Petaluma High School - Trojans Yearbook (Petaluma, CA)

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THE ENTERPRISE, T6 These schools, unlike the high schools and academies, did not seek to give any of that work which we now call cultural, but sought instead to train the student to do certain particular things. Their defect lay in the narrowness of their purpose; they sought to train the hand and eye, but neglected the mind and heart. They turned out machines,—persons not trained to think, and hence not fitted for business in a larger way, as leaders and employers. The Petaluma High School has before it a career of usefulness to the community it serves, with this as its ideal: to give its boys and girls a mental training which shall make them stronger as men and women, more effective as wage earners, better citizens, and truer in all the nobler relations of life. It proposes to make use of all that has been found worth while in the world ' s store of knowledge and experience, and it aims to give each student the chance to make mental growth on that kind of matter which is best suited to his ability and needs. One student gert the best results from a course of study with Latin and history made prominent in it; another does better on a diet of modern languages and literature ; another finds the study of commerce and its methods best for him; another thrives on science, while still others get most stimulation and growth out of courses in which the manual arts, mechanical drawing, etc., have prominence. Our High School aims to present such a choice of studies as to meet all reasonable needs and tastes, and to give such guidance to the student in making his choice of studies as to avoid the mistakes that in after years often cost one very dear. In California we have at our hands natural resources such as no other country has ever had, in fertile agricultural lands, miles and miles of standing timber, mines great in variety and extent, and almost unlim¬ ited water power, waiting to be converted into electricity for commer¬ cial and domestic uses. We have virgin markets calling for us across the seas, while within our own borders, the steadily growing population gives a stimulus to manufacture and agriculture that older communities do not feel. W e have also been undisturbed, for the most part, by the great vortex of calamity which is overwhelming Europe and which has made our eastern trade conditions so feverish and dangerous both finan¬ cially and morally. Our own affairs go on in their wonted, steady, thriv¬ ing way; our population, our business, our growth, are but little affected oy the awful abnormality of the times. What has the Petaluma High School to do with developing these

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(Eli? ijtglj Submit Now that we are established in our line new building and have all made our high resolves to get the most out of its opportunities, let us recall what it is that we expect our High School to do for us. We know full well that we must get value for the time we spend here. We know that the school costs money which the taxpayers of Petaluma cheerfully furnish. e know that it costs parents much hard earned money to send young men and women to school when they might be at work earning part or all of their own living. We know that it is pleasant to be familiar with history and science and literature, and to be able thus to enjoy the world’s store of good things. But we also know that the High School is not provided merely to the end that we shall get more pleasure out of life through these things. It is provided for a more serious purpose than that; it is provided so that we ourselves shall be able to do better our part in the world ' s work, and so that we shall have ambition enough to want to do a large and worthy part. It is provided for the purpose of making us more useful and better and happier in all the serious relation¬ ships that make men and women worth while,—as workers, as citizens, as parents, as friends. We have often to explain what a High School is for, and it is not always easy to give an answer that is satisfying either to ourselves or to our questioner. The truth of the matter is that our conception of what a High School should aim to accomplish has changed greatly in the past few years under the pressure of modern demands. The older type of school was one in which the student was, for a time, withdrawn in his interest from active life, to study classic thoughts, manners and ideals of bvgone times, together with certain other subjects whose purpose was to cultivate mental agility. This course produced a few—a very few—educated people, of broad culture and frequently great ability. Its defect lay in the narrowness of its field; only those who could afford a long, expensive course, which required supplementary work in a profes¬ sional school or in business, could secure the benefits of its training. To supply an education that would lead more quickly to increased ability as a wage earner, business colleges and trade schools sprang up. — 13 — •Tv

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I THE ENTERPRISE, T6 resources and opportunities? As a part of our generously planned edu¬ cational system, it has before it possibilities of rendering the most tre¬ mendous kind of service to a great people, in turning out citizens equipped with worthy ideals of citizenship, with broad, tolerant, recep¬ tive minds and stable characters, and with specific training in certain things which business and professional men and women should know; thus equipped they are ready to assume leadership and direction in their work as soon as experience has been added to the training of the school. The school has for one of its duties to open up before the students a vis¬ ion of the possibilities that life places before them. Many young men and women have little ambition because they do not know what various kinds of work there are to be done, or what rewards different occupa¬ tions hold out to the successful worker. The High School is intended to reveal to the student the possibilities of different ife careers,—to help them choose as well as to prepare them to start on their careers. Not less practical is the service which the High School renders the young citizen in raising his standards of judgment as a consumer,—so that he shall be able better to appreciate the good things of life, in literature, in drama, in art and music, in apparel, in house building and home furnish¬ ing, in government, and, in general, in all individual and social re’ation- ships. With all this the High School must awaken his ambition by show¬ ing him what the world holds out as its rewards to those who aim high enough and strike hard enough, and it must show him the great va’ue of those solid, enduring virtues that make a man or woman worth while in a world where littleness and feebleness and uncertainty ma rk so many of our brothers and sisters as failures.