VITAL TOPICS. Permit me to call the attention of the Institute to a few of the questions which seem to demand our consideration as educators at this time, some of which relate more particularly to the administrative side of our professional life; for it seems to me that the full recognition of the high rank of the teacher will never be secured until we have settled certain vexed questions, relating to the proper governing powers in school affairs, the qualification and tenure of office of teachers and school officers, and the protection with which society should invest the office of teacher when once the position is properly and satisfactorily filled. Educators have been too reluctant to speak, and to attempt to control public opinion, whereas the public are only waiting for intelligent opinions, based upon sound judgment and ripe experience, to guide in the affairs of our school work. Let but this body of New England teachers speak authoritatively, advisedly, and earnestly, not dictatorially, and the New England people will hear and heed. SCHOOL OFFICERS. There was a time when the local and general administration of school affairs was placed in the hands of anybody who would accept a public office, and that day has not wholly passed. Like the days of Genesis, it bids fair to become a cycle. It almost needs an Almighty fiat to speak order out of the chaos which has brooded over the administration of our common schools. Joseph's coat was never more variegated in its colors or diverse in its parts than a school board. The nursery rhyme of the " butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker" finds its complete fulfilment in this composite, resembling in physical structure that geologic strata called in New Hampshire "puddingstone," the softness of whose name is in striking contrast with the obduracy of its heart. This Institute was founded in the midst of this unfitness of men to administer on the interests of the school, and its fortynine years have been spent in battling for a better order of things, and it is not at all likely that its jubilee year will witness the survival of all the fittest and the death of all the unfittest. We cannot expect that a race of educational experts will suddenly appear to manage the public interests of the school, any more than we can expect a race of statesmen to grow up from the seed of dragon's teeth sown in political fields for the last quarter of a century. We can ask that the best men of the community, its wise men, its conservative men, its learned men, shall stand at the head of educational concerns. School officers should be broad in view, liberal in opinion, possessed of good common-sense, and know the difference between a good school and a poor one, between cheapness and fitness, between a wise ecomony and disastrous ruin. Such men need not necessarily know Latin or Greek, may have never seen the inner walls of a college, or have borne the honorable titles of Esquire, Reverend, or Honorable. No greater honor belongs to Sir Charles Read, of London, one of the first of English scholars and citizens, than that he presides over the school board of his own city, and has for his associates in council such men as Prof. Gladstone, Rev. Drs. Angus and Maguire, Hon. E. L. Stanley, Thomas Hel ler, Arthur Mills, M. P., and women like Mrs. F. Fenwick Miller, Mrs. Surr, and Miss Taylor. His proudest distinctions have grown out of the splendid work he has accomplished in building up in that great world's metropolis a system of free schools, which will ever reflect honor on his name and memory. Similar men we need all over our land to-day, to give stability and character to our school administration and to save it from the perils of political affiliations or communistic notions; to be able to plan courses of study; to protect the integral and vital parts of our system from the hated shafts of the demagogues and small politicians, whose hobby-horses are the Liliputian span, retrenchment and nepotism. Fitness for it, permanency in it, should be our demand with reference to the officer who controls these vital matters. SUPERVISION AND SUPERINTENDENTS. Without assuming to trench upon the discussion of this most important topic, which is soon to come before you, permit me to congratulate you that in this department of school work so much has been accomplished during the last forty years. Thomas Wilson Dorr, the hero of the Dorr Rebellion of 1842, was the originator of the present plan of city supervision, Providence, R. I., was the first city which adopted it, and Hon. Nathan Bishop, of New York, a member of this Institute since 1838, was the first officer of this rank at Providence, and afterwards first superintendent of schools in Boston. Under its various grades of State, county, and township superintendency, it has been one of the order-producing forces in our present status. Gen. Eaton reports that the importance of intelligent oversight of schools finds continually increasing recognition with the people, " and further, good supervision abundantly justifies itself by its effects." Hon. A. R. Weaver says of the system of supervision in New York, "There is no attribute of our school system which, when wisely administered, is productive of more direct and practical benefit that personal supervision by competent officers." Dr. Batenam also says, "It can hardly be doubted that the model and ultimate school system of the future will embrace, as essential parts, a supervision of the State, the county, and the town." In the matter of State supervision, the New England States have had a remarkable history, and from the appointment of Horace Mann in 1837, to the present incumbents, she has enjoyed the services of men who have added by their labors to the vigorous growth of the common school. In city and town supervision, also, we have had a most remarkable history, superior, on the whole, to that of any other equal section of our country. All of our larger towns and cities, with the exception of Hartford, Conn, enjoy the advantages of supervision, and in one State (Rhode Island) every town is required to elect annually a superintendent of schools. In respect to county supervision, we have had a limited experience, and no one of our States now recognizes that office. We have been slow, too slow, to note the value of this office, and quite unwilling to adopt measures not initiated on our own soil. Horace Mann once said, "The newer Western States enjoy one great advantage over the people of Massachusetts, they have been exempted from the immense labor of forever boasting of their ancestors, and so have had time to devote to their posterity." Such testimony to our conservatism in school affairs may be regarded as authoritative, but its force will be a little modified by the statement that the movement of our educational forces is towards the adoption of the county plan of supervision. Maine has had a brief experience to test its value, and if I mistake not, there is a strong desire to return to the plan; Rhode Island, owing to the straitness of her borders, and to town and State supervision, does not miss this office; while New Hampshire, Vermont, and Connecticut are steadily growing into an appreciation of their needs of county work. One grand feature of our school supervising work is worthy of special mention. It is that our common school ranks are self-supporting, and the several grades of work are reached by steady and deserved promotions for our own members as educators. The day is not wholly past, but is rapidly declining, wherein distinguished or even second-rate lawyers, doctors, or clergymen must be called in to minister at our educational altars in the absence of qualified priestly candidates from our own profession: four of the six New England States have teachers in the highest State offices. Taking the country at large, we believe that no profession has in its ranks as leaders more distinguished men than those who honor the high places of superintendency in this country, men, too, who have served in all departments from the district schools upwards, and who know their business by a living experience. Such men as Corthell and Tash, of Maine; Conant, of Vermont; Dickinson, Philbrick, Stone, Marble, Harrington, of Massachusetts; Stockwell and Leach, of Rhode Island; Northend and Parrish, of Con |
