imable value to the pupils and
the school. A further service that is far more unusual than difficult
may be performed by the pupils who are not new, in the way of removing
strangeness for those who are entering what seems to them a sort of new
esoteric cult in the high school. The girls of the Washington Irving
High School[55] of New York City recently put into practice a plan to
give a personal welcome to each entering girl, and a personal escort
for the first hour, including the registration and a tour of the
building, in addition to some friendly inquiries, suggestions, and
introductions. The pupil is then more at home in meeting the teachers
later. Here is the sort of courtesy introduced into the school that
commercial and business houses have learned to practice to avoid the
loss of either present or prospective customers. Some day the school
must learn more fully that the faith cure is much cheaper than surgery
and less painful as well.

3. GREATER FLEXIBILITY AND DIFFERENTIATION REQUIRED

The recognition of individual differences urged in section 1
necessitates a differentiation and a flexibility of the high school
curriculum that is limited only by the social and individual needs to
be served, the size of the school, and the availability of means. The
rigid inflexibility of the inherited course of study has contributed
perhaps more than its full share to the waste product of the
educational machinery. The importance of this change from compulsion
and rigidity toward greater flexibility has already received attention
and commendation. One authority[57] states that "one main cause of
(H.S.) elimination is incapacity for and lack of interest in the sort
of intellectual work demanded by the present courses of study," and
further that "specialization of instruction for different pupils within
one class is needed as well as specialization of the curriculum for
different classes." There must be less of the assumption that the
pupils are made for the schools, whose regime they must fit or else
fail repeatedly where they do not fit. Theoretically considerable
progress has already been made in the differentiation of curricula, but
in practice the opportunity that is offered to the pupils to profit
thereby is curtailed, because of the rigid organization of courses and
the uniform requirements that are dictated by administrative
convenience or by the college entrance needs of the minority. The only
permissible limitatio