Our children, who look out upon a world of bewilderment, doubt, and instability...
Our girls, upon whom it has been imposed that they share with their brothers in only the very least...
The adolescent girls among them — each one looks at herself and sees neither the artless child nor the grown woman, and stands questioning between the two...
This strange medley with which our society teems, which our eyes see at home, in the street, and at school — what have we done for its sake, that it may live its life as the best that living can be, and set out upon the paths of truth and of building?...
There is the home, we say; but how many are the houses in which all the needs of children and adolescents — and even of grown young women — are provided? And we point our finger at the school and cry: Here!...
But the aware observer soon falls back in disappointment!...
This discordant mixture we call a school still — save for the very few — sets the program above your child's head, so that he walks as if under a heavy nightmare... The concern of our schools is the book and the dry — more often than not odious — subject matter; it pays no heed, then, to these dynamic creatures in whom life clamors, in whose breasts hope and youth ring out in ululation...
These are our children; and an aware handful of
our society is thinking of them in a new way, and working to help them, for the sake of their lives... And the Young Women's Christian Association has taken the broadest step in this field.
The step began thirty-seven years ago, when the association was a small [...], living on the help of its mother in the United States; but this kernel soon became an independent tree,
Before the machine and the work, differences and nationalities melt away...
Mealtime is a pleasure among companions
A gaze full of hope and promise