Brookline High School - Murivian Yearbook (Brookline, MA)

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C -5 NINETEEN thirty three C -9 iftana G. (Sariurr Near the mouth of the St. Croix River, on Maine’s eastern boundary, stands the little city of Calais, where Miss Gardner was born and spent her early years. Here, immediately after graduating from High School, she began the great ad- venture of teaching. Perhaps the motto of the school committee of that day was, “Only the able should survive,” for they invited her to take charge of an ungraded school of forty- two pupils whose ages ranged from five to nineteen years. After nine years of fine service to her town and pupils alike, Miss Gardner joined the procession of the hundreds of Maine teachers called to advancement in the schools of Massachusetts. Following a brief teaching period in Provincetown, she taught for two years in Quincy. From Quincy, Miss Gardner went to Newton remaining for eight years; then she came to Brookline where she was a teacher for twenty years in the Pierce School. How splendid was her service there, all her fellow-workers well remember. It was yeoman service without noticeable comment upon high standards or noble ideals, for she made these abstractions very real to her pupils. Her motto might well have been “No child shall leave this class without a gift from me”, although there was no self-aggrandisement because of the spirit in which her work was performed. With the abolishing of the ninth grade, Miss Gardner was called to the French Department in the High School. Here she met the new demands with her usual efficient readiness. Two summers were spent in the study of French at Middlebury College, Vermont. Then came several entire summers profitably lived in the home of a cultivated French family. Two other summers were made most valuable and enjoyable by trips to Europe, where one was devoted to travel and the other to study at the Sorbonne and the Alliance Francais. Such arduous study, unbroken throughout this teacher’s twelve years’ service, has not only enriched her power and given continued interest to her classes for mastery of the language, but also has helped to interpret to them the history and literature of the French culture. Tt is thro the kind of teaching Miss Gardner has given, the firm holding of her pupils to the completion of each piece of work, and keeping to her own tasks with unfailing rigor, that these boys and girls can look forward to their great tasks of the future with courage and a quiet heart. Life has no better gift to offer to an honored teacher than this faith. 11

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C- -9 0-0 A [IHETEEH THIRTY-THREE iFlnmtrr Uanmrii At the recent Institute of Character Developing Forces in Boston, our State Commissioner of Education, Dr. Payson Smith, gave utterance to his conviction ' that the subject of Money Management should rank next to Health in importance as a part of the modern school curriculum. His opinion is rapidly coming to be shared by people of all walks of life, and has been expressed by another noted educator as follows: . .... “Financial education should have its beginnings the minute a child starts to think in terms of money, and should continue thereafter by means of allowances at home, specific teaching in all the schools, and advanced courses in college that are required for a degree Brookline has the distinction of being the first place in the country, if not in the world, to include Money Management in its curriculum, and Miss Florence Barnard was the one appointed in the fall of 1028 to become the first Manager of Economic Education throughout a public school system. Years of intensive study, on the problem of how human beings can live well-rounded, well-balanced lives through the scientific management of money, had qualified Miss Barnard for this position. By experimentation since that time, she has evolved a thoroughly practical and skillfully educative plan for strengthening and stabilizing the foundations of our whole financial structure. Her method makes vivid the fact that out of the wise use of money (regardless of the size of income) there is a growing apprecia- tion and acquirement of spiritual values which result in enrichment of life for the individual. It also carries with it a high moral training that is significant and fundamental for social progress. Miss Barnard’s activities in the field of Economics have extended far beyond Brookline. Among the ways she has been and is at present serving are the fol- lowing: As Chairman of the Economic Committee of the Massachusetts Teachers’ Federation, Chairman of the Economic Education Committee of the Massachu- setts Parent-Teacher Association, Member of the National Education Association Committee (of five) on the Economic Status of the Teacher, Member of the N. E. A. Committee on Home Economics, Member of the Council of the American Provident Society. She is also the author of the “Outline on Thrift Education’’ which, in a nation-wide contest open to all teachers, received first prize from the National Association of Mutual Savings Banks. Her special abilities in this field and the value of her work have come to be recognized by leaders of organizations of widely varying interests, such as: Better Business Bureaus: National Council of Superintendents; General Federation of Women’s Clubs; American Bankers’ Association; State and National Girl Scouts; National Congress of Parents and Teachers: National Federation of Business and Professional Women’s Clubs as well as Y. W. C. A. and Rotary Club groups. Formal recognition was given to Miss Barnard’s work by Congresswoman Rogers in a speech before the House of Representatives on July 14, 1932, and by the introduction before Congress of a Joint Resolution Dec. 7, 1932 : “That the Commissioner of Education in the Department of the Interior is authorized and directed to collect full information concerning the Florence Barnard plan of time and money management, to make a studv of such plan, and to make such infor- mation and the results of such study available for the use of the schools and the people throughout the United States.” Because of the call for activitv in these wider fields, Miss Barnard is soon to withdraw from active service in Brookline. Through her many years of devo- tion to the cause of education in this town, her qualities of mind and heart have won for her the loyalty of all students and fellow-teachers who have known her well. We shall miss her from our midst, and wish for her the success and satisfac- tion that her faithfulness and contribution merit. 13