COMMERCIAL EDUCATION iN PUBLIC SECONDARY SCHOOLS EV THOMPSON UC-NRLF $B i"] m? SCHOOL EFFICIENCY SERIES PAUL H.HANUS Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2007 with funding from IVIicrosoft Corporation http://www.archive.org/details/commercialeducatOOthomrich THE School Efficiency Series comprises about ten volumes by as many educational experts on Elementary School and Kindergarten, High School, and Vocational Instruction, Courses of Study, Organization, Management and Supervision. The series consists of monographs— with additions plainly indicated in each volume — constituting the report of Professor Hanus and his associates on the schools of New York City, but the controlling ideas are applicable as well in one pubHc school system as in another. Among the authors contributing to these volumes are Professor Paul H. Hanus, Professor of Education, Harvard University, who is also general editor of the series; Dr. Frank P. Bachman, formerly Assistant Superintendent of Schools, Cleveland; Dr. Edward C. EUiott, Director of the School of Education, University of Wisconsin; Dr. Herman Schneider, Dean of the College of Engineering, University of Cmcinnati; Mr. Frank W. Ballou, Joseph Lee Fellow for Research in Education, Harvard University (formerly Assistant Professor of Education, University of Cincinnati); Dr. Calvin O. Davis, Assistant Professor of Education, University of Michigan; Mr. Frank V. Thompson, Assistant Superintendent of Schools, Boston; Dr. Henry H. Goddard, Director Department of Psycho- logical Research, New Jersey Training School for Feeble-Minded Boys and Girls; Mr. Stuart A. Courtis, Head of Department of Science and Mathematics, Detroit Home and Day School (Liggett School), Detroit; Dr. Frank M. McMurry, Professor of Elemen- tary Education, Teachers College, Columbia University; Dr. Ernest C. Moore, Professor of Education, Harvard University (formerly of Yale UmVersity). SCHOOL EFFICIENCY SERIES Commercial Education in Public Secondary Schools SCHOOL EFFICIENCY SERIES Edited by Paul H. Hanus Commercial Education in Public Secondary Schools By F. V. THOMPSON Assistant Suphrinthndbnt of Schools Boston, Massachusbtts YONKERS-ON-HUDSON, NEW YORK WORLD BOOK COMPANY 1915 Copyright^ igiSt by World Book Company All rights reserH S 2 s bo 11 o bO 12:2 O ••-> Gc-H bo ^ o rf 4> oo-ao ^§ 60 .S ^ "o 2 R •^ M O (U c! .£] en II 11 •g 1> -EJ — — . » aj= a lass a 2 a § o 6b O 2 o erience. As is true in industrial education, many effective teachers may be drawn from the field of actual practice, but to be most effective the teacher with technical knowledge must acquire skill in the art of teaching. CHAPTER III THE GENERAL HIGH SCHOOL AND COM- MERCIAL EDUCATION THE Census of 1910 lists over five hundred cities and towns in the United States with a population of ten thousand or over. Comparatively few of these communities are sufficiently large or are financially competent to support more than one high school. It is evident that the general high school will be the usual type of institution which must serve the vocational as well as the academic needs of most communities. This fact is well brought out in the argu- ment of Mr. Bryan.^ To improve commercial courses and other specialized courses, we must see that the parent insti- tution, the general high school, offers the essential condi- tions for effective achievement. It is manifestly impossible for commercial courses to prove efficient without reasonable freedom of procedure and active encouragement. THE READJUSTMENT OF THE GENERAL HIGH SCHOOL Serious doubt about the efficiency of the general high school is prevalent, and with reason. The general high school as we have known it in the past will not, without modification, prove to be an institution fitted to meet mod- ern vocational needs. " The high school has meandered along somewhat aimlessly in academic paths and has been strangely unmindful of the interesting and urgent work waiting to be done." ^ The assumption upon which the com- 1 See page 23. 2 Charles Hughes Johnston, The High School. Charles Scribner's Sons, 1913- 36 General High School 37 munity or general high school has proceeded has been and is today in a considerable degree that general training is sufficient for the life and vocational purposes of all pupils. We are coming to see, however, that efficient training for life tasks cannot be based upon general training alone, be- cause life tasks more and more are specific and must be prepared for specifically. Specialized training as a school principle is more economic than educational. Those nations first comprehending the principle have forced the issue upon their schools. Economic conditions which have influenced the schools elsewhere are more than national; they are world-wide. Educators as well as economists must feel the force of the statement, " the era of exclusiveness is past." If we, in this country, are to achieve economic sur- vival and supremacy, our school systems must make a large contribution. Margins between success or failure today are small. Integration of all the forces which can make a nation great is necessary. Business, government, and edu- cation must unite ; if not, then by the loss of the single force we shall be beaten. Today the nation looks to education as the ally by means of which our national survival and suprem- acy shall be realized. It is agreed that the general type of high school will be called upon for large service in this new order. The pres- ent teaching corps in the present buildings must bear the immediate burden. The people who support the schools demand it and they will be too insistent for denial. The law of competition will force it. At the present moment the schools feel a new pressure, this time not the pedagogi- cal pressure of educational theorists, but the economic pres- sure which comes from the very wellsprings of society, the struggle for survival and supremacy of nations, states, and communities. There is no going back; we schoolmasters may sigh for the peaceful ways of the past, but our day has fallen in the strenuous period of the present. If we would serve society, we must measure up to the new stand- ard. Whichever community most completely comprehends 38 Commercial Education the new order and perceives the course ahead will be the torchbearer for other communities pressing keenly onward so as not to be laggards in the race. Not only commercial education but industrial and pro- fessional education are concerned in the making over of our general high schools, which must now meet more effec- tively the varied educational needs of our increasingly com- plex social structure. A fundamental lack in our general high school is the failure to supply to the boys and girls an adequate motive. The general, academic, or abstract cul- tural motive has proved ineffective ; we have failed not only to meet industrial needs, but have failed to interest and hold our boys and girls. In the present order of society, the career motive is bound to be a dominant incentive to boys and girls in high schools. Our new environment compels this situation. The influ- ence of the press, the hum of the streets, the multiplication of inventions, the increase of machinery, the stir and bustle of life in the city and in the country, all serve to turn the thoughts of our boys and girls toward the practical activi- ties which are the genius of our age. The academic quiet- ness of school halls cannot and should not resist these influ- ences. We live in a practical age ; there is so much work to do in the world, and our boys and girls must soon join the ranks of active workers ; they are eager to take their places, which is the chief reason why they leave school so early. Every investigation into the causes for leaving school shows that not necessity, but desire, has been the impelling motive. Our pupils will stay more willingly if they realize that they are being better prepared for future vocational needs, that their chances for efficient participation and better rewards in life tasks are increased. The boy willingly practises for the actual games because he appreciates that he cannot win without practice. But the practice is like the game, and the boy can see the connection at all times ; so the school should have considerable similarity to industrial society, with the connection constantly apparent. Why then should we not General High School 39 adopt the career motive as the vital incentive around which to build our courses in general high schools ? The general high school ought, then, to readjust itself in the light of the natural aspirations of youth as well as by- reason of economic need and pressure of modem environ- ment. The career motive may well furnish the basis for the reorganization of our high schools as well as for the dis- posal of their educational resources and the particular ar- rangement of studies. Not only greater interest on the part of pupils, but achievements in practical vocational educa- tion, may well be expected from our recommended proce- dure. Though not fully recognized, the career motive has been potent in our high schools, but the careers for which the school has prepared have been too few and restricted. The boy who wishes to go to college has an impelling career motive in his high school work. The number of pupils in high school who pursue courses for the sake of knowledge alone is not definitely determinable, but the usual impres- sion of high school teachers is that this number is compara- tively small. ^ The elective system was intended to be a motivating prin- ciple as well as a means of meeting individual needs; but this system was based too much upon an exaltation of the individuality of the student, and not enough upon the de- mands of society. It was defective in that it was too sub- jective, too little objective. It sent the boy out with an exaggerated notion of the ego and a false idea of social sub- ordination ; for society in the main will not fit the boy ; the boy must fit society. The elective system gave no adequate notion of community values, took little heed of social needs, disregarded the economic laws of supply and demand apply- ing to employment, and in the case of the unadapted in- dividual led him to think that society was wrong and he was right. Furthermore, it is evident from the figures of * For those who persist in high school the general educational motive is by no means unconmion. For the larger number of those who fail to persist the present motives of high school subjects have probably proved inadequate. 40 Commercial Education elimination from high school that the elective system has failed to furnish an impelling motive for achievement and for persistence in school. The new high school order will either reject the elective system or will profoundly modify it. The boy may elect, under guidance, what curriculum will best fit him for a vocational career; but, having selected, he will submit to all the requirements which his choice entails. With a goal in view he can better grapple with the difficulties involved and more cheerfully labor over the weary stretches, for in such a way is success in life achieved ; the boy with a strong motive will not quail when his courage is challenged by obstacles. Biography is filled with the story of grim struggle, of disheartening checks, of ceaseless industry, and of final triumph. The boy will not so soon quit when he sees that the school is a real practice ground for actual life careers. The elective system offered as motives the pleasure and satisfaction to be found in the pursuit of selected sub- jects, motives which appeal to those who love knowledge for the sake of knowledge; \^J , ,' not provide experience of the kind which furnishes training for the difficulties or demands to be expected in life careers. We have approached the subject of the reorganization of the " complete " high school with observations some- what general in nature. Specific suggestions looking toward the improvement of present conditions should logi- cally be forthcoming. In attempting to meet this expecta- tion, the subject of commercial education will be treated in relation to the other courses usually maintained in the gen- eral high school; naturally commercial courses will receive the greatest emphasis in the statement of specific details. The content and scope of many subjects found at present in the program of studies of general high schools can be used as the basis for immediate procedure. The readjust- ment necessary will take place chiefly in a reorganization of material with appropriate expansions to meet specific needs and with desirable contractions where present emphasis is General High School 41 unimportant. In the organization of the school, the matter of chief importance is a definite division of the program of study into separate groups; in other words, the general high school should become a school of schools, somewhat after the fashion of a university, which is frequently a con- federation of a number of schools, each with a special func- tion. A general high school attended by boys and girls lends itself easily to a division like the following : 1. A sub-school of college preparation (in those sections of the country where colleges still insist upon a preparation of their own selection). 2. A sub-school of technical and industrial training for boys. 3. A sub-school of practical and household arts for girls. 4. Sub-schools of commercial training, preferably distinct for boys and girls. Whenever the size of One school permits, the sub-school should be allowed and encdwi'aged to concentrate upon the appropriate function assigned. The subjects in each pro- gram of study, while often designated by the same name, such as English, mathematics, foreign languages, should be taught from the special points of view ; or, more familiarly stated, the English, mathematics, and foreign languages should be the kind most useful and fitting to the specific end sought. In this way the career motive will be a continuous incentive. The career motive will lose force unless the student experiences continuously the influence of the prin- ciple. Manual training high schools with one branch of the work academic, in the sense of lacking connection with the immediate purpose of the course, and the other branch technical, appealing to the vocational interest, have not as a class overshadowed the undifferentiated high school with no pretense of furnishing incentives other than those of a general nature. With one element of the course voca- 42 Commercial Education tional and the other disassociated and " academic," there may naturally result a conflict of forces with a consequent loss of effectiveness. To the general high school adopting this plan, the difficul- ties are not appalling. For each sub-school created there are now good models in the special schools in our large cities, and the sub-schools of the general high school can be reproduced in miniature upon the special school model. Most of our high school teachers are adaptable and can teach their subjects from the new point of view; few of them will be willing to admit that they are unable to re- adjust themselves to new conditions. It will be found that personal preference will lead some teachers to go into one division and some into others; those teachers who prove hostile to the whole idea might be assigned to the college division, where they will probably prove useful as conserva- tors of the old regime. The larger the school, the easier of application will be this plan. Much of the present standard equipment may be utilized; the manual training equipment may be enlarged to furnish opportunity for technical and industrial opera- tions. Our present physical and chemical laboratories may be expanded to furnish facilities for vocational work. The teaching force will usually need to be enlarged to the extent of employing experts as heads (subject to the principal) of the new sub-schools. A small school will be obliged to combine departments with as much segregation as is eco- nomically possible. A small country high school might profitably maintain but two departments, one for agricul- tural training and the other section for that particular op- portunity which is most needed by the community. Sum- marized briefly, the success of a high school adopting this procedure will be in proportion to the modification effected in the usual general scheme of organization. Better still will be the results if the complete substitution of the plan recommended can be carried out — the plan whereby the school offers a number of different courses, each with spe- General High School 43 cific aims; with such an opportunity the student will find not only encouragement for a career motive, but the condi- tions for effective vocational achievements. EFFECT OF VOCATIONAL INSTRUCTION ON THE CULTURAL VALUE OF SECONDARY SCHOOL WORK Will not the expansion of the idea of vocation bring a consequent loss of culture in the general influence of the school ? Those who raise this query deserve commendation for their concern for the high purposes which the school has cherished. Culture is hard to define and seemingly in- consistent in its exhibitions. From instances that might be adduced, culture appears to be more the result of for- tuitous circumstances than the definite product of school training. We might point out the example of the illiterate Italian boy who hums operatic airs and stands entranced before a beautiful painting, and then to the instance of the American college youth who shouts rag-time and besmears with paint the college statuary intended to edify. We may be skeptical that culture in a definite degree is the certain product of formal educational influence. It is true and praiseworthy that the effort of the school has been to arouse appreciation for culture, moral and aesthetic. To assume that the formal school courses of general or classical schools are the best or only means of imparting what is called culture, is probably untenable. The concrete-minded pupil — and he is in the majority — who fails to find an adequate motive in general high school subjects, will prob- ably resist the intended accompanying culture. If he drops out of school, as he so frequently does, he obviously fails to get either the abstract training or the still more abstract culture. The boy will probably get his culture the way he gets any educational product, i.e., abstractly, if he can assimilate by abstract processes; concretely, if his mind responds to concrete stimuli. The vocational school is not at a disadvantage in the 44 Commercial Education laudable competition of trying to lead youth to see the beauty behind the fact. Moral culture we know is not a matter of clean hands, but of clean hearts. ^Esthetic culture is not a matter of fine clothes, but of fine feeling. Poverty, in fact, seems to have been the constant condition of the great masters of art, music, and conduct, who have left us immortal mementoes of their visions. Culture is deeper than external appearance. Clothes give us respectability, but not culture. The formal study of art and literature in school has often ended in distaste and a desire to turn away from the intended applications. There is still little relation between commonly accepted educational theory and actual school practice. Assent is given to the abstract proposition of the psychologist that individual minds act in different and peculiar ways, but our school methods continue to ex- hibit an adherence to uniform methods of procedure. We are beginning to readapt our methods of teaching arith- metic by varying our practices to fit individual needs, but we do not abandon our uniform methods in seeking to im- part culture. The vocational school has a duty toward culture which is recognized by the sponsors of vocational education. While vocational education deals primarily with concrete problems, not on that account must it be inferred that beauty, truth, and virtue will fail to gain recognition. Mr. Kerchensteiner,^ the apostle of vocational education in Bavaria, emphasizes above all else the cultural possibilities of vocational training. If it be that the concrete-minded pupil will get his culture concretely, and in that way only, then the opportunity of vocational education for imparting practical culture is greater than that of general education, and the burden of obtaining greater results will be a natural consequence. Returning to the consideration of plans of high school organization, it may be pointed out that in a thickly settled 1 Education for Citizenship. Rand, McNally Company. General High School 45 state, where small cities with good transportation facilities are closely grouped, differentiated high schools may be es- tablished by cooperative effort. One town may maintain the commercial high school for the group of towns, another community the industrial, and still another the college pre- paratory course. By this simple arrangement smaller com- munities fortunately located may enjoy all the educational advantages which the large city offers, and with little or no additional cost. The adoption of this plan, in fact, is seri- ously contemplated in a group of adjoining towns in Massa- chusetts. Where there are several undifferentiated high schools in the same city, reorganization may be effected in much the same way. This will occasion a regrouping of teachers and a transfer of equipment and material. Practi- cal difficulties are easily apparent, and naturally these will often prejudice teachers against a scheme that disturbs conditions with which they are familiar and to which they are attached. The objections are not those of efficiency and economy but more particularly those of sentiment. Indeed, these objections may prove so potent that the reorganization will be effected within the different schools in the manner indicated for communities possessing but one high school. In our large cities the special high school has come with the growth of the city and the larger percentage of pupils enter- ing high school. The new schools are more often the special schools, while the general high school is not in many sections being reproduced to meet the increased demand for accommodations. THE NEW STANDARDS OF EFFICIENCY FOR HIGH SCHOOLS Whatever may be the specific plan locally adopted, we must prepare to tolerate the prospect of reorganization. The rapid growth of industrial education shows how serious and determined an aroused public may become. The advocates of vocational education have occupied this impregnable position: how can we continue to furnish a type of edu- 46 Commercial Education cation which is prevocational to the liberal professions, and refuse to make provision for the needs of the far larger class who go into industry and trade? A numerical sum- mary of the present situation in our high schools shows that we are offering an appropriate secondary education for the two millions of people who serve us in professional capaci- ties, and have given no heed to the educational needs of the thirty millions who serve us in trade, agriculture, and industry. The new conception of democracy applied to education holds that a free public school system shall fur- nish equal opportunity, through specific training, to each individual, to make the most of his best chance in life. The awakened political and social conscience of our country will not rest content with legislative and industrial reforms alone; the schools as well must give evidence of an en- larged vision and greater usefulness. The connection of the problem of improved commercial education with the larger problem of increased scope and efficiency of the public school system is of course apparent. Commercial education and manual training were the first instances of the assent of the school to the demand that the high school should include preparation for non-professional occupations. We have before indicated that neither of these subjects was added as a result of an adequate concep- tion of the nature of vocational education; that both of these subjects have been consistently conventionalized into academic high school subjects.^ The demand for improved industrial training promises to be met to a considerable degree by the creation of a new system of schools, often conducted under separate auspices and receiving special supervision and subsidy by the state. Improved commer- cial education, however, promises to come in the schools already established; our investment has been made, our connections have been laid and valuable achievements ef- fected. We shall not, however, meet the new standards of 1 See page 134. General High School 47 efficiency or of democracy without readjustment. We must make commercial education truly vocational; whatever principles, methods, or devices prove efficient in other kinds of vocational education must be adopted outright or else adapted to fit the special needs; whatever procedure is in- dicated by a study of business conditions must likewise be incorporated. Above all else, such specialized func- tions of education as commercial training must have en- couragement and freedom. The general high school may be likened to a household which is called upon to readjust its habits for the more efficient life of its separate mem- bers, most of whom are now called upon to forsake their hitherto ornamental existences for careers of economic usefulness. The new high school will be able to test its usefulness by truer standards of efficiency. The only definite standards in the past have been college entrance requirements. These we recognize are academic, institutional, and applicable to but a small portion of the mass of the pupils. As tests of vocational worth they are valueless. The needed objective standards, drawn from vocational evaluations, cannot now be set forth in the terms of present college requirements, but they can be generally characterized as the standards of social efficiency, and in general it means that the school shall train farmers, mechanics, or merchants as well as it has trained doctors, lawyers, and teachers. Just as we have estimated school proficiency in the past by observing how well our boys and girls pass college entrance examinations, so let us watch the success of our students in commerce and industry. The colleges report to us the standing of our graduates; why should not business men and manufac- turers report how our graduates are progressing in indus- try? Why not give the same attention to industrial stand- ards that we have given to college standards ? May we not match college entrance boards with business men's advisory committees? We have long tolerated the criticism of col- lege professors : may we not now hearken to the observa- 48 Commercial Education tions of the man of affairs? Should not these two influ- ences be given proper proportion? Should the present ab- surd practice be continued, whereby the interests of one tenth of the pupils dominate those of the other nine tenths, or, more appropriately, in case one must be sacrificed, should exactly the opposite practice be followed ? At the present time our high schools draw comfort from and take pride in the achievement and success of the small number of those highly selected individuals who persist throughout the course. They have been oblivious of the fate of the fifty to ninety per cent of those who fell by the wayside. The enormous human waste product of our high schools has been disregarded. H. E. Miles,^ chairman of the manufacturers' committee on industrial education of the National Educational Association, summarizes the case as follows : " Our educators have been like the old-time operators of blast furnaces who threw away the slag as bothersome and worthless, not knowing that with a little care it would some day be made into cement and better the life of the world. It is a question, however, if our educators have not as often thrown away the steel as the cement." The public which the school serves will demand a closer reckoning in the future than in the past. The public will wish to know the fate of one hundred per cent of the pupils, not alone the good fortune of the gifted few. If the advantages of the school are inaccessible to the major- ity of pupils, then we must indict the methods and organi- zation of the school. If we cannot educate our boys and girls in accordance with the school standards which we schoolmasters have set, we must look for more reasonable standards. If success in economic standards were to be obtained as infrequently as success in the school standards, what a multiplication of poorhouses would be the result! Every boy forced out of school by reason of failure in * Bulletin of the National Educational Association, September, 1913. General High School 49 school standards who subsequently becomes a useful citizen, a producer and an economic unit, stands as a witness against the reasonableness of school standards. We shall be obliged to see the educational problem in a larger and more generous light, wherein the needs of all the children are constantly in mind. We must give up the impossible task of trying to force all the children to make the traditional school achievements, which the school says spell success; we can always improve if we do not " com- plete." Indeed, the effort to improve our boys and girls through educational influences rather than to complete a prescribed scholastic course of our own choosing, promises to become the new educational ideal. Improvement is a possible, actual, and useful ideal, while completion is a lim- ited, contingent, and indefinite aspiration. Commercial education should do more than train some boys and girls to take dictation at one hundred and twenty words a minute, or finish to the satisfaction of the instructor certain model sets in bookkeeping. For the thousand and one jobs in commerce, commercial education can improve the majority of boys and girls so that they can more effectively and more profitably meet the conditions of employment and secure greater life satisfactions for themselves. The present limited opportunities for " improvement edu- cation " in our regular high schools are provided in part by the establishment of evening schools, and, more recently, by the establishment of continuation schools. Other rea- sons obviously are factors in the establishment of these schools; viz., economic inability of pupils to remain longer in regular day schools, irresponsibility of parents and children, failure to appreciate in time the value of ex- tended educational training. An instance of the recognition of the rights and needs of one hundred per cent of the pupils is seen in a recent report of the board of superintendents of New York City.^ Both » See also School Efficiency, by Paul H. Hanus, pages 13-15. School Efladency Series, World Book Company. 50 Commercial Education the argument and the plan are contained in the following excerpt from the report : " It seems desirable at the present time, while adjust- ing special schools for the mentally backward, to give adequate and fair treatment to those children of aver- age mentality who, perchance, are only slow, but who, because of their very slowness, become the retarded children owing to their inability to keep up with the present curriculum. In considering the problem of re- adjusting the curriculum we regard the present stopping place where the greatest percentage of elimination occurs as the natural point to begin the development of various differentiated courses. The distribution of children among the vocations indicates definite need for elasticity immediately following the elementary school period. After due consideration of many conclusions of weight related to the recent discussion on the subject of the length of the elementary school course in years, the following working principle was evolved, namely: the elementary school course should be made up of six years of universal or coordinate work and two years of flexible work, providing for such differentiation as is needed to meet the needs of individual children or groups of children. " We believe also that with the establishment of flex- ible, differentiated courses of study in the last two grades, in place of the present inelastic curriculum, there will probably be an increase in the gross number of graduates from the elementary schools. As a fur- ther result, judging from the experience of other cities, the percentage of matriculates to the high schools could be raised, as well as the absolute numbers entering upon secondary school work. " The suggestions made above provide for a course of General High School 51 study thoughout the eight years. We emphasize the need for a definite course during the first six years, but suggest that, beginning with the seventh year, the course should separate into three distinct branches. We would establish an academic course leading to the high school, as at present; we would also establish a commercial course and a vocational course. " As a suggestion for the utilization of the tentative flexible course for the seventh and eighth years, we should advise the extension of the educational content of the various subjects along the line of commercial training and industrial training. To this end, we submit a suggestive outline of the educational possibilities of such differential courses in the seventh and eighth year. Commercial Seventh and Eighth Year Flexible Courses — Arrangement in Detail and Method Optional English : Literature ; commercial ; vocabulary ; forms ; correspondence ; advertising. History, civics, and social life : History of trade and transportation, start locally, and expand evolutionally ; commercial law and contracts, insurance, liability laws, charters, taxation, and franchise ; commercial organization, partnerships, corporations, mergers, unions, collections, bargaining, coopera- tive stores ; division of labor ; occupational accidents and diseases ; home- making, relation of individual to home. Geography : Commercial, economic, transportation and trade relations. Mathematics : Elementary bookkeeping ; accounting, home, business, manufacturing ; per capitas, mensuration ; arithmetic — discount, bills, in- surance, interest ; banking and foreign exchange ; customs ; elements of algebra. Industrial and fine arts: Bases of value — quality, design, construction; method of purchase ; vocabulary ; conamercial design ; domestic science and art. Music : Incidental to education and physical education. Writing: Legibility, speed; stenography; accuracy, speed; typewriting, accurate transcription. Hygiene: Personal — clothing, bathing, exercise and recreation, food, ex- ercise; social — ventilation and heat, dust, light; individual utensils, hours of labor, rest; fire drill; first aid. 52 Commercial Education Nature study : Natural history of commodities. Business and office practice: Filing and cataloguing. Languages: For purpose of correspondence, one required, one optional, German, Spanish, French, Italian." Undoubtedly the principle underlying the above proposi- tion is sound, and the suggestive plan itself worthy of con- sideration. It is highly important that the specific plans adopted should be thoroughly tested by investigation and ex- periment. The teaching of stenography and typewriting to immature pupils is particularly of doubtful value, since these subjects have a vocational value only for pupils of much greater maturity, and chiefly for girls, as previously stated (page 8). Applying the principle of improvement training to the particular problem of commercial education in secondary schools, it is evident that much change of attitude on the part of teachers, of organization within the school, and of methods applied to individual subjects, will be required. If elasticity is a recognized need in the elementary school, how much more is it so in the secondary institution? We shall be obliged to institute a number of new courses to meet the needs of the many whose destinies are as sacred as those of the traditional student who remains four years to finish a prescribed commercial course. Three-year, two- year, one-year, and possibly half-year courses will naturally result. Two considerations will determine the nature of our various courses; viz., the specific business demands for which each course gives preparation, and the circum- stances of the pupil respecting his financial competence to remain in school, his mental and physical fitness for the work, and his ambition to prepare himself for a specific commercial occupation. CHAPTER IV THREE INVESTIGATIONS AND WHAT THEY MEAN FOR COMMERCIAL EDUCATION THIS chapter presents the chief facts and conclusions of three investigations conducted in and around Bos- ton during the school year 191 3- 191 4. These investi- gations were conducted by the following organizations respectively : The Women's Educational and Industrial Union, Depart- ment of Research : The Public Schools and Women in Office Service} The Boston Chamber of Commerce: Report on Com- mercial Education to the Committee on Education {Cham- ber of Commerce)? Committee of Teachers (Massachusetts State Board of Education) : Records in Business of Graduates of Public Schools.^ THE women's educational AND INDUSTRIAL UNION INVESTIGATION The report of the Women's Educational and Industrial Union is exhaustive in character, covering many phases of the manifold conditions of employment of women in business life. The Department of Research of the Women's Educational and Industrial Union is well equipped to under- take work of the nature attempted, and has in fact made 1 Published by the Boston School Committee, 19 14. 2 Special Report, Boston Chamber of Commerce, 1914. ^ Published by the Massachusetts State Board of Education, 1914. S3 54 Commercial Education a number of studies into the occupational conditions of women. ^ The present investigation extended through a period of one year, during which time studies were made in the day and evening schools, in employment agencies, in the homes and in the places of occupation of employed women. The case method was chiefly used, and the facts were secured both from written testimony of individuals canvassed and from personal conference with them. Material presented in this chapter from the above report is selected from two chapters, entitled respectively, " The Public School and its Problems " and " Summary and Out- look." While the report itself discusses a great many prob- lems not presented in this book, the selected portions deal chiefly with those problems and are intended to bring additional evidence upon issues pointed out in the volume itself. From the second chapter are first selected facts and studies regarding the persistence of commercial pupils in high school.^ " The relative persistence of the two types of students taking the academic and vocational courses has also been a subject of much discussion. This tendency is verified by the record of a large class of 635 girls enter- ing one of the Boston high schools in 1909, 441 (69.5 per cent) of whom registered for commercial subjects. . . . The annual loss both in the commercial and aca- demic groups is about one fourth during the first year. During the second year, however, the loss was almost twice as great among the commercial (30.7 per cent) as the academic students (16.5 per cent), and during the third year about one and one half times. The average annual loss for the first three years was 22.1 per cent in the commercial group and 17.5 per cent in the aca- demic group." 1 Vocations for Women, and other reports. 2 See also Chapter VI, page 97. Three Investigations 55 The reasons assigned for the lower persistence of the commercial group are stated as follows : Many of the girls reach the age of sixteen during the sec- ond year at high school, and can easily find positions not re- quiring particular skill or maturity. When these girls go into office service, they find it hard to advance without ad- ditional training, for 40.5 per cent of all girls found in evening high schools were engaged in some of the branches of office service, and nearly one half of this group had begun work before they were sixteen. Economic pressure, as indicated by the character of the father's occupation, is assigned as another strong factor for early leaving. Manufacturing and domestic and personal service are occupations of the fathers of the commercial stu- dents in larger proportions, while the better-paid callings of the professions and trade characterize the occupations of the fathers of the academic group. The comparative degrees of mental ability between the commercial and academic groups was the subject of some study. ^ " More than two thirds (69 per cent) of the total academic group (342), as compared with two fifths (42.6 per cent) of the commercial students (576), re- ceived a medium grade of * A ' and * B ' in all their courses. Since proficiency in English is a requisite for both the academic and commercial students, comparison of their relative standing in this common subject seemed to be a fair basis for consideration; almost two thirds (64.3 per cent) of the academic students, again, and but two fifths of the commercial girls were ranked as * A ' ?nd ' B ' students in their English courses." The investigator does not believe that the commercial pupils are necessarily inferior to the academic students, but * Compare the New York Report, page 97. 56 Commercial Education thinks that the interests and ambitions of the former are different : " They may feel Httle interest in Chaucer's poems or in algebra and geometry, yet be most enthusiastic and efficient workers in the affairs of the actual world about them. In fact, the experience of these girls after leaving school proves their possibilities; for almost two thirds (62.9 per cent) of the 310 studied from the schools were earning nine dollars or more, and more than one half of these (54.4 per cent) had been at work less than three years." The report presents valuable information concerning the relation between the amount of school training and the kind of commercial occupation secured.^ " The marked relationship between their schooling and their occupations is shown by the fact that 37 (out of 310), or less than one half of the 87 girls who had not graduated from day high schools, were stenog- raphers. Clerks and bookkeepers compose 56.3 per cent of this group who were not high school graduates, show- ing a large proportion who lack the technical training necessary for stenographic work. Four fifths (80.2 per cent) of the 187 stenographers and 20 of the 21 secre- taries had graduated from high school, which illustrates the higher degree of education necessary for these more responsible positions." " As the amount of schooling affects the nature of the occupation, so the occupation explains the wage. Sixty per cent of the clerical workers, of whom one half were either high school non-graduates or else merely gram- mar school graduates, received less than the nine dollars minimum wage. That nearly one half (43-9 per cent) 1 Based on data concerning women employed in business as secretaries, stenographers, bookkeepers, and clerical workers. Three Investigations 57 of the bookkeepers were also earning less than nine dollars is not surprising when we discover that almost as large a proportion of the bookkeepers as of the cleri- cal workers were not high school graduates. Among stenographers and typists, however, 80.2 per cent of whom were high school graduates, only one third re- ceived less than nine dollars." Information of importance concerning business demands and the relation of school training to them appears in this chapter. In the case of office service, the investigator finds that the chief business needs are personality and technique. Personality is fundamental, as it is the initial test to which the girl applying for a position is put. Students inherently lacking personality should be directed, through vocational guidance, to some other occupation. Technique is best se- cured through part-time arrangements with business houses. " Vocational guidance and part-time schooling, there- fore, are two important aids to the efficiency of com- mercial education, the one dealing primarily with per- sonality, the other with technique and applied theory." Attention is called to the fact that many girls have latent possibilities in the matter of personality. Lack of informa- tion, failure of the home to supply proper inspiration, gen- eral unfortunate environment, may retard promising girls in attaining success. " Personal information about the child's home con- ditions as well as about the neighborhood would help to throw light on her needs. The girl's birthplace, as well as that of her father, in the case of the foreign born, is an indication of her general familiarity with our language and customs. The father's occupation also provides another valuable source of information, which might be systematically recorded and studied, of the girl's personal needs." 58 Commercial Education Regarding the teaching of technique, the report gives this counsel in addition to the recommendation for part- time training: " In the specific training in stenography and type- writing which has been chiefly emphasized, the schools seem to be satisfactory. But the constantly changing conditions caused by the introduction of new oflice ap- pliances must be carefully followed by organizers of school curricula. For instance, the number of book- keepers is diminishing. Billing machines, adding ma- chines, and typewriters are displacing many book- keepers in large offices by a smaller number of machine operators." The report discusses the effect of the elective system ^ on commercial preparation. Unless intelligent counsel is given, pupils often emerge with improper equipment. There is likely to be an over-balance of either technical work or general training. Particularly is general training liable to be neglected. Records of successful women in office posi- tions emphasize the importance of general training. For many girls an advantageous course to pursue is to complete a general amount of general training preliminary to special- ized work. Girls who have completed a general high school course before taking specialized commercial work are shown to be well equipped for more responsible and remunerative positions. There is uniformly found a constant ratio be- tween the total amount of schooling and subsequent busi- ness success. For making commercial work more vital and compre- hensible, the report ofTers the following advice : " The constant contact with the business world, which part-time or cooperative schooling offers, is just what is needed, therefore, to tie up the schools with actual busi- 1 See Chapter HI, page 40. Three Investigations 59 ness demands. Teachers with business experience will be absolutely required, and more careful training in office practice will inevitably result. The example of a well-known business college might well offer sugges- tions for adaptations. This school has a course in office practice which consists in demonstrations of right and wrong office methods. The course presents the office force and employer in typical situations which may arise, from the first application for a position to a sudden emergency where the stenographer's ability to anticipate her employer's wants saves a trying situation. Such a course is not practicable in most schools, but, at least, it shows a recognition of the need of familiarizing the pupils with office conditions. To attain the same end, the administrative work of the head of the commercial course might be conducted in an office fitted with all office appliances, and the pupils might take turns in hav- ing charge of this office and acting as the master's cleri- cal assistants. One school has all its notices typewritten or multigraphed by commercial pupils, who also do much of the clerical work for the evening school which is held in the same building." Valuable suggestion and information is to be found in the chapter entitled " Summary and Outlook." Attention is called to the fact that office service employs more than five hundred thousand women in the United States, and that this occupation ranks among the foremost for women in its opportunities for advancement and superior working conditions. " One third of the one million and a half workers in 1910 were women, and one of its three divisions, ste- nography and typewriting, was practically and is in- creasingly monopolized by women, who constituted more than four fifths the total number. Tlie wage scale is much higher than that of the better industries and of 6o Commercial Education the other great commercial occupation, salesmanship. Only one sixth of the ii 77 women studied through a local canvass of offices earned less than $8, and the j average wage for the entire group was $11.01. Nor * is the wage in office service greatly reduced as in most other occupations ; for holidays, vacations, and absences on account of illness were paid for in the great majority of cases. It has been found that the nominal and actual earnings of the clerical worker were more nearly iden- tical than in any of the six large women-employing occu- pations. Moreover, hours were shorter and the physi- cal conditions of work better for the majority than in most lines of work." The suggestions most important to the commercial edu- cator may be summarized as follows : j 1. Recognition and application of the fundamental prin- ciples of vocational education, such as acquaintance with business demands and the trend of development; knowl- edge of capacities and possibilities of prospective workers ; placement by means of close connection with worker and employer. 2. The concrete advantages of extended education should be made clear to all parents and children ; all who possibly can do it should be urged to take a four-year high school course. A fifth year intensive course of purely technical training should be developed to meet the needs of the com- paratively large proportion who now go to private business colleges for additional specialized training. 3. Intensified commercial courses at the beginning of the high school period are of very questionable value in the light of the facts regarding wages brought out in the report. 4. Part-time schooling in training for office service is recommended, so that the prospective worker may be initi- ated gradually into the business world. School courses will have a significance possible under no other plan; also op- Three Investigations 6i portunities for placement of pupils will be opened and a situation of cooperation and intelligent understanding brought about between employer and teacher. 5. Teachers should keep in close touch with business men and offices, since office service is in a state of transition due to the growth of the large office and the improved methods of office administration, and to the introduction of time and labor saving machinery. The report urges the business man to do his share in bringing about improved methods of training for office service. He is asked to aid the educator in formulating standards for young commercial employees; these stand- ards should cover educational, technical, and personal re- quirements. The business man should cooperate with the educator by means of talks to teachers and pupils, and by furnishing opportunities for part-time experience in busi- ness houses, together with assistance in the problem of proper placing of school graduates. THE BOSTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE INVESTIGATION Some of the main conclusions of the investigation con- ducted by the Boston Chamber of Commerce ^ will be con- sidered next. The method used in the investigation is quite similar to that adopted in the study presented above, and consists of an examination of the products of the school system rather than an investigation of the resources, meth- ods, and organization of the schools. The vocational his- tories of a considerable number of men and women actually employed in Boston business houses were studied and were made the basis for the conclusions of the report. Care was taken that material furnished to the investigator should be considered confidential. No one was expected to sign his name to his vocational history, or to furnish any clue as to his identity or place of employment. In spite of these 1 See page 53. 62 Commercial Education assurances, however, many business men were unwilling to allow employees to furnish the material desired. By means of a wide canvass, a sufficient number of responses was secured to form probable conclusions. The number of vocational histories received and classi- fied was eleven hundred and sixty-five (1165), men and women. The report deals primarily with the facts concern- ing the status of men in business, while figures regarding women appear in a less degree. The report disclaims any intention to be dogmatic, because the returns are too few, but does affirm that the material collected is of sufficient weight to indicate significant tendencies. Before discussing the statistical parts of the report it will be helpful to state something of the general point of view possessed by the investigator. This general attitude is well illustrated in the comparison made between business organi- zations and schools, a comparison pointing out the essential differences characterizing the procedure of each. " Successful modern business is built upon an ac- counting system that compels the manufacturer and the merchant to know the cost and the return on every form of activity undertaken in the business. The day when the business man could rest satisfied, year in and year out, if only his net results were shown by an annual inventory to be on the right side, has long passed. Any losing venture is soon detected and is either reorganized or dropped from the business." " Our educational enterprises, although they involve great business problems, have never been forced by the exigencies of competition to establish themselves upon a solid accounting basis. Such a foundation is less easy in school matters than in ordinary commercial affairs. The raw material of the public school is furnished to the teaching staff with no opportunity of choice. Every boy or girl who applies must be given his place and Three Investigations 63 must be worked upon by the school machinery. No mer- cantile establishment would attempt to give a uniform output from such a crude, unselected material. More- over, the product of the school goes out into business or professional life, and no report can be required by the school, by which the success or failure of its manufac- turing process may be fully checked or even approxi- mately ascertained." A statistical inquiry into the wages paid to different classes of men commercial workers throws some light upon monetary rewards received. The much discussed question of whether or not stenography is a desirable vocation for boys to undertake is treated, and the path of progress in business, whether through the clerical or competitive ave- nues, is roughly indicated. Comparison of the Earning Power of Men in Business By Average Only — Men^ Years Worked Over2oyrs. 15-20 10-15 S~io Under 5 Clerical Workers .... $29.84 $24.55 $22.21 $17.01 $11.80 Stenographers 25.00 24.32 18.00 16.66 12.16 Non-clerical Workers . . 34.09 25.35 19.64 17.03 11.95 Salesmen 30.91 23.39 20.90 17.41 11.97 Following the above table are four other tables giving tabulations of the same individuals, using successively the highest wages received, the lowest wages only, the mode only, and the median only. From the tables presented the investigator makes the following deductions '? " During the first five years of service the men who are stenographers earn a little better average pay than 1 Boston Chamber of Commerce Report, page 8. 2 Boston Chamber of Commerce Report, page 8. 64 Commercial Education any of the other groups of men. Gradually, however, the men who can adapt themselves to other than steno- graphic positions gain the higher rewards." " Stenographers apparently do not reach the highest prizes in business, at least, so long as they continue to be stenographers." " Stenographers have a decided advantage over un- trained men and keep well above the minimum wage for every period of this service." " It is evident that the larger number of clerical workers reach their maximum by the end of their fifth year of service. They are better off in earning power than are the majority of non-clerical workers up to the period of fifteen to twenty years of service. At this point an equal number of men earn more pay than do the clerical workers and this advantage is held throughout the balance of the working life." " Clerical workers are, perhaps, most sure to earn a comfortable wage, but in the long run the higher pay will be most sure of being reached through the non- clerical side of the business. An analysis of the indi- vidual cases which make up the higher paid positions among non-clerical workers shows that these men are either buyers or executives and that they have reached their present positions after a service as salesmen." A similar study applied to women brought out markedly different results: " A glance at our comparison, by average only, shows that stenography is by a considerable margin the most profitable field for the young woman. During the first five-year period, the selling force offers the next best chance. . . . This analysis emphasizes the advan- tage of the stenographer over any other woman worker in the earlier years, and also shows that the selling force Three Investigations 65 offers a better chance to the girl who does not know stenography than does any other branch of clerical work." In a study of transfers from clerical to non-clerical posi- tions is brought out the fact that transfers of this nature are unusual.^ Of a total number of 1165 reports, only 52, or 4.5 per cent, had been so transferred, of whom 43 were transferred from the office to the competitive side of the business and 39 reported advantage to themselves by the change. "If these figures are a fair indication of what is going on in our business life, it is clear that the principal line of advance to any employee must be in the depart- ment in which he starts. Few will ever have an oppor- tunity to change. The need of a broader training for the competitive side of the business — where the big prizes lie — and some careful instruction by which the pupil may learn the opportunities and necessary quali- fication for actual business, is clearly indicated by this study." 2 The report also presents some elaborate tables upon the relation of earning power to total amount of schooling and specialized forms of training. The conclusions are quite similar to those of the first study presented in this chapter.^ Four years of high school training shows a real advantage in a higher minimum wage, a higher maximum wage, and a higher average. In the study of the wages of women in this report it was found that private school training (busi- ness college) added to three or four years of high school, gave the highest earning power in the group. A study was made of school subjects used in business life. 1 New York Report, page 112. 2 Boston Chamber of Commerce Report, page 11. ' See page 60. 66 Commercial Education Employees were asked to state which of the following sub- jects had been of business use to them : A. Stenography B. Typewriting C. Bookkeeping D. Penmanship E. Mental Arithmetic F. Any other school study. Affirmative replies appear as listed below: A. Stenography = 221 B. Typewriting = 357 C. Bookkeeping = 446 D. Penmanship = 675 E. Mental Arithmetic = 664 F. Any other school study (scattering) = 154 1 Although 221 persons report having used stenography, only 86 (68 women and 18 men) report themselves as ste- nographers. The investigator infers that the higher grade of clerical help have begun work as stenographers and have subsequently become office managers and book workers. Since penmanship and mental arithmetic appear largest in the list, the commercial value of these two subjects is em- phasized. Regarding the importance of stenography, the investigator has this to say : " The possibilities offered by a knowledge of stenog- raphy seem to hold a prominent place in this group of answers. Evidently, to many of the workers, the life of the stenographer seems to open up positions of value." A section of the report now under review is devoted to a study of returns from employers. The investigator, how- 1 Twenty-four different subjects, of which Business English heads the list with thirty-seven replies. Three Investigations 67 ever, was unable to secure a group sufficiently large to fur- nish a basis for conclusive generalizations. The opinions of business men regarding the efficiency of commercial courses were secured through personal interview. In all, 139 business employers were interviewed and their answers to various queries tabulated.^ In answer to the question, " What education beyond the grammar grade seems to you valuable?" we have the following results: Total number of reports — 139 No education beyond grammar school desired 22 or 15.8 per cent More education, but not defined 85 or 61.2 per cent Definite demand for higher training 18 or 13 per cent No opinion expressed 14 or 10 per cent It was apparent to the investigator that many business men know very little about the different kinds of commercial courses available in their own city. As to answers to the question, " What are the better pay- ing positions in your business?" the following tabulation is of interest. 125 responses Buyers and salesmen 87 or 69.6 per cent Department heads and managers .21 or 16.8 per cent Office positions 17 or 13.6 per cent The value of stenography as a means of securing pro- motion to the better paid positions is answered as follows : For Boys For Girls No value 65 44 Slight value 10 7 Real value 41 66 No opinion 23 22 139 139 Concerning the employer's attitude toward defects in school training, it is interesting to note that the main criti- 1 See Appendix, page 185. 68 Commercial Education cism is directed toward deficiencies in the three R's. There were forty-six who made this complaint, and only five who found objections to the results obtained in stenography. Many employers mention defects in moral and personal qual- ities, and counsel the schools to pay more attention to the de- velopment of business character. A similar condition was found in the investigation first treated in this chapter.^ That business men as a class do not seriously concern them- selves about the character of commercial training is well illustrated in the report just presented in outline. In the several other similar investigations the same situation is evident.^ MASSACHUSETTS STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION INVESTIGATION The third investigation with which this chapter deals was made by a sub-committee of three comxiiercial teachers acting for a larger committee of commercial teachers selected from the entire state of Massachusetts. The chairman of the sub-committee, Mr. Maynard Maxim of Newton, has prepared a brief summary of the most important conclu- sions for this volume.^ " One line of investigation carried out by the com- mittee concerned the actual business experience of high school graduates. Its object was to show the character of the positions secured by pupils upon graduation, the prospects for advancement, the wages earned, etc." " Questions covering these points were answered by nearly five hundred graduates of high schools in Boston, Beverly, Dorchester, Maiden, Newton, Springfield, and Westfield." * See pages 60, 6i. 2 See page 137; also Appendix, pages 155-158. 3 Mr. Maxim's complete report was not available in time to permit of larger use in connection with this volume. The complete report will appear as a Massachusetts State Document. Boys Girls . . . . $7.72 $7.75 . . . . 10.12 923 . . . . 12.77 10.73 . . . . 15.62 12.14 . . . . 18.66 13-18 Three Investigations 69 " Practically all of the 203 girls who rq)orted were engaged in clerical and general office work, including stenography and typewriting. Of the 278 boys who made returns, but 16 classified their work as that of salesmen. Fifty-eight were doing stenography and typewTiting, while the remainder described their work as * clerical,' ' bookkeeping,' and ' general office work.' Their average salaries appear in the following table : Average weekly wage during first year after leaving school, counting only the time when employed Weekly wage at the beginning of first year . Weekly wage at the beginning of second year Weekly wage at the beginning of third year . Weekly wage at the beginning of fourth year Weekly wage at the beginning of fifth year . " In reply to the question : * From your own experi- ence do you consider shorthand and typewriting worth a boy's while in school for their subsequent value in furnishing remunerative employment ? ' 206 boys stated their belief that stenography and typewriting would be of advantage, while 57 replied negatively." " In reply to the question : ' From your own experi- ence and observation, would you advise that a boy try to get into the better-paid positions through office em- ployment or by way of the selling force?' 142 boys answered * sales force,' and 116 gave their preference to office employment." " Inasmuch as the great majority of these boys had been out of school but five years or less, their answers were probably based on opinion rather than on personal experience." " It is hard to account for the fact that so few of these boys hold positions as salesmen, unless we assume that promotions to this line of work are withheld in the JO Commercial Education . case of boys of high school age until they have had a longer period of apprenticeship than the investigation covered." " The average salary of the sixteen boys who classi- fied themselves as salesmen is considerably higher than the average of the whole, being $8.17, $11.20, $15.10, $20.64, $24.50, for the respective years of the fore- going table." " It is likewise difficult to account for the great ma- jority of boys in favor of learning shorthand and type- writing when so few are actually using it in their work. Without doubt, the ability to render efficient service as a stenographer, when first gaining employment, brings a boy into closer contact with the men ' higher up ' than general office and stock room work. The subjects must be thoroughly mastered, however, for a half -trained boy stenographer is of no more practical value to a firm than a similarly inefficient girl. As a profession for men, stenography offers boys few opportunities. As a stepping-stone for a boy seeking promotion, stenog- raphy, with typewriting, may have considerable value; but the time required for its mastery consumes so large a part of the final years of a high school course as to make it of doubtful expediency." CONCLUSIONS TO BE DRAWN FROM THE RESULTS OF THE THREE INVESTIGATIONS From the foregoing investigations several important con- clusions are evident, showing that both the school and organized business need to make adjustments and to in- corporate changes looking towards improvement. I. The schools need to adjust courses and methods to correspond more closely to business practice. This means that most school commercial courses should be modernized to meet the new standards established by large organization f Three Investigations Jl and specialization of occupation. Our bookkeeping courses at present are taught largely on the supposition that boys and girls will occupy positions as head accountants. In view of the kind of service demanded, it will be manifestly wiser to train pupils, by giving due attention to skill, speed, and accuracy, in the unit processes in which the student will find business openings. New equipment in the way of spe- cial machines, such as adding machines, billing machines, card filing devices, and the like must be added to our pres- ent meager furnishings. 2. The schools must attempt and achieve more in the way of developing the personal qualities needed for success- ful participation in business. It is apparent that business men assign great importance to personal qualities, even more than to efficiency in technique. Our schools have al- ways sought to develop the moral qualities of their pupils, but in addition to this, commercial schools should try to develop the personal qualities of pupils with a specific view to their business importance. We should make this train- ing concrete, showing the relation between personal quali- ties and success in business. Pupils who lack fortunate ex- amples in their home environment should find in the school the specific information and models needed for inspiration and imitation. The schools should feel as much concern for the success of their graduates in their personal relations in business as for the quality of their technical instruction. 3. Part-time and cooperative plans will probably furnish the only adequate method of guaranteeing the achievement of satisfactory results in producing more competent com- mercial graduates. By such methods only can the pupil be checked, judged, and improved while under training. This plan renders it possible to measure practice against theory. No form of applied education has been able to succeed with- out the adoption of the plan of testing the neophyte in the practical operations of his art, and of criticising and cor- recting mistakes which could not be foreseen in purely the- oretical training. The cooperation and understanding of 72 Commercial Education business men are also important advantages to be gained by the adoption of part-time and cooperative plans of com- mercial training. 4. Guidance, placement, and follow-up work are essential features of a well-ordered, comprehensive, and effective plan of commercial training. Pupils are not at present guided to suitable commercial positions or placed in them. Much waste, discouragement, and failure are assignable to this condition. At the present time, our schools are not fur- nished with the resources, funds, and expert service neces- sary to undertake these additional functions ; but communi- ties seeking to increase substantially the efficiency of applied education must soon recognize and meet the deficiency. 5. Commercial education must expand its scope to in- clude training for commercial occupations other than cleri- cal. The above investigations indicate that while stenog- raphy is the best paid commercial vocation for a girl, for a boy salesmanship is better than all other commercial occu- pations. Merchandizing or competitive functions of busi- ness for boys offer the best opportunities, because ste- nography is a rapidly disappearing occupation for men. Commercial courses, consequently, must be recast to fur- nish training for commercial opportunities discoverable in actual business. 6. Business men must do more than find fault with the schools. They must participate in the training process. We hear much of the criticisms of business men on the schools, and school teachers have encouraged full expressions of opinions. It is important now that business men should aid the schools in the honest and serious effort to better their work. The schools invite and seek cooperation; school directors are apparently more eager to do their share than are business men. Our varied social and industrial institu- tions are passing beyond the period of individualism. Busi- ness is no longer merely business, nor are schools mere edu- cational institutions. The inter-connections which charac- terize all the more perfect organisms are taking form Three Investigations 73 throughout our social structure ; our schools must become in part business, and business must become in part schools. Reference should be made in this chapter to those con- clusions and positions appearing in this book, particularly in the chapter presenting the New York Report,^ which the material in the above reviewed investigations does not strictly support. The positions in the New York Report were taken chiefly on the assumption of a working hypothesis supported mainly by such general studies as were possible in view of the limi- tations of time and resources; these positions were not stated as certain, but urged as probable in the light of avail- able evidence. Attention should be called to the fact that the New York Report urged immediate and further inves- tigations, on the ground that the prime need of commercial education is competent evidence upon which to base its procedure. Further evidence is now beginning to appear in the various investigations recently undertaken, instances of which this chapter presents. It is recognizable that the classification of commercial occupations as " enervating " and '' energizing," and the assumption that clerical occupations come under the first caption and competitive callings come under the second, has in it more of error than of truth. The investigations presented in this chapter show that clerical and competitive commercial occupations both present situations where one may find either business success or failure. It would be more accurate to state that clerical and competitive func- tions of business have within their respective fields oppor- tunities for satisfactory advance as well as dangers of " dead-end jobs." For girls, at least, stenography, which is a clerical occupation, presents the best economic reward and in many ways the most desirable conditions of employment. The reasons assigned in the New York Report ^ for the » Chapter VI, page 130. * See Chapter VI, page 131. 74 Commercial Education poorer quality of commercial pupils found in high schools are probably untenable ; at least, other factors are stronger in the selective process than the failure of commercial edu- cation to conceive its function on a broader plane. The report of the Women's Educational and Industrial Union ^ would indicate that the economic status of the par- ents is a strong factor ; so also is the ambition and ability of the child to go to college, as well as the general social attitude toward desirable means of preparing for livelihood. Thus it was found that the economically most favored dis- trict high school in Boston has but fifty per cent of its pupils enrolled in commercial courses, whereas less fortu- nate sections of the city showed a proportion as high as ninety per cent of commercial pupils. It may be fairly claimed, however, that the investiga- tions of this chapter confirm rather than refute the main positions taken throughout the volume. We shall need, of course, more study of all the questions with which this vol- ume deals, and of other problems besides. The time has probably come when state and national authorities should undertake and carry on further inquiries. No subject within the range of secondary public instruction has larger inter- ests or involves more pupils and more extensive investment of public money, than commercial education. In our efforts to bring about more effective educational achievements, it is important that our already established courses attempting commercial education should receive the advantage of ex- pert advice similar to that available for the newer school endeavors represented by our recently founded industrial and trade schools. 1 See page 55. CHAPTER V CONSTRUCTIVE PROPOSALS THE new commercial courses to be established must proceed primarily from the objective conditions of commerce, in so far as they are discernible and significant, and from the reasonable possibilities and legitimate aspira- tions of boys and girls ; only secondarily must they proceed from those influences which we now fancy are school necesr sities. The form and content of vocational education must be drawn from the vocation,^ while the determination of particular methods may remain with the school teachers as heretofore. Without restricting its appropriate functions, the school under this procedure will render better service to society; for the newer and better ideal of social better- ment is that of service, not of domination. THE RANGE OF COMMERCIAL EDUCATION Commercial education in the future cannot be limited to the preparation for a few commercial vocations, such as bookkeeping and stenography, but must expand to include preparation for a wide range of different activities, as wide perhaps as the entire range of occupations in commerce; and very likely even within the different occupations for subdivisions of higher or lower degree.^ Industrial edu- cation is adopting a policy of founding unit courses corre- sponding to the specialized organization of industry. There is much suggestion in this practice for commercial educa- * An analysis of the division of work existing in a large retail house in Boston revealed two hundred different kinds of jobs, or unit occupations, in which one or more individuals were employed. 75 76 Commercial Education tion. Commerce, like industry, has a wide range of occu- pations for one of which each normal boy or girl may receive training. What the unit courses in commercial edu- cation may prove to be must be determined by investigation and experiment. Some suggestions upon the matter are given in the chapter upon investigations (page 58). We are beginning in progressive states (e.g., Massachu- setts, Ohio, New York, Wisconsin) a program of educa- tional expansion toward the improvement of young people already employed.^ Commercial education has a large and proper function in continuation schools. A considerable number of continuation school pupils will need commercial education in some form. If we divorce our regular day school commercial work from that adopted for continuation schools, we shall build up a water-tight compartment sys- tem which will result in a needless duplication of machinery and effort. If commercial education were to remain static, a newer and better plan for continuation schools would obviously be necessary ; but an adequate and improved plan for day schools should be developed which will be compre- hensive and efficient enough for many continuation school needs. A suggestive example of sound organization is seen in the city of Leipzig, where the whole compass of commer- cial education is found in one organization. The same director, corps of teachers, plant, and equipment constitute the educational resources in that city for commercial edu- cation of all grades. Many types of commercial instruction are necessarily maintained. In the same institution are found the boy who leaves school at the earliest legal age and the boy who persists a year or two longer ; here is main- tained the school corresponding to our commercial high schools, and students of university grade are under the same director and are taught in part by instructors who con- duct courses in the lower schools. This system is sound financially and sound educationally. 1 Compulsory Continuation Schools. Constructive Proposals y^ By means of one plant all the educational needs are met with a minimum of cost, for there is no idle machinery and no duplication of equipment. From an educational aspect the plan is commendable in that there is no confusion of poli- cies respecting the treatment of problems. Commercial edu- cation under this system is not, as with us, one thing in day schools, another in evening schools, and something entirely foreign in continuation schools. In our large cities we need to coordinate and unify our various educational agencies dealing with the problem of commercial education (page Logically, then, the organization, equipment, and teach- ing force of day high schools should be made available for that part of continuation work needed by junior commercial employees. This connection will prove mutually advanta- geous: to the continuation school by providing adequate facilities at a minimum cost, and to the regular school by giving opportunity to deal directly with actual commercial needs. The consideration of cost to communities will prove a particularly substantial argument, for the financial burden of education now borne cannot be greatly increased for desirable educational extensions without undue sacrifice. " We have argued throughout this volume that commercial education should become truly vocational, and a definition of principles has been given (page 132) . Of these principles, that of having opportunity for practice under actual con- ditions is of more than ordinary importance. Indeed, an opportunity for practical work is probably the prime essen- tial in all kinds of vocational education. The medical stu- dent has hospital practice ; the normal school pupil is given practice teaching; the trade school student works in a school shop, which commonly turns out a product sold un- der competitive terms in an open market, or else works part time in an actual shop under real conditions. Theoretical training attempted as preparation for any definite end with- out full opportunity for practice has proved unprofitable. Nearly all vocational education in the past was originally J 78 Commercial Education instituted with little opportunity for practical participation in activities which were real; and all these attempts have gone through an evolution which ended in a condition where the missing essential was supplied. Many of our scholastic enterprises, not vocational, but seeking to instruct in ob- jective facts, have gone through a similar evolution. We formerly taught physics and chemistry out of textbooks only. Now we take the pupil into the laboratory and strive to have him acquire his knowledge firsthand, by the experi- mental method, as we term it. ^ VOCATIONAL PRACTICE IN COMMERCIAL EDUCATION Commercial education has had its laboratory of actual practice, commonly in the form of the model office. Text- books made up largely of practical problems have furnished material of substantial and practical value to the student preparing for clerical occupations in commerce. Further- more, these devices have been the only forms available for vocational practice feasible for use under conditions that have quite generally prevailed, and in many places they may prove to be devices for clerical education which must be relied upon for some time to come. But obviously these devices lack reality, no matter how carefully they may be maintained; they are at the b^t a makeshift and cannot compete in effectiveness with^he opportunities which real offices and real problems present. Their limitations are at once apparent when we consider their inadequacy for the practical training of young persons for commercial occupa- tions other than clerical, and, consequently, for a large por- tion of possible and desirable commercial training they are valueless. We cannot teach salesmanship or store service by means of a model office. We can hardly expec); to estab- lish a model store in our schools ; the difficulties (hi simulat- ing business conditions, other than those we now have, for clerical pupils need no extended exposition./ Industrial education, confronted with a similar problem, is choosing Constructive Proposals 79 a wise and economical solution by seeking to use the factory as the means of opportunity for practice and experience, e.g., in the Beverly and Fitchburg plans. The way out for commercial education is along a similar path, and the busi- ness house should furnish the opportunity needed. If there is established a real and vital connection between the regular high schools and the continuation schools, where the latter are established, we may more easily make progress in securing the business house as the laboratory of com- mercial experience. The business man may perhaps be led to see a way to cooperate not hitherto recognized. If the business man sends his junior employees for a part of the time to the school, why should not the school send its pupils for a part of the time to the business house ? Let us assume a concrete situation. A business house has at certain pe- riods — for example, four hours a week during the working hours — a hundred employees at continuation school ; may not the school send a hundred commercial students from its classrooms to take the place of those temporarily at school? There are difficulties to such a plan, no doubt; there will arise questions of compensation, lack of knowl- edge of store conditions, chances of loss through inexperi- enced help, and the like ; but there are no fundamental ob- stacles to trying the experiment. It should not be more difficult for the business man to adjust himself to a new situation than for the schoolmaster. Our proposition offers a fair trade : the business man to train the school boy and the schoolmaster to instruct the business employee. To make such a plan work successfully, changes in the school as well as adjustment in the business house are neces- sary. Industrial education, in operating a shop and school plan, uses the coordinator, i.e., an instructor who has had experience in shop practice and has also had experience in the classroom as a teacher. With this double equipment the coordinator can deal effectively with the twofold situation presented. We shall probably need to adopt a similar pro- cedure in the case of commercial education if we are to 8o Commercial Education obtain an effective method of bringing the school and the business house together. Where conditions permit, the week-and-week plan characteristic of industrial education should be tried.^ The matter of arranging high school programs to permit pupils to be absent from school certain periods on particular days undoubtedly presents real difficulties of adjustment. The week-and-week plan — i.e., the Beverly and Fitchburg plan — presents practically no program difficulty. Where absences come at irregular intervals, or even on regular re- curring days of the week, the difficulties of program adjust- ment are more than apparent. For the economical and effi- cient administration of a high school, regular schedules for teachers and pupils are a necessity. Where part-time pupils pursuing commercial studies are required to be in the stores on certain days, such as Mondays, the difficulty arises concerning the proper provisions for meeting the academic assignments arranged for the day. The schedule for teachers who teach related academic studies in the school may be unwarrantedly disturbed. The school seeking to establish effective commercial train- ing must face these difficulties. The adoption of the depart- mental or sub-school organization will be one effective method of meeting program difficulties ; by this device only one department is disturbed and program difficulties do not pervade the whole school (page 41). Again, practice work in stores may be sought chiefly on Saturdays or confined to particular seasons of the year, such as the spring or fall. Pupils might work the first half day on Monday and return to the school in the afternoon for a two-hour session, wherein the academic work designed for the morning might be given in condensed form. All these program difficulties will be adjusted in some suitable way if the worth of actual practice work is sufficiently recognized by the schools. If school credits and conventional high school requirements are * Now being undertaken in connection with commercial courses in Cin- cinnati. Constructive Proposals 8 1 chiefly esteemed, cooperative relations with business houses will appear as secondary in importance, and the difficulties of part-time arrangements will loom so large that nothing so disturbing to the school routine will appear advisable. Much of the progress toward cooperation between the schools and business will necessarily depend upon the atti- tude of business men. The routine and orderly procedure of the business house are not less important to the store than similar regularity is to the school. Temporary, untrained, and immature workers in the store threaten the serenity of business managers as much as the unusual conditions men- tioned above disturb the school. The business executive has less control of certain business conditions than the school principal has of the program. The seasonable de- mands of trade arise from the habits of society; due to social custom, Monday has come to be the shopping day; the stores may use additional help to advantage only when need for more workers creates a larger demand. Primarily, the business man must feel the need of better service and greater efficiency in his employees; he must recognize the function of training as a means of securing these qualities and must see in the school the agency for furnishing effec- tive training. He must not look upon the school as a source of profitable exploitation to be used purely as temporary exigencies may suggest. The business man must recognize his duty toward the education of business apprentices. He must make sacrifices similar to those of the schoolmaster and bear his part of the inconvenience and cost of coopera- tive education. The greatest difficulty besetting the problem of cooper- ative education between commercial high schools and busi- ness houses will be found in the mental attitudes of the two potentially cooperating agents. Both may admit the abstract proposition that cooperative education is theoret- ically desirable, but their convictions may be too weak to cause them to study the problem with sufficient seriousness to discover practical plans of cooperation. The business 82 Commercial Education man may applaud the idea of cooperative education, but maintain that the pecuHar conditions of his store prevent him from participation. The school man may give assent and approval to cooperative educational principles, but see insuperable difficulties against adoption because of the wide departure from the customs and practices of his school or- ganization which the plan involves. This situation should not be discouraging, for it is merely normal and has been paralleled often heretofore when progressive movements have been temporarily halted by the disturbing difficulties of new conditions. If cooperative education is education- ally sound and economically desirable, the preliminary diffi- culties of adjustment will be overcome. There will be found some more efficient business men who will be willing to make the venture, and some more enterprising school men who will undertake the experiment. Imitation is easier than experiment, just as settlement is easier than exploration, and the majority of both business men and school men may be expected to follow the path which their more enterpris- ing leaders have prepared. BOSTON EXPERIMENTS IN COMMERCIAL EDUCATION The city of Boston has begun to experiment vigorously with possibilities of cooperative commercial education. As previously stated, the Boston High School of Commerce has conducted cooperative work since its beginning in 1906. Since 191 3, courses in salesmanship with cooperative feat- ures have been established in the Girls' High School and in the Dorchester High School. In January, 19 14, a marked extension of cooperative education was undertaken by the school authorities. A director ^ of practice work in sales- manship was appointed to coordinate commercial courses in general high schools throughout the city with practical work in a group of some six or seven cooperating stores. * Mrs. Lucinda W. Prince, formerly director of the school of salesmanship Women's Educational and Industrial Union, Boston. Constructive Proposals 83 The new cooperative courses are optional with the schools, but the desire to undertake the experiment is apparently strong". Brighton and East Boston High Schools have es- tablished cooperative courses, and the high schools of Rox- bury, West Roxbury, Hyde Park, South Boston, and Charlestown are planning to do so with the opening of school in September, 1914. The work of the director of practice is an important feature in the hoped-for success of the undertaking. Unbearable confusion to business man- agers would be the result if each individual school sought to arrange practice periods with the stores. The director of practice learns the possibilities of practice in the differ- ent stores, and is at the same time familiar with the general conditions of the schools. Thus she is able to coordinate the work between the store and the school so that the mini- mum confusion may result. The director of practice has authority also to deal with the technical salesmanship courses attempted in the schools, has supervisory functions over the teachers of salesmanship, and possesses familiarity with the moral, physical, and business conditions of the store where the pupils are sent. She brings to the store the knowledge of the limitations and possibilities of the school, and to the school the demands and difficulties of the store. The above plan is designed to bring about effective meth- ods of teaching salesmanship. Girls in high school are almost exclusively concerned with the experiment. The High School of Commerce, attended only by boys, operates a plan of longer duration, designed to meet the different conditions which boys find in business. The Dorchester High School is developing a plan for cooperative work in connection with clerical commercial education, and '^he Charlestown High School proposes to make the same ven- ture, beginning in September, 19 14. It is interesting to note that the present general adoption in Boston of seem- ingly radical methods in commercial education has not been brought about by compulsion on the part of school authori- ties, but rather by invitation to participate in an experimen- 84 Commercial Education tal educational project. Considerable freedom regarding the character of the courses is allowed. One desirable re- quirement is made, viz., that teachers of salesmanship shall be those duly qualified by business experience and training to give the technical instruction. At the present time, no careful attempt is made to relate the general instruction to salesmanship. The suggestive programs presented below may be analyzed roughly as made up of general unrelated academic work, such as English and modern languages ; related technical work, such as commer- cial geography, economics, and textiles ; and purely techni- cal or vocational work, such as shorthand, bookkeeping, and salesmanship. It is believed that experience will show that the courses should be conceived and administered as related academic and technical subjects, and purely technical work. PROGRAM OF THE EAST BOSTON HIGH SCHOOL ^ The work in the first, second, and third years includes subjects already established in the school, e.g., English, a foreign language, commercial geography, industrial his- tory, drawing, and manual training. Stenography and type- writing may be elected in place of a foreign language during the third and fourth years. Fourth year. Salesmanship, Store Practice, etc 3 points ^ Textiles 2 points^ Color and Design i point ^ PROGRAM OF THE WEST ROXBURY HIGH SCHOOL ^ Pupils may select from elective program (English re- quired) subjects totalling in points not less than 20. * Abridged to show incorporation of Salesmanship. * Twenty points are required for a full year's work. * Abridged to show incorporation of Salesmanship. Constructive Proposals 85 Second year. Commercial Geography and Industrial His- tory 3 or 4 points Third year. Textiles, including Color and Design . . . 3 or 4 points Fourth year. Merchandise and Salesmanship 3 or 4 points PROGRAM OF THE DORCHESTER HIGH SCHOOL Showing offering in the fourth year for various commercial needs FOURTH YEAR Required English 3 points Modem Language . . 3 or 4 points Phonography and Type- writing 6 or 4 points Commercial Law or Tex- tiles (for girls in Sales- manship) Elective (choose one) Economics 4 points Physics (for boys) .... 3 points Chemistry 4 points Drawing 3 points Bookkeeping 4 points Salesmanship ^ (Wholesale, boys) ... 4 points Salesmanship ^ (Retail, girls) 4 points Pupils may elect salesmanship subject to approval of teacher in charge. The programs might be criticised as attempting simulta- neously to prepare for several commercial occupations. In fact, three distinct commercial occupations are aimed at in the programs ; namely, bookkeeping, stenography, and sales- manship. In view of the fact that the schools concerned are general high schools conducted upon the elective system, the proposed courses represent a progressive step. Sales- manship as a competing commercial opportunity with cleri- cal callings has not, in the pupil's mind, at least, fully dem- onstrated its value. There is much excuse at the present time for the pupil to insure his chances for a market for his talents by securing training in more than one outlet of commerce. Honest experiment with fair competition of various commercial opportunities, accompanied by careful tests of results, will eventually show where vocational op- portunities lie. The more definite provision for the depart- 86 Commercial Education mental organization of commercial courses, or sub-school plan, may likewise prove to be a natural consequence of the quest to attain more efficient results (page 41). SPECIAL PROBLEMS IN THE ESTABLISHMENT OF COMMER- CIAL SCHOOLS AND COURSES Considerable discussion has been given of the possibility of the general high school so organizing its resources that effective courses in commercial education might be the re- sult. As before indicated, the general high school will be called upon for large service in this problem of improved commercial education. Many larger communities will choose to effect the same end by the establishment of special high schools of commerce. Already there has been a con- siderable development of the special institution in our larger cities (pages 4, 5). The special school which begins de novo has not many of the difficulties to overcome that confront the general high school ; but even there substantial advance and sound achievement will be the result only of extreme care, favoring conditions, and judicial procedure. In the first place, the special schools usually become over-large and are unwieldy at the start, before the real vocational prob- lems are comprehended. Effort and attention are centered upon the mere problem of housing pupils, of making essen- tial provisions for securing teachers, and of furnishing supplies. The matter of finding competent teachers has many real difficulties. Available candidates with satisfactory experi- ence invariably must be found in other high schools of dif- ferent character and purpose. Very few normal schools or higher schools of education are training special teachers for commercial schools. The special school will be obliged to give its teachers a new point of view if it is to achieve an adequate realization of its purpose. Communities are prone to mistake a fine building with a pretentious name for an educational idea. We have made the error in this country Constructive Proposals 87 of trying to create our special schools in ready-made fash- ion. We first construct an elaborate building to gratify local pride by appeals to the eye; we select our teachers from the local corps with no adequate notion of fitness for special work ; and we transfer our pupils to the new build- ing en masse without careful selection on the basis of voca- tional fitness. We Americans believe in " going concerns " at the start, whether our projects be educational, social, or industrial; we are too impatient to wait for experimental or evolutionary processes to show us the valuable types from which to choose and subsequently to expand. We believe that bigness is success, that smallness is failure. This men- tal viewpoint is the cause of much waste and disastrous change in our educational policies. The time-honored adage that " haste makes waste " has not given us caution in edu- cational enterprises. A community seeking to establish an effective special commercial school will do well to begin modestly. First and foremost, a principal should be selected who possesses knowledge of the special problem, broad sympathies, and qualities of leadership. Heads of departments who are effec- tive executives with the power of interpreting significant needs, demands, and conditions of business should then be chosen, and teachers of training and adaptability should be added to constitute a minimum beginning organization. A fine building, an expensive equipment, a large number of pupils, may easily create an initial condition which has in it far more of danger than of promise. Having established the new school on the basis of a minimum working force and equipment, it will next be highly important for those commissioned to carry on the work to study the problem of trying to make the special school meet effectively the objec- tive demands of business. The expansion of a useful type of school is a compara- tively simple matter, but the useful type is difficult to find. If the expansion is not too rapid, teachers may be selected on the basis of special fitness for the particular problem at- 88 Commercial Education tempted. There is always danger of too rapid growth, where usually the effort of all concerned becomes centered on mere housing. In many of our large cities, the school au- thorities are triumphant over the fact that a seat has been found for every high school pupil who has applied for ac- commodations ; conditions for effective work are often- times not seriously considered. The special commercial school may attract hordes of children who are appealed to by the mere novelty of the name or by the publicity which new school ventures secure from the press. It would be a useful experiment for our large cities to found a model high school, as is done often in the case of elementary schools, where young teachers in training may have fruitful conditions of practice, and where teachers in other high schools may visit to see work of superior merit in operation. The special commercial high school, or the specialized department of commercial training of a general high school, is confronted today with the choice of one of two divergent educational principles. These issues were presented in sharp contrast at the 19 14 meeting of the National Educational Association Superintendents' Convention at Richmond.^ Our public school systems, in embarking upon the policy of expansion to include training for industrial and commercial vocations, will not achieve immediate and effective results unless fundamental differences between liberal and voca- tional education are recognized. Liberal education enables us to appreciate and consume, while vocational education aims to train primarily effective producers. The two forms of education may be attempted simultaneously, but neither will be largely effective unless the function of each is kept distinct in the minds of teacher and pupil. The compara- tively slight modifications of general high schools to effect what is called a general vocational education will not succeed in meeting the social and vocational needs of pupils. In- deed, these modifications may cause harm, because the real * In the papers presented by David Snedden, Commissioner of Education, Massachusetts, and by W. C. Bagley, University of Illinois. Constructive Proposals 89 liberal features of the course may be disturbed with no compensating advantage in the way of specific vocational preparation. There do not exist today, among the occupa- tions which the pupils enter, callings that may be termed general occupations; hence a general vocational training aims at nothing which has an objective reality. A better and surer plan of guaranteeing worthy liberal and vocational education may be to attempt them succes- sively. None will dispute the value of the ideal of founding every individual's education upon as liberal a basis as pos- sible; but, in addition, our present need is to equip our future citizens with a vocational training to enable them to attain effective and satisfying participation in the various life vocations. Our effective medical and law schools de- mand for entrance a broad background of liberal training, but they confine their own instruction to strictly vocational work. The period at which actual vocational work should begin depends primarily upon the individual. The mental capacities, the economic circumstances, the social environ- ment, will cause some to seek vocational education as early as fourteen, and others as late as twenty-one or twenty-two. At whatever age the individual presents himself for voca- tional training, he must meet primarily the methods, en- vironment, and procedure of the vocation sought. The period of liberal training is over when he commits himself to vocational training, or as long as he follows that path.^ The above position, strictly interpreted, is probably too radical for immediate adoption as a widespread educational policy. The chief objection to it is the restriction of free- dom to the individual. As a nation, we believe in freedom to change our life plans if opportunity and inclination prompt us to do so. For immediate purposes we are con- cerned in discussing effective plans for improved commer- cial education. As before indicated (page 19), commercial education for purely vocational purposes demands more of ^ This position presents broadly the position taken at the Richmond meeting by Dr. David Snedden (page 88), with whom the author agrees. 90 Commercial Education liberal culture than other vocations attempted in the second- ary school period. But every commercial course, whether that of one year's duration or that of four, should have an intensified period, immediately before the student expects to go into commerce, where the aim, methods, and experi- ences are primarily, and perhaps almost exclusively, those of the business environment into which the student will shortly be sent. Where students may look forward to four years of secondary instruction as preparatory to entering business, the first year might be primarily liberal, the second and third years primarily pre-vocational, and the fourth year primarily, or preferably wholly, vocational.^ For those who drop out of the course through accident or choice, the continuation school or evening school should give the op- portunity for intensified vocational work which was lost by early leaving. The shorter term commercial courses may be arranged with the same relative proportions of liberal and vocational studies indicated in the case of the four- years course. Investigations presented in Chapter IV in- dicate that business success as measured by earning capacity bears a very direct relation to total years of schooling (pages 56, 57). There has been a general assumption among educators that a similar relation is found throughout all vocations; but investigations into industrial occupations fail to justify the assumption.^ It seems probable from present evidence that short commercial courses, such as those of one or of two years at the close of the elementary school period, will fit immediately for no very promising commercial occupations. These courses are very much worth while, however, if the individuals who have taken them after entering business in the minor capacities open to them, supplement their education by work in continuation or evening schools. The short term business courses are justified for those who, for limiting reasons, are unable to * See New York Report, page 140. 2 Vocations for Women. Women's Educational and Industrial Union, Boston. Constructive Proposals 91 pursue longer courses; but sound vocational advice given to those who pursue them should point out the need of sup- plementary education, which is manifestly essential for those who would rise to important positions and probably also for those who wish to look forward to even satisfac- tory wage conditions in business occupations. COURSES IN THE BOSTON CLERICAL SCHOOL The plan designed for a new clerical school to be opened in Boston in September, 19 14, embodies the principles rec- ommended with regard to the distinction between liberal and vocational training, as well as other procedure com- mended as proper in the creation of special commercial schools. This special school is designed to round out a sys- tem of commercial education which already comprises com- mercial courses for boys and girls in general high schools and a special high school of commerce for boys. The new school will serve primarily the needs of girls, by offering specialized and intensified training in clerical vocations. Three courses will be offered: first, a course for office service which will be available for girls who have success- fully completed two years of high school work, not neces- sarily commercial in character ; second, a course for stenog- raphers and high grade clerks, available for girls who have successfully completed three years of high school work, without designation of kind; third, a course for book- keepers and accountants, and a course for secretaries, who must be either high school or college graduates. The last course will be offered to both young men and women. The clerical school will attempt no liberal training whatsoever. The applicants for the various courses will come with an academic equipment which presumably constitutes the essen- tial elements of general education necessary for successful entrance into the specialized work in the vocation sought. No specified length of time for the course will be assigned ; some students with preliminary commercial training in 92 Commercial Education other schools may be expected to complete the work in half a year; others of slower rate of achievement may take a year or even longer. The methods to be used are designed to be primarily individual, while the standards of achieve- ment are designed to prepare for successful entrance into the specialized commercial occupations aimed at. Following are the unit courses of study proposed for the clerical high school of Boston. '' Course Preparing for Office Service " This course is available for girls who have completed two years of high school work, and consists of the fol- lowing subjects: bookkeeping, office practice, commer- cial arithmetic, commercial law, penmanship, and busi- ness English. " Course Preparing for Stenographic and Higher Clerical Work " This course is available for girls who have completed three years of high school work, and consists of the fol- lowing subjects: shorthand, typewriting, penmanship, business arithmetic, English, bookkeeping, political geography, and office practice. '*" Course Preparing for Secretarial Work and Bookkeeping ^ " This course is available for young men and women who are high school graduates ^ and consists of the following subjects: a (for secretaries), stenography, typewriting, business correspondence, office practice, commercial procedure; b (for bookkeepers), bookkeep- ing, use of office machinery, filing devices, commercial arithmetic, commercial law. ^ Not given during the year 1914-1915. ' College graduates may be admitted upon special action of the School Committee. Constructive Proposals 93 " Stuaents in each of the above courses are advanced as rapidly as their progress will permit, and they are given certificates when they have satisfactorily com- pleted the courses without regard to the length of time required for completion." In closing this chapter on constructive suggestions re- garding the improvement of commercial education of second- ary grade, I wish to emphasize the need of a tolerant and inquiring attitude on the part of educators engaged in con- ducting or establishing commercial schools. As an instance of a progressive and receptive attitude on the part of com- mercial teachers may be adduced the procedure of the Massa- chusetts State Committee on Business Education at its first meeting on June 14, 19 13, best illustrated by the following resolution, which was unanimously adopted and assigned to a committee for appropriate action : " It is the sense of this meeting that commercial courses should be founded primarily upon the basis of business needs, as far as such needs are discernible. This committee seeks the facts concerning those business needs which affect commercial education, and welcomes opinions of business bodies, and wishes to encourage all investigations that may shed light upon this impor- tant matter." Much of the evidence concerning business needs appear- ing in this volume was secured from investigations inspired by and resulting from the quoted resolution.^ Much other and more searching investigation in different sections of the country will be necessary before it can be said that we have any adequate fact basis for certain and stable commercial courses. It is highly desirable that each community undertake an inquiry for itself. There may be found generally much uniformity of commercial and school * Chapter IV contains a review of three investigations. 94 Commercial Education conditions, but always will there be discoverable local situ- ations which will modify in some degree the particular plans suitable for the individual community. The closer associ- ation of business men and commercial teachers will be im- portant in effecting cooperation and mutual understanding. Borrowing a ready-made plan from some community with acquired prestige in commercial education has many objec- tions. Usually the plan itself is never fully understood, and consequently only partially effective; there is also loss of the enthusiasm which self -achievement brings: we encour- age self-activity and personal achievement in our pupils; these same virtues are no less important to grown-ups, whether business men or teachers. Finally, it is the spirit in which the problem of improved commercial education is considered that is significant. More and more we are com- ing to see that the solution of all the vital problems involved in the quest and realization of better democracy must be attempted in the spirit of cooperation, of justice, and of toleration. In aspiring to a higher conception of democracy, society has placed its chief hope in the schools ; consequently in the spirit with which the school attempts the solution of its own problems will our democracy expect to find example, inspiration, and progressive achievement. CHAPTER VI COMMERCIAL HIGH SCHOOLS AND COMMER- CIAL COURSES IN HIGH SCHOOLS^ Section I SCOPE AND AIMS OF THE REPORT THE scope of this report comprises a description of com- mercial education in the city high schools ; an analysis and summary of existing conditions ; and certain constructive recommendations. In the third section, devoted chiefly to recommendations, will appear most prominently the aim of this particular investigation, viz., a suggestive program of procedure toward more efficient means and methods of com- mercial education. HIGH SCHOOLS MAINTAINING COMMERCIAL COURSES Of the twenty high schools (in 1911-1912) maintained by the Board of Education, thirteen offer commercial courses. Two high schools for boys — the High School of Commerce, Manhattan, and the Commercial High School, Brooklyn — devote exclusive attention to commercial instruction. The eleven other schools, known as general high schools, offer elective commercial courses, and about forty per cent of the pupils are found in these courses. In view of the fact that there are special commercial schools for boys and none for girls, it is not surprising that in the general high schools 1 This chapter consists of Mr. Thompson's report on the field assigned to him in the New York City School Inquiry, 1911-12, and is reprinted here with no changes in the subject matter. — Editor. 95 96 Commercial Education the ratio of boys to girls is one to fiYQ. In the city at large the sexes elect the work in practically equal proportions.^ The geographical distribution of schools with respect to residential needs is deserving of commendation. Manhat- tan has a High School of Commerce for boys and a com- mercial course for girls in the Washington Irving High School. The Bronx has a general high school with an elec- tive commercial course for boys and girls. Richmond has a general high school with a commercial course for boys and girls. Brooklyn has a special school for boys (Com- mercial High School), and a commercial course for girls in the Eastern District High School, and in addition Bush- wick High School offers courses for both boys and girls. In Queens there are six general high schools offering com- mercial courses for both boys and girls. No restriction in selecting high schools is placed on pupils, who may attend schools outside their residential districts. Of the whole high school population, approximately one third are enrolled as commercial pupils. COURSES OF STUDY A general survey of courses offered in the city high schools, both general and special, reveals the following facts : General high schools usually offer three-year commercial courses, though there are two exceptions — Curtis, which has a four-year course, and Bryant, which differentiates and offers a four-year course for boys and a three-year course for girls. The High School of Commerce has a four-year course, while the Commercial High School of Brooklyn maintains a dual offering of a three-year course and a four- year course. The courses in general high schools are largely clerical in nature — bookkeeping, business arithmetic, stenography, and typewriting, courses which have traditionally been as- * Dr. J. J. Shepard, Chamber of Commerce Bulletin, March, 191 2. Commercial High Schools 97 sumed to constitute the chief elements of commercial train- ing. In the two boys' high schools (High School of Com- merce, Manhattan, and Commercial High School, Brooklyn) these same subjects appear largely, though there is added work in commercial sciences, in commercial foreign lan- guages, and in economic subjects. In all the schools a certain measure of " liberal " training accompanies spe- cialized work, a foreign language being a general require- ment. Specialized work is preponderant in the three-year courses of the general schools, and " liberal " subjects are found in greater proportion in the special schools. CHARACTER OF PUPILS The character of pupils, social, economic, and intellectual, may profitably be mentioned in this general survey of the subject. The usual testimony of the principals of general high schools is to the effect that commercial pupils consti- tute the less desirable element of the school. " Pupils elect- ing the commercial course are of inferior intellectual power." " Doubtful if pupils are of as good mental ability as those of other courses." '* Less serious and sturdy char- acter." " Students in commercial course inferior in ethical standing, inferior intellectually and socially." " They are not so good mentally. Many choose the commercial course because they think it is easy and because they had trouble in getting through the grammar school." " Character slightly below." Conditions seem to be better in the two special high schools for boys, and in one general high school for girls. In this last school the principal reports that com- mercial girls are brighter and more intelligent than aca- demic girls. PERSISTENCE OF PUPILS The persistence in membership of commercial pupils seems to be markedly lower than the average. The average loss of membership for the city for the past five-year period is thirty-one per cent annually. The High School of Com- gS Commercial Education merce in the last seven years has lost an average of 36.7 per cent ; the Commercial High School of Brooklyn, forty- one per cent for the years 1909-19 10. Every school reports a larger percentage of loss of commercial pupils than the city average or the school average. The Washington Irving High School reports the highest percentage of membership, where forty-six per cent of commercial girls persisted until the third year, against forty-seven per cent of girls pursuing academic work. One apparent reason for greater loss of membership is the character of the pupils mentioned in the foregoing par- agraphs. Principals assign various other reasons : ** At- tractive openings come to them long before the course is completed ; so long as business men are content to employ young people only partly prepared, so long will the schools have difficulty in holding their pupils to the end of the course." " Many elect commercial courses who do not ex- pect to remain long." " Pupils who cannot stay in school long take the commercial course." A noticeable feature is the fact that boys are less persistent in all schools than girls. A suggestive reason for this is found in the testi- mony of one principal, who says that a boy can get a job because he is a boy, but a girl must possess training. Fre- quently a family close to the economic line of necessity will call upon the boy to make the sacrifice of schooling. In all high schools the total number of boys and girls entering is nearly equal; the number graduating in 191 1 shows about two girls for every boy.^ The " mortality " among boys in New York City high schools is apparently twice that of girls, and the " mortality " of boys in commercial courses is greater than that in other courses. HOW PUPILS CHOOSE COMMERCIAL COURSES Investigation showed that boys and girls select the com- mercial course as follows : The greater proportion of pupils * Annual Report of City Superintendent, 191 1, page 98. Commercial High Schools 99 make the selection the final term of the elementary school. Circulars describing the offerings of high schools are dis- tributed. The principals and graduating class teachers dis- cuss with the pupils the significance of the printed data, and the children take the circular home for the signature of the parents. High school principals report that some elemen- tary school principals call meetings of the parents for dis- cussion and conference. High school principals feel that they have little influence on or control over the selection of courses. In one high school (Washington Irving High) the course of study delays for one year the beginning of specialized subjects. During this period the child is sub- jected to a trying-out process ; study of the tastes and apti- tudes is made by teachers, and the kind of choice is influ- enced by this process. Another principal of a mixed high school (Bush wick) gives particular attention to the question of a proper choice made in the elementary school. High school principals in the main believe that there are shortcomings in the character of the guidance given to pupils. " Little attention is given to vocational guidance. Pupils ought to select after one or two years in the high school. Individual tendencies could then be determined." Principals state that pupils are unconsciously sorted into groups with respect to mental ability. In Manhattan and The Bronx the pupils of best mental attainments are said to go to Townsend-Harris Hall, connected with the College of the City of New York. Further, the testimony of prin- cipals is that the brighter pupils take academic work, with Latin as a major ; that the next in mental grade take gen- eral work with modern languages, and that those remaining take commercial subjects. There is discoverable no care- fully organized effort, such as is found in several American cities,^ to give vocational guidance in the elementary school, so that pupils are directed to the course most suited to their abilities and subsequent needs. One principal reports im- provement in these conditions : " A better quality of stu- 1 Boston has a well-developed plan of vocational guidance. lOO Commercial Education dents are selecting the course. Time was when the com- mercial department was looked upon as a suitable place for students unfitted to do the hard w^ork of the regular course. Today an increasing number of bright, well-qualified young people are definitely choosing the commercial course." TEACHERS OF COMMERCIAL SUBJECTS i Teachers of commercial subjects in all high schools come into the service by qualifying by examination upon one of two merit lists, known respectively as the Stenography and Typewriting list, and the Commercial Subjects list, j By commercial subjects are understood chiefly those clerical in nature. The general requirements of experience are somewhat similar to those of other candidates; there is, however, the provision that business experience may be counted year for year (not exceeding five years) for the required experience of all teachers. A commercial teacher is, consequently, one who instructs in some clerical art, such as bookkeeping, stenography, or typewriting. It may be pointed out here, though more specifically treated in the third section of this report, that the present system makes no provision for securing teachers to instruct in commercial English, commercial modern languages, or in subjects deal- ing with fundamental commercial sciences, such as eco- nomics or business organization. The requirements for commercial teachers, under the limitations noted, are well suited to secure efficient and trained teachers. Inspection of the work of commercial teachers showed a general good level of achievement. Some complaint was made that under the requirements elementary school teachers may acquire a knowledge of a system of stenog- raphy, secure a license in stenography and typewriting, and become commercial teachers without adequate practical ex- perience. In such a special school as the Commercial High School of Brooklyn the large majority of the teachers have had no training in business or in business methods. They Commercial Hi^h Schools: - : >. : - ioi ♦ .'.-.... ^ . ' ' ' ' ^ r ' have come from the general lists, and have been assigned to their present position because of the system which de- mands that eligible candidates shall be chosen in the order of their rating, and from requirements which seek to secure teachers for other types of high schools. It is consequently not surprising to find in special schools a considerable num- ber of teachers who have no other sympathies and use no other methods except those characteristic of a classical or academic high school. The vocational stimulus cannot fail to lose force in a special school where the largest influence comes from teachers who are not themselves imbued with the aims for which the school really stands. A study of the teaching assignments of commercial teachers shows a proportionately larger number of teaching periods than the average. regents' examinations Commercial as well as academic work is standardized by state syllabi and tested by the regents' examinations. This system tends to produce a certain degree of uniformity of subject matter and achievement. All the high schools ex- cept the High School of Commerce report adherence to the state syllabi and regents' examinations. The High School of Commerce takes the regents' tests in stenography and typewriting; for all other subjects local examinations, approved by the Board of Superintendents, are employed. The regents' examinations make no provision for " aca- demic " subjects related to commercial training, except one course called Commercial English and Correspondence. This course is designed to be given " in the last year of the course, when the pupil has had training in English compo- sition and literature." ^ It forms hardly a complete course in itself, but constitutes a supplementary part of a separate English course pursued simultaneously. Sometimes an ad- ditional two periods a week are assigned and a teacher in * State Syllabus, 1910, page 359. lo? Commercial Education the commercial department gives the instruction. Com- mercial pupils are not usually required to take this special English course to secure diplomas. The majority of general high schools maintaining commercial courses do not even offer it. RELATION OF ACADEMIC TO VOCATIONAL WORK It is a fair statement to say that commercial students get but little related academic work. The English courses of three-year commercial pupils are uniformly those of aca- demic or college preparatory character, and, seemingly with- out any reason, these courses are incomplete in themselves, since they constitute but three quarters of a course designed for four-year pupils. The mathematics, modern languages, and science are those designed to meet regent requirements, which in turn are planned to meet the traditional academic or college entrance requirements. The individual plan of the High School of Commerce and, to a less degree, of the Commercial High School of Brooklyn (which reports using regents' examinations wher- ever possible), shows a praiseworthy effort to make all the school subjects reflect the vocational purpose of the school. Several other schools are attempting better to adapt the general (" academic ") subjects to the needs of commercial pupils, but the state system of requirements ^ makes such attempts diflicult and usually ineffective. The significance of this state of affairs will be more fully discussed in a later section of this report. COMMERCIAL LABORATORIES AND OFFICE EQUIPMENT A commercial school necessarily has a laboratory with devices and equipment where the practice of clerical arts is carried on. This usually consists of rooms with typewriters, rooms fitted with bookkeeping desks, and places where model banks and filing cases are found. In most instances * Regents' examinations. Commercial High Schools 103 these appurtenances are adequate, though often used by noticeably large divisions of pupils. No shortage of com- mercial material is reported. There are often found too many pupils for the typewriters, though here the difficulty is lack of class room, not the disinclination of the authorities to furnish machines. The practice of having a commercial museum showing commercial processes and products has hardly begun. The High School of Commerce has the be- ginning of a museum which promises in time to develop in extent and adequacy. There is, with the present accommo- dations, little room for the expansion of the project. Practice work connected with clerical subjects is notice- ably intelligent and effective. Practical work of the stand- ard required in business offices is approximated in a degree commensurate with the limitations of the number of pupils, space, and equipment. Most teachers showed that they possess the requisite knowledge, which they are able to impart, concerning matters of business (clerical) technique. In some schools an exception to this statement was noted in the matter of penmanship. In the three-year courses pen- manship seems to be slighted in order to secure more time for bookkeeping. One period per week for one term is insufficient in the case of the average pupil to assure the acquisition of a clear, legible, and rapid style of handwriting. PLACEMENT OF GRADUATES Employment bureaus and follow-up systems are reported in practically all schools. Some of these are reasonably effective. All schools would like to expand these agencies ; but lack of clerical assistance and lack of other opportunities render expansion difficult. As is to be expected, the two special schools lead in these important matters. The High School of Commerce has a valuable scheme of following up graduates, but it reports difficulty in keeping track of many boys who move away, leaving no addresses. The Commercial High School of Brooklyn presents certain facts I04 Commercial Education concerning its employment bureau, the purport of which is that business houses are circularized at the time of gradua- tion, and that last year, in response to 412 requests for help, 250 boys were placed in employment. Suggestive data from other schools may be added to give a notion of the general condition. " We have a card index showing data regarding all graduates. Every graduate is now profitably employed as far as he cares to be." " The typewriter company places all our pupils." " Yes, being organized to operate with the work in typewriting." " Employment bureau practically abandoned for lack of help. No follow-up system for same reason." Several schools report cooperation with typewriter com- panies in placing graduates. Placement is recognizably better in the control of the school, because cooperation with private commercial companies involves the obvious danger of subordination of social interest to private gain. It can- not be assumed that a typewriter company is always wholly disinterested in its efforts to find positions for commercial pupils. APPARENT AIM OF COMMERCIAL EDUCATION What is the current conception of commercial education ? Some passing reference has been made to this matter, but a more specific account is desirable in order to complete the general description of existing conditions. The State Syllabus (1910)^ lists commercial subjects as follows: -^ele- mentary and 'Advanced bookkeeping, Commercial arithmetic, 'business writing, "^commercial law, history of commerce,^com- mercial English, and correspondence, Shorthand, and type- writing. Not all of these subjects are required. The state diploma in commercial subjects is given to pupils who meet the general requirements in English, science, mathematics, and history, and pass department examinations with a grade of not less than seventy-five per cent in the following sub- jects : advanced bookkeeping and ofilice practice, commercial * State Syllabus, 1910, pages 334, 335. Commercial High Schools 105 arithmetic, commercial law, commercial geography, com- mercial English and correspondence, and business writing. These requirements are only for pupils pursuing a four- year course. History of commerce is not found in the offerings of the three-year course of the general high schools. In both the High School of Commerce and in the Commercial High School is found the subject of economics, and in the former school the history of commerce. In the main, in all schools the majority of the commercial work is clerical. Facility in business (clerical) technique is the major aim. The courses of study are based upon the as- sumption that efficiency in clerical arts is the major desider- atum in business preparation. Section I has dealt with day school conditions exclusively. A description of evening school conditions and other forms of supplementary education affecting commercial training will appear in Section III in connection with the general body of recommendations. Section II TESTIMONY OF NEW YORK CITY PRINCIPALS CONCERNING THE AIM OF COMMERCIAL EDUCATION In the preceding section the attempt has been made to present in general terms the most important facts affecting the problem of commercial education. No effort has been made to pass final judgment as to the merits or shortcomings of the system. In this second section a more critical study will be made of the most important phases of the problem ; but final constructive recommendations will be reserved for the third section of the report. We may appropriately begin this section with a closer examination of the aim of commercial education as stated in the preceding section, viz., the assumption that efficiency in clerical arts is the major desideratum in business prepara- tion. We shall first present additional evidence that the schools do make that assumption, and as evidence shall 106 Commercial Education quote from statements of principals : " In our brief three- year course we are attempting to train students immediately for clerical positions." " The burden of the course is de- voted to preparation for clerical work." " We plan to have our students (boys) equipped for what is usually the first step in business — a clerical job — but we feel that a com- mercial school of this type (four years) which did not have a higher aim than that would fall woefully short of its great opportunities." " In the past I fear that the conception of the work of the school has been somewhat that of a ' clerk factory'" (boys' school, four-year course). Particularly with respect to boys, the principals do not agree that the clerical aim is the proper one. Subsequently in this section of the report it will be shown that the courses of study exalt this aim even in the special boys' schools. There can be no doubt at all respecting the aim of the three-year courses. TESTIMONY OF BUSINESS MEN The evidence of the business world is against the assump- tion that clerical training is the main objective of commercial education. Business men in particular do not assert that this conception is sound. Through the courtesy of the New York Chamber of Commerce some evidence bearing upon this point was secured during February and March of the current year (1912). The following circular letter was sent to about a hundred of the largest commercial houses of New York City : ** I. In the selection or promotion of your employees in any department of your business, do you set any educational standards, such as graduation from gram- mar school, high school, or college, as a requisite for employment ? "To what extent? " 2. Do you encourage employees to continue their education, either by attendance upon night schools or by any other means ? Commercial High Schools 107 " By what methods ? "3. Do you perceive any defects in the present busi- ness training given in our high schools? "If so, what defects are most striking? "4. Do you advise the study of foreign commercial languages? If so, please check in the order of impor- tance the following: German, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese. " 5. For a young man entering your employ which of the enumerated clerical subjects is it necessary to know — stenography, typewriting, bookkeeping ? Would a study of the fundamental principles of business, such as merchandising, advertising, salesmanship, business or- ganization, be more valuable to young men than special- ization in clerical subjects ? " 6. Should schools of commerce attempt to train for particular types of business, e.g., merchandise, trans- portation, banking, etc. ? " 7. It is manifest that to fulfill its best purposes com- mercial education should keep in constant touch with the business world and advance with the evolution of mercantile development. What methods can you sug- gest of promoting such a relation between the public commercial schools and the business interests of the city? " (Comments at length or suggestions of any nature will be welcomed. ) " The answers to question five have a particular bearing on the point we are now considering. On the basis of fifty replies received up to the time of tabulation, " fundamental principles of business '* is chosen over clerical arts in the ratio of nine to one. This same study was made in Bos- ton in 1906, and in Pittsburgh in 1909, and with somewhat similar results respecting the relative importance of funda- mental and of clerical subjects. The following quotation is taken from the report of Edward Rynearson, Director of High Schools, Pittsburgh, io8 Commercial Education Pa., to be found in the May number (1910) of The School Review. The second part of question five differs from the New York City question as follows : " What other lines of training will be more valuable as a preparation for a business career in your house ? " " Of those replying thirty-two per cent think that bookkeeping alone is essential; twenty-eight per cent state that all three are necessary ; nineteen per cent think that none of the three subjects is essential ; fifteen per cent think that penmanship is essential ; eleven per cent think that mathematics is necessary ; eleven per cent con- sider a knowledge of good English indispensable ; eight per cent think that arithmetic is valuable ; four per cent state that typewriting and bookkeeping are necessary; three per cent think that designing and advertising are valuable." ^ A few quotations from typical replies from New York business men may be added here : " We employ no male stenographers. Occasionally we can use a business school graduate in our bookkeeping department. The study of business principles ought to be of value." " For the ma- jority of positions in our employ we should prefer that he had a knowledge of the other subjects named by you." " A knowledge of stenography and typewriting would be necessary in filling certain positions where a male stenog- rapher was desired. In our particular business a knowledge of bookkeeping as it is generally taught in high schools might in some cases be helpful, but hardly ever absolutely necessary. A study of the fundamental principles, of busi- ness, such as merchandising, advertising, salesmanship, and business organization, would in general seem to be more valuable to young men than specialization upon clerical subjects." ^ 1 This evidence shows that business men in Pittsburgh do not consider that clerical subjects are of exclusive importance in commercial preparation. 2 See Appendix, page 167, Letters of New York Business Men. Commercial High Schools 109 FIGURES FROM THE PERMANENT CENSUS BOARD As a second and different kind of evidence, we present the following: At the time of preparing this report (April, 191 2) Mr. George H. Chatfield, Secretary of the Permanent Census Board, had prepared a report covering the occupations of 66,617 boys and 65,191 girls in New York City between the ages of fourteen and eighteen. As stenographers and type- writers were found 586 boys and 3244 girls; as book- keepers, 824 boys and 1364 girls; errand boys and girls fall into the proportion of 12,529 boys and 1204 girls. Here is seen the specialization of occupation by sex and the pre- ponderant number of girls in clerical positions. EVIDENCE DRAWN FROM BUSINESS ORGANIZATION Additional evidence, differing in character from that given above, may be seen in the analysis of the organization of a New York business house having an average of 5100 employees : ORGANIZATION OF A RETAIL DRY GOODS HOUSE ^ Number Per Cent Employed of Total Force Managerial 120 2.3 Buyers 130 2.5 Salespeople 1,900 37.0 Stenographers 7° i«3 Clerical 360 7.1 Inspectors 250 4.9 Stockkeepers 120 2.3 Bookkeepers 190 3-.7 Auditors 90 1.7 Delivery 55© H-o Porters and Cleaners 180 3.5 Messengers (Junior) 160 3.2 Cadets (Junior) 260 5.1 Factory Hands 500 9-8 Elevator Operators 60 1.2 Mechanics 160 3-^ 5, 100 99.7 1 These replies are reprinted as received from business houses. no Commercial Education A grouping from the above figures of positions which may be considered clerical (stenographers, clerical, book- keepers, auditors) shows 13.8 per cent. Compare this figure with the combined items, buyers and sellers, 39.5 per cent, and the result is significant. Certainly clerical training does not prepare immediately for the largest sec- tion of commercial employment, namely, selling. Below are added organization figures of three other business houses. ORGANIZATION OF A RETAIL DRY GOODS HOUSE, BOSTON ^ 1. Approximate number of employees, 967. 2. Classification of employees, e.g., managerial, buyers, salesmen, clerical, etc. Buyers and Assistants .... 54 Managerial 77 Sales 311 Stock 90 Floor Assistants 28 Cashiers 56 Clerical 116 Decorators 7 117 Alteration Piece Workers Manufacturing Repairers General Receiving and Delivery Departments 42 Shoppers and Foreign Repre- sentatives 16 Maintenance 53 3. The relative number employed in each class, e.g., fif- teen per cent clerical, etc. : Buyers and Assistants 5.6 Alteration Managerial 7-9 Sales 32-2 Stock 9.3 Floor Assistants 2.9 Cashiers 5-8 Clerical 12.0 Decorators 7 Piece Workers Manufacturing Repairers , General Receiving and Deliv- ery Departments 1.7 Shoppers and Foreign Repre- \ sentatives I 5.5 Maintenance J * These replies are reprinted as received from business houses. Commercial High Schools iii INSURANCE BUSINESS, NEW YORK, WITH 15,488 EMPLOYEES ^ What percentage of the whole organization does each class of employees represent — e.g., fifteen per cent clerical? Per Cent Superintendents 2.10 Assistants 9.38 Agents 57.86 Inspectors .i6 Managers 04 Heads 59 Assistants .61 Bookkeepers 4.53 Clerks 12.44 Stenographers 2.95 Typewriters 5.22 Telephone Operators .03 Electricians 16 Engineers .31 Porters and Cleaners 1.98 Commissariat Help .79 Printers 78 WHOLESALE DRY GOODS HOUSE, BOSTON, 365 EMPLOYEES ^ The relative number employed in each class, e.g., fifteen per cent clerical, etc. : Per Cent Managerial 2 Buyers 6 Salesmen 24 Clerical 19 Stock Hands 25 Packers 4 Sorters and Callers 7 Entry Clerks 4 Watchmen, Loft Men, Elevator Men, etc 6 Carpenters and Repairers 2 Engineer i * These replies are reprinted as received from business houses. 112 Commercial Education Figures from other business organizations show approxi- mately the same ratios with a single exception, that of a bank, where the greatest proportion of employees serve in clerical capacities. TRANSFERS IN BUSINESS Do commercial employees begin in the clerical position and transfer into other departments? Evidence is strong that such a transfer is not the usual procedure. From the replies of business men the following are offered as typical answers : *' If he enters the office it would be most desirable to know bookkeeping. If in the store, merchandising. We employ women stenographers." " We employ experts in the three subjects mentioned, but a knowledge of stenog- raphy and typewriting is necessary only to those employed in that department." " We do not make it a condition, in the case of young men entering our employ, to be familiar with stenography, typewriting, or bookkeeping, unless they are specifically employed to do one of the three kinds of work." 1 The objection may be raised that the statistics presented above deal only with large business organizations, and that facts relating to small businesses are not considered. It is safe to assert that the same ratio of clerical work is fairly constant whatever the size of the business may be. It is admitted that a boy entering a small business where he will be called upon to perform varied duties will need to have some facility in clerical arts; but he will need more to have in addition other training if he is to be as generally useful as possible. If an individual, unaided, could carry on one complete business, the percentage of his time devoted to the different activities of commerce would approximate the proportions indicated in the examples above. The major efforts of this individual would be in the competitive department of the business; and, if he could acquire by 1 See Appendix, page 167. Commercial High Schools 113 training facility in but one business operation, the essential art would be buying and selling, not keeping books. EVIDENCE FROM THE VOCATION BUREAU OF BOSTON The Vocation Bureau of Boston, in a recent bulletin (1912) dealing with the subject, "The Department Store and Its Opportunities for Boys and Young Men," presents a suggestive body of confirmatory evidence. Extract from pages 8 1 and 82 : " The most usual lines of promotion and transfer for boys may be best shown by actual examples in one of the large stores, among those investigated, for the month of July, 191 1, there being from one to six cases of each of the following: Floor boy to retail office; floor boy to shipping room; office boy to stock boy; office boy to time desk ; errand boy to inspector ; errand boy to truckman ; stock boy to teller ; inspector to retail office; inspector to mail order department; inspector to receiving room ; inspector to stock boy ; inspector to examiner; inspector to busheling room; inspector to adjustment office ; truck to salesman ; truck to inspector; truck to office ; stock boy to salesman ; elevator boy to salesman ; elevator boy to salesman in the bedding sec- tion. To this may be added a few cases of young men during the same time and in the same store : Salesman to floor superintendent; cashier to retail office; assist- ant buyer to buyer in the hosiery department ; salesman to overseer of juvenile help; assistant buyer of silks to be manager of a millinery house of an outside firm; from the stock office of the store to the Department of School Supplies of the City of Boston, through a civil service examination." There are several instances of transfer here from the cleri- cal side of the business to other functions, but these illus- trations do not show that initial entrance into the clerical 114 Commercial Education side of the business is the essential or usual prerequisite step to liberal business opportunities, which is the present mis- taken assumption of most commercial teachers. COMMERCIAL EDUCATION FOR GIRLS The burden of the evidence above deals with the boy situ- ation, but there is solid ground for the inference that a simi- lar condition exists with respect to girls. The deduction is proper that familiarity with clerical processes is not a pre- requisite for general commercial employment. Clerical training for the girl is more appropriate because a much larger proportion of girls find employment in clerical posi- tions, but clerical training for girls is not a preparation for the larger proportion of opportunities in business houses. THE SCHOOL TRAINS CLERICAL EMPLOYEES CHIEFLY The reason why school principals conclude that clerical training is most desirable from the character of the requests of business men is because commercial schools have ac- quired a reputation for training clerical help. When the business man wishes a clerk he applies to the " business " school ; when he wishes a boy or girl for other departments of his business he does not so apply. One of the New York City principals makes a proper inference in the following: " In placing boys in positions after they are gradu- ates, our experience has been that the largest demand is for boys equipped with stenography and typewriting; the next largest for those who are accurate in figures; the third for those with general horse sense ; and, lastly, for bookkeepers. Such facts seem to justify the theory that typewriters are mainly in demand, but this might be met by the statement that, if business men knew they could get from us graduates who, without stenography and typewriting, are fitted for more important things, they would seek from us such young men." Commercial High Schools 115 It is entirely possible that every boy graduate of New- York commercial schools might enter business in a clerical capacity, and that subsequently the majority might transfer to other and more promising departments; and yet the position maintained in this report remains true ; because the schools as yet train but a small proportion of the pupils who go into business. The historic example of a Cortelyou who became a cabinet member by reason of his knowledge of stenography has led too many educators to conclude that the royal road to success lies along the same path. Studies in business organization made in connection with this report ^ show a range of thirteen per cent to nineteen per cent engaged in clerical work, and that transfer from clerical departments to other departments is unusual. The evolution of success is usually within the department of original entrance; that is, the boy who enters the book- keeping department advances in that department, and the boy who enters on stock usually becomes a salesman. The chances of a high grade of remuneration in the clerical de- partment, except at the head, are relatively less than in the competitive side of business, and the likelihood of up- ward growth is relatively less. If we should adopt Dean Schneider's classification of occupations as energizing and enervating,^ clerical training will certainly come closer to the second, though probably not at all to the degree which is found in industry.^ THE NARROW AIM OF PRESENT DAY COMMERCIAL EDUCATION It is a fair inference that commercial education with its present limited objective is aiming at the preparation of boys and girls for approximately fifteen per cent of the demand for commercial employees. This fraction repre- * By the New York Chamber of Commerce and Boston Chamber of Com- merce, see pages 109-112. 2 See his report. • See Chapter IV, page 73. ii6 Commercial Education sents an important and integral part of business needs. Be- cause it is the lesser part, it should not be neglected. As indicated on page 103, this part is done well, and we can suggest little in the way of improvement. WHERE THE MAJORITY OF THE BUSINESS RECRUITS COME FROM What about the other eighty-five per cent of commercial employees? From what kind of training do beginners in the other departments of business come ? We do not know definitely. The answer to this question could not be under- taken within the limits of this investigation. We shall suggest on page 135 of this report how further evidence bearing upon the question may be secured, but the following facts and surmises are suggestive. First, it must be ad- mitted that in many businesses a certain proportion of posi- tions cannot have appropriate training in a secondary school because of the immaturity of high school pupils. The large percentage of college graduates who enter business each year shows how certain positions are filled. Again, the number of commercial schools of collegiate grade is be- coming considerable, and the graduates of these institutions enter business very rarely in clerical capacities. THE STANDARDS SET BY BUSINESS MEN Question one of the letter of inquiry sent to business men has a bearing upon the question now under consideration. Business men, as a rule, do not set educational standards even for clerical employees, although for a clerical position specific clerical ability is often sought. For all other posi- tions, which constitute about eighty-five per cent in the average business house,^ only general qualifications are indi- cated, such as good appearance, good family, good creden- * Pages 109-112. Commercial High Schools 117 tials. The following- are some typical answers to question one : " No. Each applicant stands on his own merits, but it goes without saying that a well educated young man al- ways has the preference." " We have no exact educational standards. We examine applicants in elementary arithmetic and spelling. Naturally we give preference to applicants w^ith the best educational equipment, but very often our beginners (boys of sixteen and seventeen, girls of seventeen and eighteen years of age) have only a grammar school training." " Juniors are engaged by reason of personal appearance, aptness, and general intelligence. It often hap- pens that graduates are not as bright nor as intelligent nor as adaptable as those who have not graduated." Again we present results from Pittsburgh as corrobora- tory evidence : "Of those replying, twenty-eight per cent set no edu- cational standards; forty per cent prefer high school graduates (three per cent of these preferred high school graduates to college graduates) ; fourteen per cent are of the opinion that the more education the better; eight per cent require only common school education; six per cent prefer commercial education; one per cent prefer technical school education; one per cent require * brains,' not * diplomas ' ; one per cent consider prime requisite ' congeniality.' * I would not overlook the most essential of all requisites, and those are good deportment and personal tidiness, which are of the utmost impor- tance and carry great weight.' " We infer from the opinions of business men two things : 1. That clerical training is not a prerequisite for em- ployment, except for clerical positions, nor at present is any other kind of specific commercial training sought as an alternative. 2. As far as the testimony of business men goes, the ii8 Commercial Education results are mainly negative ; there has been no clear formu- lation of principles to guide commercial schools. It is likely that, even in the case of clerical positions, the majority of beginners enter without preparation and are trained in the business houses. For, while clerical training aims at about fifteen per cent of the openings, by no means do the special schools fill this proportion of the places. So of necessity the great majority of business positions are filled by boys and girls who come from elementary schools, the general, manual training, and classical high schools, pri- vate schools, and colleges. It is significant that business men do not point out any superiority of the commercial school product over the general school product. We can- not escape the conclusion that the non-commercial schools have a larger influence in the sum total upon business than do the special schools, and it is an open question whether or not the general school is not giving at present more appro- priate training for the major business needs. The pupil in the general high school does not get false impressions con- cerning business demands; he is not led to believe that clerical ability is the one essential, and in applying for a posi- tion he does not seek office work as the only business oppor- tunity. The issue raised here will be constructively dealt with on page 140 of this chapter. It is evident that business men have had no choice of an alternative, for commercial schools have not offered any- thing but clerical work. During the past five years there has been a marked development of schools of salesmanship con- ducted within stores, and correspondence schools of the same nature. Both illustrate, as far as they go, the growing conviction that other and more important functions of busi- ness must have appropriate training. COEDUCATION IN COMMERCIAL EDUCATION The principle of coeducation in business education as car- ried on at present in general high schools deserves some Commercial Hi^h Schools 119 comment in passing. The significant fact observable in Mr. Chatfield's figures is the specialization of occupation by sex. Business men confirm this fact by the frequent statement, " We employ women stenographers." Clerical training is more appropriate to the tastes and capacities of girls. They succeed better in it, and find employment with this equipment more readily. Coeducational commercial schools, as stated above, testify that boys drop out faster than girls. Here is a typical answer from school principals : " Initial ratio of boys to girls is 2 to 3 ; at the end of the course the ratio is I to 4 or 5." The boys of the High School of Commerce of Boston, which has the double advantage of being a sepa- rate school (no girls), and having a course of study of a character not exclusively clerical, persist in attendance on the average better than boys in general schools, e.g.. High School of Commerce, Boston, annual loss of membership, 13.46 per cent (1906-10) ; English High School, Boston, 16.7 per cent (1907-10); Central High School, Detroit, 17.6 per cent (1905-10); East High School, Cleveland, 17.4 per cent (1905-10). AN EXPERIMENT IN SEGREGATION OF THE SEXES In one general high school in New York City (Bryant), an experiment has been made during the current school year in segregating the sexes in commercial courses. Following is the reply of the principal under date of March 19, 1912 : " Referring to yours of the 13th instant, I beg to say that before the segregation of the sexes in our commer- cial department forty-one per cent of the boys who en- tered would leave before the end of the first term. Since we have made a commercial course adapted to the requirements of boys, only eight per cent leave during the term, and of this eight per cent seven eighths leave the commercial course to enter the regular four-year course." 120 Commercial Education While this experience seems to be a strong endorsement, the experiment has been carried on for too short a time to base positive conclusions upon it. Economic, social, and sentimental reasons still tend to keep many high schools coeducational, but it is well worth while in New York City to inquire further into the principle of segregation. For the purpose of effective commercial education, we maintain that the segregation of the sexes is of vital importance. COURSES OF STUDY IN NEW YORK CITY We may now proceed to examine with some detail several courses of study in operation in New York City commercial schools. Courses of study can only be judged in the rela- tion of principle to practice. If the aims are challenged then the course of study exalting those aims cannot be approved. Let us examine several courses of study in the light of desir- able and of mistaken aims. Courses of Study of the Commercial High School, Brooklyn three-year course four-year course First Year / Hours Hours English 5 English 5 Business Practice (Arithmetic and Business Practice (Arithmetic and Penmanship) 5 Penmanship) 5 Commercial Geography 2 Commercial Geography .... 2 Biology 3 Biology 3 Bookkeeping and Correspondence 4 German or Spanish 5 Music I Music i Drawing 2 Drawing 2 Gymnasium 2 Gymnasium 2 Assembly i Assembly i Commercial High Schools 121 Second Year Hours Hours English 3 English 3 History 3 History 3 Stenography 5 Stenography 3 Physics or Chemistry 4 Physics, Chemistry, or Algebra . 4 Accounts 5 Language 5 Music I Bookkeeping and Correspondence 4 Gymnasium 2 Music i Drawing 2 Gymnasium 2 Assembly i Assembly i Third Year Hours Hours English 3 English 3 American History 4 American History 4 Stenography 5 Stenography 5 Law, Shop, or Drawing .... 3 Language 5 Accounts 2 Accounts 5 Typewriting 5 Music i Music I Gymnasium 2 Gymnasium 2 Assembly i Assembly i Fourth Year Hours English 3 Language 4 Typewriting 5 Law, Drawing, or Shop 3 Economics 3 Chemistry, Physics, or Geometry 4 Music I Gymnasium 2 Assembly i The Four- Year Course gives a thorough preparation for business and for life, and leads regularly to the Diploma of the school. It also fits those who desire it for higher study. The Three-Year Course is designed for those who cannot afford to take the longer time. It omits the study of a foreign language and leads to a Certificate. The courses are so arranged that at the end of the first year a pupil may change from the three-year course to four, or from the four-year to the three. Parents will be kind enough to indicate in the space below the course they wish their sons to take by crossing out the course or language which is NOT to be taken. 122 Commercial Education The aims of the four-year course are set forth in the first explanatory paragraph, and they are apparently two- fold ; namely, a preparation " for business and for life " and for higher institutions. The advantages of specialization are lessened in this double objective. The whole theory of spe- cial schools is to devote the major effort to some one aim. The attempt to include preparation for higher institutions is unfortunate. It was explained to the investigator that fit- ting for life was not an optional and distinct aim, but a con- comitant of the purpose of this school which, while fitting boys for business, gave general culture and equipment for citizenship. This is entirely praiseworthy, but it ought not to be necessary to assume that a proper vocational education does not contain within its own meaning these general as- sumptions. Fitting for life has long been stated to be the aim of general education; but the definition of the meaning of the expression has too often not been clear or satisfactory. The choice of subjects found in the course of study and the methods of teaching them in a special school intended to provide vocational (commercial) training for business is justified by New York City principals, as follows : first, some of the subjects must be of a general character, giving the material necessary for any well-informed person — such subjects as English, history, arithmetic; second, the methods involved in acquiring certain subjects are useful as a part of a general equipment — such subjects as mathe- matics, science, composition; third, other subjects must con- stitute a body of special vocational equipment — such sub- jects as bookkeeping, office practice. The course of study under consideration shows, to a de- gree, a comprehension of and adherence to these principles. Such a subject as English, while constituting a subject in- volving general values, still can and should be in a commer- cial school a specific kind of English for pupils selecting the vocation of commerce as an objective; for it is entirely possible that one subject may possess a twofold value, viz., culture and vocational training. A similar statement Commercial High Schools 123 will apply to other subjects, such as history, chemistry, and physics. The assertion that the course of study fits for higher institutions shows, in a large measure, that the voca- tional motive shares attention with another, the accomplish- ment of which is difficult and engrossing. An examination of college entrance requirements and state syllabi will bear out this contention. In the above course of study are found subjects which cannot be justified as requirements for any adequate reason, e.g., music for four years, drawing, and geometry. We can find no adequate evidence to show that stenography should be a requirement for boys in a commercial high school. Shop work with no bearing on the problems of commerce as an elective in a commercial school is out of place. Biol- ogy may be justified on the ground of its general value; but as fundamental commercial sciences physics and chemistry with special applications should be preferred. Biology is more aptly the science for agricultural education. The course of study is too choppy ; that is, there are too many subjects, and too few periods are assigned to each. This probably comes from the attempt to divide the aim of the school. We agree with the following opinion of the Committee of Sixty (High School Teachers' Associ- ation) contained in the official bulletin of March 16, 1912: " We concur in general with the present tendency in educa- tional theory favoring greater concentration upon fewer high school subjects. At present many of our students are required to carry six or more subjects at once. This leads to distraction, superficiality, and the violation of many prin- ciples of efficiency." In justice to the school under consideration, it should be mentioned that a number of subjects, e.g., chemistry, are made to conform to the vocational purpose of the school. One English teacher expressed himself as dissatisfied with the English course as tested by regents' requirements, and favored a different kind of English to suit better the needs of commercial pupils. The head of the department, how- 124 Commercial Education ever, was of the opinion that the academic EngHsh was of superior advantage. The principal of the school was en- tirely favorable to the opinion voiced in the criticisms given above. He says : " Our syllabi follow in English the regu- lar state and city syllabus ; in other departments we follow plans of our own, adapted to the special requirements of a commercial school. Our history is made largely social, in- dustrial, and economic. Our physics and chemistry are given but four periods a week, where the college entrance requirements call for five periods, and the work is made to turn largely upon industrial applications. Our mathematics is also necessarily below college entrance requirements, being given only four periods a week." The Commercial Course in Jamaica, Flushing, Newtown, Richmond Hill, Far Rockaway, and Bushwick High Schools FIRST YEAR English S German, French, or Spanish 5 ■ Commercial Arithmetic, i and 2 Physiology and Hygiene .... 5 Bookkeeping, Penmanship, and Business Forms, i and 2 . . . . 5 Drawing 2 Voice Training and Declamation i Music I Physical Training _2 26 Pupils wishing to defer the study of Bookkeeping until the second year may take in its place either Biology or Algebra. SECOND YEAR English 3 German, French, or Spanish S Bookkeeping 5 Stenography, 3 and 4 5 Typewriting 4 Business Correspondence 3 Physical Training 2 Music _]_ 28 Pupils not wishing to take both Stenography and Bookkeeping may sub- stitute for either of these Algebra or Chemistry. Commercial High Schools 125 THIRD YEAR English 3 German, French, or Spanish 5 Bookkeeping and OflSce Practice, 5 and 6 5 Stenography, 3 and 4 5 Typewriting 4 Commercial Law 3 25 Pupils not wishing to take both Stenography and Bookkeeping may sub- stitute for either of these Geometry or American History and Civics. This course is followed in the schools noted above and is closely similar to the courses used in the other general high schools offering three-year courses. It is interesting to note that pupils not wishing to take the vocational subjects of the course may substitute other subjects not vocational. If pupils take advantage of this option, how may it be claimed that they are pursuing a commercial course? One principal asserts that pupils practically never do take advan- tage of it in his school. The course is frankly clerical; it is pursued mainly by girls, who can best profit by it and who find the readiest market for clerical accomplishment, and it is defensible for them. It is not suitable for boys, a lesser number of whom are attracted by it ; the failure of boys to persist in it has already been noted. The general subjects, such as English and modern languages, are not related to the vocation, and very frequently no separate sections are maintained for commercial pupils. The course, on the whole, is better for girls than the course in the Commercial High School of Brooklyn is for boys. The requirement of commercial law may be questioned. The term is preten- tious and suggests a degree of maturity which cannot be assumed in the third year of the secondary school period. 126 Commercial Education Course of Study in the High School of Commerce, Manhattan COURSE OF STUDY The High School of Commerce, Manhattan first year Required Periods English 4 German, French, or Spanish 4 Algebra 4 Biology * (with especial reference to materials of commerce) . . 4 Business Knowledge and Practice ** 6 Drawing (second half year) 2 Physical Training * 2 Music _i 27 * Including Physiology. ** Including Local Industries and Government of the City of New York 2 Business Writing 2 Business Arithmetic, Business Forms and Methods . . 2 SECOND YEAR Required Periods English 3 German, French, or Spanish 4 Plane Geometry 3 Chemistry (with especial reference to materials of commerce) . . 4 History * (with especial reference to economic history and geog- raphy) 3 Stenography 3 Drawing and Art Study 2 Physical Training __£ 24 * First half year, Beginning of Nations to 1300 a.d. Second half year, Modem History to 1750. Electives Periods German, French, or Spanish 4 Bookkeeping and Business Forms 3 Business Arithmetic i Commercial Geography i Commercial High Schools i2y Required ™^ ^^ Periods English 3 German, French, or Spanish 4 Geometry and Algebra * 3 Physics 5 History ** (with especial reference to materials of commerce) . . 3 Drawing and Art Study i Physical Training 2 ' 21 * In the second half year, students may elect additional Stenography and Typewriting or Bookkeeping in place of the second course in Mathematics, or may give double time to Mathematics by omitting either Stenography or Bookkeeping. ** First half year, English and Colonial History, 1620 to 1750. Second half year. Modem History (England and the Continent), 1750 to present time. Electives Periods German, French, or Spanish 4 Bookkeeping and Business Arithmetic 3 Stenography and Typewriting 3 Drawing and Art Study 2 Commercial Geography i Required '°^™ ™^ Periods English 3 German, French, or Spanish 4 Economics and Economic Geography 4 History of the United States (with especial reference to industrial and constitutional aspects) 4 Physical Training _2 Electives Periods A Foreign Language 4 Advanced Chemistry 4 Economic Biology 4 Trigonometry and Solid Geometry 4 Elementary Law and Commercial Law * 4 Advanced Bookkeeping, Business Correspondence, and Office Practice 4 Stenography and Typewriting 4 Drawing and Art Study 4 Modem Industrialism i * Students who do not elect law in the fourth year may receive instruc- tion in Commercial Law in connection with Advanced Bookkeeping. 128 Commercial Education The course shows a broad scope intended to cover both " general culture " and training for business. It is open to the criticism of containing too many subjects with too few recitations per subject. Again, we do not approve stenog- raphy as a compulsory study for boys in any year. We seri- ously doubt the wisdom of compulsory music, drawing, and art. Plane geometry as a compulsory study in commercial schools cannot be defended, and the geometry and algebra of the third year are of more than doubtful value in such a school. The amount of compulsory algebra and geometry throughout the course is practically that of a college pre- paratory school, and this school is not frankly college preparatory. The High School of Commerce is the only school not fettered by regents' examinations, and the opportunity to establish a course of study more suitable to the special needs of commerce is consequently large. The course of study is stronger than that of the Commercial High School of Brook- lyn; but the school has not taken full advantage of its opportunities. In addition to the defects pointed out above, it should be noted that commercial geography as an elective one period per week in the third year could well be offered with more periods as a required study in the same year in- stead of algebra and geometry. Commercial law in the fourth year (elective) should replace history (required).^ The school syllabi show a commendable effort to embody the vocational purposes of the school. The general subjects, when possible, are made to possess a commercial value. For example, the aim of the instruction in modern languages is said to be " thorough grounding in the essentials of gram- mar; reading of representative German, French, and Span- ish prose; the acquiring of an active vocabulary; mastery of simple commercial correspondence. The aim of the course is to give the pupil a fair speaking knowledge, a good reading knowledge, and a familiarity with commercial Ger- * See footnote i, page 140. Commercial High Schools 129 man, French, or Spanish." Testimony from the principal is as follows : " The general work is intimately related to the fundamental work of the school, and for that reason has little in common with the general work of the academic high school. Every department has its particular problem, the task of making its work function in a genuine training for business." We conclude that the ideal set up in this testimony would be far more productive of results in a course of study more definitely vocational. TEACHERS IN COMMERCIAL SCHOOLS WITHOUT EXPERIENCE AND TRAINING As noted on page 100, the lack of teachers with commer- cial experience and sympathy is a serious matter. In the Commercial High School of Brooklyn, eighteen out of ninety-six are so-called commercial teachers — meaning teachers who instruct in clerical arts. The remaining teachers — seventy-eight in number — came from general lists designed to furnish teachers for academic high schools. It cannot safely be assumed that the majority of these teachers will acquire the vocational point of view after being assigned to the special school. Higher schools of commerce (college and university) have attained some prominence in this country, and it would seem probable that such schools could train sufficient teachers for secondary schools of com- merce.^ The requirements of Germany are suggestive as proper models. In that country teachers for secondary commercial schools are required either to be graduates of higher commercial schools or else to have actual commercial experience. REASONS FOR POORER QUALITY OF COMMERCIAL PUPILS Attention was called on page 97 to the relatively poor quality of commercial pupils (particularly in general high * See page 32. 130 Commercial Education schools), poorer in mental power, social grade, and in per- sonal character. A law of human gravitation probably ex- plains this phenomenon. Our commercial education at present trains only for the "enervating " occupations of commerce, corresponding in a rough way to the automatic work of industry. Commerce has its full amount of ener- gizing occupations — more perhaps relatively than has industry. But commercial education does not take cogni- zance of these opportunities; and as a consequence the higher type of individual, the energetic, forceful, and am- bitious boy or girl, does not pursue commercial education. There are other contributory reasons to the failure of the best pupils to select commercial education. Social prejudice is still strong against many forms of applied edu- cation. Teachers in the elementary schools, consciously or unconsciously, influence the brightest pupils toward what is considered more liberal education. Ambitious parents still see in the professions a better prospect than in business. Changes in this attitude are beginning. The overcrowding of the professions and the growing oppor- tunities of business are counteracting influences; the pre- ponderance of college men entering business is another significant sign. Commercial education can be made to appeal to all classes of pupils, but several specific things are immediately neces- sary to remedy present conditions. Commercial education must greatly expand its scope to embrace the larger oppor- tunities of business; business men must cooperate in many ways and must set standards and point their needs more specifically. It is also important that a large amount of in- formation concerning business opportunities must be made available for pupils, parents, and teachers. OBJECTIONS TO REGENTS' EXAMINATIONS Finally, a word must be said here as to the effect of re- gents' examinations on commercial education. The foremost Commercial High Schools 131 objection to the regents' examinations in this field is the fact that these examinations enforce and perpetuate a set of standards which are artificial, not real. The limitations of the present purpose of these examinations, and the desir- ability of adding other and more important aims, have already been pointed out. Further, a set of written tests, such as constitute the regents' examinations, do not test vocational efficiency, for the true test of vocational effi- ciency is the success of the individual in business; and a thorough system of following up pupils in business is a more appropriate test of vocational efficiency than any writ- ten test can be. But the teacher is held responsible for the success of boys and girls on written papers. The teacher's promotion to the highest grade of rank is judged in part by this standard. The natural inclination of the teachers is to disregard the real test in the business world and to exalt the artificially imposed standard. The investigator found evidence that the temptation is strong for teachers to drill pupils on past examination papers, to emphasize topics which are liable to be asked in the state tests. The danger is con- stant that coaching and cramming may take the place of instruction and the development of real power. Again, it is an open question whether written examinations really test educational achievements. Educators have never agreed that they do.^ The apparent reason w^hy commercial education has been subjected to the regents' examinations is due to the fact that commercial subjects have been classified as academic subjects, instead of vocational subjects. The state depart- ment does not demand examinations in agriculture, home science, and shop work, presumably because these subjects * In a paper before the Harvard Teachers' Association, March 9, 191 2, Clyde Furst, Secretary of the Carnegie Foundation, made the statement that an exhaustive study of the results of college entrance examinations showed that achievements in these tests have little relation to the records made in the preparatory schools and small relation to the grades attained in college. — The School Review, page 324, May, 1912. 132 Commercial Education are classified as vocational. The failure of educators to conceive commercial education as vocational in nature is the cardinal error in the whole matter. The further treat- ment of this matter will be reserved for Section III. Section III VOCATIONAL EDUCATION DEFINED We asserted in the concluding statement of Section II that the crux of the shortcomings pointed out lay in the failure to conceive commercial education as vocational edu- cation. What, then, is vocational education, and why is commercial education not vocational? We have adopted the following definition of vocational education : 1 " ' Voca- tional education ' shall mean any education the controlling purpose of which is to fit for profitable employment." The definition, however, is not so significant as the interpreta- tion of it. Certain forms of vocational education in several states are aided by state money. The definitions of voca- tional education in these cases are very specific, and ap- proved schools must fulfill the conditions laid down by the state authorities. In general, state-approved vocational schools must have a direct connection with the vocation taught. Teachers in the schools must have had actual experience in the vocations; there must be advisory committees composed of members representing the industries taught; the equipment must be suitable, and the selection of pupils must be made some- what upon the matter of fitness and adaptability. Courses of study must be formulated in harmony with the aim as defined; provision for cooperative and part-time work must be made. There is no admission of the principle of divided motives such as have been pointed out in connection with the New York City commercial schools. The vocational * Massachusetts State Laws, Acts 191 1, Chapter 471. Commercial High Schools 133 schools under the interpretation of the Massachusetts law must meet the needs actually discoverable in the industries aimed at. We have pointed out the discrepancy between^jcomnaercial — needs and commercial education. In a word,Ceducation is vocational in proportion as it meets the needs and condi- tions of the vocation. New York City commercial schools lack the vocational characteristics just so far as they fail to see and meet those needs. In a broad sense, all schools are vocational in that they aim at general preparation for participation in life's activities; but preparation for voca- tional life in a specific and comprehensive way is the essen- tial aim of vocational schools. NEW YORK CITY COMMERCIAL COURSES ARE NOT VOCATIONAL New York City's commercial courses are academic rather than vocational. The general subjects in the course are in most cases not related to the vocation; the specific voca- tional subjects cover only a part of the vocation, and the lesser part at that. Compared with the vocational industrial courses taken as a type, the commercial courses under con- sideration have so small a connection with commerce that they cannot be strictly classified as vocational. It is true that the pupils who have pursued these courses go into com- merce, but that fact does not make the courses vocational. The product of all the schools in any large commercial center goes into commercial pursuits, but this fact does not make the schools vocational. Approximately sixty per cent of the graduates of one of our large Eastern colleges go into commerce,^ but this institution cannot be called a vocational school. The failure of the teachers to conceive commercial work as vocational is well illustrated in the official bulletin of the High School Teachers' Association of New York * Studies made of the classes of 1901, 1904, 1905 of Harvard College. 134 Commercial Education City, March i6, 191 2. Here, under an excellent suggestion for a five-subject program, is found the designation of commercial subjects as optional with algebra, Latin, house- hold economics, mechanic arts ; that is, commercial work is just like an academic subject, to be pursued four or five periods a week in connection with other subjects having general or indefinite aims. One would not for a moment expect to train industrial workers by any such plan, and the attempt to train commercial workers is equally futile. THE COUNTRYWIDE MISCONCEPTION OF COMMERCIAL EDUCATION New York City is not the only city with a false or inade- quate conception of commercial education. Such a concep- tion is countrywide. The prevailing notion concerning commercial education may be seen in the printed proceed- ings of the National Educational Association, 1911 (pages 827 to 868). The important papers in the proceedings have the following titles : " Bookkeeping Fundamentals," " Teaching Typewriting for the Best Results," " Business English," " Commercial-Economic Geography," " Short- hand, Its Educational and Practical Value." Nowhere in the discussions does there appear the realization of funda- mental principles. None of the speakers seemed interested in the matter of whether or not commercial education is pointing in the right direction, to say nothing of whether or not it is hitting the mark. INADEQUATE FOUNDATION OF COMMERCIAL EDUCATION There are reasons for the widespread ineffective type of commercial education. Commercial education came into the public school systems of the country at an unfortunate time, at a time when it was pedagogically unfashionable for schools to have a vocational purpose. All subjects at Commercial High Schools 135 this epoch were idealized in order to make them yield what were considered cultural values. When manual training came into the schools, many people thought it would benefit industry. We now find it necessary to industrialize manual training if it is to serve vocational ends. It will be equally necessary to vocationalize commercial education, for com- mercial education has been conventionalized into a high school subject which gives " points " toward a high school " academic " diploma. The aims, means, and methods of commercial education have been subjected to no investiga- tions preliminary to adoption, nor to real tests as to pres- ent effectiveness in practice. Commercial education was originally conceived to be merely clerical training, like that carried on in business colleges, and that notion, largely unchanged, still persists. A BETTER PLAN Let us suppose that commercial education, like industrial education, had been delayed until the present time. Let us assume that state authorities in order to establish commer- cial education should appoint commissions to study the prob- lem and to report an appropriate plan of procedure. What would they most likely do, and what plans would probably be proposed? Without doubt the program of procedure adopted would be quite similar to that for industrial education. The plan adopted for state-aided schools in a neighbor- ing state are suggestive. In Massachusetts an investigation of the need of an industrial school in a community is made through a temporary commission, which consists of ^ " man- ufacturers and workingmen representing dominant indus- tries of the vicinity, of ladies of experience in social and industrial questions, and of members of the local school * Bulletin No. 3, 191 1, Massachusetts State Board of Education. 136 Commercial Education committee, together with the superintendent of schools." The problems to solve are in part these : " What is the need of industrial education in the community? What are the dominant industries to be served by the proposed school? What becomes of boys and girls leaving school at fourteen ? Which groups are to be reached by different forms of in- dustrial, household arts, or agricultural training? What part is the all-day school to play? the part-time (coopera- tive) school? the evening school?" The above method is recommended. Why should not such a procedure be advantageous in establishing commer- cial schools and in testing commercial schools now in opera- tion? The problem of industrial education is closely similar to the problem of commercial education. Each leads to useful occupation in the community. Training for the pro- duction of goods and training for the marketing of goods should be based on similar principles. An increasing num- ber of industrial corporations combine in one management both economic operations. There is no reason why one should be practical and the other academic. ADJUSTMENTS THAT COMMERCIAL EDUCATION MUST MAKE Commercial education to fulfill its function must make several important adjustments. Courses of study must be so planned that the general subjects shall be related to com- merce; teachers of general subjects in commercial schools should have had either practical business experience or train- ing in higher commercial institutions; and the more im- portant departments of business shoidd receive appropriate recognition. In the studies of business organization, referred to above,^ we saw that a large portion of business may be called com- petitive, i.e., buying and selling. In the study of the depart- * Pages no, III. Commercial High Schools 137 ment store organization we saw that forty per cent of the whole force are employed in the active, creative function ' of business. Commercial schools must train for this need. Clerical training does not train for the buying and selling of goods. BUSINESS MEN HAVE NOT SEEN THEIR RESPONSIBILITIES Again, commercial education must establish working re- ^' lations with business houses — a partnership in which each does its share, the school in giving proper theory, and the business house in offering opportunities for practice. The problem of proper commercial education will not be solved until the business man admits and assumes his responsibil- ity in the matter. Cooperative arrangements are no more impossible in connection with business houses than in con- nection with factories, and there is no reason why the manufacturer should show recognition of responsibility to the extent of shouldering part of the burden of educa- tion and the business man expect the state to assume the whole function. In fact, there is but one philosophy of vocational education: differences should be found only in details. Because the public school has hitherto assumed the sole burden of commercial education, commerce has felt no responsibility for it. But the experience in vocational (industrial) education points strongly to the general con- clusion that the school unaided cannot deal effectively with the problem (see Dr. Schneider's report). Business men will need to go through the evolution of thought which is leading the manufacturer to assume his share in industrial education. For reasons of efficiency, expense, and expe- diency, commercial training will need to be divided between the school and the business house. Business, like industry, formerly had a system of apprenticeship which will need to be reestablished in some form of cooperation with the schools. In the meantime the schools must not wait ; a plan 138 Commercial Education which is immediately possible must be undertaken ; and prac- tical cooperation between the school and business must be constantly aimed at. DIFFICULTIES IN THE WAY OF BETTER COMMERCIAL COURSES It is true that trained teachers and suitable textbooks are not now available, that we have no satisfactory standards of work. There never will be these teachers nor the essen- tial means of instruction unless we make a beginning, and we have too long delayed the attempt. Five years ago the materials of industrial education were unorganized, and no teachers were available. The energy of states and in- dividuals has done much in the short intervening time; a markedly successful beginning has been made, and the essential materials for effective industrial education are beginning to appear. A vigorous beginning of improved commercial education is equally possible in the next five years. The important thing is the conviction that the com- mercial education we now have must be thoroughly reor- ganized and improved. NEWER TYPES OF COMMERCIAL SCHOOLS — HIGH SCHOOLS OF COMMERCE The creation of high schools of commerce in the large cities of the country shows a beginning of the realization of the principles maintained in this report. Unfortunately, these schools, as a rule, have not broken away from the clerical traditions which have obsessed commercial educa- tion. In the following pages we present two courses of study which are suggestive of what is needed. Commercial High Schools 139 Course of Study for a Boys' Commercial School (4 years) FIRST YEAR Periods per Periods per Week of Home Week of Preparation Recitation English (related) *..... 4 5 Commercial German, or Spanish, or French (to be pursued for four years; to be selected after one month in school) 4 5 Penmanship, ist half; Business Knowledge and Practice, 2d half 4 5 Physical Geography,^ % of year; Physics/ ^ of year 4 5 Mathematics (Commercial) 4 5 Assembly (talks by business men) i 20 36 No electives. SECOND YEAR English (related) * 4 5 A Modem Language. (See ist year) 4 5 Bookkeeping 4 5 General History,^ % year; Commercial Geography, Kyear 4 5 Mathematics (Commercial) 4 5 Assembly (talks by business men) i 20 26 No electives. THIRD YEAR English (related) * 4 5 A Modem Language. (See ist year) 4 5 Chemistry (Commercial) 4 5 Typewriting I Assembly (talks by business men) i Economic History 4 5 Local Industries 2 16 23 * These general subjects are understood in each case to be treated in rela- tion to commerce. 140 Commercial Education Periods per Periods per Week of Home Week of Preparation Recitation Elective — One of the following subjects required: Bookkeeping 4 5 Stenography and Typewriting (to be pursued 2 years) 5 6 Plane Geometry 4 5 Advanced Commercial Arithmetic (Special Com- mercial Problems) 4 S Drawing (Commercial Design) 3 FOURTH YEAR English, ist half (related); Civil Government, 3d quarter; Commercial Procedure,^ last quarter . . 4 5 A Modern Language. (See ist year) 4 5 Economics 4 S Bookkeeping, unless taken 3d year as elective (in- cluding Arithmetic and Penmanship review) ... 4 5 Assembly i Lectures by business men, Advertising, Salesman- ship, South America, Business Procedure, Eco- nomic Resources of the United States 2 16 23 Elective — One of the following subjects required: Merchandise, Salesmanship, Business Organization . 4 5 Bookkeeping, Accounting 4 5 Stenography and T3T)ewriting (continuous elective) . 5 6 Chemistry, Applications to Commerce 4 5 Drawing (Commercial Design) 3 The above course of study is not offered as a finality, but as one that is practicable under present conditions and promises a possibility of development away from the cleri- cal instruction of the past toward training for the larger as- pects of business activity. In the course of time the group (fourth year) named "lectures, etc.," should grow to a more defined subject given the full time during the fourth * Such aspects of commercial law as may be valuable and comprehensible to students of high school age. Commercial High Schools 141 year. This course of study does not compel exclusive at- tention to clerical subjects, though there is opportunity by means of electives for boys to get as good clerical training as has been offered in the past. The general tendency of the course is to direct the boys' attention toward the active, competitive side of business. By means of electives in the fourth year, opportunity is given to specialize in one of the three major functions of business, viz., merchandising, ac- counting, secretarial work. Along with the pursuit of the above outlined course all students should undertake appren- ticeship work in stores ; they should be employed on Satur- days, Mondays, during holidays, or by means of some other part-time arrangement. Theory without practice is unprofitable. Cooperative Arrangements Between Schools and Business Houses We recommend the beginning of cooperative plans be- tween commercial schools and business houses. We present no argument for the desirability of such cooperation be- cause objections are not so apt to arise over its desirability as over its practicability. Successful experiments are now carried on, e.g., in Boston, where boys work during the long vacation period, on Saturdays, and during the Christmas and Easter holidays. The definite week-and-week plan charac- terizing industrial education has not been widely attempted. It is probable that commercial education will find some other arrangement more profitable. The best plan can be discov- ered only by experiment, and experiment should begin. No one has attempted yet, apparently, a part-time plan for girls ; the difiiculties here are probably not greater than for boys, and the need of such a plan will become increasingly apparent. For a girls' clerical course we commend the one found in the Washington Irving High School as most effective. This course has the advantage of concentration upon voca- 142 Commercial Education tional subjects in the second and third years. The course can be improved by requiring general subjects to be related to the vocation. Exemption from regents' examinations would make this easily possible. Washington Irving High School Course of Study of Three Years FIRST YEAR Required Periods English 5 Commercial Arithmetic 5 German, or French, or Spanish, or Group II, or Group III, of second year, and additional drawing 5 Drawing 2 Domestic Science and Art 5 Physical Training, including Physiology and Hygiene 2 Music I Declamation and Voice Training i 26 SECOND YEAR Required Periods English 5 Physical Training 2 Music I Declamation and Voice Training i Drawing 2 The Modem Language chosen in the first year may be continued during the second and third years as an alternative for Music, Declamation, and Drawing in the case of those who select Group I, Group IV, Group V, and Group VI. Second and Third Years (Stenographers and Typewriters) Stenography, Typewriting, Bookkeeping, Penmanship, Spelling, Office Practice 19 THIRD YEAR Same as Second Commercial High Schools 143 Merchandise and Salesmanship for Girls We recommend that a course of study similar to the above with the subjects merchandise and salesmanship as a vocational group be established in connection with the Wash- ington Irving High School. The school, by reason of its location in the business district, seems to offer a favorable opportunity for such an experiment. A large number of girls find employment as salesgirls ; this employment prom- ises opportunities of comparative attractiveness.^ The fail- ure of the school system to supply education for the training of salespeople has compelled large retail stores to institute schools of their own, e.g., John Wanamaker. It is quite probable that the stores would enter into a cooperative plan with the schools, whereby this training could be more effec- tively carried on. Separation of the Sexes in Commercial Education We recommend, in general high schools, the segregation of the commercial pupils into a commercial department. This department should reproduce as nearly as possible the separate special commercial schools, and the sexes should be separated for efficiency and for vocational reasons. The boys should pursue a course as nearly as possible like that of the best special commercial schools for boys, and the girls should be given a course founded upon the best models for girls. The city of Cleveland has a high school of commerce for boys and girls ; but the sexes pursue different courses, each suited to the needs of the sex.^ There is no more rea- son for the same courses for boys and girls in commerce than there is for the same courses for boys and girls in in- dustry. One of the city high schools (Bryant) is following a plan of segregation like the plan recommended above.^ 1 Bulletin No. lo, Girls' Trade Education League, 6 Beacon Street, Boston. 2 Further information contradicts this statement. See Chapter I, page 7. ^ See page 119. 144 Commercial Education Elective Commercial Courses The question has been raised as to whether or not pupils taking general courses without a particular objective should be allowed to take incidental commercial courses — such as a year in bookkeeping. As long as the principle of election in high schools is maintained, it will be illogical to deny such privilege. An incidental commercial course taken in high school does not mean commercial training; a pupil with this equipment offering himself to a business house as a product of specialized training will damage the cause of commercial education. Undoubtedly much of the criticism of business men on commercial schools has been due to ex- perience with such inadequately trained boys and girls. It is evident that a boy who has pursued a course or two in manual training is not fitted for industry, and it is equally evident that a commercial subject or two does not fit for commerce. Our general recommendation for specialization, for segregation, and for concentration suggests a general modification of the elective system in high schools ; but we will not press this point further than to state that vocational education cannot be effectively undertaken under the prin- ciple of election of studies as generally applied today. Evening mid Continuation Schools A report on the efficiency of commercial education would be incomplete if it did not deal with the problem of evening and continuation commercial instruction. An excellent ex- position and summary of this subject was made by Dr. John L. Tildsley, principal of the DeWitt Clinton High School, in an address before the New York Chamber of Com- merce.^ Mr. Tildsley quotes Mr. Chatfield's figures, show- ing that there are 400,000 boys and girls between the ages of fourteen and eighteen in New York, of whom less than 150,000 are enrolled in schools, public and private. Approx- 1 Monthly Bulletin, Chamber of Commerce, March, 191 2. Commercial High Schools 145 imately 250,000 boys and girls are not under day school influence, and it is certain that the major portion of the number do not attend evening schools. A very large part of this total of 250,000 could profit by commercial instruc- tion. The City Superintendent of Schools advised ^ the sub- stitution of day continuation schools for the present evening schools affecting children coming under the compulsory attendance law. This suggestion is in entire accord with our recommendations, but we desire to emphasize the fact that day continuation schools should be planned to include those between the ages of fourteen and eighteen, and that evening schools be made available for all over eighteen. This plan has proved practicable in Germany and seems easier of control and organization than any other plan. Mr. Tildsley recommended that commercial continuation schools should be conducted by the Chamber of Commerce. Here we differ. Education has grown to be a function of the state — not only traditional education, but all education which is necessary for the welfare and benefit of the state. Continuation schools of all kinds promise to be effective and integral parts of the general educational machinery. Pub- lic opinion has not in the past recognized the now evidently enlarged scope of public education. Conviction of the need of continuation schools is growing, and support and expan- sion will necessarily follow. Cities of this country are un- dertaking the problem of continuation schools with success and promise — witness Boston and Cincinnati. Commercial education in the evening schools of New York has long been carried on. Large numbers of pupils ^ are enrolled, and the success attained has been such as to justify, with our recommendations as to continuation schools, the retention and expansion of the work. Mr. Tildsley ^ mentions some of the obstacles of evening schools as follows : " The greatest obstacle to the success of even- * Monthly Bulletin, Chamber of Commerce, March, 191 2. * Report of the City Superintendent of Schools, 191 1, pages 140-142. * Chamber of Commerce Bulletin, March, 191 2. 146 Commercial Education ing school work in this city is the great fluctuation in the attendance of the pupils. Our business hours are long; the distances to be traveled great. The will power neces- sary to induce pupils to attend evening courses on four nights a week for one hundred and twenty nights, from eight to ten o'clock, is found only in the exceptional boy. Busi- ness education cannot thrive on a forty per cent basis of attendance of those registered." A thorough investigation of the evening schools could not be undertaken by us, but a brief discussion of evening commercial instruction is appropriate in this report. Commercial work in evening schools in New York City is quite similar to that in other large American cities. The work is almost wholly clerical and without most of the liberal features found in day-school courses. There is a lack of gradation of students with respect to age, previous attainment, and capacity, a condition which makes for in- effectiveness and loss of membership. As is usual in even- ing schools throughout the country, there is found a consid- erable proportion of pupils who come with serious purpose, with a realization of their needs, and with an ambition for improvement; but this class forms the winnowing from the chaff, for the major portion of evening school pupils do not remain and do not profit in considerable measure by the instruction offered. Improvement can come by a closer adaptation of the work to the needs of pupils. The establishment of continu- ation schools, recommended above, would be of substantial advantage toward better gradation. The principles of the specialization of work for closer adaptation of courses to commercial needs is no less essential in evening commercial schools than in day commercial schools. Again, the analogy of industrial evening schools is suggestive. One state ^ re- stricts attendance upon evening classes to those over seven- teen years of age, who are employed during the day in in- * Bulletin No. 3, Massachusetts State Board of Education, 191 1. Commercial High Schools 147 dustries to which evening courses are closely related. The strongest features of the plan are the subdivisions of the courses which meet specifically the needs of the varied groups of industrial workers. The present undifferentiated and wholesale method of commercial instruction carried on in evening schools forms an example of ineffectiveness in marked contrast to the plan above suggested, which emphasizes individual needs. Proposed Evening Commercial Course in the High School of Commerce A course which promises substantial improvement for one class of commercial workers has been proposed by Prin- cipal Sheppard of the High School of Commerce. The aim of the proposed course is to supplement the work done in day commercial courses by offering advanced work similar to that of higher schools of commerce, such as the Wharton School of Philadelphia, or the New York School of Com- merce, Accounts, and Finance. The course promises oppor- tunity for training for fundamental business needs and does not restrict work to the clerical arts. This course should be offered without delay. The needs for adequate commercial instruction will be met, as we have pointed out, by differen- tiation of effort ; and the course recommended promises to meet effectively the needs of several large and important classes of commercial workers. Failure of the Public to See the Need of the Extension of Evening and Continuation Schools Any comprehensive conception of the larger problem of supplementary education, whether in evening or in continu- ation schools, whether for industrial workers or for com- mercial workers, does not at present exist in this country.^ * Principal Tildsley has pointed out this fact in the following terms: "In this country we have not begun to realize the importance of this work. We 148 Commercial Education In New York there are 10,000 commercial pupils in day- schools, a somewhat smaller number in evening schools ^ — a total which forms an insignificant figure when compared with the possible number of persons who enter commerce each year, and who could profit by commercial instruction of some kind. In the country at large, in spite of the fact that we spend large sums for education, we have scarcely progressed beyond the ideal of literacy in education; that is, a conviction that each individual should know how to read and write and perform simple numerical operations. We have not yet come to the efficiency ideal of education, i.e., the ideal that each individual should be rendered as competent as possible through training. Our compulsory education law shows this, for we compel none to attend school after fourteen ; ^ we have no compulsory continua- tion schools except in Ohio and Wisconsin, for those who have entered business or industry. A large expansion of many forms of applied education, involving day, continua- tion, and evening schools, will be necessary before it can be said that we are dealing with the issue in a way at all com- mensurate with its importance. When we really begin a comprehensive program of procedure, we must deal with both industrial and commercial education by the same meth- ods, because there is fundamentally but one problem to be solved. have nothing to offer in comparison with the work done abroad. The Board of Estimate of this city groans over the sum spent for evening schools. This year it has refused to increase the appropriations for the growth of these schools, and it has cut out an appropriation of $15,000 for opening evening sessions of the High School of Commerce. Munich, in 1906, with a population of half a million, spent $275,000 for continuation schools of all kinds. New York spent last year $700,000. If it had appreciated the importance of this field of civic activity as did Munich, it would have spent over two and a half millions." — Chamber of Commerce Bulletin, March, 191 2. * City Superintendent's Report 191 1, pages 140-142. * Persons in New York State between fourteen and sixteen not employed are required to attend day school. Commercial High Schools 149 One-Year and Two-Year Commercial Courses Returning to the day school problem, we recommend as instances of proper differentiation commercial courses of one year and of two years, in addition to the three-year and four-year courses now offered. Those who cannot attend for the longer period should have the best possible oppor- tunities accessible to them. The need of shorter courses has been appreciated by the New York High School Teachers' Association, and set forth specifically in the report of the association (1910-1911) : ^ " Many of the boys must necessarily leave a school of this sort before the end of the course. It should then be planned so that certain results should be accom- plished at definite stages. This need not be placed be- fore the boy in a way that will tend to encourage him to leave before the necessity really arises. The par- ticular aim of the first year should be to make good office boys; of the second, to make capable clerical assistants; of the third year, to make efficient stenog- raphers. The object of the fourth year is to help the boy locate himself in the special field of commerce and industry that he has selected." Courses with specific objectives are to be commended, but we cannot agree that the proper aims have been stated in the above recommendations, especially for the second and third years. Facts have been presented in this report showing that other aims for boys are more appropriate (pages 115, 116). Intermediate Schools and Commercial Courses Elsewhere will be found a report on the intermediate school (Dr. Bachman's report).^ Many pupils entering ^ High School Teachers' Association, 1910-1911. Sub-committee on a Preparatory Course for boys entering commercial life, pages 85-86. 2 This report also is published as a part of the School Efl&ciency Series. 150 Commercial Education intermediate schools will pursue studies which will lead to commercial occupations as an outlet. Some pupils will not continue their education longer than the period com- prised in this type of school, and others will continue one or more years in the high school commercial courses. It will be highly important, in case intermediate schools with com- mercial courses are established, that commercial instruction appropriate to the age, capacity, and vocational needs of the pupils be determined. What this will prove to be we are not prepared to state. Subsequent investigations must deal with this important question; but we do recommend that special "field" studies into actual business conditions be an important element of any plans that may be adopted. Need of a Special Commercial School in Jamaica While investigating commercial courses in the Jamaica and Richmond Hill high schools, the attention of the in- vestigator was directed to a recommendation of one of the principals that a special commercial high school should be located at some point convenient to both districts, into which the commercial pupils of each school could be collected. We approve this recommendation, believing, as the general tenor of our report indicates, that specialization, segregation, and concentration make for increased efficiency in all lines of vocational work. SUMMARY AND RECOMMENDATIONS 1. The contemporary conception of commercial education in New York City should be largely expanded, and should emphasize the larger and more important aspects of com- mercial activities, such as merchandising, salesmanship, busi- ness organization, and advertising (see pages 115 to 119). 2. A temporary special commission should be created to consist of commercial teachers temporarily detached from teaching service, who should cooperate with business ex- perts, and examine into business conditions in relation to Commercial High Schools 151 commercial education. A commission of this kind will dis- cover a more adequate basis for commercial instruction, whether in day, evening, or in continuation schools, than the city now has. The partial studies presented in this report regarding business conditions affecting commercial educa- tion can with profit be carried on until clearer and more positive conclusions can be reached. 3. There should be a council of chairmen of commercial departments in high schools to study, weigh, and recom- mend to the Department of Education ^ improvements in courses and methods pertaining to commercial education; in other words, there should be a definite agency, officially recognized, for the organization and unification of educa- tional experience in the field of commercial education. 4. The sexes in commercial courses should, wherever pos- sible, be separated. The training for each sex should be differentiated in accordance with the differing tastes and aptitudes of boys and girls, and the different vocational demands which each will meet. 5. The regents' tests for commercial subjects and related academic subjects should be abandoned to give larger scope for objective standards drawn from the business world (see page 130). 6. Teachers of academic subjects in commercial courses and in special commercial schools should possess, either through actual business experience or through theoretical study, or both, a knowledge of and a sympathy with the proper ideals of commercial education. To this end there should be separate eligible lists for all teachers giving in- struction in commercial schools and courses (see page 129). 7. There should be a supervisor of commercial work for all grades, whether in intermediate schools, evening and continuation schools, or in day schools. There should be a unified policy throughout the whole range of the work. The divided attention of a number of general supervisors, some * Board of Superintendents and Board of Education. 152 Commercial Education concerned with day schools and others concerned with even- ing schools, can yield neither unified policy nor comprehen- sive treatment. 8. Special teachers should be appointed to act as field agents for commercial schools and courses. These teachers may be called vocational assistants and should perform duties in connection with commercial education similar to those of " coordinators " in connection with industrial edu- cation. (See Dean Schneider's report.) 9. Cooperative relations between commercial schools and commercial houses should be sought and established. Teachers and business men must unite upon a common plan. That New York City business men realize the importance of such cooperation is shown by the Chamber of Commerce in appointing a special committee on commercial education. Other commercial bodies should adopt a similar policy. Business men must share the burden of education with the state, and must share this burden in a direct way by giving opportunity for participation in practice during the period of school training. Advisory committees of business men (with advisory functions only) should be established to guide and counsel commercial schools on the one hand, and, on the other, to awaken business men generally to a sense of their responsibilities with respect to commercial educa- tion. It is only by an equal partnership of the schoolmaster and the business man that the problem can be solved in a comprehensive and effective way. Up to the present time the schoolmaster has borne more than his share in the attempted solution of the problem. Appendix APPENDIX LETTERS RECEIVED FROM NEW YORK BUSI- NESS MEN IN ANSWER TO QUESTIONS SUB- MITTED IN CONNECTION WITH THE NEW YORK SCHOOL INQUIRY ^ Question One In the selection or promotion of your employees in any de- partment of your business, do you set any educational stand- ards, such as graduation from grammar school, high school, or college, as a requisite for employment ? To what extent ? Answers to Question One " As a rule we select them from High School pupils." " Graduation from grammar school." " We do not require our employees to be graduates, but prefer they should be." " No." " No." " No, but from experience believe we should." *' No." " No, but we prefer school or college graduates." " Graduation from Grammar School is a requisite. We have a preference for High School graduates — especially Com- mercial High School. A course in a good business college is a distinct advantage." " No." " In the employment of young men in any department of our business we do not set any specific educational standards but much prefer that they should be graduates of gram- mar school, high school, or college." 1 The answers have not been edited as to style, capitalization, etc., so that the evidence may appear in its original form. 155 156 Commercial Education " Certain positions in our Company require more education than others, and to this extent inquiry is made as to for- mer schooling." " We have no exact educational standards. We examine appli- cants in Elementary Arithmetic and Spelling. Naturally, we give preference to applicants with the best educational equipment, but very often our beginners (boys of sixteen or seventeen, girls of seventeen or eighteen years of age) have only a grammar school training." " No." " No. Each applicant stands on his own merits, but it goes without saying that a well educated young man always has the preference." " No educational standards are set in regard to my factory employees. Office employees, however, are required to have had at least a grammar school training." " We do not set a positive standard as the personality is of more importance than the standard. We give decided preference to the educated applicant." " No, but applicants for employment on the clerical force of the New York Life Insurance Company are required to pass an examination." " We take our employees generally at a young age, after hav- ing graduated from Grammar School and give them the opportunity to work up." " In our engineering work, and in the more technical kinds of work involved in the construction and maintenance of the telephone plant and in the management of the forces who handle the traffic, we aim to have men graduated from college engineering courses. " It might be well to explain that we maintain schools for splicers, instrument setters, inspectors, operators, and salesmen, where employees are carefully trained in these respective lines of work." " For Junior and Minor positions we give practical tests in arithmetic as to quickness and accuracy in figuring, hand- writing as to form and legibility, judging both as to neat- ness of work, as well as correctness and expedition. Gen- erally we have found graduates of the ordinary public school more proficient than those coming from the so- called parochial schools." Letters Received in Answer to Questions 157 " For certain specialized work, graduation from or training in the higher scholastic grades is preferred or necessary. It is, of course, difficult to state any fixed educational stand- ard in the employment of men, as no organization can, with success, limit itself to the employment of those meet- ing such standards. For ordinary work or in the employ- ment or promotion of younger people, the grammar and high school graduations are not necessary, although preferred." " Upon engaging boys we make it a point to get active and trustworthy ones who can write English correctly." " Yes. Preference given to men trained in European Commer- cial School and American High Schools or Colleges." " Yes, excepting.* " * College education we find detrimental in busiijess. Too conceited and unwilling to commence at the lower round and learn the business." " No." " Only in exceptional cases do members of the Firm make engagements. " Our records would not give information in regard to Educational Standards. " Juniors are engaged by reason of personal appearance, aptness, and general intelligence. It often happens that graduates are not as bright, nor as intelligent, nor as adapt- able as those who have not graduated." " Where possible, we give preference to applicants who have had a High School or College education." '* We require graduation from public schools and give pref- erence to high school and college graduates, because we believe that the additional years of schooling give them a better foundation on which to build." " Grammar School, preferably High School ; college gradu- ates, as a rule, will not stay. (Chief essentials : Penman- ship, grammar, spelling, mathematics.)" " I prefer high school graduates, as such graduates are at about the age where they are willing to adopt our business methods, and are not too old to be willing to begin at the foot of the ladder." " Other things being equal, we select men with such technical 158 Commercial Education education as tends to fit them for the special line of work which they choose." " No." " General intelligence and personality." " The applicant must of course make satisfactory showing of necessary qualifications for the position sought. If he is a junior his address and appearance of intelligence are my guides, assisted by information as to the education he has had. It is indispensable that he be well grounded in the three R's." " Although I regret to say that business men generally make little distinction when they engage boys in the lowest capacity, errand boys and runners (at five or six dollars a week), still if they have had a good grammar school edu- cation and graduated, they can more readily find places and promotion generally more likely." " No." " Applicants are always asked for details as to their education, but we have no fixed standard for a requisite." " No." " No arbitrary rules. For our selling force we endeavor to secure such men as have had training in chemistry." Question Two Do you encourage employees to continue their education, either by attendance upon night schools or by any other means ? By what methods? Answers to Question Two " We advise it, but do not insist." " By advice and otherwise." " In employing children under sixteen years of age we en- courage their attendance upon night school, particularly if they have not graduated from the Grammar-school." " We make no special efforts in this direction." " Yes." " When we find a young man with proper ambitions we do all we can to encourage him to advance his education." Letters Received in Answer to Questions 159 " Night schools." " Yes, by advice, however, only." " Yes, in a general way." " No." " We are always desirous that our employees should, as far as possible, continue their education either by attendance at night school or private instruction." " The Company as a whole does not. Sometimes individual heads of departments may do so. The Company approves of its employees continuing their education." " Employees are encouraged to attend night schools and be- ginners are often advised to do so. The clerks encourage themselves, as the value of an education is very keenly felt in the strife for advancement in position. We have encouraged attendance upon University Extension Courses, and have a number of clerks pursuing studies especially in Actuarial Mathematics and in Accounting. " To more exactly meet the needs of employees, we have established classes in English (Grammar and Correspond- ence), in Arithmetic and in Algebra. The English classes, of which there are three, each meeting for one hour each week for a term of thirty weeks, meet a felt need, and we have been able to enroll less than half the number desiring to take the Course. The teachers are specialists from the Staff of the High School. Our purpose is to bring the trained teacher into contact with our clerks for immediate practical benefit." " Yes." " Yes. Night Schools." " Employees are not directly encouraged in any special manner to continue their education, but, at the same time, they are not discouraged in that regard ; in other words, * It 's up to them.' " " Yes, if there are any employees with sufficient ambition. We have had one or two who pursued certain branches at night school with success, but they were extraordinary exceptions. Few are able or willing." " The Company has no general systematic method for this pur- pose. In some parts of the office, however, where the work is more or less technical, as in the Actuary's Department, i6o Commercial Education efforts have been made for a number of years past to encourage employees to devote their time, outside of the office, to studying Bookkeeping, the principles of Account- ing, Mathematics, and Actuarial science. Employees of the Actuary's Department who show aptitude are encour- aged to take the examinations of the Actuarial Society and are given assistance in such work." " They know, if they do not continue to educate themselves, particularly in business methods, they will have little chance to advance." "By the Company's schools referred to in ' i,' by the circula- tion of a Company newspaper ' The Telephone Review,' and pi other technical and business periodicals, and by a society known as ' The Telephone Society,' which meets monthly to discuss various phases of the business, the employees of the Company are encouraged to study vari- ous phases of the telephone business, and thus to fit them- selves for advancement in the organization. There is no general attempt to encourage attendance upon night schools or other outside classes." " Only on occasions where the incumbent indicates brightness and ability which with more and better training would fit him for a higher position." " The continuation of education by employees is naturally en- couraged by suggestion as to courses of study to fit them for positions higher in the organization, and by affording them the opportunity of attending night schools should their duties not be such as to ordinarily detain them to a time which would prevent their attendance." " We urge them to study and perfect themselves in German." "Look with favor on many young men who attend night schools." " Yes, if apparently they are ambitious, otherwise it is useless." " No." " Intelligent employees, in special cases, have been, and are, encouraged to continue education by night school and sometimes by day school, and we have in such cases paid for education, but it is not part of a system. " For several years we had a school in the store mainly to teach Writing, Spelling, and Arithmetic, but as it was Letters Received in Answer to Questions i6i not in all respects satisfactory, it has been abandoned. Cost was not the serious consideration. " Everyone at present holding leading positions either as Buyer or holding important Office or other positions has been advanced from the ranks. " Merit, not educational standards, has been, and is basis of advancement." " We have no particular method in regard to encouraging em- ployees to continue their education after entering our serv- ice. This phase would depend wholly on the individual." *' In a general way only, and not by any defined methods. We have, however, recently given our employees the oppor- tunity of taking a course in the Sheldon School, half the expense being borne by us." " Left to their own discretion." " Certainly. By reading good books, attending lectures, and by studying financial and mercantile affairs. Benjamin Franklin said that he learned many things by asking ques- tions, and we encourage all our junior clerks to ask all the questions which come to their minds relative to busi- ness matters." " We encourage young men to study, to attend lectures and to form clubs or associations for purposes of mutual help." " Yes. We have a school known as the John Wanamaker, New York, Commercial Institute, composed of three schools. Two for boys and one for girls. Commercial Course." " Yes. Employees must comply with the wants of the busi- ness during business hours." " Except to impress upon our employees that promotion de- pends upon qualification, and the latter usually on dili- gence, I do not interfere except to approve where collat- eral study is voluntarily undertaken." " I generally advise young boys when they enter our office to attend night schools." " I have, where there was an evidence of study and applica- tion. Paying for courses in business colleges." " We encourage our employees to attend night schools and pay the expenses of some of them to attend the Y. M. C. A. courses, especially on real estate." " Yes." " Yes. Appeal to self interest." 1 62 Commercial Education Question Three Do you perceive any defects in the present business training given in our high schools? If so, what defects are most striking ? Answers to Question Three " Too many fads and finishing touches, and not sufficient at- tention paid to understanding the fundamentals." " No." " Principal defect we observe is handwriting." " Reading, Writing, Spelling, Grammar, particularly, neg- lected." " Writing very poor. Adding a lost art." " The lack of training in logic and debating, and arithmetic (practical) and the languages." " The most apparent deficiency of the average graduate is his inability to write a good business hand." " Know nothing about methods." " We are not familiar with what business training is at pres- ent given in our high schools." " We receive very few high school graduates, our clerical force seldom having gone beyond the grammar school. Our professional force are usually college graduates." " The main defect we find in the High and Grammar Schools is the lack of concentration on the essentials for business, namely, Spelling, Arithmetic, and Writing. This affects the High School because it affects the rudimentary grades. The Evening High Schools in this city realize the situation and are giving especial attention to these subjects." " Inability to express their views clearly. Narrow views." " I do not think the training in writing and arithmetic, either in the High Schools, private schools, or the colleges is what it should be. We have many college graduates apply * The blank space in this and succeeding cases shows that no answer to the particular question was attempted, although the writer had answered other questions. Letters Received in Answer to Questions 163 to us for positions, who cannot write a good hand or spell properly." " I do not feel in a position to answer this question, except perhaps to say that, in my opinion, English grammar, composition, and spelling are rather neglected." " We have a good opinion of our high school training." " Our examinations show that many of the applicants who have spent one, two, three, or four years in the high schools are not well grounded in the fundamentals, i.e., Spelling, Handwriting, and Arithmetic." " Pligh School training appears to be satisfactory." " Our experience with the average high school graduate would indicate that their training has been defective in the fol- lowing directions : " (a) The ability to analyze a set of conditions, or once the conditions are analyzed to draw reasonably logical conclu- sions; expressed in another way — ability to think logi- cally and clearly. "(b) The ability to express themselves clearly either verbally or in writing." " Cannot specify under this heading." " From general observation, it might be said that the business training in high schools in clerical work is defective in that it is not sufficiently modern. The pupil is trained in forms and methods which are perhaps antiquated. This appears when he makes his first attempts in actual busi- ness, as he is generally unable to identify the technical terms of the different forms of his organization with the names of those he has used in schools. There also seems to be a fairly general lack of the rudiments of English, writing, and mathematics." " Lack of thoroughness ; bad spelling." " Entire lack of proper commercial training." "The essentials, i.e.. Writing usually poor; Spelling, Arith- metic, and Grammar also." As above stated, the Firm does not engage employees, and those who do, do not feel qualified to answer, but think that in the Public Schools, sufficient attention is not paid to Thorough Instruction in writing, arithmetic, and spelling." 164 Commercial Education " We do not feel that we have sufficient information at our command to enable us to reply intelligently to this question." " From a commercial standpoint we should judge that the average high school gave scant attention to business training." " Poor Penmanship." " There seems to be too much attention paid to some of the so-called higher branches of study, to the detriment of the simpler branches such as spelling, geography, English grammar, and legible writing." " My impression is that our public schools should give much more attention to manual and industrial training." " Cannot express an opinion owing to our not being sufficiently posted in regard to the present methods in use to justify us in criticising the same." " I have made no study of this subject." " An absolute lack of foreign languages and little knowledge of commercial matter." " Lack of acquaintance with bookkeeping." "Recent graduates seem to be totally unfamiliar with business methods." " Lack of practicability." *' Lack of manual training." " No observations." Question Four Do you advise the study of foreign commercial languages? If so, please check in the order of importance the following: German, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese. Answers to Question Four " Spanish, French, German." " Decidedly yes. Spanish, French." " Knowledge of foreign languages is not necessary in our business, — but would encourage the study of German." " Yes, in order of importance as named by you." " French, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese." " Not necessary but desirable — German preferred." Letters Received in Answer to Questions 165 " German, French, Spanish." " German, French, Spanish, ItaHan." " Spanish, German, French." " We most decidedly beheve in the importance of the study of foreign commercial languages, and for American com- merce in manufactures we put Spanish and Portuguese first, for the reason that as far as the Rio Grande River on the North-American Continent, and extending to Cape Horn, the languages used are Spanish and Portuguese, and as all the countries concerned are non-manufacturing countries, they furnish a greater market for the United States than other countries of the world. Consequently, a knowledge of Spanish and Portuguese is of the utmost importance. French is valuable also, and Italian to some extent, while German is of no particular value except for doing business with Germany." " For our business, no language is needed except English." ** The study of foreign commercial languages is of benefit in our business only as a mental discipline. Whatever trans- lating needs to be done is easily cared for. Perhaps the order in which you name the languages shows the relative importance as well as any." " Not to the detriment of general business training." '* Yes. I think you have named the languages properly in the order of importance, but I hardly think I should include Portuguese." " German and Spanish, I think, are the most important of the languages mentioned." " Spanish is very useful in our country, having in view de- velopment of Trade with South America and West Indies." " No particular advantage." ''German, Spanish, and French, in the order named, is most desirable." " Considering only the requirements of this Company, the study of commercial languages is not especially helpful." *' Consider German of great importance and to come first, Por- tuguese second, as this is the most prevalent among the commercial elements of the South American countries." 1 66 Commercial Education " The study of foreign languages seems advisable, due to prob- able further development of foreign trade, and in the order named — Spanish, German, and French. Italians and Portuguese, in this hemisphere particularly, are more or less familiar with Spanish." *' German, Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese." " French, German, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese." " Yes. German, Spanish, French." " French, Spanish, German, Italian, Portuguese." " Not for our business. There are always some in our employ who from birth speak German, French, Spanish, or Ital- ian; such are given positions where they can be called upon when necessary. It is seldom that those who study foreign languages in public schools in New York are able to put such study to practical use. " Foreign languages are better taught in Europe. If as well taught here as abroad, they would be valuable, but only to those who intend making practical use of their knowledge. One serious trouble is that children have too many studies. Schools of Languages would supply above deficiency." " For our special business we advise the study of Spanish, German, French, as relatively named." " We most assuredly do advise the study of foreign languages, and from a commercial standpoint consider Spanish and Portuguese the most important, with French, German, and Italian in the rotation named." " Yes. German, French, Spanish." " Better to abandon the study of foreign languages except in the case of students who have an aptitude and a desire to adopt one of the professions as a vocation." " This almost wholly depends upon the position to be filled, and is necessary or not as governed thereby." *' French, German." " Yes, in the order numbered. Spanish, German, French." " Spanish, French, German, Italian, and Portuguese are all valuable acquisitions in the order named, but for the mere smattering that a book education can give, without prac- tice, I should not delay the subject's entrance into business life, but would encourage him to take up whichever he found most advantageous in his leisure hours." Letters Received in Answer to Questions 167 " Spanish, German, French, Italian, Portuguese." " Would depend on the larger nationality employed by the em- ployer. As a merchant with the trading nation." " German, French, Spanish." "German ist; Spanish 2d; French 3d." " German, Spanish, French, Italian, Portuguese." Question Five For a young man entering your employ, which of the follow- ing clerical subjects is it necessary to know: stenography, typewriting, bookkeeping? (5a) Would a study of the fun- damental principles of business, such as merchandising, adver- tising, salesmanship, business organization, be more valuable to young men than specialization in clerical subjects? Answers to Question Five "Bookkeeping. A general knowledge is very desirable; but there must be some specializing." " Stenography — Typewriting. Both if engaged for same. Bookkeeping — if engaged for same. (5a) Yes." " The principles of business such as merchandising and sales- manship would be most valuable in our business." "Neither. (5a) Yes." "It depends. Bookkeeping most important. (5a) Yes." "Not necessary to know any of the above. Prefer a young man with a good public school education, proper home training, and good common sense — and we will train him in our ways." "If he enters the office it would be most desirable to know bookkeeping — if in the store, merchandising. We have women stenographers." " Depends on the position he is engaged for. Stenography — Yes and no. Typewriting — Yes and no. Bookkeeping — Yes. (5a) Yes, most decidedly." " We employ experts in the three subjects mentioned, but a knowledge of stenography and typewriting is necessary only to those employed in that department. A knowledge of bookkeeping is valuable. A study of the fundamental principles of business should be encouraged." 1 68 Commercial Education ** Stenography — No. Typewriting — No. Bookkeeping — No." " We do not make it a condition in the case of young men en- tering our employment, to be familiar with stenography, typewriting, or bookkeeping, — unless they are specifi- cally employed to do one of the three kinds of work. We believe, however, that a study of the fundamental prin- ciples of business, such as merchandising, salesmanship, business organization, etc., is infinitely more valuable to young men going into business than specialization upon clerical subjects." " We employ no male stenographers. Occasionally we can use a business school graduate in our bookkeeping de- partment. The study of business principles certainly ought to be of value." " It is not necessary to know any of these subjects. It may be explained that as a rule clerks begin with us as boys and gradually advance from primary to more difficult clerical work. A lad of ready intelligence will grasp the salient features of the work, and if he feels the need of further instruction will go to Evening School or get it in some other way. Boys and girls pick up typewriting with easy facility. In recruiting our typewriting departments it is preferable to train the clerks from the beginning. Ste- ;iographers, of course, must learn stenography at the school and have considerable business experience before we find them of much value to us. A knowledge of Book- keeping is always of value, but as a general rule it is not essential for our work. A study of the fundamental prin- ciples of business, as a High School course, should be of great value for its broadening effect." "Bookkeeping. (5a) Yes, I do not think bookkeeping should be neglected." " It depends on what position the employee is to occupy ; if he is to be a stenographer, he must naturally know ste- nography and typewriting, and if a bookkeeper, bookkeep- ing. For the majority of positions in our employ we should prefer that he had a knowledge of the other sub- jects named by you, although they are not essential, as we take applicants only in the lowest positions and train them ourselves." Letters Received in Answer to Questions 169 " It all depends upon the position the young man is to fill. Of course it is to one's advantage to have a knowledge of stenography, typewriting, and bookkeeping. It seems to me that a study of the fundamental principles of business would be more advantageous to young men, because a knowledge of those principles would better enable them to learn and intelligently understand clerical subjects." " Fundamental principles as you specify are very much more important than stenography — but bookkeeping should be understood by all. Stenography is very useful to assist progress." " Knowledge of Bookkeeping and the fundamental principles of business would be of assistance in our office work." " With us, the work is divided in departments, and it is not necessary for the bookkeeper to know shorthand or type- writing, but the typist must know stenography, etc. It will always be of considerable advantage to acquire by study the fundamental principles of business, unless it is intended by the employee to remain in special work, such as typewriting, bookkeeping, cashier, etc." " A knowledge of stenography and typewriting would be nec- essary in filling certain positions where a male stenog- rapher was desired. In our particular business a knowl- edge of bookkeeping as it is generally taught in high schools might in some cases be helpful, but hardly ever absolutely necessary. A study of the fundamental prin- ciples of business, such as merchandising, advertising, salesmanship, and business organization would in general seem to be more valuable to young men than specialization upon clerical subjects." " In large organizations clerical work has to be considerably specialized just as the business has to be specialized and departmentized. The relative value therefore of sten- ography, typewriting, bookkeeping, etc., depends upon the special department or service which is expected. Of course the broader one's education and knowledge is the more fitted to move from one position to another as oppor- tunities or openings occur. " Merchandising, advertising, salesmanship, business or- ganization are all fruitful fields for specializing. 170 Commercial Education " While good salesmen have to be bom rather than bred, education in this line is one of the most fruitful fields and promising opportunities of any in commercial life. " Good salesmanship is more difficult to obtain than almost any other service in manufacturing and commer- cial enterprises. It involves ability, the right tempera- ment to judge of human nature, great energy and buoyant spirit, and a philosophic temperament. Snubs, rebuffs, and disappointments must be taken without lessening enthusi- asm and hope. While these qualities must have a natural basis in the individual, they can be greatly developed and cultivated by education and experience." " Bookkeeping, or its essentials, is the usual subject most necessary for a young man to know in entering business. In an organization of many diversified departments, how- ever, it cannot be stated that this is the usual essential, as there are many other classes of labor called for. " Speaking of the average young man, as most young men have to take the first chance of employment that is offered, it would seem that a specialized education in one particular line would limit his opportunity for such em- ployment. Under the conditions, it would seem advisable to devote his education to clerical subjects, inasmuch as there is a universal field for this class of labor. In this way he comes in contact with almost all of the other de- tails of an organization, or is in a position to observe the workings, and effects, of the special lines of advertising, salesmanship, etc. He may then, at a school, if interested, learn the fundamentals and fit himself for the opportuni- ties which may present themselves in his organization or in any other. This, of course, bears only upon a young man who has no other resources." " Stenography and Typewriting are desirable. (5a) No." " Stenography — No. Typewriting — No. Bookkeeping — Yes. ( 5a) Merchandising — Salesmanship — Business organization most important. "Bookkeeping (accurate)." " Depends on the position he is going to occupy." " In our store, women occupy such positions. We have had bright young people especially taught. (5a) Difficult to i Letters Received in Answer to Questions 171 answer in form in which question is put. All the subjects are interesting. That which would interest one, would be useless to another." " Young men entering our offices as stenographers must also be competent operators on the typewriter. Bookkeeping is a distinctly separate branch. The fundamental prin- ciples of business would naturally be more valuable to a young man than the specialization of a clerical subject." "If we want a stenographer or a bookkeeper, we cannot accept anyone not familiar with stenography or bookkeeping. We have found, however, that bookkeeping as taught by some of the ' business colleges ' is very unsatisfactory. Generally speaking, the study of fundamental principles of business is in our opinion of more general and far- reaching advantage than the specialization upon clerical subjects." " Stenography — No. Typewriting — No. Bookkeeping — No. (5a) Yes." " I do not require a knowledge of stenography, typewriting, or bookkeeping from a young man entering our employ. At the same time a knowledge of all or any would of course be of great service to a clerk. I would urge every young man to specialize on some one subject if he can find a practical instructor. Many teachers are altogether theoretical and have no practical experience." " This obviously depends upon the young man's selection of his work or profession; this determined, it is clear that he should then fit himself by special study." " A good common school education is essential. Business or- ganization, etc., is being taught by many firms." " Depends upon nature of position. (5a) Yes." " Typewriting is of very little value without stenography. To- gether I regard them as a valuable asset to a young man. He should also have a fundamental knowledge of book- keeping." " Stenography — No. Typewriting — No. Bookkeeping — Yes . (5a) I think it would." " Stenography and Bookkeeping. (5a) The young man can best equip himself from experience. There is no school that can qualify him equal to experience. It is practice, not theory, that perfects." 172 Commercial Education ** Stenography — Some. Typewriting — Yes. Bookkeeping — A little. (5a) Yes." " Bookkeeping. (5a) Yes." " Stenography — No. Typewriting — No. Bookkeeping — No. (5a) Yes." Question Six Should schools of commerce attempt to train for particular types of business; e.g., merchandise, transportation, banking, etc.? Answers to Question Six " Yes, and give opportunities for aptness in any line best adapted to." " No." " The lines of education would probably be good for other lines of business." " General training preferable." "Yes." *' No. Do not believe it possible to get the proper teachers. They lack experience of the right kind." " I think so." " Yes, most decidedly." " They should teach the fundamental principles of business, and, following that, train for particular types of business." " Yes." " We decidedly believe that schools of commerce should train for particular types of business, but not to the exclusion of the study of the fundamental principles of general business." *' General principles might be useful, but the man who comes up through the ranks, if he has the other necessary quali- ,fications, usually is the most useful." " Schools of Commerce should be both practical and general in instruction. They should be at once Technical schools, giving the exact instruction needed by the pupils in their particular lines of business, and Business Men's Univer- sities, imparting a broad culture in everything pertaining to business and commerce." Letters Received in Answer to Questions 173 *' Yes, most important." " We think that the training referred to would be valuable to any young man entering business." " The principle of Universities in training students for the practice of Law, Medicine, Engineering, et cetera, should, I think, also apply to schools of commerce in training young men for particular types of business." " Owing to the vast differences between the above branches, it would be very advantageous to teach them separately if the proper teachers are available." '' If well grounded in subjects mentioned in previous questions, training for special branches could come later, even after business experience begins." " A general business education will always be of greater ad- .vantage than training for particular types." " It would hardly seem practicable for Schools of Commerce to train for particular types of business, for example, mer- chandise, transportation, banking, etc., but a study of the broad, fundamental features of such types of business as in * 5 ' would seem to constitute a very valuable training for young men." " Yes. Schools of commerce, especially in the higher training, should specialize, without, however, overlooking that a grounding of general commercial knowledge should first be instilled before the specializing process begins, other- wise the result may be a pedant or narrow person unable to grasp or judge of essential surroundings and general influences as they affect specialized endeavor." *' The establishment of classes for certain types of business with which all or the greater part of other businesses must come in contact, such as those mentioned in question, seems advisable in the night or higher schools, as the young man may familiarize himself with conditions ahead of his present position, or he who may not be in the em- ploy of any one of the specialized departments may learn the necessary details for use in his organization, the idea being to fit the already employed man to broaden and in- .crease his knowledge for the benefit of his own house." " Not necessary in our line of business." 174 Commercial Education " Classes in each department would be important." " No. I think neglect in the essentials is the principal trouble, as when a boy determines what he wishes to do for a life work then is the time for him to qualify for that occupa- tion, but he wants in any event to have a good ground- work." " Yes." " Schools of Commerce should encourage a pupil to specialize on the particular type of business he may select." " No. A general business education should be given to serve as a foundation for the subsequent training, through prac- tical experience, in any special line." " Good idea, but practical experience is best." " I believe that the best training a young man can find is by actual experience and work in a commercial house, bank- ing house, or business institution. I think much valuable time is lost by youths in attending schools of commerce, and I do not favor providing such schools at public ex- pense. I believe that manual training schools would ren- der greater service than commercial schools." " Yes." " If the course could be made practical, yes." " No." " The best school of commerce is a well-conducted business office. Given the three R's, the basis of stenography and typewriting and the principles of bookkeeping, I would rather take the applicant than if he was a graduate from High School or a School of Commerce." " Unless a young man proposes to devote himself to a specific branch, I think it is wise that he should have a fair knowl- edge of all branches of commerce." " In general, yes. That the young man may have a proper interpretation of the special requirements of one class. Don't believe in multiplicity." " A student should be permitted to elect whether he would take a general course in business or a special." " No." Letters Received in Answer to Questions 175 Question Seven It is manifest that 'to fulfill its best purposes commercial edu- cation should keep in constant touch with the business world and advance with the evolution of commerce. What methods can you suggest of promoting such a relation between the pub- lic commercial schools and the business houses of the city ? Answers to Question Seven " Business men taking a more active interest, and being called into consultation more frequently." " Teachers should study business practically and not only theoretically." " Would suggest that the business men, particularly those who employ junior help, should from time to time be in com- munication with the Board of Education, that they may express their opinions from their point of view." " Have no specific suggestions to offer." " By occasional sending of circulars by commercial schools and colleges among the business interests." " Wide-awake, conscientious, and ambitious instructors will find ways and means of keeping in pretty close touch with the business world." " Unable to answer this question." " We entirely agree that it is essential that commercial education should be kept in constant touch with the business world and advance with the evolution of mercantile development, and the method we would suggest is that the principals of pupils or graduating classes should ascertain, if possible, from the various pupils the particular business they wish to adopt, and lists of such pupils should be sent to impor- tant houses in order that they may make a selection of such employees as they may desire, either to fill vacancies or to provide a reserve of young men to be gradually ab- sorbed as occasion may require." 176 Commercial Education " Frequent lectures from successful men engaged in the actual business being taught." " There is no better way than to study the requirements and necessities of the business of the city — the trained edu- cator analyzing the situation and arranging courses of instruction to meet the needs disclosed. Inquiries like the present ones are directly in line." " Yes." "I do not feel competent to answer this question." " One method, I would suggest, towards keeping Commercial schools in touch with the business world would be to have courses of lectures given to the students by experi- enced and practical men actively engaged in business." " I. By soliciting the managers of large corporations to ad- dress the pupils. " 11. By voluntary services on the part of the pupils offered to large corporations." " Inquiries by representative commercial bodies, such as yours, and subsequent conferences with professional educational authorities." " This will hardly prove practicable, except through lectures of experienced business men, before and for the benefit of teachers in the Schools of Commerce." " It would seem possible to promote a relation between the public commercial schools and the business interests of the City, by having lectures on business subjects delivered before the advanced classes of the schools, by men actu- ally engaged in various lines of work, by inspections of business places and plants of one sort or another. Stu- dents might be required to submit written reports of what they have heard or seen at these lectures or inspections. It might also be possible to assign to different students or groups of students the investigation of the main features of some particular line of business, the result of this in- vestigation to be embodied in a report ; such investigations could be directed by the instructor and an attempt made to have the cooperation of some one in the particular line of business affected." " I can see no way by which such a desirable contact between Technical education and Practical mercantile operations Letters Received in Answer to Questions 177 can be sustained unless the Commercial colleges can se- cure the cooperation of experienced leaders in actual walks of commercial life, by getting such representative men to agree to give talks or lectures at different times to the classes in the commercial schools. It might be possible to secure a given number of bankers (by that I mean both National and private bankers), leading manufacturers and merchants, to agree to give such addresses on practical topics, rotating from year to year in getting a new list so that it would not be burdensome upon any, and it would be well to include, if possible, in such addresses or lectures some of those men who are professional business organ- izers, economizers, and systematizers." The methods adopted at the different Y. M. C. A. schools, that of having talks and lectures by practical and success- ful business men for their specialized classes, seem to be fairly suited for the purpose of keeping the student abreast of the times. If this method could be extended to the schools in a way adapted to the understanding of the stu- dent, and also in a more advanced manner to the higher classes, the student undoubtedly would be kept more in touch with the developments of modern business methods. Young boys should not be expected to grasp details of business. The student must be older, and, if possible, trained to some extent by actual experience to benefit by the teaching of men who do not realize the limitations im- posed by inexperienced youth. "If the teacher of commercial education in the day schools were able, at certain periods, to enter into some business organization, and through experience in the actual work of such organization refresh himself and use the workaday knowledge thus gained in his teaching, the student would naturally be benefited by the broader view of the teacher in the consequent departure from practically all theory to some fact. This would, of course, require cooperation from the business men of the city. Perhaps it might also be suggested that each school have a library of the business forms in use by different houses. These forms would be up-to-date, but should not be beyond the capacity of the pupil, the selection to be made by the 178 Commercial Education teacher and the uses explained and their correlation to the forms used in schools illustrated. The young man attend- ing night school has more opportunities during his daily work of keeping himself in form as to the modem developments." " All we want is bright, active, and trustworthy boys who are thorough in their work and write English correctly; a knowledge of German is desirable." " Constant touch necessary with the development of daily busi- ness — a close relation with prominent men in each walk of business." " In our experience we have not found as a rule that commer- cial college education was of much consequence." " This question would be better answered by those that have been in touch with the situation, and by studying the sys- tems of Germany, Switzerland, and some of our own In- stitutions, where advance has also been made of late years." " We suggest that the Public Commercial Schools come more in contact with active business men. A course of lectures given by progressive, practical men engaged in active busi- ness would be valuable. We also suggest a consideration of the methods utilized by the Harvard Business School." " The public commercial school should make a systematic at- tempt to keep in touch with their old pupils and learn from their employers why they succeed or fail. This will en- able the school to choose studies and methods that tend to success and avoidance of failures." " By having the Board of Education include not only profes- sional but also business men." " I would suggest that competent and experienced business men be employed to lecture on commercial and financial topics, the lectures to be followed by a period of time sufficient to allow the pupils to ask questions regarding the subject matter. As I have already stated, I believe the privilege of asking questions is likely to result in the stimulation and encouragement of knowledge." "I regard Herman Schneider, Dean of the College of Engi- neering, University of Cincinnati, as one of the best Letters Received in Answer to Questions 179 equipped authorities on this subject and I commend you to him. He has done practical and, I think, very valuable work." ii >> " By giving courses of lectures on the growth of Commerce, its needs and requirements, and to stimulating the activity of the scholars to increase their knowledge and fitness for the opportunities that will present themselves in their future life." " I can add nothing to the previous answer." " I think that the Chamber of Commerce can be of great aid in establishing a system of cooperation between business firms and commercial schools whereby some certificate or recommendation by such schools would enable such stu- dents to readily find good positions at once in firms. Most banking firms prefer to engage German clerks (as edu- cated in Germany) who understand English, French (and occasionally Spanish), and who appear to have a knowl- edge of business methods, no doubt taught and enforced in the German high schools." " The commercial colleges in their teaching well illustrate the best methods. There the boy can decide the class he leans to and develop." "(a) Keep up a constant propaganda among the merchants of the advantages of commercial education. "(b) Let the Chamber of Commerce as representing the best business interests of the City grant diplomas and medals in a public way, showing great honor to the recipients and thus making same of considerable value." General Comments in the Letters Received For ordinary business, insist upon a thorough, practical knowledge of arithmetic even if higher grades of mathe- matics are abandoned. Learn to spell well. Handwriting should be plain and legible, not necessarily handsome. " Dictation or letter writing should be clear, definite, and well expressed, so there could be no doubt as to meaning. i8o Commercial Education " For foreign trade a good knowledge of Geography is very essential." " Would say that for the class of people employed in our busi- ness, — too much emphasis cannot be laid on a thorough education in reading, writing, and arithmetic. Many who apply to us, and that we have to employ, are sadly defi- cient, particularly in fractions, even though they have graduated from the Grammar-school." " The public schools and colleges, in cases where the students intend to enter a commercial career, ought not to be so insistent about the study of Greek and Latin. A good training in Commercial Law, Arithmetic, Grammar, and the Languages would in my opinion be much more beneficial." " Dear Sir: — "Acknowledging your circular letter of the 15th inst., would say, we seldom employ young men in this office, preferring to select bright lads fifteen or sixteen years of age, who can write a good hand; and who are ad- vanced in our service, to fill either clerical positions, or become salesmen; and oftentimes, the heads of different departments, and our branch offices. " If our public schools would attempt less, they would accomplish more in the writer's opinion; what I wish to express is this; that a lad who can write a good hand and who has been well schooled in spelling, is what we require most. " Bear in mind that my remarks refer to a Commercial establishment doing business exclusively in the United States." " The time is rapidly approaching when the needs of this coun- try for its agricultural and pastural products, will be equal, or more than equal, to the supply, the consequent result of which will be a great stimulus to foreign trade in manufactures. Therefore, we are inclined to lay special stress upon the importance of having the pupils in public schools taught the value and importance of our relations to foreign countries and the possibilities of commerce which lie therein." Letters Received in Answer to Questions i8i "Dear Sir: — " I enclose categorical answers to your questions as sub- mitted. Our business is of a kind where to a large ex- tent we must train our own employees. It is our principle to secure a capable head for a department and make him responsible for the successful execution of the work and it is the duty of the General Manager to see that the de- partments dovetail together. With a man at the head of each department and in most departments, with a capable assistant, we find it possible to use a great deal of cheap, clerical labor. " The effect of theoretical business training is hard to judge. Certainly a large number of those who receive a theoretical training do not seem to have profited much by it. Some young men apparently have in them the ability to grasp what is expected of them and to accomplish it. Others do not have this ability and apparently never get it. It is undoubtedly true, however, that a man is not necessarily a failure because he does not make a success of the first position in which he is placed. In our large institution, we do not find it necessary to get rid of an individual altogether unless he is chronically unwilling to work or unusually stupid. Usually, we find some place where he can do well his part of the work of the machine. " Studies that train the mind and make the individual capable of grasping situations in dealing with them, are in my opinion very beneficial for a young man going into business. The details of the business itself do not have to be learned in a day and the young man usually is able to assimilate them gradually after he has started his work." "If there is one weakness which shows above others, it is in my opinion, that too little attention is given to the study of the English language. The man of the future who cannot talk or write logically will be severely handi- capped. The man who succeeded in the past with little command of English will have a hard road to hoe if he attempts to succeed in the future with such a handicap. " Great tendency among young business men today to be unreasonable, as a class they are inclined to go to extremes, this is a fault of the American people as a whole. 1 82 Commercial Education " A business man oug-ht to have a little legal training, that he may realize there are two sides to every problem." " I answered these questions in a general way. In one depart- ment of our business we prefer young men with a college education, but as a rule, when we engage boys that begin at the lowest rung of the ladder, we look for such that are active and trustworthy, will do their work thoroughly, and can write English correctly. The last two qualifica- tions are the most difficult to find. The spelling of the applicants is as a rule very bad, and the great trouble we find with boys is their lack of thoroughness." " My experience is, that to obtain efficient men, in Banking, we must look largely for Europeans. They are the best trained in calculation, relating to Banking, and imbibe from earliest childhood, the thorough elements of a busi- ness training. As important as any other part of the edu- cation, is a correct knowledge of the English language. " This means a completed course of study in the High Schools, with great leaning towards a completed college course of three to four years." " I am personally clearly of an opinion that our schools make a serious mistake in not giving a boy the education re- quired in any large business and my experience is that a very large proportion cannot write a well written letter. We require each applicant to send us a written application. If you were to read them it certainly would be a great sur- prise to you to note the small proportion of even fairly well written applications, " The necessary essentials are sadly lacking and many recommendations we receive from teachers are a surprise to us. Apparently non-essentials are considered of the most importance." " Ambition is the great essential. The ambitious will en- deavor to qualify and will avail themselves of oppor- tunities. " To those who wish to enter Mercantile Life, a good education is helpful, and should be attained if possible. Studies should be those that bear especially on occupation it is proposed to follow. Letters Received in Answer to Questions 183 " A college course is not Essential for success in business. " College life gives polish and carriage and is of advan- tage socially; nevertheless, four years spent in College can often be better employed in studying the special occupation which the boy or girl intends to follow. It may easily happen that College life and studies will unfit the student for business life. " A good foundation in Reading, Writing, Arithme- tic, and Spelling, is absolutely necessary, and often neglected for a smattering of other important studies. " Trade and Commerce Schools are Desirable, both for college students and those who have not been able to pursue the higher branches." " Commercial schools should have an efficient employment bureau, with representatives who are in constant touch with the business world and positions should be obtained for the graduates without expense to them or to their employers." " Find what the young man has a special liking for or acquaint- ance with. If he is undecided, advise him to follow his father's occupation even to a trade." FORMS USED IN THE BOSTON INVESTIGATIONS The two forms on pages 184 and 185 were used in the inves- tigation conducted by the Committee of the Boston Chamber of Commerce, discussed in Chapter IV (pages 61 to 68). The three forms on pages 186 to 188 were used in the investigations conducted by The Women's Educational and Industrial Union, of Boston, in 1913-1914, discussed in Chapter IV (pages 53 to 61). 1 84 Commercial Education BOSTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Special Committee on Commercial Education VOCATIONAL HISTORY This Committee wishes to gather as many individual records as possible in order to have a broad basis of facts upon which to recommend commercial courses. NO ATTEMPT WILL BE MADE AT ANY TIME TO TRACE ANY RECORD TO ANY INDIVIDUAL. YOU ARE REQUESTED NOT TO SIGN YOUR NAME NOR YOUR FIRM NAME. I. Line of business — as i. Department Store? 2. Wholesale Groceries? 3- Insurance? 4. Or? (Please write your business on line above) n. How many years have you worked ? in. What is your principal duty ? Buyer of SeUer of Stockkeeper. Bookkeeper. Stenographer. Or ? (Please fill in your position) a. About how much per week does this pay you ? b. Please state briefly the work you first had, your pay in that work, and your principal changes or transfers. IV. What school training did you have ? a. Grammar grades ? years b. Public commercial high school course ? years c. Private commercial high school course ? years d. Public General high school coiu-se ? years e. Public Technical high school course ? years V. Have you made any use of the following subjects ? a. Stenography ? d. Penmanship ? b. Typewriting ? e. Mental Arithmetic ? c. Bookkeeping ? f. Any other school study ? If so, was it in getting your fiist job or have you used the knowledge in your work since ? VI. What subject would have been of value to you if you could have studied it in school? Please suggest any subject that you think it would be well to have taught, whether it has ever been taught in any school or not. PLEASE USE REVERSE OF SHEET FOR ANY REMARKS YOU WISH TO ADD NOTICE. — Please state whether this blank has been filled out by a man or woman. Letters Received in Answer to Questions 185 BOSTON CHAMBER OF COMMERCE Special Committee on Commercial Education Form of Questionnaire to be Filled Out by Personal Interview with Employers Line of Business Employing About Employees I. Do you require a grammar school training ? II. What education beyond the grammar grade seems to you valuable ? III. What are the better paying positions in your business ? IV. Are boys or girls who start in the office and prove efficient, in line for these better paid positions ? V. Does a knowledge of stenography and typewriting help a boy or a girl get into the better paying positions ? VI. Is there any training which could be given in school which would make your employees better fitted for their work with you ? VII. Do you find your applicants as well trained in the ordinary school subjects as seems to you desirable ? If not, what are the principal defects ? i86 Commercial Education I ss CO wgW OPO o iv. A. n^ fv, •-5| J-S --SI -S ^5 J3 ffl as W h-l S i 8 fV, S s !2 g i2 >i >^ V ja & A. 1 M g rt ^ CJ 1 3 & O o >. a ^ r3 ^ 60 c ^ *& o W r>- ^ a ^ *i CJ 3 >k -O ■'3 52 s >> >. a rt a ^ o w /v. -o JVj u "g (J *j c)5 e« ^ S .a> >, tij 0) >t > rt cj T3 j: a 1 a o s ji 1 >% & b3 g ■w >t ^ T3 .a ^ O •^ >o i2 V M O M o 1 1 t "§ < y > s m -s a o "H ji M c^ g 3 U3 m 2 tfl ^ g r\ w o C^ -§ cd =3 m oi H V i § ii •g C/5 bO fl •S H .y 3 (V. fS ^ a »-i ■tJ y rt -o g 'fl ^ o ■w w rt m 1 J 1^ ■3 o , 1 u & en o UM O !§ 2J u s ii ri "H 1 o .2 4 I ;? »^ 00 » O M M M 3 Oa- ^ -5.2 ^all K.a o a> O 73 O 3 22 a^ 11 ^^ Letters Received in Answer to Questions 187 •a '&. ■i3 •§. Q ^a 8 ^ al '■§ ^ 1 1 ~~ II 1 P4 •0 •^% ^ 1 'Cfi ; 1 IS 1 i-i § ♦3 i ^ wv— h g. a. 1 1 i ej .11 11 < 1 ^ 1 1 Q 1 kH fe H4 H OT .w ^ t> {[" 2 1 .2 1 T3 i ■J ^a _^ pq U4 t ^^ ' ^ .^ 1 1 03 "^ fl') 9 5^ ^ •-) P3 h 8^8 .. i ^ J3 SBS S » 1 '>> a 1 f2 1 « « « «*5 •«t ^ VO o f Si"? rt is t3 S .2 a o o W U U < .§ 5. 8 ll •a 2 i88 Commercial Education 11 o « SBg I/) o «« 00 Index I INDEX Academic work, and vocational rela- tion, 102; and vocational courses, 9; related, 3. Actual education in shop and school, 17- Adding machines, 58. Adequate equipment, desirable quali- fication, 35. Adjustments, of schooling to practice, 71; to be made by commercial education, 136. Age of employed, 8. Aim, narrow today, 115; of commer- cial education, 104. Appendix, 153. Appraisal as a basis, i. Arithmetic, mental, 66. Art, 19. Bagley,W.C., 88. Baltimore returns, 5. Barrows, Miss, 20. Beverley plan, the, 79. Bookkeeping, 92. Boston budget, 1,2; Chamber of Com- merce Investigation, forms used in, 1 83-1 88 ; Report on Commercial Edu- cation, 1914,53,61; Clerical School, 91; experiments, 82; High School of Commerce, 82; returns, 6. Brighton High School, 83. Bronx General High School, 96. Brooklyn Commercial High School, 95 ; Eastern District High School, 96; Special School for Boys, 96. Bryan, W. J. C, address of, 22. Bryant High School, 96. Budget, Boston, i, 2. Buffalo returns, 5. Bulletin No. 3, Mass. State Board of Education, 29. Bushwick High School, 96. Business men, bUndness of, 137; par- ticipation of, 72; testimony of, 106; ignorance of, 67; opinions of, 67. Business, organization, evidence drawn from, 109; recruits, where from, 116; world and commercial education, 13; its attitude, 14. Career motive, 39. Carnegie Foundation, 131. Census Board, figures, 109. Chamber of Commerce Btdletin, N. Y., 96. Chamber of Commerce, N. Y. Monthly Bulletin, 19 12, 144-145. Chambers of Commerce, aid valuable, 31- Character of pupils, New York City, 97. Charlestown High School, 83. Chatfield, G. H., 109. Chemical laboratories, expansion of. 42. Chicago returns, 6. City Superintendent of Schools, Re- port, 1911, 145. Civil Service, 19. Clerical employees trained by schools, 114. Cleveland returns, 4. Co-education, 27, 118. College and industrial standards, 47; professor, criticism of, 47; require- ments and vocational standards, 47. Commerce, welfare affected, 2. Commercial and academic divisions, 3. Commercial courses intensified, 3; in High Schools, 95; relation between them and the social and industrial structure, 28; educational inquiry in sixteen cities, 2; tables of re- turns on, 4-6; educational ques- tions on, submitted to superintend- ents, 3; education in, effective plan, 17; parentage of pupils enrolled, 3- 7; present needs of, 11; replies of 191 192 Index superintendents on, 3-6; what answers show, 7-1 1; special prob- lem today, 16. Commercial High Schools, 95; of Brooklyn, 96; or separate com- mercial course, 3. Committee of Teachers. Records in Business of Graduates of Public Schools, 1914, 53, 68. "Complete" high school, 22. Conclusions from the three investiga- tions, 70. Constructive proposals, 75. Continuation schools, 76, 144, 148. Cooperation, 72. Cooperative arrangements between schools and business houses, 141. Cooperative courses, 82, 83. Coordinator, the, 79. Corporation schools, 17. Courses of study in New York City, 96, 120-129. Culture, getting, 43; loss of, 43; and poverty, 44. Curtis High School, 96. Dead-end jobs, 73. Dean, Arthur D., 13. Definite aim, motivating value of, 19. Democracy, new conception of, 46. Detroit returns, 6. Difiiculties in way of better courses, 138. Director of practice work, 82-84. Dorchester High School, 82, 85. Douglass Commission, of Mass., 20. Drawing, mechanical, 18. Drygoods house, figures from, 109-111. Earning capacity not a measure of suc- cess, 90. East Boston High School, 83, 84. Economic inability of pupils, 49. Efiiciency, 29, 45. Elective courses, 144; system, 39, 58. Emphasis of effort, 9. Energizing occupation, 73. Enervating occupation, 73. English, 9, 19, 41, 66. Equipment, oflSce, 102. Establishment of commercial high schools and courses, 86. Evening schools, 144-148. Extended education, an advantage, 60. Failure of the home, 57. Father, occupation of the, 57. Fitchburg plan, 79. Flexible courses outlined, 51. Flower, Lucy, High School, Chicago, II. Follow-up work, 72. Forms used in investigations, 183-188. Freedom, restricted, 89. Furst, Clyde, 131. General High School, the, 22, 36, 96. General training, preliminary, 58. Geographical distribution of schools, 96. Girls' clerical course, 141-142; com- mercial education, 114; High School, Boston, 82. Grouping schools, 45. Guidance, 72. Hanus, Professor Paul. School Effi- ciency, 49. Harvard Teachers Association, 131. Herrick, C. A., 14. High School courses, the claim for, 19; elimination of pupils of, 20; human waste of, 48; inefl&ciency of, 48; of Commerce, 96. History, 9; industrial, 18. Home conditions, 57. Housing pupils, 86. Hyde Park High School, 83. Improvement of teachers, 32. Inadequate foundation of commercial education, 134. Industrial training, 2. Industry, and commerce, their differ- ences, 18; welfare of, affected, 2, Inspection of teacher's work, 100. Insurance houses, figures from, 11 1. Intensified course, 3, 10, 90. Interests and ambitions of students, 56. Intel-mediate schools, 149. Investigations, Boston, 1913-14, 53; needed throughout country, 93. Index 193 Jamaica, N. Y., need of special school, ISO. Johnston, C. H., 36. Jones, E. O., 32. Kansas City returns, 4. Kerchensteiner. Education for Citizen- ship ^ 44. Laboratories, 102. Languages, 41. Leipzig, City of: example of, 76. Letters from business men, 155-179; comments on, 179-183. Liberal education, 88. Liberal profession, provision for, 46. Limiting effort to clerical work, 8. Local development on local needs, 94. Los Angeles returns, 4. Loss in commercial and academic pupils, 54. Loss of membership, 98. Lucy Flower High School, Chicago, 11. Man of affairs, criticism of, 48. Manhattan High School of Com- merce, 95-96. Manual training, 12. Manual-training high schools, 41. Massachusetts Census, 8; State aided industrial schools, 34; State Board of Education. Bulletin No. 3, 191 1, 146; State Board Investigation, 68; State Committee on Business Edu- cation, June 14, 1913, 93; State laws, 132. Mathematics, 9, 18, 41. Maxim, Maynard, 68. Meaning and Practice of Commercial Education, by Herrick, 14. Men and women of affairs as teachers, 34- Mental abiUty, a comparative study of, 55. Merchandise, for girls, 143. Method and interest, separation of, 15. Miles, H. E., report of, 48. Milwaukee returns, 5. Misconception of commercial educa- tion, 134. Model office, the, 78. Modem languages, 19. Moral qualities, 71; training, 18. Motive to be supplied to pupils, 38. National Educational Association. Bulletin, Sept. 1913, 48; Superin- tendent's Convention, 1914, 88. New high school order, its effects, 40. New use of established schools, 46. New York City commercial courses not vocational, 133. New York City Report, 73, 95. New York returns, 5. Newark returns, 4. Newer types of commercial schools, 138-141. Office employment vs. selling, 69, 102; service, 92. One-year courses, 149. Parents, irresponsibility of, 49; strong factors, 74; meetings of, 99. Part-time and cooperative plans, 58, 71. Penmanship, 66. Permanent Census Board, 109. Persistence of pupils, 97. Person, H. S., 32. Personality needed, 57. Personal qualities, development of, 71. Philadelphia returns, 6. Physical laboratory, expansion of, 42. Pittsburgh returns, 6. Placement, 72, 103. Policy defined, 89. Position defined, 89. Present conditions, 1-2 1. Pre- vocational work, 90. Prince, Mrs. L. W., 82. Principals, N. Y. City, testimony of, 105. Professions, provisions for, compared ' with those for industry and trade. Program, division of, 41; of studies, 18. Proportion of secondary pupils in com- mercial courses, 3. Public Schools and Women in Office Service, 53. 194 Index Quality of pupils poor, reasons, 129. Queens High Schools, 96. Questions submitted to Superintend- ents, 3. Quickness, 18. Range of commercial education, 75. Readjustment of general high schools, 36. Ready-made special schools, 87. Recommendations, 150. Reconstruction, need of, 2. Regents' examinations, loi; objec- tions to, 130. Related theory, teaching of, 17. Relation between commercial educa- tion and business world, 13. Relation to academic, 9. Replies from superintendents, 3-6. Roxbury High School, 83. Salary. See Wages. Salesmanship, 3, 10, 78, 82, 143. San Francisco returns, 4. Schaub, L. F., Professor, 33. School, part of social and industrial structure, 29; organization and teachers, 23; training and earning power, 65. School Review, The, 131. School shop, a, 77. Schooling and occupation, 56. Scope and aims of report, 95. Scott, W. A., Professor, 2,2>' Secretarial work, 92. Sectional differences of practice, 22. Segregation of sexes, 119. Selection of courses, 98. Selling vs. ofl5ce employment, 69. Separation of method and interest, 15. Sex, 8, 27; segregation by, 3, 119, 143. Shepard, J. J., 96. Skilled labor, lack of, 2. Snedden, David, 88. South Boston High School, 83. Special Commission, 30. Special high school, 9; problems, 86. Springfield returns, 5. Standards, democratic, needed, 20; set by business men, 116. State Syllabus New York, 104. Statistics, U. S. A., and Mass. Census, 8. Stenographers, 8. Stenography, 29, 66, 70, 92. St. Louis returns, 6. Store schools, 17. Store service, 78. Sub-schools, 41. Suggested courses, 1 38-141. Summary, 150. Teacher, his functions and training, 31. Teachers of commercial subjects, 100; securing, 86; preferences of , 42; with- out experience and training, 129. Teaching forces available, 31. Technique, efficiency of, 71; needed, 57- Testimony of business men and prin- cipals, 106. Thompson, F. V., N. Y. City Report, 95- Three Investigations, Boston, 1914, 53. Tildsley, J.L., 144. Town groups and the conmiercial high school, 45. Transfers in business, 112. Two-year courses, 149. Typewriters, 8. Typewriting, 29. Unit courses, 75. United States Census, 8. Universities and colleges interested, 32. Van Denberg, 20. Vocation Bureau, Boston, 113. Vocational destinies, 2; education, 88, 132; histories, 62; instruction, its effect on cultural value of secondary school work, 43; practice, 78; school and culture, 44. Wages, 69, 70; average for women, 60; men's earning power classified and analysed, 63. Washington Irving High School, 96; girls' course in, 142. West Roxbury High School, 83, 84. Women's Educational and Industrial Union, Boston, 11, 82, 183-188; Report, 1914, 53. 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