Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1922-07-04

~ EW YORK CITY, June 30.-How to be-
N come well educated though poor is a
problem that has long puzzled many
Woodworking Americans. Now, at last,
satisfactory solution seems to have been found
in the workers universities that are being
established in so many industrial cities
throughout the country.
Already more than so of these universities
are in operation, as we'll as innumerable study
classes, where working men and women may
go in their spare hours and receive an ex-
cellent education. They are financed by the
workers themselves. Some of them, such as
the Amherst Glasses for Workers and the
Trade Union College of Boston, have close
utilization with our big universities Harvard,
Boston Tech, Wellesley and Tufts, for exam
pie, have all been interested and generous in
their support of the Boston workers college,
while the Amherst classes were originated and
are taught by instructors from the Amherst
College faculty. All are under the general
supervision of the Workers Educational Bu-
reau of America, whose headquarters is here
ir New York.
Although the Amherst experiment in work
ers' education is not typical of most of the
ventures, the reason for its inception is.
cit seemed to u.s." says the secretary Of the
undertaking, "that the relations between
American colleges and the communities sur
rounding them varied from armed neutrality
to actual hostility, and that this was unfortu-
nate for both community and college; that
American colleges (noninally open to any
one) were available to very few whose family
incomes were not above the average, and this
was true largely because our educational sys-
tenn is founded upon scheme of pre-requi-
sites making the graduation from grammar
and high school almost essential il one is to
enter college. So that, once having dropped
out, it is almost impossible to go on again,
even though one is so exceptionally fortu-
nate as to have the funds and the leisure nee
eSsary.
cit seemed to us unfair that the great mass
of workers should automatically be disquali-
fed because the mechanical arrangements of
our educational system happened to be such
that it was impossible for them to fulfill it's
requirements, and hence that workers should
practically be debarred from college and uni
versities supported by community funds or
endowed for the purpose of giving education
to all"
Few College Graduates
Only per cent of all the millions of adults
ir this country are college graduates. The
majority not only Cannot afford the money
and time required to go to college; they can
not even afford to attend high school. The
average citizen and voter goes promptly to
work as soon as he has completed grammar
school, if not before, having acquired only
the barest smattering of an education and,
until recently, little chance of acquiring any
more.
The new workers colleges are specially de-
signed to meet the needs of this average citi-
zen and worker. The classes are usually held
o" two evenings week and on Saturdays and
Sundays in the most convenient place which
happens to be available. Some are housed
in high school buildings, some in public halls
and others in local trade union headquarters.
The workman pledges himself to attend the
classes thirty-six weeks year during period
of three years.
Special textbooks have been written for his
benefit by experts. They present lucidly and
eementarily the background of each subject