“We are anxious to find, by the opening of our term in September, a competent instructor in wood-working for our course in mechanic arts, now in its second year. He should be a good and ready draughtsman, skilful in perspective and projections, and ready in black-board sketching, besides being acquainted with the use of tools, and apt at class-teaching. He will have at first $1000 a year.”
[102] “The first report of the Industrial Educational Association of New York gives a list of thirty-one schools in that city in which industrial education is furnished.”—Address of Prof. S. R. Thompson, Industrial Department of the National Educational Association, Saratoga Springs, N. Y., July, 1885.
The lack of competent instructors is the most serious difficulty which the new education is destined to encounter. The desire to adopt tool practice is so widespread among the people that educators, whether willing or otherwise, are compelled to attempt to gratify the demand. At the same time the force of competent instructors is very small, and the danger is that the new system of education will be brought into disrepute through the failure of its proper administration.
In 1882 Mr. Paul Tulane, of Princeton, N. J., made a large donation, consisting of his realty in the city of New Orleans, in aid of education in the State of Louisiana. In 1884 the University bearing its donor’s name—Tulane—came into existence. In the deed of donation Mr. Tulane declared that by the term education he meant to “foster such a course of intellectual development as shall be useful and of solid worth, and not be merely ornamental or superficial.” Hence manual training has been made a prominent feature of the institution.[103]
[103] John M. Ordway, A.M., late Professor of Metallurgy and Industrial Chemistry of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has been called to New Orleans to organize and direct the manual training department of the institution; and he is assisted by Charles A. Heath, B.S., and Everett E. Hapgood, graduates of the School of Mechanic Arts of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
There is in operation at Crozet, Va., a manual training school called, after its founder, Mr. Samuel Miller, “The Miller Manual Labor School;” but of the methods of training pursued at this school the author is not accurately informed.
Girard College, dedicated nearly forty years ago, has adopted manual training. In response to a letter by the author, asking for information, Mr. W. Heyward Drayton, of Philadelphia, gives the following historical sketch of the introduction and progress of tool practice by the laboratory method in that noble institution:
“From time to time some of the directors recognized the importance of mechanical instruction, but after one or two attempts further efforts in this direction were abandoned, as those proved utter failures. It was not until Dr. Runkle, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, at the instance of the late Mr. William Welsh, then president of the Board of Directors of City Trusts, delivered a short address on the subject in the lecture-room of the Franklin Institute in this city, that any practical mode of introducing this branch of study into the college was presented.
“... Following as nearly as possible the scheme suggested by Dr. Runkle, and aided by many suggestions from him, in April, 1882, we began to instruct the larger boys to use tools in several kinds of metals. We were so fortunate as to secure the services of a very competent and enthusiastic instructor, who confined his instruction merely to teaching the use of tools, but without any pretence of teaching any trade. The result of two years’ experience has been so satisfactory that our boys leave the college to go to workshops, where they secure sufficient wages to support them at once; and they have, in many cases, been found so expert that in a few months their wages have been increased. We have been so encouraged by this as a substitute for apprenticing lads, which is fast becoming impossible, that we have just erected commodious workshops [laboratories], in which, on the same system, but to many more boys, we propose to teach the use of tools in wood-work also, as we have heretofore taught in metals. To this time we have been compelled, from want of facilities, to confine our instruction to about one hundred and seventy-five boys. We expect next month (October, 1884) to increase the number to three hundred—only being limited by the youth of the pupils, many of whom are too young to permit of their handling tools.”
Manual training has been made part of the curriculum of the Agricultural and Mechanical College of Auburn, Ala., and the department is under the direction of a graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.[104]