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Page 47
2. FACULTY STUDENT ADVISERS FROM THE TIME OF ENTRANCE
Not only the failure of pupils in their school subjects but the failure
also of 13 per cent of them to remain in school even to the end of the
first semester, or of 23.1 per cent to remain beyond the first semester
(Tables V and VI)--of whom a relatively small number had failed (about
�)--make a strong appeal for the appointment of sympathetic and helpful
teachers as student advisers from the very time of their entrance. One
teacher is able to provide personal advice and educational guidance for
from 20 to 30 pupils. The right type of teachers, their early
appointment, and the keeping of some sort of confidential and
unofficial record, all seem highly important.
Superintendent Maxwell mentioned among the reasons why pupils leave
school[56] that "they become bewildered, sometimes scared, by the
strange school atmosphere and the aloofness of the high school
teachers." There is a strangeness that is found in the transition to
high school surroundings and to high school work which certainly should
not be augmented by any further handicap for the pupil. There are no
fixed limitations to what helpfulness the advisers may render in the
way of 'a big brother' or 'big sister' capacity. It is all incidental
and supplementary in form, but of inestimable value to the pupils and
the school. A further service that is far more unusual than difficult
may be performed by the pupils who are not new, in the way of removing
strangeness for those who are entering what seems to them a sort of new
esoteric cult in the high school. The girls of the Washington Irving
High School[55] of New York City recently put into practice a plan to
give a personal welcome to each entering girl, and a personal escort
for the first hour, including the registration and a tour of the
building, in addition to some friendly inquiries, suggestions, and
introductions. The pupil is then more at home in meeting the teachers
later. Here is the sort of courtesy introduced into the school that
commercial and business houses have learned to practice to avoid the
loss of either present or prospective customers. Some day the school
must learn more fully that the faith cure is much cheaper than surgery
and less painful as well.
3. GREATER FLEXIBILITY AND DIFFERENTIATION REQUIRED
The recognition of individual differences urged in section 1
necessitates a differentiation and a flexibility of the high school
curriculum that is limited only by the social and individual needs to
be served, the size of the school, and the availability of means. The
rigid inflexibility of the inherited course of study has contributed
perhaps more than its full share to the waste product of the
educational machinery. The importance of this change from compulsion
and rigidity toward greater flexibility has already received attention
and commendation. One authority[57] states that "one main cause of
(H.S.) elimination is incapacity for and lack of interest in the sort
of intellectual work demanded by the present courses of study," and
further that "specialization of instruction for different pupils within
one class is needed as well as specialization of the curriculum for
different classes." There must be less of the assumption that the
pupils are made for the schools, whose regime they must fit or else
fail repeatedly where they do not fit. Theoretically considerable
progress has already been made in the differentiation of curricula, but
in practice the opportunity that is offered to the pupils to profit
thereby is curtailed, because of the rigid organization of courses and
the uniform requirements that are dictated by administrative
convenience or by the college entrance needs of the minority. The only
permissible limitations to the variables of the curriculum should be
such as aim to secure a reasonable continuity and sequence of subjects
in one or more of the fields selected. One of the chief barriers to a
more general flexibility has been the notion of inequality between the
classical and all other types of education. This assumption has had its
foundations heavily shaken of late. The quality of response which it
elicits has come to receive precedence over the name by which a subject
happens to be classified. "France has come out boldly and recognized at
least officially the exact parity between the scientific education and
the classical education."[58] Indeed one may doubt whether this parity
will ever again be seriously questioned, because of the elevation of
scientific training and accomplishment in the great world wars as well
as in its adaptation for the direct and purposeful dealing with the
problems of modern life. Especially for the early classes in the high
school does the situation demand a relatively flexible curriculum, else
the only choice will be to drop out to escape drudgery or failure.
Inglis maintains that the selective function of the high school may
operate by a process of differentiation rather than by a wholesale
elimination.[59] The pupil surely cannot know in advance what he is
best fitted for, but the school must help him find that out, if it is
to render a very valuable service, and one at all comparable to the
success of the industrial expert in utilizing his material and in
minimizing waste. The junior high school especially aims to perform
this function that is so slighted in the senior high school. Yet
neither the organization nor the purpose of the two are so far apart as
to excuse the helplessness of the latter in this important duty.
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