The educational screen (c1922-c1956])

May, 194} Page 169 The Film and International Understanding Educational Film Plan for the United Nations HERBERT S. HOUSTON Chairman of the Institute for the Advancement of Visual Education and Vocational Training SIR Staflford Cripps in a recent address before the old University of Aberdeen put the present situa- tion clearly when he said: "We must take action now to make certain that our victory will not be barren and will stretch through the years of peace as well as those of war." People are beginning to see clearly that a great job of mass education is to be done if people generally have the understanding on which alone per- manent peace can be founded. This education must be of the broadest character, free from partisan, religious or racial bias and based, of course, on the deep convic- tion that the kind of world the United Nations are fighting for is a Free W^orld. How can that kind of mass education be provided in the time available? It is safe to assume that the read- ers of this magazine would say at once—only by the educational motion picture in the schools and the agencies of adult education in the United Nations, al- ways in the language of the country in which the pic- tures are shown. That is precisely what is proposed in the Educational Plan outlined in this brief article. A few days ago at the Century Club in New York this plan was explained to a group of leading educators, nearly all with broad international experi- ence, including Dr. Paul Monroe, President of the World Federation of Education Associations. Dr. Stephen Duggan, Director of the Institute of Inter- national Education, Dr. Malcolm Davis, Associate Di- rector of the Carnegie Endowment, Dr. Henry A. At- kinson, Director of the World Alliance of Churches. Dr. Reinhold Schairer, Director of the U. S. Committee on Educational Reconstruction, Dr. Ken Shaw, Di- rector of the China Institute, and one or two others. They strongly endorsed the Plan and expressed the hope that ways would be found for putting it to work. This Plan has grown out of the plan of the late Dr. David Starr Jordan (of Stanford University) to which was given the Raphael Herman Award of $25,000.00 some years ago for being the best for promoting Peace through the Schools of the world. In 1937 the writer of this article, who had been one of the Board of Judges making the award, presented the substance of the David Starr Jordan Plan in an address before the World Fed- EJitor's Note: Dr. Houston's article deals with the most comprehensive plan yet proposed for the use of the educational motion picture as a world-wide instrument of international understanding. It is not a plan which was devised overnight, but is the result of years of evolving thinking on this problem. We commend it to our readers for serious consideration and evaluation. Comments will be welcomed. Dr. Houston is an educator, editor, and world traveler, eminently qualified to speak in this field. Formerly publisher of The World's Work magazine, and editor of its Spanish edition, he now is a mem- ber of the American Committee of the International Chamber of Commerce, a member of the Motion Picture Research Council, and Chairman of the Institute for the Advancement of Visual Education and Vocational Training. Edited by DR. lOHN E. DUGAN Haddon Heights, New Jersey, Schools eration of Education Associations in Tokyo. It was unanimously approved and placed on the permanent program of the World Federation. Dr. Paul Monroe stated at the recent Century Club Conference that it was still on the Permanent Program and the World Federation stood ready to support it in every possible way. The present Plan, based on the Jordan Plan, has been drafted by the writer with the collaboration of Dr. Wallace W. Atwood. President of Clark University. and Dr. F. Dean McClusky. Head Master of Scar- borough School and one of the editors of Educational Screen. It is proposed in the Plan that Dr. Atwood will develop a series of educational motion pictures ex- plaining and interpreting, in both text and picture, the human and economic facts about each country—always in relation to each other and the world. It is also pro- ])osed to have a series of pictures on world economics as the basis of Peace, by one of the greatest living economists. Dr. John B. Condliffe. long head of the Economic Section of the League of Nations and now Professor of Economics at the University of Califor- nia. These educational motion pictures are to be definitely for the schools and for the many agencies of adult education in the United Nations. They will be made by educators, interesting and pic- torial, but always distinctly for the schools. Their purpose will be to interpret the economic, cultural and spiritual principles on which the United Nations hope to build the post-war world. In order to have them factual and free from propa- ganda it is proposed, when an organization is effected for the United Nations, to have an international com- mittee of educators, representing each country, formed to determine general policy as to production and dis- tribution. The expectation is that the successful pattern will be followed that has been used by the Office of Education in the production (under contract with pri- vate producers) of the training motion pictures for the war industries. Various methods are now being con- sidered for the necessary financing—from the govern- ments of the United Nations, from Foundations, and from private sources. But whatever way is decided on as the best, all things considered, it is clearly manifest that the very moment has come to develop a broad educational motion picture plan for inass education throughout the United Nations.