1942: Education

Education for Victory.

Pearl Harbor sounded the most serious challenge that American education has had to face in its history. Every educational institution in the country from the kindergarten to the university realized that it had a contribution to make, either to the maintenance of morale or to adaptation of its work to the immediate needs of the national emergency. All institutions were involved in the first; those from the high school on, in the second. The task confronting teachers at all levels was tersely summarized in a pamphlet, This War and the Teacher, issued in June by the Commission on Teacher Education of the American Council on Education: 'Today we in the United States are caught up in a great crisis of civilization. All we believe in is at stake. A war must be won; a peace must be created. These tasks are indivisible and will require generations. We have begun the work; our children must carry it through. The challenge is imperative and universal.'

It was inevitable that a certain amount of confusion should arise; as was indicated in the pamphlet cited, teachers were uncertain whether to remain at their posts or enter services — military and industrial — which seemed to them more immediately contributory to the war efforts; colleges and universities, with enrollments already declining, waited for a definite lead from the Selective Service authorities on the probable effect of the draft on the clientèle from which they drew; in the field of vocational training the need of manpower was for a time indefinite. Education could not go on as usual nor even, as it was urged, better than usual; new and immediate adaptations were demanded by the emergency.

Under the rallying cry adopted in 1940, 'Education for Defense,' a great step forward had been made on the ideological front, and education in the meaning of democracy had become the dominant motif. With Pearl Harbor 'Education for Defense' was replaced by 'Education for Victory,' a slogan which was adopted by the U. S. Office of Education as the title of its official journal in place of School Life.

Too much credit cannot be given to the major national organizations in education for the assumption or extension of their leadership and guidance in the war emergency. It was a fitting celebration of the seventy-fifth anniversary of its establishment in 1867 as the National Bureau of Education that the U. S. Office of Education, through its Commissioner, Dr. John W. Studebaker, should have stepped in as the recognized leader in the dedication of the national educational resources to the war needs. Two weeks after Pearl Harbor representatives of national educational organizations were convened in Washington to constitute the U. S. Office of Education Wartime Commission in order to consider and offer guidance in every phase of education. Committees were appointed to study a variety of problems, including vocational training for defense industries; preparation of teachers and pupils for out-of-school war services; needed curriculum changes in the schools; teacher shortages; acceleration of courses; collection and dissemination of information on educational adaptations to the crisis; and policies for postwar education. To cooperate with the national commission state educational wartime commissions were established.

In a folder issued by the National Education Association on The U.S. Office of Education: Its Wartime Services, 22 different types of activities were listed. 'Practically the entire Office of Education has been shifted to wartime duties,' states the folder. 'Facilitating the Government rationing program; study of problems involved in possible evacuation of school children; accelerated training of doctors, dentists, and pharmacists; and many other projects are being prosecuted with energy and success by the Federal service arm for education — The U.S. Office of Education.'

The first and most urgent activity promoted by the Office in cooperation with states and localities was the development of courses for vocational and technical training. Since 1940 3,050,000 workers for war industries had been trained. It is planned in the program for emergency training to prepare about 2,000,000 workers each year in courses varying in length from ten weeks to a year. At a higher level the Office cooperated with 200 colleges and universities in the training of engineers, chemists, physicists, and production managers (ESMWT). Provision was also made for the training of operators of farm machinery, for which, 1942-43, the Office received an appropriation of $141,240,000. Other services include training for food production, the distribution occupations, homemaking, and vocational rehabilitation; preparation of files to speed up wartime training; civilian morale service; inter-American education through 25 demonstration centers, exchange of students and teachers, and study materials; supply of 'boom town' schools; preparation of materials for the sale of defense savings stamps; civilian defense; aviation education through the preparation of materials of instruction; gardening; nutrition; radio script and transcription exchange; plans for postwar adjustments; and publications. In many of these activities the Office cooperated with other governmental agencies.

The National Education Association devoted all its resources to the war effort. In particular the Association directly and through its committees and commissions was concerned with the problems of teacher shortage and salaries, of Federal aid for education, and of the financial support of schools during the crisis. In January the Educational Policies Commission of the Association issued a bulletin, A War Policy for American Schools, in which it was recommended that 'immediate priority in time, attention, personnel and funds' be given to the following activities as appropriate war duties: Training workers for war industries and services; safeguarding health and physical efficiency; producing goods and services for war needs; conserving materials; raising funds to finance the war; increasing effective manpower by correcting educational deficiencies; protecting school children and property against attack; protecting the ideals of democracy; teaching the issues, aims, and progress of the war; sustaining the morale of children and adults; and maintaining intelligent loyalty to American democracy. The Commission directed attention to the importance of adult education, and recommended that schools and libraries should serve as community centers for discussion, reading, and recreation.

In the field of higher education leadership was assumed by the American Council on Education which was created for this purpose during World War I. The Council called a conference which was held in Baltimore at the beginning of January and was attended by representatives from about 1,000 institutions of higher education. The work of this conference is discussed later.

In August state superintendents of education and directors of vocational education, experts in rural education, and representatives of colleges and universities met in Washington for a National Institute on Education and the War. The Institute was addressed by representatives of Federal agencies — OPA, OCD, OWA, the War Savings Staff of the Treasury, and of the Army, Navy, and Air Forces. The chief topic of discussion was the shortage of specialists for the armed forces and war industries — radio operators, medical technicians, telephone and telegraph linesmen, master mechanics, and automotive mechanics. These shortages had already been recognized a few months earlier when a Commission to Mobilize Manpower was set up under the chairmanship of Paul V. McNutt, Federal Security Administrator.

Educational Developments.

As already stated, every branch of the educational services was affected by the war. The rapid influx of women into all kinds of war activities and industries directed attention to the need of provisions to take care of young children. The nursery school assumed a new importance in view of the need of children from two to five or six years of age for 'a happy well-ordered place to play, regular food and rest, and the security and well-being that result from well-planned programs conducted by trained personnel.' For parents the nursery school could provide training in nutrition and schools, homes, and welfare agencies could receive guidance on the appropriate environment and programs for preschool children. The WPA, which had already been serving 55,000 children in 1,250 localities, allocated $6,000,000 to establish war nurseries for an additional 50,000 children of working mothers. The sponsorship of these nurseries was left to the localities. Where they were able to pay, parents were charged 25 cents per day for each child to defray the cost of food and trained personnel. The preparation of nursery school teachers was undertaken by public authorities, colleges and universities, and organizations concerned with the welfare of children and their families.

One of the most serious revelations of the war was the discovery of the grave amount of illiteracy in the country. According to the 1940 census it was found that more than 10,000,000 adults 25 years of age or over had received only a fourth-grade education or less, and a fourth of these had not completed even one year of schooling. At least 150,000 physically fit young men were kept out of the army on account of 'functional illiteracy,' that is, inability to read written directions. From another direction it was also found that large numbers of aliens could not be naturalized because of illiteracy. Steps have been taken to remedy what has come to be recognized as 'a scourge,' since it not only impeded both military and civil war efforts but would seriously affect the country in peacetime.

It was inevitable that the special needs and demands of the war emergency should lead to the discovery of shortages in all kinds of unexpected directions. The demand for specialists in industry and the armed forces which depend upon more than trade skills directed attention to the inadequate supply of young men and women trained in mathematics, chemistry, and physics. Efforts to meet the situation in selecting personnel for the navy by lowering the pass mark in the mathematics examination failed to produce the necessary supply. The same was true in the sciences dependent upon a knowledge of mathematics. Responsibility for these conditions attached not merely to poor teaching but to a soft theory of education and a campaign which had been waged for twenty years against 'mere knowledge' and subjects so considered.

Even more startling, since it was of national concern, was the report in The New York Times, June 21, 1942, of the results of a questionnaire sent to over 1,200 colleges and universities on the teaching of United States history. Replies, received from 690 institutions or 56 per cent of those to whom the inquiry was sent, showed that in 82 per cent of them history was not a required subject and that students could and did graduate without taking any American history at all. Nor was American history required for admission in 72 per cent of the colleges. An attempt to explain the situation by the fact that certain aspects of American history might have been studied in economic, political, social science, and literature courses was regarded as unsatisfactory by those who felt strongly that a knowledge of national history was essential in the current crisis and at all times for training in citizenship and democratic ideals. The National Association of Manufacturers associated itself with the National Education Association at the conference of the latter body held at Denver in June in urging that attention should be given to the subject. The same demand was made by Gov. Ralph L. Carr of Colorado at the same conference and by Associate Justice Robert H. Jackson in an address to the State Bar of Texas on July 4. Professors of history all over the country deplored the omission of United States history and urged its importance for the understanding and preservation of democracy. As in the case of mathematics, so in the case of history the situation is due to the attack on the study of straight subject matter and the substitution of social studies and problems in its place.

Teacher Shortage.

From the opening days of the war and on the basis of the experience in World War I a shortage of teachers was feared and, as events proved, with justification. In September, at the opening of the school year it was estimated that there was already a shortage of teachers. This was due in part to the salary situations in many sections of the country and in rural schools all over the country; in part it was due to transportation difficulties arising from the gasoline situation which threatened the closing of rural schools; but in the main it was due to the more attractive opportunities offered in defense industries. At the present rate of wages it was hardly to be expected that teachers could be retained at the average salary of $77.42 a month paid not only in Southern but also in other states and only for those months during which schools are open. Not only did teachers in poorly paid schools leave for other occupations, but new opportunities were opened up in defense training activities in mathematics, sciences, home economics, commercial subjects, industrial arts, agriculture, and physical education. Salary adjustments were reported as having been made in 18 per cent of cities of over 100,000 population, with 23 per cent additional cities promising increases, as compared with 8 per cent and 17 per cent respectively in rural areas. Married women were urged to return to teaching and a nationwide teacher placement agency was recommended to be established in the United States Employment Office in Washington to find positions for available teachers. The most serious result feared was that incompetent and inexperienced persons would be employed and that standards of certification would be lowered; seven states were already appointing high school graduates at the age of 18 or 19.

Youth Problems.

The American Youth Commission of the American Council of Education which had devoted six years to the study of the problems of youth issued its final report, Youth and the Future by Floyd W. Reeves, with an introduction by Owen D. Young, chairman of the Commission. The problem was discussed from both the short and the long-range view. In view of the unrest which arises from unemployment the first concern must be to plan for the employment not only of returned soldiers after the war but also of youth now in school. As a long-range policy it was urged that to make employment available for all youth under 21 should be considered a social responsibility to be provided through CCC, NYA, and works programs. Education should be compulsory to 16, followed by a year of work between school and the next stage whether in occupations or further study; the year would be exploratory to discover needs and abilities. All able and willing to work should find employment, which could be increased by encouraging profit-sharing enterprises, consumer cooperatives, and production of goods and services at prices within the reach of consumers. In the schools more attention should be devoted to vocational guidance and training, work experience, a more realistic study of current problems through social studies, and participation in community activities, and greater emphasis should be placed on health and physical fitness. The importance attached to health and physical fitness was strengthened by the fact that on physical grounds enough young men to make up 15 combat divisions had been rejected by the armed forces.

The recommendation to utilize CCC in a continuing program for youth was based on the report of a five-year study made for the American Youth Commission by Kenneth Holland and Frank E. Hill, Youth in the CCC. The authors referred to the experiment as one of the most important in American education in the past quarter of a century. The CCC not only provided for the care of youth in the depression period, but made a contribution to the war efforts by the kind of training that it had provided in routine habits, discipline, and skills based on army practice and needs.

It was ironical that, when the American Youth Commission came out in favor of CCC and NYA, a movement had begun in Congress to abolish both organizations despite strong pleas for their continuance by the President and Paul V. McNutt. After some debate, in July a bill was passed to liquidate CCC over a period of twelve months and to transfer its equipment to the army. The NYA which had in the previous fiscal year been granted an appropriation of $151,767,000 was continued with an appropriation of less than one-third of that amount, probably on the assumption that its work could be taken care of in the vocational training program of the U.S. Office of Education and an appropriation of $5,000,000 to be used for loans to college students.

Federal Aid.

The movement for Federal aid for education which began during World War I was continued with greater intensity and with an accumulation of arguments in its favor. What had been known before about the absence of genuine equality of educational opportunity was strengthened by additional information which had accumulated in the years immediately before and during the war — on illiteracy, physical fitness, provision of schools, economic status of teachers, and uneven distribution of taxable wealth and population. Mr. Thomas of Utah introduced S.1313 (The Educational Finance Act of 1942) in the Senate to make an annual appropriation of $300,000,000 to reduce inequalities of educational opportunities in elementary and secondary education. These funds would be apportioned to the states according to their relative financial needs for public schools in accordance with a formula based on the number of inhabitants 5 to 17 years of age and the personal net income of each state. The funds so apportioned would be used for the expenses of public elementary and secondary schools, including, if desired, kindergartens and junior colleges; not more than 20 per cent could be used for buildings and equipment. The states in turn would determine plans for apportioning funds to their local communities. The Bill provided that all control of education should remain with the state and local communities in matters of administration, personnel, curriculum, and instruction over which Federal officers and agencies were forbidden to exercise control. Where separate schools exist for separate races, the states must provide a just and equitable apportionment of funds to provide schools for minority races. States were required to spend from state funds as much as had been spent in 1941 for schools. Federal funds could be used only for public agencies under public control. Audits and reports would be required, local school officials dealing only with their own chief school officer and he in turn with the U.S. Commissioner of Education.

Colleges and Universities.

Institutions of higher education were more directly and more immediately affected by the outbreak of war than any other part of the educational system. They were dependent on a clientèle which might be drafted at once for service; they had in many departments personnel whose special training would be a valuable national asset; the larger institutions were equipped to engage immediately in research for war purposes. Ready as they were to place all their resources at the disposal of the Government, the Government made no definite statement of its needs, nor was there any guidance as to how the selective service regulations would affect college students under the new conditions. The only thing that was clear was that military training on the campuses would not be provided as in World War I.

Some guidance was provided by the American Council on Education through its Planning and Executive Board in the suggestion made two weeks after Pearl Harbor that able students be permitted to accelerate their studies and graduate before the age of induction into the armed forces, and that care be taken to meet the future demand of engineers, physicians, dentists, and other professional workers. On the call of the Council representatives of some 1,000 colleges and universities met in conference in Baltimore on Jan. 2. The task before the Conference as defined in a message from President Roosevelt was twofold — to help in winning the war and to lay the foundations for the kind of peace that would guarantee the preservation of those aspects of American life for which the war was being fought. He expressed the hope that 'these institutions which had contributed so largely to the development of American culture' would not be 'destroyed or impaired.' As a result of the deliberations of the Conference colleges throughout the country adopted plans to accelerate courses by allowing abler students to carry heavier programs and by utilizing the long summer vacation and curtailing other vacations. In this way students could complete the normal four-year courses in three or even less than three years. Students were also admitted immediately after graduating from high school.

The chief difficulty with the acceleration plans was that many students relied upon earning money during the summer vacations to pay their fees. This was only partially alleviated by the above mentioned Congressional appropriation of $5,000,000 to be used for loans to students to pay for tuition, fees, and their keep up to a maximum of $500 to any one student. The loans were to be repaid to the Treasury at 2½ per cent interest. Proposals were put forward to increase the appropriation to ten times the amount. On the financial side also faculty personnel was affected; the acceleration program did not result in increased income to the colleges, but involved heavier teaching loads and additional terms for which instructors received little or no additional remuneration. The situation was further aggravated by the depletion of instructors in mathematics, sciences, and technical subjects.

As the year progressed the higher educational institutions were still left in uncertainty as to the needs of the Government, and the uncertainty was still further increased by the delay of the Government in announcing whether the draft age would be lowered to 18. Under the Student Enlisted Reserve Corps students could remain in college for two years unless the demands for active service were changed. At the beginning of the academic year a plan was proposed to enlist some 200,000 carefully selected freshmen and at the end of the first year in college to make a further selection of those able to continue their preparation in special fields — medicine, dentistry, engineering, physics, chemistry, ministry, or the industrial fields.

The absence of a coordinated plan for the utilization of higher education for war purposes was the theme of discussion at a second conference held in Baltimore in July. The importance of higher education to the country was indicated by the fact that although only 12 per cent of the selectees were college graduates, 80 per cent of those selected for officer training were drawn from that group. Financial aid was needed to enable students to pursue courses throughout the year; those who were physically unqualified for military service could be trained for other service; and special attention should be paid to the education of young women for the national effort.

The trend of students was in the direction of technical or professional training which would equip them for war service. So strong was this trend that some fear was already expressed lest the traditional liberal arts courses would be permanently affected. The need of such courses, especially in languages, was shown by the provision in selected institutions of intensive courses in the less known languages of the world, including Burmese, Korean, Malay, Thai, and Pidgin English. The year also saw an unanticipated increase of women in preparation for technical and professional work hitherto pre-empted by men, as well as in those courses — home economics, nutrition, and nursing — which have always been their fields.

The accelerated program was well established and some anticipate that the traditional four-year college course may be replaced in the postwar period by three years. In the meantime the popularity of the two-year junior colleges increased, the number rising from 610 in 1941 to 627 and the enrollments from 236,162 to 267,406. Although only 44 per cent of the junior colleges were public, they had 74 per cent of the enrollments.

If the traditional college course is reduced to three years, it is not impossible that the junior college course may be extended by an additional year. The length of the post-secondary school course is by no means a settled issue, particularly since Chicago University announced early in the year that it would award the A.B. degree at the end of two years. President Robert M. Hutchins in explaining this departure argued that there must be a line of demarcation between general and special education and that a distinction should be made between those qualified to enter on a course of specialization leading to the A.M. in three years, and those who should be eliminated. In the extensive discussions throughout the country no support was given to the Chicago plan; the general criticism was that it would cheapen the traditional A.B. degree and create confusion in the whole field of higher education.

Educational Field in 1942.

The educational picture for 1942 was not altogether satisfactory from the point of view of a coordinated plan. On the other hand, all educational institutions have risen to the occasion; teachers volunteered their services in a great variety of war activities — school and civilian morale, civilian defense, sale of defense savings stamps, first aid and nutrition courses, salvage campaigns, and conducting registration for sugar and gasoline rationing; in some areas teachers gave up part of the summer vacation to look after children, to take special courses, and so on. Also on the credit side is the cooperation between educators through the National Education Association and business men through the National Association of Manufacturers, a cooperation which must lead to mutual understanding of the national importance of education and of educational expenditures. The colleges and universities, perhaps the most strategic centers for the supply of trained manpower and leadership, have suffered most, not only from the prevalent confusion as to their duties, but also from financial uncertainty. Enrollments in colleges beyond the freshman year and in university graduate departments were expected to decline, which would mean loss of income — only partially made up by Federal loans to students, special grants under the ESMWT appropriations of the U.S. Office of Education, and payment for the use of plant and dormitories for the training of officers for the armed forces. Only a small fraction of the higher educational institutions could expect advantages from these sources. The academic year, 1942-43, opened with a drop in enrollments in most colleges ranging from 5 to 58 per cent despite a general increase in freshman classes; the drop was sharpest in law schools and teachers colleges. The lowering of the draft age created new uncertainties for the colleges.

All institutions were threatened by the proposal of a Treasury official to tax bequests for charitable purposes — churches, hospitals, and educational institutions. Further uncertainty was injected into the financial situation by local tendencies to tax college and university property not used directly for educational purposes. The financial conditions faced by these institutions raises the question whether Federal aid will be sought and, if obtained, whether Federal control can be avoided. See also ADULT EDUCATION.