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WHAT THE LAYMEN ARE SAYING ABOUT SCHOOLS

BY THEMSELVES

O YOU notice that instead of continuing our former heading for this department: "What the Laymen Are Thinking," we have adopted a new title? This is to save ourselves the labor of proving to some of our correspondents that the old title could properly be applied to some of the offerings.

School is a Reciprocal Service

Do you remember that the EDUCATIONAL REVIEW formed a committee from various states who encouraged four hundred editors. to feature the good side of schooling? This is how the editor of the Atlantic City Press responded:

"Every day is a fitting time to impress upon the minds of the young and of the taxpayers that the public school is a cooperative or reciprocal proposition. The taxpayers maintain the schools that they may develop men and women who will maintain the traditions and ideals of America. The school children should not forget that they are indebted to the taxpayers for this opportunity to acquire an education. When the taxpayer sees the many eager faces schoolbound to-day he should not regret the dollars he gives to education, and when school days are over the boys and girls in school to-day will go forth just as eagerly into the world, grateful to those who made an education possible for them. "Sometimes it seems hard to pay taxes and to study indoors when all of the outdoors is 'crying out loud' for you, but if you doubt that it is worth it ask somebody who didn't have a chance to go to school."

Student Strikes

Thus does the Evening Star of Washington, D.C., illumine a troublesome situation:

"The recurrence of school strikes illustrates the disposition on the part of school children nowadays to dictate and to strike if their wishes are not observed. Such strikes have occurred in various parts of the country, and have with few exceptions resulted in defeat for the students. Resistance of authority has not succeeded. The astonishing part of these manifestations of juvenile obduracy is that they have in most instances had parental support. In the old days children were sent to school, not merely allowed to go. The truant and the shirker got short shrift at home. If there was a dispute on matters of discipline it was usually settled by the parents in favor of school authority. At present it would seem that the student is his own judge and authority. If he does not like his teacher he strikes. If he has to walk a little farther

to school that he thinks he should he strikes. He has not yet organized under union rules, but such a movement would not be surprising in view of the present ten

dencies."

Sweet Land of Liberty

Academic freedom to extend downwards gets this cheer from the editor of the New York World:

"The managing editor of the school paper at Trinity College has been suspended from the institution for a month because he dared to criticise an amazing statement of the Dean that it is our duty in college to disregard the individual and turn out a Trinity type.' The young editor objects to the stupid theory that education is a machine-made affair turning out young men to think by rule and investigate within defined limits and to be as much alike as two peas in a pod. He revolts at the thought

that colleges should stamp out all individuality, all personal initiative, all originality, and mould all students to a pattern to be labeled as different cigars and fashions of underwear are labeled.

"And he is right.

"He thinks that colleges should encourage individuality and teach youths to be themselves, do their own thinking, and become a credit to their schools by achievements only possible through emergence from a rut. He is to be congratulated on having 'brains enough and courage enough to declare himself.""

Proud of the Great Responsibility

Here is a tonic exclamation by the editor of the Evening Bulletin of Providence, Rhode Island:

"The value of the American school plant is something over two and a half billion dollars. A survey of statistics gives some idea of the magnitude of the task of giving the next generation sufficient knowledge, character, and strength to carry on selfgovernment. The urge to build better schools, to graduate pupils better equipped to face life's problems, to give back to the community better citizens, has become in the United States a natural inspiration to achievement. That there is still room for great improvement is obvious but, with public faith in the benefits to be derived from education at a height, the future seems at least as bright as the record of past progress is praiseworthy."

What are Public Schools For?

Here is a layman who ought to be on the curriculum commission. He edits the Salt Lake City News. Hear him:

"The people of ancient times, especially the Greeks, held to the idea that one of the primary purposes of education was to prepare men for the service of the state. Educators of to-day recognize that if education and training in the schools makes a man an intelligent and patriotic citizen, it

has not gone wide of the mark. And yet in certain sections of our country there is a prejudice against the election of educated men to public office. The result is that many of our legislators are woefully ignorant and this accounts for the passage of tyrannical laws. Fortunately our judges are usually men of higher intelligence and judicial wisdom overrules legislative stupidity.

"It would be a fine thing if the schools of to-day could bring something of the spirit of the Atheian youth, when Athens was at her best, into the hearts of the American youth. The vow which the Athenian boy took flames with a high and fine patriotism. 'We will never bring disgrace,' says the vow, 'on this our city by any act of dishonesty or cowardice, nor ever desert our suffering comrades; we will uphold the ideals and sacred things of the city, both alone and with many; we will revere and obey the city's laws and do our best to arouse like reverence in those who are prone to set them at naught. We will strive to quicken in all the sense of public duty. All this will we do that our country may become not weaker, but greater, better and more beautidul than when we received it.'

"This was the vow made by every young citizen of Athens, the most beautiful city of the ancient world. So long as they kept this vow their country was free and great nations always fall from within. Athens fell from her high estate before she was conquered by a foreign foe."

An Albany Editor Salutes the Schools

Among the respondents to the REVIEW'S Committee's invitation to tell the truth when school opened, the editor of the News, Albany, N. Y., did himself, the schools, and Albany, proud:

"Twenty thousand children, eight hundred teachers are in school in our town! What could be more inspiring? What a duty to the Albany of to-day and to-morrow! Is going to school really the tiresome rule of rote, dull books and senseless computations it used to be? The answer is that

it never was. It only seemed to be. What solitary person struggling with life's problems in adult years would take away one day of school, and blackboards and books, and teachers and training of the mind from one of these 20,000? They are going through the first brilliant phase of life. They are at the beginning of things, when all is new and fresh, and can learn almost in an instant what has taken us long and tedious generations to discover."

A Buffalo Boost

Ladies and gentlemen, shake the hand of the editor of the Buffalo Evening Post. These are his sentiments:

"Whatever economies Buffalo may indulge there should be no parsimony in providing schools for our boys and girls. They are entitled to the best there is in the way of a public education. More and better schools of the higher grade mean better citizens. The young men and young women who take a course in the high school are better fitted in every way to take up the burden of life. They understand better the responsibilities of citizenship. They are able to get more out of life.

"It is a fine thing to see so many of our young people seeking the doors of the high schools eager to equip themselves for the duties of life."

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"In 1870 the school board of Cincinnati adopted a resolution providing that 'religious instruction and the reading of religious books, including the Holy Bible, are prohibited in the common schools of Cincinnati, it being the true object and intent of this rule to allow the children of the parents of all sects and opinions, in matters of faith and worship, to enjoy alike the benefit of the common school fund.'

ment of this rule, and the State supreme court held that the provision in the constitution requiring the passage of suitable laws to encourage morality and religion. was one addressed solely to the judgment and discretion of the legislative department; and that, in the absence of any legislation on the subject, the board of education could not be compelled to permit the reading of the Bible in the schools. 'On the other hand,' writes Cooley, 'it has been decided that the school authorities, in their discretion, may compel the reading of the Bible in schools by pupils, even though it be against the objection and protest of their parents."

Cleveland Cheer

The editor of the Cleveland News qualifies for initiation into the honorable order of school supporters:

"To-day the schools which fairly represent the period in which we live set so high a standard of proper lighting, heating, abundant fresh air, clean windows and floors, neat desks and lockers, often with little touches of beauty and charm such as flowers in window-boxes, that their influence on the children who must build and maintain the dwellings of the next generation cannot fail to be wide and fine.

"So the schools which are free to all children, the typical, up-to-date unit of the vast system of popular education on which ward and upward, even in their appearance this republic is built, lead the way onand in the setting which they make for the daily life of the boys and girls who attend their classes. It is a service of immense value, the importance of which is not diminished by the silent, unobtrusive way it is carried on, day after day, through all the years of the average pupil's school training."

How Children Regard School

Readers of the REVIEW keep sending in their cuttings from newspapers to show

"Suit was brought to enjoin the enforce- the changing attitude of editors. This one,

late enough, is too good to miss. Editor, Chicago Daily News speaking:

"It is the habit of adults to view the juvenile mind at the reopening of school as filled with vain regrets and longings for a continuation of the freedom of vacation. This may be true, and yet

"A small miss of the neighborhood was asked rather pityingly last night: 'Are you glad school's coming?' 'Yes,' was the unhesitating reply."

Helping Again

Who is this Baltimore American editor and what makes him continually hit the mark educationally? From month to month this department of the REVIEW gets these positive, constructive, patriotic comments upon schooling clipped from this newspaper. Somebody write him acknowledgment:

"The business of childhood is school, and the country is clearly agreed on one pointunless children stick to business the country will not prosper.

from the office thought, or pretended to
think, that a child who managed to stay
away from school a day or a week without
punishment was a smart kid. Most of them
no longer pretend to think so. They recog-
nize the fact that a job is a job and that
nize the fact that a
school is a big and a real job-not too big
for a boy or a girl, but big enough to de-
mand close attention.

"And in school nowadays the children are more and more expected to work. Aside from the three R's, it does not make much difference what they study during the early years. The question is of keeping at it, of getting the swing of thinking, of learning just what their problems are and how problems are solved by concentration and common sense. The power to think straight comes slowly. Mental judgment is for most of us hard to develop.

"Children are very different as individuals, and yet they are very much alike in one thing-ambition. They all want to get on in the world. They all want to do well. The earlier they get the idea into their heads that school helps them to do well only if they stick to it and do their best in it, that school is their business, the better they will get on."

"The school business is not only bigger but better than it ever was before. Conditions are more conducive to study. Equipment is more complete. Subjects of study become more and more sensible. The Layman for the Three Rs and How Our schoolhouses are practical as institutions of learning and beautiful to the eye.

"But, best of all, the attitude of the public which insensibly encourages or discourages the child to pursue his job, becomes steadily more encouraging. There used to be a theory, widely advertised, that children hated to go to school, that their hatred was justifiable.

"In the good old days the tendency of children to play hookey was laughed at, along with the mother-in-law joke and the one about the young married couple. But nowadays even the most unenlightened citizen realizes the necessity for schooling and the importance of enlightenment as a business

asset.

"A business man who would fire an office boy instanter for one unexcused absence

to Live

Your long-time friend the editor, the Evening Transcript, speaketh:

"The more one ponders, the more one is convinced that the three Rs still symbolize the fact that fundamentals will always be necessary and that they are bound to be slurred over in a scramble, well meaning though it be, to teach the youth a little of everything on earth.

"There is a great deal of plausibility in the idea that schools should teach the youth how to make a living, but it begs the question in not defining living. Heaven knows that in this day money is useful, but how you get it and how you use it are still matters of more importance than the money itself. It may not fall in with

the views of many 'practical' parents whose opinions are much to be respected, but sometimes they overlook the practical value of the sound foundation of an education."

No Protests Against the Expense of High Schools

Speaking of the growth and cost of high schools the Philadelphia Record goes on to

say:

"These schools come high, but the people want them, and it is a healthy sign that there is no protest from taxpayers against their mounting costs. A city's educational status is judged largely by the percentage of the pupils who pass from the elementary to the high schools. This figure is rising rapidly in Philadelphia, and so long as there is an urgent demand for more advanced instruction the Board of Education is well justified in the millions which it is spending upon high schools."

Pleased to Pay Taxes

This is cheerful reading from the editorial column of the Courier of Camden, New Jersey:

"The school system of Camden is one of the city's biggest industries. It turns the raw material of citizenship into 'finished product.'

"Every day some 22,000 children are, so to speak, being poured into the hoppers of this busy mill.

"Camden City spends more than a million dollars a year on this enterprise. Total expenditures last year were $1,494,450. Of this, the city itself put up $1,111,859.06. "When you see a fine factory, you know there are brains studying every move made in the business.

"Somebody is planning for it all the time. Somebody is studying the need, the material, the machinery, the whole operation of the works. Somebody is directing the expenditure in order to get profitable returns. "When you see a fine school system, you

may be equally sure it is not the result of chance."

Pupils' Strikes Again

This is from an editorial in the Herald, Passaic, New Jersey:

"School 'strikes' have happened before. Morris Kamelhor, a picturesque West Paterson justice of the peace whose name was often in the New York newspapers, led such a 'strike' many years ago when the pupils of West Paterson's new school were compelled to wade through mud to a rear entrance, while teachers were able to walk over board planking to the front door.

Some few years ago the mothers of Albion Place withdrew their children from the Albion Place school house because the principal had been transferred to Delawanna and because they held the conviction that the transfer was prompted by the spite of a school board member.

"But children in school are not free agents. They have no right to 'strike' and their parents have no right to withdraw them from school, for a day or for a week, unless they intend to send their school-age boys and girls to private schools or to provide for tutors. Men who labor without contract can strike when they will. The State insists that children under fourteen must attend school and parents who take the law into their own hands must be prepared to take the consequences."

Deadly Civic Training

The Washington Post has positive views upon a fundamental school objective:

"For years 'Constitution of the United States' has been an item in the curriculum of high schools. But the teaching of it has too generally been perfunctory, and indeed too often unsympathetic and unappreciative. Pupils have been required merely to answer questions by rote, without any real understanding of their meaning and especially of their direct and vital application to their own everyday lives. The Constitution has

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