Pickering College - Voyageur Yearbook (Newmarket, Ontario Canada)

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THE VUY.MlfiUR 159 -iff 5. wi' jffilglt . .jfit 1 . n Voyageufr Staff Henderson, Williams, Bowser fAdvert1'singj. Charters fPl1otograpl1yj, Mr. McCulley, Mr. Perry fStaff Editorl. Strouse fAtl1letz'c Editorj, Rudy Renzius fArtj, Buchanan flnterary Editorj. of the school and the factory may he again applied. This time however we will keep the matter of craftsmanship in mind and thus attempt to correct the two errors in interpretation to which the idea is suhject. A furniture factory may take wood to huild tables. To the workmen it is all wood, nothing more and nothing less. They saw and hammer and polish and paint. The result is a row of tables not one of which differs one whit in appearance from any other. Yet one tahle may last ten months, an' other only two. Une table may hreak a leg, another split down the middle. The difference depends on where the flaws were in the wood. The workmen had ignored them as well as they had ignored where the special strength of any single piece lay. There is the other type of factory. Here the raw material is studied and tested. The piece of wood that will make a tahle top hecomes a tahle top. Another piece, after the flaws are removed, seems Ht only for a hrace: hut 19

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THE, VOYAGEUR EDITOIQIAI. s MR. CHARLES SAID IN CHAPEL ONE NIGHT, Pickering is your house by the side of the roadf' The years we have spent here, for many of us, have been our happiest. The sharp corners have been slowly rounded. Our learning has not been only academic for that is not the only purpose for which Pickering has been established. The group of boys who are here have come from all parts of Canada and the United States. They have learned to work together and in many cases have become fast friends-bonds that will never be broken. From our house by the side of the road we have seen the world, as if on review, go by. Many boys who are leaving would like to remain in such a place as Pickering and avoid the sordid way of life. If they did this they would remain only boys and never become men. The years, the friendly years, we have spent at our second home have passed too quickly. Friendships and experiences are the beautiful things of life that are never forgotten. Pickering has left us many memories that are indelibly imprinted on our minds. That etching, after this year, will be Pickering and shall never be forgotten. ' R. J. STROUSE N oNE MANNER OF SPEAKING a boys' school is, after all, like a factory and the students form the raw material. One need go but a little further with this outworn analogy to place the old boys as the finished product. The whole business, of course, holds good and is applied in this way, item, enter the new boy or raw material, item, several years of subjecting the student to various processes, item, the graduate or finished product is thrust forth into the world market where he assumes a certain value according to his merits. This is all very well but it may be sadly misunderstood. In the first place there are those who will apply this analogy too closely, take the image too literally. The result is that the whole responsibility for the degree of success with which the boy meets in the world is thrust upon his school. If he is a rotter, the school must be poor, if he is a brilliant success, the school must be a first class place. Then there are those who commit a second type of mis' understanding. They are inclined to believe that a boy will be what nature made him no matter where he gets his education. To them the school is merely a place where he spends a few years picking up the elements of readin', writing and 'rithmetic. The truth lies somewhere between these two views and may be the easier located by a consideration of the meaning of craftsmanship. Here the analogy 18

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THE VGYAGEUR braces are needed and it fulfills its function. When this factory turns out its products, each of them is suited to perform some task. It is suited to perform that task because its makers have recognized the intrinsic values of the raw material from which it was made and have so wrought as to make its strengths of most use and its weaknesses of least harm. The analogy between the good factory and the good school may easily be seen. We old boys of Pickering College believe we attended a school which gave heed to the importance of craftsmanship. Out in the world of tofday we come to realize more and more just how significant such a school may be, and how valuable. For here we may see the results of the two errors mentioned above. In some nations of the world we may find what happens when the analogy of the factory is applied too closely. We discover the regimentation of youth, the attempt to Cast every man by a single die, the meatfgrinder process of educating. Un the other hand we find too, and this in our own country, the results of considering education merely as a matter of providing boys with certain of the rudiments of knowledge. These are the educators who, while they do not make the error of attempting to mold all material to one pattern, commit a fault on the negative side in that they do not realize that raw material may be improved and its usefulness as well as its beauty increased by a process which will intensify the effect of the good qualities in any participating piece. Both methods breed intolerance, the first by inculcating certain prejudices, the second by allowing -prejudices to go unquestioned and unnoticed. The years of the new Pickering College number now some odd dozen. The ranks of her old boys are increasing. Among their number will be found men in all stations of life. Some of them the world will herald as successes, some will pass unnoticed, some will earn the censure of their fellowmen. But whatever be the judgment of the world, it is our belief that, with few excepf tions, they learned tolerance at Pickering and with it acquired a sense of values that will do them yeoman service in the years to come so that, no matter what their station, they may see themselves as necessary parts of a society that is bigger than themselves but which owes them a debt of gratitude because what they were was carefully fashioned, so that what they now are is a realization of the best that was in them. OLD BOY 20