Oakwood Collegiate Institute - Oracle Yearbook (Toronto Ontario, Canada)

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THE OAKWOOD ORACLE Oakwooditesl-our school continues and will continue its climb up- ward from honour to honour, every year attaining something coveted by all. If there has been a lack of school spirit in the past, see that there is plenty of it in the future, remembering always that it takes more than school spirit to achieve success. QE'ur IBups'QlZluh The fact that Oakwood Collegiate contains no Boys' Club is an admis- sion that we girls are better organizers and managers than the boys. Our brawny hockey and rugby heroes fade away when the season for their sport is past. Is there no way to bring the influence of these and others into contact with our daily school life '? The boy who has no interest in sport or who could not make a school team would be vitally interested in a movement of this sort. To him it might mean many a pleasant afternoon or evening passed away engaged in the pursuit of his hobby with another member of the Club. We might, of course, have a Little Brothers' Club Society, and such like, but the boys of 1940 would be constantly reminded of the fact that we, the girls, were the first to form such an organization. The meaning of the word club will convey our purpose to you. A club is a number of persons associated for a common purpose or mutual benefit. fShould Mr. Brown or Mr. Hanna read this article the definition was taken from Websters dictionaryb-surely among our great number of boys there are many different hobbies and if the boys following the same hobby got together-i-? We might, for example, have in the club a Philatelist Society. For the benefit of first-formers this means a stamp-collecting society falso Webster's dictionaryl. The number of boys around the school engaged in this fascinating pursuit are innumerable. Then perhaps a checker or crokinole society for the indoor lad or, a skiing or tobogganing club for the one who enjoys the great outdoors. The great aim of the club would be not to detract from school work but merely to make the school a more pleasant and happier place for the average boy. What do you think about it? Qfhucatiun anh war Education has been defined as the discipline of the intellect. It forms character and through it one recognizes standards of good judg- ment. Likewise in it, I believe, lies the prevention of war. We have had the experience of war and we all know the tragic re- sult of physical combat. Practically everyone is eager to prevent war. Let us look at the nations of the world to-day. We see that in those countries where the standard of education is high, there is government by the people and not by a sovereign head. These countries have rid themselves of the elements which caused war in the past-the personal ambitions of rulers and the enmity of one towards another. The British Empire is composed of colonies inhabited by people of different race, religion and ideas, but we have peace and unity. Why is this? It is because the mother country, through that great teacher Ex- perience, has learned that her colonies must have their rights reserved Page Eleven

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THE OAKWOOD ORACLE Qutographs . Sandpaper it off I How often have we heard that command in the last few weeks? Are our desks, our books, and our P.T. shoes not cov- ered with these dreadful autographs? Do not Mr. Jackson and another very well-known teacher make our lives hideous nightmares becaus of them 'T Surely it is no crime to inscribe our names thus indelibly on the tops of those desks from which we rise, sometimes in fear and tremb- ling-sometimes to hurl missiles at a studious one who appears too intent on absorbing the knowledge from his text books. May not our auto- graphus. so skilfully written, prove an inspiration to students yet to come. 1 p ,O e Lives of great men all remind us, We can make our lives sublime And departing, leave behind us Footprints in the sands of time. Although at the moment, few of us contemplate leaving footprints in the sands of time for the encouragement and inspiration of posterity, still we do enjoy and benefit by our school associations. The unselfish manner in which our instructors perform their often difficult duties, should inspire us to greater efforts to carve our names, not merely upon our desks, but rather upon the scroll that at the end of our school days will mark the success which we have attained. The memory of the years spent at Oakwood will ever be refreshed by the sight of the names of our school mates so artistically UD in- scribed on the pages of the Oracle. Some of them may attain positions of great responsibility in life, thereby not only bringing credit to them- selves, but reflecting honour upon the school of which we are so justly pi-our. School Svpiriteggain! Much has been said in our halls during the year now closing con- cerning school spirit, how it was becoming a thing of the past and how the lack of it was slowly but surely undoing all the good work of those who went before. This rumour is enough to stop anyone's clock- sufficient cause for fear-and incentive enough to make the slowest of us quicken our pace, But is our school spirit dead ? lixactly six years ago, in the Spring edition of our Oracle, someone wrote an inspiring and awful editorial on this same subject. He de- clared that school spirit was, at that time, at its lowest ebb and pointed out the merits of the school when he first entered it. From his point oi' view Oakwood was doomed to become but a name in a very few years. bo you see, even in that period, the same old battle was being waged, and yet we have managed to keep on our feet and gain the envy ui' all. It is an established fact that there is always someone possessed with the idea that our patriotism is not as it used to beg perhaps that will always be the case. Ol' course there may be grounds for some of it. Our teams are so used to walking away with all honours, that when they do manage to suffer defeat, everyone becomes a pessimist. Page Ten

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THE OAKWOOD ORACLE and so it is said that although the Imperial parliament can legally legis- late for Canada, practically it cannot. ' By the bitter road of experience we have been taught to dislike war and because we have been educated by passing through the last great wai, nations are continually seeking ways and means by which such an experience can be prevented. 5 The mind of a country is similar to that of an individual. Educa- tion teaches an individual to respect the rights of others, so education will teach a nation to respect the rights of its fellow nations, for fun- damentally is not every war caused by one nation usurping the rights of another 'F With world wide high standards of education there would be an ideal condition of every nation respecting the rights of others. From education we obtain knowledge and understanding. Another cause of war has been that nations do not understand one another. The international conflict in China only a few years ago was caused by the fact that the Chinese people could not understand why foreigners should hold private concessions in Chinese territory. Education is to-day working in a practical sense to prevent war. Statesman from all the great nations in the world learned through ex- perience and training that disputes could be more effectively settled by conference than by war. That knowledge led to the formation of the League of Nations which in one year settled fifty-eight disputes, any one of which might have caused war. A great many look upon education as one of the minor contributions to world peace. I am of the opinion that it stands first and after that let us improve our economic relations. bthuul While all melts under our feet we may well grasp at any exquisite passion, or any contribution to knowledge that seems by a lifted horizon to set the spirit free for a moment, or any strange stirring of the senses, strange dyes, strange colours and curious odors, or work of the artist's hands, or the face of one's friend. Not to discriminate, every moment some passionate attitude in those about us and in the very brilliancy of their gifts some tragic dividing of forces on their ways is on this short day of frost and sun to sleep before evening. Walter Pater speaks, a professor of Oxford. His quiet words il- lumine the meaning of the life of school. School does not mean text- books with, if this book should chance to roam -on the fly-leaf. Nor blackboards weary with sentences scrawled in despair and corrected in exasperation. Nor the relief of bells each forty minutes. Nor a pad black with detentions. Nor a Dominion looseleaf note book with curling dirty pages, signature on the cover, and beneath it. A not book, the more in which there is, the less you may know is in its owner's mind. Nor the despair nor elation of a report. All reports are untrue. They are as far from the reality of the facts in the pupil's mind as the symbol o is from zero. This what school appears to be. It is what school is not. To study is to be eager. The life of school is the eagerness of students to live. That is why they are at school, to learn to live richly. When we sense nothing physically or mentally we are dead. Read again Walter I'ater's words. ln life, school is morning. Many sleep in, morn- ings. All day they have a headache. Students who do not live the life ol' school have slept. All through life they are bewildered. Pngr Tirrlrc