The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1917-07-28
OUR SCHOOLS IN WARTIME
THE TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
IMPORTATION BUREAU
By Frederic j. Haskin. Director
Washington. d. G.

first days of the war in America was
the liberal response of the colleges TO
the call for men. Almost every one
of our big universities took up mill
tary training. The first officers tram
ing camps were filled with college
men. Is this tendency going too 1af
for the best interests of the nation
This is only one of the tremendous
ly important problems which war
brings to the schools. From the KIN
dergarten for the tiny tots scarce apie
to talk, all the way up to the post
graduate course in the great unlver-
sity war means new conditions to be
faced, new tasks to be accomplished.
The war has made sweeping ana
fundamental changes in the educa-
tional system of every belligerent IN
Europe. 1t will make changes in our
own. We will have to be exceedingly
careful that these changes do good
and not harm.
The United States commissioner OF
education, Dr. p. P. ClaXton. has
started a campaign, whose slogan is
No lowering of efficiency In our
schools. DR.. ClaXton reminds us that
we must depend on our colleges to
keep up the supply of trained men.
Yet the college man has undeniably
greater tendency to get into the army
than the average man.
This is due to a variety of causes,
and does not argue that the college
man is ahead of the rest of us in pa
triotism. He has better chance TO
become an officer than the man with
only a grammar school education. and
that is an attraction. He is quicker
to feel the cause of the allies as his
own, because his training has kept
him in closer touch with English and
French culture and traditions. Per-
haps most important of all, the ma
nf holnnO Tn ella Sc
which does not have to worry about
the bread and butter of present and
prospective dependents.
So the college man is always quick
to enlist in the army. If this move
ment goes so far as to drain the col
leges of men, it threatens national eff
ficiency, because in a few years We
will begin to feel a shortage of en-
gineers, technical experts and trained
young men in all lines. By that time
they will be very badly needed, for We
hope that the work of world recon-
struction will have begun. There are
10000, 900 men of what we have fixed
as military age in the country today.
There are only about 10000 men in
the colleges, and from these 10000
men the trained scientists and techni-
cal experts of the future must be
drawn.
No attempt will be made to prevent
leges. 1t is every mans right to fight
for the country in the first line, if he
wants to and is physically fit. More
over there are many men in the col
leges who are not training for techni-
cal work, who are merely getting a
liberal education enabling them to en-
JOY life better, and who are particu-
larly fitted for war service because
their families will never have to live
by their toll In view of such facts
the colleges must manifestly be per-
pitted to continue to furnish their
share to the army. Only, the bureau
of education intends to point out the
dangers of the situation, and to urge
the man who is getting a training
that will make him valuable to the
nation to consider his duty carefully
The country has probably spent a
good deal on his primary and high
school trainingi if he is in a state col
lege, 1t has spent more there. 1t is
for him to decide where he can best
discharge the obligation; if his train
, ing has been worth much to him, he
is capable of making the decision for
himself
Europe have taken a terrible blow in
the last three years. Their output
OF trained men will certainly fall far
| below what it was before the war for
several years after peace has return
ed This will mean an additional
need and additional opportunities for
Americas trained men.
Ihe conScription system in both
France and Germany recognized the
Importance of keeping up the sup
ply or specialists, but both of these
countries got to the point some time
ago where they could not spare any
abte-bodied man from active service
England recruited millions of volun-
teers before she reSorted to conscrip-
ton, and this volunteer period drain
har N1r1fx kolI
| an anecdote of a majors orderly who
was given a long column of, figures
| relating to socks and shoes to add up.
/ Instead of sitting down over it with
a pencil as the major admitted he
| himself would have done, the orderly
! ran an indifferent eye over it and set
/ down total. MY man." said the
major sharply, you had better be
accurate" Il think you'll find it cor
rect, sir" replied orderly respectfully.
HIM" said the major, and then,
| what did you do before you enlist
ed? Il was professor of mathematics
at 1872 said the orderly, naming
one of the oldest and most famous
universities in the world.
That man would probably have
i-been worth more to his country teach
ing mathematics than adding columns
of socks. But the first rush of voIun-
| teering swept the English universe
ties like flame. Something of the
same sort has appeared in this coun-
try, altho it has been on a much
smaller scale.
This problem of keeping the col
leges up to the mark is only one OF
the tasks that the educational system
of the nation faces. The bureau OF
education sees such an increased de-
mand for trained men certain to arise
in the future that it will try to in
crease the number of high schoo
students as much possible. Com
missioner Claxton points to Russia
and China as two immense fields
where American technical men will
be wanted in the work of develop
ment. Both of these great republic.
have vast wealth and vast resources
and both of them have shown theil
preference for American engineer.
and Industrial experts. Russia pro
poses to ask us to work the mines Of
Sakhalin. The Chinese preference fol