The Taranaki Herald. (DAILY EVENING.) TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1914. GIRLS AND EDUCATION.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXII, Issue 144328, 17 February 1914, Page 2

The Taranaki Herald. (DAILY EVENING.) TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 17, 1914. GIRLS AND EDUCATION.

The education of girls is a subject to which Dr. Truby King long ago devoted a great deal of attention, and he has come back from England apparently more than over convinced that there is something radically wrong with •a system of education which, to quote the resolution passed by the Medical Congress last week, pays insufficient attention to ensuring normal, orderly, well-bal-anced development, and complete fitness for maternity and the practical care of a home. It may be only a coincidence, but It is a fact that as the educational standard among women rises the birth-rate declines. Dr. King quoted an American authority to show that of 4448 women who passed through Wellesley College, one of the largest women’s colleges in the United States, between the j ears 1879 and 1900, no less than 3096 have never married; 1001 have married hut have no surviving children; while the other 1361 have married and have 3138 surviving children. The average number of surviving children to each married woman is only 1.3, while if the whole group of 4448 women is taken the average is only ,7. per cent., or about two

children to three women. The French, it is stated, are a decadent race, committing race suicide, because of the limitation of their families to something like two per married couple. But the more highly educated women of America, it would appear, have applied a very much lower limit. The same American authority, commenting on the fact that 1001 of the 4448 women in question, though married, had no surviving children, remarked that there were four possible explanations: —(1) They could not reproduce; (2) they could not bring about the survival of their children; (3) they were unwilling’ to undergo the sacrifice, the fatigue, the limitation of intellectual and social pursuits, all necessary for the working out of the vast plan of evolution; (4) they could not withstand the economic pressure. Turning to the subject of eugenics, Dr. King said investigation had shown that the birth-rate was numerically unsatisfactory, but particularly so in the best classes of the community, meaning the most capable physically, mentally, and morally. It need not be argued from this that in order to ensure the perpetuation of the race the education of girls should be neglected. But it seems quite certain that the higher education of the sex is proceeding in the wrong direction. It must be evident to everyone who gives the subject a little thought that an educational system which aims at tho emancipation of woman from her dependence upon man, and trains her to independence and self-support, must tend towards race suicide, or in other words towards a decreasing birthrate. It is perhaps an oldfashioned idea, but we would infinittdy prefer to see girls brought up to be useful to their mothers in assisting in household duties, with a view to being good wives and good mothers in due time, than to have them obtaining scholarships, becoming expert shorthand writers and typists, or able in other ways to make their own way in the world in competition with the other sex. Admitting that it is an admirable thing for a girl or young woman to earn her own living in case of necessity, yet it is a fact at the present moment that there is no avenue of employment so wide open to the really capable young woman as that of domestic duties, and none either in which, if her inclinations are that way, she has greater chances of meeting with a good mate for life. Unfortunately, however, the educational system rather turns the attention of young girls to what they are led to regard as a life of independence. Their studies do not permit them to “help mother” much, and mother, with the mistaken idea that the girls’ lessons are of first importance, becomes the family drudge, and thus furnishes the girls with another incentive to study in order to emancipate themselves from possible drudgery of the same nature. Their ambition is to get into an office and have nothing to do with babies or cooking. But it is an ambition which will prove fatal to the race if it is encouraged, and the system of education does encourage it.