340 AMERICAN SHIPYARD APPRENTICESHIPS, 



try rests with the young men you are training. It is not a question of altruism, it is purely a 

 question of self-preservation of the industry, and any industry is by no means any stronger 

 than the young men it has in training for taking positions in the industry later in life. 



The outline which Mr. Bailey has made here for apprentices presupposes, to a certain 

 extent, that it is for the trades, and I believe that is the main object of the paper. As such, 

 it seems to me admirable, and there is only one suggestion I have to offer, and that is with 

 reference to his scholarship. Grade A. For this he is suggesting that the apprentices be sent 

 tO' an engineering school for a four-year course. If this is meant as a reward of industry, 

 I think it is admirable. If it is meant as a method of supplying applicants for second-line 

 positions in the industry, it seems to me as if it would be better to get at it in another way, 

 namely, to enter into cooperation with the technical colleges and get the men from the techni- 

 cal colleges on some sort of contract basis. These men can be put through any course in 

 practical training desired and then put into the positions they are heading for. We have 

 worked out a scheme something like this, and it has been tried out with fair success. Our 

 scheme was this — ^we took young men fresh from college on a two-year contract basis. We 

 offered them $25 a week and started them with the full knowledge we would lose money on 

 the men at first. They were to be stationed in various departments of the plant, and we were 

 to keep tabs on them as they went from place to place, the stationing was to rest in our hands 

 and not to be decided by their preference. The question of increase of compensation was 

 arranged on the basis of an increase of $1 per week for every two months' service they ren- 

 dered, and that was an increase amounting to $6 a week during the course of a year, and at 

 the end of the contract — the two years — the man either remained with us or did not at our 

 option. As it happened, the cessation of activity put a crimp in our work, and we were 

 compelled to part with many of the men we would like to have retained. 



We made compensation for experience in this way — we started a fresh graduate at $25 

 a week. The man who had been out of college for a year received $30 a week, and if he 

 had been out of college two years he received $35 a week. The man who had been out more 

 than two years was not eligible for the corps. 



I believe the industrial companies agree with the educational institutions that this is the 

 best way of supplying the second line of offense and are willing to cooperate with them, and 

 it has been my experience that the technical colleges are not the ones who hang back on such 

 an agreement as that. They are always willing to regulate the courses in any way they can to 

 meet individual needs, without positively rearranging them, as some organizations seem to 

 wish. You hear complaints from some of the short-sighted industrial organizations that 

 these men are "no good," and you analyze the matter carefully and find they are "no good" 

 because some man, when the superintendent has asked him, has failed to know how to care- 

 fully adjust a lathe or how to install certain piping, or some other bit of detailed knowledge. 

 It is not that the colleges have failed, for they are not supposed to teach details but to give 

 a sound, fundamental training. The industrial organizations should reahze this. 



Mr. Benjamin G. Fernald, Member: — Mr. Bailey's paper discloses a recognition of 

 the absolute necessity of thoroughly training, in the crafts, sufficient men to furnish a nucleus 

 for the continuation of a high standard of workmanship, and he has met the difficulties 

 squarely by offering sufficient incentive to attract and hold boys of the right sort. 



The technical college has brought about a condition with which I am not in sympathy. 

 I do not believe that it works for the ultimate good of any business or industry to separate its 



