Grand Forks herald. [volume] (Grand Forks, N.D.) 1916-1955, 1922-01-12

nllillons OF people who would like to glide through
the air at 80 to so miles an hour to whom several
times that speed would have no attractions.
EVENING SCHOOLS.
The decision of the Grand Forks board of edu-
cation to inaugurate evening schools in the city will
be generally commended. Long experience in other
communities, has demonstrated the fact that in
every moderately populous center, there is a field
tor the evening school. Some illiteracy exists al
most everywhere, and the reduction of this defect
alone is of sufficient importance to warrant the put
ting forth of considerable effort in this direction.
The evening school is the only method by which the
situation can be met successfully in actual practice.
1t is not alone however for the removal OF this
particular detect that the evening school is desir-
able. There are in every community young people
beyond regular school age as we'll as adults who, for
one reason or another, have not completed the or
binary courses of study provided in the public
schools, and by reason of this lack in their educa-
tional training, their efficiency as members of So
clety is impaired. and their capacity to en- oy the
benefits which community life provides is lessened.
The statement is sometimes made that the person
who has had the opportunity to attend school in
childhood for whatever deficiencies there are in his
education. and that the community is under no OBJ
legation to remedy the effects of his own negligence.
Perhaps this is true when considered on the basis
OF the obligation of the community to the individ-
ual alone, and even that is somewhat debated, but
the community is concerned not alone with the fix
ing of responsibility for the existence OF a certain
O0NN~@ NNS ''AA S'S VI SAION NOlIAl
ton and its results. 1t is not we'll for the com1nua-
ity that any of its members should be restricted in
their capacity and i'll their outlook by educational
defects. and even though the individual himself may
be responsible Tor these defects, the community is
interested in having the condition corrected. so that
it may add one more to the really useful and service
able members OF its group. For this reason any
agency which tends to provide those whose educa-
tlonal opportunities have been neglected with fur
ther means for Improvement. is in the interest Of
the community itself, and the community should
assume the responsibility for it. This points d.
rectly to the local board Of education when the mat
ter Of evening schools is considered.
There are two vital and important factors in
the conduct of All evening school,. 1t. has been
shown by repeated experiment that the kind of tut
ton necessaryEfor the training Of adult or nearly
adult l%lliterates, or those who are backward in their
studies. requires entirely different equipment from
that which is necessary in the ordinary teaching in
the public schools. The grown man who seeks to
improve his knowledge of English cannot success
fully be taught in the same manner that the little
child is 1 taught. In the one case, the teacher is deal
ing with the mind of a child in the other, with the
mind of a man, although that mind lacks develop
ment in certain specific directions. But there is
such as vast difference that the methods OF tuition
must be entirely distinct. This applies in almost
every line of work in the evening schools as they are
operated in actual practice, and it has been found
that a separate teaching force is required. In one
school. the authorities make the statement that
their best teacher Of English among the foreign
groups was a local labor leader who had been
brought into contact with the adult population in
an official way. and who himself was quite dehc-
lent in academic learning. His accent was i1nper-
feet, and his grammar left much to be desired. But
he could and did teach persons of his own age and
OF his own group to speak, understand. and read
and write the English language much better and
more rapidly than any other teacher in that partic-
ular school had been able to do. u
Another essential feature is the adoption OF &C
tive and vigorous, measures for the recruiting of
students. Those who are most in need of the work
OF the night school are the very people who are
least likely to come in contact with it unless their
%attention is directed to it by some outside agency.
A general invitation means little or nothing to them.
Personal contact and personal investigation are
necessary, and some Of the most useful work that
has been done in this direction in some other cities
has been done by employers who have carefully
icanvassed their employees, have ascertained in what
particular fields Of knowledge they were deficient,
and what their opportunities were for attending
might schools and being benefited by them. In this
particular, Grand Forks employers can be OF won
lderful assistance The mere swelling OF the num-
ibers in attendance at the evening schools if Of itself
of no value. The important thing is that there shall
ibe in attendance the greatest number possible Of
Those persons who are in need of the facilities which
can be afforded, and who are in position to benefit
by them.
ATTENTION Mr.. BRIGGS.
4 cannot replied the lad to Old Mr.. Washing
ton tell a lie. 1 felled it with my little Ratchet.
But he added,twith a thriftiness that helped make
him Virginia's richest man, "inasnluch as ] did fell
tit, 4 should like to sell the motion picture and car
ltoon rights to the telling incident, under the title,
THE APEX or sHYNEss.
We've heard of shy men, but here's an English
novelist who says he feels a strange embarrassment
when he finds himself alone with one Of his ~
feminine characterss-Bosto transcript.
EEF