iners have usually had considerable previous experience as machine
operators or finishers. The length of experience depends on the kinds
of garments and ranges from three to eight years.

Trimmers and assorters learn their work as helpers to experienced
employees. A year or so of experience is required before they can be
entrusted with responsible work.

Foremen are selected from the working force or, in a few cases,
trained especially for their positions. Although there are few
opportunities each year for advancement to foremanship, employers
declare they cannot get enough persons of ability to fill vacancies. A
study of the previous experience of foremen and forewomen made by the
survey shows that they come from nearly every department of the
factory. The length of previous experience among the cases studied
ranged from three months to nine years.

EDUCATIONAL NEEDS

The quality which proprietors of garment making establishments value
above all others in their employees is adaptability. The reason for
this is that the manufacturing of clothing differs from almost all
other kinds of industrial work in the frequency with which changes
take place in the size and shape of the product and in the range of
materials which must be handled by the same workers. There is an
annual change in the weight of cloth used for the different seasons,
from light to heavy and from heavy to light. The size and shape of the
pieces which compose the finished garment are determined by changes in
style which vary from the minor modifications occurring yearly in
men's clothing to the radical changes in the style of women's
clothing. A wide variety of fabrics is employed, ranging from thick to
thin, smooth to rough, closely woven to loosely woven and from plain
weave to fancy weave. In one season a single establishment will make
garments from as many as 200 different fabrics, and each operator is
likely to work upon 60 or more different kinds of cloth.

In view of the fact that many of the workers are foreigners or of
foreign parentage, and that the frequent changes in styles and
materials require the giving of detailed instructions by foremen,
instruction in English is of more importance in the garment trades
than in occupations where there is a larger proportion of native born
and where the products and processes are more uniformly standardized.

All clothing workers should have a practical knowledge of the
fundamental operations of ar