Stowe, Abraham Lincoln, John Greenleaf Whittier, Walt Whitman, Carl Sandburg, Stephen Vincent Benet, Henry Wallace, Wendell Willkie, Franklin D. Roosevelt. I also suggested that they use Bernard Smith's The Democratic Spirit.

This procedure forced the students to read and browse with a a definite goal in mind. Once a week the material was brought to class and the students argued over the suitability of the poems or essays read. As we went along, we worked out a scheme of classification which was changed several times in the course of the term. The final index read Wisdom and Humor of the Common Man, The Common Man in Verse, and Growth of the Democratic Idea in Speeches and Essays.

The following are some of the questions and controversies that arose in the course of the reading and classification:

Should we include jokes ascribed to Lincoln? Are jokes literature? Are the wise sayings from Poor Richard's Almanac literature? Can you call Washington and Jefferson common men? Aren't we worrying too much about the common man these days? Do the Hottentots want the pint of milk and the Four Freedoms or are we imposing our ideas of the good life on them? Is this the right way to study the history of American Literature? Wouldn't it be better to study it chronologically? Are Walt Whitman and Carl Sandburg really poets? Shouldn't poetry have rhyme and rhythm?

We had only one term and we had to cover the required books of the grade which include Macbeth, Untermyer's Modern Poetry and Arrowsmith, so the sum total of our gleanings was necessarily limited.

The New Colossus by Emma Lazarus provided out title page. Under the headline Wit and Humor, we had Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Adams, William Legget, Thomas Paine, Thomas Jefferson, Abraham Lincoln, Carl Sandburg, Walt Whitman, Theodore Roosevelt, Dorothy Thompson, Israel Zangwill and Alexander Woollcott represented.

Under The Common Man in Verse we had several poems by Walt Whitman, one by J. R. Lovell, one by Longfellow, Markham, Robert P. S. Coffin, Sandburg. One student devoted himself to study of The People, Yes! by Sandburg. We had a poem by Stephen Vincent Benet and the words of Part IV Ballad for Americans.

Growth of the Democratic Idea in Speech and Essays provided excerpts from the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, speeches on education and the rights of the people by Wash

ington, Patrick Henry's famous speech in the House of Burgesses, Jefferson's inaugural address, something from Daniel Webster, William Cullen Bryant, Robert La Follette, The Gettysburg Address, The Atlantic Charter. We had excerpts from Wendell Willkie's One World and from Wallace's Century of the Common Man and other speeches.

The anthology closed with Dear Adolf by Stephen Vincent Benet, a radio script in which a United States soldier writes Hitler why his pals are fighting.

In the words of a student who wrote the introduction "We do not contend that our opus is complete nor do we believe that we have done a great service to humanity. . . . However, it represents the hopes, ambitions, dreams and ideals not only of the men who were gifted with the ability to express themselves in words but all those who firmly believe in the true, democratic American way of life." P.S. The class collected $20 to pay a professional typist and took all the mechanical matters out of my hands. ANNE CUTLER

Fort Hamilton High School

JOE AND LOUIS

While we have no argument with Samuel I. Altwerger's article on Related Technical Information-Mathematics and Science in the Vocational High Schools (January, 1944 High Points) we would like to carry the discussion further. We would seek the basic causes of this occupational disease of which narrow mathematics and science objectives are but a symptom.

When Joe Vocational goes to school, he is treated as though he would do Everything as a plumber. That is to say, he is considered as living in a plumber's apartment, going to plumbers' movies, voting as a plumber and acting as a plumber-consumer. This is so because the ideal of his school has been to relate and correlate all subjects to his shop subject-plumbing. Fortunately, this ideal has not been too thoroughly accomplished.

On the other hand, we have Louis Academic. For a very long time, his school tried to keep him away from the sordid cares of everyday living. It concentrated on the cultural heritage: the classics, Latin, etc. Fortunately for Louis, the world sneaked in here and there, but it was never made really welcome.

Let's return to Joe for a moment. His school gets Federal funds

under the Smith-Hughes Law. This means Joe has to spend thirty hours a week in school (some of you may have been misled into thinking the teachers must spend that time in school, too, under this law but that's not true). Half of this time must be used for shopwork on a useful or productive basis. Under the Smith-Hughes law, but that's not true). Half of this time must be used for shopeducation that takes care of the other half of Joe's time. Half of it, namely, 71⁄2 hours or ten periods per week, must be in related technical information and that is Mr. Altwerger's special complaint. The other ten periods per week Joe spends in becoming culturedand citizen-trained. But since the State Education Department demands five periods a week of English, that leaves Joe five periods a week for social studies or hygiene and health education or music or anything else. Poor Joe!

A few years ago, the Marshall Committee, investigating the vocational high schools saw the problem of Joe and Louis. They said, "The present organization of secondary education in New York City tends to widen the gap between the cultural and the vocational aims. The result of this is that the so-called cultural subjects become merely cultural, that is, their objectives become primarily appreciation and their inherent vocational worth is neglected. On the other hand, the vocational courses tend to have as their main objective the development of skills to the neglect of the cultural growth which all vocational work, properly organized, can give."

They had previously said, "All of life's activities may be classified in several large groups. One of these would include the activities concerned with earning a living and professional advancement. Another would include civic and social activities, those involving living with others and participating in a democratic society. A third would include personal activities, those having to do with self-development, self-expression, appreciation and cultural growth. Since all secondary schools have the task of preparing children for life, they must all prepare them for activities in each of the three groups mentioned above."

In urging the unification of both branches of the secondary school system, they also said, "The traditional separation of vocational academic education has prevented the development of a unified secondary school program in New York City. With such separation there is danger of developing a caste system, as was pointed out in the report of President Roosevelt's Advisory Committee on Educa

tion in 1938. Such a dual system is in direct opposition to the American plan for a single system of education for all children. Furthermore, it must be noted that an inevitable result of division between two systems is competition and lack of understanding between two groups of teachers."

Excerpts like those quoted show how progressive the Marshall Report is. Therefore, it is all the more disturbing to find in it a recommendation that "permission be sought from the New York State Education Depatment to experiment with a program of vocational education fitted to a five-hour school day with both academic work and shop work reduced by one-half hour." If the present time allotment for academic work is less than adequate, cutting it down a half-hour would make it approach the vanishing point.

The central, all-important recommendation of the Marshall Committee, however, is to "Remove the present barriers between the vocational high schools and the academic high schools." In this lies the welfare of all the future Joes' and Louis' of the high schools of New York, aye, of America.

It is high time for action to be taken. A beginning was made about two years ago with the establishment of a vocational department at Tottenville High School. Last July, the Board voted to extend this to Benjamin Franklin and Franklin K. Lane. With a tremendous post-war high school building program already on paper, we must plan what is to go on in those schools. Shall we go on frustrating Joe Vocational and Louis Academic or will they both go hand in hand to a better world?

ABRAHAM DIAMOND Samuel Gompers Vocational High School

TEACHER-KNOW THYSELF

Most discussions of school situations have centered on the behavior and personality problems of students. The teacher role has either never been considered as a factor, the influence of which is as important as other factors, or it has been taken for granted as a constructive constant. In much of the guidance material in the schools, there are copious explanations of the various phases in the field of character development, such as all aspects of home conditions, but rarely mention of the large role of the teacher.

Is it that teachers are more afraid than others to realize the im

portance of this factor? It is a well known fact that most persons tend to hide their own emotional difficulties from themselves so that their influence on daily actions is successfully concealed. Teachers are no more unusual than others in this respect. But it is the very unique relationship that exists between students and teachers that makes it especially necessary for teachers to be aware of their own personality structures. While the parent role is the greatest force in shaping the fundamental patterns of children, the teacher role, because it is, in many ways, the substitution of the parent role, is of vital importance.

It is easy to see how situations in school are often, for the child, the continuation of situations in the home. Schools rightly show great interest in collecting data on home conditions in order to understand the attitudes of students in school situations. In this way, the school becomes aware of many causal conditions shaping school attitudes. What the school is not generally aware of is the way in which teacher behavior may strongly affect these attitudes. Just as it is necessary for the teacher to recognize causes for pupil attitudes, so it is necessary for a teacher to know, to as great a degree as possible, the nature of his own attitudes. For few situations afford as much opportunity for the expression of concealed emotions as the school situations.

Whether the teacher is aware of it or not, the very position of being in charge of young people, forces him somewhat into the parent role. He may, without realizing it, enact the kind of parental authority he himself had received as a youngster. He may derive satisfaction from his supreme authoritative role, and exploit it. Often commands are given not so much for the pupils' need of them, as for the need within the teacher. Even the vocal tone of the direction often echoes the inner tension.

TEACHER EXPRESSION. There are many situations in the classroom that are obviously very tempting occasions for the teacher to express his own stresses. There is the most common use of sarcasm. While it is true that sarcasm may at times crystallize a point sharply, it is a dangerous technique to use on a growing personality. What makes a teacher use it? Perhaps an unconscious need to avenge himself for his own slights similarly received; or a wish to bolster his own ego needs; or a strong personal reaction to the individuality of a particular youngster.