Central High School - Cog N Pen Yearbook (Newark, NJ)

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TO PARENT | А | | | April 29, 1924. Dear Parents:— Duty! How many ideas it brings to mind! Duty, a word all- enveloping in its magnitude! All of our acts involve duty. Duty to self, to parents, friends, country— in fact every right act is the result Xf duty consciously or unconsciously performed. We readily understand why our children must ever have the thought of duty before them. Duty is the guardian and director of our conscience. It is neces- sary to imbue our children with the conception of duties well accom- plished. Duty well performed loses its routine when it comes from the heart and becomes zlorified into service. Too many of us fail to do our duty to ourselves. Is your child do- ing his full duty to himself or to society? One way in which children fail to do their duty is to neglect school tasks and duties. Children should regard it as a duty to be in their places each day, eager to do their day's work, with the feeling of appreciation of the opportunities, offered them. If children are imbued with the feeling that school is.a: p rivilege involving the duty of tasks well done, the school will be cleared of retarded pupils who are clogging the system and preventing the ambitious from: progress- ing. Unpreventable causes may result in failure, but most of the failures ire due to neglect of duty. If each child does its duty to the very best of its ability, life will be happier and our schools will be able to accommodate ail who are seeking admission. Urge your children to see to it that they do their duty at all times thoroughly and willingly. Principal.

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ТЕ ЕРІ WW, E. om . SET IDA children hear a foreign language at home and where the surroundings are not altogether favorable for the best educational results, failures are bound to be rela- tively numerous. Children so handicapped are at a disadvantage regardless of the iype of elementary school they attend. It is a graduates of ten-month schools situated in certain matter of record that the crowded neighborhoods are relatively inferior in ability to do high school work. The ten-month school does not increase their native ability. Тһе all-year school, on the other hand, by additional trainining, tends to offset their disabilities. that the all-year plan enables us to graduate pupils Also, it must be remembered who, under the ten-month plan, would drop out of school before graduation. Іп other words, the all- year plan gives the dull pupil a chance to graduate, while the traditional plan gives him no chance. Con- sequently, only the brightest of the regular schools are compared with the rank and file of the all-year schools Also, it is well to remember that many children living in con- and, hence, ought to show a better record. gested districts find it difficult to meet high school because they lack suitable places for They fail, not because they lack intelligence, but because requirements, study and can obtain little assistance at home. of certain conditions under which they must live. It is manifestly unfair to charge such failures to all-year schooling merely because all-year schools happen to be located in these districts. figures bearing upon this subject is not that all-yearness The significance of the makes the product inferior, but that schools in crowded city districts have many handicapped children to deal with. What is to be marveled at is not that some of these children fail in high school, but that they are enabled to reach high school. It may happen that some pupils go to high school poorly prepared, but since poor scholarship is not con- fined to all-year schools, there is no justice in placing blame for such conditions upon the all-year plan. [here is no good reason for promoting pupils too rapidly in any school. Wherever this mistake is be- ing made, the proper remedy should be applied, and that remedy is simply not to promote pupils until they are fit for promotion. The remedy is the same for both all-year and ten-month schools. Abolishment of all-yearness would aggravale, not remedy, the situa- tion, for the handicapped children would have little opportunity to overcome their handicaps. What has been said of high school records applies also to records obtained by our school surveys. Some all-year schools made a good showing, others, a poor one, but the same is true of regular sc hools. In gen- eral, records made by the two-language' schools were inferior, regardless of the type of organization, this inferiority being due principally to the children's not knowing the English language well. THE ГІМЕ ELEMENT It has been said that the short term of the all- year schoo! is a disadvantage because the school must be reorganized so many times during the year, but the truth is that several reorganizations are not necessary and are not actually made, for it is just as rasy to arrange that a teacher keep a class a year under the all-year plan as under the regular plan. This is a matter of administration. Even the reorganization of July Ist, when about one-fourth of the pupils leave for the summer, may be effected without loss to the pupils, if the plan is administered with care. From the standpoint of the children the short term is really an advantage, for when a pupil fails he must repeat only three months’ work, while in a ten-month school a before receiving another opportunity for promotion—five if child must wait either five or seven months he fails in February, seven if he fails in June. Cer- tainly it is better for a pupil to lose only three months than it is for him to lose six. Го children who cannot afford to remain in school many years this is an im- portant item. Under the all-year plan a pupil may fail once during the year and still accomplish a full year's work as measured by the course of the ten- month school. Repetitions of grades in the all-year school are not so costly to children and do not pre- vent ultimate success: in the ten month schools repeti- tions are serious and lead to almost certain failure to graduate. It has been said, however, that pupils do not save (Please note that in one breath it is said that they gain so much time by attending school all year. much time that they reach high school too young, and that in another it is said that they really gain little time). By the all-year plan children are given an opportunity to do in nine months what others do in Then for the next three months they may ad- (Continued on page 93) len.

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vu, 2 ` | П DT T LL DRUMS OF DOOM By Morris Targer Nestling in among the Raveaux Hills lies р . Aubrey, а tiny French village of some four hundred people. Picture Dawn! The sun, a molten ball of fire creeps slowly up above the waving green meadows, darting forth multicolored streaks of flame. At length with a startling suddenness, Old Sol blazes forth upon a peaceful world, gleaming wondrously in all his dazzling splendor. А new day has come! The sleepy little hamlet begins to awaken. A cock's shrill clarion—the yelp of a dog and a thin line of smoke begins to curl towards the heavens. “hen another and another. Soon Andre Valtier, big of bone and heart is seen walking to his blacksmith chop, singing to himself. Не is at peace with the world. A few minutes later, the clang of the anvil -ings out midst the neighing of many horses. As if by signal immediately all the little shops and booths began to open and the children to appear, walking in merry groups of threes and fours, going to school with their books in their arms. The tinkling of a cowbell, the faint bah-h of a sheep—all chimed in to make this an atmosphere of quiet and serenity. Then from the Mme. Valtiers house, darted a slim, lissome girl of some eighteen summers. Her hair was a deep chestnut brown, that matched Old Sol 8 in radiance, her smooth oval face with just a tinge of red in each cheek was as smooth as а baby’s. Her eyes were big and brown and sparkled mis- He nose was a bit tilted and her full This With a sudden peal of joy, Roxie raced away as light as a chievously. red lips surrounded a set of pearl white teeth. was Roxie Valtier, daughter of the blacksmith. fawn, for walking ahead she espied Raoul Lenisse, her betrothed. When but a few yards distant she raised her voice and said, in a tone of mock severity, He does not Oh!” anger, “So, this is how my beloved one acts. even deign to see his little Roxie. she cried tremulously, “I am mad with and she stamped her tiny foot on the ground. On hearing her voice, Raoul immediately turned around and seeing who it was, walked back hastily and took her in his arms in a bear-like embrace. “Oh,” she cried, looking up into his dark, hand- some face. “І love уош.” And I you,” returned the happy Raoul as he pressed his lips to hers. Then he released her and flushed but glad, they both continued to walk along the road, her ridiculously small hand in his own, each wrapt in silence. So they continued until they came to the crossroads, where they parted, Raoul to go to