SEED IMPROVEMENT MEETING. 207 



THE VOCATIONAL SCHOOL. 



There remains the independent vocational school of which 

 we have thus far none in Maine, although our state law pro- 

 vides for its liberal aid by the State when any community is 

 prepared to establish one. The distinct grade school usually 

 takes boys and girls at the end of the elementary school course 

 at the age of fourteen or fifteen and gives them training in the 

 elements of a chosen trade. Only the largest cities would be 

 likely at present to provide a patronage large enough to warrant 

 the establishment of such a school. It is to be hoped, however, 

 that at least one or two such schools may soon be started to 

 provide for some of the youth who now pass directly from the 

 common school into industry to their own ultimate loss and to 

 the depreciation of the service of the industry they enter. 



INVOLVES EXPERIMENT. 



We do not see our way to the end of our industrial education 

 plans. It is not necessary to do so in order to undertake these 

 things that now appear right and just. Experiments are in- 

 volved and some mistakes are likely to be made. I am not dis- 

 turbed, however, either by the charge of experimentation in the 

 schools, or by the possibility of mistakes. All of our educa- 

 tional progress, as well as other progress, is the result chiefly 

 of experiment. Without it we should be at the begintiing of 

 time. The unchartered course may be less easy to follow, but 

 It leads to the undiscovered continent of new achievement. 

 And if we are to hold still our plans for educational betterment 

 until the danger, of mistakes has passed, then there is little 

 hope for that growth of which we have believed public education 

 to be the best guarantee. 



Maine faces a future of brightest industrial prospect. No 

 other State surpasses ours in the possibilities of the economic 

 improvement of her people. But let us remember that Maine's 

 future is in her children. As they are being educated with 

 respect to personal rectitude, to civic responsibility and to useful 

 service so will the Maine of the future realize the potential 

 prosperity we believe is hers. It is our present obligation in 

 our school system as in all our other institutions to point our 



