5. Application of the student’s time to learning the free operation of the tool together with opportunity to try its operation on some personally chosen work.
6. Satisfactory high scale of wage, but one which can be exceeded in actual production.
7. Encouragement to the operators and then more encouragement.
8. Selection of suitable operators.
Of all these the ones most overlooked are numbers 1, 3 and 6.
Many managers think that good instruction can be given right in the producing departments, whereas this has been proven to be a great interference with both production and schooling.
Most attempts to use skilled mechanics as instructors has failed because they lacked the ability to properly convey to others the knowledge they possessed. The assistance of a trained teacher has made the work of many mechanical instructors a real success.
The opinion that the company is doing a disinterested thing in training new operators has led some to believe that the wage scale for learners could be made very low. One way to help a man to act like a gentleman is to dress him as such and treat him as far as possible as such. The same holds true with operators in training. The fact that they are rated well and trained by the best of mechanics, on the best of tools, in a shop with good surroundings, means much in the final success of industrial training.
(Signed) R. S. Drummond,
Formerly Vice-President and General Manager.