TRAINING OF GIRLS.

Taranaki Daily News, 18 September 1920, Page 6

TRAINING OF GIRLS.

FOR HOUSE AND HOME, PLEA FOR OVER-BURDENED MOTHERS. An eloquent plea for the butter education of girls in the Dominion, especially with a view to the improvement of home life and household work, was made by Mrs. F. E. ISaunie, of Auckland, at the Technical Schools conference in Wellington last week. The question before the conference was the administration of technical schools and the' committee of boards of managers. On the question of election and representation on boards 'of managers, M v s. F. E. Baume said she had listened for two days to the discussions of the conference, and had carefully studied the order paper. There had been many references to boys, but, as far as she could remember, none to girls. It seemed to her that half the children of the Dominion were thus being ignored, for half the children of school age were girls. The educational authorities, of the Dominion had not touched the fringe of the subject of vocational training for girls. Really, she felt that they knew nothing about the education of girls. One delegate had said the agricultural education of boys was a farce, too. The aspect from the woman's point of view, from the point of view of the mother of a family, was far the most important point of view. The problem ai the education of girls was the most difficult I problem they had at the present time. A little was done to train girls commercially as wage-earners, but nothing for. the great profession of home-making. (Hear, hear.) The home was the real business life of every true woman. Statistics had been given to show that in the Dominion out of 8000 girls attending school only 800 went on to secondary schools. So there were over 7000 girls unprovided for. For financial reasons connected with the cost of living, many girls had perforce to go into "blind | alley" occupations, as serious a matter for girls as for boys, though it might be said that most of the girls eventually i married. It was estimated that from 80 to S."> per cent, of the girls married, but this did not altc- the fact that the problem was acute in the period of leaving school and marriage. WAGE-EARNING AND HOMEMAKING. There were two sides to the problem —vocational training for wage-earning .•\nd vocational training for homc-mak-; ing. The girl must be trained for a trade, if she was going into industrii' :ife, so that she might be a skilled and not an unskilled worker. But she must have other training. The art of homemaking was not the art of cooking. Cooking was nothing—mother could teach that:—it was really the fundamental science of home management that should be taught. A girl must be trained how to meet the .increased cost, of living; she must know how to keep house economically; she ■must understand the chemistry of food, how to provide children with adequate nourishment, so that they might be physically fit and become good, sound citizens. (Hear, hear.) The Slate, declared Mrs. Baume earnestly, neglected its responsibility to the girl. There was no effort to teach the girl her responsibilities to lb» social system in which she found herself. Women on the boards of managers could be of great assistance. At present girls went into shops and offices at the age of fourteen, perhaps after three months or so at a business college. DIGNITY OF THE WORK. The time was due when the State should undertake the training of the girl for the management of the home. They should train the girl to bpcome a home assistant or a domestic worker. The State should endeavor to make the parent realise the dignity of home assistance as a calling. It should be looked'on as quite as dignified and responsible as the profession of nurse. The speaker said she would like to see the State establish a training college for domestic workers and home assistants, and endeavor to raise the occupation to the statu of a profession and eliminate the notioi. of domestic servant—she did not like to us that 'word. It should be placed on a business footing, the hours of work should be fixed* and the whole thing should'hc organised. It was the freedom of the shop, the office, and the factory that drew the girls there, and every mistress and every mother ought to be educated to realise that in the treatment of the girl in the homo. (Hear, hear.) Mrs. Baume recalled the opinions' of members of the British House of Commons when Florence Nightingale asked permission to go to the Crimea to ,mirse the sick and wounded soldiers. They called her a hold woman, and worse —yet she was the founder of the honorable profession of nursing. So it would be with work in the home.

CHILDREN OF TO-MORROW. It was wrong, continued the speaker, that the task of helping the overburdened mother should be left to private enterprise, to the Women's National Reserve, and other bodies, however good their work. Public men talked about the decline of the birth-rate, but until they helped the overtaxed women of the Dominion, they were not going to alter things. (Hear, hear.) She need not tell them that the physique of the children of to-morrow depended on the physical state of the women of to-day, and, until they altered the present state of things, it was useless to look for improvement! Help in the home was the crying need of the day, and they could never get it until they raised the status of the workers in the home to that of an honorable "vocation. "The State must realise this, and the State must provide for the proper training of domestic workers," she added. "I suggest definitely that you must have in the administration of yom« schools women with a grip of women's work. No man can possibly know anything about it, though he may have studied books, however much he thinks he knows about it. (Laughter.) The future of our girls concerns us all. We want to take them from "blind alley" occupations; we want them'to see there is some dignity in home service. Domestic work must be organised on a proper business footing, with proper hours. Child welfare should be the main object of the education of the Dominion, and it must go back to the home with the physical welfare of the mother. Women must have a. say in the administration of tho schools," (Applause.) Mr. W. S. La Trobe, Director of Technical Education, said he was entirely in sympathy, with the proposal. Some special provision should be made for ensuring that at the least one member of the board should be a woman, At the