means of restricting the number of journeymen in the trade and of insuring new workers favorable to the union." The representatives of the unions frankly admitted that the main purpose of limiting the number of apprentices to the shop is "to prevent the overcrowding of the trades with its resulting reduction of wage, and stated that "it is right in principle for those dependent on a trade for a livelihood to protect themselves against undue competition and to organize themselves for the protection of mutual interests. While this is true we have always favored the proper training of the apprentice in the shop and many of the unions have, through their by-laws and trade agreements, tried to insure this to the boy." The very fact that practically none of the shops in Minneapolis have the full quota of apprentices provided for by union regulation shows that limitation of apprentices is not a practical issue at the present time. Measured from every angle the facts and opinions gathered from these conferences are very unsatisfactory and discouraging to those who have believed in apprenticeship as a means of promoting industrial skill and intelligence. With the exception of three important railroad shops, and here and there an employer employing one or two apprentices, practically no employer, whether operating under union rule or independent of such rules (as most of them are) has the quota of apprentices to which he would be entitled under such rules and regulations. Because of the nature of their work, which consists of a variety of repairs, affording a good opportunity to use and instruct apprentices, these three railroad shops have found the employment of apprentices to be profitable both from the standpoint of immediate returns and as a means of securing good workmen. Perhaps the most striking fact brought out by the study was that for numerous reasons employers, almost without exception, do not want to be bothered with apprentices. "Apprentices are unprofitable as a business proposition." "Modern industry is organized to produce goods, not to train new workers." "In his first year the apprentice, as a novice, is a liability rather than an asset." "The wage of the modern apprentice is too high; he exchanges his labor for wages greater than his work." "The employer cannot afford to pay the wage and in addition go to the trouble and expense of giving instruction." "The wage paid is so high as to make it impossible for the employer to employ apprentices, and if he does it is necessary to use them for productive work rather than as learners." "The cost of systematizing and supervising the work of the learner makes the task unprofitable from the standpoint of either immediate or future returns." "It is not safe in some lines to employ the apprentice as a young learner because of the danger from machines and the value of the materials handled." In the seasonal trades employers objected to obligating themselves to giving continuous employment to apprentices. Practically all employes declared that, aside from the cost, they disliked to assume responsibility of training young workers under the conditions under which they must carry on their business. To the facts brought out in these representative statements of employers the union, as a whole, did not take exception. They deplored the specialization which they recognize in modern industry and which is making apprenticeship increasingly difficult. They conceded that at least in some trades the apprentice is undoubtedly unprofitable to the employer, but contended that "the employer usually makes back the loss before the close of the period of apprenticeship." Some of the unions admitted that the wage of the apprentice, particularly for the first and often for the second year, was too high for a learner, but declared that it was necessary in order to attract desirable boys in view of the wage which they might earn in juvenile and specialized occupations. Most of the unions, though recognizing that the employer faced difficult problems, felt that it would be possible to go much further in systematizing the shop experiences of the apprentice than the employer seems willing to go, and that a proper system of helper training would not only do away with the most of the present fear as to injury to the apprentice and damage to goods, but would also provide a better trade education than is now being given. "Only in proportion to the employer's sense of obligation to prepare new workers, even if it is necessary for him to go to some expense and trouble, can the shop succeed as a device for instructing the apprentice." Employers claim apprenticeship does not develop desirable boys at the present time. Some employers profer "American boys." These employers say, however, that "the American boy is not willing to serve faithfully in the trade." Many employers declare that they are constantly being besieged by apprentices who want to remain at one machine or process where the wage is better than in the regular apprenticeship. "Apprentices don't want to learn the whole trade, but just enough to get by." "Many apprentices never finish the training, if such it may be called." "They leave for more money at special jobs in other shops." "They drift away to other shops and cities carrying with them the asset of experience and skill which they have gained with one employer to use for the benefit of a competitor." "Even when they serve until journeymanship they are quick to shift to other shops before the employer who has apprenticed them is able to profit by his investment in them." "If he The unions admit that it is becoming increasingly difficult to get promising apprentices for the trade, but claim that this is due, in part at least, to the fact that many of the trades have ceased to train apprentices properly. "If the apprentice is not engaged or instructed in anything but a monotonous drudgery he sees nothing ahead of him in the trade." learns only a few specialized processes he does not see why he should remain three or four years as an apprentice learning only to be a machine hand." The unions recognize, as do the employers, the temptation on the part of the apprentice "to shunt off into a special task as a machine worker," but feel at the same time that "there is too much of a tendency on the part of some employers to take advantage of this attitude of the apprentice by assigning him to one task permanently." The unions admit that apprentices do quit before their time is out and sometimes go elsewhere to represent themselves as journeymen. "Admittedly the matter is difficult to control." "Where the trade is strongly organized the union often succeeds in compelling the apprentice to return and complete his apprenticeship." "If the shop careers of the apprentice was properly organized and systematized the present difficulty in getting and holding good boys would largely disappear." The attitude of the apprentice himself in the opinion of both employers and unions had a great deal to do with the decline of apprenticeship. The following quotations are representative statements from both employers and employes taken indiscriminately: "Like the employer, the American boy, and to an increasing degree the foreign-born boy, object to being bound by rules and regulations as to wage, period of service, and kind of employment and training." "In many instances he looks upon apprenticeship as a form of wage slavery." "Unlike the apprentice of European countries he is not willing to make thorough-going preparation for the future, but wants the largest immediate return for his labor." "It is the spirit of the age which has had most to do with the failure of apprenticeship in getting and keeping promising boys." In a few of the trades at least the beginning wage of the apprentice is less than he could earn in a short while in some juvenile employment or factoryized process. Even when the wage at the start is as good or better than the apprentice could make in other lines the gradual rise of wage from year to year during his period of service does not appeal to him as offering the same opportunity for quick return as other lines outside the skilled trades. In his eagerness he forgets that if he would forego wage-earning journeymanship at the end would offer better wages and larger opportunity for advancement than can possibly come to him in highly specialized occupations, where the entrance wage is good but where the top wage is soon reached. "The shifting of apprentices to other positions is due to a desire for a larger wage, and if the employer does not grant the request for the change of work, the apprentice will shift to another shop where it will be." "In the shops where the work under modern production is highly specialized in all departments and the piece rate system of wage is used there is undoubtedly a strong temptation for the boy to remain as some one machine or process rather than to shift to another machine and begin again at a lower wage." "Undoubtedly the failure under the modern system of production to systematize and standardize the shop experience and training of the apprentice, as well as the almost total absence of technical instruction, is a moving cause of the failure of so many apprentices to finish the required period of service." "Much of the work they perform is menial, automatic, monotonous, meaningless, and uninteresting. Some of this is probably good and unavoidable, but too much of it leads apprentices to feel that it is of no consequence and leads nowhere." "Discouraged because they are not gaining any. insight or skill in trade processes they seek a change of employment, a new start and a larger income." The apprentice of today must rely for instruction upon the foreman and journeyman. Unless this journeyman has a direct interest in the apprentice the boy is frequently neglected. The testimony of apprentices themselves, as well as the statements of employers and of journeymen who remembered their experience while learning the trade, seem to indicate that in many cases the indifference and unwillingness of the journeyman to teach the trade to apprentices has helped to discourage and eliminate them. The lack of proper shop training of the apprentice was admitted by both employers and employes for practically all of the trades with the exception of the machine shops of the railroads, where the apprentice is trained under the terms of a specific agreement between the railroad company and the machinists' union. Under the terms of this agreement apprentices "will be instructed in all branches of the trade during their term of apprenticeship, and as far as practicable will not be required to work over four months on any one machine or class of work." These shops have charted the work of the apprentice for each of these four years. In addition to charting the work these shops keep accurate records showing just what work the apprentice does from year to year and what progress he is making. The exhibit following is the card checking system that has been devised by the superintendent of motive power of the Soo railroad. It is introduced here because it represents the highest development of systematic training of apprentices that we have found in this city. MINNEAPOLIS, ST. PAUL & SAULT STE. MARIE RAILWAY COMPANY. Record of... Machinist Apprentice Entered Service 6-9-11. Age 18. Lathe work di- 4-2-12 to 7-2-12" 10-2-12 Good.. Good. 1-2-13 Good.. Good. A little slow in movement and conception. 4-2-13 Good.. Good. Second Year 10-2-12 66 1-2-14 Good.. Good. 66 4-2-14 Good.. Good. 7-2-13 Good.. Good. Year Planer. Fourth Devoted to floor work, in-1 cluding air brake and 7-2-14 Good.. Good. Year Remarks: Will make a good mechanic. Getting better. O. K. In general the character of the experiences and the amount of attention which the apprentice gets in the different trades of Minneapolis_depends upon the individual employer and the nature of his business. Employers vary greatly in their general attitude toward apprenticeship and the apprentice. Some feel a sense of responsibility for the apprentice much more keenly than others. Some make an effort which they concede has not been satisfactory to themselves to give the apprentice as wide an experience as the shop will permit. Others, as has already been pointed out, state frankly that they dislike to be bothered with apprentices and permit the boy to receive his training through the chance experiences of the trade. The extent and variety of the experience of the apprentice differ widely in different plants. In general the more highly specialized the plant or business the more difficult it is to broaden the work of the apprentice and get for him an all-around training. Regulations as to training of apprentices have been adopted by the unions in most of the trades of the city. Plumbers, steamfitters, lathers, cabinetmakers, plasterers, and cigarmakers have no provisions. As has already been pointed out the machinists provide that the apprentice must be shifted from machine to machine once every four months. The stonecutters provide that "the apprentice shall be given the best work as far as he is able to do it and pushed along as fast as his ability will allow." In the case of the electrical workers the apprentice "must, before being admitted as a journeyman, pass an examination before the regular examining board of this local union." The employing painter who has an understanding with the union agrees "to use all proper endeavor to instruct the apprentice to learn said trade." The written contracts of apprenticeship made under the auspices of the bricklayers' union has the broad provision that the sheet metal workers' "helpers who look promising are asked to join the union. The brewers' organization provides that "all apprentices must be given the opportunity to work in all departments of the brewery." With the exceptions of the machinists' union the blacksmiths' union has the most specific regulations of apprentice training in its by-laws. “A helper shall be permitted to have a fire after he has worked three years continuously in the shop that he is employed in. He shall not be required to work on one class of work for a longer period than six months, if at all possible, and during the period of his advancement he shall be instructed in all branches of the trade, after which he shall receive from the company a certificate." In It will be seen from the above that only a few of unions have any regulation as to the kind of experiences and training that the apprentice is to get. In some cases the provisions of the unions as regards training are, because the trade is poorly organized, not much more than paper regulations, according to the statements of these unions themselves. most cases these provisions are general in character and do not regulate the shop work of the apprentice. In the case of only one union, which has no strength outside of the railroad shop, has any definite and systematic plan of training been charted. Even in the case of some of the more strongly organized unions, such as the bricklayers, the training of the apprentice has been left entirely to the employer and the chances of the trade. The criticism of the kind of training given to apprentices came from both employers and employes, who found themselves in substantial agreement. All recognized and deplored the entire absence of technical instruction of any kind which all believed the shop never has and never can give properly. "Technical knowledge cannot be acquired in the routine of the trade." "Drawing and laying out of the work cannot be learned on the job." "The apprentice must get his technical training from the outside or from trade papers." "Journeymen are not able to instruct in anything else than the processes of the trade, even if they had time." "Technical training must be given by outside agencies as the school or trade papers." The statements with regard to the shop experiences of the boy were no less positive. "Modern apprenticeship is no way to train boys, who just have to pick up their trade knowledge." "The apprentice has always been neglected." "Not one out of twenty-five employers takes any interest in the boy other than paying for a day's work." "Journeymen are unwilling to teach boys what they know about the trade." "Boys are not kept with one man but shifted too often." "No time is devoted to the training of apprentices." "The boy runs errands instead of learning trade." "The tendency of the trade is to make the boy a machine hand." "Employers keep boys on one machine too long." "There is no training for the better branches of the trade." "A worker learns by bitter experienec long after his term of apprenticeship has been served." RELATION OF THE SCHOOL TO APPRENTICESHIP TRAINING. We have seen from the foregoing pages that apprenticeship seems to be on the decline, and the employes and employers, as a group, are not only dissatisfied with it as an inadequate means of training new workers but believe that under modern conditions, unaided by other devices at least, apprenticeship offers little or no hope as a system of preparing youths of Minneapolis for the skilled trades. It remains to consider here the question of how far the industrial school can be used to supplement the shortcomings of apprenticeship or to serve in part at least as a substitute. In consideration of this question conferences were held with employers and, wherever the trade was organized, with employes as well, in the following lines: Electrical working, stone cutting, plumbing, carpentry, painting, machine shops, bricklaying, cabinet making, auto repairing and construction, printing, sheet metal working, hoisting engineers, stationary engineers, steamfitting, plastering, laundries, structural and iron workers, dressmaking, millinery. In these conferences the effort was made to learn whether there was any need for school instruction in the trade and whether this instruction should be given in (1) all day classes, preparing the youth in part, at least, before he entered the trade; (2) in part time or co-operative classes, taking part of the working time of the apprentice for school training; (3) in dull season classes attended for a full day by apprentices or young workers already in the trade during the dull season, as in the case of the building trades; (4) in evening trade extension classes, extending the knowledge and skill of the apprentice or adult worker; or in some combination of two or more of these different types of classes. Of all the trades listed above only the structural iron workers and laundries took the position that there was no training of any kind which the school could give. All the other trades were practically a unit in their belief that there was a need of trade instruction through the schools, although they differed as trades in their idea as to whether day, part time, dull season classes or evening instruction was needed. Evening school instruction was favored by all the other trades listed above. The survey did not find a single trade in which either the employers or employes believed that evening classes should attempt to train novices for any trade in whose processes they had had no previous experience. All believed that the time given to evening instruction was too short (about 100 hours per year); that the effort to prepare men for trades for which they had had no experience would be a waste of time of the student and the resources of the school. All these trades, however, heartily approved of the evening trade extension classs, taking men who were already engaged in trade processes during the day time, and giving them in evening schools the practical and technical instruction that would advance their knowledge and skill. The interest of both employers and employes in evening schools of this kind was shown by the hearty co-operation and assistance they gave to the Minneapolis vocational survey in drawing up evening school courses to meet the needs of both apprentices and journeymen already in the trade. The part time school designed for the apprentice or young worker, and |