It is a matter for regret that most women, upon leaving an industrial career for marriage, drop so completely out of touch with their former work. In the case of the untrained woman, who has received little and given little in her work, it is a matter of no moment; but when years have been given to skilled labor, it is economic waste to have the skill lost and the process forgotten. Many times the woman finds herself after a short life in the home obliged to earn a living once more for herself or it may be for a family. She returns to her teaching or her office work or a position in the library; but she is no longer, at least for a considerable time, the expert she once was. Why should not the former teacher keep up her interest in educational literature and the new ideas in what might have been her life work? Would it not be well for the one-time stenographer to keep a gentle hold upon the quirks and quirls which once brought to her her weekly salary? A young mother of my acquaintance who was a concert violinist of much ability has found no time for more than a year to practice, "since baby came," and thousands of dollars spent in making her a player are being thrown away. To some this might seem the right thing. She has found "the home her sphere." To others it seems a serious waste. We advocate often that the middle-aged woman who has reared her children should return in some way to the work of the world outside the home. In the case of the trained woman her training should be made of use in such return. She should, however, beware lest her tools are rusty from disuse.
We may not perhaps leave the questions involved in a discussion of vocations as they affect homemaking without noticing that certain occupations are considered especially dangerous to the moral stability of girls. Nursing, private secretaryship, and domestic service present dangers in direct proportion as they bring about isolated companionship for the girl and a male employer. Girls must not enter these employments without the knowledge of how to protect themselves from lowering influences.
CHAPTER XIII[ToC]
The Girl's Work (Continued)—Vocations Determined By Training
The question of vocation choosing begins to make itself felt far down in the grammar school, first among the retarded and backward children who are old for their grades and are merely waiting and marking time until the law will allow them to leave school and go to work. These children are usually either mentally subnormal or handicapped by foreign birth and so unable to grasp the education which is being offered them.
As soon as they are released the girls go to the factory, to the store, or to help with some one's baby or with the housework. No other places are open to them, and their possibilities in any place are few. They cannot rise because they are mentally untrained.
The upper grades of the grammar school lose annually many children who would be able to profit by the help the school offers to those who can remain. Some drop out because they see no need of remaining when the factory will employ them without further knowledge. Others chafe at spending time on what seems to them, and what sometimes is, quite unrelated to the life they will lead and the work they will do. Some leave reluctantly, because their help is needed in financing a large family. Many go gladly, because they will begin to earn and to have some of the things they ardently desire. And until yesterday the school paid little attention to their going, regarding it as one of the necessary evils. Still less attention did it pay to what these pupils became after they left. The school's responsibility ended at its outer door.
Now that these conditions are being changed, the school is finding responsibilities and opportunities on every hand. The foreign-born are taken out of the regular grades where they cannot fit, and are taught English by themselves first of all. The subnormal children are studied for latent vocational possibilities, and where minds are deficient, hands are the more carefully trained for suitable work. Courses are being revised with a view to holding in school the boy or girl who wants practical training for practical work. Secondary schools have taken their eyes off college requirements long enough to consider fitting the majority of their pupils to face life without the college. Studies of vocations are being made; vocational training is being offered; vocational guidance is at last coming to be considered the concern of the school.