The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-02-10
4 VAST ARMY OF
 NIGHT STUDENTS ToiIerS for Knowledge Burn
 Midnight Oil BOTH MEN AND WOMEN More Students in Night Schools in New York Than Men in the
 Standing Army of the
 United States.
BOTH MEN AND WOMEN

New York February 9.-fSpecial)-
 metropolis has a great army of civil
 ians that is drilling, drilling, drilling,
 every night through the winter-an army
 over twice as large as the enlisted strength of the army of the United
 States today. It is great force con
 stantly growing and recruiting its ranks to defend the city against the incursions of the barbarian hordes of ignorance and
 mental decay and ineffciency. It has no waving banners, no inspiring bands and, in fact. its enlisted men carry no
 arms It gives no spectacular parades.
 In fact. it is largely a sitting army rath- CT than standing one. Both men and women compose it-l50,000 of them-and
 there are no class distinctions in it, for in the ranks are wealthy bankers and brokers, as well as poor boys and girls who are unable to complete an elemen- tary education before the great maw of the metropolitan business world swallow ed them up It is, in short. the great
 army of men and women who go to school after working hours, the army of . persons who put in overtime in study to increase their efficiency in the world
 the night school army of the metropolis. | If every theatre and concert hall in l the city, as well the two big opera 1 houses and the great auditorium of the Madison Square Garden, were thrown op- l en, they could not seat this great army
 of evening students. It is a larger army l than the big host of pleasure seekers that
 throng the. public amusements of all l kinds every night and flutter<about the ] glowing lobster palaces" and cafes un- l til long after midnight. And though the i activity of the evening students does not attract nearly the attention called l forth by the gayer nocturnal activities l of the town, it Is tremendously more 1 important And the significance of this army of students after hours. steadily
 working to perfect themselves for larger parts in the great drama of metropolitan
 life, is a very great one
 But even the number 15o,OOO does not represent fully the extent of this great l movement for mental improvement. For 1 the night school army has what might l be called an immense civilian reserve,
 the persons who do not take regular
 evening courses, but attend serious lec-
 lures given in the evening. Last year l the aggregate attendance at such 1ec- l lures was over 100000. Under the aus 1 pices of the Board of Education alone, 1 5,464 evening lectures of educational char l acter were held, attracting 1,14,4E per-
 sons. A good part of these lectures,
 however, are welded into regular edu- l cational courses in which examinations
 are held and certificates are given for 1 proficiency.
 1 Nearly everything under the sun is studied fin the after -business-hours class l es throughout the city, and the classes range from plain reading and writing
 and 'rithmetic," in the elementary pub 1 lie evening schools, for boys who have to
 lcomplete an elementary education and
 contribute to the support of families too, l to night courses for university degrees, 1 given in New York University. There
 is public school where old negro man.
 mics learn the modern cookery of the north, or dressmaking; schools in sew
 ing and millinery work for girls, school 1 for janitors, a school for office boys, 1 schools for automobilists and for brick l layers, for pattern makers and for me chanical engineers, for artificial flower l makers and for stock brokers, in short, l for Jacks (and Jills tool of all trades. Of course, the greatest number of eve
 ming students are in the public courses
 given by the Board of Education. There were 121, ,f37 enrolled in these classes last year, about S5 per cent in the elementary
 classes. In the high school classes stem l ography and bookkeeping are the most 1 popular subjects. Then there are the Y. NJ. c. A. schools which are spending
 s1OO,000 a year and giving special train l ing to 5000 men, the trade schools, where 1 boys and young men may receive train i ing in the skilled occupations, other l schools conducted by civic and phlan- 1 thropic and educational organizations, | civil service examination schools, schools
 conducted by big industrial corporations l and by the big traction companies and ! the various evening university courses. Of course, the aristocrats of this army l are the men and women who are devot-
 ing their evenings toward securing what the average person considers is sufficient 1 to occupy his full time with univer- sity degree. New York University, the l educational extensions of which have kept pace with the growing demands of a city that is gradually coming to have a 24-hour working day, has some 1,o00 of 1 these evening students. Besides it's big night classes, it carries on a truly post graduate school for special business 1 training, in It's school of commerce. Ac- counts and finance, which has 150 stu
 dents, and a regular college where de- 1 gree equivalent to Bachelor of Arts can i be obtained. in the Washington Square 1 Collegiate Division.
 | This last, New Yorlx's night college, is | one of the most interesting collegiate in- l stitutions of the country. To it come l lawyers, business men and school teach
 CTS, who are eager to spend their evenings
 ip hard work. adding to their equipment l the mental grace and polish that comes 1 with the college education. To the teach CTS the coveted college degree opens the l way to promotions to superintendencies and other high positions, but many of | the other hard students in the night col 1 lege enter into the work after long day 1 Of toll simply to cultivate their minds
 and open for themselves wider vistas of
 mental life. About two-ffths of the stu dents in the collegiate division are wo- men.
 Some of the most noteworthy of the | evening schools are those conducted by | the various Y. NJ. C. A. branches. typical l of which is the West Side branch in .lan- 1 haitian, in which the Y. M. c. A. plan of | vocational education has reached the 1 highest development yet obtained in this l country Two thousand men and boys
 are enrolled in the schools of the fnstitu- 1 tion, where, in addition to courses in bus 1 mess ma athematics and languages, there are about score of educational courses. | the subjects of some of which have not l become topics for educational study any where else in the country.
 l The class is crowded with prospective | office boys being initiated into the myste- 1 res of filing systems, telephone switch ! boards and other matters of office rou- 1 tine; in another place wealthy men are l learning all about how motor boats are l built and run; in the automobile school 1 millionaire owners and woiIld-be chauf- 1 feurs work side by side learning the mo l dus operandi of the motor car. There are courses in real estate. interior decorating l and furnishing. printing, structural en- 1 gineering and plan reading and esumat- 1 ing, contract law, business law, invest 1 ments, exporting, business management the whole forming a vocational college