OLD SCHOLARS' CLUBS.
[TO THE EDITOR. Or THZ "SPECTATOR...1
SIR,—I have not forgotten your ready kindness about three years ago in giving publicity to a letter of mine on the sub- ject of Social Institutes for working men and women—self- supporting clubs, occupying in many instances by a special permit halls and rooms in the Council schools of the Metropolis and of certain provincial towns and cities. Such clubs, as you may remember, seek to provide a stepping-stone be- tween the dreary street and the evening classes provided by the Education Authority, besides offering some adequate alternative to the more questionable amenities of the public- house, and an opportunity for healthy fellowship and recrea- tion after monotonous hours of subdivided labour.
These associated clubs for working men and women have steadily multiplied (over one hundred and twenty are now in vigorous existence), owing, perhaps, largely to the fact that they eliminate at the outset the serious problem of "bricks and mortar," and find, ready to band, ample facilities for the creation of special classes for their members in subjects of their own choice. The purport of my present letter is to set Lefore your readers an interesting development which is .an organic by-product of the Social Institute scheme, and to point out that, as such, it seems capable of widespread adaptation.
Your readers are doubtless aware that in connection with nearly all the Public and Secondary schools of the country there are Old Boys' Associations, which tend to foster and conserve comradeship, school honour, and mutual helpful- ness.
No organization of this sort has hitherto been devised in any adequate sense for the Elementary schools of the country, but there seems no good reason why the same healthy senti- ments which are surely latent also in the hearts of children of the less fortunate classes, should not be brought to the surface and put to wise account. Four months ago an experiment on these lines was initiated in the County of Somerset, and to-day there are in process of formation fifty-four Old Scholars' Clubs, directly under the auspices of bead.teachers in each case, with the ready co-operation of the school managers, who have granted facilities for evening gatherings fortnightly during the winter months. A class- hobby of some recreative nature, chosen by Old Scholars and teachers themselves, will be the chief feature at these gather- ings (the Clubs will be for boys and girls distinctively, roughly speaking between the ages of thirteen and eighteen years) and subjects of such varied natures as photography, pillow-lace-making, readings from great authors, and part- singing will form part of the curriculum.
Another feature will be the correspondence section. It is common knowledge that hundreds of young people are crossing the seven seas each year to find a home in Western Canada and in other outlying parts of the Empire, and a letter from the Old Country, especially a letter to be counted on regularly, means more to these boys and girls than a home- staying correspondent can possibly realize. At each Old Scholars' gathering, then, half an hour will be allotted to this subject, letters being written systematically to old school friends on the other side of the world, and their replies will be read and discussed in due course. How many of us live in a lonely valley of our own choice, and it may well be that in this unselfish exercise not a few of our boys and girls at home will find a path over the "Great Divide." There will be a School song, a School badge, and a School motto—outward and visible symbols of fellowship in a common purpose. The members of the Club will pay a subscription of 6d. for the year, and they will be invited largely to manage the Club themselves.
Friends of this movement in Somerset have promised prac- tical help. Ladies in and near the towns and larger villages .are giving garden parties to the Old Scholars this coming summer, and nature-study expeditions, sketching parties. bicycle runs, and, in one case, swimming practice gatherings have been arranged. His Majesty's School Inspectors, Minis- ters of all denominations, and, last in order of writing, but certainly first in importance (for they furnish the main dynamo of the scheme), the teachers themselves, have enter- tained its proposals with all readiness, and there seems no reasonable doubt but that its operations may most usefully be extended to other parts of England. Lord Salisbury's advice "to study large maps" seems very much to the point in this connexion, and it is intended to form a general Federation of Old Scholars' Clubs, and simultaneously to constitute a National Advisory Council, with representatives of each County, meeting at stated intervals in London. These Clubs will, in process of time, federate, each group finding its own natural centre in its County town, and these County centres, in their turn, will have a common focus and centre in London—a Headquarters and Clearing House offering to each and all of them the practical benefits of their federated activities. We know full well that, wholly admirable as are its efforts, the Education Department on the side of its Evening Schools has largely failed to attract young people into the sphere of its formative influences. There is a lamentable waste of human effort, and a huge expense of money, in the deterioration and stunting of those young lives, which too often run amuck in the gutter after eight or ten good years spent in the Elementary Schools—the grave depreciation, or virtual writing off, of an asset valu- able beyond computation in a Nation's Balance Sheet. And here the Old Scholars' Club seems to find its rightful place and function. True to-day, as indubitably true they will ever be, are the words of that wise Greek of old, "Man- hood, not masonry, makes a City great." Where, then, are our wise master builders and masons ? This House of precious young Lives—shall we build it in brick, or in polished marble of price and beauty ?
I shall be very glad to correspond with any of your readers who may wish actively to participate in the development of the scheme. May I add that I refer particularly to people of some leisure in Counties other than the County of Somerset ? Finally, it will readily be agreed that each County must work out its own salvation, earning thereby the rightful wage of sound accomplishment. This Cause, assuredly, has a living Soul within it. Who is on the side of Michael and his Hosts ?
The Crofton Hotel, Bridgwater, Somerset.
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