Table II presents the school statistics of 266 cities, whose total population, according to the census of 1880, was 10,790,034, or a little more than one-fifth of the total popula tion of the United States.

The tax for school purposes on assessed valuation ranges from .95 of a mill to 25 mills per dollar of assessed valuation. It is 10 mills or more iu 31 cities and 4 mills or less in 81. The total receipts for 1883, 10 cities not reporting, were $32,461,172. The total expenditures for the year, 11 cities not reporting, were $30,008,015. The totals are apt to be misleading unless particular attention is paid to the details of the table; for example, 36 of the cities do not report school population, so that the total under that bead (viz, 2,894,836) is for 230 cities only. Nineteen of the 36 cities that fail to reportschool population do not report school enrolment; in addition, 49 cities that report school population do not report enrolment in schools; so that the total school enrolment, viz, 1,857,435, is for 198 cities, of which number 181 report this item and also school population. The average daily attendance, viz, 1,218,655, is for 245 cities. From an examination of the statistics of 213 cities that report both school population and average daily attendance, it appears that the average daily attendance (1,066,357) is very nearly 40 per cent. of the corresponding school population (2,797,818). But this population, it must be remembered, greatly exceeds the number of youth whose attendance might reasonably be expected. The legal school period in the cities tabulated ranges from 10 to 17 years, whereas from 6 to 8 years is in all countries the recognized duration of the school period. Philadelphia, the cities of Massachusetts, three cities of Rhode Island, and a few cities of New Hampshire report the shortest period, i. e., 10 years. The actual condition of school attendance in the United States may be more fairly illustrated by the statistics of these cities than by the statistics of all the cities. Twenty-four cities of Massachusetts, having a school population of 179,121, report enrolment in public schools as 176,781, or 98 per cent., and average daily attendance as 128,847. If the estimated enrolment in private schools (23,685) be added, we have a total enrolment exceeding the legal school population. Three cities of Rhode Island, having a school population of 9,257, enroll 6,678, or 72 per cent., and have an average daily attendance of 4,040. The estimated enrolment in private schools brings the entire school enrolment up to 87 per cent. of the school population. Philadelphia, with a school population of 250,000, reports an average enrolment of 105,424, or 42 per cent., and an average attendance of 99,364. If the estimated enrolment in private schools, viz, 18,000, be added, the entire eurolinent reaches very nearly 50 per cent. of the school population. In the cities specified, the ratios of average daily attendance to enrolment are as follows: Twenty-four cities of Massachusetts, 98 per cent.; three cities of Rhode Island, 60 per cent.; Philadelphia, 42 per cent. One of the most gratifying evidences of the progress that the free school system is making in southern cities is found in the increasing rates of school attendance: for instance, in Richmond an average attendance is reported of 93.9 per cent. in the white schools and 97.8 per cent. in the colored schools.

Upon a careful examination of the conditions of school attendance in cities, both of our own and other countries, it appears evident that an average attendance at schools, public and private, of not less than 90 per cent. of the youth included in the ordinary ages of school attendance should be maintained. How far this is accomplished in any particular city cannot be exactly shown without the census of the youth of those ages, with the attendance at all classes of schools. The data that we have, however, show very clearly the need of better results in this particular.

It need hardly be suggested that a deficiency of school accommodation, such as unfortunately exists in many of our cities, effectually prevents the desired attendance. In a number of cities there is a disposition so to limit appropriations that the building and furnishing of school-houses cannot possibly keep pace with the requirements of a rapidly growing population. The tendencies of a such course are illustrated in the condition of things in Milwaukee, where since 1882 the liberal policy which

previously characterized the citizens and the common council has been interrupted by acts of the legislature. Hon. Joshua Stark, president of the school board, says: It is to be regretted that the measures adopted to restrict taxation could not have been so framed as to allow a reasonable outlay to meet the increasing educational wants of the city. I do not doubt that the school census to be taken this month will show an increase in the number of children between the ages of 4 and 15 of more than 5,000 within the past three years. That number will have swelled to fully 7,000 by the 1st of January, 1885. But little addition has been made to our school room during the past three years. It is probable, therefore, that before means can be secured for the erection of more school buildings we snall have many thousand children in the city who ought to be in the public schools but must be excluded for want of room. It is to be hoped that some way may be devised to lessen this great evil and positive misfortune to the city.

In the southern cities, in which the increase of school population by immigration is small, the deficiency of school places, so generally complained of, is due to the recent date of the free school system, the low state of school finances, and the necessity of a double system of schools to accommodate white and colored children respectively. Whatever be the cause of the deficiency, it is an evil that should be distinctly set before the taxpayers and promptly overcome.

Half day sessions in the primary grades are very generally adopted as a means of meeting the pressure for school places. This seems to work very well, so far as the children are concerned, but care must be taken not to impose too great a strain upon the teachers. As a rule, the teacher must change with the class; occasionally one teacher is found who is able to do double work. When this is the case, the salary should be proportionally increased.

A general conviction of the importance of elementary education will go far to insure a full use of the school provision, but experience shows that this is not under all circumstances the only force required for bringing about the desired result.

In crowded cities, where business competition is keen and the necessities of life not easily secured, compulsory school laws have been deemed necessary to counteract the greed of parents and employers and to bring to light the disabilities from which parents must be relieved before it is possible for them to allow their children the benefit of school privileges.

In my last annual report the status of each State and Territory with reference to compulsion was set forth. But compulsory laws enacted by State legislatures may fail of effect in individual cities through the indifference or opposition of the municipal authorities. Where local school officers are not in agreement with the State authori. ties on this subject it would seem that the opinion of the former ought to determine the local action, since, presumably, they understand the situation better than any other class of persons.

Hon. Daniel Leach, superintendent of schools, Providence, R. I., calls attention to the failure of the city council to pass an ordinance to carry into effect the truant law enacted by the last general assembly. He says:

While there may be serious objections to rigidly enforcing the whole law as it now stands, there are some sections of it that ought, unquestionably, to be put in force at once. It is an undoubted fact that there are a very large number of the youth of this city of proper school age without any regular employment, now grow ing up in ignorance, roaming our streets, and becoming initiated in the worst of evils. Can any one with proper sentiments of humanity, and who Las any regard to the future of our city, doubt that this increasing evil ought without further delay to be reme died? There are, besides, hundreds of our youth who enter school, but who are in the habit of running away and enticing others to join them. Many of this class cannot be controlled by their parents, who often beg for some assistance to enable them to keep their children in school. The number of truants the past term is very much larger than ever before. None but teachers can be fully aware how much our schools are suffering from this cause. Ought not something to be done, and that speedily? But in regard to children who are regularly employed under the age of twelve or fourteen years, and when the necessity of parents absolutely requires for their comfortable support the profits of their labor, there are serious difficulties in rigidly enforcing the law. There are in this city quite a number of families that

would be obliged to go to the Dexter Asylum were it not for the pecuniary aid of their young children. A judicious arrangement, however, that shall be humane and that will be mutually satisfactory to all, can be made by employers and parents under the advice and sanction of the school authorities.

Ought not the wisest legislation that humanity could dictate and a prudent foresight suggest receive the most earnest and careful consideration? Indifference or apathy in regard to this momentous subject should no longer prevail. Let those who have doubts of its importance visit our schools and consult the police records.

The cities in which an efficient truant service has been established report, I believe, without exception, excellent results from the system. Hon. John Jasper, superintendent of schools, New York City, presents the following among other interesting details of the work of the department in that city:

The total number of visits made during the year was 41,295, classified as follows: to stores and factories, 24,498; to homes, 12,013; to schools, 4,784.

Although, as above seen, 24,493 visits were made to stores and factories in which children were known or supposed to be employed, only 243 instances were found in which there was a violation of the law. This fact of itself proves the hearty cooperation of employers and shows the public sympathy and support in the matter of properly instructing the young.

The number of certificates countersigned by the city superintendent stating the child had received fourteen weeks' instruction during the year was 1,075, an increase of 54 over the number granted the previous year.

In the matter of truancy an improvement is to be noted. Last year 2,495 cases were reported, this year 2,069, a decrease of 17 per cent.

* *

During the year the department made a complete and thorough census of all children between the ages of 5 and 14 years residing in the first, second, third, and fourth wards.

The returns show that the total number of such children was 5,315, and that of this number 4,603 attended school. Of the 712 non-attendants 501 were under 8 years of age, and were not, therefore, amenable to the compulsory education act.

Of the remaining 211 non-attendants 14 were physically disqualified, 7 were kept home by poverty, and 36 were legally employed. It will thus be seen that 154 children in the wards just mentioned were absent from school in violation of the law.

Since the census was made 64 of the 154 non-attendants have been placed in school, 18 have become 14 years of age, and 43 have been removed or could not be found. There are, therefore, at the present time only 24 non-attendants in the four lower wards of the city. Of the 4,603 children who attend school in these wards, 2,962 actend the public schools, 1,611 the parochial schools, and 30 private schools.

By such a thorough canvas of the wards of a city as is here reported, the amount of irregularity and non-attendance at school caused by extreme poverty, want, or vagrancy is readily ascertained. This is a matter that is exciting much attention just now in foreign countries, and information is frequently sought as to the measures employed in our own cities for bringing the children of the classes indicated under proper instruction.

The attempt has been made in a number of cities to maintain special schools for such children, but the more general practice is to gather them, so far as possible, into the regular schools and make such allowance for them as their circumstances require. Teachers and school officers generally show great interest in the welfare of this class, and are indefatigable in their efforts to secure aid for them from charitable organizations. In New York the wants of this class are met by the corporate schools. Of the operation of these schools Mr. C. Loring Brace, the secretary of the Children's Aid Society, writes as follows:

There are thousands of children in this city who are left in bitter poverty, often without breakfast in the morning, half clad, ignorant, and exposed to every temptation. They naturally form our notorious criminal class. On the other hand we have a series of board or free schools with an organization and a standard too strict and high for street urchins, which could not, without serious dangers, assume an eleemosy nary character by feeding and clothing the little wanderers of the streets. How have we reconciled the two? Simply by creating, through voluntary effort, an intermediary system: that of the day industrial or corporate schools. These are founded by private associations and only receive by act of legislature a part, say one-half, of their support from the school tax on ratepayers, proportioned to the sworn average attendance. The rest of their income comes from private benefaction. They are under the rules and regulations of the school board and are examined annually and inspected

occasionally by the officials. But the examinations, owing to the occupation and character of the children, are much less strict and less is expected of the pupils than in the New York ward schools. The only strictness observed is in requiring a correct recording of the average attendance, on which the appropriations are based, and in preventing all "sectarian teaching," the latter measure being designed to prevent the Roman Catholics or any Protestant church from getting control of the free schools. The industrial schools, both day and night, are under private trustees, who appoint their own teachers and raise their own funds (except the annual tax appropriation), but who conform their course of studies more or less closely to that of the board schools. Their object is to gather in the street children, runaways, truants, little bootblacks, newsboys, and all the nondescript crowd of half vagrant boys and girls who used to infest the New York lanes and alleys. They give them one or more meals in the day, clothe them as they earn the clothes or shoes by good marks, cleanse them, train them in common school studies and some branch of industry, and then after a time forward them on to the ward schools, or to places in families, or at trades, or on farms. The children are not overstrained, for they have brain work varied by hand work. They do not suffer from headaches, for food is given to the most needy; the hours are not long; some have simple gymnastic exercise and all get a week or two in the country in summer. Then many of them take necessarily half time sessions because they are supporting themselves and their families by street trades. Irregular attendance has to be permitted. The day industrial school becomes a kind of Botany Bay for all the truants, hard cases, and little vagrants of the ward schools.

The average annual expense per head, including cost of food, clothes, fuel, rent, and salaries, is only about $20, reckoned on the average daily attendance. The numbers for the year in the schools of our own association, the Children's Aid Society, are about 10,000 in the aggregate, and those in several other associations will amount to as many more; so that some 20,000 children of the poorest classes are thus taught and reclaimed each year by this intermediary system of schools for the poor. No friction or misunderstanding between the private and public authorities has thus far occurred in this matter; but of course this happy result has only been attained by much wisdom and good sense on both sides. The industrial schools keep to their own field, the ragged and verminous and hungry and ignorant children and those in street occupations. The board inspectors only demand the essentials to be expected from such a class. The private school is a kind of complement of the public school. It does a work the other cannot do, and then it prepares for the other.

The Children's Aid Society, in addition to these industrial schools, has many boys' lodging houses, and in 31 years has placed out some 70,000 children in homes, mainly in the West.

The result of all these instrumentalities of charity and education is that juvenile crime and vagrancy during the past 20 years have been steadily diminishing in New York, and that now we can confidently say that no poor child in New York need be homeless in the street, or beg or steal for a living, or want for a meal, if he will work for it, or be without a school, where he can get both industrial and book training and plain food, or wait long for a place of work and a home.

Under ordinary circumstances the most efficient cause of regular and full attendance will be found in the excellence of the schools themselves, as is made apparent by every general effort for improving the schools.

INSTRUCTION IN PRIMARY AND GRAMmar grades IN CITY SCHOOLS.

The grades which enroll the large majority of the pupils, viz, primary and grammar or intermediate, never presented so near an equality as at the present time. The improved methods introduced into these grades, and more especially into the primary grades, within the last few years, have been noted in my successive reports. It will be interesting to consider exactly what instruction these schools now offer and by what tests their work is determined. The statements of attendance, examinations, and promotions presented in the current reports of several cities throw much light on this subject.

BOSTON.

[Report of the superintendent, Hon. E. P. Seaver, for the year ending March, 1884, and of the board of supervisors for the year ending September, 1884.]

From the statistics of school attendance for February, 1884, it appears that the entire number of pupils in the schools at that time was 55,578, of whom 24,208, or 43 per cent., were in the primary grades. Of the primary pupils 6,563 were in the first class. Presumably these figures represent fairly the attendance and distribution of

pupils for the year. Two examinations of the first primary classes were held in 1884. Two examinatisus of this class were held in 1884, of which the order and subjects were as follows:1

Examinations of the first classes of the primary schools for promotion to grammar schools.

As a result, 1,349 pupils were promoted to the grammar schools in January and 4,310 in June. The promotions made in June represent, it will be seen, nearly 66 per cent. of the attendance of the first class as reported in February. The ages of the pupils of the first primary class may be inferred from the classification as to age reported in February, viz:

[Report of the superintendent, Hon. John Jasper, for the year ending December 31, 1883.] The total average attendance of pupils for the year in all the schools participating in the school fund was 143,177; the average attendance in the primary schools and primary departments was 75,548, or 52 per cent.; during the year 16,594 pupils, or 22 cent. of the average attendance in all the primary grades, were promoted to the grammar grades. The law provides that no pupil shall be promoted from any primary school unless examined in all the studies prescribed for the first grade of primary schools and found qualified by the principal of the department into which the promotion is to be made. The prescribed studies are the same as those included in the examination of the Boston primaries, with the addition of sewing and vocal music.

BROOKLYN.

[Report of the superintendent, Hon. Calvin Patterson, for the year ending December 31, 1883.] The total number of pupils enrolled in the public schools of Brooklyn December 31, 1883, was 65,872, of whom 45,524, or 69 per cent., were in the primary grades. Of the primary pupils, 5,066 were enrolled in the first class. The number of pupils promoted from this class to the grammar grade was 6,168, or 135.6 per cent. of the average attendance. To understand this ratio it is necessary to keep in mind that the promotions were made semiannually, and therefore, assuming the average attendance for a term to be at least equal to the registry at the close of the term, the number pro

1 See School Document No. 14.