Schools of Social Service.

[Boston Evening Transcript.]

The approach of school and college days is marked this year by very definite announcements from three schools of social work that they are prepared to give systematic and modern training in philanthropic branches. In Boston Simmons College1 begins its second year of instruction in social work, in New York the sessions of the School of Philanthropy open on October 2, and Chicago University is announcing an Institute of Social Science and Arts.

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This is significant and impressive. means that organization not only has been recognized as legitimate in branches formerly supposed to be necessarily largely emotional, but that there is distinct "market" for the trained social worker, upon his or her graduation. As the current number of CHARITIES states it, the field includes those who wish to enter public administration; it offers to school teachers, clergymen, physicians, managers of charitable societies and volunteer workers of every description a training in social activities that is gained practically only in this way, and under the most advanced conditions of instruction.

The need of training in social work is increasingly felt. Conditions confront the city and the country that are new, without precedent, and insist upon treatment, if not upon solution. When millions are congregated where formerly thousands lived, it is no longer possible to continue the methods that in a fashion were adequate for thousands. The advent of the millions or the hundreds of thousands has raised questions. of poverty, crime, pauperism and charity that demand the sanest consideration. Conditions have grown complicated more quickly than experience has trained workers to meet them.

Under these circumstances the demand for trained philanthropists is inevitable, and it is also self-explanatory that numbers of the young men and women now enjoying collegiate education are drawn by their humanitarian instincts and by the evident need of trained workers to enter the field of philanthropy. The teaching profession, medicine, law, and even the pulpit, are often declared overcrowded. Business does not appeal to young men whose tastes are rather in the direction of making over conditions than in acquiring wealth. Young women are being increasingly attracted by the opportunities offered in settlement activity and charitable work.

The founding and the continuance of these schools of service and philanthropy are matters for congratulation, although it would, of course, be unwise to believe that the schooling alone can fit for active social service. In all three instances mentioned above "laboratory work" in the nature of

In conjunction with Harvard University. En CHARITIES.

visits to institutions, and first-hand study of the conditions described, are a necessary part of the program.

The country runs no danger for many years of being overstocked with trained workers in this field. Many of the most serious problems of city life are still before us, and it is necessary to raise trained minds to meet them. The administration of the charitable and corrective agencies of the city and the state requires a training that can no longer be had by a business man suddenly transplanted by an election or by a friend's mistaken kindness into a new position of this kind. The problems of the child, the criminal, the poor and homeless are our problems, and, with our increasing knowledge of their import in the body politic, we realize increasingly the need of schools, not of final training, but of introductory instruction, such as the schools connected with Simmons College, the New York Charity Organization Society and the University of Chicago.

National Conference Notes.

[From Co-operation, September 2, 1905.]

In general the program of the conference was of high character. Papers showed evidence of much care in preparation and discussions were, with some exceptions, animated and intelligent. Dr. S. G. Smith, the president, and Secretary Alexander Johnson are entitled to much credit for the manner in which they planned and executed their difficult duties under particularly dif ficult conditions. Dr. Smith is a skilful presiding officer and the meetings were conducted with decision and system.

The conference has always been characterized by a notable absence of what may be styled "politics" or "wire-pulling." It has been a peculiarly democratic body. Office seeks the man and any delegate who openly aspires to position invariably meets defeat. At the Portland meeting it was noted with regret, even resentment, that some departure was attempted by a small element, from this time-honored custom or tradition. An attempt was made by this element to control the selection of the next president and of the next place of meeting. The crushing defeat which the conference administered to this attempt is likely to discourage similar efforts for some time to

come.

Growing out of the expansion of the conference with the resultant increase in the duties and responsibilities of the executive officers, is the suggestion that the general secretary should devote his entire time to the work of the organization. The idea has been received with much favor and may eventually be adopted. The principal obstacle in the way of immediate adoption is the lack of sufficient income to pay the necessary salary of a competent secretary.

Published Every Saturday

VOL. XV

Dr. Barrows,

Prison Congress.

Dr. Samuel J. Barrows, President of the Corresponding secretary of International of the New York Prison Association, returned last week from Europe where at its meeting in September in Budapest, he was elected president of the International Prison Congress. This body meets every five years, and Dr. Barrows carried with him an invitation from the Congress of the United States, communicated by the President, to hold the eighth session in this country in 1910. By an unanimously adopted resolution, the invitation was accepted an especially happy circumstance from the fact that the congress owed its inception thirty-five years ago to an American, Dr. E. C. Wines.

This year's meeting at Budapest, was under the presidency of Rickel de Bellye, head of the Hungarian prison system, and called together a remarkable body of men and women, foremost not merely in prison administration, but in all those fields which deal with the problem of prevention and the relations of the criminal to the community.

Among these subjects, several were emphasized of distinct American inception,-resolutions in fact being passed approving the placing of children in families, if possible; cottage institutions where institutions are needed; daily life and work in groups with separate rooms only at night; and the establishment of juvenile courts and probation officers. The growing American practice of keeping children out of mixed court rooms and giving them a semi-parental as well as judicial examination when accused of wrongdoing, aroused much enthusiasm. One entire section was given up to preventive work; the remaining three to the subjects of penal law and kindred topics.

Dispensary Law Enforcement.

Two Dollars a Year

No. 3

The origin and purpose of the New York Dispensary Law, and six years' experience in its enforcement were the subject of the regular meeting of the New York State Medical Association of New York County at the Academy of Medicine. on October 16.

Evidence was presented which was generally attested by all the speakers that the law has had a wholesome effect in limiting the number of dispensaries to those for which need existed, in creating a system of records at each dispensary, though these are by no means uniform in the various dispensaries, in raising the standard of the employé, in providing comforts for the patients, and in the separation of the sexes in the waiting rooms. On the other hand, there was equally good evidence that the primary purpose for which the law was created, namely that dispensary service be limited to the sick poor was not being accomplished. By an interpretation of the State Board of Charities, dispensaries are required to investigate the circumstances of only such applicants as give evidence by dress, speech or reputation that they can payan interpretation which results in wide divergence of method.

The Charity Organization Society last year investigated 1,428 cases for thirtyfour different dispensaries. The largest number from one dispensary was 746, while four different dispensaries reported but one each. While several dispensaries make their own investigations, or use other agencies, the number of times an investigation was made was only about one in three hundred applications. There is a wide-spread feeling among practitioners that they are deprived of reasonable fees by the multiplicity of free service which, in many cases, has become

a menace to the honesty and self-respect of the poor rather than a service to them.

A definite initial stage may The Movement be said to have been reached for Moral Prophylaxis. in what promises to be an important movement in this country, in a meeting October 12, of the Society of Sanitary and Moral Prophylaxis at the New York Academy of Medicine. The work accomplished by the parent French society of the same name, was presented by Dr. E. L. Keyes, Jr., and the nature, scope and character of the agencies that should provide education in matters relating to the sex functions were discussed by Dr. Prince A. Morrow, Dr. Keyes, the Rev. Dr. Lyman Abbott, Dr. Luther R. Gulick, of the Board of Education, and Dr. P. M. Balliet, dean of the School of Pedagogy of New York University.

All speakers bewailed the mystery and ignorance prevailing, concerning this subject. There was, however, a general consensus of opinion that the social vice and the diseases resulting from it are very prevalent; that ignorance is largely to blame for this, and hence education by the proper agencies is the most effective remedy; that parents are the best teachers of these subjects to their children, and that they are often condemning their children to lifelong misery by a false modesty concerning this most delicate subject; that individual instruction begun before the age of puberty is absolutely the most useful, but that students in the secondary schools and especially young men in colleges can be benefited by a good book or good lecture dealing with the subject in a frank, but wholesome way.

The meeting was well attended, and there was evidence of general co-operation from those who feel a concern for the higher physical and ethical life of the people.

expositions, social economy has been worthily installed.

At the exhibition in Liege, the exhibit in this department for the United States was collected by the American Institute of Social Service of New York and ranked third, Belgium coming first, France second. The exhibit was selective and typical: one movement was chosen and an exhibit requested from an organization carrying on the work in question.

Group XVI, that devoted to Social Economy, was subdivided into twelve classes, including apprenticeship, protection of child labor, profit sharing, security of factories and workshops, regulation and remuneration of labor, large and small industries, co-operation, distributive and productive; labor, mining, agricultural; workmen's dwellings, institutions for the intellectual and moral development of workers, public and private movements. for the welfare of citizens, institutions for thrift, hygiene; public and private charity.

One of the notable exhibits was that of the New Jersey Bureau of Statistics, which presented photographs of various movements for industrial betterment in factories and workshops. Exhibits of certain factories and workmen's houses set off by beds of flowers and turf showed how great centers of industry may be made centers of beauty. Exhibits of other large industrial houses went to prove that in many cases principles of industrial betterment have been applied with courage and generosity and that it has been made possible for women employés to live well at very little cost.

Social Service gives descriptions and histories, as illustrative of the progress of Philanthropic movements in America,

Other features of the exhibit of which

Society of New York, the Institutional were the work of the Children's Aid Church, as expressive of the new movement in practical religion, of which the activities of Grace Church, New York, are illustrations, the Pilgrim Steam Laundry, the Charity Organization Society of New York, the School of Philanthropy of New York, the Salvation Army, St. John's Guild with its floating hospitals, the National Consumers' League, and the Five Points House of Industry.