Wage Earning and Education Part 5

Most of the men who enroll in night school cla.s.ses need a course of at least two or three years. All but a few, however, insist on having their supplementary training in small doses. Frequently they want only specific instruction about a specific thing, such as how to lay out a certain piece of work or how to set up a particular machine tool. They want to secure this knowledge in the shortest possible time, and very few want the same thing. A course of two or three years does not appeal to them. Another difficulty is that their previous educational equipment varies widely, and some are not capable of a.s.similating even the specialized bit of trade knowledge they need without a preliminary course in arithmetic. As the personnel of the cla.s.ses changes to a marked degree from term to term, the courses undergo frequent modifications. Apparently the teachers and princ.i.p.als have made a sincere effort to adapt the instruction to the demands of the men who attend the schools, but the fact is that the difficulties inherent in such work make it impossible to organize the cla.s.ses on any basis except that of subject matter, which means fitting students into courses, rather than adapting courses to the needs of particular groups of workers.

The enrollment is far below what should be expected in a city of nearly three-quarters of a million inhabitants. The total number of journeymen, apprentices, and helpers from the skilled manual occupations, receiving trade instruction in the night schools, is considerably less than one per cent of the total number in the city.

A large enrollment is necessary for efficient administration. Success in specializing courses in night schools, as in day schools, requires a large administrative unit. The possible variety of courses is in direct ratio to the number enrolled. In a cla.s.s of 200 carpenters there would probably be, for example, 10 or 15 men who need specialized instruction in stair-building. On the basis of the present enrollment of 40 or 50 carpenters the cla.s.s would dwindle to three or four, with the result that the per capita teaching cost becomes prohibitive.

The relatively small result now obtained is not the fault of the schools, but is due princ.i.p.ally to the fact that the great field of evening vocational instruction is treated by the school system as a mere side line of the technical high schools. The evening cla.s.ses are taught by teachers who have already given their best in the day cla.s.ses. The enrollment cannot be greatly increased so long as this type of education is handled as one of the marginal activities of the school system, manned by tired teachers and directed by tired princ.i.p.als. It is a totally different kind of job from regular day instruction and requires a different administrative organization, with a responsible head vested with sufficient authority to meet quickly and effectively the widely varying demands of its students. This will require the speeding-up of administrative methods in the establishment of courses and the employment of teachers, a freer hand for the princ.i.p.als as regards both expenditures and policy, and most important of all, the organization of all forms of continuation and night school instruction under a separate department.

A COMBINED PROGRAM OF CONTINUATION AND TRADE-EXTENSION TRAINING

In considering the general conclusions of the survey as to what should be done in the matter of trade preparatory and trade-extension training in both day and night schools, it must be borne in mind that these two types of vocational training are still in the experimental stage. Their future development will probably involve a wide departure from conventional school methods and the evolution of a special technique through trial and experiment. At the present time we can only formulate certain of the main conditions to which future advance in these fields must conform.

First of all, it must be recognized that such work is a big job in itself and cannot be successfully conducted as an appendix of the day school. It is worth doing well, or it is not worth doing. It needs an organization sufficiently elastic and adaptable to quickly make adjustments to unusual and unexpected conditions. It needs the supervision of a competent director who can devote to it all his time and energy, and a corps of teachers who not only know how and what to teach, but who possess a firm conviction of the value and utility of this kind of instruction. In the hands of teachers who bring to it only the margin of interest and energy remaining after a hard day's work in the high school, or who are unable to comprehend the radical difference between teaching a boy in the day school 35 hours a week and teaching a boy four hours a week in the continuation school or evening cla.s.s, the full measure of success cannot be expected. The employment of day teachers for night school work has never been other than a makes.h.i.+ft, and the insignificant results attained in night schools throughout the country have been due in great measure to this cause.

Apart from the fact that the interests of adolescent workers imperatively demand the establishment of day continuation schools, an additional argument in favor of such schools is that they would provide a means for making the night trade-extension work effective, through the use of continuation day school teachers for night school work. Such a plan would mean that teachers employed on this basis would have charge of a day continuation cla.s.s during one session of four hours, and a night cla.s.s of two hours, making a total of six hours' work per day. A plan of this kind would make possible the establishment of the fundamental conditions for successful trade--preparatory and trade-extension training in the night schools.

The present system is unjust to both teachers and students;--to the students because the man or boy who sacrifices his recreation time to attend night school has a right to the best the schools can give; to the teachers because no teacher can work a two-hour night s.h.i.+ft in addition to seven or eight hours in the technical high school without seriously impairing his efficiency.

The development of this plan would necessitate the establishment of two centers, one located in the eastern and one in the western section of the city. In these centers should be housed the day vocational school, the day continuation cla.s.ses, and the night vocational cla.s.ses. This would relieve the technical high schools of a task which does not belong to them, and which by overloading the teachers seriously interferes with the work they were originally employed to do. At present a considerable number of the technical high school teachers are devoting from one-fifth to one-fourth of their total working day to elementary teaching, as most of the work in the night schools is below high school grade.

By bringing together all the trade preparatory and trade-extension work under one roof, it is possible to secure the highest efficiency in the use of equipment. Expensive shops can be justified only on the basis of constant use. If the suggestion for the establishment of a vocational school is acted upon, such future contingencies as the continuation school should be borne in mind in planning the buildings and equipment, so as to permit of extensions as they may be required.

It is practically certain that universal continuation training for young workers up to the age of 17 or 18 will be made compulsory in all the progressive states of the country within the next decade. The Ohio school authorities should get ready to handle the continuation school problem before the example of other states and the overwhelming pressure of public opinion forces it upon them.

CHAPTER IX

VOCATIONAL TRAINING FOR GIRLS

The discussions in the preceding chapters have been limited intentionally to a consideration of the needs and possibilities of training for wage-earning pursuits in which men predominate. The conditions which surround vocational training for girls are so fundamentally unlike those encountered in the vocational training of boys that a combined treatment leads to needless complexity and confusion.

Cleveland uses a relatively smaller amount of woman labor than most other large cities. In only one of the 10 largest cities in the country--Pittsburgh--is the proportion of women and girls at work smaller as compared with the total number of persons in gainful occupations than in Cleveland. In 1900, 20.4 per cent of the workers in the city were women; by 1910 the proportion of women workers had increased to 22 per cent, a s.h.i.+ft of less than two per cent for the decade.

A consideration of the occupational future of boys and girls shows at once how widely their problems differ. The typical boy in Cleveland attends school until he reaches the age of 15 or 16. About this period he becomes a wage-earner and for the next 30 or 40 years devotes most of his time and energy to making a living. The typical girl leaves school about the same time, becomes a wage-earner for a few years, then marries and spends the rest of her life keeping house and rearing children. To the man wage-earning is the real business of life. To the woman it is a means for filling in the gap between school and marriage, a little journey into the world previous to settling down to her main job.

The most radical and important difference between the two s.e.xes with respect to wage-earning is found in the length of the working life.

The transitory character of the wage-earning phase in the life of most women is clearly seen in the contrasted age distribution shown in Table 13.

TABLE 13.--PER CENT OF TOTAL POPULATION ENGAGED IN GAINFUL OCCUPATIONS DURING THREE DIFFERENT AGE PERIODS

----------------------+-------------+------------+ Age period Women Men ----------------------+-------------+------------+ 16 to 21 60 85 21 to 45 26 98 45 and over 12 85 ----------------------+-------------+------------+

Approximately 85 per cent of the boys and slightly less than 60 per cent of the girls between the ages of 16 and 21 are at work. In the next age group--21 to 45--given by the census, 98 per cent of the men are at work, but the proportion of women employed in gainful occupations drops to 26 per cent, or about one in four; in the next age group--45 and over--it falls to about 12 per cent, as compared with 85 per cent of the men. Of the women still at work in the older age group, over one-half are engaged in domestic and personal service as servants, laundresses, housekeepers, etc.

TABLE 14.--NUMBER EMPLOYED IN THE PRINc.i.p.aL WAGE-EARNING OCCUPATIONS AMONG EACH 1,000 WOMEN FROM 16 TO 21 YEARS OF AGE

Manufacturing and mechanical industries: Apprentices to dressmakers and milliners 4 Dressmakers and seamstresses (not in factory) 20 Milliners and millinery dealers 17 Semi-skilled operatives: Candy factories 6 Cigar and tobacco factories 15 Electrical supply factories 10 Knitting mills 11 Printing and publis.h.i.+ng 8 Woolen and worsted mills: Weavers 5 Other occupations 7 Sewers and sewing machine operators (factory) 53 Tailoresses 25

Transportation: Telephone operators 19

Trade: Clerks in stores 28 Saleswomen (stores) 35

Professional service: Musicians and teachers of music 6 Teachers (school) 4

Domestic and personal service: Charwomen and cleaners 5 Laundry operatives 13 Servants 81 Waitresses 9

Clerical occupations: Bookkeepers, cas.h.i.+ers, and accountants 26 Clerks (except clerks in stores) 20 Stenographers and typewriters 62

The occupations in which the girls now in the public schools will later engage can be determined with a relative degree of accuracy by employing a method in general similar to that utilized in forecasting the occupations of boys. It must be taken into account, however, that the wage-earning period for women, except in the professional occupations, usually begins before the age of 21. For this reason the 16 to 21 age group probably offers the best basis for determining the future occupational distribution of girls in school. If all women at work up to the age of 25 were included the figures would be more nearly exact, but unfortunately data for the period between 21 and 25 are not available. The figures at the right of Table 14 show the number engaged in each specified occupation among each thousand women in the city between the ages of 16 and 21. The proportions given for the professional occupations, particularly teaching, are too small, because of the fact that few women enter the professions before the age of 21.

Applying these proportions to the average elementary school unit, it will be seen at once that the number of girls old enough to profit by special training is too small in any single occupation to form a cla.s.s of workable size. In such a school there would be about 80 girls 12 years old and over. Of the skilled occupations listed in the table stenography and typewriting offers the largest field of employment, yet the number who are likely to take up this kind of work does not exceed five or six.

DIFFERENTIATION IN THE JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL

The organization of the junior high school, where the enrollment is made up entirely of older pupils, obviates this difficulty to some extent. Instead of 80 girls there are from 300 to 500, with a corresponding increase in the number who will enter any given wage-earning occupation.

Not less than one-eighth and probably not more than one-fifth of these girls will become needleworkers of some kind. They will need a more practical and intensive training in the fundamentals of sewing than is now provided by the household arts course. The skill required in trade work cannot be obtained in the amount of time now devoted to this subject. It should be made possible for a girl who expects to make a living with her needle to elect a thoroughly practical course in sewing in which the aim is to prepare for wage earning rather than merely to teach the girl how to make and mend her own garments. As proficiency in trade sewing requires first of all ample opportunity for practice, provision should be made for extending the time now given to sewing for those girls who wish to become needle workers.

This can easily be done through the system of electives now in use.

The establishment of cla.s.ses in power machine operating during the junior high school period appears to be impracticable, due to the immaturity of the girls and the small number who could profit by such instruction.

A discussion of the present sewing courses in the public schools will be found in Chapters XIV and XV, which summarize the special reports on the Garment Trades and Dressmaking and Millinery. In the present chapter the consideration of these occupations is limited to an examination of the administrative questions connected with training for the sewing trades.

SPECIALIZED TRAINING FOR THE SEWING TRADES

The compulsory attendance law requires all girls to attend school until they are 16 years old. This forces a considerable number into the high schools for one or two years before they go to work. As a rule the type of girl who is likely to enter the needle trades selects the technical high school course, not because she has any idea of finis.h.i.+ng it, but because she believes it offers a less tiresome way of getting through her last one or two years in school than the academic course. The technical course requires three and three-quarter hours a week of sewing during the first two years. The student may elect trade dressmaking and millinery during the third and fourth years.

Very few girls who can afford to spend four years in high school ever become dressmakers or factory operatives. If the school system is to do anything of direct vocational value for them it will have to begin further down. Most of them leave school before the age of 17 and the years between 14 and 16 represent the last chance the school will have to give them any direct aid towards preparation for immediate wage-earning.

For successful work in machine operating the cla.s.s must be large enough to warrant the purchase and operation of sufficient equipment to give the pupils an opportunity for intensive practice. The only way this condition can be secured is by concentrating in large groups the girls who need such training. Little will be accomplished in training for the sewing trades without specialization, and specialization in small administrative units is impossible. The teaching and operating cost in a school enrolling, say 200 girls, who want the same kind of work, can be brought within reasonable bounds. In a school where the total number who need specialized training does not exceed 10 or 15 the cost is prohibitive.

In the opinion of the Survey Staff a one or two year vocational course in the sewing trades should be established. The entrance age should not be less than 15. Courses should be provided for intensive work in trade dressmaking, power machine operating, and trade millinery. A conservative estimate of the number of girls who could be expected to enroll for courses in these subjects is 500. A trade school might be established where only this type of vocational training would be carried on, or it might be conducted in the same building with the trade courses for boys recommended in a previous chapter. In either case the number of pupils would be sufficient to warrant up-to-date equipment and a corps of specially trained teachers.

Training for the sewing trades consumes more material than any other kind of vocational training. For this reason economical administration requires some arrangement for marketing the product. During the latter part of the course the school should be able to turn out first-cla.s.s work. The familiarity with trade standards the pupils obtain through practice on garments which must meet the exacting demands of the buying public has a distinct educational value. The Manhattan Trade School for Girls in New York City and other successful schools in the country operate on this basis. There is reason to believe that there would be little difficulty in making arrangements with the clothing manufacturers in Cleveland to furnish a good trade school as much contract work as the cla.s.ses could handle.

OTHER OCCUPATIONS

From one-fourth to one-fifth of the girls in the school will later enter employment in commercial and clerical occupations, as stenographers, typists, clerks, cas.h.i.+ers, bookkeepers, saleswomen, and so on. Their needs will be considered in Chapters XII and XIII, in which the findings of the special reports on Boys and Girls in Commercial Work and Department Store Occupations are summarized.

A relatively small number will become semi-skilled operatives in industrial establishments, such as job printing houses, knitting mills, and factories making electrical supplies, metal products, and so on. As a rule such work requires only a small amount of manual skill or deftness. Not much training is needed and it can be given quickly and effectively in the factories.

About one-ninth of the girls in the school will enter paid domestic or personal service of some kind. The household arts courses probably meet the needs of girls who may be employed in such occupations as far as they can be met under present conditions. The woman domestic servant occupies about the same social level as the male common laborer, and a course which openly sets out to train girls to be servants is not likely to prosper. The load of social stigma such work carries is too heavy. At some time in the future it may be possible to ignore the traditional and universal att.i.tude of our public toward the so-called menial occupations sufficiently to consider training servants. At present such a possibility seems remote.