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o Privately sponsored day care and recreational programs for the retarded are now available in many parts of the nation. Local and state associations for retarded children alone sponsor over 300 day camps and 150 residential camps as well as more than 1,000 other recreational and social group programs.

WHILE these successes have been building, however, long-term national trends have been raising new challenges to which those concerned for the mentally retarded must address themselves.

Soon, for example, ninety percent of Americans will be city-dwellers, their lives shaped daily by mass technologies. . . . Effective and meaningful living requires that the individual obtain more and more formal education. . . . The spiraling growth of the American population -- some 70,000 babies are born each week -- strains the already undermanned teaching and other social service professions to meet even the needs of the normal.

STATE AND LOCAL MENTAL RETARDATION AUTHORITIES ARE CONCERNED about what the galloping complexity and sophistication of American life will mean to the retarded, who have the lowest capability to adapt to swift change. They ask:

o What effect will automation have in the lives of the retarded? Will it take over those jobs which the retarded can now handle? Will it create new jobs for them?

o How can communities be helped to cope with the some 75 percent of the nation's mental retardation that is produced in low income, disadvantaged areas?

o Can the schools develop and utilize special education techniques that will fit the retarded student for social adequacy and economic productivity in tomorrow's society?

o Will enough of the coming years' college and high school graduates see and seize the challenge of building careers in work with the mentally retarded?

o Will the developing comprehensive health program and planning packages include adequate planning and services for the needs of the retarded?

o Can the tide of research and program innovation be kept running strong until it yields the major breakthroughs needed to bring significant reduction in the incidence of mental retardation?

The Committee is investigating and will continue to investigate these and other questions. It is essential, however, to select a few major problems for immediate attention in order to ensure an effective focus and significant result.

MOST URGENTLY IN NEED OF ATTENTION, MR. PRESIDENT, ARE THE FOLLOWING 10 AREAS:

1. Mental retardation services must be available to more of the nation's people.

Particularly, ways must be found to bring these to low income, disadvantaged neighborhoods, both urban and rural.

Community public and private agencies working with the mentally retarded must move swiftly to assure that the retarded in lower income neighborhoods receive the same services as the retarded in other neighborhoods. Provision for the needs of the retarded must be included in the comprehensive "one-stop" community health care programs now being developed. In need of special attention are medical and social measures -- such as parent and child health, family planning, and counseling programs -- that give promise of reducing mental retardation in "high risk" areas now having an above average rate of incidence.

The nation's schools must plan both to improve their special classes for the mentally retarded and -- because it can now be clearly shown that many children become retarded during their school years -- to raise their over-all instructional quality, especially in those schools whose students live in a retardation-fostering environment. Pre-school programs -- such as Project Head Start -- need increased emphasis in this connection.

Private citizen organizations have especially meaningful challenges in these areas. That they have had success in stimulating and building public awareness and services in the field of mental retardation should not blind them to how much remains to be done.

The voluntary agencies are able to express the will and apply the strength of citizens banded together for cooperative action. They should, therefore, take the lead in developing new directions for social services, effective liaison among themselves for comprehensive action, and careful, objective analyses of need and resource to assist state and national legislators in writing pertinent, effective legislation for the mentally retarded.

2. More effective and extensive manpower recruitment and training programs for work with the mentally retarded are needed.

Acute shortages of professional specialists -- especially teachers, therapists, physicians, social workers and nurses -- continue to hamstring programs for the retarded in all parts of the nation.

Careers in work with the retarded must be brought to the attention of the nation's young people. And the incentives -- financial, career developmental, intellectual and prestigious -- that would stimulate youth interest and commitment in such careers need intensive build-up.