CHAPTER XII

HOME AND SCHOOL ASSOCIATION THE HIGH SCHOOL'S RIGHT ARM

MARY V. GRICE

FOUNDER OF HOME AND SCHOOL LEAGUE OF PHILADELPHIA

Introduction. The "Commencement.”—It is commencement day at the high school. Lights blaze throughout the great auditorium. Down every aisle pours a flood-tide of humanity. Literally, all sorts and conditions of men-representatives from hundreds of homes come, attracted by a compelling force to this centre of community interest. The curtain, still undrawn, hangs in dignified folds, typifying the sharply defined line dividing the two vital forces of the day. The home eager, expectant, informal, an onlooker, waiting breathlessly for the final touch of that hand into which its "bloom and flower" have been committed during the past four years. The school-assured, didactic, with an air of work accomplished, breathing finality in every movement.

The whisperings of an aunt and older sister to our left stir a sense of human interest which quickens into a flow of sympathy for the young "Pauline" of whom they speak. Such heroic efforts, such forgettings of self, as are revealed in their conversation that that one life might have reached this day successfully. The sister a

maker of artificial flowers, the aunt a caretaker of a little shop, but the genuineness of their joy over the one in that white-frocked group who was theirs related them to the whole gathering with the welding power of nature's touch.

On the other side a father and mother rehearse in low tones their plans for the university life of their son now graduating. Running on in happy fashion from this day of honor, visioning his law course until it ends in a judge's robe. Throughout the great gathering, wherever the home gives expression to its hopes, similar confidences are being exchanged.

A few short hours and the school will have handed back to these homes its finished product-handed it back with the conscious knowledge that in the large majority of cases the home knows no more how to cope with the budding powers and impulses of youth than though a child had never passed through its doors. That building of character through the guidance of the hot blood of adolescence into the dynamic of self-control is as unknown to most parents as is the nebular hypothesis.

Community Need versus Traditional Pedagogy.--We listened to the whole long programme with that combined sense of pathos and joy, that yearning surge which always stirs in facing youth pushed forward to the "firing-line." We found ourself at last one of the crowd, surging out into the night and melting away into the separating streams of humanity which ebbed back from the evening's flow into the homes whence they And ever the recurrent question persisted: Why should this great public building, erected at such large expense to the people. with its force of workers trained largely at the expense of the people, be of such small

came.

value to its community in proportion to that community's great need?

The aunt and older sister with their laudable ambitions, the father and mother with their legitimate pride and far-reaching plans are but types that faintly shadow the wide divergence of interests and opportunity that the schools of a country like ours should be called upon to reach, not only in the old-time method of school approach, but in a broader way that shall correlate existing forces, until together they shall make for greater social efficiency. Again we ask: Why should not this institution, with its splendidly organized faculty, its force of trained workers, its systematized tasks, be reaching and moulding these homes in far more vital ways than it does? Why should its influence cease with the commencement hour?

As long as youth is in our midst these two forces of the home and the school will be directing their energies toward the same object. Having very largely the same end in view-the development of a manhood and womanhood which shall finally eventuate in citizenship worthy of a democracy-why should they work so unknowingly of each other? Why, indeed, so often in direct opposition to each other? The answer seems very simple. It is because they never meet on common ground where they can draw from one another the strength which would mean an added power to both. If education is, indeed, to be a drawing out rather than the in-cramming process of the past, to what more profitable form of educational endeavor could a school lend itself than to that of drawing out from the community about it those latent forces that will make for the upbuilding of a noble citizenship?

Night after night the surrounding streets will be filled with young life seeking some self-expression, often falling a prey to those who in their day and generation are "wise" and have commercialized this universal spirit of youth. Yet the high school building will stand forbiddingly closed, darkened, and aloof, frowning down on public revelling places in pharisaic attitude, thanking God it is not as they, forgetting that life is so vastly greater than its marble halls, forgetting, indeed, that the only possible excuse for its existence lies in the contribution it is able to make to the real life of its time.

The School Approach-The Home's Appeal.-Was the school satisfied with its "finished" product on that commencement night? We cannot speak as one who knows, but we should judge from the wave of uncertainty and dissatisfaction sweeping over the educational world to-day that it was not.

For the home we can speak, and speak from the inside. Never in the history of education has the home been more restless than now. Never has it been less willing to set its stamp of approval upon the "product" of the schools. Proof of this can be seen on all sides. Current publications are filled with denouncements of the schools. To be sure, these articles are mostly by the laity, but let it not be forgotten that the laity is composed largely of the taxpayers, and, should they once be awakened to their power, changes could be made. Not content with anathematizing the system, this same layman on all sides is "backing" with his influence and means various educational experiments, if, perchance, he may but prove them out to the satisfaction of those in charge of the schools.

Upon no one point has more criticism been directed than upon the high school as it has been commonly known. Academic, apart, it has been sending forth its finished (?) product almost wholly unprepared for life. Back into the homes the students go, to find themselves unable to cope with the simple problems of every day living. And the home is as powerless to supply a way to help them as the school. Is it not reasonable to suppose that if these two dynamics in the life of youth were but to work together, and work understandingly, there would come an added power to both? As it is to-day, the school fails to use its good right arm, which is none other than this influence of the home.. Not until there is some method devised whereby this force can be utilized through school agencies will any system of education. attain its full efficiency.

Home and School Associations. Here and there sporadic attempts have been made to bring about a helpful co-operation between the two, but no one plan has yet crystallized into an accepted pattern. After twenty years of effort with various experiments we have come to the conclusion that so far no better way has been developed than that expressed in the simple term "Home and School Association." It is wider (not better) in its service than the "Mothers' Meeting" and more flexible and far-reaching in its influence than the "ParentTeacher" groups. It has a staying quality not to be found in the latter. It is more heterogeneous than alumni associations and has aims that reach the heart fibres of the people more directly than the civic club. It grows out of that unerring impulse to human action, the love of the child, that is bound, when coupled with knowledge, to lead on to better things for the child.