Creative Impulse in Industry: A Proposition for EducatorsMarot, Helen
Science
Creative Impulse in Industry: A Proposition for Educators
Marot, Helen
Business and education -- United States; Technical education -- United States; Working class -- Education -- United States
Indeed the value of the experiment will rest on discovering whether or
not it holds the interest of the pupils, or how and where it diverts
it. The experiment is launched on the assumption that the normal
adolescent child is concerned with the responsibilities of adult life;
especially it is assumed that he is concerned to function creatively,
to associate with others in productive work, to help supply such
fundamental needs as the housing, feeding and clothing and the
pleasures of the world demand. It is assumed that the desire for
experience in pure science, in art for art's sake, comes _before_ as
well as after this period when the need for social contact is, it is
again assumed, the dominating emotion. We have no scientific proof
that any of these things are true, but we have sufficient evidence to
justify an experiment.
Whether or not it is possible for modern industry to offer young
people a proper chance for making their social adjustments is also a
question which I hope this experiment may help to answer. We can do no
less than use the conditions of industry as they present themselves
to us as our basis for a trial. I have started with the belief that
possibly the division of labor and scientific methods of management
if handled by the workers in conjunction with engineers and people of
experience can be made the instruments of associated life. If there is
ground for this assumption it will be important to induce the young
people who enter the school and work shop to give their industrial
experience a fair trial and to postpone the pursuit of pure science or
art for its own sake.
The subject matter taken up in this school can be subjected to a
formal school classification, under such regular academic headings
as Mathematics, Science, Economics, Geography, History, Reading,
Composition and Drawing. While these subjects will be experimentally
rather than academically pursued, it will be a matter of small moment
and short time for pupils to makeup deficiencies which the traditional
school courses require. This is true because the pupils will have had
first hand experience with the subject matter in which the ordinary
school child is trained or hears about. The free pursuit of their
studies will give them a familiarity and speaking acquaintance with
the subject matter with which the traditional school is avowedly
concerned but which it handles and guards as though it were the
custodian of some precious, but insubstantial matter, belonging to a
world somewhat attenuated.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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