Shawnigan Lake School - Yearbook (Shawnigan Lake, British Columbia Canada)

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z Kg y education Jrn awale ul amnowledament m mb c(mfowu£i m So me editor aeaiccde mi umwh annucd to ffleadmabter, 1952=1958.

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t G. P. Kaye, Esq., c.a. Headmaster 1952 - 1958

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(editorial 9 5Jn; CANADA AT THIS TIME there is a serious danger of the younger genera- tion becoming too well adjusted. It is apparent from the remarks of some parents that their greatest fear is that their children will not be popular, that they will be unhappy oddities playing by themselves. Of course, it is very often desirable that young boys should get along with others; but teaching them how to do this — that is, how to become socially adjusted — should not be the prime aim of education. There is a great danger among Canadians to allow what has become an unconscious mania for conformity to get out of hand — one should not want to be like other people unless first one has asked oneself the question why, and second one has found good positive reasons. A recent survey of college students revealed that barely one in ten wants a job in which he needs to be creative and original. Few want to start a business of their own, and few want to be doctors or scientists — the way is too long and too tough. It would seem then that in the independent school there is something better one can do, perhaps, than simply adjusting one ' s boys to the group in which they are going to live, and to the influences they will find around them. A feeling for co- operation must of course be taught, but this should be only one of the things one should want from one ' s boys. In addition to teaching an understanding of the limited need for conformity, the independent school should teach its boys to cherish the right to think and act for themselves. They must be taught to analyse carefully all situations, and to discriminate between that which is first-rate and anything of less worth; and in the final analysis, they must be taught to base their conclusions and their actions not on the requirements of conformity but on a basis which includes only those things which are true, honest, just, pure, lovely and of good report. In the same way, when one attempts to analyse the position of the independent schools in this society one arrives at the conclusion that they should enjoy a recognized place in any system of education simply because they are independent; because they believe in the value of a particular kind of education for the young and indeed have the courage, in spite of a general prejudice against them, to devote all their energies toward it. This is an age of mass production, mass entertainment and mass education. Moreover, there are people unfortunately who believe that Page Four