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thus relieve the institute of a serious hindrance and burden. The work to be done in an institute ought to be evangelistic in nature and inspiring in the character of its influence rather than be confined to the formalism of the common branches and a review of subject matter, yet this too frequently occupies most of the time of these teachers in normal institutes and thus deprives them in fact of their actual mission for a better and broader helpfulness.

5. SUPERVISION OFTEN DISCOUR AGES PROGRESS.

It is also to be recognized that some county superintendents are compelled to prefer their teachers and would-be teachers to attend the annual two weeks session of the institute they conduct rather than to have them attend a full term at any good normal or preparatory school, particularly if the attendance' at said school would take them away from the institute and deprive the institute fund of a dollar a head. This shows the limitations and restrictions that may come from the license system which grants the teacher's certificate and also conducts the teachers' institute, showing that teachers are not even free to do the best they can for themselves, because they are at the mercy to some extent of those who examine for certificates and who can put them to much inconvenience if their dictation and absoiute supervision is not recognized.

6.-NEED FOR ACTUAL PERMANE NT RECOGNITION FOR WELL PREPARED TEACHERS.

There is, therefore, much room for modification in plans of management. There is no good reason why teachers should be constantly examined and re-examined. There should come a time, and its length should be reasonable, when a teacher's certificate should be perpetual and where the crack of the whip of supervision should mean a different kind of requirement than merely a formal technical examination in the legal branches. There should be progress and it should be of a kind that is professional and encouraging. Such a status is impossible so long as teachers' authority to do educational work is limitel to six months, nine months, one year or two years. College graduates, normal school graduates of good standard schools, and persons of good scholarship ought to be encouraged to do educational work and be granted perpetual certificates. Such credentials do not insure employment,they really have little or nothing to do with employment, and yet as much time is to-day spent upon this kind of teachers individually as there is spent upon those who are poorly educated and can hardly comply with the very lowest standard of qualification. There is room for improvement in permanency and such improvement can not come too soon if actual progress in educational affairs ought to be considered as important. The old idea that this spur of annual or biennial examinations will keep teachers alive, awake and enterprising is one of the basest falacies, as it has the counter effect of destroying their spirit and depressing their interest in educational work of the

highest and best sort. Whenever a teacher is found to be competent he should be honored with professional recognition and encouraged to go ahead to greater success, and every inducement should be offered to get out of the class of those preparing and those partially incompetent, as by such means a new life would be infused into the business of professional teaching and there would be something definite as a standard to attain. To-day there is no standard, no end to testing, no chance to get into a professional status, and the tread-mill of the business is a constant factor in destroying usefulness and power. When is this condition to end and the new era of progress to be begun?

THE IMPROVEMENT OF RURAL SCHOOLS.

The following is an extract from an address of Supt. J. E. Durkee of Buena Vista County, before a Farmers' Institute recently held in that county:

In order to investigate the question of the consolidation of schools, the writer recently visited the schools at Terrill, where the central school system is now in operation. Terrill is a small town situated in about the center of Lloyd Township in the southeastern corner of Dickinson County. In the spring of 1900 the question of consolidation was carried by a small majority, but owing to some legal question, the system was not put into operation until September, 1901. The board, in the meantime, did not sell the old buildings deeming it best to wait until the new plan had been tried. It has now been in operation for a year and a half. The school was thoroughly graded and was quite up to the standard with schools of the same size in other towns. To test the attitude of the pupils toward the plan a vote was taken in every room and not a pupil could be found who favored going back to the old system. Driving over the longest route taken by any of the school lacks nothing but the most unqualified approval could be found among the parents. One farmer said, "I was opposed to it at first as my girl has to ride about four miles, but after trying it for a year or more, I am well satisfied. She has learned more in the last year than she could have learned in the old school if she had gone until she was thirty." The school hacks are comfortable spring wagons covered and fitted with seats and each having a small oil stove for cold weather. The pupils ride back and forth to school in perfect comfort and safety in the coldest weather, and only two or three times. have bad roads proved a serious obstacle.

Investigation showed that the expense was a trifle more than under the old system. If the attendance had remained the same the expense would have been less, but, since the central schools have been established, the attendance from the country has nearly doubled; and as a consequence more hack drivers have been employed, making the expense a trifle more. The system is so popular with the people that the electors with but nine dissenting have voted to sell all of the old school houses, and they are now being carted away for farm buildings.

I was informed that with some slight improvements they make excellent corn-cribs, hen-houses and pig-pens, and the township realized from them some thirteen hundred dollars, which is about one-third the cost of the new four-room building, which takes their place. Four of the adjoining townships in Clay and Dickinson counties have now adopted the central school system, and are preparing to put it into operation as soon as a building can be erected. Bankers, real estate men and loan agents were unanimously of the opinion that this system had tended to advance the price of real estate in ever part of Floyd Township.

Consolidation is the spirit of the age. We find no tendency more marked than the tendency to expand that which is narrow, and to unite that which is separate. This has been called an age of Synthesis -an age of putting together that which for centuries has been kept apart. In science and in art, in business and religion there is everywhere manifest this consolidation activity. The old stage has given place to the railroad, the corner grocery to the department store, and the little work shops to great manufacturing establishments, which in turn have combined into great trusts which regulate the entire business of the country. Everyone concedes that this tendency is an inevitable. consequence of progress and is in itself entirely wholesome. It is only when this principle is carried to the extreme and vast commercial combinations seek to meddle in the powers of government, and trample upon the rights of the people that we lay upon them the heavy hand of the law. This tendency is felt in agriculture as well. Twenty years ago you paid your farm-hand $15 to $20 a month. He plowed. with a light team and a twelve-inch plow, seeded with an eight-foot seeder, dragged with a ten-foot drag, harvested with a five-foot reaper, and it took an army of men and adrove of horses to thrash four or five hundred bushels a day. Now you pay your hired man from $25 to $30 a month. He drives four big horses, plows with a gang, uses an eighteen-foot seeder, a twenty-foot drag, and in harvesting and threshing does more work, and does it easier, than could be done by four men with the old machinery.

In the matter of schools the principle of consolidation is only beginning to be felt. While farms have been growing larger, rural school districts and schools have grown smaller. What has become of the old fashioned school with its thirty or forty brawny boys and big rosy-cheeked girls? The male teacher of that day was illiterate, the schoolhouse and equipment was poor, but with its spelling matches and singing schools, it has what the rural school of to-day has not, and cannot get, the inspiration and enthusiasm of numbers.

To-day it is a rare thing to find more than fifteen or twenty pupils in the rural school. The young men have nearly all abandoned the profession of teaching for better salaries and more continuous employmient. Women make excellent teachers, in many respects being better qualified by nature to teach and lead the young; but somewhere

in the child's school life, especially in the latter part of it, he should come in contact with a man's mind and a man's way of thinking.

Investigation will show that the big country boys and girls are attending the town schools, or colleges where they can afford it, and those who cannot afford it stay out because so few of their companions are attending. One big boy said to me recently: "I do not go to school because it is so lonesome." Whatever were the faults of the old-fashioned rural schools they were not "lonesome" places. In one school in Buena Vista county the average attendance for last year was one and two-thirds. The total cost of running that school was about $40 per month. For half the money the children could have been conveyed to a central school, or they could have been sent to Buena Vista College, if old enough, their tuition, board and expenses paid by the district, and money saved the tax payers. I know of no better evidence that "farmers have money to burn" than the fact that such schools are maintained.

50,000 babies were born in the state of Iowa last year. These 50,000 babies have 150,000 brothers and sisters under five years of age. These 200,000 children have some rights which their parents and the state are bound to respect. True they are the "heirs of all the ages," but they are likely to be cheated out of their birth-right unless their parents or the state will administer wisely this grand heritage. Most of them are normal children posseessed of a nervous system capable of putting them in touch with the world and its knowledge, and their destinies are in the hands of their parents, their teachers, and the state. Any scheme of reform that does not include these children will in the end prove a failure. The state owes to each of these children an equal chance to obtain an education. We used to sing: "Come along, come along, and do not be a fool; for Uncle Sam is rich enough to send us all to school." I ask is there any good reason why Uncle Sam should not send these country boys and girls to as good a school as he provides for their city cousins? It is time we applied to educational matters that grand old political maxim, “Equal rights to all and special privileges to none."

The Dubuque board of education is resting on its arms and awaiting the petition of the grade teachers in the public schools setting forth. their view of the principles which should govern salaries. The teachers at present hold views, not a view. The only point on which they are agreed is that the general level of salaries is too low. This is true if the test is the average rate paid in the cities of the state. The best salaries are paid in the rapidly growing towns, where the demand for teachers keeps pace with the growth in supply. The capable and experienced grade teacher in Dubuque must choose between leaving home or accepting a lower salary than she could obtain elsewhere.— Dubuque Daily Times.

CAP E. MILLER

Superintendent of Keokuk County Schools.

This gentleman is a product of Keokuk County. He was born and reared to man's estate on a farm in English River Township, near South English, Iowa. "He has earned his own money, fought his own battles and by the strength of his own resources has won for him

self a high standing inthe educational work of the state. Alert, active and awake to the probabilities and possibilities of life he has continually kept the car of progress in the van of the procession."

We find him teaching in the rural schools, saving his money and attending school when circumstances allowed it. And here in the rural schools he made a reputation which was not long confined to his home county. Iowa County recognized his worth and ability and called him to Millersburk to the principalship of the schools at that place. Here he remained two years. From Millersburg he went to the Iowa State Normal School from which excellent institution he graduated with honor in 1901, receiving the degree of M. Di. His worth was recognized by President Seerley, who sent him to Adel in 1901 to act as superintendent of schools during the sickness of the superintendent at that place. He remained here one month and it was the quality