p. 27 | An Idaho Educator’s Plan for a Real Education

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jun 4, 1908

An Idaho Educator’s Plan for a Real Education

The present educational systems were attacked by Rev. E. A. Paddock, president of the Idaho Industrial Institute at Weiser, in an address delivered before the co-operative class at the First Congregational church, Chicago, recently. The speaker declared that the average college graduate is a complete failure when called on to make his living by manual labor, and the whole educational system tends to create a feeling of caste. He urged as a remedy that students be required to devote at least half of the day to learning a trade.

“I believe the social disorders which are prevalent in this country to-day arise on a large scale, if not wholly, from the fact that our system of education is all wrong,” he said.

“We are training one faculty and sacrificing others. The remedy is to be found in a half-time school, where the student will be kept half a day at his books, and taught some trade during the other half. The half-time school system would tend to break down the feeling of caste.

“Many prominent employers have told me that the poorest recommendation a young man can bring them is his college diploma. The fault lies in the fact that too much attention is paid to theory, while practical work, most needed in the battle with the world, is almost entirely overlooked. Give the boy an education, but give him also the means of applying that education.”— Boise (Idaho) Evening Capital News.