intelligible and appreciative use of the labors of others, a considerable
understanding of these various matters.
Where this work for girls is at its best in Cleveland, it appears to be of a superior
character. Those who are in charge of the best are in a position to advise as to
further extensions and developments. It is not difficult to discern certain of these.
It would appear, for example, that sewing should find some place at least in the
work of seventh and eighth grades. The girl who does not go on to high school is
greatly in need of more advanced training in sewing than can be given in the
sixth grade. Each building having a household arts room should possess a
sewing machine or two, at the very least. The academic high schools are now
planning to offer courses in domestic science. As in the technical high schools,
all of this work should involve as large a degree of normal responsibility as
possible.
We omit discussion here of the specialized vocational training of women, since
this is handled in other reports of the Survey.
When we turn to the manual training of the boys, we are confronted with
problems of much greater difficulty. Women's household occupations, so far as
retained in the home, are unspecialized. Each well-trained household worker
does or supervises much the same range of things as every other. To give the
entire range of household occupations to all girls is a simple and logical
arrangement.
But man's labor is greatly specialized throughout. There is no large remnant of
unspecialized labor common to all, as in the case of women. To all girls we give
simply this unspecialized remnant, since it is large and important. But in the case
of men the unspecialized field has disappeared. There is nothing of labor to give
to boys except that which has become specialized.
A fundamental problem arises. Shall we give boys access to a variety of
specialized occupations so that they may become acquainted, through
responsible performance, with the wide and diversified field of man's labor? Or
shall we give them some less specialized sample out of that diversified field so
that they may obtain, through contact and experience, some knowledge of the
things that make up the world of productive labor?
Cleveland's reply, to judge from actual practices, is that a single sample will be