"Regarding the framework for testimony on the part of our association, I find myself in agreement with it." State No. 6 "I would particularly emphasize items (2) and (4) in the board statement in that there is a manifest danger that their particular efforts recruitment of professional personnel might be diluted by such a program. "With the advent of the Domestic Peace Corps a large rank of spokesmen for mental health would be joined by new, more verbal spokesmen. The latter issue may create some confusion and give some cause for concern in National, Federal, State, and local programs. "But, be that as it may, I think the program is a good one, and we would be interested in using Corps men if the Congress enacts such a program." State No. 7 "The use of volunteer services in mental hospitals and in residential centers for the mentally retarded, as in other health facilities, has vastly increased over the past several years. Their usefulness has come to be virtually unquestioned. No matter how many personnel there are in these institutions volunteers are always needed and add something to the hospital atmosphere that personnel cannot. Probably of fundamental importance is that, through volunteer services. institutions are brought closer to the local community. "Ideas for uses of volunteer services should be further implemented; the fact that volunteer services have been particularly successful in the mental institutions setting emphasizes this point. "It is our plan to develop volunteer services to the maximum, not as substitutes for needed personnel but as supplementary services that only volunteers can give. Each institution has allowance for a director of volunteer services. It has been found crucial to the development of a successful volunteer service that there be adequate leadership from within the hospital itself. "Without on-the-spot leadership, volunteers are ineffective, often detrimental in their efforts, and do not themselves gain from the experience. "This latter point suggests some reservation in the idea of a National Service Corps. From the standpoint of a medical facility the volunteer service is an intimate relationship between the hospital and the community. To a large extent its value is based on the fact that it belongs to the local community. There is no particular problem in recruiting volunteers, except in very isolated areas, so long as the hospital welcomes them and provides the necessary framework for their work. Therefore it is difficult to see how volunteer corpsmen can add more than can be provided at present or will soon be provided by the rational implementation of existing plans. "One function which might be most suitable for volunteer corpsmen would be as an assistant to a director of volunteer services. In this capacity a corpsman could help in administration and public relations serving as well as a model volunteer. Certain volunteers now work in similar capacities. However, again this is probably more effective when the person handling these functions is a local citizen. "In summary, two factors are against the need for national involvement so far as mental institutions are concerned: (1) The value of volunteer programs rests on local leadership and local grassroots support: (2) at present volunteer programs are developing satisfactorily, likely at maximum rate, in our institutions for the mentally ill and the mentally retarded. "Probably areas where volunteeers have not worked are the ones that a National Service Corps could help most, such as in prisons, with the migratory workers, in slum areas, etc. "Finally, perhaps the first step should be for the Federal administration to advise the States, the various private and public organizations involved. and all citizens in the country of the importance of developing volunteers, both as workers and leaders, in attempting to face many social problems of our times Later if the volunteer movement does not develop appropriately, a National Service Corps could be put into operation. "Following the initial survey which has fairly well documented the need, would it not be more sensible for the Federal Government first to set up a consulting team to try stimulating local groups to develop further volunteer programs particularly in those areas which have not yet been involved. Then the next sten might be implementation through select demonstration projects working with migrant workers, in prisons, or in some other particular sore spot. "Finally, in principle we favor concerted efforts toward the maximum utilization of latent manpower which is motivated toward good works. However, our feeling is that these efforts should remain as local as possible and as nongovernmental as possible. Should a National Service Corps develop, in a stepwise fashion as we suggest or on a larger scale, we would cooperate to the fullest and could offer a number of projects in the setting of the mental health program in our State." State No. 8 "In response to your request for an opinion about the National Service Corps idea, I wish to indicate general approval." State No. 9 "We support general approval of the testimony to be given by the board of directors of the association as outlined in your communication of June 12, 1963." State No. 10 "We wholeheartedly support the idea of a National Service Corps Act, which provides the use of corpsmen in the mental health hospitals. "Should such corpsmen be assigned, we certainly can use them." State No. 11 "I think it is especially important to be sure that mental health programs are not used as the primary selling point by anyone in trying to pass the legislation authorizing the National Service Corps. "In my opinion, we would be interested in using members of a domestic peace corps in some of our institutions. At this time I cannot say exactly how they would be used but I firmly believe that the way they are used should be determined by the local program making use of them in conjunction with the responsible State office. This is especially important if these people are to be actually valuable to the patients we are trying to help." State No. 12 "I would use the corps men if the Congress enacts the program." State No. 13 "I would approve in principle the use of corps men for assignment to hospitals and schools for the retarded, in principle, although obviously the details of such a program would have to be worked out in advance. "In conclusion then, I would support in principle." State No. 14 "I know that some of our members have been worried but I can't find the need to be concerned about domestic service corps interfering with the use of volunteers. I am sure that it will not solve the manpower problem. I am certain that there must be flexibility, and I would certainly think that some of us should be represented on the advisory planning and control level of the program. "Perhaps you have heard that we have, on a local basis and operated within the State, two projects which are of this general type. "The first one we reported to Leonard Duhl and to the special assistant to Attorney General Robert Kennedy, who both indicated that they would watch this with interest since it seemed to be a prototype of National Service Corps operation. What we have set up is this: We have for 9 years been operating a summer camp for patients from our hospitals. This has been in a camp borrowed from the Boy Scouts, or the Girl Scouts, and therefore operated only after they had finished using it. The camp runs about 3 weeks and will run this year from about August 15 to early September. "The fact that the legislature this year gave us some land and some money, and that probably by next year we will have a permanent camp of our own which we will operate all summer, may be only incidental but I think it was looking forward to this that in part led us to develop the notion and procedure which is the prototype of the National Service Corps. We have circulated all the colleges, and have offered college students interested in serving people an opportunity to work for us for a 2-month period starting July 15 and going to September 15. We have clearly made this not primary a financial offer since we are paying only $100 a month plus room, board, and laundry, and not enough, of course, for any college student who has to earn his way through college. Over 100 inquiries resulted even though our circulars went out comparatively late. About 60 valid applications came in. We have interviewed all the ap plicants and have now selected for appointment 20 girls and 16 boys, plus their alternates in case anyone drops out. "The groups of young people will be employed by us for 2 months. The first month they will spend at one of our hospitals being oriented and indoctrinated and given some background and training by lectures and seminars as well as by an opportunity to work in a supervised situation on our wards. In the second month they will become the greater part of the staff of the summer camp. "We will have our usual camp director, a male social worker; an assistant director; and we will have some nursing and aid personnel but the greater portion of the work of the camp will be done by these college students. We have tried to select students that have had some camp experience and some skills useful in a camp, as well as perhaps a major in psychology or sociology, plus an interest in working with people. We have been tremendously pleased, almost amazed that a high caliber of youngsters should have applied for this job. The camp program involves about 100 patients, both men and women, mostly from the chronic continued treatment wards of our hospitals. The patients and the staff share quarters, wear the same kind of clothes, join in all sports and recreation without regard to who is patient and who is staff. In the past, the experience has been very valuable for our staff people who have gone to the camp and this has been very helpful in the treatment and rehabilitation of our patients. We believe that this kind of a National Service Corps will improve still further results as far as our patients are concerned, and will give a group of interested young people an experience they would not otherwise have. "The second proposal we have in the works for a service-corps-type operation is now just in the planning stage by a joint committee of the department of mental health and the department of education. We propose this fall, if we can get it going fast enought, to try to recruit a group of young people into work at our hospitals. The recruitment will be aimed mostly at those youngsters who have completed high school, have not been very interested about going on to college, and don't know what they want to do. We will probably try to add a few college dropouts. "The understanding is to set up a program which is distinctly time limited: that is, a 1-year program renewable perhaps for a second year but for no longer. Again, we propose to pay a nominal sum. We do not want this to become a career in itself either by virtue of an indefinite employment commitment. We hope that these youngsters will get a certain basic orientation along the lines of our psychiatric aid training program and we anticipate that a certain number of them may become interested in a career as a psychiatric aid. If they do, we will then transfer them to the regular psychiatric aid training program and take them out of this temporary assignment. "However, we also anticipate that some of them will show an interest in, and perhaps an aptitude for, working in occupational therapy, recreational therapy. perhaps even social work or clinical psychology. Almost certainly some of them will become interested in careers as registered nurses. In any case, we hope to maintain enough flexibility so that youngsters with intelligence and aptitude may be transferred to assignments in these various departments on an apprenticeship training basis with the hope that if they find such work to their interest and liking they will then resign from the Service Corps and move into formal training into one or another of these disciplines. "I take the trouble to outline this in considerable detail because I think you ought to know why we are not afraid of the Service Corps. We believe that we have though through some of the problems and are convinced that this will be helpful to us as well as to the youngsters we enlist. We do not see any breach of State's rights (since this has been mentioned, you know, by some of our colleagues) and we do not see any threat to our existing programs either in use of volunteers or of recruitment. "On the contrary, we hope that we may recruit some useful people out of such a program but the very least we think we will be giving with the second program particularly, to a group of dropout youngsters, who have lost their identity and their identification, is the chance to regain it and perhaps to establish themselves on a straight line toward a life activity." NATIONAL COMMITTEE ON EMPLOYMENT OF YOUTH, Hon. HARRISON A. WILLIAMS, Jr., Chairman, Subcommittee on the National Service Corps, DEAR SENATOR WILLIAMS: On behalf of the National Committee on Employment of Youth, I wish to express our strong endorsement for the goals of the National Service Corps proposal. Although exclusively concerned with the immediate task of bettering job preparation and opening up new work opportunities for our growing core of unemployed youth, NCEY is also convinced of the urgent need for a national unveiling and attack on the invidious conditions in our rural and urban slums creating a chain of hopelessness, school failure and dropout, lack of marketable skills, and chronic unemployment. Should the National Service Corps do no more than open the eyes of those more fortunate to the brute facts of public squalor, it would serve an important service. But there is much more that the corps can contribute. In my view, President Kennedy spoke directly to the American mood when he appealed to us to ask, "what you can do for your country." According to the National Social Welfare Assembly, 20 million Americans are already engaged in unpaid volunteer work. With growing leisure time, millions more will undoubtedly be willing to serve if they are properly challenged. The corps could vividly demonstrate the need for volunteer service. It could give retired persons a chance to contribute their knowledge and experience where it truly matters. It could give young people a chance to test their interests and competence in social work as a preliminary to entering careers in health, welfare, and education, where trained professionals are so sorely needed. The time for such a program is now. The facts are clear that the preponderant numbers of our deprived population are Negro or members of other minority groups. As President Kennedy has said, the promise of gains in equal rights this year will be an empty promise if a man has no tools, no health, no money, no hope, with which to claim them. The corps would be one way of showing that we really mean to break down the morass from years of social and moral injustice. In implementing the National Service Corps, we would urge that priority be given to areas where there are new few existing services and where the numbers of people in need far exceed the available services. We urge also that the corps contain a built-in evaluation system to assure that volunteers are performing necessary functions; supervisors are adequately trained; the project fulfills its stated purpose. One final point. No one program, no one approach, can be expected to solve the massive social problems existing in our slums today. Without training and job opportunities for the spiraling numbers if idle youth today, the problems will inevitably worsen, creating, in Secretary of Labor Wirtz' words, "one of the most explosive social problems in the Nation's history." We therefore stress the need for the enactment of the Youth Employment Act, along with the National Service Corps. Together, they will be a hopeful beginning toward meeting the vast needs of two-fifths of our population living in poverty or deprivation in the land of plenty. Sincerely, ELI E. COHEN, Executive Secretary. STATEMENT OF MRS. HAZEL BLANCHARD, PRESIDENT, NATIONAL EDUCATION AssoCIATION, ON S. 1321, THE NATIONAL SERVICE CORPS ACT The National Education Association supports S. 1321, the National Service Corps Act. The association urges passage of this legislation. At the 1962 annual representative assembly held in Denver, July 1962, the 6,700 delegates adopted a special resolution which reads in part as follows: "The National Education Association calls for wide recognition of the grievous problems in education of disadvantaged Americans. The mobility of the disadvantaged serves to underline the fact that their problems are the problems of the whole society. The forces that prevent their successful adaptation to urban living lead to low achievement, dropout, delinquency, disease, and disorganiza "It is of the highest importance that the American people take steps to combat these problems at their roots. Public schools of good quality, universally available to all Americans, are the greatest single hope. Such schools are costly, but not nearly so costly as the other programs which must be and are provided for dealing with these problems. "The association urges that action programs be planned and implemented which will lead to the rapid improvement of the educational, economic, and environmental status of disadvantaged Americans.'" While the proposal for a National Service Corps had not yet been made, it is clear that the association's elected delegates share with President Kennedy and the sponsors of S. 1321 a deep concern for the problems of that segment of our society which circumstances prevent from sharing the economic, social, and educational rights to which every American is entitled. The National Service Corps can demonstrate, as has the Peace Corps, that American ideals of equality of opportunity and human dignity are not idle platitudes. The philosophy of survival only of the fittest is not part of the American creed. This Nation was founded on the principles of cooperation. of helping one's less fortunate neighbor. It is appropriate that as a nation we reaffirm these principles. The National Service Corps will provide through demonstration and proper utilization of volunteers, leadership to those communities who request the assistance of specially skilled professional personnel in solving their sociological and educational problems. In the area of education there are several possibilities for National Service Corps volunteers to be helpful: The development of cooperative day care centers for children of working mothers which can provide safe supervision for children between the close of the school day and the parent's return from work is one important-and largely unfilled-need in many communities. Training volunteers in teaching adult basic literacy courses is a vitally important service for both rural and urban areas. Training community volunteers to tutor homebound physically or mentally handicapped children and youth is another unmet need. These are only a few examples of many educational services in which National Service Corps volunteers with special skills can supplement the formal educational programs of many American communities. The NEA believes, of course. that such programs should be part of the tax-supported public education program. However, replistically, we recognize that such projects exist only rarely. Through demonstration by the National Service Corps the value of these and othr projects can be recognized as important aspects of the education program. far outweighing the costs involved. The National Education Association is dedicated to the upholding of democratic civilization, to the promotion of the welfare of children and to the fostering of education for all of the people. Support for the National Service Corps clearly corresponds with these high principles of achieving human dignity. NATIONAL POLICE CONFERENCE ON P.A.L. AND YOUTH ACTIVITIES. Hon. HARRISON A. WILLIAMS, Jr.. Chairman, Subcommittee on the National Service Corps, DEAR SENATOR WILLIAMS: At the annual meeting of the National Police Conference on P.A.L. and Youth Activities, held in New York City in January 1963, a resolution was unanimously adopted and sent to the President of the United States through the Deputy Attorney General, Hon. Nicholas Katzenbach, supporting the National Service Corps bill. Our organization feels that through the National Service Corps, the Federal Government at last will render aid to those areas in the country which are, so many times, the "breeding houses" of delinquency. Our organization has for the past 20 years, been vitally concerned with not only the delinquent children, but with causes of delinquency. As police officers, we have, many times, seen our young people turn against the law mainly because of their environment. |