convinced of its merit. The tabulation of data received from all of the 42 schools is arranged in table 4 to show the possible advantages and disadvantages in the activity period and nonactivity period type of organization. Principals and faculties presently concerned with how best to organize the extraclass activities schedule may find this table helpful.

Table 4.—Advantages and disadvantages of activity-period type of organization, as reported by 42 selected high schools

Characteristics of Activity Period Organization

Advantages

Pupils participate more extensively

Teachers participate more generally

Total staff has professional responsibility for extraclass activities

Affords greater number and wider range of activities

Results in better coordination of activities

Tends to increase support of homeroom and student council activities

By devoting 1 period daily to activities, school leadership shows the importance it attaches to program, therefore teachers and pupils are likely to think it important

Facilitates the collection of data, statistics, research concerning / pupils' activities

Affords the opportunity to compare one year's statistics with those of subsequent years and thus reveal trends

Enables ALL pupils to participate

Is likely to encourage activity groups outside of scheduled period
Greater assimilation of activities by or into curriculum, greater
correlation with it

Minimum activities program supported by school financially;
no-dues; included in student council budget
Spreads memberships and leadership offices

Disadvantagės

Results usually in extended school day

Needs considerable machinery to operate

Unlikely to serve all activity needs of pupils

Puts pressure on pupils and faculty to participate

Creates problem of what to do with pupils who do not join activity groups

Meetings must operate on rather precise time schedule

Difficult to operate in larger schools

Characteristics of Nonactivity Period Organization
Advantages

Extends school day only for those participating in activities
Requires no elaborate machinery or extra personnel to manage
Requires coordinator, however, and positive coordination, for
adequate appraisal

Provides activities only for those who choose to attend

Provides fewer activities usually

Permits larger sections of activities

Permits individual pupil to participate in greater number of
activities

Sponsors are teachers who usually desire to sponsor activities
Individual activity usually financially self-supporting, by dues
Does not complicate daily time schedule

Permits meetings to end as desired; no limit by time of period
Easily adapted to larger school, or school on double session

Disadvantages

Selective rather than extensive participation likely
Professional attention usually by segment of staff
Some staff members likely to be in overdemand
Difficulty of collecting data, statistics, etc.

Appears to give activities secondary role to the primary role of
regular class work

Forces pupil to choose between school activities and personal activities

Tends to exclude pupil who may have other duties before and after school

Tends to operate against the pupil of lesser scholastic achievement, or pupil working after school

Favors unsupervised and uncoordinated activities

Results in separation of homeroom activities from other activities

Reports from the 42 high schools do not suggest that the entire program of extraclass activities can be handled through an activity period. The experience of some schools indicates that an effective activity period strengthens the total activities program and may result in an expanded number of before- and after-school groups. That experience, however, is reported by a minority of the schools reporting.

Whether to have an activity period or not is a matter for the individual high school's faculty and student body to study. There is no suggestion here that the activity period will prove desirable in every high school. Regardless of activity period or not, secondary school leadership faces the responsibility of producing a coordination of extraclass activities that results in stimulating benefit to ALL pupils.

Estimate of Pupil Participation in Public High Schools

It is interesting to speculate on the number of activities, number of sponsors, and number of pupils participating in at least one extraclass activity in American high schools. For the purpose of this estimate, extraclass activities include hobby and departmental clubs, service activities, intramural and interscholastic athletics, cocurricular activities, student

councils, scholarship societies, personal development groups, vocational study clubs, and other miscellaneous types of clubs or groups, for which formal school credit is ordinarily not given. "American high schools" include the regular 4-year, the junior-senior 6-year, the 3-year senior, and the 3-year junior high schools, as well as the high schools of truncated or irregular type of organization.

It is reasonable to estimate that 8 extraclass activities with an approximate membership of 20 pupils in each exist in the "hypothetical" average public high school. With a total of 24,314 public high schools in the Nation, this means an aggregate of 194,512 separate activity groups, nearly 200,000 teacher sponsors, and 3,890,240 pupil members. If it were possible to include the number of teachers allied with more than one activity group, the estimated number of sponsors would undoubtedly have to be revised upward.

Extent of Pupil Participation in the High School

The principle of extraclass activities for all pupils does not necessarily. imply that all pupils participate, but rather that all pupils have the opportunity to participate and are encouraged to do so. Information on

The extent of pupil participation in journalistic activities reveals an estimate of 30,000 high-school publications (newspapers, magazines, annuals, and other like documents), produced by 15,000 high schools involving 1,000,000 pupils and $16,500,000 in annual expenditure, according to Walter E. Hess, managing editor, National Associa tion of Secondary-School Principals, Washington, D. C.

the extent of pupil participation enables the high school to compile statistics for the whole school and for the particular activity group. It provides quantitative data which may form a basis for revising the entire program. It provides qualitative data, to some extent, in that low participation in a particular activity may indicate pupil dissatisfaction. No activity is likely to persist if it does not attract pupils and hold their interest. A major reason for the study of pupil participation is to enable the high-school authorities to determine what extraclass activities hold pupils' interest. Along with this information, the results of a pupil survey will indicate what activities the pupils are interested in joining.

The success of the extraclass activities program in turn depends on the success of each individual activity. If the high school is to appraise the effectiveness of the total program, it ought to have reliable information on the amount of pupil participation in all extraclass activities.

What a High School Should Know

The experience of several large high schools suggests that a good extraclass activities program (nonathletic, intramural, and athletic activities included) should accomplish a participation of 80 percent of the student body, with each pupil counted only once regardless of number of activities per pupil. Pupil participation of 85 percent or more is considered excellent. A danger point is reached if pupil participation falls under 70 percent, for then the number of nonparticipants constitutes a hazard to the entire program of extraclass activities; if the high school has an activity period, the nonparticipants may have to mark time while other pupils engage in activity groups, in which case scheduling difficulties between the two groups may develop.

What should a high school know about pupil participation in extraclass activities? Current practice in a selected number of high schools recommended by State directors of secondary education as having well-developed programs indicates that answers to the following questions can be classified as necessary information:

1 For detailed information on techniques for measuring pupil participation in extraclass activities, see Hand, Harold C. How To Conduct the Participation in Extraclass Activities Study. Illinois Secondary School Curriculum Program Bulletin No. 5, Office of the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Springfield, Ill., May 1949.