Cornell University Library HF5381.B63 Youth, school, and vocation, 3 1924 002 649 352 CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY NEW YORK STATE SCHOOL OF INDUSTRIAL AND LABOR RELATIONS THE GIFT OF Verne A. Bird Cornell University Library The original of tliis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924002649352 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION MEYER BLOOMFIELD Director of the Vocation Bureau of Boston Special Professor of Vocational Guidance Boston University WITH AN INTRODUCTION By HENRY SUZZALLO, Ph.D. Professor of the Philosophy of Education, Teachers College Columbia University HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO COPYRIGHT, 191^, BY MEYER BLOOMFIELD ALL RIGHTS RESERVED tEht 3Riber«(be SreM CAMPRIDGB . MASSACHUSETTS U . S . A To MRS. PAULINE AGASSIZ SHAW CONTENTS Inthodttction. By Henry Suzzallo . . . . vii I. The Choice of a Life- Work and its Diffi- culties 1 II. The WASTEFxjii Start and Inefficiency . . 9 in. Educational and Vocational Guidance . . 27 IV. The Organization of Vocational Gotdance 50 V. Vocational Guidance in Germany ... 95 VI. Vocational Guidance in England and Scotland 109 Vn. Vocational Guidance and Health Guidance 148 Vni. The School and the Start in Life . . 158 IX. The Social Gain through Vocational Guid- ance 171 Suggestive Material 177 Bibliography 262 Outline 268 Index 272 INTRODUCTION It is very doubtful if one can really appreciate the present movement for the vocational guidance of youth, unless he understands its connection with the persistent social philosophy of the American people, and perceives it to be, what in fact it is, another stage in the effort to equalize opportunity for the children of our Commonwealth and to perfect our social effi- ciency. In a sense the school has always aided a few of its students to find their occupations in the world. The function was crudely though certainly exercised through the selective standards of traditional school life. These selective standards favored those of station and intellect to enter professional life. The whole system of schooling from the primary school through the college was pre-professional. The old-time teacher gave little thought to those who did not register at the school — those who were not prosperous enough to take the leisure and pay the rate, those who were not interested in languages and books and abstract thoughts, those who were so handicapped in body and mind that conventional schooling promised little'. Nor was the master greatly concerned about those who made slow pace at school. These were not "smart." What more could the teacher do for them! It was as viii INTRODUCTION well they went to work. It was different with the prize scholars of the school. Let one of these feel the rest- lessness to go to work, and the teacher made a pilgrim- age to the home to enUst the parents' aid to keep the boy in school. The school's selection, instruction, and protection, whether exercised consciously or -uncon- sciously, favored the talented few. These reached the end of the college course to find themselves at the threshold of professional life, whither they had been guided from the beginning. There are marked difficulties with this restricted service of the schools. The educational system sends into professional life more persons than are required. It gives httle or no attention to the education and dis- tribution of men among the very necessary and very numerous non-professional occupations. In cbnse- quence the professions suffer from overcrowding and from a type of economic competition that interferes with the idealism of professional service. But the other occupations fare worse, for they suffer from that all- around incompetency which follows the complete want of an appropriate choosing and training of men for tasks. Into the ranks of industry, agriculture, com- merce, and personal service enter the men and women whose school experience has directly or subtly con- vinced them that they are partial or total intellectual failures, for the traditional school has unjustly meas- ured the mental competencies of every type of youth by its high but narrow standards of pre-professional INTRODUCTION is training. Somewhat dispirited, these find their occu- pations by chance, and with the feehng that they are to labor at something which is second best. The schools have a large contribution to make to individual happiness and to social efficiency, by as- suming the task of aiding all who come under its care to make a successful transit from the period of educa- tion to that of responsible workmanship in the world. The mere fact that all occupations, rather than a few, become a matter of school concern will do much to make every type of service seem worthy to him who enters it. It will be an antidote to vocational snobbish- ness which our society can well afiPord to administer, jh a sense, the consciousness of dignified and respect- able labor, is fundamental. Without it the highest type of specialized skill cannot be acquired or sustained. Under any thoroughly democratic regard for varied needs and divergent abilities, the school will cease to touch the majority of its children with the hand of discouragement, for the contact with the world's use of every quality of mind will broaden its own stand- ards and rid it of the tendency to underestimate what the many have to offer. It is this fair dealing with all kinds of work and talent that the new democratic spirit in education invokes. The movement for the vocational guidance of youth is then one of our efforts to make our school system reflect the idealism of our people. But its significance goes far beyond what it would tender to individuals. X INTRODUCTION Viewed from the social end, it gathers a sanction from the stern and obvious dictates of industrial and politi- cal necessity. Does not industry complain of the ham- pering of the incompetents? Already they become a handicap in the competition for a world market. And does not the state, reflecting the tender mercy of the social mind, turn its back on all hard law that would let the incompetent starve and tax its citizens in- creasingly for public charity? It is a safer and happier state that puts its money into competency, self-re- liance, and the joy of continuous workmanship rather than into charity for those whose defective training and placement in life make them unemployable. In the light of what a soimd school policy might accom- plish, is not the charity we give, with so much sense of virtue, merely a fine paid for guilt in sinning against social foresight? A program for vocational care may well frighten the timid schoolmaster who is hard and fast in the clutch of his craft-habit of teaching from a book and shutting his eyes to the consequences. The sturdier sort, made sensitive by the tragic tales of educational statisticians and social investigators, will welcome the new meaning which the program brings to school serv- ice. Such a one will not hesitate to begin some special care of the multitudes who leave school early and fumble long in the world for a task they have not been trained to perform. It is to aid those who have come into a sense of the full social duty of the school that INTRODUCTION 3d this volume is presented. The book will help to over- throw that conception of school function which stresses the watchful selection of the few and the forgetful elimination of the many. It will substitute the new idea that the school is a distributive institution which aims to find for each his effective place in work and citizenship. It will give counsel as to modes of pro- cedure with constant reference to the experiences of successful achievement. That the volume has been written by one who has himself had a large part in the preliminary experiments will add to the worth of every- thing said. Henry Suzzallo. Teachers College, Columbia Untvebsitt. May, 1916. YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION THE CHOICE OF A LIFE-WORK AND ITS DIFFICULTIES "He therefore sometimes took me to walk with him," writes Benjamin Franklin of his father, "and see joiners, bricklayers, turners, braziers, etc., at their work, that he might observe my incUnation, and en- deavor to fix it on some trade or other on land." The busy age we hve in does not seem so favorable for the kindly offices of youth's natural advisers. While many a parent, teacher, or friend spends energy and sympathy to give some girl or boy vocational sugges- tion and help, the fact is clear enough that a vast ma- jority of the yoimg people in our land enter upon their careers as bread-winners in the trades and professions unguided and unprepared. Chance is usually given the upper hand to make or mar the most critical period of working life. At no other time in history have the sons and daugh- ters of the people been turned out on so large a scale to earn their living, and into so complicated a social order; never before have fourteen-year-old children been so free to settle, largely by themselves, some of the big- 2 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION gest problems in life; and never has there been so great a need as now for wise cooperation of home and school with the young beginners in the work of the world. Young Franklin on a brief visit to the shop or foim- dry could probably have seen a whole trade in process. To-day this could scarcely be. Minute division of la- bor, speciaUzation to a degree which leaves the average worker in ignorance of the steps which go before or fol- low his own partial operations, do not encourage the same personal view of industry. Commerce and the liberal professions are hardly less detailed and hardly less in the hands of specialists. Spinning, weaving, and the making of a coat, the manufacture of nails, watches, and shoes involve scores of operations. Likewise the management of a modern store, an office, or a factory calls for qualities peculiar to a highly developed age of appKed science. A new profession has arisen in the efficiency engineer, whose business it is to study the costly results of overlooked waste and extravagance in our lai^e-scale production and distribution of goods. Big estabUshments are working out personal data sheets in order to measure more scientifically the value of their employees. One specialty store in Boston has developed a system of personal records which lessens guesswork in the employment and promotion of its two thousand or more people. We are living in the midst of a restless period, which is impatient with crudeness, and too preoccupied to pause over the stumblings and gropings of its bewil- THE CHOICE OF A LIFE-WORK 3 dered youth. Into this arena of tense effort, the schools of our country pour their annual thousands. We trust that somehow the tide of opportunity may carry them to some safe vocational destination. Only the rela- tively few who reach the higher training institutions can be said to have their problems at least partially solved during the critical period of adolescence. What becomes of that young multitude sent out to cope with the strange conditions of self-support? Whose business is it to follow up the consequences of this transition from school to work? Whose business is it to audit our social accounts, and discover how far our costly enter- prises in education, the pain, the thought, the skill, and the sacrifice we put forth with the growing generation, are well- or ill-invested in the field of occupation? These are vital questions, and perhaps the most vital is how far the work and careers our children turn to are the result of informed choice, of accident, or of necessity. The higher training schools are as pro- foundly concerned in this problem as are the elemen- tary schools. The well-to-do are no less affected than are the poor. Until society faces the problem of the life-careers of its youth, the present vocational anar- chy will continue to beset young work-seekers. Wast- ing their golden years, they discover, oftentimes too late, how much even a helpful suggestion at the crit- ical moment might have shaped their futures. They become unhappy, indifferent, and discouraged; and hence the pitiful letters written to those who care i YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION about these problems, from men and women who real- ize too late the reason for their futility as workers. Society has been slow to recognize the need of co- operating with its future workers in the choice of their careers. It has not realized that successful choice of life-work is impossible to the unadvised and the un- prepared. Common sense tells us that intelligent selection of a life-work is the result of intelligent fore- thought and preparation. We cannot expect youth to find itself vocationally without furnishing it continu- ously with the material and incentives for thoughtful Selection. In other words, there can really be no one detached day or provision for considering life-career problems; but rather is oiu* entire scheme of education and employment essentially a process, good or bad, of Vocational guidance. Now real selection is impossible where the world of occupation is a dark continent. Choice, like play, is usually the product of many influences, not the least of which are suggestion and example. The children of a neglected neighborhood mimic the drunken woman arrested by the policeman, while those of the well- supervised city playground have opened to them a world of wholesome activities. A city kindergarten teacher, spending her vacation in a Nova Scotia fish- ing hamlet, gathered about her one day a group of the fishermen's children. She tried them at the game of "Trades." They could go through the motions only of netmaking, hauling-in of fish, and the simple house- THE CHOICE OF A LIFE-WORK 6 hold crafts of spinnii^, carding, and weaving which they had seen their mothers and grandmothers en- gage in. The mimicry of the urban workers, like the plumber, engineer, the merchant, and the newsboy, was altogether meaningless to these children. The yoimg people of a crowded district play ambu- lance driver, fireman, the street-cleaner, and the actor of cheap melodrama; but when they are older, pud the sense of adventure is less keen in their impulse for vocational expression, one finds how much local so- cial ambitions count. The neighborhood doctor who drives about in a shiny bi^gy, or in a motor-car with red-cross devices; the lawyer with his nonchalance in the dread pohce court of the district; the dentist with his gilt signs across a private dwelling in the tenement quarter, carrying proudly the title of doctor; and the druggist — that master of confections and magic drugs — such persons figure heavily in the family judgment at the infrequent vocational conferences of the tenement home. To be sure, there are examples of the school-teacher, the civil engineer, and the man "on the road"; their rise from an unfavorable en- vironment flashes a vocational hint to the neighbor- hood; but this is feeble as against the potency of social esteemlwhich is bestowed on local personages in the more famiUar professions. It is in our centers of population, in the apartment- and tenement-house districts, that the masses of chil- dren are to be found. Here is much need for unfolding 6 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION the panorama of occupations to the quick intelligences of the young people. Parents here are toiKng day and nijght, and family relationships often suffer. The teach- ers preside over large classes, while these neighborhoods are filled with a crowd of the unskilled, the poorly paid, the unemployed, and the misemployed. Itjsji^^lace ^l.^i^J[i^ts and deep shadows; and for^mgijia^jnds of diildren life opens unpromisingly. Democracy prob- ably still h(msoutopportunities to the child that can avail himself of them. But the highly gifted as well as the ungifted Hve here, equally doomed to undevelop- ing and cheaply paid labor. Marshall, the economist, has shown that a large pro- portion of genius is lost to society because it is born among the children of the poor, where it perishes for want of opportunity. For we have no plan for conserv- ing the talents_pf the poor; no plan for utilizing the re- sources of the immigrant. Our schools are fettered by routine. Any social experimenting designed to fructify the gifts of the new peoples is left to private philan- thropy. A large proportion of the children in our cities who leave school for work as soon as the law allows are foreign-born or the children of foreign-born. Surely the hard-driven parent, struggling for a foot- hold in an alien country, must fail as a vocational ad- viser to his children. The truth is that parents do not tell their children what they should be, the children do the telling; if there be time, indeed, for such con- fidences. THE CHOICE OF A LIFE-WORK 7 Who shall help such children? To whom shall they turn for counsel and information about the schools and the vocations? The gathering of reliable occupational information involves painstaking labor and large re- sources; moreover, it can properly be done by special- ists alone. Such information calls for the correlation of a variety of facts from many and often unfamiliar sources. An illustration of the kind of service needed is to be found in the use made by one vocational ad- ^^ser of a report on tuberculosis in the various indus- tries, issued by the Massachusetts State Board of Health. The report disclosed the fact that granite- cutting was among the most unhealthful occupations. From his experience as a social worker, this adviser knew that many Italians are employed in quarries and stone-yards, and that very many Italians return to their own country to die of the white plague. He took pains, therefore, to point out, particularly to teachers, that when an Italian boy intended to work at stone- cutting, the parent should see to it that a medical ex- amination gave the boy a pulmonary clean bill; for the weak-limged Italian boy who took up stone-cutting would probably be committing suicide. Another illustration of vocational help has been the work of a young woman who some years ago was in charge of a small hbrary in a social settlement on the East Side of New York. Her idea of circulating books was to work out with each boy and girl the kind of book that would best minister to his or her needs. And 8 YOUTH, SCHOOL. AND VOCATION these needs were studied with infinite care. Her minis- trations brought to the knowledge of the ambitious and idealistic youth of her neighborhood vocations that were unknown to them before. Forestry, social research, library science, neighborhood work, social, and civic service, were among the careers opened to young boys and girls in touch with the library and the other influences which in time clustered about that in- stitution. And those careers are followed to-day with no little distinction by the beneficiaries of that vital- izing influence. Clearly the time has gone by for a laissez-faire atti- tude toward this most fundamental of conservation problems. The success achieved by those who have helped to shape a youth's career is not fully accounted for by pointing to gifts of insight and patience in the adviser, or to exceptional qualities in the boys and girls who could benefit by an interest in their welfare. To content one's self with such explanation is to doom the mass of our children to fruitless lives. After all, it is with average and not with exceptional individuals that the community must mainly concern itself, and results that are worth while have attended even mod- est efforts at vocational guidance of large groups, as of a school, a club, or like organization. Only a back- ward social conscience can paUiate a lack of effort to attempt some remedy, however tentative, for the pres- ent chaos in the transition from school to self-support. II THE WASTEFUL START AND INEFFICIENCY Evidence of what the let-alone policy is costing so- ciety may be found on every hand. A talk with any ob- servant employer, or with almost any parent, teacher, or student of social conditions, reveals an astonish- ing abundance of testimony. Indeed, the amount of proof is only equaled by the general failure to heed its lessons. Little argument is needed for the systematic vocational guidance of youth; and yet, on the whole, no problem has till now eUcited so little effort to meet it in the constructive way which modem methods of deaUng with other social problems suggest. Perhaps the most impressive body of facts bearing on the consequences of our failure to face the vocational needs of youth is to be found in the report issued in England a few years ago by the Royal Commission on the Poor-Laws and Relief of Distress. ' Nothing more deeply impressed that commission in the course of its exhaustive investigation than the reckless pauperiza- tion of England's promising youth. In the Majority Report, the commissioners lay stress on the great prominence given to boy labor, not only in the evidence which came before them, but also ' Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor-Laws and Relief of Distress. London, 1909. 10 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION in the various reports of the special investigators; and the conviction is expressed that this is perhaps the most serious of the phenomena which they have en- countered in their study of unemployment. Well- trained boys find it difficult enough to secure a foot- hold in the skilled trades; but if in addition to this there are the temptations to crowd the occupations which promise neither skill nor outlook nor future, the fact is clear that such conditions in the British Empire are making directly for unemployment in the future. The Minority Report is even more emphatic. It points out the consequences of entering "bUnd-aUey" occupations, and states that perpetual recruiting of the unemployable by tens of thousands of boys is per- haps the gravest of all the grave facts which the com- missions laid bare. "We cannot believe," the com- missioners say, "that the nation can long persist in ignoring the fact that the unemployed are thus being daily created under our eyes out of bright young lives, capable of better things, for whose training we make no provision. It is, unfortunately, only too clear that the mass of unemployment is continually being re- cruited by a stream of young men from industries which rely upon unskilled boy labor, and turn it adrift at manhood without any general special industrial qualification and that it will never be diminished till this stream is arrested." Professor Michael E. Sadler, in commentmg on the evidence before this Royal Commission, states that THE WASTEFUL START 11 boys and girls are tempted by the ease, the fairly good wages, and the sense of independence in entering occu- pations which leave them, at the time when they begin to need an adult's subsistence, wholly out of Kne for skilled employments. They are driven into the ranks of the unskilled. Certain forms of industry squander in this way the physical and the moral capital of the rising generation. His conclusions are that if no coun- teracting measures are taken, great and lasting injury will befall the national life. An official report some years ago on boys leaving the London elementary schools shows that forty per cent became errand and chore boys; fourteen per cent, shop boys; eight per cent, office boys and minor clerks; while only eighteen per cent went definitely into trades. There is a fairly satisfactory law in England governing employment in factories and workshops. It is the un- r^ulated drift from a vast variety of juvenile occupa- tions into the low-skilled labor market that presents grave aspects. In his study of boy labor, Mr. Cyril Jackson points out that few boys ever pick up skill after a year or two spent on errand or similar work. The larger number fall into low-skilled and casual employments. 1 Ample confirmation of the Royal Commission's find- ings may be found in the Report of the Consultative ^ Report of the Royal Commission on the Poor-Laws and Relief of Distress. Boy Labor. Appendix, vol. xx. By Cyril Jackson. London, 1909. 12 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Committee on Attendance at Continuation Schools in England and Wales, published at about the same time. The conclusions from its investigations and interviews with scores of employers and others read much like the pages of the Royal Commission's Report. The evils of educational neglect during adolescence, this com- mittee finds, are often aggravated by the ease with which "bUnd-alley" occupations are entered upon. Such employments as that of errand boy are not nec- essarily demoraUzing. Many a boy has started in this humble way on a career of success. But callings Uke this are apt to waste the years during which a boy should make a beginning at a skilled or developii^ occupation. The probabilities are that yoimger and cleverer competitors eventually oust the untrained workers, and at a time when these untrained workers are burdened with adult responsibilities. The necessity of guidance intended to avert the en- trance by thousands of boys and girls into a vocational cvl-de-sac is appreciated by this committee. Its con- viction is clearly expressed that the most dangerous point in the lives of children in an elementary school is the moment at which they leave it. Investigations have shown how difficult is the taking of the right step at this stage, and the lamentable consequences of tak- ing the wrong one. This difficulty is due in large meas- ure to the inability of parents to get the necessary information as to the conditions of employment, the wages, and the future prospects in various occupations. THE WASTEFUL START 13 as well as a knowledge of the educational opportuni- ties and the requirements for efficiency in such occu- pations. The committee has found that many parents are under no necessity of sending their children to work, and that they would be both able and willing to accept lower wages at first for the sake of subsequent advantages in the vocations; but their ignorance of these matters makes it impossible for them to select work wisely for their children. "Unless children are thus cared for at this turning-point in their lives," says the Consultative Committee, "the store of knowledge and discipline acquired at school will be quickly dis- sipated, and they will soon become unfit either for employment or for further education."' American testimony as to this important matter has, during the past three or four years, powerfully con- firmed the English findings. Several investigations, by public and private organizations, of the vocational problems of young working children and the reasons why they left school for work, deserve brief review. Two Boston school-teachers were appointed by the Superintendent of Schools to make a study during 1912 of the conditions in the school, home, and occu- pational life of children for the purpose of establish- ing vocational guidance in the school system. The study was to be, at first-hand, of the children in cer- tain selected school districts of the city representing a ' Board of Education, Report of the Consultative Committee, p. ii. London, 1909. 14 YOUTH, SCHOOL. AND VOCATION typical variety of economic, racial, geographical, and industrial conditions. The points for special study of two groups of boys and girls in the school districts, namely, the graduates of the preceding year, and those who dropped out from the grades, are covered in the following questions: — (o) 1. How many of the graduates continued to attend school? 2. What schools? 3. What vocational intent entered into their decision to attend a given school? 4. How many persevered to the end of the school year in attendance? 5. How many left school during the year, and why? 6. How many of the graduates went to work after gradua- tion? Kind of work? 7. How many remained at home, and why? (6) 1. The reason or reasons for leaving school, special refer- ence being made to the number who left school to go to work and to what extent actual poverty of the family was the cause. 2. The occupation entered, and why. (a) How obtained? Vocational plan? (6) Wages? (c) Length of employment? (d) Changes of employment? (e) Causes for change ? (J) Chances for advancement? It may be of interest to quote some of the findings from the report of one investigator: — Girls who went to work and their opportunities There was little or no difFerence in the occupations open to the girls who graduated and those who left before graduat- THE WASTEFUL START 15 ing. The principal places open to them were in the depart- ment stores as bundle girls at $2.50 to $3.50; in the factories at $3 to $4; in stores as salesgirls at $5; in tailors' shops at $2.50 to $3.50. Needless to state, after the first glamour of working has worn off, the girls tire and leave such work, or the season be- comes dull and they are "laid off" temporarily or perma- nently, according as they seem more or less desirable to their employers. Reasons for leaving school The proportion of girls forced by financial circumstances to leave school was comparatively small. Being backward in their grades, dislike of school, desire for a change, desire to be with friends who were working, were principal reasons. Parents' knowledge qf vocational opportunities It was most pathetic to see how little the parents knew of the real industrial conditions and of what educational and vocational opportunities, entirely within their reach, existed in Boston. This was true in far, far larger extent of the par- ents of girls who left school in the grades than of those who graduated. This was due, doubtless, to the fact that the graduating classes have been given talks along these lines, and, even if the parents did not attend conferences given by schools and associations, they have gleaned some knowledge from the girls when they did not have personal knowledge. Deductions My experience has been that the vast majority of the parents of the girls in the study just completed knew noth- ing except what they had obtained through the school as to the various high schools and their specialties — • the trade and industrial schools — the necessity of extra training and preparation to enter any occupation in which there were chances for advancement. The attitude of the parents when visited in the homes made it appear only too clear that prac- tically all would welcome such guidance and avail themselves of it. 16 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Equally interesting are the conclusions of an inves- tigation carried on by the University of Chicago Set- tlement into the opportunities in school and industry for the children of the neighboring stockyard districts. The main points of inquiry in the study were: The industrial opportunities for children between fourteen and sixteen years of age; the kind of jobs they secure, wages, and chances for advancement; the relation of the public school to local economic conditions; the at- titude of parent and child to the school and the job; the relation of the family income to the causes for early leaving of school; and what may be done to bridge the gap between school and work and to guide youth into an appropriate vocation. The conclusions are: — 1. The district studied is peopled by immigrants of vari- ous races ; their work is unskilled; and their main source of employment is the stockyards. 2. The testimony of principal, teacher, child, and parent unites in the conclusion that the public school is not meeting the needs of adolescence and adjusting the child to his future work. 3. The great exodus from school comes before the seventh grade, and shortly after the child reaches the age of fourteen. 4. The ignorance of parents, the willingness of children, and the pressure of straitened circumstances combine in forcing boys and girls to leave school for work as soon as the law will permit it. 5. Few children from the neighborhood go to high school, or keep up any form of educational interest after leav- ing school. 6. Yet the boys and girls have talents and abilities in special directions. THE WASTEFUL START 17 7. The occupations entered are easily learned, mechanical, and devoid of educational value. 8. The kind of jobs secured is much a matter of chance; the migration from place to place does not lead to better opportunities; the pay is small; and the net result is instability of character. 9. A number of "subnormal" boys are as successful in industry as many "normal" boys. 10. There is no marked economic advantage to be gained by a longer stay in school; before the age of sixteen preparation in school does not count, considering the ordinary run of mechanical occupations open to chil- dren. 11. Over half of the families from which the working chil- dren come have such a low income that the wages of the boy and girl are judged necessary. 12. The experience of older boys and girls shows a small average contribution to the family income, a short average time in each position, and a long average period of idleness. All of these persons stopjwd school during the fourteen-to-sixteen-year period. 13. Aside from parasitic industries, there is no economic necessity for juvenile labor, according to the testimony of employers. 14. The public school is best adapted to deal with the prob- lem of vocational direction. The most intensive study of the conditions under which children in this country leave school to go to work is to be foimd in one of the voliunes on Woman and Child Wage-Earners in the United States, a series of studies published by the United States Government in 1910. For special inquiry, six hundred and twenty- two children were chosen in seven different localities in two Northern and two Southern States. One cannot fail to be impressed by the similarity of the evidence 18 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION presented in this investigation to that of the others just discussed. Take, for example, the summary on the opposite page, which analyzes the causes for leav- ing school, and note how closely the order of causes resembles those given in other reports. This table shows, as do other investigations, that two thirds of the children who drop out of school for work could have remained if they had so desired, or if they had been intelligently influenced and could have foimd it worth while to stay in school: — The intervening years, then, between leaving school — which for the majority of children occurs when they are fourteen years of age — and entering upon work which promises any development at all, are largely wasted. Society gains but little by the labor of thou- sands of its children at the most precious period of their growth. This is not because much of the work done is not of use; but with our present neglect we provide no corrective for the mischief which attends all uneduca- tive work. The reports of the two commissions on In- dustrial Education in Massachusetts, investigations into street trades in Boston, Chicago, and elsewhere, and all the observations of the child-saving societies in this country confirm the Royal Commission's alarm over juvenile labor as now carried on. The employer is very often as much a victim of these conditions as the boy himself. The allurement of good pay for uninstructive work is soon seen through by many a boy, and his restlessness during employ- THE WASTEFUL START 19 ment, where often, without any apparent provoca- tion, he throws up his place, is a constant source of vexation, and undoes in the more promising occupa- SUMMARY OF CAUSES FOR CHILDREN LEAVING SCHOOL Cause for child leaving aohool to go to work Number Per cent Necessity: — EarningB necessary to family support. Help needed at home Self^upport necessary Total Child's help desired, though not necessary: — In family support To buy propMty. In home work To earn money for education of self or relative . Total.. Child's dissatisfaction with school: — Tired of school Disliked school (general manner of life there). Disliked teacher Disliked to study Could not learn Not promoted Too big for class Total ChOd's preference for work: — Work preferred to school Spending money wanted Association desired with friends who worked . Total.. other causes: — Ill-health To be kept off the streets To learn a trade or business To avoid vaccination Removal of residence. _. . . . Mother's disapproval of coeducation. . "Too much play" Company pressure Total Grand total. 169" 6 11 186 140^ 12 14 7 173 35 64 31 16 10 S 14 165 44 8 9 61 16 1 6 2 1 1 1 7 35 30.0 27.9 9.8 5.7 100.0 Two children never went to school, but studied at home. 20 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION tions any plan which the employer might have in view for the promotion of his boys. This skipping from job to job can only mean for most boys and girls certain THE TYPICAL EMPLOYMENT RECORD OF ONE CHILD BETWEEN THE AGES OF 14 AND 16 FROM INVESTIGATION MADE fiY MISS MARY FLEXNEB PositioUB beld Length of time in each First 3 days In factory, sorting buttons Second 2 months Ribboning corset cov- ers and machine work on them Third 1 week Ribboning and but- toning Corset covers Fourth Time unknown Ladies' underwear Fifth Up to Christmas Errand girl Sixth 2| months Ribboning corset cov- Seventh Time unknown ers Errand girl Eighth A few weeks Trim, cut, and exam- ine men's ties Ninth A few weeks Return to second job Tenth A few weeks Home work, ribbon- ing By permiBslon of the Henry Street Settlement. demoralization. They become job hoboes. They are given work only because nobody else is in sight or so cheap, and they stay at work as little as they may. Juvenile wages are their portion, no matter what serv- ices they render, nor for how long a period. A tragic situation is here disclosed. Not only do we find that modern work conditions "put a man on the shelf" in THE WASTEFUL START 21 the prime of his years, because the speed and skill of younger brains and hands are called for, but we find, too, a shelving of youth itself before life has given these groping beginners a fair chance. They seem doomed to be juvenile adults bound by an iron law of juvenile wages. The "dead end" or "blind-alley" occupations, therefore, with their snare of high initial wa,ges and their destructiveness to p,ny steady or serious life-work motive, are breeding perilous evils. Unanimous testi- mony on this point by the special investigators of the Royal Commission has led to the opinion that this, per- haps, is the most serious of all the problems encoun- tered in its study of unemployment. A term of sinister suggestion has been coined to describe the products of this vocational anarchy — "the unemployables." The unemployables are people whom no ordinary employer would care to employ, not so much because of their physical or mental incapacity, but because their economic backbone has been broken. The vo- cationally wasted years have landed their victims on the industrial quicksands; they become the wanderers of our job jungle. Tempting wages with no training, the wrong use of youthful energies, long hours of dull and sterile work, conspire to turn out, when youth- hood is over, a horde of phantom-workers, quite blighted as to their vocational ideals and possibilities. It is clear that adequate provision for social as well as vocational training, and systematic life-work coun- seling at the period of life when boys and girls are most 22 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION largely thrown upon their individual efforts, would help correct these disastrous conditions. The move- ment for vocational education rests solidly on an ap- preciation of the facts. Education has become more praoy and girl to find that train- ing which shall strengthen them for self-support and vocational progress? Not a few employers confessedly THE WASTEFUL START 23 expect their competitors to bear the brunt of training employees, who are eagerly appropriated when they have become proficient. The beginners in almost every desirable occupation are expected to know something and amount to something from the very outset in em- ployment. New demands are made upon the public school sys- tem as the best agency for solving the problem of vo- cational education. The right of every child to the best possible chance in life makes necessary the public control of vocational training. The future develop- ment of our industries, and the promotion of high- grade productive enterprises which pay good wages and encourage intelligence, call for the training of large groups, such as the public schools alone can reach. Employers require well-trained youth for their shops and ofiBces, and they take the schools to task for the ill-equipped product turned out. Vocational education, therefore, has grown into a nation-wide movement, partly in response to the employer's needs; but more especially in response to the needs of the individual workers who face new exactions on efficiency, and to a realization that civilized standards of living depend for their maintenance largely on the quality and skill of a nation's workers. Yet underlying the demand for efficiently produc- tive youth, both in the trades and in the professions, there is another demand which the movement for vo- cational guidance has brought into the foreground. 24 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION It is right that those who give employment to boys and girls shall ask for efficiency. It is wholesome, loo, for any public institution to be measured by the concrete test of results and be called upon to check up its work. But it is equally the right and duty of those entrusted with the nurture of the rising generation to make the vocations reiider account, too. What hap- pens to the boys and girls under the new influences in employment is not alone a matter between them and their individual employers, nor between them and their parents, but it is essentially one for the community. The vocational movements in education — that is, the movements for vocational education and guidance — have brought forward some far-reaching questions of school and social policy. These movements, with their multiplying schemes of training, and their vo- cation bureaus, vocational information, scholarship, follow-up, and research societies, have focused atten- tion on the widespread failure of the recent past to understand the trials of helpless children in the gulf between school and work. But now that aroused in- terest everywhere in the after-school problems of boys and girls has begun to manifest itself in the form of numerous vocational help projects, the question as to what is the duty of the public school toward its children who leave for work looms large. Is it the business of our schools to follow their children into the shops and store? Shall the schools have any voice as to, the kind of work the children may do? And if the schools are. THE WASTEFUL START 25 indeed, to follow the children into employment, how far may they go in their control and supervision of the start in life? These and similar questions thinking people through- out the world are pondering over. There is not so much discussion now as to whether or not the school shall have anything to do with such matters; the situ- ation is clear enough; thoughtful people everywhere realize that it is social ruin to leave the adolescent worker adrift. Our main concern, then, it is generally conceded, is with the most effective ways of taking up the costly slack in our educational service. Guidance of some sort we have always with us as a matter of course; there is vocational guidance, if it may so be called, even where there has been least thought given to the changes which have taken place since home and shop have ceased to be the center of directive vocational in- fluence. Take any class of children in any school and ask for compositions on what they intend to be, and why; their papers will automatically reflect precisely the kind of vocational suggestion and bias, the knowl- edge or lack of it which they absorb from school, home, and neighborhood. Those who have had the oppor- tunity to help boys and girls with organized vocational information and counsel, know how far ahead such children are, in the strength and definiteness of their future plan and aim, as contrasted with the children who hear little, or perhaps only partial truths, about 26 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION the work of the world, and the training which is re- lated to it. The educational protection of the young ends ar- bitrarily when the work certificate is granted. Assur- edly this is not to the interest of either the child or the employer. On the contrary, the few years after leav- ing school should be the time for most thoroughgoing follow-up work by the public. While school authori- ties are given increasing resources to train for the de- mands of modern vocational life, they should be like- wise empowered to deal with uses which are made of the training given. A searching appraisal of occupa- tions must be undertaken, so that foreknowledge and forewarning shall be the common possession of every parent, teacher, boy, and girl. The job, like the school, should be made to give an account of itself. The de- sirable occupations must be better known and pre- pared for; the dull and deadly being classified in a rogue's gallery of their own. Not till this is done can reciprocal purpose matk the relation between em- ployer and employee. For the uneducative, if neces- sary, work which young people are yet obliged to do, compensatibn must be provided in the form of leisure and opportunity for further improvement, social as well as vocational, in special day classes and schools for such workers. Is it too inuch to hope that the near future will see our schools unite With the best employ- ers to further, during its decisive vocational years, youth's promise of service and growth? Ill EDUCATIONAL AND VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE A GROWING interest and an increasing literature on the subject indicate a new attitude toward the voca- tional problems of the adolescent. The Convention of the National Education Association, held in 1910, might be said to have found its keynote in the signi- ficant title of President Eliot's address, "The Value, during Education, of the Life-Career Motive." Hun- dreds of teachers departed with renewed conviction that the success of the coming education will lie in the strength of the controlling purposes it develops in boys and girls to live and work efficiently. The Re- port of the Committee on the Place of Industries in Public Education is a contribution to the subject of vocational preparation. It grasps throughout the fundamental need of training to choose life-work in- telligently. "It is to be hoped," Says this Report, "that the cbnstructive work and the study tit industry in the elementary school will ultimately be of such a eharac- ter that when the pupil reaches the age at which the activities o! adult life make their appeal, he will be able to make a Wise Choice in reference to them 28 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION and be already advanced in an appreciable measure toward the goal of his special vocation." The question of choice of a life-work involves quite as much selecting the right kind of further schooling as the right vocation. It is quite as important to attend the right kind of high or other school as it is to do the work one is best fitted for. Before the work of vo- cational counseling and help had gone far in the pio- neer efiforts of the Boston school system a few years ago, it was realized that the aimless drift of the grade- school children into the several departments of the high schools was a serious obstacle to any real voca- tional guidance. "If children know so httle about the different aims and special uses of the college prepara- tory or the manual arts courses as to go into them without careful forethought and selection," reasoned those interested in vocational counseUng, "we cannot hope to do much toward a thoughtful choice of a life- work." The truth is that boys and girls have been drifting from the lower schools to the secondary schools very much as they drift from school to job. It is not a matter of surprise, therefore, that there should be a large and preventable dropping out from the early classes of our high schools, too. Educational guidance, then, has become the recog- nized first step in vocational guidance; the bridging of the gap between the elementary and other school opportunities. In such vital interlocking of a commu- nity's training resources, there is a genuine guidance; EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 29 thete is, moreover, a new sense of value imparted to the scheme of pubKc education as a whole. Two illus- trations from Boston school experience show a prom- ising beginning in the new method of helping in the selection of pupils for the various high schools of the city. Both the High School of Commerce and the High School of Practical Arts receive applications for en- trance from several hundred more grammar school graduates than can be accommodated. What pupils are to be given the preference? On what basis are they to be picked? The Boston School Committee authorized the school superintendent to work out with the school principals a plan whereby each school might designate one or more teachers to serve as vocational advisers for the school. Over two hundred teachers have been so designated, and their services to the high schools in question may be told in the words of the officials themselves. The head master of the High School of Practical Arts writes: — When it became evident that many more girls than could be taken had sent in applications for admission, I wrote the principals requesting them to turn the list over to the voca- tional counselors with the suggestion that the pupils be graded according to their standing in cooking, sewing, and drawing. I also asked that those who could afford only one year for further preparation be directed to the trade schools. Girls without special liking for our work were shown the possibilities of the other schools. The girls were classed in three groups, — first, second, and third, — according to standing in the subjects above men- tioned, together with the taste and personal adaptability of each. I took all of the first and some of the second, giving 30 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION personal attention to some special cases. If good judgment has been shown, our classes will be made up of girls who will take an interest in the work of the school and who will profit thereby. Here is a communication of the former head master of the High School of Commerce: — The plan of having the vocational counselors of grammar schools select boys for our high school was as follows: "The problem with the High School of Commerce has been a press- ing one for the past two years. Last year we selected by lot, thinking that such a method was fairest and most democratic. When vocational advisers were apt>ointed in each grammar school, we thought that we could properly call upon them to solve the problem. At a nleetihg held in the spring) some of us addressed all the vocational advisers of the grammar schools, explaining the types of school and the kind of boys suitable. Opportunity was given for questions. Many of the advisers then visited the schools. They took the matter in earnest, calling in the parents and forming a very careful judgment in selecting the boys. At our school we feel that the best method yet has been found and that the system will improve year by year." An organized scheme, then, for advising young peo- ple as to the continuance of their schooling and its bearing on future occupation is a promising approach to a solution of the vocatipnal situation we have been considering. 4An,espe(riHient with a group of high- school boys shortly before tneir graduation a few years ago revealed a need for life-career guidance, an effort to meet which led to what is probably the first voca- tion bureau in this country. Sixty or more boys were invited to a reception on the. roof-garden of the Civic Service House in the North End of Boston, in order EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 31 to talk over their future plans with the late Professor Frank Parsons and several other workers of that neighborhood house. The interviews disclosed that about a dozen of the boys were going to college, a third of the rest hoped to be lawyers, almost another third doctors, three or four had definite plans for business careers, while the rest had no plans and were going to take whatever came along. It is a question whether those with no plans in view were not better off than the boys who planned for legal and medical studies, woefully unprepared, most of them, for the expense, the sacrifice, and the struggles that even moderate success in those callings demanded. Indeed, vocation, a calling, in its literal sense, is not the word to use; with many of the boys the ideal compulsion to devote themselves to some one pursuit above all others was not manifest. There could be no doubt that the ambi- tion and perseverance of some of these boys would overcome the obstacles in store for them; but unfortu- nately the story of success is more easily told than that of mediocrity or failure. We have yet to learn how to take stock of waste and misdirection as well as of achievement in human pursuits. An oflSce was opened to give those who so desired an opportunity to talk over their vocational problems with a sympathetic and skilled economist. Professor Parsons took charge of the Civic Service House Voca- tion Bureau, where scores of men and women of all ages and conditions, as well as hundreds of letters. 32 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION came to him from all parts of the country. A note of lost-self seemed to be the burden of an amazing num- ber of these communications. Of course, little could be done for the letter-writers, because helpful voca- tional counsel cannot honestly be given except through intimate personal contact. Professor Parson's work is described in the last vol- ume which he wrote, entitled Choosing a Vocation.^ This pioneer work shows how the author in his treat- ment of the applicant, emphasized the importance of scientific method in self-analysis in the course of a number of interviews with the counselor. The coun- selor, on the other hand, was to be trained according to a definite plan, and equipped with a knowledge of the vocations, of industrial statistics, and of the avail- able educational opportunities. Within a year the interest taken by business men, educators, and social workers in the possibilities of a well-organized vocation bureau, located centrally in offices of its own, gave that pioneer experiment a better foundation and a wider scope. The new Vocation Bu- reau's cooperation with the Boston schools was among its first activities. Early in the spring of 1909, the School Committee of Boston passed a resolution inviting the Vocation Bureau to submit a plan for vocational guidance to assist public-school pupils. The Bureau thereupon presented the following suggestions: — ' Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 33 First, the Bureau will employ a director to give practically his entire time to the organization of vocational counsel to the graduates of the Boston public schools during the ensu- ing year. Second, the work of this vocational director shall be car- ried on in cooperation with the Boston School Committee or the Superintendent of Schools, as the Committee shall see fit. Third, it is the plan of the Bureau to have this vocational director organize a conference of masters and teachers of the Boston high schools through the Committee or the Superin- tendent, so that members of the graduating classes will be met for vocational advice either by this vocational direc- tor or by the cooperating school masters and teachers, all working along a general plan, to be adopted by this con- ference. Fourth, the vocational director should, in cooperation with the Superintendent of Schools, or any person whom he may appoint, arrange vocational lectures for the members of the graduating classes. Fifth, the Bureau believes that school masters and teachers should be definitely trained to give vocational counsel, and therefore, that it is advisable for this vocational director, in cooperation with the Superintendent of Schools, to establish a series of conferences to which certain selected teachers and masters should be invited on condition that they will agree in turn definitely to do vocational counseling with their own pupils. Sixth, the vocational director will keep a careful record of the work accomplished for the pupils during the year, the number of pupils counseled with, the attitude of the pupils with reference to a choice of vocations, the advice given, and, as far as possible, the results following. These records should form the basis for a report to the Boston School Committee at the end of the year. The Bureau cherishes the hope that it can so demonstrate the practicability and value of this work that the Boston School Committee will eventually es- tablish in its regular organization a supervisor of vocational advice. 34 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION On June 7, 1909, the School Committee at a regular meeting took favorable action on the Vocation Bu- reau's suggestions and instructed the Superintendent of Schools to appoint a committee of six to work with the director. For over a year the committee thus appointed, consisting of three masters and three sub- masters, held weekly meetings at the office of the Vocation Bureau. Their first report to the Superintend- ent of Schools is worth giving in full, not only because of the valuable suggestions it contains, but also as an indication of the teachers' place in school vocational guidance: — The Committee on Vocational Direction respectfully pre- sents the following as a report for the school year just closed. The past year has been a year of beginnings, the field of op- eration being large and the problems complicated. A brief survey of the work shows the foUowing results: — A general interest in vocational direction has been aroused among the teachers of Boston, not only in the elementary but in the high schools. A vocational counselor, or a committee of such counsel- ors, has been appointed in every high school and in all but one of the elementary schools. A vocational card record of every elementary school gradu- ate for this year has been made, to be forwarded to the high school in the fall. Stimulating vocational lectures have been given to thirty of the graduating classes of the elementary schools of Boston, including all the schools in the more congested parts of the city. Much has been done by way of experiment by the mem- bers of this committee in the various departments of getting employment, counseling, and following up pupils after leav- ing school. EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 35 The interest and loyal cooperation of many of the leading philanthropic societies of Boston have been secured, as well as that of many prominent in the business and professional life of the city and the State. A good beginning has already been made in reviewing books suitable for vocational libraries in the schools. It was early decided that we should confine our efforts for the first year mainly to pupils of the highest elementary grade as the best point of contact. The problem of vocational aid and counsel in the high schools has not as yet been directly dealt with, yet much that is valuable has been accomplished in all our high schools on the initiative of the head masters and selected teachers. It is safe to say that the quality and amount of vocational aid and direction has far exceeded any hitherto given in those schools. The committee, through open and private conferences, and correspondence with the head masters, have kept in close touch with the situation in high schools, but they feel that for the present year it is best for the various types of high schools each to work out its own plan of vocational direction. The facts regarding their ex- perience can properly be made the basis of a later report. A committee of three, appointed by the Head Masters' Asso- ciation, stands ready to advise with this committee on all matters relating to high-school vocational interests. Once during the year the principals of the specialized high schools met in conference the vocational counselors of the city and have presented the aims and curricula of these schools in such a way as greatly to enlighten those responsible for advising pupils just entering high schools. The committee have held regular weekly meetings through the school year since September. At these meetings every phase of vocational aid has been discussed, together with the adaptability to our present educational system. Our aim has been to test the various conclusions before recommending them for adoption. This has taken time. Our most serious problem so far has been to adapt our plans to conditions as we find them, without increasing the teachers' work and without greatly increased expense. We have assumed that the movement was not a temporary "fad," but that it had 36 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION a permanent value, and was therefore worthy the serious at- tention of educators. Three aims have stood out above all others : first, to secure 1 thoughtful consideration, on the part of parents, pupils, and teachers, of the importance of a life-career motive; second, v to assist in every way possible in placing pupils in some re- \ \ munerative work on leaving school; and third, to keep in J J touch with and help them thereafter, suggesting means of im- provement and watching the advancement of those who need such aid. The first aim has been in some measure achieved throughout the city. The other two have thus far been worked out only by the individual members of the com- mittee. As a result we are very firmly of the opinion that until some central bureau of information for pupils regarding trade and mercantile opportunities is established, and some effective system of sympathetically following up pupils, for a longer or a shorter period after leaving school, is organized in our schools as centers, the effort to advise and direct merely will largely fail. Both will require added executive labor which will fall upon the teachers at first. We believe they will accept the responsibility. If, as Dr. Eliot says, teachers find those schools more interesting where the life- career motive is present, then the sooner that motive is dis- covered in the majority of pupils the more easily will the daily work be done and the product correspondingly improved. In order to enlist the interest and cooperation of the teach- ers of Boston, three mass meetings, one in October and two in the early spring, were held. A fourth meeting with the head masters of high schools was also held with the same ob- ject. As a most gratifying result the general attitude is most sympathetic and the enthusiasm marked. The vocation counselors in high and elementary schools form a working organization of over one hundred teachers, representing all the schools. A responsible official, or committee, in each school stands ready to advise pupils and parents at times when they most need advice and are asking for it. They sug- gest whatever helps may be available in further educational preparation. They are ready to fit themselves professionally to do this work more intelligently and discriminatingly, not EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 37 only by meeting together for mutual counsel and exchange of experiences, but by study and expert preparation if need be. As a beginning of our work with pupils we have followed out two lines : the lecture and the card record. The addresses have been mainly stimulating and inspirational. It seems to the committee, however, that specific information coming from those intimately connected with certain lines of labor should have a place also in this lecture phase of our work. In a large number of high and elementary schools addresses of this character have been given by experts during the year. The committee claim no credit for these, though carried out under the inspiration of the movement the committee repre- sent. The custom of having such addresses given before Junior Alumni Associations, Parents' Associations, and eve- ning school gatherings has become widespread, the various masters taking the initiative in such cases. The speakers are able to quote facts with an authority that is convincing to the pupil and leads him to take a more serious view of his future plans, especially if the address is followed up by simi- lar talks from the class teacher, emphasizing the points of the speaker. This is a valuable feature and should be extended to include more of the elementary grades, especially in the more densely settled portions of the city, from which most of our unskilled workers come. A vocational record card calling for elementary-school data on one side and for high-school data on the other, has been furnished all the elementary schools for registration of this year's graduates. The same card will be furnished to high schools this fall. These cards are to be sent forward by the elementary-school counselors to high schools in Sep- tember, to be revised twice during the high-school course. The value of the card record is not so much in the registering of certain data as in the results of the process of getting these. The effect upon the mental attitude of pupil, teacher, and parent is excellent, and makes an admirable beginning in the plan of vocational direction. The committee are now in a position where they must meet a demand of both pupils and teachers for vocational enlightenment. Pupils should have detailed information in 38 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION the form of inexpensive handbooks regarding the various callings and how to get into them, wages, permanence of em- ployment, chance of promotion, etc. Teachers must have a broader outlook upon industrial opportunities for boys and girls. Even those teachers who know their pupils well gener- ally have little acquaintance with industrial conditions. The majority can advise fairly well how to prepare for a profes- sion, while few can tell a boy how to get into a trade, or what the opportunities therein are. In this respect our teachers will need to be more broadly informed regarding social, industrial, and economic problems. We have to face a more serious problem in a crowded American city than in a country where children are supposed to follow the father's trade. In meeting the two most pressing needs, namely, the vo- cational enlightenment of teachers, parents, and pupils, and the training of vocational counselors, we shall continue to look for aid to the Vocation Bureau. The Bureau has been of much assistance during the past year, in fact indispensable, in matters of correspondence, securing information, getting out printed matter, and in giving the committee counsel based upon a superior knowledge of men and conditions in the business world. The question of vocational direction is merely one phase of the greater question of vocational education. As a con- tributory influence we believe serious aggressive work in this line will lead to several definite results, aside from the direct benefit to the pupils. It will create a demand for better lit- erature on the subject of vocations. It will help increase the demand for more and better trade schools. It will cause teachers to seek to broaden their knowledge of opportunities for mechanical and mercantile training. Lastly, it will tend to a more intelligent and generous treatment of employees by business houses, the personal welfare and prospects of the employee being taken into account as well as the interests of the house itself. What some of the specific aims and activities of a vocation bureau are may, perhaps, be illustrated by a concrete presentation of the work in Boston. EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 39 The general aims of the Boston Vocation Bureau are: — 1. To study the causes of the waste in the passing of un- guided and untrained young people from school to work, and to assist in experiments to prevent this waste. 2. To help parents, teachers, children, and others in the problems of thoughtfully choosing, preparing for, and advancing in, a chosen Ufe-work. 3. To work out programs of cooperation between the schools and the occupations, for the purpose of enabling both to make a more socially profitable use of talents and opportunities. 4. To publish vocational studies from the point of view of their educational and other eflSciency requirements, and of their career-building possibilities. 5. To conduct a training course for qualified men and women who desire to prepare themselves for vocational- guidance service in the public-school system, philan- thropic institutions, and in business establishments. 6. To maintain a clearing-house qf information deaUng with life-career problems. The Vocation Bureau's activities, it will be noted, consist of individual service, investigations, and con- structive experiments in the fields of education and employment. The main divisions of the Bureau's work may be grouped under the following heads: — Clearing-house for vocational guidance Offices are maintained in a downtown building where books, pamphlets, reports, press and magazine clip- pings, manuscripts, and other reference material are available to teachers, parents, investigators, students. •40 YOUTH, SCHOOL. AND VOCATION and others who call for information, suggestions, and help. The files contain the best material thus far pro- curable in this country and abroad bearing on life- career problems. Research and publications Vocations open to boys and young men are carefully studied in accordance with the scheme later presented here and the results are published in tentative pam- phlet form. Three months has been the minimum time devoted to one study. Some have taken longer than a year. From fifty to one hundred or more people are consulted personally as to the facts in each occupation — employers, superintendents, foremen, workers in their homes as well as in the place of work, imion oflS- cials, social workers, instructors, and other authorities. In each case the manuscript and printed proofs go back for revision and correction to those who have given trustworthy information. An economist reviews final proofs to insure statistical accuracy. The purpose of these studies is: — 1. To present vocational facts simply and accurately. 2. To make accessible^ in time, a body of information as to employments: the professions as well as the trades, skilled, semi-skilled, and unskilled; the business, the homemaking and governmental callings, and also any new and significant vocational activities of men and women. 3. So far as possible to supply parents, teachers, and other interested persons with the material necessary for an in- telligent consideration of the occupations, their needs. EDUCATIONAL GUTOANCE 41 demands, opportxmities, relative desirability, training requirements, and the possibilities they offer for careers. 4. To analyze the relation of vocational aptitudes, inter- ests, and habits to modern industrial demands, and thus lay an adequate foundation for a system of training re- gardful of social as well as economic needs. The proper utilization of such material should make for a heightened interest in the community's training opportunities, and should make the fact increasingly clear that society will gain immensely by devoting the adolescent period in whole or in part to preparation for a right start in life. Above all, such studies should help toward a clearer understanding of what working life ought to develop in social as well as in wage-earn- ing efficiency. THE PLAN OF THE INVESTIGATION OF OCCUPATIONS 1. To gather a body of detailed and accurate information as to the various occupations open to boys and young men in skilled and unskilled, professional, and other pursuits. 2. To place this material in the hands of teachers and vo- cational counselors. .3. To use this information in advising the hundreds of boys and young men who come to the Bureau for aid. 4. To have it available at the Bureau for general public use. 5. To make it the basis of a series of vocational bulletins and books. Methods 1. By a card system of investigation, touching the occu- pation at fifty points of vital interest. 42 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION 2. By studying all available, carefully selected, firms in an industry. 3. By going through factories, workshops, stores, and places where young persons are employed, to study con- ditions of employment at first-hand. 4. By personal interviews of the investigator with em- ployers, superintendents, foremen, and employees in an occupation. 5. By interviewing officials of labor unions, clubs, or as- sociations representative of an occupation. 6. By verifying all material upon an occupation by re- peated visits, and by going to other firms or individuals in the same occupation. 7. By a wide use of books and periodical literature. The firm 1. Name of firm and address. 2. Superintendent or employment manager. 3. Total number of employees, male and female. 4. Numbers of girls and boys. 5. Shifting in relative number of boys and girls, if any. 6. Union, non-union, or open shop. 7. Will the employer take boys sent by the Vocation Bureau? 8. Will he attend conferences held by the Bureau, if in- vited ? 9. Will he join the Employment Managers' Association? 10. Every efifort is made to establish cordial coBperation. The occupation 1. The nature of the occupation. 2. The processes of manufacture or divisions of work in- volved in it. 3. The variety of skill required for entering the occupation. 4. Opportunities for changes from one department to another. 5. Employment offered seasonal or steady through the year. 6. Physical conditions of the occupation. EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 43 7. Special dangers, as machinery, dust, moisture, heat or cold, hard labor, strain, monotony. 8. Competitive conditions and future of the industry. 9. White cards used to show pursuits with normal con- ditions and future ; colored cards for ' ' dead-end ' ' or dan- gerous pursuits. Pay 1. Pay at the beginning, as wages or salary, and hours of employment. 2. Pay of certain ages and various groups. 3. Time or piece payment, premium or bonus. 4. The rate of increase. 5. Upon what does increase in pay depend? 6. Minimum, average, and maximum pay of those in the occupation. Thehcyy 1. How boys are usually secured in an industry. 2. What previous positions they have held elsewhere. 3. What questions asked, tests applied, or records kept. 4. The age of entering the occupation. 5. Educational requirements. 6. The advantages of various kinds of educational equip- ment. 7. Physical and personal requirements. 8. Continuation of training for advancement in the occu- pation. Positions and advancements 1. Positions open to boys, as employees in factory, work- shop, or salesroom. 2. Opportunities for advancement, as — a. In oflSce. b. Foreman or superintendent. c. Buyer. d. Traveling salesman. e. Manager. /. Partnership or proprietor. 44 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Comments cf people 1. Comments of people in the industry as to its nature, future, and what it offers as an occupation for boys: (a) of the employer or superintendent; (6) of the foreman or floor superintendent; (c) of boys now employed in the occupation; (d) of people formerly engaged in the occu- pation or who may have intimate or expert knowledge concerning it. Other information 1. Comment and report upon the occupation by the State Board of Health. 2. Statistics of the Census Bureau upon the occupation in Boston, in the State, and in the United States. 3. Bibliography for this industry, as the latest books or periodical articles dealing with it. 4. A list of schools giving vocational training for this oc- cupation. Vocational bulletins 1. From the material on the vocational cards, from books and papers upon occupations, and from other informa- tion are prepared vocational bulletins, giving as leading points: (o) The occupation, its nature, conditions, and future; (6) pay, positions, and opportunities; (c) the boy, qualities and training; (d) comments of people in the occupation; (e) health reports; (/) census statistics; (g) bibliography; (Ji) schools. 2. For verification and suggestion these bulletins are sub- mitted to men who have given information in an investi- gation and to other persons in the same occupation, in typewritten and in proof form. 3. These bulletins give simple and direct working infor- mation upon the various occupations open to boys and young men in Greater Boston. 4. They are for the use of the Bureau, of teachers, parents, boys, and others interested in the welfare of youth. EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 45 Work vrith the Boston schools One of the principal provisions in the arrangements, as already noted, between the Boston School Com- mittee and the Vocation Bureau was for a group of teachers to be known as vocational counselors, to be appointed by their respective principals and to repre- sent every school in Boston. The teachers so appointed have been meeting throughout the school year to con- sider the educational opportunities of the city, the vo- cational problems of the children, and to confer with employers and others who have been invited to the sessions. The work of the vocational counselors has been a labor of love. Nobody has expected that occupational meetings could alone equip for effective vocational guidance. Important results, however, have come out of these meetings. In the first place, every school in the city has had one teacher — indeed, in some schools, committees of teachers have formed voluntarily — to consider the dropping out from the grades of many boys and girls. These teachers are personally studying the home, street, and other influences which steady or imsettle the children when the compulsory education laws no longer restrain; they are trying to discover what as- sistance a school can give to parent and child perplexed with the problems of a life-career. There is plentiful testimony showing that fathers 46 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION and mothers now turn to the Boston schools as never before for advice and help concerning their children's future. Questions as to what high schools or vocational schools, and what courses, should be chosen are con- tinually coming before the counselors. The abilities, the interests, faults, and promising tendencies in the children are topics of grave discussion between parent and teacher or principal, the point of view being not only that of present school requirements, but also that of the probable careers of the children. In the class- rooms the occupational talks have been repeated in order to make clear the efficiency requirements of the practical world outside. School programs and even commencement-day programs have begun to show how schools are facing the challenging world which is soon to claim the productive years of these children. This awakened practical interest of the schools in the life-work of the children cannot stop short of com- prehensive supervision and protection of the after- school careers of boys and girls. Already teachers, on their own initiative and with an expenditure of much time and energy, have gone into the homes of their pupils, and have sought to get first-hand knowledge of the industrial environment. If our schools are to have any guiding relation to life, — and all educational re- form clamors for this relation, — teachers must be given every incentive to touch in such personal ways the realities of the life which their pupils will e3q)erience. EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 47 The Bureau's relations vnth employers The Vocation Bureau realizes that a sound devel- opment of its work depends not only on close contact with schools, neighborhoods, teachers, parents, and children, but also with employers, business organiza- tions, industrial experts, and the occupations them- selves in all their ranges, variety, and changes. Occu- pational investigation, fundamental though it be, is not vocational guidance. The investigation deter- mines, to be sure, what kind of cooperation is possible or desirable, and on what terms; it is the basis of vo- cational information, of program-making for special training courses in schools, and of social and legislative action; but the vocational-guidance idea requires that contact with the employments be something more than onlooking. Moreover, there are well-endowed agencies for specialized research. A vocation bureau must in- deed be, among other things, a research agency; never- theless, it must depend for some of its most valuable material on other agencies, such as bureaus of labor. Moreover, its work must not duplicate the work of the child- welfare agencies; nor solely promote vocational education — the commissions at work in various cities and States are better equipped for this work. It is the special business of a vocation bureau to organize that conscious and continuous service which takes hold of the child when the life-career motive has been awak- ened, and helps guide, strengthen, and protect it, par- 48 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION ticularly through the transition crisis between school and work. ; The employer's help is absolutely essential to the success of such a plan. To fail to profit by his criti- cism, by his point of view, and his important coopera- tive possibilities, is to invite failure. The Bureau, therefore, is in close touch with a large number of in- dustrial, commercial, and professional establishments whose oflScials are in sympathy with its purposes. In order to promote the employer's contribution to vocational guidance, the Bureau organized in 1912 a conference of employment managers, probably the first organization of the kind. Men representing two- score or more of the important manufactiuiig and business establishments of Greater Boston, formed, in December, 1912, an Employment Managers' As- sociation, whose objects are defined in its constitution as follows: — ARTICLE I NAME AND OBJECT Section 1. The name of this organization shall be the Employment Managers' Association. Section 2. The objects and purposes of the organization shall be: — 1. To discuss problems of employees; their training and their efficiency. 2. To compare experiences which shall throw light on failures and successes in conducting the Employment De- partment. 3. To invite experts or other persons who have knowledge of the best methods or experiments for ascertaining the qual- EDUCATIONAL GUIDANCE 49 ifications of employees, and providing for their advancement; and more particularly to study the questions connected with the most efifective employment of young people. When employers provide for vocational guidance as schools are now beginning to do, we shall find a basis of cooperation between school and work which will help solve some of the difficulties which now vex both school and occupation. The main purpose of a vocation bureau, it is obvi- ous, and of all educational and vocational guidance, is the promotion of the social, efficiency of those who live by labor. Through fresh devices of service it strives to develop the life-career possibilities latent in the educative process and in the vocations. No im- dertaking inspired by the spirit of conservation has set before itself a task more difficult, nor more important. IV THE ORGANIZATION OF VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE Obviously the carrying out of a plan for vocational guidance must ultimately center in some responsible and competent individual. A committee or an asso- ciation can do much in stimulating public opinion and in organizing resources. But such work done well re- quires that it be the special business, indeed, the life- work, of some qualified man or woman. Undoubtedly, a new profession, that of the voca- tional counselor, is developing. The conditions of the time call for it, and whatever the volunteer may do in inspiring young people for the serviceable lite, it is certain that professional responsibility can alone cope with the many problems in this work. The duties of the person charged with the management of a voca- tion bureau are various. They cover a wide range of activity and relationship. They call for study, in- vestigation, and energy. The work of individual guidance is delicate and difficult. Helping to develop purpose, to light the pathway of pursuits, and to shape the careers of the doubting, the eager, and the ambitious, is a task which calls for exceptional qualities of intelligence and con- secration. Fortimately, the idea of vocational assist- ORGANIZATION 51 ance to young people appeals to all thinking men and women, and it should therefore not be hard, with de- finite plan and energetic purpose, to secure a large measure of cooperation. Now, it is essential for any community which un- dertakes the work of guidance to set before itself the steps to be taken or avoided in this enterprise. Later in this chapter will be discussed some of the dangers and pitfalls which -attend the work of voca- tional guidance. The purpose here is to outline some details of organization and the functions of the voca- tional coimselor, executive director, or whatever may be the name for the person in charge. The first suggestion to those about to open a voca- tion bureau is — go slowly. If the right foundations are not laid before actual work in counseling is begun, it is certain that good work cannot be done. At least a year should be devoted to a preliminary investi- gation of local resources, of the industrial environ- ment, and of the social and vocational problems of the children. The kind of study to be made is well shown in the following examples: — CHARTING CHILDHOOD IN CINCINNATI Helen Thompson Woolley Director, Child Labor Division, Cincinnati Public Schools When a pharmacist compounds a prescription, he knows what efifect the various elements have on each other. He can analyze them even after they have interacted with the juices 52 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION of the human system. When a manufacturer starts a piece of raw material on the road toward a finished product, he can account tor the smallest change, the minutest process. But when a child starts on the bleak road which leads from one deadening occupation to another, who can chart his path or gauge the forces that mould and shape his future life? To do this very thing is becoming one of the paramount purposes of educators. The task is enlisting the interest of all who desire a saner conservation of childhood. The boy and girl who leave school untrained, adolescent, groping, are more and more seen to be the rawest of raw materials. Society's obligation to do its utmost that this material may increase in beauty and eflSciency is no longer thought to cease when the school door closes. One of the most comprehensive attempts to find out just what industry means to children is being made in Cincinnati. This attempt was made possible by the passage of a unique child-labor law, which, for the first time in history, gave to one office sufficient authority over the working children of a community to permit a many-sided study of a large group of them. While this study has not been completed, some ab- sorbing discoveries can be forecasted, entailing some equally absorbing reflections on current educational movements. For example, we are making a special investigation of eight hundred school children, as a result of which we hope to be able to compare the rate of development, mental and physi- cal, of those in industry and those in school. It will then be possible to say what is the eflfect of industry on children who enter it at fourteen. The eight hundred boys and girls of whom we are making a spec^ial study were fourteen years old when they left school to begin work. All of them were entering some industry, not merely helping at home. All were native-born white children. Except for these characteristics, the children were taken at random, as fast as our office force would permit. We feel sure that the series adequately represents the whole group. The scope of the investigation includes a study of the mental and physical development of children in industry ORGANIZATION S3 as compared with children of corresponding age and grade who stay in school. We are studying in detail the industrial life of the working children. Finally, we are investigating the industries themselves in which the children engage. It has already been pointed out that we hope to be able to compare the rate of mental and physical development of children in industry with that of children in school. We can also study the children who do not succeed industrially and find out whether their failure is to be attributed to the chil- dren themselves, to the home, to the school, or to the in- dustry. By discovering what relation there is, if any, be- tween a child's mental and physical tests and his success or failure in various kinds of industry, we can throw some light on the problem of vocational guidance. Meanwhile all the records we are collecting about the industrial experiences of the children themselves — the kind of work open to them, their earnings, increases of pay, the amount of unemployment among them, their reasons for changes of position, and their attitude toward work and school — will be indispensable in deciding upon a program of industrial education or of vocational guidance. A study of the industries is equally necessary in both these problems. The information about industries may be cast in the form of bulletins for the use of teachers and parents. An outline of the work of the Educational and Voca- tional Guidance Department of the schools of Newton, Massachusetts, recently organized, also illustrates the care with which responsible people undertake voca- tional-guidance projects in a school system. There are three distinct duties of the department: (1) The charge of all school-attendance records including the school census and the enforcement of school-attendance laws; (2) the granting of work certificates; (3) educational and vocational guidance work. The keeping of chil- 54 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION dren in school is considered a most important part of the work and much care is taken in checking up the records each year and investigating children who are not enrolled in the schools. Considerable guidance work is done in connection with the issuing of work certificates with the result that some children have been persuaded to continue at school. This applies especially to children under sixteen who are carefully questioned in regard to the necessity of going to work and home conditions when they apply for certificates, and this information is checked up by communicating with the principal of the school last attended. With the group over sixteen years of age an endeavor is made to keep track of their progress and advise them particularly against frequent change of position, and to get them interested in evening courses offered either in Newton or Boston which would help them. Two investigations have been made; one of pupils attend- ing the Newton Evening Schools, and the other of those who had been members of the Vocational School for six months or longer. The purpose of the first study was to ascertain the needs of those attending the evening schools as indicated by their previous school history and industrial record. The connection between the course followed in school and the kinds of work done since leaving school and the success at- tained were the reasons for the second study. Both investi- gations have helped in indicating the needs of children for which the department should provide. A beginning was also made in collecting information con- cerning high-school courses, and a pamphlet on the courses offered in the Vocational School has been published. The Technical High School published a similar pamphlet on the Fine Arts Course. These pamphlets are for the use of pupils about to leave the grammar grades, and are intended to help them and their parents in deciding which high-school course should be chosen. ORGANIZATION 55 Frequent vocational conferences should be held, attended by the representatives of all the interests that may be expected to cooperate. The business man, the manufacturer, the labor-union oflScial, the school- teacher, the attendance officer, and the social worker are all needed in such conferences. It should be made the duty of some committee with a well-paid secre- tary, who may be regarded as in training for the even- tual position of vocational counselor, to make a careful canvass of the educational and vocational opportuni- ties in the town, city, or country, and get into personal relation with working children and their parents in order to understand their problems. Chapters of this vocational survey may be made the topics for discus- sion at regular meetings. One of the main results of these conferences will be a consensus of opinion as to what is to be done in the proposed vocation bureau. Some will aim for an educational program, some for an apprenticeship arrangement in local industries, and others again for the placing of boys and girls in shops and stores. All these views represent elements of value to the project, but time and patient discussion and knowing the facts can alone develop a program which will receive general support. It may be that differences of viewpoint will show one party aiming for the short haul of immediate re- sults, and another for the longer haul of social and educational readjustment. No little skill will be re- quired to shape a work which, while serving urgent 66 YOUTH, SCHOOL. AND VOCATION and perhaps immediate needs, yet points unhesitat- ingly toward the infinitely more important task of laboring for the right conditions, the right education, and a public sentiment which will deal constructively with the vocational interests of yoimg people before they become problems. The person selected to conduct a vocation bureau must possess executive ability, initiative, resourceful- ness, and an education which combines academic and industrial knowledge with social-service experience. It may well be that a working man or woman who has earned a college education will be found best qualified. It is also likely that some one occupying a responsible position in a business or educational in- stitution, and possessing social vision as well as keen interest in the problems of youth, may be of the type desired. The method used by the Boston Chamber of Commerce in selecting men as members or paid secre- taries for committees is suggestive. A terse and definite plan is laid out for the committee under consideration. The type of man desired and a list of qualifications that he should possess are agreed upon. The names suggested are then marked according to the degree and special fitness for the service in question. A blank form made up for this purpose is used, and those who are given the highest rating are invited to serve. The type of person suitable for the position of vo- cational director can as a rule best be determined by the residents of the locality interested. A rural com- ORGANIZATION 57 munity or a small town will probably call for quali- fications different from those which a city vocation bureau requires. The predominant vocational in- terests of a community are an important element in determining the type of director. It should be re- membered that the committee which chooses its ex- ecutive is doing a work of vocational guidance, and it must apply, in a sense, the principles which are to guide their own executive in the work. The relations between the counselor and the appli- cant cannot be formal, official, or temporary. They must be friendly, intimate, and more or less contin- uous. What makes the appointment of vocational directors or counselors in schools, settlements, or like organizations so desirable is the opportunity for long contact with individuals. A single interview is seldom sufficient for service that is worth while. Parents and teachers who enjoy years of opportunity for studying the make-up of a boy or girl find it hard enough to ascertain the vocational bent of the child. Prolonged, earnest effort on the part of the counselor is imperative, and a corresponding effort on the part of the applicant, or the service fails of results. No better example of thorough vocational help can be found than the work of the Vocational Scholarship Committee of the Henry Street Settlement, New York. This committee was organized about five years ago, in order to help children become efficient workers and avoid the "blind alley" trades. 58 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION To make it possible for these children to have both guidance and training, this settlement gradually de- veloped the idea of giving scholarships for two years, for definite training to boys and girls between the ages of fourteen and sixteen, who could legally go to work and whose families could not afford to give them further education than the law requires. This com- mittee has learned the important truth that free schools are a mockery unless children are free to use them. In 1908 the committee granted one scholarship, the next year this number was increased to five, and since then the work has gradually increased. The com- mittee has given a total of one hundred and twenty- six scholarships during the five years, and fifty-one of these children have completed their course and are now working. Three dollars a week, or one hundred and fifty dollars a year, is the maximum of any one scholarship, which is somewhat less than the child would probably be earning. Applications for scholarships come from all parts of Manhattan and the Bronx, through club leaders, settlement residents, school-teachers and visitors, the district nurse, charitable societies, and various other sources. At the monthly committee meeting the ap- plications are presented by the secretary, and the com- mittee makes its awards to those children who seem to be in greatest need. The children are advised as to trade training and schools. The girls are being taught dressmaking, millinery, hand-embroidery, sample- ORGANIZATION 59 mounting, box-making, costume designing and illus- trating, and several are taking commercial courses. The boys are preparing to be carpenters, electricians, printers, and mechanics. Some children are kept in the elementary schools until they graduate before they are entered in the trade school. Records are carefully kept of the fifty-one children who have finished their training and have gone to work. The comparison of their wages with those of fifty-one children of the same age, taken from the records of the Alliance Employment Bureau, which places children carefully, is a most interesting one, and proves conclusively, at least for this small number, that the children who have had two years of train- ing are able to earn a much higher wage than those who go to work without any previous training. The average wages of the untrained children who have been working six months is $4.30 a week, and that of the trained children, $6.85. Of the children working one year the average wage of those unskilled is $5.10; that of the trained children, $9.50. Of the children work- ing two years the average wage of the untrained chil- dren is $5.85; that of the trained children, $10.24. That all guidance and training activities will some day be supplemented by provisions for economic assistance, nobody who cares for children can doubt. The work at Henry Street is prophetic. Children that must work cannot enjoy that equality of opportunity which our publicly supported school system implies. 60 YOUTH. SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Of special importance is the economic equipment of the counselor. Guesswork and vague generalizations about social problems and conditions of employment will properly discredit the work. An essential element in the coxmselor's service is expert knowledge of what is going on in a store, factory, or office. He must in- vestigate, interpret, and know how to apply vocational facts. At present it is doubtful whether psychological tests of the ordinary sort can be used to much advantage by the counselor. Laboratory psychology is not far enough advanced to enable one to fathom bent and aptitude by formal tests of concentration, sensitivity, imagination, and the like. With the progress of research, evidence of lines of strength and weakness in various psychological tests will become more and more usefid to the counselor. Since the first edition of this book was issued, five years ago, the early diagnosis of general intellectual ability of the abstract type, such as is required of sci- entific workers, lawyers, and teachers, has been made more feasible by certain investigations, notably those of Spearman and Thorndike and their pupils. Tests of important features of clerical capacity — such as ability to observe, compare, arrange, and judge items of words, numbers, and the like rapidly and acciu-ately — have been put in shape by Thorndike for actual use in the selection of employees. It appears that if facili- ties for competent research are provided, the general ORGANIZATION 61 2 rt 'g u •3,'" 62 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION decision concerning relative fitness for (1) advanced education for expert scientific, technical, or profes- sional service; (2) clerical or office work; and (3) me- chanical or trade and factory work can be based in part upon a psychological inventory taken as early as the age of fifteen. The matter of fitness for (4) work at influencing men, as in salesmanship or executive work, is still more difficult to measure in childhood, but even here systematic tests of early symptoms of efficiency may be devised that will be of practical serv- ice in connection with the general history, provided it be systematically secured, of the individual's abili- ties, interests, and training. Mental measurements in vocational guidance [writes Professor Carl Seashore] have their chief value with refer- ence to the more highly specialized vocations. This is so mainly for the reason that measurement to be effective must be specific and intensive. We do not measure "things in general." It a boy is brought into my laboratory to find out what he should do in life, he is turned away tor the more specific formulation of his problem. But if he asks what qualifications he has for this or that specific occupation, we can in some instances furnish him correspondingly specific information. Thus, if he aspires to be a musician, his musical talents may be measured with the utmost care. We have a special equipment for that purpose and can make as many as one hundred specific measurements, all parts of a fairly complete system, for the survey of musical talent. We measure his natural capacity for hearing pitch, time, and intensity of sound, and his natural power in producing these by voice or instrument. Then we measure his musical imagery, memory, association, and judgment, and analyze the character of his musical feeling, both by subjective and objective tests. In all these cases our interest is directed to ORGANIZATION 63 natural, inherited capacity as opposed to acquired ability or skill. From these measurements we construct a musical "talent chart," which is a picture in which the expert, the teacher, and even the youth himself, can see at a glance a quantita- tive outline of his musical qualifications. There are the rea- sons for or against entering upon a musical career, so far as natural capacity, and, therefore, the chances of success are concerned. There is seen which kind of music he is best quali- fied for, what are his prospects for the speedy acquisition of skill in each of the fundamental aspects of music, and the phase he needs to give special attention to. If he is already in the vocation and has encountered difficulties, there is a qualitative analysis of the conditions of his case. With reference to qualifications for more general occupa- tions, the measurement can, of course, not be made so ex- haustive, but certain psychophysic tests may well be made to determine if there is any defect which would seriously stand in the way of success in a chosen career. A thorough acquaintance with local and other coop- eratmg resources is needed by the counselor, and his facility in connecting the appropriate resources with the needs of the individual applicant will count for much in his work. The bureau can only in the course of years and with a large expenditure of money become the repository for every kind of information that may be called for. An important part of the counselor's program is the skillful utilization of existing sources of information and service. There are men and women in almost every occupation who would be willing to cooperate with the bureau, serving as special advisers and perhaps employers for selected individuals. It is not to be supposed that the bureau director can master 64 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION the important details of every pursuit. Problems may arise with reference to the ability or the circumstances of some particular young man or young woman, and the help of a representative of the trade or profession in question, acting as a vocational "big brother," will prove of great value. The guidance of youth in vocations cannot, of course, confine its outlook to the mechanical or commercial alone. The multiplication of vocational schools, in- cluding those in medicine, dentistry, and law; the in- ferior standards and the pecuniary motives of many of them; and the overcrowding of the liberal professions by the unfit and the ill-equipped, give rise to questions of the gravest character in advising as to these careers. Professor Felix Adler has said that one of the difficul- ties he has encountered in advising young men was in impressing them with the gap between their admiration and their endowments for a vocation. The coimselor'a duty of stimulating is great, but it is primarily his busi- ness to deal with facts. There is an important literature which the counselor must familiarize himself with. Vocational handbooks such as Trades f(yr London Boys, and Trades for London Girls, Mrs. Ogilvie Gordon's Handbook of Employ- ments, and others, may be found in the public libraries and should be part of every school and coimselor's library. Unfortunately, we have not as yet in this country a sufficient variety of cheap and practical vo- cational primers giving the results of expert study of ORGANIZATION 65 occupations similar to those published in various Ger- man and English cities. One series of tiny booklets published in Leipzig, and costing not more than a few cents apiece, covers almost one hundred different vocations, — the chemist, the tinsmith, the teacher, the merchant, the cook, the waiter, the druggist, the farmer, the sailor, the tapestry-maker, and many others. What am I To Be? is the title of this series. The London County Council pamphlets are models of their kind.* The Boston Vocation Bureau vocational booklets present the results of investigations in the following way: — VOCATIONS FOR BOSTON BOYS Nature of Occupation. Shoe Manufacture. Date of inquiry. July 1, 1910. Name of Firm Address Superintendent or Emplojmient Manager rn . 1 u t 1 (Male, 2750. Total number of employees | p^^^j^^ ^^^^ Number of boys, ISOO; girls, 1000. Has there been a shifting in relative numbers of each? No. There is fixed work for each. PAT Wages of various groups, and ages. Errand boys, counters, carriers, H years old, $3.60; assemblers, assistants, 'pattern bays, 16 years, $3.50 to $6; lasters, 20 years, $6 to $7; other ' work, 20 years or more, $8 to $12 for young men in early em- ployment. Wages at beginning. $3.50 to $6. Seasonal. By year. ^ See Appendix. 66 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Hours per day. 7.30 A.M. to 6.30 P.M. To 12 M . on Saturday in summer. One hour nooning. Rate of increase. This is very irregular, averaging $1 -per week each year. a. On what dependent? Not at all on age, but on ability and position fMed, or on increase in skill in a certain process. b. Time or piece payment — any premiums or bonus ? 66% piece payment. Premium on certain lines for quality and quantity qf work, neatness of departments, etc. BOYS How are boys secured? By application to firm, by advertising, and by employees. It is impossible to find enough. Their ages. Fourteen years and up. Previous jobs. Nearly all boys come into this industry Jrom school. A Jew come from other shoe factories, or from retail shoe stores. Previous schooling. Grammar school, or a certifixsate of literacy or attendance at night school must be presented. Are any continuing this training? Yes. Where? In public evening schools, Y.M.C.A. classes, and Continuation School in Boston. THE INDUS TRT a. Physical conditions. Most sanitary, udth modem im- provements and safeguards, with hospital department and trained nurses. h. What variety of skill required? Some mechanical skill. The ordinary boy of good sense can easily learn all proc- esses. e. Description of processes (photos if possible). Errand boys, counters, carriers, assemblers, assistants, pattern boys, lasters, trimmers, and work dicing, welting, and iron- ing shoes. Abo in office, salesman, foreman, manager, or superintendent. d. What special dangers. Machinery. The chief danger arises from careleaaneaa. Dust. Modem dust reTnovers are used. Moisture. Not to excess. ORGANIZATION 67 Hard labor. Steady labor rather than hard. Strain. Not excessive. Monotony. Considerable on automatic machines. Competitive conditions of industry. New England is a great center of the shoe industry. There is extreme com,petition, but with a world market. Future of industry. The future of a stable product in universal demand. What chance for grammar-school boy? He would begin at the bottom as errand boy. High-school graduate? In office, or in wholesale department, to become salesman, or manager. Vocational-school graduate? Trade school, giving faMory equipment, would be best. What opportunity for the worker to show what he can do in other departments ? The superintendent and foreman study the boy and place him where it seems best for him and for the firm. TESTS What kind of boy is desired? Honest, bright, healthy, strong. Boys living at home are preferred. What questions asked of applicant? As to home, education, experience, and why leaving any former position. What tests applied? For office work, writing, and figuring. What records kept? (Collect all printed questionnaires and records.) Name, address, age, nationally, married or single, living at home or boarding, pay, date of entering and of leav- ing. Union or non-union? Open shop. Comment of employer. Education is better for the boy and for us. Will he take boys sent by Vocation Bureau? Yes. Will he attend Vocation Bureau conferences if asked? Gladly. Comment of foreman. Employment bureaus have failed us. We look everywhere for boys, but find few such as we want. The average boy can apply himself here so as to be well placed in life. 68 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Comment of boys. We have a bowling-alley, reading-room, and library, park, and much to make service here pleasant. It is something like school still. We m£an to stay. Piece-work vnll give us good pay by the time we are twenty years old. Health Board comments. Inhaling naphtha from cements and dust from leather-working machines, and overcrowding and overheating workrooms, are to be guarded against in this oc- cupation. The danger of each injurious process may be pre- vented by proper care. Census Bureau Report on this Occupation, Massachusetts, 1908 a || 1 1 i 1 It ■5s li 1 g 2.3 413 »S6,260,028 »104,I71,6O4 »38,950,428 «£62.59 46,063 23,187 $168,967,116 Bibliography, The Shoe Manufacturing Industry in New Eng- land. I. K. Bailey {New England Stales, v. i, 1897), and Massachusetts Labor Bulletin, No. 14, May, 1910. School fitting for this occupation. The Boston Continuation School. Investigator. This information gathered from these cards has been transcribed into narrative form for the use of teach- ers, and portions of some specimen bulletins are here given : — Banking In the lowest position in banking, that of errand boy, boys receive $4 and $5 a week. For regular messenger service the pay begins at $6 a week or $300 a year, increasing, on an average, at the rate of $100 a year. Young men as check- tellers, clerks, bookkeepers, and bond salesmen receive from ORGANIZATION 69 ( to $1000 a year. The average bank employee in Boston receives $1100 a year. Tellers, who must be responsible and able men of thirty years or over, have salaries ranging from $2200 to $3300. Savings banks pay somewhat higher salaries and offer a better future to one who must remain in the ranks of the business. Bank oflBicers receive higher salaries now than bank presi- dents did twenty years ago. Officers and heads of depart- ments in a banking-house are not always taken from the employees; they are often selected by a firm from its ac- quaintance in the banking world. Rarely are boys employed in the banking industry under sixteen years of age, which is the more general age for enter- ing. Some firms will not employ them under nineteen years of age on account of the great responsibility of the messenger service. Boys must be gentlemanly, neat-appearing, intel- ligent, honest, business-like, and able to concentrate their minds upon their daily work. The ordinary high-school education is the general require- ment for banking. Some boys enter the business without completing the high-school courses, but are consequently often unable to make proper advancement. Courses in busi- ness schools are desirable, and one should have fair training in mathematics and bookkeeping and be a good penman. In one banking-house investigated, having 195 employees, there were but three college graduates, one being the cashier. Banking men wish that this condition were different, but be^ lieve that it is best for those who enter the occupation to do so early in life. A second reason for this is that the average pay of the bank employee does not appeal to the college man. The physical conditions of the occupation are of the highest grade. There is moral danger to young men on the specula- tive side of the stock and bond business, and no broker is al- lowed to receive orders from a clerk of another firm. There is keen competition among national banks and trust companies in bidding for deposits, and in the stock and bond business for speculation and investment. There is little com- 70 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION petition among savings banks and cooperative banks. These have their lists of depositors, and interest rates are controlled by business conditions. The business of the future in all lines will be excellent be- cause of the vital connection of the banking business with the money system of the country, and with all hues of ac- tivity in the financial and industrial world. Comments by people in the business "Messenger service is the first stepping-stone in banking. A boy should realize that here lies his opportunity. The careless messenger will be a careless bookkeeper or clerk and an unsuccessful bank man." " The chances of a boy are better in some respects in the small bank than in the large one. In the small bank one learns all parts of the business and has a much better future. The successful men in such firms are often chosen as officers in the large firms." " Bank combinations in Boston in recent years have given prominence to men who had achieved success in their smaller field, or in their particular form of banking experience." " Service in a bank is educational, even if one does not re- main, in methods and mental training. But the person who goes out in middle life finds it difficult to get a position in the business world." "A boy should get into the credit department of a bank- ing house, where he may come in contact with the cashier or president." " Savings banks do not generally take boys direct from school. Age, maturity, and some kind of business experience are desired." " Investment in stocks and bonds is a great business and calls for high intelligence." " Character comes first, for banking is a business of con- tinual trusting in men. Banks are willing to pay for hon- esty, energy, brains, and good judgment." " Banking calls for ability to judge human nature and to carry many details in mind, for accurate and rapid thought, and for clear and firm decision." ORGANIZATION 71 " Every consolidation brings a search for the best men, and every bank is looking for the right kind of young man." " There is a good future in the banking business in all its departments, owing to the great development of this coun- try in industrial and commercial lines." Confectionery Manttfactuee This study of the industry deals with the manufacture of confectioneiy under modern conditions in large establish- ments which employ from one hundred to one thousand people. The facts and conditions presented are in the main such as prevail in the general industry in New England. The health conditions of candy-making are favorable in the large establishments. In the smaller and older ones un- favorable conditions prevail. Some rooms in which candies are cooled are kept regularly below normal temperature, while others, in which mixing takes place, are above normal temperature. There is some danger from machinery, and discomfort, if not danger, from steam and heat. In this industry, in various factories, there are employed from three to six times as many girls as boys. The girls per- form hand processes in the making of candies, and do the work of boxing and labeling. The proportion of boys being relatively so small, there is greater opportunity for them to rise to the responsible positions. The big factories employ many boys, because there is so much work that they can do, and because men generally are unwilling to work at the wages paid in this occupation. In the factories investigated, one halt of the male employees were found to be under twenty-one years of age. Pay at the beginning varies from $3 to $6, according to the age of the boy and the particular work done. Boys act as helpers and assistants, shippers, mixers, and boilers; the more difficult processes are performed by men. Pay in the positions enumerated varies from $3, the lowest sum paid at the beginning, to $12. The average increase per week each year is $1.25. Young men of eighteen or twenty years who remain permanently in the occupation earn from $12 to $15 a week. As foreman of a room, a man earns $18 or $20 a week. 72 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION In the mixing processes and the general industry very many Italians are employed, because of their quickness and the adaptability of the race to this kind of work. In some establishments a few boys are regularly trained as apprentices to learn the entire business; such become foremen, superintendents, traveling salesmen, and mana- gers. Boys begin at the age of fourteen in this industry. They must be clean, bright, quick, and strong. Most boys enter- ing live at home, as is the case in industries paying low wages at the beginning. While no special education is necessary, one must have the usual attendance at the grammar school, or present a certificate of literacy. With some firms a knowl- edge of chemistry is an advantage in the manufacturing de- partment. It is an industry in which the educational requirement is small, and the most important qualities desired are neatness and quickness. Comments of the people in the industry " There is a fair chance for the advancement of a boy or young man; vacancies are regularly filled by selecting from employees who have shown their industry and ability." " From the nature of the business and the number of facto- ries in and about Boston, the chance for steady employment of a fair per cent of young men who have learned the work is very good. One should become acquainted with all de- piartments, serving some time in each if he wishes to become master of the occupation and earn good pay. He should work also in several factories." " It is a good occupation for one who masters it thoroughly. People outside have no conception of the magnitude of the candy business." " Boys with push and health may become able to earn a good living; those with fair education may reach the higher positions. A boy must have the quality of perseverance and interest himself thoroughly in his work. There is more de- mand than ever for mental ability, for mind put into one's work." ORGANIZATION 73 "A former luxury is becoming a necessity and the candy- making business offers a fairly good future for a boy or young man." THE LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT Landscape architecture deals with plans and designs for the laying out of public and private parks and grounds' and city planning. It is allied to architecture, horticulture, and civil engineering. The health conditions of this occupation are excellent. To his indoor work the landscape architect adds the variety and exhilaration of working out of doors. He has steadily before him an ideal of form and beauty in his own undertakings as well as continual contact with them in the work of other men. Indoor work, which is mainly planning, writing, and draft- ing, runs quite steadily through the year; outdoor work is done mainly in the summer. Young men must expect little if any field work at the start. To some the only drawback in the profession is that of travel, a great deal of which is necessary for practicing land- scape architects. On the other hand, steady confinement in- doors is surely a disadvantage. In this industry there is not such keen competition as is found in commercial lines. Contracts calling for the better grades of work are not awarded as the results of solicitation; business comes to a firm mainly because of its reputation. Both landscape architecture and civil engineering, allied in- dustries, are steadily increasing their fields of activity. The profession of landscape architecture has grown greatly in re- cent years, yet there are few large firms. It is one of the most modem and promising of occupations. While there are neither many nor large firms in the coun- try, in the vaults of one firm investigated lie copies of twenty thousand drawings for work actually done. Success in landscape architecture depends on the individ- ual or firm that can do good work and make it known to the public. The landscape architect bears the same relation to the landscape contractor as the architect bears to the building 74 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION contractor. The landscape contractor executes the plans and designs prepared by the landscape architect, under the super- vision of his representative on the grounds, usually a civil engineer or planting superintendent. Older terms for the profession are "landscape engineer" and "landscape gardener." Landscape gardening now has to do especially with the planting side of the profession, and boys prepare for it by employment with a landscape archi- tect and by field work. Wages for boys entering this vocation range from $4 to $6 and $7. Such wages usually cover the period of learning the occupation. A young man who has taken a school course in the profession may enter at $10 or more. While learning, a draftsman receives about the same pay as in architectural offices, from $9 to $12 a week, and a planting department clerk $12 per week; an assistant in the field from $8 to $10, and a superintendent of outdoor work $15. Beyond those positions when young men have served a period of learning of four or five years, pay increases steadily, quite equaUng that received in building architecture, and averaging from $1000 to $1800 per year. As in all lines of business, advancement and success depend upon personal ability, thoroughness of training, and business conditions. Pay in the profession, while generally stated by employer and employee in the figures given above, is usually computed by the hour, especially for indoor work. The usual age for entering is sixteen years; a boy younger than this would have no opportunity except as office boy. One must expect to give the years between sixteen and twenty to learning the profession, earning only enough for living expenses. Most boys found in such an occupation live at home. One should have ability in drawing, taste in design, an accurate mind, good sense, and good eyesight. A boy should be strong, of good habits, and of normal physique. A high-school education is the least requirement. Most boys entering landscape architecture in Boston and vicinity come from the Mechanic Arts High School, the Institute of Technology, Harvard University, Bussey Institute, and the ORGANIZATION 75 Worcester Polytechnic Institute. One must be well trained in mathematics, surveying, and drafting. A knowledge of plants is an advantage in all cases, and with some firms an essential. Many students use their school or college vacation for studying the profession with a landscape architect, thus get- ting practical field work to supplement their school courses. Comments of people in the industry " It is a profession demanding hard work with long hours and much painstaking service for moderate financial returns. Most who go into it do so for love of the occupation." " The work is in part of an advisory nature, necessitating investigation, which is the opportunity of young men. They draw up plans and direct the execution of them by con- tractors." " Teach a boy drawing, no matter what he can do or what occupation he may enter. It trains the mind and hand and is of help always." " Conditions have changed greatly in recent years. The Metropolitan Commissions pay a higher price for a shorter season and sometimes draw young men away from archi- tects' offices." " Better be a first-rate grocer than a second-rate landscape architect. One must think carefully before entering this pro- fession, so that he may not put in three or four years and find himself not fitted for it." " This occupation opens the door to a congenial work and gives one broad views and interests in life." Outline of the Vocation Bureau's study of the department store The Department Stoeb 1. Its nature. 2. From the public point of view. 3. The rise of the department store. 4. Competition. 5. Future. 6. Method of treatment. 76 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION 7. Chart of department-store organization. 8. Four major divisions. 9. Departments of merchandise. 10. The general manager. 11. The board of managers. Merchandising oh Buting: 1. The receiving-room. Positions. 2. The marking-room. Positions. 3. The stockroom. Positions. 4. The division of buying: Positions. The buyer. The assistant buyer. The merchandise manager. Assistant merchandise manager. Diagram of the merchandise department. The boy in the merchandise department. Age. Positions. Pay. Advancement. Superintending and Selling: A. Divisions and positions in this double department: 1. Employment office. 2. Floor superintending. 3. Selling. 4. The educational department. 5. The division of expense. 6. The division of supply and construction. 7. The mail order department. 8. The delivery system. B. The more important positions and features of superin- tending and selling: 1. The store manager. 2. Diagram of store management. ORGANIZATION 77 3. The store superintendent. 4. The floor manager. 5. Requirements for successful salesmanship. 6. Diagram of salesmanship requirements. 7. The boy in the selling department. Age. Positions. Pay. Advancement. 8. The basis of pay in selling. The Office Department: 1. Its nature. 2. Simple ofloice divisions. 3. Divisions in oflSce work in the highly organized store. (1) Credit and collection department. (2) Charge account bookkeeping. (3) The cashier's ofiSce or accounting-room. (4) The C.O.D. division. (5) The auditing department. (6) The purchase records department. (7) The payment department. (8) The stock record department. (9) The statistical department. 4. Diagram of the office department. 5. Positions in the office department in the highly organ- ized store. 6. The bookkeeper. 7. An actual case of advancement. 8. The boy in the office department. Age. Positions. Pay. Advancement. The Advertising Department: 1. Its nature. 2. The modern trend. 3. Divisions in store advertising. 78 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION 4. Positions. 5. Diagram of the advertising department. 6. The advertising manager. 7. Important assistant position. 8. The boy in the advertising department. Age. Positions. Pay. Advancement. 9. Work producing advertising men. Conditions or Service: 1. Hours of employment. 2. Seasonal increase in trade. 3. Diagram of seasonal changes. 4. Seasonal increase and decrease in the number of em- ployees. 5. Vacation. 6. Physical conditions. 7. Influences making for fatigue. 8. Competition in service. 9. Where the way divides. WELrARE Work: 1. The nature of this work. 3. Three lines of opportunity. A. Educational: The school of salesmanship. • B. Administrative: (1) Efficiency bulletins. (2) Merchandise conferences. (3) Efficiency records. (4) School enrollment. , C. Social: (1) A mutual aid association. (2) An insurance or mutual benefit association. (3) A savings deposit system. (4) A medical department. (5) The lecture committee. ORGANIZATION 79 (6) The library committee. (7) The suggestion committee. (8) The entertainment committee. (9) The clubhouse committee. (10) The music committee. (11) A store paper. (12) Workers in this division. (13) A sample daily club report. The Employee, Pat, and Pbomotion: 1. Suggestions from an employer to boys who may wish to enter this occupation. Personal appearance. Past record. Courtesy. Perseverance. Don't be overlooked. 2. Some qualities required. 3. Educational training required, or of value. 4. Two main lines of progress, quoted from a department store paper. 5. Pay. 6. Promotion. 7. Advice from a store manager. 8. Actual cases of advancement. 9. Quotation from a government investigation. Supplementary Matebial: /l. Summary of positions : Members of the firm or corporation, or high officials. The merchandise department. Superintending and selling. The office department. The advertising department. 2. Positions not distinctive to the department store. The furrier. The store detective. Additional activities. ( Heads of factories. 80 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION H H Pi < W w o O % o ^ H l-( rl m <1 M ?1 H < S !> >< P y ^ Q s o .J rt 2 M s ;?; 1 ORGANIZATION 87 and public vocation bureaus and to courses of prepara- tion for this specialized service in normal and profes- sional schools. Such courses are already given in sev- eral leading universities. Here is the outline of the Boston University course: — CouESE EST Vocational Guidance Objects: (a) To provide instruction and practical training in the duties of vocational counselors in schools, philan- thropic agencies, and business establishments. (6) To afford opportunity for the study, under direction, of vocational problems in education and educational problems in employment. (c) To open the way for contributions, based on reading, -p research, and service, toward more socially effective material and processes in education and employment. (d) To enable school departments to undertake tentative experiments in vocational guidance. Methods — Topics: Lectures — conferences — reading — research — field work — reports. I. Vocational guidance as a modern social problem. (a) The need for vocational guidance. (6) Agencies for vocational guidance. (c) The chief problems of vocational guidance. (d) Terminology. n. Elements in the choice of a vocation. Foundations in vocational eflSciency. (o) General survey. (6) Educational influences. (c) Social influences. (d) Economic influences. m. Factors in vocational guidance, (a) General survey. (6) The occupations. 88 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION (1) The study of occupations for vocational guid- ance purposes. (2) Scientific management and scientific placement. (3) Hiring, promotion, and discharge. (c) The individual. (d) Agencies for employment. (1) The labor exchanges. (2) Juvenile employment and after-care committees. (3) Placement agencies. (e) Educational readjustments. (J) Cobperative effort. rV. The practice of vocational guidance, (a) In schools. (6) In vocation bureaus and other agencies: in industry. (1) The duties and equipment of a vocational coun- selor. (2) The technique of vocational guidance. (3) Problems: case work. V. Summary and cautions — Review and literature. VI. Methods of organization. Related practical work (optional) : Part I. Study of vocational agencies by prearranged visits. Part II. Assignment to an elementary, high, or vocational school, in cooperation with the school counselor. Part m. Assignment to a factory or mercantile establish- ment in cooperation with employment manager, and educational or welfare manager. A question which constantly arises in vocation bu- reau work is its relation to employment and to employ- ment agencies. Our discussion thus far should have made clear the fundamental aims of a vocation bureau. An office for individual counseling and for studying the problems of social and educational readjustment will need very large resources to superadd an employ- ORGANIZATION 89 ment oflBce. This latter is no small business, and re- quires far more investigation and study than are or- dinarily given. While a vocation bureau gladly finds many incidental occasions to suggest openings for its applicants, it will fail of its purpose if its larger, con- structive functions become sidetracked. A specially organized department, such as is discussed in a later chapter, is necessary for considerable employment work, but there can be and should be the closest co- operation between a vocation bureau and employment service of any kind. Employment managers of large stores and factories should be kept in touch with the vocation bureau, not only for the benefit of those who, under proper conditions, may be referred to them for work, but chiefly because the adoption of vocation bureau methods and ideals in industry may ultimately become such bureau's largest contribution to social welfare. The progress of vocational guidance cannot be ex- pected to go on free of errors and mishap. Differences of opinion as to what such work should be, as to what are its proper aims and standards and how to carry them out, must necessarily give varied phases to the movement. Local application of the bureau idea will differ in different localities, and, doubtless, there will be much to learn and much to undo. Not found wanting will be the exploiter and the charlatan, advertising vocational guidance as the pat- ent key to success. Every commimity will have to 90 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION be on guard against snares of this sort; no idea more easily lends itself to harmful exploitation. At what age shall vocational suggestion and guid- ance begin in the school? Professor Paul H. Hanus, who was chairman of the Massachusetts Commission on Industrial Education, has with reference to voca- tional training answered the question also for voca- tional guidance. The years up to fourteen, he main- tains, should be enriched with all that a broad and liberal curriculum can give. From fourteen to sixteen years, differentiation, not specialization, in school work may take place along the lines of the probable occupations of the boys who are not going to a classi- cal high school or college, and with regard to the pre- dominant industries of the locality. This in order to develop general vocational intelligence. Prior to the fourteenth year, however, it is desirable that school work include vocational enlightenment; for example, talks on familiar trades and professions, excursions by classes or groups of children to shops, stores, offices, and vocational schools, and manual training. Applying these suggestions to guidance in the ele- mentary schools, there is first a fundamental need of stimulating the ideal of vocational purpose. School work inspired by the "life-career motive" is the ideal of all progressive educators. As thousands of children will for some time, unfortunately, go to work from the grammar school, the vocational director or the school counselor, where they are appointed (as in Boston), ORGANIZATION 91 should get into touch with the boys and girls and their parents in order to work out gradually the question of the least objectionable occupation, if, indeed, there be any choice. The most important part of this work, however, will be in the endeavor to find a way to continue the appropriate schooling of these boys and girls. In time legislation rather than advice will have to be relied on to protect the futures of these children. The vocational decision, when made, should repre- sent, of course, the conclusion reached by the boy or girl, young man or woman, or by any one who may be receiving advice. Decision is not the business of the counselor, but that of the applicant. The counselor is there for suggestion, inspiration, and cooperation. The over-zealous school counselor who "prescribes" vocations is quite likely to commit the error of forcing decisions on children prematurely, and perhaps driv- ing them to work. Without a genuine personal touch, then, the coun- selor's service to the applicant cannot be very valu- able. Human beings, not "cases," are before him, and therefore a mechanical treatment of bureau prob- lems is intolerable. If the possession of accurate voca- tional information is desirable, no less so is the giving it without bias. A counselor prejudiced in favor of a particular line of pursuits, be they industrial, academic, or what not, is vitiating his usefulness. No vocation bureau can fulfill its mission which leans toward one or 92 YOUTH, SCHOOL. AND VOCATION another of the occupations. Its business is to deal with the facts, impartially and responsibly. An even more serious indictment would be the dis- pensing with the program of analytical and educational effort on the part of the applicant, and converting the bureau into an office for a short cut to jobs. Some em- ployers will be found ready to take advantage of any laxity in the bureau's standards. When a vocation bureau degenerates into an agency merely for supply- ing young people to employers, the time has come to close it up. As has been already suggested, the placing of young people in employment calls for most careful investigation and organization. Without a system of supervision, without a plan for the definite training of every child it helps send into uninstructive employ- ment, and without a definite educational agreement with every employer who is thus served, the vocation bureau with other than incidental employment fea- tures must only intensify existing evil conditions of juvenile labor. Every adviser has become familiar with the types who seek occult assistance. They are morbidly intro- spective. The relation to their fellows and to their work is not normal. The personal data sheets or printed list of personal questions, such as the coun- selor may prepare for the applicant, cannot be used mechanically, and with reference to the type of ap- plicant here in question they will usually prove worth- less. Self -analysis is like a drug habit with these people ORGANIZATION 93 and before vocational help of any value can be given, the counselor will probably find it necessary to deal frankly with their mental and emotional make-up. The vocation bureau is not equipped for service in the field of abnormal psychology. Its rigorous common- sense methods should be sufficient to deter the coming of those who need other than the bureau's help. The bureau must ever be on guard against dabbling in sub- jects foreign to its powers. In dealing with the life-work problems of young people sane conservatism must prevail, and a sharp sense of responsibility control the work of the voca- tional director. The methods he uses and the sugges- tions he makes are all fraught with serious conse- quences. No other work calls more insistently for sense, judgment, and straight thinking. Misguidance is a constant possibility in bureau work. With a grow- ing number of counselors in the field, and with the ex- tension of this service through both public and private endeavor everywhere, the dangers multiply. Good in- tentions cannot excuse the lack of care and adequate equipment on the part of the advisers. The applicant himself is a factor in the bureau's liability to disserA^ce. To answer a list of personal questions, either orally or in writing, honestly and satisfactorily, is a difficult process. Not many people can face themselves objectively. Inability as well as unwillingness to do so may be the reason. To know one's self after the manner presupposed by many 94 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION so-called self -analysis charts is a sign of genius and ca- pacity not in need of a counselor's help. Exploring the vocational possibilities of a troubled or discouraged applicant calls for a large expenditxu-e of thought and energy. No progress can be made if the applicant does not meet the counselor's exertions in a cooperative spirit y The margin for error and misjudginent is large at best, and the applicant must attend faithfully to the reading, the investigating, and the work required of him. ' There is no royal road to vocational guidance. Pre- tentious claims do not belong to the legitimate voca- tion bureau. What may be confidently expected during the early years of this work is mitigation of the pre- vailing anarchy during the decisive years of school and occupational changes, through energetic application of science and sympathy to this problem. To sum up the principal dangers which the movement may encounter, attention is again directed to the danger of forcing de- cisions upon young children through wholesale coun- seling; too little personal relationship; absence of gen- uine research work; superficial suggestion; vocational bias; job-finding instead of constructive social service; pretentiousness; and generally inferior equipment of the executive and the bureau. Mistakes are inevitable in this endeavor to help the coming generation to find itself, but a rigid standard of service and of social re- sponsibility can alone insure against their too frequent repetition. VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY We consider now some of the important enterprises carried on by public and private agencies in Germany, England, and Scotland, for the purpose of helping boys and girls in their start in life. These countries have been selected for special discussion because their work of vocational assistance, some of it old and much of it still in the early experimental stages, possesses pecu- liar suggestiveness for workers in similar fields in the United States. Conditions and even viewpoints will be found so unlike our own, oftentimes, that direct adoption of the schemes described will be obviously out of the question. Genuine social service, as every ex- perienced worker knows, is never a transplantation; it must grow out of local insight and necessity. This, too, should be pointed out: The countries mentioned differ not only with respect to one another in methods and policies of helping the children vocationally, but they differ, too, in many details, within their various sub- divisions. Scotland does not follow England, nor does England follow Germany in the work of vocational assistance. The work in Birmingham is unlike that in London, while Edinburgh differs from both. North 96 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Germany and South Germany are widely apart in both methods and results. In a survey of foreign experiments, one cannot fail to be impressed by the elaborateness of machinery de- veloped; the extent and effectiveness of the national and local support through legislation and money grants; and also by the extraordinary development of volunteer service on the part of men and women who are drawn from school, manufacturing, commercial, labor, civic, and social-service groups. Although German literature on the subject of voca- tional counseling and the choice of a life-career is con- siderable, and some of it of a most thorough and ex- cellent character, there is at the present time not more than a beginning of distinct and organized activity in this field. German social enterprise has concerned it- self thus far largely, among other things, with the im- mense task of establishing the continuation and part- time school system, which has become a world model, and the system of labor bureaus which place boys and girls who seek work. Nevertheless, the schools have not been indifferent to the career problems of the children. Before the school-leaving period draws near, and shortly before the fourteenth birthday, teachers and others call at- tention to the various wage-earning opportunities open to the children. They describe the supplementary train- ing provisions of the municipality and the procedure in VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY 97 getting work through the labor exchange. In a few cities and towns municipal vocational information offices have been started — usually in connection with some well-established agency, such as the statistical bureau — for the purpose of advising parents, children, and teachers as to industrial conditions, the state of the labor market, and the nature of the demand for workers. These "consultation hours for parents," so called, are among the most interesting and promising activities in the recent German movement for organ- ized vocational guidance. A notable instance of this type of work is to be found in the city of Halle, where the director of the Statistical Biu-eau, Dr. Wolff, has for several years conducted on his own initiative a depart- ment for vocational counseling. The abundant eco- nomic material of the office is made available to those who seek information as to the nature of various em- ployments. Office hours are advertised when the di- rector or an assistant will be found on duty for voca- tional counseling. The schools, too, are keenly interested in preventing the children from becoming careless job-seekers, and they take a personal interest in directing children to the nearest labor exchange and to other placement agencies. Parents are invited before the children leave school to attend informal conferences, at which a brief talk is given to point out the mischief of drifting into employment without forethought and plan. Pamphlets are often distributed showing what the various occu- 98 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION pations are and their educational requirements; also the institutions, public and private, which give the required training. Specific advice is avoided by German teach- ers, who realize that giving occupational information is the work of a specialist and that people unprepared for this task should not assume the serious responsi- bility it entails. The school authorities, nevertheless, endeavor to use their influence in securing attendance of the leaving children at the Labor Bureau until they have been placed. Once started in employment, the boy, and in some places the girl, will be required to attend the appro- priate continuation or part-time vocational school for two or three years, four or six hours a week. If the boy is in mercantile work, he will go to a commercial school, and if in industry he will attend courses dealing with the practical or related theoretical work of his trade. For that army of children who are in unskilled callings, classes are formed to give instruction in subjects com- mon to a large group of miscellaneous occupations and helpful also in developing character and citizenship. The question as to what further instruction a boy or girl is to receive is settled by the nature of the employ- ment undertaken. Therefore, it is not the choice of a career which confronts the average German schoolboy, but the question as to how well he will do the work he is almost destined for. To be sure, the children have some choice as between entering the ranks of the skilled or the unskilled pursuits, the latter paying children, VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY 99 as is everywhere the case, relatively more attractive wages than the former. But for the most part the so- cial and economic position of the children settles the general class of employments which they are likely to go into. In this fact lies the explanation for the absence thus far ia Germany of a scheme of guidance comprehen- sive and supported by law. Guidance, it has been thought, was a somewhat needless procedure in the case of young people whose career was more or less a predetermined matter. Recent events show the dis- content of thinking Germans with such a mischievous assumption and the situation which it has created. Many towns are distributing occupational handbooks, and a large number of social agencies are working for organized schemes of vocational information and guidance to precede the employment stage. Certain far-reaching changes in industrial condi- tions have brought about the new demand for voca- tional guidance. Germany's most successful part- time vocational schools are to be found where the factory system has not yet transformed the old-time methods of production. In South Germany, where shops employing from ten to fifty workers are the prevalent type, apprenticeship is still a possibility. In- dividual skill counts for much where the worker is not altogether a process or an automatic worker. Initia- tive and manual dexterity find scope in the small shop, where often a variety of tasks are to be performed by 100 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION an individual. This is not the case in the factory- dotted areas of North Germany. The part-time school as a state enterprise in ap- prenticeship training is only a logical continuation of the system which the employers themselves once supported in self-interest and managed as part of their function. But in the rapid changes, from small to large meth- ods of production, from a rural and semi-rural to an urban and mobile population, and with increasing sub-division of labor, an apprenticeship system cannot alone meet the needs of thousands of young people facing the wage-earning life. Nor does the apprentice- ship system, even though supplemented by the voca- tional school, assure a right start in life for all classes of children. Criticism has, therefore, grown in volume, and in the public addresses of leading German econo- mists, educators, and social workers will be found co- gent arguments for the establishment of supplement- ary guidance plans to help children and parents. Despite the admirable placement and training pro- visions to be found in a number of German States, the fact remains that there is an unregulated and menac- ing drift of young people into trades, a drift which causes oversupply of workers in some industries, while in others there is a scarcity of workers. The economic results of this chaos have been pointed out at recent conventions of economists and labor organizations. The probable breakdown of training provisions, and VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY 101 a condition of chronic unemployment and underem- ployment for a large percentage of the. workers, are the consequences. Thinking Germans no longer rely on the law of supply and demand to work magic in correcting the maladjustment. The tendency on the part of those leaving school to make straight for the immediately profitable unskilled occupations threat- ens the ejBScacy and appeal of the vocational school. In the Trade and Labor Census, of 1907 there were 350,000 young people noted as employed in miscel- laneous callings, aside from the familiar trades. Of these not more than about 150,000 had had any vo- cational training, the rest being employed as helpers, in no need of specific eflBciency training. There is no reason to believe that the number of such neglected factors in the working population has diminished. On the contrary, all indications point not only to an increase in their number, but to the possibility of a majority of young workers finding themselves before many years in the ranks of the "blind-alley" work- ers. Neither well-disposed individuals nor local com- munities are strong enough to deal with a situation whose roots are deep and wide. For this reason a number of experiments have been undertaken for the purpose of trying out what it is hoped may lead to a state-wide or federal plan for vocational guidance. Of late years, in Munich and in Pforzheim, parents, teachers, physicians, and officers of the Labor Bureau and labor unions have cooperated in conferences for 102 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION the purpose of emphasizing the thoughtful selection of life-work and of calling attention to less familiar and to overcrowded trades. Several labor organizations, too, have attempted a counseling service, but with little success, owing to their inability to give this work the time and resources which it requires. In 1908 the Halle Bureau of Statistics, already mentioned, opened its office evenings to information seekers. The schools were notified of the Bureau's readiness to give infor- mation as to wages, conditions, and apprenticeship requirements of the various industries in the city. A secretary now keeps records of the advice given and endeavors to follow the progress of the children who have been counseled. The local Labor Bureau, of course, mediates in placing the children. The organ- izer of this experiment. Dr. Wolff, believes that the child's natural counselors, the parents, are often too busy and too little informed as to the nature of the va- rious employments to be effective advisers. Parents* consultation hours were therefore establishied in the director's office to enable fathers and mothers to dis- cuss with ejqjerts the vocational problems of their children. The consultation office has been open also to adults who sought information about various trades and conditions. The work has developed beyond the stage of mere information-giving, definite suggestions being now given to yoimg applicants, based on the Biu-eau's study of their educational equipment, health, personal inclinations, and the financial condition of the N VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY 103 family. When the decision is finally made by the par- ent and child, the help of the Biireau is sought in se- curing an opening, and especially an apprenticeship opportunity for the boy. Private agencies and individ- uals are often enlisted in the search for a promising place. The Bureau of Statistics endeavors to keep its advisory material fresh by frequent study of the labor market, of demand and supply, and the promising avenues of employment. A record is kept of employers who will cooperate in an apprenticeship agreement. Various trades and commercial organizations have been enlisted in assigning members to .give public lectures on the various trades, businesses, and profes- sions. In 1908, the year of opening, 27 applicants made use of the Halle consultation hours; 54 in 1909; 79 in 1910; and 104 in 1911. The range of visitors to the office has now grown to include a large number of busi- ness men, manufacturers, teachers, and public officials who desire help in a large variety of occupational prob- lems. Of 264 individuals counseled during the first three years of the consultation hours' service, 128 had had only elementary schooling, while the others were distributed among the higher schools. Two thirds of all who applied were fourteen years of age or under. Eighty-five were started in life under apprenticeship arrangements. Halle has not neglected its girls. Consultation hours for girl apprentices have been started by a body of public-spirited women, while the task of starting girls 104 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION as domestic servants is looked after by the House- wives' Association of the city. Halle's example has been followed by half a dozen other cities, the statistical bureaus, which in Germany represent a high type of efficiency, usually acting as centers of vocational infor- mation for schools, parents, and children. At the conventions held during recent years by as- sociations of labor-exchange officials, of economists and social workers, notably those held in Dtisseldorf in 1910, and more recently in Breslau and Elberfeld, the papers which attracted particular notice were those advocating municipal vocation bureaus. This proposal has borne fruit, for we find similar recommendations appearing in the political platforms of various parties, especially in relation to social poli- cies for cities and towns. In August, 1913, Dusseldorf opened a guidance office for the city and surrounding districts, accompanied by placement bureaus for ap- prentices. Frankfort is carrying on a series of motion- picture lectures showing the various employments, the object being to interest boys and girls in thinking about their future vocations. The Berlin Labor Bureau Central Office conducts public motion-picture shows with a like purpose, the first of these having been given in May, 1913. In 1912 the Leipzig Manufacturers' As- sociation started a guidance bureau for young people. In this enterprise they have not had the support of the workingmen, for one reads in their organ, the Leipzig Labor Daily {Ldpziger Volhszeitung) of May 14 and 15 : VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY 105 "The vocational-guidance bureau ought not to be in the hands of an employers' organization until we se- cure a very effective law for the protection of appren- tices against overwork and underpay"; and "Such bureau should be a state or municipal institution." There are. other advisory offices throughout Ger- many, too numerous, indeed, to record in this brief survey of significant beginnings in organized vocational guidance inspired by social service aims. Some of these offices are supported by philanthropic societies, some are connected with established charities, some are em- ployers' devices to get more suitable employees, and others are slight experiments looking to a public im- dertaking of the work. The vocational guidance service of some of the Ger- man labor bureaus has been so excellent that a brief ac- count of their work will be of interest. In Strassburg, since 1902, the Municipal Labor Bureau has endeav- ored, with the official support and direction of labor organizations and the Chamber of Commerce, to start boys in life as well as possible. The control committee is made up of employers and employees from various occupations of the district. This committee seeks in- formation as to suitability of the employers who an- nounce the vacancies. All boys who are about to leave school, whether with work in prospect or not, are obliged to report themselves with their parents to the Labor Bureau, the school officials taking pains to se- cure this attendance. The teacher distributes cards 106 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION to be filled in by all the boys and girls leaving the ele- mentary schools, and their parents are summoned for an evening conference with the school authorities, who explain the purpose of the cards. Within a few days the cards must be taken to the Labor Bureau. Each boy at leaving time is examined by the health officer as to his physical condition, and notes are entered upon the boy's card. This card is examined by the Labor- Bureau officials, as well as by employers' committees. All boys and girls report back regularly with their con- trol cards until they have been placed as suitably as circumstances permit. To help in cases where poverty would force an unwise choice of employment, scholar- ship grants, or subsidies, have been started with gov- ernment aid, and there are other instances of special financial assistance to start the boy properly. The Munich Labor Bureau, like that of Strassburg, just described, works in intelligent cooperation with the School Department. The boys go out of school to a large variety of apprenticeship openings, such as mechanics, bakers, locksmiths, woodworkers, etc. They are carefully examined medically. Every effort is made to prevent waste and drifting in undertaking employment. The German people have a horror of waste in any form, particularly the waste due to inter- mittent employment. Everywhere vocational advice stresses the importance of preparation for permanent work. Germany, like England and our own country, is not VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY 107 without its grievous problems of child labor. Not all the children can avail themselves of the advice given; and there are instances enough of parents who are ignorant and irresponsible. Efforts toward better reg- ulation of juvenile employment, the raising of the com- pulsory school age, and the prohibition of certain em- ployments to minors are energetically going forward. Nevertheless, Germany has laid foundations of social and educational policy which are of immense assist- ance in the present efforts for vocational guidance. It is a truism in German educational thought, that no oc- cupation, whatever may be its character or problems of organization, can be permitted to go on indifferent to the developmental needs of its young workers. Com- pulsion has long been looked upon, at least in some parts of Germany, as the foundation of success in any scheme of training young workers. This principle is be- coming the universal practice in the Empire. Influenced by this, there are advocates of a like policy with re- spect to the start in life of the boys and girls; that is to say, while decision must always necessarily be a free act, and besides, the free act of parent and child, there should be suitable provision, publicly supported, for the supplying of vocational information and expert guidance to young people who are headed for employ- ment. While the industrial field is an object of special emphasis with the leaders in the German movement, there is no failure to recognize the fact that such guid- ance is indispensable to all career seekers, whether 108 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION in the professions, commerce, trades, or government service. When contrasted with the widespread organization of counseling service in the United Kingdom, the fore- going account of German beginnings wquld seem to in- dicate a rather tardy recognition of the problems which confront the school-children at the transition stage. Such impression would not do justice to the facts. The truth is that in no other country is there a larger body of intellectual leaders who have been thinking deeply on this transition problem. University professors, rec- ognized authorities in social and civic affairs, distin- guished economists, party leaders, publicists, and men and women at the forefront of advance movements in the Empire are among the conspicuous participants in the beginnings which this diapter has only briefly sketched. VI VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND Although various Scotch and English towns have for years been carrying on some juvenile advisory and placement work, frequently through members of the care committees, established primarily to supervise school feeding, two parliamentary enactments, one known as the Labor Exchanges Act, passed in 1909, and the other as the Education (Choice of Employment) Act, passed in 1910, may be said to be the mainsprings of the present vocational-guidance activities in the United Kingdom. These two acts, with respect to their advisory and juvenile employment provisions, have been in process of application simultaneously. Under their authority many important experiments are under way. The separate education act of Scotland became effective in 1908, with the following provi- sions: — It shall be lawful for a school board, if they think fit, in ad- dition to any powers already vested in them, to incur expend- iture and to defray the same out of the school fund, in carry- ing out or in combining with one or more school boards to carry out the following objects (that is to say) : In maintain- ing or combining with other bodies to maintain any agency for collecting and distributing information as to employ- ments open to children upon leaving school. 110 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION The Education (Choice of Employment) Act, 1910, quoted in part reads: — An act to enable certain local education authorities to give boys and girls information, advice, and assistance with re- spect to the choice of employment. 1. — (1) The powers conferred upon the councils of coun- ties and county boroughs as local education authorities under section two of the Education Act, 1902 (in this act called the principal act), shall include a power to make arrangements, subject to the approval of the board of education, for giving boys and girls under seventeen years of age assistance with respect to the choice of suitable employment, by means of the collection and the communication of information and the furnishing of advice. Under the Labor Exchanges Act of 1909, the Board of Trade, which combines many of the functions of, and corresponds to, our Departments of the Interior, Commerce, and Labor, was authorized to make its own regulations for the conduct of these exchanges and to establish such juvenile advisory committees as it thought fit. The joint memorandum issued by the Board of Trade and Board of Education has laid the foundation of the present relationship between the schools and the juvenile labor exchanges. While one cannot say how long the policies laid down in this document will con- tinue in their present form, there being a determined effort on the part of a number of leaders in child-wel- fare work to secure to the school authorities the ex- clusive control of the advisory and placements services for those under seventeen, the probabilities seem to be VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 111 that for a long time to come the suggestions substan- tially as outlined in the following memorandum will be in force: — Memorandum with Regard to Cooperation between Labor Exchanges and Local Education Authorities exercising their Powers under the Education (Choice qj Employment) Act, 1910 1. We have had under consideration (a) the Education (Choice of Employment) Act, 1910, and (6) the Special Rules with regard to Registration of Juvenile Applicants in Eng- land and Wales made on the 7th February, 1910, by the Board of Trade after consultation with the Board of Educa- tion, under the Labor Exchanges Act, 1909, and printed as an appendix to the present memorandum. Under the new act the councils of counties and county boroughs, as local ed- ucation authorities, are empowered to make arrangements, subject to the approval of the Board of Education, for giving to boys and girls under seventeen years of age assistance with respect to the choice of suitable employment, by means of the collection and the communication of information and the furnishing of advice. In the special rules of the Board of Trade two alternative methods are indicated by which in- formation, advice, and assistance with respect to the choice of employment and other matters bearing thereon can be given to boys and girls and their parents in connection with the working of labor exchanges. Paragraphs 2 to 5 of the rules make provision for the establishment by the Board of Trade of special advisory committees for juvenile employ- ment, which may, as one of their functions, take steps to give such information, advice, and assistance, but without any responsibility with regard thereto being undertaken by the Board of Trade or the ofiScers in charge of labor exchanges. Paragraph 6 of the special rules contemplates the case of a local education authority which has and desires to exercise statutory powers for the purposes of giving information, advice, and assistance, and provides that, where such powers are exercised in accordance with a satisfactory scheme, the 112 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION registration of juvenile applicants for employment shall not be conducted by the labor exchange except in accordance with the scheme, and that the Board of Trade may dispense with the services of a special advisory committee so far as the area of the authority is concerned. The enactment of the Education (Choice of Employment) Act, 1910, renders it possible for the procedure contemplated by paragraph 6 of the special rules to be brought into operation. 2. We are of opinion that the employment of juveniles should be primarily considered from the point of view of their educational interests and permanent careers rather than from that of their immediate earning capacities, and accord- ingly we urge upon local education authorities the desirabil- ity of imdertaking, in accordance with the principles set out in the present memorandum, the responsibilities ofiFered to them by the new act. We consider that it is of importance that these responsibilities should be exercised in the fullest cooperation with the national system of labor exchanges es- tablished under the Labor Exchanges Act, 1909, and the Board of Education will, therefore, before approving any proposals from local education authorities for the exercise of their new powers, require adequate provision to be made for such cooperation. Where a satisfactory scheme has been brought into force by a local education authority, paragraph 6 of the special rules will operate, and the Board of Trade will be prepared to recognize a committee of the author- ity as charged with the duty of giving advice with regard to the management of the labor exchange for its area in relation to juvenile applicants for employment. There are certain areas in which, pending the passing of the act, the Board of Trade have already established, or have definitely undertaken to establish, special advisory committees under paragraphs 2 to 5 of the special rules, and we presume that the local education authorities for these areas will desire to continue the arrangements aheady made, at least until some further experience has been gained, and will consequently defer the exercise of their powers under the act. So far as other areas are concerned, the Board of Trade do not pro- pose to take any steps for theestablishment of special ad- VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 113 visory committees until after the 31st December, 1911, ex- cept in the event of the local education authority passing a formal resolution to the effect that they do not propose to ex- ercise their powers under the Choice of Employment Act. 3. We recognize that the methods to be adopted by au- thorities in working the act must necessarily be subject to considerable variations in accordance with local conditions, and will, in particular, be affected by the distribution of the labor exchanges, the districts of which are not necessarily coterminous with the areas of authorities. We think, how- ever, that in normal cases some such arrangements as are indicated in the following paragraphs are likely to be found effective in practice and may be expected to insure a rea- sonable distribution and correlation of functions between the authorities and the labor exchanges. 4. The work to be undertaken by public bodies in giving assistance in the choice of employment for juveniles may be regarded as having two branches. In the first place, there is the task of giving such advice to boys and girls and their parents as will induce them to extend where possible the period of education and to select, when employment becomes necessary, occupations which are suited to the individual capacities of the children and, by preference, those which afford prospects not merely of immediate wages, but also of useful training and permanent employment. In the second place, there is the practical task of registering the actual ap- plications for employment and bringing the applicants into touch with employers who have notified vacancies of the kind desired. 5. In any scheme of cooperation put forward under the new act, the first of these two tasks — that of giving advice — should, we think, be assigned to the local education au- thority, with the assistance of such information as to the conditions and prospects of particular kinds of employment as can be furnished by the Board of Trade through the labor exchanges. We think that the authority should act through a special subcommittee, which may, perhaps, also be the sub- committee charged with the supervision of continuation and technical schools, and which should always include an ade- 114 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION quate number of members possessing experience or knowl- edge of industrial as well as of educational conditions. In its detailed working, which should include the keeping in touch with boys and girls after as well as before employment has been found for them, such a subcommittee will, we trust, realize to the full the services not only of teachers and of school attendance oflScers, but also of voluntary workers, whose activities may here find one of their most valuable educational spheres; but the work will be of a kind which depends largely upon skilled and effective organization, and it will probably be found desirable, as a rule, to put at the disposal of the subcommittee an executive oflScer, who will act as its secretary and maintain the daily contact between the authority, the voluntary workers, and the labor exchange. 6. As regards the second of these two tasks, namely, the registration of appUcations for employment and the selection of applicants to fill vacancies notified by employers, there is need for cooperation between the education authority and the labor exchange, and direct relations should be established between the subcommittee or oflScer of the authority and the officer in charge of the juvenile department of the labor exchange. For this purpose it will probably be found con- venient for the two officers to be located in the same or con- tiguous buildings. At present a good deal of the work done in connection with the employment of children is done at the elementary and other schools at which the children are in at- tendance, and no doubt this will continue to be the case, at any rate so far as the giving of advice is concerned; but we desire to point out that the notification of applications for employment to a central office will increase the range of va- cancies open to any one applicant and will therefore advance the fundamental object of placing each applicant in the em- ployment which best suits him and to which he is best suited. We contemplate, therefore, that applications for employ- ment from children still at school will continue to be received and entered upon the necessary cards by their teacher, but that the cards will then, generally speaking, be forwarded by him to the authority's officer. The applications from boys and girls who have left school can, we think, most conven- VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 115 iently be registered by the officer of the labor exchange, but arrangements should be made to admit of such applicants being interviewed by the authority's officer either at the time of registration or as soon as possible after, as it is desirable that they should be fuUy advised before vacancies for em- ployment are brought to their notice. All applications re- ceived in either of the ways indicated should at once be made available either in original or in copies for the use both of the education authority and of the labor exchange. Notifications of vacancies for employment should be made to the officer of the labor exchange, who will furnish the authority's officer with information as to each vacancy for which he proposes to submit a boy or girl, and with the name of any boy or girl whom he proposes to submit for it. Information passing be- tween the authority and the labor exchange will naturally be held to be strictly for the purposes of their cooperation. We anticipate that in ordinary cases the question whether a particular vacancy is suitable for a particular boy or girl will give rise to no difference of opinion between the two officers. It will, however, probably be necessary to provide for the possibility of a difference of opinion. We think, therefore, that as a rule the decision should rest with the authority's representative as regards any child who is still in attendance at an elementary or other day school or has not left the day school more than six months previously, and that as regards applicants who have passed this limit the decision should rest with the officer of the labor exchange, who will, however, consult the authority's representative in all cases in which this is practicable, and will in all cases inform him as to the manner in which each vacancy is ultimately filled. 7. Should any scheme be submitted for the approval of the board of education under the act in which it is proposed to vary these limits or otherwise to depart materially from the scheme of cooperation outlined in this memorandum, it should be accompanied by a full statement of the special reasons urged by the local education authority in support of the proposed variation. The special circumstances of the case will then be considered jointly by the two departments. 116 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION Not only was cooperation with the schools sought for at the starting of the labor exchanges, but begin- nings were made, too, in enlisting the help of the school medical inspectors and the certifying factory surgeons. The industrial district of Dewsbury illus- trates the type of service sought. The factory surgeon for the Dewsbury district reports to the advisory committee on every child who is rejected from em- ployment because of any physical handicap. The committee's secretary then visits such a child and en- deavors to obtain for it either suitable employment or necessary medical treatment. It was found in the early cases that children had been working for months after being rejected by the doctor because of defects which slight medical care would remedy, but no atten- tion was paid to these defects until the secretary hunted up the children. For the sake of clearness the situation with regard to the two acts just mentioned is summarized. In Eng- land and Wales two methods of administering juvenile employment schemes are in operation: One is the Board of Trade scheme, whereby that board conducts a juvenile labor exchange as part of the national sys- tem of labor exchanges throughout the country, and furnishes both the funds and the officials. In such case the board appoints a local committee of representa- tive men and women, called the juvenile advisory committee, whose duty it is to cooperate with the ex- change officers. London affords a striking example of this type of development. VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 117 The other method permits the juvenile exchange to be administered by the local education authority, namely, the education committee of the council, pro- vided that said local authority submits a scheme to the Board of Education which can be approved under the joint memorandum already described. On approval, the Board of Education sanctions a grant of money in aid of the advisory work of the local labor exchange. It will be seen that this is an adaptation of the plan followed by Scotland in organizing its employment information bureaus in close coordination with the schools, some time before the national system of labor exchanges came into existence. Nearly twoscore local education authorities are now conducting such school advisory and employment agencies, the best known being those in Birmingham, Liverpool, and Cambridge. A dozen or more additional cities and towns have sub- mitted schemes which are awaiting approval. As regards the plan of work there are certain basic features common to all the juvenile labor exchanges, whether under the Board of Trade or the local educa- tion authorities. These features are, first, keeping a record of the children leaving school for work; second, offering advice and guidance to boys and girls between fourteen and seventeen years of age; third, granting interviews to parents and others who desire to consult the officials; fourth, keeping a register of the positions open. Perhaps the most striking of these features, and it is at this point that nationalization is the strongest. 118 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION is the opportunity now open to boys and girls for in- dividual advice and care when leaving the elementary schools. The schools have to turn over to the juvenile bureau the printed card forms on which are entered particulars as to health, character, aptitudes, etc., of all the leaving pupils. These records have to be passed in for all pupils, whether they desire assistance in find- ing employment or not. The records are not always thorough or intelligible, because not all teachers and schools perform this duty conscientiously. Indeed, some records seem to be valueless; still this is not a criti- cism of the scheme as a whole, for such deficiencies are remediable. The school usually puts itself on record with the records of its children. These advisory committees represent a vast amount of unpaid public-spirited service. They are unique to England. The juvenile labor exchanges have profited greatly by their interest and cooperation. In London and elsewhere these committees are divided into sub- committees known as "rotas," in sessions of which the members take turns in personally advising the out- going boys and girls. American opinion regards the task of interviewing and advising as perhaps the most complicated and delicate service in vocational guid- ance, one demanding insight, expert knowledge, and a specialized training besides. That volunteers should undertake so difl&eult a task argues leisure and great devotion. It seems hardly probable, however, that this particular feature of the English work will be perma- VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 119 nently left to the volunteer. Guidance during the crit- ical years of adolescence is, as has been indicated, the principal aim of the Choice of Employment Act, with employment as a secondary consideration. The grant allowed by the Board of Education is specially stated to be in aid of the executive officer, or officers, ap- pointed by a local education authority for this work: — In view of the great importance of the duties of such an officer, and of the necessity of securing thoroughly adequate qualifications, the board is prepared to make annual grants in aid of approved salaries paid to executive officers in re- spect to duties carried out in accordance with the scheme under section 1 of the Choice of Employment Act. The Board of Trade scheme expressly disclaims re- sponsibility with regard to any advice or assistance given by its committees. The education officers, on the other hand, representing, as they do, the locally elected authority, which is accountable to a local constituency, act, as a matter of course, with a lively sense of inti- mate and responsible relationship to the children. The school employment bureaus are not without advisory committees of their own. Members of the care com- mittees, which have been dealing thus far with school feeding and other needs of poor children, are rapidly including vocational assistance among their duties, while frequently they are appointed to the Board of Trade juvenile advisory committees. A detailed description of a few of the foremost voca- tional aid enterprises in England and Scotland follows, the work in London being first under consideration. 120 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION London With nearly 70,000 children leaving the elementary- schools each year, the problem in London is suflSciently appalling. Volunteer service has developed here to an extraordinary degree. The London County Council with its energetic education committee and system of care committees; the Board of Trade with its strong central juvenile advisory committee and eighteen local advisory committees; the apprenticeship and skilled employment committees; befriending commit- tees; and other agencies in bewildering variety — all these make the work in London deserving, indeed, of a separate monograph. The magnitude of London's problem, and the impossibility of dealing with it in the way smaller communities attack their vocational aid problems has made the London scheme unique. To understand the workings of the vocational help ma- chinery in London, it will be necessary to consider first the organization of the London juvenile a.dvisory com- mittee. This is appointed by the Board of Trade to cooperate with the juvenile labor exchanges in the area known as the administrative county of London. It consists of : — 1. Six persons nominated by the London County Council. 2. Six persons possessing special knowledge of chil- dren and juvenile employment. S. Three employers. 4. Three workpeople. VOCATIONAL GUmANCE IN ENGLAND 121 It is the duty of this committee to advise the Board of Trade from time to time in regard to all matters relating to the management of the juvenile branches of the labor exchanges, and in particular to form com- mittees in connection with each local labor exchange. In addition, it supervises and directs the work of such local committees. This central committee appoints the local advis- ory committee whenever a juvenile labor exchange is started in London. Thirty persons constitute the local advisory com- mittee. Of these, ten are nominated by the London County Council and two by the consultative com- mittee of London head teachers, while there cannot be less than four representatives of employers and four representatives of workpeople. The remainder is made up of persons specially interested in the welfare of young persons, and includes teachers and social workers. The following are the functions of the local com- mittee as prescribed by the Board of Trade: — 1. To focus the existing scattered efPorts of different or- ganizations dealing with juvenile employment in the locality. 2. To organize a systematic procedure for obtaining, in co- operation with teachers and the care committees, knowl- edge of the character, qualifications, and home condi- tions of children about to leave school, and about to register at the labor exchange as applicants for em- ployment. 3. To form subcommittees or "rotas" to attend at the ex- 122 YOUTH, SCHOOL. AND VOCATION change for the purpose of interviewing applicants and their parents in order to — ■ (o) Give advice with regard to employment in general and with regard to particular vacancies. (b) To endeavor to secure the attendance of boys and girls at evening continuation or technical classes. 4. To secure in cooperation with the labor exchange au- thorities that — (o) Employers are informed as to the work of the local committees. (6) Adequate information is obtained as to the condi- tions and prospects of particular trades and situa- tions. (c) The records of all information relative to children, employers, and employment are so kept as to be readily available for the purpose of the committee. 5. In cooperation with care committees, boys' and girls' clubs, and institutions for the welfare of juveniles, to organize a system for keeping in touch with such boys and girls when placed as may be thought to need super- vision. 6. To report periodically and make suggestions to the London juvenile advisory committee and to carry out such instructions as may from time to time be issued by them. A local committee may recommend to the London juvenile advisory committee the names of persons as new members of the local committee provided the number (30) is not exceeded. It is also within the power of a local committee to recommend to the Lon- don advisory committee the names of persons to serve on rotas, as approved workers, without being members of the local committee. Local advisory committees are concerned with juveniles under the age of seventeen. The authorities are under no delusion as to the VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 123 number of what may be termed really satisfactory openings for children. Returns of the occupations fol- lowed by boys on leaving school were obtained a few years ago by the London County Council. These re- turns showed that about half of the boys entered "blind-alley" employments, and, at most, a third found employment in any class of work which could be in any manner regarded as skilled. Employers offer- ing vacancies of the less satisfactory kind are able to do without any help from labor exchanges. For a long time they will continue to be able to do so, despite all labor exchanges. Many children must work as soon as possible; their poverty is real. Now the records show how limited is the number of good openings, amount- ing, indeed, in the cases of the boys to not more than about a third of the available positions. Obviously the remaining two thirds of the boys in search of work are driven to unpromising and undesirable sorts of work. This situation is bad, and it will not be remedied alone by the establishment of advisory committees. Nevertheless, there is a positive social gain in the ex- istence of these committees. Vacancies of any kind will be filled, no matter what any committee may think; but they are now to an increasing extent filled with the knowledge of the labor exchange people. The advisory committee is enabled to keep in touch with the boy; they may be able to find him more suit- able employment at a later date; but they are, at any 124 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION rate, in a position to trace his industrial career and ascertain exactly the effect his work has upon him. There can never be a satisfactory solution of the problem of juvenile employment until detailed and conclusive information is available regarding the con- ditions of boy and girl labor. It is hoped that the advisory committees, in their dealing with disadvantageous forms of employment, will be in a position to point out what further public action is necessary to remedy evils which may be dis- covered. A very large percentage of children who apply to the exchange do not obtain employment through the ex- change. Of the juveniles who register, little more than half are foimd employment. The remainder find work on their own account, and nothing more is known of their careers. To remedy this deficiency is, perhaps, the committee's most important duty. A most important feature of the local advisory com- mittees' work is the attempt to organize a system under which accurate information may be obtained of the industrial career of each boy and girl placed. The committee endeavors to test the value of its work by reviewing the progress of the placed children. The point of view of the child, his parent, as well as the opinion of the employer, are ascertained. A boy may have been placed in employment for which he is phys- ically or otherwise unfitted, or he may be given a situation with prospects of permanent employment. VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 125 He may have taken up work in which he can hope to be successful only by taking certain special training courses. He is advised accordingly. Some employers require certain qualifications in the worker engaged. It is desirable that the committee should know such facts. Now all this kind of information, so essential to good work by an advisory committee, can be secured only through investigation. An interesting method of ascertaining the industrial progress of the young workers has been adopted by some advisory committees: — Every juvenile, when he is placed, is invited to call at the exchange periodically and let the committee know how he is getting on. He comes in the evening when rotas are meeting. A notice of such meetings sometimes appears in the window of the exchange. It is found that children make considerable use of this opportunity of consulting the secretary or committee. Some local advisory committees have established cooperation between themselves and the local certify- ing factory surgeons, who, in certain cases, have under- taken to notify the advisory committee of the names of rejected children, with a recommendation as to the type of employment for which they are best suited. The advisory committees endeavor to place the juve- niles in accordance with the physician's disclosures. This, then, in broad outline, is the work of the Lon- don advisory committee and its local committees. There is an earnest endeavor, first, to know the chil- 126 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION dren, their needs and capabilities; secondly, to place them as advantageously as conditions will allow; and thirdly, to study results of this placement through the system of after-care which is being developed. The facts which will be forthcoming after a few years' trial of this great enterprise will be invaluable for their il- lumination of industrial conditions as reflected in the careers of the children studied, and of special service in the formulation of future educational and social policies. The London schools are being brought into close working relation with the exchanges. Many teachers are breaking away from the traditional silence and routine of the English teaching body, and are making personal studies on their own account of the children who leave prematurely for wage-earning. As yet the United Kingdom is not ready for the German system of compulsory daytime instruction for young workers. Attention is therefore centered on existing shortcomings in the evening school system. These defects are glaring, though not at all peculiar to England. Dwindling classes, indifferent and disheart- ened students, the natural handicap of artificial light- ing, and weariness of both students and teachers after the day's toil, are familiar conditions. The situation in Great Britain, as with us, is an indictment of the prin- ciple of voluntary and of evening attendance by chil- dren between fourteen and eighteen years of age. The Munich boy between fourteen and seventeen years of VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 127 age, employed throughout the year though he may be, is compelled to attend for two hundred and forty day- light hours per session during each of the three years. In London the number of student hours per enroll- ment per evening session amounts to something like forty-five. BiBMINGHAM Nowhere in England will be found a more intelli- gently executed plan of helping children start in life than in the city of Birmingham. The education com- mittee, through its central care committee, has built up an organization of school care committees which now covers nearly the whole of the city. The scheme op- erates under the Choice of Employment Act and was approved by the Board of Education in consultation with the Board of Trade in July, 1911. An integral part of the Birmingham scheme is the chain of juvenile labor exchanges distributed at central points through- out the city, in the management of which there is the closest co6peration between the school and Boajd of Trade officials. A corps of nearly fifteen hundred men and women, called helpers, undertake to interest them- selves in the individual children and their parents who use the labor exchanges. During the first seventeen months nearly eleven thousand applications were re- ceived from employers, and seven thousand children under seventeen years of age were placed, besides numbers of other cases in which the helpers themselves undertook to counsel and place the children. 128 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION About thirteen thousand boys and girls leave the elementary schools in that city each year; most of them are absorbed by offices, factories, workshops, and warehouses. The need of guidance and training is apparent as soon as the careers of these children are scrutinized. To meet this need, the following plan, in active operation for more than two years, is in charge of the central care committee, which devotes its atten- tion to the industrial problems of boys and girls from the time they leave school until they are seventeen years of age. This committee consists of six members of the education committee, four representatives of teachers, three of employers, three of workmen, four social workers, the school medical officer, and others. The committee carries on its work through two sets of agencies (l) the juvenile employment exchanges, and (2) school care committees. The Central Juvenile Employment Exchange This is in charge of an officer specially appointed by the Board of Trade on account of his knowledge, training, and fitness for dealing with the employment of juveniles. He attends the meetings of the central care committee and acts in consultation with their officer. The chief work of the exchange is: — (1) To receive and register applicants for employ- ment from youths and girls under seventeen years of age. VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 129 (2) To receive and register applications from em- ployers for juvenile employees. (3) To endeavor to place the applicants for employ- ment in the situations for which they are best suited and in which they are likely to be most successful. The exchange is in a good position to select the ap- plicant, because both the exchange and the central care committee have accumulated an immense amount of information about the various trades of the city, and so can advise as to wages, prospects, and conditions in any trade. It knows what trades lead to regular and improving work, and can caution against bad condi- tions and prospects. By the time a child applies for a post, the officials above mentioned will have in their possession a report concerning it from the head teacher of its school, from the school medical officer, and from the school care committee helper. In the first twelve months 7180 applicants were received from employers, and 4907 were filled. For the convenience of parents and juvenile appli- cants five branch exchanges have been opened in vari- ous parts of the city. School care committees The scheme provides for the appointment of a school care committee for each elementary school in the city. Many schools thus have their own care committees. In a number of cases it has been found advisable to 130 YOUTH. SCHOOL, AND VOCATION group several neighboring schools under one care committee. These committees consist of school man- agers, teachers, and others prepared to interest them- selves actively ia boys and girls. The members are as- signed as "helpers" to a small number of children each. The helper is put in touch with the boys or girls about three months before they leave school, and at once tries to set up a friendly relation with the parents as well as with the children by visits to the home or by other means. The helper endeavors to keep in touch with the boy or girl for about three years. This, as regards employ- ment, is necessary to counteract the aimless drifting or the capricious change from job to job, to give encour- agement to face and overcome difficulties, to see that, if changes are advisable, they are made for the youth's benefit and do not give rise to intervals of disastrous unemployment. The conditions under which boys and girls are em- ployed are in many places quite unsatisfactory, and have a bad efifect morally or physically, or both. In- formation is gathered by the central care committee and the juvenile employment exchanges, which some day doubtless will be used to improve these conditions. Further education and kindred influences The helper takes an interest, and stimulates the parents' interest, too, in further education of the boys and girls. They are urged, where the hours of work VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 131 allow, to join classes at the technical schools, schools of art, evening continuation schools, or at such institu- tions as may be most suitable to the individual cases. Again, meetings of parents are held from time to time, such as have already been organized by several school care committees; also meetings of boys and girls about to leave school or who have recently left. These meetings are found to be valuable means of rousing interest in the future well-being of the children. The helper's notebook is an interesting device for keeping track, not only of the children, but of the helper's effectiveness as well. These notebooks when carefully employed are a veritable store of social in- formation. Four pages from such a notebook are here reproduced as pages 133 to 136. The relation of the Birmingham teachers to the scheme herein outlined is real and active. Many head teachers use commendable care in the reports on the children who leave school. These reports indicate the groups of children which in the teacher's judgment need a good deal of after-care, those which need only a moderate amount, and those which need no after-care except perhaps as to continued education. For the first eight months during which these records were kept, nearly half of about nine thousand cases were referred to the school care committees, which in turn called upon the helpers for assistance. Many organiza- tions in Birmingham, particularly those interested in boys, have been enlisted in the scheme. Here social 132 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION workers and teachers, as is the case in Boston, New York, Cincinnati, and other cities, have been giving their time and their energy generously to the work. Parents' meetings are carried on by many school care committees. Employers are often the speakers at such meetings. With reference to girl labor, Birmingham presents the problem characteristic of our own American cities. The girls desire office work and too many take courses in shorthand and typewriting. The start in life for these girls is difficult, indeed, and the outcome quite unsatisfactory. The market for stenographers and office workers is overstocked. The element amongst whom the exchange renders its most useful service is that group of girls who, desiring a manual occupation, have been guided into the better trades, such as book- binding, leather-stitching, etc. As in the case of the boys, there is a great demand for girl labor. The city has not adequately faced, and few cities have faced, the problem of vocational guidance for girls. Two use- ful handbooks have been issued by the central care committee as part of a series on the principal trades and occupations in Birmingham. One deals with the various trades for women and girls; the other with printing and allied trades. There is much effort to secure continued training in evening schools for the children placed. VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 133 (1) Cbild's name. (2) No Address School (1) Standard. (2) Date of leaving. Home conditions Father's occupation Mother's occupation (if any) No. in famUy — (1) over 14; (2) under 14. Social or other organizations Bvening school or classes child promises to attend. (1) Promise or (2) Flans for employment. Will application he made to the J. B. Exchange. Dates of visits Remarks and Notes 134 YOUTH, SCHOOL, AND VOCATION .a S f ■f a -» a 5"d '-g ■go' III .^i Ph 2 « =■ .2 £• 1 1 ■s s ft a B a o c3 § ,a o p "r a s t s ; M "^^ fe 2 ■2 fl fi '3 .£ ,9 +3 id o • S g S S ■^ i ■a £ a o e ££S i ft'S s ^ ft . r„'-3 E i fa » g •= ■H S Oj ft€ >- B 'S fl ft S a +^ fl a H a i2 5- S "H B 2 o o .2 g o S a .2 a B 2 a; in « ft m S a E s a g g, - .S a o 2 T:! ■» ? s -g a, 2 H =■ a ■£ ■ _ 4J « ft m w - a m « » a _ H g S 53 ! 'a « ' « 2 it ^ -^ 'I' O te ^ ft p o a s ^ a J -- ft s ^ « « s .a w «1 _ « B "S M^;rtrt£in!?ife-0[?3,a £ ft53 -d a TS 3 <1 ^5 CO 4^ hH a z o o c3 S 411 i. MS* S 5 ® a ll§i S " h ft ^ 2 « s S"^ is ■§ S •§ o g -o »-i a s s c O ID p» d a 3 « O j^ fe S K a OS S5 a « '3 a; 03 a 0} j3 £ .o t^ ftS £■2 Is ■B s u " a s a s -^ ° S J I g S o oj " m fe ft ft h 'S a 2 -S « M ■^ * .S w a g " F « ■a g a 5 .2 ■o 2 o ftS b 'S ,a a ft as » i i- £ -S S .2 ^ VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND 135 ■a o .S 3 = A s « =2 S I oT s t« « e a ■a § % a £ o o g a a 5 -5 pi £ u ■H ■3 o S „ fe s e § " « ? S •a p, " S k ^ o be %, p- !3 a S S s t ^■g a ? S- 'd v c s S J 2 » ■§ I ^ s i fi I § s g S I « h .S oT .§ 3 S M g s a -g ■« -a « 3 &«*'a'goa'''a ■i3a'°'§'d2»S ii.i».S -ooja'^fl all |i-s|§i|| ||e.^ 2?i^||.||i "S9"S-'S**°oaKoZ;'0_iB p<°9£'d'00'3i> "2'g-gE?lsg'g«S"2ss? as^S^lst^l ?^r3|f!|siiif|ii|.|l^|^fill 3£5agSStSo5Joa.i^o.a^-gg°ots-gi8.2-fK.S f5'aSr*?«?o<»^flOjB®fltiflSe3430flh*^'*^SS« P^S?» o g 3 ■S B 5 § a i I as B E4 8 1 I I ISO ^ ^ 0) n 0] §■ I i I « 3 g 3 a > ^ s ^ ( 180) w W !z; o H !?; < o »— I IB Eh g 3 if ■g-a ^£ 0^ o W g a a I o g e fl « 3 S g fl .3 *f-i u o « ''I '3 1 P4 g fe s » S w ■§ S ■a 1 s a (181) H f* tn o fe fe n H i-i p ■S "H t? i 2 15 6 rz; 1-3 n m o^ - ris o o o ft h O V m^ o CO U ^^ O A) " Sag £■ a a a 9^ n c4 0} a s £ o >. •■" '« oil- s' >ig,^a aj:a fto) ■agg-aS <" cS S O ^ -3 O fl o u Bo OB (fi o o o '■Sad cs 5 o o 0) ■0 h'S (n aSSS . . o t « -Si ■a a !3 O •a'-s o^ g 1.2 "M o M o Ed m o ill S 1 1 di M H ^ 4h ■o'g ■Si tj 1^ s ■a 5 o ni H 1 Sis S a CO 2 o 0*a s 1 sX«p looqos 3uT.tTi(i winrans Supna (197) " 1 i ■§' •a ■a g o fe -o a £€ a I i tl I I 3 t s tf ^ m 1 a S 1^ d S ^1 a tS a S i ..( 198 ) (199) n K cd 03 ►^.M>Ja3 on .00 SIS sn<3fl f ifl ■g It 11 1 t si h fl 1 1 |Zi 1 ■o It Mp, ll +4 Is 4 111 ^1 5 60 ^1 li •g 00 p MOooOgp ( 200 ) S s| Ic- g'l si^5 9" a „ m « a M ph i; +a tj -t^ o P P ■£ « « as «H bn _ tj M « ^ ™ ■ ™ 43 -U .^ S %%>Aixt ( 201 I I Eta es o ,q M n h n h O I-) SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 203 POINTS FOR DISCUSSION Used in a Series of Conferences with New York School Officials A new agency : — What new agencies, if any, should be introduced into the public schools to lessen the number of children under sixteen who quit school for work? What more can the principal and teacher do? How best reach the parents? Should the leaving periods be better regulated, and how distributed throughout the year? What kind of educational and vocational information should be given in the elementary school? High school? Who should give it? How follow up the results of such advice? Should occupational booklets be used? What kind? How prepared and by whom? Lectures? Counselors and advisers : — Should there be a staff of special counselors? What training should they have? How qualify for the work? What should be their powers and duties? What their relation to the school teacher? What preliminary studies and investigations are needed before introducing such system? How extensive and intensive should such studies be? Pre-vocationd schools : — How far can the pre-vocational school as now organized serve the purpose of holding children longer in school? How assign children to these or vocational schools? Who should attend to the assignment? What follow-up should there be? 204 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL What variety of vocational experiences and opportunities should be introduced? How flexible the system of transferring from course to course? Tests and medical inspection : — What physical and mental tests should be used as part of the vocational service under discussion? What medical supervision? How can it be made more significant in choosing a voca- tional course or a career? How can differentiated courses be used as a test for apti- tude? How shall such tests be supervised? Employment : — What help shall be available for children who seek work? Shall they be permitted to hunt jobs unaided? Should the school or other agency give advice and warn- ings as to particular employers and employments? Shall the schools attempt to find positions or should this be left to the Municipal Employment Bureau? Should the schools have a follow-up system for all children under sixteen now at work, no matter how they found their jobs? What is the objection to the school attempting to find work for those under sixteen? What is the objection to children finding their jobs for themselves? Should the schools attempt to control the juvenile labor supply? How best do this? Or should the schools instead work with existing employment agencies? Until the compulsory school age is raised, what should schools do for those seeking work from sixteen to eigh- teen — for those already in employment? Should children under eighteen be obliged to report to some school agency at stated periods for physical and other examination? SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 205 What contact should the school establish with employers? Is further legislation needed for effective supervision by the schools of the work and progress of employed cliil- dren under eighteen? Should the Department of Education or a new bureau or- ganize this service; or would it be best to effect a com- bination of existing departments and agencies? HIGH SCHOOL, SOMERVILLE, MASS. Questionnaire fob High School Pupils Name Age Yrs. Mos. Class Room 1. Do you expect to complete a course of four years in the High School? 2. If not, how many years do you expect to stay? 3. If you do not expect to remain four years, what is the reason: — (a) Financial conditions? (6) Lack of success in school work? (c) Desire to go to work? {d) Loss of interest? 4. Please underline the course which you are now taking : -r- (a) General. (6) College Preparatory. (c) Manual Arts. {d) Commercial. (e) 2-year Commercial. 5. What led you to choose this course: — (a) Advice of parents, teachers, friends? (6) Success of others? (c) Belief in your personal qualifications and ability for the work of this course? 6. Do you know what studies are included in this course : — (a) In the first year? (6) In the second year? (c) In the third year? {d) In the fourth year? 206 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 7. What qualifications do you think you have for the work of this course? 8. What line of work do you intend to follow after you leave High School? 9. What do you understand to be the requirements of this work? 10. How have you ascertained these requirements? 11. Is this the work which you really desire to do? 12. What have your parents advised? 13. To what extent, if any, have possible financial benefits influenced your choice? 14. If this is not the work which you really desire to do, why are you not preparing to follow your personal choice? 15. What service to the community are you plamiing to render through your vocation? Extba: A. For College Preparatory Pupils : — 1. For what college are you preparing? 2. Why have you chosen this college? 3. What are its requirements? B. For Scientific, Normal School, Normal Art School, etc.. Preparatory Pupils: — 1. For what school are you preparing? 2. Why have you chosen this school? 3. What are its requirements? Note: — Please answer questions in full where space is given: otherwise, as briefly as possible. The purpose of this inquiry is to help in the conduct of the school rather than to be inquisitive concerning the personal aSairs of the pupils. Please answer frankly. Replies will be considered confiden- tial. II RECORDS OF A BOSTON SCHOOL VOCATIONAL COUNSELOR One day a boy in our school brought an application for a City Hall license to his teacher for her signature. She hesi- tated about signing it, as the child was small for his age (fourteen), puny, and very nervous. He had been in the Massachusetts General Hospital twice that year; the first time with appendicitis, the second time with adhesions. In spite of the excellent nursing he had received there, — all free, by the way, — he was sUll weak and unsteady and quite unable to do his school work properly. On questioning the boy, the teacher found that he was getting up at 3.30 every morning, going over to the news- paper oflSces and lugging back heavy bundles of papers to his older brothers who kept a prosperous news-stand "on the Hill." From that time until school-time he was helping sell the papers, often getting no breakfast. He was really doing five hours' work before nine o'clock. The child insisted that he got sleep enough, as he went to bed at 6.30 every night. As his home was in a crowded tenement house and the weather was warm enough to necessitate open windows, the sleep he could possibly get was quite inadequate, espe- cially under the circumstances. The teacher withheld her signature and sent for the father. He corroborated the boy's statement, but protested, "My Myer has to work. I am a weak man." " How old are you? " asked the teacher. *'I am forty-two," he replied. "And don't you work at all, yourself?" she exclaimed in surprise. "Oh, no!" he answered; "I have my children to work for me." The teacher labored in vain to make him see or even admit that harm might come to the boy, by early rising, no breakfast or insuflScient sleep. "He's not sick," he declared; "he goes to bed at six o'clock." But she was still unconvinced. She sent for the Supervisor 208 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL of Licensed Minors and stated the case to him. He at once took the matter in hand, verified the facts, and soon con- vinced the ''weak" parent that he must take better care of the boy, or the court would take a hand and he would have to "pay money" besides losing all income from the boy. The oflBcer forbade the boy to work before 6 a.m., made the father promise to obey the rules, and the teacher signed the slip. The boy got proper food and sleep, his nervousness lessened, and his school work improved. Incidents like this led us to ask ourselves how far the for- eign children were really looked upon as economic assets by their parents. Were they used as sources of income at the earliest possible age, or were they kept in school as long as possible only being taken out for work when forced by necessity? We decided to find out by following up, during a definite period, as far as possible those children who had been taken out of school to go to work. We took for our data the school year 1911-12. Our school is specially adapted for such inquiry, as thirty- eight per cent of its seventeen hundred children are of Italian parentage, while sixty-two per cent is practically Jewish. The other nationalities are, therefore, negligible. We first made a tabulated list from the available school data of those children. We found there were eighty-one of them, all between the ages of fourteen and sixteen years. They formed only 4.7 per cent of the total enrollment of the school, being 7.8 per cent of the total number of Jewish pupils and 12.4 per cent of the entire number of Italians, indicating that more Italians in proportion leave than Jews, which we later found to be true. Of these eighty-one child workers, thirty-seven were of Jewish birth or parentage, while forty were Italian; only four belonging to other nationalities. Of the Jewish children only four were born in this country, while twenty-six were born in Russia. Ten Italians were American born, thirty were born in Italy or Sicily. Cards could not be found for twelve children, so their birthplaces could not be traced. SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 209 Thirty-seven of these children entered school in the "Un- graded" or non-English-speaking classes. Only twenty be- gan in the first grade and had the four full years of grade work before leaving; for the ungraded pupils must spend from three months to two years in learning the language before they can be transferred to the grades. Most of them then enter the third or fourth grades, a few exceptionally bright ones being sent to the fifth. They are always handi- capped by lack of knowledge of English, so that if they have to leave at fourteen years for work, they are very poorly equipped for life. The old law required that the child must reach the fourth grade before leaving, and the majority left either in the fifth or sixth grade, very few of the eighty-one reaching the higher classes. A moment's thought will convince any one how little "schooling " they had. No history, no grammar, no govern- ment, only elementary English, and only a glimpse at the countries of the world. What meager "content of mind" with which to meet lite! Next, we made out an exhaustive list of questions to be sent to the working children. This list we made as detailed as possible. The questions covered school, home, family, individual, and employment data, and were intended to show such facts as these: the age and grade on entering and leaving school; the number of years in school; the reasons given by the child for leaving; the ability of the parent to keep the child in school; the birthplace of the child; the number of years of the parent in America; whether both parents were living; the number of children in the family; the number already working; the total number of persons in the home; number of rooms in the tenement, the weekly rent and income of the family; the use of present wages of the child, etc. For the work data of the child himself we secured the name of the firm, the trade, the kind of work, the hours, wages, conditions, etc. The new labor law has so limited the hours and thus modified wages, however, that these are not quite the same as last year. The hours are shortened for the 210 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL younger ones and the older ones work overtime and are paid in proportion. All wages of minors are in process of adjust- ment to the new scale. On the old schedule the child's wages averaged $5.50 per week. The list of questions we revised and simplified again and again, even giving it to pupils of one of the school classes to be filled in at home, to be sure the questions were clear. It was interesting to find how very simply the questions must be worded. "Family income" meant nothing. "How much money does your father get a week?" brought part of the answer, and by asking for the weekly wage of each worker in the family and adding the items, we found the total "family wage." Then we sent the lists to the children who had gone to work; either by brothers and sisters still in school, or by carefully instructed pupils of the higher grades. We were often surprised at the intelligence and persistence shown by the youthful investigators. "I sat right down beside her and asked her the questions, and filled it out myself" reported one girl. "Only her mother was in and she was afraid to answer" was the report from an Italian family. That hinted of the old country, fear of taxes or persecution. "But I'll go again to-night when she's in herself," said the child. And a second visit brought the desired replies. Again, "You know that boy you asked me to look up? Well, he's a crook and he's just been sent over," was one report given in a disgusted tone. A hopeless, sad case; for the mother told us only last week with tears in her eyes that "my other boy, he gets in bad company and is away again. His father has n't any work, and my girl she got a feller and only earns $5, and when a girl wants to get married, I can't take her money." The child workers themselves took a lively interest in filling out the lists fully and correctly, and often sent us in additional bits of information. As, "I caught my hand in a candy machine and was laid off for two weeks. But S 's paid me my wages," S 's being a favorite place of em- ployment on account of the good wages, fair treatment, bene- fit clubs, and medical attendance the girls receive. Or, "You tell Miss A. my mother is in Russia, and I am working to SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 211 have hercome over." Again, "I'll come up myself some noon and see her." And very often, "I do wish I could have stayed in school to graduate"; the simple exercises and blue- ribboned diploma given at the completion of the eighth year being a much appreciated goal. Of our eighty-one children some had moved away; others, chiefly Italian girls, had stayed at home to help in the house- work. One proudly reported, "I don't have to answer any questions, I'm engaged." Quite a sufiScient reason, our prin- cipal thought. A number of the boys were working with their fathers on teams, in tailoring places, or in barber shops. Some returned incomplete lists. But we were able to get twenty-five exhaustive lists answering all of the questions sent out. As these represented both Jewish and Italian boys and girls, we felt that we had sufficient data on which to base our conclusions. Then we proceeded to arrange our tables and work out our averages, which brought out some very interesting facts and comparisons. Table I. Ages and grades From this table we found that nineteen of the children were foreign-born, only six having been bom here. The Jewish children averaged eleven years on entering school, which, as they left at fifteen years, gave them four years of school. The greater number of Italians entered at nine years, but left a little earlier, giving them about six years in school. But while the majority of both entered the un- graded classes, the Jewish children got ahead faster, more of them staying in school until the higher grades. Table II. Family card From this we found that the majority of the parents were living — only three fathers and two mothers being dead. More of the Jewish parents could speak English than the Italian; almost none of the Italian mothers speaking any- thing but their mother-tongue, even after living here several 212 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL years. They depend on the children to deal with the Ameri- can world for them. Only three fathers were not at work. Two mothers were at work, these being in families where the fathers had died. Tdbk III. Incomes To decide on the necessity for putting the child to work, it was necessary to find out how many persons were being supported on each "family wage," and how many persons in each family were already contributing to that sum. We found that the average number of children in a family was six, which, with the two parents, made eight persons to be sheltered, warmed, fed, clothed, and amused from the family purse. There was an average of two other children aheady at work, making three persons already contributing to this sum. A study of living conditions showed that the number of rooms in each tenement averaged 4.8 for the Jewish families, and 3.8 for the Italians. As the number of persons was eight to a family, this made two persons to a room, including the kitchen. The average weekly rent paid by the Jewish fam- ilies was $4, while the Italians paid slightly less than $3.50 for fewer rooms. There was a marked difference in the location and condi- tions of the tenements occupied by the two races. The Italians crowded into as small space as possible and made no attempt to live in American fashion. The typical Italian tenement consisted of a combined kitchen, dining-room, and parlor at the front, with the sink between the two windows, — for the economy of the landlord and the convenience of the plumber, and one, two, or three semi-lighted or dark bedrooms opening out of this one room, — all for a family of eight. The Jewish families, however, tried to have a parlor for company and holidays — even if it must serve as a bedroom at night. One poor but cojirteous soul apologized for her empty front room by explaining that her daughter had just SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 213 been married, and as they had no money for her dowry they had given her the parlor furniture. Further study of Table III showed that the average weekly family wage of the Jewish family was $22.46, making the individual averages (eight to a family) $2.83. The Italian wage was but $16.33 and the individual income only $1.97, less than the $2 considered possible to live on by social work- ers. The total average was $19.29 and the average per person only $2.40. This must cover the five economic "must haves" — rent, food, heat, light, and clothing, not to include amuse- ments. Table IV. Reasons for leaving Referring to Table IV we find that ten of the Jewish chil- dren said that they were obliged to leave, while only four claimed they were not. Even these felt that they needed more than their parents could give them. Only three wished to leave. Of the Italian children nine were obliged to help the family; only three were not. One girl was "too old to stay in school." Thus the most of them left school not voluntarily, but because they felt the pressure of necessity. The majority of the parents were wilUng to have kept the children in school, but felt that they needed their help. Who is to determine the necessity, — the child, the parent, the school, the business world? Under the new law several thousand must receive further instruction or return to day school. The firms will no longer employ fourteen-year- olders. Can the parents keep the child in school? Before answering, let us study local conditions. The school is in the very heart of the most congested district in New England. Rents for the better class average quite as high if not higher than elsewhere in the city or suburbs. Children often tell us, "We are moving to Roxbury to get more rooms and not pay so much rent." Where in the West End they pay $20 to $25 for five small, ill-Ughted, stuffy rooms, in other sections they can get a fiat of six bright, sunny rooms for the same money. Quite a consideration in a rapidly growing family from a moral as well as a physical point of view. 214 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL Living is expensive, too. The average weekly cost of food for a family is $9.75 ; coal sells at from $8 to $9 a ton, — the latter price if bought by the bags at 45 cents and two bags a week used. Staples are no cheaper here than anywhere else. Flour is 80 cents a bag; butter, 40 cents a pound; milk, 9 cents a quart; potatoes, 25 cents a peck; and the much dis- cussed eggs sell at from 35 to 60 cents a dozen. These prices are the current ones given by a class still in school and are sent in by the mothers. Light averages $3.15 a month. Clothing varies — one week considerable is bought, others very little. One mother gave 25 cents a month as being her average. This clothing item has some interesting phases. When the children are small, the Jewish or Italian mother buys their little dresses, coats, shoes, and even hats (for Sunday — they are never worn on week-days) in the base- ment or one-room stores of the neighborhood. She gesticu- lates and haggles to her heart's content and often secures great bargains. Even the children are great shoppers and reply to the sewing teacher's query, "Why were you gone so long?" with "He wanted 4 cents a yard for that lace and I went over to N.'s, where I knew I could get it for 3 cents." Many mothers never shop farther uptown than Bowdoin Square and a shopping trip to "H 's" is an event. "I must go uptown with my mother this afternoon" is an indis- putable excuse for absence. But as the children get old enough to go shopping alone, the attractions of the big stores soon lead them from the West End. We begin to see signs of budding vanity, — a bead chain from the "fi-ten," a plaid hair-ribbon bought in J.'s basement store, a tight skirt worn in spite of discomfort "because it becomes me," or perhaps on Monday even a white collar and gay tie worn over from Sunday. One small girl, so poor that she has but one black sateen dress, proudly displays a wrist-purse of brown leather, and another also poverty poor rejoices in a gay pink hair-ribbon which quite conceals her wispy hair. This love for pretty things crops out early in our little aliens and should be legitimately gratified. We of more sober ancestry cannot half appreciate this longing for glitter- SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 215 ing gold and bright raiment. But it must be provided for or it will lead into temptation before many years. The yoimger children in the family must be considered. Often the child leaves because "there's five younger than me and my father says he can't support me any longer." How fast the Uttle tots outgrow dresses and how often they have to have new shoes 1 "My father has to buy one of ua new shoes every week" is a frequent wail. And such cheap shoes as they are — no wonder they wear out so quickly. The children dearly love the little black-eyed, curly-haired tots, and are anxious to work "to help buy my baby clothes." Many and many a boy or girl not yet out of the 'teens is regularly helping to support the yoimger ones, either by giving their wages to the mother for the family fund or by using them in a definite way. In one case two of our old boys are sending themselves through Art School and at the same time clothing three little sisters, and doing it well, too, — by tending a news-stand in a hotel. Then the pleasures of life! The music lessons, clubs, dances, theaters, all so fascinating to our children of South- ern blood! And the "movies," nothing has ever so bewitched them! One sweet-faced, blue-eyed lad actually "fit the cop," to quote his own words, who refused him admittance after 6 P.M. Our school district and adjacent streets are dotted with them in all the allurements of their lights and music. And for better or for worse they are here to stay. And it is our business as lovers of children to see that they are "for better." Many of the films are unobjectionable and a large number are educational. The children are keener critics than we. The boys scoff at too sentimental love-scenes, — "they're too silly"; and the girls "don't like the shooting." But many a geography or history lesson is verified by an enthusiastic description of a "snake dance" or an "Indian fight" or a "canal view" seen that week at a favorite "Star" or "Beacon." We may wish the conditions surrounding these places of amusement were different, but the child sees only the joy and action, and goes every time he gets hold of a stray nickel. 216 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL And how to gratify the higher ambitions I All praise and gratitude for the opportunities offered by our settlements for music and dancing lessons, for clubs and sewing classes and gymnasiums. But the teaching given there can be but ele- mentary. And that boy whose skillful touch is drawing such exquisite strains from his beloved violin as we enter the school hall must earn the money for his own lessons. What can be done for the hand-minded.? Our elementary schools as yet furnish no answer to this girl's plea, "But, Miss A., I don't want to go into a candy factory, I love to make hats." So she leaves to learn her trade in a basement millinery shop, from whence she soon turns out stylish and even artistic hats. Can the family wage supply all these needs.' The family incomes average about $20. Of this $3.50 goes for rent, $10 for food, $1 for heat, 75 cents for light, leaving about $5 for clothing, insurance, house replenishing, and pleasures for eight people. If the father's wage cannot cover all these things, the child must leave school and contribute his $4 or $5 weekly, which will help to secure them for himself. For this cannot all be done on $2 a week, — $2.75 or $3 a week is all too meager as shown by the actual figures, taken, not from dry reports or hearsay, but from the weekly data given by the mothers themselves, and set down fresh from their facts. What is the remedy? Many suggestions are offered: cooperative stores, special discounts, mothers' pensions, continuation schools, etc.; but the one vital thing which will enable the children to remain in school is to give the father a living individual wage suflScient to support and educate the children he has given to the nation, that they may become "Little Citizens" in fact as well as name. Ill SPECIMENS OF VOCATIONAL TALKS GIVEN BY EXPERTS AT MEETINGS OF THE VOCATIONAL COUNSELORS OF BOSTON The Educational Side of the Shoe Industry The educational side of the shoe industry might be classi- fied under four heads: — 1. The first would be the preparation of the expert in the shoe industry, — that is, the man who knows shoes thor- oughly, as well as the anatomy of the human foot. 2. The second class would include the training of the superintendent and foreman to take charge of our large shoe factories. 3. The third group would include the salesman and the expert on the seUing end of the enterprise. 4. And the fourth type of school would be the kind that gives a general education to the boy or girl who goes to work in the shoe factory as an ordinary operator. Now I will pass over briefly those four classes. Of the first type of school there are at least one or two in this country and a great many across the water. If you should go to London, Berlin, Amsterdam, Cologne, and all the great German cities, you would find large buildings devoted to the study of leather products. Those schools pre- pare the expert in the same way as the Institute of Tech- nology prepares the chemist to go out and do the analytical work of our large industries. Of the second type, which prepares the foreman and super- intendents, there are a number of private schools situated in Brockton, Lynn, and some other large shoe centers that make a specialty of training operators in the different lines of work done in the shoe factories. Now, I want to go over briefly to-day the ways in which 218 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL the ordinary shoe-worker becomes a superintendent and foreman when he does not get this preparation in the school. In the large country districts of Massachusetts and New Hampshire and Maiae we will find isolated shoe factories manufacturing third-rate shoes. These factories draw upon the country help for their labor. They take the girls, for instance, and break them in on the stitching-machines. They take the boys and men and break them in on the differ- ent lines of machinery that they use in the factories. When a man has been in the factory some six months he migrates to some other shoe center, usually Lynn or Brockton. Usu- ally no one can join the union who has not had six months' experience of this kind. As the result of his experience in the third-rate factories he goes into the labor unions and he is taken into the different departments devoted to the trade. He then goes out looking for a position, with his union card, and he gets into some high-class shoe factory and tells the foreman that he is an experienced laster on first-class shoes. He goes to work and he spoils a great many shoes. Then the foreman comes up to him and tells him that he will not do and dismisses him. As a result of that experience he goes to still another shoe factory iu the same town, or in an adjoin- ing town, and applies for a position again. He may work a few days in the new factory when he gets dismissed once more. This may go on for two or three weeks. Finally he gets into an establishment where he meets some kind friend who is able and willing to help him along, and in this way he secures the training necessary to be a first-class laster. That is what is called "stealing a trade," and it is what a first- class worker always has to go through. Now, the question arises, What can the schools do to help the superintendent and foreman? I feel that in every large shoe center there should be evening courses for men working in the shops, to supplement their day experience, to give them the knowledge that they obtain so laboriously in the industry itself. For example, a man is working in the lasting department. He wants to know something about the organization of the shoe department, or the cutting department, or the finishing SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 219 department. You know we begin to work at the stroke of the gong in a large industry like this, and it is impossible for a man who works in one department to go into the one that follows and try to get some idea of the general organization of the whole plant. No, he must go to his machine and stay there till the bell rings to go home. In this way he loses the knowledge that was given to the boy who was taught under the old apprenticeship system. That is the universal experience, and, as I said, an evening school in some one of our educational centers devoted, for example, to a course of lectures on the boot and shoe indus- try, would give this man practical experience to supplement what he already knows, and thus he would have a knowledge outside his own immediate department. Now, the class that I want to lay particular stress upon is the average worker. The average boy is the boy who does n't care much about school. Nevertheless, that boy when he comes to man's estate must get an existence, and he is very probably the boy who will later work in the shoe factory. The question arises. What can you do for this boy? I feel that every boy who lives in a shoe center ought to know something about the shoe industry. It ought to be a part of his mental training course. He should know how to cobble shoes. I have in mind at the present time a teacher in one of the grammar schools in Lowell who devotes four hours a week to cobbhng. Every boy in the school brings his shoes, and that teacher does all the cobbling in that neighborhood. You go into a shoe factory to-day and you will see a man taking a large strip of leather and putting it in at one end of a machine and taking it out at the other. If John had re- ceived in the grammar school a course in manual training, in cobbling, in shoemaking, he would know just what the different steps are in the process of shoemaking. If John knows that it is necessary to condense the fiber of leather by beating it on the lapstone, then when he goes into the shoe factory that machine will mean something to him. Why? Because he will make a comparison between his previous experience and what he is learning now. That is the only way the shoe industry can be made educational to-day. 220 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL It is the same way with cutting and stitching. If a girl goes into a shoe factory to-day and works on a stitching- machine, all she does is to feed the machine. She knows nothing about the different kinds of leather, the different processes in the manufacture of the shoe. A boy should be taught something of the anatomy of the foot. He ought to know that our feet are a mass of a great many small bones, and he ought to know that if those bones are crowded the foot will be deformed. A course of two hours a week, from the seventh to the ninth grade in the grammar school, in cobbling and shoemaking, would facili- tate matters greatly. Have the children tell something about the different hides, the best part of the hide, something about the belly of the hide, what kind of leather wiU make the best soles, the best heels, etc. A course like that would develop in the boy an industrial intelligence, and when he goes to work on the machine he will not become a part of the ma- chine; he will know what he is doing, he will know the object of every pull, of every twist, of every movement of that machine*^ As it stands to-day, the shoe industry is not edu- rcational. The boy at the machine to-day does no thinking, develops no initiative, has stimulated in him no ambition. At the age of eighteen or twenty he knows even less about the shoe industry than when he left school. He is absolutely ignorant and cannot use his head. Lunch-Room and Restaxjeant Work fob Young Women Next to teaching, the most valuable piece of work that can be done in the community to-day is to offer wholesome, hearty, well-prepared, palatable food to the average man and woman, at such a price as he or she can afford to pay. I believe, in spite of the fact that it is precisely this thing I am personally trying to do, that I can get a point of view which enables me to see things in a way that justifies me in drawing this conclusion, and in believing that it is really unbiased. Now, assuming that this is so, I think you can see at once SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 221 why this opportunity to come before the men and women of the Boston pubhc schools who are peculiarly interested in vocational guidance seems to us a rather big one. I can see, as the future results accruing from this little conference to-day, an increased force of trained workers who, in time, will make it possible for us to realize the ideal which we are some of us already beginning to see. I believe that it is the entrance of women into this line of work in the last fifteen or twenty years which has made possible this feeling on the part of a good many of us who are in the work. Now this afternoon I want to make three points: — 1. In the first place, I want to speak of the permanency of the field. I am going to try to prove to you that it is perma- nently established, and that it offers employment to an increasingly large number of persons, under conditions which can be made healthful and pleasant, at a wage which com- pares favorably with the returns from many of the other trades. 2. Secondly, we find that more and more there is coming to be expected, in those who take up this work, some degree of technical knowledge and training, so that not only the food, but the manner of its serving, may be of the highest quality. 3. In the third place, a certain amount of business educa- tion to aid in the sale of the product is desirable. In speaking of these three points it seems to me that it is logical to assume that the workers in this field must be more and more drawn from the intelligent, trained group in the community, and, as a corollary to that, that this field of restaurant and lunch-room work does recommend itself to the intelligence of the men and women who are interested in the training of young people. Now, in considering the question of the field itself, — that is, as to whether it is promising, as to whether it is fulfiilling a real need in the community, not only for to-day but for i to-morrow, — I think we need to stop for a moment and review the history of the lunch-room as it exists to-day. I think we might very logically ask, in the first place. Why have we these big lunch-rooms? Why is it necessary 222 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL for us to establish these big eating-places all over the city? Well, the history of the development of the commercial lunch-rooms is the history of the development of modern industry. In the old days when every man did his work in his own little shop, or in his neighbor's shop, every man was near enough to his kitchen to be able to go to it, the meal being prepared by the women in the home. But when the man had to leave the shop and come to the big factory to do his work it is perfectly obvious that some other method had to be provided. Of course the lunch-room and the caf6 were the solution. But, as larger and larger numbers of people came longer and longer distances from their homes, you can see at once that in this simple and natural way the need for the large and small lunch-rooms was met. There is no ques- tion but what the permanence of the field is well established, for the reason that there is no question but what our modern methods of business are going to hold for a long time yet. It is going to be a long time before we go back to any measur- able degree to the old situation. And so that means the con- tinued necessity for feeding the great laboring groups of the community. To-day in Boston there are twelve hundred licensed lunch- rooms, besides all the many common eating-houses, private clubs, and other institutions which are not required to be licensed. In the 1905 census in Massachusetts eight thousand women are given as the number earning their livelihood as waitresses. There are no figures as to how many other women, or how many men, are engaged in processes of lunch- room work. I have taken a group of six of the best lunch-rooms in Boston from which to get figures. In all six of these lunch- rooms, four of which are managed by women, there are about thirty thousand people fed every day, twenty thousand of whom are fed at noon. These lunch-rooms employ about eighteen hundred persons, fourteen hundred of whom are women. I said that four of these lunch-rooms are managed by women. Of those four two are college-trained persons. In all six lunch-rooms many women are employed in mana- gerial positions. These managerial positions, of course, have SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 223 an interest for any one who is considering possibilities for advancement. Salaries range from $900 to $1800 a year for women. I do not know about the men. For the cooks and kitchen workers — those who handle all the different proc- esses of preparing and serving the food — the average hours are fifty-four a week — about nine hours a day. For the waitresses it is about fifty hours per week. For cooks the average wage is from $10 to $16 a week, with two meals a day, and the average working week is about six days. Some of this is evening work, up to eight o'clock, when supper is served. In the kitchen group of assistance the average wage is $6 to $9 a week, beginning usually at $6 in the less skilled part of the work, and advancing to about $9 a week, with two meals. Beginning at $6, most of the lunch-rooms have a scale of wages depending somewhat on tenure of office. As to conditions of work in the lunch-rooms, I think, in all justice to the subject, we ought to say that in these six lunch- rooms of which I am speaking, together with perhaps a lot more in the city of which I have not as intimate a knowledge, the conditions are good. I think the scale of wages, the length of the working hours, and the character of the place in which the work is performed are all probably the best that you would find. Those of us women who are in the trade realize more and more fully that, with the exception of the lunch- rooms of which I have spoken, and possibly a few others, unsatisfactory conditions prevail. I want to contend this afternoon that those conditions can and must be changed, and that they will be just in so far as the more intelligent type of worker is introduced into the field. Long hours, insufficient wages, lack of kitchen space, all improper conditions are absolutely unnecessary from the business point of view. It will come, then, in time, to be reaUzed that to have uncomfortable, unhealthy conditions is the most extravagant course to pursue; as also to have unskilled workers. Those conditions are already changing. Competition itself is eradicating them. As more and more people go into the field, it becomes more and more necessary that those of us in the field should produce an article better 224 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL than the other man's. Then the greater education, the greater knowledge on the part of the average patron as to the science of food itself, is making a very real demand upon us and is helping very much to push things along in that direction. Now, there is one disadvantage in lunch-room work at the present time, a disadvantage from the point of view of some people, which is n't necessarily a disadvantage at all. That is the situation which we find in the "short day." "Short- time" work is the name we give to the trade of the worker who comes in to work only four hours at noon, when, of course, the greater bulk of the work has to be done. It was pointed out to me the other day that really we are filling a need in the community by providing the opportunity for "short-time" work for women. Many women whose families are working away from home have that period at noontime free. There is one thing, however, which it seems to me really ought to be eliminated, and that is what we call the "broken day." In many places meals are served from seven to seven, with a rest in between in the afternoon. From my point of view this should be done away as far as possible. I bring that point in here because the solution of that problem has to do with the question of training before the worker comes to the lunch-room at all. At present, in our lunch-room, we could take two of our waitresses and give them a full working day if they were able to sew and darn; for we have the care of a considerable amount of linen. In our group of twenty waitresses we have not one who is qualified for this work. The highest paid position is that of the cook, and I have found it one of the most difficult things to get waitresses who can do things in the kitchen which need to be done. I think this is because of a certain attitude of mind which prompts many young women to undervalue the importance and the dignity of such work, and I believe very, very firmly, that, under present conditions at least, the solution of that prob- lem must come through the teaching which the girls receive in the schools. They must have a change of heart toward the work which is behind the scenes. In most instances un- satisfactory service can be laid very largely to the fact that SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 225 we find ourselves unable to get the kind of trained intelli- gence absolutely essential in the handling of the food which is put before the customer. The Opportunity ov the High-School Student in Lunch-Room and Restaurant Work I want to speak to you to-day particularly of the oppor- tunity which exists for the high-school student in lunch- room work. A year ago I should have said that she had no opportunity therein. I should not have considered for a moment being troubled with a girl who was as young and inexperienced as the average high-school girl is. But early in the summer the manager of one of the lunch-rooms in the city came to me and said she had a girl who had been under- going a year's experience in her own little lunch-room, and would we give her a chance in ours? We thought it over and decided that we would do so. So she came to us. Before she came we wondered what kind of Work she could do. We started her in on eight hours a day, giving her light work, but such as required care. She began looking over meat. It is most diflScult to get for this work the trained worker. We have in our kitchen a large amount of ground meat which has to be looked over. Perhaps it never occurs to you, when you are eating your croquettes, that the meat of which they are made has to undergo a very close inspection to rid it of bone and gristle. It takes an hour and a half to do that kind of work. We gave her the inspection of the meat and found she did it carefully and well. We really felt a decided ray of hope that the schools of Boston were beginning to train the girls to do things carefully, and that in the future we should have their cooperation in preparing girls to take infinite pains. We had one girl who started as a "checker." All the food that is served on trays has to be checked, as you know. She had some bookkeeping knowledge, so we gave her a trial as a bookkeeper, in which she did exceedingly well. When we were reorganizing our bakery and putting it on a scientific basis, we took her and made her bakery superintendent, and 226 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL in this work she has done very well, indeed. She has in five years gone from $3.75 a week to a position where she is now getting $15 a week on a seven-hour day. We have in our employ ten high-school girls, five of whom are doing "short-tune" work. Mrs. Moran has called your attention to the fact that a certain number of girls really wish to have employment for a short number of hours each day. I found that out of five of these, three had been with us five years and the other two, two and three years. So you can see it is not simply a drifting work, but something that has met a real need. There are five other girls who are high-school graduates on "short-time" work, getting from $8 to $15 a week, with two meals. And we consider that they are going to be in time very efficient and valuable workers. The three qualities which I consider most essential in this kind of work are: First, that the girl should be able to take a great deal of care; secondly, that she should be ambitious to attain a certain standard of excellence in the work; and, thirdly, that she should be able to secure good team play. We are fortunate in our place in having a large kitchen in which to work, yet even then you can guess the amount of friction that inevitably occurs where so many work together. The girl who aspires to a managerial position must be able to secure this good team play, be able to work well with other people. I have had quite a good deal of experience with girls, and I feel that they would all have been of very much more value to us if they could have had practical experience like this before taking up the regular college work. I think this whole business of feeding people has been too much looked down upon by every one. It rests to a great extent with the teachers to correct this idea. I think there is an artistic sense involved in getting up a well-balanced bill of fare, and it seems to me that we have the right to expect that one of the most valuable results incident to women going into industry as they have in the last few years will be the bettering of conditions, and I wish that you teachers, in talking with your girls, would emphasize the fact that theirs is a great opportunity in shaping these conditions. If condi- SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 237 tions are poor in certain restaurants and lunch-rooms, people must get to work to change them. Competition alone will do a great deal in accomplishing that thing. Questions and Answers Q. Is there any chance for a woman, after she has reached middle age, to remain in this work? A. I do not think that I can answer that question authori- tatively. I know that a good many women who have reached middle age are holding their positions in this work. It is a matter of regret that the tenure of office of some of our waitresses has been fully twelve years. The strain of such work is considerable, and one of the essentials of such work is that you should be very quick and clear-headed. It would seem that after such a time the waitress should have ad- vanced to different and better positions. Q. Are those two meals that the waitresses get as good as what the patrons receive? A. In answering that question, I must again speak from my limited experience. Our waitresses have what is called a "restricted" menu; that is, they have the same things to eat that the guests secure except that they do not get the more expensive dishes, such as chicken. I understand that it is the custom in some summer hotels to give employees what is left when the guests get through. Q. Could not something be done to help waitresses get better food.'' A. I think there is always a way to do the thing that ought to be done. We should, of course, have to establish the fact, first, that conditions need to be changed. Q. What are the chances for a girl to start out for herself in lunch-room work? A. There is always an opportunity for a well-managed lunch-room, the only difficulty being that considerable cap- ital is required to start with. Still, unless it is done in a rather large way, it is not apt to be profitable. Q. Would you advise a girl to go into hotel work as a waitress? 228 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL A. I should not. The city hotels are not well managed, and that is because they lack proper supervision. ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING I shall speak to-day merely of the average boy or girl. I shall not refer to the genius except to say at the very out- set that the ordinary laws do not govern his actions. There- fore what I shall have to offer will be what seem to me the possibilities in the field of electrical engineering for the aver- age boy or girl, and I must say right here, at the beginning, that, from my point of view, there is a comparatively Umited field for the girl in electrical engineering lines, though I ought to add that one of the best men in the engineering precession in the Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company is a woman. Of course that is a very rare exception, yet I hope I shall be able to show that in certain branches of engineering there is ample opportunity and good prospects for successful and profitable work for women. Electrical engineering reaches modern industrial condi- tions so intimately and at so many points that it seems to me that those characteristics which tend to successful accom- plishment in electrical engineering are very little different from those which tend to successful accomphshment in almost any branch of professional activity. Electrical engineering touches the fields of intercommuni- cation in the telegraph and telephone, embraces mining, the use of electric lines, transportation on the electric street railways and the interurban railway, which latter promises enormous growth in the near future, and also the field of illuminating engineering. In this last branch I believe women may well play an important part. The electric signals for all branches of the railway service may also properly come within the field of the electrical engineer. Now, if we consider any one branch of the electrical engineering profession, we find that in general it may be divided into distinct groups of effort, involving either the sales side, the pure engineering side, the manufacturing side, the financial side, or the accounting side. SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 229 So far as relative remuneration is concerned along these various lines, I think there is no question but that from the standpoint of the average boy the commercial or sales side offers the greatest opportunity by far. And by saying that I think it offers the greatest opportunity I mean this: that the boy of the average high-school training, with the average keenness, the average enthusiasm and interest in whatever work he may undertake, is likely, without a specialized knowledge, to make a greater advance in the sales depart- ment than he is in the purely engineering department, in the accounting department, or the financial department. I be- lieve that the average boy is apt to succeed better in the sales department than he is in the department of manufacturing. There are opportunities in the department of manufacturing for a few — not a large number — ■ but for a few leading, high-priced men. On the other hand, there are opportunities in the sales department for a considerable number of leading, high-priced men, and it is for that reason that, so far as my own ejcperience goes, I believe it is wise to direct the average keen, alert boy to the possibilities in the commercial line rather than in the purely engineering line. It is not at all a difficult thing for one good engineer to keep a thousand aver- age workmen well occupied. It is, however, becoming more and more important in the engineering profession that goods, after being produced, should be sold. And it takes, I think, a different order of ability to present to a possible customer the advantages of a particular line of product from that required to design or operate electrical machinery. I should, therefore, if I were deaUng with the student of the average high-school age, feel strongly inclined to direct his attention to the sales rather than to any other one of the special depart- ments in the engineering profession. Now, what are the characteristics which are important in the average boy for him to make a success along electrical engineering lines. I dislike to say along electrical engineering lines because I believe that those elements which contribute most markedly to the success of a young man entering the profession of engineering are not very different, whatever branch he may choose to enter. I do not think it is very 230 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL different in civil engineering from what it is in electrical engineering, not very different in mining from what it is in mechanical engineering. Pretty much the same general characteristics count for success in all of these lines of work. I shall, of course, assume that any boy who goes into engi- neering has a high regard for truth, because engineering in its very essence is the securing of the truth and the applica- tion of that truth to the advancement of the interests of mankind. I should imagine, therefore, that we may accept it as fundamental that any boy who enters the engineering profession shall be honest. If he is, however, to enter the profession it is absolutely essential that, whatever else he may be, he should be mentally alert. For no man who is at all sluggish in his temperament will make a success in the highest sense of the term in the engineering profession. So many opportunities arise calling for quick judgment. I do not say that the slow but sure boy will not make a certain success, but he will not make the success, other things being equal, that the mentally alert boy will make. So I regard this quality as one of the chief assets of a boy who is to enter that profession. It is not only in the sales department that this is true; it is markedly true in the operation depart- ment, and those of us who know of this side of the work know that there are many emergencies which arise calling tor instant action, preceded by unerring judgment. I believe that for the boy who is going into engineering mental arithmetic is one of the best things which can be studied. If I were to choose between partial payments and a good sound knowledge of mental arithmetic, I should not hesitate one instant to leave out the partial payments and put in the mental arithmetic. For mental alertness is brought about by mental arithmetic more than by any other study, to my mind. And while I am speaking of those things which conduce to the ability of the teacher to judge of the character of the boy, I would urge that there be in the high schools a greater realization of the importance of bringing the boy in contact with some of the real things which are taking place along engineering lines. There is no reason why the schoolboy of SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 231 seventeen or eighteen should not be brought into contact with a real power station, for instance, rather than be simply hearing about it. There is no reason why he should not be brought into contact with a real telephone exchange. And I believe that the teacher will get a very clear idea as to whether that boy has any sense of perspective or not from the character of the questions he asks or the descriptions he gives of this visit. It seems to me that in much of this dis- cussion of the possibiUty of picking for a boy the particular vocation in which he is likely to be successful there has been altogether too much analysis of the individual and too little bringing him in contact with the actual operations. Boys thinking of entering the electrical profession must of necessity be good observers; they must analyze the situa- tion; they must think. And thinking is not a commodity to-day among students so absolutely in excess of the demand that we may pass it by without some careful consideration. They must observe, I say, they must analyze, they must think, and there is no reason why a boy who has had the average high-school training and comes up to this standard should not succeed in some particular Une of engineering work without further training. It is possible for men with only a grammar-school training to rise to positions of real distinction. I have known of those who did so. One minor point which I might speak of here is the im- portance to students who think of entering the work of engineering of keeping some form of systematic data. I believe that there is no reason whatever why a young man of sixteen or seventeen should not begin to collect such data, an examination of which by the teacher will show the trend of that boy's mind. I have inquired of many high-school teachers and masters of high schools as to whether any sys- tematic card cataloguing was done along this line, and I find that it is by no means general, and in fact rare. But if we are to judge whether a boy's qualities are such as to make it probable that he will be successful in engineering work, it seems to me that we can get the tendency of his mentality, the tendency of his interest, by having him collect for himself such data as I have spoken of. I do not believe, however. 232 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL that our most promising material comes from the boys who as children were always rigging up batteries from old tomato cans ; but I do believe that it comes from the boys who show a certain interest in these things, and I think such interest should be encouraged. A boy who is going into engineering or any other kind of work must realize the importance of loyalty and mutual helpfulness. There are too many boys who go out into work with the idea that the great thing is to look out for No. 1 ; that their advancement depends upon what they do for themselves; and they do not realize that in the organization of which they form a small part those that are responsible are very keen to observe whether a boy is loyal to his employer and whether he is mutually helpful to his fellow- employees. My feeling, then, is, briefly, that we must accept as funda- mental for any boy who is going into engineering work, that he should be honest, that he should be mentally alert, that he should show in some way that he is able even at the age of fifteen or sixteen to discriminate between the trivial and the important. Though not absolutely essential, it is de- sirable that he should have a high-school training. And he should have an appreciation of the importance of mutual helpfulness. I do not think that it is absolutely necessary that a boy should be trained in the higher mathematics, though it is important that he should have some power of imagination. Imagination is a very important asset for the engineer, but that he should show' some power of analysis also seems to me absolutely essential. The importance of the personal ele- ment cannot be too strongly dwelt upon, especially in the sales department. It is very important for any man who is selling his product to know sufficient of its engineering rela- tions to be able to put explicitly and briefly and tactfully before his possible customer its best points, and to size up the situation so that he shall know when he has gone far enough. I believe that more sales are lost from the attempt to be a little old man and thus bore the prospective customer into buying for the sake of getting rid of a nuisance. SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 233 Just a word in regard to illuminating engineering. Illu- minating engineering is a distinct branch of the electrical engineering profession, and this is a field into which I believe a girl may very well enter. It does not require that a person shall be highly trained in mathematics, in language, or in literature. It does require that he should have a good knowl- edge of physics and sesthetics, for he should possess good taste. It seems, therefore, that it is preeminently a field for women. I think the aesthetic sense of womankind is certainly, so far as my experience goes, somewhat superior to that of mankind, and therefore, since illuminating engineering is in its infancy a young girl of sixteen or seventeen or eighteen — a girl just developing into womanhood — might do very much worse in my judgment than study the subject of illum- inating engineering, with the idea of making it a profession. It is very much like sanitary engineering in that regard. There is more demand than supply. Now, as to what remuneration may be expected for the average boy who is entering one of the larger manufacturing companies to secure needed experience before taking a posi- tion of greater or less independence, I can only say that the wage which the average boy may expect upon leaving the high school will not be greater at the start than eight or nine dollars a week. I have known many college men to begin at nine dollars per week. The boy has got to make his own place. Some boys will go ahead faster than others, of course. As to what a boy may rise to in the sales line, there is no reason whatsoever why he should not r^idly rise to $2000 or $2500 a year, and there is no reason why a boy of marked ability should not go some thousands beyond that. The sales engineer is a very well-paid man. I don't say that all sales engineers get $4000 or $5000 a year, any more than all teachers get that. But there is no reason why he cannot rapidly rise to at least $2000. In the purely engineering department I think progress is slower. I cannot say much about the financial department. In the work of the illumin- ating engineer there is every reason to believe that the best opportunity is along consulting lines, and any one of us who has done that work knows that it is extremely profitable. 234 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL On the accounting side I believe that the returns are not very different from those of the average bookkeeper. And you know what those are. They are small. If you ask, Is not the profession of engineer crowded.'' I say, yes it is. And why should n't it he? It is an attractive field. There are many opportunities — and the opportuni- ties exist for the boy or girl without a college training, not to the same degree, perhaps, as for the boy or girl with col- lege training, but certainly to a hopeful degree. We hear it said that for college men there is more and more demand. Of course, after the high-school graduate gets his job, the question of success depends upon himself, but I believe that any teacher who looks at the thing from the standpoint of general mental ability, loyalty, mutual helpfulness, keenness in analysis, ability to distinguish between the essential and the trivial, I can say that such a boy's chances for advance- ment are very hopeful. THE BUILDING TRADES The question you are interested in, I take it, is the infor- mation necessary in order to advise a particular boy intelli- gently in the matter of taking up the building trades. There are only a limited number of things that any boy can do. He can go into the mechanical industry, or he can go into commerce or transportation, or some of the professions^ The first question for him to decide is. Which of these am I best fitted for? If he has mechanical ability to any degree at all this fact is true, — that he has practically as good an opportunity either in some sort of mechanical industry or in the building trades as in any other one of the fields that I could mention. The building trades have been growing and developing with surprising rapidity for the last decade or two, and there is every indication that they are going to in the future. So it is wise for the boy to consider seriously entering some kind of occupation where he will have the opportunity to use his mechanical ability. The next .question is. How shall we find out whether any particular boy has an aptitude for mechanical work or not? SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 235 Fortunately, this is a thing that is usually easy to determine. Almost any boy begias as a child to show a constructive ten- dency it he has mechanical ability. He likes to build things, to put things together. He likes to create things on a small scale, in his boyish way, in much the same manner that his father and his elders build things and construct things in a substantial and real way. Observe the boy in his boyhood and judge if he has natural structural ability. It is probably easier to determine this than to determine almost any other of his natural capacities. If he does show these indications it is wise to consider seriously his entering some line of mechanical work. Now the kind of mechanical work he shall do will depend very largely on how the boy is circumstanced. If he has the intellectual power, in addition to the mechanical gift, to go on with his school trainiag, and if he is so situated ia his home surroxmdings that it is possible for him to continue his training, the proper thing for that boy to do is to go on through the high school and into college or technical school and get a thorough engiaeering training, with the hope of en- tering into the important positions in mechanical industry. He may go into architecture, or mechanical engineering, or electrical engineering, or what not. Which one it will be he can determine later. The decision which he should make early is, whether he shall continue his school work into the high school, with the idea of getting a college training. Of course that will depend, in its turn, upon his own and his family's circumtances and upon his intellectual power. As a rule it is fairly easy to determine how far a boy who is going into mechanical work shall continue his school training, his preparation for industrial work. Just as soon as you know accurately his home conditions, his parents' means, and his own progress and attainment in his school work, you can judge pretty well whether this particular boy is likely to be able to stay in school until he is twenty-two or twenty-three or twenty-four years old. Granted that he has the opportu- nity to stay in school and get the thorough preparation, the chances are about ninety-nine out of a hundred that it is the wise thing for him to do. There may be exceptions, but 236 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL I think the chances are as great as ninety-nine out of a hundred that it is wise, because the mechanical industries and the building trades are getting each year more and more complicated. There are more and more kinds of material that are being used, more and more ways in which those ma- terials are put together. Therefore scientific knowledge and systematic methods are more and more essential. The boy cannot get too much training as a background for his work. Suppose, on the other hand, he is a boy who is forced to go to work when he is fourteen or sixteen years of age, and must get along as best he can under those conditions. If he is going into mechanical work I would again urge that one of the essential things for that boy to get in mind is the neces- sity of training for something more than just the muscles of his arm, the skill of his fingertips. He has got to train himself in mechanical intelligence. Fortunately, there are abundant opportunities in Boston for such a boy, who is obliged to go to work in the daytime, to get supplementary training in the evening schools in the particular line which is his choice. The boy starting in at sixteen years of age has compara- tively few opportunities for employment excepting as an apprentice and a helper of one sort or another. He does n't get a chance to commence to work with tools. His employer cannot trust him with them until he has had years of experi- ence in the kind of work that he is going to take up. So that it is all the more necessary for him to have somebody on the outside, apart from his employer, guiding him and directing him. Also, he has got to make his decision between two general types of mechanical work: He must choose between the building branch and the manufacturing branch. Each has its advantages, and each, perhaps, its drawbacks. In gen- eral, if he gets started in the manufacturing trades the chance of his finding continuous, settled employment for all the months of the year will be better than in the building trades. In the latter work continuous employment under one em- ployer is generally a difficult thing to secure. In the former work, there is more likelihood of his getting continuous employment. On the other hand, if he looks at the matter of SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 237 wages, the mechanic in the building trades as a rule receives a much higher rate of wage than the mechanic in the manu- facturing branch does, though in the long run the two oflFset one another. But, aside from the question of continuous employment and the rate of wages, there is one thing that I would ask you to remember particulariy and to point out to young men whom you have occasion to counsel, and that is, not so much the question of the immediate advantage of one type of work over another, as the ultimate goal to which one class of posi- tions or another class of positions may lead. I don't like the term position very well because it suggests something that is stationary. Instead I like to think of these lines of work as pathways that lead somewhere. It is true that some of them don't appear to lead to any definite future, and a good deal has been said and written on the subject of so-called "dead- end" positions; but my observation is that these are ex- tremely rare, for you come across very much more frequently a "dead-end" boy that has n't the ambition or has n't the vitality to climb than you come across a position which does n't ofifer opportunities to the boy who has the vision to see the future that is in front of him, and the perseverance to climb step by step. Because of the conditions which I spoke of a moment ago, namely the uncertainty of employment, as soon as a boy finishes a job on one building, the chances are that he has got to look for a new one on some other building. He finds his life almost of necessity a roving life, from job to job, from employer to employer. This condition requires an unusual degree of perseverance, an unusual degree of skill in finding new situations, in adjusting one's self to the uncertainty of business and the hurly-burly of the survival of the fittest. The slow, plodding, persevering boy, for that reason, is often, under such circumstances, left behind, where the same quaUty might be of great value to him in enabling him to rise slowly, step by step, in some kind of a position where he had the opportunity before him of working continuously, month in and month out, year in and year out, under the same employer, who could plan work for him in advance. 238 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL An accurate survey of the building trades in Boston to-day would show a very small percentage of American boys enter- ing the building trades. It would also find a rather surpris- ingly small percentage of skilled mechanics in the building trades who had learned their trades in this country. To a very large degree, though not exclusively, the building trades are recruited from men who have learned their trade in Europe and who have come over here at times of special stress and have stayed here because of the higher rate of wages. The statistics of our immigration show a very large number of persons entering into this country every year. Newspapers give us these figures, and we are surprised at the great multitude crossing the ocean, especially in the spring. As a rule comparatively little is said in the news- papers about the current going the other way; and as an actual fact, during the last three months, a very large per- centage of the number of people who crossed as immigrants last spring have been returning to their homes in Eiu'ope. It is this passing back and forth between Europe and America that suppUes the varying demand for mechanics in a good many of our building trades throughout the whole of the East and to some extent as far West as the Mississippi River. I have described in a general way the situation as I find it. In each one of the different branches of the trade there is a splendid opportunity not only to get good positions and a living at the start, but in each one of them there is a pathway that leads on and up, and the boy who has perseverance and ambition has a better opportunity even than skilled mechanics. THE PROFESSION OF THE ARCHITECT ... It is a satisfying profession. ... I have never re- gretted through fair or foul weather the decision that I then made to be an architect. ... I remember a further inquiry which I made, because it throws a side light on the profession. I was talking to two members of a firm, and I said, 'I sup- pose an architect has to have a certain skill in drawing." In SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 239 that case it took two of them to make an architect because one had no skill in drawing. Do not tell your pupils you don't need to know how to draw. I suppose you want to know what an architect is. Books say architecture is decorative construction. An architect, therefore, is a designer of decorative construction. I prefer to say a designer of appropriate construction. ... I mean the architect must have a sense of fitness, a sense of the requirements of his building so that he will design a construc- tion that meets those requirements, that could not equally well meet another set of requirements. He is helped in this by the architectural development of the age. ... A ques- tion that is often asked is, why should n't women be archi- tects? They are not naturally in close touch with building materials and those that make use of them. They can be architects, — some few are, — but they are much more nat- urally conversant with the materials of interior decoration, with textiles, with paper, and their keen color sense makes it easy for them to produce happy results. ... As an archi- tect not only thinks in terms of building materials, but studies the fitness of expression that must be achieved in his building, he knows more or less — generally less — of the historic architecture of all countries. He has, at least, an idea of former civilizations. He has a very definite idea of civili- zatiobs of to-day and their material and spiritual require- ments. It goes without saying that a building that would be suitable for a church in Germany would not be suitable for a church in northern California. In appealing to children I think you must not be too definite in your own minds as to the common figures regard- ing the profession. I don't know whether architecture is a profitable profession or not. I suppose people make a living by it or there would not still continue to be architects. I know the standard of attainment in the profession was never higher than it is to-day. . . . But I know it is not a profes- sion in which it is easy to work up from the ranks. ... I speak of this because if you have high-school pupils in your charge you may very well direct them toward tradesmanship. They may learn drafting . . . but it would n't constitute 340 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL training necessary for an architect. In the oflSces in England it is a common thing to find draftsmen who have taken up draftsmanship as a profession and never expect to get be- yond it. The Americans are more ambitious. Usually in an American ofiBce there will be young men who aspire to get experience which will enable them to open offices of their own, and that makes them from the outset interested in architecture as a whole rather than a form of building. . . . The draftsman who is chiefly a designer of decoration is not necessarily in sympathy with the materials in which his ideas will be worked out. There is ^ type of architectural draftsman whom you cannot drag away from the drawing- board. . . . So, as I was saying, there is a type content with the drawing-board, but not ambitious to design a building and see it built. No architect that I know of is ever satisfied with the second place in the competition to say nothing of the emoluments . . . although we know very well that not everything we draw is sure to be realized in material. As you probably know, when a boy goes into an office knowing very Uttle except what he has learned in school, he generally has to learn the alphabet. When we put him to calling people on the telephone we find he does n't know it,' and his greatest difficulty for the next few weeks is to study that — at least, that is the experience with those who come into my office. ... A boy gets $5 or $6 a week running errands, tending the telephone, and making tracings of full- sized drawings. Those are the principal duties of a boy in an architect's office. The tracings are his opportunity for his growth. A boy ought never to draw a line the meaning of which he does not understand, and if the office is well organ- ized, he will not be long in finding the meaning of the lines. . . . Prom the tracings he comes in time — sometimes a year or two — to making simple drawings from scale him- self. . . . When a boy can do what is called quarter-scale drawing, he may be worth $8 or $12 a week. ... In a few years more, especially if he makes use of his evenings, he will get so that a building of some importance can be worked out by him from the architect's sketches, with oversight. If he shows good taste and good judgment, he will gradually come SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 241 to be worth $18 or $20 a week. (I am speaking of Boston now.) . . . The boy who has found his work, who is inter- ested in design, who studies at night, or better still, in the afternoon in one of the technical schools, is fitting himself by learning what he is less likely to be able to learn in the office, that is the theory of design. . . . Design alone is not sufficient equipment. . . . The Boston Public Library . . . is an illustration of the right kind of building . . . and sig- nificant example as it is of the effective use of building material, I assure you that that building would look almost ordinary if executed in common brick. Q. What are the problems of a beginner who does not get into an office and tries to build up a practice? A. In this community I think it is pretty hard for an architect to get work unless he has acquaintances and friends. It is a small profession and most Boston architects would agree it is overcrowded. It is not the place to begin unless a man has excellent technical training and a good many friends. . . . TRAINED NURSING "Nursing is a most natural, useful, and fascinating occu- pation for women." Handicaps which deter many girls from entering the pro- fession: — •» Long hours. ra| Poor food. if. Short working life. Military discipline. Mothers, teachers, and pastors all fight against having a girl enter. They are trying to correct these handicaps and are suc- ceeding; one girl in a hundred regrets taking up the work, and there are great compensations for the disadvantages. They are also trying to direct the attention of a better class of girls to this vocation. 242 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL Qualifications necessary: — "All qualifications which would make a first-class teacher would make a first-class nurse." Warmth of disposition. Kindness of heart. Willingness to work with hands. Attractive appearance. Alert mind. A girl who likes to help her mother; loves to make people comfortable; never runs away from the sick and is kind to all suffering things makes the best nurse. Educational preparation: — Latin almost essential on account of medical terms. Good English absolutely necessary. Good spelling and writing. Anatomy and physiology. Courses in college or nursing preparatory course. Chemistry. Preparatory course given at Teachers' College, Columbia University, and at Simmons College. Advantages offered by hospitals: — Massachusetts General: eight-hour system; fifty-six hours a week. Good food and pleasant home life. Good opportuni- ties for graduates. A candidate may visit the school to inves- tigate and find out the curriculum. Nurses are cared for if ill. Could place all graduates, opportunities increasing daily. Salaries: — Private nurses: $25 a week with living expenses. Equiva- lent to institutional position at $600 a year. In institutions, $40 to $75 a month, or experience may bring as much as $150. Superintendent of training-school, $125 to $150 a month. Head nurses, $40 (about). School, district, and social welfare nurses, $40 to $65. In Philadelphia, $1800 a year. Regular vacations, and opportunities to rest at night. Not all work easy, but all interesting. SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 243 Graduates in 1910 and 1911: — 20 in institutions. 10 in private work. 3 anaesthetists. 1 nurse in laboratory. 1 social worker ($75 per month). 1 district nurse ($70 per month). 1 nurse instructor ($65 per month). Entrance examinations: — Arithmetic, fractions, and percentage. Age limit being abandoned: prefer candidate of twenty- one years, but will take girls from, eighteen to twenty. Girl ought to enter school which will make her eligible to national Red Cross organization. Call coming for candidates who can teach; in schools, settlements, etc. Good health necessary for girls who enter. Period of training is three years. In some schools tuition or fee is charged. In others small allowance is made to cover cost of uniform and books. Living expenses are given, with a few exceptions. n Hard for nurses to save anything, but institutional nurses have more chance to than private ones. Popularity of private nursing decreasing. Position as nurse in doctor's office pays best. Increasing call for nurses in tuberculosis cases, and for those who can teach mothers and prevent infant mortal- ity. Demand for district nurses greater than supply. Social standing, good; better than formerly: move in good society and apt to marry well. Training schools: some are frauds, and one should be care- ful in choosing. Few salaried instructors. Not a dangerous trade. No person with organic disease admitted. Candidates apt to improve in health. Work, twelve hours a day. At Massachusetts General a high-school education or equivalent is required. Standards are going up all the time. To-day less faith in use of drugs; more in nursing. IV EXAMPLE OF OCCUPATIONAL STUDY FOR THE USE OF THE LONDON JUVENILE LABOR EXCHANGES Conditions of Juvenile Employment in Steam Laundries The number of persons employed in the County of Lon- don, according to the latest Factory and Workshop Returns made for 1907, in steam laundries and in hand laundries under the Factory and Workshop Act is shown in the follow- ing table: — County of London, 1907 — Laundries Works and depart- merUs Male persona employed Female persona employed to Is Co 1 ■^1 00 g. SI t 00 00 g. ^4 Factories 555 Workshops 1,037 87 13 . 171 23 1,781 3J3 2,039 859 816 81 1,511 ««5 15,653 7,631 18,010 7,9S7 The number of young persons employed in hand laundries is obviously too small for any inquiry with regard to them to be profitable in connection with juvenile employment, except in so far as they might offer facilities for training in high-class laundry work for a limited number of hours and days a week. The inquiry has, therefore, been restricted to steam laundries. Information was obtained with regard to 150 steam laun- dries employing over 12,000 persons, or an average of 80 persons per laundry. The 405 steam laundries not visited, SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL S45 or giving only vague information, in nearly all cases employed less than 25 persons in 1907. Of the 150 firms giving infor- mation tabulated in this report, 119 were visited by Miss Woodgate and 31 by Miss Gladys M. Broughton. Detailed reports of their visits have been furnished to the Secretary of the London Juvenile Advisory Committee. The largest number of well-constructed laundries was found in South London. Number of persons employed by firms giving information grouped under the Labor Exchange areas visited Labor Exchange area Clapham Junction Camberwell Elephant Other areas south of Thames. Shepherd's Bush Walham Green Hackney Islington Other areas north of Thames Total Number employed by firms gimng in- formc^on 2,073 1,071 896 1,466 1,446 1,393 1,008 588 12,155 Percentage qf total employed by firms giving infontuUion 18.2 17.0 8.8 7.4 12.1 11.9 11.5 8.3 4.8 100 The number of boys employed in steam laundries is very small. A few are taken on at fourteen or fifteen years of age as van-boys, and occasionally they become van drivers later on. A few boys of sixteen or more are employed in the wash-house, beginning as hydro-extractor boys and then mov- ing on to washing machines. Wash-house work is heavy, and few vacancies occur. Men washers earn usually from 23*. to 30s., and van-men from 22s. to 28s. They are usually recruited from other trades. The number of men engaged in hand laundries is larger than appears from the returns, as the employers are fre- quently husband and wife, and both engaged in the manual work of the laundry themselves. 246 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL For reasons which will be examined later on the proportion of young girls in the laundry trade is exceptionally small, and many laundries dislike employing any under sixteen years of age. The factory returns show an average of less than two girls under sixteen per steam laundry. Learners, therefore, were frequently found to be between 16 and 18 and in some cases over eighteen years of age. Number qf employed by firms giving information Percentage of total employed by firms giving information Learners to 100 persons em- ployed 1,763 6,909 3,483 14.5 56.8 28.7 Stating number of learners. . . . Not stating number of learners 7 Not stated. Total 12,156 100 Girls are engaged as calender workers, hand ironers, shirt and collar machine ironers, packers and sorters, and in vari- ous miscellaneous jobs such as "shaking out," "trotting," etc. The least skilled work, on which these girl learners can at once receive wages, is taking the articles as they pass out at the back of the calender. The most skilled is hand ironing, which is rarely taught in steam laundries to girls under sixteen. Wages of learners. The difference with regard to skill re- quired, shown by the initial wage of the learner, is indicated in the table at the top of page 247. Disregarding a first week's trial for nothing the following initial rates were paid. In many cases hand ironers gave three months for nothing, being taught by a skilled ironer who received anything they earned, and were afterwards put on piecework. Wages in second and third years. The different ages at which beginners are taken on make it impossible for any fixed rules to be made with regard to increases in rates of pay. A strong girl of seventeen or eighteen will earn much more in her second and third years than young girls of four- SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 247 Percentages of imrk-people ' employed by firms paying the specified initial weekly wages to learners Calender viorkert Packers and aarlera Band ironera Nil 1.0 5.8 16.8 17.0 48.1 11.3 29.8 3.1 4.9 16.6 7.2 38.3 1.1 49.7 Under 2s 6.2 is. and under 3s 3s. " 4s 4s. " 5s 5s. " 6s 6s. and upwards 24.1 14.3 3.2 2.6 ■ Total 100 100 100 Number of work-peo- )le' employed by inns giving infor- mation. 6735 7170 5203 teen or fifteen. Nor is it the custom for a girl to stay at the branch which she may have started on. After the first few months she finds out what she prefers and the vacancies con- stantly created in a trade employing such a large proportion of adult women give her good chances of going on to skilled work. The Board of Trade Wages Inquiry for 1906 showed that in London Steam Laundries of girls under 18 working full time: — i percent SB per cent earned S5 per cOKt earned ) p&r cent Calenderers Receivers, markers, sorters, and j>ackers . Hand ironers (piece) ...... Machine ironera Be. or less Ss. or leas 78. or less 4«. or less Be. to 6ff. 78. to 8s. 4«.to 65. 8. to8«. 88. to 98. 6d. 68. to 88. 78. and upwards. 8». 9a. ed. " 6a. As stated above the hand ironers on piecework would gen- erally have served about three months for nothing or for a small time wage. ' Total number irrespective of occupation. £48 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL Range of earnings of competent workers. Except in the case of hand ironers, either day wages or weekly wages are cus- tomary in laundries. Ironers engaged on work requiring especial care are also paid by the week, day, or hour, and machine ironers are sometimes paid by piece. Some difficulty arises in comparing wages from the fact that in different branches the length of the customary week may be different. Packers and sorters are generally engaged the whole of the week. Ironers frequently only begin on Tuesday and often finish on Friday. In the Board of Trade Wages Inquiry those working at least five days a week were counted as working full time. The ranges of earnings of these full-time workers in London are given below: — Percentage of adult women (full timers) whose earnings for a given week fell within the undermentioned limits — 1906 lAmiU of earnings qf women ISyeare and upward) Calmderen Time Band ironere Piece eortere.paekere Time Under 10» 35.0 60.7 4.1 0.2 13.0 55.8 26.8 4.0 0.4 9.6 10s. and under ISs... 15s. " 20s... 20s. " 25s... 25s. and upwards. . . . 41.3 36.9 11.4 0.8 Total..... 100 100 100 Number included in 509 1737 613 These returns for 1906 may be compared with the state- ments as to maximum rates earned in different branches made by employers visited in 1911-12. SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL S49 Percentage of persons employed by firms paying the undermen- tioned maximum rates to specified classes of workers — 1911-12 Maximum rates CaUnderera Hand irormt Receiv&rs, and packers Under Ws 0.4 89.9 9.7 2.7 25;.3 43.4 26.6 10*. and under 15* 3.4 IBs. " 2,0s 32.1 20«. " 25* 39.2 25*. and upwards 25.3 Total 100 100 100 Total number of persons in all branches employed by- firms giving information . . 8391 7562 10362 The statements conveyed in the last table may be summed up: — (1) The most competent calender workers rarely reach 15s. a week. (2) Competent hand ironers, packers, and sorters can practically always earn 15*. a week, and in laundries employ- ing one foiurth of the work-people covered by the reports can rise to 25«. and upwards. It will be noticed that whereas the table of maximum rates paid gives a rather better position to hand ironers than to packers and sorters, the table of actual earnings gives a better position to packers and sorters. This is explained by the much greater irregularity in the hours observed by many of the ironers, who are often mar- ried women, and the number of cases in which "full time" for ironers includes only five days. The percentage of women over eighteen who earned less than 10*. is very largely due to the number of adult women who enter the laundries as beginners. Hours of work. All the laundries visited were organized 250 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL according to one of two of the systems allowed by the Fac- tory and Workshop Act, 1907. Nearly all laundries are kept running the full time per- mitted them, but in the large majority of cases only certain sections of the workers are actually at work during the whole period. The laundries which choose the system which allows them to work from 8 a.m. until 9 p.m. on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday every week begin work at 11 a.m. on Mondays and close at 4 p.m. on Saturdays. The laundries which choose the system which allows them to work from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. on ordinary days and 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on Saturday are allowed to work one hour later on not more than four days, other than Saturday, in any one week, and not more than sixty days in any calendar year. Under both systems young persons must always cease work at 8 p.m. at the latest. Percentage oj the total number of work-people in all branches employed in laundries where the understated hours were worked in an ordinary week by the specified groups oJ workers. Hours per week exclusive (J meaUimea Adidt packers and sarins Juvenile packers and sorters AduU calender workers Juvenile calender workers AduU ironers Juvenile ironers Dnder 4S 0.3 0.8 6.4 3.6 14.4 16.4 17.0 48.2 0.5 7.0 3.6 16.8 34.8 8.1 29.3 2.3 1.3 8.2 8.7 17.6 12.8 18.0 36.2 2.8 0.4 6.7 4.4 20.1 28.7 10.2 27.2 11.6 21.2 30.2 9.1 11.4 10.6 6.0 1.0 17.7 45 and under 47^ 47i " 60 60 " sai 68i " 65 65 " 67i 67i " 60 60 27.8 26.7 1.6 11.0 10.8 3.8 0.7 Total 100 100 100 100 100 100 Number of persons in all branches em- ployed by firms giv- mg information 10896 9379 10825 9368 T320 6722 The packers and sorters are those who are the first to begin and the last to finish. Sometimes calender workers not SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 251 required at the calenders are expected to "clean up" on Mondays or Saturdays. As these are the two departments in which young persons are the most readily employed, this means that young persons are often employed longer hours per week than many adults. The number of young persons engaged as ironers is very small, and it can be seen from these tables that in laundries employing more than two thirds of the work-people covered by the reports, young persons employed as calender workers, packers, and sorters worked fifty-five hours and upwards; and that in laundries employing more than one fourth, young persons employed in these branches worked sixty hours in an ordinary week. Slack season. It is doubtful whether any trade gives such regular employment to women as steam laundry work. August and September are months affected by slackness in London, but the holiday exodus is to some extent balanced by the inward stream of provincial and foreign visitors. Sea- side laundries, besides importing skilled labor from London, send work into London. Shorter time may have to be worked, but in most laundries all the workers paid weekly wages receive full pay even in slack weeks. The Board of Trade Wages Inquiry for 1906 showed very slight variations in numbers employed, ranging from 98.0 per cent of the average number in February to 103.3 per cent in June. The wages fluctuations ranged from 93.3 per cent of the average in August to 107.3 per cent in June. Arrangements jar meals. Except in West London some kind of arrangement was generally made for meals to be eaten on the premises. Number and percentage of work-people grouped according to the arrangements for meals — Number Percentage Meals purchasable on premises 8,027 16.7 Provision made for heating food 7,625 62.7 May have meals on premises 164 1.4 Must have meals outside 731 6.0 Vague or no information 1,608 13.2 Total . 12.155 100.0 252 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL Special qualifications required. For success as a sorter and packer, intelligence, accuracy, and good education are all necessary, and combined with capacity for management may make promotion from the wage-earning ranks possible. Cleanliness, respectability, average height and strength are desired for calender workers. Ironers need height, strength, "a straight eye," and a desire to learn. Training. Although ironing, packing, and other branches require skill and experience for efficiency, the demand for workers is too great for any system of apprenticeship to be insisted on. In some cases girls pay 10«. or 20s. premium to be taught ironing and give a certain time for nothing. There are rarely any girls under agreement even tor so long as a year. In most branches a girl "picks up" her training from those near her. Special arrangements are made for teaching ironing. The commonest system is to pay a skilled ironer to teach the learner working next to her or to let her have everything the learner earns for a fixed period. Three firms have a special "ironing school," with a competent teacher. Frequently the forewoman or the manageress is responsible for teaching the girls. Very few of the managers had had experience to enable them to judge of the effect of trade-school training. Special circumstances of the trade. The prevalent custom of sending soiled linen to the laundry at the beginning of the week and of expecting it back again within six days has been responsible for many of the drawbacks to this industry from the point of view of those interested in the employment of young persons. It necessitated unemployment part of the week and unduly long employment on other days, with the result that it was mainly carried on by older women with the strength to work very long hours at a time, and with domestic claims upon them which made them prefer to be unemployed two or three days a week. The establishment of steam laundries and the steady increase in work for hotels much less affected by domestic customs, created a demand for young persons, a daily supply of work from customers and a justification tor regulation of SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 253 hours by law. But laundries are only slowly coming into line with other factories, and married women still form a large proportion of those employed. The Home Office report as to the "Marriage state of Women over 18" in 1907 based on voluntary returns from employers, shows the marked con- trast between the laundry industry and other industries in this respect. Percentage oj women over eighteen Vnmarried Married Widowed Total In — 64.2 81.4 33.0 85.6 28.1 14.7 S1.9 10.7 7.7 3.9 15.1 3.7 100 Other non-textile factories. 100 100 Other workshops 100 The results of this employment of married women obliged to work excessively long hours on certain days in the week have left their traces on the industry, which is often still regarded as only suitable for a rough class of young girl. Advantages and disadvantages. Great care is needed in placing a girl in a laundry. In the abstract the industry has much to recommend it. It is inconceivable that the demand for labor should not steadily increase as cleanliness increases amongst the population. Employment is constant. The heavy parts of the work are now done in the wash-house with the aid of machinery worked by men. Factory inspection secures safeguards from excessive heat or moisture. A girl having learned ironing at a laundry finds her skill useful in after life, and has a trade to which she can always resort when the need arises. As a packer and sorter she develops intelligence and powers of management, and her money wages could be much higher than is customary at present if she brought to her work a better education than is customary in the trade. The disadvantages at present existing are numerous. The hours permitted by law, which are not usually worked in the 254 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL trades previously reported on, are frequently worked by young persons in laundries and are far too long. Young per- sons employed on calender work frequently never pass on to a more skilled and more remunerative braneli. The tone of the laundry frequently leaves much to be desired. Every one of these disadvantages can be obviated by care on the part of parents and guardians placing girls and of superintendents of laundries. MATERIAL USED FOR VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE BY THE GRAND RAPIDS (MICH.) JUNIOR AND SENIOR HIGH SCHOOLS Seventh and Eighth Grades The vocational guidance work of the seventh and eighth grades is taught in connection with English grammar and geography, for all of the exercises are composition, either oral or written. They cover such subjects as occupations, simple biography, and the value of an education. The pupil is not marked on how much he knows of these, but on how well he tells what he knows. All the exercises have proved of interest to the pupils, and have filled a long-felt want among teachers of composition, because the subjects seem to be vital and enlarge the horizons of the class. The study of some occupations is less likely to interest the girls. A few general subjects under the study of occupations are the following: 1. The study of a home occupation. 2. This occupation compared with the same occupation in foreign countries. 3. The account of a trip through some manufac- turing plant, oflSce, building, or store. Sample exercise: — The comparative study of an occupation 1. In what foreign countries can this occupation be found? 2. How does the occupation in these other foreign coun- tries differ from it as I know it? 3. Where should I especially like to live to follow it? Why? a. Is the country healthier? b. Does the country give me more opportunity to expand my occupation? 256 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL A few subjects under the study of biography are these: 1. The life of a successful celebrated person. (This should be read to the class by the teacher.) 2. The life of a success- ful person that the pupil knows. 3. The life of the pupil himself. Sample exercise: — The life oj a succes^ul person 1. When and where did live? 2. What work did he do? 3. What was the most important point in his life? 4. What pleasiu-es did he have? 5. What made his work successful? 6. Did he render service to his fellow-men? 7. Did he live by any law, or motto, or aim of his own? What was his guide (law, motto, aim) and was it a good one or not? Why? Sample subjects that may follow the pupil's life are as follows: 1. How I earned my first money. 2. How I spend my Saturdays. 3. My first real work. To show the value of an education, the following subjects are good : 1 . A talk by some young person who has returned to school after being out for a period, on "Why I Left School" or "Why I Came Back to School." 2. What people I know say about the value of an education. 3. What I could do if I left school now. 4. What other yoimg people have done who have left school at the end of the eighth grade. 5. Wages of eighth-grade graduates as compared with the wages of high-school graduates. 6. What a family has done. (This is taken from an article in the Outlook of August 26, 1911.) 7. My high-school course. Ninth Grade In the ninth grade, the study becomes personal, and enters into more elaborate biography. Perhaps the first exercises will be as follows: — My ancestors: Where they came from. Why they came to this country. Whether or not they had to contend with hardships. What they have done here. SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 257 My 'parents: Early life. Hardships. Occupation, its diffi- culties and advantages. What they have done for their children? Myself: My childhood; my school life; any uncommon good fortune, or bad, that has befallen me; my pleasures, favorite studies; my ambitions; my health, etc. These essays will serve not only to draw the pupil out and secure natural expression, but also to establish a personal and intimate relation between pupil and teacher. The teacher should hold the information gained in this way as a privileged communication. The school spirit of the pupil may be transformed by it. Morals and Manners can well be added to this in a series of essays, in which, with the true spirit of comedy, the unde- sirable is shown its own image in the glass of nature. Mono- logues and dialogues give a fit form. The subjects are inex- haustible; presenting the person with bad manners, (1) In the Street Car. (2) At the Theater. (3) On the Playground. (4) Buying a Hat. (5) Telling a Fish Story. (6) Gossiping with a Neighbor. The healthy humor of the mimicry does much to make the class one. Health and Hygiene also adds a stimulating subject for composition as well as for better living among the children. Some of the subjects given are: The Value of Open- Air lAfe; Exercise; Proper Amount of Sleep; Food Values; Bathing; Neatness of Person. Among the biographies most useful in this grade are those of Helen Keller, Jacob Riis, Booker T. Washington, Phillips Brooks, Jane Addams, Alice Freeman Palmer, Mary Lyon, Thomas Edison, etc. An essential element is that the suc- cess was often attained without advantage at the start of life. Most of this work is oral. Tenth Grade In the tenth grade, a great number of occupations are listed at the suggestion of the class, perhaps because mem- bers have some special opportunity for knowing them; then each pupil presents one orally or in written composition; 258 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL helped in his preparation by means of an outline. A part of this offers opportunity to do some research work. One girl listed three hundred and fifty occupations for women, and the salaries paid each. Her method was to take the lists of the telephone directory and call up the people whose names she found. Then she asked what she wanted to know. Inge- nuity will invent other methods. Others obtained their facts from relatives or friends who knew the occupation. Suggested outline The vocation: 1. Its character, its present status, its future, its healthfulness, the kind of life it compels as to hours and other conditions, its effect upon one's personal development, its opportunity for service to the community. 2. The prepa- ration necessary for entering the vocation (general require- ments, natural ability or skill, education, special training), the means of entering it (apprenticeship, working up, school- ing, local chances of an opening). 3. Sidelights on the voca- tion (opinions of those in it at present, statistical reports, laws affecting the vocation^ periodicals and books discussing it, personal observation). In the second half of this year some of the ptlpils will be ready to study some occupation that they expect to enters Those who have no definite occupation in mind will choose one under the guidance of the teacher that has some special interest in him. An outline can be given by the teacher to aid the pupil in his investigations. My own vocation: 1. Origin or history. 2. Modern con- ditions (as in preceding outline). 3. Good points and bad points (degree of independence, permanence, importance, remuneration, — money or pleasure in the work itself or in social returns). 4. How to enter it (preparation, cost, length of time for study). 5. Characteristics necessary for suc- cess. This last will require self -analysis of a limited kind, as well as analysis of men in the occupation, and should be strictly confidential. Here it may be possible to save some one who habitually fails in mathematics from entering engineering SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 259 because a hero or relative has succeeded in it, or because father or mother are ambitious that he shall succeed in it. Eleventh Grade Now that vocations have been considered, the preparation becomes important, and schools and colleges may be studied. There are various kmds to consider, among which are the industrious, professional, and purely literary; art schools, manual trailing schools, schools for physical training, etc. Each pupil should take a special interest in some school and look it up through its catalogues and by interviews with graduates, and compare with other schools of the same kind. The small colleges versus the large, the co-education versus the separate schools for men and women, Eastern colleges versus Western, native versus foreign; all of these are good subjects for discussion and debate. The ideals of the colleges and the condition of student life there are soon to be valu- able to them, as well as the value of a college education. The subjects required for college entrance, and other conditions must be ascertained, and pupils' own programs inspected to see whether their work is properly mapped out. In the second half of this year the ethics of the vocations are considered. Girls who are not going to college and have no special choice study problems of domestic life; the rela- tion of mistress and servant, of expenditure, of gossip, of treatment of clerks, in the stores, proper dress, and buying good or cheap articles in providing their household supplies. Those who have no definite plans consider the moral codes of the professions, and business life. The subject is inexhaust- ible. The ethics that inspired the founders of the Consumers' League, Anti-Saloon League, and other leagues for the better- ment of social conditions are debated here. Twelfth Grade When the occupations of the business and professional world have been studied, to which most men devote their lives and by which they earn their hving, it is well to single 260 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL out for special study those which are distinguished as sup- ported by and for the people because they are necessary for the public well-being and the betterment of society. Soon most of the pupils in this grade will be earning their own liv- ing, and paying either by taxes or by gift for the maintenance of public institutions. Public institutions maintained by subscription will supply subjects for the first half-year, and those maintained by taxes for the second. The result of the first year's study must be a growth in public spirit, a willingness to give support by seeking occupation in one of the institutions, by contribut- ing in money and kind, or by the aid of a vote or sympathy. Each for All is the unconscious teaching, and a return to the state and society for benefits received. When they are asked, "What institutions does the state maintain for its people, opening occupations to some of its citizens.''" the class will readily suggest a. long list, beginning with the Police Department and ending with the Army and Navy. In ten minutes the list will contain more institutions than are sufficient to supply subjects for the individuals of the class. It will include the Board of Health, City Hospitals, Fire Commission, Water Supply, Weather Bureau, — an indefinite list. This is swelled by the institutions the state charters and in a fashion directs, such as Insurance Com- panies, Railroads, Trusts, etc. These subjects are excellent to exercise the pupil in research work; he has now reached a stage where it is well for him to collect and organize a large body of facts independently. His material will be obtained from the reference library, by personal visits for inspection of the institutions studied and interviews with the officials, or by any other means that ingenuity can devise. The organization of this body of material and writing of a manu- script in the best possible form, with footnotes, a bibliog- raphy, and an outline, this is a labor to stimulate the pupil to his highest effort. Among the institutions supported by contributions are Churches, Charities and Corrections, Associations of Com- merce, Historical Societies, Musical Societies, Women's Clubs, Art Leagues, Lodges, Consumers' Leagues, Anti- SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 261 Saloon League, Y.M.C.A., Y.W.C.A., Red-Cross Society, Anti-Tuberculosis Society, etc. A final report to the class by each pupU of the main points made in his essay is a reve- lation of the value of this work to the younger people. BIBLIOGRAPHY The following publications are of interest to students of vocational guidance, and may well serve as the nucleus of a school vocation library : — Bibliographies Bayonne, New Jersey, Public Library. Classroom libraries on vocations selected for the fifth to eighth years of elemen- tary schools. 1913. Brockton, Massachusetts, Public Library. List on voca- tional guidance and training. (In Quarterly Bulletin, July, September, 1913, pp. 22-24.) Brooklyn, New York, Public Library. Choosing an Occu- pation. 1913. Chicago School of Civics and Philanthropy. Finding Em- ployment for Children who leave the Grade School to go to Work, p. 53. Grand Bapids, Michigan, Public Library. List on vocational guidance. (In Bulletin, October, 1913.) New York School of Philanthropy, 130 East 22d Street, New York. List on vocational guidance. (In Bulletin, November, 1911.) Pittsburg. Monthly Bulletin of tjie Carnegie Library, vol. 18, no. 5, May, 1913, p. 196. Pratt Institute Free Library, Brooklyn, New York. What to Read on Vocations. 1912. Philadelphia, Board of Education. Pedagogical Library. A working library on vocational guidance. 1912. Providence, Rhode Island, Public Library. What Next? A brief list on vocations. Teachers College, Columbia University, New York. List of books relating to industrial arts and education. 1911. Vocational Bureau, 6 Beacon Street, Boston. List of books, periodicals, etc., on voca.tiop^l gujdapce. (Ou^ qf print.) BIBLIOGRAPHY Books Allen, Frederick J. Business Employments', A Vocation Bureau Study. Ginn & Co., 1915. Bloomfield, Meyer. The School and the Start in Life. The United States Bureau of Education, Washington, 1913. The Vocational Guidance of Youth. Price, 60 cents. Houghton, Mifflin Company, Boston, 1911. Revised edi- tion, 1915. Readings in Vocational Guidance. Ginn & Co., 1915. Bray, Reginald A. The Town Child. T. Fisher Unwin, London. Butler, Elizabeth Beardsley. Saleswomen in Mercantile Stores. Charities Publication Committee.New York, W12. Cooley, Edwin G. Vocational Education in Europe. The Commercial Club of Chicago, 1912. Davis, Jesse B. Vocational and Moral Guidance. Ginn & Co., 1914. Dean, Arthur. The Worker and the State. Century Com- pany, New York, 1910. Eliot, Dr. Charles W. Education for Efficiency. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston. Freeman, Arnold. Boy Life and Labor. P. S. Kiug, London, 1914. Gordon, Mrs. Ogilvie. Handbook of Employments. The Rosemount Press, Aberdeen, Scotland, 1908. Greenwood, Arthur. Juvenile Labor Exchanges and After- Care. P. S. King & Son, London, 1911. Hanus, Professor Paul H. Beginnings in Industrial Educa- tion. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston. Johnston, Charles Hughes. The Modern High School : Its Ad- ministration and Extension. Charles Scribner's Sons, 1914. Keeling, Frederic. The Labor Exchange in Relation to Boy and Girl Labor. P. S. King & Son, London, 1910. King, Irving. Social Aspects of Education. The Macmillan Company, 1912. Laselle, Mary A., and Katherine Wiley, with an introduc- tion by Meyer Bloomfield. Vocations for Girls. Price, 85 cents. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1912. 264 BIBLIOGRAPHY "Mein Kunftiger Beruf." A series of booklets published in Leipzig by C. Bange. Parsons, Professor Frank. Choosing a Vocation. Price, $1 net. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1909. Sadler, Professor M. E. Continuation Schools in England and Elsewhere, chap, xv, on Apprenticeship and Skilled Employment Committees. University Press, Manchester, England. Snedden, Dr. David. The Problem of Vocational Education. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston. Thorndike, Edward L. Individuality. Houghton Mifflin . Company, Boston, 1911. Trades for London Boys. Trades for London Girls. Longmans, Green & Co., London. "Was Werde Ich.?" A series of booklets published in Leipzig by Albert Otto Paul. Weeks, Ruth Mary. The People's School. 60 cents net. Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston, 1912. Women's Educational and Industrial Union. Vocations for the Trained Woman, Other than Teaching. Women's Educational and Industrial Union, 264 Boylston Street, Boston, 1910. Women's Municipal League. A Handbook of Opportunities for Vocational Training in Boston. $1.25 net. Women's Municipal League, 6 Marlborough Street, Boston, 1913. Reports American Federation of Labor: Committee on Industrial Education, Senate Document no. 936, 1912, 62d Con- gress. Boston School Committee: Annual Reports, 1910 (appendix G. P. 147); 1911 (appendix B. P. 32); 1912 (all). Finding Employment for Children who leave the Grade School to go to Work: Chicago School of Civics and Phil- anthropy. Inquiry into Vocational Aims of High-School Pupils, Somer- ville, Massachusetts. School Report, 1913. Miss Bessie p. Davis. BIBLIOGRAPHY 265 National Child Labor Committee. Proceedings 8th Annual Conference at Louisville, 1912. National Conference on Vocational Guidance. 2d Report on New York Session, October, 1912. $1. School and Employment in the United States, Board of Edu- cation, London, England, 1914. Students' Aid Committee of the High-School Teachers' Association of New York City. Publications. Benjamin C. Gruenberg, Secretary, Commercial High School, Brook- lyn, New York. Teachers College Bulletin. Address of Professor Thorndike on Vocational Guidance, March 29, 1913. Teachers College Record. Educational Surveys and Voca- tional Guidance. January, 1913. The Making of a Girls' Trade School. September, 1909. Columbia University Press, Columbia University, New York. The American Girl in the Stock-Yards Dist. Part ii, 1913. Louise Montgomery. The Child, the School, and the Job. James Hiatt, Secre- tary of Public Educational Association. The School and the Start in Life. Meyer Bloomfield. United States Bureau of Education, 1914. Vocational Survey of Minnesota, 1913. The Minnesota Teachers' Club. Conditions under which Children leave School to go to Work, United States Bureau of Labor (vol. 7), 1910. Vocational Guidance. United States Bureau of Education. Bulletin no. 14, 1914. Year-Book, 1910-11. New York City High-School Teachers' Association, vol. 5. Periodical Literature Charting Childhood in Cincinnati. Mrs. Helen T. Wooley. Survey, 30: 601-06. Crying Need for Connecting up Man and Job. F. A. Kellor. Survey, 31 : 541-42. Facts about Working Children of Cincinnati and their Bearing on Educational Problems. Elem. Sch. T., 14: 59-72; 132-39. 1913. 266 BIBLIOGRAPHY History of Vocational Guidance. T. H. Hutchins. Assoc. Seminar, 21 : 46-60, 84-91, 128-47. 1912-13. Launching the Child. M. E. Bruere. Outlook, 101 : 75-80. 1912. Practical Arts and Vocational Guidance. C. A. Prosser. Manual Training, 14: 209-22. 1913. Psychological Tests in Vocational Guidance. Journal of Ed. Psych., vol. 4, no. 4, pp. 232-37. 1913. Studies in Vocational Guidance. E. E. Lewis. Sch. and Home Ed., vol. 32, no. 4, pp. 135-38; vol. 32, no. 6, pp. 212-14; vol. 32, no. 7, pp. 247-51. 1913. The Vocation Bureau of Boston. F. J. Allen. National Municipal Review, January, 1913. Opportunities in School and Industry for Children of Stock- Yards Districts. University of Chicago Press. The Social Waste of Unguided Personal Ability. American Journal of Sociology, 1913. The Vocational Interests, etc., of the Pupils in Certain High Schools in Iowa. Irving King, School Series, March, 1914. The Vocational Counselor in Action. Meyer Bloomfield and L. F. Wentworth. Survey, 30: 183-89. 1913. The First Course in Vocational Guidance. Survey, 26: 848- 49. 1911. The Occupations of College Graduates. Dean Frederick P. Keppel, Educational Review, December, 1910. Vocational Guidance. Stephen S. Colvin. Independent, 78 425-28. June 1, 1914. Vocational Guidance and the Public. Edu^. Sch. R., 19 51-56. 1911. Vocational Preparation as a Social Problem. Educ. R., 45 289-97. 1913. Vocational Guidance. Stratton D. Brooks. Sch. R., 19 42-51. 1911. Vocational Guidance and the Teacher of Science. Sch, Seminar, 13: S9-97. 1913. Vocational Guidance: In High Schools. F.M.Giles. Sch.R., 22: 227-34. April, 1914. Vocational Guidance in Cincinnati. Frank P. Goodwin. Voc. Ed., 3: 249-59. March, 1914. BIBLIOGRAPHY 367 Vocational Guidance through the Library. American Li- brary Association Publication Board, 78 East Washington Street, Chicago. Reprint from Massachusetts Library Club Bulletin, January, 1914. Vocational Guidance. Board of Education, New York Document no. 4, 1914. N.E.A. Phoceedings How should the School System contribute to an Intelligent Choice of a Vocation on the Part of the Pupil? George P. Knox. 1912, pp. 417-25. Practical Arts and Vocational Guidance. C. A. Prosser. 1912, pp. 645-61. The Use of the Library in Vocational Guidance. Jesse B. Davis. 1912, pp. 1267-73. The Value during Education of the Life-Career Motive. Charles W. Eliot. 1912, pp. 133-41. Vocational Guidance. Meyer Bloomfield. 1912, pp. 431-36. Vocational and Moral Guidance through English Composi- tion in the High School. Jesse B. Davis. 1910, pp. 713-18. OUTLINE THE CHOICE OF LIFE-WORK AND ITS DIFFICULTIES 1. A suggestion from Franklin's Autobiography 1 S. Haphazard start in hfe . 1 3. Changed conditions 1 4. The new specialization of labor 2 5. The eflSciency engineer 2 6. The adolescent crisis .2 7. Young work-seekers . 3 8. What vocational choice involves 4 9. Play and vocation 4 10. Tenement children 5 11. The home and the life-career 6 12. What one counselor has done .... 7 13. An East Side librarian 7 14. The problem of vocational guidance . . .... 8 THE WASTEFLX START AND INEFFICIENCY 1. Englajid's experience 9 2. The future for the boys 9 3. Reports of the Royal Commission on the Poor-Laws . . 10 4. Other testimony ' . . 10 5. "Blind-alley" children 12 6. American experience 13 7. Some Boston testimony .... 14 8. Studies by the University of Chicago Settlement ... 16 9. United States Government investigation 17 ■M. Why children leave school for work ... . . 18 11. Job hoboes . . . . 18 12. The unemployables 21 13. The problem of vocational education .... . . 22 14. New demands upon the public schools ... . . 23 15. The problem of vocational guidance 23 16. Far-reaching social program . . 24 17. Current vocational influences . . 25 "18. The aim of vocational guidance 26 OUTLINE EDUCATIONAL AND VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE -1. President Emeritus Eliot on the "Life-Career Motive'' . . 27 2. Choice of further training 28 3. Educational guidance 28 4. Two illustrations 29 -5. Beginnings in vocational guidance 30 6." Pioneer work of Professor Frank Parsons 31 7. The Vocation Bureau 31 8. Work with the Boston schools 32 Report of the Committee on Vocational Direction ... 34 The activities of the Vocation Bureau of Boston .... 39 The employer's relation to vocational guidance .... 47 i. THE ORGANIZATION OF VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE 1. Vocational counseHng — the new profession 60 2. First steps 51 3. Preliminary survey 51 4. Suggestion from Cincinnati 52 5. The Newton Plan 53 6. Suggestions for procedure 55 7. Selection of director 56 8. The counselor in action 57 9. The Henry Street Vocational Scholarship Committee . . 57 10. Psychological tests in vocational guidance 60 11. Use of local resources 63 12. Ambition and aptitude 64 13. Vocational literature 64 14. Training vocational counselors 87 15. Guidance and employment 89 16. Exploiting vocational guidance 89 17. At what age should guidance begin? .... ... 90 *48. The vocational decision 91 19. Cautions in vocational guidance 92 20. Principles of vocational guidance 93 21. Summary of the dangers 94 VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN GERMANY 1. Local factors 95 2. Guidance and the German schools 96 3. Parents' consultation hours 97 '^. Predetermined occupation 98 270 OUTLINE 5. Chan^ng industrial conditions 99 5. Vocational guidance efforts 101 7. Work in Halle 102 8. German labor bureaus . . , 105 0. Vocational guidance policies 107 VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE IN ENGLAND AND SCOTLAND 1. Two basic acts 109 2. Memorandum ofooSperation Jbe^een labor exchanges and the schools Ill 3. Methods of carrying out the s^emes J16 4. Volunteer advisoiy committees ......... 118 6. London 120 6. Work of local committees 121 7. The employment of children 124 8. Details of help to minors , 184 ' 9. Birmingham , 127 JO. School care committees . , . . 128 11. Further education 129 12. The "helpei^s" notebook 133 13. Edinburgh 137 14. Circulars to parents and children . 138 15. Regulations pertaining to the wprk in Edinbiu-gh . . , 145 VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE AND HEALTH GUIDANCE 1. Essentials in employment schemes 148 8. Necessity of legislative control 148 5. The Minority Jleport 149 4. Future of unskilled labor 160 6. Needs of " blind-alley " children 151 6. Medical inspection 151 7. The Dewsbury experiment 153 8. The physician and the start in life 157 THE SCHOOL AND THE START IN LIFE 1. The keynote of service 158 2. Outline of policy for schools in relation to employment . . 159 3. Research and social vision 160 4. The problem before the schools , . 162 6. The basis of employment 163 6. School and occupation 163 OUTLINE 271 ^. Supervised work-seeking 166 ' 8. Adolescent employment ]67 9. Vocational help bureaus 168 THE SOCIAL GAIN THROUGH VOCATIONAL GUIDANCE ■^1. The "one talent" 171 2. Evolution of the vocations 172 3. New avenues of service 172 4. An example of vocational guidance 173 6. Social interdependence of vocations 173 6. The ideal of the work-career 176 7. The challenge to the occupations . , 176 8. Ideals of vocational guidance 176 SUGGESTIVE MATERIAL 1. Schedules and Questionnaires 179-206 2. Records of a Boston School Vocational Counselor . . . 207 3. Specimens of talks given before the Boston Vocational Counselors 217 4. Examples of occupational study, for the use of the London Juvenile Labor Exchanges 244 5. Material used for vocational guidance by the Grand Rapids, Michigan, Junior and Senior High Schools 255 INDEX Adolescence, 3. Advisory committees, English, 118. Alliance Employment Bureau, 59. Apprenticeship, 150. Berlin Labor Bureau, 104. Beveridge, W. H., 165. Birmingham, 127. Blind alley, 12. Blind-alley occupations, 10. Board of Trade, 110. Boston School Committee, 32. Boston school-teachers, 13. Boston specialty store, 2. Boston Vocation Bureau, 39. Choice, like play, 4. Choice of life-work, 4. Choosing a Vocation, Parsons, 32. Cincinnati, Charting Childhood in, 51. Civic Service House, 30. Committee on the Place of In- dustries, etc., 27. Comparative wages chart, 61. Complicated social order, 1. Consultative committee, 11. Critical period of working lite, 1. Crowded district, 5. Cul-de-sac, 12. Dead-end occupations, 21. Decision, vocational, 91. Democracy, 6. Department store diagram, 80, 81, 84, 85, 86. Dewsbury, 116. Dewsbury factory surgeon, 154. East Side Library, 7. Edinburgh, 137. Edinburgh School Board circu- lars, 139. Educational guidance, 28. Efficiency engineer, 2. Eliot, President, 27. Employment Managers' Associa- tion, 48. Follow-up work, 26. Foreign-born, 6. Fourteen-year-old children, 1. Franklin, Benjamin, 1. Game of "Trades," 4. Germany, vocational guidance in, 95. Gordon, Mrs. Ogilvie, 64, 137. Guidance, 12, 25. HaUe Statistical Bureau, 97. Hanus, Prof. Paul H., 90. Health guidance, 157. Helper's notebook, 134-136. Henry St. Settlement vocational scholarships committee, 57. High School of Commerce, 29. High School of Practical Arts, 29. Higher training schools, 3. Industrial education commissions in Mass., 18. Informed choice, 3. Intelligent forethought, 4. INDEX 273 Investigation in Boston, 14. Italians, 7. Jackson, Cyril, 11. Job-jungle, 21. Kindergarten teacher, 4. Labor Exchanges Act, 109. Laissez-faire attitude, 8. Life-career motive, 90. London, 120. London County Council, 121. London elementary schools, 11. Majority report, 9. Marshall, 6. Massachusetts State Board of Health, 7. Medical oflScer, 153. Medical supervision, 155. Memorandum, joint, 110. Minority report, 10. Minute division of labor, 2. Modern education, 22. Munich, 101. Munich Labor Bureau, 106. National Education Association, 27. Newton educational and voca- tional guidance department, 53. Occupational world, 164. Parents' consultation hours, 97. Parsons, Prof. Frank, 31. Preventive medicine, 172. "Process" workers, 22. Psychological tests, 60. Report of Boston teacher's com- mittee, 34. Research, 158. Royal Commission on the Poor Laws, 9. Sadler, Prof. Michael E., 10. Schooling, choice of further, 28. Scotland, 117. Seashore, Prof. Carl, 62. Social organization, 164. Specialization, 2. Strassburg, 105. Summary of causes for children leaving school, 19. Systematic life-work counseling, 21. Tempting wages, 21. Tenement home, 5. Thorndike, Prof. E. L., 60. Typical employment record, 20. Unemployables, 21. United Kingdom, 152. Vocation Bureau, Civic Service House, 31. Vocational anarchy, 3. Vocational education, 23. Vocational guidance movement, 23. Vocational help bureau, 170. Vocational movements, 24. Vocational service, 160. Vocations for Boston Boys, stud- ies in, 65. Wolff, Dr., 97. Woman and child wage earners in the United States, 17. Cornell University Library HF S381.B63 Youth, school, and vocation. 3 1924 002 649 352