Therefore it is particularly momentous to the pupil,
should the school record ascribed to him prove frequently to be
incongruous with his potential powers. It has already been pointed out
in these pages that the failures frequently tend to designate specific
difficulties rather than what is actually the negative of 'ability plus
application.' This does not at all deny that in some instances there
appears to be the ability minus the application, and that in other
cases the pupils are simple unfitted for the work required of them.
1. SOME ARE EVIDENTLY MISFITS
There is a strong presumption that many of the 485 pupils who failed in
50 per cent of their school work and dropped out (reported in Chapter
IV) represent misfits for at least the kind of school subjects offered
or required. One cannot say that even hopeless failing in any
particular subject is a safe criterion of general inability, or that
failure in abstract sort of mental work would be a sure prophecy of
failure in more concrete hand work. It is altogether probable that some
of the individuals in the above number were not endowed to profit by an
academic high school course, and that others were the restless ones at
a restless age, who just would not fit in, whatever their abilities.
But even of these pupils a considerable number display sufficient
resourcefulness to satisfy many of their failures and to persist in
school two, three, or four years.
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