Western Canada High School - Yearbook (Calgary, Alberta Canada)

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BOOK Page 7 THE HIGH SCHOOL AND THE GRADUATE—Continued The Secondary School’s contribution to education may be indicated by what it does or attempts to do. An eminent educationist states the following to be the teaching processes of a Secondary School: 1. It utilizes the Cultural Capital of Society to generate in the pupil a com¬ plete horizon of intelligent attitudes toward his world, of just standards of moral and aesthetic values, of the special abilities required in his reactions to his physical and social surroundings. The Secondary School does not teach science and history and literature and language; it utilizes these elements of culture and others in educating the pupil, 2. It guides the individual into the discovery of a succession of intellectual interests, pursuits which he will follow, wholly apart from the constraint of the school or the teacher. 3. It develops in the individual the ability to study. It generates right attitudes toward conduct and sees to it that they become in¬ corporated into the personality of the pupil.” With very many young people all of these aims are not realized. To what extent they are depends most of all upon the attitudes of the young people themselves. What graduates take away from high school will depend upon what they have put into their work. Up to high school leaving time, home and school have guided, directed and pro¬ tected adolescent youth. These influences have been the main factors in moulding character. Henceforth, character will be forged; self-forged. After high school days, our students of to-day will be depending upon themselves, which is well, for this is essential to their full development. There will come the inevitable discouraging diffi¬ culties and defeats, but there can be joy in overcoming difficulties; and as for defeat, no soul is ever vanquished, who refuses to accept it. Youth does not concern itself with these matters. The Future beckons to the adventure. The best wishes of Western go with ours and every other class of ' 34. May the future bring to them life enjoyment crowned with achievement. Mr. Flick— Are there any questions?” Pat White— Yes, sir, how do you calculate the horse power of a donkey engine?” » Budding Western Author— This is the plot of my story. A midnight scene. Two burglars creep stealthily toward the house. They climb a wall and force open a window and enter the room. The clock strikes one. Kay Pallesen (breathlessly)— Which one.” Fran Cadzow— You remind of the sea.” Dune Campbell—“Why? Because I ' m wild, restless and romantic?” Fran Cadzow— Nope, just because you make me sick.”

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Page 6 YEAR THE HIGH SCHGGL AND THE GDADDATE M.K.H. Within a few weeks our Grade XII students will have completed the four year course of the high school. Now that school is finished one of the most perplexing problems for these young people is to decide upon the occupation or profession which they shall enter for their life work. Some students early decided this matter, but for many this decision remains to be made. In times like the present, with the future certainty of greatly changed economic and social conditions, the parents’ problem in advising becomes especially difficult. Two determining considerations for every parent should be, the occupation or profession the son or daughter is most deeply interested in, and those aptitudes which they know the young people to possess. Unfortunately, it too often happens that parents do not know with what special aptitudes their children may be endowed. The high schools have been, and continue to be, mainly schools of preparation for the University and for the Normal College, but during the four years of daily contact with students, teachers discover aptitudes, often other than Academic, that parents have never known their sons and daughters possessed. It is a matter for regret that this information is so little made use of, not only at this particular time but during all the years of the students high school course. Close co-operation between parents and teachers must increase the usefulness and efficiency of any school whether high or elementary. In the writer’s opinion there is an even greater need for it in the high than in the elementary school. The Home and School organizations are doing excellent work in helping to bridge this gap, and, although much remains to be done, the movement is along right lines and is assured of a future of increasing helpfulness. A common criticism of? our high schools is the excessive amount of home work demanded of students. The criticism is just, but the blame should fall in the right place and that is, on the Curriculum. For the heavy curriculum, however, the Department of Education is not entirely to blame. Just so long as the high school teacher specialists who assist in framing the curriculum are allowed to over-emphasize the importance of their special departments, just so long will the abuse of excessive home work remain. Important though the curriculum may be, yet it is not the major factor in sec¬ ondary education. The efficiency of a hiqh school staff, the earnest attitude of the student body and the close co-operation of community and school outweigh the curri¬ culum value. The high school has many problems which it cannot solve satisfactorily alone. One of the most serious of these is the failure of many students to accept responsibility for the preparation of work. Two of several reasons are responsible for this situation. One is the large amount of time devoted to the pursuit of pleasure, thus leaving little or no time for study; the other is inability or refusal to recognize the necessity for educational effort. In this school, fortunately, these students form a small minoriy. Nevertheless they are too many, constituting as they do an increased burden to the school and to the ratepayer. The main cause for concern, however, is the ultimate loss to these students themselves. This is a problem for the home as well as the school, and its solution will require their united efforts. At this time when high school graduating classes are about to say good-bye to school days, one is led to reflect upon what the high school has done or attempted to do for them. First of all it has provided security and a proper environment during the most critical years of adolescent life. The value of this contribution is perhaps not generally recognized.

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Page 8 YEAR VALEDICTCKy By W. LLOYD HUTTON Another graduating class is about to make its way into the world. The outlook is not a hopeful one. One has only to glance about to see evidences of this. On the one hand one sees great wealth, on the other, dire poverty. One sees granaries bulging with wheat, yet people starving for bread. One sees a desire for communism (in the best sense of the word), yet a turning to dictatorships. One sees international conflict, yet a desire for peace. Above all, one sees a striking inadequacy to cope with the new conditions. The picture is veritably a gloomy one. Upon looking at conditions superfic¬ ially, one would be inclined to say: What’s the use?” and continue a placid, careless course. Really, a new set of conditions exists upon the earth. A new set of imple¬ ments must be forged to meet them. Most important is a need for a new quality of leadership. The multitude is longing for leadership, almost willing for the moment to accept whosoever will offer. Hence the necessity that the worthy and the qualified and the honorable should step in and prevent disorder and loss. The besetting danger that threatens all great communities lies in the thought that we have accomplished most of the things that can be done; that nature has yielded up all her secrets; that science has revealed all her truth; that society is so well or¬ ganized that there is little room for improve¬ ment; that we can gratify ourselves with looking back, comforting ourselves with the accomplishment, rather than looking forward LLOYD HUTTON and nerving ourselves for a renewal and greater effort. One of the lessons of education is that there is no finality in success. We emerge into a world where the same rule holds inexorably; where circumstance and environment will call up new powers again and again; where the penalty of failure may indeed be peace, but where the rewards of success will be fresher endeavor. In an essay written about 1815, William Hazlitt began thus: The present is an age of talkers and not of doers, and the reason is that the world is growing old.” People who today say that the world is old are preaching the outworn creed of decrepitude and decay. The world is new. New forces are entering it daily, forces which unless controlled and directed will be the means of her engulfment. Never in her history did the world stand in such crying need of leadership; virile, active and far-sighted leadership of the highest type. Here then lies the opportunity for youth. Develop a high form of leadership, and develop 1 it we must, and we have work aplenty. We will feel the exultation which comes from overcoming obstacles which lie in our path, we shall justify our existence in it by making the world a brighter and happier place in which to live. Leadership! — to-day’s challenge to youth and education.