CONGRESS OF PARENTS AND TEACHERS, INC. 505

Each of these weights counts to some degree. Each of these weights
tips the scales to the advantage of Maryland's students. However, there
are other weights which can and should be applied.

John Lubbock, the Lord Avebury, wrote: "The important thing is
not so much that every child should be taught, as that every child
should be given the wish to learn. " Today as never before this prin-
ciple must guide our educational policies and programs.

We live in history's most exciting, challenging and formidable mo-
ment — the era of the knowledge explosion. In the last twenty-five
years, mankind has acquired more scientific information than in all
previous history. Ninety percent of all the scientists that ever lived
are alive and working today. Emerging evidence indicates that seventy
percent of all knowledge destined to support our present students
during their lifetime is as yet unknown and undiscovered; that a stu-
dent expecting to earn his livelihood with his hands will have to learn
new techniques at least six times before his retirement.

Thus we cannot hope to provide our students with sustaining skills,
secure technical truths, constant or comprehensive knowledge. But
we can provide them with the attitude to adapt, the confidence and
courage to accept rapid change, the ability to continuously learn, the
emotional security to regard change as an exciting challenge.

The first responsibility rests with you, the parent. Comprehension
and confidence, an attitude to accept change and an appetite to con-
stantly learn can best begin in the cradle not the kindergarten. We
must prepare our children to cope with the pressures and anxieties
that have become commonplace.

Educators and parents must search for new methods of encourage-
ment so that making mistakes is not equated with failure. Teacher
and critic of the American school system, John Holt, has blamed the
child's dread of school and reluctance to question or experiment upon
our present system which penalizes error with failing grades.

As never before, our children will depend upon education for eco-
nomic survival, on continuing education for economic security. There-
fore, their attitude toward school must be one of joy and not terror.
We cannot tolerate any elements within our school system which dis-
courage or alienate our children. The pernicious drop-out problem,
the prevalence of student discontent, the undergraduate use of drugs,
even the hippie movement are manifestations and symptoms of exist-
ing flaws and failures which must be eliminated.