The Manitowoc pilot. [volume] (Manitowoc, Wis.) 1859-1932, 1918-12-26
EDUCATIONAL.
(By ], w. Voborill
Continued from December l2)
PRUSSIANIZING AMERICAN
EDUCATION

quote only part of it;
"The manufacturer is learning rap
idly; but in this new study of indus
try he will not accept blindly what the
schools have been giving him, but will
demand that the schools be made over
to meet the new economic and social
situation. Among other things, the
aroused manufacturer will demand
that education be made real and inter
esting; that it shall be made business
like; that the pupil be made to under
stand his future possibilities,
which are, mainly: % the duty of
earning a living; (2) the duty of es-
tablishing himself as a real member of
society by marrying and bringing up a
family; (3) the duty of performing his
full share as citizen. He will de-
mand, too, that the schools cooperate
more than they do with the parent
the industries, and civic life in gen
eral, This they can do by using, first,
the factory, the farm, and the store, as
laboratories in which to give part of
the school education by making the
school an adjunct to the factory, store,
and farm; and third, by dividing the
work of teaching between the shop
and the school under the so-called CO.
operative method"
The school an adjunct" to the fac
tory! This gentleman's ideal for the
school of the future is to make it
sort of annex to factory.
Referring to number "3" above, one
might ask: How is a citizen to per
form his full share in a republic if he
quits school at fourteen, after having
learned merely the rudiment of an
education and after that receiving no
instruction except in the tricks of a
job or trade? Such a person might
perform his duties as a citizen in Ger
many under the regime of the Kaiser,
but he can not do it under a demo-
cratic form of government except of
his educating himself and thus rising
above the level OF his meager prepar-
alton in school for the duties of citi-
zenship.
Lincoln, referring to our govern
ment, said, 1T is government of the
people, by the people, for the people,"
but if the aroused manufacturer"
succeeds in realizing his demands"
We may find it necessary to say, This
is government of the wealthy, by the
wealthy for the wealthy If that
should come to pass, the next order of
events would probably be a regime of
the BolsheviM
Let no one gather the impression
| that the leading educators of the eoun-
try are not cordial to the idea of Civ
| ing instruction and training of a sort
| that would be regarded by sensible
business men and manufacturers as of
a useful and practical nature. AS a
matter of fact, all are thoroughly com
mitted to this idea and our educators
were working out plans and giving in
struction with constantly increasing
efficiency long before the manufac-
turer became aroused" In fact, see
ing this development put an idea into
| his head and aroused" him. He saw
how he could use the system they
were providing in his business If he
could get control of it, What the edu-
Gators of the country believe is that
the interests of the children of the ma
| tion will be safe in the hands of school
men because they have no axe TO
grind, but that they will not be safe in
the hands of the aroused manufac-
turer" The school men of the country
are unalterably opposed to n dual sys-
tenn of education, as being un-Ameri-
can, inefficient in the larger sense,
and adapted only to Prussian or
other caste system. The chances are
that even among manufacturers not
one in thousand approves a dual sys.
tem certainly not II he knows it's ori-
gin and It's significance.
A prominent city superintendent IN
Wisconsin said to me few days ago,
The continuation school as it is now
developing in Wisconsin is a fraud.
The laboring people are led to believe
that they can take their children out
OF the public schools where they are
getting all-day instruction and at
fourteen years OF age put them to
work so that they may be earning
money and at the same time have them
get all the schooling they need In the
part-time school," lie added that he
could see that the idea was spreading
rapidly in his city that children did
not need more schooling than they
could get In the first eight grades to.
gether with degree of skill In some
form Of work in a shop or factory II
viii be observed that this Ii precisely
to caste idea in education as found il
Germany
What do | mean by prussianxins
our education2 | mean primarily this
ID subtle, even II unconscious, nj
tempt to use the children Of the labor
Ing people including farmers, as cogl
In machine, in attempt to follow th,