In the case of girls, the first principle to be recognized
is that the education of women is a problem by itself; that, in all its
lower grades at all events, it is not to be laid down exactly upon the
lines of education for boys.
"The school system may be made a forceful agency for building up the
family, and the integrity of the home is without doubt the vital
question of the age.
"Edward Everett Hale, with his far spiritual sight, has discerned the
necessity for restoring home training, and advocates, to this end, short
school terms of a few weeks annually. It is probable that in the future
many school departments will be relegated to the home, but the homes are
not now prepared to assume these duties.
"When it was discovered that citizens must be prepared for their
political duties the schools were opened; but the means so far became
an end that even women were educated only in the directions which bear
upon public and not upon household economy. The words of Stein, that
'what we put into the schools will come out in the manhood of the nation
afterward,' cannot be too often quoted. Let branches in household
economy be connected with all the general as distinguished from
normal-school grades, and we not only relieve the girl immediately of
the strain of working with insufficient food, and of acquiring skill in
household duties in addition to the school curriculum, we not only
simplify and harmonize her work, but we send out in every case a woman
prepared to carry this new influence into all her future life, even if a
large number of these women should eventually pursue special or higher
technical branches; for we are women before we are teachers, lawyers,
physicians, etc.
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