SCLENCE AND EDUCATION 63 
resist the temptation of asking, however, whether it is probable 
that the decline in percentage enrollment and apparent appreci- 
ation of physics as a high-school subject is about to cease. Can 
we reasonably expect at the present time to see a reaction set 
in and to see physics soon regain its former position as a high- 
school subject? I have been asked to speak of physics only, 
but what I say concerning physics as a high-school subject 
today could be reuttered in much stronger terms regarding 
other high-school sciences. 
I regard it as most timely that this Academy has at this 
meeting turned its attention to a consideration of science as a 
factor in our common school educational system. A wide- 
spread spirit of unrest and a prevalent dissatisfaction with our 
school curricula coupled with a strong popular demand for effi- 
ciency and conservation in all life’s activities are making new 
demands upon common school education. Nor, in my judg- 
ment, will this demand cease with the close of our present 
struggle for the maintenance of our national freedom. On the 
contrary, I believe, that the period of reorganization which will 
follow the close of the war, if the perpetuity of democratic 
institutions is guaranteed, will demand that our system of 
public school education shall be thoroughly reorganized with a 
view of making it more efficient and of greater value to the 
masses. 
THE SMITH--HUGHES ACT 
The demand for greater efficiency on the part of our public 
schools, so far as it relates to the training of the masses of 
young people who will of necessity, in a large measure, become 
the producers of the next generation, is clearly shown by the 
passage by Congress of the Smith-Hughes Bill. By the terms 
of this act many millions of dollars will be available as federal 
aid for the promotion of strictly vocational training to be 
given within our public high schools. This act seeks to en- 
courage the public high school to provide technical training for 
boys in agriculture and the industrial trades and for the girls 
in domestic economy. Moreover, this technical training is to 
begin with the entrance of the pupil into the high school, that 
is, at the age of about fourteen. 
