The Delinquent Child and the Home
Chapter 8: The Ignorant Child: The Problem of the School
Sophonisba Breckinridge and Edith Abbott
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IF the environment that has influenced these delinquent boys and girls is to be correctly understood, an inquiry into the relation between the child and the school is a necessary supplement to the chapters dealing with conditions in the home. It was not possible to obtain the data for a thorough examination of the school status of the children brought to court as delinquent, but such material as was collected is believed to be both interesting and important. Although the court record calls not only for the name of the school which the child has been attending, but also for the grade and the teacher's name, these latter items are very rarely given, and in a large proportion of cases there is no information whatever regarding school attendance. The record is left blank much more frequently for the girl than for the boy, and the proportion of cases in which there was an entire absence of information relating to the school attendance was so large for both the girls and the boys that this material in the court records had to be discarded as valueless.
Because of the meager information furnished by the court records, and because it was considered inexpedient at that time to attempt an investigation of the actual school status of these children by visiting their former teachers and principals, a printed statement[1] was prepared with blanks to be filled out by the child himself under the supervision of the investigator when the family schedule was secured. This "school statement" asked for his present age, his age at beginning and his age and grade at leaving school, the school or schools attended in Chicago, the last grade attended, and finally a list of the studies which the child thought
(127) had helped him most to earn money, with the reason for his choice of subjects.
Out of the 584 boys for whom family schedules were obtained, 281 boys filled in the school statements. These latter have been attached to the paragraphs about the child's family as furnishing additional information of value.[2] The data furnished by the statements regarding the child's age at beginning and leaving school, the school, and last grade attended, have been tabulated. Some question may be raised as to whether these 281 boys are typical of the whole 584, and it should be pointed out that in general the 281 were the best rather than the worst boys in the group. The most illiterate made no attempt to fill out the schedules. And from the boys who are still in the John Worthy School, the state reformatory at Pontiac, the state penitentiary at Joliet, the house of correction, or similar places, and from those who have become permanent tramps and have been lost track of, no statements could be secured. It seems' fair then to consider these 281 as the better half of the group. And, finally, before attempting a discussion of the school status of the delinquent boys attention must be called to the fact that only 5474, or 48 per cent, of the 1 1,413 boys brought into the juvenile court during the decade 1899-09 were of compulsory school age, that is, under fourteen; for 1903-04, the year selected for special study, 538, or 49 per cent, of the 1087 boys brought to court were under this age.
Passing on then to the data furnished by the school statements, the important points to be noticed are the age at which these boys entered and left school and the progress they made as indicated by the grade reached. In Table 25, page 128, the data relating to the ages at which the boys of different nationalities entered school are presented, together with the totals for all nationalities.
From this table it appears that to per cent of the boys who gave their age at beginning school had entered by the time they were five years old, 48 per cent when they were six, 25 per cent when they were seven, and 17 per cent not until they were eight or older; to summarize, 83 per cent of the boys entered school before
(128)
| Nationality | 5 or younger | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American | 3 | 16 | 6 | .. | 1 | 1 | 27 |
| Bohemian | 4 | 10 | 2 | .. | .. | .. | 16 |
| Colored | 3 | 4 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 12 |
| English | 1 | 6 | 9 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 22 |
| German | 6 | 29 | 19 | .. | 1 | 1 | 56 |
| Irish | 6 | 31 | 10 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 50 |
| Italian | 3 | 9 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 24 |
| Polish | .. | 5 |
10 |
9 | 5 | 3 | 32 |
| Russian | .. | 5 | 2 | .. | 1 | .. | 8 |
| Scandinavian | 1 | 6 | 4 | 2 | .. | .. | 13 |
| Other | 1 | 10 | 1 | 2 | .. | .. | 14 |
| Total | 28 | 131 | 68 | 21 | 13 | 13 | 274[3] |
| Per cent |
10.2 |
47.8 | 24.8 | 7.6 | 4.8 | 4.8 | 100.0 |
they were eight years old. The nationality of these boys is given with their ages in this table because, while only 17 per cent of all the boys entered when they were eight or older, it is significant that when the data for each nationality are considered separately it appears that 33 per cent of the Italian boys, 33 per cent of the colored boys, and 53 per cent of the Polish boys entered at eight years or older, and are, therefore, considerably behind the average child in coming under school influence and discipline. It is quite probable that in the case of all these children who entered late, their earlier years were spent in places where they had no opportunity of attending school, and that the age at coming to Chicago and the age at entering school correspond closely.
More important than the age at entering school is the question of how long they remain in school and what progress they are able to make while there. Data relating to both of these points were furnished by 262 of the 281 school statements and are pre-
(129) - sented in Table 26. A study of this table shows that the child's leaving school had apparently no relation to the fact of his having reached any particular standard. The great majority of these boys (190, or 73 per cent) left at the age of fourteen or before they had reached the legal age, no matter what grade they had reached.[4] For example, the 142 fourteen-year-old boys who left were in all grades ranging from the first to the eighth. It is very significant that 48 boys, 18 per cent of the total number, left school illegally before they had reached the age of fourteen in spite of the compulsory education law, that only 72 boys remained after the age of fourteen and of these only 31, 12 per cent of the whole number, stayed until they were sixteen.
| Age | Grade | total | per cent | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | High school | |||
| 10 | .. | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 2 | .7 |
| 11 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 1 | .. | .. | 1 | .4 |
| 12 | .. | .. | .. | 2 | .. | 1 | .. | 2 | .. | 5 | 1.9 |
| 13 | .. | 1 | 5 | 8 | 8 | 8 | 3 | 7 | .. | 40 | 15.3 |
| 14 | 1 | 6 | 5 | 16 | 44 | 29 | 30 | 11 | .. | 142 | 54.2 |
| 15 | .. | 1 | 2 | 6 | 4 | 12 | 8 | 7 | 1 | 41 | 15.7 |
| 16 and over | 1 | .. | 2 | 2 | 3 | 8 | 11 | 2 | 2 | 31 | 11.8 |
| Total | 2 | 9 | 14 | 34 | 60 | 58 | 53 | 29 | 3 | 262 | 100.0 |
| Per cent | .8 | 3.4 | 5.3 | 13.0 | 22.9 | 22.1 | 20.2 | 11.1 | 1.2 | 100.0 | |
A further study of the table shows that these children not only leave school early but make little progress while they are there. Thus it appears that only three Out of 262 boys ever
(130) reached the high school, that only 29 others ever reached the eighth grade, that 119 (45 per cent) did not get beyond the fifth grade, that 25 (9 per cent) failed to get beyond the third grade, that nine boys had never passed out of the second grade, and that two had never got out of the first.[5] The backwardness of these boys in school can perhaps be better understood by comparing the grades reached by them with the grades reached by children of the same age who have made a normal rate of progress. That is, the child entering the first grade at seven-the compulsory school age-should be in the second grade at eight, in the third at nine, and so on.[6] Allowing, however, one year for failure to pass or for a late start, he should be in the second grade at nine, in the third at ten, and in the next higher grade for each added year. In Table 26, the heavy zigzag line has been drawn to indicate this relation between age and grade; the numbers above the line represent the boys who have passed on at the normal rate of progress, as thus described. All the numbers below the line represent boys who have failed to make such progress. But to say that 188, or 72 per cent, of the total number of boys had fallen below this line of progress is to give too favorable an impression of the situation, for such a statement fails to give any idea of the extremely backward condition of many of these boys. Eighteen of the boys in the first, second, and third grades, for example, were fourteen or older; of the sixteen-year-old boys, one was in the first grade, two were in the third grade, two in the fourth, three in the fifth, eight in the sixth, and although fifteen were above this grade, only two were in high school, where the normal sixteen-year-old boy belongs.
Another method of ascertaining how far these delinquent boys were behind normal boys of the same age when they left school is to compare the grades which they reached with the grades reached by all the children who left school in a given year to go to
(131) work. The reports of the Chicago Board of Education do not make possible such a comparison for every year but they furnish statistics for the year 1909 which show the grades last attended by the children who were given age and school certificates during the year.[7] From these figures it appears that only 28 per cent of the boys who took out working papers during the year 1908-o9 had failed to reach the sixth grade, and only 12 per cent had stopped before they reached the fifth grade, whereas Table 26 shows that 45 per cent of the delinquent boys were below the sixth grade and 23 per cent were below the fifth.
The small number of boys who remain in school after they have reached the age of fourteen means of course that the great majority are called upon to assume some of the pecuniary burdens of the family. It was pointed out in an earlier chapter that in a very large proportion of cases the delinquent boy is the eldest child in a large family and that the great majority of these families are poor. His slight wage-earning capacity must, therefore, be utilized at the earliest possible moment at which his age and school certificate can be secured and he can become a supplementary wage-earner with the sanction of the law. The temptation to evade the law is sometimes too great to resist, and the child is not only deprived of the slight educational requirement prescribed by the law, but is given perhaps a first lesson in law-breaking by parents who swear that he is fourteen when he and they alike know that he has not yet reached that age.
It is obvious that the child thus deprived of opportunities is the child most in need of them. To many of these boys, however, leaving school means much more than a loss of opportunity. It means being placed in the way of great and varied temptations while the will is weak and the mind not yet intelligent. Work is not always easy to find, and desirable work which offers even a small amount of training and awakens ambition and interest is hopelessly scarce. Attention has already been called to the large number of boys who become messengers or errand boys, or enter some similarly undesirable occupation. The boy out of school at fourteen or the ages immediately following, is likely to be also a boy
(132) out of work, or a boy in an occupation associating him with bad companions or offering other temptations to delinquency.[8]
It appeared in Table 2[9] that half the delinquent boys brought to court came at the age of fourteen or in the two years immediately following their withdrawal from school. If the provision in the state law which requires the compulsory school attendance of boys between the ages of fourteen and sixteen who are not working could be rigorously enforced, the number of delinquents would perhaps decrease during these years.[10] Ever since the year 19o5, the department of compulsory education in the city of Chicago has called attention in each succeeding annual report to the necessity for better means of protecting and disciplining boys between fourteen and sixteen, not merely because they become demoralized themselves, but because they encourage smaller boys to become truant and delinquent.[11] It is, of course, a commonplace to say that until the enforcement of the law is made possible, these boys are on the high road to delinquency, and, in spite of six years of agitation, there is still urgent need of improvement in the facilities for dealing with them. The latest report of the superintendent of compulsory education issued in June, 1911, strongly emphasizes "the necessity for better provision for the correction and care of children between fourteen and sixteen years of age who are beyond parental control and who prefer idleness to school attendance or employment . . . . . The only recourse under present conditions against a fourteen-year-old truant who has committed no
(133) other offense than truancy, is to charge him with incorrigible or delinquent conduct and ask his commitment to the John Worthy School or St. Charles. The former is a prison school where the worst type of delinquent boys is sent. St. Charles has not sufficient capacity to provide for urgent delinquent cases."[12]
Coming finally to that part of the school statement in which the boy attempts to tell which studies have helped him most "to earn money" there is some unique and interesting material. It is, obviously, information which does not lend itself to tabulation and which cannot even be summarized in definite and precise terms. But these poor attempts at writing show much mote vividly than any statement of the number of years which the boys spent in school, or of the grades which they reached, the poverty of their equipment.
Although any attempt to classify these statements is difficult, some are sufficiently alike to be discussed in groups. There are, first, the statements belonging to the most handicapped boys; the boys who, while they are able to make the figures to fill in the blanks left forage and grade, fail in' the attempt to write a single word. The names of the schools, or of the studies, which they tried to write are alike illegible; in a few cases the boy has scrawled his own name, which the blank does not call for, as if in a brave attempt to show that he could after all write something. For example, two Italian boys of seventeen and twenty who were in the second grade, and a German boy of nineteen who thought he was in the third, seem unable to write any word at all; another nineteen-year-old German boy and a colored boy of fifteen can write only their names; while
( 134) four Polish boys, one fourteen years old, two eighteen, and one nineteen, can scarcely write a word that can be read, though the attempts which they made seem to indicate that they believed themselves able to write. In this latter group belong also two Bohemian boys, seventeen and twenty years old, a German boy of nineteen, a Danish boy of fifteen, a Norwegian of nineteen, and a seventeen-year-old Irish boy who was born in this country.
In another group are the statements of 25 boys who are slightly better off in that they are able to write a word or two, and in a few cases to attempt a labored excuse for a sentence. One would hesitate, however, to say that they were able to write. The eighteen-year-old boy who says "i can to rede" and the boy of nineteen who says " It habs me Count" are typical of the small number who attempted the difficult question regarding the studies which had "helped most."
In the next large group, which includes the majority of the remaining schedules, the boys can write and put several words together but the wretched spelling and still more wretched writing give evidence of such extreme ignorance that it may be fairly called illiteracy. This is evidenced also by their poor attempt to tell which studies have helped them and how. A Polish boy of twenty, who had been sent to the Polish School by his parents who themselves can speak no English although they have been here seventeen years, says, " Writeing and Reading" have helped him because " If i can write and Read i can go in the World and make a ezey living." The boy had worked for an upholsterer, but when seen by the investigator had been idle for two months. A similar case is that of an Italian boy whose father speaks very little English and his mother none at all although they have been here twenty years. This boy attended what he calls a " Pucilc," evidently meant for public, school and enumerates " Reading Writing Geoghy and Aricits" because "they made me get my School Certifat." The boy was one of a family of five children and seven grandchildren and the certificate which gave him the right to work for them was indeed a thing of value. A poor Polish boy whose father has been insane ten years and who has evidently shared his mother's struggle to "bring up the family," reached the fourth grade in a parochial school and writes in pathetic detail that "Reading and Retmetic"
(135) have helped him most because " Reading helps me find work by reading in paper and Retmetic helps me count my hours I put in and count my Celary."
Many other similar examples might be given: A boy of seventeen who attended school seven years and was only in the second grade when he left selects " Reeding, Ritting, and Conting" because " I codont get no work if I coudont Reed or Rite or spell." Another seventeen-year-old boy who also was in school seven years says he was only in " t room" grade in what he describes as the "Parofial Scool." He enumerates "reading and riting" because when i am at home and have nothing to do i read and rite." Still another, seventeen years old, who is a varnisher in a pool table factory, says, " Reading, writing (because) in worke, it helps me."
More interesting, perhaps, are the statements which explain in what special way the boy has used his studies or found them helpful. Thus the eldest of two Polish boys who run their father's coal and hack business, and support the family of 10, says briefly, " Rhitmetic" because " I have figure Coal Bills and Carriage Trips"; and the younger one, aged seventeen, finds that "Arithmetic, Reading Wrighting" were all helpful " Because I figure the Weights of Coal." An Italian boy who is the sole support of a family of eight and who is a machinist's helper finds arithmetic most useful and says in explanation " I after use a ruel." One boy who began to attend school when he was ten and went to work at thirteen does not specify which studies helped him, but says, as if in explanation of all things, " We needed the money to Spend on Shoes." An Irish boy of eighteen specifies " Reding" and his explanation is " I am a Cook." Another boy does not select any special studies but says, " I was driving a coal wagon and the lesson learned me to give right change back and read the names and addresses."
It is, however, a point of further interest that some of the boys say quite definitely that the school struggle was not worth while, and they can find no word to say regarding the usefulness of any study. Thus, one who was eighteen years old says briefly, "No studies held me I dont ned them"; and another, who is also eighteen, comments very plainly, "None of studies have helpt any to Earn my money." One boy who is now nineteen but who was
( 136) kept in school until he was sixteen and had reached the sixth grade says with like certainty, "There is Know studies which have helped me (because) I am a painter." An Irish boy, eighteen years old, who works in a barber shop, left school when he was thirteen and writes, " I done hard work which did not Rezure (require) School." An Italian boy who is only fifteen cannot say that he has been helped in any way but writes in explanation " I work with my hand."
There are, of course, among these school statements a few written by boys who could write well-not placing the standard of writing among boys higher than it should be!-but these, like the cases of boys who come from comfortable homes, are infrequent exceptions. Taken as a whole, the statements show clearly that the majority of these delinquent children when they left school to go to work were handicapped children, knowing probably how to read, but writing with the greatest difficulty, if at all.
But the school statements do not in themselves complete the story of the ignorant child. Some account must be given of the 303 boys out of the 584 whose families were visited, but who did not fill out the "statement." A considerable number of these boys were away from home, in institutions, "out West," in the army or navy, and in some cases the family wished to conceal from the boy the visit of the investigator because they did not wish to revive the memory of his court experience. But in other cases, of which the number is unquestionably larger than the schedules show, the boy was not able to read or write and did not, therefore, return the school statement at all. Some account of these totally illiterate boys must be given in order to supplement the testimony that is furnished by the school statements. Far more ignorant than the most ignorant boy who attempted to scrawl a few figures or a misspelled word on the schedules is the boy who cannot read or write at all. Such a case, for example, is that of the Polish boy nineteen years old who is unable to read or write, who attended school but who did not get beyond the first grade. His mother says "he did not go more than one day a week." A similar case is that of an Italian boy sixteen years old, born in this country, who began to go to school when he was ten " but did not go much," and who can neither read nor write. He now owns a paper route
( 137) and "wants to save his money to go tonight school." There is also the case of a German boy of nineteen who cannot read or write; another Italian boy who, when he was brought to court at the age of thirteen, had never been to school at all; an Irish boy of nineteen who is said to be a good worker and "good to the family but so illiterate that he can scarcely read or write." A Polish boy who did not come to this country until he was thirteen, went to school only until he could find work. He is now seventeen and unable either to read or to write. A Swedish boy was scarcely able to read or write when he was eighteen, but he has since been attending night school. A Polish boy of eighteen who was born here is unable to write. An Irish boy of sixteen cannot write. An Irish boy eighteen years old is a carpenter and has recently been earning $25 a week, but he cannot write at all and asks his sister to write for him when necessary. It seems unnecessary to mention any other similar cases, but the facts about two Bohemian boys, both of whom had brutal fathers, should perhaps also be given in this group. In one case the father refused to allow the boy to attempt to fill in the schedule, saying that the boy had had "no schooling." The boy had had a very poor record when he was taken out of school at the age of eleven and was perhaps " mentally deficient," but the record showed that the father had refused to allow any of the children to go to school. In the case of the other boy, even when he lived with an aunt, the father would not let him go to school if he could help it, and falsified the child's age certificate to make him work. Those who know the boy say that he probably would have done well in school if he had been allowed to attend.
This list of cases has been given somewhat in detail in order to emphasize the fact that the school statements by no means tell the whole story of ignorance and illiteracy. There is undoubtedly a very considerable number of other boys whose records would be much the same if they could be obtained. Such illiteracy as is revealed by the school statements is unquestionably typical of the condition of the boys who are brought into court. It should be noted here that the machinery for preventing the illiteracy shown by the school statements had been tardily set in motion. The child labor law of 1903 had been passed and was in operation for
( 138) the first time in the year 1903-04 when these boys were brought into court. This law not only provided that children under fourteen years of age could not be gainfully employed during school hours but that no child between the ages of fourteen and sixteen could be so employed unless he had first received an age and school certificate approved by the superintendent of schools; and during this year, these provisions were supposedly in force.[13] The school certificate then, as now, required not only a statement regarding the date of the child's birth sworn to by the parent or guardian, but also a statement by the teacher and principal of the school that the child could " read and write legibly simple sentences." This law also provides that " in the case of a child who cannot read at sight and write legibly simple sentences" a certificate may be issued provided the child is attending an evening school and his attendance there is certified weekly. And it is further provided that, when the evening schools are not in session, "an age and school certificate shall not be approved for any child who cannot read at sight and write legibly simple sentences." This law unfortunately does not provide that the child must be able to read and write "in English,"[14] and although there are very few cases in which it happens that a child is able to read and write in some other language when he is not able to do so in English, an opportunity of evading the law exists since the child's claim to proficiency in a foreign language is not easily tested.
It is significant in this connection that of the 281 boys from whom school statements were obtained, 140 were under fourteen years of age and 111 others were under sixteen when brought to court, so that 251, or nearly nine-tenths of them, came under the
( 139) provisions of this law[15] and were not legally entitled to their " working papers" unless they were able to " read and write legibly simple sentences." Yet of all the school statements handed in, only one, that of a boy who left school at twelve and who says " I go to night school every night" contains any record of the attendance at evening school prescribed for illiterate children before the issuing of the school certificate.
Any explanation of this illiteracy among delinquent boys must fall under one of two heads: (1) either the boy did not go to school, or (2) he was so handicapped that he made little or no progress while there, or (3) he may have been able to read or write some foreign language, and therefore not truly illiterate. This last explanation could have applied to so few cases that it may be disregarded since the boy was urged to fill out the statement in any language.
On the first point, irregularity of attendance or non-attendance, there is much to be said. The great majority of these boys had spent their entire school life under a compulsory education law. In 1899 the year in which the juvenile court was established, a compulsory education department was already in existence in Chicago and a law providing for the establishment of a parental school for truant boys had been passed. In the year 1903-04, along with the new child labor law which has been described, a new compulsory education law was being enforced. This law not only extended the period of required attendance to the whole school year, but it made possible the better enforcement of the law by providing for the punishment of parents whose children were kept out of school. During this year, therefore, the compulsory education department sent 1060 warnings to parents and prosecuted 307
( 140) who did not comply.[16] The parent who kept a child out of school to deliver washings, to "mind baby," or to "keep house while mother was away working," could be punished by fine and imprisonment if the offense were continued.
Just how far failure to attend school is an explanation of illiteracy it is not possible to say; there is no question, however, of there being a close connection not merely between truancy and illiteracy but between truancy and delinquency. And while only 64 Of the delinquent boys who came into court during the year 1903-04 were charged with truancy as well as with some other delinquent offense,[17] the detailed histories of the cases kept on file in the court records show that I f 7 other delinquent boys "would not go to school" although not charged specifically with truancy. That is, in a very large number of cases the boy's parent or guardian or the probation officer or some one familiar with his habits knew that he had been staying away from school although he had escaped being brought to court for this offense. The following table shows for 1903-04 and for another and more recent year, 1907-08,[18] the ages of all the delinquent boys who would not go to school, whether they were charged with truancy in the court records or not.
This table shows that in 1903-04, 181 boys, and in 19078, 120 boys "would not go to school." It should be noticed, however, that the table includes boys of all ages from seven to sixteen, although the compulsory school law requires attendance after the age of fourteen only when the child is not working, and it is well known that no practicable method of enforcing this law has yet been found. But for the boy who is supposed to be attending school, irregular attendance is as demoralizing above the age at which attendance can be enforced as for the one below it. Looking, however, only at the children under fourteen, namely, children of the compulsory school age, it appears that even these incomplete data show that in 1903-04, 166 boys under fourteen, 34 per cent of all
( 141) the delinquent boys of this age brought to court during this year,[19] and in 1907-08, 87 boys under fourteen, one-fourth of the total number under this age brought to court during the year, were in need of discipline for persistently staying out of school.
| NUMBER of BOYS | ||
|---|---|---|
| Age | 1903-1904 | 1907-1908 |
| 7 | 2 | 1 |
| 8 | 4 | 3 |
| 9 | 18 | 2 |
| 10 | 31 | 14 |
| 11 | 31 | 16 |
| 12 | 43 | 25 |
| 13 | 37 | 26 |
| 14 | 6 | 17 |
| 15 | 6 | 12 |
| 16 | 1 | 4 |
| No report | 2 | .. |
| Total | 181[21] | 120 |
There were, then, in 1907-08, at least 116 of the delinquent boys under sixteen and 87 under fourteen, or one-fourth of the total number under fourteen brought to court during this year, who were staying away from school. This percentage for 1907-08 is smaller than that for 1903-04; that is, 25 instead of 34 per cent. Some of the 1903-04 boys, however, were charged with truancy, not when they were first brought to court but when they were returned later on a new charge. Similarly, many of these 1907-08 boys will be returned to court again, and if their entire histories could be read four years from this time, there is every reason to believe that a very considerable number of them would later be
(142) described as "refusing to go to school." Either percentage, however, is sufficiently large to show a striking connection between truancy and delinquency among boys. It is significant that in the more recent year there is a large number of truant boys at the ages of fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen. Attention was called in an early part of this chapter to the fact that the great majority of boys who become wards of the court leave school and go to work when they are fourteen; that they are often out of work as well as out of school; and that they are given special opportunities, as it were, to become delinquent.
There is, however, as has been said, a possible explanation for illiteracy other than a failure to comply with the compulsory education law. The boy may have been handicapped by a poor mind or a poor body which no amount of patient attendance at school could cure. There are the children who are the victims of St. Vitus' dance; the epileptics; the boys described as mentally deficient, or weak-minded; and finally, the poor backward boys described as "not very bright" or "dull and slow," such as a Dutch boy who was never able to get out of the kindergarten and is said by his mother to be "weak in the head." This boy is now sixteen and has tried to work with a construction company, but his mother thinks he will never be able to work satisfactorily. Or there is the case of a German boy who never got beyond second grade at school and was thought mentally deficient. He has not been successful in work either, and the probation officer thinks he will always be a "half-witted tramp." Many examples of such cases are cited in the list given at the end of this chapter,[22] which also shows the limitations under which the court labored in regard to the treatment of these children. As there is no institution in the state in which epileptic children can be cared for and only one institution, and that crowded, for feeble-minded children, the judge could make use only of those institutions provided for normal children.[23]
In turning from the delinquent boy to the delinquent girl, data bearing upon the question of school status were more difficult to obtain. It will be recalled that family schedules were secured only for those girls who were in the state training school in the summer of 1908, and since many of these girls had been in Geneva
(143) for a considerable period of time, school statements from them similar to those obtained from the boys would have had little value as their content would have been materially modified by the training already given through the school at Geneva. It was found, however, that the Geneva records contained some interesting information regarding the school status of the girls at the time when they became wards of the school. These data were statements obtained from every girl at the time she was committed to the institution regarding the amount of schooling she had had or the last grade she had attended before she came to Geneva. The data presented in Table 28 were obtained from a study of these records for the five years from July I, 1904, to July 1, 1909, and show the ages of 705 delinquent girls when they entered the school, together with the grades they had last attended.
| Age | Never in School | GRADE | Total | Per Cent | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | High School | ||||
| 8 or under [24] | 1 | 1 | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 3 | .4 |
| 9 | .. | .. | 2 | 2 | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | .. | 4 | .6 |
| 10 | .. | 8 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 2 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 17 | 2.4 |
| 11 | .. | 3 | 5 | 11 | 2 | 1 | .. | .. | .. | .. | 22 | 3.1 |
| 12 | 1 | 6 | 9 | 9 | 10 | 9 | 5 | .. | .. | .. | 49 | 6.9 |
| 13 | .. | 7 | 9 | 13 | 12 | 20 | 6 | 3 | 1 | .. | 71 | 10.1 |
| 14 | 3 | 8 | 10 | 19 | 18 | 15 | 16 | 8 | 2 | 2 | 101 | 14.3 |
| 15 | 5 | 6 | 16 | 31 | 31 | 31 | 24 | 15 | 11 | 1 | 171 | 24.3 |
| 16 | 4 | .. | 3 | 19 | 23 | 25 | 26 | 12 | 11 | 2 | 122 | 17.3 |
| 17 or over | 6 | 4 | 2 | 18 | 23 | 26 | 30 | 20 | 12 | 4 | 145 | 20.6 |
| Total | 20 | 43 | 59 | 126 | 120 | 129 | 104 | 37 | 37 | 9 | 705 | 100.0 |
| Per cent . . . | 2.8 | 6.1 | 8.4 | 17.9 | 17.0 | 18.3 | 14.8 | 5.2 | 5.2 | 1.3 | . . | 100.0 |
(144)
This table does not show as did Table 26 (page 129) for boys, the age at which the girl left school. In a number of cases the girl was in fact attending school at the time of her commitment, but as 539 girls out of the 705 (76.5 percent) were fourteen or over, and so beyond the compulsory school age, some had left school altogether; a few as the table indicates had never been to school. The table, therefore, does not indicate the divergence from what would be the normal rate of progress in school; for some of the sixteen-year-old girls may have left school at the age of ten or twelve. It does, however, make possible a comparison with what might be called the degree of advancement contemplated by the compulsory school law and that actually attained by these girls. That is, in contrast to Table 26 in which the number of boys below the line had failed to make normal progress in school, Table 28 shows below the line, the girls who at the time when they entered Geneva were below the standard for girls of their age who had been kept in school. The normal sixteen-year-old girl should be in the high school, and the fact that 120 girls of this age had, according to the table, never reached the high school shows that they were below the normal standard whether they were still in school or not. Out of 705 girls who reported their school grade, 635, or 9o per cent of the whole number, were below the black line. Here, again, the table gives no adequate idea of the extreme cases which are found. Twenty of these girls, eighteen of them over fourteen, had never been in school at all; 43 other girls, whose ages ranged from eight to seventeen, claimed that they had been to school but had not got out of the first grade.
Although the delinquent girl seems then to be more illiterate than the delinquent boy, the explanation of this illiteracy is not on the face of it so evident. It was pointed out that there were two primary causes of backwardness among the boys: (1) a large number of them were truants, who had been to school very irregularly, and (2) many of them were so handicapped physically or mentally that they made little progress in school even if they attended regularly. With regard to the first point it appears that the number of truant girls is insignificant compared with the number of truant boys. In 1909-10, the superintendent of compulsory education
(146) reported 3482 truant boys and only 132 truant girls.[25] It is probably true, however, that truancy is less easily detected among girls than among boys, since the latter are more conspicuously disorderly when absent from school. Certainly girls are kept at home much more frequently than boys to help with the housework and to care for the younger children, and, even if not officially designated "truants," their attendance at school is none the less irregular and uncertain, and, in turn, unprofitable.
With regard to the second reason for lack of progress at school, the physical or mental handicap, little comment is necessary after a reading of the girls' "family paragraphs" to which reference has already been so frequently made. As with the boys, there is evidence in a considerable number of cases of subnormal development; and the presence at Geneva of feeble-minded or mentally deficient girls who were committed to the institution because of immorality shows a need for a better system of protecting these unfortunate children. It should also be added that not only was a larger proportion of poor homes found among the delinquent girls than among the boys, but a larger number of these were homes in which there was not only poverty but degradation, and from such homes a greater degree of illiteracy must be expected.
In attempting to summarize the conclusions from such data as have been presented regarding the school status of these boys and girls, it may be said briefly that in the great majority of cases the delinquent child is also an ignorant child, and in a large number of cases an illiterate child. This is obviously due in part to the fact that many of these children enter school late and leave when they are still very young, some of them before they have reached the age of fourteen and are legally entitled to their working papers, and nearly all the others as soon as they reach this age. Their illiteracy is explained in part by the fact that during the short period when they are supposedly attending school,
( 146) they attend very irregularly, and in part by the fact that while they are in school they are so handicapped mentally or physically that they make little progress.
That the schools are trying to meet the needs of the delinquent child and to remove such causes of delinquency as illiteracy and truancy is evidenced in many ways: by constant improvement in the methods of enforcing the compulsory education and the child labor laws; by the establishment of ungraded classes or subnormal rooms, to care more satisfactorily for the dull or backward child; by the vacation school, which provides a healthy substitute for the street in the summer; and finally by the manual training centers, which are referred to so touchingly in the school statements of those boys who said that the "studies that helped them most" were, as they expressed it, "work with hands." Even the children can connect instruction in these centers quite definitely with that lifelong work with the hands which is sure to be their portion. And finally, it should not be forgotten that these illiterate children are also, many of them, children of illiterate and degraded parents, and that upon the home, rather than upon the school and the court, must be placed the true responsibility for the ignorant child.
(147)
NOTE TO CHAPTER VIII
MENTALLY DEFECTIVE BOMB BROUGHT TO COURT AB DELINQUENT
No list which was at all complete could be compiled of the delinquent boys who were also subnormal, or mentally defective. In fact it is now recognized that the question of a child's mental condition can in many cases be determined only after the child has been carefully examined by an expert. It has seemed worth while, however, to present the following 43 cases of boys who were obviously "peculiar" or "queer" or "weak in the head" or "feeble-minded" and were so described by parent or probation officer. The statement of the disposition made of their cases indicates the more or less accidental and haphazard method of treatment inevitable when the resources of the court are limited and when there is lacking even the machinery for discovering the degree to which the child's intelligence differs from the normal intelligence, and the bearing of that difference upon his treatment. The list is given in this form rather than in the form of a tabular statement because the latter would suggest completeness and exactness in a way that would be distinctly misleading.
(I) Eleven-year-old German boy in court three times; put on probation the first time, then sent to the John Worthy School, and later placed on probation again.(2) Fourteen-year-old German boy in court once; put on probation.
(3) Fifteen-year-old German boy in court twice; sent to the John Worthy School both times.
(4) Swedish boy in court three times; sent to the John Worthy School the first time, then placed on probation, and later sent to the John Worthy School.
(5) Eleven-year-old German boy in court twice; sent to the John Worthy School both times.
(6) Eleven-year-old Canadian boy in court twice; put on probation the first time; then sent to the John Worthy School.
(7) Ten-year-old English-American boy in court once; sent to the John Worthy School.
(8) Ten-year-old German boy in court twice; put on probation the first time; then sent to the Chicago Parental School.
(9) Fourteen-year-old Irish boy in court once; put on probation.
(l0) Thirteen-year-old German boy in court four times; put on probation the first two times; then sent to the Chicago Parental School the last two times.
(148)
(11) Boy, nationality unknown, an epileptic, in court once; put on probation.
(12) Thirteen-year-old Italian boy, in court two times; put on probation; then sent to the John Worthy School.
(13) Twelve-year-old Polish boy in court three times; put on probation; then sent to the John Worthy School, and later sent to St. Charles.
(14) Thirteen-year-old American boy, in court twice; put on probation; then sent to the John Worthy School.
(15) Fourteen-year-old German boy, no record.
(16) Thirteen-year-old German boy, in court three times; paroled the first two times; then sent to the John Worthy School.
(17) Thirteen-year-old German boy, in court once; sent to the John Worthy School.
(18) Twelve-year-old Dutch boy, in court once; sent to Glenwood.
(19) Fourteen-year-old Irish boy, in court once; placed on probation.
(20) Twelve-year-old Irish boy, in court three times; sent to John Worthy School the first two times, then placed on probation.
(21) Eleven-year-old Irish boy, in court three times; sent to John Worthy School, then fined, and later sent to the John Worthy School.
(22) Twelve-year-old Polish boy, in court four times; was fined, then sent to the John Worthy School the last three times.
(23) Eleven-year-old American boy in court once; placed on probation.
(24) Fourteen-year-old Polish boy, in court once; sent to John Worthy School.
(25) Fourteen-year-old American boy, in court three times; was fined, then sent to Glenwood, and later sent to St. Charles.
(26) Ten-year-old Bohemian boy, in court three times; placed on probation each time.
(27) Ten-year-old Polish boy, in court four times; placed on probation each time.
(28) Sixteen-year-old Irish boy, in court twice; sent to the John Worthy School both times.
(29) Fifteen-year-old Irish boy, in court twice; placed on probation each time.
(30) Fourteen-year-old Swedish boy, in court twice; sent to the John Worthy School; then placed on probation.
(31) Fourteen-year-old German boy, in court four times; sent to John Worthy School each time.
(32) Fourteen-year-old German boy. in court four times: sent to
(149) John Worthy School, then fined, later placed on probation, and then sent to Dunning.
(33) Fifteen-year-old Irish boy, in court twice; placed on probation; then sent to the Bridewell.
(34) Fourteen-year-old Italian boy, in court three times; sent to the John Worthy School the first two times, then sent to the penitentiary.
(35) Fourteen-year-old Irish boy, in court three times; placed on probation, then sent to the John Worthy School, later sent to St. Charles.
(36) Fourteen-year-old boy, nationality unknown, in court once; placed on probation.
(37) Twelve-year-old Irish boy, in court four times; placed on probation, then sent to the John Worthy School, again placed on probation, and later sent to the John Worthy School.
(38) Fourteen-year-old Irish boy, in court five times; placed on probation, sent to John Worthy School, placed on probation, sent to John Worthy School, and then sent to Pontiac.
(39) Eleven-year-old German boy, in court four times; placed on probation, sent to John Worthy School, again placed on probation, and then sent to John Worthy School.
(40) Fifteen-year-old German boy, in court once; placed on probation.
(41) Twelve-year-old Polish boy, in court three times; sent to Chicago Parental School, then to John Worthy School, and later placed on probation.
(42) Eleven-year-old colored boy, in court once; placed on probation.
(43) Fifteen-year-old boy, nationality unknown, in court twice; both times was placed on probation.
