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the minimum of wages paid in Dakota is $30 per month and we shall soon have a corps of teachers who will work miracles, almost, in our educational advancement. One very excellent teacher writes me as follows: 'I find many teachers of our county wide awake and interested in their work, but the majority are so poorly paid that they can not afford to buy books, travel to institutes, and otherwise improve themselves. I know of one who is getting $25 per month and pays $14 per month-or $3.50 per week-for board.' Some good teachers are compelled to teach at such wages because they are forced into competition with non-professional and unqualified teachers. Thus, the professional teacher is forced into competition with farm hands who would otherwise be idle during the winter months, and who possess, as a rule, very few of the qualifications that go to make up the real teacher. It is here that we find an illustration of the most marked difference between teaching and keeping school."

XIV. SCHOOL-HOUSES.

COUNTRY SCHOOLS.

[From the School Laws of Oregon, 1887, pp. 135-8.]
Location.

1. It is assumed that the school district has been accurately surveyed and the metes and bounds recorded. Without this the choice must be to some extent guess work. The location should be as near as may be convenient to the geographical centre of the district; but reference must be had to the roads by which it can be reached and the impediments that may lie in the way. In rural districts the geographical centre when access is easy should be preferred to the centre of population, because the latter is liable to change.

Site.

2. Hollows and the edges of swamps should be avoided. Hill-tops are also objectionable. A moderate elevation from which the ground slopes in all directions is to be preferred. A piece of woods which would shelter the house from the prevalent winds of winter is a great protection; but no trees should be allowed to stand within 50 feet of the building.

Orientation.

3. This question has not yet been settled by theorists. So much depends on the location and the site and the kind of building that is erected that no general rule can be given. Considering that the country school-house is usually closed for about four months in summer, it will generally be most convenient to have the house built so that the pupils may sit facing the north; the windows should then be on the east and west sides.

Plan and size.

4. Let us for the sake of simplicity confine our attention to the country school-house with one teacher and an attendance of from 20 to 50 pupils. In such school-houses more than two-thirds of the people of the United States have received and will receive their elementary education. A square house is objectionable. The length should be about one-third greater than the width. This gives room for the teacher's platform and for a recitation bench, and places the desks in a square block in front of the teacher. There should be at least 12 square feet of floor space for each pupil. The ceiling should be 12 feet in average height; this will allow each pupil 150 cubic feet of air space, and under no circumstances should there be less than this amount. A house 24 x 18, inside measurement, will accommodate twenty-two pupils; a house 28 x 21 will accommodate forty pupils, 24 x 32, fifty pupils. It is advisable to build a house large enough for an attendance one-fourth larger than the number usually going to school in the district. The new house attracts better teachers and the double attraction secures more pupils.

Light, heat, and ventition.

5. If the teacher's platform is on the north side of the house and the pupils' entrance on the south side, the windows should be on the east and west, none on the other sides. The eastern windows should be grouped towards the north and the western windows should be grouped towards the south. If the windows are equally distributed over the walls, the lighting is bad for some purposes, and there is no good place for black-boards. If two-fifths of the length of each of the two walls (the eastern and western) is assigned to a group of windows, the remaining wall-space is ample for black-board surface, and

each black-board is exactly opposite to a window. The placing of black-boards on the piers between the windows is very objectionable. Whether the black-board surface is wood, or slate, or plaster, it should be a permanent part of the wall itself. Slate is in the long run the cheapest, as it is also the best material. Movable black-boards in small houses are troublesome.

A ventilating stove is the best available source of heat. It costs but little more than an ordinary stove. Almost any stove can be converted into a "ventilator" by surrounding it with a sheet-iron jacket, and bringing a tube from the exterior air to the space between the stove and the outer casing. The chimney flue should be divided longitudinally into two parts, one for the escape of smoke and the other for the escape of vitiated air. The opening for the latter purpose should be at or very near the floor. The best place for the stove is usually the northwest corner of the house. Two moderate sized stoves placed in different corners are better than one large one. Only one of them is needed in moderate weather and two will make the room comfortable in the coldest part of winter. A large stove in the middle of a school-room is an unsightly obstruction and tends to produce disorder. A ventilating stove placed in the northwest corner, with a stove-pipe extending almost to the ceiling and by a horizontal branch entering a flue in the southwest corner will give an almost equable temperature in all parts of the room. The opening into such a smoke flue near the floor will be a very efficient aid to ventilation, but the opening should be protected by a register which can be closed at pleasure.

It frequently happens that such aids to ventilation as have been described are not sufficient. Our reliance must then be placed on the doors and windows. The windows should be within 12 inches of the ceiling and should come down to the level of the desks. They should be in two sashes, with cords and pulleys to move up and down. It is quite a common practice to lower the top sashes a few inches and keep them in this position while the school is in session. This is a double error, it lets out the pure, warm air which we wish to retain, and lets in a stream of cold air directly on the heads of the pupils. If the ventilating flue with an opening at the floor, is not sufficient to carry off the impure air, the best plan is to open every door and window in the building for one or two minutes, not more than three minutes, and when the room has been thoroughly flushed with fresh air close all the openings. If necessary, the operation may be repeated at the end of every hour.

Wardrobes or cloak rooms.

6. A place for depositing the outer garments in safety and in an orderly manner is a necessity in even the cheapest and smallest school-house. Such a place is often obtained by building a vestibule in front of the house. This arrangement improves the external appearance of the house, but it is comparatively costly and not free from other objections. The cheapest and best plan in a house of only one room is to cut off from the south side of the room two small cloak rooms, one for the boys and one for the girls. The pupils' entrance is by a door leading into the small passage between these two closets. There is no door to the closets; an arched doorway always open exposes the interior of the closets at all times to the eye of the teacher whose desk is in the north side of the house. These closets should be furnished with suitable clothes pins and with shelves to hold lunch baskets.

Larger houses.

7. If two rooms are needed they should be on the same floor and separated by a glass partition with movable sashes. A front room 24 by 32 and a back room 24 by 30 will accommodate about one hundred pupils. The flues should be in the walls adjoining the partition. For three rooms the building should be of a T shape, the perpendicular line representing a room 24 by 32, and the horizontal line two rooms, each 23 by 21. The dnes may be conveniently placed in the angles where the front building adjoins the rear building. For four rooms place a corridor 6 feet wide between two sets of rooms, such as are described in the beginning of this paragraph. It is only when more than four moms are needed, or where the ground is unusually expensive, that a two-story house should be built.

Plastering.

R. As most of country school-houses are closed during nearly half the year, the plastning is apt to be affected by the damp. The walls should be wainscoted to the height 94 feet from the floor. If the rest of the wall were sheathed with wood of a lighter or than the wainscoting and the ceiling covered with the same material, it would be band much better than plaster, more ornamental, more durable, and not so much more expensive.

Outbuildings.

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9. The health and comfort of teacher demand: First. That a substantial woodshed be built, and a sufficient supply of good fuel be placed therein at the beginning of each term.

Second. Common decency always demands that water-closets be provided and placed in the opposite rear angles of the school-yard, or in some other convenient situation. Gravel, plank, or brick should be laid from the school-house to these buildings. The advantages of placing these closets in easy and convenient communication with the school-room are numerous. The fierce winds of winter, the wet and soft grounds in fall and spring are dangerous exposures to delicate children in leaving a hot room and who are compelled to traverse the length of the playground through mud and water to a mean and miserable shed, through which the wind constantly and freely blows. These water-closets should be simple and substantial in construction and not too large. Two feet and a half room is ample for each child, and never under any circumstances should there be two seats in the same inclosure. Each seat should be in an inclosure by itself, and the screens between each one should be 6 feet in height or more. In very many delicate and nervous children nature refuses to perform its usual functions, however great the necessity, in the presence of others or under unaccustomed circumstances, and a decent privacy in the school conveniences is necessary to save such from daily pain and more often serious consequences.

The promiscuous arrangement and condition of the ordinary school privileges urgently demand that these necessary appliances should receive at least as much care as the other circumstances of school life.

Apparatus.

10. Globes, charts, numeral frames, outline wall maps, ink, paper, text-books, cube and square root blocks are necessary appliances for the efficient management of every school.

Furniture.

11. Among the indispensable articles of furniture are a few chairs, a teacher's table, black-board and crayons, a clock, a dictionary, a water pail and cups, pointers, erasers, brooms, and brushes. Each school should be furnished with a closet, in which the movable property may be secured.

Improvements in school-houses.-Superintendant Williams, of York County, Pa.: "Directors should exercise more care in the location of school buildings. A house should never be built on low, swampy ground, on the top of the highest hill in the district, or on a stony piece of ground that is of no value for any other purpose, nor on the rear of the lot, compelling children to wade to it through mud over shoe-tops. Houses should be built on dry ground, sheltered from the cold blasts of wind, and the entrance should always be away from the sunny side. Houses are often built too small. A house should be long enough to afford ample room for seating, recitation, and black-board exercises. The space between the last seat and the black-board is nearly always too small for convenience and satisfactory recitation work. The width of the room is very often insuflicient, causing narrow aisles, and great inconvenience in passing to and from recitation. The centre aisle is often not more than four feet wide, making it inconvenient and unsatisfactory. Ceilings are generally too low. A house should be long enough, wide enough, and high enough to afford ample room and capacity for good ventilation. School grounds are nearly always insufficient. No less than half an acre should be given to every house. A few dollars invested for this purpose might save many dollars, broken limbs, and many other serious injuries. A few porches should be removed and built larger, more substantial, and closed at the ends. Several pupils have been severely injured, and, in one case, a pupil lost his life by neglecting so small a matter as closing the sides of a porch."

The grounds should be fenced.—Superintendent McNeal, of Dauphin County, Pa.: "Arbor Day has done much for the improvement of our school grounds. In many of the yards shade trees have been planted and are growing nicely, and in a few years will present the appearance of beautiful parks. Much more would have been done in this direction if the yards were all fenced. Let directors fence the grounds so that the trees and shrubbery will be protected, and the teachers and pupils can be relied upon to do the rest in the way of beautifying them."

A factor of more than ordinary importance.-Superintendent Hamilton, of Allegheny County, Pa.: "The school-room environment of the pupil is a factor in his educational development of more than ordinary importance. Nothing, perhaps, if we except good teachers, contributes more to the success of school work than well-planned and suitably

furnished school buildings. The proper heating, lighting, and ventilating of these buildings, as well as the suitable fencing, grading, and beautifying of the grounds attached thereto, must each have its requisite attention before the highest results can be expected." Provide home-like attractions and conveniences.-Superintendent Strayer, of Cambria County, Pa.: "There is not, however, the interest taken in the improvement of school grounds and houses that there should be. Grounds should be inclosed with a neat, substantial fence and shade trees planted. It is an absolute waste of time and money to plant trees according to the instructions of the Governor and State Superintendent, unless grounds are freed from rubbish and placed in proper condition. Arbor Day exercises will never be generally observed until a radical change is made, and school officers, teachers, and patrons plainly see that houses and grounds should receive the same attention that is bestowed on other educational agencies. Is it not the duty of all concerned to provide home-like attractions and conveniences for our boys and girls if we would wisely expend the money given to the support of the common schools?"

XV.-SCHOOL SYSTEMS.

The Minnesota system of education.-Superintendent Kiehle: "Our system of education may be considered complete when a good common school, well equipped, and well taught for at least eight months of the year, is located within the reach of every family, and from which every boy and girl of promise and ambition may reach the high school. From the high school the way should be plain and practicable to any of the departments of the university. In brief, every child of the State should have the opportunity and encouragement to make the most of himself, to attain the highest degree of skill, intellectual and mechanical, of which he is capable, and therefore his highest usefulness. "Moreover, a system of education does not consist in the aggregate of all parts, as when the elementary, the academic, and the collegiate are all formed within the State without organic relations.

"I believe that Minnesota may claim justly, and with some pride, not only that she has schools of all grades, but that they are so related that each department, grade, or class is adapted to and contributes directly to the efficiency of the others. The pupil who does well in the lower grade finds, when he knocks at the door of the grade above, that his record has gone before him, and is there set to his credit. He finds, too, that the work of the school above is adapted to the training already given, and the promise of all this has been his encouragement from the beginning."

XVI.-STATISTICS.

POINTS FOR CONSTANT CONSIDERATION IN THE STATISTICS OF EDUCATION. [Report of the Committee on Educational Statistics of the National Council of Education, presented by Hon. John Eaton.']

1. Statistics of education are not to be regarded as of greater value than the end for which they are kept. We do not educate that we may keep statistics, but we gather statistics that we may know better how to educate.

2. Statistics of education can not give completely that wonderful work in man. At best they must come short of the whole story of what education does, and its results. We should not expect from them what there is not in them.

3. We should neither overestimate them nor underestimate them, nor put them out of place in our plans or efforts. If a teacher may lay down his life for his pupils, he certainly should not, in a struggle simply to perfect his statistics. Better sacrifice the record of a school than the children in it.

4. Numerals are not the whole of statistics. There must be description or descriptive texts enough for their correct understanding and interpretation; graphics may add much to their value.

5. Whatever adaptation to local peculiarities with respect of what statistics include or exclude, the more they approach to a universal language the better. The progress of statistics towards the universal may foreshadow the international in law, commerce, and, generally, in intercourse among communities and nations and the possibilities of universal peace. How long has the measuring of social and civil forces been subordinated to the problems of war? How long have war statistics been to the front? Why has not the time come to bring to the front statistics tending to peace, of which the educational are the most central and significant of other conditions, showing the power in their individual or collective capacity in respect to all that pertains to human progress

1 National Council of Education-Proceedings, 1887, p. 60.

in every department? Is not this precisely what has been going on for these fifty years? Compare educational statistics of to-day with those fifteen years old. The United States are in the way to lead in perfecting educational statistics. Are our institutions to be preserved? The knowledge of their value, the signs which point out the causes and prevention of peril, must be in possession of the people. Our affairs are not to be directed by a king or a class, but by a majority of all the people. Therefore the people, all the people, should be constantly studious of the vital interests which these statistics represent. Do farmers and seamen watch the storm signals? Every citizen should watch the signals of sociology. How stands the barometer of intelligence? Whither tend the currents? What are their velocity and force? No citizen should be ignorant or indifferent. He should not only see how his child or neighborhood stands, what the details of these facts are in themselves, but how they compare with others and with the best standards. This would have some effect on the universal boasting that my class, my school, my college, my city, my State is the best,-which we have ad nauseam.

6. The aiming towards larger or more universal bearings of statistics in education need not, and should not, take from their local meaning or lessons; but should add to them by affording larger range of comparisons. Each school, each district, ward, town, parish, borough, or city or county, each seminary, academy, college, university, should keep its statistics so as to accord with all others of similar character in its State; and each State should so keep its records as to compare in certain important particulars with those of every other State in our Union; indeed, every nation may so keep its statistics that they may have some accord, some fair ground of comparison, with those of every other nation.

7. Statistics of education should be, in form and nomenclature, not only to be compared with themselves, but with statistics representing other sociological conditions. They should not only show what the school attendance and the school work performed are in a given civil unit, district, ward, city, etc., but what the school population is; and at once furnish a safe basis of comparison, first as to illiteracy, second as to morals, crime, etc., third as to health, sickness, longevity, and so forth.

8. It should not be forgotten that statisties of education in the United States are not primarily authoritatively secured by the same agency; and in bringing them into comparison, all essential differences should be regarded. The nation has gathered certain facts about education for a series of decades; each State, also, now has its statistics of education; moreover, certain municipalities report special items for their own benefit; besides, private institutions, whether chartered or not, have their own way of making the facts about themselves known. The National Bureau of Education, an agency for collecting and publishing statistics of education, has issued annually a Report since 1870; all reports to it are voluntary. But it has sought to utilize all authoritative collections of educational data and to give to each statement or collection the actual value of the authority or source from which it was derived. The Bureau has drawn from the United States censuses, State censuses, city school reports, and the authorized statements made by all classes of institutions. During the time of half a generation in which this work has gone forward systematically year by year, the points for constant consideration above enumerated have been kept in mind, and greater and greater approximation to them has been secured. Is it not time to revise what has already been accomplished and to take a step forward?

9. In working toward any ideal of statistics, it should be remembered how much is dependent upon legislation, and under what a variety of difficulties it must be accomplished in Congress, in the several States and Territories, and in numerous municipalities.

10. The great advantage of a national initiative is the last point that I wish to enumerate in this preliminary statement of the points for constant consideration in the statistics of education. If this council can agree thus far, may it not be prepared to go forward at a future time in a specific enumeration of what educational statistics should include, and in what periods and in what manner they should be recorded, collected, and published?

More accurate and reliable under a township system.-Superintendent Raab, of Illinois: "What is true in mechanical affairs is equally true in intellectual affairs-the simpler the machinery the more effective it is, and the less liable to get out of order. The gathering of the general and financial statistics of the schools of the State, as at present conducted, is a difficult task, and their accuracy is in an inverse ratio to the difficulties under which it is accomplished. To most boards of directors, because it is an unusual task to them, the reports to the trustees cause a great deal of annoyance, and because the work is done unwillingly the reports are made late, thus preventing the boards of trustees from making their reports to the county superintendents in time. What an amount of time and labor could be saved, and how much could the accuracy and reliability of these statistics be increased, if one report from each township were to be made to the county superintendent, embracing in one document the data which now have to be collected by from six to ten boards of directors."

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