Perhaps the reader now has at least partial answer to his question concerning changes in the organization and content of the curriculum. But he may be asking, "How were these schools guided in determining the content of the curriculum?" Chiefly there were two criteria: the demands of adult society and the concerns of adolescents. The influence of these criteria varies from school to school and from teacher to teacher.

Some give great weight to analyses of what adults do. They argue that schools should know clearly the sorts of activities in which adults engage and the kinds of problems they have to meet. Then the work of the school, they say, should prepare youth to engage in those activities and to meet those problems. An excellent statement of social demands is found in "The Mississippi Program for the finprovement of Instruction ."²⁵ Nine areas of human activity and problems of living are listed as the basis of currictilinn construction: (1) Protecting Life and Health (2) Cetting a Living (3) Making a Home (4) Expressing Religious Inipulses (5) Satisfying the Desire for Beauty (6) Securing Education (7) Co-operating in Social and Civic Action (8) Engaging in Recreation (9) Improving Material Conditions.

This is one of several such lists of adult activity which have been widely used by schools in many states as the guide to curriculum revision. An examination of the programs of the Thirty Schools reveals that they, also, have been influenced by the social demands of adult life.

The other criterion, adolescent concerns, has likewise influenced the participating schools. It was fortunate that results of the studies of the Commission on the Secondary School Curriculum²⁶ became available while the Thirty Schools were seeking solid-rock foundations for curriculum rebuilding. These studies asserted the importance of needs of youth as the source of the curriculum in this statement: "The purpose of general education is to meet the needs of individuals in the basic aspects of living in such a way as to promote the fullest realization of personal potentialities and the most effective participation in a democratic society."²⁷

The emphasis here is upon the problems which young people face while they are still young people, upon the concerns of high school students while they are still in high school. At this age the student is concerned with such questions as these: What should I do to make a living when I leave school? How may I decide what I am best fitted to do? How should I prepare for a job, get it, and hold it? How may I become a self-sustaining, useful citizen? I want to become a person of recognized usefulness in the world of adults. How may I do this? How can I develop better relations with my parents and brothers and sisters? How can I help with the family financial problems? I need friends. What must I be and do to get on well with others? I don't understand myself. Why do I feel, think, and act as I do? Am I normal physically, emotionally?

I am a citizen of the United States. What are my rights and duties as a citizen? What is democracy? What does it mean? How is it better than other ways of life? I must be sure of something. What can I believe in? Is there any meaning in life? How can satisfaction in living be achieved?

It is obvious that these present concerns of youth reach out into the future. He realizes that he is becoming what be is to be. He has his problems which must be solved today, but he has other long-time concerns which carry over into the years ahead. He is thinking of himself as a man in the world of men and he wants to play a man's part when the time comes. But he is still a youth with youth's own immediate task of solving the exciting puzzle of growing tip in a very perplexing world. None of the Thirty Schools would deny that preparation for the responsibilities of adulthood is important and that there certainly should be a long look ahead; but the business of living satisfactorily now at age seventeen is equally important, they say. Perhaps the best possible preparation for meeting the demands .of adult life is to live successfully now at seventeen.

Guided by some such thinking as this, the Thirty Schools ,were convinced that both present needs of youth and adult social demands should be used as sources of the curriculum. Any attempt to derive the curriculum from only one of these sources, they said, would result in neglect of important values. Traditionally secondary schools in the United States have based their work upon custom or upon certain demands of adult life which have been accepted without much question. The Thirty Schools have re-examined society in an attempt to learn what adult life really requires of youth. At the same time they have tried to discover youth's common concerns and to help them in their immediate perplexities. These studies have led to the core curriculum and to most of the innovations in the participating schools, whatever the plan of organization may be.

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