musical numbers and recitations, and followed with refreshments and conversation. In South Bend, Ind., a committee of the chamber of commerce has been instrumental in arranging a series of "civic center meetings" held every two weeks in a number of the public schools. The school board furnished not only heat, light, and janitor service, but also a motion-picture machine. An extensive program of concerts, readings, and lectures are held in the Montclair (N. J.) schools under the combined auspices of the local women's organizations, the board of education, and Unity Church. Plainfield, N. J., offers several suggestive forms of cooperation: Three of the school yards, with the adjoining buildings, are used for playground purposes under the control of the city playground commission, with the cordial cooperation of the board of education. Various buildings are used for social center purposes under the general direction of a citizens' committee on evening recreation. This committee was organized at the suggestion of the board of education and has in its membership the president of the board and the superintendent of schools. It employs a supervisor under a salary, who devotes her whole time to conducting and promoting the work. The board of education furnishes the buildings with heat, light, and janitor service and pays a portion of the salary of the supervisor. The work includes evening meetings of various kinds, for dancing, club purposes, instruction, municipal orchestra, etc. * Library centers in several of the school buildings are open on various evenings to give the library benefits to the people of the neighborhood. * * The town improvement association of Bloomfield, N. J., maintains classes in sewing, folk dancing, and athletic games one night a week in two grammar schools. The Washington Irving High School, in New York City, is the headquarters for the Gramercy Neighborhood Association. This body conducts weekly dances on the roof or in the gymnasium of the high school, arranges orchestral concerts, programs of motion pictures, and cooperates in securing loan art exhibits for the foyer of the building. It has been allotted office space in the high school and is doing much to improve social conditions in that part of the city. In Jersey City a volunteer extension committee of 20 or 30 members cooperates with the board of education in the maintenance and direction of public dances and club work for young women and men. Embroidery, folk dancing, and choral work are included in their activities. In the same city a public forum is held in one of the large high schools on Sunday afternoons by the People's Institute. At these meetings topics of a civic, social, or ethical character are presented by wellknown speakers. While the instances just recorded happen to be drawn from eastern localities, they nevertheless illustrate forms of cooperation that are to be found in all parts of the country. SOCIAL AND RECREATION CENTERS. The recent tendency to use public school buildings during the evenings in organized social and recreational activities can not be measured in accurate quantitative terms. The difficulty is that there is no agreement as to what constitutes a social center. According to current usage "social center" is applied to a wide range of undertakings; similar sets of activities have different names in different places. "Evening center," "school center," "community center," and "civic center" have all been applied to evening enterprises that in some cities go by the name of social or recreation centers. The difficulty is further complicated by the lack of uniformity in record keeping and the absolute lack of information in many school board offices as to the precise number of evening occasions that called for the use of their school edifices. An attempt was made during the months of February, March, and April, 1914, to obtain uniform records of evening occasions in cities of 5,000 population and over. To all superintendents who offered to cooperate, blank forms were furnished with spaces for a daily record of evening activities. Of the 233 cities that accepted this offer, filled-out cards were returned by 110. In tabulating these cards, those which showed evening occasions other than those of the regular night school as frequently as at least twice a week were assembled in one table. In this way a tentative selection of those cities that might be considered to have social centers was made. Whether or not a school having evening activities open to the public as frequently as twice a week represents the minimum standard for a social center can only be decided by the judgment of time. It seemed, however, the most significant standard that could be adopted for the present. The table thus prepared shows that 53 cities, having an aggregate of 296 schools, meet the requirements of the standard. According to trustworthy reports there are also 29 other cities that claim to have social centers, but regarding which detailed information is not at hand. Such reports as are available indicate that in these 29 cities there are about 100 schools that are locally known as social centers, and there is strong evidence that they are enjoying a normally rapid growth. Some of the more significant recent developments in cities where social center work has become a definite part of the school program may be briefly noted. In New York City experimenting in social center methods has been carried on by volunteer committees in cooperation with the board of education. As a result of these efforts, several expert social workers were added to the regular evening recreation center staff and the scope of their work in several neighborhoods was extended. Centers that had been maintained for women and girls only were reorganized so as to admit men and boys. Social dancing and motion-picture entertainments with paid admissions were found to afford an income as well as desirable forms of amusement. Struggling amateur orchestras were put on a flourishing basis through the opportunity to rehearse in the school building, and public forums were instituted where political rallies, meetings of labor unions, and warm discussions of live local questions could freely take place. Perhaps the most important result obtained at these experimental social centers was the development of local committees with the ability to help to sustain and direct the work. In one or two of the centers the growth of income-producing activities was such as to supply funds for all of the expenses of the extra activities except that of the salary of the paid expert organizer. As a result of these experiments the policy in the evening recreation work tends to favor neighborhood organization as a distinct goal of the school-center activities. In Philadelphia the social centers which for a number of years. were maintained by the Home and School League and allied organizations, with light, heat, and janitor service from the school board, have now been taken over by the recently established municipal board of recreation. The dramatic clubs that flourished in the Chicago social centers have been stimulated by an arrangement whereby any club successful in staging a play is allowed to present its production at other social centers. Through such exchanges healthy rivalries have been set up and the clubs have had a greater incentive to do good dramatic work. In Milwaukee, where the social centers are included under the "extension department" of the school board, unusual pains have been taken to adapt school accommodations to recreational uses. Some of the details of this work are set forth in the following statement by the supervisor of recreation: Experience has proven that the average school building can, with little difficulty and comparatively little expense, be made to meet the demands of evening recreation center work. By screening windows and lights, the assembly halls are transformed into spacious gymnasiums. Basement rooms are made attractive by painting the cement floors, whitewashing the walls, and brightly illuminating with electricity. Where basement rooms are not available, the regular classrooms are used. The seats are put on runners or wooden strips in groups of four. By this simple device the schoolroom can in a few minutes be cleared of seats and desks. A door tender is in constant attendance in the main corridor. He is there to act as reception committee rather than to act as police. Every possible attempt is made to secure for this position a man of tact and pleasing personality who can speak the language of the neighborhood. Settees and easy chairs transform the main corridor into a lobby where neighbors may meet for friendly conversation. The classroom nearest the door is used as wardrobe where wraps may be checked free of charge. Each full-time center is in charge of a director, who devotes his entire time to the work. The centers open three evenings a week are in charge of the day-school principal of the building. Workers for the different activities are drawn mainly from the public-school teaching corps. Some are secured from the local State normal school and from Marquette University. A cooperation in the maintenance of social centers and other recreational activities has been effected in Grand Rapids, Mich., between the board of park commissioners and the board of education. The former maintains a superintendent of recreation and the latter furnishes space and facilities for his work. In Louisville, Ky., the five social centers are entirely supported by the neighborhoods in which they exist. Each center is under the control of a local council, which sends two representatives to a central council consisting of a member of the board of education, the superintendent of schools, the business director of the board, and the director of the social centers. Any neighborhood desiring to use its school building as a social center is obliged to send in a petition and guarantee the support of the center for a definite probationary period. An interesting feature of the social center activities in Los Angeles, Cal., is the special provision which is made for immigrants who are planning to take out naturalization papers. The director of the work describes as follows one of the methods employed: The New Citizens' Club meets on Thursday evenings. A few young men, some of whom are newly naturalized citizens and others who expect to be, are vitally interested in the political, social, and economic questions of our day. All take part in the discussions, and many show surprising intelligence. Once a month there is a special meeting, with an address by some prominent citizen, when those who pass the citizenship examination at the superior court are specially invited. At the close of each semester recognition day services are held. All the new citizens who have received their second papers within the six months are specially invited to a banquet given by prominent citizens as hosts. Later, in the auditorium there is a public meeting. The program consists of addresses by leading citizens and city, county, and State officials; patriotic music and motion-pictures, and the ceremony of extending the right hand of citizenship. The meaning and value of American citizenship is emphasized. ADULT EDUCATION THROUGH LECTURES. Besides the annual lyceum and other courses mainly of an entertaining character, there is a growing tendency among school boards to arrange series of public addresses having definite educational aims behind them, such as have for years characterized the New York public-school lecture system. In its simplest form this effort to increase adult education is revealed in a lecture course in the school buildings under the management of a citizens' committee, or some other voluntary body, working with the sympathetic cooperation of the school board. The public-health movement is prominent in these undertakings, and from many cities come reports of lectures on tuberculosis, care of the teeth, and personal hygiene, which are given under the auspices of local medical associations or State health departments. The arrangement of public lectures of an educational character is facilitated in several States now through the circulation of lantern slides from the State department of education. In Wisconsin the extension division of the State university not only loans lantern slides, but is providing motion-picture films. A more advanced type of this sort of endeavor is illustrated by the educational extension courses arranged each year by the school board of Birmingham, Ala. During the 1913-14 season 156 lectures were given, representing 9 courses ranging from 3 to 75 lectures. Some of the topics covered were: Child health and hygiene, municipal recreation, home and school gardening, street railway transportation, and city building. All these lectures were free and were made possible through the generous cooperation of professional and business men of the community. In Baltimore, Md., the public lecture is utilized as a step toward the development of public schools as neighborhood centers. The arrangement of courses of public evening lectures has been made a duty of the first assistant superintendent of schools. For his assistance the board has appointed local committees in the districts where neighborhood centers are organized. Many of the lectures are devoted to municipal topics, and all are planned to secure popular interest. At the same occasion musical numbers are provided, and whenever possible the lecture is connected with the meeting of some parent-teacher association or other body associated with the school. Printed invitations to these meetings are widely distributed. EVENING SCHOOLS SOCIALIZED. The night school shows signs of losing much of its traditional formality. "Our reading rooms and game rooms in the night school are always full"-such notes as this one from Athens, Ga., indicate the character of the new element that is coming more and more into the evening-school program. Many cities now announce gymnasium courses that have all the attractions of organized games. In New York, high-school buildings occupied hy night schools have been opened on Friday evenings for the special benefit of organizations formed out of the student body. These include dramatic societies, literary, and debating clubs, gymnasium clubs, musical societies, and 73226°- -ED 1914-VOL 1- -30 |