GETTING YOUTH TO WORK

Evening Post, Volume CXXIII, Issue 128, 1 June 1937, Page 8

GETTING YOUTH TO WORK

Dealing, 'at length with "the. problem of unemployed youth, C. Mclntyre suggests that experience proves that the age when a boy should be moulded into becoming a ufeeful, self-reliant citizen is-from fourteen to sixteen1 years. To the opportunity of obtaining employment at that age'the demand ,by employers for a matriculation "certificate is in" most cases :;an insuperable barrier. Formerly a, proficiency certificate was a passport to a position for learning- a trade, or prpfefisibn. Under the matriculation system the correspondent contends thai the pupil is subject not to real education but ; 4o cramming with "a lot of stuff that will be forgotten in' a few months." Other obstacles to employment' the correspondent finds in the "new legislation which insists that age and not ability is the standard by which a boy or girl is to be paid," "limitation of apprentices," and the encroachment of women into.men's field of labour.: He concludes: "Let us get down to "common facts. Where it is not,=a ( case ;ofHfe or death, use manual labour, take away those irritating restrictions concerning apprentices; let the male portion of our community do the providing for their dependants; 'let' the womenfolk do women's work only;.make every position open to boys who have passed the sixth or even seventh standard examinations; get down towhat is practical, give' every encouragement to those with ability and'do.not by law chain them to the duds; then we will solve the question of placing our boys in employment."