EDUCATION ON THE WAR

Of the many problems forced upon the United States by the present European conflict, one of the most important is an educational problem--What shall the schools teach about the war? This question cannot be solved by the method adopted by certain New York schools; there teachers were forbidden to speak about the war. The Graduate School of Education recently held a meeting of schoolmen to discuss the problem more fully. The results of this conclave have meaning for teacher and student alike.

The principal speaker, Professor Elliott, spoke as an "educational layman". He had two basic assumptions--American teachers are seekers after objective truth, and the function of American education is to perpetuate our democratic ideals. Both these assumptions can be readily granted. But from there on this theory treads on dangerous ground. According to it, since objective truth lies clearly on the Allied side, no teacher can be intellectually neutral. The best course for American education, then, is to preach the Allied cause.

The conclusions of this sort of reasoning can be criticized on two grounds. First, the demand for expressions of opinion only in the class-room is a direct contradiction of a basic tenet of American education--objectivity. Such interpretation in education can be justified only by assuming that all the facts about the war have been proved, which is not the case. Then, too, school-boy minds are very easily swayed; the teacher's words are the gospel truth. Certainly a teacher has a right to present his interpretation of the facts. But he must not substitute this interpretation for the facts themselves; it must not pose as the truth.

Secondly, pro-Allied sentiment among proponents of this educational approach to the war tends to interpret a furthering of the Allied cause as a defense of American democracy. This, too, has yet to be conclusively shown; maybe British propaganda agents will be forced to prove it soon. But in any case, the basis of such a program for education here appears to be the old "one fact and a prejudice" saw.

It seems doubtful if this theory is an adequate approach to the problem. America faces a difficult job in staying neutral, and the teaching of pro-Allied interpretations of the war will not help. If America is to stay calm in the face of foreign fire, it would do well to go on teaching both sides of the question as it has in the past. Contrary to some belief, there still are two sides.