vallo, took an active part in the campaign against child labor, and led a movement for the betterment of school houses and grounds. At the Athens conference, in recognition of the work of the women of Georgia, the General Education Board gave to the State normal school at Athens $7,500 in scholarships to meet the 46 scholarships of $50 each already provided by the women of the State, offered tɔ duplicate for three years all new scholarships of $50, not to exceed 50 in number, which these women would provide up to January 1, 1903, and added $4,500 to the $6,000 which the women had raised for the Winnie Davis Memorial Hall. Doctor Buttrick, who announced the gift, said in closing:

We ask that we may have a little part in the great work which has been inaugurated by the people of the South and in which the women of Georgia are bearing so honorable and noble a part.

Doctor McIver reported to the Richmond conference the organization of a woman's association for the betterment of the public schoolhouses of North Carolina. He reported 20 counties as having good organizations, and said their purpose was to form an association around every public school where two or three women could be found who would give their services to the work. Doctor Frazer, in his report, recognized the work of the Richmond educational association, through whose efforts the conference had been brought to Richmond. These examples serve to show what an agency for effective service the conference has found in these organizations.

And then the politician, what shall be said of him? It taxes the memory of no one to recall the time when he was afraid to raise his voice in behalf of the public school. To-day Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Louisiana boast their "educational governors," while in many other States officials in high position have spoken out in no uncertain terms for free schools adequate to the needs of all the people.

It is still more encouraging to know that these men are not mere timeservers, riding into public favor on a wave of popular enthusiasm. Governor Aycock took a positive stand with the schoolmen in North Carolina at a time when it meant probable defeat, and side by side with the schoolmen the fight for schools for all the people was made and won. Governor Montague went all the way from Richmond to Montgomery last February to meet with the public school officers of Alabama and discuss with them the relation of the child to the State. He welcomed the conference to Virginia last April, attended many of its sessions, and entertained it in his home. The moral support thus given the movement by the broad-minded and large-hearted cooperation of those highest in authority can not be overestimated. It causes the humblest teacher in the land to take up his task with new courage and an added feeling of civic usefulness and of self-respect.

These are typical of the forces which the conference and the Southern Board have developed and attracted to themselves. With their simple and constructive creed of upbuilding society through the education of the child they have offered a common point of contact for all the forces-social, religious, political, and economic-which are working for the higher evolution of American democracy. President Ogden graphically stated this strategic position of the conference in his annual address at Richmond:

All are perfectly familiar with the sovereign demands-material, intellectual, spiritual-of educational interests. Executive combinations of many sorts-land, buildings, taxation, legislation, systems, methods-are under requisition for the service. Its infinite details increasingly enlist the unremitting toil of hundreds of thousands of painstaking teachers--men and women-representing every grade of instruction, from the simplest to the most abstruse.

For the moment, in the center and foreground of this vast perspective stands this conference-a composite aggregation of men and women, interesting because so varied in its personnel.

Some are profoundly ignorant of the technicalities of education, quite unfamiliar

by personal knowledge with even the recitation rooms or the methods of contemporary school life. Others are within the sacred fraternity of teachers, and in the group may be found representatives of every rank in the teaching profession. Still others are charged with the official responsibility of educational management on behalf of the State or corporate bodies. But all are here with one accord in one place-officials and citizens, professionals and laity-by reason of a common belief in the beneficent power of education and because each distinct element is essential to the spirit that must vitalize the conference.

The solvent, the fusing power, that creates the common point of contact is the belief, perceived in varying degrees by all here present, that the great social duty of our age is the saving of society, and further that the salvation of society begins with the saving of the child.

3.-Defining its methods of operation.

The conference, as we have said, is now in full possession of its general aim. Future development must be looked for along the line of devising new methods of work, new ways of organizing and using the forces at its disposal to make them more effective in the accomplishment of desired results. Much, however, has already been accomplished in the way of defining general lines of activity. The development of these constitutes, perhaps, the most interesting aspect of the history of this movement.

Genesis of the Southern Education Board.—The Southern Education Board and the General Education Board grew out of the same conditions and supplement each other in function. The conference had its origin in the need of cooperation to make more effective the missionary work in the South. The first conference developed the need of the organization of agencies controlling contributions from the North to schools in the South. The situation calling for such organized effort was first presented by Rev. A. B. Hunter, of Raleigh, N. C., in a paper on “Cooperation among schools: "

We all have a common interest [he says] in securing the interest of generous people in the work. If that interest is turned aside by appealing to false or unworthy motives, we all suffer. It is estimated that since 1870 the North has been giving to negro schools in the South at the rate of about $1,000,000 a year and that it is giving that amount now. This sentiment of sympathy is readily recognized by many who have only their own personal ends to serve, and it has become a nuisance in the business offices of large northern cities to receive the visits of those who are soliciting money for negro schools, basing their appeal upon this well-recognized feeling of sympathy. Sometimes the salary of the solicitor consumes a large part of the money collected. If the public confidence is once weakened by these efforts of unworthy men, damage will be done not only to the institutions which they represent, but to all the negro schools.

Rev. George T. Fairchild, of Berea College, Ky., in presenting a brief by President Frost, of that institution, calls attention to these same evils and further urges the need of cooperation to prevent the waste of effort and ineans. "Evils come," he says, “from too many schools in limited territory, while large regions are left destitute." He points to the associated charities in large cities as an example of increased efficiency coming from cooperation, and urges the necessity of an approved list of institutions made out with reference to age and equipment, efficiency of administration, and location.

The conference embodies the spirit of these two papers in the sixth article of its "Message and appeal," which is as follows:

VI. The principles now widely recognized and applied under the head of associated charities, tending to prevent the bestowal of gifts upon unworthy persons, have a proper field for exercise in the support of institutions of learning in the more needy parts of our land, and, while fully realizing the practical difficulties in the way of any such application of those principles, we are of the opinion that the gifts of the North in aid of educational work of the South should proceed upon lines of intelligent, equitable, and discriminate selection, and that great care should be taken by the people of the South in authorizing appeals for outside

aid, though such aid is greatly needed by worthy institutions both for support and endowment.

The second conference gave new impetus to this demand for organized effort and turned the direction of it into larger fields. Doctor Dickerman, in a remarkably forceful paper on “Cooperation in educational work," upon the basis of a survey of educational conditions in the South, in which he points out in detail the great need of better houses, longer terms, more efficient teachers, and improved methods, urges with irresistible force that neither the church nor private enterprise can accomplish the task of educating the people; that the public school is the only hope of popular education, and that in the school systems already organized under the Government we find the only agency representing sufficient organization to cover economically and efficiently the vast territory within the 1,300 counties in the South. He shows by citing numerous instances that the generosity of the North, by being diverted into improper channels, frequently works an injury, antagonizing and crippling existing schools, dividing the educational forces of the community instead of harmoniously developing them; that in this hurtful rivalry sound standards are abandoned and superficiality and pretense substituted for a well-graded, thorough course of education; that by giving young pupils the names and forms of superior education these privately supported institutions tend to bring the public school into discredit.

The conclusion is evident. The cause of education in the South can be served best (1) by bringing the existing public schools into a more efficient state of organization, and (2) by directing the generosity of the North and the best efforts of the South to their better equipment. In connection with this last point we get the germ of the main function of the Southern Education Board.

In the last analysis [says Doctor Dickerman], that which is before all other things is popular interest in education among the people to be benefited by it. This must precede the schoolhouse and precede everything. People will never get much out of any privileges till they feel their value. But feeling their value, appreciating how much a good school signifies to them, their children, and the righborhood, they will not be content with a term two months long nor with an ince pable teacher nor with humdrum methods. Having a noble conception of the school, nothing will satisfy them till they see its realization.

In these suggestions we have a foreshadowing on the one side of the organization of local initiative and control, and on the other the organization of outside aid to supplement local effort.

With regard to the second type of organization a more explicit statement is found in Mr. Baldwin's paper on The present problem of negro education."

It is our duty [he says] to organize a general educational board, by which effective work may be accomplished throughout the South; that funds given to the negro cause may be given through such an organization, or to schools approved by them, so that the giver may be sure that his contribution will be used effectively. The North to-day is tired of giving indiscriminately to a multitude of colored schools in the South. Many of our rich men, who are charitably disposed, and who want to give largely to the negro cause, demand that any school asking for funds be under good business management and that effective industrial training shall be given. The mere advertisement or statement that industrial training is given at any school is no longer sufficient inducement to procure funds. The approval of an educational board, properly organized, will be in itself a warrant to those who may contribute that their gifts will be expended properly.

Then, toward the close of his paper, Mr. Baldwin gives the suggestion for a "general organization for Southern industrial education" for both races.

The conference expressed in its resolutions its appreciation of "the urgency of the need for a general committee of direction in harmony or in conjunction with the management of those [the Slater and Peabody] funds to guard against the haphazard and in some cases harmful use of money contributed at the North for negro education."

It authorized the executive committee to appoint a field agent to study the conditions and report such facts as would make more clear what agencies and methods should be encouraged and what avoided or reformed, the purpose being to secure a more efficient concentration of effort in all educational work carried on in the South.

Doctor Dickerman was appointed field agent, and began the work of investigation now being conducted by the boards. During the year he visited schools in Virginia, the Carolinas, Georgia, and Alabama, conferring with school officials and teachers, and reported a universally cordial reception. "If there has been any doubt in the beginning," he says in this report, "as to the practicality of this work, the evidence is now abundant that such a doubt is without foundation.” The conference, recognizing the value of his service, thanked him and asked him "to continue this work for another year, to visit the superintendents of the various schools of the South, to obtain suggestions from them, and to confer with representative men of the section in regard to the progress and needs of Southern education, and to report the results of his observation and inquiries to the next session of the conference."

This report was made at the Winston-Salem conference and was laden with facts and suggestions leading to larger endeavor. This Winston-Salem session marks an epoch in the history of the conference in many respects, but first of all in the definition of its policy and the organization of its agencies. This report of Doctor Dickerman, as well as his previous work, helped to pave the way for this. After enlarging on his previous report of conditions in the rural South, stating again the necessity for improved conditions for the education of both races, and reiterating his faith in the public school as the engine of popular education. he offers two suggestions which have been adopted in the policy of the conferencefirst, that the time has come for some comprehensive undertaking to foster an educational spirit in the rural portions of the South; and, second, that this work must be directed by the men already in the field. With reference to this second point he says:

Some of us come from a distance and think, perhaps, to bear a part in this educational work. Let us not lose out of mind that primal law: The men on the ground are in the foremost place. They know the situation. They are familiar with conditions. They have sharpened instincts to sense the meaning of things that would be a snare to others. In agreement with them is strength. We have to wait for these master spirits of the South to bring in the new order. Our highest ministry is to work with them, to help them like Jethro in the tent of Moses— sympathetic guests with open mind to enter into their plans and make them our

own.

This educational leadership of the South was largely represented at this meeting, and conditions were ripe for action. The definite suggestion leading to the organization of the Southern Education Board with its bureau of information and investigation was made by President Dabney in his paper, previously referred to, on "The public school problem in the South." This paper is a perfectly frank and graphic statement by a Southern man of the conditions of Southern schools and school systems, reenforced by an array of facts, including comparative tables of statistics, that made its appeal irresistible.

Premising that the South is an agricultural section, that its people live in the country, and must therefore be educated in the country, the author goes into an investigation and discussion of the rural public schools. The general condition in the Southern States is emphasized by comparison with the North Central States:

These States contain a million fewer people, but had the same number of children enrolled in the schools. The percentage of school population in average attendance is 52.50 in the North Central States as against 40.32 in the Southern

States; the total number of teachers is 181,916 against 127,577; the number of schoolhouses is 105,118 to 96,849, but the value of school property is $230,391,589 to $67,473,856; the average number of days schools are taught is 155.6 in the North Central States, 109.6 in the Southern States; the average salary of teachers per month is $43 to $31.75; the total expenditures in the North Central States are $84.802.319 to $36,280,166 in the Southern States, which is $3.23 per capita of the population, or $20.85 per pupil in attendance in the North Central States, against $1.34 per capita of population and $9.72 per pupil in attendance in the Southern States. We should remember that the Southern States include a population of over 7,000,000 negroes, and were devastated thirty-six years ago by a terrible war. The comparison is not perfectly fair-few comparisons are-but it shows what this population can do and what the results in wealth productions are, and sets a standard toward which the Southern States should strive to build.

This general view is followed with a statement of conditions in typical Southern States, and the whole situation is again graphically typified in this comparison of Tennessee and Iowa:

This State contains a slightly larger population than Tennessee, but somewhat fewer children. The enrollment in the schools of Iowa is 87.5 per cent of the school population, against 70.1 per cent in Tennessee. In Iowa 57.3 per cent of the school population are in daily attendance, against 49 per cent in Tennessee; teachers number 28,694 in Iowa to 9,195 in Tennessee; the schoolhouses are 13,836 to 7,185; the value of school property is $16,908,076 to $3.063,568; the average value of school property is $1,222 in Iowa to $426 in Tennessee; the average number of days the schools are kept is 158 in Iowa to 96 in Tennessee; the average teacher's salary is $45 in Iowa to $31 in Tennessee, and there are three times as many teachers in Iowa; the total expenditures are $7,978,060 in Iowa and $1,751,047 in Tennessee; this is $3.80 per capita of population or $21.89 per pupil in attendance in Iowa, against 87 cents per capita of population or $5.17 per pupil in Tennessee. The author attributes these backward conditions first of all to the extreme poverty resulting from the civil war and reconstruction, and, after this, to defective organization, the interference of politics with school administration, and in many cases to ignorance and the indifference of ignorance. Pointing out the way to improvement, he says:

Our system of school legislation and management and our methods of school taxation must be completely turned round before we can have anything like a system of efficient public schools. The school money must be raised to a larger extent from the State as a whole and be distributed more in accordance with the needs of the people. School management and supervision must be centralized to a considerable degree in the hands of representative and skilled experts. There should be a State board of education composed of the ablest educational authorities to be found, who should be responsible for all the public schools and should elect a State superintendent, who should in turn have the fullest authority with regard to the organization of schools, examination of teachers, courses of study, and the distribution of funds, and have the general direction of county and city superintendents. The schools of the counties and towns should be in the hands of boards of like powers working under the general direction of the State board and its superintendent. Who would think of carrying on any great business, reaching every part of the State, by the worthless methods, or no methods, which prevail in the South in regard to our schools? We must have a thoroughgoing reform in these things before we can even begin to build good schools.

Then comes the specific recommendation to which all this has been leading up: The immediate need of our people is information and guidance. They need leaders to show them the way. We need a central propaganda or agency which shall conduct a campaign of education for free public education and which, while it educates the people on this subject, shall use every opportunity to instruct them. as to the best forms of legislation for their conditions and the best methods of organization for their schools. This is then the definite proposal that I would make to this conference. Shall we not at this meeting take steps to establish such a propaganda for free public schools in the South?

This step was taken in the form of a resolution authorizing the appointment of an executive board. The committee on platform and resolutions, composed of Dr.