ttees in their towns and districts.
It means the teacher is finding the status and position the teachers
in their profession ought to have in their communities, and the war
has done a great deal towards achieving that desirable end, though
there is still a good deal to be done.
In the Government Service there has undoubtedly been great
opportunities for women, especially those of organizing, executive and
secretarial ability--and in many cases the payment in higher posts
is identical for men and women, and higher posts, if they have the
ability, are freely given to women and the whole position of women
in our Civil Service is improved. In the very highest posts, such as
those of Insurance and Feeble-minded Commissioners, etc., women before
the war received the same salaries as men.
The organizing ability and the common sense way in which our women
in voluntary organization, quite rapidly, themselves decided what
organizations were unnecessary and merely duplicating others, and
refused to help them, so that they died out quite quickly, roused
admiration, and the war has educated vast numbers of women in
organization and executive ability. Women who never in their lives
organized anything, and never kept an account properly, are doing
all kinds of useful work. One nice middle-aged lady whose War Savings
Association accounts were being kept wrongly, or rather were not
really being kept at all, when told they must be done fully and
correctly by one of our National Committee representatives, said, "Oh,
but you see, I never did anything but crochet before the war"; but we
have succeeded in making even the crochet ladies keep accounts and do
wonderful things.
In the great world of mechanics and engineering, women are doing
a wonderful amount of work and, there is no doubt, will remain in
certain departments after the war. One danger there is in the women's
attitude--so many of our women have learned one branch of work very
quickly, that there probably will be a tendency to believe that
anything can be learned as easily. There are only certain departments
of mechanics that can be learned in a few months' time, and women will
probably go on doing these. Such work as theirs in optical munitions,
has shown their very special aptitude for it and in law-making,
etc., they will be used more and more. Women have successfully done
tool-setting and can go on with that. The training for civil and
mechanical engineering is long,
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