October 10, 1918.

STUDY OF METHODS OF AMERICANIZATION,

576 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK, N. Y.

GENTLEMEN, We took up this work a year ago and during the past year have conducted two Americanization classes among our foreign-speaking workingmen. Teachers were provided by the Board of Education. The course of instruction followed was laid out by the board with special reference to the nature of the work. The interest shown by the workingmen was such that, whereas at the inception of the classes we intended to hold but two sessions a week, we, at the request of the pupils themselves, held five sessions per week throughout the term, and the attendance throughout held up in a satisfactory manner, and the interest among the men who benefited by the classes was marked.

As a preliminary inducement toward getting our men to accept this opportunity we informed our workingmen (at our Cleveland plant) that we would be willing to share onehalf the burden of their instruction by paying them regular wage rates for one-half the time spent in the classroom, and this plan has been followed up to this time.

We were rather disappointed at the beginning by finding a considerable proportion of our foreign-speaking workmen rather indifferent to the question of education, although we endeavored to explain to them that it would be very difficult for them to absorb American ideas and ideals unless they were able to both speak the English language and read the public press printed in the English language.

...

We have now organized for the fall and winter along the same lines as were followed out last spring and summer.

Our chief difficulty was in providing a suitable location for the school sessions, where the men could attend without loss of time, and we accomplished this by setting up a classroom in the plant. The night men attended a one-hour session before reporting for work, and the day men had their session at the close of their day's work. . . .

WORKING WITH IMMIGRANT SOCIETIES

Profitable co-operative relations, similar to those established between public educational agencies and industrial organizations, are being formed by the public schools with the immigrants' own organizations. It is coming to be a common occurrence for trade-unions, especially in certain industries which have foreign-born workers, to create educational committees whose function is to work out an educational program to meet the needs of its members. In several cities, co-operative relations have been established with the local boards of education, and classes in English have been carried on jointly. The most extensive work of this kind has been done by the International Ladies' Garment Workers' Union, in conjunction with the New York City Board of Education. For two years an arrangement has existed whereby the union provides the attendance in classes for English and other broader subjects, which meet in the school buildings, in charge of teachers supplied by the school board. In 1918-19 there were nineteen such English classes maintained in four public schools, with an aggregate average attendance of 570. This is a small proportion of the eveningschool attendance in the New York schools, but the good will and co-operation of the workers are not measured by numbers and are assets not to be overlooked; the school must make use of any spontaneous and self-initiated efforts to get instruction in English, and it may be

possible that attendance can be got and maintained in this way where no other method would succeed.

The educational director of the Ladies' Garment Workers' Union points out that the union holds a strategic position in relation to the education of the workers.

The shop plays the same social role in the life of the adult worker as does the school in that of a child. In it he finds his group, his center of social gravity, his chief point of interest.

If this theory is tenable, the union has a peculiar position in relation to educational work among its members. If it forms the natural and cohesive group, to which the workers look automatically and with confidence, it can have a considerable influence in adult education. Similar co-operative relations are also being established with other organizations in which the immigrants' leisure-time activities and interests

center.

The function of this chapter is to discuss public institutions for the Americanization of the immigrant. The preceding pages have set forth the case of the evening school and of classes held in places of employment and in co-operation with the immigrants' own organizations. We have by no means completed the category of needed institutions if we are to provide for every individual who requires an adequate opportunity for elementary education. Literacy, at least, is the right of every individual, and it is a debatable question whether the state

may not demand literacy of adults, as the right of the state; the state, however, is in no position to set up a demand until it has made provision for meeting it.

CONNECTING HOME AND SCHOOL

The illiterate or non-English-speaking woman in the home is not reached with any surety through either the evening school or the factory class. Throughout the country it is found that foreign-born women are not found in industrial employment in the same proportion as are foreign-born men, so that the factory class will not reach the majority of foreign-born women. Evening schools uniformly are made up of males in undue proportion. We may only suggest the reasons for this situation. Certain Old World races disapprove of the woman leaving the home to appear in public places; their women marry early, have large families, and usually cultivate a deeper home life than do native

women.

If the foreign-born woman is to be furnished educational opportunity, we shall need to devise additional agencies for the purpose. The problem of the immigrant woman in the home is the most difficult one confronting Americanization forces to-day. Mention has been made of the use of the home teacher, originating under public auspices in California; this project, however, is to-day scarcely more than a name and a hope elsewhere. No one has attempted to define

on.

what shall be the technique of the home teacher.1 All sorts of difficulties appear. There is the question of expense: to teach individuals in their homes would take a great many teachers and involve a per capita expense far in excess of the cost of the group teaching hitherto carried How shall the home teacher gain access to the home-a difficulty by no means imaginary? Then again, the immigrant home with its many children, boarders, relatives, presents unpromising conditions for instruction. The home teacher would seem to work to greater advantage by persuading the women in the home to attend convenient classes held during the day in some neighboring school, and to follow up attendance at such classes. The home teacher ought surely to visit the homes of immigrant women and to persuade attendance at classes especially arranged; she may be of substantial service in aiding immigrant women to learn about American conditions of living, in giving instruction about the care of children, and in solving the difficulties encountered by women placed in a strange environment. At the best there will always be many women who by reason of family cares

1 The State Commission on Immigration and Housing of California has this to say of the home teacher in its Manual for Home Teachers:

"The home teacher, as we conceive her purpose, seeks not primarily the special child, though that will often open the door to her, and afford her a quick opportunity for friendly help, but the home as such, and especially the mother who makes it. This discrimination as to aim and purpose cannot be too much emphasized, or too consistently maintained; for the care of abnormal children, important as it is, can by no means take the place of the endeavor to Americanize the families of the community.'