Show Education In Crisis I The poverty and hunger that grip so 50 many of the tree free nations of the world cannot be permanently permanently perma- perma allayed without sufficient education It is important not only for children to be taught their letters and their sums but youngsters must also be kept in school long enough to learn dIscipline and valuable skills SCHOOL PROBLEMS HERE AT HOME Many authorities on education education tion are disturbed by the lack of progress made in the United States toward bringing equal and adequate education to all of our boys and girls Earlier this i year Congress was su sufficiently impressed to pass legislation providing new aids to education The out drop problem has been carefully studied and the tact fact i emphasized t that hat drop o outs drop u t s make far less when they go to work than do graduates and I that their learning power motivation motivation moti- moti I I and adaptability are likely to be sadly lacking But we in the US U.S. are at least i I sharply aware of the value of basic education and we are determined determined de- de I to do all that we can canto i to better our schools and uni- uni I I This country spent some 39 billion on education last year recognizing that only through training our young can we assure cultural social and I I economic advancement for all allour allour our citizens And we are not likely to permit permit per per- mit outlays for defense or space projects or foreign aid to slow our expansion of educational plant and teaching manpower TRAGIC CO COMPARISONS IP ABROAD The statistics on developing free nations make our worries appear trivial until we realize that peace and liberty will be ensured for all of us only if our brothers In those countr i 1 e s learn to provide for themselves and keep themselves free Education Education Edu- Edu cation is the essential lever for this Yet it is estimated that more than a quarter of a billion children children chil- chil dren from 5 to 14 years of age in the developing nations of Asia Africa and Latin America will not have gone to school at all in 1966 Add to this the bitter fact I i I I I I that about half the adult population tion in these non Communist 1 parts of the earth amounting to nearly cannot million read reador or write Reports from the United Nations Nations Na- Na indicate that there has been an increase of approximately approximately million in the total of the worlds world's illiterates in the I past six years probably due dueI I mostly to population growth I Even this figure is considered by demographic experts to be optimIstic They point out that struggling countries want to make their I educational picture look as bright as possible so I Ithe the estimates maywell be below the actual totals LONG HARD ROAD AHEAD Some idea as to the desperateness desperateness desper- desper I of the school situation even in some of the more ambitious ambitious am- am free nations may be gathered from the fact that India expended only the equivalent ot of million on education during during dur- dur ing the latest year of record Compare that with our own 39 billion in 1965 For the Indian child this means a pupil per outlay of perhaps 32 annually annually- barely money enough to pay for books and teachers for the few children who actually do get to toI school Statistics show too that about million young Indians are not getting any formal education I at all ali And all the time Indias India's POPulation is soaring upward by at least 12 million annually Some idea of the enormity of the problem maybe gained from the knowledge that Indias India's gross national income in 1963 was only 32 billion less than the United i States lays out for education alone KNOWLEDGE KNOWLEDG KEY TO WORLD i FUTURE Now that swift transportation and instant communication have made us One World whether we like it or not education for forthe forthe the Free World becomes practically practically as important to the United United Unit Unit- ed States as education for our own people For what is now crisis in the developing nations nations nations' na- na become can catastrophe for the Free World if the more I fortunately situated countries 1 do not work to raise the knowledge knowl edge skills and hope of pea pe pIes caught in Ignorance want and despair Ii |