ee 





















THE BULLETIN OF THE 
DEPARTMENT OF 
SECON DARY-SCHOOL 
PRINCIPALS 


OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATION ASSOCIATION 


Issued Eight Times a Year 
Monthly October to May Inclusive 


MARCH, 1938 
Serial Number 73 








BULLETIN NUMBER 73 


Proceedings of the 


Twenty-second Annual Meeting of the 
Department of 


Secondary-School Principals 
of the National Education Association 


ATLANTIC CITY, NEW JERSEY 
February 26 to March 2, 1938 








THE CONTENTS OF THIS BULLETIN ARE LISTED IN EDUCATIONAL INDEX 


Published by 


THE DEPARTMENT OF 
SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS 
QF THE NATIONAL EDUCATION ASSOCIATION 


H. V. CHURCH, Executive Secretary 
5835 Kimbark Avenue, Chicago 








Proceedings of the 
Twenty-second Annual Meeting of the 
Department of 
Secondary-School Principals 
of the 

National ( Education) Association -* < 


at 


ATLANTIC CITY, NEW JERSEY 


on 


February 26 to March 2, 1938 


38 


Edited by 
H. V. CHURCH 
Executive Secretary of the Association 


Published by the Department, 1938 









TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL CONVENTION 
of the 












Department of 
Secondary-School Principals 


of the 


NATIONAL 
EDUCATION ASSOCIATION 













The twenty-second annual meeting of the Department of 
Secondary-School Principals met in Atlantic City, New Jersey, 
Saturday, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, February 26, 28, 
March 1, and 2, 1938. 









FIRST GENERAL SESSION 


The first general session of the twenty-second annual con- 
vention of the Department of Secondary-School Principals was 
a dinner meeting in honor of Charles Hubbard Judd. At seven 
P. M. 488 guests were assembled in the American Dining 
Room of Hotel Traymore, Atlantic City, New Jersey, on Sat- 
urday, February 26, 1938. The careful planning of all de- 
tails by Miss Ada Weckel and Superintendent M. R. McDaniel 
of Oak Park Township High School, Oak Park, Illinois, and 
Principal Henry P. Miller, High School, Atlantic City, who is 
the local chairman of this convention, contributed to the suc- 
cess of the occasion. 

A trio from the Atlantic City High School stimulated con- 
versation. / 

President of the Department, M: G. Jones, Principal of 
Union High School, Huntington Beach, California, introduced 
the speakers. 

President Robert M. Hutchins of the University of Chi- 
cago was the first speaker. 





























6 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


THE ORGANIZATION AND SUBJECT MATTER OF 
GENERAL EDUCATION 


ROBERT M. HUTCHINS 
The University of Chicago 


I have journeyed from Chicago for only one reason, to pay 

my tribute to one of my closest friends, to whom I owe my own 
general education, such knowledge of public education as I 
have, and indeed such common sense as [ still possess. From 
the moment almost nine years ago when I first met Mr. Judd he 
has given me instruction in private and support in public. He 
has been responsible for every intelligent move I have ever 
made. When I have made unintelligent ones, it has been be- 
cause he has been out of town. His departure is the greatest 
personal and official blow I have sustained. This will be ob- 
vious from the remarks I propose to make this evening. This 
is almost the first speech I have ever delivered without showing 
it to your guest of honor first. 

I should like to spend the rest of the evening telling you of 
my devotion and affection for Mr. Judd, and I should do it if 
it were not for the embarrassment I should cause him. I shall 
merely say, “Here was a Caesar; when comes there such an- 
other?” and pass on to the organization and subject matter of 
general education. 

I assume that we are all agreed on the purpose of general 
education and that we want to confine our discussion to its 
organization and subject matter. I believe that general educa- 
tion should be given as soon as possible, that is, as soon as the 
student has the tools and the maturity it requires. I think 
that the program I favor can be experienced with profit by 
Juniors in high school. I therefore propose beginning the pro- 
gram of general education at about the beginning of the Junior 
year in high school. Since I abhor the credit system and wish 
to mark intellectual progress by examinations taken when the 
student is ready to take them, I shall have no difficulty in ad- 
mitting younger students to the program if they are ready for 
it and excluding Juniors if they are not. 

The course of study that I shall propose is rigorous and 
prolonged. I think, however, that the ordinary student can 
complete it in four years. By the ingenious device I have al- 
ready suggested I shall be able to graduate some students ear- 
lier and some later, depending on the ability and industry that 


they display. 

























7 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





General education should, then, absorb the attention of 
students between the ages of fifteen or sixteen and nineteen or 
twenty. This is the case in every country of the world but this. 
It is the case in some eight or nine places in the United States. 
Where the high school and the junior college are part of a large 
city school system, the organization has been successful. 
Where, as at the University of Chicago and Stephens College, 
the institution has either a small high school or none at all, the 
insignificant size of the first two years of the program and the 
large size of the last two years create great difficulties. If you 
have seventy students entering the four-year unit at the junior 
year in high scnool and seven hundred entering at the fresh- 
man year in college, it is absurd to talk about a coherent four- 
year program. You must have a curriculum that the seven 
hundred can enter in the middle without being handicapped 
because they did not enter at the beginning. 

If in such institutions as my own the scheme I advocate 
is to succeed, we shall have to convince local parents, at least, 
that it is wise for them to send their children to us two years 
earlier than they have been accustomed to sending them. I 
think that if parents cannot be persuaded to do this, the Uni- 
versity of Chicago should abandon collegiate work altogether 
and give up its freshman and sophomore year. Those years at 
present are a foreign body in the otherwise admirable consti- 
tution of the university. The students in them have different 
ambitions from those in the divisions above; the teachers have 
different ambitions, too. But if ties cannot be found for these 
two years above, they must be found below; for I do not believe 
that two years at any level is long enough to provide an ade- 
quate education. It is suggestive that two-year units do not 
exist anywhere else in the world; they are known only in the 


United States. 

I may mention at this point one aspect of the organization 
of general education which ought to be trivial but in this coun- 
try is most important. I favor awarding the Bachelor’s degree 
in recognition of genera! education; I favor awarding it at 
about the end of the sophomore year. This suggestion is not so 
startling as many people seem to think. President Butler of 
Columbia advocated it in his annual report for the year 1901-2. 
In France the Baccalauréat is used to indicate the satisfactory 
completion of general education. The reasons for giving it 
the same significance here are, first, that it now has no sig- 








DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS 





[March, 







nificance at all. The Bachelor’s degree means four years in 
college. As the president of Hiram College has lately said: 

To most college “students” who sit long enough and patiently enough, 
and docilely give back a modicum of the wisdom that has flowed past 
their ears, there will come in time the reward of their long-sitting, sheep- | 
skins to cover their intellectual nakedness. . .. The usual requirements for 
graduation, “a minimum of one hundred and twenty hours with addi- 
tional credit for physical education,” may represent little more than 
hours of painful but patient sitting. Their blood relationship to achieve- 
ment is so far removed as to make the claimed relationship laughable. 

But it is not only the credit system and the examination- 
by-the-teacher-who-taught-the-course system that makes the 
A.B. certify merely to four years of sitting. It is also, and I 
think principally, the fact that the standard four-year college 
of liberal arts is and must be concerned with both general and 
specialized education. Even in some of the oldest and most 
conservative of these colleges you will find that the student 
may indulge in extreme specialization at an early stage. Yet 
the preparation with which students enter these colleges is 
such that the colleges must also give them a general education. 
These two aims can only confuse the colleges, and hence con- 
fuse the significance of the degree that they offer. 


\ 
t 
{ 
{ 
Columbia, Johns Hopkins, Chicago, and several other . : 
i 












































places have attempted to meet this situation by dividing the 
first two years from the last two. Some institutions have even 
given them different staff and administrations. Here we face 
again the problems raised by two-year units. The first two 
years is not long enough for general education; the last two is 
not long enough for advanced study. The remedy would seem 
to be a four-year unit beginning with the junior in high school 
and leading to the Bachelor’s degree, and after that a three- 
year unit beginning with the junior year in college and leading 
to the Master’s degree. The Bachelor’s degree would then indi- 
cate an adequate general education, and the Master’s an ade- 
quate experience in advanced study. This Master’s degree 
should also indicate that the holder is qualified for a teaching 
position in which research is not expected or required. 


The last two years of the present college of liberal arts is 
left stranded when the college is divided into upper and lower 
divisions. We have found at Chicago that one of our more dif- 
ficult problems is how to provide any intelligible plan of ad- 
vanced study in the junior and senior years. Some of our de- 
partments have succeeded in persuading students to plan their 
courses beginning with the junior year for three years to the 





—— ee oe 























1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 9 





Master’s degree. These departments have been able to effect 
notable improvements in both the general cultivation and the 
specific training of their graduates. I recommend the award 
of the Bachelor’s degree at the end of the period of general 
education, that is, at about the end of the sophomore year, for 
the sake of advanced study as much as for the sake of general 
education. 


It may be objected that many students will not want to 
add a year to their program of advanced study. This in my 
view is an argument for the plan. We are going to be com- 
pelled to accommodate the youth of the nation up to the end 
of the junior college, that is, to about nineteen or twenty. 
There is no reason why we should accommodate them after 
that. Beginning with the junior year, education should be 
limited to those who are able and willing to profit by it. We 
should rigorously select our students at the university level, by 
which I mean the beginning of the junior year. Since, there- 
fore, many students should terminate their education at the 
end of the sophomore year, one problem is how to induce them 
to do so. I think they will stay on and, through sheer impor- 
tunity, get themselves a degree unless they can receive some 
recognizable and popular insignia at the end of the sophomore 
year. The Bachelor’s degree is recognizable and popular. 
Since it serves no useful purpose at present, I believe it should 
be made to serve the very useful one of persuading students to 
get out of education who should not be permitted to remain 
in it. 

If general education is to be given between the beginning 
of the Junior year in high school and the end of the sopho- 
more year in college and if the Bachelor’s degree is to signify 
the completion of it, the next question is what is the subject 
matter that we should expect the student to master in this pe- 
riod to qualify for his degree. My views on this question are 
well known. I wish I could add that they are well understood. 
I am afraid that what I need to tell you most urgently is what 
I do not regard as a desirable curriculum in general education. 


I do not hold that general education should be limited to 
the classics of Greece and Rome. I do not believe that it is 
possible to insist that all students who should have a general 
education must study. Greek and Latin. I do hold that tradi- 
tion is important in education—that its primary purpose, in- 
deed, is to help the student understand the intellectual tradi- 
tion in which he lives. I do not see how he can reach this un- 











10 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


derstanding unless he understands the great books of the 
Western world, beginning with Homer and coming down to our 
own day. If anybody can suggest a better method of accom- 
plishing the purpose, I shall gladly embrace him and it. 


Nor do I hold that the spirit, the philosophy, the technol- 
ogy, or the theology of the Midlde Ages is important in gen- 
eral education. I have no desire to return to this period any 
more than I wish to revert to antiquity. Some books written 
in the Middle Ages seem to me of some consequence to man- 
kind. Most Ph.D.’s have never heard of them. I should like 
to have all students read some of them. Moreover, medieval 
scholars did have one insight—they saw that in order to read 
books you had to know how to do it. They developed the tech- 
niques of grammar, rhetoric, and logic as methods of reading, 
understanding, and talking about things intelligently and in- 
telligibly. I think it cannot be denied that our students in the 
highest reaches of the university are woefully deficient in all 
these abilities today. They cannot read, write, speak, or think. 
I do not suggest that we should attempt to introduce the triv- 
ium and quadrivium into the American college. I do say that 
we must try to do for our own students what the seven liberal 
arts did for the medieval youth. If the Middle Ages have any 
suggestions to make on this point, we should welcome them. 
We need all the help we can get. 


I should like to point out in passing that in the Middle 
Ages people went to universities at thirteen or fourteen. They 
read books and experienced disciplines that are regarded as 
far too difficult for Ph.D.’s or even university professors to- 
day. Most of the great books of the Western world were writ- 
ten for laymen. Many of them were written for very young 
laymen. Nothing reveals so clearly the indolence and inertia 
into which we have fallen as the steady decline in the num- 
ber of these books read by students and the steady elimination 
of instruction in the disciplines through which they may be un- 
derstood. And all this has gone on in the sacred name of lib- 
eralizing the curriculum. 


The curriculum I favor is not too difficult even for very 
ordinary American students. It is difficult for the professors, 
but not for the students. And the younger the students are 
the better they like the books, because they are not old enough 
to know that the books are too hard for them to read. The en- 
tire course of study that I propose is now in force at St. John’s 
College, Maryland. There an unselected group of indiffer- 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 11 


ently prepared students are studying these books with tre- 
mendous enthusiasm thirty-five hours a week. They read last 
fall ten dialogues of Plato and voted to have extra classes so 
that they might read and discuss all the rest of them. In con- 
nection with the reading, they are going through a formidable 
course of instruction in grammar, rhetoric, logic, and mathe- 
matics. The entire freshman class at Columbia is now reading 
and discussing twenty-five of the great books in philosophy and 
literature. I understand that “Rushing Week” at Columbia 
was a failure because the students were too interested in the 
reading to be interested in fraternities, that the books are the 
chief subject of discussion at all informal student gatherings, 
and that the only complaint comes from teachers in other 
courses who feel that their work is suffering from the enthusi- 
asm the books in the humanities course arouse. For seven 
years and more I have taught these books to unselected pupils 
in our University High School and to freshmen, sophomores, 
juniors, and seniors in college. None of them has suggested 
that the books were too hard or that they were not worth read- 
ing. I can testify from this experience—though not, of course, 
very scientifically—that students who can read anything thrive 


on these books and that the younger they are the more they 
thrive. 


Those who think that this is a barren, arid program, re- 
mote from real life and devoid of contemporary interest, have 
either never read the books or do not know how to teach. Or 
perhaps they have merely forgotten their youth. These books 
contain what the race regards as the permanent, abiding con- 
tributions its intellect and imagination have made. They deal 
with fundamental questions. It is a mistake to imagine that 
young people are interested only in football, the dramatic asso- 
ciation, and the student newspaper. I think it could be proved 
that these activities have grown to their present overwhelming 
importance in proportion as the curriculum has been denatured. 
Students are interested in the extracurriculum because the cur- 
riculum is so stupid. Young people are interested in fundamen- 
tal questions. They are interested in great minds and great 
works of art. They are, of course, interested in the bearing of 
the ideas in these books on the problems of the world to-day. It 
is, therefore, impossible to keep out of the discussion, even if 
the teacher were so fossilized as to want to, the consideration of 
current events. But these events then take on meaning; the 
points of difference and the points of similarity between then 

















12 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


and now can be presented. Think what a mine of references 
to what is now going on in the world is Plato’s Republic or 
Mill’s Essay on Liberty. If I had to prescribe an exclusive diet 
for young Americans, I should rather have them read books 
like these than gain their political, economic, and social orien- 
tation by listening to the best radio commentators or absorbing 
the New York Times. Fortunately we do not have to make the 
choice; they can read the books and listen to the commentators 
and absorb the New York Times, too. I repeat: these import- 
ant agencies of instruction—the radio and the newspaper— 
and all other experiences of life, as a matter of fact—take on 
intelligibility as the student comes to understand the tradition 
in which he lives. Though we have made great advances in 
technology, so that the steam turbine of last year. may not be 
of much value in understanding the steam turbine of 1938, we 
must remember that the fundamental questions today are the 
same with which the Greeks were concerned. The answers 
that the Greeks gave are still the answers with which we must 
begin if we hope to give the right answer today. The answers 
they gave have affected human history so profoundly that we 
cannot approach the issue of the purpose of the state, for exam- 
ple, without unconsciously reflecting their views. We may ap- 
ply to these early thinkers the words of Cardinal Newman 
about Aristotle: 

Do not suppose, that in thus appealing to the ancients, I am throwing 

back the world two thousand years, and fettering philosophy with the 
reasonings of paganism. While the world lasts, will Aristotle’s doctrine 
on these matters last, for he is the oracle of nature and of truth. While 
we are men, we cannot help, to a great extent, being Aristotelians, for 
the great Master does but analyze the thoughts, feelings, views, and opin- 
ions of human kind. He has told us the meaning of our own words and 
ideas, before we were born. In many subject-matters, to think correctly, 
is to think like Aristotle;.and we are his disciples whether we will or no, 
though we may not know it. 
Do not suppose that in thus including the ancients in my course 
of study I am excluding the moderns. I do not need to make 
a case for the moderns. I do apparently need to remind you 
that the ancients may have some slight value, too. 


Do not suppose, either, that because I have used as exam- 
ples the great books in literature, philosophy, and the social 
sciences, I am ignoring natural science. The great works in 
natural science and the great experiments must be a part and 
an important part of general education. Here again I am not 
concerned with the method; I am concerned with the end. The 
student should understand the leading ideas in the natural 































PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 13 





1988] 


sciences. Do you think he does to-day? On the contrary, what he 
gets to-day is either a superficial shower from a survey course 
or professional instruction from the first day of freshman year, 
based apparently on the notion that every member of the class 
is going to be a chemical engineer. General education is not 
professional education. The curriculum must be designed to 
prepare the student for intelligent citizenship. The type of 
scientific instruction that I received in college has no place in 
the kind of college I am proposing. As for survey courses of 
the usual variety, they have no place there either. They degen- 
erate too easily into a rapid tour of all the facts known in phys- 
ics, chemistry, and biology. The basis of the scientific program 
should be the great landmarks of scientific work, the books and 
the experiments. 

Neither at Columbia nor Chicago has anybody interested 
in the kind of curriculum I am suggesting had the facilities for 
the kind of scientific instruction we have wanted to give. At 
St. John’s College those facilities are available and are now 
being used. It appears that between a half and a third of the 
course of study will be mathematics and natural science. 


Another problem that has disturbed those who have dis- 
cussed in this issue is what books I am going to select to cram 
down the throats of the young. The answer is that if any rea- 
sonably intelligent person will conscientiously try to list the 
one hundred most important books that have ever been written 
I will accept his list. I feel safe in doing this because (a) the 
books would all be worth reading, and (b) his list would be 
almost the same as mine. There is, in fact, startling unanimity 
about what the good books are. The real question is whether 
they have any place in education. The suggestion that nobody 
knows what books to select is put forward as an alibi by those 
who have never read any that would be on anybody’s list. 

Only one criticism of this program has been made which 
has seemed to me on the level. That is that students who can- 
not learn through books will not be able to learn through the 
course of study that I propose. This, of course, is true. It is 
what might be called a self-evident proposition. I suggest, 
however, that we employ this curriculum for students who can 
be taught to read and that we continue our efforts to discover 
methods of teaching the rest of the youthful population how to 
do it. The undisputed fact that some students cannot read any 
books should not prevent us from giving those who can read 
some the chance to read the best there are. 








DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


I could go on here for hours discussing the details of this 
program and the details of the attacks that have been made 
upon it. But these would be details. The real question is 
which side are you on? If you believe that the aim of general 
education is to teach students to make money; if you believe 
that the educational system should mirror the chaos of the 
world; if you think that we have nothing to learn from the 
past; if you think that the way to prepare students for life is 
to put them through little fake experiences inside or outside 
the classroom; if you think that education is information; if 
you believe that the whims of children should determine what 
they should study—then I am afraid we can never agree. If, 
however, you believe that education should train students to 
think so that they may act intelligently when they face new 
situations; if you regard it as important for them to under- 
stand the tradition in which they live; if you feel that the pres- 
ent educational program is unsatisfactory because of its “pro- 
gressivism,” utilitarianism, and diffusion; if you want to open 
up to the youth of America the treasures of the thought, imag- 
ination, and accomplishment of the past—then we can agree, 
for I shall gladly accept any course of study that will take us 


even a little way along this road. 


Dr. Judd was the second speaker. 


SPECIALIZATION, THE BANE OF SECONDARY 
EDUCATION 


CHARLES H. JUDD 
The University of Chicago 

One of my friends told me about a man in Indianapolis 
who had been successful for many years in conducting a large 
business. As he grew old, he had associated with himself his 
two sons. One day he called in the sons, who by that time had 
gained some acquaintance with the establishment and its sales 
policies, and said to them that he noticed that the profits of 
the year just closing had been less than usual. “I have con- 
cluded,” he went on to say, “that probably new methods are 
needed in order to keep our business moving forward. I have 
therefore decided to turn over the concern to you. You are 
under no obligation to continue the policies which I have fol- 
lowed. I am going to take a trip around the world.” 

That man was a practical psychologist. He knew when 








oe 
~ 


——_— —_— eee a ae a. ae [6a 














1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 15 
the patterns of his nervous system had become fixed. What is 
perhaps more to his credit, he knew what to do when he was 
no longer flexible and adaptive. I imagine that probably he 
was in reality more flexible and adaptive than most old men 
are. The very fact that he had interests large enough to en- 
gage his attention and excite his curiosity showed him to be 
still plastic. 

Plasticity of mind is a virtue which the educational system 
has not always recognized as of major importance. There was 
a time, if I read the history of education aright, when ac- 
ceptance of authority and acquaintance with the pronounce- 
ments of authority were regarded as the true goals of all 
schooling. Men were expected to conform and were regarded 
as showing by conformity the highest intelligence. 

The educational system is by no means free today from 
traces of the earlier devotion to conformity. The teacher who 
ranks at the top of the class the pupil who answers questions 
in the familiar terms of the textbook or in the impressive lan- 
guage used by the instructor himself is either consciously or 
unconsciously attempting to pattern according to fixed stand- 
ards the thinking of those whom he instructs. Such a teacher 
is, in fact, exploiting human nature. Young people come to 
school full of what Kipling calls “insatiable curiosity.” They 
are eager to rummage into every accessible corner of the uni- 
verse. They are surprised at everything which they encounter 
because, after all, this is an astonishing universe. They form 
all kinds of weird hypotheses and are delighted with every dis- 
covery that they make. Harsh experiences tame these young 
hopefuls and tie them down to realities. Of the harsh experi- 
ences, none are more exacting than those encountered in the 
schools. In ordinary life there are usually several ways of 
dealing with situations.and attaining moderate success. In 
school the variety of correct answers seems to be strictly lim- 
ited. Conformity soon comes to be the accepted method of get- 
ting on well with teachers and with the marking system. 


One cannot quarrel with the schools when they insist on 
some degree of conformity. There are accepted patterns which 
must be followed if one is to formulate correct English sen- 
tences. If one starts with a singular subject, it is intolerable 
that the following verb be plural. Similarly, if Euclidian pos- 
tulates and axioms are accepted, the rest of geometry seems to 
be inevitable. The schools are obliged to recognize these hard 
and unalterable facts. The schools cannot ignore standards. 

















DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


The difficulty with education when it does its duty in en- 

forcing rigid standards is that it often leads young people to 
proceed in all their thinking on the assumption that the whole 
world operates in a perfectly regular way. The expectation of 
uniform procedure at all times proves to be misleading. It is 
something of a shock when one has learned in school that there 
is a certain well-established law of economics to discover that 
some great corporation goes on its profit-making way utterly 
unregardful of that law. It is sometimes fatal to maintain 
that one has the right of way when it is strictly true that one 
does have the right of way according to the rules of traffic. 
Modern life is a curious mixture of law and relaxations of law, 
of principles laid down by the fathers and revised by later gen- 
erations, of things that one may do, but had better not do. 

There are examples without end of the demand in the 
world for adaptability. Consider, for example, that recently 
much-discussed phenomenon of technological unemployment. 
Here is an accountant of excellent training and unsullied rec- 
ord. This man is the embodiment of accuracy and perfection 
of style in his professional work. Suddenly the world passes 
through one of those inexplicable evolutions which students of 
economics call a “business cycle” and our accountant is out of 
a job. If he were like his child, he would turn to some new toy, 
but he is not like his child in ninety-nine cases out of a hun- 
dred. He does not know how to turn to anything. He looks 
at the advertisements every morning in the hope that someone 
needs an accountant. He walks up and down the streets of the 
financial district of the city looking for a position as an ac- 
countant. There is just one part of the social cosmos into 
which our individual trained to be an accountant can fit. He 
has spent his life cultivating proficiency in one art, and he in- 
sists on practicing that one art. He finds himself bewildered 
and lost in what has become for him a social chaos, inhospitable 
to the talent which he has polished by long use. 

It is quite certain that some day there will be general ac- 
ceptance of the educational principle that the two complemen- 
tary duties of the educational system are to cultivate absolute 
conformity to standards and at the same time prepare the 
products of the schools to live in a world which demands for 
success a high degree of adaptability, or willingness and ca- 
pacity to abandon all accepted standards and meet new situa- 
tions with new forms of behavior. It will require a radical 
change in the attitude of some of our colleagues to be happy 




























PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 17 





1938] 


in the new educational world which will be ushered in by the 
acceptance of these dual objectives of education. I remember 
very clearly the teacher of geometry in the high school which 
I attended. She has long since gone to the reward which was 
abundantly due her. That reward makes up, I hope, for the 
difficulties which she encountered in changing a group of semi- 
civilized miscreants into followers of Euclid. She used to mark 
a demonstration in geometry wrong if there did not appear at 
the end in neat form the three triumphant letters Q.E.D. I 
cannot by any stretch of imagination picture that adherent to 
standards accepting the duty of making anyone flexible. 

The thesis which I am trying to defend in this paper 
reaches in its implications far beyond the behavior of pupils 
and teachers. School administrators, parents, members of 
school boards, college professors, citizens, private and public, 
and all other human beings who can be thought of as influen- 
tial in determining educational policies now tend, and have for 
a long time tended, so emphatically to favor rigidity in meth- 
ods of teaching and in choice of subjects to be included in the 
school curriculum that it is going to be difficult to turn their 
interest to the cultivation of flexibility. 

One special obstacle in the way of securing interest in 
flexibility is the fact that high-grade scholarship is always 
closely related to specialization. The universities of this coun- 
try are committed to specialization. They want no intellec- 
tual Jack-of-all trades. It is quite unthinkable to the typical 
academic mind that a student should be well grounded in two 
subjects which are not directly related. It is conceded that a 
scholar may know something about a subject closely related 
to his specialty. A chemist may know something about physics, 
and a student of French may know something about English. 
It is not to be expected that a historian should be competent 
in biology or that a mathematician should be competent in 
philology. When state departments of education become pow- 
erful and exercise their full influence in directing the educa- 
tion of pupils in secondary schools, they take sides with the 
universities and require close specialization on the part of 
teachers. They frequently go so far as to write on each cer- 
tificate to teach a very short list of subjects in which the 

teacher may practice his art. 

I am not in any doubt as to the advantages of minute, spe- 
cialized scholarship. As a student of psychology, however, I 
am aware of the consequences of specialization. For some 









18 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


years past the educational world has been informed that there 
is little or no transfer of training. The evidence which has 
been cited in support of this statement is drawn from an exam- 
ination of the many examples of extreme specialization readily 
found in every school—specialization which has closed the 
minds of teachers as well as pupils to interest in more than one 
subject. Specialization builds a high wall around the mind. 
Anyone who has grown accustomed to the sheltered life within 
a specialty will seldom take any risks by attempting to go out- 
side the region with which he is familiar. It is quite the fash- 
ion these days to assert with pride that one does not know any- 
thing in fields in which one has not studied. The student of 
Latin knows nothing about statistics; the student of statistics 
knows nothing about literature; the student of literature knows 
nohing about biology—and each is proud of his limitations. 


Narrowness in one’s intellectual life would not be so bad if 
one did not have to live with other people. I should be per- 
fectly willing to allow my colleagues to shut themselves up in 
their own fields if it were not for the fact that we have to meet 
together in the University Senate. At the meetings of that 
body questions have to be settled which are not questions of 
mathematics or language or of the kind to which our depart- 
ment of education gives its special attention. I have observed 
a number of cases in the meetings of our Senate when the evi- 
dence seemed to point emphatically to a complete absence of 
transfer of intelligence. Indeed, the only descriptive term 
which I think can be appropriately used in describing some of 
these cases is the term “negative transfer.” 


What I have observed can be seen, I am sure, in all facul- 
ties of all colleges and all secondary schools. Not only do spe- 
cialization and its consequent influences appear in faculty 
meetings, but they are socially contagious. Teachers of the 
languages make derogatory remarks about all science teach- 
ing, and science teachers reciprocate. I happen to know that 
everyone makes remarks about the teaching in the department 
of education. Students often believe what their instructors 
tell them. I know this to be true because it has sometimes 
taken me several weeks of contact with a student who was com- 
pelled to elect courses in education to convince him that the re- 
marks made about education by some noneducational member 
of the faculty are in need of reinterpretation. 

What I am trying to say is that our major academic ten- 
dency, the tendency to demand specialization, is dangerously 





1938) PROCEEDINGS 0F TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 19 


likely to make our students like ourselves—narrow-minded. 
Narrow-mindedness is a trait which is sharply to be contrasted 
with intellectual flexibility of plasticity. 

I pointed out earlier that it does not seem necessary under 
existing conditions to present any vigorous argument in sup- 
port of conformity, or what I am now calling “specialization.” 
We may with propriety spend such time and energy as we have 
at our disposal asking whether there is any way in which the 
secondary school can actually cultivate plasticity and flexibil- 
ity. I am encouraged to believe that ways can be found of 
making pupils flexible. 

If there is one characteristic more conspicuous than an- 
other in a mind that is flexible, it is universal interest in new 
experiences. If you encounter an individual who is interested 
in any subject that comes up, you are in the presence of a mind 
that is quite certain to be flexible. If this statement is ac- 
cepted as true, the prescription of a method of procedure in 
secondary-school teaching is fairly easy. Keep curiosity or 
universal interest in new experiences alive. Put negatively, 
this prescription is: Do not suppress the interest which pupils 
have when they enter school. 

I believe that the secondary schools of this country have a 
new opportunity to teach interestingly. They should take full 
advantage of this opportunity. A few years ago, when attend- 
ance on the secondary school was relatively uncommon and the 
urgency to get young people out into practical life was intense, 
the secondary school gave a great deal of attention to what was 
called “economy of time.” The courses taught in the schools 
were condensed, and all the interesting details were taken out. 
The fact is that most of the teachers of the present generation 
have to carry on independent researches in order to correct 
this omission in their own education and to discover the inter- 
esting materials that exist in their subjects. 

The time has come when economy of time is not the en- 
grossing requirement. I suggest that the requirement be set 
up for every secondary-school class period that at least one in- 
teresting fact not in the textbook be presented by the teacher. 
This requirement would send teachers scurrying to the libra- 
ries and to other sources for something out of the ordinary and 
would greatly stimulate both teachers and pupils. 

Another suggestion of a like kind is that a number of 
courses be organized in every school which are expressly de- 
signed to be interesting. I think I will venture the heresy that 





20 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


every pupil should be required to elect each semester at least 
one snap course in which nothing is taught because it has to 
be learned. 

I have often thought I would spend some time in my old 
age writing an article or perhaps a book entitled Great Snap 
Courses. I shall send out a questionnaire and ask graduates to 
tell me what they learned in snap courses, how many they took, 
how teachers in these courses behaved, and so on. I shall re- 
duce all my findings to tables or possibly to some form appro- 
priately describable as a contribution to visual education. I 
believe that royalties on such a book would probably exceed 
those that I have been able to collect on my less scholarly writ- 
ings. 

If anyone recoils against one snap course per pupil per 
semester, I have another suggestion. Let the secondary schools 
follow the example of the colleges and give their pupils general 
survey courses, or, as they are sometimes called, “orientation 
courses.” A general survey course can properly break away 
from some of the drab traditions of the past. Most of these 
traditions are, as I have pointed out, traditions of specializa- 
tion. Let us open the windows and let science and literature 
and some real classics in, not in rigid courses systematically 
organized for purposes of intellectual regimentation, but in dis- 
cursive courses designed to stimulate curiosity and universal 
interest. 

I must, however, restrain my enthusiasm for these unor- 
thodox courses. I could put up a real argument for flexibility 
of mind by appealing to the facts of biological evolution. I 
could show that the cerebrum is the most flexible part of the 
human organism. I could show that old age and senile decline 
come when men and women lose interest in new experiences. 
I am sure that I am right in making a plea for plasticity as one 
of the major virtues. I may have obscured the issue by sug- 
gesting particular devices. If so, I ask you to forget my de- 
vices but remember the main truth, which is that a secondary 
school that specializes pupils too intensively is undoubtedly a 
school seriously in need of reorganization. 





1988] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 


SECOND GENERAL SESSION 
Monday, February 28, 1938 


The second meeting of the convention was divided into 
two sessions: (1) A high-school program held in the Sub- 
marine Grill of Hotel Traymore at 2 P. M., and (2) a junior- 
college session in Ocean Hall, Marlborough-Blenheim Hotel. 


High-School Program 
The theme of this session was the Inflwence on Secondary 
Schools of the Codperative Study of Secondary-School Stand- 
ards. 
Prin. Paul E. Elicker of Newton High School, Newton- 
ville, Massachusetts ; Chairman of Atlantic Zone Visiting Com- 
mittee, and First Vice President of the Department, presided. 


Principal Byron J. Rivett of Northwestern High School, 
Detroit, Michigan, presented his paper, As a School Principal 
Sees It. 


THE INFLUENCE ON SECONDARY SCHOOLS OF THE 
CO6PERATIVE STUDY OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL 
STANDARDS 


B. J. RIVETT 
Principal, Northwestern High School, Detroit, Michigan 

The six accrediting associations in the United States have 
done a great deal to improve the secondary schools by insisting 
upon standards and by regular inspection. The public high 
schools are supported by the state and local communities but 
each individual school, no matter how well conducted and how 
well equipped, needs appraisal by an outsider. A reason for 
this is the fact that human nature is such that, without crit- 
icism, one tends to become self-satisfied. Therefore, if the 
administrator is honest with himself, he must admit the value 
of appraisal by an agency outside the local school system. 

Speaking particularly of the North Central Association, 
the present system of reports and visits is too indefinite and in- 
complete. Much has been done by them in raising the quali- 
fications for teachers and in improving library and laboratory 
facilities. On the other hand, little has been accomplished to 
stimulate the study of the schools’ aims and objectives, the 
community, the pupils themselves, the degree to which the 





22 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


school is serving the community, and in actually realizing its 
objectives.* The routine of conducting a school requires so 
much time and energy that the principal is inclined to give 
little attention to the larger aspects of the school’s problems. 


To be more specific, what did we learn by participating in 
the Codperative Study of Secondary-School Standards? First, 
the preliminary check lists sent us were valuable because they 
gave us in detail what were considered as necessary and de- 
sirable in conducting a secondary school. Several members of 
our staff studied these carefully and made suggestions for re- 
vision particularly with reference to a large city high school. 
Secondly, we considered it a great privilege to be chosen as one 
of the two hundred schools to be visited by the committee, al- 
though we knew that it involved much extra work. Very little 
is of real value unless some effort is involved. It may be of 
interest to those that did not take an active part to give some 
detail of the procedure. The check lists entered from A to N 
were as follows: (A) Information and Instruction; (B) Philos- 
ophy, Purposes, and Objectives; (C) Pupil Population; (D) 
Curriculum and Course of Study; (E) Pupil Activity Pro- 
gram; (F) Library Service; (G) Guidance Service; (H) In- 
struction; (I) Outcomes; (J) School Staff; (K) The School 
Plant; (L) Administration; (M) Personal Data; (N) Indi- 
vidual Evaluation. 

We spent a great deal of time on these fourteen check lists 
and all members of the teaching staff assisted in preparing 
them for use of the committee. The assistant principal did all 
the work on the school plant because he was trained as an en- 
gineer and spent several years teaching in a vocational high 
school. It was necessary to compile the data for the pupil pop- 
ulation from the pupils then in school in order that it might be 
strictly up to date. Some of these data are required in city and 
state reports so that the figures were readily available, but we 
had not recently determined the socio-economic status of the 
pupils. We learned that over sixty per cent of them were in 
the laboring classes, skilled and unskilled. In order that the 
teacher should have some part in the preparation of check lists, 
each one graded herself on the Individual Evaluation lists. 
Afterwards these were reviewed by the department heads and 
the principal. We gave a great deal of attention to the one 
on outcomes. The ten department heads and the principal 


*The defects of the present system of accrediting are well stated b 
the coérdinator Walter C. Eells in the January, 1938, Educational Record. 





1938) PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 23 


studied the items and the final report was the result of a con- 
ference of this group. 

Previous to this study we had not been obliged to state 
definitely our philosophy, purposes, and objectives and we had 
not given enough thought to the outcomes, that is, how well we 
were accomplishing our objectives. These are two of the most 
valuable check lists for any school because the administrators 
and the teachers must of necessity do some thinking. If the 
outcomes do not agree with the objectives, there should be re- 
organization of curriculum and improvements in instruction. 
For a number of years we had not satisfied with our curricu- 
lum and we had been reorganizing it to meet the demands of a 
changing pupil population. We were pleased to use the check 
lists on the curriculum to assist us in clarifying our ideas. Per- 
haps enough has been said to illustrate the value of these tests 
to any teaching staff. 


SURVEY BY VISITORS 


Another important part of the school’s participation was 
the visit by a committee of five members. These were Frank 
C. Jenkins and John P. Lozo from the Washington office, Wes- 
ley Beadle from the State Department of Instruction, Harlan 
Koch and Edgar Johnston of the University of Michigan Col- 
lege of Education. They spent three days in the Northwestern 
High School visiting all teachers to see the classes in opera- 
tion. They also spent some time studying our check lists, 
called on the Superintendent of Schools and the Assistant Su- 
perintendent in Charge of High Schools, and had luncheon 
with the Northwest Kiwanis Club, composed of business and 
professional men in our community. Finally, they met all of 
our teachers in a meeting to discuss the aims of the study. 
Thus, this committee of. visitors must have been able to ap- 
praise the school quite accurately. We urged them to give us 
constructive criticism but they were reluctant to do this be- 
cause they did not have the authority of an accrediting agency. 
However, we believe this should be done when visited for the 
purpose of accrediting a school. 


OTHER ASPECTS OF THE SURVEY 


The Coéperative Study of Secondary-School Standards 
also received additional information about the school by means 
of standardized and judgment tests given to one hundred elev- 
enth grade pupils, by means of a study made of the success of 














24 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


our graduates in colleges, by a follow up study of former pu- 
pils, and by a questionnaire sent to parents. We have learned 
much from the last two, in particular. Obviously, we did not 
see the questionnaire sent to parents because frank and honest 
statements were desired, but the committee sent us the results. 
In general, the parents’ criticisms were just-and dealt chiefly 
with the faults of certain teachers and with the overcrowded 
conditions in our school. 

A questionnaire was sent to several hundred former pupils 
with the request that it be filled out and returned by mail. The 
questions included the following: name, address, if graduated, 
race, sex, why pupil left school, present occupation, income per 
week, extent that high school helped in securing and holding 
present position, extent that school course and life developed 
interest in and appreciation of the following fields and par- 
ticipation since leaving school: athletics and sports, music, 
theaters and movies, use of libraries, reading books and maga- 
zines outside of libraries, interest in good health, religious ac- 
tivities, citizenship activities, social activities, and interest in 
formal education. In addition, these former pupils were asked 
to characterize their total experience in high school as— 


Most satisfaction experience I have ever had 

Thoroughly satisfied with most things 

Well satisfied but wish a few things were different 

Fairly well satisfied, but many things were disappointing 

Not very well satisfied, although a few features were 
pretty good 

Decidedly dissatisfied with most things 

Most unsatisfactory experience I have ever had 


Then followed two questions, namely, 

What is the most satisfying thing about the school, as you 
think back over your experience with it, and what is 
the most disappointing thing about the school? 

Ninety-nine replies were received, of which 42 are boys 

and 57 girls, 87 white and 12 colored, 64 were graduated from 
high school and 35 left before graduation. The occupational 
status was as follows: 

Working for wages, 78 Unmarried giris at home, 6 

Housewives, 12 Unemployed boys, 3 


The weekly salaries of 37 boys ranged from $4 to $60, of 37 
girls $6 to $20. The median wages for boys was $25, of girls 
$19. Twenty-nine of the 37 girls worked in offices as stenog- 
raphers, typists, bookkeepers or general office girls. Sixteen 


















PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 25 





1938] 


of the 37 boys worked in automobile factories as apprentices, 
machinists, or laborers. 

They were asked to state the amount of help the school 
had given them to secure and hold their present positions. 

Thirty-two said the school had been of great help or indis- 

pensable ; 

Sixteen said it had been of little or no help. — 

By analyzing these figures, it was found that of the 32 who 
had received great help 17 were office girls, 2 were Ford ap- 
prentices, 2 were housewives, and the remainder were holding 
positions in which high-school graduation was required. Of 
the 16 who had received little or no help, 10 were boys working 
in a factory and 2 were unemployed. 

The following are the figures for the question, 

To what extent do you feel that your school course and 
life developed interest in an appreciation of the following fields 
and participation in them since you left school? 


Very much Very little 
and some and none 


Athletics and Sports ....................--........--- 


Theater and movies ...................2------------. 56 35 
Use of libraries....................2.22222.--2.222------ 67 24 
pT ERR LEE PIES Seon Ie meee De 46 46 
Reading books and magazines outside 

Sg ea eel anc Ae ieee a ae 73 19 
Interest in good health............................. 84 7 
Religious activities -.......................--.-..- .. 483 43 
Citizenship activities -............................- 74 18 
Social activities .............,......2.-.-.--..-------++- 73 19 
Interest in further formal education ... 67 21 


Some were not checked: 

An interpretation of these leads one to believe that these 
young people think we. are emphasizing the following very 
much: interest in good health, citizenship and social activities, 
athletics and sports, reading books and magazines outside of 
libraries. To a lesser extent we are emphasizing further for- 
mal education, use of libraries, and the theater and movies. 
The smaller numbers for music and religious activities are ex- 
plained by the fact that music is an elective subject and reli- 
gion is not taught directly. The nearest approach to it are the 
Hi-Y and the Girl Reserve Clubs. 

The next question is one of interest because it gives the 
general impression of the school left in the minds of the young 
people one to three years afterwards. Of 95 who answered 









26 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


this question, 77 or over 80% (33) were well satisfied, (28) 
thoroughly satisfied, (16) or thought it the most satisfactory 
experience they had ever had. Six were not well satisfied and 
only one was decidedly dissatisfied with most things. The re- 
mainder (1) was fairly well satisfied, but many things were 
disappointing. 

The answers to the question, What is the most satisfying 
thing about the school, are encouraging. Thirteen did not an- 
swer this. Of the remainder, 30 said the capable and friendly 
teachers, 20 the social life and contacts, 12 the athletic activi- 
ties, 22 the satisfaction they got from studying certain school 
subjects (every department was mentioned), 5 the develop- 
ment of their personality, 4 the opportunity to choose the sub- 
jects they liked, and 4 the variety of subjects. Among the mis- 
cellaneous replies, 2 mentioned graduation, one the short school 
day, and one colored boy said the fairness on racial discussion 
in the social science classes. One boy said high school is edu- 
cation and fun combined. 

The replies to the question, What is the most disappoint- 
ing thing, are interesting in the variety of answers. Twenty- 
six did not answer or said they had no complaint, 3 regretted 
they had to leave, and 15 were personal matters which is no 
criticism of the school, such as they did not finish high school 
or did not enter social activities. This leaves 40 who had a 
real criticism. 

We have devoted considerable time to this study of former 
pupils because it gives a fair opinion of what young people 
think after they have left school. 


CONCLUSIONS 

We have few suggestions to make if this procedure is fol- 
lowed in accrediting secondary schools. We would not reduce 
the number of check lists but we believe that some of them can 
be abbreviated. Furthermore, we suggest that, if regional as- 
sociations use this plan to inspect schools, they spend sufficient 
time to do it well. Recently, the State Department of Public 
Instruction and the University of Michigan made a one day 
inspection of the Northwestern school which was inadequate 
for a large high school. We recognize that in this case the of- 
ficials could not afford any more time because of the large 
number of schools which required inspection. Incidentally, 
would it be possible to invite an educated layman to assist in 
these inspections? 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 27 


We have heard a criticism of using this detailed proce- 
dure by a regional association to accredit a secondary school. 
One principal said the amount of time and effort is entirely 
too great. If it were necessary every year we would agree with 
him, but we understand that the committee would not require 
it more often than once in three or five years. We admit that 
a great amount of work is necessary but we believe it is worth 
the effort. 

In conclusion, we have nothing but praise for the work of 
the committee and the visitors. The Codperative Study of Sec- 
ondary-School Standards is one of the most important contri- 
butions for the improvement of secondary schools that has 
been made in the last two decades. We hope that the regional 
associations will use the check lists and the results of this 
study so that the secondary schools of the country will continue 
to improve the services to their community. 


This report was followed by a report by Floyd W. Reeves, 
Chairman of President Roosevelt’s Advisory: Committee on Ed- 
ucation on The Federal Government and the Secondary-School. 


THE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT AND THE SECON- 
DARY SCHOOL 


FLOYD W. REEVES 


At the request of the Chief Executive, this Committee for 
more than a year has been studying the problems of Federal 
relationships to State and local conduct of education. From 
the beginning it has seemed clear that any fundamental clari- 
fication in those relationships must be based upon a thorough 
consideration of the place of education in the United States 
to-day. 

The schools are only one of the devices used by society for 
the care and training of children and youth, but for that pur- 
pose they are now beyond doubt the leading institution. They 
have thus become the object of increasing concern, not because 
their achievements have not been great, but because the mag- 
nitude of the task continues to increase. 

Education at the secondary level in this country was for a 
long time considered a special privilege, available only to a few 
on the payment of tuition fees, and designed chiefly as a pre- 
liminary preparation for certain professions. During the lat- 





28 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


ter part of the nineteenth century the growing realization of 
the implications of democracy led to the development of the 
high school as a part of the common-school system. 


In retrospect, nothing in the evolution of American edu- 
cation is more striking in its sweep than the development of 
the secondary school. Nothing like it had ever happened in 
any other country. As late as 1890 in the United States only 
3.8 per cent of the number of young people 14 to 17 years of 
age were enrolled in public high schools; at present more than 
60 per cent of the population of high-school age are enrolled 
in public high schools. In 1987 for the first time the number 
of graduates from high schools in a single year passed the mil- 
lion mark. There are now some 25,000 public high schools in 
which over 230,000 teachers instruct almost 6,000,000 boys 
and girls, by means of a curriculum that is gradually, although 
inadequately, being adapted to meet the individual and social 
needs of American youth. 


The expansion of high-school courses to meet one new 
demand after another without any fundamental reorganiza- 
tion of programs has brought great confusion into their offer- 
ings. The pupil, his parents, and the public frequently see no 
sensible or necessary meaning in the arrangement of the cur- 
riculum. There is a great need for a recodification of educa- 
tional objectives and methods in the secondary schools, so that 
pupils, parents, teachers, and taxpayers may have a definite 
picture of the world of human knowledgé and human attitudes 
into which the pupils are being introduced. 


In any reorganization of secondary schools, a central place 
should be given to their major task of preparing all youth to 
the age of at least eighteen for useful, self-sustaining member- 
ship in American society. This means that there must be far- 
reaching modifications of secondary education, new curricu- 
lums, new courses, and, possibly, new methods of instruction. 

The curriculum reforms needed in the secondary schools 
can be achieved only through decentralized efforts and by 
methods that meet with widespread public approval. It seems 
not too much to hope that schoolmen may be able to settle their 
major differences with respect to the objectives and procedures 
of the public secondary school, and then to provide the leader- 
ship that is needed to bring about change on a Nation-wide 
front. 

Particularly in a democracy, based on the absence of class 
distinctions, is there need to maintain unity in the educational 





ee eee ee eee ee ee ee 


rth O83 Sg wn“ aA wm & =~ — ee Oo 


ase. u ¢ 


1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 29 


system. European educational organization, based on a two- 
class system of society, furnishes no appropriate model for 
the schools of the United States. The dual type of school sys- 
tem maintained by most of the countries of Europe, with one 
set of opportunities for young people who are to enter the pro- 
fessions and another for the working classes, must be avoided 
in this country if the purposes of American democracy are to 
be achieved. 

Most high schools offer some types of training designed 
specifically to prepare for employment, but programs in the 
vocational field are relatively undeveloped. The schools are 
still groping for the solution of many problems that must be 
solved before sound programs of occupational preparation can 
be provided on a substantial scale. 

For adequate occupational preparation, many young peo- 
ple need special vocational training, but consideration should 
also be given to the far greater importance of general training 
for useful employment. Underlying each particular special- 
ized trade or calling must be the basic skills and habits—accu- 
rate arithmetic, careful use of the language, and responsibility 
and conscientious work. Both elementary and secondary 
schools need better facilities for giving this basic training 
which will prepare a young person to learn a job quickly and, 
if the job vanishes in the course of technological change, to 
shift over without serious trouble to some new type of work. 
The useful habits and traits roughly included in the term 
“character,” together with flexibility of mind and a wide range 
of interests, are the essential foundation for a successful work- 
ing life in any occupation. 

The complex opportunities and pitfalls of modern life 
make it practically impossi+le for most high-school pupils to 
make a wise choice of future occupation on the basis of casual 
observation of the world around them. Yet only a few schools 
are providing educational and vocational guidance under 
trained and capable counselors. In the absence of suitable pro- 
vision for guidance, much of the high-school education now 
provided fails to meet the needs of the pupils. More attention 
to guidance is needed, with a more realistic definition of the 
requirements for ultimate employment and a better supply of 
data as to relative opportunities in the various fields. 

The Committee believes strongly that there are few edu- 
cational problems now before the American people to which 
they should give more earnest thought than the need for sound 





30 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


and adequate programs of vocational education. In these days 
of economic insecurity there are few phases of life more vital 
to young people than getting and holding jobs. All schools, 
and particularly all secondary schools, must seek to improve 
the preparation they give for the world that awaits their pu- 
pils beyond the classroom. 


For twenty years vocational education of an intensive and 
specialized type has been promoted in the public secondary 
schools of this country by Federal grants that increased to 
$10,377,581 during the fiscal year ending June 30, 1937. Under 
new legislation ‘which recently became effective, the Federal 
grants now authorized amount to $21,785,000 annually. The 
grants have been authorized for vocational education in home 
economics, agriculture, trades and industries, and the training 
of teachers for these fields. Beginning in 1937-38, training 
for the distributive occupations is also included. 


The general operation of the various programs of voca- 
tional education has been exceedingly unsatisfactory in a num- 
ber of respects. A few of the major points of adverse general 
criticism are as follows: (1) The difficulties in administering 
local schools have been increased; (2) there has been some 
tendency toward the creation of a dual school system; (3) ar- 
rangements for coérdination with the interests served by other 
Federal agencies, particularly the Departments of Agriculture 
and Labor, have been inadequate; (4) relatively little research 
of an evaluative type has been carried on; (5) Negro schools 
in most States that maintain separate school systems for Ne- 
groes have not been justly treated. These criticisms apply 
more to some of the programs than to others, but the deficien- 
cies enumerated have been chronic throughout the federally 
aided system of vocational education. 


Some of the difficulties just mentioned and others that 
run through all the vocational programs are due to the fact 
that the statutes providing for the Federal aid are highly spe- 
cific and detailed. Not only are the funds allocated among the 
specific fields of vocational education, but such matters as the 
number of months per year and the number of hours per week 
to be devoted to vocational education by full-time students, and 
the hours of classroom instruction per year in part-time 
schools, are also specified by law. 

In the interests of more equitable provision of opportuni- 
ties for vocational education, of less separatism within the 
school system, and of greater flexibility in State and local 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 31 


school administration, it is recommended that all special Fed- 
eral aid for vocational education of less than senior college 
grade be consolidated into one fund. With few limitations, the 
amended statutes should make this fund available to the States 
for all desirable types of occupational preparation. 

If the various existing funds are not consolidated, how- 
ever, the Committee believes that at the very least the States 
should be authorized, subject to the approval of the Office of 
Education, to make transfers between the various funds for 
vocational education. As matters now stand, the limits of the 
various programs are not only rigid and inflexible, but States 
frequently have more funds available for certain activities 
than they can use, while they are greatly in need of funds for 
other activities within the range of vocational education. 


Walter C. Eells followed with a lantern-slide discussion on 
the Bases for a New Method of Accrediting Secondary Schools. 


BASES FOR A NEW METHOD OF ACCREDITING 
SECONDARY SCHOOLS 


WALTER CROSBY EELLS 


The Codperative Study of Secondary-School Standards 
was formally organized in the summer of 1933. 

This paper is to be devoted, by request of those respon- 
sible for planning this program, to a discussion of the under- 
lying bases for the accreditation of secondary schools. 

What are the fundamental principles, the essential bases, 
for such an independent attack on the problem? I shall list 
eighteen. 

1. The common purpose of all secondary schools is the 
transmission of racial culture and the development of the pu- 
pil, individually and as a member of society. They are alike 
in making use of individual teachers, in functioning in a school 
plant, in possessing a curriculum, in employing instructional 
methods, in presupposing a background of knowledge and skill 
in elementary school, in meeting several days a week for a ma- 
jor portion of a calendar year, and in many other respects. If 
such broad similarities as these did not exist, any common 
method of evaluation and accreditation would scarcely be feas- 
ible. 

2. There should be no inflexible insistence upon uniform- 
ity and rigidity of organization, method, and standards for all 





32 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


secondary schools in all parts of the country through any arti- 
ficially imposed accreditation procedures. 

3. The public school and the private school, the Catholic 
school and the Protestant school, the urban school and the rural 
school, the large school and the small school must be judged 
by comprehensive flexible standards, rather than by narrow, 
uniform, and rigid ones. 

4. The same norms cannot fairly be used for judging the 
plant, the curriculum, the library, and other features in Maine 
and Montana, in California and Connecticut, in Vermont and 
Virginia, in New York and New Mexico. It is desirable that 
studies be made and procedures summarized on a nation-wide 
basis, but that application of them be made on a regional or 
state, or even local basis, with due regard to variations in local 
conditions and educational, economic, and social background. 

5. All phases of the school—plant, staff, program—are 
to be evaluated chiefly as functioning units, not primarily as 
static ones; the program, the methods of administering it, and 
its results, are the chief matters to be considered. 

6. A school must be judged as a whole, not merely as the 
unrelated sum of its separate parts. This means that accredi- 
tation will not necessarily be refused because a school is weak 
in one feature, or fails to meet a particular standard. Possible 
deficiency in one field may be excusable or even desirable, or 
may be more than compensated for by superiority in another 
field or fields. The general level of the school’s work and the 
interrelationships of the different phases of it will need to be 
considered. 

7. Methods of accreditation, as far as possible, should be 
based upon scientific studies and objective evidence, rather 
than upon untested assumptions and unsupported opinions. 
This means that the results of research studies and other re- 
cent scientific investigations of secondary education should be 
given full consideration in the development of better methods. 
Standard tests, approved measuring instruments, valid scales, 
and similar devices should be used—but they should be used 
intelligently, not blindly. 

8. The considered judgment of competent educators is an 
essential factor in the evaluation of the quality and character 
of the work of a school. This principle is not in conflict with 
the preceding one, but is supplementary to it. It means that 
while statistical data are necessary, they are not sufficient. 
There should be a judicious mixture of the subjective and of 





—_ 8 SFO OP eee CD COD 


19388] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 33 


the objective. Statistical method cannot replace expert judg- 
ment, but it can form a much better basis for the legitimate 
and helpful exercise of such judgment. Judgment should be 
based upon all the scientific evidence and other objective data 
available, not on guesswork or hunches. Evaluation should be 
based upon a careful study by. a committee of competent edu- 
cators, who will spend sufficient time in the school to famil- 
iarize themselves with all important phases of its work. 

9. This is simply a recognition of the common scientific 
procedure that theory should be tested by experiment, and is 
an application of it in the educational field. In the case of the 
Coéperative Study, two hundred carefully selected schools 
have been used as the basis for the validation of the materials 
and procedures which it expects to recommend. 

10. While we may know the definite character and amount 
of apparatus necessary for an experiment in physics or chem- 
istry for a class of a given size, we do not know the optimum 
number of books for a library, the most desirable outcomes in 
the teaching of English, or the best methods of supervision. In 
such cases, after as valid measurements or evaluations as pos- 
sible have been made, the adequacy of the school in these fields 
must be judged in part by comparison with other schools 
measured by the same methods. 

11. A school should be judged in terms of the extent to 
which it meets satisfactorily the needs of all pupils who come 
to it, not alone of those who continue their formal education in 
institutions of higher learning. Standards have been dom- 
inated in many cases, if not completely determined, by college 
admission criteria. This principle means that it is not suffi- 
cient to evaluate the school merely in terms of the success of 
its graduates in the college and university, important as this 
may be as one element; it must be evaluated also in terms of 
its success in giving an education for successful living—eco- 
nomic, social, and personal—to the young people who do not go 
on to college. 

12. A good school is a growing school. It should be judged 
by. its progress between two different dates as well as by its 
status at a single date. This means, as Oliver Wendell Holmes 
once observed, that “it is not nearly so important where we 
stand as the direction in which we are going.” A poor school 
which is steadily improving may be more worthy of accredi- 
tation than a much better school which is steadily deteriorat- 


ing. 











34 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


13. Any useful, stimulating, and valid method of accredi- 
tation must be flexible with the passage of time; that is, it 
must be capable of reasonable modification from year to year, 
as new bases of evaluation and different levels of achievement 
are suggested or developed from the use of existing ones. 
Change is a universal law. Methods of accreditation, like 
schools themselves, must be constantly changing if they are to 
keep up to date. Methods which are flexible in their applica- 
tion to a particular school, which recognize valid differences 
between schools and between their purposes and pupils, will be 
such as to be easily modified, also, with the passage of time and 
the benefit of experience. 

14. The number of factors evaluated in the modern sec- 
ondary school must be sufficiently large and varied to give 
valid evidence of worth in each of the main areas of the 
school’s work. This means that the accreditation of a school 
on the basis of a small number of rigid measures is insuffi- 
cient to give a valid measure of all essential aspects of the 
educational program. 

15. Accrediting procedures and materials must be brief 
enough in extent and convenient enough in form to be practi- 
cable for use in all secondary schools. This principle must be 
considered in connection with the preceding one, and a proper 
balance be struck between the two. Materials must be brief 
enough to be usable but long enough to be valid. Extensive 
sampling is required, rather than complete measurement. The 
samples, however, must be significant factors that really char- 
acterize the school and have been proved to possess real dis- 
criminative value. Criteria should take as a model, not the 
photographer who with his lens takés in everything in sight, 
but the artist, who skillfully selects the significant elements in 
the landscape and uses them to suggest details all of which do 
not appear explicitly on the canvas. 

16. If criteria for evaluation are sufficiently flexible, ex- 
tensive, and thorough, it is not essential that they be applied 
annually. This means that complete evaluation of a school 
may need to be made only at regular or irregular intervals of 
several years. Changes of administration or other unusual 
conditions may justify reconsideration of accreditation at spe- 
cial times. Partial evaluations may be made at intervening 
periods. Continuous self-evaluation is important. 

17. The basis and methods of accreditation should be 
such as to require interest and participation in the process on 







> © = & Oo we ct mw a Mm 


= | 




















PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 35 





1938] 


the part of the entire professional and non-professional staffs 
of the school. This means that the basis of accreditation can- 
not be limited to statistical blanks filled out by clerical assist- 
ants, or even to information furnished by the principal alone. 
It should be a codperative process involving mutual criticism 
and suggestion by the entire staff. Criteria should be such as 
to stimulate frequent if not continuous consideration and dis- 
cussion by the school staff regardless of whether or not a visit 
by a committee of competent educators is anticipated. 

18. The primary function of accreditation by the state or 
regional association should be stimulation toward continuous 
growth and improvement, not merely inspection and admission 
to membership. 


CONCRETE PROCEDURES FOR IMPROVED METHODS OF 
ACCREDITATION 


Figure 1 shows the location of the 200 carefully selected 
secondary schools which participated in the experimental study 
last year. These schools were chosen geographically so as to 
represent every state, the number in each state being propor- 
tional to the number of regionally accredited schools existing 
in the state. They were also selected on a proportional basis 
as regards size and type of control. They vary in size from 
one of only 20 pupils to one of almost 10,000. Thirty-two are 
private schools, 168 are public. In order to study the non- 
accredited schools also, 25 of this type were included. Other 
factors taken into consideration were type of curriculum, 
number of years included, type of community served, urban or 
rural location, racial groups educated, and boarding or day- 
school status. No effort was made to select the best schools. 
In fact, a definite effort was made to secure schools of varied 
quality, from very inferior ones to very superior ones, since 
the object of the study ultimately was to arrange these 200 
schools in order of educational excellence in order to form a 
scale for comparison, for purposes to be stated later. 

In order to secure extensive and valid criteria for evalua- 
tion, these schools were studied by seven different methods, the 
relative weight to be given to each method being indicated 


below: 



















(March, 


DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS 


36 




















* PUBLIC 
¢ PRIVATE 


_ 





ye 








Fig. 1. 


Location and Type of Two Hundred Coéperating Secondary Schools. 

















PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 37 



































Percentage 

1. Evaluative Criteria ___- 40 

a. Educational Program 20 

b. Staff -_- 10 

c. Plant —_- 4 

d. Administration 6 
2. Field Committee Juigments -. 20 
3. Progress as Measured by Standard Tests 20 
4. College Success of Pupils ~__- aoe oO 
5. Non-college Success of Pupils Lecnicsteaea . @ 
6. Judgments of Pupils 6 
7. Judgments of Parents oe 4 
100 


A word or two of explanation concerning each of these 
seven methods is desirable. 

1. Evaluative Criteria. Each school has been visited for 
p2riods of two to ten days each by a committee of experienced 
educators who have made a detailed examination, analysis, and 
appraisal of extensive information prepared in advance by the 
school concerning its philosophy and purposes, curriculum, pu- 
pil activity program, library service, guidance service, instruc- 
tion, educational outcomes, staff, plant, and administration. 
In doing this more than 1,100 different items in these areas 
have been checked and over 500 evaluations have been made. 
These are known as the Evaluative Criteria. The committees 
have paid particular attention to instruction, approximately 
90 per cent of the 5,500 teachers having been visited in their 
own classrooms, many of them being thus visited several times. 
The visiting committees have usually consisted of three or 
more men, at least one of whom has been a recognized educa- 
tional leader in the state in which the school is located. 

2. Field Committee Judgments. In addition to collecting 
and evaluating the large amount of quantitative data indicated 
in the previous paragraph, the visiting committees have made 
a general qualitative evaluation of each school, taking into con- 
sideration especially the underlying philosophy of the school, 
the nature of its pupils, its environment, and the adaption of 
the school to local needs and conditions. 

3. Standard Tests. In order to measure significant pupil 
progress a series of nine psychological, achievement, and social 
attitudes tests was given to approximately 100 pupils in each 
school in the early fall of 1936-37. The achievement tests 
included the fields of English, social studies, natural science, 
mathematics, and vocabulary; the social attitudes tests meas- 












38 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


ured attitudes toward war, the United States Constitution, and 
treatment of criminals. The tests were administered under 
uniform conditions by ten men who went to the schools for this 
express purpose. In the late spring of 1937 they returned to 
the schools and gave equivalent forms of the same tests to the 
same pupils, if they were still in school, in order to measure 
progress in these fields during the year. Approximately 20,- 
000 pupils were tested on the fall trip, while 17,300 were found 
to be available for the spring testing. These tests, over 300,000 
in number, have all been scored at the Washington office and 
are being interpreted with due regard to mental ability, pre- 
vious academic work, and current curriculum of the pupils 
tested. 

4. College Success of Pupils. In order to judge a school 
by its products as well as by its processes, two special studies 
have been carried out. For the first one the codperating 
schools furnished lists of almost 13,000 of their graduates in 
the classes of 1932 and 1936 who had entered some 1,700 insti- 
tutions of higher education. These lists were classified and 
sent to the registrars who furnished information concerning 
entrance and subsequent scholastic success of the pupils. The 
returns form an excellent measure of the success of the differ- 
ent schools from the standpoint of college preparation. For 
schools whose primary function is preparation for college and 
university the weight given this factor will be greater than the 
6 per cent suggested above; for those which send relatively 
few of their graduates to college the weight will be less. Ten 
per cent is to be given to the two measures of success of the 
product of the schools, divided appropriately for each school 
studied, and with due regard to the relative completeness and 
reliability of the two types of data secured. 

5. Non-college Success of Pupils. In order to measure the 
success of the same schools from the standpoint of the thou- 
sands of pupils who did not go to college, a follow-up study 
has been made of over 7,000 young people who had entered 
the schools as sophomores in the fall of 1932, but who had 
withdrawn from high school before graduation, or if gradu- 
ating had not continued their formal education beyond that 
level. 

6. Judgments of Pupils. At the time of the second test- 
ing trip, the opinions of over 17,000 pupils were secured on 
matters relating to the curriculum, guidance, pupil activities, 
and other important phases of their experience in the schools. 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 39 


7. Judgments of Parents. A final measure of the success 
of the schools has been secured by obtaining the judgments of 
parents of over 7,000 members of the graduating classes. By 
means of a return postcard they expressed their frank opinions 
concerning the teaching, helpfulness, guidance, character de- 
velopment, and other important phases of the influence of the 
schools on their sons and daughters. 

All of this extensive array of evidence is being studied by 
the research staff in the Washington office during the current 
year. It is being summarized, analyzed, weighted, and com- 
bined to give a total measure of the quality and success of each 
of the schools studied and its place in the final scale. As 
pointed out later, this scale will be used to validate the various 
tentative items of the suggested criteria and as a basis for 
comparison with other schools seeking accreditation in the 
various associations or states. 


COMMITTEE 
JUOGMENT 





NORMAL i 13 48 76 
ACTUAL |! '7 47 68 54 


Fig. 2. Distribution of Judgments of Four Visiting Committees on 
General Quality of the Two Hundred Schools. 

In spite of the care with which the 200 experimental 
schools were originally selected, some doubt was felt whether 
they would form a satisfactory distribution, ranging in ap- 
propriate proportions from the very inferior to the very su- 
perior. It was feared that there might be a preponderance of 
the better schools. Considerable light upon this question and 
upon the ability of the field committees to make competent and 
discriminative judgments is shown in Figure 2, indicating the 
distribution of judgments of the field committees. These com- 
mittees were instructed to grade each school on a scale from 0 
to 100 in terms of its general educational excellence. The aver- 
age of their evaluations turned out to be 49.5 with a standard 
deviation of 18. A distribution of their evaluations in seven 

















40 DEPARTMEN1 vf SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


classes in standard deviation intervals was made and com- 
pared with a theoretical or chance normal distribution. The 
two results are shown in Figure 2. The boundary line includes 
within it 200 small circles, each representing a school, if nor- 
mally distributed. The solid circles represent schools placed 
according to committee judgments. The outline circles repre- 
sent schools of the normal distribution, which were not found, 
or if found, were not so identified and evaluated by the visiting 
committee. The number of black circles without the boundary 
line must of course equal the number of outline circles within 
it. It will be observed that the actual distribution of commit- 
tee judgments agreed surprisingly closely with a normal distri- 
bution. The number rated as superior was slightly greater than 
normal, while the number rated as average is eight less than 
might be expected in a pure chance distribution. The dis- 
crepancies in each case, however, are relatively slight. 


Figure 2 covers the 200 schools for the country as a whole. 
Figure 3 is drawn according to the same plan, but for the 
schools in the six regional associations as separate groups. It 
is evident that normality of distribution is approximated very 
closely, even with the relatively small number of schools in 
each region. As far as the evidence of visiting committee 
judgment is concerned, therefore, it appears that the sampling 
of schools is very satisfactory not only for the entire country 
but for each of the six regional associations. 

Figure 4 is introduced to show’ the marked variation in 
pupil ability found in the different schools and as further evi- 
dence that very inferior as well as very superior schools are 
probably included in the group. It shows the distribution of 
mental test scores for 100 pupils in each of three schools, the 
one that stood highest, the median, and the lowest on the 
American Council on Education Psychological Examination. 
It is notable that the highest school has 85 per cent of superior 
pupils, while the lowest school has 99 per cent of inferior pu- 
pils, measured by the same test. 

Figure 5 is a sample of the method by which we expect to 
report to each of the 200 codperating schools its relative stand- 
ing on a considerable number of significant features which 
have been measured or evaluated by one means or another. 
The left side of the thermometer is a percentile scale, from 
0 to 100; the right side a special scale adapted to the feature 
under consideration, in this case the number of volumes in the 
library. The thermometer is filled to a point to correspond to 

















1938] 





PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 


NORTH CENTRAL 
NEW ENGLAND 19 Schools 








69 Schools 


wORMA 
acTuar. 





MIDOLE STATES 
e 












LJ acTuas a 22 2? 26 * 
sonmac = # 2 
ACTUAL e e ® 4 ’ NORTHWEST O 1? Schools 
O 
SOUTHERN rr 

43° Senoots ~ . 

worvar ¢ ‘ ’ q LU 

acTuau 8 ’ s 6 ¢ 


WESTERN e 








WOAMAL 17 nomua 6 3 > 2 ‘ 
actuas @ 8 7 ih) ‘ actuay t] ‘ s ' 1 


Fig. 3. Distribution of Judgments of Four Visiting Committees on Gen- 
eral Quality of the Schools in Each of the Six Regional Associations. 


PSYCHOLOGICAL LEVELS 
Three Schools 


HIGHEST 














OO 
{eye} 
E ) C 8 A 
NORMAL 7 24 36 26 ? 
ACTUAL O ° Tr) 45 40 
LOWEST 
MEDIAN 
SCHOOL alas 
000 
000 
000 
000 
000 
loko) 
q a 000 O00 
& 000 000 
, E i) Cc 8 A A 
| NORMAL 7 24 36 24 7 NORMAL 7 264 36 24 ? 
ACTUAL 7 23 39 26 3 ACTUAL 96 3 ‘ (+) ° 


Fig. 4. Variation in Mental Ability of Pupils in Three Schools Tested 
, by the Codperative Study. 








(March, 







42 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS 








the school’s standing in the feature measured. The national 
norm, of course, is the 50-percentile point. Regional, size, 
type, and accreditation norms have also been computed and 
are indicated by appropriate symbols on the scale, regional 
norms being placed on the left side, the others on the right. 
The information available for a particular school is indicated 
in the explanatory statements given on the lower left-hand 
portion of the figure—in this case for a large, Southern, ac- 
credited, public high school. We feel that this device will 
permit a quick and easy determination of the comparative 
“educational temperature” of a school in the feature measured, 














SAMPLE THERMOMETER SCALE 


NUMBER OF 
VOLUMES 
IN 


(199) 





TITLE: Subject summarised 





















SI, : < SPECIAL SCALE; For the 
Number of schools on which. is particular feature 
the scale is based —". indicated by the title-- 
if in this case the number 
PERCENTILE SCALE: ae of volumes in the library. 





Uniform plan, 100 to 0 eis 4 special scale for each 
for all thermometers 5 095 thermoneter. 


REGIONAL NORMS: 
Western i ee 
Middle States M.S. $ 


North Central N.C. , 





















SIZE NORMS: 
Very large (over 1000) V.L. 
Large (500 = 999) L. 
Medium (200 - 499) M. 























Southern So. 
Northwest mY. Small (0 ~- 199) s. 
New England NE. 
















COUNTRYWIDE NORM 


TOR ALL SCHOOLS: 
(50 percentile point 
on all thermoneters) 




















HIGH SCHOOL - 
(A large, Southern, accredited, , 
public school) 

t 














ACCREDITATION NORMS: 
Accredited Acc. 


















1. This school, in number of vem Nonm-Accredited W.Ac. 
volumes in its library, 
is equal to or better than ee 
52 % of the 199 schools 
measured. soc io3s 
2. It stands slightly higher 
than the average Southern So 945 
school (3 points). 
3. It stands decidedly lower a ad 
than large schools in 
general (16 points). 5-390 
4. It stands at the same level 
as accredited schools in om ‘26 
general. 






§. It stands somewhat higher 
than the average public 
school (5 points). 


Fig. 5. Sample Thermometer Scale for Reporting Significant Phases of 
Measurement of Judgment of * anesty of School—Based on Objective 
vidence. 













1938) PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 43 


and of its significance in comparison with other appropriate 


groups of schools. 

Figure 6 shows another sample thermometer scale, the 
only difference being that the special scale on the right is in the 
form of qualitative evaluations measured from one to five, in- 
stead of an objective basis as in Figure 5, where number of 
volumes was under consideration. In this case the school rep- 
resented was judged to be better in budget procedures than 74 
per cent of the schools studied. 

We believe that significant information presented in the 
manner indicated in Figure 5 and Figure 6 should be exceed- 
ingly interesting and decidedly stimulating to a school. It 


SAMPLE THERMOMETER SCALE 


Committee evaluation 
or average of a maber 
of euch evaluatione 
concerning the presence 
and functioning of the 
Accreditation feature studied 





(As on previous 
5.0 Perfect or 
sample page) practically perfect 


4.0 Very good 

3.0 Average 
0 Poor 

1.0 Very poor 


Fig. 6. Sample Thermometer Scale for Reporting Significant Phases of 
Measurement of Judgment of the Quality of a School—Based on 
Qualitative Judgments. 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (Mareh, 


SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION 


BUSINESS SCHOOL AND 
BUOGET MANAGE MENT COMMUNITY 


NIZATION SUPERVISION 
nant (200) (200) (196) (200) (197) 


j-43 T 











4 4 3.7 
r 3.9 a 3S ” 
42 36 


45 





L440 
39 
36 
































“a* Weight 
1s 16 


“ i g* vege veer 


Fig. 7. Thermometer Scales for Reporting the Five Principal Phases of 
School Administration for a Medium-sized, Private, Accredited School. 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 45 
should also be very useful to a committee passing upon the 
possible accreditation of a school. We expect to send each 
of the codperating schools a booklet consisting of some twenty 
pages of the thermometer scales, one or two pages for each of 
the principal areas studied. A sample page of this book is 
shown in Figure 7. This figure shows for a certain medium- 
sized, accredited, private school its standing on each of the 
five principal phases of school administration—organization, 
supervision, budget, business management, and school and 


LIBRARY - ADEQUACY 


EVALUATIONS COMMITTEE 
PERIODICALS , USE T 


NUMBER OF 
DISTRIBUTION APPROPRIATENESS RECENCY 
VOLUM: °° 
tes) (196) (94) ox (200) (200) (195) 
















































































= Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight 

S 6% 4% 5% om 6% 10% 

Fig. 8. Thermometer Scales for Reporting Seven Phases of the Adequacy 
of a Library for a Very Large, Public, Accredited School. 





46 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS {March, 


community relations. Marked irregularities in the educational 
temperatures of the different features is evident. They sug- 
gest bases for study and possible improvement. 

Figure 8 shows another sample page, one for judging the 
adequacy of the library according to seven different features. 


SUMMARY OF EVALUATIVE CRITERIA 


EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM STAFF PLANT ADMINIS- 
—_ ~ TRATION 





r 


CURRICULUM PUPIL 
ACTIVITIES 
(200) (200) (200) (200) (200) (200) (200) (200) (200) 


Zeéo = = & & 


a 7 7 
a 5s a 
q 4 


a Tr oe 


LIBRARY GUIDANCE INSTRUCTION OUTCOMES 


aa aad — 's s 


td 


4 
























































Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight 
= ua = SS SS he a SS 





TOTAL WEIGHT - EDUCATIONAL PROGRAM - 50% 


Fig. 9. Form of the Thermometer Scales for Reporting the Nine Im- 
portant Subdivisions of the Evaluative Criteria. 


The school represented, a very large, public, accredited one, is 

very high in all features, but can best look toward further im- 

provement in the matter of recency of its book collection. 
The five scales shown in Figure 7 for different phases of 





1938 | PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 47 


school administration will be averaged to secure data for plot- 
ting a school’s relative standing on administration as a whole, 
with four sets of similar norms for comparison. These will 
be shown in summary form on a single “Administration” ther- 
mometer, and similarly for the other principal areas covered 
by the Evaluative Criteria. The form for a single summary 
page of these nine summary thermometers is shown in Figure 
9. This furnishes a compact general picture of the educa- 
tional temperature of the school, but for most purposes of an- 
alysis and stimulation to specific improvement probably the 
detailed pages for the different fields will be more significant 
and helpful. 

Finally a general summary page (Figure 10) will show 
each school its relative standing, with corresponding groups 
of norms, for the seven general measures used in evaluating 
the school. In this case the nine thermometers of Figure 9 
have been summarized into the single thermometer which is 
the first one of Figure 10. The first seven thermometers in 
Figure 10 are summarized, using the appropriate weights as 
shown at the bottom of each, to make a single composite 
“Grand Total” which will be shown on the thermometer at 
the extreme right of the figure. This will summarize the final 
ranking of the 200 schools in order of excellence on the 
weighted composite of all the measures used. 

For each of the 200 schools included in the past year’s 
study it is expected that approximately 138 thermometer scales 
will be furnished for indicating educational temperatures, dis- 
tributed as follows: 


Summary of seven measures (Fig. 10) 
Summary of evaluative criteria (Fig. 9) 
Curriculum 
Pupil activities 
Library (Fig. 8, part)- 
Guidance _ 
Instruction ~~~ 
Outcomes ___- 
































Administration (Fig. 7) 

Test results (one for each test) 
College success 2 
Non-college success ~-~- 
” Pupil judgment 

















It is expected that these comprehensive reports will be 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


ready for distribution to the 200 codperating schools early in 
March. Doubtless they will be of distinct interest and value to 
these particular schools. But is this their only usefulness? 
By no means. We expect to use these summarized results as a 
basis for the validation of all the procedures and methods used, 


GENERAL SUMMARY OF SEVEN MEASURES 


EVALUATIVE COMMITTEE PARENT 


GROWTH COLLEGE WON-COLLEGE PUPIL 
RA “Sa “oo SUCCESS JUDGMENT JUOGMENT 
(198 (200 eat) (198) . a 


; be 


00) » 94) 








5 
4 


92 athe 7 
















































































w Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight Weight 
> "i “ee . ok am 100% 


Fig. 10. Form of Thermometer Scales for Reporting the Seven Methods 
of Measurement of the Quality of a Secondary School. 


and as the final method of measurement to be suggested for 
the accreditation of all secondary schools. It is not expected 
that all of these methods will need to be used for schools which 
are later evaluated by these revised methods. 








1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 49 


It will, of course, be true that not all of the educational 
temperatures shown on the thermometers are equally import- 
ant, and some may be of no significance whatever for purposes 
of accreditation. Relative weights have been assigned to them 
on the basis of committee judgment and experience. UIlti- 
mately, however, the significance and validity of each separate 
measure will be tested by statistical analysis. How will this . 
validation process be carried out? When the schools have been 
arranged in order of educational excellence according to the 
composite of all the measures (right-hand thermometer in 
Figure 10) they will be divided into three groups, superior, 
average, and inferior schools, as shown in Figure 11. The 


<Q 


Fig. 11. Three-fold Classification of Schools to be Used as 
Criteria for Determination of the Validity of Particular 
Thermometer Scales and of Other Tentative Criteria. 


division shown (25 per cent—50 per cent—25 per cent) will 
assure beyond all reasonable doubt that no really inferior 
schools have been classified as superior ones and no really su- 
perior schools have been classified as inferior ones, and at the 
same time will give large enough groups of criterion schools 
(50 in each) to be statistically significant. Each thermometer 
scale will be tested by finding the extent to which the feature 
it measures is characteristic of the superior schools and is not 
characteristic of the inferior schools. It is expected that some 
of the tentative scales thus will be proved valueless for dis- 
criminative purposes and others may have low validity. Such 
results will permit a selection of the most valid and significant 
scales for use in the measurement of a school if it is not de- 
sired to use all of those outlined above which are to be used 
ini reporting results to the 200 codperating schools. It will be 
possible to select a group, for example, of the 25 or 30 ther- 
mometers of highest proved validity, if it is desired to have a 
very brief scale for a rapid but incomplete evaluation of a 





50 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


school; or a group of 50 or 60 thermometers for a better evalu- 
ation; or a group of 100 or more for a more nearly complete 
and highly reliable measurement. 

How can measurements of educational temperature on 
these suggested thermometer scales be used as a criterion for 
accreditation? This is an important question, although per- 
haps not as important a one as how schools can be constantly 
stimulated toward further improvement once they are ac- 
credited. The primary objective of the Codperative Study has 
been to develop a measuring instrument for secondary schools 
which will be more valid, more flexible, and more stimulating 
to further growth than any now in use. The Codperative 
Study is a temporary, not a permanent organization. It is 
nation-wide in scope of its experimental study, but it is not 
national. It does not contemplate setting up a single perma- 
nent agency in Washington or elsewhere to act as a super-ac- 
crediting body with uniform standards for the country. It is 
trying to develop a uniform instrument of measurement and 
evaluation. The exact methods by which such an instrument 
may be used for purposes of accreditation, however, are to be 
left to the regional and state accrediting agencies. But it is 
suggested that a regional agency may properly adopt a general 
standard that a school applying for accreditation should expect 
to attain a general average educational temperature on the 
thermometers used of 20 or 30 or 40 “degrees,” but that a low 
temperature on one scale, depending upon the nature of the 
feature measured and the aims and conditions in which the 
school is working, may be compensated by a higher tempera- 
ture on some other scale. The suggested general level may be 
raised or lowered in the light of experience and local condi- 
tions. These scales are not designed to replace the expert edu- 
cational diagnostician and practitioner, but to furnish him a 
more valid and reliable basis for making his diagnosis and 
prescription. They will not work themselves. They must be 
worked by sympathetic, intelligent, educational interpreters. 


(JUNIOR-COLLEGE PROGRAM, MONDAY, 2:00 P. M.) 


The junior-college program was held in Ocean Hall, Marl- 
borough-Blenheim Hotel. Principal John E. Wellwood of Cen- 
tral High School, Flint, Michigan, and member of the Execu- 
tive Committee of the Department of Secondary-School Prin- 
cipals, presided. 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 51 


Dr. Kenneth L. Heaton, Director of the Codperative Bu- 
reau for Educational Research of the State Department of 
Public Instruction of Michigan, read his paper. 


INNOVATIONS IN THE SECONDARY-SCHOOL 
CURRICULUM 


KENNETH L. HEATON 

Director, Codperative Bureau for Educational Research, Lansing, Michigan 

There is much experimentation in the field of secondary 
education, and interest in these experiments is on the increase. 
Although the significance of many experiments can hardly be 
evaluated at this time, it is to be hoped that when so much en- 
ergy is expended there will surely be some residue of signifi- 
cant achievement. 

It is the function of this paper to present a review of some 
of these innovations as the basis for an informal discussion of 
their possible significance to the junior college. In selecting 
innovations for presentation we do not endorse them or proph- 
esy as to their permanence. We can but present those which 
seem to be attracting most widespread attention at the present 
time. 

1. The first type of innovation is directed toward a read- 
justment of objectives to the functional needs of the present 
day. Some of these revisions are fragmentary ones which re- 
sult in the addition of a new course, or the revision of an old 
one, or other minor adjustments within the old curriculum 
pattern. 

Other schools are not contented with fragmentary 
changes, but find it more satisfying to make fundamental re- 
adjustments of the total curriculum plan. Such a step requires 
more bravery, but the results have been more fruitful in sug- 
gesting what to eliminate, as well as what to add, to the pro- 
gram of instruction. A recent report by the Commission on 
Secondary Education of the Progressive Education Association 
will illustrate what is meant. This report makes an analysis of 
the contributions that could be made by the natural sciences to 
the needs of students. Instead of suggesting minor readjust- 
ments in the traditional courses of biology, physics, and chem- 
istry, they try to set up an analysis of the important under- 
standings of science as related to the following aspects of the 
student’s life: 

a. Individual development 

b. Immediate personal and social life 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


c. Social-civic life 

d. Economic-industrial life 

e. Relationships to the natural environment. 

f. Cultural life 

Whether the changes be fragmentary or comprehensive 
in scope, the effort is to readjust objectives to conform with 
the most important needs of present-day life. 

2. The second important type of innovation is expressed 
in efforts to secure greater integration of the learning experi- 
ence. Several approaches are being made to this problem. Va- 
rious schools are organizing a core curriculum which allows 
students to concentrate for a considerable period of time in a 
large area of experience, as a substitute for the usual sequence 
of unrelated courses. Some schools are trying to secure this 
integration, not through core courses, but through the selection 
of objectives and units of learning which represent functional 
needs and units in life experience. Still others are trying to 
accomplish a similar purpose by using summary courses at 
the end of the college period, with or without comprehensive 
examinations to test the degree to which integration has been 
achieved. 

The purpose of these various schemes for integration is to 
make it easier for students to see relationships between the 
various traditional fields of learning, and relationships of the 
curriculum to everyday experiences. 

8. The effort is also being made to adapt instruction to 
individual differences of students. There is no more com- 
monly accepted fact than that boys and girls and young people 
are not alike in their abilities, achievements, and needs. :; To 
adjust the curriculum to this fact has not been found easy. 
Some schools use two.sequences of courses—one for superior, 
and one for inferior students. Many have offered elective se- 
quences of courses according to differences in interests. Some 
are offering remedial instruction and coaching classes to meet 
the peculiar needs of special groups. Others are recommend- 
ing that the curriculum be built on the basis of individual elec- 
tive units to permit what might be called solo learning. The 
need is clear, but the methods are very much in the experi- 
mental stage. 

4. Students are being involved in community planning 
and in other forms of social action as a part of the curriculum. 
Fenn College in the city of Cleveland offers what is called the 
blended curriculum in which full time during a third of the 

















PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 53 





1938] 


freshman year is devoted to thorough investigation of the 
problem: How Can I Improve Cleveland? Such experiences 
are important if they prepare students for effective participa- 
tion in community life. Other schools are using community 
surveys, are involving local citizens in the planning of ob- 
jectives and in the discussion of problems with students, are 
involving students in communtiy activities, and using a vari- 
ety of methods to remove the isolation which separates edu- 
cation from off-campus life. 

5. Space will permit only the mention of a few of the 
other important experiments which are now under way: 

1. Efforts to provide more intimate association of stu- 
dents with a small group of faculty members, over as 
much as two or three years. 

2. An emphasis upon self-direct student activities. 

3. Emphasis upon the improvement of reading and study 
habits, oral and written expression, and other skills 
which are essential to self-teaching. 

4. Participation in group action with fellow students and 
with adult citizens. 

5. Methods involving intrinsic rather than extrinsic mo- 
tivation of learning. 

6. Methods involving a variety of experiences and con- 
tact with a variety of books and materials rather than 
with a single textbook in a course. 

7. The use of growth measures and objective records to 
replace or supplement traditional systems of marks 
and report cards. 

8. More emphasis upon scientific methods for appraising 
the results of instruction. 

We have tried to point out what seems to be some of the 
most popular of curriculum changes. - It is self-evident that it 
is not possible at this time to evaluate any of these innova- 
tions. If scientific methods of appraisal are used wherever 
there is experimentation, we will be able gradually to sift that 
which is good from that which is mediocre. 

A panel discussion based upon Dr. Heaton’s address fol- 


lowed. 









54 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


INNOVATIONS IN THE SECONDARY-SCHOOL CURRIC- 
ULUM WITH IMPLICATIONS FOR THE JUNIOR 
COLLEGE 


WILLIAM H. CONLEY 


Dean, Wright Junior College, Chicago 


The junior college occupies a rather peculiar place in our 
American educational system. By many it is regarded as a 
two-year unit of the senior college or university. On the other 
hand more and more people to-day are coming to look upon the 
junior college as an integral part of secondary education, as 
an extension upward of secondary education. Such a trend 
in thought is.justified by the experience of the larger junior 
colleges in which it is found that only a very small percentage 
of the students who enroll as freshmen ever reach the senior 
college. It is further justified by the recognition of the exten- 
sion of the school age made necessary by current economic and 
social conditions. If, then, the junior college is to be con- 
sidered as more closely related to the secondary school than to 
the senior college it is most appropriate to consider the im- 
plications for the junior college of innovations in the secon- 
dary-school curriculum. 


My remarks on the subject will be entirely from the point 
of view of the junior-college administrator. I shall try to 
group the various secondary-school innovations that have im- 
plications for the junior college into types and express our 
attitude toward them. Secondly, I shall attempt to present 
a specific case of the high-school curriculum revision in the 
Chicago public-school system and its implications for the jun- 
ior colleges in that system. 


It appears to me that there are three or four major types 
of innovations in secondary-school curricula which should have 
a definite influence on the offerings of the junior college. First, 
there is the effort through different organization and differ- 
ent emphasis to bring about integration in subject matter cen- 
tering around the experiences of the high-school students. Sec- 
ondly, there is the curriculum aiming at general] education. 
Thirdly, there is the very important trend toward further vo- 
cational training within the high school. Fourthly, there is 
the so-called core curriculum prescribing a certain amount of 
work and permitting the student to choose the balance of his 
program in the light of his future plans and with the aid of 


expert counselling. 





a 

















55 





PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 






1988] 


The question immediately presents itself: What are the 
implications for the junior college of these innovations? The 
first of these changes is simply a challenge to the so-called tra- 
ditional type of junior college. The junior college, no less than 
the high school, can adopt an unrealistic approach in any cur- 
riculum whether preparatory or terminal. Advances in the 
direction of integration of subjects around the practical prob- 
lems of the students at the high-school level require that simi- 
lar advances must be made, if they have not already been made, 
in the junior college. 

The second type of innovation—beginning a general edu- 
cation, by which I mean contacting the student with the total- 
ity of his environment and developing within him disciplines 
and attitudes that will lead to clear thinking, an appreciation 
of his environment, and a social consciousness—should have a 
very definite and far reaching effect on the curriculum of the 
junior college. When this type of work is offered in the elev- 
enth and twelfth grades as, for example, at Pasadena and in 
certain experimental high schools, the junior college will have 
to revise its offerings in general education. This revision will 
aim at the completion of general education by the end of the 
fourteenth year—perhaps as suggested in a recent recommen- 
dation by a committee of the faculty of the University of Chi- 
cago. 

The trend toward vocational work at the high-school level 
demands that the junior college serving such high schools offer 
a program of general education which can be adapted to those 
students who follow the vocational course before entering the 
junior college. Then, if students find that they do not wish to 
continue in technical work, or if employment is impossible 
after completing the course, they may re-adjust themselves by 
pursuing the course in general education. 

The core curriculum is an innovation which requires fur- 
ther adjustments in the junior college. The great freedom 
such an organization permits in the secondary school, requires 
that if the junior college is to be more than a preparatory 
school it must offer a varied program which will serve any stu- 
dent coming up through the secondary school. 

In general it seems that a justifiable conclusion is that the 
forces which caused the change in the traditional high-school 
curriculum have caused the tremendous growth of the junior 
college and development along lines other than those of a pre- 
paratory school for the university. The implications of the 





56 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


innovations in high-school curricula are that the junior col- 
lege must adapt itself to those innovations by emphasizing gen- 
eral education. It may also, of course, offer preparatory work 
and semi-professional curricula. 

Let me turn now to the second point I wish to discuss, the 
specific example of the Chicago public-school system where 
there has recently been a sweeping reform in secondary educa- 
tion. The junior colleges in that system (Wright, Wilson, 
Herzl) have been able to adapt themselves to the changes with 
little difficulty. A realization that the old curriculum was not 
serving the needs of the students in a great metropolitan area 
where only about ten per cent of the high-school freshmen 
went on to college led to the inauguration by the superintend- 
ent of schools of a new plan involving a core curriculum and 
permitting choice, with counsel, from an array of vocational 
and preparatory sequences. This meant that many high- 
school graduates weuld seek admission to the junior colleges 
who did not possess the usual units required by universities 
for admission. It meant that other students would come to the 
junior colleges who had taken a preparatory course and who 
wished to continue their preparation for the professional 
school or the university, or wished to change to a semi-pro- 
fessional or terminal curriculum. The junior colleges, which 
had been set up only two years before this innovation, had 
organized a curriculum which could be easily adapted to any 
type of secondary-school change. This curriculum has as its 
primary objective general education. Over one-half of the 
work of the junior-college student was prescribed in those fields 
of knowledge with which everyone should have at least a speak- 
ing acquaintance: English, social science, physical science, bio- 
logical science, and humanities. The balance of the student’s 
work might be elected in university of professional school prep- 
aration, in semi-professional training, or in further general ed- 
ucation. It was quite simple to adapt this to the high-school 
change. First, the amount of time required in social science, 
which had been greater than in any of the other required 
courses, was cut down to permit students preparing for the 
professions to take additional specialized work. Then a series 
of exemption tests was arranged by the department of exam- 
inations so that students might be accelerated in the required 
courses if they had unusual preparation or particular aptitude 
in those fields. 

The Chicago experience seems to justify the contention 








1988] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 57 


that if the junior college is primarily interested in giving gen- 
eral education and provides opportunities for those who wish 
to elect either terminal or preparatory sequences it can easily 
adapt itself to any secondary-school curriculum innovation. 

In conclusion, then, it appears that the implications for 
the junior-college secondary curriculum changes are the fol- 
lowing: j 

1. The junior college must be more concerned with adapt- 
ing itself to high-school curriculum changes than to univer- 
sity requirements because the forces causing the high-school 
changes are the same forces that have caused the growth of 
the junior college. 

2. A junior-college curriculum emphasizing general edu- 
cation offers the greatest opportunity of adaptation to the bal- 
ance of the secondary-school program and at the same time 
seems to be the most desirable program for this unit of edu- 
cation. 

As more and more junior colleges take steps in this direc- 
tion it is my opinion that they will do much in justifying our 
position in the American school system. 


INNOVATIONS IN SECONDARY CURRICULUM, WITH 
IMPLICATIONS TO THE JUNIOR COLLEGE 


GEORGE H. MERIDETH 
Deputy Superintendent, City Schools, Pasadena, California 

For purposes of concreteness, any considerations herein 
are actual or projected practices in the curriculum of the 
Pasadena secondary schools. While the major considerations 
will be on the high school and junior college, the junior high 
school must be included. Any thorough-going analysis of cur- 
riculum practices must include all years of the secondary pro- 
gram. 

1. The Pasadena secondary curriculum is organized, 
from seventh through the fourteenth grades, for maximum de- 
velopment of the individual by carefully planned programs 
wherein individual maturity, interests, and needs are recog- 
nized as of major importance. 

2. Organizing of the curriculum is based upon demo- 
cratic procedures, with teacher groups working closely with 
consultants. To insure a continuously live program, these 
faculty curriculum groups are constantly at work. 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


3. A major innovation has been the survey courses. They 
cover the broad areas of life science, physical science, hu- 
manit-es, social science, business and commerce, and family 
relations. 

4, They are organized upon the assumption that the pri- 
mary function of the secondary school is to provide explora- 
tory experiences for each student. 

5. The major purpose of each survey course is to develop 
understandings and appreciation of the area covered. Skill 
training or accumulation of facts, per se, are minimized here. 

6. Advisors are working closely with the instructional 
staff to insure teacher growth and security in handling the 
new materials and new methods. Pupil insight into relation- 
ships between the areas cannot be éxpected if teacher insight 
to direct the learning situation is lacking. Thus, a program of 
in-service training of teachers and use of curriculum commit- 
tees provides guarantees of teacher growth for the new pro- 


gram. 
7. A second innovation is a growing program of pupil 
experiences which will emerge from interests and needs awak- 


ened in the survey courses. These sequential experiences are 
in two major groups; for the student concluding his formal 
education in the junior college, and for the student going to 
the university after graduation from the junior college. 

8. The high-school and junior-college programs are some- 
what traditional for the college preparatory student. Inno- 
vations like survey courses in high school bring implications 
to the junior-college program to conform to standard collegi- 
ate practices and yet build upon the survey for contiguity in 
pupil experiences. As the high school uses newer aids, such as 
visual and auditory, and places more emphasis upon under- 
standings and appreciations, methods in the junior college 
must be changed. 

9. The greatest service the junior college can render is 
in the area of terminal training. Present economic conditions 
make employment for the high-school gradrate extremely elu- 
sive. Pasadena has thus shifted skill trai.ing from the high 
school and placed it in the junior college. Skill training thus 
emerges from pupil interest aroused in the survey course (but 
the sole value of the survey is not in giving direction for sub- 
sequent skill training; it also means that more pupil insights 
into relationships and appreciations of other fields may be 
present). 





A BC wet TD Th A 88 FR Ae 4. 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 59 


10. To cite a few examples, ten years ago 98% of Pasa- 
dena’s junior college graduates took college preparatory work; 
last fall 39% of the graduates had certificates for college. The 
reason is a growing pupil awareness of the worth-while char- 
acter of the skill, terminal courses. We cannot provide facili- 
ties to meet pupil demand in our technology department, nor 
can we fill the demands of employers—every graduate of the 
aviation design and construction course placed, as have been 
the graduates in residence design, in electrical technology, and 
in civil technology. 

11. Careful planning of the curriculum means providing 
terminal courses following the surveys: (1) Humanities, with 
journalism, printing, commercial art, illustration, design, vocal 
and instrumental music, music composition; (2) Physical sci- 
ence, with technology, air conditioning, illumination consult- 
ant; (3) Life science, with doctor and dentist’s assistant, for- 
ester, laboratory technician, recreational leader; (4) Social 
science, with social worker; (5) Business and commerce, with 
stenographer, salesperson, buyer, accountant, ad writer; (6) 
Family relations, with nursery governess, hostess, caterer, 
vocational clothier. Other terminal courses must be pro- 
vided as new needs become apparent. 


12. A third innovation is a gradual amalgamation of 
curriculum and so-called extra-curriculum experiences. This 
includes everything from student government to athletics, for- 
ensics, publications, etc. It is recognizing that the extra-cur- 
riculum is the real functionalization of the curriculum. It is 
an attempt to bring theory and practice into a close working 
relationship. 


18. Innovations in the secondary school implies to the 
junior college: (a) Closer unity of the curriculum so educa- 
tion may be a constantly on-going process; (b) Utilization of 
new materials and techniques to vitalize all activities; (c) Pro- 
viding educational opportunities to develop interests and needs 
awakened in the exploratory or survey courses; (d) Recogniz- 
ing that all activity is learning and all learning is activity— 
all under the heading, curriculum. 


The meeting closed after a long and interesting discussion. 


rd 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


THIRD GENERAL SESSION 
Tuesday, March 1, 2:00 P. M. 


The third session was split into two groups: a senior high- 
school group and junior high-school session. 

The senior group met in the Submarine Grill of Hotel 
Traymore and was opened by President Jones, who, after a 
short introduction, presented Mr. Walter E. Myer, Director of 
the Discussion-Group Project. 


INTRODUCTORY STATEMENT 
; WALTER E. MYER 


Director, Discussion Group Project 

For a number of years there has been a growing disposi- 
tion among educators to get together for the purpose of talk- 
ing about their common problems. In many places admin- 
istrators and teachers in the field of secondary education have 
adopted the practice of meeting regularly in small groups that 
they may engage in systematic and sustained discussion of 
vital issues. In Pennsylvania the network of discussion 
groups, with all members actual participants, has spread over 
the entire state. Elsewhere the groups were until recently 
scattered and sporadic. In many states they were practically 
unknown. 

Such was the situation a year ago, when the Department 
of Secondary-School Principals stepped into the picture. The 
Planning Committee of this organization decided upon a cam- 
paign, national in scope, to encourage the movement which 
was already under way. Educetional planning through or- 
ganized discussion was accepted as a statement of policy and 
is the goal to be reached. By virtue of a grant from the Gen- 
eral Education Board, the Committee was able to adopt a com- 
prehensive program. A national office was established in 
Washington. An organization extending to all the states was 
undertaken and the effort to foster small discussion groups of 
educators throughout the land was inaugurated on the first 
of last July. Now, after eight months’ experience with the 
project, we are here to-day to clarify objectives, to take stock 
of achievements, to study difficulties which are in the way, and 
to plan for the future. 

The goal of the Planning Committee is the organization of 
secondary-school administrators into local discussion groups in 





i ee, ee | OU, ee 








1938} PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 61 


every state of the Union, or the perfection of organization 
where it is already under way. The idea is that each state 
shall be divided into areas of suitable size so that the admin- 
istrators within each area may meet periodically to discuss 
their common problems. In a state ideally organized there 
will be a sufficient number of these groups so that every prin- 
cipal may attend the meetings and participate in the discus- 
sions. The groups will be large enough so that there may be a 
variety of ideas and points of view and small enough so that 
there may be actual participation by every member. The 
principals then throughout the state will be meeting in their 
local areas at definite intervals—in most cases monthly. When 
a state is covered by this network of local discussion groups, all 
the administrators responsible for the formulation of educa- 
tional policy will be engaged in a work of coéperative thinking 
and planning. Each will have the benefit of the information 
and the ideas of all. Each individual’s thinking will be sharp- 
ened through a contact of minds. Leadership will have a 
chance to assert itself, and the power of leadership will be 
tremendously enhanced. At the same time, the general level 
of thinking and of practice will be lifted, for there will be a 
tendency for the common level to approach the highest achieve- 
ments. ys 

The program of the Discussion Group Project includes 
the codperation of all the local units within a state. Above 
them is to be a central organization. The state will provide 
a coordinator, who will be charged with the supervision of the 
discussion-group activities within his jurisdiction. He will be 
in communication with all the discussion groups, whether ad- 
min‘strators, teachers, or laymen, within the state. In many 
cases, he will be able to supply them with material. He will 
give suggestions and advice. His office will serve as a clear- 
ing house for all local groups, and will work to the end that 
all may have the benefit of large-scale codperation. In many 
cases, the state codrdinator will work with the executive com- 
mittee of the state-principals association. As we shall see 
later this afternoon, such a plan is already in operation in the 
state of Pennsylvania. Under a plan of that kind, the codr- 
dinator and the state executive committee prepare materials 
for’ discussion in the local groups. They provide for codper- 
ative effort on the part of local bodies. In certain cases, a 
group will be working on some phase of an educational prob- 
lem and a neighboring group will be working on another phase 














62 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS {[March, 








of it. The studies of these local bodies will be sent to the state 
coérdinator and a codperative report will be prepared. Pub- 
licity will then be given to it. All the groups in the state will 
be made acquainted with the findings and recommendations of 
those who have carried on the study. There will be active con- 
sideration and debate on the report throughout the state. Un- 
der such circumstances it is highly probable that the thinking, 
the research, and the discussions will result in modifications 
of practice. This plan facilitates progress in education through 
rational processes of study, planned publicity, and general dis- 
cussion. 

Let us assume that a state is organized in the manner 
which has been described. There is a central planning or di- 
recting organization, and there are regional groups meeting 
regularly for systematic and sustained discussion of the prob- 
lems which come before the local groups and of the problems 
presented for local consideration by the central agency. Then 
let us assume that, such an organization of a state having been 
effected, some important state-wide problem arises for con- 
sideration. Let us assume, for example, that a state curricu- 
lum revision program is under way. The machinery is then 
available for the bringing of this program to all of the admin- 
istrative educational leaders of the state. The program is not 
sent merely to each individual administrator’s desk, but it goes 
to educators who are organized for the very purpose of giving 
immediate and effective attention and consideration to it. Such 
circumstances are highly favorable to intensive attention, fol- 
lowed by definite action. A plan of this kind makes possible a 
workable organization of educational thinking. 

To what extent has the program of the Planning Commit- 
tee been realized? I cannot tell you, of course, that all the 
states have been organized in the manner suggested. The 
work is just now getting under way. It is possible, however, 
to report considerable progress during the eight months that 
the goal has been pursued. 

The first job was to set up a skeleton organization. It was 
necessary that someone be found in each state who was willing 
to undertake to guide the discussion-group activities. In other 
words, the first task was to select coérdinators for all the 
states, to acquaint them with the general purposes, and to get a 
start everywhere at the work of forming the local unit. 

That part of the work has now been done. There is a 
coérdinator in each state. A list of all these state officers has 









= “A NR © =~ MBM rn ww 


s 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 63 
been distributed here this afternoon. Most of the state codr- 
dinators have appointed regional directors, who are respon- 
sible for the organization of the local discussion groups in their 
districts. In a number of states local groups have been organ- 
ized and are already holding their monthly meetings. In other 
words, quite a number of the states are now approaching the 
sort of organization I described a while ago. Several of the 
state codrdinators will appear on the program this afternoon 
and will explain to you in some detail the way the work is pro- 
ceeding in their states. This will give you a definite picture of 
the Discussion Group Project as its work is developing out in 


the field. 
I have said that the plan which we are following antici- 
pates the development of problems and materials for discus- 
sion by the codrdinators of the various states, assisted by the 
executive committees or by research committees of the state 
principals associations. During the period, however, when 


organization is being perfected throughout the country, it 
seems essential that suggestive problems and materials be pro- 
vided by the national office of the Discussion Group Project. 


It is not intended that these materials shall displace those 
which any state organization or any local group may have de- 
veloped for itself. They are submitted by the national office 
merely for such use as the state and local organizations may 


care to make of them. 

For the purpose of giving the newly-formed discussion 
groups something definite to work on, the national office is 
suggesting that during the first year active consideration be 
given to the reports of the Committee on Orientation of the 
Department of Secondary-School Principals. This Commit- 
tee, after several years of study, prepared, as you know, a re- 
port on the Issues of Secondary Education which was published 
in January 1936, and another report on the Functions of Sec- 
ondary Education which was published in January 1937. . No 
one intends that the conclusions of this Committee, eminent 
though its members are, should be imposed upon any educator 
or any group. It does seem appropriate, however, that the 
work which was done by the Committee should at least have 
the.active attention of all those who have places of responsi- 
bility in the field of secondary education. This seems all the 
more appropriate, inasmuch as the Committee was commis- 
sioned to make its studies and to offer its recommendations by 


the Department of Secondary-School Principals. 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


Accordingly, the Issues of Secondary Education and the 
Functions of Secondary Education are recommended by the na- 
tional office of the Discussion Group Project as suitable texts 
for study and debate by local discussion groups throughout the 
nation. In order to facilitate the consideration of these re- 
ports, a discussion guide based upon them has been prepared. 
It is called Problems of Secondary Education. It contains a 
brief summary of each Issue and each Function. Following 
each summary, there is a list of topics or questions particu- 
larly suited to the purposes of a discussion group. A group 
using this guide as a text will find definite topics for discus- 
sion, and the material is so arranged as to call attention to local 
educational practices and to raise a question concerning the 
extent to which these local practices are in harmony with the 
philosophy enunciated in the Orientation Committee’s reports. 


In a number of the states, the Jsswes and Functions are 
being discussed in periodical meetings by practically all the 
principals. In nearly all the states these reports, together 
with the discussion guide Problems of Secondary Education, 
are having the attention of at least a few groups. The extent 
to which the nation is being covered in the consideration of 
this material will be more apparent after the state codrdinat- 
ors who are to appear on this program have given their re- 
ports. 

It is not the purpose of the Planning Committee, how- 
ever, to stop with the organization of principals into discus- 
sion groups. If the progressive plans evolved by administrat- 
ors in the field of secondary education are ever to be carried 
out effectively, the classroom teachers must have the benefit of 
the training which comes from professional discussion ; hence 
high-school faculties are being formed into discussion groups 
with the idea that certain of their meetings shall be given over 
to the consideration of professional problems. These faculty 
sessions devoted to professional discussion constitute a form 
of in-service training of teachers. The Discussion Group 
Project is offering the discussion guide, Problems of Secon- 
dary Education, without charge to all high-school teachers who 
wish to form themselves into discussion groups for the study 
of the Jssues and Functions of Secondary Education. Encour- 
aging progress has been made in the promotion of such dis- 
cussion. Two months after the effort to develop this form of 
discussion in high-school faculties was inaugurated, more than 
a thousand high-school faculties had adopted such a plan of 








1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 65 


study. The Problems of Secondary Education supplied by the 
national office of the Discussion Group Project was being used 
as a text in these faculties and at least fifty thousand high- 
school teachers in the more than a thousand schools were par- 
ticipating in the program of professional discussion. 


Discussion of the Jsswes and Functions of Secondary Edu- 
cation, together with the Problems of Secondary Education, 
has also been carried to the universities. The materials pre- 
sented by the Discussion Group Project are now being used in 
about seventy-five universities, and more than six thousand 
students in the secondary education classes of these institu- 
tions are engaging in the discussions. Representatives quali- 
fied to speak of the discussion activities in high-school facul- 
ties and in universities will appear on the program this after- 
noon to explain what the work means when carried on in these 
fields. 

I have undertaken to give a general picture of the pro- 
gram which is being developed by the Planning Committee of 
your Association. The details of the picture will be filled in 
later in the program by representatives of states and of local 
groups. Before we turn, however, from a consideration of the 
program as a whole, I should like to emphasize the fact that 
this movement has developed in response to a compelling social 
need. This is a complex world in which we live. With all its 
complexity and all the attendant confusion, it bears down al- 
most smotheringly upon the individual. A man cannot per- 
form the routine duties of the day, cannot meet his obligations 
to his family, to say nothing of his country, without coming 
face to face with problems whose ramifications are positively 
baffling. 

Educators have not escaped the universal perplexity. 
These are days of peculiar difficulties for the secondary 
schools, as well as days of: unexampled opportunity. We all 
know that things are happening in this field. There are few 
who doubt that the secondary school is passing through a tran- 
sition stage, with the future undetermined. We all know of 
the thousands of boys and girls who are putting in their ap- 
pearance in the high schools because they cannot find employ- 
ment elsewhere. We know that the high-school enrollment is 
incréasing, that many of the newcomers are nonacademic. We 
know that increasingly the secondary schools are coming to be 
regarded, not as feeders for institutions of higher learning but 
as being themselves institutions to which the children of all 





66 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


the people are turning in the hope that somehow they will be 
helped in their quest for security, comfort, and happiness. 

What can the schools do for all these young people of such 
diverse tastes, capacities, and needs during the years of ado- 
lescence? What are the functions of the secondary school? 
This would be a question difficult enough if the young people 
were to be prepared for life in a stable society, but society to- 
day is not stable. As we look out upon the national and inter- 
national scene, we can be certain of nothing except the fact 
that change is in the air, and that the old sense of security is 
gone. We must send the young people out into a world with 
which we are not ourselves familiar. 

If, taking account of the size of their tasks, those respon- 
sible for the development of educational policies can devise 
means whereby they may work together at the job, so that 
each may benefit by the thinking of all, they are more likely to 
proceed in the direction of wisdom. Such is the reasoning 
behind the discussion group movement. 

Too much must not, of course, be claimed for discussion or 
dialectic as the device by which we may arrive at truth or wis- 
dom. Conversation and debate are not substitutes for reading 
and individual thought. If one does not read and think in 
privacy, he cannot talk effectively in public. As Graham Wal- 
las says, “Reading is quicker than listening, and concentrated 
individual thought than the verbal exposition and counter- 
exposition of arguments, while the printing-press enables a 
man who has anything important to say to address the eyes 
of those interested in his subject in a whole nation or the 
whole civilized world rather than the ears of a few friends. 
* * * No one desires to return to the old belief that oral dia- 
lJectic is a sufficient guide to truth without direct observation 
and solitary thought.” “But I myself,” he continues, “believe 
that the degree to which we have abandoned it is unfortunate. 
Dialectic is slow and inexact, but in many sciences, and par- 
ticularly in those whose subject-matter is human action and 
feeling, it has magnificent possibilities of fertility.” It is 
these magnificent but long-neglected possibilities which may be 
realized through the formation of discussion groups. If we 
can revive the ancient art of oral dialectic and use it as a sup- 
plement to the many: devices for the transmission of fact and 
opinion with which we are familiar in this modern world, we 
may contribute mightily to the effectiveness of democracy and 
to the solution of our common problems. 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 


PENNSYLVANIA DISCUSSION-GROUP PROJECT 


OSCAR GRANGER 


Principal, Haverford Township High School, Upper Darby, Pennsylvania; State 
Coérdinator for Pennsylvania 


The Pennsylvania Branch of the Department of Secon- 
dary-School Principals which was organized in 1933 has over 
five hundred members. 

The local study group movement was inaugurated by the 
branch during the fall of 1935. Early in 1936 fifteen commit- 
tees were appointed to work on various problems in the field of 
secondary education. Several of these committees are still 
active while others have completed their work. The reports of 
these committees have been a major item at all state branch 
meetings since 1935. At present, practically all of the sixty 
local associations are participating in a study of the curricu- 
lum problems arising from the new compulsory attendance law 
of Pennsylvania. They are also, in most cases, reporting on 
their own local projects. A chronology of the highlights of 
our three years’ experience in Pennsylvania may be helpful to 
other state groups. 

The News Letter of the Pennsylvania Branch on February 
23, 1935 contained a list of forty-four associations of which 
thirty-five were active principals’ groups. This issue also out- 
lined a report of a special committee appointed to select a num- 
ber of significant studies for special consideration by all of the 
principals’ groups. This report included a list of eight studies 
for special emphasis and further reported that a total of twen- 
ty-one different studies were being made by one or more of 
the local groups. 

The Pennsylvania Branch held a state conference inde- 
vendent of all other state educational groups on November 1, 
1935. This was the first meeting of its kind and because it 
proved so successful it has been continued as an essential part 
of the state program. At this meeting, a series of round tables 
was conducted on several state studies. A resolution also was 
adopted which suggested that a state planning committee, 
with members holding office several years, be appointed to in- 
sure continuity in the state program, and promote the whole 
local study group movement. 

This Planning Committee has studied the activities of 
local associations, encouraged local associations to adopt cer- 
tain problems for study and research, coérdinated the efforts 
of local groups in the development of a continuing state pro- 





68 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


gram of research, and given publicity to the reports. This 
committee has been accomplishing these things through agen- 
cies set in operation by its planning and the functioning of the 
president, other officers and committees. 

In the winter of 1936 a questionnaire was circulated 
among the principals of the state to determine what studies 
were considered to be of greatest significance. Fifteen im- 
portant studies were selected whereupon fifteen standing com- 
mittees were appointed to promote them. In some instances 
the committee was appointed wholly from one section of the 
state; however, in most cases the committee was composed of 
men from different parts of the state since it was thought that 
a broader representation geographically would give greater 
emphasis to the study. Committees composed of men living 
near each other have proved to be the better type as the mem- 
bers must have frequent meetings to promote their project. 

Our program in 1936 and 1937 gave sufficient time for 
several reports by these committees. In fact, the state meet- 
ings were built around certain of the more significant of these 
studies. A luncheon meeting was also held where every local 
group had an opportunity to make a brief statement about 
some phase of their work. Often these reports were mimeo- 
graphed. 

Present legislation in Pennsylvania has made attendance 
compulsory up to seventeen years of age in 1938; and eighteen 
years, in 1939. This legislation will retain ninety thousand ad- 
ditional youth in our secondary schools. What kind of class- 
room activity to offer these pupils is a problem confronting all 
high-school principals of the state. 

On February 4th of this year the State Association met in 
codperation with the State Department of Education to demon- 
strate a technique for the study of the adequacy of the high 
schools of Pennsylvania to meet the needs of youth who will be 
forced to remain in school until eighteen years of age under the 
new attendance law. Sixty boys and girls including about 
twenty who had left school formed a panel and discussed the 
high-school program, making many valuable comments. That 
afternoon a panel of laymen composed of fifteen representa- 
tives of various citizen groups discussed the same questions. 
They too, made many valuable suggestions. 

An evening meeting took up the problem of encouraging 
all local associations in the state to promote similar programs 
in order to influence local high schools to study this problem by 





' co = cT \! \w -_ J ml 


1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 69 


a program that included teachers, pupils, and laymen as par- 
ticipants. The special committee to study this problem ex- 
pects to gather suggestions for new subject-matter areas from 
the local studies. Each school has been invited to send sug- 
gested courses of study to a central office where they will be 
classified, evaluated and made available to all schools of the 
state. 

The present set-up in Pennsylvania includes in addition to 
the usual officers: (1) A planning committee, whose member- 
ship changes very slowly, to do long range planning for the 
association; (2) A coérdinating committee of eight men, rep- 
resenting eight different areas of the state, to codperate with 
the Discussion-Group Project of the Department of Secondary- 
School Principals; and (3) A research committee of five to 
guide and help the local study groups in their study of signifi- 
cant problems. 


DISCUSSION GROUP PROJECT IN INDIANA 
M. L. KNAPP 


Principal of Elston Senior High School, Michigan City, Indiana; and Coérdinator 
for Indiana 


The Discussion Group Project initiated under the direc- 
tion of the Department of Secondary-School Principals has 
progressed very: satisfactorily in Indiana largely for two rea- 
sons: the quality and challenge of the material in the Orien- 
tation Committee’s reports, and a desire on the part of the 
high-school principals of Indiana to improve and make their 
work more fruitful. 


This attitude on the part of the principals was revealed 
by the promptness and willingness with which most of them 
responded when asked to act as group or district organizers in 
beginning the work. 

Last August the ninety-two counties of the state were 
blocked off into thirty districts in such a manner that no one 
in a given district would have to drive over forty or possibly 
fifty miles to attend a meeting. The number of counties in a 
given district varied from one to six, depending on density of 
population and natural group centers. An effort was made not 
to”have a district which contained fewer than ten high-school 
principals. 

On August 31, letters were sent to twenty-five able and 
active high-school principals in that many districts explaining 





70 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


the nature of the project and asking them to act as group or- 
ganizers in their districts. Four of these were unable to un- 
dertake the work for very legitimate reasons, but within a 
short time twenty-one favorable acceptances had been re- 
ceived. Of this number twenty are still active organizers. In 
October, during the meeting of the Indiana State Teachers’ 
Association at Indianapolis a luncheon meeting was held, 
which was attended by eighteen organizers and Mr. Walter E. 
Myer, Director of Discussion Groups. The meeting served to 
get the organizers acquainted, clarify plans, and quicken ac- 
tion. 

Since that time other organizers have been appointed until 
now eighty-eight of the ninety-two counties are under the di- 
rection of an organizer, and all but six of these counties are 
actively participating. 

January reports from the organizers showed that 401 
principals and thirty-six county and city superintendents were 
taking part in the discussions. Representatives from five of 
the universities and colleges in the state are also taking an 
active part. 

Most of the group meetings are held in the evening as din- 
nor meetings with definitely organized discussion following 
the dinner. This has served to unify the principals of a dis- 
trict into a more closely knit unit. All organizers indicate an 
enthusiastic interest on the part of those participating. 

The January reports also showed that approximately 155 
high schools are using Problems of Secondary Education as a 
basis for faculty discussions. This is somewhat significant be- 
cause the reports indicate further that faculty members not 
only discuss the /ssues with a great deal of interest but in some 
cases wish to do something about them. Local situations are 
receiving some critical study in terms of the questions raised 
by the Jsswes, and some changes seem likely to be made which 
will offer an opportunity for more effective work. 

It is the hope of the Coérdinator that by the close of this 
school year five hundred principals and superintendents and 
five thousand secondary-school teachers in Indiana will be 
giving close consideration to the Jsswes and Functions as pre- 
sented in the reports of the Orientation Committee, 





1938 PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 71 


THE DISCUSSION GROUP PROJECT IN VERMONT 


JOHN C. HUDEN 
Cradford, Vermont; Coérdinator for Vermont 
Mr. Chairman, and members of this conference: 

Lack of time prevents my giving an adequate description 
of Vermont’s educational problems, so I will limit my intro- 
ductory to four postulates. 

1. Vermont is a small rural state. 

. Our high-school principals know each other rather 
well. 

. Vermont’s educational tradition favors such projects 
as the Discussion Groups. 

. These conditions are conducive to the success of this 
Project. 

Vermont’s plan for introducing the Project was simple, 
direct, and forceful. Three distinct phases deserve special 
mention. 

1. Late in August 1937 our State Codrdinator sent a copy 
of the Problems booklet to every principal. This was 
followed by an endorsement from the State Director of 
Secondary Education. 

. Dr. Briggs described the Project at the annual con- 
vocation of the principals on October 8, 1937. Almost 
100% attendance was secured. (Among those absent 
was the State Codrdinator, James Francis Smith, who 
had been stricken with paralysis early in October, 
1937. His work is being carried on by the State Di- 
rector of Secondary Education and an Acting Coordi- 
nator.) 

. Between October 18-27, 1937, State Director Ralph E. 
Noble conducted principals’ meetings at centers con- 
venient to the high schools in eight sections of Ver- 
mont. The Acting Coédrdinator was allowed two hours 
at each meeting, so that eight regional groups were 
formed. At least one hour of each meeting was de- 
voted to a sample discussion session conducted by the 
Acting Coérdinator. (Copies of the programs and ma- 
terials used are available.) 


To date each of the eight regional groups has held from 
one to three meetings. More have been scheduled for the 
spring term when traveling conditions will be better. 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


The Problems pamphlet has been the basic material for 
these meetings, but magazine articles, professional texts, etc., 
have also been used profitably. Some of the bulletins issued by 
the Codperative Study of Secondary-School Standards have 
been of much value, and have furnished much valuable infor- 


mation. 

Regional Coérdinators have been urged to control the dis- 
cussions so that all materials shall be oriented to the Jsswes and 
Functions, as recommended by Dr. Briggs. 

The major aim this winter has been to get the high-school 
people talking about their daily tasks in terms of the Issues 
and Functions. To this end, the principals are giving increas- 
ing attention to the use of the Problems booklet at their faculty 
meetings. 

Our primary aim has been continued for the second se- 
mester. Our next move, however, will be to offer the Discus- 
sion Group materials and services to the professors of secon- 
dary education in Vermont Colleges. 

While it is too early to make any accurate evaluation of 
our progress, we can claim that five distinct advantages have 
arisen from the Project: 

1. The principals have obtained a broader outlook on 
their everyday problems. Immediate difficulties do 
not seem as huge and forbidding as formerly. 

. The principals are more eager to search out magazine 
articles and text references bearing on their work, par- 
ticularly where the /sswes and Functions are involved. 
The principals have found new courage in the unity of 
purpose engendered by their frequent meetings. 

. The principals have found new possibilities for codp- 
eration with other schools. 

. The principals have found opportunities to revise their 
educational philosophies, some of which have remained 
undisturbed (or even unformulated) until now. 


The disadvantages seem to center around lack of time, 
lack of materials, lack of ability to concentrate on major 
problems, and lack of trained discussion leaders. So many 
small problems arise in connection with the discussions that 
much time is wasted. Some meetings have resolved them- 
selves into discussions of implementation, rather than the in- 
tended Problems. On the whole, however, Vermont’s Project 
is meeting with a hearty response, and we hope to report still 





= | 65 CS Oe et 85 lle OO OM 




















PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 73 





1938] 


further enthusiasm and progress at the meeting in New York 
next June. 


THE DISCUSSION-GROUP PROJECT IN TEXAS 


E. B. COMSTOCK 
Principal North Dallas High School, Dallas, Texas; and Coordinator for Texas 


It was on November 17, last, that Mr. Waiter E. Myer, 
National Director of the Discussion Group Project, came to 
Shreveport, Louisiana, to address the State Teachers’ Associa- 
tion. At that time he called a meeting of Coérdinators from 
Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas, and gave them instructions 
in regard to their work. He started a project at that time 
that has met with success in the Southwest. 

One week after the meeting at Shreveport, the High- 
School Principals’ Association of the State of Texas, at its an- 
nual meeting held at Houston, was told of the plans for discus- 
sion groups. The principals of the state apparently were wait- 
ing for something like this to happen. Although that organi- 
zation had been running for thirteen years, and the matter of 
joining the Department of Secondary-School Principals had 
been proposed several times, it never felt inclined to accept 
the proposal. This year the desire to receive such bulletins as 
No. 59 on the Jssues and No. 64 on the Functions of Secondary 
Education, and their interest in this project when presented 
caused the principals and supervisors to vote unanimously to 
join in a body the Department of Secondary-School Principals. 
This action was a direct result of the discussion group move- 

*ment and an important one for the schools of Texas. 

Mr. Myer wrote me a few weeks ago that he was asking 
the codrdinators from Vermont, Pennsylvania, North Caro- 
lina, Michigan, Indiana, and Texas to report at this meeting. 
If we add the areas of the states here named, except Texas, 
and to the total add the areas of the states of Maine, New 
Hampshire, Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Rhode Island, 
that sum will be 10,000 square miles less than that of Texas. 
The great distances that schoolmen in Texas have to travel to 
attend state or district meetings or conventions of any sort 
make the organization of discussion groups somewhat different 
from that within densely populated areas. 

The state of Texas has for a number of years been divided 
for Interscholastic League purposes into eight regions. There 
are four regions on the North, with centers at Canyon, Abilene, 













74 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS {[March, 


Denton, and Texarkana. There are four regions in South 
Texas, with centers at Huntsville, San Marcos, Kingsville, and 
Alpine. 

It was easy for us to adopt for the purpose of discussion 
groups these geographical divisions. In each one of these eight 
regions,—each about the size of Indiana,—there has been ap- 
pointed a regional director. Each region is composed of four 
districts, making thirty-two districts in the state. Each one of 
these thirty-two districts is larger in size than the state of Con- 
necticut. Each district director has charge of approximately 
eight counties. The district director is not only calling to- 
gether representative schoolmen from his counties for discus- 
sion-group purposes, but is influencing the principals of high 
schools to study with their teachers the Jsswes and Functions 
of Secondary Education. The constant flow of these pamphlets 
and bulletins from Washington to Texas indicates somewhat 
the effect of this movement. 

In the four regions in the North from New Mexico on the 
West to Arkansas on the East, the work is quite completely 
organized, and the rapidity with which the work is advancing 
depends upon the ability and initiative of the regional and 
district leaders. 

In the southern part of the state, the work is being satis- 
factorily conducted in two of the four regions. Region V, with 
Houston as the center, is being well organized by Principals 
W. S. Brandenberger and E. D. Martin. Last month E. D. 
Martin led one discussion group with Issue No. 1 as the sub- 
ject. 

Region VII is being organized by Superintendent Floyd G. ° 
Betts of the Wharton Schools. He has selected district leaders 
from Wharton, Beeville, Laredo, and McAllen. 

There seems to be a little lethargy in the San Antonio and 
El Paso regions, but it is probably due to the fact that the 
right men were not contacted at the start and changes have 
been necessary. 

The studious, painstaking, and scholarly reports of the 
Committee on Orientation are being read and studied through- 
out the state. Professors of secondary education in our state 
teachers’ colleges and even in denominational schools are using 
the Bulletins No. 59 and No. 64 in their classes. Last summer 
Dr. C. A. Wisseman, Professor of Education in Southern Meth- 
odist University, used them as the main texts in a graduate 
course. Many school executives were in his classes. This has 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 15 


made our work much easier. The well worked-out summary of 
Issues and Functions printed in eight pages, known as Prob- 
lems of Secondary Education, is receiving much praise 
throughout the state. Judging from the enthusiasm the prin- 
pals are showing who desire to do some professional work with 
their teachers, a car load of these bulletins will soon be neces- 
sary for the state of Texas. 


NORTH CAROLINA DISCUSSION-GROUP PROJECT 


ELMER H. GARINGER 


Principal, Central High School, Charlotte, North Carolina; State Codrdinator for 
North Carolina 


The principals of the large high schools in North Carolina 
have had an organization for the discussion of their problems 
for the last fifteen years. This group has met one or more 
times each year and has done some rather significant work at 
one time or another. During the depression, however, there 
was almost a complete turnover of personnel in the position of 
high-school principal. The task for the last two years has been 
to revive this organization and to give it direction. The proj- 
ect ef the Planning Committee of the Department of Secon- 
dary-School Principals has come at an opportune time. At the 
first meeting of this group in Winston-Salem on October 15th, 
1937, the study guide sheets for the Jsswes and the Functions 
were distributed and an explanation was made of the project 
which was being launched by the Department. The principals 
appointed a committee to arrange for a meeting in December 
at which time a discussion might be held. Individual mem- 
bers expressed the desire to have this first discussion projected 
on a high level so that it might serve as a model for other 
meetings throughout the year. The committee urged Dr. Myer, 
the National Director, to appear at this meeting to conduct the 
discussion and he very kindly accepted the invitation. The 
meeting was held at Duke University on December 3rd and 4th. 
The Departments of Education both at Duke University and 
at the University of North Carolina codperated to make this 
a most outstanding program. Function One was used as a 
basis for the afternoon program. The number present was 
_about forty-five and represented schools from the most distant 
points of the state. After a preliminary explanation by the di- 
rector, a most vigorous discussion was held in which practically 
the entire audience participated. The meeting had been called 
at 2:39 and adjourned at about 4 o’clock. Time was allowed 





16 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS {March, 


for the men to socialize and to get about the campus and relax. 
At a dinner meeting in the evening, Dr. Myer was called upon 
to give an explanation of the plan for the project and to tell 
something of the steps that had been taken in other states. 
Most of the persons present participated in the discussion that 
followed as to the merits of the undertaking and the methods 
that might be most likely to succeed. At the end of the meet- 
ing the state director was asked to name principals to act as 
regional directors in order to bring into the project a great 
many principals and teachers who could not attend the all- 
state meetings. 


The North Carolina Education Association has been oper- 
ating for a number of years under the district plan. The state 
is subdivided into six regional districts. The state director 
attempted to select a professionally minded and aggressive 
principal in each of these districts to promulgate and to foster 
the movement in his district. The plan in operation then is 
one that consists of a state codrdinator and six regional co- 
ordinators working under the direction of the national director. 


A full discussion was held concerning the best method to 
pursue in these discussions in order to get principals and 
teachers actively at work in discussion groups. It soon ap- 
peared that the plan which might be effective in one region 
might not be most effective in another region. In some sec- 
tions of the state, a schoolmasters’ club that meets monthly is 
the most wide-awake and professional of any active club. At 
least, two of the regional directors prefer to tie their organiza- 
tion up with the schoolmasters’ club. In Greensboro, for ex- 
ample, the director holds a discussion group in the afternoon 
at four o’clock and the men then attend the banquet and meet- 
ing of the schoolmasters’ club. In one other district, this plan 
seemed to be the best one to follow. In a third district, the 
director found that a county organization seemed to be the 
most plausible one. Within a month after the state meeting at 
Duke University, this director had organized discussion groups 
in nine of the counties in his region and similar groups have 
since been organized in the remaining counties. This director 
saw to it that the leading principals in each of the counties in 
his region had in his hands the study guide sheets. He also 
found that the schoolmasters’ club was helpful in fostering the 
idea of a discussion group. In a fourth district, the writer 
attended a meeting only recently that proved to be highly suc- 
cessful. In this district there are fourteen counties. The di- 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 77 


rector sent announcements to all of the high-school principals 
of the region asking them to come prepared to discuss Function 
two. A professor of education from Queens-Chicora College 
was invited to act as chairman. Every county except one was 
represented. Thirty-five principals were in attendance. The 
meeting became so enthusiastic that the chairman could hardly 
adjourn the group at six o’clock. Dr. Richard P. Gummere, 
Dean of Harvard University and a member of the Committee 
on the Coédperative Study of Secondary-School Standards, was 
the guest of the group at a dinner and speaker for the evening 
on the subject of Modern Trends in Education. This entire 
program proved to be most stimulating and profitable if one 
may judge by the interest and enthusiasm shown. 


A third all-state meeting has been held at Chapel Hill on 
February 11th and 12th under the auspices of the University 
of North Carolina. Functions two, three, and four were used 
as a basis for the discussion. Dr. Edgar W. Knight, Chairmar 
of the Committee on the Re-Statement of Educational Objec- 
tives of the Educational Policies Commission, Dr. Howard W. 
Odum, a member of President Hoover’s Committee on Social 
Trends, and the Educational Psychologist, Professor A. M. 
Jordan, were the leaders of the discussion. Use of university 
and other expert talent for some of these meetings is excused 
in the hope of projecting the whole thing on a high level of 
thought. Some principals, however, are so reticent and so 
lacking in self-confidence that they will not participate when 
the expert is present. It is necessary to have some meetings, 
at least, in which the expert is not there. On the other hand, 
it does not seem wise to exclude men in university and college 
circles such as those mentioned. Laymen, too, should be in- 
cluded and are being invited to participate in several of the 
centers. 


In all but one of the six regions of North Carolina, the ma- 
terial used as a basis of discussion is that included in the study 
guide sheets of the Department of Secondary-School Princi- 
pals. In the other district, the principals chose to use their 
own problems. In the promotion of this project, the state di- 
rector has had the full codperation of the State Department of 
Education and the North Carolina Education Association. The 
Commission on the Codperative Study of Secondary-School 
Standards has shown its interest by offering to send one of its 
staff to another state meeting which is being planned for April 
at Pinehurst. 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


The main problem in promoting discussion groups seems 
to be to get the type of leadership that is needed for the dis- 
cussion period that will stimulate everybody to participate. A 
booklet or a bibliography giving information to leaders as to 
the proper methods for conducting a discussion is needed very 
greatly. University professors and others who accept the re- 
sponsibility of leading these discussion groups need some 
coaching so that they may not make the period just another 
class period in which they teach the group. They ought to be 
members of the organization but they ought not stulify or 
cramp the ideas or the expressions of the principal who is do- 
ing the practical work. There are not enough well trained and 
mature, practical school men to make these discussion groups 
what they should be. The expert help must be used. If it is 
used in a sensible fashion, the discussion will be on a high level 
and the outcome will be valuable not only to the principals but 
to the schools of education generally. Too often the schools of 
education have been far removed from the field of reality. 
This discussion group project ought to correct that situation in 
some measure. 


A COMMUNITY DISCUSSION PROJECT 


LLOYD N. MORRISETT 


Assistant Superintendent of Schools in charge of Secondary Education, 
Yonkers, New York. 


Our secondary-school principals and directors during the 
last two or three years became interested in reports, and more 
particularly in discussions of the reports which came from the 
Orientation Committee. Some time and attention during the 
early months of 1937 were devoted by our principals and di- 
rectors to a cursory. study of the reports. The further the 
study was pursued and the more thinking that was done as a 
result of reading the reports, the stronger the urge became to 
make a careful, systematic study of the Jsswes and the Func- 
tions of Secondary Education as enunciated by the Orientation 
Committee of the Department of Secondary-School Principals. 
Consequently the group at one of its meetings last March de- 
cided that each principal would ask his faculty if the faculty 
as a group would like to undertake a long term study of the 
Issues and Functions of Secondary Education as reported by 
the Orientation Committee, and also of the reviews and criti- 
cisms of the Committee’s report as these might come from the 
press from time to time. The principals were assured that the 





, i 


a ee ee oe a. | UO. 


1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 19 


administration would furnish half as many copies each of 
Bulletins No. 59 (Issues of Secondary Education), No. 60 
(Proceedings of the St. Louis meeting of the Department, 
which dealt with the Issues), No. 64 (The Functions of Secon- 
dary Education) and No. 65 (Proceedings of the New Orleans 
meeting which dealt with the Functions), as there were mem- 
bers on each school faculty. 


PURPOSES OF THE STUDY 


At the time our program for examining and studying the 
Issues and Functions was being planned those who planned 
and supported the proposed program conceived the purposes of 
the study for those interested in or working in the secondary 
schools of Yonkers to be: 

1. To become acquainted with the problems which secon- 
dary education is face to face with to-day. 

2. To examine critically the reports of the Orientation 
Committee. 

3. To clarify our own thinking concerning the problems 
and their implications as raised in the reports of the Commit- 
tee. 

4. To use the Jssues and Functions as preferred material 
for professional group meetings, discussions, and conferences. 

5. To relate the problems and implications contained in 
the reports to secondary-school problems which actually exist, 
face, and challenge us now in Yonkers. 

6. To re-examine and consider our local school practices 
as they relate to courses of study, curricular offerings, organi- 
zation, administration, objectives, guidance, attendance, meth- 
ods of instruction, health service, expenditure of funds for 
books, library service, supplies, equipment, etc., in the light of 
the implications and philosophy of the Committee’s reports. 

7. To encourage individual teachers to modify their prac- 
tices as their conception or philosophy of secondary education 
changes or develops. 

8. To provide faculty meetings, department meetings and 
group conferences with a common basis for discussion which 
would provide for democratic participation and challenge the 
best talents, efforts, and thinking of each member (we have 
great faith in the democratizing elements of this study). 

9. To provide teachers, principals, and directors with 
this particular phase of professional equipment so as to stimu- 
late and encourage professional leadership, and to be prepared 





80 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


as a group of teachers to provide leadership for lay groups in 
their study or thinking on similar problems. 

10. To extend, when we ourselves are prepared and 
equipped to do so, the study, consideration, and examination of 
the Orientation Committee’s reports on the Issues and Func- 
tions of Secondary Education to lay groups in the city of Yon- 
kers by inviting such groups as parent-teacher associations, 
neighborhood councils, study clubs, etc., to undertake a careful 
systematic study of the Jsswes and Functions under profes- 
sional leadership which we will offer. 

The principals presented the idea of a long term study of 
the Jssues and Functions of Secondary Education to the teach- 
ers of the several schools, and after the teachers had had a 
month or six weeks to think this matter over, to discuss it 
among themselves, and to decide what they wanted to do, a poll 
was taken. As a result of teacher decision eight of our nine 
secondary schools developed and planned for an earnest, seri- 
ous, professional long-term study of the Jssues and Functions. 
Two schools plan to make this study at intervals of about six 
weeks over a period of three years. Others have planned to 
make an intensive study of the Jssues and Functions for a year 
and to decide at the end of the year whether or not they want 
to continue the study, while a third group has plans for contin- 
uing the study at regular intervals over a period of two years. 
The plans of the eight schools are similar in several respects, 
and also differ widely at certain points. I shall give the pro- 
gram of one of our schools which I think typically illustrates 
the direction which the study is taking in the Yonkers secon- 


dary schools. 


THE PLAN 


The staff of this high school was supplied with copies of 
Bulletins No. 59, 60, 64 and 65 of the Department of Secon- 
dary-School Principals; a bibliography of closely related pro- 
fessional literature including recent reviews and criticisms of 
the report as carried in professional magazines; copies of 
Problems of Secondary Education, a discussion outline pub- 
lished by the Department of Secondary-School Principals. 

The teachers were invited to make for themselves a survey 
of the Jsswes and Functions; of the breadth and scope of the 
Orientation Committee’s reports; of the magnitude, import, 
and significance of the undertaking of a long term study which 
the group of teachers was planning and mapping out for itself. 








9s in 


and 
n of 
unc- 
‘on- 
ons, 
oful 
fes- 


oll 











1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 81 





Early acquaintance on the part of teachers with the Issues 
and Functions indicated the need for knowledge of the back- 
ground and of the history of the Jssuwes and Functions as re- 
ported by the Committee. Materials were made available to 
the members of the group which gave an over-view of the his- 
tory and background of the Committee’s work, and also of the 
personnel and equipment of the Orientation Committee itself. 
Later a two-hour meeting of the staff was devoted to a discus- 
sion of the history and development of the final reports on the 


Issues and Functions. 

Teachers were asked to select certain issues and functions 
in which they were or might be particularly interested. Com- 
mittees were thus formed to study, examine, criticise, and to 
conduct meetings of the staff as a whole or smaller groups in 
the consideration of the particular issue or function or both 
selected by the committee. These committees vary in number ; 
some have three; others four or five; while one has seven mem- 
bers. Effort was made to have each committee in so far as 
possible made up of both men and women, young and more 
experienced teachers, and teachers of more than one subject. 
This was not always possible since the major. factor which de- 
termined membership on a given committee was interest ex- 
pressed by the teacher himself. 

The several committees are finding it necessary to in- 
crease their number from time to time, to ask for help from 
their associates, and to appoint special committees for definite 
purposes, and to ask for extension of time. The important 
thing is that the committees are at work, the teachers are inter- 
ested, and they, I think, are getting real joy and a genuine 
pleasure out of the adventure. 

The staff as a whole meets once a month to have a com- 
mittee composed of members of the group lead and direct the 
staff in a discussion which lasts from one to two hours on some 
issue or function, or some implications growing out of the 
Issues and Functions. The last time I attended a meeting of 
this particular faculty the reports and discussions were con- 
cerned with “If secondary education is to be provided at public 
expense for all normal individuals, what must we do in this 
school to meet the demand and offer profitable educational 
training to those in attendance?” Specifically the discussion 
dealt chiefly with the need for changing or modifying courses 
of study, changes in requirements, new courses, breaking with 
tradition, Regents examinations, the need for new measure- 









82 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


ment techniques, new standards, guidance, the classification of 
pupils, and lastly college entrance requirements. 

At present the staff contemplates continuing the study for 
at least another school year, the school year 1938-39. 

There are approximately 450 teachers in the secondary 
schools, grades seven to twelve inclusive, in Yonkers. Of these 
450 teachers 400 have since October been seriously, busily, and . 
I think enthusiastically, engaged in a study of the Jsswes and 
Functions. This study is the basis for faculty meeting dis- 
cussions, departmental meeting discussions, small group dis- 
cusions, and is carried on largely through committees of 
teachers. These committees which at the present total fifty or 
more have been appointed to study, analyze, collect data, do 
research in one or more of the Jsswes and Functions and on 
certain implications growing out of the study of these Issues 
and Functions. 


DINNER DISCUSSION MEETINGS 


It has been a source of genuine satisfaction to note that 
as the study proceeded the interest of the teachers as a group, 
especially of certain individuals, has increased and become at 
times almost contagious. Then again, it was felt that it would 
be to the advantage of the teachers if larger groups of teachers 
than would be represented by the staff of any one school should 
come together at least two or three times a year to exchange 
ideas and viewpoints, and discuss the more fundamental im- 
plications of the Jsswes and Functions as they concern secon- 
dary education in Yonkers. As an outgrowth of this thinking 
a committee of six teachers was set up to find out the wishes 
and the desires of their associates relative to the larger meet- 
ings, and to formulate and carry out plans in accordance with 
the wishes of the teachers. As a result of the committee’s 
work a series of three dinner discussion meetings was planned; 
two of these have already been held. The first was on the eve- 
ning of December 9 at which time we had as our guest and dis- 
cussion leader, Professor Will French of Teachers College, a 
member of the Orientation Committee. Two hundred twenty- 
five of our teachers, principals and directors attended this din- 
ner discussion meeting. We gained much in insight and in- 
spiration from Professor French, and those present responded 
to Professor French’s leadership, and liberally entered into a 
worth-while discussion of Issue II, “Shall secondary education 
seek to retain all pupils in school as long as they wish to re- 























83 





PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





1938] 


main, or shall it transfer them to other agencies under educa- 
tional supervision when, in the judgment of the school au- 
thorities, these agencies promise to serve better the pupils’ 
immediate and probable future needs?”, also of Function X, 
“To retain each student until the law of diminishing returns 
begins to operate, or until he is ready for more independent 
study in a higher institution; and when it is manifest that he 
cannot or will not materially profit from further study of what 
can be offered, to eliminate him promptly, if possible directing 
him into some or other school or into work for which he seems 
most fit”. Our second dinner discussion meeting was held on 
February 16, at which time we had the privilege of having as 
our guest and discussion leader, Professor Heber Ryan of the 
State Teachers College at Montclair, New Jersey, also a mem- 
ber of the Orientation Committee. Approximately two hun- 
dred teachers, principals and directors attended and discussed 
Issue IX “Shal] secondary education seek merely the adjust- 
ment of studencs to prevailing social ideals, or shall it seek 
the reconstruction of society” ?, and Function I “To continue 
by a definite program, though in a diminishing degree, the in- 
tegration of students; this should be on an increasingly intel- 
lectual level until the desired common knowledge, apprecia- 
tions, ideals, attitudes, and practices are firmly fixed”. From 
all indications the group enjoyed the evening, and were in- 
tensely interested in the fundamental implications of Issue IX 
and Function I for secondary education in our system. The 
expression of the group was to the effect that we should have a 
third dinner meeting in April, and also plan for a series next 
year. At the April meeting we expect to have as our honored 
guest and leader another member of the Orientation Commit- 


tee. 


IMPORTANCE OF THE PROGRAM SET FORTH 


The important thing in connection with the study which 
we in Yonkers are making of the Issues and Functions is that 
the secondary teachers by and large are making a careful, vol- 
untary study of the reports of the Committee and of the cur- 
rent educational literature relative to these reports. The 
teachers and principals are reading, studying and thinking 

“through the problems raised in the reports. They are also . 
clarifying their own thinking and formulating, as a group, 

what might be said to be a philosophy of secondary education 

under a common stimulus and looking toward common objec- 















84 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


tives. We had in mind when our program was conceived cer- 
tain objectives or purposes which have already been set forth 
in this paper. In the main we are gratified with the develop- 
ment of the program of study. We are satisfied with the di- 
rection it is taking, are pleased with the enthusiasm, interest, 
critical attitude, and professional zeal which characterize our 
teachers. 


YONKERS TEACHERS COMMENT ON THE ISSUES AND 
FUNCTIONS OF SECONDARY EDUCATION 


The following paragraphs are copies of parts of com- 
ments by secondary teachers in the Yonkers schools upon the 
Issues and Functions of Secondary Education. These com- 
ments were taken from the hundreds which have been ac- 
corded the administration by teachers of the high schools 
within the past few months. 


The study of Jssues and Functions of Secondary Educa- 
tion. has been particularly stimulating to me in several re- 
spects. 

First, it has explained to my satisfaction the programs of 
junior high schools with the so-called exploratory techniques 
which I have heard severely criticized by senior high school 
teachers because of “the little ground covered”. I can now 
appreciate the purpose and value of such courses. 

Secondly, the study has clarified for me the functions and 
purposes of a guidance program in secondary schools. The 
possibility of establishing such a program generally does not 
now seem so remote. 

Thirdly, the study has opened my eyes to the difficulties 
faced by the progressive school administrator. I fear that 
most teachers are too devoted to their individual subjects to 
appreciate administrative problems. 

Lastly, I have found that the study has changed my point 
of view toward my own subject, English, and toward non-aca- 
demic students. I am glad to admit that I no longer consider 
my subject of primary importance in every student’s program ; 
I like to think that I have formed a fairer, more complete view 
of his program as a whole. My interest in non-academic stu- 
dents has been greatly strengthened by the challenge which I 
now feel they offer to the teacher—to give them not instruc- 
tion to enable them to pass a final examination or to enter col- 
lege, but instruction that will prepare them for life. 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 85 


I believe the study of the Jsswes and Functions is bringing 
the larger problems of secondary education effectively to the 
attention of many of us who have too long considered the 
teaching of our particular subject as the only real problem 
needing our consideration. . 

I am sure that we have already gained the whole-hearted 
codperation of a large proportion of our teachers in our en- 
deavor for adjustment in this school. 


From the study carried on in Yonkers, I feel more 
strongly that our present secondary education is inadequate to 
meet the needs of our students. I believe that there is an im- 
mediate need of vocational schools. 

To take a specific example. There are many pupils in my 
English classes who have reached the limit of their ability. 
To them a study of subject matter is a waste of time and they 
will not do their best as they are not interested. They do not 
care for further mathematics as they think they know it all 
because they can add two and two. Literature is not appreci- 
ated. They benefit mostly by social studies and general science 
because in those subjects they come in contact with everyday 
problems. 


The strengthening of a rapidly-developing realization that 
certain needed changes are overdue in large areas of the edu- 
cational world. At all times, and particularly in view of pres- 
ent-day social and economic conditions and in the light of the 
results of modern psychological research, educators must rec- 
ognize: 

a. That education is not only a continuous process but 
should so far as feasible be definitely organized as such. 

b. That secondary education particularly must be con- 
ceived and in actual practice conducted as growth under guid- 
ance. 

c. That the program of studies of secondary education 
should be so clarified and vamped that it will really provide 
the pupil with a design for living. 

d. That no subject, technique, or objective should be con- 
tinued solely on the grounds of precedent. 

“ e. That the subject matter is to be evaluated not for its 
alleged intrinsic value but as an effective medium for pupil ex- 
perience in problem-solving. The ultimate criterion in the se- 
lection of subject matter should be in fact as well as in theory 





86 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


the present needs and the probable future needs of the pupil. 
In this connection, it is well to scrutinize carefully the claims 
that the study of this or that subject develops habits of logical 
thinking or scientific approach. If many experienced teachers 
of these subjects fail to show such qualities as a matter of 
habit in their daily affairs, it is questionable whether study of 
this kind can be expected to produce them in pupils. 


Our staff this school year has been rather systematically 
studying and discussing in faculty meetings the Jssues of Sec- 
ondary Education as found in Bulletin No. 59 of the Depart- 
ment of Secondary-School Principals of the N.E.A. 

In my opinion, the chief value of these discussions to date 
has been to vitalize our faculty meetings; that is, to change 
them from the principal controlled to the forum type of meet- 
ing which doubtless is a worth-while metamorphosis. 


The reports of the Committee on the Orientation of Sec- 
ondary Education have proved to be in Roosevelt High School 
of general interest to most of the teachers. These reports are 
especiaily pertinent in that they discuss many of the issues 
which are of great importance to-day in secondary education 
giving arguments for and against the issue. I believe that 
every teacher in secondary school should become familiar with 
the information that is embodied in these reports. We have 
already had an opportunity to study two of these reports, 
namely Guidance and Safety. We found the meetings to be 
most profitable. As the year goes on in our own school, many 
of these reports will be discussed at teachers meetings. 


The report of the Orientation Committee on the /ssues 
and Functions of Secondary Education contains many valuable 
and practical suggestions. The study of that report has been 
a source of encouragement to “carry on” with the planning of 
a new flexible English program that will approximate the 
meeting of the needs and the mental capacity of each individual 
child. I was most interested to find that so many of our edu- 
cators have devoted themselves to the study of problems that 
concern us locally. 

Accordingly, initial steps have been taken to re-organize 
the English Department. In this connection, a study of the 
report was made for the purpose of securing helpful sugges- 
tions. The Orientation Committee groups the failures into 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 87 


three classes: (1) the pupils who fail to live up to a certain 
standard of passing, (2) the pupils who are far below the 
average of the group, (3) the pupils who are not working to 
their full mental capacity. 

With this information as a basis I, as chairman of the de- 
partment, classified the pupils who were failing in English 2. 
Two classes were assigned to a 2B English class. The achieve- 
ment of the pupils in this group was far below the average of 
accompiishment of the normal pupil! in the group. 

In English 2B a course of study is being followed that 
gives to these pupils subject matter that is within their capac- 
ity to understand. I know that these children are profiting by 
their English work. Formerly I felt that they were profiting 
very little by their presence in the English class. 

Since “the correct approach of guidance is for the school 
to study the pupils and assist him step by step in enlarging 
and enriching his life inside the school and out’, the High 
School of Commerce offers a new elective course, Social Eng- 
lish and Personality Development. This course answers af- 
firmatively the question in Issue VIII: “Shall secondary educa- 
tion present merely organized knowledge, or shall it also as- 
sume responsibility for attitudes and ideals?” 


Through reading the Committee’s report, the opinion I 
nave held for a long time has been strengthened ; namely, that 
much of our failure to continue the social and emotional inte- 
gration of pupils so well initiated in our elementary schools is 
due to our own narrow specialization which has resulted in too 
much concentration on teaching of subjects and not enough 
emphasis on training boys and girls for better living under the 
present sozial and economic conditions. 

The report has widened the real teacher’s horizon, and 
has found new vistas, wherein the teacher may discover many 
new opportunities, for service to that “forgotten group” of 
young men and women who otherwise might complete our 
school courses, and still be unprepared to find their place in 
the world of confusion that awaits them. The report is in- 
deed democratic, in that it recognizes the school’s responsi- 
bility for caring for “all of the children of all of the people”. 


Discussions centering on the Orientation Committee Re- 
port have helped me to see the picture as a whole. Each 





88 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


teacher, especially in the high school, is apt to have a rather 
narrow view and think largely in terms of his own subject. 
Group discussions broaden our viewpoints and help to coérdi- 
nate our efforts. 

The discussion on guidance, held in our own school, em- 
phasized the need for reorganization to care for pupils who 
cannot benefit from our courses of study as, at present, de- 
signed. The problem seem to be, not only to make a new 
course of study, but also the one of leading the pupils who need 
that new course, to follow it. 


It seems to me that if we could have a proper educa- 
tional system, one which functions in school and out, one which 
would be a continual educational process, under vertical su- 
pervision, from kindergarten, through, or well into, adult life, 
we could reconstruct the thinking of the world. Adult edu- 
cation is here to stay ; why not then link it with education from 
the beginning. To do this we must change our idea of one 
school preparing for another; but have as a goal better, fuller, 
richer living year by year. If our system were so organized 
that a pupil could, after he had reached his “educational satu- 
ration” point, in so far as academic learning is concerned, leave 
one place and continue in another where his personality fits, 
we could re-establish the world. 

How to accomplish this is the task. I do not believe that 
we should look upon this as an insurmountable obstacle. Nei- 
ther do I believe that we should say “When are you going to 
begin”, or “What are you going to do about it”. No super- 
intendent, no group of educators is going to be able to do any- 
thing about it until the great army of teachers is sold to the 
idea. It is each teacher’s duty to begin thinking, planning, and 
motivating her professional life around these Issues and Func- 
tions. What a really effective beginning it would be! If each 
teacher said to herself “What can I do about it? How may I 
begin? I shall begin right now thinking toward the goal.” 
Then, we would be moving with an unconquerable force to- 
ward a new day in education. 


Regarding the use being made in Yonkers of the Orien- 
tation Committee’s Report on the Issues and Functions of Sec- 
ondary Education, I think that the method of discussions led 
by representatives of the research workers who have helped to 
make the study is the most helpful and illuminating way to 












89 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 









clarify our thoughts on the many bewildering phases of this 
subject. The summarized findings and recommendations rep- 
resenting various points of view need to be interpreted and set 
forth by those who are familiar with the practical considera- 
tions as applied over a larger field than our own community. 
Such a procedure helps us to square our problems with those 
of the nation as a whole and to make a more intelligent local 
application of the principles involved. 














The Orientation Committee’s Report on the Issues and 
Functions of Secondary Education has encouraged me to try 
to figure out just what our schools should try to give the great 
mass of boys and girls now enrolled. I have come to the fol- 
lowing conclusions: 

1. That the teacher himself should be worthy of imita- 
tion. Through contact with him every boy and girl should 
want to be a good citizen, want to be courteous, want to speak 
clearly, think logically, stand straight, look you in the eye, be 
truthful, considerate, codperative. The teacher should, there- 
fore, be selected on grounds of personality as well as of learn- 
ing. 

2. That every boy and girl should be taught efficient work 
habits that will carry over into any field he may later choose. 

3. That utilitarian training, even for the student who will 
not go on to college, should got take the place of a firm ground- 
ing in the never-changing fundamentals. Even for the boy 
with a low I. Q. who may become at best a plumber’s assistant, 
it is more important, in school, to learn to read the newspapers 
with a grain of salt than to handle plumbing tools. His em- 
ployer will in most cases be willing to teach him that. 

4. That for those who are going on to college especially, 
and as much as possible. for the others, too, there should be 
more opportunity for independent thinking and research than 
we have at present in the average secondary-school course. 

5. That the teacher should make a greater effort to find 
out something about each student’s background, home life, am- 
bitions, hobbies, talents, etc., and guide that student accord- 
ingly. I would suggest in this connection that a course be 
given in Yonkers in “Guidance for the Classroom Teacher”. 
One or two guidance experts in each school cannot possibly 
handle the problems alone. They need the codperation of 
classroom teachers who are also adequately trained in this field. 








































90 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


The new type of secondary school is characterized by tol- 
erant, friendly, and spontaneous relationships among pupils, 
teachers, parents, and other members of the school communi- 
ties. It offers opportunities and encouragement to the cre- 
ative aspirations of all the adventurous spirits of the school 
community. It exemplified those aspects of democracy and 
Americanism which promise most for the present and for the 
future. It is an adventure in common purposes and in their 
fulfillment through individual endeavor. 

The most acute and immediate problem of the secondary 
school is that of organization, content, and method of the cur- 
riculum. It must be broadly conceived in harmony with the 
social aspirations of our American democratic communities, 
the needs and opportunities of the evolving economic era and 
the traits which characterize children in their teens. The im- 
pulse and desire of children is to live their own lives and to be 
themselves. The successful curriculum will provide opportu- 
nities for each pupil to have a share in selecting his own work, 
to follow and develop his worthy individualistic avocational in- 
terests and to complete those self-accepted tasks for the sense 
of mastery, the joy of accomplishment and the approval of his 


fellows. 











To me Issue IX, “Shall the schools undertake to reform 
the world?” is particularly interesting, for the problem con- 
stantly confronts teachers both with individual pupils and in 
a general way. It seems to me that every subject in the cur- 
viculum and every activity of the school offer rich opportunity 
to establish in the minds of the young people a desire to culti- 
vate worthy qualities of thought. One illustration alone may 
be presented here. The home-room organization is a fruitful 
field in which to plant the seeds of good government and good 
citizenship. Guided unobtrusively by a wise counselor, stu- 
dents learn in class elections and in other group activities to 
exercise judgment and to place character and service above 
personality and mere popularity. 





Possible outcomes—Individual characteristics of students 
as these concern their interests and capacities will be recog- 
nized. This will inevitably increase the need for the guidance 
function in the form of gathering and interpreting cumulative 
information about the individual, (Function VII and IX) ; 
ascertaining his “specialized interests, aptitudes and capaci- 





























i, ee ee ee | 6 









91 





PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





1938] 





ties’ (Function IV); aiding his personality adjustment in 
school and social life, and on into vocational life (Function 
VII). 

The discussion of the report will help toward placing em- 
phasis on the individual rather than on courses and their con- 
tent. If school people would come to consider every child in 
their charge first as an individual with strengths, and weak- 
nesses, ambition and thwartings, handicaps and health, and 
other phases of his personality and character, then adequate 
curriculum offerings would almost automatically follow. The 
report points to such emphasis and so will accelerate education 
toward preparing students for happy and optimum social and 
individual adjustment. 












I am happy to state that I have found in the Report on the 
Issues and Functions considerable material conducive to real 
thinking in the field of secondary education. Perhaps the fol- 
lowing will best reflect my feelings of what the Report means 
to me: 

1. The aim of American secondary education must be to 
socialize man completely and make him socially efficient. 

2. Education for social efficiency must be elective in char- 
acter. 3 

3. Education must keep changing its scope and functions 
according as life becomes more complex. 

4. In asystem of education of this type the teachers ought 
to be trained in resourcefulness rather than in a fixed proce- 
dure. 

5. Education should point toward building intellect 
rather than factual knowledge. Emotions rightly directed are 
power ; they are the “steam in the boiler” so to speak. The in- 
tellect controls the steam. 
















There must be talented and serious instructors who are 
capable of keen intellectual analysis and who are not afraid of 
truth wherever they find it. They must be able to analyze the 
difference between political “bogeys” and “scare-words” and 
phrases that are the inventions of selfish political interests and 
real organized political and economic evils that are costing 
society millions of dollars annually. 

Education must teach the fallacy of getting “something 
for nothing”, and the “you are a sap if you work” psychology 
must be eradicated if we are to make any real progress against 
















92 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


the great organized “rackets” that militate against democracy. 
This paragraph is suggested by Harry Elmer Barnes. 


The most interesting and important observation to me is 
the realization that due to present times, economical depression 
and lack of outside educational agencies the school must occupy 
itself with a class of pupils and instruction which we have not 
before considered a part of education. 

Two statements of the report of the Orientation Commit- 
tee of Secondary Education dealing with the issues of secon- 
dary education are particularly significant to me. “If the 
schools are provided by society they should be able to prove 
that they have accomplished the purposes for which they are 
provided”, p. 132, and “Acceptance of the rule of the majority 
is almost universally attained, but not such subsidiary princi- 
ples as toleration of the opinion of the minority and freedom 
cf thought, speech, and assembly—It is not only our right but 
our duty to inculcate these same principles—in the young.” 
p. 141. 

Granting that educators have a clear idea of the values of 
the mores, traditions, and technology of society, how can these 
values be obtained if instructors accept them in word only? 
Can freedom of thought be inculcated in the young unless such 
principles be respected among the teaching group? To-day too 
many preach the doctrine of freedom of thought but have no 
respect for an opinion which differs from the group mind. Can 
real respect for such principles be instilled in the young when 
there is no courage on the part of the instructor to defend such 
a standpoint if he be in the minority, and no respect on the 
part of the group for one daring to assume such a position? 
Must a new influx of instructors conditioned in true democracy 
be awaited or are there means within existing school systems 
of attaining such ends with the present teaching tenure who 
have been subjected to the apparently capricious and intimi- 
dating will of superior forces? 


When one reads over these issues and functions, he realizes 
that we teachers cannot use the old subject matter objectives 
of education. We must define new major goals toward making 
our people think in terms of contributing to the welfare of 
society at large—goals that will help us to preserve our de- 
mocracy, just as all the dictatorship countries mould their 
youth to preserve their form of government. And we cannot 








rch, 

















PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 93 





1938] 


sit back and expect our children to know of the good fruits of 
a democracy. Their minds must be inculcated with its ideals 
by our teachers. 

If, by reading and discussing these functions and issues of 
the Committee, we teachers become aware that we have these 
same problems in all our local communities and that we can do 
something about them without shifting the burden to another 
institution, we are on the right path—the path that wil! help us 
to face the problems and solve them in the way to make our 
children happy and to provide the state with an intelligent 
electorate for the future. 


The first gain I had from the study of education being con- 
ducted in Yonkers was a new sense of respect toward my su- 
perior officers, more confidence in them as leaders because they 
recognize problems we workers face and talk about daily. 

Secondly I was rewarded by sharing the wave of alertness 
among some colleagues. (Of 45 teachers about 10 began read- 
ing the N.E.A. pamphlets, gradually about that many more 
read at least one. After years of indifference that 50% were 
awakened to professional education is remarkable. Idealists 
yet.) 

The aspect of the report that interested me most was the 
idea projected of not submitting all American youth to a 
standard school training, of enriching and enlarging the C.C.C. 
type of training to meet the needs of some. 

Reorganization should enable high schools to work with 
suitable human material; to diversify programs for different 
ability levels; to check the present tendency of snobbery in 
teachers and pupils toward mark with your hands which now 
results in “miseducation”, toward a standard of silly luxury 
beyond the ability of the earner to produce for himself (caus- 
ing an identification of the dome of the capitol in Washington 
with a nursing bottle). Can this be done, however, by our 
schools in time to prevent an overthrow of democratic govern- 
ment? 

School programs should when reorganized be able to do 
something of that which they set out to do, whereas at present 
we turn out half-baked snobs who feel the world owes them a 
living; and whereas at present the intelligent worker in schools 
suffers from chronic professional heartbreak because she finds 
no resemblance between her day’s work and her teachers’ col- 


lege hokum. 
















94 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


THE USE OF THE DISCUSSION GROUP MATERIAL IN A 
UNIVERSITY 


GEORGE BAXTER SMITH 

Assistant Professor of Education, University of Buffalo, Buffalo, New York 

Speakers have given and will give you an idea of the way 
in which the two Bulletins of the Department of Secondary- 
School Principals, when used as discussion materials, have 
been of value to them in their various projects. They have 
sketched for you a type of professional meeting which in- 
cludes, for the most part, their in-service associates—people 
who are now connected with the schools. Important as we all 
think in-service professional contacts to be, those of us in the 
university field feel also that pre-service investigation and 
study of the issues and functions of secondary education 
should have a prominent place in the total professional train- 
ing of men and women looking toward careers in educational 
service. 

Ever since programs have been planned for masters’ de- 
grees in secondary-school administration, supervision, class- 
room teaching, guidance, and so forth, we have given the stu- 
dents an opportunity to choose a course which has been based 
on our own analyses of types of secondary-school problems 
which would undoubtedly be discussed many times in such 
meetings as the previous speakers have described. The diffi- 
culties presented by the obvious necessity of basing such a 
course on innumerable references to books and periodicals and 
the evident limitation imposed on this plan by the lack of suita- 
ble, succinct material were substantial ones. 

When the Department of Secondary-School Principals 
published the two volumes on Jssues and Functions, at least 
some of the difficulties were removed. We had at our com- 
mand, then, a group of basal materials with which to start. I 
wish to emphasize the phrase “with which to start,” for the 
two Bulletins cannot be thought of mainly as textbooks. In 
fact, in each succeeding semester during which I present this 
course, it becomes more certain that the Bulletins are a point 
of disagreement rather than agreement, and students use the 
listing of arguments in the Bulletins as spring-boards into the 
sea of literature in agreement or refutation. I, myself, dis- 
agree with the statement in the Introduction to Bulletin 59, 
that “both administrators and teachers should become thor- 
oughly convinced that one side of the issue or the opposite side 
is sound.” From this disagreement with a statement which 





1938) PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 95 


appears as early as page fourteen, every other page holds some 
point of difference for myself or some member of the class. 

The teaching procedures followed in the course quite 
naturally are group discussion techniques; and, as the classes 
range from 25 to 35 students, such procedures may be followed 
with some hope of success. 

An attempt is made to organize the work of the class so 
that various discussion techniques may be practiced. The first 
issue, for instance, may be presented to the class in the form 
of a forum, the instructor acting as the speaker. Issue two 
may be developed through group discussion, the instructor 
acting as leader. Issue three may be used as the topic for a 
panel group made up of members of the class, with the in- 
structor acting as chairman. A symposium and a debate 
might be organized, but neither has been used up to the pres- 
ent. By the time this overview of techniques and a glimpse of 
the types of materials contained in the Bulletins have been 
completed, the instructor will know the students well enough 
to make intelligent choices of individuals who seem qualified to 
act as chairmen or leaders. It is impossible, of course, to give 
all an opportunity to act as leaders, but through panel discus- 
sions, for instance, all are at least baptized with platform ap- 
pearance. All will have audience experience. 


With an increase of professional discussion in public- 
school systems, as evidenced in the reports to-day, it seems 
logical that the opportunity for participation in discussion as 
a basic professional technique should be afforded in university 
programs of study. 

As seems to be the custom in graduate courses, some 
method of evaluating the work of the students must be devel- 
oped. As the discussions in class bring out the points of view 
of men in all types of school systems, from the city of Buffalo 
to high schools with one hundred or two hundred students, it 
is felt that an application of the principles and theories out- 
lined in the reports and developed in the discussions should be 
made to the individual situations in which the members of the 
class find themselves. The plan under which we have oper- 
ated up to the present is to require a paper from each member 

.of the class on each Issue and on most of the Functions. This 
is to be written directly after the class discussion and based on 
an analysis of the practice in the particular system in which 
the individual student works, a statement of his position on 
the problem and his reasons for maintaining this position, and 





96 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS {March, 


suggestions for changes in practice which might lead to the 
position defended. 

The value and place of the Bulletins in such a program 
cannot be minimized. 


DISCUSSION GROUPS IN MICHIGAN 


RAY BECHTOLD 
Principal, Baldwin High School, Birmingham, Michigan; State Coérdinator for Michigan 


For several years groups of high-school principals have 
been meeting in Michigan to discuss their common problems. 
Some of these groups have worked extensively along particular 
lines, such as‘social studies and guidance. The Department of 
High-School Principals of the Michigan Education Association 
has used some of the groups as committees on certain projects 
because of the fact that they were already organized and the 
members lived in the same general regions, making it more 
convenient to hold meetings. 

A philosophy of education committee appointed by the de- 
partment worked on the tentative report on the Jssues of Sec- 
ondary Education and made suggestions to the Briggs Com- 
mittee. This committee also stimulated faculty-group discus- 
sions in the state. One method that was used was the inclusion 
of a demonstration faculty meeting at the annual convention of 
the department. 

At the present time there are some twelve or fifteen prin- 
cipals’ groups meeting in the state. Some discuss chiefly im- 
mediate practical problems of administration, but the ten- 
dency is toward a greater amount of time being given to the 
discussion of basic fundamental principles. The discussion 
outlines furnished by the coérdinator have been received by all 
groups and are being used to some extent. 

Over two thousand outlines have been requested by Michi- 
gan principals for use in faculty group discussions. 

We have not insisted that groups restrict themselves to 
outlines furnished, nor that they feel that this material will be 
outmoded if circumstances prevent its use until a later date. 
It has seemed important to stimulate thoughtful discussion 
regardless of the materials used. 

The state Department of Public Instruction, and more 
particularly their Curriculum Steering Committee have been 
interested in the program and are cooperating. They see pos- 
sibilities of securing greater interest in the development of 








the 






97 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 








their. plans by supplying discussion groups with materials for 
discussion, and also the benefits of more intelligent coéperation 
on the part of principals and faculties who have thought 
through and discussed the functions of secondary education. 
The State Sectional Curriculum Conference held at Ypsi- 
lanti recently and sponsored jointly by the University of Michi- 
gan, Michigan State Normal College, and Wayne University 
included a talk on state and national discussion groups in the 
secondary field on their program. Those present at the con- 
ference were college and university professors, county and city 
superintendents, principals, and teachers. 
The Directing Committee of the Secondary-School Cur- 
riculum Study who have a full time director and who are lay- 
ing the groundwork for a most interesting experiment in im- 
proving secondary-school practice have shown a consistent and 
continuing interest in the discussion-group project. 
Michigan’s member of the Executive Committee of this 
department, Mr. John E. Wellwood, has lent assistance and 
advice. The Michigan Education Association’s executive staff 
have been kindly disposed and have assisted where possible. 
The chief codperating agency, of course, has been the De- 
partment of High-School Principals of the Michigan Educa- 
tion Association. At their annual convention the discussion 
project was explained and copies of the discussion outline 
handed out not only to the principals for their own use but 
also supplies for faculty discussion meetings. 
Indications are that some faculty groups have been carry- 
ing on discussions based on the outline and many others have 
definite plans for such activity during the present semester. 
Two examples may indicate some of the Michigan activ- 
ity. The Edwin L. Miller Roundtable, composed of principals 
of high schools in the territory in and around Detroit will have 
a meeting shortly devoted to a discussion of the Briggs Re- 
port, with special emphasis on its actual effect on high-school 
practice. 
The Upper Peninsula principals met on February 5. A 
report from a participant follows: “Over thirty men were 
present for the all-day session. In the afternoon Dr. J. Cecil 
Parker, Director of the Secondary-School Curriculum Study, 
diScussed that project. In addition we considered professional 
problems of interest to high-school principals such as school 
sound equipment, lighting for athletic fields, visual education, 
and the group-discussion project. A number of schools are 












































98 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


devoting faculty meetings to the discussion group, and others 
signified their intentions of beginning such discussions this 
semester. There is nothing definite to report as to the think- 
ing evolving from this discussion. It is, nevertheless, a health- 
ful sign to note the interest being manifested in the discussion 
project.” 

To summarize, all important agencies having to do with 
secondary education are showing an intelligent, friendly inter- 
est. A start has been made. It remains to be seen how the 
project will develop and how much effect will be felt in the 
high schools of the state. 


The junior high-school people met in Ocean Hall of Marl- 
borough-Blenheim Hotel. Owing to the sudden and severe ill- 
ness of Virgil M. Hardin, Principal of Pipkin and Reed Junior 
High School of Springfield, Missouri and Member of the Ex- 
ecutive Committee of the Department, Mr. Paul E. Elicker pre- 
sided. 


CURRICULUM INNOVATIONS ON THE JUNIOR HIGH- 
SCHOOL LEVEL 


HAROLD B. BROOKS 

Principal, George Washington Junior High School, Long Beach, California 

The purpose of this discussion is to describe curriculum 
innovations as developed in one school situation. During the 
past year in the Long Beach public schools consideration has 
been given to the newer phases of curriculum development. To 
assist the certificated staff in understanding the concepts and 
issues involved Dr. Hollis L. Caswell of Teachers College, Col- 
umbia University, conducted a series of curriculum confer- 
ences. 

As the discussion of the new curriculum progressed these 
needs emerged : 

(1) The statement of a common viewpoint relative to 

what the schools should accomplish; 

(2) The enlistment of maximum teacher participation; 

(3) The development and selection of functional mate- 

rials; 

(4) The methods of utilizing materials. 

In order that all the educators in the system might share 
in developing the basic educational philosophy Dr. Will French, 
then superintendent of schools, requested each member of the 
staff to formulate a report indicating what he regarded as the 








March, 


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1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 99 





most important qualities or characteristics to be developed 
in pupils as a result of his teaching. These ideas were care- 
fully analyzed, organized and edited by one of the supervisors’ 
and published by the department of curriculum and research 
in a pamphlet entitled Growth Through Education. 

This pamphlet has recently been presented to the faculties 
in the various schools as the basis for discussion of further 
curriculum development. The underlying philosophy ex- 
pressed in the pamphlet is: the purpose of education is con- 
ceived to be the promotion of growth in a desirable direction. 
The five clearly defined major growth strands, each leading 
onward to an implied goal, are: 

Fitness of mind and body. 
Desirableness of social relationships. 
Competence in thought and action. 
Creativeness in ideas and expression. 
. Worthiness of ideals. 

Following a concise analysis of the leading objectives of 
education, there is a description of the characteristics of an in- 
dividual who has attained each goal. As an aid in estimating 
whether or not an individual is growing in the direction of the 
goal, a list is given showing the characteristics of progressive 
growth on the part of the individual. 

This explanation of the method employed and the results 
obtained in developing a practical statement of desired out- 
comes is presented because it is assumed, (1) that the partici- 
pation of the entire staff in preparing a statement of objectives 
is basic to the development of effective teaching and (2) that 
a clear statement of the purpose of teaching applicable to daily 
situations in the classroom is essential to the improvement of 
the curriculum. 

Throughout the entire development of the curriculum 
teacher participation has been a feature of paramount im- 
portance. This has been shown in the following ways: (1) The 
consistent use of suggestions and contributions from the teach- 
ing staff, (2) The provision of opportunities for utilizing the 
special interests and abilities of the staff, (3) Assigning def- 
inite responsibilities to classroom teachers, (4) Experimenta- 
tion by the teachers before the final adoption of the course, 
(5) Relieving the teacher of classroom duties while engaged in 
curriculum work, (6) Extra compensation for curriculum 
work done in the summer and (7) Expressed recognition for 


ot 99 po 


1Elga M. Shearer, Supervisor of Elementary Education, Grades 4, 5, 6. 















100 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 





assistance rendered. It should be made clear that one of the 
major purposes in developing the courses of study was to pro- 
vide opportunities for growth on the part of the teachers. 
The idea was emphasized that there was nothing final about 
the course submitted for consideration and use. Instead, the 
development of the courses of study represented a dynamic 
means for evaluating and clarifying thinking with respect to 
the experiences suggested for the pupils. 

For over a decade the teachers have coédperated in the de- 
velopment of courses of study for the purpose of stimulating 
the youth of all ages to acquire knowledge and skill in solving 
a problem that to him seems both important and necessary. 
Although the belief is held that the total experiences of the 
child constitute his curriculum, courses of study are consid- 
ered indispensable. The prediction is made, however, that if 
the five strands of educational growth mentioned above are ac- 
cepted as representing the desired outcomes of education they 
will determine the area of an emerging curriculum. This 
statement of goals may also serve as a means of determining 
the value of the present content of courses of study to the end 
that only the material of greatest functional worth may be re- 
tained. 

Each course of study passes through two distinct stages 
of publication. The first draft is tentative and intended only 
for classroom experimentation. The second issue is modified 
as a result of the previous experimentation and represents the 
best thought and effort of the entire staff. 

Already considerable work has been done in planning cur- 
riculum materials to help boys and girls attain maturity with 
respect to these major objectives of growth. The limits of 
this discussion will permit only a brief statement of two typical 
curriculum innovations which illustrate the methods pre- 
sented above. 

The goal of fitness of mind and body has been given spe- 
cial consideration in the eight junior high schools. Carefully 
prepared courses of study in health and physical education? 
have been made available in printed form. “The aim has been 
kept foremost to select and describe only those activities and 
topics for discussion which possess proved functional value. 
To attain this result a comprehensive procedure has been fol- 
lowed for developing the courses of study. 


2Prepared by Jessie B. Anderson, Paul D. Jones, and Helen S. Thomp- 
son. 


















an se) oe aot Ot =i 








wrewewF ewe c¢ce tr & 





101 





PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





1938] 


A first draft was written by a classroom teacher released 
from instructional duties and was used to stimulate sugges- 
tions for improving the course. The second issue represented 
the work of a committee of teachers who had experimented 
with the first draft. The author of the experimental course 
was chairman of this committee. 

In this way rhythmical activities, skill tests, team games, 
self-testing activities, and problems in healthful living appro- 
priate to the maturity level of the pupils have been selected 
and described in detail for the teachers. It is interesting to 
note that special emphasis was given to growth in character 
traits and social behavior in the physical education activities. 

Adequate provision has been made for equipment and 
building accommodations to carry out the program as outlined 
in the course of study. As new buildings have been con- 
structed for all the junior high schools during the past two 
years a unique opportunity was afforded to develop the phys- 
ical education buildings in accord with the up-to-date functions 
they were to serve. Separate buildings for the boys’ and girls’ 
activities have been provided in the George Washington Junior 
High School with a large area between for the future con- 
struction of a standard gymnasium. The latest shower and 
locker equipment and facilities have been installed on the first 
floor of each building. On the second floor a health education 
room has been equipped where each class meets at least once 
each week for class instruction. Ample provision has been 
made for teaching health by means of motion pictures. A 
small gymnasium approximately the size of two standard class- 
rooms, a cot room and sun deck for rest cases, offices and first- 

aid rooms were also included. 

These features of the building are mentioned because they 
are basic to a comprehensive program in healthful living. It 
is evident that the new curriculum in its various phases needs 
the very best in classroom facilities, equipment, reference ma- 
terial, and instructional supplies. 

Another illustration. For a number of years the faculty 
of the George Washington Junior High School has endeavored 
to develop an effective program of group guidance. It was 
yealized that as the pupils carried on their various activities 
throughout the school day they were encountering many prob- 
lems of social development. As a result a desire was expressed 
by the teachers to help the boys and girls solve these problems 
and grow in desirableness of social relationships. After an in- 










102 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


vestigation of suggested plans for promoting guidance activi- 
ties it was decided in 1930 to organize the school into home- 
room groups and to schedule a definite period for social devel- 
opment. The time allotted was from 8:30 A. M. to 8:55 A. M. 
on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. 

Soon after the home-room guidance period became a part 
of the teacher’s program it was apparent that there was need 
for material which the teacher could use in planning discus- 
sions and activities based on the social interests of junior high- 
school pupils. As no suitable course of study for the home 
room was available Vice-Principal A. B. Liff was asked to pre- 
pare material for the use of teachers in the guidance periods. 
This was in the form of a number of brief one-page statements 
known as Home-Room Guidance Bulletins. Approximately 
one hundred of these bulletins have been prepared on such 
topics as: We Know So Many Things That Aren’t So, The 
Courage of Your Convictions, Why Take a Chance? The Con- 
ceit of Shyness, and The Audience and the Performer. Most 
of these bulletins have been provided in bound form for the 
veady reference of the teachers. 

These bulletins were suggested by the social needs of the 
pupils within this particular school. An attempt was made to 
obtain the views held by the pupils and teachers regarding the 
p~oblems under consideration. In this way the ideas proposed 
represented practical, common-sense solutions which were ac- 
ceptable as a basis for further discussion. The appropriate- 
ness of the subject matter, the attention given to the interests 
of the pupils, and the originality of the style and manner of 
the presentation are important factors in determining the 
value of these bulletins to those children for whom they were 
designed. 

As a further extension of this plan for furnishing curricu- 
lum materials to teachers for group guidance, during the past 
year an outline’ was prepared for use in junior high-school 
classes where special attention was given to guidance. Six 
teachers representing various junior high-school grades were 
given extra remuneration during the summer to organize the 
suggestions furnished by the teachers. This outline was pub- 
lished for use in the schools in September, 1937. 

This social guidance was not an isolated and uxrelated ex- 
perience for the pupils. With the help of a skilful home-room 
teacher the pupils were able to appreciate the value and sig- 


*Leone Voils, editor. 





—_ if ww OUBlC Sh CUCU TDC! OO. OO 


1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 103: 


nificance of the other activities engaged in during the day. By 
utilizing the opportunity for discussion and participation in 
special activities afforded by the home-room period they were 
able to help each other under the leadership of the teacher to 
make their behavior increasingly intelligent by acting more 
and more upon better and better thinking. 

This plan of group guidance is based on several assump- 
tions which are as follows: (1) Definite assistance in the social 
development of boys and girls is a major responsibility of the 
junior high school, (2) Each teacher in the junior high school 
should be prepared to share in directing the group guidance 
activities of the school, (3) The home-room organization is 
the best method developed to date for the guidance of youth, 
and (4) A basic factor underlying the success of the home 
room or any other form of group-guidance organization is the 
availability of appropriate curriculum materials suited to the 
needs of the pupils in a particular school. 

These innovations are representative of present-day 
movements at the junior high-school level for better growth 
and development. How effectively they function in the lives 
of boys and girls can be determined immediately in the day by 
day behavior. However, if teacher interest, sympathetic un- 
derstanding, and codperation can be considered criteria for 
evaluation, these features have merit. 


PROVIDING MEANS FOR STUDENT PARTICIPATION 
THROUGH THE CURRICULUM 


L. E. VREDEVOOGD 
Principal, Tappan Junior High School, Ann Arbor, Michigan 

Education for our day demands a curriculum which is cen- 
tered about life itself as it touches or may touch the student 
in our secondary schools. The school program must become 
living and experiencing rather than simply preparing for life 
in the future. 

This new spirit in education demands student participa- 
tion in experiences which are real and vital to the life of the 
student and to those about him. The static must give way to 
the dynamic. The activities must be functional activities in 
the lives of the students themselves. The things which stu- 
dents are doing should not be done for the sake of merely doing 
something, but rather doing things which are functional and 
the doing of which develops those participating. 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


Many have found that the acceptance of the new philoso- 
phy is much easier than the application of this philosophy to 
the practices in their schools. The demands of the new cur- 
riculum for student participation are generally accepted, but 
the methods and procedures of this participation differ widely. 
We are attempting to build our curriculum around those prob- 
lems and activities which already exist and have social value 
to the student, rather than setting up artificial means for act- 
ing and experiencing. 

We wish to explain in detail one or two of the forms of 
participation in our school. Let us first look at the organiza- 
tion which is set up for student participation. First we have 
a Student Council, which operates under a constitution of the 
Student League. This constitution was drawn up and adopted 
by the student body and accepted by the faculty. The Student 
Council, through this constitution, assumes control of such 
things as the traffic in the halls, the traffic around the school, 
the social activities of the students, the student fund, and many 
other things. Many of you will immediately say that this is 
the same old type of student government. 


The entire student body, under the direction of the Stu- 
dent Council, is given the opportunity to participate in plan- 
ning committees. Some of these committees are the Excur- 
sion Committee, the Little Theater Committee, the Traffic 
Committee, the Social Committee, Costume and Make-up Com- 
mittee, Athletic Committee, Advisory Presidents Committee, 
Auditorium Committee, and so forth. On each of these com- 
mittees there is one Student Council representative who re- 
ports back to the Student Council. This organization gives the 
Student Council direct control of the student activities and pro- 
vides an opportunity. for those who are interested to partici- 
pate in the planning activities. The faculty also works through 
these committees. 

Many schools have similar organizations. However, we 
are attempting not to have democracy or participation in form 
alone, but in the actual working of the school program. There- 
fore these committees and the Student Council activities are 
made part of the school’s curriculum. Let me explain how we 
do this. 

One of the essential things in our student constitution is 
that it places complete control of the Student Council funds in 
the hands of the students. It is rather amusing to us to see 
how many schools are setting up so-called student govern- 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 105 


ments, but upon close analysis we see that the financial part of 
that government is carefully controlled and supervised by the 
administrator and teachers. A fundamental test for any of 
our democratic systems is an analysis of the control of the 
financial organization. The ultimate use should be the expres- 
sion of the will of the group. In order to make our student 
government really democratic we decided that they should 
have complete control of their own funds. Some will object 
to this because they believe that students are immature and 
incapable of handling and budgeting their money. We believe 
that the reason some students are unable to handle their own 
money is because they have never had experience in doing so, 
and furthermore because certain teachers and administrators 
are hesitant to relinquish control and direction of money which 
belongs to the students. Therefore we insist that the students 
be given complete control as to the collection and the spending 
of their money. ; 

It is true we give them a teacher as an adviser, if her ad- 
vice is needed. However, no money is spent from our Student 
Council fund unless an authorization is received by the office, 
signed by the president and business manager of the Student 
Council. Thus no individual nor group of individuals can 
spend any of the money unless the Student Council has author- 
ized the spending. We will admit that this makes it a bit in- 
convenient at times when we desire to do things that should 
not be done with student money, but it is worth the incon- 
venience to see the students sit down and plan, check, appraise, 
and budget the money when they realize that they are respon- 
sible, and that they are the ones who suffer or gain through 
poor or careful planning and budgeting. 

The actual bookkeeping, collecting, disbursement, budget- 
ing of the funds have many of the functions which the stu- 
dents will experience in their business in future life. as well 
as in the personal accounts at present. Therefore we have 
taken this activity, at the direction of the Student Council, and 
have given to the 9B mathematics class the problem of book- 
keeping, collecting, disbursing and working out the details of 
the Student Council finances. This demands from those in 
that mathematics class accuracy, honesty, alertness, and power 
in the use of business arithmetic. Thus we have put into our 
mathematics curriculum the functional activity of the finan- 
cial aspect of the Student League, which is a meaningful and 
worthwhile experience for those in mathematics. 





DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


Let us look at the functions of the Excursion Committee. 
The Excursion Committee is composed of a representative 
from each social studies class, one Student Council member, 
and a teacher-adviser, and is under the direction of the Student 
League. The Excursion Committee receives request for ex- 
cursions from the various classes on the days which have been 
assigned for those class excursions. , They make decisions be- 
tween conflicting requests, make contacts with the place to be 
visited, make the needed assessment for the excursion if trans- 
portation is involved, and send a letter of appreciation after 
the excursion has been held. Here again we find an activity in 
finance which requires planning, execution and appraisal. 
Therefore we have put into the mathematics class this activity 
of collection and managing the excursion accounts. It not only 
has the function of providing a worth-while activity for the 
students but also keeps the students informed as to the actual 
cost of our excursions. Every time an excursion fails to pay 
for itself, the class carefully checks to see what were the con- 
tributing factors in planning which led to this deficit. At the 
end of the semester all excursion accounts must check and bal- 
ance and a permanent record is made so that the next excur- 
sion committee can use this past experiment as a basis for 
future planning. Each semester witnesses greater efficiency 
in the handling of this project. 

Then there is another activity which involves finance and 
bookkeeping but has much more to offer as a learning experi- 
ence to those participating, and that is the control of the Tap- 
pan School bus fund. Through the coédperation of the Tappan 
P.-T. A. we purchased a school bus for about nineteen hundred 
dollars. We were able to pay, through various donations, ap- 
proximately eleven hundred dollars, and were required to bor- 
row the remainder at four per cent interest. The bus was the 
outgrowth of the endeavors on the part of the students and 
parents for several years to obtain safe and satisfactory trans- 
portation facilities to our experimental camp and on our ex- 
cursions. Now the traditional thing would be to handle the 
expense account of this bus in the office. It would be easier 
and more simply done. However we have turned this whole 
activity over to the ninth grade mathematics class as a worth- 
while experience in something real. 

First, they had to determine a rate of mileage chasge 
which would take care of depreciation, interest, and operating 
expenses. Second, they had the experience of handling the 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 107 


personal account of an employee, the bus driver. Third, they 
had the experience of buying accessories for this bus. Fourth, 
they soon realized that the bus would not run forever and that 
they must plan for replacement within about ten years. This 
class has had, we believe, one of the widest experiences in busi- 
ness mathematics that any class could offer. They had to es- 
tablish a bookkeeping system, as the other classes had to do. 
They did not start with a system, but they developed a system 
to fit their needs, just as any business firm would do. They 
began by going to the central office, which has charge of the 
internal accounts, and studying the type of system in use there. 
Then they decided which parts of this central bookkeeping sys- 
tem were or were not essential to their problem, and from thi: 
they developed a bookkeeping system which gives us the basis 
for making rental charges to other schools and to the excur- 
sion committee, and an accurate picture of the status of this 
account at all times. From the eight hundred dollar balance 
of three years ago these mathematics classes have seen their 
planning function to the extent that this spring we will pass 
out of the debt column and begin the experience of setting up 
a sinking fund for the replacement. 


We do not wish to dwell too long upon these details, but 
it may be interesting to you to know that we have placed in 
our mathematics curriculum every financial account which we 
have any connection with in our school program. All of our 
fees, book rentals, parties, candy sales, and other things which 
have finance as one of their factors are checked and handled 
through our mathematics classes. Thus it is not an exaggera- 
tion when I tell you that occasionally I walk into these mathe- 
matics classes and see the students actually counting amounts 
which run into one, two, and three hundred dollars. It is true 
that the students at Tappan Junior High School are becoming 
more and more aware of the collection and disbursement of all 
funds, and ars having the experience of participating in an 
activity which has in it meaningfulness and social values for 
life itself. 

One of our classes has this year handled, balanced, and. 
supervised over seventeen hundred dollars, another over one 
thousand. It is interesting to see these students go about the 
buiiding or come into the office with a record of these accounts, 
and question certain expenditures. An administrator who 
wishes to provide this type of student participation must be 
willing to accept questioning on the part of the students as to 








108 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


the disbursement and the collection of certain fees. This on 
the surface may seem too great a price to pay for this curric- 
ulum development, but it places the administration in a favor- 
able position with the student body when they realize that 
everything is open and above board. Therefore our mathe- 
matics curriculum in the ninth grade has passed from the era 
in which students were doing problems in order to develop 
skills in mathematics. It is a curriculum which is centered 
about activities which demand skills, attitudes, and ideals. It 
is most interesting to see these students developing a social at- 
titude which is alert to possible savings which can be passed 
on to students in this or that way. It amuses the wholesale 
candy men to have the students call and order the candy and to 
tell them which candy is and which is not the best seller, and 
which candy is and which is not of a quality suitable to offer 
for sale at our candy counter. The curriculum is then centered 
about student participation and socialization after the curric- 
ulum is built. 

We have acquired through student and faculty coépera- 
tion about 258 acres of land in the northern part of our state. 
It was wild and undeveloped. The details of this development 


would be too long for this discussion, but we wish to mention 
the students’ part. They planned, developed, and named the 
Each trip, which lasts three or four days, must be care- 
Coéperation must 
exist or they will be unable to live together for the period dur- 
ing which they are more than 180 miles from home and eight 


site. 
fully organized or the entire group suffers. 


miles from the nearest town. Each season has witnessed an 
increase in the efficiency of planning and the execution of 
these trips. The first means of transportation, which was an 
old truck has been replaced by a new school bus, owned and 
controlled by the P.-T. A. and the student body combined. 
Every step of the project has been one of codperation with par- 
ents, teachers, and students by the Lake Council in control. 
They had to codperate and socialize the project in order to suc- 
ceed. When trips have failed, they were quick to appraise the 
factors which led to failure. When finance or support of some 
enterprise failed the social studies and mathematics classes 
appraised the steps of planning and executing in order to find 
the reasons. To-day they are proud of the Wilderness Lake 
project because it represents their work and endeavor. 
Another type of participation reveals what students do in 
integrating a project in the school program. Last October the 




















PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 109 








1938] 


Little Theater Council looked over several plays for a major 
school production in January. They seiected “The Prince and 
the Pauper.” This selection worried many. of us on the staff. 
It was an ambitious undertaking for junior high-school stu- 
dents and they were to have complete control. 

First they set up the divisions of work, such as costumes, 
make-up, publicity, etc., and delegated them to classes and 
groups. The group which was to select the actors first set up 
certain qualifications for each part and then considered indi- 
viduals for the parts on the basis of need of the play and the 
need of the student. To our surprise they found a 7B boy and 
a 9A boy who closely resembled each other for the leads. The 
problems increased as the production developed. They had to 
choose between making money and providing all those inter- 
ested with good entertainment. After much discussion they 
decided that profit was not the important thing. 

The costume group were unable to get their ideas of dress 
across to those who were to make them. Finally. they called 
in the art class to draw and paint plates which those making 
the costumes could follow. Teachers as well as students were 
selected and assigned duties. These assignments were made by 
the administration after the committee had presented a plan 
which seemed workable. 

To us the most significant thing about all the integrating, 
socializing, and educational factors was the final decision of 
the student group. They decided that in as much as everyone 
who helped was important to the final production, all should 
receive credit. Rather than preparing a long list of names of 
directors, actors, stage hands and others who assisted, the 
group eliminated all names from the program and put in place 
of them this statement: “Presented by the students, faculty, 
and parents of Tappan Junior High School.” 

We hope that this discussion has not been boring because 
we have attempted to give some of the details of student par- 
ticipation. There are many things which need improvement 
and changing. However we are making a sincere attempt to 
help the student learn through reality. You will find the stu- 
dent being allowed to supervise the cafeteria in planning teas, 
luncheons and parties, assisting in the library in selection of 
books and working procedures, handling discipline cases, and 
actually learning democracy by living. in a democratic system. 

In conclusion we wish to give one example of the effect of 
this upon the student morale. A month ago a student came to 








110 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


the office and made an appointment for a group who had a 
problem. On the day of the appointment a group of boys and 
girls came into the office and presented their problem. There 
appeared to them a conflict in an administration procedure and 
the students’ desires. The fact that the students felt free to 
question our actions was gratifying to us, but the most sig- 
nificant thing was the statement by the leader of the group, 
who said, “You know we operate here in Tappan on the prin- 
ciple you and your faculty have convinced us is right, and that 
is the greatest good for the greatest number. We represent 
the students and our request is for their good.” This type of 
thinking is bound to change any school’s program. Upon this 
basis we hope to continue, and experience has taught us that 
student participation is essential to a democratic school sys- 
tem. 


CURRICULUM INNOVATIONS IN THE JUNIOR HIGH 
SCHOOL 


R. D. LINDQUIST 
Principal, University High School, Columbus, Ohio 

The term curriculum innovations as used here applies to 
changes in the character of the school experiences through 
which the junior high-school children are educated. The term 
therefore covers changes in both method and content. The 
maintenance of a dichotomy by dealing separately with these 
aspects of learning experiences has seriously plagued us too 
much and too long. 

The learning experiences in the junior high school are 
gradually coming more into line with the ascertained needs of 
twelve, thirteen and fourteen year old children. This is a 
hopeful sign and indicates that we are being driven less by our 
preconceptions of a prior judgment concerning the organiza- 
tion of the junior high school and that we are taking a more 
common sense point of view that grows out of experience with 
children of this age group. 

Some of the bizarre practices based upon what we choose 
to call the junior high school idea are passing out. The idea 
that exploration should be vocational exploration, the idea of 
specialization, the old idea of guidance as disassociated from 
teaching, the idea that it is a “young high school”—these things 
are graduaily giving way to a broader and more flexible type 
of exploration, to a single teacher directing many of the child’s 





am rate pete ete rR hm Fr 


1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 111 


experiences, to continued required work in English, social 
science, science, mathematics, and arithmetic, to a functional- 
izing of the subject matter in the several subject areas, to a 
simpler type of school organization resembling more the ele- 
mentary school than the highly compartmentalized senior high 
school. 

At the University School of Ohio State University we have 
an organization of class teachers throughout the school. Their 
functions naturally differ somewhat in the junior high school 
from what they are in the elementary school, and in the senior 
high school from what they are in either of the other two. In 
the junior high school the class teacher has the following re- 
sponsibilities: 

1. To direct the learning activities of a group of thirty- 
five or forty children called a class. Some of these activities 
she has charge of directly as, for instance, in the hour and a 
half unified studies period, in which English social studies and 
science are taught. Others she has control over directly as 
in advising the child about the use of his unscheduled time and 
in conferring with his other teachers concerning modifications 
in his work in mathematics, physical education, art, music, 
typewriting, etc. 

2. To supervise what is called a “continuation period”, i.e., 
a period or two during the day which to begin with is unas- 
signed time. The child reports to the home room during these 
periods and plans, together with the teacher, how to use his 
time. He may decide to remain there for work or he may de- 
cide to work in the art room, or shop, or music studio, or 
science laboratory, or typewriting room or library. 

3. To direct the work of the group of teachers who work 
together as the unified studies staff. These may number two 
or three and for short times even more. 

4. To help the child to see his various activities in rela- 
tion to each other and as parts of a whole. 

5. To assemble, edit and forward to parents periodic and 
special reports of the child’s progress in each of his school 
activities. 

6. To call and conduct parents’ meetings and to confer 
with individual parents concerning their children. 

7. To supervise social activities of the class held under 
school auspices. 

Class teachers carry two-thirds or three-fourths of a reg- 
ular teaching load in terms of classes. They meet as a group 








112 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS March, 


under the chairmanship of the assistant director of the school 
to work out policies, procedures, schedules, etc. They are se- 
lected because of experience, sensitivity to child needs, good 
judgment, emotional stability, love for the work, etc. They 
stay with one class for at least two years. We are considering 
extending the period to three years. Certain general school 
policies which are conducive to the smoother working of such 
a plan are: 

1. The individualization of instruction in art, industrial 
art, music, typewriting. These are areas in which no school 
courses are offered which may be attacked class-wise. Chil- 
dren from any grade may be assigned to any of these areas for 
any period and for varying lengths of time by arrangement 
with the teacher in charge of the area. 

2. The unscheduled time of pupils in the above areas 
comes as a rule during the unified studies period at the begin- 
ning of the day and they are drawn into the work of the uni- 
fied studies by invitation of the class teacher or upon their own 
initiative. 

3. Teachers are accustomed to writing the essay type of 
progress reports. 

4. Clerical help sufficient to typewrite such reports is 
available. 

5. The pupil-teacher ratio is low enough to leave time for 
the many teacher conferences necessary to carrying on such a 
codperative program. 

6. The school librarian considers herself an assistant 
teacher to help in the use of book materials. 

7. The central office is willing to delegate to class teach- 
ers responsibility for programming and for making changes in 
programs, providing they can make the necessary arrange- 
ments with other teachers. 


Some of the advantages which we see in the plan are: 

1. More continuous, intelligent and sympathetic direction 
of the junior high-school pupils’ learning experiences. 

2. A better balanced, less scattered and distracting pro- 
gram of activities. 

3. Growth in powers of self-direction because the child is 
constantly having to plan his time under teacher guidance. 

4. Greater flexibility in time divisions, making possible 
continued work over a period upon work in which this is an 


advantage. 
5. Units of work in which subject specialists function as 




















118 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





contributors and in which specialized subject matter becomes 
functional and meaningful. 

6. A reduction in the amount of useless record keeping. 

7. A better codrdination of home and school influences. 

8. A much more extensive use of such areas as music, art, 
etc. 

Some of the difficulties encountered are: 

1. The difficulty in finding time to give all the guidance 
that is called for. 

2. Giving the child a substitute for the security he felt 
from digesting a single book and from working a definite score 
on a text given to all children and from having it recorded that 
he had completed a standard unit of work. 

3. Finding time for the great deal of group planning by 
teachers that is required by such a plan. 

4. Evaluating the results of what we have done. 


EVALUATING THE ADDRESSES OF 
MESSRS. VREDEVOOGD, BROOKS, AND LINDQUIST 


CHARLES FORREST ALLEN 
Supervisor of Secondary Education, Little Rock, Arkansas 

It is difficult in a few minutes to evaluate properly the 
thoughtful papers you have just heard. Not all change means 
progress; but all progress requires change. Dr. Overholtzer 
once well said that changes in the curriculum “sometimes dis- 
turb those who are too snug and complacent”. On the other 
hand there are many “would-be-searchers-of-research” who 
had better hold fast to that which has proved good. Schools 
having qualified leadership and other reasonable facilities 
should experiment to the extent that local conditions will jus- 
tify; but haphazard experimentation is probably more likely 
to do harm than good. A majority of schools may more safely 
follow than lead. This conclusion Mr. Vredevoogd has aptly 
suggested when he stated that it is easier to accept a philose- 
phy than to apply it. 


I. Providing Means for Student Sarticipation Through the 

Curriculum, by L. E. Vredevoogd. 

Mr. Vredevoogd has based both his theory and his pro- 
cedure on the well accepted practice of learning to do by doing. 
Probably no better functioning of a course in mathematics can 
be found anywhere than the one he has explained to you. The 
stimulus both for effort and for accuracy is a worthy one. 









DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


Without a well organized and functioning system of extra- 
curriculum activities, such innovations as he described would 
not likely have been introduced into the Tappan Junior High- 
School curriculum. However, few schools should attempt to 
adopt his program without first having adapted it. While his 
ultra-liberal plan of student participation no doubt is function- 
ing successfully under his leadership, it may not function so 
well should the plan be inherited by a less dynamic personality 
than the principal at Tappan. 

I recall working in a boys’ reformatory school on the west 
coast where I went to study “student self-government”. The 
plan worked well there till the governing council dismissed 
themselves and several other inmates. A certain high school 
in the North Central group states likewise at one time had a 
well functioning student organization. So well did it func- 
tion that the faculty could go visiting while the students held 
forth. The plan worked—till the crisis occurred. Soon there- 
after the principal was seeking another position. I know two 
high-school graduates (boys) who spent two months viewing 
western scenery on money fraudulently obtained through ticket 
sales, advertisements, and otherwise, which frauds they care- 
fully concealed for several years. Probably you, too, have 
personal knowledge of many such incidents. 

For centuries society has found it wise to place safeguards 
and limitations to the authority granted its youthful members. 
I know a parent who boasts she leaves money convenient for 
her boy to find, or take, to prove to herself he is honest. Is it 
fair thus to tempt a youth? Rousseau may have permitted 
Emile to sit in his window where Emile would have fallen only 
one story and onto soft ground; but could he have taken that 
risk from a city sky-scraper with concrete walks to cushion 
the fall? I may be wrong, but I believe that “student par- 
ticipation” in government is terminology connoting much sig- 
nificance. 

As a matter of fact, Mr. Vredevoogd tells us his figuring 
and calculating of his school finances and his budgeting is done 
by a ninth grade class—under supervision of a teacher, we 
hope. Likewise, his excursions and other extra-curriculum 
activities have some kind of sponsorship. To what extent his 
plan may be adopted without being adapted will depend largely 
upon the enthusiasm, preparation, and good “horse sense” of 
those responsible for the program in the school concerned. It 
is probably a safe conclusion that a majority of secondary 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 115 


schools can profit by adapting and providing more of the kind 
of program carried on in the Tappan Junior High School. 


II. Curriculum Innovations on the Junior High Level, by Har- 
old B. Brooks. 


The chief value of such a paper as the one read by Mr. 
Brooks is that it tells us WHY and WHAT his innovations are 
rather than theorize on what should be done. We can see his 
program beginning and how it continues to grow. He did not 
start wondering and wandering; but he began by thinking and 
planning, and he realized the effectiveness of codperative plan- 
ning. He and his co-workers determined the product desired 
before they began molding its form. His plan of careful ex- 
perimentation based upon the best judgments he could mar- 
shall gave reasonable assurance of probable success, and ac- 
cordingly the pupil became “our” child instead of “his” child. 

His conclusion that “courses of study are indispensable” 
coincides with the assumption that few teachers have time or 
ability to do much original thinking and planning. His pro- 
cedures for accomplishing his first “major growth strand”, 
“fitness of mind and body”, suggests a welcome relief from 
programs directed toward competitive athletics by so-called 
physical education departments in many schools. 

In keeping with his stated theory that the curriculum is 
the total experience of the pupils, his guidance work deals di- 
rectly with activities in which they are engaging. Here, and 
now, he builds the basic foundation of those habits, attitudes, 
and ideals that will more safely guide the pupils toward the 
“implied goals” tentatively determined. 


III. 

Mr. Lindquist has given us an interesting account of one 
of the leading centers of experimental procedures in formu- 
lating educational theories and practices. Repetition of his 
portrayal is unnecessary. May we warn those interested, as 
we have previously urged, that not every school with its local 
limitations can do all the things found possible in a university 
demonstration school with its favorable conditions and spe- 
cialized directors aided by competent teachers. 

° Probably Mr. Lindquist would not advise adopting his 
plans and procedures without much adapting for local needs. 
In the original Dewey Demonstration School at the University 
of Chicago, Mr. Dewey declared that departmentalization in 
the more advanced grades was necessary to secure competent 








116 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


teachers, no one teacher being able to teach everything. On 
the other extreme Mr. Lindquist and his coworkers would urge 
“continuous reconstruction of experiences”, which plan is “op- 
posed to all forms of compartmentalization”. Surely such a 
program as he recommends must have in mind a longer period 
of “general” training before “specialization” begins. Un- 
doubtedly specialization must begin some place and sometime. 
Anyhow I prefer a specialized surgeon to remove my appen- 
dix rather than risk one trained only through “general educa- 
tion” courses. Furthermore, I wonder what the poor, or the 
“average” teacher will do with so indefinite objectives, or lack 
of objectives, to stimulate and guide his uncertain procedures. 


The Ohio Research Bulletin, May 15, 1935, p. 125 says, 
“Specific achievement in scholastic fields is not attempted”; 
attain freedom in thinking, choosing, planning, and doing and 
to accept philosophically the concomitant responsibilities and 
but on same page says, “This school intends to help children to 
inevitable necessities.” This is a fine theory that is probably 
possible under a system so well sponsored by such competent 
educators; but for schools by and large, I fear these high 


sounding terminologies are quite as confusing as they are help- 
ful. 


This evaluation may be inadequate and even unfair for 
the reason it is based chiefly on the Ohio University, May Bul- 
letin, 1935, which Mr. Lindquist said was to be the chief source 
of his address. The bulletin deals more with the elementary 
school than with the secondary division. 


However, I do not want to be misunderstood. There is 
much sound educational practice in the procedures at the Ohio 
University Demonstration School. I doubt not that their pu- 
pils will rank higher in social and civic efficiency than will 
those of most other schools; but I am not sure but that with 
such expert guidance other schools could do about as well under 


other plans. 








= S| + Be 













1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





FOURTH GENERAL SESSION 
Wednesday, March 2, 1:40 P. M. 


Submarine Grill, Hotel Traymore 


Principal K. J. Clark of Murphy High School, Mobile, Ala- 
bama, and member of the Executive Committee of the Depart- 
ment of Secondary-School Principals, opened the session by in- 
troducing Principal T. Bayard Beatty of Radnor Township 
High School, Wayne, Pennsylvania. 


WHICH OF OUR HIGH-SCHOOL GRADUATES ARE 
QUALIFIED FOR COLLEGE? 


T. BAYARD BEATTY 
Principal, Radnor Township High School, Wayne, Pennsylvania 


It has been but four years since our former State Super- 
intendent, James N. Rule, issued a request which in the Royal 
World is known as a “command performance”. Every secon- 
dary school within the state of Pennsylvania was asked to 
make every effort to keep the secondary-school population 
within the school, so that the unemployed might secure the few 
available jobs for their families who were in dire need. To 
this task every secondary-school principal lent his heartiest 
support, and boys and girls who were once urged to leave our 
doors, by our academic and book-minded teachers who found 
them fit only for “failure”, remained with us. Scores of tru- 
ant cases were re-opened, some willing teachers applied a new 
set of tactics, and new devices were found whereby some of the 
waiting-to-get-out thousands were put to project working— 
units associated with problems of everyday living. Instruction 
through moving pictures was provided for the eye-minded 
and non-academic, and once over the early adolescent period 
they remain with us still. 

To-day in many systems, adapted cours~s have been pro- 
vided in commercial fields, in wood and metal shop, in citizen- 
ship, in social living, etc. These boys and girls are now going 
into society equipped to provide a better home for themselves, 
with a higher regard for practica] citizenship than they would 
have had had they gone into shops, stores, or into the alleys of 
their communities. All of us can point to individuals who now 
graduate with a fine sense of responsibility, moving with an 
assurance, three years ago, unknown to them. 




















118 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


All of the secondary-school men present will recall the ten- 
sions created when these slow moving, poor reading, indiffer- 
ent, truant cases were come upon us; now, where is the teacher 
who does not count the gain great, indeed! Once we could 
not tolerate the two types in the same classroom situation. 
Now that occurs quite commonly. True, different types of in- 
struction, two types of marking, have come into being, each 
based upon what the teacher knows or thinks he knows the 
pupil’s ability to be. Now it iz the teacher’s task to challenge 
that latent ability, find the pupil’s interest, and build upon it 
a desire for some wholesome experience in which he catches 
the infection characterizing true education whether on the 
level of the one who would be a good citizen and college stu- 
dent or on the level of one who would be a good citizen and 


truck driver. 

That the secondary-school standards suffered, there is no 
doubt when judged solely in terms of the traditional secondary 
school set-up. But concern regarding this problem brought its 
gain. Education to-day is looked upon as self-education and it 
is therefore, self-sought, not altogether a regurgitation, as 
once characterized the lecture recitation procedure. The log, 
the teacher, and the student are again the ideal situation, for 
the teacher’s first task is to arouse and fire the interest of the 
student. This interest is woven by the skill of the teacher, into 
the student’s life plan and a major education operation has 
been performed. This change has been rendered possible 
through the “command performance” that we find a way to 
fit youth for living before leaving. 

I have seen a mathematics class of thirty slow thinkers 
working on individual assignments from many books and many 
sources, some in masonry, some in simple accounting, some in 
a review of fundamentals, each working at his own rate and 
upon assignments fitted to his and her ability and educational 
plan. I have seen college preparatory mathematics, classes in 
algebra, geometry and trigonometry at work under a teacher 
who once said, “mathematics must be presented en masse and 
very little deviation from the group can be allowed’. Then, 
after three years, I have seen this same teacher present all her 
work on an individual basis, some students doing their work 
in three, four and five periods per week, while others did the 
same in two or three periods per week. This procedure cul- 
minated in one mathematics student taking to college, credits 
in calculus, college algebra, and analytical geometry. 













1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 119 


I cite these illustrations to show how successful may be- 
come our individualized courses when teachers become willing 
and the school organization remains flexible. Again we see 
the teacher, the student and the log situation, long since lost 
to the sight of many of us because of the great numbers en- 
rolled in our secondary-school classes. 

The solution to this, the over-crowding problem, is not 
easy for there is a real teacher problem. Now it has become 
necessary for the teacher “to learn the pupil before he can 
teach him.” To over-worked teachers this does impose a re- 
sponsibility and a burden. But the good teacher accepts the 
problem as one to be tackled and solved, so he starts, first learn- 
ing the student, his past experiences, his present abilities and 
his future program, and with this equipment he is doubly pre- 
pared. Here is seen teacher training in service at its very 
best and the performance is delightful to behold. 

Last, but by no means least, there is the graduation prob- 
lem for the secondary school. The pupils detained in the 
schools do call for a modification of standards for graduation 
for some, and therefore, parents and, perhaps, colleges think 
the standards are lowered for all. This alarms parents and 
they write to college authorities, to state departments, making 
inquiries as to the school’s standards and its ranking. Some 
patrons in fear, or in pride, or for prestige, remove their sons 
and daughters and place them where they may be given the 
treatment they and their forefathers received in “Ye good old 
days”. 

We are met here to-day to prevent, if possible, any mis- 
understanding on the part of the college concerning the lower- 
ing of standards that might prove a handicap to the secondary 
school. The college must not lose faith in the integrity of the 
secondary school and its product. To this end we are met and 
out of these conferences to-day we hope to see grow, a better 
understanding, a growth in mutual confidence, that no disgrun- 
tled patron may shake. 

Section 1414 of Act. No. 478, passed by the recent legisla- 
ture and approved July 1, 1937, reads as follows: “The term 
‘compulsory school age’ as hereinafter used, shall mean the 
period of a child’s life from the time the child’s parents elect 
to have the said child enter school which shall be not later than 
at the age of eight years until the age of seventeen years dur- 
ing the school year one thousand nine hundred thirty-eight- 
one thousand nine hundred thirty-nine (1938-1939) and there- 

















120 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


after until the age of eighteen years. Provided that any child 
past sixteen years of age who holds a certificate of graduation 
from a regularly accredited senior high school or any child who 
prior to the effective date of this act has left school and is le- 
gally employed shall not be subject to the provisions of this 
section.” 

I presented a paper at Bucknell, October 16th on Guid- 
ance and the Gap between the Secondary School and College,— 
in the general discussion which followed, much concern was 
expressed about the equipment, the techniques, and the person- 
nel necessary to “make the adjustments so that all students can 
profit by their school experience and graduate.” Your speaker 
was asked from the floor that special attention be called to the 
problems confronting the majority of the secondary schools. 

I see three phases to this problem; first, few school sys- 
tems throughout the state have the facilities to retain or to de- 
tain these seventeen and eighteen year-olds with profit to each 
individual. Favored, indeed, are those systems which have 
courses where in pupils may alternate their school work with 
some type of industrial apprenticeship. The smaller schools, 
and they are in greatest number, will need to be provided with 
some specialized equipment to make them more profitable to 
the community and to the state. And second, where will the 
school authorities find the teachers who are qualified to work 
with this type of pupil? Few, indeed, are the specialists that 
can cope with the truant, the shiftless, the very slow and the 
below normal types. That some way, some solution will be 
found, I have no doubt, but many are to-day wondering where 
to turn in the face of this new “command performance”. 

My next concern here and now is that tied up with gradu- 
ation. Secondary-school men have been thinking and discuss- 
ing, more or less under cover, how to cope with the wide varia- 
tions in types and standards presenting themselves as individ- 
uals for graduation. Here again patrons note the candidates 
in cap and gown, in tuxedo and commencement dress and ask 
“why so”? 

In some groups it has been suggested that one diploma be 
granted to all who are prepared for college, another to those 
prepared in the commercial field, another for those prepared 
in industrial arts and home economics and still another for 
those in general citizenship. These schools prefer having but 
one document and they desire it to be labeled “a diploma”. 
Other schools prefer two documents, granting a diploma to 








i. at ie Ge fe 


sa ote Ss sO Ot 

















1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 121 





those completing the academic course, all other receiving a 
so-called certificate. Personally, I fear that if these two are 
offered, the academic tag will remain attached to the diploma, 
whereas the stigma of physical labor will be detected in the 
certificate. 


Are we on the verge of issuing two types of graduation 
papers, one for the academic student and the other for the in- 
dustrial student, or is there another possibility? Shall we 
issue one diploma for all and individualize by supplementing it 
with a statement in some detail showing the training and prep- 
aration leading up to such an award? 

Maybe, “we are walking backward into the future”, afraid 
to face the time and its real issue, namely, that education is 
one continuing process from the infancy to the end or the ful- 
fillment of life and that these artificial stoppings called com- 
mencements with their diplomas and caps and gowns, suggest 
a completion of what should be a life-long experience. Maybe 
the custom of commencements is “one more honored in the 
breach, than in the observance;” who knows? I, at least, 
wonder ! 

I have dwelt thus long on what has been happening within 
the secondary-school walls since 1930, that there might be a 
common understanding. During the coming years our secon- 
dary schools face a more highly intensified problem—what to 
do with the non-academic adolescent. On the other hand, the 
student who is college bent need not be drawn down to the non- 
academic pupil’s level, for, as we must learn what to do with 
the non-academic individual, so also must we learn to recognize 
the varied needs of the individual in the academic program. 
It is not only the non-academic provram that must be re- 
organized, but also the college preparatory, so that the stu- 
dents will come to the college with a greater variety of expe- 
rience, a maturity and a greater ability to make generaliza- 
tions and reach logical conclusions denied students of ten years 
ago. 

What kind of colleges do we have into which to fit these 
widely trained and widely differing student products? There 
is the religious college, restricting its student body largely to 
its own church; there is the state university where every fa- 
ther thinks he has a right to send his son; there is the conserv- 
ative college requiring much mathematics and much dead lan- 
guage; there is the so-called “goose step” college where all fol- 
low one mold; and finally there is the college where individuals 











122 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


count and where each student’s individuality is sacred; here’ 
the college strives to find out and develop the spark within. 
Then there are colleges that partake of each and all of the 
above characteristics. 

Into these colleges the secondary school must fit the fol- 
lowing types of students: First, there is the student by birth 
or the student in spite of himself, his parents or his commu- 
nity; then there is “the book worm” student, frequently called 
the “teacher’s dream”, or “the answer to a teacher’s prayer” ; 
this student does everything expected of him and saves the 
teacher’s face; then there is the son-of-a-gentleman student 
whe must needs go to college to associate with his father’s 
friends and business associates; there is the press-athletic- 
student who aspires and fails to find college what the press said 
it was. Then there is the family pet student who comes up 
through the secondary school, “on flowery beds of ease’’, since 
father and mother will not have their prodigy work as hard 
as they did, so a “white collar job” must be their goal. There 
is present, too, the social climber with an average I. Q. of 93 
who wants to enter Bryn Mawr but she eventually lands in 
some so-called junior college and graduates in two years or 
finally lands in the so-called country club college. Again and 
again, the “dumb dora” type looms up before us, who, acting 
upon the advice of a friend, transfers from the general course 
that was preparing her to make her own clothing and seeing 
to it that her future husband and children might eat proper 
food, moves to the colleges course and dances her way into 
matrimony. Once in a while there is the type who suddenly 
comes to life through adversity or sudden shock, shifting from 
a seventy per cent pupil to an eighty-five per cent student. 

Every conscientious secondary-school principal and head- 
master who has been in the profession several years, knows 
pretty accurately what type of student each college, university 
or technical school desires and he knows rather accurately 
what type graduate emerges from the college in question. So 
that the faculty and the principal or headmaster, if allowed 
perfect freedom and if given double assurance that their rec- 
ommendations and personal letters would be held in the strict- 
est confidence, could honestly direct students toward and away 
from each college in turn. 

But because of pressure, on the part of parents, friends, 
and other pressure groups, principals and headmasters are led 
to make veiled inference, state half truths, and avoid nega- 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 123 


tives entirely. On the other hand, the college admission’s of- 
ficer is prevailed upon in the same way and many are accepted 
that should have been rejected and many rejected that should 
have been accepted. 

How then can we know whom to recommend and whom to 
reject? 

No one has put this more succinctly than Ben. D. Wood 
in the July, 1934 issue of the Bulletin of the American Asso- 
ciation of Collegiate Registrars, when he says, “The only pos- 
sible way of improving college admission, or the general proc- 
ess of guidance of which it should be a part, is to improve the 
quality and accuracy, and increase the extent, of the informa- 
tion which we have concerning students as growing individ- 
uals throughout their whole educational careers, with special 
emphasis on their pre-college careers.” 

And even at the risk of becoming tedious through repe- 
tition, I must repeat what I reported here at a session of the 
P. S. E. A., last December. If the success of our students is 
being measured on the following criteria, even though on a 
tentative set-up, under the Cirection of Dr. Ralph Tyler, it 
ought to provide secondary-school men and headmasters with 
certain “leads” that indicate what to prepare for. 

I. First evidence of intellectual competence is required in the 
form of: 
1. Academic achievement 
2. Intellectual curiosity and drive 
3. Scientific approach 
4. Study skills and habits 
. Evidence of cultural development; use of leisure time, ap- 
preciative and creative. 
In the arts 
Nature studies 
Athletic and sports 
Publications 
Management 
Forensics 
Movies 
Social Activities 
Social Service and church work 
. Hobbies 
III. Practical competence, common sense and judgment. 
1. Financial competence 
2. Ability to obtain a job and keep a job. 


SEAN eaRwN 


4 
—_ 














DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS {March, 


3. Environmental adjustment 
4. Judgment in distributing time 
IV. Philosophy of life (personal pattern of goals) 
1. Vocational objective 
2. Philosophical objective—Reasons for selecting particu- 
lar college 


Religious attitudes 


V. Character traits (patterns of behavior) 
Integrity, responsibility, initiative, etc. 
VI. Emotional balance (including mental health) 
1. General factors, worry, self-control, sense of humor. 
2. Family relationships—normal or broken home, attitude 
toward parents 
3. Sex adjustments—a. Attitude: curiosity, b. Under- 
standing of, or desire to understand physiological im- 
plications. 
4. Religious adjustment 


VII. Social fitness 
1. Ability to make and keep friends 


2. Poise and manner; maturity 
3. Social accomplishments 
4. Appearance; taste in dress, grooming 


VIII. Sensitivity to social problems 
1. Concern about campus issues 
2. Awareness of contemporary problems 
3. Ability to criticize intelligently 
4. Willingness to assume responsibilities of citizenship ; to 
make personal sacrifices. 


IX. Physical Fitness 
1. Health habits 
2. Sports engaged in 

If success in college can be determined by these nine cri- 
teria, then evidence that our students rate well up in these 
fields ought to win for them consideration by the college admis- 
sions officers. 

And strange as it may seem, practically all of the forms 
studied by our committee and analyzed by Mr. Gladfelter, call 
for just such evidence as listed above and which our Princi- 
pal’s Association stands ready to provide. Last December I re- 
ported the following, resulting from a questionnaire sent to a 
representative list of secondary-school principals. 








PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 125 


All expect to submit a list of subjects taken, giving 
teacher’s marks received. 

All expect to submit the student’s numerical rank in 
class. 

Most expect to submit a record of objective tests 
taken and scores received. 

races expect to submit the record of intelligence tests 
taken. 

Most expect to submit some outstanding social and 
personality traits as estimated by five or more mem- 
bers of the faculty. 

Some expect to summarize anecdotal evidence into a 
paragraph or two. 

All expect to submit a record of unusual accomplish- 
ments. 

All expect to submit a record of the student’s major 
characteristics. a. 
All expect to submit a record of the student’s major 
handicaps, such as lack of application, lack of perse- 
verance, etc. 

All expect to report special distinctions or honors re- 
ceived. 

Most principals will report any evidence of creative- 
ness, poise, civic concern, etc. 

Most principals are willing to submit this personnel 
data in duplicate for the use of the dean, for place- 
ment and guidance. 


Thus you will see that most of us are expecting to submit, 
and many have been submitting evidence bearing on the afore- 
mentioned nine criteria being used to determine possible suc- 
cess in college. 


The principals are eager to adapt their offerings to pros- 


pective students and no principal can know any college too in- 
timately, for the college personality is so very intangible. To 


this end, secondary-school principals desire from the colleges 
the following: 


roh, 1938] 
1. 
2. 
3. 
2u- 
4. 
5. 
6. 
7. 
de 8. 
-. 9, 
n- 
10. 
11. 
12. 
tO 
1. 
i- 
e 
3- 2. 
is 
ll 
x . 3. 
a 





Some check back on the personality trait list sub- 
mitted, particularly on those points at which college 
experience seems to disclose a discrepancy between the 
rating of the school and the rating of the college. 


In connection with marks achieved in college, we need 
any record of specific weaknesses or strengths, that 
might enable the secondary school to revise its courses 
or provide further enrichment. 

Any knowledge from the dean regarding the student’s 
inability or ability to budget his time, ability to take 
notes, ability to make reports, power to analysis and 
ability to generalize, would assist the guidance depart- 
ment 








DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


4, Any evidence of the student’s reading ability; his lack 
of experience, or evidence of maturity, would materi- 
ally improve the school’s future directing of appli- 
cants. 

All secondary-school men, principals, and headmasters, de- 
sire some report indicating why students were rejected, or ac- 
cepted, and some would like to know whether they remain for 
graduation. 

Many desire the scholastic record by the end of the first 
semester, some prefer it at the end of the year. But all desire 
a first year’s report. Here, I would like to go one step further 
and ask whether we ought not to receive more than the scholas- 
tic record. To do the very best kind of guidance and in order 
to give the colleges the best they deserve, we must receive evi- 
dence from the college of a much more personal character. 
Then we can guide to your doors what you as college authori- 
ties want and we can turn away from your files, the applica- 
tions of hundreds of misfits yearly. 

Secondary-school administrators everywhere stand ready 
to submit much more ready personal material by way of evi- 
dence, when we are certain that this information is held in 
strictest confidence. 

At a recent session of suburban principals, displeasure 
was openly voiced, for it appears that what some principals 
thought was given in strict confidence and for the best inter- 
ests of the college, was shown either to the applicant himself 
or to his sponsor, and the principal and his school “lost face” in 
his community. 

On the other hand, some colleges have lost faith in certain 
principals and headmasters because of over praise, through a 
too subjective estimate of a codperative student. But maybe, 
if the college in turn, reported back to the school more than 
the student’s poor marks, the error might have been corrected 
and the school man politely rebuked. Again I return to the 
statement made earlier in this paper, that the major items of 
our reportings to the colleges must be based on objective evi- 
dence; and just as soon as the subjective element is eliminated 
the matter of adjustment will be greatly simplified. 

In conclusion, I would say: First, the secondary school 
must know what each college represents, its requirements, its 
policies, its personnel, and in general, its personality. 

Second, the faculty and the principal or headmaster must 
know what each student achieves in relation to his ability. 











1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING | 127 


Third, the college authorities and the secondary-school au- 
thorities must respect all information as valid, since it is based 
on evidence; some evidence may be submitted, other types may 
be available if desired. 

Fourth, the college must actively participate in the matter 
of guidance, regarding the student’s higher education as just 
another step in the educational process. They must build upon 
the experiences of the school. Would it be asking too much of 
colleges to have them do what has been done in a few cases for 
several of our students, when the admission’s officer said, 
“These are the opportunities we offer you in your freshman 
year; discuss this program with your principal and submit 
your choices to us”? 

When a college places a student in mathematics a year and 
a half or two years beyond his preparation, there is valid cause 
for complaint; this neglect is uimost criminal and could have 
been avoided with closer codperation with the secondary school. 
But, on the other hand, when a college takes a student where 
he is and sends him on from there, we have a type of intelli- 
gent guidance that makes for perfect confidence. I must refer 
again to the case cited earlier, for here was a boy who was al- 
lowed to go ahead in mathematics and was advanced into jun- 
ior year in mathematics, with this personal comment from the 
head of the mathematics department, “My young man, by the 
time you have your B.S. from this school you will have done all 
of the mathematics we require for your Ph.D.” 

And finally, to the extent that the colleges are willing to 
practice guidance within their groups, the secondary schools 
are released and can send them candidates able to go beyond 
their expectations in practice and achievement. And to that 
extent will they be able to lower or adapt their standards to the 
new type student making application for entrance. 

Personally, I look forward to the day when the relations 
between secondary schools and colleges are so professional and 
so intimate that no student will be recommended to take any 

course in any college which he will not pursue with profit, both 
to himself and to the college, and the secondary-school faculty 
will assume that responsibility. 
I have answered my assignment, WHICH OF OUR HIGH- 


oe 


SCHOOL GRADUATES ARE QUALIFIED FOR COLLEGE? 
by inference, by direct and by negative statement; maybe YOU 
think by Magnificent Evasion! 
























128 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 





THE KANSAS PROGRAM FOR THE IMPROVEMENT OF 
INSTRUCTION 


DALE ZELLER 
State Curriculum Director 

The codperative state-wide program for the improvement 
of instruction in Kansas is in the second year of its intensive 
phase. This program is sponsored and financed by the Kansas 
State Teachers Association, the State Department of Educa- 
tion, assisted by consultants furnished by the Department of 
Field Studies and Surveys of George Peabody College, which 
is financed by the General Education Board. While the inten- 
sive phase of the program is planned for a period of five years 
it is hoped that this intensive phase will develop by nurture 
and guidance into a continuing program which can be carried 
forward by the State Department of Education with reason- 
able effort and expense at a regular rate of progress in the di- 
rections developed during the five-year program. At all times 
the purpose of the program is to aid the state of Kansas in pro- 
viding more effective education for the children of Kansas. 

The program for the two years has included a teacher pro- 
gram, a lay program, and a legislative program. In its inten- 
sive phase the program has for its objective the improvement 
of instruction in all of the aspects which affect the experiences 
of children under the guidance of the school. The points at 
which improvement is needed and the methods used to improve 
instruction at these points are arrived at through the conclu- 
sions of teachers, administrators, parents, and laymen, who 
have studied the needs of instruction in Kansas and who are 
interested enough in improvement to join in a coéperative plan 
for improvement. The Kansas program as planned has three 
differentiating characteristics: (1) That it shall grow from the 
grass roots, (2) That it shall be evolutionary in character, and 
(3) That it shall proceed at a pace that those who are partici- 
pants can take and are willing to take. 

For two summers committees from Kansas have worked 
in the curriculum laboratory at Peabody College preparing 
materials and suggestions for carrying forward the work. 
The first year was a study program; therefore study bulletins 
were prepared for teacher and lay groups. These bulletins were 
planned to present important issues of education to Kansas 
people through the discussion method and on the basis of dem- 
ocratic discussion to evolve group plans for doing something 


about the issues presented. 










ee 


=— a — wa 

















1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 129 





Kansas has no highly centralized system of education; 
therefore participation was placed on a voluntary basis and 
with no fixed pattern of organization predetermined. Admin- 
istrators in the state volunteered to sponsor study centers. 
These centers range in size from 3-county organizations to 
20-county organizations, while a few of the larger cities have 
city-wide organizations. The leaders of these centers are the 
steering committee for the state. At center meetings small 
local groups were organized for study, leaders were selected, 
plans made, and materials distributed. During the first year 
these small local groups under the direction of a chosen leader 
studied the materials prepared on the issues of education in 
Kansas. 

This method of solving edy~ational problems through the 
democratic method of discussion is as important a part of the 
program as the contemplated modification in classroom pro- 
cedures and materials. Since the vital educational issues in 
Kansas are not in separate compartments for rural teachers, 
elementary teachers, and secondary-school teachers, but are 
common problems for lay and professional groups, these first 
year study groups were composed of a cross-section of the 
teachers of the state whenever such organization was possible. 
This meant that in each study group rural teachers, elemen- 
tary-school teachers, secondary-school teachers, junior-college 
teachers, and administrators were participants. At the close 
of the year’s work each study group made a report to its cen- 
ter who in turn compiled a center report for the state office. 
This report included: (1) A statement of group opinion in 
regard to the issues studied, and (2) A statement of reaction 
to suggestive steps in the second year’s program. On the basis 
of the group opinion expressed about the educational issues in 
Kansas objectives were planned for the second year’s program. 


Materials were developed for this phase of the program 
during the second summer’s work in the curriculum labora- 
tory. Among the questions asked in the summary report from 
local groups two were especially pertinent in developing objec- 
tives for the second year’s program. These questions were: 
“Are there areas of social life in which Kansas should be edu- 
cating and in which she is failing to provide adequate educa- 
tional opportunity? If so, what are they?” The answer to the 
first question was a unanimous “yes”. A list of several pages 
of suggestions was made in answer to the second question. As 
a result of this report the committee planned to prepare ma- 


















DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


terials and suggestions for giving educational experience to 
children in the public schools in some of the social areas that 
the teachers of the state listed as important. This became the 
objective of the second year’s program. Fifteen problems in 
thirteen areas of social life were selected in which to develop 
exploratory materials. In addition the committee presented 
the group thinking of the state in regard to the point of view 
of education, the aims of education, organizing instruction, 
and the scope and sequence of the curriculum for reconsidera- 
tion of the study groups. These materials were published in 
Bulletin No. 3 of the state-wide program for the improvement 
of instruction in Kansas. 

The important emphasis for this year’s program is on the 
use of new materials of social significance in classroom situa- 
tions. The point of view, the tentative aims of education, and 
the method of organizing instruction were studied in local 
study groups with the purpose of seeing how well these could 
be made to function in classroom situations when children and 
teachers met together. During the period of study this fall 
plans were made to introduce the new materials on as wide a 
front as possible and with as many patterns as possible. The 
procedures used in the secondary school are following several 
patterns. Practically all schools participating are introducing 
their new materials in the daily program now set up in their 
schools, the modification being in materials and methods of in- 
struction rather than in the schedule. The most common prac- 
tice is for a teacher of a subject to select an area that has a re- 
lation to her subject and to organize a unit of instruction in it. 
For example, a teacher of journalism did a unit of work from 
the area of “Understanding my School”, and published an issue 
of the school paper about the local schools. Often two or more 
teachers of different subjects—for example, history and Eng- 
lish; or social problems, mathematics and English—who teach 
the same group of children select a problem in an area and plan 
to teach the unit with each teacher making the contribution 
possible in her particular subject. Protecting Life on Kansas 
Highways was taught in this way by a social problems class, a 
physics class, and an English class. The problem was orig- 
inated in the social problems class, the problenis of physics in- 
volved were solved in the physics class, while reading, talking, 
and writing phases were carried on in a laboratory English 
setup. 

Sometimes an entire school chooses an area and each 





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1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 131 


teacher attacks a problem in the area that is most pertinent to 
her work. In the rural schools frequently an entire county 
makes its plans for attacking a problem. For example, a 
county that has taken great pride in developing its school li- 
braries took the area of Providing Reading Opportunities and 
planned to improve its school libraries. Another county in the 
heart of the dust bowl is working on What Our County is Do- 
ing to Save Its Soil, a problem taken from the area of Con- 
serving Our Soil from Land and Water Erosion. 


Two guiding principles govern the use of the materials 
for exploratory purposes: (1) All instruction shall be commu- 
nity centered, that is, community resources must be discovered 
and utilized in teaching the area, and (2) All instruction must 
begin with and be kept within pupil interest. Last year after 
study, teachers agreed that the value of a school in a commu- 
nity should be felt in improved community living; therefore it 
follows that the teacher or teachers who are contemplating in- 
struction in an area may well select a problem in an area in 
which the community has already moved to action. Schools 
plan to participate in library improvement in a county that is 
concerned about libraries, conserving the soil in a county that 
is concerned with soil conservation, using power in a commu- 
nity that is developing power resources. While trying to help 
all teachers see and understand their communities as living, 
functioning, developing organisms, it is desirable for them to 
sense the aspirations of their communities and throw the in- 
terest of young citizens into realizing these as it is desirable 
to see lacks in a community and attempt to meet these. 


The other requirement is that the exploratory work begin 
and be kept within the interest of the group the teacher is 
guiding. Since the exploratory materials prepared for tryout 
this year deal with problems that generally can be solved only 
through group solution and since children on all levels of 
growth need to come in contact with and have practice in solv- 
ing problems of group significance, it is highly important that 
children participate with interest and increase their interest 
in the problem because of participation. Therefore three 
qucstions will be asked in evaluating the exploratory work: 
(1) Was the unit community centered and did it aid the com- 
munity in doing something it was interested in doing, (2) Did 
the pupils participate with interest, and (3) Did the pupils 
leave the problem with added inter est in it? 











DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


Next year’s program will grow from the experiences of 
those who used the materials for exploratory work this year. 

A program for laymen and a program for legislation has 
paralleled the work planned for teacher groups. The Kansas 
Congress of Parents and Teachers helped to finance a study 
bulletin for parents during the first year of the program. 
Local units of the Congress sponsored the local study group in 
a community and were advised to ask the local school admin- 
istrator to act as group discussion leader. This year all state- 
wide civic groups with enough interest in educational matters 
to have a state education chairman were asked to make some 
phase of the program their educational work for the year. 
The response was practically unanimous. 

In the program curriculum is defined as all the experiences 
of a child under the guidance of the school, and the experiences 
of children at certain points are influenced by conditions that 
can only be improved through legislative action. Therefore 
such matters received the attention of teacher and lay groups. 
Certification of teachers, supervisory facilities, financing which 
includes tuition and transportation, qualifications and selec- 
tion of the state superintendent, and organization of the state 
department of education, are all matters of concern in the pro- 
gram because they so vitally affect the experiences that chil- 
dren have under the guidance of the school. During the sec- 
ond summer’s work at the curriculum laboratory, a group of 
administrators studied the long-time legislative needs of edu- 
cation in Kansas and prepared a bulletin for the use of study 
groups. It has just gone to press. 

Incidentally it might be said that the lay and teacher study 
groups have been convenient units for action in legislative 
matters. 


How valuable has the program been up to date? The 
value will have to be measured by the interest of those who are 
participating in it and the actual modification of practice 
through the use of materials in areas of social significance. 
The point of view of education, the aims of education, and com- 
munity improvement must be developed through experiences 
in classroom situations. Indications are that desirable prog- 
ress is being made. 

Often the question is asked, especially by secondary-school 
people, “What changes do you expect to make?” or more spe- 
cifically, “Do you intend to eliminate subjects?” There is only 
one answer and that is that whatever changes are made will be 








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1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 133 


made by teachers and approved by laymen after study and dis- 
cussion. These changes will come slowly or rapidly according 
to the desire of the participating groups. The problem of those 
administering the program is to furnish opportunities for dis- 
cussion of vital issues, to provide suggestions and materials for 
those who wish to modify what is being done, and to aid in 
keeping the direction while modification is taking place. 

The test for success is the test suggested in the beginning. 
The program must grow from the grass roots, make modifica- 
tions through evolutionary procedures, and proceed at a pace 
dictated by interested participants. Teacher interest and 
teacher growth are the present indications of successful prac- 
tice. 


COGPERATING SCHOOLS IN STATE OF CALIFORNIA 


F. C. WOOTEN 
Professor Education, Claremont Colleges, California 

At the present time there are thirteen Codperating Schools 
in the state of California. These schools have derived their 
designation from a general plan of development of secondary 
education set up by the State Department of Education, with 
the collaboration of higher institutions in the state, in 1934. 

The 1934 plan for development of secondary education was 
a comprehensive one. There were ten points to the program. 
They were as follows: 

1. The superintendent of public instruction appointed an 
Advisory Committee on Secondary Education of twenty-six 
members in February, 1934. The tasks of this committee in- 
cluded: (a) the responsibility for giving consideration to every 
phase of secondary education; (b) developing plans for evalu- 
ating current school practices; (c) outlining a program of cur- 
riculum experimentation and improvement; (d) devising 
means for making available, directing, and codrdinating the 
educational forces and resources of the state; (e) evaluating 
progress in the reconstruction program; and (f) developing 
new plans for further progress. 

2. A Committee on Coéperating Schools, consisting of ten 
members of the Advisory Committee. This committee was to 
give consideration to (a) the general types and methods of 
experimentation to be undertaken; (b) the principles and pro- 
cedures to be applied in selecting schools as experimental cen- 
ters; (c) the technique to be used in the guidance, control, and 











134 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


evaluation of the project; and (d) the plan for securing the 
coordination of the curricula and procedures of all secondary 
schools, lower schools, and colleges and universities that were 
involved in the project. 

3. The organization of the state into nine regions in each 
of which there was to be a committee which would collect re- 
ports of curriculum projects under way, plan regional confer- 
ences, contact workers in various schools, and evolve criteria 
from the evaluation of teaching, administrative, and guidance 
practice. 

4. The establishment of a curriculum revision informa- 
tion service which would report usually in mimeograph form, 
a wide range of curriculum revision activities collected by the 
regional committees. These reports were mimeographed and 
sent to all of the high-school principals in the state. 

5. The preparation of a set of sixty bibliographies on the 
various phases of secondary education was made. Each bibli- 
ography contained approximately fifteen well selected and an- 
notated references. 

6. Conclusion of arrangements with the California So- 
ciety of Secondary Education for the publication of materials 
of immediate concern to the reorganization program in the So- 
ciety’s magazine, The California Journal of Secondary Edu- 
cation. 

7. The preparation of a handbook on secondary educa- 
tion to carry such a title as Adolescent Growth and Develop- 
ment. 

8. An agreement to be entered into whereby all colleges 
and universities of the state will admit students from a limited 
number of selected high schools upon the recommendation of 
the principal and without requiring the students to have com- 
pleted a prescribed subject pattern. 

9. The encouragement of at least two California high 
schools to enter the Eight-Year Experiment of the Progressive 
Education Association. (The University High School, Oak- 
land, and the Eagle Rock High School, Los Angeles, became 
members of the Eight-Year Experiment.) 

10. The preparation of a Parent-Teacher Handbook on 
Secondary Education. 

One can see from this list of ten points in the secondary 
education reorganization program that a variety of activities 
was set in motion. Also, it may be seen that the Codperating’ 
Schools in California do not constitute an isolated program of 











1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 135 


experimentation. They were, rather, designed to be but an 
essential part of an all-round program of improvement of sec- 
ondary education in the state. 

The task of this paper is to indicate the developments that 
have taken place under Points 2 and 8 of the above list, i.e., the 
selection and work of the Coéperating Schools and the relation- 
ships which have developed with the higher institutions of the 
state. 


SELECTION OF SCHOOLS 


A series of conferences attended by representatives of the 
University of California, the Association of California Secon- 
dary-School Principals, and the State Department of Educa- 
tion resulted in the selection of eleven schools to be placed on 
the Codperating Schools list by the spring of 1935. The eleven 
schools became thirteen by the addition of two schools in the 
summer of 1936. The thirteen are as follows: 


Name of School No. Years Enrollment Type of Community 

Burbank Senior High............ 3 822 Suburban Town 
Burbank 

Carpinteria High .................. 4 204 Rural Town 
Carpinteria 

Eagle Rock High .................. 6 1,741 Metropolitan 
Los Angeles 

Benjamin Franklin High... 4 2,460 Metropolitan 
Los Angeles 

James A. Garfield High........ 6 2,795 Metropolitan 
Los Angeles 

Manual Arts High................ 3 3,627 Metropolitan 
Los Angeles 

David Starr Jordan.............. 3 494 City 
Long Beach 

Fremont Senior High............ 3 1,968 City 
Oakland 

University Senior High........ 3 1,950 City 
Oakland 

Pasadena High...................... 4 3,689 City 


and Junior College, (11, 12, 
13, 14 grades) Pasadena 


Sequoia Union High.............. 4 1,439 Town 
Redwood City 

Santa Monica Senior High.. 3 2,073 City 

~- Santa Monica 

Yuba City Union High.......... 4 612 Town 
Yuba City 


Information concerning certain of these schools has been 
made available in nationally circulated periodicals and books. 








136 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


For a concise statement of the earlier experimentation at the 
Eagle Rock High School, reference may be made to A Challenge 
to Secondary Education, edited by Samuel Everett’ for the 
University High School, Oakland, various aspects are treated 
in the University High School Journal;? and, for the Pasadena 
Junior College, two references by Superintendent John A. Sex- 
son and Deputy Superintendent George H. Meredith*® give 
rather complete information. 

In all of the schools there has been developing progres- 
sively a larger and more effective participation of the entire 
teaching staff in working out a philosophy of secondary educa- 
tion and in the adjustment of the school to that philosophy. 
In general the basic principles underlying the experimental 
work in all of the schools are quite similar. 

The school is the social institution specifically charged 
with the task of interpreting our Western culture to the oncom- 


ing generation. This involves the adjustment of the pupil to 


the environment, physical and social, in which he will build his 
own life and, reciprocally, the training of the individual to work 
in codéperation with others in adjusting the environment to the 


needs and interests of the pupil and his fellows. The position 
is very infrequently taken that adolescent boys and girls are 
capable of reforming society and the presumption is not held 
that the inexperience of youth can solve the problems which 
the wisdom of adults cannot solve. The attitude is built up, 
however, that social and individual problems should be at- 
tacked with vigor, intelligence, and vision. Training in the 
solution of problems within the school is the most prevalent 
avenue followed toward the building up of this attitude. 

The complex inter-relationships involved in any problem, 
social, political, economic, or scientific, necessitate over-step- 
ping the limits of traditionally organized subject-matter in 
following this problem approach. The result is a demand on 
the teacher for a more comprehensive knowledge of social in- 
stitutions and techniques characteristic of modern civilization 


1Everett, Samuel, Ed. A Challenge to Secondary Education. Chap- 
ter III, by W. B. Featherstone, “New Schools for a New Day.” D. Apple- 
ton-Century Company, 1935. 

2University High School Journal. The University of California 
University High School, Oakland, California. (Published quarterly). 

8Sexson, John A. “A New Type of Secondary School.” The Bul- 
letin of the Department of Secondary School Principals of the National 
Education Association. 22: 1-11. February, 1938. Everett, Samuel, 
ibid. Chapter VIII, by George H. Merideth, “A Plan for the Junior 


College.” 








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1938} PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 137 


than was needed by the subject matter specialist of a genera- 
tion ago. This effort to understand complex inter-relationships 
inevitably brings into the study of any problem unit materials 
formerly thought appropriate only in history, literature, sci- 
ence, music, art, government, or mathematics courses. 

_All of the coéperating schools are experimenting with so- 
called core courses. The view is taken that, in a democracy, 
all people should be alike in certain respects, not necessarily in 
degree, but in kind. Consequently, attention is given in the 
core course to English skills, quantitative relationships, funda- 
mental ideas of American democracy, modern dependence upon 
the results of scientific investigation, appreciation of the best 
of music and of art, and techniques of codperation in solving 
problems within the school and in the outside world. These 
core courses are found in the various schools under the names 
of personal living, social culture, basic course, orientation, so- 
cial living, and others. The underlying idea is the same, i.e., 
that the pupil has a fundamental need for adjustment to the 
world in which he lives and that, in order that this adjustment 
may be made, he must have a common experience with his fel- 


lows. 

The development of guidance functions in these schools is 
one of their outstanding features. The responsibility for guid- 
ance is in some cases largely in the hands of a group of coun- 
selors specially trained for the work; in others the basic course 
teacher is responsible for the guidance of the pupil. One of 
the most apparent outcomes of the guidance effort is the dis- 
covery of the more specialized needs and interests of the pupils. 
This discovery leads in turn to the organization of many 
courses somewhat new to the secondary program of studies. 
Illustrative of these are a course in general physical science in 
which the chief emphasis is laid on the consumer’s point of 
view rather than that of the producer; a course in biological 
problems in which biology is approached from the point of 
view of the human being culminating in a thoughtful treat- 
ment of sex education; and courses in social arts, vocational 
and professional orientation, consumer education, family re- 
lationships, and orientation to the junior high school. These 
newer type courses are closely related to the practical task of 
living in democratic America, a task which modern youth faces 
perplexedly and with a search for understanding. 

In California, as in other parts of the United States, ex- 
perimentation in secondary education has been delayed by a 














138 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


feeling on the part of secondary-school administrators that ad- 
mission requirements to higher institutions obstructed the way. 
In 1935 all of the higher institutions in California approved 
the designation of certain schools as Coéperating Schools with 
the provision that graduates would be accepted on the basis of 
the recommendation of the principal and the submission of 
such records as the school] cared to submit. In a sense these 
schools felt relieved of the usual requirements for entrance 
set up by the University of California. The University, be- 
cause of its position as the official accrediting agency in the 
state, was the chief concern of the administrators. Many 
of the private colleges in the state depended more upon per- 
sonal information about the candidate for admission, infor- 
mation derived from the letters and personal interviews and 
recommendations, than they did upon the distribution of units 
set forth by the University. The whole problem revolved 
around the completion of requirements for the junior certifi- 
cate at the University It should be stated that the public jun- 
ior colleges in the state, approximately forty in number, must 
provide for the junior certificate along the same plan as that 
followed by the University. The University, including the 
public junior colleges, therefore, when it agreed to admit the 
graduates of the Coédperating Schools, did not agree to waive 
the requirements for the junior certificate. The result is that 
any graduate of one of the Codperating Schools going to the 
University must complete these requirements by the close of 
his sophomore year in college. These requirements include the 
provision that a student must have had a high school or in the 
lower division of the University a year of algebra and a year 
of plane geometry. Knowing that their graduates would have 
to meet this requirement in the University, the counselors in 
the Coéperating Schools exert efforts to discover early in their 
high-school careers those pupils who anticipate entering the 
University. Such pupils are then counseled very strongly to 
take the required courses in mathematics, and in many cases 
at least two years of one foreign language, so that their lower 
division work at the University will not be taken up in part by 
studying subjects which are usually taught in the high school. 
This policy of “playing safe” on the part of the Codperating 
Schools seems to some to vitiate the experimental work which 
they are seeking to do. To others, it is not a serious matter, 
especially in those cases where the experimental work in the 
school is limited in its area, thus leaving plenty of time in the 







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139 





PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





1938] 


pupil’s program to take the college preparatory subjects, or in 
those cases where the number of high-school graduates going 
to college is very small. Another aspect of the situation, which 
minimizes the effect of the junior certificate requirements, is 
the fact that all public junior colleges must admit graduates 
of the public high schools. Since a very large percentage of 
such graduates enroll in terminal courses, generally vocational 
in nature, in the junior colleges, the junior certificate require- 
ments do not apply. In the cases of the Jordan High School 
in Long Beach and twelfth grade of the Pasadena Junior Col- 
lege, most of the graduates go on in the same school system. 
Still another aspect is found in the case of the Garfield High 
School in Los Angeles where only from five to eight per cent 
of the graduates attend any higher institution. 

The chief obstacles to the development of experimental 
work in California high schools, in addition to those mentioned 
in the preceding paragraphs, seem to be the difficulty on the 
part of the professional staff in many areas to carry their pub- 
lic with them. Although the high school in California is indeed 
a “people’s college” there is a strong tendency on the part of 
the public to view with alarm much tinkering with the cur- 
riculum. There are, however, many schools in which experi- 
mentation has gone farther than in the schools designated as 
Codperating Schools. Such experimentation is brought about 
quietly by serious and continued study of the problems of sec- 
ondary education by the administrators and staffs. It is cer- 
tainly safe to say that there has never been a time nor a place 
where the ferment of up-to-date thinking is working with 
greater effect than is now the case in California. 

A second type of obstacle to curriculum reorganization in 
California is found in the limited resources of the State De- 
partment of Education. The Department at present has one 
officer designated as the Chief of the Division of Secondary 
Education. He has no assistance of a professional nature. The 
tasks with which he is charged in a state with almost six mil- 
lion people, and 550 high schools enrolling 92 per cent of the 
boys and girls of high-school age are sufficient to demand a 
staff of four or five well-trained and professionally competent 
educational leaders. At the present time there seems to be no 
remedy for this situation. The school people of the state are 
demanding leadership but the leadership is not available. 

In general the Codperating Schools are blazing the trail 
to a better type of secondary education. If earnest effort, in- 


























































140 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


telligent study, and awareness of problems on the part of the 
secondary administrators and teachers in California constitute 
a portent of what will happen in the next decade the future is 
exceedingly bright. The devotion of this professional group 
to the welfare and interests of youth, as well as to the per- 
petuation and improvement of American democracy, is the 
most encouraging feature of secondary education in California. 


EJECTING HIGH-SCHOOL INSPECTION 


G. ROBERT KOOPMAN 
Assistant Superintendent, Department of Public Instruction, Lansing, Michigan 


Probably nothing except furtive wire-tapping as prac- 
ticed by Federal agencies past and present is more despicable 
or deleterious than typical high-school inspection. Further- 
more, the apparent acceptance of such inspection by local edu- 
cational authorities has been such that the practice has been 
difficult to eliminate. The title of this paper, Ejecting High- 
School Inspection, is used advisedly. A few years ago the 
Michigan Department of Public Instruction decided to change 
its policy dealing with relationships with high schools. This 
fact was announced. Certain changes in attitudes, forms of re- 
porting, and method of advising schools were made. The re- 
sult was a slight improvement of relationships between the 
Department and local schools, but little else. Educational lead- 
ership did not spring into existence. Submissiveness of prin- 
cipals and superintendents was not materially reduced. There 
was no apparent increase in confidence. Administrators asked, 
“What do you think?” They did not say “We have made cer- 
tain gains—now where?” or “We’ve met a technical obstacle, 
what would you suggest?” All of this in the face of an obvious 
need for socially useful secondary schools. 

This phenomenon prompted some curious people in the 
Michigan Department of Public Instruction to look back of the 
scenes. This was the picture which presented itself. 


1. The Department had no consistent and fundamental 
policy of relationship with local units. 

2. The Department agents were covering a number of 
items such as fire inspection for which there were duly 
constituted inspectorial agencies. 

. Reporting to the Department was based on the theory 
that certain arbitrary standards such as “having a 
library” were valid. 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 


. The agents did evaluate schools. 

. The Department was relinquishing controls in one 
field and holding on to controls in another. 

. No consistent policy of application of standards was 
followed. 

. The Department was a party to accrediting by the 
University of Michigan. 

. No new relationship of a positive nature was promised 
as a substitute for inspection or visitation. 

. The Department as an integrated agency did not know 
the facts concerning the effects of its policies or lack 
of policies on local units. 


Obviously the picture was one of good intentions hope- 
lessly jumbled with malfunction and misfunction. Remedial 
action was called for. Dr. Eugene B. Elliott, Superintendent 
of Public Instruction, had been advised to set up an intensive 
study of the secondary curriculum. This was done. The Mich- 
igan Study of the Secondary Curriculum is now set up on a 
twelve-year basis. It has as its purpose the following: 

“The central idea of the Michigan Study of the Secondary- 
School Curriculum is to plan and to conduct a long-time codp- 
erative program for the improvement of secondary education 
in Michigan. The basic purposes of the study are to discover, 
to evaluate, and to develop desirable modifications in the sec- 
ondary program. It is essential that changes be made in terms 
of contributing to the more effective meeting of the needs of 
pupils, both those who are and those who are not going to col- 
lege, and to the improvement of the community. 


“These basic purposes involve such activities as: 

1. Consideration of the objectives of the secondary school. 

2. Improvement of the relationships between the secon- 
dary-school experience of the pupil and his previous 
and subsequent experiences. 

. Improvement of methods of assisting the secondary- 
school pupil with his problems of entering and pursu- 
ing his subsequent experiences. 

. Improvement of programs of evaluation of secondary 
education and of pupil growth. 

. Extensive participation in planning, executing, and 
evaluating instruction by administrators, teachers, pu- 
pils, and laymen.”? 


1Parker, J. Cecil. Changing Secondary Education in the United States. 











DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS [March, 


This study is being ably directed by J. Cecil Parker, for- 
merly of Fort Worth, Texas. While it is in its first year, it 
promises to challenge traditional and non-functional curricula 
in every Michigan high school. It will employ exploratory 
schools and other standard methods of improving institutional 
effectiveness. A new light is dawning on the high-school 
teacher. No more is mere conformity the modus operandi. 


The need for change of practice was so urgent that even 
in the secondary field it was deemed unwise to await gradual 
developments. Furthermore, the elementary schools needed 
leadership. The Curriculum Steering Committee had stimu- 
lated much interest in changing elementary education for the 
better. Schools were asking for direct services from the De- 
partment. Consequently, for the first time there was set up a 
unified instructional office. The functions of several bureaus 
were transferred to this office along with the personnel. New 
personnel was also added. All of this meant considerable re- 
organization which touched every division of the Department. 

Such reorganization was furthered by the formation of a 
Department Coérdinating Council which was designed to in- 
sure that every division should contribute to creative research 
and creative educational leadership. 

It can be readily seen that high-school inspection was 
swallowed up and supplanted by a consultation staff centered 
around instructional services. This called for staff specializa- 
tion which is going forward nicely. 

Naturally consultation service and inspection are concepts 
that fight each other. They do not fit into the picture nicely 
so every force contributes to the ejection of inspection as such. 
This has meant changing behavior and attitude of agents. 
True, members of the instructional office slip back occasion- 
ally but they are quickly reminded of their inconsistency by the 
ineffectiveness of their own behavior when they do backslide. 
Schools are now notified of impending visits. Blanket indict- 
ments have given way to careful and realistic criticisms of edu- 
cational programs. The emphasis is on data not bureaucratic 
opinion. 

Concurrent with the installation of the instructional office 
came the study of the relationship of the Department to the 
local school district. The first step in this investigation was a 
series of group visits to schools. These visits sent nearly all 
division heads and many other members of the Department to 
typical schools. These people saw enough to realize the integ- 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 143 


rity of a local unit and to see instructional strengths and weak- 
nesses. In writing reports of these visits staff members have 
shown an appreciation of the work of the local superintendents 
in their attempts to improve the total educational programs 
of these units. 

There followed conferences and an announcement of the 
new community-school policy which committed the Depart- 
ment to the servicing of total communities in terms of all edu- 
cational needs. This policy is quoted: 

1. The relationships of the Department with local schools 
are based upon the service concept of educational lead- 
ership. This concept is inclusive and democratic and 
should take precedence over such concepts as inspe- 
tion, supervision, direction, the dissemination of rul- 
ings or direct evaluation of local programs by outside 
agencies. 

. It is appropriate that the Department deal at all times 
with total educational needs of a given school system. 
This implies that departments or courses will not be 
treated as units but as parts of a total educational of- 
fering of a given school. This in turn means that the 
Department is concerned with unmet educational needs 
as well as the effectiveness of the present program. 

. The local community is responsible for planning, exc- 
cuting, and appraising its educational organization and 
curriculum. The Department functions by supplement- 
ing local guidance and leadership in the planning and 
appraising activities. 

. Criteria for the planning, improving, and appraising 
of educational programs should be derived from the 
community. This implies that the community is the 
basic social institution and the source of social values. 
Educational recommendations should be developed and 
tested by such community values. 

. The Department is primarily concerned with consta 
improvement in the use of facilities and personnel 
rather than in the meeting of relatively static stand- 
ards. 

. Evaluation of local programs shall be made in terms 
of local objectives. 

. The program of consultation of the Department com- 
prehends practically the entire professional member- 
ship of the Department and operates as a unit so far 











DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


as the local school is concerned. The determination of 
the needs to be met and the general arrangements for 
consultation are considered to be the responsibility o! 
the local school executive acting as a representative of 
his constituent groups—the board of education, the 
faculty, and the community as a whole. 

. The Department will encourage educational institu- 
tions outside of the local community such as institu- 
tions of higher education and vocational institutes to 
deal directly with individual applicants rather than 
with the community educational institution, provided 
that the educational institutions should afford services 
for individuals and outside educational institutions. 

This led to one more major change. There existed a need 
for annual reporting concerning the many factors with which 
education is concerned. A study was made of these factors. 
A sort of self-survey instrument was finally devised to cover 
the need for the present year. Children, teachers, board mem- 
bers and other citizens participate in the survey. This form 
consists of the following parts: 

I. Community Information 

II. School Organization 

III. Pupil Personnel 

IV. Teacher Personnel 

V. School Plant 

VI. Learning Activity 

VII. Budget Items 

A new plan for annual reporting has been agreed upon to 
take effect on July 1, 1938. This plan calls for the following 
basic reports: 

July 1—Finance and child accounting 

October 1—Exploratory Survey and Annual Report of In- 

struction 

November 1—Annual Plan for Instructional Improvement 

Much coordination within the Department and much stim- 
ulation of initiative in the local district may be expected. 

The developments which have been described have given 
the Department a new orientation. They promise to eliminate 
gradually about one-half of the small high schools in Michigan 
by a process of self-study and advisement on district reorgani- 
zation. 

High-School inspection has been ejected by the process of 
substituting consultation services, supplemented by self-sur- 








/-_ Ww = 





1938 | PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 145 


veys and basic research. And finally, the Department has built 
for itself a framework of structure and function which pro- 
vides for continuous growth and can accommodate a tremen- 
dous expansion of activities such as social research and educa- 
tional research. There need be no retreating except as finance 
may limit the number of working agents. Local school dis- 
tricts have demanded so many specific services that the case 
for a codperative relationship with local schools has been made. 


Dr. Ralph W. Tyler reported on the Evaluation in the 
Eight-Year Study of the Progressive Education Association. 

(The complete report may be found in the October 15, 
1937, issue of the Educational Research Bulletin.) 

At this juncture Mr. Clark called the President of the De- 
partment to the chair. 


Mr. Jones asked Francis L. Bacon, Chairman of the Com- 
mittee on Planning, for the report which follows: 


PROGRESS REPORT 


COMMITTEE ON PLANNING 


The Committee on Planning submits the following report 
on progress made during the past year: 

This meeting marks the end of the second year of activ- 
ity for the Committee on Planning. A statement of the his- 
tory of the Committee, its problems, objectives, personnel, etc., 
was made in the first annual report which was made at the 
New Orleans meeting last year and published in the 1937 pro- 
ceedings number of the Department Bulletin. The first year 
was spent mostly in laying the foundation for the Discussion- 
Group Project, in the interpretation of the reports on the 
Issues and Functions of secondary education, in studying and 
evaluating the work of the Department, and in outlining a pro- 
gram for a codperative attack on some of the urgent problems 
in secondary education. These activities resulted in the Com- 
mittee making a number of recommendations to the Executive 
Committee. 

Throughout the second year of activity, the Committee 


- 


continued work along the same general lines. The one project 
which has been given particular emphasis is that of promoting 
a nationwide program of discussion groups in secondary edu- 
cation. This project has not only received educational recog- 




















146 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


nition on a national scale but has been a means of carrying into 
effect other goals toward which the Committee is working. 

A special meeting of the Committee was held at the NEA 
in Washington, D. C., on October 21. Among the matters 
which received attention at this gathering were: the personnel 
and work of the various Department committees; publications 
to be issued by the Committee on Planning; the improvement 
of Department magazines; the National Association of Student 
Officers ; proposed change in the name of the Department; re- 
lationships of the Department with other educational agencies ; 
the annual convention; revision of the report on the Jssues 
and Functions; and the progress of the Discussion-Group 
Project. Recommendations in regard to these matters were 
transmitted to the Executive Committee through President 
Jones, who was present at the meeting. 

Among the other activities carried on under the auspices 
of the Committee on Planning during the past year the fol- 
lowing are outstanding: 

A letter was sent to members of the Committee on Orien- 
tation requesting that they furnish questions for discussion on 
the Functions. After all members had responded, the ques- 
tions were mimeographed and distributed widely. 

Agenda were prepared for the use of the Committee on 
Publications at its first meeting, held February 19, and its sec- 
ond meeting, November 6. 

Articles dealing with some phase of the report of the Co 
mittee on Orientation and the work of the Committee on Plan- 
ning have appeared in the following periodicals since Febru- 
ary, 1937: School and Society, California Journal of Secondary 
Education, The Educational Digest, Scholastic Magazine, The 
School Executive, Occupations, College of Education Record, 
Illinois Teacher, The Christian Science Monitor, Journal of 
the National Education Association, The Phi Delta Kappan, 
The Clearinghouse, The Church School Journal, Bulletin of the 
Department, Industrial Arts and Vocational Education, Jour- 
nals of a number of state teachers associations, Educational 
Abstract, New York Herald Tribune. 

Letters, together with other material about the Discus- 
sion-Group Project and the Jsswes and Functions, were sent to 
a selected list of two hundred fifty professors of secondary edu- 
cation with a view of interesting them in the Project and the 
use of the reports in their classes. About eleven thousand of 
the Jssues have been distributed and about eighty-five hundred 


of the Functions. 













i ll 


rd 


147 


1932] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 


A booklet entitled Talking It Through: A Manual for Dis- 
cussion Groups has been prepared. Preceding the writing of 
this volume, a survey was made of all the literature on the sub- 
ject of discussion groups and the work of groups already in 
existence. 

A folder describing the work, objectives, problems, etc., of 
the Committee on Planning has been published. 

A summary outline of the Issues and Functions for use by 
discussion groups was developed, published, and more than 
eighty thousand copies have been distributed. 

Many addresses delivered by members of the Committee 
and two radio programs have dealt with some phase of the 
Discussion-Group Project or the report on the Issues and 
Functions. 

State Codrdinators for Discussion Groups have been ap- 
pointed in forty-nine states. 

As a result of the joint recommendation of the Committee 
on Planning and the Executive Committee, three new commit- 
tees have been appointed by the President of the Department. 
These are the committees on Implementation and Practices, 
Student Activities, and Publications. 

The Committee has recommended a plan for a policy of 
program continuity over a long term and a plan for evaluation 
of the national meeting. 


Mr. Will French made a brief report for new committee 
called the Implementation Committee. 

Mr. Edgar A. Johnston presented an extended report for 
the Committee on Pupil Activities. (Portions of this report 
will be printed in succeeding Bulletins.) 


Mr. Oscar Granger presented the report for the Commit- 
tee on Publications: 


REPORT OF PROGRESS BY THE COMMITTEE ON 
PUBLICATIONS 


The Committee on Publications submits the following re- 
port on progress made during the first year of its activity: 

Origin and Purpose. The formation of the Committee 
on Publications resulted from a recommendation made jointly 
by the Planning and the Executive Committees at the 1937 an- 
nual meeting of the Department held at New Orieans. The gen- 
eral purposes of the Committee on Publications are: (1) to 








eerie 








148 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


study the form, character, and frequency of issues of existing 
publications, and to make recommendations for changes or new 
proposals; (2) to develop a set of principles for the guidance of 
the editorial staff of the Department; and (3) to assist with 
Department periodicals by serving in the capacity of an evalu- 
ating and advisory board. 


Personnel. The members of the Committee on Publica- 
tions, appointed by McClellan G. Jones, President of the De- 
partment, consists of the following: W. C. Reavis, University 
of Chicago, Chairman; Walter E. Myer, Director, Discussion- 
Group Project of the Department; and Oscar Granger, Prin- 
cipal, Haverford Township High School, Upper Darby, Penn- 
sylvania. 


First Activities. By means of correspondence and one 
special meeting the Committee has conducted a continuous 
campaign throughout the year to improve and establish stand- 
ards for Department publications. The first stage of the work 
was to study the existing publications, to bring together the 
views held by members of the Department, and to ascertain 
what changes were desired. Many suggestions were received 
from members of the Department in regard to the Bulletin, and 
also on the proposal that a publication be developed in the field 
of student activities. After considering all suggestions and 
studying all phases of the Department’s publication, the fol- 
lowing report, approved by the President of the Department, 
was submitted to the members in the supplement to Bulletin 


No. 65: 

1. Recommended that the Bulletin of the Department be 
published eight times during the school year, October 
to May, inclusive. 

1) Scope of the Bulletin: 
To cover the entire field of secondary education 
with emphasis especially on administration. 
2) Special features of the Bulletin are sections de- 
voted to: 
(a) Study and discussion groups. 
(b) News and short items about organizations, 
schools, projects, and events. 
(c) Books and materials for administrators and 
teachers. 
(d) Adult education in the secondary field. 
. Recommended that the Department take over the mag- 
azine, Student Leader, for the purpose of encouraging 





1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 149 


the development of better practices in student activi- 

ties in the member schools. 

1) This magazine to be published eight times during 
the school year. 

2) Scope of the magazine to include all basic student 
activities in secondary schools. 

To this report were appended questions for returns from 
the members. 

The result of the referendum showed nearly unanimous 
sentiment for increasing the number of issues of the Bulletin 
to eight a year, and for developing a student magazine dealing 
with activities in the secondary field. 


Changes in the Bulletin. Several changes have been made 
both in appearance and contents. The chief principals which 
have been adopted to guide the editorial staff are: 


CONTENTS 


. The Bulletin shall report and promote the activities 
and projects of the Department. Special emphasis 
shall be given to the following: plans for the winter 
and summer meetings; the Discussion-Group Project; 
Student Life and the organizations this publication 
represents; and the work of committees. 

. The Bulletin assumes the obligation of keeping the 
membership of the Department informed on trends 
and the latest developments in secondary education 
over the country. 

. The majority of articles shall be fairly specific in na- 
ture. Caution shall be taken not to publish material 
duplicating that which has appeared in other periodi- 
cals which are likely to be available to secondary- 
school principals. 

. The long articles shall be of outstanding merit and 
shall pertain directly to secondary-school administra- 
tion. The feature article of each number should not 
exceed three thousand words; other contributions 
should be limited to fifteen hundred words. 

. News notes shall be of importance only to secondary 
education. 

. Digests of addresses delivered at important conven- 
tions, if printed, shall bear directly on matters per- 
taining to secondary education. 














DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


. Book notes shall be confined to books of professional 
interest to secondary-school principals and shall mere- 
ly tell what the books contain, attempting no critical 
evaluation. 


. The Bulletin shall contain the following special sec- 


tions: (1) Reports of Committees; (2) News Items; 
(3) Book Notes, (this department to be divided into 
two parts; the first section to contain an annotated list 
of new books of particular interest to the secondary- 
school principals; and, second, all other publications 
received at the Department office to be listed under 
the caption, “Current Publications Received”); (4) 
Calendar of Professional Meetings of special signifi- 
cance to secondary education. 

. The personnel of all Department Committees when 
completed shall be run in future numbers of the Bulle- 
tin. 


STYLE AND MAKE-UP 
. The title has been changed from Bulletin to The Bul- 


letin. 

. A more attractive front cover page has been designed 

—first used in February number. 

. The titles of each of the special departments are boxed 

and a more attractive type has been selected. 

. Other changes in style and make-up which have been 

made with a view of developing a more attractive and 

readable publication include: 

a. In writing News Items, the key phrases in the lead 
sentences are set in caps and small caps. 

b. The titles of articles are now set in ten point large 
caps, names of authors in ten point small caps, and 
positions, addresses, etc., of author, in six point 
type. 

. Hairline rules are placed between the title of the 
article and the name of the author, and between the 
name of the author and the beginning of the article. 

. The running head is eliminated on the pages where 
articles or special sections begin. 

. Each number of the Bulletin contains a minimum of 
sixty-four pages plus the four cover pages. 

. A more appropriate and attractive paper stock has 
been selected for the cover pages. 





1238] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 151 


The Committee hopes to continue to make further im- 
provements, both in content and in style, of The Bulletin. The 
staff has established contacts which are yielding an abundance 
of excellent material. With the foundation which has been laid 
this year, it should be much easier in the future to look ahead 
and to develop plans well in advance of new undertakings. At 
this time many of the plans for next year’s issues of The Bulle- 
tin have been completed. 

The publication, Student Life, is designed to encourage 
better practices in student activities in secondary schools. The 
purpose is not to advocate or encourage some activity of prac- 
tice as opposed to another, but to inform all students about all 
activities considered worthy in secondary schools. Following 
the publication of the first number, encouraging comments 
came from principals of secondary schools, faculty advisers, 
students, and others interested in young people. Interest in 
the new magazine has developed rapidly. Up to the present 
time the Committee has not been able to give much attention 
to the guidance of this new publication or to the development 
of a set of principles for use by the staff. 


The next task of the Committee is that of evaluating the 
work done on Student Life and of developing a set of princi- 
ples for use by its editorial staff. Two of the important prob- 
Icms are to determine the relative emphasis which should be 
given to different activities, and to stimulate more students to 
write for the publication. 


The Committee on Publications and the editorial staff will 
appreciate suggestions and constructive criticisms from mem- 
bers in regard to other work which is needed on Department 
publications in order to make them of greater service to Amer- 
ican secondary schools. The Committee is aware that the task 
ahead is not an easy one, and that much remains to be done be- 
fore the two publications now being issued attain the desired 
standards. The Committee believes that during the first year 
of its activity a sound basis for the future progress of De- 
partment publications has been established. 


Respectfully submitted, 
OscAR GRANGER 


WALTER E. MYER 
W. C. REAVIS, Chairman. 




















DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


~ 
or 
Nm 


The report for the Nominating Committee was made by its 
chairman, Mr. W. L. Spencer: 


President: Paul E. Elicker 
First Vice President: K. J. Clark 
Second Vice President: Oscar Granger 


Executive Committee: 
Virgil M. Hardin 
M. G. Jones 
Truman G. Reed 
John E. Wellwood 


On motion the report was accepted. 


Mr. O. V. Walters presented excerpts from the report of 
the auditor of the finances. (This report will appear in a later 
Bulletin.) 


The incoming President of the Department made a short 
speech accepting the office. 


The following ballot was distributed: 
NATIONAL COUNCIL OF NATIONAL HONOR SOCIETY 
AND NATIONAL JUNIOR HONOR SOCIETY 
Sponsored by the Department of Secondary-School Principals 


M. R. McDaniel, President, Oak Park, Illinois 
q Paul E. Elicker, Newtonville, Massachusetts 
A. E. MacQuarrie, Minneapolis, Minnesota 
(The terms of the above expire in 1939) 





Charles F. Allen, Little Rock, Arkansas 

H. J. Parker, Corvallis, Oregon 

W. L. Spencer, Montgomery, Alabama 
(The terms of the above expire in 1940) 


L. W. Brooks, Wichita, Kansas 
H. V. Kepner, Denver, Colorado 
L. E. Plummer, Fullerton, California 
(The terms of the above three expire at this Convention) 














1938] PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 





BALLOT 


(Vote for three) 
L. W. BROOKS, Principal, Wichita High School East, 
Wichita, Kansas 


E. B. COMSTOCK, Principal, North Dallas High School, 
Dallas, Texas 


M. M. MANSPERGER, Principal, Junior-Senior High 
School, Freeport, New York 


CLAUD B. PENDLETON, Principal, Smiley Junior 
High School, Denver, Colorado 


STACY E. PETERS, Principal, High Schools, 
Lancaster, Pennsylvania 


L. E. PLUMMER, Superintendent of Schools, 
Fullerton, California 


EMILY P. BROCKWOOD, Principal, High School, 
Haddon Heights, New Jersey 


JOHN H. SCHWATKA, Principal, Southern Junior- 
Senior High School, Baltimore, Maryland 


JERRY J. VINEYARD, Superintendent of Schools, 
Nevada, Missouri 


oo Oo bw: et Ob 2: a 





The balloting resulted in the election of 
L. W. Brooks, Wichita, Kansas 
Ernest B. Comstock, Dallas, Texas 
Stacey E. Peters, Lancaster, Pennsylvania. 


Adjournment. 


























National Honor Society 





MEETING OF THE NATIONAL COUNCIL OF 
THE NATIONAL HONOR SOCIETY 


Atlantic City, New Jersey 
February 27, 1938 


The National Council met in Hotel Traymore. Present, 


members Allen, Elicker, MacQuarrie, Spencer, and Church. 
Absent, members Brooks, Kepner, McDaniel, Parker, and 
Plummer. The terms of members Brooks, Kepner, and Plum- 
mer expire at this convention. The following names were 
placed on the ballot below: 


ONoOoOOdoodaaonadg 


cer, 


BALLOT 


(Vote for three) 

L. W. BROOKS, Principal, Wichita High School East, 
Wichita, Kansas 

E. B. COMSTOCK, Principal, North Dallas High School, 
Dallas, Texas 

M. M. MANSPERGER, Principal, Junior-Senior High 
School, Freeport, New York 

CLAUD B. PENDLETON, Principal, Smiley Junior 
High School, Denver, Colorado 

STACY E. PETERS, Principal, High Schools, 
Lancaster, Pennsylvania 

L. E. PLUMMER, Superintendent of Schools, 
Fullerton, California 

EMILY P. ROCKWOOD, Principal, High School, 
Haddon Heights, New Jersey 

JOHN H. SCHWATKA, Principal, Southern Junior- 
Senior High School, Baltimore, Maryland 

JERRY J. VINEYARD, Superintendent of Schools, 
Nevada, Missouri 


On motion of member Elicker, seconded by member Spen- 
it was passed that the national constitution and the model 


154 


























PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 155 





1988] 


constitution be amended to provide for the establishment of 
chapters in schools not members of a regional association and 
not on the approved or recognized list of state departments. 
Such schools are advised to establish local honor societies, 
make reports to the National Council of their activities, con- 
stitution, and by-laws, and submit to inspection by someone 
appointed by the office of the National Council. After a satis- 
factory probationary period of two years, such schools may be 
granted a charter and shall be subject to further special and 
annual reports and inspection. Such charters may be revoked 
for cause by the Secretary of the National Honor Society. 

On motion of member Allen with a second by member 
MacQuarrie it was voted to amend the constitutions to the end 
that the title to the emblem, whether purchased or bestowed on 
individual member, shall rest with the National Honor Society. 

Moved by member Allen, seconded by member MacQuar- 
rie that M. R. McDaniel be chosen as president of the National 
Honor Society. Carried. 

Moved by member Spencer, second by member Elicker, 
that A. E. MacQuarrie be chosen as vice-president of the Na- 
tional Honor Society. 

Adjournment. 

















156 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


CONSTITUTION 
OF THE DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL 
PRINCIPALS OF THE NATIONAL EDUCATION 
ASSOCIATION 


ARTICLE I—NAME 
The name of this organization shall be the Department of 
Secondary-School Principals of the National Education Asso- 
ciation. 


ARTICLE II—AIM 
The aim of this department shall be the advancement of 
secondary education by providing a clearing house of discus- 
sion bearing upon the problems of administration and super- 
vision, by encouraging research, by upholding acceptable 
standards, by fostering professional ideals, and by formu- 
lating a working philosophy of secondary education. 


ARTICLE III—MEMBERSHIP 

SECTION 1—The membership in the Department of Secon- 
dary-School Principals shall consist of two classes: active and 
associate. 

SECTION 2—All individuals shall be eligible to active mem- 
bership who are members of the National Education Associa- 
tion and who are engaged in administrating supervision, and 
teaching secondary education, upon payment of the annual fee 
of $2.00 to the executive secretary. 

SECTION 3—Members of state organizations of secondary- 
school principals shall be eligible to active membership in the 
Department of Secondary-School Principals, by the payment 


of the annual fee of $1.00. 
SECTION 4—AI] other persons interested in secondary edu- 


cation, who are members of the National Education Associa- 
tion, shall be eligible to associate membership upon payment 
of the annual fee of $2.00 to the executive secretary. 


SECTION 5—Only active members shall have the privilege 
of voting or holding office. 


SECTION 6—AIl members, both active and associate, shall 
receive the publications of the Department. 





Se | a Ane ie al ee on 

















1938 | PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 157 


ARTICLE IV—OFFICERS 


SECTION 1—The elective officers of the Department shall 
be a president, a first vice president, and a second vice presi- 
dent. 


SECTION 2—The president and the vice presidents shall 
hold office for one year. 


SECTION 3—The executive committee shall consist of the 
officers, the retiring president, and three other members each 
elected for a term of three years. At the first election, one 
member shall be elected for only one year and one other for 
two years. The executive committee shall be representative 
of junior high schools, the several types of senior high schools, 
and junior colleges. 


SECTION 4—The executive secretary shall be selected by 
the executive committee; his duties and compensation shall be 
determined by the executive committee. 


ARTICLE V 


SECTION 1—The president shall, sixty days in advance of 
the annual meeting, ask each of the state associations of the 
Department of Secondary-School Principals to name a repre- 
sentative who shall then be appointed by the president as a 
member of the nominating committee. 


SECTION 2—Eighteen members of the nominating com- 
mittee shall constitute a quorum with not fewer than three 
from each of the following regional associations of colleges 
and Secondary Schools: New England Association of Colleges 
and Secondary Schools, the Association of Colleges and Sec- 
ondary Schools of the Middle States, the Association of Col- 
leges and Secondary Schools of the Southern States, the North 
Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools, the 
Northwest Association of Secondary and Higher Schools, and 
the Western Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. 
Any lack in the representation herein provided shall be filled 
by nomination from the floor. 


SECTION 3—The nominating committee so constituted 
‘shall meet following its selection and after electing a chair- 
man, shall prepare a list of candidates for the several offices, 
to be submitted to the Department at its final business meet- 


ing. 














158 DEPARTMENT OF SECONDARY-SCHOOL PRINCIPALS (March, 


ARTICLE VI—FINANCE 


The president shall appoint, subject to the approval of 
the executive committee, two members who shall, with the ex- 
ecutive secretary, constitute a board of finance to act in the 
capacity of trustees, to have custody of the funds of the De- 
partment, to have same properly audited, and to submit an- 
nually a report to the Department. Bills shall be paid by the 
executive secretary upon the authorization of the president. 


ARTICLE VII—MEETINGS 


SECTION 1—The Department of Secondary-School Prin- 
cipals shall hold two meetings yearly. The regular annual 
meeting shall be held at the time and place of the meetings of 
the Department of Superintendence of the National Education 
Association, unless arranged for otherwise by the executive 
committee of the Department. 


SECTION 2—The second meeting of the Department shall 
be held at the time and place of the annual summer meeting 
of the National Education Association. 


ARTICLE VIII—AMENDMENTS 


The Constitution may be amended by a two-thirds major- 
ity vote of those present and voting at the annual mid-winter 
meetings. A proposed amendment must be submitted in writ- 
ing at the preceding annual meeting, or must be submitted in 
printed form to all members of the Department thirty days 
before the annual meeting. In case the latter method is used, 
such amendment must receive the approval of the executive 
committee before it can be printed and sent to the members 
of the Department. 


ARTICLE IX 


Roberts’ Rules of Order shall govern in all meetings of the 
Department. 




















1938 | 


PROCEEDINGS OF TWENTY-SECOND ANNUAL MEETING 


159 











“TALKING IT 
THROUGH" 


Latest Publication of the Department 





Essential to Discussion 
of Department Problems 


15° PER COPY 


DEPARTMENT OF 
SECONDARY SCHOOL PRINCIPALS 


5835 Kimbark Avenue 
Chicago, Illinois