Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1933-11-19
Fears Negro May Be National
Burden Due to Depression
d.. ambrose CaIiper Declares There Is
Danger of Losing Ground Through
Educational CurtaiInsertt

Because Of curtailment ofeducational
facilities, a grave danger exists that the
Negro may come out of the depression
a burden to the Nation, losing much of
the hard-won ground previously gained
in improving his cultural and economic
development.
This statement was made by DR.
Ambrose Caliver. senior specialist in
the education of Negroes for the United
States Office of Education. in making
public facts indicating that Negro
schools and colleges have been hit far
harder by straitened financial con-
ditions than corresponding white insti-
tutions
The day is past he said, when the
Negro makes excuses for himself as
recently freed slave, nor is the country
any longer willing to accept such ex-
cuSes. The result Is. he explained, that
the colored man must keep pace with
the developments of an enlightened age
or find that he is a burden to himself
as well as society.
Education is the sole means for equip
ping the Negro for this life. and almost
all he progress made in this direction
has come since the World War. Now,
LII. Adllhtl dooGlbGut 1NblNllIAA4A4Nl1ln la
the name of economy threaten reversion
to pre-war additions.
Plight Is Serious.
DR.. Caliver attributed the seriousness
of the plight of Negro education-far
more serious than in the white schools
to the subnormal condition of Negro
education before the depression.
Where a man has the bare neceSsi-
ties of life and you take a quarter OF
what he has away from him, you are
striking him far harder blow than
when you take away a fourth OF the
goods of the man who has plenty" he
said in illustration.
He described the possibility Of obtain
ing appropriation of funds under the
national recovery act as the one ray
of hope. Aid granted from public
works and relief funds will not repair
all the defects existing in Negro educa-
ton, DR.. Caliver asserted. but a wise
and speedy use of such aid will
strengthen greatly the props now sup
porting the educational structure.
He estimated that improvement in
the general economic situation will not
be reflected in education for at least
two years. so that the schools can look
for no immediate improvement in their
situation unless there is outside as
Sistance.
Retrenchments Hit Needed Subjects.
Retrenchments in Negro schools are
likely to be particularly disastrous in
effects on hard-won gains in racial cul-
ture, Dr. Caliver believes, since one of
the first steps taken to meet restricted
budgets has been elimination from
curricula of courses in music, art,
physical education and health and vo-
cations, these having been the last adj
ditions.
It is not a matter Of reduction in
these fields but of elimination, because
the Negro schools had so little that any
cut wipes out entirely these studies, he
said.
In recent years most emphasis has
been laid on the cultural aspect of
Negro education by intellectual leaders
of the race, since ii Is in the field Of
fine arts that the Negro is held to pos
sess special opportunity to develop.
The principal aim of the Association
for the Study of Negro Life and History,
outstanding organization of its kind in
the United States, which recently held its
annual meeting here, has been to foster
racial culture by giving the Negro a