Bisbee daily review., 1915-07-23
Friday, July 23, 1915.
UTILITY vs. CULTURE.


 our system of education" complained Herbert Quick, editor Preside at a bankerfarmer confer ence Chicago, "s survival the times when mere knowledge was a test of culture.
 The university operated nithe interest of the grad school the high school that pupil will go to university or college the primary and second ary schools are based on the theory that pupils will pass through the grades above and finish with the equip. ment of a college professor
 This is not only absurd-it is criminally absurd We know that only small percentage of youths will pass through the high school. We knw that a much smaller percentage will ever see the inside of college lr Qucks auditors agreed-as most persons will agree-that he was right There is a tendency nowadays education practical and seryiceablo for the dinary purposes of life, but it hasn't gone very far Nearly all the city public schools are stll training their children to enter the high school and the schools training them enter the colleges and the colleges arc training them the graduate schools-all without given thought to what it's all about, the real pur pose of education in scheme of life.
 And stfl as has been the from time immemoral most children hate to go to school" glad when their time to drop out.
 There is one glorious excepuon-the Gary schools and those in other that modelled them since the remarkable success Of William Wirt Gary aupcriu,endcnt attracted national attention In Gary there difficulty in keeping children in school They seem to attend voluntarily and gladly and pursue their studies with genuine zest The reason is apparently that their work Is removed from the old cutanddred routine taken out of the of mere theory and given prac ucal application to real chndren's interest and the life they know and are curious. to know more about
 Another striking exception is found in Wright County. Ia. few years ago a county superintendent of rural schools named Benson began to suspect that something was wrong asked the boys and girls what they pcated do their life worll-'farmng or something esc Eightydye per of the boys and nearly all the girls answered that whatever they might at, it wouldn't be farming.
 That was a mighty serious matter. It meant that the rural schools there almost everywhere else in the United States of harmony with their environ ment They were getting children and pre- pairing them live their life, doing better work and finding more enjoyment than their parents had found
 Two years later s5 per cent of the girls and nearly all the boys declared that they meant stay the all their lives. It startling reversal and wholesome the agriculture of the United States What had happened in the meantime? MT Benson had simply begun teaching agriculture and domestic econo my and relating arithmetic grammar and other theore teal studies these practical directly and in erestingly that they all swallowed eagerly. The children knew now what it was about; they knew what their minds under the influence of the education opened naturally and apprecatyey to the advantages of their own environment
 Miss Jessie Field has done much the same thing in Page County She has ruralized the rural schools
 But in spite the Gary innovations, it is a long way yet to the "cyizng Of the city schools" The most prom sing development along that line in the rapid growth and surprisingly popularity of technical high schools.
 Thousands of boys and girls who weary of theiI lessons under the old system and wanted drop them for good have taken up their technical studies with thusasm because they some use" to that of instruction has definite connection with life they know it. It is adapted to their surroundings It fits them to a living and at the same time gives them broader outlook on the world And from the standpoint of the community that foots the bill it is ad mrabIe for 1t tends make industrious intelligent and enicient men and women instead of mere scholars o snobs Useful citizenship replaces the cenuries-olc ideal of selfish personal culture