs even a fraternity
There had been no class ball; such
even an opera-house hired. j. b. as
the principal was affectionately called
complimented the class on it's finished
work. reminded 1t that only a start
had been made, expressed the hope
that sooner or later every member of
1t would be able to enter a university
and distributed the Certificates of
graduation. No observer extended
sympathy to parents; there was no
call for sympathy. Every boy of the
class was prepared to get out and
hustle for a living, enter the univer-
sity or take the old mans place in the
store or the sawmill. Every girl had
passed her examination to teach, and
had her credentials as a-teacher. They
hadn't a normal school training, but
/ those that went to teaching made good
teachers.
There was. too, implanted in each
graduate a love for the orderly way of
doing things. the direct way that takes
short cuts when the popular road
around is unnecessarily long. But the
graduates LEFT the school with some
thing more than regard for order and
drectness They left 1t with rev
erence for authority and law, with a
patriotism and love of country infinite
ly deeper than is attained at the mere
flag waving stage; with high ideas of
their responsibilities and duties as cit
izens which made of them as good cit
izens at primaries and elections as some
of them proved themselves on the firing
line during the Spanish war
Such was the old time high school,
such was the old-time high school
teacher and the old-time high school
work. 1t is a question whether the
graduates of the other evening had had
better training. When youth and maid
reach tls high school they are or should
be beyond the methods OF the primary
grades. The influence OF their teacher
should not be taken up with the minor
details of conduct, but should make for
higher things. patriotism. reverence for
the law. respect for authority. But do
they?
The principal of one of the most inn
portant high schools of the State, one
that stands high on the university ac-
credited list, told me recently that he
was opposed to high school fraterni-
ties; that he regarded them as waste
full of the students time, as un-Amer-
lean and productive of snobbishness
and insubordination. But" said he.
"the students insist upon organizing G
fraternities and i am poweriess TO pre-
vent them"
That teacher may not have realized
it, but in his statement was a confess
sion of INSTRUMENTATION and contempt
of authority in his school. which will
follow the students brought under its
influence through life. Nor will the
book learning" compensate them for
It, Successful contempt for authority
at school will bring them into contempt
of authority in the larger school of
life into which they graduate. All
things considered. 1t might be well to
bring about divorce between the
frifls of high school life and the pur-
pose for which the high school was,
originally at least, intended, the train
ing of young men and women to be
! effective in the workaday world
Parents who are not in society" and
don't want to be would not then be
taxed to keep up appearances which
are beyond their means and station,
and the tendency toward insubordina-
ton and snobbishness in the schools
/ would be overcome. However strenu-
Gus the race may have grown of late,
tits the part of good policy to keep the
1 children on a simple Lie basis until
/ they are at least out of their teens.