Wood County reporter. [volume] (Grand Rapids [i.e. Wisconsin Rapids], Wis.) 1857-1923, 1922-06-08

| dents cabinet at a time when the
| keenest brains of the nation were
needed to guide its destiny shows ii
lself that he is a man whose opinions
must be respected.
The national system of education
| needs reformation.
1t has stood still in its fundamentals
while every other art and science has
advanced.
The American youth of today is be-
| ing turned out of schools not fitted
to give his best in the battle that an
| ever growing complex economic stu
alton demands. He is being bedecked
with educational "pretties," a dress
uniform that must be cast aside to
give place to the dull drab Of the
working garb and the time he loses
IN making that change is a precious
time of strength and enthusiasm, of
plastic years that yield too easily
many times to the fingers of circum-
stance and environment, of ideals that
may be shattered by the rude hand of
necessity.
Children should be trained to ap-
probation of the finest things in life
but they can never secure those fine
things unless they are equipped to ex-
pend to best advantage every power
nature gave them at birth and Amer
lca's educational system today is neg
Letting too many of those powers and
feeding to excess others.
We Americans have long been lust
ly proud of our free public school sys-
tenn. For the more easy-going life we
lived dozen years ago it did very
we'll. Nok, it seems to me, our deep
est, fundamental notions of what a
system of schooling should be are in
need of complete reshaping. We
have been sending our children out in
to the world to work their way up-
ward, but with blunted tools in their
hands. Now they need more accurate
fitting for the work they are to do
and we must supply it.
Lies Real News.
Let US look at the matter more in
detail. Every year certain proper
ton Of our children must begin work
and leave school at the end of the
grammar grades. They have these
grades with the elements of arithme-
tic, geography, history, English and
other languages hardly much more
Those who are fortunate enough to
finish high school have, of course
gone much farther into mathematics
and history and the languages, and
into the past and present activities of
the world-what we call cosmogony.
But the point am making is that this
system of education strikes me as be-
ginning at the end instead of at the
beginning. All these studies given
our children have been useful enough.
but except for mathematics and Eng
lish study, they all constitute train
ing for the finer things of life rather
than for life's first practical needs.
Let me hasten to say that l am not
for curtailing in any measure the
training of the very humblest of our
children for enjoyment of the finest
things in life. The point is that this
training should come at the proper
time, and that life can mean nothing
to him until he has been taught some
means of earning his livelihood. Our
colleges themselves yearly release to
| the world great crowds of eager young
people highly trained in the apprecia-
ton of Hfe's finest things They
| know the great deeds and the great
| works of art of the far past. They
| have deep understanding of natural
and economic law. They have been
taught to understand and enjoy life,
| and measure the present against the
background of the past. But all this
is for enjoyment and understanding
it is not training for actual work.
Many a college graduate enters the
world wise enough, but actually be-
wildered and helpless.
Chance for Youth
| | would not for anything surrender
| or curtail the training we should give
our children in appreciation of the
| fine things of life. But long ago It
struck me that, for the safety of the
individual and for the safety of the
country, the ideal system of education
for the average young boy or girl in
our land consisted of at least high
school training and the acquisition OF
some practical trade.
This has been no idle theory OF
mine. The theory has been in practi,
cal operation in the home school start,
ed and maintained by the Loyal Order
of Moose, at Mooseheart, not far from
Chicago, along the Fox River in Hi.
nois. Experts have been generous