Spontaneity must be the soul of such a movement. “It was my strong conviction that the development of such a social movement should come from the people themselves, not that a ready-made program or plan should be given them, but that they should develop their own.” One by one centers are being formed. The Board of Education furnishes the building, the local social center organization pays the immediate expenses which its activities incur. The movement has been started right. “I am a great believer in democracy,” Mr. Condon says. “The people can be trusted to settle social questions as they should be settled, provided all sides can be fully presented and time taken for deliberation. The school house affords the one opportunity where all can meet on common ground as American citizens and as good neighbors, where the question of wealth and position may be forgotten, and where what a man is in himself, and what he is willing to do for the common good, counts most.”
Such is the spirit in which Mr. Dyer, the men and women who worked with him, and the men and women who succeeded him, have striven for the advancement of education; such the spirit of co-operation and progressiveism which dominates this great city school system.
FOOTNOTES:
[21] Much of this material appeared originally in Educational Foundations.
CHAPTER VIII
THE OYLER SCHOOL OF CINCINNATI
I An Experiment in Social Education
On the west side of Cincinnati, separated from the main part of the town by railroad yards, waste land and stagnant water, surrounded by factories and a myriad of little homes, stands the Oyler School. “Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?” queried a doubter. Answers, in bell tones, the philosopher, “If a man can build a better house or make a better mousetrap than his neighbor, though he fix his home in the woods, the world will find a path to his door.” Because Oyler has built a better school in a better community the world sits at Oyler’s feet to learn of its experiment in social education.
The first time that I went to the Oyler School I encountered a Committee of Manufacturers. A Committee of Manufacturers in a public school during business hours! These men had met to talk with the school principal over the location of a library, which the entire community had worked to secure. When the time came to go before the Park Board over in the center of the city, to secure a playground near the Oyler School, the local bank furnished automobiles, and dozens of business men, leaving their offices, took the opportunity to endorse the work of the school, and to second its demands that play space be given to West End children. The manufacturers have become interested because in less than a decade the Oyler School has changed the face of the community, creating harmony out of discord, and order out of chaos.