THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHER

OCTOBER, 1906

EDUCATION OF WOMEN IN GERMANY

RECCA DORMEYER

Principal of the Preparatory and Collegiate School, Chicago

One of the characteristic features of the nineteenth century was the constant progress in the education of women; and it still continues. Women are better instructed, and at the same time play a more important part in instruction. The history of education in this century will be notable for the great number of women who were educators—some real philosophers and distinguished writers, and others enthusiastic teachers.

There is no country where pedagogy has received a more philosophical and a higher development than in Germany. The German philosophers, Kant, Fichte, Schlegel, Schleiermacher, Herbart, Benecke, and Jean Paul, associated the theory of education with their speculations on human nature; even the great poets, Lessing, Herder, Goethe, and Schiller, have contributed through certain grand ideas to the construction of a science of education.

In the nineteenth century Germany took part in the great movement toward a more liberal education for women. There is no more an inclination toward the opinions of the over-courteous moralist, Joubert, who said: "Nothing too earthly or too material ought to employ young ladies-only delicate material should busy their hands. They resemble their imagination, and like it should touch only the surface of things."

Pestalozzi, Schlegel, Schleiermacher, and Jean Paul Levana stand for a higher and more serious education for women, but

they conclude that their training should be for their own interests, their nature, and their proper destination-more a domestic education than for entering a public arena; they wish woman to remain woman. Bettie Gleim is the first who demands for girls, as well as boys, a public education; but she finds no general sympathy. Neverthless, it is considered necessary that women should be better instructed. The reasons given for it in the

convention in Weimar in 1875 were:

1. In order that they may be able properly to raise their children, of whom they are the natural instructors.

2. In order that they may be the fit companions of their husbands that they may feel an interest in their pursuits and participate in their life-such being a condition of conjugal happiness.

3. In order that they may not quench by their ignorance that inspiration of heart and mind which previous studies have developed in their husbands, but that they may nourish this flame by conversation and reading in common.

In the decree of 1875 for the higher girls' schools, which had been left until then to the management of private enterprise, ornamental and decorative elements predominated completely over that of use. Women should become pictures of a certain gorgeous attractiveness-not white sunlight, but a kind of rose-pink, artificial bedizement. It is true that woman is the companion of man upon earth, yet she exists also on her own account. She needs above all an education which prepares for direct self-preservation -not numerous accomplishments for the purpose of making conquests. It is a question of the true measure of value of knowledge to herself-not its effects on a husband. It is a question of not catching the shadow and losing the substance. In 1887 a petition was sent in from several women's clubs which had sprung into life, headed by H. Lange, saying that by the multilateral of the subjects of studies a solid education would be impossible, and only a superficial knowledge could be acquired. The first consideration would be to give women, not an ornamental domestic education, but a preparation for the vocation of life. Female educators, with Helene Lange and Luise Buchner as

leaders, demanded a larger field in teaching and the instruction of the higher grades of girls' schools, which had until then been entirely in the hands of men who followed the teaching of Rousseau and polished the mentality and manners of girls, to the end, that they might become companions for husbands. The granting of the petition was partly due to the Victoria Lyceum in Berlin, an institute which since 1868 had been devoted to the accomplishments of women. In 1888 special scientific studies for teachers were added, and, with the permission of the Kultusministerium, female teachers who had been employed in the higher girls' schools for at least five years passed after a three years' course the examinations for principals. Step by step they fought their way; in vain men urged that female teachers for the higher grades were neither necessary, nor desirable, nor worthy to be admitted. The ice was broken, and there was no holding back any more. It had been easy enough to suppress the single woman; the women united had become a force. In 1894 the Kultusministerium reformed the Höhere Töchterschule, and at the same time the normal school, which had been in existence since 1875, was enlarged from a two- to a three-year course. In several universities preparatory courses were arranged, extending to six semesters, for principals' examinations.

Plato based his recommendations of equal education of men and women on equality of civil functions; in modern thought it is the conception of equal rights and of equal abilities that tends to prescribe the same course of intellectual training for both sexes. I have my doubts of its being advisable to pursue entirely the same course of studies. At all events, I am opposed to coeducation after the age of fourteen. While girls are endowed with a quick intelligence, while they divine and see more quickly than boys-Bronson Alcott says, "Divination seems heightened to its highest power in woman"-they lack in continuity and depth of thought. Prolonged attention wearies them; they are too mobile to be profound. There is no reason why they should have a less serious education than boys; but the methods employed ought to be different. Then, again, the period from fourteen to twenty years of age should be entirely given to study; but naturally the

young man thinks more of the roguish eyes and laughing lips he sees at his side than of his mathematical formulas; his Latin might suffer less. He will without doubt be sure of his amo, amas, amat, and the girl cannot help to sympathize with the poor lad, and sighs amemus. Too early marriages are often the result; boys of twenty or still younger spoil their prospects in life by marrying, and in most cases, after a short time, they conjugate the past amavi.

It

Like mushrooms, teachers' associations have sprung up, many teachers' conventions have been held, and the general German teachers' association numbers now seventeen thousand members. They not only extend their arm all over the fatherland, but also reach into foreign countries. In England there is a German teachers' association, under the leadership of Helene Aldermann, and one in France, under the leadership of Miss Schliemann. is their purpose to watch the interests of teachers and help them in every way—those who either wish to perfect themselves in foreign languages, or who come as teachers of German only. In London a home and sanitarium are connected with the association. In the year 1900 a new law for teachers' examinations was passed, and philosophy was added as a compulsory study. In 1889 was founded the first college-Realgymnasium-for girls, which was changed in 1893 by Helene Lange, its principal, into a Gymnasium preparing students in a four-year course for the university. This college corresponds to the collegiate course of four years, resulting in the conferring of the degree of A.B., in Chicago, Yale, Harvard, and Cornell universities. With the fifth year the conferring of the German universities begins.

With this the opening for women in the study of medicine and similar sciences was accomplished. Soon followed others and there are now fifteen colleges in Germany with a four- to a six-year course. They are in Berlin, Karlsruhe, Leipzig, Hanover, Königsberg, Stuttgart, Breslau, Munich, Hamburg, Frankfort, Cologne, Mannheim. In Prussia women provided with the certificate are admitted to hear lectures but are not matriculated as in other states.

Although nothing hinders German girls from entering uni

versities, yet, since they are inclined more by nature for domestic life, or since German fathers are still opposed to that kind of education for girls, only a small percentage take advantage of it. Until 1903 there were only 122 graduates from the colleges, while from the normal schools there graduate yearly a large number without becoming teachers; which proves that the study of modern languages is preferred by women to the study of ancient, which is the greatest difference between the colleges and the normal schools. In Baden, Würtemberg, and Hessen many institutions have coeducation.

Compulsory education begins at the age of six and continues to the age of fourteeen. Negligent parents are liable to punishment by fines or even by imprisonment. There are five grades of instruction for girls, so that each one has the opportunity to receive the education adapted to her need:

1. Public schools, without charge for tuition-Volksschule. 2. Manual-training schools, also free-Fortbildungs- und Haushaltungsunterricht.

3. Public middle schools, where tuition is charged, and private schools both called Höhere Töchterschule.

4. Normal schools-Seminar.

5. Colleges for girls-Gymnasium.

Both public and private schools are under the supervision of the state, and both receive from the state a yearly allowance.

In Prussia there are 36,138 free public schools, attended by five million children; the cost is $67,480,000 annually. Boys and girls receive the same instruction. They are attended by the children of the working classes, who receive not only free books, but are fed and clothed also if necessary. A bun and hot milk are provided for those who have had no breakfast at home before lessons begin.

Not more than forty pupils are permitted in one room. They have eight grades, and the instruction might be compared with the grammar schools in America. The curriculum is: reading, arithmetic, composition, grammar, religion, geography, German history, natural science, drawing, singing, gymnastics, and needlework for girls.