Such is the real substance of the present movement in favour of
technical education. But, instead of bringing to public consciousness
the, perhaps, unconscious motives of the present discontent, instead
of widening the views of the discontented and discussing the problem
to its full extent, the mouthpieces of the movement do not mostly
rise above the shopkeeper’s view of the question. Some of them
indulge in jingo talk about crushing all foreign industries out of
competition, while the others see in technical education nothing but
a means of somewhat improving the flesh-machine of the factory and of
transferring a few workers into the upper class of trained engineers.
Such an ideal may satisfy them, but it cannot satisfy those who keep
in view the combined interests of science and industry, and consider
both as a means for raising humanity to a higher level. We maintain
that in the interests of both science and industry, as well as of
society as a whole, every human being, without distinction of birth,
ought to receive such an education as would enable him, or her, to
combine a thorough knowledge of science with a thorough knowledge of
handicraft. We fully recognise the necessity of specialisation of
knowledge, but we maintain that specialisation must follow general
education, and that general education must be given in science and
handicraft alike. To the division of society into brain workers and
manual workers we oppose the combination of both kinds of activities;
and instead of “technical education,” which means the maintenance of
the present division between brain work and manual work, we advocate
the _éducation intégrale_, or complete education, which means the
disappearance of that pernicious distinction.
Plainly stated, the aims of the school under this system ought to
be the following: To give such an education that, on leaving school
at the age of eighteen or twenty, each boy and each girl should be
endowed with a thorough knowledge of science--such a knowledge as
might enable them to be useful workers in science--and, at the same
time, to give them a general knowledge of what constitutes the bases
of technical training, and such a skill in some special trade as
would enable each of them to take his or her place in the grand world
of the manual production of wealth.[185] I know that many will find
that aim too large, or even impossible to attain, but I hope that if
they have the patience to read the following pages, they will see
that we require nothing beyond what can be easily attained. In fact,
_it has been attained_; and what has been done on a small scale could
be done on a wider scale, were it not for the economical and social
causes which prevent any serious reform from being accomplished in
our miserably organised society.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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