396 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXXVI. No. 926 



Dr. Frederick Adams Woods summarized tlie 

 results of unpublished studies whicli lie has 

 made in historiometry, showing the preponder- 

 ant influence of heredity in influencing the 

 course of history. Professor Corrado Gini 

 contributed a long paper dealing with the evi- 

 dence obtained from demographic statistics on 

 certain eugenic problems. The paper was a 

 decidedly interesting one but impossible of 

 brief review. Professor F. C. S. Schiller's 

 paper on "Practicable Eugenics in Educa- 

 tion " was an exceedingly keen analysis of the 

 significance, from the standpoint of eugenics, 

 of the existing educational system of England. 

 The social side of the congress was one of 

 its most pleasant features. The hospitality 

 committee, under the chairmanship of Mrs. 

 Alec. Tweedie, arranged a series of banquets, 

 receptions, teas, garden parties and excursions 

 which made it possible for the members of the 

 congress to meet not only one another, but 

 also many of the most distinguished persons 

 in English scientific, social, literary and pub- 

 lic life. 



Eaymond Pearl 



INDUSTBIAL EDUCATION IN THE 

 PHILIPPINES 



Under the leadership of American educa- 

 tors, Philippine education is making a re- 

 markable advance. Indeed, according to re- 

 cent reports received at the United States 

 Bureau of Education, there are features of 

 present-day education in the Philippines that 

 are well worth the careful attention of school 

 leaders in the United States. 



It is in the field of industrial training and 

 useful arts that the Filipinos, under American 

 teachers, are making the most notable prog- 

 ress; such progress, in fact, that in certain 

 lines — particularly lace-making and embroid- 

 ery — the products of the Philippine schools 

 not only compare favorably with the work of 

 the famous French and Swiss experts, but 

 promise to compete with them successfully in 

 the world's markets. 



The whole system of education in the 

 Philippines is based on the principle that the 

 children should receive training that will pre- 



pare them directly for the life they are to live. 

 The boys receive manual training from the 

 very beginning. In the lowest grades they 

 make articles that they can use and sell, both 

 in their own localities and elsewhere. The 

 most important industry taught the boys is 

 hat-weaving. It is a prescribed exercise in 

 the primary schools. " The Bureau of Edu- 

 cation at Manila considers it one of its legiti- 

 mate functions to give such training in the 

 making of good hats as will afPord a large 

 number of children a permanent means of 

 earning a livelihood," wrote Mr. Frank E. 

 White, Director of Philippine education, in 

 1910, after the courses had been introduced, 

 and the development of the work has more 

 than justified his claim. Chief among the 

 products are the famous " buntal " hats, made 

 from the leaf stem of the opened buri leaf. 

 The schools do not attempt to replace hand 

 machinery with modern apparatus, for it is 

 recognized that there is a real demand for the 

 products of careful handworkmanship. Be- 

 sides the prescribed courses in the primary 

 schools, there are regular grade schools, where 

 the boys spend the greater part of the school- 

 day in actual manual labor in the shops. A 

 set of dining-room furniture in red narra, 

 made at the Philippine School of Arts and 

 Trades in Manila, sold for $200 at last year's 

 carnival. 



In the girls' schools plain sewing and 

 housekeeping have generally formed the pre- 

 scribed courses, but recently lace-making and 

 embroidery have been introduced because they 

 are arts which, besides possessing educational 

 value, furnish the girls with a remunerative 

 occupation. There were already in the 

 Philippines young women who had learned 

 embroidery and lace-making in the convents 

 under the Spanish regime. Furthermore, be- 

 cause of their great natural aptitude for such 

 work, and because of their patience and deli- 

 cacy of execution, the Filipino women are 

 considered among the most skiKul workers in 

 the world in these arts, their products being 

 classed by experts as even superior to that of 

 the French and the Swiss. The schools are, 

 therefore, working on sure ground in teaching 



