EVENING SCHOOLS AND SCHOLARSHIPS. 337 



ber of young men who will develop into valuable quartermen, foremen and officials, of even 

 greater responsibility. 



With companies employing several thousand men it should be the aim to recruit both 

 their technical staffs and managerial staffs as largely as possible from their own employees. 

 The shipbuilding companies under the present business conditions and outlook for marine 

 construction cannot offer a large number of extensive practical testing courses to technical 

 {graduate students as is done with such marked success by the large electrical manufactur- 

 ing companies, and hence the technical graduate sometimes becomes discouraged and leaves 

 the employ of the shipbuilder after only a short term. 



It is believed that a trial of the scholarship plan will greatly assist the shipbuilder in 

 keeping up the quality of his construction and technical staff. 



The common cause of failure of home correspondence school courses is the lack of en- 

 couragement and assistance to the student and his desire to begin advanced courses without 

 suitable preparation. Where such a course is won as a scholarship the boy has the constant 

 incentive to maintain his apprenticeship record and he also has the guidance of the supervi- 

 sor or instructor to assist and encourage him. 



The establishment of scholarships (b), (c) and (d), as outlined above, has been au- 

 thorized by one large American shipbuilding company, and the details of this work are being 

 developed with the intention of annoimcing these scholarships so that a few of them may be 

 competed for and granted within the next year. 



In solving this problem of supplying our shipyards with men possessing manual skill, 

 as well as technical and theoretical ability and knowledge, it is well not to overlook home 

 talent familiar with the work of the home yards and whose ties are largely there. Such 

 yoimg men are in line for more valuable service to the company than those who are only 

 highly technically educated or manually skilled or without the community ties. The combi- 

 nation of these qualifications is a step in the direction of efficiency and progress. 



In making general promotions in the yard consideration must be given to the effects on 

 the general morale. It is sometimes evident that men who have worked for most of their lives 

 at their trades do not take kindly to working under foremen who are theoretical and techni- 

 cal men without practical experience. This, therefore, is a call for trained workmen brought 

 up through the apprenticeship system, well educated, skilled in the trades of their choice. Such 

 graduates from the apprentices may work up to foremen and even stiperintendents. 



The large electrical companies have given the apprentice question more consideration 

 than have the shipbuilders. They employ large numbers of technical graduates and immedi- 

 ately place them in positions where they gain a good degree of practical experience in what 

 might be termed "technical apprenticeship courses" open to graduates from engineering 

 colleges. 



A novelty in apprentice training has been introduced by the General Electric Company at 

 Lynn, known as the cooperative course at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. By 

 the cooperative plan the apprentice alternates three months with the Institute of Technology 

 and three months in the apprentice shops. This course has been arranged to cover a period 

 of two years. A similar arrangement is in vogue with the Westinghouse Company 

 and a leading university, and I understand some of the locomotive companies have also fol- 

 lowed such a procedure with success. It is quite feasible for some shipyards, advantageously 

 located, to take the initiative and work out something on the principle of the cooperative 

 course with an engineering college, by which the apprentices may alternate with the institution 

 selected. This would not be easily adaptable for isolated yards, far distant from the vicinity 



