THE CELIBACY OF TEACHERS 



WHETHER women are more effi- 

 cient teachers than men, and 

 whether single women are more 

 efficient teachers than married 

 women, are disputed questions which 

 it is not proposed here to consider. 

 Accepting the present fact, that most 

 of the school teachers in the United 

 States are unmarried women, it is 

 proper to examine the eugenic conse- 

 quences of this fact. 



The withdrawal of this large body of 

 women from the career of motherhood 

 into a celibate career is desirable if the 

 women are below the average of the 

 rest of the women of the population in 

 eugenic quality. But it -would hardly 

 be possible to find enough eugenic 

 inferiors to fill the ranks of teachers, 

 without getting those who are inferior 

 in actual ability, in patent as well as 

 latent traits. And the idea of placing 

 education in the hands of such inferior 

 persons is not to be considered. 



It is, therefore, inevitable that the 

 teachers are, on the whole, superior 

 persons, eugenically as well as per- 

 sonally. Their celibacy must be con- 

 sidered highly detrimental to racial 

 welfare. 



But, it may be said, there is a con- 

 siderable number of women so deficient 

 in sex feeling or emotional equipment 

 that they are certain never to marry; 

 they are, nevertheless, persons of intel- 

 lectual ability. Let them be the school 

 teachers. 



This solution is, however, not accept- 

 able. Many women of the character 

 described undoubtedly exist, but they 

 are better placed in some other occupa- 

 tion. It is wholly undesirable that 

 children should be reared under a neuter 

 influence, which is possibly too common 

 already in education. 



If women are to teach, then, it must 

 be concluded that on eugenic grounds 

 preference should be given to married 

 teachers, rather than single ones, and 

 that the single ones should be encour- 

 aged to marry. This requires (1) that 



considerable changes be made in the 

 higher education of young women, so 

 that they shall be fitted for motherhood 

 rather than for nothing except school 

 teaching, and (2) that social devices be 

 brought into play to aid them in mating 

 — since it cannot be doubted that a 

 large proportion of celibate school 

 teachers are single from necessity, not 

 from choice, their profession not being 

 favorable to finding mates. 



It is, perhaps, unnecessary to mention 

 a third change necessary: that school 

 boards must be brought to see the 

 undesir ability of employing only un- 

 married women, and discharging them, 

 no matter how efficient, if they marry 

 or have children; and that the courts 

 must be enabled to uphold woman's 

 right of marriage and motherhood, in- 

 stead of, as at present, upholding school 

 boards in their denial of this right. 



Against the proposal to employ 

 married school teachers, two objections 

 will at once be urged. It will be said ( 1) 

 that for most women school teaching is 

 merely a temporary occupation, which 

 they take up to pass the few years 

 until they shall have married. To 

 this it may be replied that the hope 

 of marriage too often proves illusory 

 to the young woman who enters on the 

 pedagogical career, because of the 

 lack of opportunities to meet men, and 

 because the nature of her work is not 

 such as to increase her attractiveness 

 to men, nor her fitness for home-making. 

 Pedagogy is too often a steriHzing 

 institution, which takes young women 

 who desire to marry and deprives them 

 of the possibility of marriage. 



Again it will be said (2) that married 

 teachers would lose too much time from 

 their work ; that their primary interests 

 would be in their own homes instead of 

 in the school ; that they could not teach 

 school without neglecting their own 

 children. These objections fall in the 

 realm of education, not eugenics, and 

 it can only be said here that the reasons 

 must be extraordinarily cogent, which 



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