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helping him (the Senator) draft plans for a program of federally aided vocational education for this country. It is also to be noted that the profound wisdom of Sam Gompers, his vision, his sense of social responsibility is reflected, to this day, in the demand for related academic study in the vocational education field.

When, at the close of the Second World War the movement for Federal aid for education was developed with great nationwide enthusiasm, the American Federation of Teachers and our parent body the American Federation of Labor took the lead in pointing out that a permanent program of Federal aid to education must be granted in five fields: (1) Aid for school construction; (2) aid for teachers' salaries; (3) aid for services for all children to promote their health and welfare; (4) aid for scholarships and loans in higher education for all youth who would profit through such a program; and (5) aid for a program to combat letter and social illiteracy.

In continuing our efforts to press for aid in these five areas we have actively since 1945 worked for a program of Federal aid for scholarships the subject which is before this committee today. Wartime greatly accelerated the special college training programs of our young people in both the academic and trade fields, proved of considerable value.

At the close of the war these programs were followed then by the GI bill which through scholarships gave our Nation thousands of trained men, and in turn made these men into citizens, better equipped to serve our country in peace as well as in war.

The growing awareness of the value of extending such scholarship opportunities to thousands of men and women and at the same time, the realization that unless some means were found to encourage and help young people who come from poor families get the chance to go to college led our trade union movement to launch a nationwide movement to recruit promising young men and women from our trade union families to compete for scholarships offered by our labor movement. We are proud of labor's record of help and inspiration given to the young people whose parents or who themselves were helped by the scholarships our movement offered them.

Other private organizations, also interested in an educational program for American youth beyond the high school level then also initiated and developed similar programs. These developments were a symbol, but a symbol which helped point up the need for an expanded program of undergraduate scholarships.

We would particularly point out the remarkable programs which our movement has developed in synchronizing higher education with sound apprenticeship and on-the-job training. For example: the Plumbers Union has developed a remarkable program, particularly in California, through which a young man may complete the apprenticeship requirements of his trade while he is completing his academic work on the college campus in engineering. Under this plan he is able to get his college degree and his promotion from apprentice to journeyman at the same time, having completed the requirements made of him in both categories. Similarly, the electrical workers (IBEW) and the machinists have done a remarkable work of helping rebuild our educational concepts and programs of education by dovetailing academic work of high quality with on-the-job training.

In the last few years scholarships offered through the NDEA have renewed our hope for a broader approach. We are happy to gain a point in asking that the emphasis first placed almost entirely on mathematics and science should be expanded to an emphasis on knowledge, which while it included training in mathematics and science, included then also the social sciences, languagesall the humanities. It is this broad choice of study which we are happy to see is recognized in Mrs. Green's bill.

The two-prong program in this bill now before this committee is of great national significance. We heartily endorse title I, especially because it contains safeguards of construction and maintenance which are needed in any building program.

We would point out that the granting of low interest rate, long-term loans both to college construction and for academic and student programs is a direct help to the student. It is our hope that the granting of these loans for construction and facilities will lighten the pressure on the college for immediate funds to such a degree that the colleges may not have to increase their tuition rates as greatly and as rapidly as they now find it necessary to do.

Col

leges, throughout the country, are today compelled to raise their tuition fees greatly; some as much as 50 percent. The granting of the loans authorized in title I, should lessen the pressure now compelling the college to increase tuition to meet its demands for housing and other campus facilities.

We would further point out here that the higher tuition rate affects not only the full-time student but also the student who would wish to avail himself of part-time college work, taking 2, 4, or 6 credit hours of work, while he is employed on full time.

Title II of this bill which provides aid for scholarships is a permanent investment for our Nation's welfare and for the development of the individual. We welcome title II especially as it reserves to the student the sole right to select the institution to which he will apply for admission, and of course, leaves to the institution the sole right to determine if a student is to be accepted. We wish here to emphasize our deep regret that the bill makes a requirement for a means test to be applied in the selection of students who are to be granted scholarships. A means test in any form is anathema to labor and harmful to many young people. Actually, very few students whose families are able to finance a full college program would apply for financial assistance. It should be observed that applications for college entrance tests for scholarship grants are filed either at the end of the junior year or very early in the senior year by students, in most schools. We believe the use of a means test in this connection may have a most unfortunate effect on the student; particularly if such requests are not treated with absolute confidence by the school administration. We would rather take a chance on having a student who does not need financial help crash the scholarship program than to risk holding a student before his fellow students as too poor to go. Perhaps statutory requireinents, which would classify as confidential the personal information gathered by the school in regard to its applicants would be sufficient to protect the dignity of the poor student.

The young man or young woman who has completed college and has justified by his record the scholarship which was awarded to him may be very proud when he "has arrived" to boast of the humble poverty-stricken home from which he came, but the adolescent who is still in high school could be badly hurt if he happened to be classified as a needy student. It is also possible, that rather than accept a classification as a needy student some of the best students would fail to apply. Such action or such failure to act on the part of any student, would not reflect a weakness on the part of the student, but would simply reflect the sensitive qualities of the average adolescent.

In regard to the language of the bill we would raise two small questions at this point in relation to the administration of this act. We, as a professional teachers' organization, are at all times intimately concerned with protecting the hopes as well as the rights of the poor student. Hence we would direct your attention to page 20, line 13 and 14. Would the requirements that the student must devote "essentially full time to educational work leading to a bachelor's degree" be broad enough in language to allow a student to earn enough to pay for his living costs? In other words, if a student is given a grant, or loan, of $1,000 for an academic year, and his tuition alone is $900 or $1,500 per year, would he be allowed to earn the remaining needed sum under a broad interpretation of the words "essentially full time"?

The second question is akin to the first one: Would the requirement that the applicant who takes the qualifying test must be attending a high school make it impossible for a winning applicant to defer entering college on his scholarship a year later, using the interim year to earn and save enough to cover his incidental expenses beyond tuition costs, during his academic career? Would the supplemental sums made available under section 228 (p. 27) be allowed to cover all or any essential expenses beyond tuition rates for the successful candidates? Would a reference to these questions under the heading of "definitions" in this act clarify the answers to these questions? Or would it be the thought of this committee that the statute when adopted had better remain simply drawn, as it now is, and have the Commissioner issue periodic rules and interpretations which could be more flexible and therefore more easily administered than a statutory requirement?

In closing this statement, I would ask if in the report on the bill, from this committee, there could be recognition of the heavy weight given to vocabulary and other socioecenomic environmental influences in the most generally used so-called standardized tests. Unfortunately, a child who comes from a family in

which knowledge and learning have never been stressed; a home in which the school textbooks are the only books that have ever been seen cannot really compete with children where natural environment gives them vocabulary and ready opportunities. We all know that vocabulary and language are strongly emphasized in the standardized tests most widely used today.

While this bill can enter into a consideration of how a State may evaluate the relative capacity of the student seeking a grant, would it not be proper to suggest that the Office of Education gather, compile, and interpret data on students which reveal the emphasis given to environmental factors, particularly in language and available books, in determining the real significance of the findings in a standardized test. Perhaps reference to these factors may encourage further study in how to enrich the environmental factors in the lives of underprivileged children and youth so as to help and encourage them to "fill in" for those shortcomings whatever will best develop the child or youth. Surely great research in this field is necessary, particularly as background material for evaluation not only of the student but of the so-called standardized tests themselves.

Mr. BRADEMAS. Thank you very much, Miss Borchart. The committee appreciates your suggestions, and I am sure will consider them when the time comes for marking up the bill.

The committee is adjourned.

(Whereupon, at 4:15 p.m., the subcommittee recessed until 10 a.m., Friday, March 17, 1961.)

AID TO HIGHER EDUCATION

FRIDAY, MARCH 17, 1961

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES,

SPECIAL SUBCOMMITTEE ON EDUCATION

OF THE COMMITTEE ON EDUCATION AND LABOR,

Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met at 10 a.m., in room 429, House Office Building, Hon. Edith Green (chairman of the subcommittee) presiding. Present: Representatives Green, Giaimo, Brademas, Smith of Iowa, Quie, Goodell, Dent, and Pucinski.

Also present: Nicholas H. Zumas, subcommittee counsel; Melvin W. Sneed, minority counsel; and Betty Pryor, subcommittee clerk.

Mrs. GREEN. The subcommittee will come to order.

We have announced that other people can file additional statements without objection. We will ask that the record be kept open through March 27 for any individuals or groups who want to file additional statements for the record.

I would also ask unanimous consent this morning to make part of the record at this point a telegram from the president of the University of Chattanooga, Leroy A. Martin; to also make part of the record a letter from Harvard President Nathan M. Pusey, a letter from Joe Jefferson, the executive secretary of the Association of College Admissions Counselors; and a letter from Joseph F. Marsh, president of Concord College, Athens, W. Va.

Without objection, they will be made part of the record. (The documents referred to follow :)

Hon. EDITH GREEN,

CHATTANOOGA, TENN., March 15, 1961.

Chairman, Special Subcommittee on Education of the House Committee on Education and Labor, House Office Building, Washington, D.C.: Current loan program operating under title 2 of the National Defense Education Act has been eminently successful. Local institutions have administered this program competently with commendation of Washington officials. Recommend that scholarships under proposed amendment to title 2 should be administered by the institutions rather than State boards. The success of this program will be determined largely by cooperation between colleges and constituent high schools preserving long established mutual confidence which provides academic and financial data required to allocate scholarships on basis of need and merit.

LEROY A. MARTIN, President, University of Chattanooga. 201

HARVARD UNIVERSITY, Cambridge, Mass., March 14, 1961.

Hon. EDITH GREEN,

House of Representatives,
Washington, D.C.

DEAR MRS. GREEN: Unfortunately, I am so embedded in administrative duties here in Cambridge that I shall find it impossible to attend any one of the hearings of the House Special Subcommittee on Education on March 15, 16, and 17. As you know, President Kennedy appropriated my right-hand man, McGeorge Bundy, and since his departure in January I have been carrying on his duties as dean of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences, in addition to my

own.

I hope that, instead of my appearing personally, you may be willing to accept this written statement of general approval of Mr. Kennedy's proposed program for aid to education by the Federal Government.

Federal aid has long been needed to raise the general level of education through the Nation, increase the quality of teachers, broaden the opportunities for students, and provide funds on a self-help basis, for construction of educational buildings, libraries, and laboratories. It is essential, I believe, to empha

size matching funds and loans.

American higher education has not asked and does not want direct general assistance from the Federal Government in order to pay faculty salaries and meet general operating expenses. I, therefore, note with pleasure that the President does not suggest this. Instead he emphasizes the loan program for college housing and suggests enlarging it to include structures other than residence halls. I also am pleased by his proposed State-administered scholarship program. I hope that the lack of any mention of new or augmented fellowship programs to increase and improve the supply of college and university teachers will not mean that this very important need will be sidetracked indefinitely, conditional upon a general revision of the National Defense Education Act.

Since I do not have a copy of the bill at hand, but am depending on the original message of the President for my information, I can only say that I feel that his are sensible proposals in what seems to me to be a minimum program. I wish to be recorded in favor of the program, since it is a beginning, and I hope that the Congress will give support to the President's plan.

The program recently set forth by the American Council on Education embodies most of the features that I would respectfully recommend to your committee's attention. As I have already noted in a letter to Chairman Powell (copy attached), I am very much concerned that the Congress take positive action toward removing the oath and affadavit from the National Defense Education Act. This I believe to be a most important condition in the relationship between the Federal Government and colleges and universities, and I do not like to think this much needed change might be forgotten in the year when the Federal Government appears for the first time to be able to make a concerted effort to assistant education at all levels on a nationwide basis. Sincerely yours,

NATHAN M. PUSEY.

FEBRUARY 20, 1961.

Hon. ADAM C. POWELL,

Committee on Education and Labor,
House of Representatives, Washington, D.C.

DEAR MR. POWELL: I am sorry to have misunderstood the precise meaning of your letter of January 11.

I have been opposed to both the oath and affidavit provisions in the National Defense Education Act, because I believe they tend to be devisive and create an unnecessary, impractical, and unwanted barrier between government and education and to lead to misunderstanding and resentment on the part of students and all those who care for our American principle of noninterference by government in educational administration.

When, more than a year ago, the Senate returned to committee for further study the Kennedy-Clark amendment, I was persuaded that opposition ought to be centered on the affidavit rather than the oath in the hope of getting prompt action from the new session of Congress. Despite protracted discussion and many appeals by leading educators and educational organizations, the repeal effort got no further than the Senate and even then was passed in an amended

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