sociological studies of the communities in which they live. They are taught to study the church life, the schools, the industries, the local government; they are sent out to care for those of their own race in the jails and poorhouses; they teach in the Sunday schools; they read the Bible and sing to the poor and aged; and they mend the cabins of the destitute. In this way they not only gain a knowledge of their neighborhood, but they come to have a real interest in helping those around them. Teachers who confine their work to the schoolroom and are interested mostly in their salaries are of little value to the negro race. A normal school that fails to create a generous enthusiasm for helping in every possible way the communities into which its students go is of very little real value. The teachers of the negro race have an opportunity such as is not given to white teachers. They stand at the beginning of the real life of their people. They ought to influence their social, industrial, and religious, as well as their intellectual, life, and their school training should prepare them to do this. In order that young people may learn the proper relations of the sexes, co-education is important. It is not enough to talk to students of either sex as to what their relations should be to the other. They must be taught by actual experience to respect one another, and right relations must be established. To take a young man who has been guilty of ungentlemanly conduct away from a table in a school dining-room, where he has had the privilege of meeting young women, and place him at a table where there are only young men, means more than a year's lectures on morals and manners. In all the training of colored teachers it is important to remember how limited has been the experience of the race in all that has to do with civilized life. As Mr. Charles Dudley Warner says, in a recent paper read before the American Social Science Association: The evolution of a race, distinguishing it from the formation of a nation, is a slow process. We recognize a race by certain peculiar traits, and by characteristics which slowly change. They are required little by little in an evolution which, historically, it is often difficult to trace. They are due to the environment, to the discipline of life, and to what is called education. These work together to make what is called character, racecharacter, and it is this which is transmitted from generation to generation. It is this character, quality, habit, the result of a slow educational process, which distinguishes one race from another. It is this that the race transmits, and not the more or less accidental education of a decade or an era. When we come to understand, then, what the education of a race means, we shall understand that normal training for an undeveloped race like the blacks of our own land must be more than usually comprehensive, and will be successful only so far as it brings them in contact with real life. In a recent number of the Southern Workman, Mr. Hugh M. Browne, a colored instructor at Hampton Institute, speaking of the difference between the white and colored races of this country, says: The white race has been questioning nature for centuries. This wonderful civilization of the present day is the result of their wrestling with nature as Jacob wrestled with the angel. I read only a few days ago of Edison importuning nature for three years and putting to her 6,600 questions to ascertain one fact. The history of the negro race is well-nigh destitute of such talks with nature, and our development is deficient to the extent of this destitution. As Mr. Browne says, the white boy in his home, and the homes of his playmates, gathers a most abundant stock of known facts with which he may commence his investigation. Of these the colored child is deprived. So far as possible, then, the normal as well as the public schools for colored children should give an all-around training which will, to some extent at least, make up for defects in home conditions. In an address delivered before this association in 1872 General Armstrong said: What the negro needs most and what he needs at once is an elementary and industrial education. The race will succeed or fail as it shall devote itself with energy to agriculture and the mechanic arts, or avoid those pursuits; and its teachers ought to be men inspired with the spirit of hard work and acquainted with the ways that lead to material success. Power, character, manhood, is the ultimate end of education, of experience, and of life. The negro race needs leaders-earnest, practical men and women who shall devote their lives to the material, intellectual, and spiritual uplift of their people. These leaders our normal schools ought to develop. For men and women of this sort there never was a more important field of usefulness. Their work will receive recognition from both the white and black people of our land. DISCUSSION HON. G. R. GLENN, state commissioner of education, Atlanta, Ga., said that the ideal of normal training which these good gentlemen have presented shows that the normal schools are not doing what they should do. The normal schools have not acquainted their graduates with the real conditions in which the people live. We are not yet able to secure from the normal schools teachers who can command the situation. The normal schools have not yet reached that measure of growth where they can make men see all that can be developed from a child. Our normal-trained teachers know books enough, but put in the face of a 'situation they cannot meet it. We want as a product from the normal schools, for both white and colored schools, men and women who can command the situation-men who can do things as well as learn them. The part of the brain controlling the sense of touch is several times larger than that controlling any one of the other special senses. This sense, then, should receive a much larger proportion of cultivation than each of the other senses. The child should be thrown into contact with things- he should be a doer. If you can teach these people as they ought to be taught to be producers - we shall close up our jails and prisons. The marvel is that these colored people have not fallen into more ditches than they have. We must make a new people out of the coming generation. If education will not solve this problem, then there is no solution for it. PRINCIPAL G. N. GRISHAM of the Lincoln High School, Kansas City, Mo., said that our colored normal schools are still in the stage of giving subject-matter; they have not yet reached the point where strong professional training is given. He believed the process of educating a negro's brain is not different from the process of educating a white man's brain. But there must be some different methods because of different environment. PRESIDENT R. R. WRIGHT of the State Industrial College, Savannah, Ga., emphasized the disadvantages of the dual system of schools. We do not get proper supervision, and it isolates the colored people. A white teacher can visit white and colored schools alike, can profit by their example and avoid their mistakes. The colored teacher is barred the privilege of visiting the white school. The dual system also prevents the white people from knowing anything of our social life. Under this condition how can a county superintendent select the best teachers intellectually, morally, and religiously for the teaching of our children? PRESIDENT CHARLES D. McIVER, in reply to Hon. G. R. Glenn's argument that teachers are not properly and completely qualified in the normal schools, said that it is not the function of the normal school to give all the theory and experience that only years of active teaching can give. It is the function of the normal school to give teachers the right start and to introduce them to the profession, as is the case in law and medical schools. PRESIDENT JAMES E. RUSSELL closed the discussion by showing most admirably the difference in aim between the normal schools of the South and those of the North. The South needs men and women with a well-rounded development, teachers with initiative who can go into city and country and lift the people to a higher plane of living. Too often, in the North and West, the normal schools prepare men and women to work in a great machine, a great system of schools-to be cogs in a great wheel. In the South teachers are going out from the normal schools with a spirit of service to lift mankind. I assume, said he, that this must become the normal-school aim in every part of this country. DEPARTMENT OF MANUAL TRAINING SECRETARY'S MINUTES FIRST SESSION.-WEDNESDAY, JULY 11, 1900 The meeting was called to order in Thompson Auditorium at 3 P. M. by the president, Charles H. Keyes, of Hartford, Conn. The president delivered an address on "The Relations of Manual Training to Trade Education." It was discussed by Vice-President Charles A. Bennett, of Bradley Institute, Peoria, Ill.; Secretary L. A. Buchanan, of Stockton, Cal.; and Principal B. A. Lenfest, of Waltham, Mass. A letter bearing upon the subject from Charles H. Warner, principal of the Mechanics' Arts High School of Springfield, Mass., was read by the president. It was determined to refer the subject of the president's address to a committee, to make a full study of the question and report to the department at its next annual meeting. Colonel Francis W. Parker, of Chicago Institute, Chicago, Ill., then delivered an address on "Character, Content, and Purpose of the Course in Manual Training for Elementary Schools." The discussion of this address was opened by Mr. Bennett, who was followed by Superintendent W. B. Powell, of Washington, D. C.; Superintendent J. H. Van Sickle, of Baltimore, and others. The secretary called attention to the excellent and comprehensive exhibits, illustrative of the two leading topics of the program, which had been secured by the president of the department, with the active support and co-operation of the Charleston Citizens' Committee. He spoke especially of the exhibits of Porter Military Academy of Charleston; of Pratt Institute, Brooklyn; of the Teachers' College of New York; of the Gustaf Larsson Training School of Boston; of the Hartford High School; of the Millersville (Pa.) Normal School; of the city exhibits of Newark, N. J.; Dayton, O.; Yonkers, N. Y.; Passaic, N. J.; and Stockton, Cal. These exhibits and others were installed in the large hall just back of the Auditorium stage, and were open to visitors at all hours save those of the general morning sessions of the National Educational Association. The president then appointed the following COMMITTEE ON NOMINATIONS Superintendent J. H. Van Sickle, of Baltimore, Md. Miss Hattie M. Gower, of Los Angeles, Cal. Superintendent W. B. Powell, of Washington, D. C. The following resolution was then offered by the secretary, and, on motion, unanimously adopted: and WHEREAS, Great interest has been manifested in the relation of manual training to trade instruction; WHEREAS, It has been suggested that trades should be taught at public expense; be it therefore Resolved, That a committee of five be appointed by the president to investigate the subject during the coming year and report at the meeting of the department next year. Adjourned. SECOND SESSION.-THURSDAY, JULY 12 The meeting was called to order by the president, and the Committee on Nominations, thru Chairman Van Sickle, made its report, recommending for officers the following: For President-Charles A. Bennett, Bradley Institute, Peoria, Ill. Upon motion, the persons named were duly elected officers for the ensuing year. in Manual Training for High Schools," was presented in a paper by Superintendent J. H. Van Sickle, of Baltimore, and one by Principal B. A. Lenfest, of Waltham, Mass. The general discussion was opened by Miss Hattie F. Gower, of California, who was followed by President Bennett. Mr. Bennett was followed by a number of speakers, after which the officers-elect were formally installed, and President Bennett announced as the Committee to Study the Relations of Manual Training to Trade Education: Supervisor Charles H. Keyes, Hartford, Conn., chairman. Principal George A. Merrill, San Francisco, Cal. The department then adjourned sine die. L. A. BUCHANAN, PAPERS AND DISCUSSIONS TEACHING TRADES IN CONNECTION WITH THE PUBLIC SCHOOLS CHARLES F. WARNER, MECHANIC ARTS HIGH SCHOOL, SPRINgfield, mass. I suppose it will not be questioned that there is a general feeling thruout the country—at least in the foremost educational centers-that, if possible, manual-training high schools should do something to meet the growing demand for education in the trades. There certainly can be no doubt about the demand for this teaching. One needs only to ask his next-door neighbor, if he be a manufacturer, to be told that the situation in industrial quarters is alarming, and is steadily growing worse. The country is flooded with inferior workmen; but the skilled mechanics are few in number, comparatively speaking, and are, for the most part, advanced in years. They were trained under the apprentice system which, in this country, is practically gone. There are no young men under training to take their places, and the conditions in the industries are such, at present, that there can be no adequate provision for supplying the need which was formerly met by the apprentice system. I will pass over the causes which have brought about this condition of things, but they are not far to seek. It is sufficient to state the factand I think it cannot be doubted—that the promise for the future of the better order of handcrafts in this country is nothing short of alarming. More than a hundred manufacturers have confirmed this statement; and they go farther and say that, so far as they are able to see, the only solution is to be found in the education of youth. To one who has not |