Baldwin School - Prism Yearbook (Bryn Mawr, PA)

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fEfje CbitovS of “tCfje JtlileStonc” ant) fCfje Class of 1922 m miringlp Qebicate fCfjiS IBoolt to J$ltnnie iJBechlmti)

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 Upper School

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 tutorial awaking Equate pegs UounD Our American zeal for standardization is a terrible and wonderful thing. It makes us build houses with nothing but their street numbers to differentiate them. It leads milliners to copy a Paris hat in cheaper materials—with the result that shop girls and debutantes are indistinguish- able; and look what it does to our public buildings. All our gasoline stations are miniature Graeco-Roman temples, large railroad terminals are built on the lines of Roman baths and all ecclesiastical buildings are a heterogeneous conglomeration of Romanesque and Gothic, French, Ger- man or English. We crave “normalcy” even in education. If a girl is endowed with a brilliant mathematical mind she must spend a great deal of her time struggling with Latin and English because without these subjects she would not be “educated.” No matter what her individual inclinations and ability, no matter what her own views on a given subject may be, she must conform to the standard. What the colleges have decreed, the schools must confirm. So year after year our preparatory schools sand- paper the square pegs until they are all quite smooth and round. Then the colleges set their stamp upon them, until at the end they are like different brands of soap—each college turning out its own particular brand. Our modern Shakespeares are forced to play football—every normal American boy ought to play football—while the unimaginative athlete slaves over Paradise Lost. This levelling process begins so early that long before girls are out of prep, school, many of them have learned to spend little or no time on the thing for which they have any natural ability, in order that they may have more time to grapple with the subjects which are round holes for them. Unfortunately, square pegs once made round can no longer fit square holes. By neglecting algebra, for example, a girl’s mathematical powers are greatly lessened, and she may even lose much of her interest in the subject. The result is that society acquires another normal Ameri- can woman, with a well-rounded education, a perfectly balanced intellect and a healthy, vigorous body—mens sana in corpore sano—all of which would be admirable, if it were not that at the same time civilization loses a potential mathematician who would, perhaps, have proved of inestimable value to the world. Of course, the numbers of people who, even given the best of opportunities, could be truly great, must necessarily be in the minority, and for the majority no one will deny the benefits to be derived 8