The daily worker. [volume] (Chicago, Ill.) 1924-1958, 1928-03-31

gone into the production of his own
"human" material. The new method
has been installed in the educational
plants at Highland Park and Ford
son. 1t consists in taking the raw
material-American Youth-puttlng
it thru the Ford factory process, the
most efficient in the world, and pres
to, there appears the "Lizzyot," the
robot made in the Lizzie tradition
the future worker in the Ford fac
tory, to replace the overworked,
speeded up, prematurely aged helpers
who have been thrown out on the
waste pile as wreckage.
Jerome K. Davis, liberal apollo
gist. who in the June atlantic
Monthly" is very enthusiastic about
the experiment, seriously halls Ford
as a pioneer educator who may extend
his Revolutionary" methods to educa-
ton. The man who said history is
bunk"-who thinks zone good way to
hinder progress is to fill a mans head
with the learning of the past" who
has the utmost contempt for higher
education, because while you are por-
ing over books, you are not up and
doing'-is looked upon by this Yale
professor as a pioneer in the revolu-
tionizing of education.
Ford has established in his univer-
sity, a trade school. About half Of
those enrolled are sons of widows,
and 10 per cent are orphans. The ex-
ploitation of handicapped children
who have little or no adult protec-
ton, is by no means new capitalist
trick. Over a hundred years ago it
was common practice for the early
industrialists in England to hire
whole orphanages, and work the chill
dren under unspeakable conditions for
more than 16 hours day. At Ford's
trade school, boys between the ages
of II and 10 receive 1920 week, a
hot lunch and So month which must
lie banked until the course is finished,
TO encourage thrift. The instruction
is confined to mechanical subjects and
such scientific training as is neces-
sary in the production and perfection
of terrestrial and aerial tin Lizzies.
Two-thirds of the pupils time is spent
in the shop, the other third in the
classroom. Due to Ford's prejudices
or interests-none of the elements
of common high school education
are included in the curriculum. So
that, after three years of education"
the products emerge highly skilled
young mechanics, trained exactly to
suit Ford's needs, and trained only to
think on his mechanical problems.
Professor Davis boasts about the way
geography is taught! 1t is "made
vivid" he says, "by a description of
The Ford sales and distributive or
ganization thruout the world"
What about those places where
Ford has no distributive agencies?
They're not on the map! The stu
dents are taught that nothing exists
outside of Ford and his plants. What
kind of conception of society and
the world does the student get in such
narrowed, limited sphere? "One of
the functions of the Schools" says
Dewey, "is emancipation from local
and temporary incidents of exper-
fence, and the opening of intellectual
vistas unobscured by the accidents of
experience or of. personal habit and
prediction" Ford's schools can't be
bothered with such highfalutin nom
sense! His basic school ideals are:
Cleanliness, safety, accuracy, speed
and ingenuity"
The liberal Professor Davis is much
impressed by the fact that Ford's to-
tai expenditure in this experiment of
a -profit-making nature, mounts
to over million dollars. But he tells
naively that "in the old days it used
to cost thousands Of dollars to paint
the machines in the school depart
ment, while today the boys put on all
the surface coats, and handle pump
repairs and all the smaller broken in
struments. Formerly badly worn tools
were strapped, but now the trade
school repairs and rebuilds and turns
back $4,000 worth of tools each
month" More brilliant boys have
made discoveries resulting in econo-
mics for the company, we are told, the
most remarkable being an invention
which saved a pound of copper for
each car, and $1,000 day for Ford!
What the boy got out of this inven-
ton. Professor Davis does not say,