Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1935-09-12
Guidance in
15-Year-Old
Associations
Luck in Numbers Has
Emphasis as Youth
Gains Friends.
BY ANGELO PATRL.


A GIRL of IS is fretting because her
- father says that boys who stay
later than 9 o'clock in the evening
ought to be sent home. If they don't
know enough to go they have to be
told, and the girl thinks father is
pretty close to awful Can't she have
a boy friend? Can't he take her to
the movies? Can't she have a little
fun like other girls who haven't such
awful fathers?
I am afraid not I am afraid she
will have to put up with this father
who thinks that high school freshmen
ought to have their social occasions
over by evening, study while, rest a
while and get to bed by 8 o'clock. ]
have a great deal Of sympathy with
that father, and with all fathers and
mothers who are trying to get some
sense into their children's heads about
this boy-friend and girl-friend idea.
Fifteen-year- old children grow fast
They use so much of their energy in
growing that often they have little
enough left for study. They fall back
in their work. Many a freshman fail
ure is caused by this overdone boy
and-girl association. When a couple
Of children of this age sit side by side,
as close as they can get, in darkened
room, whispering together for hours,
they exhaust their nervous energy to
an alarming degree and are unfit for
work next day. They lose lesson,
then another and soon are on the
failing list.
1t is right enough for boys and
girls to associate happily. to work and
play together, but for two Of them to
seek each others exclusive company is
not so good for them as they imagine.
To excite and stimulate nervous cen
tiers without adequate expression Is a
dangerous practice at best, and, in
this situation, dangerous beyond
measure. 1t cannot be done with
safety to the health and happiness of
the boys and girls.
This group Of 15-year- Odds, and the
general group of high school fresh
men, are in the halfway stage where
childish impulse and adult desires
struggle for mastery. The balance is
not within the power Of the children.
The adults must weigh the scales on
the side of sanity, health and growth.
These young folk should have clubs
IN which they gather to develop
mutual tastes and interests. Once
during each term they should have
a grand spread and a dance that
lasts to midnight, with teachers and
parents as onlookers. At all times
they should be encouraged to take
each other for granted as good COM
rades and playfellows, not as boy
friends and girl-friends In the present
day meaning.
There Is luck In numbers at this
stage. Each boy and girl should be
merged in the group, not singled out.
These groups, If they are functionins
normally, will shift and reform SC
that the members have wider asso-
citation. That wider association Is
the ideal condition among these
children.
The parents attitude can influence
this to great extent. If they assume
that the 15-year-old son and daugh-
ter are children TO be protected and
guarded and reared in healthy appre-
citation of themselves and Of each
other, that this protection and train
ing is the right of all children, the
young ones will accept that idea and
come nearer to solving their difficult
ties than they do at present by the
pairing-of plan.