Woman's work in municipalities

by Mary Ritter Beard

The Providence Public Education Association has also been greatly interested in industrial education, among other things, and in pushing through a child labor bill. It had written into the measure the requirement “that every child under sixteen years of age must be able to read and write simple sentences in English before it can receive a working certificate” which will undoubtedly increase the regularity and prolong the school attendance of children as well as increase the demand for schoolhouses in mill towns if it is enforced. The Association has worked for medical inspection in the schools, open-air classes, public lectures in the schools at night and proper provision for assembly rooms in which to hold them, visiting teachers, better sanitation of schoolhouses, fire drills, and parents’ education. Many of the investigations and reform measures in Providence undertaken by this Association are directly traceable to its women members.

Among the volunteer associations whose aim is the better education of children, the American Institute of Child Life holds a worthy place. Dr. Wm. B. Forbush is president but the officers and active workers include both men and women. Mrs. M. A. Gardiner of Philadelphia and Miss Edna Speck of Indianapolis are the field secretaries of the Institute and they go from city to city seeking to interest mothers in the study of their own children.

The Institute grew out of a conference held at the White House during the administration of President Roosevelt during which it was argued that most mothers are too busy with their home tasks to search in books on child study and in other sources for just the right material to supply their children’s mental and moral requirements. Hence the need of an association to assist them.

The object of the Institute is thus explained by Mrs. Gardiner: “Our Institute of Child Life occupies a unique place among educational organizations. Its purpose is to collect from the most authentic sources the best that is known about children and to put such knowledge within easy reach of busy parents and teachers. The Institute provides expert help in children’s needs, amusements and varied interests.”

Believing that “women can best overcome the superstitions of women and men about their children which would prevent their standing for reforms and proper education,” the Federation for Child Study was recently formed in New York City with Mrs. Howard S. Gans as president. The board of managers, composed entirely of women, is divided into the following committees: reference and bibliography, ways and means, comic supplements, children’s literature, work and play for children, schools, and legislative. Conferences are held regularly by the Federation on matters affecting the nurture and education of children. Well-known educators often address the conference and the women discuss the issues raised by such lectures.

Efforts to unify the educational work of the women of each state are being made by the Department of School Patrons of the National Educational Association. Members in each state are suggested as follows: one member Association of Collegiate Alumnæ; one member General Federation of Clubs; one member Council of Jewish Women; one member National Congress of Mothers; one member Southern Association of College Women; and one member at large.

The union of club and college women in Connecticut is called the Woman’s Council of Education, and affiliated therewith are the W. C. T. U.; the Congress of Mothers; Holyoke Association; and Teachers’ League. Each society is assigned a definite line of special study; then all work together for laws and for better prepared and paid teachers.

Libraries

No survey of women’s work for education would be complete without some mention of their part in promoting the circulation of good books. The educational work which women have done through libraries is both great and obvious, although the public that profits by them may not fully realize the number of traveling libraries and stationary and circulating libraries that women have directly established.

The first large concerted movement on the part of the club women was for the extension of education through books and scarcely a woman’s club in the country fails to report an initial activity in that direction. In little log cabins on the frontiers as well as in splendid buildings in the cities books have been housed and distributed among readers by the earnest efforts of women whose culture early ceased to be individual; that is, they were anxious to pass on to the multitudes such culture as they themselves possessed.