South Philadelphia High School - Keepsake Yearbook (Philadelphia, PA)

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ANNE WRIGHT: DISTRICT SUPERINTENDENT What is knowledge? Is knowledge the same as education? It would be of interest to me to know how you young people react to these questions. Have you ever wondered what has been the basic purpose of your years in school? It is at this point of purpose that the crucial differences between the ideals of different countries are most easily evident. In America I believe the basic purposes of education are: 1. To teach individuals how to think 2. To help us to appreciate the differences among people and to live happily with these diiferf ences in a democratic society 3. To provide individuals with the specialized knowledges they will need in order to work. Possession of knowledge does not guarantee that an individual will think. It is education which gives to an individual the ability to use knowledges and facts in order to arrive at a con' clusion. It is education which helps us to understand that the purpose of thinking is to arrive at a belief. It is education which leads us to question and to doubt but ultimately to believe. Our world has conquered space-where once our youth looked longingly at the star' studded sky, we now dream of other worlds and other planets beyond the stars-perhaps of other people. Have we given much thought to our relations with these possibly new peoples- can we live happily with them? Most of us have the capacity to live well with our neighbors but find it difficult to understand people from far away. What education do we need to help us live well in this wonderful new world which is unfolding? A man needs to have knowledge in order to work but this is only a part of his life. He needs too, as a worker, basic values of honor and integrity, of truth and of faith. It is because of all these needs of man that neither knowledge nor the grasping of knowledge is enough. What we must strive for is education and understanding, In your lives, will we teachers see our failures or our success. Superintendent, District Three ANNE WRIGHT 5