PENNSYLVANIA.

BY NATHAN C. SCHAEFFER.

THE SCHOOL SYSTEM.

The law providing for the establishment of a system of common schools was enacted in 1834. It was amended in 1836. By its provisions every township, borough, and city was made a school district under the management of a board of directors or controllers. In the townships and smaller boroughs the number of directors is six. In most of the larger boroughs and the cities the number varies according to the number of wards into which the municipality has been divided.

The power to fix the amount of tax for school purposes is vested in the school board in all cities except Philadelphia, where the levy is made by councils. The maximum annual tax for school maintenance is 13 mills, but the law allows an additional tax for building purposes, which must in no case exceed the amount levied for school maintenance. A tax not exceeding 1 mill may be assessed for library purposes.

School boards are vested with power to select school sites, build schoolhouses, grade the schools, employ the teachers, adopt the text-books and the courses of study, furnish free text-books and supplies, and organize in townships as a board of health during the prevalence of epidemics or contagious diseases. They are further charged with the duty of enforcing the law which makes attendance at school compulsory for all persons between the ages of 8 and 13, and of others between 13 and 16 who can not read and write the English language intelligently or are not regularly engaged in some useful employment or service.

Orthography, reading, writing, ⚫English grammar, geography, arithmetic, history of the United States, and physiology and hygiene must be taught in every district. Provision is made for such other branches as the board of directors may see fit to include in the curriculum. In addition to these branches the teachers must also have certificates of scholarship in elementary algebra and civil government; and no teacher is permitted to give instruction in branches not enumerated on his or her certificate.

Sub

The act creating the office of county superintendent was passed in 1854. sequently laws were enacted permitting cities, boroughs, and townships of 5,000 inhabitants to elect separate superintendents. The salaries of the county superintendents are paid out of a legislative appropriation, while those of the other superintendents are paid out of the treasuries of the school districts which elect them.

Before a school superintendent can be commissioned, it must be evident to the State superintendent that he possesses the literary and professional qualifications required by law. The term of office is three years. The election of the county superintendent is held at the county seat on the first Tuesday of May by a convention of school directors. No other State, county, or municipal elec

tion is held at the same time.

The system of holding annual teachers' institutes puts the whole responsibility for the success of the institute upon the superintendent, whose visits and examinations have made him familiar with the needs of his teachers, gives him funds adequate for securing the best available talent in the whole country, provides for the closing of the schools during the institute week, and gives the teachers the same compensation as if they were teaching.

The act providing for the establishment of State normal schools was passed in 1857. During the last year the thirteen State normal schools received $130,000 for maintenance and tuition, at the rate of $1.50 per week for every student willing to sign a pledge to teach two years in the public schools. The aggregate value of the buildings and equipment of these schools exceeds $4,000,000. The course of study covers three years.

The school department was made a separate department of the State government in the year 1857. Before that time the secretary of the Commonwealth was ex officio superintendent of common schools. The State superintendent is appointed for a term of four years, by the advice and consent of the senate.

For many years there was no definite high school policy. Cities and boroughs, indeed, organized and maintained efficient high schools, but it was only in 1895 that a general high school act was passed. In 1901 the policy of aiding township high schools by State appropriation was inaugurated. During the school year 1903-4, 163 township high schools received aid in this way, and the number is rapidly increasing. The courses of study cover from two to four years, according to the needs and resources of the community in which the high school is located. The total number of high schools in the State is 630.

The growth of the system has exceeded the most sanguine expectations of its founders. According to the statistical report for the school year ending June 1, 1903, it gave employment to 31,449 teachers, and furnished school facilities to 1,193,669 pupils. The total expenditure for that year was $24,354,888.23. The estimated value of the school property was $68,523,701.44.

THE EXHIBIT.

The educational exhibit of Pennsylvania presents the ordinary work of many schools in their different grades, with courses of study, etc. The kindergarten and manual training schools are particularly well represented. Photographs are, of course, a prominent feature of the display. A fine oil painting of Thaddeus Stevens, loaned by the Lancaster school board, is prominent upon the wall at one end of the section and properly challenges the attention of the visitor. It is here to commemorate the great fact in the school history of Pennsylvania that, in 1835, he prevented the repeal of the law for the establishment of common schools which had been enacted the year before, mainly through the efforts of another son of New England, Hon. Samuel Breck. Over the pillared entrances on each of the inner sides of the inclosure there is a splendid showing of historic portraits loaned by the department of public instruction; on one side Samuel Breck, Thomas H. Burrowes, Henry L. Diffenbach, and charles R. Coburn, and on the other, facing these, J. P. Wickersham, Elnathan Elisha Higbee, David J. Waller, and Nathan C. Schaeffer. These lifelike portraits, heavily framed in gold, in pleasing contrast with the dark background upon which they hang, occupy a commanding position and attract rauch attention. 1. The committee on education of the Louisiana Purchase Exposition Commission, in June, 1903, appointed as director of education for Pennsylvania at the exposition Supt. Addison L. Jones, of Westchester, who at once formulated plans for the collection and installation of an educational exhibit from the public schools. The plans were submitted to and accepted by Col. James H. Lambert, executive officer of the commission, and the committee on education. A circular letter containing addresses by State Supt. Nathan C. Schaeffer and Colonel Lambert to school officers and teachers, and rules for the preparation of exhibits, was prepared and sent out to all superintendents and other school officers early in September, 1903.

At a meeting of the normal school principals and the directors at Harrisburg

it was decided that the normal schools should make a collective exhibit. A committee in each school was appointed and their work was well performed. This is the first world's fair in which all of the normal schools bave been represented.

Nearly all of the material for the exhibit was collected in Westchester by. March 1, 1904. To arrange the matter and install it at St. Louis two assistants to Superintendent Jones were appointed, Alicia M. Zierden, a graduate of Bucknell University and a teacher in the schools of Dubois, was made first assistant. Miss Zierden had done valuable work in the department of education in the expositions at Buffalo and Charleston. Prof. T. L. Gibson, formerly superintendent of Cambria County, and more recently an institute instructor, assisted in the preparation and installation of the material.

Supt. Edward Brooks, of Philadelphia, began early to make preparations for the best city exhibit the schools could prepare. He appointed committees in the different departments of the school system. The commission gave onefourth of the entire block allotted to the State to the schools of this city. The space was small, but the display is greatly admired.

The Philadelphia erhibit. The kindergarten exhibit was intended to represent the progress of the kindergarten idea up to the present time. It consisted of work of children in public kindergartens, representing a sequence of a year's work as arranged in the programme authorized by the director of kindergartens; also a series of papers explaining the principles and methods of Froebel's philosophy as applied in the gifts, accompanied by drawings showing their application in the practical work with the children. In detail it represented the mathematical analysis of the gift work in sewing and original expressions of the children on this basis; original work in weaving, sequences in paper folding, paper cutting, original illustrations of kindergarten stories in drawing, and “color work" from models with brush and pencil. A typical programme of a month's work in the kindergarten contained an outline of a morning talk, games, gift, and occupation exercises, accompanied with drawings illustrating the details.

The exhibit of the elementary schools consisted of papers on language, arithmetic, geography, history and civics, physiology and hygiene, together with work in drawing and sewing, kindergarten work, etc.

The papers on language showed the successful application of the idea that in the correlation of studies language should be made the central study, and that history and literature on the one hand, and "nature study" on the other hand, should be grouped around this center. The work is characterized by another educational maxim placed prominently on our exhibit, "Language is the instrument of thought and the medium of expression." The influence of these two principles was manifest in the language work of our exhibit.

The exhibit in arithmetic was characterized, first, by the fact that the muchlauded Grube system had been discarded for a more natural and logical system called the "normal system," and, second, by the prevalence of that analytic method of thought and operation which has done so much to revolutionize instruction in arithmetic in this country. The work ranged from the elementary processes of the first grade to mensuration and the elements of algebra in the eighth grade. The business applications of arithmetic were made prominent in the exercises.

The papers in geography showed the coordination of political and physical geography in the treatment of each individual country or State, and the influence of physical conditions on plant and animal life and upon the occupations, characteristics, and the welfare of mankind. In case of the United States

these influences were correlated with the history of the country, especially in respect to the State of Pennsylvania.

The work in physiology and hygiene represented the general character of class-room work in the Philadelphia schools. The work included, first, a description of the body as a whole; second, the bony framework; third, the muscular system; fourth, the digestive system; fifth, the blood and its circulation; sixth, the lungs and respiration; seventh, the skin and its functions; eighth, the nervous system and the special senses.

The papers on history indicated the methods and purpose of teaching this branch in the public schools. Those in the primary grades related to some prominent event in our country's history or to the deeds of its great men. The main object of the teaching, in these as well as in the other grades, is to cultivate a love for the study and a desire to learn more of our country's history, rather than to fix in the memory a certain number of facts or dates. Biography is made the basis of historical study in these grades. In the grammar grades more attention is given to events and those larger movements that indicate the Progress of the nation.

The sewing exhibit of the pupils, placed in a large glass case at the entrance to the Philadelphia section, consisted of specimens of plain and fancy sewing and dressmaking by the pupils of the elementary schools, ranging from 8 to 14 years. The exhibit included lace handkerchiefs, fancy underwear, beautiful and dainty dresses, etc.

The exhibit in drawing consisted of SO mounts, 22 by 28 inches, containing an average of 10 drawings to each mount, part of which were displayed openly, the remainder being contained in two wall cabinets. In addition there were S bound volumes containing over 1,300 drawings. The drawings exhibited were selected from the work of all grades, and consisted of drawings of leaves, sprays, plants, common objects, etc., executed in colored chalks and crayons in the lowest grades, and in pencil, pen and ink, and water colors in the highest grades.

The exhibit of the Public Industrial Art School consisted of: (1) Drawings and designs in monochrome and colors, water color sketches, and charcoal drawings; (2) clay models, conventional forms and designs, nature forms in low relief and in the round; (3) wood carvings; (4) photographs of children at work in the various class rooms.

The pupils of the school are drawn from the fifth to the eighth year of the public schools, and attend one session of two hours each week in the after

noon.

The Central Manual Training School (William A. Sayre, A. M., principal) and the Northeast Manual Training School (Dr. Andrew J. Morrison, principal) united in the exhibit of manual work. In the manual work of the exhibit, which is a distinctive feature of these schools, each exercise involves a mechanical principle, and the chief object of the instruction is the development of this principle rather than a finished piece of work.

The aim is to teach the pupil to express his thought in a concrete form with the least waste of time and material and in accordance with the most approved methods.

Principles involved in the exercises are explained, and the elementary stages of the work at the bench, the forge, or the machine are gone through with by the instructors. Free-hand blackboard sketches are freely used. Mechanical shapes and units are designed to familiarize the student with types and methods of construction.

The exhibit of the Central High School of Philadelphia is designed to give to those interested in public education a fairly satisfactory conception of the

plant itself, its history and development, its methods, and the part it plays in the civic, economic, and literary life of the city of whose educational system it forms the apex.

The plant itself—the building and equipment, confessedly the largest and most complete in the United States-is illustrated by a series of photographs exhibiting every detail, exterior and interior, class rooms, laboratories, and the magnificently equipped observatory. The various departmental exhibits show well the work done in the several lines of instruction which they represent.

As a school is to be judged only by its results and effects upon the community, the intellectual activities and achievements of its body of alumni are represented in some degree by the large library of works which have proceeded from their pens. It is enough to say that many of the greatest names in the literature and in the political, scientific, and professional life of our entire country are there represented.

In the exhibit of the Philadelphia Normal School every department of work is represented. A careful study of the 64 pages of its leaf catalogue and of its bound volumes, physical apparatus, and manual work will give a good idea not only of the aim of the school, but also of the educational tasks accomplished. Each department tells its own story by picture and text, but besides this, by a well-devised scheme of graphics, the number of hours devoted to each subject, the cost and running expenses of the school, and other valuable information may be obtained at a glance. Few normal schools contain such finely equipped laboratories, and these, together with the large and well-arranged class rooms, are shown by many photographs. All departments present a carefully arranged course of study. In some departments, notably literature, this, from the nature of the case, is the only exhibit. In many cases the course of study is made clear by notebooks, papers, maps, and other illustrative material, the work of the students.

Other exhibits.-The exhibit of Pennsylvania, so far as the public schools outside of Philadelphia are concerned, is composite. The best work of a grade is put together, so that the State is the unit of the exhibit rather than the school district. The work of all the kindergartens appears together, likewise that of the first grade, and so on through the grades. The high school and normal school products have been arranged by subjects, the papers from each branch appearing in a cabinet. Where there is sufficient work from a district, it is installed together, always with the name of city or district plainly marked and the name of the child on every article contributed.

The display is made on the inside walls of the booth, in leaf cabinets, base stands, and special show cases, and is classified under the heads of work from ungraded and graded rural schools, graded city schools, manual training, normal, and special schools. In portfolios and on the walls there are about 3,000 photographs of school buildings, interiors with children at work and at play; manual classes at sewing, basketry, weaving, in the shops, and in the gardens; plans and drawings in full of model rural school buildings; evolution of the schoolhouse, showing the first log building and its successors until the modern school structure is reached; noted places and buildings in Pennsylvania history.

Most of the written work and some drawings from the respective grades are nicely bound in cloth, each subject by itself, labeled with the branch and frequently with the district. In nearly all the volumes are found teachers' statements, describing in full the method of teaching, with other information necessary to a full understanding of the work and its value in a system of education. There are about 900 volumes and portfolios.

There are series of charts showing graphically the growth and extent of highschool instruction, teachers' tenure of office and salaries; progress and extent