The labor journal. [volume] (Everett, Wash.) 1909-1976, 1911-04-07
NIGHT SCHOOL BRINGS
SATISFYING RESULTS

Continued from Page One'l
entertained, we came away with the
firm conviction that we had witnessed
revolution in school work and school
methods. We did not find playrooms,
hut workshops. No frivolous 'rah, 'rah,
bows. but determined, serious young
men and women, middle aged men and
women, working out their destiny by
practical application of practical prob
lens.
In the domestic science department,
women. both young and middle aged,
were mastering the culinary art. Play
Oh no. Working girls and wives OF
working men were fitting themselves
for lives of domestic happiness. Isn't
it an old saying, "a man well fed is a
man content 2" The lady in charge OF
that department gave her services free
of charge and made the statement that
if she could have that class of students
she was amply repaid for her time and
trouble. Can you ask of our public
servants a higher type of service? In
another room a class of girls and women
were taking lessons in sewing with the
little lady in charge both companion
ana instructor.
Three classes in English, made up for
the most part by young men and WON.
en- of apparent Scandinavian birth.
Working people, every one of them,
eager to fit themselves to hold their
own in the land of their adoption. 1t
was fascinating to watch their intense
eacerness and to be told that one young
woman who read with scarcely a trace
of Norwegian accent, had been in this
country lust nine months. In the book
keeping department the students were
being taught business methods by
actual experience. Here was a bank in
full operation with its tellers and ac-
countants. Across the room an exact
duplicate of an accounting department
of a business house. A class in stenog-
raphy, typewrting, penmanship, arith-
metic.
We entered one room and found a
class listening intently to a lecture on
electricity accompanied by demonstra-
lions. in that class were a half dozen or
more members of the electricians union
men who are skilled in their trade. And
these boys are enthusiastic over the
course. and say they are learning things
about their own trade that they, skilled
worbmen, did not know before.
In the manual training department
boys and young men were working at
the lathe, at the bench, operating band
saw Their handiwork stood about
them, filing cases, intricate inlaid work,
cabinets, stands Another class was
busy at mechanical draughting, working
out book theories on paper. One work
ing man of middle age showed his own
constructed plans Of a new house which
is to be his before long. A class in bot
any, one in physics. In every room en-
tered the same electrically charged at
mosphere greeted the visitor Those
students We're in deadly earnest. They
were conscious of the opportunities de-
MED to them in the past, grateful for
the opportunities vouchsafed them by
the present, and elated by the vista
opened to them for the future. No sane
man or woman ever loses ambition, but
many Of them have knocked long at the
door of opportunity. Does it pay? Ask
those eager people who have taken ad-
vantage of this trial course in the night
school system and the answer will come
to you most promptly and affirmative
~.