VOCATIONAL EDUCATION

In its broadest sense, vocational education includes any training designed to impart knowledge of any trade or profe ion, but the phrase is usually restricted to industrial education of le than college grade for boys and girls over fourteen years of age. Contrary to general belief, the training of children in skilled trades has occupied the attention of governing bodies in this country since early times. As far back as the seventeenth century, laws existed ensuring the proper apprenticing of youths to skilled trades. Until the closing years of the nineteenth century, however, the only institutions imparting systematic training in trades were the reformatories. The attention given to the subject in some European countries aroused the interest of various educators in this country, among the most prominent being Calvin M. Woodward and John Daniel Runkle. The former founded the first manual training school in America in St. Louis, in 1880. From that time, the whole subject of vocational training has been given much thoughtful attention. As an outcome of the discu ion which the subject has aroused, the Smith Hughes Act was pa ed by Congre in February 1917, and approved by President Wilson, becoming effective on July 1st of the same year. This Federal Vocational Education Act seeks to promote such education and to provide training courses for teachers by means of grants to the various states. The act is administered by the Federal Board of Vocational Education. Four cla es of vocational training are recognized: (1) Evening industrial cla es for boys or girls of sixteen years of age or over (2) Part-time or continuation schools, for children over fourteen who have entered employment. In some states, including New York, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and New Jersey, such schools are compulsory. Instruction must be given in'the regular working hours. (3) Unit Trade preparatory schools, which provide instruction to children of fourteen years of age, or over, to fit them to enter some specific trade. (4) General Industrial Schools in cities with a population le 25,000, these schools giving instruction in various trades. (modern Buccino), ancient town, cania, Italy; capital of the ancient city, on Armina (Fiore), Tus AMPHIBIUS. river, longest in Europe, c. 2400 rises in Valdai plateau; flows E. as Kazan, then turns 8. and Caspian Sea by innumerable near Astrakhan; chief tributaries, Vetiuga, Kama, Samara; principal begins near source; one of chief cial rivers of the world; connected fine system of canals with Black, and White seas; also with Dnieper, Dniester, Don, ete. sturgeon, pike, and other fisheries; bound during winter.