The consolidated rural school

1)!'

{ < , ?

• ;''. '

!) J !.

' t

u

[1. ^

Digitized by the Internet Archive

in 2008 with funding from

IVIicrosoft Corporation

http://www.archive.org/details/consolidatedruraOOraperich

« C »' t " c t' C • c

iS:^SM=^!kA

^THE

CONSOLIDATED RURAL
SCHOOL ^

EDITED BY

LOUIS W. RAPEER ^
w

PRESIDENT, RESEARCH UNIVERSITY

PRESIDENT, FEDERATION FOR AMERICAN CHILDHOOD

WASHINGTON, D. C.

ILLUSTRATED

CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

NEW YORK CHICAGO BOSTON

Mai.

Copyright, 1920, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS

^.

^i^^((3

PREFACE

The value of co-operation in place of individualism is
rapidly rising in the consciousness of the American people.
For many reasons we are far more closely related to more
people of the world than formerly and are more conscious of
the relationship. This expansion of personality is ready
to-day to conceive and to realize feelingly the brotherhood
of man and both national and world citizenship. The ad-
joining farms or nearest small villages do not circumscribe
the breadth of our interests, acquaintance, nor economic
exchange. To-day we think more in terms of the county,
the State, the nation, and the world, instead of provincially
limiting ourselves to the farm and the little one-room school
district.

The automobile, telephone, good roads, trolley cars, news-
papers, magazines, and larger administrative participation
tend greatly to widen the area of our social connections.
The stupendous world war with its unprecedented stimulus
to close national organization of railroads, agriculture, and
manufacturing, with all their implications of sacrificing indi-
vidualism to social efficiency, has sent the world, and espe-
cially America, a long way toward a desirable organization
of. all of each nation's forces. The consolidated rural school
is part and partner of this broader socialization and integra-
tion. It stands for educational efficiency in the interests of
the nation and humanity by means of a greater degree of
co-operation and organization over a wider area of territory.

Already thousands of such schools have displaced the
little one-room structures of restricted neighborhoods and
mental outlooks from sea to sea. Every State has done

IV PREFACE

something to develop such schools and a considerable body
of literature has appeared in the form of reports, magazine
accounts, and isolated chapters in books, describing more or
less accurately this new and important type of educational
advancement. Along with the larger, graded school, taking
the place of as many as ten or more single-room schools of
the pioneer type with transportation of pupils for long, dis-
tances, frequently five or more miles from all directions, we
find developing also at the consolidated-school centre such
strategic factors as a school farm, a home for the principal
teacher and his family, homes for other teachers and janitor
on the school property, the integration of the village trading
centre and farms, an increased use of the school as a com-
munity centre, especially where a good auditorium is pro-
vided, and a very much closer adaptation of the work of the
school to definitely social and particularly rural needs.

These remarkable transformations are worthy of the
closest study, interpretation, and publicity. Isolated reports,
surveys, and single chapters fail to do justice to the theme
and fail also in acquainting many people with this type of
solution of the great rural-school problem. We greatly need
a first-class, thoroughgoing book, based on investigation,
nation-wide acquaintance with this type of School, and thor-
oughly and cautiously worked out and illustrated. Such a
volume few busy educators have time to produce. Feeling
the need, however, the editor has done his best in producing
such a volume by the method of co-operation of specialists
found successful in other volumes of this series. We do not
hesitate to pioneer and open up the way for more thorough-
going works in the future. Our purpose is practical, directed
to immediate and wide publicity of a very worthy hypothesis
for the solution of a very grave problem, how to secure better
rural education in this democracy.

The volume is based on rather definite aims of education
and on a social theory of the function of the rural public
school. The general aim held is that of social efficiency

PREFACE V

while the subordinate aims under which may be grouped the
principal needs of country people and the principal problems
of life which they solve well or ill somewhat according to the
nature of the schooling which they receive are analyzed as:
(i) Vital efficiency, (2) vocational efficiency, (3) avocational
efficiency, (4) civic efficiency, and (5) moral efficiency. These
are the fundamental goals of each chapter and are treated
explicitly in the chapters on the programme of studies. If
the principal problems of life lie in these fields then it is the
business of education to make minimal essentials those school
activities which produce efficiency in solving them. How
children may be changed physically and mentally by suitable
methods to secure these five efficiencies of character is treated
briefly in two chapters on the learning and teaching processes.

We have selected a few of the leading specialists and suc-
cessful workers in this field to help in the production of a
first volume on the consolidated rural school. This method
of co-operation needs no defense. It has long been success-
fully used by the medical profession and others, and has
demonstrated its utility in education by a number of good
books, among which we may mention the volumes by Pro-
fessor Paul Monroe and the lamented Professor Charles
Hughes Johnston, and our own "Educational Hygiene" and
''Teaching Elementary School Subjects." Another volume
written by the editor alone, on ''Rural School Hygiene,"
will in part also treat of the consoUdated school.

The editor here expresses his warm appreciation for the
assistance of the contributors, of the many who have fur-
nished photographs and data from personal experiences, of
Doctor Harold W. Foght while in the United States Bureau
of Education, and of his wife, Frances Chandler Rapeer.

L. W. R.

Washington, D. C, January, 1920.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER PAGB

I. National and Rural Consolidation .... i

By Louis W, Rapeer, M.A., Ph.D., Director, National School of So-
cial Research, and President of Federation for American Childhood,
Washington, D . C . Author of ' ' School Health Administration, ' ' ' ' The
Administration of School Medical Inspection," Coauthor and Editor
of "Educational Hygiene," "Teaching Elementary School Subjects,"
and "How to Teach the Elementary School Subjects"; Associate
Editor of American Education and of the American Journal of School
Hygiene.

II. The American Rural School 21

By Philander P. Claxton, Litt.D., LL.D., United States Commis-
sioner of Education, Washington, D. C. Joint Author of "Effective
English" and of numerous government reports.

III. Community Organization and Consolidation .

By Warren H. Wilson, Ph.D., Professor of Rural Education, Teachers
College, Columbia University, New York City.

. V

IV. Rural Economics and Consolidation .... 66 ( —

By T. N. Carver, Ph.D., Professor of Economics, Harvard University,
Cambridge, Mass. Author of "Rural Economics" and "Readings
in Riural Economics."

V. School Administration and Consolidation . . 91 L-

By the Editor.

VI. The Growth of Consolidation 108

By Major A. C. Monahan, B.S., Sometime Specialist in Rural Educa-
tion, United States Bureau of Education, Assistant Director of Re-
construction in Hospitals, United States Army, Washington, D. C.
Author of numerous government bulletins such as "The Consolidation
of Rural Schools" and "Transportation of Pupils at Public Expense."
vii

Vlll CONTENTS

CHAPTER PACK

VII. A Visit to a Consolidated School .... 130

By Katherine M. Cook, Specialist in Rural Education, United States
Bureau of Education, Washington, D, C. Formerly State Superin-
tendent of Public Instruction of Colorado. Author and Coauthor of
numerous government bulletins such as "Rural School Supervision
in the United States," "Surveys of the school systems of Alabama,
Colorado, Wyoming," and "A Manual of Educational Legislation."

^ VIII. The Consolidated-School Site and Its Use . 149

By A. C. MoNAHAN and the Editor.

IX. The Consolidated-School Building .... 166

By the Editor.

X. The Teacherage 190

By the Editor.

XI. Transportation of Pupils at Public Expense . 208

By A. C. MONAHAN.

iy^ XII. Methods and Facts of Consolidation . . . 239

By W. S. FoGARTV, County Superintendent of Preble County, Ohio,
Lee F. Driver, County Superintendent of Randolph County,
Indiana, A. C. Fuller, Jr., State Inspector of Rural Schools
of Iowa, A. M. Merrill, Principal, Jordan High School, Sandy,
Utah, C. G. Sargent, Professor of Education, Colorado Agricul-
tural College, Fort CoUins, Colorado, and Superintendent C. H.
Skidmore, Granite School District, Salt Lake County, Utah.

XIII. The Curriculum of the Consolidated School. 284

By the Editor.

XIV. The Curriculum of the Consolidated School

(Continued) 301

By the Editor.

1/ XV. Rural-Life Needs and College-Entrance De-
mands 317

By the Editor.

XVI. The Outside of the Cup— Relative Values in

English Instruction 344

By the Editor.

CONTENTS IX

CHAPTER PAGE

XVII. Learning Processes of Country Children . . 364

By the Editor.

XVIII. The Teaching Process in the Consolidated

School 392

By the Editor.

XIX. The Country Girl and the Consolidated

School 425

By Katherine M. Cook.

XX. Rural Recreation and Consolidation . . . 444

By the Editor.

XXI. The Difficulties of Consolidation . . . . 475

By L. J. Hanifan, M.A., State Supervisor of Rural Schools, Charles-
town, West Virginia. Author of "Social and Community Ac-
tivities."

XXII. The New Consolidated School 497 ^

By the Editor.

Bibliography on Consolidation 520

Index 543

ILLUSTRATIONS

A corn project — Instruction in cultivation, Virginia Frontispiece

FACING PAGE

Country boys at practical work 12

Building a silo. A project in farm mechanics in Minnesota 12

A nineteenth-century school and twentieth-century fanning implements

side by side 24

A brooder and laying house, Berks County, Pa . 40

Poultry club work of Pennsylvania State College 40

A home-made brooder 40

Cast of "Midsummer Night's Dream" as presented by the school children

of Rockingham, N. C 60

A school assembly room 60

Learning how to prune an orchard 76

An orchard project 76

Animal-husbandry study at first-hand 84

Pupils studying tree grafting at Sherrard, West Virginia 84

Studying alfalfa at first-hand 98

Learning to judge cattle in club work 98

A home project with seed com 98

A Wyoming consolidated school 114

A type of many abandoned pioneer schools 114

A consolidated school, Woodstown, N. J 118

From five to twenty such structures may be eliminated by one consoli-
dated school 118

The Colorado school visited by Mrs. Cook 134

zi

XU ILLUSTRATIONS

FACING PAGE

A movable partition for auditorium use, Cache La Poudre school ... 134

Girls gaining domestic eflficiency 142

Practical sewing for Colorado girls 142

A model bam in North Carolina 152

A model bam at a country-life school 152

Play at a consolidated school, Preble County, Ohio 158

Supervised play at a consolidated school in Marion County, Ohio ... 158

A one-story building erected at Aberdeen, Washington 174

An attractive building and site 184

A neat example of the two-story type with basement 184

A modest teacherage in West Virginia 204

A good bam for horses, vans, bicycles, auto-busses, and other vehicles,

Preble County, Ohio 218

Ten in a row ready for the home trip, Preble County, Ohio 218

A start toward farm carpentry 248

Bird houses constructed in Preble County Schools, Ohio 248

Agriculture is the central subject in rural education 294

A class in botany at a summer school 294

Members of the Boys' Com Club with agent explaining the root system,

Alabama 298

A school agricultural exhibit in the Philippines 298

A domestic arts exhibit 308

A day of recreation in the mountains 308

Grading and testing com in a school laboratory, West Virginia 320

A class in soil study in Wisconsin 320

Farm mechanical drawing in a Maryland school 320

The library wagon of Washington County, Maryland, stopping at a farm-
house 356

A well used library room 35^

A small printing outfit is a great help in English and m community spirit 362

ILLUSTRATIONS Xlll

PACING PAGE

Pig-club work in Pennsylvania 372

Stud)dng a milking-machine 372

A lesson on the horse 372

Teachers learning vegetable gardening at a summer school 398

Giving the girls a chance at West Alexandria, Ohio 398

Outdoor group games for girls at the Cache La Poudre consolidated school 434

A canning-club girl, Oregon 434

A garden project by Girl Scouts 440

A field day in Preble County, Ohio 460

Junior orchestra, ages 6 to 12 470

Vital efl&ciency through physical education is emphasized in all Philippine

schools 470

Students in costumes for a play which they produced in connection with

their graduation exercises, Manila, P. 1 492

Float representing the San Andres primary school in the floral parade,

Philippine carnival, Manila, 1915 493

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL
SCHOOL

CHAPTER I
NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. What have been some of the principal effects on democracy of

the Great War?

2. What is a democracy and in what ways is it superior to autocracy?

3. What are some of the principal weaknesses of our democracy?

4. In what ways can public schools promote the best democracy?

5. What are the relative advantages and disadvantages of rural and

urban life ? "

6. What are some of the principal problems and needs of country

people as you know them? Classify these needs under the fol-
lowing headings:
(i) Health and physical-development needs.

(2) Economic and vocational needs.

(3) Recreational and avocational needs.

(4) Civic and co-operative needs.

(5) Moral and religious needs.

7. In what ways do the single-room schools help and fail to help sig-

nificantly in the solution of the above rural-life problems?

8. What is your present conception of a consolidated school? On

what is this conception based?

9. What is the best type of consoHdated school of which you have

knowledge ?
10. To the solution and satisfaction of which of the above rural-life
problems and needs might a first-class consolidated school be
expected to contribute?

I. The Present Rapid Increase of Social Integration

National Consolidation. — The World War has worked
unprecedented transformations in the organization of Ameri-
can life. Individualism and competition were the great

2 tflE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

economic and civic watchwords of the period before. Hu-
man brotherhood, universal democracy, world citizenship, a
league of nations, and co-operation for social efficiency are
the watchwords to-day. We have witnessed the interesting
social anomaly of the Supreme Court of the United States
prosecuting and fining corporations for co-operation and
integration on a large scale and at the same time arranging
with the individual members of the corporations for a greater
and stronger co-operative organization and a more rigorous
setting of prices than ever. The old Antitrust Sherman Law,
on the one hand, and the organization of all the railroads of
the country under a single government head, on the other,
represent the rapid and inevitable change of view-point.
The war has done for us in a few years what perhaps a
century would not have accomplished in making us a united,
organized, purposeful, and efficient nation.^

A tremendous centralization of government has sudden-
ly taken place, never to decentralize to our former status.
Our young men have been taken from their homes, their
factories, and their farms, and have been sent by the hun-
dred thousand to Europe *'to make the world safe for de-
mocracy"; the government has taken over many entire
industries, nation-wide in scope, such as the railroads men-
tioned, and has integrated and ruled them as a unit and
with a firm hand; prices have been set for all the principal
commodities; and both production and consumption have
been interfered with and regulated in the interest of national
welfare to an extent formerly deemed utterly impossible ex-
cept in a socialistic state. As the federal government has
become entirely dominant and masterful in the nation, so,
too, the individual State governments have drawn to them-
selves extensive powers formerly thought to be the posses-

1 See address by the late President Charles R. Van Hise on " Some Eco-
nomic Aspects of the World War," as published in Science for January 4 and
II, 1918, and his "Conservation and Regulation in the United States During
the World War," published by the Food Administration, Washington, D. C.

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 3

sion of smaller governmental units or of individuals them-
selves. The nation and each unit of the nation, be it State,
county, or township, has become to a large extent a mighty
organized team of workers with a single purpose doing a
great piece of work. Individuals joining such co-operative
groups both lose and gain by the process. Usually they gain
far more than they lose. In a democracy a fine balance be-
tween the individual and the state is maintained and its
government ever comes from the consent and co-operation
of the governed.

Becoming part of a great organization necessitates a
knowledge of the whole co-operative enterprise and the part
each plays in it; it necessitates trained habits of working co-
operatively with broadened views and purposes; it requires
of all that they use their initiative, originality, and energy
for the promotion of the ideals and aspirations of the group.
In such a world, with all the new and mighty engines and
instruments of transportation and communication available,
the social horizon of each person necessarily must be very
much broader than in the days when the members of a
family were practically all-sufficing, producing and consum-
ing all they needed, and finding little stimulus to wide ac-
quaintance and social give-and-take. Then the world was
vast and unknown, as in the time of Columbus and later, to
the provincial individualists on the little farm living unto
themselves. To-day the world is rapidly becoming smaller
and nearer to us all and it may safely be affirmed that a large
county, with its good roads, telephones, newspapers, rural
delivery, larger market, varied interchange of products and
specialization of labor even in farming, and better schools
with their wider view is, for all practical purposes, much
smaller to-day than was a township forty years ago. In
fact, for many thousands of people, a state with its many
counties is better and more intimately known than was
the township for the same number a few generations back.
The journey of a family of children to a consolidated rural

4 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

school five miles away in a school-owned and controlled
auto-bus or school-hack may be less of a journey with far
less hardship and exposure and with possibility of far better
attendance than the tramp through snow and mud, or even
over good roads, to the single-room "district" school of the
days gone by. As personahty grows large and social the
boundaries of the world recede until we become citizens of
the little community of the world. Not to feel this close-
ness and kinship argues our own limited social develop-
ment.

The City's Advantage. — The chief point of vigorous
growth and development in the United States has, however,
been not in the country but in the cities. It is in the cities
in the last fifty years that we have seen most of the decided
inventions and improvements in living. The best brains and
brawn of the country have flown thither several hundred
thousand strong each year. Arriving there these persons,
naturally individuahstic by farm-training and isolation, have
at first worked for themselves or at most for the city at the
expense of the country. Here practically all the noteworthy
developments in government, in sanitation, in association, in
recreation, in business, and in education have taken place.
The city has steadily beaten the country in competition.
The schools of the city have been the marvel of the rural
regions, and one of the chief reasons of many people for
"leaving the farm" has been to obtain the advantages of the
superior city schools. As a consequence of so many absentee
landlords of farms, we have the grave evil of wide-spread and
rapidly increasing farm tenantry, the "renters." Strange
as it may seem, city life has been made more attractive
for millions than country life. Even in health, the great city
of New York has surpassed the rest of the State with a
lower death-rate. The city has procured this attractiveness
by being open-minded, social, progressive, co-operative,
alert and inventive. The country has stood still or moved
more slowly because of the opposite of such qualities.

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 5

In the legislature, in the business deal, in enterprise, and
in the schools the city has achieved a marked advantage
over the country. The school buildings have been far more
sanitary and attractive; the courses of study have been
more closely related to the needs of life and more meaningful
to the pupils; the principal additions to the ordinary school-
ing have nearly all been made in the city; the teachers have
been much better trained, better paid, and have stayed in
the profession in many more instances until they have
learned to do well this most important work of modern
democratic governments; the school years have been longer;
attendance of pupils has been more punctual and regular;
medical supervision, physical education, vocational and
domestic education, art and musical education, have been
made regular parts of the school activities. The teachers
have not only been superior and more permanent but they
have had excellent supervision and training, both before
they have entered the schools and while in service — through
principals, supervisors, and superintendents. The leaders
of country children and youth, on the contrary, have been,
for the most part, young untrained girls who have never seen
superior teaching done, have never learned how to do it,
and who do not have the age and breadth of view, nor re-
main in the work long enough to get to be much more than
"blind leaders of the blind/' "The rural school has been a
little house, on a little ground, with a little equipment, where
a little teacher at a little salary, for a little while, teaches
Httle children little things." Such teachers, who, according
to Commissioner Claxton's figures in the next chapter, are
the typical teachers of the nation's rural schools, cannot give
pupils a wider view of life and the world to-day than they
themselves possess. If their horizon does not extend beyond
the adjoining farms the horizons of the children will not
except by chance extend farther. Such teachers necessarily
create ineffective provincials where they need to create
socially efficient citizens of the world.

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

II. The Rural-Education Problem and the
Consolidation Hypothesis

The Rural-Education Problem. — Some of the best minds
of our nation and others have wrestled with the problem of
how to improve rural education. The problem seems to
break up principally into the following analysis:

1. How can we get better and more permanent teachers?

2. How can we get better and more needed subject-matter?

3. How can we get better and more supervision and administra-
tion?

4. How can we get better and more buildings and equipment?

These usually resolve themselves into the problem:
How can we get more money for rural schools ? and its cor-
ollary, How can we get this money wisely spent?

The consolidated school is one hypothesis, or tentative
solution, for this great problem of how to secure more ef-
fective rural education and thus a higher type of country
life. The principal suggested solutions are, among others,
the ten following:

1. Strengthen the state departments of public education.

2. Provide compulsory laws for minimum salaries, terms, attend-
ance, etc.

3. Provide new sources of revenue for schools.

4. Provide a better distribution of the money now spent.

5. Strengthen the county departments of education in various
ways, and provide for the county unit where absent.

6. Provide for extensive supervision of teachers in rural schools.

7. Provide consolidated schools in place of the many single-room
schools.

8. Provide school-farms and a better living for the principal
teacher.

9. Provide transportation of pupils to large schools.

10. Provide for high-school, normal-school, and other professional
training for rural teachers.

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 7

Many different solutions in actual practice as schools are
to be found scattered over the United States.^

Now all of these are good. Probably all are necessary.
We can get fairly good schools without consolidation and its
concomitants. County Superintendent Cook of Baltimore
County, Maryland, has undoubtedly obtained fairly good
schools without consolidation, through extensive and pro-
fessional supervision and a number of the other nine fac-
tors. Consolidation is hard to secure in many places and in
some spots it is probably undesirable. We should like to
take the space and time to analyze the advantages and dis-
advantages of each of the ten typical solutions mentioned
above and compare them with the aim of selecting the single
solution or group of solutions which has most of advantage
and least of disadvantages. Before proceeding further some
definition may be desirable.

A consolidated rural school may be defined tentatively
as a school produced by bringing together the pupils of two
or more single-room or othe^ schools in a graded school of
at least two rooms and two teachers for the purpose of better
educational advantages. It is of various types and increases
in excellence as it adds various features. Such additions
may be listed as follows:

1. Classrooms — from two to many.

2. With but the upper grades to an entire elementary school and
high school.

3. From no assembly-room and study-hall to excellent ones.

4. From no rooms for agriculture and household arts to excellent
ones.

5. From no laboratories for the sciences to one or more for each.

6. From no lunch-room to an excellent one.

7. From no gymnasium, shower-baths, and outdoor-play appara-
tus to full equipment.

8. From outdoor privies to best modem indoor flush toilets.

» See Monahan's bulletin of the U. S. Bureau of Education on Consolida-
tion and Foght's "The Rural Teacher and His Work" (Macmillan).

8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

9. From no office for principal or teachers' retiring-rooms up to
the best for both sexes and an excellent office with waiting-room.

10. From small grounds of less than an acre up to a site with fifty
or more.

11. From no transportation of pupils up to the best, in exhaust-
heated, glass-lighted auto-vans.

12. From no teachers' and principal's cottages, or teacherages, up
to the best.

13. From no experimental and demonstration use of land up to
best.

14. From no good ruralized course of study up to the best.

15. From poor, inexperienced, inadequately trained teachers up to
best normal and college graduates.

The list might easily be extended as a class exercise.

The first-class consolidated school, serving an area re-
quiring pupils to be en route either way no longer than an
hour as a maximum when transported at public expense,
seems to combine more advantages and fewer disadvantages
than any other solution, covers more of the other solutions,
and does so with greater economy for the results obtained
than any other. For brevity, we list below some of its chief
advantages and disadvantages which might easily be ex-
tended, expanded, and discussed at length.

ni. Superior Consolidation and Its Advantages

Some Advantages of First-Class Consolidation. — i. It
greatly widens the acquaintance groups uniting several
small or partial communities into one, and so broadens the
individuals socially, and meets the imperative demand for a
broadening of economic and social co-operation. Pupils
who go to school together from an area ten miles or more in
diameter for five to twelve years, through elementary and
high school in many cases, will possess in adult life a neigh-
borhood much larger and richer in its relationships than the
narrow one produced by the one-room school. Where this
consolidated area is a natural, economic, racial, transporta-

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 9

tional, and distributional unit, as it should be, we have an
area as large as a Western township or larger developed into
a neighborhood.

2. It provides inevitably for better educational, econom-
ic, and social leadership. The larger school with from one
to several hundred pupils must be placed under strong
management and wise leadership. It necessitates from the
nature of the case a man or woman as principal teacher and
supervisor, with a strong personality and good educational
training. As soon as the strategic importance of this post
is recognized, there will be the inevitable demand that the
principal give his entire time, winter and summer, to the
school and the community, and be an educational, agricul-
tural, and social leader. This immediately involves a home
for the principal on the school property and a school-farm.
The free use of the teacherage and the farm will add some-
thing to what should be a good money salary, not less than
a hundred dollars a month, twelve months in the year, and
thus make it possible to obtain and retain a man with a
family who has been trained in education, agriculture, rural
economics and sociology, and in the elements of rural
leadership, a man with at least a bachelor's degree from a
good agricultural college. Since the farm and teacherage
can be purchased at once or through bonds at the time the
school building is erected, a fair share of the principal's
pay has been provided for at the beginning without the
usual annual financial agony. Under the one-room system
there seems to be no way by which a sufficient salary for
each teacher can be secured when paid as annual or monthly
wages. House-rent and the free use of the farm and its
products may soon be taken as a matter of course, to which
a good salary is to be added.

3. More professional teachers subordinate to the prin-
cipal will be procured and developed. Such a principal will
not be satisfied with young-girl novices, a new one each year,
without education, experience, training, or vision, to prac-

lO THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tise on the children. He will have an opportunity to con-
vince the school board of the economy of superior teachers
at any salary necessary to obtain them. His graded school
with its better division of labor and opportunity for special-
ization by the department plan, each teacher teaching a few
instead of many subjects, the contingent opportunity,
growing out of the nature of the situation, of living at a
good boarding-place in a house also erected on the school
property for the use of the unmarried women teachers, and
perhaps another for the single men teachers, the better
social opportunities for recreation and association, and the
fine opportunity to observe some good teaching and to get
frequent and professional supervision and help in becoming
a better teacher — these advantages add greatly to the value
of the position for a teacher; and for seven to twelve hundred
dollars a year real country-minded teachers can frequently
be secured as able as those in cities obtaining larger annual
salaries, although the consolidated school must usually equal
at least the city salary and the attractions there.

The one-room school has been entirely unable to procure
such teachers. Every consolidated-school teacher can be a
normal-school graduate and equipped perhaps with a year
or more of experience in a one-room school and in many cases
with some college work. Weekly teachers' meetings, read-
ing circles, a good school library, the presence of high-school
teachers in the same building, the constant study of com-
munity and general social needs, and the interest and free-
dom obtained by a new type of school for adjusting the
school to both the nature of children and society, will all
prove stimuli to growth not available in a smaller school
with an isolated teacher and children of all ages in all
grades. That first-class consolidated schools (not "cheap
imitations of the real thing") can secure such teachers the
statistics from many States, as indicated in succeeding chap-
ters, show. Break the ice of tradition with such a school
and people somehow release the grip on their purses and are

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION II

more ready to purchase a genuine rural education for their
children.

4. As suggested, high-school provisions may usually come
at the beginning or develop with such a school. The larger
area, the better attendance, the increased number of pupils
passing through the grades, the better opportunity to give
publicity to the desirability of secondary education, and
the greater interest and stimulus coming from numbers,
lead inevitably under good leadership to a vigorous high
school closely adapted to community welfare. That con-
solidation actually secures high schools and a vastly increased
high-school attendance over the one-room-school plan has
been amply demonstrated by reliable statistics. We be-
lieve that such a school is preferable to a county high school
with dormitories for girls and boys as are found in Mis-
sissippi, North Carolina, and elsewhere. Daily rides in a
school-bus are probably preferable to being away from
home at this age. If we are to realize the slogan of the
United States Bureau of Education and rise to the educa-
tional standard which the modern age is making imperative,
a high-school education for every hoy and girl, no other plan
seems to bring it more quickly and permanently in the
country and village than the consolidated school with free
transportation in school-owned vehicles.

5. Where such schools are established in large numbers
in a State, as in several States already, the inevitable ten-
dency will be for these high schools to increase the attendance
and service of agricultural colleges and normal schools, both of
which have a great dearth of students in comparison with
State and national needs. The demand of the times for
trained rural teachers and agriculturists and for real leaders
in these two supremely important lines is at present either
not met at all or but meagrely satisfied. Such schools more
and more guide pupils back to rural service. The con-
solidated school, in our judgment, is the hope of these im-
portant and fundamental higher schools and thus the hope

I

12 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of the country. What they should do in encouraging the
entrance of high-school graduates to their schools and courses
we suggest in a later chapter.

6. A better programme of studies can be provided, based
on social needs and the nature of mental and physical
growth in children. The range and quality of educational
activities in a one-room school are necessarily limited.
Nearly every factor in the situation hinders enrichment
and modernness here. Nothing is more fraught with prom-
ise fovr rural life than the many original experiments now
being carried on in these consolidated schools from Cali-
fornia to Maine and from Washington to Florida. Even the
Philippines and Alaska have important contributions to
suggest. Psychologically, a new country or a new type of
social institution, such as the consolidated school, clears
the ground of retarding tradition and opens the way for
progressive experiment and adjustment. Another chapter
by the editor enters more fully into the problem of the pro-
gramme of studies and rural-school curriculums. A city
school in the country is very far from our standard for this
new country school. The needs of life as determined by in-
telligent surveys of actual life furnish the starting-point
for real education, and rural needs are in many ways very
different from city needs.

7. A much-needed and better social centre for the
larger community is provided, or can be provided and
made possible, through the consolidated school. An audi-
torium and gymnasium, or the two combined, are becoming
standard features of such schools as of the best city schools.
The playground is larger and has more drawing power on
the community and pupils. The school-farm, however small,
is a source of interest, comment, instruction, and community-
meeting- together for agricultural conference. A motion-pic-
ture show in the auditorium is one of the chief recreations
of the people of many consolidated- school neighborhoods.
A glimpse of one in Ohio is given in a later chapter. The

Repioduced by courtesy oj Diuision of Agricultural Idstruction, U. S. Dept. of Agriculture

Building a silo. A project in farm mechanics in Minnesota

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 1 3

daily assembly in an auditorium can be made more
valuable to many pupils than their knowledge of any sub-
ject, and may legitimately be considered an important
subject of the curriculum. Indeed, auditorium activities
succeed best where the principal, faculty, and students give
as much time to preparation of this as to any one of the
regular subjects. School fairs, athletic meets, debating and
public-speaking societies, ''literaries," agricultural and other
exhibits, public voting, non-sectarian religious meetings,
and many other social-centre activities naturally take place
here in the single public building possessed by all the peo-
ple. The post-office is being located in a number of schools
and parcel-post buying and selling, eliminating large middle-
men profits, is being experimentally developed. This fea-
ture is also expanded in later chapters.

Many other advantages might profitably be discussed.
The enlarged social mind of the modern countryman who
gets about in his automobile over a wider range of territory
than his fathers and who is in connection by other means
with a great variety of persons and social activities easily
adapts itself to the consolidated school. Some difficulty
may be met in establishing such a school, but once estab-
lished it quickly becomes a part of the community life, even
as the motion-picture machine, the automobile, or any
other clearly desirable creation of the modern age, as the
following letter suggests:

Worcester, N. Y., Sept. 15, 1915.
Doctor Thomas E. Finegan,

AssL Commissioner, Education Department, Albany, N. Y.

Dear Sir: — I am owner of a farm in union free-school district
number 3, Otsego County, N. Y. In 1915 six school districts con-
solidated.

I was strongly opposed to the consolidation and to the new school
and I harbored resentment toward our district superintendent for
establishing it.

After one year's trial and observation I have changed my mind.
We are delighted with the new regime. Our twelve-year-old girl

14 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

passed Regents' examination in English, geography, arithmetic, and
United States history during the year. She is now entering the high-
school department.

For six teachers in poorly equipped buildings we have received
five normal-school and college graduates in one modern plant. The
work is now graded and scientifically conducted, while an auto-
mobile school-bus calls at our door daily to transport the children.
No one with a family to educate would willingly go back to the old
conditions. Very truly yours,

L. J. CoE.

A number of other similar letters from representative
patrons, pupils, and others in the State of New York may
be found in the annual report for 191 7 entitled *^ Elemen-
tary Education^' of the Education Department of the Uni-
versity of the State of New York. The volume, by the
way, h a mine of information on and illustrations of con-
solidation in that great State which until recently has been
doing comparatively little in this line. These letters could
be matched by correspondence from patrons in most parts
of the country. That by the time this chapter is read some
ten thousand or more such schools (with consequent aban-
donment of from fifty to a hundred thousand little schools)
will have been established is our best argument. After giv-
ing a summary of advantg,ges of consolidation, as expressed
by the present State Superintendent of North Dakota who
has had much experience in this field, we shall leave dis-
cussion of further advantages to later chapters.

A detailed statement of the benefits of consolidation:

1. Increases the attendance.

2. Makes the attendance more regular.

3. Increases the enrolment.

4. Keeps the older pupils in school longer.

5. Provides high school privileges at one-third the cost.

6. Makes possible the securing of better-trained teachers.

7. Results in higher salaries for better-trained teachers.

8. Makes possible more and better grade work.

9. Improves industrial conditions in the country.

10. Enriches the civic-social Ufe activities.

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 1 5

11. Conserves more largely the health and morals of the children.

12. Increases the number of eighth-grade completions.

13. Provides adequate supervision.

14. Reduces truancy and tardiness.

15. Develops better school spirit, i

16. Gives more time for recitations.

17. Increases the value of real estate.

18. Produces greater pride and interest in country life.

19. Prevents the drift to the larger towns and cities.

20. Brings more and better-equipped buildings.

21. Eliminates the small weak school.

22. Creates a school of greater worth, dignity, and usefulness.

23. Makes possible a more economical school.

24. Provides equal educational opportunities.

25. Gives much greater and better results in every way.

IV. The Disadvantages of the Consolidation
Hypothesis

The disadvantages, difficulties, and problems of the con-
solidated rural school are taken up in a later chapter and met
by convincing argument. We need not summarize them
here. The chapter may be read immediately if desired.
The hardest problem is to get a real consolidated school,
with complete or fairly complete plant, transportation, and
staff, established. After that it is its own best argument.
State aid, county administration, strong county superin-
tendents, and able publicity are desirable. The teacher is,
however, the single most important factor in education and
no consolidated or other school can be a success with poor
teachers. These teachers must have supervision, training
while in service, reasonable inducements to stay at the
school for a number of years, and satisfactory equipment.
The pupils should be gathered from a large enough taxing
and transportational area to make possible a good rural
graded school with high-school provisions. They should be
transported at public expense in first-class conveyances
under the best supervision obtainable. Supervision of the
recreation of the pupils in the auto or other bus is ^ot second

1 6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

in importance to such supervision at school or home. The
principal must be an educational and agricultural leader,
teacher, supervisor, and trainer of teachers.

Frequently where a consolidated school is found disap-
pointing or little better than the one-room system but few
such essentials are provided. The plant may be called a
consolidated school when it is little more than a two to
six room building for a large number of children who have
to walk long distances and be instructed by poor teachers
without supervision, using a course of study made for a
city-school system. This is like the disappointment aris-
ing from the purchase of an automobile without a top, side-
curtains, tires, tool-box, electric starter, instruction-book,
bumper, brakes, mud-guards, and so on. The thing is en-
titled to the name automobile, but automobiles in general
should not be judged by the performance of a poor, ignorant
driver with such a machine. A complete, first-class car and
a skilled chauffeur give durable satisfactions of a high order.
Later chapters give detailed descriptions of the kind of con-
solidated school that is worthy of the name and will furnish
a real rural-life education near the home farms.

V. Summarizing Principles

In Conclusion. — National consolidation of interests and
efforts are taking place on a gigantic scale and with great
rapidity due to the World War and stimulated enterprise.
The vast industrial activities of the country are being or-
ganized into combinations that tend to eliminate waste and
competitive inefficiency, but now under the leadership and
regulation of a democratic government instead of its active
opposition and hindering laws. If government regulation
fails or is less effective, everything considered, then gov-
ernment ownership, then nationalization or socialization, of
these enterprises will be undertaken as the government has
already taken over the postal service, much of the express

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 1 7

business in the parcel-post, the schools, water-supplies, and
many other natural monopolies. The prices and distribu-
tion of wheat, corn, cattle, and many other farm products
will hereafter be handled more on a national scale and
under government direction. We enter to-day a period of
rapid economic and social nationalization. Any rural region
that remains individualistic, reactionary, with an education
no better than that of the pioneer type of single-room school,
is bound to fall behind in all five types of social efficiency,
vital, vocational, avocational, civic, and moral.

This national concentration and management will prob-
ably not tend to increase the size of farms, as Professor
Vogt indicates in his "Rural Sociology," although it will
greatly increase the need of broader national knowledge
and co-operation among farmers. The farm will and should
probably remain at that size which can best be handled
economically by the average rural family with the best
of modern machinery and agricultural science. Tenant
farming will be decreased and ownership will again become
characteristic. More ideal living will be achieved in the
rural community, and a chief factor in this rise to a new
standard in response to pressing needs will be a new type of
public, democratic school appropriate to broader rural or-
ganization and higher efficiency. We have made the start
toward such an institution by the present consolidated
school. That it is a cure-all for every rural and national ill
we do not believe. That it is a safe and progressive line of
advance we have no doubt. May its tribe increase !

National Rural-Educational Principles. — ^As a fitting
close to this chapter and introduction to Commissioner
Claxton's masterly survey in the next, we append the fol-
lowing resolutions which were unanimously adopted at a
recent national conference on rural education and leader-
ship.

''We appeal to all interests for hearty co-operation in a
nation-wide campaign for the improvement of our rural

l8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

schools, and to this end we indorse the following items
agreed on and adopted at the Nashville Conference in the
fall of 191 5:

1. An academic term of not less than 160 days in every rural-
school commtmity.

2. A sufficient number of teachers adequately prepared for their
work.

3. Consolidation of rural schools where practicable.

4. A teachers' home and a demonstration farm of five. or more
acres as a part of the school property.

5. An all-year school adapted to local conditions.

6. A county library with branch libraries at the centres of popu-
lation, the public schools to be used as distributing centres.

7. Community organization, with the school as the intellectual,
industrial, educational, and social centre.

8. High-school education for all country boys and girls without
severing home ties in obtaining that education.

9. Such readjustment and reformation of the courses of study in
elementary and secondary rural schools as will adapt them to the
needs of rural life.

We respectfully submit the following additional items for the
improvement of the rural-school situation:

10. We express our approval of a larger unit in school adminis-
tration to the end that the democratic ideal of equal opportunities for
all children may prevail. Americanism should mean adequacy, but
this quality can be demonstrated in American citizenship only when
the greatest good to the greatest number shall become the cardinal
principle of American education.

11. We believe that the great need of rural elementary teachers is
a broad mastery of a fairly limited group of subjects, each rich in
social values. To this end the course of study for rural teachers in
the normal schools should relate specifically to the problems of the
rural teachers. Accordingly, the course of study should give large
place to history, English language and literature, the rural sciences,
including economics, marketing, rural organizations and administra-
tion, and recreation and play. There should be eliminated the for-
eign languages, the higher branches of mathematics, and such other
subjects as do not contribute rather definitely to the full performance
of the rural teachers' task.

12. We believe that the great American need is an intelligent and
productive home-loving, home-owning rural population. We urge,
therefore, the great demand upon the rural schools, elementary and

NATIONAL AND RURAL CONSOLIDATION 1 9

high, for the effective teaching of agriculture and other rural ac-
tivities. We believe that a home-project plan by which each child
conducts some agricultural home project under the direction and
guidance of the school, coupled with the demonstration and experi-
mental farm on the school grounds offers a satisfactory and effective
means.

13. We recommend the establishment of rural normal-training
teachers' courses in normal schools, teachers* colleges, universities,
and agricultural colleges for the purpose of preparing normal-training
instructors, that these instructors may train their students for a
better understanding of rural conditions and how to meet them, and
ultimately prepare them for better teaching and more effective service.

14. We recommend the establishment of county travelling li-
braries for use of rural schools, with the county superintendents'
office as the distributing centre.

15. Since the public school is the foundation of our democracy and
since the ultimate purpose of that democracy is to perpetuate itself,
we believe the surest road to this end is for the people to exemplify
in the community itself the lessons of free institutions in the manage-
ment of their public schools. We realize that our rural schools have
not kept pace with other lines of progress and that new levels must be
reached. In order to realize this it becomes necessary for us to employ
the best talent to co-operate with us, for which we must return a just
remuneration. If we as a people are to maintain our strength we must
retain our responsibility. Good teaching seeks to encourage the child
to develop and rely upon his own resources, so good government
seeks to inspire a people to unfold their own powers through the
proper exercise of the same."

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. If possible, visit at least one single-room school and a consolidated

school and compare their advantages and disadvantages.

2. Which would cost a community more: providing first-class, single-

room rural-school plants and teachers or a first-class consoli-
dated-school system?

3. Which of the ten suggested solutions of the rural-education prob-

lem have been put into successful operation in your present
county ?

4. What are the relative advantages and disadvantages of a county

high school or schools with pupils living in dormitories and of
a number of consolidated elementary and high schools combined
with free public transportation? (See Doctor Foght's book on

20 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

"The Rural Teacher and His Work" for descriptions of some of
the Southern boarding-schools.)
$. Make a list of rural problems as suggested by Doctor Vogt's vol-
ume on "Rural Sociology."

6. Has the city had any such advantage over the country as sug-

gested in this chapter? Give your reasons.

7. What advantages of first-class consolidation have been omitted

from discussion in the chapter?

8. Before reading further make a list of the arguments country

parents and others would make against consolidation.

9. Is free transportation in publicly owned vehicles essential to the

definition of a consolidated school?

10. In what ways could a first-class consolidated school promote

larger social movements?

11. How many consolidated schools are there in the United States?

At this writing (191 9) there are nearly eleven thousand, defining
the school very liberally as one formed by the union of two or
more schools for better educational advantages, and at least two
teachers doing graded work. It should include public transpor-
tation, a model building, and superior teachers and curriculum.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Vogt — "Rural Sociology." Appleton.

2. Carver — "Rural Economics." Macmillan.

3. Year-Books of the United States Department of Agriculture,

Washington, D. C.

4. Butterfield — Chapters in "Rural Progress." University of Chi-

cago Press.

5. Suggestions for Parcels-Post Marketing, United States Depart-

ment of Agriculture, Farmer's Bulletin, No. 703.

6. Rural-Life Surveys by: The Roosevelt Commission; The Presby-

terian Board of Home Missions; United States Bureau of Edu-
cation, in its Educational Surveys; various other State and
private organizations.

7. Foght— "The Rural Teacher and His Work," Bibliography, pp.

345-354- Macmillan.

8. Rapeer — "Educational Hygiene," sections on health sociology

and chapters on rural health. Scribner.

9. "Teaching Elementary School Subjects," chap. I. Scribner.

10. Foght, "Rural Education," Bulletin, 1919, No. 7, U. S. Bureau of

Education. Contains list of surveys of rural education and
present country-life commissions.

CHAPTER II
THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL

Preliminary Problems

1. To what extent have cities profited by the expenditures of the

country for the schooling of country boys and girls? (See
chap. VII, on Movements of Population, in Vogt's "Rural
Sociology,")

2. To what extent are cities and entire states and the nation inter-

ested in and responsible for the proper schooling of all country
children ?

3. If people remained all their lives in the communities where they

obtained their schooling, and each community thus obtained the
product of its expenditures, great or little, to what extent would
this lessen the need for county. State, and national support?

4. What did the draft of the young men of the land show the health

conditions to be? What per cent were rejected for physical
defects? What per cent were iUiterate? See " Second Report
of the Provost Marshal General," Government Printing Office,
Washington, D. C.

5. How many single-room schools of your home State have less than

fifteen pupils?

6. What per cent of the rural teachers in your home State have a

high-school education? What per cent have had at least two
years of normal-school training ? What per cent are college grad-
uates ?

7. How does the professional and general training of the rural teacher

compare with that of the rural physician? Is the work of the
one less skilled, scientific, professional, or less important than
the other?

8. What per cent of the rural pupils of your home State graduate

from the eighth grade? From high school?

9. What is the unit of school administration in your home State,

district, township or town, or county control?
10. What are the principal educational reforms needed in your home
State for the betterment of rural education?

Note. — The reports of your State superintendent or commissioner
of public schools, the reports of county superintendents, the proceed-

22 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ings of State teachers* associations, and the reports of any educational
and social surveys made by the United States Bureau of Education
or other organization will be of help in this preliminary orientation.
The annual reports of the United States Commissioner of Education
give summaries of rural-school progress and conditions. Some of the
above problems may be left for the problems in application after read-
ing the chapter if desired, although this is not recommended.

I. The Rural-School Problem

In our industrial, social, civic, and religious democracy
everything waits on education. No real progress and no
lasting improvement in any line of life is possible except
through the better education of the people. The deepest
meaning of democracy is equality of opportunity. This is
impossible without equality of opportunity for that edu-
cation which prepares for life, for citizenship, and for pro-
ductive occupations. Therefore the right education of all
the people becomes our chief concern, and to provide better
and more adequate means thereto must be the most im-
portant task of society and State. Among the agencies of
education, the public school may, I believe, fairly be con-
sidered the most important.

Since almost three-fifths of the children of school age live
in the open country and in small towns under rural con-
ditions, and since more than three-fifths of the enrolment in
the public schools of the nation is in the public schools of
rural communities, the rural public school represents the
larger half of the public-school problem. Since the drift-
ing of population from country to city is approximately
400,000 a year and that from city to country is almost
negligible, the city is interested in the schools of the coun-
try in a manner and to a degree which do not obtain in the
reverse direction. Since only two- thirds of the people of
the country as a whole are living in the States in which they
were born, and nearly one-fifth were born in other States of
the Union than those in which they now live, and since these

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 23

movements from State to State are largely of the rural popu-
lation, the improvement of the rural schools of any State
becomes a matter of interest to all other States and to the
nation at large. Of course this is also important for other
and still more important reasons. The many studies of
various phases of the rural school made in recent years and
the voluminous discussions in books, magazines, and the
daily press, and on the platform indicate an increasing gen-
eral consciousness of these facts. It is therefore no new nor
small problem of which I am to present here a brief outline,
and for the solution of which I am to try to offer some sug-
gestions.

Approximately 16,000,000 children of school age (6 to
20) live in the rural communities of the United States; about
11,000,000 of these are enrolled in the public schools.
Something like 60 per cent of those enrolled are in the 212,-
000 one- teacher schools; the remaining 40 per cent are in
consolidated and village schools having two or more teach-
ers. The average enrolment in the one-teacher schools
is approximately 31, which is less by 6 or 8 than the aver-
age enrolment in other schools of country and city. In
more than one-fourth of these one-teacher schools the total
enrolment is under 15, and in a large part of these it is less
than 10. In many such schools, therefore, the enrolment
must be considerably more than the average of 31. In
many schools the actual attendance on any day is so small
as to make the per-pupil cost of the schools very large and
to make it difficult for both teachers and children to main-
tain the interest necessary for any profitable work. The
State superintendent of Iowa reported for the month of
January, 19 10, 250 schools in that State with an enrol-
ment of five or less, and 1,814 with an enrolment of from
6 to II. On the best day in the third week of that month
10 schools reported an actual attendance of one pupil only;
35, two each; 73, three each; 160, four each; 244, five each;
thus 522 schools reported an actual attendance of five or

24 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

less. The average daily attendance out of every loo pupils
enrolled was in 1910, for the city schools, 79.3, and for the
rural schools only 67.6. The average daily attendance
based on enrolment fell as low as 54.4 per cent in Missis-
sippi, 51.4 per cent in Delaware, and 51 per cent in Mary-
land.

Even in the great State of New York in 191 5, as shown
in a letter on the imperative need of a larger unit of rural-
school administration and school consolidation written to
the legislature of the State by Commissioner Finley, there
were 11,642 elementary schools. Of these, 8,430 were one-
room schools. In almost half of these (3,580) the average
attendance for 19 13 was ten or less, as follows:

Average Average

Schools Attendance Schools Attendance

13 I 440 6

74 2 533 7

172 3 544 8

235 4 631 9

362 5 576 10

The Terms. — The average length of rural-school terms
in 1910 was but 137.7 days; for city schools it was 184.3
days, a difference of 46.6 days in favor of the city schools.
The average length of term of the rural school varied in the
several States, from 90.1 days in New Mexico, 93.3 days in
North Carolina, 94.5 days in South Carolina, 98 days in
Arkansas, to 178 days in California, 178.6 days in New
York, 1 8 1. 2 days in Connecticut, and 190.2 days in Rhode
Island. The difference between the average length of rural-
school term and that of city-school term varied in the sev-
eral States from 3.8 days in Rhode Island and Connecticut,
8 days in California, and 9.8 days in New York, to 68.5 days
in North Carolina, 69.8 days in Alabama, 71.2 days in Ken-
tucky, and 88.5 days in South Carolina. But averages do
not tell the whole story of the lack of equality in opportu-

V.

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 25

nity for education in the rural communities. Recently the
Bureau of Education asked all the county and township
superintendents of the several States for facts about in-
dividual schools. This inquiry revealed the fact that not a
few rural schools are in' session less than three school months
of 20 days each, and a few only a little more than one
month. In Jeff Davis County, Georgia, the average length
of all white schools was reported as 60 days; in Liberty
County, Georgia, white schools were reported of 40, 50, 60,
and 80 days, colored schools of 30, 40, and 50 days; in Wal-
ton County, Florida, white schools of 30 and 60 days, the
average for the county being 80 days; in Putnam County,
Tennessee, white schools of 27 and 40 days were reported,
the average for all schools being 90 days; in Lincoln County,
Nebraska, schools were reported of 59, 79, 86, 98, 99, and
up to 160 days; in Shannon County, Missouri, the terms
ranged from 60 to 160 days. These examples taken at ran-
dom serve to indicate the wide variety of conditions in
many States. The average daily attendance of children
enrolled in rural schools of the entire country is approxi-
mately 95 days. For a few States it is less than 60 days
and for many counties less than 40 days.

The School Plants. — Within the last ten years there has
been a very encouraging improvement in rural schoolhouses
and their equipment, but many schools are still taught in
houses wholly unfit for the homes of children during the
years when environment means so much for health of body
and character of soul. One room, poorly built, ugly, badly
lighted, heated, and ventilated, dirty, with uncared-for
grounds, no adequate supply of pure water, and with filthy
outhouses or none — these specifications indicate the type of
rural schoolhouse still all too common, in most parts of the
country.

The Administration. — Within the last few years there
has also been a commendable increase of interest in the im-
provement of rural-school organization, control, and super-

26 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

vision, and some improvement has been made in most
States. However, the single-school district is still the most
common unit of organization and control. It is the only
basis of organization and control for the rural elementary-
schools of seventeen States and partly so for four other
States. It is the largest factor in organization and control
in seven other States which have a semi-county system in
which the balance of power rests with the districts rather
than with the counties. There may be as many as 30,000
or 40,000 school directors in some of these States. Some
years ago one State superintendent reported that there were
in his State 25,000 district school directors, of whom 5,000,
he said, could not write their names. Historically neces-
sary, the usefulness of this plan of school organization is
now passed and the tendency is away from the single-school
district to the large unit of town, township, magisterial dis-
trict, or county.

The tendency toward the county is becoming stronger.
Nineteen States are organized on the county basis and
several others have a semi-county organization, dividing
control between county and some smaller unit — union dis-
trict, township, or single-school district. Several other
States have county boards of education with limited func-
tions; thirty-nine States have county supervision, three have
county and supervisory district supervision. All others
have some kind of township or district supervision, but in
most States the supervision is not efficient and under pres-
ent conditions cannot be. A county superintendent, hav-
ing meagre education and no professional knowledge, elected
or appointed for partisan political reasons, paid a salary so
small that he must devote most of his time to some other
means of making a living, and dividing the remainder of his
time between the routine business of his office and the super-
vision of a hundred or more schools scattered over a terri-
tory of three to five hundred square miles, this territory
being traversed by bad roads during a good part of the

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL

One Reason Why Positions in the Country Schools of.
Fisher County are Not Desirable

27

- )

93.5 Per cent
of the teachers changed
positions in 1913-14i

6.5 Per cent
of the teachers did not
change positions in 191 3-1 4»

IN A TOTAL OF SIXTY-TWO TEACHERS;

58 changed positions at beginning of last session.
4 taught two years at same place.
None taught three years at same place.
43 were new teachers in the county.

Contrast this with the schools abroad where teachers seldom change
more than once in a lifetime.

Does any other public or private business permit such a waste by
the constant changing of employees?

If positions are to be made more attractive to the best teachers
and if the school is to attain its highest efficiency, there must be a

LONGER TENURE OF OFFICE FOR THE TEACHERS

— From "A Study of Rural Schools in Texas, ^^

Bulletin of University of Texas.

28 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

time the schools are in session, cannot be expected to render
much help to the individual schools and teachers nominally
under his charge. In some States in the South professional
supervisors, one or more to a county, are employed to assist
the county superintendents in their professional duties, but
the number of such supervisors is still comparatively small.
The Teachers. — While many earnest and scholarly men
and women are to be found among teachers of rural schools
in all States, the average preparation of these teachers is
much lower than that of the teachers in our city schools.
Some studies made by A. C. Monahan and Harold W.
Foght of the Bureau of Education show quite clearly that
most of the teachers in the rural schools have neither the
education nor the professional knowledge and training
necessary for success, either in teaching or in school manage-
ment, nor do they remain at one place long enough to enable
them to gain the influence in the community which the
teacher must have for the full accomplishment of his duties.
There are approximately 265,000 rural-school teachers in
the United States. Foght sent a questionnaire to 6,000 of
these in 55 typical counties, every State being represented.
He received 2,941 replies. It may be safely concluded that
those from whom the returns were received were the better
teachers rather than the worst. Twenty-five per cent of
these were men, 75 per cent women, 18 per cent of all were
married. Four per cent had less than eight years of school-
ing; 32.3 per cent (one- third) had no professional training,
not even that which can be gained by attendance a few
weeks at a summer school. Their average age at the time
they began teaching was 19.2 years; at the time of the in-
vestigation 26 years. They had an average of 45 months'
experience in teaching, gained through an average period
of 6.8 years in an average of 3.4 different schools. They
had been 12.2 months in the schools in which they were
then teaching and had remained in each school in which
they had taught an average of 13.8 months. Twenty-six

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 29

and five-tenths per cent had attended a normal school and
3.4 per cent had finished a normal-school course; 19 per
cent had attended a college of some kind, and 7.3 per cent
had completed some sort of college course. Only 20 out of
the entire number had attended schools preparing especially
for work in rural schools and giving courses in rural economics.

The average salaries of the teachers replying to Foght's
questionnaire was $350. Monahan reported the average
yearly salary of teachers in one- teacher schools in 19 States
to be $307.51, and the average salaries of all teachers in
these States to be $430.60. In one State the average annual
salary in one- teacher rural schools was $143.73, j^^^ $2.27
less than the cost of feeding a prisoner two meals a day in
the county jails of the State. There were, of course, many
teachers whose salaries were less than the average.

The studies in most rural schools, despite all talk about
redirection, are still practically the same as they were when
they were copied without much adaptation from the schools
of the cities. There has been in some places some adapta-
tion of readers and arithmetics to the special needs of coun-
try children, and in some rural high schools some instruction
is given in agriculture. The laws of several States require
that agriculture shall be taught in the elementary schools,
but httle effective teaching of these subjects can be found
in most schools of this grade. A girl who does not know
barley from oats cannot accomplish much with a flower-
pot for a demonstration farm in a school that closes before
the time of planting field and garden crops begins.

Of the teachers replying to Foght's questionnaire, 66
per cent were giving instruction in eight grades or more
and heard from 25 to 35 recitations per day; probably the
average number of class recitations per teacher per day in
the one-room country school is 32. Muerman gives this
number as the typical number for the schools of the West.
If every minute of the five-hour school-day could be used for
recitations, the recitations would have an average of g}4

30 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

minutes each. But much less than the full time can be so
used, probably not more than three hours — i8o minutes.

There are many interruptions. Coming and going of
classes consumes much time, as do also cases of discipline.
Muerman counted 273 questions, more or less useless, asked
by pupils of the teacher in one school in the course of one
day. The lesson periods average six or seven minutes, three
or four minutes for classes in lower grades and 10 or 12 in
some of the more important classes of the higher grades.
It may easily be seen that the actual time any child gives
to school work cannot be long. Studies made in schools in
different parts of the country indicate an average time of
lyi to 2 hours for children in the first two or three grades,
2 or 3 hours at most for children in the intermediate grades,
and not more than 3K or 4 hours for those of the higher
grades. I have found schools in which the smaller children
gave attention to any school work either at study or at
recitation less than 30 minutes a day. If all children of
most rural schools did intensive work for 2^ hours in the
morning and then went home, much more might be accom-
plished than is now accomplished.

Until a half-dozen years ago there were very few high
schools in the rural communities of most States and more
than half of the boys and girls of rural America are still
without free access to any good high school with full courses
of four years. One-fourth or more of all boys and girls of
this generation get some high-school education, but the
proportion is much smaller in the communities in the open
country than in villages, towns, and cities. Frequently the
country high school has only one 'or two teachers, and often
these are very poorly prepared to do high-school work.

So much for the schools as they are; now a few words as
to their more important needs and some suggestions as to
how these needs may be met.

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 3 1

II. Rural-School Needs

Longer School Terms. — Probably the most patent need
of the rural schools is a very large increase in the average
length of school term and a nearer approach to equality in
length of term in all these schools. The American school
term, even in the cities, is short as compared with the school
terms of other countries. In most of Europe the schools
are in session from 200 to 250 days. In Australia rural
schools run 225 days or more. I know no reason why Amer-
ican boys and girls need fewer days of schooling than those
of other progressive and cultured countries, nor do I know
any reason why boys and girls in the country need fewer
days of schooling than they would need if they lived in
city or town. It would be still more difficult to imagine a
reason why in our democratic republic made up of these
States we should be content to give the children of one
rural community opportunity of schooling through only 40
or 50 days when those living in other communities have
access to better schools and for three or four times as many
days, or why we should as a people be content that the
children of one State may have only 90 days of schooling
in the year while those of another may have 180 days or
more. Surely we no longer think of education as a private
matter, ajffecting only the individual. The public welfare,
in which the private weal is bound up, depends on and de-
mands the education of all.

More Money Better Spent. — For longer terms and a
nearer approach to uniformity in length, larger tax rates,
wiser economy in the use of funds, and in many States
larger units of support and administration will be necessary.
All these should be comparatively easy of attainment.
School taxes are, as a rule, very low and expenditures for
education very small as compared with taxes and expendi-
tures for other purposes and with the value and impor-
tance of the results. We are yet far from Doctor Eliot's ideal

32 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of expenditure for the education of the child equal to that
for its food or clothing. In 191 2 the total expenditure for
all public-school purposes in the United States averaged
$5.05 per capita of the total population. This average
ranged from $1.52 in Alabama and $1.53 in South Carolina
to $9.18 in Utah and $9.30 in California. In that year the
total expenditure for public schools was approximately
$483,000,000; but only $285,000,000, less than 59 per cent
of the whole, was for teachers' salaries. Teachers' salaries,
the most important item in the lengthening of the school
term, could therefore be doubled with an increase of less
than 60 per cent in the total expenditures. This would
give a substantial increase in the monthly salaries of teach-
ers and at the same time lengthen the school term to an
average of 180 or 200 days. Since the average for city
schools is already more than 184 days, the increase possible
by this increase of 60 per cent in the total expenditure
might be so used as to bring the rural schools up to the full
term of the city schools, even after adding both to the
monthly salary of city and country teachers and to the
length of the city-school term. Even if no addition were
made to the monthly salary of the teacher, the larger an-
nual salary that would come with a longer school term
would increase the efficiency of the schools in other ways
and especially by putting and keeping in the schools better
teachers and giving them more opportunity for experience
and enabling them to concentrate their energies to a greater
extent on the work of the school. It is the salary for the
year rather than for the month that counts. I believe no
thinking man or woman with any knowledge of economic
causes and conditions will deny that this increase in school
funds might be made both easily and profitably. It would
be easy to show where much more than this amount could
be saved in public or private expenditures without injury
to any useful cause.

Larger Units of Support and Control. — Per capita wealth
varies sharply from section to section and from one local

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 33

community to another and the variations are not always
due to the industry or other virtues of the people or to the
lack of them. Fertile lands, mines, the convergence of
highways and railways, position with regard to natural
routes of commerce, for none of which the people of the
community are primarily responsible, enable the people of
one community to obtain larger results upon their invest-
ments of labor and capital than those of another, and possi-
bly to levy tribute upon the smaller returns of others.
Therefore, while local communities may and probably
should tax themselves for houses and equipment, and to a
sufficient extent to insure the maximum interest in the
schools, the larger part of the school funds should be raised
by taxes levied on all the taxable property, rural and urban
alike, of both county and State. In most States half the
funds for running expenses for the schools might well come
from county taxes and half from State taxes, no county to
receive any part of the State funds until it had levied a
county school tax of not less than a given minimum. Some
part of the school fund should always be set apart toliSp
counties m proportion to their Heedsi This part might be
apportioned to the several counties of the State in propor-
tion to school population (or aggregate attendance) and in-
versely as the ratio of taxable property to school population,
as is done in Tennessee. The idea that the federal govern-
ment through some modification of its earlier policy by
which it gave millions of acres of public lands for the sup-
port of public schools should conserve and promote all its
most important interests by devoting some part of its large
revenues (larger by much than the total revenues of all the
States combined) to public education and so apportion its
appropriations for this purpose as to even up to some ex-
tent at least the great difference in school facilities caused
by difference in taxpaying ability in the several States, and
at the same time give the largest possible encouragement to
the States to help themselves, leaving to the States full
freedom in the development and control of their school

34 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

systems, is too fascinating and at the same time too difficult
and wide of application for discussion in this paper; but it
is worthy of the most careful consideration of all patriots,
economists, and statesmen. The large federal contributions
to the States now for vocational education are no more
worthily spent than millions more each year could be ex-
pended for other objects.

With the larger units of support must, of course, come
larger units of control and more efficient agencies of ad-
ministration and supervision. It is seldom wise to give to
small communities funds from what appears to them a for-
eign treasury without making at the same time suitable pro-
vision for its expenditure. Examples of the bad effects of
such a policy are too numerous to require specification. In
^ all those States in which the county is the unit for other
/^governmental purposes it should be the unit also for school
•'administration. In the New England States, where the
town is the governmental unit, it should also, no doubt, be
the unit of school administration, as it is. In the State of
New York, with its strongly centralized system, supervision
may well be under the immediate direction of the State
with its district superintendents as its agents.

Plan of County-School Organization. — In a circular let-
ter sent out some time ago by the Bureau of Education
and republished in bulletin 1914, No. 44, the Bureau of
Education suggests the following plan of county-school or-
ganization:

1. The county the unit of taxation and administration of schools
(except that, in administration, independent city districts employing
a superintendent would not be included).

2. A county-school tax levied on all taxable property in the county,
covered into the county treasury, and divided between the independent
city districts and the rest of the coimty on a basis of the school popu-
lation. ^

^ This basis is suggested for the division between the county district and
the independent city districts. The county board of education would expend

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 35

3 The county-school funds, including those raised by taxation and
those received from the State, expended in such a way as would as
nearly as possible insure equal educational opportunities in all parts of
the county, regardless of the amount raised in any particular part.
(Any subdistrict should be permitted to raise, by taxation or otherwise,
additional funds to supplement the county funds, provided the sub-
district desired a better school plant, additional equipment, or a
more efficient teaching force than could be provided from the county
funds.)

4. A county board of education, in which is vested the adminis-
tration of the public schools of the county (except those in independent
city districts), composed of from five to nine persons, elected or ap-
pointed from the county at large; the board to be non-partisan; the
term of office to be at least five years, and the terms arranged so that
not more than one-fifth would expire in any one year.

5. A county superintendent of schools, a professional educator,
selected by the county board of education, from within or without the
county or State, for a long term (at least two years), who shall serve
as the secretary and executive ofiicer of the county board and as such
be the recognized head of the public schools in the county (except
those in independent city districts).

6. District trustees in each subdistrict of the county, one or more
persons, elected by the voters of the district or selected by the county
board, to be custodians of the school property and to serve in an ad-
visory capacity to the county board. The expenditures of local funds
raised by the subdistrict would rest with the trustees subject to the
approval of the county board.

7. The powers and duties of the county board of education:

(a) To select a county superintendent, who would be its secretary
and executive ofiicer in the performance of all of its other functions,
and to appoint assistants as required.

(b) To have general control and management of the schools of the
county.

(c) To submit to the regular county taxing authority estimates of
the amount of money needed to support the schools.

(d) To regulate the boundaries of the school subdistricts of the
county, making from time to time such alterations as in its judgment
would serve the best interests of the county system.

(e) To locate and erect school buildings.

the funds of the county district according to the needs of the various schools,
not according to school population. This does not mean among the subdis-
tricts on the school popvdation basis.

^6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

(/) To supply the necessary equipment.

(g) To fix the course of study and select text-books (using the State
course and State-adopted text-books in the States where action has
been taken).

(h) To enforce the compulsory education laws.

(i) To employ teachers, fix their salaries and the salaries of other
employees.

Experience shows, I believe, the wisdom of some such
policy.

Better State Administration. — In most States there is
urgent need of some reform in State administration. Possi-
bly the ideal organization for the State would, in most
cases, be a State board of education of seven or nine mem-
bers, elected or appointed from the State at large, the terms
of office for the members expiring in such a way as to reduce
to a minimum the possibility of packing the board for
sinister purposes. In a board of nine members the tenure
of office might well be nine years, the terms of not more than
two members expiring in any biennium. This board should
elect a State superintendent or commissioner of education
and all his assistants from the world at large and should
have power to remove any of them for cause. Among the
assistants of the chief State school officer should be a suffi-
cient number of supervising specialists and the office should
have the power to require prompt, faithful, and intelligent
performance of duty by county-school officials.

Ruralized High Schools for All. — In rural communities,
as elsewhere, all boys and girls should have free access to
good high schools so organized as to give such education as
is adapted to the early and middle years of adolescence and
to prepare them for the duties and responsibilities of life
and citizenship and for some useful occupation by which
they may make their living and contribute toward the sup-
port of the commonwealth. Let me quote here from my
introduction to the Report of the Commissioner of Educa-
tion for the year ended June 30, 1913:

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 37

The complex problems of our political, civic, industrial, social, and
spiritual democracy demand of the masses of the people more exten-
sive knowledge of facts and principles than can be given by the ele-
mentary schools, and a discipline and training different from any
which can be gained in childhood before the years of adolescence.
Children learn by imitation and accept and act on authority. In the
preadolescent years they are unable to reason inductively to great
fundamental principles, formulate them into words, and reason from
them by deduction to intelligent practical applications in concrete
new instances. But this is just what is most needed for the self-
guidance required by democratic institutions and life. The education
possible in childhood may be sufficient for citizenship in a benevolent
despotism where a "little father" rules over his "children," in a
society of rigid and unyielding stratification, in a feudaUstic indus-
trial organization in which the masses of people are only unthinking
"hands," and in a spiritual despotism in which freedom of thought is
unknown; but democratic government, government of the people,' by
the people, and for the people, is manhood government. Democratic
institutions of whatever kind demand of all who participate in them
such self-guidance as is impossible without an understanding of gen-
eral principles and the habit of consecutive, abstract reasoning and
individual initiative and self-restraint.

We must find some way of continuing the education of the great
majority of children through the high-school period, through the
years of early and middle adolescence. Under present economic con-
ditions this will be possible only when we can find or devise some way
by which boys and girls may contribute to their own support while
attending school, or of continuing their studies out of school. In rural
farming communities this is comparatively easy. Where good high
schools are maintained in such communities and there are good ele-
mentary schools to prepare for them, the per cent of high-school at-
tendance is much larger than in most cities and manufacturing towns.

Better Subject-Matter. — Courses of study in rural
schools need reconstruction and redirection. As human be-
ings and as citizens, men and women living in the country
have the same or similar interests in the humanities (the
term is used in its broad sense) and things pertaining to
civic life and citizenship as other people have. But as
farmers and farmers' wives, making their living from the
soil and living in isolated country homes, their interests

38 THE CONSOLroATED RURAL SCHOOL

differ widely from those of men and women of the laboring
and professional classes in the cities. Whatever may have
been the case in the past, it has now come about that farm-
ers need a fuller and more extensive, more varied and thor-
ough, knowledge and more comprehensive grasp of funda-
mental principles and greater power of adjustment than
men in any other trade or profession. The same is true of
the farmer's wife as compared with other women. Of the
chemistry and physics of the soil, of plant and animal life,
of methods of tillage, of the feeding and care of animals, of
plant and animal diseases and the means of protection
against them, of farm machinery and its operation, care, and
management, of buying and selling, of bookkeeping and the
business side of farm life, of fertilizers and the means of pre-
serving the fertility of the soil, of the breeding of plants
and animals, of road-making and forestry, of drainage and
irrigation, of the sanitation of the farm home, of the best
use of the food products of the farm, of the care of children
in isolated country homes (where the physician cannot be
called at a moment's notice and where municipal engineers
do not look after every detail of sanitation), of the early
education of children, and of many other things on a knowl-
edge of which the success, prosperity, and happiness of the
farmer and his wife depend — nearly all country schools at
the present time take little account. Their courses of study
need to be remade upon the basis of what the farmer needs
to know, and their teaching must take into consideration the
environment and the raw material and experience which the
country boy and girl bring to school.

Need of Rural Surveys. — Just what the course or courses
of study in any rural school should be cannot be determined
until careful and thorough studies have been made of the
vocational life of men and women living normal lives in
normal rural communities. Such studies must take into
consideration what these men and women need to learn of
each branch of knowledge and of its possible and probable

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 39

applications in their life-work. As a first step in such a
study the Bureau of Education some time ago sent question-
naires to a thousand farmers and as many farmers' wives
living on and by their farms in the open country in several
different States. The questions were as follows;

Please state briefly what the farmer should know about
i) Physics.

2) Chemistry.

3) Biology.

4) Meteorology.

5) The soil.

6) Cultivation of the soil.

7) Fertilizers.

8) Plant life.

9) Selecting seeds.

10) Propagation by budding, grafting, etc.

11) Harvesting crops.

12) Animal life.

13) Insects and birds.

14) Feeding.

15) Breeding.

16) Marketing crops and live stock.

17) Farmers' buying, selling, and credit co-operation.

18) Preserving fruits and meats.

19) Machinery, its operation and its care.

20) Care of trees and forests.

21) Keeping accounts.

22) Banking.

23) Commercial and common law.

24) Farm buildings.

25) Engineering.

26) Road building.

27) Farm sanitation.

28) Other subjects connected directly with the farmer's life.

It is the purpose of the bureau to send these to other
thousands of farmers and farmers' wives and to supplement
this by somewhat similar questions for supervisors and in-
structors in agriculture and home economics in colleges and
high schools, and for students of rural economy. But all

40 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

these will not help far. They can serve only as a beginning.
Thorough, extensive rural surveys must be made by experts
on the ground in different parts of the country very much as
industrial surveys have been made in Richmond, Minne-
apolis, and many other cities. There must also be simi-
lar surveys as to the duties and responsibilities of citi-
zenship in civic and social life in rural communities and of
the preparation necessary for their intelligent and success-
ful performance. When these surveys have been made and
a body of necessary knowledges, skills, ideals, and abilities
has been formulated, men and women learned and wise in
methods of education and of child development must de-
termine which of them can be taught in the schools; how and
in what order, and to what extent, and also how they can
be organized and transmuted into the things we call dis-
cipline and culture; for the man who turns the clods must
not be permitted to be a clod himself, even though an in-
telligent and skilled one. There must be in him also some-
thing that aspires and sings.

In the country even more than in the city is it important
that there should be a very close co-operation between the
school and the home. If the teacher knows how to discover
and use it, the out-of-school experiences of country children
give them a larger fund of rich raw material for reworking
and interpretation in the schools than the out-of-school ex-
periences of city children give to them. For most of the
knowledge which should be gained in school by country
children there is a readier and wider application in country
life than for the knowledge gained by city children in city
schools. In making courses of study for rural schools it
must be remembered that farming is still a trade, or rather
a combination of many whole and complex trades, if, in-
deed, it should not be called a learned profession, and not a
single, simple process or a series of such processes, as is the
occupation of many people in the industrial life of the city.
Little or nothing on the farm and in the farm home can be

A brooder and laying house, Berks County, Pa.

Poultry club work of Pennsylvania State College

A home-made brooder
"The New Spirit" at work in rural Pennsylvania

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 4 1

done by rule of thumb. The freedom of adjustment that
comes only from a mastery of fundamental principles is ab-
solutely necessary. The independent farmer must have the
power of self-guidance under complex and constantly chang-
ing conditions. To make sure that principles are under-
stood and flexible in their use and that they have real con-
tent, they must be constantly tested in practical applica-
tion. Therefore rural school and farm and home must be-
come as nearly as possible one for the education of the
farmer's boy and girl, and each should be intelligent about
and sympathetic with the other in a way and to a degree
now seldom found.

Professional Teachers. — But no policy of support, con-
trol, and administration however wise, and no courses of
study however thorough and logical, may be expected to
accomplish much without competent teachers. Teachers
make the schools and they are larger factors in the making
of rural schools than they can be under modern conditions
in the making of urban schools. The teacher of a grade or
of a subject in a city school is a part of a large and more or
less efficient machine, which, once started, continues largely
by its own momentum. Her tasks are definite and narrowly
limited. It is quite otherwise with the teacher in the small
country school of one, two, or three teachers. Here the ma-
chinery is light and loosely put together, if indeed there
can be said to be any machinery at all. The teacher's tasks
are large and indefinite. There are opportunity and need for
men of power of initiative and self-guidance. Personality,
scholarship, professional knowledge, and the skill which
comes from intelligent experience count for more in the
country school than they can in the city school. More care-
ful consideration needs to be given to the selection of teach-
ers in the rural schools and to schools in which to prepare
them for their work.

We may not hope to offer to all children even approxi-
mately equal opportunities for education nor to obtain any-

42 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

thing like satisfactory returns from our investments of
money, time, and interest in our public schools until in all
the States we shall have higher and more nearly uniform
standards of qualification for teachers, which standards for
teachers in rural schools must include a good beginning at
least in knowledge of rural life, rural occupations, and rural
economics. At present we are giving some kind of profes-
sional preparation to only a small per cent of those who
are to become teachers in the rural schools, and only in a
few normal schools does this preparation include even a
good beginning in those things which pertain especially to
the work of the rural schools. I have already stated that
in a study of rural teachers in 55 typical counties, repre-
senting all the States of the Union, Foght found that only
3.4 per cent of the 2,941 teachers replying to the questions
sent to 6,000 teachers were graduates of any normal school,
that only 26.5 had attended normal schools at all, and that
only 20 teachers out of the whole number had attended
schools giving special preparation for rural school work.
For many years we have maintained normal schools at the
cost of taxes paid by all the people in country and city
alike, but in most States almost all the graduates of these
schools have found places as teachers in city schools and
the country schools have been benefited very little. If
graduation from college with some work in courses in edu-
cation or from public or private normal schools or from
high schools with teacher-training courses be accounted the
minimum adequate preparation for teaching — and cer-
tainly nothing less should be so accounted — then we are not
preparing anything like a sufficient number of teachers to
meet the yearly demands for new teachers in the public
schools. In 191 2-13 there were in such schools and courses
as I have named approximately 135,000 students, about
28,000 of whom graduated in the spring of that year. In
the summer and fall of 191 3 more than 100,000 new teach-
ers were needed in the public schools alone. If all these

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 43

graduates of the spring had begun teaching in the fall, more
than 60,000 places would have remained to be filled by new
teachers without the minimum of preparation indicated by
the fact of graduation from a school of one of these kinds.

I must be permitted to enter here a firm protest against
any idea that we are to be content that teachers may con-
tinue to be admitted to work in the rural schools with such
meagre academic and professional preparation as may be
gained in high schools of four years with a little time given
in the fourth year to the history of education, psychology,
methods of teaching, and school management. That such
preparation may be better than most rural teachers now
have I admit, but I have already called attention to the fact
that the rural teachers have more difficult tasks to perform
and therefore need more thorough and comprehensive prep-
aration than city teachers. The training courses in high
schools and county normal schools may be necessary as
temporary makeshifts and as stepping-stones to something
better, but to accept them as permanent means of preparing
rural teachers would be to condemn forever the rural schools
to inefficiency and rural life to poverty and futility. If the
American people are in earnest about education and about
the betterment of country life, they must demand of rural
teachers higher standards of preparation and see to it that
schools with adequate standards and appropriate courses of
instruction are maintained in sufficient numbers for their
preparation. I know of no important culture country
whose teachers are so poorly prepared for their work as are
the majority of rural teachers in most of our States.

Consolidation of Schools. — But even with all teachers
prepared reasonably well for their work the rural schools
must continue to be inefficient and unsatisfactory if most
schools are to continue to be one-teacher schools and if
teachers are to continue to change from place to place as
they now do. No teacher can teach well twenty-five chil-
dren of all ages and of all grades of advancement from the

44 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

first grade to the high school. Thirty-five classes a day
with a teaching time for each class of from four to twelve
minutes will continue to baffle the skill of the best. Even
if by skilful combination the number of classes in such schools
should be reduced to twenty, as I believe they may in most
schools, the number would still be too large.

The coming and going of teachers, reducing their work
to a kind of day labor, is still more detrimental to the work
of the schools. For successful teaching much more is neces-
sary than knowledge of subjects taught and of methods and
devices of teaching and school management. Teachers
must know something of the powers, capacities, tendencies,
weakness, and strength of the children they teach. Such
knowledge implies a knowledge of their parentage. They
must know something of their experiences in the home, in
the field, in the shop, at work and at play, and in associa-
tion with kindred and friends, else they will not know how
to use the results of these vital experiences as the raw ma-
terial of lessons to be learned in school. They must know
something of the contemporary home life of the children,
their occupations and interests and their relations to their
parents, else they will not be able to bring about that close
co-operation between school and home and the unity of
school and home interests without which the work of the
school cannot be made to take hold on the lives of the chil-
dren. They must know the details of the work which the
children have done in the lower grades that they may use
the knowledge gained in these grades as the basis of new
lessons to be learned, and that the children may learn and
interpret the new in terms of the old and dovetail the one
into the other in such a way as to make the work of one
year a development and continuation of that of previous
years. They must know something of the inner life of the
children, of their ideals, hopes, and dreams of the future, else
they will be unable to make the lessons of the school take
hold on these, modifying them and being enriched by them

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 45

as they must be before the school, its lessons, and its dis-
ciplines can be made to project themselves into the future
and take hold on life as they should, and as they must be-
fore they can become fruitful in deeds, in life, and in char-
acter.

III. Suggestions for Improving Such Conditions
Through Consolidation

As a means of bringing about such a consolidation of
schools as will obviate the necessity of one teacher attempt-
ing to teach children in all the grades of the elementary
school and at the same time secure a longer stay of com-
petent teachers in the same schools together with many other
desirable improvements not otherwise possible, I make the
following suggestions:

1. That in all States the unit jor school administration
be made as large as possible — the town in the New England
States, the county or parish in most other States — so as to
permit the greatest possible freedom in forming single-school
districts and adjusting their boundaries to geographic fea-
tures and the outlines of settlements, and to insure to all
schools of the township or county equally adequate support.

2. That the school laws of all States should make it easy
for town and county boards of education to co-operate in
forming union districts of territory from two or more town-
ships or counties and in establishing, maintaining, controll-
ing, and supervising schools in them when this is necessary
to the best interests of the people.

3. That careful surveys be made of the territory of all
school-administration units and that on the basis of these
surveys they be divided into school districts of from ten
to fifteen square miles each, the exact size and shape of any
district depending on physical features, location and char-
acter of roads, means of transportation, density of popula-
tion, trade centre, and other conditions. Where roads are

46 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

numerous, good, and convergent, the district may well be
larger than where they are few, bad, and parallel or per-
pendicular to each other. Twelve square miles, three by
four or three and a half miles square, will probably be a
good average in two-thirds of the towns and counties of the
country. The Bureau of Education is now making a care-
ful and exhaustive study of the possibilities of organization
on this basis. It is already apparent that in most counties
the number of schools may be reduced by one-half, in many
by two-thirds or three-fourths, and in some by as much as
four-fifths or five-sixths. In some counties of Pennsylvania
and probably of other States as many as eight one-teacher
schools might be brought together in a territory of this size.

4. That at the most suitable and accessible place in each
consolidated district a good schoolhouse be built, attractive,
comfortable, and sanitary, with classrooms, laboratories,
and library equipped for the work which such a rural school
should do, and an assembly-hall large enough, not only to
seat comfortably at one time all the pupils of the school,
but also to serve as a meeting-place for the people of the
school district.

5. That on the school grounds a house be built for a
home for the principal and possibly also for other teachers.
This house should not be expensive, but neat and attrac-
tive, a model for the community, such a house as any thrifty
farmer with good taste might hope to build for himself.

6. That as a part of the equipment of the school there
should be a small farm, from four to five acres or more if in
a village or densely populated community, and from twenty-
five to fifty acres or more if in the open country. The prin-
cipal of the school should be required to live in the prin-
cipal's home, keep it as a model home for the community,
and cultivate the farm as a model farm, with garden, or-
chard, poultry-yard, small dairy, and whatever else should
be found on a well-conducted, well-tilled farm in that com-
munity. He should put himself into close contact with the

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 47

agricultural college and agricultural experiment station of
his State^ the departments of agriculture of State and na-
tion, farm-demonstration agents, and other similar agencies,
and it should be made their duty to help him in every way
possible. The use of the house and the products of the
farm should be given the principal as a part of his salary in
addition to the salary paid in money.

7. That after a satisfactory trial of a year or two a
contract should be made with the principal for life or good
behavior, or at least for a long term of years.

8. That the school sessions be adapted to the industrial
needs and climatic conditions of the district. It is not
necessary that primary and advanced pupils attend at the
same time. In the North and in mountainous sections pri-
mary children should attend school in the spring, summer,
and fall.

The Consolidated-School Centre. — In this way it will be
possible to get and keep in the schools men of first-class abil-
ity, competent to teach children and to become leaders in
their communities. The principal of a country school
should know country life. A large part of country life has
to do with the cultivation and care of the farm. The best
test of knowledge here as elsewhere is the ability to do. The
principal of a country school in a farming community should
be able to cultivate and care for a small farm better than
any other man in the community or at least as well. It
may be true that ^Hhose who can, do; and those who can^t,
teach," but it should noi be so. It must not be so if the
teacher is to do the work and have the influence in the com-
munity that he should.

The school-farm will, of course, serve as a demonstra-
tion farm for the district, with the principal of the school,
to some extent at least, as a farm-demonstration agent, di-
recting the home work of boys and advising the men as to
their work and the whole community in many important
matters of citizenship and life.

48 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

I am assuming that the principal of the consolidated
country school will be a man. As a rule, it should be so.
In every school attended by large boys there should be at
least one man; other teachers may well be women.

The increased prosperity and wealth that would come to
any community with such a school as would be possible un-
der the plan suggested would soon enable it to pay sufficient
salaries to obtain the services of men and women of the best
native ability, education, training, and skill. Any man
who ought to be allowed to teach as the principal of a
country school in a farming community can make the use
of such a home and school-farm worth to him as much or
more than the money salary now paid to rural-school prin-
cipals anywhere in America. Under the plan suggested the
principal's wife might in many instances become the leader
of the social life of the community and help in making the
teacher's home and the school a social centre. She might
also assist the women teachers in extending the school work
to the homes of the district, making the work and the care
of the homes more intelligent and tying the women and
their homes to the school as the principal would tie the
men and their farms.

The plan here suggested would not prove very costly.
If bonds were issued to pay the first cost of house and land,
by the time the bonds matured the increase in the value of
the land would in most communities amount to as much as
its first cost and the community would have at a compara-
tively small cost property of a much greater permanent
value.

After a long and careful study of the problems of the
rural schools I see no other way in which any thoroughgoing
permanent improvement may be wrought out for our rural
schools in most parts of the country. But this way is clear
and practicable and the principles involved are not untried
in this country and elsewhere. Its general adoption would
increase the value and efficiency of the American rural

THE AMERICAN RURAL SCHOOL 49

school more than we can now understand. Anything that
will add in even a small degree to their effectiveness is worthy
of careful consideration and patient trial.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. To what extent has consolidation been accomplished in your

home State?

2. What per cent of these schools are simply graded schools in the

country without the other features necessary to make them first-
class ruralized schools ?

3. What per cent of the one-room schools in your State have mod-

ern school plants with trained teachers and satisfactory rural
courses of study ?

4. What changes, if any, would be necessary to establish the county-

unit system of school administration in your State ?

5. What are some of the things that rural pupils most need to learn

in school?

6. Can these well be provided economically in single-room schools?

7. What suggestions are given in the chapter for securing satisfac-

tory consolidation?

8. How are bonds obtained for building consolidated schools in your

State?

9. How much money would be available for a consolidated school if

the appropriation for each child equalled ex-President Eliot's
standard of the amount spent for its food and clothing?
[Q. How can such expenditures be justified in the minds of country
people? What per cent of this sum should be paid by the
consolidated-school community, the coimty, the State, and the
nation ?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Recent reports of county and State superintendents of public

schools and the United States Bureau of Education.

2. Surveys of rural schools and country life.

3. Carney — "Country Life and the Country School." Row, Peter-

son & Co.

4. Foght— "The Rural Teacher and His Work." Macmillan.

5. Arp — "Rural Education and the Consolidated School." World

Book Co.

6. Cubberley — "Rural Life and Education." Houghton, Mifflin Co.

50 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

7. Hart — "Educational Resources of Village and Rural Communi-

ties." Macmillan.

8. Vogt — "Rural Sociology." Appleton.

9. Field and Nearing — "Community Civics." Macmillan.
10. Smith — "Educational Sociology." Houghton, Miflflin Co.

SOME TYPICAL SURVEYS

A. State surveys by the U. S. Bureau of Education:

1. Educational survey of Wyoming.

2. Educational conditions in Arizona.

3. Educational survey of Tennessee.

4. Educational survey of the schools of South Dakota. .

B. Self surveys by States:

1. Minnesota, State Department of Public Instruction.

2. Wisconsin, State Department of Public Instruction.

3. Missouri, State Department of Public Instruction.

4. Montana, State Department of Public Instruction.

5. Pennsylvania, State Department of Public Instruction.

C. By boards and bureaus:

1. Public Education in Maryland, by the General Education

Board, New York.

2. Surveys of a number of rural counties by the Presbyterian

Board, New York.

3. Sanitary survey of Porter County, Indiana, and others,

United States Public Health Service.

D. By universities:

1. Survey of Lane County, Oregon.

2. Survey of a county in California, by Williams, published by

the United States Bureau of Education.

CHAPTER III
COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION AND CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. Describe some rural co-operative enterprise, such as a creamery,

elevator, or store, of which you have knowledge.

2. What has led to these " getting- together " movements?

3. Why are not more of these organizations established?

4. What forces have favored and hindered such co-operation?

5. Do the best farmers to-day attempt to ''raise all they need for the

family" as in 1850? Why?

6. In what ways does specialization in farming lead to greater world-

wide connections?

7. How does the consolidated school enlarge the acquaintance unit

of a rural community?

8. Why do farmers so frequently "move to town"?

9. Is farm tenantry a good or bad thing socially?

10. In what ways are the interest of the farmers and the rural village
trading-centre identical ?

As has been ably set forth in the preceding chapter, the
community gives character to country life in our time.
This is another name for the organized neighborhood.
The name describes the people with their properties and
institutions who live within easy reach of one another in
the country. The community is the habitat of a farm fam-
ily. In it personal acquaintance takes on a very intimate
form and verifies personal character. In the country com-
munity everybody is known to everybody else. The weak
are known to be weak; the honest are known to be honest.
The reason for this is in the fact that those who farm can-
not go far from home, and must return to the farm prac-
tically every night. Therefore, acquaintance with those

SI

52 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

near at home is very close. With persons outside the limits
of the home community acquaintance is scanty. The com-
munity in the country intensifies acquaintance but limits it.
Upon this acquaintance unit are based all the new social
institutions of rural life. The co-operative credit unions
depend upon personal acquaintance for their security.
The co-operative creameries and grain-elevators could not
admit to membership men not known well to their fellow
members. Likewise consolidated schools take a district as
large as the circle of personal acquaintance and co-operation
activity for their legislative boundaries. Federated churches
assemble all the people who can attend their services by a
convenient team-haul or automobile-ride.

I. Necessity at Work

Economic forces are moulding anew the social form of
country life. The chief of these forces are in the city which
acts as an assembly of people who do not produce raw ma-
terials. The city depends for the supply of such materials
upon the people in the country, at the same time so adding
to the value of these products as to create a demand for the
finished articles such that even the farmer must buy of
the city.

It must not be lost to sight that the city is the central
fact or expression of the forces which to-day mould country
life. The necessity which forces country people, prone to
household forms of existence, to organize their households
into communities is imposed by the cities.

The World Market. — The second fact which is to-day
remodelling the form of the country community is the inter-
national character of the market. This is often expressed
in the term ''the world market." Of this world market the
cities are the centres, but the remotest farmhouse comes to
that world market as a customer. Few or none are the
households in mountain-coves where to-day men wear

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION AND CONSOLIDATION 53

homespun. Few are the renters or "croppers" who do not
''live out of a store." I have seen the transformation in
remote settlements where a self-sufficing industry prevailed
twenty-five years ago. To-day these people are so eager
for the cash with which to buy ''store-clothes" that the
man of the house, father often of six to ten children before
he is forty, journeys many miles to seek employment upon
railroad or lumber enterprises in order that he may, by
working most of the weeks of the year in a camp, enable his
children to wear what others wear and eat and enjoy what
others have. The opulence and cheapness of the city mar-
kets, which are furnished with all that England or China
produces, tempt every member of a self-sufficing household
to become a wage-earner and so to become a consumer of
other men's and of other nations' goods.

Communication and Transportation. — Transportation is
another name for a force which, with the power of necessity,
irresistibly moulds the social life of the country and makes it
over into the community form. The goods, the people, and
the news from all the world are brought into every region.
Country people come to see that they must associate them-
selves into community organization in order to secure and
to enjoy what the world sends. A good illustration of this
use of the neighborhood form is in the Chautauqua enter-
tainment, to which country people are devoted. Most of
these organizations for the hearing and seeing of celeb-
rities, lecturers, and entertainers are village or open-coun-
try affairs. The system has had to accommodate itself to
the community form. The local Chautauqua is an illus-
tration of the social form country life takes in utilizing
world ideas and enjoyments. The consolidated school is a
form of community organization made necessary by the de-
sire of country people to learn in the world school. Of all these
forces the city is the centre and the expression.

54 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

II. Historical Review

Household organization is a permanent form of country
living. It is older than America — as old as Deuteronomy.
When there were no cities in America the household was
self-sufficing. Socially and economically it maintained it-
self, depending upon other households only as convenience
or as exigency demanded. Co-operation was for emergen-
cies only. What was needed was made on the premises.
Stores were mostly places of exchange of neighborhood goods.
Schools were one- teacher supplements of the home learning;
for the parents considered themselves the proper and suffi-
cient teachers of their children. Churches were places of
meeting, often irregularly used, in which religious services
were supplementary to those of the family. Their doctrine
was patriarchal, a family interpretation of Christianity.
Such social life is still somewhat common. But wherever
the household rules the countryside it indicates that the
city and the world market have not yet effected the reor-
ganization which is inevitably and rapidly approaching.

Before 1870 household farming was the rule. There was
no other form of social organization except that which, like
the one- teacher school, supplemented the household. Now
the emergence of determining institutions of a community sort
signifies that a new era has come in American country life.

Solitary Farming. — When free land in an earlier day
affected vitally the organization of American life, it created
the individualistic type of person, which has always in
American history exerted a great influence. Land so free
that it was of no value intoxicated the children of European
serfs and bondsmen and almost set them mad with the
spirit of independence. They began to idealize personality,
to magnify the value of individual opinion, of private prop-
erty, and to regard individual freedom as an ultimate ideal
instead of a means to spiritual and social ends. Yet in-
dividualists did not forswear the world. They did not be-

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION AND CONSOLIDATION 55

come monks or nuns. Hermits and individualists are not
alike, but most unlike. And as American individualists live
very much in society there have been many clashes and
conflicts between their theories of the freedom of the in-
dividual will and the obligations of an organized society.
Yet that earlier time has made in our history an indelible
impression, contributing to our philosophy, religion, and
education the individualistic elements which idealized the
loneliness and isolation of the wilderness life.

The Migrant Farmer. — When the homesteads were
given away — free land offered in a legalized form — to those
who had come to set value upon land, we find arising in
America a new social type, the migrating farmer. Migra-
tion, especially between 1870 and 1890, has had lasting ef-
fects upon American country people. Families went west-
ward, leaving behind many of the social elements of life,
and founded neighborhoods without traditions, churches
without creeds, schools without culture, and industries
without reserves of capital. The history of the Western
States is only now emerging from the period wherein the
effects of an artificially formalized migration which at-
tempted in twenty years to set up in uniform ways over all
our domain the social culture based upon farming that the
Eastern States had matured in the slow growth of two hun-
dred years. Often the social forms are there, but the value
of them is absent. The homesteading process degenerated
into a speculation in land, in timber, and in minerals, and
this has often debauched the government's high purpose.
The migratory social forms are temporary, as the exploita-
tion which followed the migration is to be temporary. For
our present purpose it is enough to record the force of the
migration in its effects upon such institutions as the school
and the church. They have not been advanced nor per-
fected by the period, with its artificial *' homesteading.''
The improvement of the schools has come from the older
settlement, not from the newer.

56 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

The Exploiters of Land. — There followed the year 1890
a period of exploitation of farm values which produced
social forms not before seen in America. The retired farmer
appeared first in the Middle West, having sold his homestead
in order to secure in cash the land values which he had not
earned. Securing perhaps $100 per acre for lands which he
had received free from the government, he came to live in
town with that freedom from social obligation which one
might expect in a man who could regard land bestowed by
the State as a private possession. The retired farmer has
a bad record, for his situation has been one of slavery to
hostile necessities. He has ever been known as the foe of
all community progress. Succeeding him has come the
landlord, a type different only in his holding his lands for a
bigger rise in price instead of selling. The American farm
landlord has usually been an absentee, living in town away
from his farm, and a social absentee, in that he has insulated
himself from responsibility for the social improvements
which his properties were expected to support. We have,
for example, known owners of five-thousand-acre tracts in
Illinois and in Texas to command their tenants, on penalty
of losing their leases, to vote against school consolidation.

The children of tenants really require a better school
than the children of owners, because their home resources
are more meagre, but the American landlord, bound by no
legal requirements, sense of social responsibility, nor social
usages, such as usually determine the conduct of European
landlords, has persistently declined to improve the local
school, church, or playground. Being an exploiter, he has
regarded only the financial advantage of his position. Be-
ing a speculator, he is waiting for the cash gains of increased
land prices, not for the more remote but sound economic re-
wards of more intelligent agriculture.

The Tenure of Land. — The farm tenant, or "renter," as
he is usually called with fine precision, is *4n a worse con-
dition than that of any European tenant.'' He has, as a

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION AND CONSOLIDATION 57

rule, a lease of only one year. He can secure no better,
because the landlord expects to sell and will not encumber
the property. The tenant usually desires no longer lease,
because he hopes to "skin the land," and actually does often
get a better reward from the year's work than the landlord
receives. The land, which is essentially an asset of society
and of the community, has to pay the costs of this expensive
exploiting process. It is true that not all landlords nor all
tenants are as bad as the type, but the situation is unpro-
tected by legal safeguards, and the pressure of economic
motive works out just about as we have described. In
counties of the Middle Western States, in which tenancy
rises as high as fifty, or even seventy, per cent of the popula-
tion, the social improvement of the community is retarded
while financial gains are being made. The means of money-
making are provided while the schools and roads are left
by the local authorities just where they were in the time
when the farm household was self-sufficing. Some money
is made in the present at the expense of present and future
character and social efficiency. Money eclipses men.

III. Organized Society in Control

Social control has come to the farm. This control is en-
forced not by the State but by the city, the railway, and the
market. The State has little direct control over the farmer.
In the city, policemen have much to say about the daily
conduct of affairs; but in the country, social control, not a
whit less potent, is exerted by international prices of wheat
or beef, by railway and mail influences, and by the compact
will of the masses of consumers whom "the farmer feeds."
The husbandman has come into existence under these con-
ditions, that is, the farmer who farms according to social
control. He is characterized by two new elements, not in
other types of countryman observed: he co-operates and he
uses scientific methods.

5$ THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Wherever husbandry appears there are found colleges of
agriculture and schools capable of carrying into the local
community the teachings of the laboratory and of the ex-
perimental farm. Husbandry always organizes in the form
of such co-operative enterprises as grain-elevators, cream-
eries, egg-gathering associations, and credit associations.
These educational and business forms are expressions of the
community. They are always of the size of the commu-
nity. They depend upon one another. Without the trained
minds developed by and in the consolidated-school district,
co-operation cannot endure. Without the distributed profits
which co-operation alone can assure, better education will
be impossible.

Temporary and Permanent Forms. — The household and
the community are permanent forms. The individualist,
the migrant, and the exploiter are temporary; they may ap-
pear and reappear and constitute an always present fringe,
but these are farmers in the way of becoming something
else. The country must depend upon households to till the
soil. The household group is God's plough for breaking the
sod of nature and reducing chaos to fertility. Families
alone can endure in the country. Persons are nothing in
the contest with nature; the household group is everything
victorious, fruitful, productive. The individuaHst is an
antisocial tiller of the soil. The migrant and the ex-
ploiter, produced as they have been by necessities expressed
in legal terms, are temporary social forms. The household
and the community are the permanent forms of rural
society.

While the household was self-sufficing it dominated the
country. Roads were not of primary importance. Schools
required to be only handmaids of the home, and the one-
teacher school did very well in the narrow place allowed by
the parents to any teacher other than themselves. Churches
were forums of the opinions which thoughtful patriarchs
held. Doctrinal argument was the chief duty of the church.

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION AND CONSOLIDATION 59

Spiritual nurture, like intellectual culture, had no need to
rise above that fitness which a man requires who lives among
his kindred on an isolated farm.

IV. The Community and the World

Integration. — With the emergence of cities — whose causes
are not here being explored — country people have been
obliged to form themselves into communities. It is rightly
said in some sections: "We have no community here, only a
settle-ment." Men have settled there and stayed but they
have not co-operated; they have not been drawn together
by the study of the marvels of transportation and of inter-
national commerce. When the first foods have come from
afar — sugar from Cuba more tasty than sorghum, bananas
from the tropics cheaper than native apples, ginger in Chi-
nese wrappings more salable than spruce-gum — then the
process has begun which will not end until the local com-
munity has organized for the manufacture of its raw products
and their sale in the interests of the neighborhood purse.

With the coming of intelligence about the great world,
it is no longer sufiicient to be taught to read and write and
cipher; a great competition sets in requiring the local com-
munity to educate its children until eighteen years of age
in the best learning and culture of the times. This involves
the creation of institutions as large as the country can
afford. The household farmer kept his institutions small,
in order that he might live at home in a maximum degree.
The community farmer makes his schools, his churches, and
his business enterprises as big as he can, on the principle of
modern economy and for the further reasons that leaders
adequate to the country business are few and the larger
the grouping the better the chance of finding a leader.

A Larger Unit Needed. — The household is inadequate
because its members go away, leaving it diminished in size.
The stronger go and leave the weak; the leaders go and

6o THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

leave the tame and docile clustered in the farmhouse, with-
out initiative and without defense. The household is edu-
cationally inadequate; and the one- teacher school which
is its handmaiden has no abilities with which to command
any situation. The content of modern teaching cannot be
written on the small blackboard of the one-room school,
any more than the passion of world service can be embodied
in a church without either a pastor, an organization, or a
social philosophy.

When wheat is priced in London, wool prices are fixed
by the Australian fleece, butter dominated by Denmark,
beef by Argentina, and American cotton lifts its white boll
to greet the cotton of Egypt, then community organization
begins to be talked of in every farming country. Tillers of
the soil all over the world say "farmers must organize."
In all lands, from Japan to Oregon and back again the other
way, the form of permanent organization is as big as may
be, consistently with the absolute necessity of personal ac-
quaintance. Farmers who organize must trust one another,
and the basis of trust is the verifying of personal character
by personal acquaintance. This means in business the co-
operative unit. It means in education the consolidated
school. It means in religion the federated church.

The Enlarged Horizon. — The organization of country
people to confront the world is the community, and as a
natural thing the community is as large as possible. Its
size is limited only by the team-haul. As soon as the auto-
mobile shall have superseded horse-drawn vehicles the
country community will be made larger. The spirit at
work in it is one of bigness. In this the present time differs
from the period of household farming, for in that time men
idealized the small neighborhood. The family was self-
sufhcient, with its mind concentred upon itself. Men did
not look afar, but very intensely at home. Now the farmer
or villager is offered broad views of the world and he must
seek broad relations with his neighbors.

Cast of "Midsummer Night's Dream" as presented by the school children
of Rockingham, N. C.

A school assembly room
A place where the whole community may congregate

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION AND CONSOLIDATION 6 1

Reasons for this are found in the fact that open-country
communities are less populous than they were before ma-
chinery displaced farm-hands. Village communities are
based upon commercial enterprises which of their very na-
ture seek enlargement. The margin of profit being small,
merchants and agents, lawyers and contractors, physicians
and commission men who make up village populations, seek
to enlarge their community boundaries by extending their
clientele. Thus the village-centred country communities
are to-day as big as they can be.

The dominant type of farmer in this era of the social
control of agriculture is a man who respects bigness. He
wants big machinery, big cattle, big horses, and he aspires
to till an acreage up to the economic limit. Such men have
a great influence in the direction of enlarging the community.
Their influence is always exerted toward an enlistment in
the big world in as big companies as possible. They are
impatient of little churches, of petty educational work, and
of country Ufe too localized. As this type of husbandman
attains a greater influence in the country, community or-
ganization takes the place of tiny ^'settle-ment'' organiza-
tion. The sense of neighborhood is extended to a larger
circle. But always within the limitation that the community
can he as large as personal acquaintance and no larger. The
consolidated school is a great invention for enlarging, en-
riching, and refining this acquaintance unit. Here is one of
its dominant aims.

V. Community Ways

The internal organization of the country community is
peculiar to itself. Among European and American rural
populations it partakes of certain characteristics which, if
the term be not misunderstood, may be called ^^demo-
cratic." The country community, with its radius of five
and diameter of ten miles, is just about big enough to dis-

WHAT THIS COMMUNITY DID

IT MOBIUIZED FOR RESUUTS

THREE THINGS ARE CONSIOCREO

IS IT POSSlBUe FOR A COMMUNITy TO PUAN FOR ITS FUTURE OCVCUOPMCT?

DO WE CARC TO OO IT7 IS IT W O RTH W H I UE 7 I F SO H O W C AN IT B B OO N E 7

ir DECI8IOIl_IS_f AVORABLe COMMITTEf 8 ARE APPOINTEO TO STUDY TOWWV»NO REPORT DEflNITE PBOJeCTS FOR THEXpMINQ YEAR

62

WHAT ONE COMMUNITY FOUND
— ORGANIZATIONS SELF-CENTERED

^^PUBUC X PUBLJC ^

SCHOOL

'UBL
CiAL

63

64 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

cover leaders and to correlate personality with leadership.
As the rule in all community organizations, financial and
other, one man has one vote — at least there is a limit put
upon the power of any one man, such as to reserve for per-
sonality a secure place. In a Middle West grain-elevator
organization, for example, one man may own four shares,
but he may have only one vote in the control of this com-
munity enterprise.

Another way of the country might be expressed in the
term country-mindedness. Granges exclude those who are
not in businesses which insure their having rural sympathy.
Country communities are jealous of outsiders. In some way
the man of influence must belong to the sacred industry,
the fellowship of those who till the soil. He must know the
fight with nature from personal experience or they will not
work with him. Farmers believe themselves to be in an
industry set apart, unlike any other, but necessary to all
others. To be country-born, to till and own, to be a country-
school teacher, minister, or physician, or of some essentially
related trade, is necessary if one is to get within the circle
of rural influence.

The functions of the country community, which must be
locally performed, are production, with its attendant tasks
of breeding, orcharding, and so forth; manufacture of raw
materials raised; the final organization of credit, in exchanges
of borrowers; education in schools which teach the child
until he is eighteen years of age during the period of his en-
largement upon the whole world; and religion, in the con-
gregation of worshippers. Social welfare among country
people requires a community performing these in a maxi-
mum degree. The consolidated school is the natural out-
come of social evolution, in which personality bursts the
confines of family and merges with community and world
experience. This thought will be amplified in the following
chapter.

COMMUNITY ORGANIZATION AND CONSOLIDATION 65

Summary

The country community is the acquaintance unit, the
habitat of the farm or village family.

Necessities of life determine the form of the social unit
of country life.

Household organization has been superseded by com-
munity organization, with several intermediate and sec-
ondary types, such as individuaUst, migrants, speculators,
all created by the forces of necessity.

The husbandman is the countryman who responds to
social control of the whole world, which centres in cities,
railroads, and markets.

To the world control the household is not adequate, and
the community, because it is bigger, a better field of leader-
ship and a safer arena of personality, is consciously organ-
ized by husbandmen in co-operative business and consoli-
dated schools.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

See end of next chapter. These two chapters may be considered as a
unit, both dealing with the forces which enlarge the rural social
mind in its knowledge, habits, and ideals to county-unit and con-
solidated-school size. These forces lie at the basis of all school
reform and must be thoroughly understood in considering demo-
cratic modes of advance in our country. These social forces are
frequently overlooked and underestimated in attempting to es-
tablish consolidation. Democracy is a mode of living in which
all gain education and growth by participation and sharing social
responsibility. Communities must grow to the co-operation level
before consolidation of interests and efforts will flourish. The
school is both an outcome and a potent cause of such social
development . — Ed .

BIBLIOGRAPHY

See end of jollowing chapter

CHAPTER IV
RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. See those at the beginning of the preceding chapter.

2. What is the unit of school organization in your county? What is

the unit of civil (governmental) organization ? What is the unit
of trade, of buying and selling? Are these the same? Should
they be?

3. What has the rural church done in any community with which you

are familiar in promoting the broader social mind and spirit of
co-operation necessary to consolidation? What could it do?

4. If possible give an example of a church that promotes broad com-

munity organization and consciousness. (See chaps. XVII and
XVIII of Vogt's "Rural Sociology" and chap. IV in Foght's
"The Rural Teacher and His Work.")

5. Examine the writer's volumes on "Rural Economics" and "Hand-

book of Readings in Rural Economics." Macmillan.

I. Social Unity Preceding Consolidation

Need of Neighborhood Self-Consciousness. — One of t!ie
greatest obstacles in the way of an effective organization of
rural communities for the co-operation of consolidation or
anything else, as shown in the preceding chapter, is the
difficulty which the people have in realizing their own unity.
The perception by the people that they really are a com-
munity must precede any effective organization. The basis
of all community of action is territorial unity. There should
also be racial unity and ideational unity, but without ter-
ritorial unity the others can scarcely exist. Whether we are
speaking of the great community called the nation or a small
community called a neighborhood, the principles are very
much the same.

66

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 67

Suppose, for example, we were to try to realize the unity
of the great community called the nation under the follow-
ing conditions: Let us suppose that for purposes of military
defense the present territory of the United States was in-
cluded with its existing boundaries, coasts, and frontiers.
Then let us suppose that for purposes of civil administra-
tion the territory west of the Mississippi River, and also
Mexico and Alaska, were a unit and were entirely separated
from the territory east of the Mississippi River, which might
include a good part of the Dominion of Canada. Then sup-
pose that for purposes of education the old Mason and
Dixon's line were taken as the dividing-line between dif-
ferent systems, all of North America north of the Ohio
River, including the Dominion of Canada, being treated as
one unit, and all south of the Ohio, including Mexico, being
treated as another unit. In this mixed-up state of affairs
it is apparent that none of us would have a very clear idea
as to what our nation was.

We are to-day suffering from some such confusion with
respect to the small community known as the neighborhood.
Most of us have rather vague ideas as to what our neighbor-
hood is. For educational purposes (i) we have, for example,
one territorial unit. For marketing purposes (2) we have
another, more or less understood but not usually found
located on our maps. That is to say, farmers will drive a
certain distance to a certain town or trading centre; the
territory which is tributary to that centre is not very well
marked, and does not coincide with any political boundary.
Then for purposes of civil administration (3) we have the
town and township, the county, etc. I am afraid that we
shall never develop the genuine neighborhood conscience
until we achieve something like unity in these three inter-
ests. The school district, the civil township, and the eco-
nomic unit should coincide as nearly as possible. When
farmers have to go to one place on election day, to another
place for trading and shipping, and to still a third for their

68 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

school meetings, they cannot be blamed for their lack of
neighborhood conscience. Where the school and the civil
administration and the market-place are in the same centre,
with the same territory tributary in all three respects, it is
possible to develop a genuine neighborhood conscience.
This, in my opinion, is one of the strongest economic rea-
sons for the consolidated school.

The Economic Boundaries. — However, I think danger
may some time arise. The work of consolidation may go
too far. The territorial unit which should be included in a
school district should not be greater on the average than the
township, though in sparsely settled regions it might be
larger. If the boundaries of the township can be redrawn
so as to coincide with the boundaries of the marketing dis-
trict, still another advantage will be gained. If the school
district should be made too large, it might defeat the develop-
ment of the neighborhood conscience as surely as though it
were too small.

It seems to me that the determination of the boundaries
of the consolidated district should be a part of a general plan
for community building and should not stand alone. If the
planning is done with a view to the administrative efficiency
of the school system and that alone, some very large and
important social interests are certain to be neglected. Be-
cause the small single-room school district of the old type
does not coincide with any other economic or social unit is,
in my opinion, one of the chief reasons for condemning it.

One of the first objects which the consolidated school
ought to achieve is to acquaint the pupils intimately and
comprehensively with their geographical habitat; that is,
with the geographical features of the school district. There
should, for example, be an outline map of the district
painted permanently on the blackboard, showing not only
the boundaries of the district but every road and by-road,
every creek and swimming-hole, every important hill and
valley, the boundaries of every farm, the location of the

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 69

farm buildings, and even the boundaries of the fields on the
farm, with something to indicate woodland, pasture, and
ploughland. Then from year to year the crop which is grow-
ing in each field could be indicated by means of colored
chalk. With this map constantly before the eyes of the
pupils, and with constant encouragement to correct it,
complete, and fill it in, indicating from week to week the
condition of the crop in each field, the pupils would begin to
know their own geographic habitat. Again, they should be
made acquainted with the products of the district and the
outlets of the inlets.

When the school district coincides with an economic
unit, that is, when practically all the farmers of the school
district do their marketing at the same place, this is made
possible; but it is hardly possible with the school district as
it is now organized in many of our States. The pupils, or
at least the older pupils, should know from year to year
what is shipped out of the school district and at least the
larger items which are shipped in to supply the needs of
the district. When every person who grows up within a
school district is thus familiar with the basic economic facts
regarding it, there will be knowledge enough to form the
basis for neighborhood discussion; and out of this will grow
something which may be not inaptly called neighborhood
statesmanship.

I am convinced that the average neighborhood needs
statesmanship quite as intensely as the large community
known as the nation needs it. One reason why we have
national statesmanship is because people have a fairly
definite conception of national unity and of national in-
terests. The average high-school pupil to-day learns more
about national exports and imports than about the exports
and imports from his own neighborhood. He knows more
about crop areas and maximum and minimum production
in the nation as a whole than he knows about his own com-
munity. People are therefore thinking about national prob-

70 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

lems and discussing them, and out of this knowledge,
thought, and discussion grows national statesmanship. Let
us by all means promote in every possible way the develop-
ment also of neighborhood statesmanship. If every neigh-
borhood develops something akin to statesmanship and
really begins to take measures to promote its own prosper-
ity, one might almost say that the prosperity of the nation
as a whole would take care of itself, though, of course, there
would still be need for national statesmanship. However,
they who have been able to think clearly and plan wisely
regarding the economic interests of the neighborhood, will
furnish the very best material out of which to develop men
who can think clearly and plan wisely regarding the larger
national interests.

II. Integrating Country Life

Organization of Rural Communities. — The writer has
been actively interested for a number of years in promoting
a better organization of rural interests. The more he
studies the problem the more he is convinced that the ef-
fective organizations of these rural interests must begin
with a definite neighborhood conscience. He sees in the
consolidated school the key to the whole situation, provided, as
suggested above, the boundaries of the school district co-
incide fairly closely with the boundaries of the unit of civil
administration and of the economic unit as described above.
After this has been achieved, the school may very well
become a centre of the organization movement. One of the
most striking things about the effective rural organization
of Denmark as well as of Holland, Germany, Belgium, and
Ireland, is the part which the school has played. There the
local schoolmaster is usually the secretary of the farmers'
co-operative association; and one reason why he can func-
tion so well in this capacity is that the school district is a
real neighborhood and not merely a certain number of square
miles of territory.

m

I P:Hl.llt|fi;:!ll

h^|3| sit

ii ^ lilii^lPKl!: Ill

i.i:ilill';lliil^iS;'i

>5h £ si? i8s< : S.S 6S^hI^2

(From the Year-Book of the United States Department of Agriculture for

71

72

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

It is not very difficult to convince farmers of the advan-
tage of organization. There is probably not a farming com-
munity in the United States which does not need some
form of organization. Much excellent work has been done
by certain national associations, such as the Grange, the
Farmers' Union, the Gleaners, the Society of Equity, etc.
But the thing that still is lacking is community organization.

However, organization for its own sake is a very poor
programme. Organization to supply certain definite needs
is a very good programme. No two communities are likely
to have precisely the same needs; therefore no two com-
munities are likely to be served by precisely the same kind
of an organization. A considerable study of the problem
has convinced the writer that the following outline includes
the principal needs of the average rural community:

Needs of
rural com-
munities s
which require
organization

I. Business
needs

II. Social
needs

Better farm production.

Better marketing facilities.

Better means of securing farm supplies.

Better credit facilities.

Better means of communication:

a. Roads.

h. Telephones.

1. Better educational facilities.

2. Better sanitation.

3. Better opportunities for recreation.

4. Beautification of the countryside.

5. Better home economics.

Social Needs. — The business needs of the farmers have
received somewhat more attention than the social needs,
and yet it is probable that the social needs are quite as acute
as the business needs. It was at one time believed that the
one thing needful for the improvement of country life was
to increase the income of the farmers. We are now begin-
ning to discover that that is only half of the problem, and by
no means the most difficult half. We find, for example, that
the wealthy farmer is more likely to move to town than the

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 73

unprosperous farmer. In fact, the wealthy farmer some-
times moves to town simply because he is wealthy — because
he has accumulated a competence and is therefore able to
afford the luxuries of city life. Those sections of the country
where agriculture has been most prosperous, where land is
highest in price, and where farmers have grown rich in the
largest numbers, are the very sections from which they have
retired to town with the greatest unanimity, and where
there is in consequence the largest percentage of tenancy.

In some of these rich sections we find the schools and
churches and other agencies as badly run down as in the
poorest sections. In fact, if you want to find the best gen-
eral social, educational, and economic conditions in the
open country you should go, not to the regions where the
soil is rich nor to the very poorest, but to sections where the
land is just moderately productive. Here you will find
farmers who are moderately well-to-do hut not rich enough to
retire. They stay on their farms and educate their chil-
dren, and build up schools, churches, roads, and other
things to make country life tolerable. In the very poorest
sections of course they cannot afford these things. In the
very richest sections the landowners are living in town and
spending their money there, and spending just as little in
their old neighborhoods as they possibly can.

The writer well remembers a certain school district in
the heart of the corn belt as it was about forty years ago.
He has recently been back to the same neighborhood. The
schoolhouse is just as it was forty years ago. It has been
kept in fair repair, but so far as improvements are concerned
not ten dollars have been expended either on the building
or on the grounds. The school-teachers get very little more
in the way of salary than they got forty years ago, yet forty
years ago the whole district could have been bought at $25
an acre. Now there is scarcely an acre that could be bought
for less than $150, and the price runs from that up to $200
an acre. It would seem as though the people were finan-

74 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

dally able to support a much better school. However,
forty years ago but two farms in the district were farmed
by tenants. Now more than three-fourths of them are so
farmed. The owners are "living in town.'^

Where this situation exists we get into a vicious circle.
Because the school is so poor farmers who care for the
education of their children do not Kke to live there; they
move to town as soon as they can afford it. Because they
move to town the schools remain poor and inefficient, and so
things go from bad to worse. Something must be done, ap-
parently, to make it more worth while for well-to-do farmers
who really care for good schools to remain in the country
where they can support good schools. One difficulty with
the school just described is that the district included but
four square miles. The consolidated school, which would
give the farm children some of the advantages which they
get in a city graded school, would have gone a long way to-
ward keeping some of those farmers on the land.

The Cityward Tendency. — If we were distressed to find
that water was flowing from one lake into another, we should
not think it a very wise plan to try to pump some of it back
into the upper lake. That would only accelerate the flow
downward again. We should try rather to prevent the flow
downward. For a long time many people have been dis-
tressed to find that population is moving from the country
districts to the cities and towns. It has occurred to some
of them that the thing to do is to colonize city people in the
country. This plan is just about as wise as that of pump-
ing water back from the lower into the upper lake. It would
only accelerate the movement cityward. It ought not to
take a very wise man to see that it would be wiser to find out
why the people are moving cityward and then, if possible,
to remove the cause.

One reason undoubtedly is that, for some years at least,
the rewards of labor have been higher in the cities than in
the country. That which we now call the rising cost of

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 75

living is partly a movement toward an equilibrium; that is,
toward a condition where the rewards of industry will be
approximately as great in the country as in the city. When
the farmers are enabled to get a little higher price still for
their products we may expect that the equilibrium will be
reached.

There is another reason, perhaps still more important,
why country people move to the city. Some of the most
prosperous of the country people do not find in the country
the means of social, intellectual, and esthetic satisfaction
which their prosperity enables them to afford. They find
them in somewhat greater measure in the towns and, since
they can afford to do so, they retire from the farms to the
towns. This movement of prosperous people from the farms
to the towns will never he stopped until the country offers as
great attractions as the towns. Until this is done, the faster
farmers become prosperous enough to afford to retire to the
towns, the faster they will retire.

Another reason why country people move to cities is
that some of them have not been trained to see and appreci-
ate the real satisfaction which country life affords. People
who think that an electric sign is more beautiful than a
sunset, that shop-windows are more beautiful than grass
and trees and flowers, that crowded streets are more beau-
tiful than open fields, that one of our modern plays, most of
which are written by men who mistake neurosis for men-
tality, is more beautiful than an outdoor pageant, will prob-
ably continue to go to the cities. Well, the country will
perhaps be well rid of them. But the desire for change and
variety of experience in a lifetime will always remain a big
factor as long as town and country are so unlike in so many
ways.

There are two things above all others which need to be
done. The rewards of labor, abstinence, and enterprise in
the country must be still further increased, and more of the
adornments and embellishments of life must be made avail-

76 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

able for country people. In order to increase the farmers'
income we must spread scientific information more effec-
tively, we must have better methods of marketing, of pur-
chasing farm supplies, and of financing the farmers' busi-
ness enterprises. In order to increase the adornments and
embellishments of life in the country, we must have better
schools, better sanitation, better recreation, and more gen-
eral beautification of the countryside. These are all essen-
tial parts of a constructive rural programme. Every item
in that programme calls for organization.

The School at the Centre. — The key to most of the edu-
cational problems of the country is the country school.
There is scarcely a single phase of country life in which the
country school may not become a vitalizing factor. The
boys' and girls' clubs should begin there. The study of
farm production, of marketing, of sources of supply, of farm
accounts, and of road and telephone construction should be
a part of the work of the country school. But this work
should be extended over the social interests of the commu-
nity also. The knowledge of one's environment should in-
clude one's economic and social as well as one's physical
environment. The first attention of the committee on edu-
cation should obviously be directed toward the country
schools.

There should be a distinct and persistent movement to
make the country schools at least as efficient as the city
schools. To accomplish this the entire school system of the
State must eventually be supported and administered as a
unit, as the school system of a city is now. That one sec-
tion of a city is less wealthy than another is not considered
a valid reason why the children of the poorer section should
have poorer schools than those of the richer section. This
policy should be made to apply to the entire State. That
there is less wealth in the country than in the city ought not
to be considered a valid reason why the country children
should have poorer schools than the city children. They

Learning now lo prune an orchard

^HHS^h^I^hhI

K

iW^fff^^'^^^WWi JMW

^ «'* ' . ' ' jr^nC ''.d^^l^rlKj!^

HPPHEH

^^.

j^iri^

1

H

Reproduced by courtesy of Division of Agriculliiral Instruction, U . S. Depl. of Agriculture

An orchard project. Renovation of an old orchard by high-school boys in

Maryland

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 77

should all have equal support out of the tax fund of the en-
tire State, and they should all be administered as a unit.
If each ward of the city were restricted to the taxes of that
ward for school purposes, it would often happen that the
most populous wards, where there were the most children
needing schools, would have the least money to support
their schools, because of the scarcity of taxable property,
while the least populous wards, where children were scarc-
est, would have the most money for schools, because of the
large amounts of taxable property. This would be so ob-
viously wasteful and inefficient that no enlightened city
would tolerate it. Yet that is precisely what happens in all
of our States. Schools are supported, not in proportion to
the need for them, which is the only correct principle, but
mainly in proportion to the amount which each community
can raise.

In order that the State school system may be adminis-
tered as a unit there must be at the head of the State sys-
tem a highly trained expert, not elected, but appointed as
is the superintendent of a city-school system. He should
have ample power and an adequate staff of assistants and
inspectors to enable him actually to inspect the schools of
every county in the State.

Again, in each county there should be an educator, not
elected as most county superintendents are now, but ap-
pointed by a board of education as are city superintendents,
with ample power and a staff of assistants which will en-
able him to inspect and control every school in the county.
Again, the county should be redistricted so that every
school district shall be large enough to support a first-rate
school which shall compare favorably with the schools of
the cities and the larger towns. The boundaries of this dis-
trict should, as stated above, coincide so far as possible with
those of the unit of civil administration and also, so far as
they can be determined, with those of an economic unit.

Until these things can be brought about through State

78 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

legislation each community can do a great deal toward the
improvement of its own schools through concerted action.
The study of the broader questions of national economy
may well be turned over to the higher institutions of learn-
ing, where students are more mature than they who attend
the district school. But the questions of local or neighbor-
hood economy, with which the study of economics ought
always to begin, may be studied to advantage in every
country school.

But the country school cannot possibly do everything in
the way of education that is needed. At any rate, there are
some things which one can learn better outside of. school
than within. The committee should learn how to utilize
other educational resources, such as study clubs, natural-
history clubs, circulating libraries, not entirely of cheap
fiction ,'^but in part at least of solid reading which will be of
economic use to the community, and so on. Use should
also be made of such educational agencies as the stereopticon
and motion-picture outfits, and lecturers from the state
colleges and other higher institutions.

III. Idealizing and Realizing Rural Values

The moral advantages of a closer neighborhood organi-
zation and a more definite neighborhood conscience are al-
most as important as the economic advantages. That man
is a political animal, we have on the authority of Aristotle.
As he used the expression, political animal meant precisely
the same as social animal. Recent psychologists have given
a new support to this doctrine by showing that the individual
never reaches his normal development except in a social
organization. Isolation and lack of definite correlation
among individuals produce moral reactions of the most
lamentable nature. The individual comes in much closer
contact with his neighborhood than with his state or his
nation. His moral reactions are more largely determined

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 79

by the type of neighborhood organization than by the type
of state or national organization.

^ They who cannot or will not work together are the natural and,
one might almost say, the legitimate prey of those who can. Whether
we like it or not, it is a law of life, a part of the economy of nature.
There is no use kicking against it; the only thing to do is to conform
to it. Unless we can manage to work together with our fellows we
must expect to be preyed upon, governed, or exploited by those who
can.

No people ever succeed in governing themselves until they are able
to work together. Until they learn that, they will be governed by
some one else, either an outside power which subjugates them, a ruling
class within their own members, or a boss. So long as they quarrel
among themselves or work at cross purposes, others who have learned
the art of working together will rule and exploit them.

It is as true in business as in government that the people who
work together will rule or exploit those who work at cross purposes.
That is one thing which ails the farmer at the present time. It is not
necessarily true that farmers are more cantankerous than other peo-
ple, though it sometimes seems so. But there are so many of them,
they are so widely scattered, and they are so much more expert in
dealing with the forces of nature than with the forces of society, that
it is physically more difficult for them to work together than it is for
other classes. However, these natural obstacles in the way of united
effort must be overcome by a greater wisdom and moral discipline
than other classes possess, otherwise the farmer will always be at a
disadvantage. That is what wisdom and moral qualities are for — to
overcome difficulties.

Now we need not waste any sympathy on those who will not or
cannot work together. They get what they deserve. Of course we
all have our own opinions as to what a good man or a bad man is
like. We generally call him a good man who possesses the qualities
which we admire, which is very likely to mean the qualities which we
think that we ourselves possess. Looked at broadly and imperson-
ally, however, the essential difference between good men and bad
men is that the former are very careful of their own obligations and
other people's rights, whereas the latter are very particular about
their own rights and other people's obligations. Every great moral
teacher has tried to make men good by telling them of their obliga-

*The substance of the next few paragraphs was published in the Agricul-
tural Student in October, 1913.

8o THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tions and not of their rights. We are naturally so much inclined the
other way that this is necessary in order to restore a proper equilibrium.
Now it is rather obvious, is it not, that people who are careful of
their own obligations and other people's rights are easy to get along
with. A community made up of such people can always work to-
gether. On the other hand, people who are very particular about their
own rights and other people's obligations are hard to get along with.
A community made up of such people cannot work together at all.
In our impatience we are sometimes tempted to say that such people
have no rights and deserve to be exploited. However, the question
becomes complicated when we have a community made up in part of
people who would like to work with their neighbors and in part of
people who will not.

The foregoing is presented here to show how closely the
problem of organizing rural interests is bound up with the
question of religion and morals. Unless the right moral in-
fluences are at work creating the spirit of working together
and mutual helpfulness, no effective organization will be
possible. The church, the school, the religious press, and
every other moral agency must begin at the bottom by
teaching people to be careful of their own obligations and
of the rights of others, and overcome the tendency to be
insistent upon our own rights and other people's obligations.

City Life vs. Country Life.^ — Our branch of the human race has
not yet demonstrated its ability to live in cities. We have been a
pioneering race for something like two thousand years, and no one
knows how much longer. It is probably harder for a race to change
the habits of its lifetime than it is for an individual. This habit has
made us an outdoor race, whose chief characteristic is strenuous mus-
cularity. Such a race degenerates rapidly whenever it attempts to
live an indoor life of bodily ease and luxury. It is always at its best
when it is pioneering — when it is obeying the first command written
in its sacred book: "Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth,
and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over
the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the
earth."

We have all heard stories of the children of certain families who

* The substance of the next few paragraphs was published in the Delineator ,
June 8, 1914,

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 8 1

hang around home waiting for the patrimony and then quarrel over
its distribution. Over against despicable examples of this kind we
have the more robust and inspiring examples of those children who
go out into the world and create families and patrimonies of their
own instead of quarrelling over their share of the estate. When a
race ceases to be a pioneering race, that is, when, instead of going out
to find new opportunities, the children of the race hang around the
older centres of civilization waiting for the accumulated riches of the
past generations, they generally fall to quarrelling over their distribu-
tion. This is even more despicable than for the children of a family
to wait for their patrimony, and it is a more certain mark of degenera-
tion.

Much of that which goes under the euphonious name of social re-
form is merely a symptom of this kind of degeneration. Its home is
in the cities, it springs from urbanized minds, and its prophets are
mainly members of urbanized races. Strong, robust, self-disciphned,
individualistic men are never exploited. If they do not like their
treatment in one place, they go where there is land, where they can be
independent. Weak, whimsical, timid, gregarious men, who are afraid
to get very far from the herd, are always exploited. They cannot
even be truly organized. They can be herded together as mobs,
browbeaten by their own leaders, excited to spasmodic group action,
but so far as constructive, consistent, united action is concerned, it
is beyond their power. Only self-disciplined men, capable of con-
trolling their impulses, willing to suffer loss for a principle, but capable
of working together with their fellows for distant ends, either with or
without leaders, are capable of genuine organization. Such men can-
not be exploited.

Another symptom of the degeneration which comes to our race
from city life is ''class consciousness." Once upon a time there was
an important dialogue between a man from the city and a man from
the country. Please remember the important fact, commonly over-
looked, that the one was from the city and the other was from the
country. The man from the city asked: "Who is my neighbor?" Such
a question would not occur to a real countryman. He has no doubt
as to who his neighbors are. But a man from the city does not al-
ways know. He is inclined to consider whether they are members of
the same occupation, profession, or religion as himself, or whether
they are people with about the same income who can entertain on about
the same scale as himself, or whether they are the people who live
within easy reach.

The man from the country who answered this question by telling
the story of the good Samaritan was in the habit of emphasizing the

82 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

fundamental relations of life. The geometrical relations are very
much more fundamental than are the class relations. In fact, all
class consciousness, such as was shown by the priest and the Levite, is
contrary to the scheme of life and social relations which this man
from the country came to establish. The wisest social workers even
in our cities are beginning to realize that the neighborhood must be
the basis of a genuine reconstruction of city life.

Broadening the idea of neighborhood we have the principle of ter-
ritoriality as the basis of nationality. Enlarge the neighborhood
sufficiently and we have the 'territorial group called the State. Sev-
eral times in the history of the race other groups than the territorial
group, other organizations than the territorial State, have claimed
the loyalty of the individual. Whenever the average citizen is more
loyal to another group, say a church, a party, a labor organization,
than to the State, the State has disappeared. That is to say, when he
will obey the orders of some other organization rather than the law
of the land, the territorial State has already been subverted. Needless
to say, these other groups, based on a common rehgion, or a common
occupation, which sometimes stand as rivals for the loyalty of the
people against the group, commonly called the State, which is based
on the occupation of the same territory, have their origin in cities.
Indoor people are the only ones who can easily forget the principle of
territoriality and the law of the la^td.

Pioneering in this country needs redirection. During the past
decade it has taken thousands of our most valuable citizens beyond
our own borders to enrich the life and increase the power of other
nations. In place of these sturdy, self-reliant, courageous citizens,
who are willing to face hardship, and capable of creating their own
opportunities, we are receiving in vast numbers men who prefer to
go where opportunities have already been created for them by pioneer-
ing activities of others, to fill positions created for them by the busi-
ness enterprise of a sturdier race. In other words, we are losing men
who can create opportunities and are receiving men who are only
capable of filling opportunities created by others. This means that
we are in process of becoming an urbanized, and therefore a degener-
ate, nation.

The difficulty is not, as some seem to think, that we do not dis-
tribute our immigrants. They probably do better to stay in the cities
because they would be useless on our farms. Our farmers would not
hire many of them, and they have not the qualities which make
pioneer farmers. Besides, if we could send more of them to the coun-
try and keep them there it would only accelerate the movement to-
ward Canada and the cities. The stream of population is moving

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 83

away from our farm regions. It is much more important that we re-
tard the flow of that stream than that we try to turn a new stream to-
ward the farms.

While so many thousands of our farmers are emigrating beyond
our boundaries in search of more land, it has been ascertained that
not more than forty per cent of our tillable area is actually under
tillage, and of this not more than fifteen per cent is actually yielding
satisfactory returns. If the untilled sixty per cent were all poor land,
while better land could be had for the asking just over the boundary, it
would be difficult to convince many of these farmers that they ought
to stay at home and cultivate this poor land. But there are reasons
for believing that this is not generally the case. The lands which they
are seeking abroad have two characteristics which fit them for isolated
and individual farming. The soils are new and fertile and therefore
require no investment to bring them to a high state of productivity.
Again, they are suitable for the growing of a staple crop — wheat —
for which there is a ready sale in a highly organized market. Thus
the marketing of this product takes care of itself.

Much of the land still untilled in this country is capable of a
high degree of productivity, but will require some investment of capital
to bring it to that state. The problem of financing the farmer during
this period of waiting must be solved. Again, much of this land is
suitable for mixed crops and agricultural specialties rather than for
one or two great staple crops. The products of this kind of farm-
ing do not market themselves. It requires organized effort on the
part of the farmers; therefore the problem of marketing must be
solved before these lands will attract farmers and keep them from
going abroad. Here is a new kind of pioneering which challenges the
young men and women of our race.

The Young Women. — The challenge is even more to the
young women than to the young men. They will have the
harder half of the burden and they will find less to attract
them, ^ost young men are attracted by an outdoor life,
and even physical hardships do not deter them, if there is a
chance for real achievement, together with genuine com-
radeship. That is what a soldier's life involves. But none
would want to be a soldier if he were deprived of comrade-
ship and if there was no chance of achievement. Young
women are not so strongly attracted to this kind of life.
Nothing but religion will sustain them in it, and unfortu-

84 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

nately women are, contrary to the common belief, far less
religious than men. The reason for this common error is
that what we commonly call religion is of a namby-pamby
sort. There is little in it to sustain the spirit of a crusader,
which is characteristic of any genuine religion, at least, the
only kind which appeals to men.

To conquer our untilled lands, to subjugate them, and
force them to yield food for a great people, to build great
families with high ideals in order that we may become a
great people worthy of being fed, is a task which ought to
fire the ardor of our young American crusaders as no old
crusader's zeal was ever fired. It is a vastly greater task
and vastly more worthy of accomplishment than any which
the old crusader faced.

We have therefore the opportunity for great achieve-
ment. Can we give the young men and women also the
comradeship which is, next to the opportunity for achieve-
ment, the most important factor in sweetening the outdoor
life of hardship to which we are calling them ? They must
go in groups and colonies. We need a revival and readap-
tation of the old New England method of settlement by
colonies. Sometimes a preacher would gather a congrega-
tion around himself and lead them out into the wilderness
and build up a little colony around his church. We no longer
have a wilderness where free land can be had, but with less
hardship a colony could now be started on land which would
have to be purchased. It would be necessary for the col-
ony as a whole to work out the problem of credit and farm
finance. An organized rural Hfe, whether it be of the old
New England type or of some other type, will be necessary
to give the sense of comradeship in this great rural crusade.

But what has this crusade to offer to the young men and
women of America? From the standpoint of a pig- trough
philosophy of life it has nothing to offer. They who prefer
the flesh-pots of Egypt would better stay in Egypt. In-
door work, freedom from responsibility, short hours, time

Animal-husbandry study at first-hand

Pupils studying tree grafting at Sherrard, West Virginia

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION Sj

for carousal in rooms full of lurid oratory, beer, and tobacco,
will never be the lot of those who enlist for this productive
campaign. But from the standpoint of the creative philos-
ophy of life it has the best things in the world to offer.

^'To young men it offers days of toil and nights of study.
It offers frugal fare and plain clothes. It offers lean bodies,
hard muscles, horny hands, or furrowed brows. It offers
wholesome recreation to the extent necessary to maintain
the highest efficiency. It offers the burdens of bringing up
families and training them in the productive life. It offers
the obligation of using all wealth as tools and not as a
means of self-gratification. It does not offer the insult of
a life of ease, or esthetic enjoyment, or graceful consump-
tion, or emotional ecstasy. It offers, instead, the joy of pro-
ductive achievement and of noble comradeship in the pro-
ductive life.

'*To young women also it offers toil, study, frugal fare,
and plain clothes, such as befit those who are honored with
a great and difficult task. It offers also the pains, the bur-
dens, and responsibilities of motherhood. It offers also the
obligation of perpetuating in succeeding generations the
principles of the productive life made manifest in them-
selves. It does not offer the insult of a life of pride and
vanity. It offers the joy of achievement, of self-expression,
not alone in dead marble and canvas but also in the plastic
lives of children, to be shaped and moulded into those ideal
forms of mind and heart which their dreams have pictured.
To them also it opens up the joy of productive achievement
and the noble comradeship of the productive life.'^

This does not mean that there are no possibilities of
material reward in the new type of agriculture to which
young men and women are called. During the last two
generations, owing to the rapid opening of the Western
lands, agriculture has been so depressed that many farm-
ers have felt discouraged. They have seemed to be pouring
their lives into a soil which drank it up and gave little in re-

86 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

turn. Thus the strenuous life of the farmer was robbed, in
part at least, of the joy of achievement. He could not al-
ways see that he was achieving anything. That condition
is now at an end. Henceforth the growing power of con-
sumption and the retarded expansion of our farm area
will give the farmers who know how to adjust themselves
to the new situation a more ample reward for their labor.
Nevertheless, every farm will continue to cry, like the
daughters of the horse-leech: ^'Give, give.'* The more pro-
ductive it is the greater will be the opportunity for further
investment of labor and capital in its improvement. The
farmer will find little encouragement for a life of ease and
luxury. They who desire that kind of life will continue to
go to town. They will be bought out by those who retain
their strenuosity and their faith in the productive life. To
such as these the world belongs.

rV. The Free Farmer and CoNSOLroATioN

The Small Farmer. — One of the most important of all
economic problems is the preservation of the prosperity of
the small farmer who does most of his own work on his own
farm. His salvation depends upon his ability to compete
with the large farmer or the farming corporation. Two
things threaten to place him under a handicap and to give
the large farmer an advantage over him in competition. If
these two things are allowed to operate, the big farmer will
beat him in competition and force him down to a lower
standard of living and possibly to extinction.

One thing which would tend in that direction is a large
supply of cheap labor. The small farmer now has an ad-
vantage because of the difficulty which the big farmer has
in getting help. So great is this difficulty that many of the
bonanza farmers are giving up the fight and selling out to
small farmers. That is, the big farms, the farms that can
only be cultivated by gangs of hired laborers, are being di-

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 2>'J

vided up. Give the owners of those farms an abundant sup-
ply of cheap labor — ^make it easy for them to solve the prob-
lem of efficient help — and they will begin again to compete
successfully with the small farmer, who, because he does his
own work, has no labor problem. If we can keep conditions
such that the capitalistic farmer has great difficulty in
getting help, the small farmer will continue to beat him in
competition, and the bonanza farm will continue to give
way to the one-family farm.

Another thing which threatens the prosperity and even
the existence of the small farmer is the handicap under
which he finds himself in buying and selling. The big
farmer who can buy and sell in large quantities, and also
employ expert talent in buying and selling and in securing
credit, has an advantage over the small farmer who must
buy and sell in small quantities and give his time and atten-
tion mainly to the growing of crops rather than to, selling
them. Much of the supposed economy of large-scale pro-
duction, even in merchandising and manufacturing, is found,
upon examination, to consist wholly in an advantage in
bargaining, that is, in buying and selling. When it comes
to the work of growing farm crops, as distinct from selling
them and buying raw materials, the one-family farm is the
most efficient unit that has yet been found. But the big
farmer can beat the individual small farmer in buying and
selling. It would seem desirable, from the standpoint of
national efficiency, to preserve the small farm as the pro-
ductive unit, but to organize a number of small farms into
larger units for buying and selling. Thus we should have
the most efficient units both in producing and in buying
and selling.

If this is not done, the only farmers who can enter suc-
cessfully into the production of agricultural specialties,
where the problem of marketing is greater than the problem
of producing, will be the big capitalistic farmers. The small
farmer may hold his own in the growing of staple crops, in

SS THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

which field the problem of economic production is perhaps
greater than that of efficient marketing. The reason for
this is that there is a well-organized market for staple crops
and the problem of marketing is therefore somewhat less
difficult than in the case of agricultural specialties. But
even in the growing of staple crops the small farmer will
have a hard time of it if he is forced to compete with the big
farm when it is cultivated by gangs of cheap laborers. The
two worst enemies of the small farmer are the opponents of
co-operative buying and selling, on the one hand, and the
advocates of enlarged immigration to the rural districts, on
the other. The latter would help the big farmer in the buy-
ing of labor for his farm, and reduce the price of the small
farmer's own labor when he undertook to sell it in the form
of products.

Organization must be the watchword of the small farmer
in the immediate future. He is the one remaining person in
our industrial civilization who both works with his hands
and is self-directed. He is the only laborer who, in large
numbers, is his own boss. It is our deliberate opinion that
the real strength of the republic depends upon him more
than upon any other one class. But he will disappear unless
the Hving conditions of the country are made attractive to
men who are capable of self-direction. If they are not,
every man who is capable of self-direction will leave the
country to be tilled by men who can only work under the
direction of a superior.

Consolidation. — The key to this situation is the neigh-
borhood, or the rural community. The key to the neighbor-
hood is the rural school as a community centre. But the
rural school cannot possibly function as a community centre
unless there is a community, and unless this school is at, or
near, the centre. To have several isolated district schools
scattered about over what is really the community, no one
of them being by any chance at the natural centre of any-
thing, hinders this work of community building and this
makes impossible the building of a genuine rural civilization*

RURAL ECONOMICS AND CONSOLIDATION 89

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. From your study of these two chapters make a Hst of the social

conditions necessary or desirable for school consolidation.

2. What light do these two chapters throw on methods of promoting

consoHdation?

3. In what kinds of communities would consolidation proposed by

school officials be apt to fail?

4. What has the Y. M. C. A., the Y. W. C. A., the Red Cross, the

Grange, or other similar organization done to promote com-
munity enlargement and ^'getting together"?

5. How can the county newspapers and farm journals be used to

show the people what consolidated schools are doing and could
do?

6. In what ways could an organization of young men and women,

teachers, parents, merchants, and professional men promote com-
munity co-operation ?

7. Why is it sometimes desirable to start recreational and trade co-

operation in such form as community motion-picture shows and
creameries before consoHdation of schools is attempted?

8. What literature could you procure to place in the hands of in-

telligent farmers that would inform community leaders on con-
solidation ?

9. Why is it desirable to have farmers themselves initiate consolida-

tion rather than have it started by the teacher, preacher,
physician, county agent, or other such individual or group?
10. With what opinions in the two previous chapters do you disagree?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Wilson — "Evolution of the Country Community." Pilgrim

Press, Boston.

2. Carver — "Principles of Rural Economics." Macmillan.

3. Rapeer — "Educational Hygiene," chaps. V and VI, on co-opera-

tion. Scribner.

4. Plunkett— "The Rural Life Problem of the United States." Mac-

millan.

5. Fiske — "The Challenge of the Country." Association Press,

New York.

6. Bailey — "The Country Life Movement." Macmillan.

7. Anderson — "The Country Town." Baker and Taylor.

8. Report of the Country Life Commission. Government Printing

Office, Washington, D. C.

90 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

9. Butterfield— "The Country Church and the Rural Problem."
University of Chicago Press.

10. Quick— "The Brown Mouse." Bobbs, Merrill Co.

11. "The Fairview Idea." Bobbs, Merrill Co.

12. Hayes— "An Introduction to Sociology." Appleton.

13. Wilson— "The Church at the Centre." Missionary Education

Movement, New York.

14. Coulter— "Co-operation Among Farmers." Sturgis and Walton.

15. Rural Surveys in Various States, by the Board of Home Missions,

156 Fifth Avenue, New York.

16. Monahan — "Consolidation of Rural Schools and Transporta-

tion at Public Expense." Bulletin of the U. S. Bureau of Edu-
cation.

CHAPTER V
SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. Reread the concluding section of Chapter I and note the prin-

ciples of rural-school administration held by prominent edu-
cators.

2. What administrative proposals are made in Chapter II ?

3. Why was the district unit of school control natural and desirable

in pioneer times before State responsibility for education had
very much developed?

4. Describe the form of administrative control in Utah and Ohio.

(See Foght's "The Rural Teacher and His Work," p. 130.)

5. What States still have the district system, the county system, the

township, town, or mixed system? (See map on next page.)

6. What States have the most consolidated schools? What form of

administration do these States have?

7. What recent contributions have been made on a large scale to

school support and encouragement of progress?

8. What are the objections to a small county board of education in-

stead of three "directors" for each little school and teacher?

9. How can democracy and efficiency best be harmonized in this

matter?
10. What power have your State and county officers in promoting
consolidation beyond "agitation" and publicity?

Problems of Small Systems. — Superior men and women
may be able to get along fairly well even though they live in
poor, tumble-down houses and outgrown forms of govern-
mental control, but the average run of people are undoubt-
edly greatly helped in their growth by favorable environ-
mental conditions. Progressive communities in country
districts may obtain good schools, including consolidation,
under any form of educational administration, but the evi-
dence goes to show that improving the general organization

91

93

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION 93

and administration of the schools decidedly raises the gen-
eral educational level.

It is possible administratively for the State school code
to make it necessary for the State superintendent or com-
missioner to hand out the State appropriations, for example,
in such a way as almost to demoralize the schools, and then
again it may insure such an apportionment of the funds as
will stimulate the best efforts of communities along the best
lines. Giving out school money on the basis of the number
of children living in districts, regardless of whether they at-
tend school or not, fails to stimulate attendance. Giving it
out partly (say, one-third) on the basis of the total aggre-
gate number of days attended by all pupils stimulates
school communities to get their children to school every
day in the school year. Giving it out partly on the basis of
the number of teachers employed (say, another third or
more) frequently stimulates school directors to add another
teacher for an overcrowded school. Reserving some of
the fund to encourage good movements, like consolidation,
helps greatly to bring it about, especially where the fund,
as in Minnesota and some other States, is large.

Where each separate school in the country is managed
by a board of school directors (the district system) we have
a plan of administration that encourages the habit of think-
ing of each separate school unit as an isolated thing, whereas
if the board of directors had charge of ten to a thousand
schools they could more readily consider bringing little
weak schools together at one centre with or without trans-
portation.

I. City Experimentation and Its Lessons

City Experimentation in Administration. — We need
hardly explain and illustrate the principle that the form of
administration we use for a State or county greatly modifies
the development of good schools. The principle has been

94 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

amply demonstrated for many years. In the last few dec-
ades, in fact since the industrial revolution has built up the
city mode of living, administrative progress has been very
great in these new and congested centres. In Germany and
England the progress has in many ways been greater than
in our own country, although we have done a tremendous
amount of costly administrative experimentation. From
the most decentralized local or ward political control the
people have been driven by hard experience to adopt one
after another of the administrative measures which in busi-
ness and in European cities have brought more efficient and
honest government.

Cities, starting as small towns with perhaps a single
school board for a single school, have grown rapidly into
large municipalities with thousands or hundreds of thou-
sands of inhabitants. Each new accession to the city in the
form of a ward or a school has had its representative board
of directors. Frequently there have been as many or more
directors than teachers, even as in rural districts in many
States there are three times as many able-bodied men as
directors and managers as there are teachers. Board mem-
bers have multiplied in many cities until over a hundred
members have tried to manage the schools at one time; the
city territory has in some cases spread over an entire
county.

Too Many Cooks Spoil the Broth. — The results almost
inevitably have been in city after city the ruination of the
schools and wide-spread failure to furnish education of the
right kinds and where it was most needed. Where the dif-
ferent local members have met as a central board the situ-
ation has been little improved over the purely local system
if at all. Members have got into each other's way; the
board meeting-room has been turned into an oratorical hall
in which to play to the galleries, talk for the newspapers,
and to do business so formally, or with so many committees,
that much business was lost in the red tape; members have

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION 95

fought and "log-rolled" for their respective localities, fre-
quently getting schools built where they were not needed
in order to boost land values or their own prestige while
other schools in the city were overcrowded and on part time;
teachers have been employed because they had friends on
the board rather than for teaching efficiency; politics have
ruled to such an extent that the best men would not be-
come members of such an organization; in general, there
has been a great lack of that business efficiency which
American business men of the best type have been evolving
in their great industries for a half century.

We need not stop to give particular illustrations of the
inefficiency of such a system. As the needs for real school-
ing became more manifest and the expenses of the schools
grew until they became a burden, cities began to call for
efficiency in public-school administration, and they have
obtained it chiefly by centralizing control: lessening the
number of directors, getting them elected or appointed at
large, from any part of the city, arranging for them to limit
themselves to legislative work and hiring executives to do
the work of superintending and supervising schools and
carrying on the business end of the work. Boards were
reduced from as high as one hundred and forty-six members
to five, and three members on a large city board with hun-
dreds of teachers to-day is not uncommon. Now we can
get some of the best men of the city to serve without pay;
they can meet around a table in a small room with a few
chairs about for auditors, and can despatch legislative work
as it is done in the best business concerns of the day. In
some cases, as in New York City, the local boards have
been kept as school visitors and advisers of the principals
and central board. The people have not felt with time that
they have lost any democratic privileges or responsibilities
which they should bear. The schools have prospered as
never before, and a new era in school administration in cities
has taken place. The recent surveys have helped greatly

96 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

in facilitating these changes in many cities that had not
whole-heartedly gone over to the new system.

Centralization in the Country. — Another reason for the
greater centralization has been the increase of population.
When people were scattered about over the land and schools
were separate and isolated from one another, the thought
of handling several of them as a group did not rise. Still
another reason has been the relative decrease in the size
of the country with the invention of all the many new
means of bringing people together and into closer communi-
cation. It was harder to travel over one district or town-
ship in the early days than it is in most cases to travel over
a whole county or very large city now. Telephones, tele-
graphs, railroads, trolley-cars, automobiles, increasingly
better roads, free mail and parcel-post delivery at our
doors in city or country, better wagons for transportation
of numbers of persons, such as the coal-heated busses and the
exhaust-heated autos, have all worked together to banish
isolation and to bring great numbers of people over large
areas into quite close and intimate touch with each other.
The world as a great human brotherhood is rapidly ap-
proaching, even by the aid of terrible wars. But "co-
operation is becoming more than a belligerent virtue.'*
The administration of all the schools in large areas, hundreds
of square miles in extent, is as inevitable as has been the
integration of administration in cities.

II. The Three Systems of Control

The district system with its purely local control was
fairly satisfactory for pioneer life. With the growth of
population and modern improvements and inventions it
must give way to more efficient forms. Cubberley summa-
rizes some of the chief faults of the district system as follows :

The chief objections to the district system of school organization
are that it is no longer so well adapted to meet present conditions and

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION 97

needs as are other systems of larger scope; that the district authorities
but seldom see the real needs of their schools or the possibilities of
rural education; that as a system of school administration it is expen-
sive, short-sighted, inefficient, inconsistent, and unprogressive; that
it leads to great and unnecessary inequalities in schools, terms, edu-
cational advantages, and to an unwise multiplication of schools; that
the taxing unit is too small, and the trustees too penurious; that
trustees because they hold the purse-strings, frequently assume au-
thority over many matters which they are not competent to manage;
and that most of the progress in rural-school improvement has been
made without the support and often against the opposition of the
trustees and of the people they represent. . . . This large number of
school ojSicers stands to-day as one of the most serious blocks in the
way of progressive educational action.^

The district system is doomed in American schools.
In the last few years many States have tried to make the
change over to the township or county system and a large
number have succeeded, especially in getting the county
unit. Consolidation cannot flourish under the district sys-
tem. It takes outside agencies to get the various school
directors, usually three to each little one-room school, to-
gether and to agree. Indiana with the township system and
with hundreds of consolidated schools and Illinois just
across the line with the district system and very few illus-
trate the point. New York has recently advanced to the
township stage, and then unfortunately receded to the in-
efficient district system, but not for long. Under such a
system the county superintendent is politically elected and
has Kttle real influence or power to educate directors up
to an appreciation of the value of a change. If he has un-
usual power, his directors are too many and too changing for
him to meet and influence during his brief tenure of office.

In making the change over to the larger unit of adminis-
tration there is sometimes expressed the natural fear that
there will be less democracy, less interest in and control
over the schools by the people. The answer is that the pres-

» "Rural Life and Education," p. 184.

98 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ent interest in schools in the district or even in the township
could hardly be worse than it is, and that it certainly is
little greater than if the county were the unit. Further-
more, democracy and interest do not depend greatly upon
the piecemeal character of the control and participation.
The schools are still to be managed for the people, by the
people, and of the people. Their control over their repre-
sentatives for an entire township or county is not less and
frequently far more than of the individuals of the Httle
school community, and they are able to demand and ob-
tain far superior schools in the main. There are manifold
opportunities to share in the Hfe and teaching of the school
if the people will participate in the many ways possible
aside from direct management. While there are possibly
some dangers for the remote future of democracy in cen-
tralization over a larger area, yet we feel that it is desir-
able to take this one step which appears clearly necessary
and rest assured that democracy will meet the larger prob-
lem. If democracy means a wider sharing of common in-
terests and activities, then a county system with a series
of consolidated schools directed by real leaders and with
means at hand for getting the people together to share in
a larger and richer community and county life may easily
give farmers more real democracy than the hundreds of lit-
tle individualistic and isolated schools without leadership
and agencies for bringing the people together.

The township system has several advantages. In the
East it is called the town system. In Indiana a single
school trustee manages the schools of the township, such as
are not separate districts under separate boards within the
township. In Pennsylvania each township outside of in-
corporated boroughs with their own boards and superin-
tendents or supervising principals has a board of school di-
rectors elected for six-year terms. In Massachusetts the
town is not bounded by straight longitudinal and latitu-
dinal lines drawn without reference to natural features, such

Studying alfalfa at first-hand

Learning to judge cattle in club work

A home project with seed corn
This is the education which administration must facilitate

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION 99

as streams and mountains, but is the country about one or
several small villages or even rather large cities. These
villages and cities are not independent, but are taxed for the
country schools, and all share alike. Investigations of the
best and most equitable apportionment of school taxes and
responsibilities of public education show that this is more

showing Ttaf
rious Districts
Cenixr CountvPa

just than the system where the village or larger place is
separate entirely in taxation. Education is a kind of com-
modity that does not stay put. If you pay taxes for a fire
department, street-lighting, or anything of the kind, you get
what you pay for and it remains in your town thereafter.
When a community pays for the schooling of a child he
frequently, and we might say usually in America, does not
remain to live and work where he obtained his schooling.

We are a migratory people. The country and the village
community frequently suffer most since they educate pupils
who later go to the cities. The cities have more property
belonging to the entire State economically to tax and thus
get large sums of money by a low millage. The maximum
limit for cities of the first class may be six mills, while for
rural communities it is twenty-five mills. Even then the

lOO THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

rural district frequently cannot get enough money for good
schools. The city makes a smaller relative sacrifice for
schooling and yet it gets free of cost the product of several
years' school of the country and small town. The drift is
practically all cityward. These and many other considera-
tions, such as the fact that schools are not, like most public
utihties, local affairs but are strictly State institutions,
getting their rights and powers from the State as a whole,
lead to an appreciation of the town system of New England
which taxes all and unites all of a natural community with
farms and central towns and stores and makes all share
alike in educating, or at least schooling, the children. The
value of such an organization has been well brought out by
Professors Wilson and Carver in preceding chapters.

Yet even such natural districts may be too small or may
fail to fit a scientific plan of consolidation over a wide terri-
tory. The best plan for the development of consolidation
is to have thorough surveys of areas at least as large as
counties, which of course vary very greatly in size, and then
plan very carefully for future consolidation, where it is
desirable, plotting desirable transportation routes and in-
dicating the location of the consolidated-school plants.
Where the township has not followed natural lines, such as
rivers, mountain ranges, and the outlines of the community
trading at one centre, as in a great part of the West where
townships are bounded by six-mile sides regardless of
physiographical or social conditions, the limitations of this
unit of administration become clearly apparent. While the
township is better than the district system, it is not big
enough for the new consolidation and concentration taking
place. In most States the governmental unit is the county,
and the tendency is strong for all to use the same unit.
There is no good reason for keeping the schools on a smaller,
narrower base than the general government, and we proph-
esy that States with township systems will have either to
establish the county system or make many changes to pro-

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION' lOI

cure the advantages of the larger unit and escape the dis-
advantages of the smaller.

The County Unit. — A strong State control of education
is everywhere necessary. The whole educational system is
the child of the State, not of the federal government nor
of the local community, district, township, or county. We
have our State school laws, and these supersede all others.
For administrative efficiency the governmental work of the
State is divided into counties. In the county the most im-
portant and expensive activity is that of public education.
It has the largest force of government workers in the form
of teachers, and we may naturally expect in every State the
county, large or small, to administer all the schools as a
unit. There is opposition to these larger units by those
whose taxes will be raised, or who fear they will be raised, by
those who oppose any change, and by those who will lose
some of their official powers. The county system permits
of a small county board of education, instead of many
boards, from which we could expect broad-minded views and
administration of consolidation. It permits of a county
superintendent free from party politics appointed by the
board from among the educators of the State or nation, and
from him we could expect efficient leadership in consolida-
tion. It would make possible taxation of the entire county
for the schools of the entire county, and obliterate some of
the great inequalities of opportunity offered in poor and
rich districts or districts happening to be traversed by rail-
roads or containing mines to be taxed. Cubberley has well
expressed the general plan of county school administration
in his various books, and since not only State aid and im-
proved State apportionment of school funds but the county
unit are desirable for the best development of rural educa-
tion through the consolidated school, we beg here to set
forth his general plan:

ICX2 * tHE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

III. Plan of County Administration Desirable for
Consolidation

Details of a County-Unit Plan. — Good principles of edu-
cational organization and administration would indicate
approximately the following as a desirable form for county
educational reorganization:

/. General Control.^

1. The consolidation, for purposes of administration, of all schools
in a county, outside of cities having city superintendents of schools,
into one county school district.

2. The election of a county board of education of five represen-
tative citizens, from the county at large and for five-year terms, the
first board however to so classify themselves that the term of one
shall expire each year thereafter. This board to occupy for the schools
of the county approximately the same position as a city board of edu-
cation does for a city.

3. Each county board of education to seek out and elect a well-
trained professional expert to act as a county superintendent of
schools, and to fix his salary. Such officer to enjoy approximately the
same tenure, rights, and privileges as a city superintendent of schools,
and to have somewhat analogous administrative and supervisory
duties and responsibilities.

4. Each county board of education to hold title to all school prop-
erty, outside of separately organized city school districts, with power
to purchase, sell, build, repair, and insure school property.

5. Each county board of education to act also as the board of
control for any county high schools, county vocational schools, county
agricultural high schools, and the county library, and to have power
to order established such types of special schools as may seem neces-
sary or desirable.

* In chap. X of Cubberley*s "Rural Life and Education," drawings show-
ing a number of counties before and after reorganization are given also; while
in Appendix D of his "State and County Educational Reorganization," a county
containing a city, five towns, and one hundred and three rural districts is shown
in one drawing, and in another as reorganized into one city school district and
one county-unit school district, the latter subdivided into fourteen attendance
subdistricts, with a graded consolidated school and a partial or complete high
school attached in each. Full statistics as to teachers, costs, and tax rates for
this county are also given.

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION I03

6. Each county board of education to be directed to order a care-
ful educational and social survey of its county, and upon the basis of
such to proceed to reorganize the school system of the county by abol-
ishing all unnecessary small schools, substituting therefor a few cen-
trally located and graded consohdated schools, with partial or com-
plete high schools attached, and to transport children to and from
these central schools. Each such school and its tributary territory to
be known as an attendance subdistrict, the bounds of which may be
changed from time to time as in the case of city attendance lines.

7. Each county board of education to have power to appoint,
either alone or in co-operation with a city school district, or some
adjoining county school district, a school health officer, a school at-
tendance officer, and such other special officers or supervisors as the
educational needs of the county school district may seem to require,
and to establish or join in the establishment of special type schools.

//. Educational Control.

1. Each county school district to be managed as an educational
and financial unit by the county board of education and its executive
officers. Cities contained within the county, which maintain a full
elementary and secondary school system, employing a certain number
of teachers (for example, twenty-five) and a city superintendent of
schools, may ask for and obtain a separate educational organization,
except that all general school laws of the State shall apply, and that
the county school tax shall be levied uniformly on all property within
the county.

2. On the recommendation of the county superintendent of schools,
each county board of education is to appoint all principals and teachers
for the different schools of the county, outside of the separately or-
ganized city school districts, and to fix and order paid their salaries.

3. On the recommendation of the county superintendent of schools,
each county board of education is to approve the courses of study and
text-books to be used in the schools, the unit for the adoption of each
being the unit of supervision.

4. Each county board of education to approve the employment of
special teachers and supervisors for the schools, and, on recommenda-
tion of the county superintendent of schools, to appoint them, and to
fix and order paid their salaries.

5. Each county board of education to have charge of the county
library, and all of its branches, to appoint a county librarian and as-
sistant librarians, and to provide for the care and development of the
library and the circulation of books. The school libraries would be-
come a part of the county library, and a branch library would be pro-
vided for in connection with most of the consolidated schools.

I04 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

///. Business and Clerical Control.

1. Each county board of education shall appoint a secretary and
business manager, who shall act as secretary for the board and shall
have charge of the clerical, statistical, and financial work connected
with the administration of the schools of the county school district.
He is to approve all warrants drawn on the funds of the county, and
to prepare the financial and statistical portions of the required annual
school report.

2. The secretary of the county board of education to have general
charge of all purchases of supplies for the schools and the distribution
of the same, and to have general oversight of all janitor service and
repair work, except as otherwise provided for by the county board of
education.

3. For each consolidated school or small school retained (atten-
dance subdistrict) the county board of education to appoint one local
school director, to act as agent of the county board in the attendance
subdistrict, and with power to make repairs as directed, see that the
necessary supplies are provided, assist the principal or teachers in
the maintenance of discipline, and act as a means of communication
between the people whose children attend the school and the county
board of education and its executive officers.

4. The secretary of each county board of education- to be the
custodian of all legal papers belonging to the county school district;
to approve all bills and, when such have been ordered paid, to draw
warrants for the same; to give all required notices; administer oaths;
sign contracts as directed by the board; register all teachers* certif-
icates; distribute blank forms and collect and tabulate the statistical
returns; keep a complete set of books covering all financial transactions
and all funds; and perform such other clerical and statistical functions
as he may be directed to do.

5. Each county board of education to approve an annual budget
of expenses for the schools of the county, both for school maintenance
and for buildings and repairs, and may order levied, within certain
legal limits, a county school district tax to supplement the funds re-
ceived from the State school tax and the county school tax, the latter
to be levied on all property in the county and divided between the
city school district and the county school district on some equitable
apportionment basis. ^

^ This greatly simplifies and equalizes taxation. Under such a plan there
would be a State tax (or appropriation) for education, a general county school
tax levied on all property in the county, and then such city-district or county-
district taxes as may be needed to supplement the amounts received from State
and county funds. The inequalities of the present small district taxation
would be abolished, and a pooling of effort on a large scale substituted instead.

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATI^ I05

6. Each county treasurer to act as treasurer for all city or county
school districts in his county, and to pay out all funds on the orders
of the proper city or county school district authorities, when approved
by the secretary of the county board of education.

IV. Powers and Duties of the Superintendent.

In addition to those previously enumerated, the county super-
intendent of schools is:

1. To act as the executive officer of the county board of educa-
tion, and to execute, either in person or through subordinates, all
educational policies decided upon by it.

2. To act as the chief educational officer in the county, and as the
representative of the state educational authorities. To this end he
shall see that the school laws of the State and the rules and regulations
of the State board of education are carried out.

3. To have supervisory control of all schools and libraries under
the county board of education, and general supervisory control of all
officers in its employ, with power to outline, direct, and co-ordinate
their work, and, for cause, to recommend their dismissal.

4. To nominate for election, and when elected to assign, transfer,
and suspend all teachers and principals, and, for cause, recommend
the promotion or dismissal of such.

5. To visit the schools of the county, to advise and assist teachers
and principals, to hold teachers' meetings and institutes, to direct the
reading-circle work in his county, and to labor in every practicable
way to improve educational conditions within his county.

6. To act as the agent for the State department of education
in the examining and certificating of teachers, and to decide, upon
appeal to him, all disputes arising within the county as to the in-
terpretation of the school law or the powers and duties of school
officers.

7. To oversee the preparation of the courses of study and to ap-
prove the same, to study the educational work done in the schools,
and to approve for purchase all text and supplemental books and all
apparatus and supplies.

8. To recommend changes in the distribution or the organization
of the schools, to recommend the establishment of new schools or
branch libraries, and to assist in the correlation of the work of the
schools with that of the libraries, agricultural activities, and other
forms of educational service.

9. To prepare and issue an annual printed report showing the
work, progress, and needs of the schools of the county.

Io6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Such a Reorganization Not Easy. — To inaugurate such a
reorganization will require that the methods of three gen-
erations and the selfish interests of individuals and com-
munities will need to be overcome. Such a fundamental
reorganization, too, cannot be expected to come through the
voluntary co-operation of district authorities, upon which
we have so far placed our chief hope. District authorities
are too short-sighted, and know too little as to fundamental
rural or educational needs. Neither can we expect much as-
sistance from the average politically elected county super-
intendent. The system of which he is a product too often to
him seems a sacred system, and, in the district-system
States, he is too afraid of the enemies he may make in the
districts, and the opportunities he may give an opponent to
defeat him for re-election, to render much service looking to
any fundamental reorganization of rural education.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What steps are necessary or desirable in your State for a larger

unit of school control and more effective educational measures?

2. Do your consolidated schools receive State aid? How much?

3. Examine Cubberiey's plan of county educational organization in

his "State and County Educational Reorganization."

4. Summarize the features of good rural-school administration as

given by Monahan in his bulletin of the U. S. Bureau of Edu-
cation entitled "County-Unit Organization for the Adminis-
tration of Rural Schools.'*

5. How many school directors manage the schools of New York

City? How do the number of teachers, the value of school
property, and the annual appropriation for schools compare
with the same factors in the rural schools of your State ? What
is the difference in number of directors?

6. Is a large territory necessarily managed by many boards?

7. Give the good and bad points of the pure county system as illus-

trated by Louisiana.

8. When a State is cut up by mountains, as in Pennsylvania or Mon-

tana, what hindrances to consolidation are occasioned by the
township system?

SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION AND CONSOLIDATION lO

9. How should consolidated schools in your State obtain their funds

and why ?
10. Is it wise to have local boards with very limited powers even where
we have the township, town, or county systems?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Cubberley — "Public School Administration." Houghton Mif-

flin Co.

2. "State and County Educational Reorganization." Mac-

millan.

3. Monahan — "County-Unit Organization for the Administration of

Rural Schools." U. S. Government Printing Office.

4. Foght — " The Rural Teacher and His Work." Macmillan.

5. Surveys of Various States by the U. S. Bureau of Education.

6. Arp — "Rural Education and the Consolidated School." World

Book Co.

7. Betts and Hall— "Better Rural Schools." Bobbs, Merrill Co.

8. Cubberley — "Rural Life and Education." Houghton Mifl^n Co.

9. Flexner and Bachman — "Public Education in Maryland." (A

survey.) General Education Board, New York.
10. Monahan — " Consolidation of Rural Schools and Transportation of
Pupils at Public Expense." Government Printing Office.

CHAPTER VI
THE GROWTH OF CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. Consolidation began about fifty years ago. Can you account for

its rapid development in only the last decade or two?

2. What factors have contributed most to the spread of consolidation ?

3. What influences work most to bring about consolidation in your

own State?

4. Why is the consolidation movement so slow in some sections of the

country where it would be an entire success?

5. How can such retarding influences be met?

I. The Beginning of the Consolidation Movement

It seems desirable at this time to set forth the main
facts of consolidation in the United States. When con-
solidation, as the word is generally understood, began in the
United States is difficult to say. Probably in the older
States from very early times schools were abandoned for
the sake of economy and the children sent to neighboring
schools. In Massachusetts sufficient instances had occurred
previous to 1869 to bring the question before the State
legislature in that year as to whether children from an aban-
doned school district might be transported to another dis-
trict at public expense. The legislature acted favorably
and school trustees were authorized to pay for the trans-
portation of children to a neighboring district out of the
school funds. The law reads as follows:

Any town in the commonwealth may raise by taxation or other-
wise and appropriate money to be expended by the school committee
in their discretion in providing for the conveyance of pupils to and
from the public schools.

108

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLn)ATION ICQ

Honorable Joseph White, formerly secretary of the Mas-
sachusetts State Board of Education, stated that the act
was introduced into the legislature through the efforts of a
practical man from one of the rural townships of large terri-
tory and sparse population, where the constant problem is
how to bring equal school privileges to all without undue
taxation. The first children carried to school at public ex-
pense under the provisions of this act were in the town of
Quincy, in the eastern part of the State, the town in which
Colonel Francis Parker gained his fame as a progressive
school superintendent. There, in 1874, a school with less
than a dozen children was closed and the pupils carried to
another one-teacher school, the union making a school not
too large for one teacher. The district abandoning its
school, after paying tuition and transportation expenses,
found that its outlay was less than the amount which would
have been required to maintain the old school. No special
educational advantages came to the pupils transported to
such a union school, of course, except from the association
with a greater number of children.

The Montague Consolidated School. — The first con-
solidation for the definite purpose of securing for the chil-
dren better educational opportunities appears to have oc-
curred in Montague, Massachusetts. There, in 1875, as a
result of a campaign conducted principally by one of the
school committee, Mr. Seymour Rockwell, three ^'district"
schools were abandoned and a new brick building was erected
at a central location, to which the children from the aban-
doned districts were transported at pubHc expense. This
school is still in a flourishing condition. It serves a terri-
tory of approximately twenty square miles. A high-school
department was added very soon after the school was es-
tablished and graduated its first four-year class in 1884.

The Concord Consolidated School. — The second con-
solidated school in the United States was probably one es-
tablished in Concord, Massachusetts, the home of Emerson,

no THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Hawthorne, Alcott, and others. A central building was
erected in 1879, replacing several one-teacher schools. Con-
cord at that time, with the township, included about 4,000
inhabitants. The area was about twenty-five square miles.
For school administration purposes it was divided into two
village districts and five rural districts. Prior to 1879 the
common schools were twelve in number, occupying eleven
houses. Five of these schools were in the central village;
two, in the same building, were at West Concord; the re^
maining five were in the outlying farming districts. The
district schoolhouses were at distances of from one and a
half to three miles from the centre. At the centre was a
high school to which pupils came from all parts of the town-
ship. The new building was appropriately called the
Emerson School and contained eight rooms. When first
opened it replaced the five schools of the central village.
Later the other seven were taken in, one at a time. Thus
both at Quincy and Concord we find the consolidated
school arising in communities made intelligent and co-opera-
tive probably by their able men. "An institution is but
the lengthened shadow of a man."

II. The Spread of Consolidation

Other Consolidation in Massachusetts. — Following the
establishment of the Concord consolidated school came
others in the neighboring townships. By the year 1888,
104 townships out of a total of 240 in the State were spend-
ing money for the conveyance of pupils. In the school year
1888-89 the amount paid for that purpose was $22,118.38.
In 1891-92, 160 townships and cities were paying a total
of $38,726.07 for transportation. In 191 2-13 almost ex-
actly ten times this amount was paid for the same purpose.
Finally, in 1913-14, the amount so expended was $426,-
274, and to-day it is over a half million dollars.

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLIDATION III

Consolidation in Ohio. — The movement spread from
Massachusetts to other northeastern States and the West
and South, until now it is doubtful if a State can be found
in the Union without a number of examples of successful
consolidated schools. Ohio and Indiana took hold of the
idea earlier than most of the other States. Consolidation
was easier to establish in these States than in the great
majority of States, because both Ohio and Indiana, like
Massachusetts, were organized on the township basis, al-
though of a different type.

The first consolidated school in Ohio was the Kings-
ville school, in Ashtabula County. A. B. Graham, in a
bulletin of the Ohio State University, says:

In 1892 the Kingsville township board of education was confronted
with the necessity of providing a new school building. Their schools
were small, and the per capita expense was unduly large. It was
finally agreed to transport the children of the township to Kingsville,
which was one of the district schools of the township. For the cost
gf transportation a special bill was introduced into the general as-
sembly and became a law April 17, 1894. The measure applied only
to Kingsville township. In the succeeding general assembly another
measure was passed for the relief of the counties of Stark, Ashtabula,
and Portage. On April 5, 1898, the assembly passed a general law
on the subject. In 1897, one year before the law was made general,
Mad River township, in Champaign County, transported eighteen
children to Westville rather than establish a new subdistrict and build
a new schoolhouse. This was the first step toward establishing a
centralized school in western Ohio.

A law of Ohio, approved April 25, 1904, authorized the
board of education in any township to suspend schools in
any or all subdistricts in the township and convey pupils to
a centralized school, with the provision that no school with
an average daily attendance of twelve or more could be
abolished against the opposition of the majority of the
voters of the district. Following the passage of this law the
movement for consolidation progressed rapidly. In 19 10
there were 178 centralized or consolidated schools in the

112 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

State; 49 of these were township schools serving the entire
township. In 191 2 there were 192 townships out of 1,370
in the State with their schools completely or partially cen-
tralized. By 1914 there were 358 consolidated schools; by
191 5 there were 468; and in 1916 there were 539. The last
few years, as illustrated later by Preble County, have wit-
nessed greatly accelerated progress.

Consolidation in Indiana. — Consolidation in Indiana was
first agitated by Caleb Mills in 1856. Nothing of impor-
tance, however, was done until 1889, when the legislature
passed an act recognizing the right of township trustees to
pay for the transportation of pupils to consolidated schools.
In 191 2 there were in the State 589 consolidated schools,
distributed in 70 of the 92 counties of the State. In 19 14
there were 665 consolidated schools in 73 of the 92 counties
in the State, attended by 73,404 children, or 35.9 per cent
of all the pupils attending rural schools; 26,403 children
were transported at an expense to the public of $491,265.
This is approximately 36 per cent of the children attending
the consolidated schools. Between 19 14 and 191 6, 41 ad-
ditional consolidated schools were established, making a
total of 706.

A study of the consolidated schools in Indiana by the
State Department of Education in 1916 revealed clear
evidences that better educational opportunities are pre-
sented in the consolidated schools than in other rural
schools. For instance, that better teachers are provided
is demonstrated by the fact that the average daily wages
paid in consolidated schools are $3.37, as compared with
$2.76 in other rural schools. In spite of this greatly in-
creased salary, the cost per pupil in the consolidated school
is not much greater than in the other rural schools, the
figures being $25.64 and $22.71 respectively; an insig-
nificant difference when considering the greatly increased
advantages. The establishment of so many consolidated
schools has made high-school education possible to country

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLffiATION II3

children within easy reach of their homes. This is evi-
denced by the fact that of the total number of children en-
rolled in the consolidated schools 22 per cent are in the high-
school departments. That Indiana, after twenty-five years
of experience with such a large number of consolidated
schools, is satisfied with the type of school even when the
expense is greater than that of the old type is evidenced by
the rapidity with which district schools are being aban-
doned for consolidated schools. In the past five years, for
example, the number of schools abandoned was over one
thousand.^

Consolidation in Other States. — Massachusetts, Ohio,
and Indiana have established up to the present a greater
proportion of consolidated schools than any other States.
The extent of the movement elsewhere is given in the fol-
lowing pages. It will be noticed that it has gone furthest in
States with large administrative units for school affairs —
that is, in those with the county or the township organiza-
tion; and that it has made little headway in States with the
small *' school-district" unit, except in a few where a rela-
tively large amount of financial aid is given by the State as
a stimulus.

III. District, Township, or County Unit — Which?

The Unit of Organization and Consolidation. — The de-
pendence of the movement for consolidation upon the form
of organization is well illustrated by the neighboring States
of Indiana and Illinois, the first with about 706 consoli-
dated schools, the second with less than 40. Indiana has
been organized on the township basis since 1852, with all
the schools in any township under the control of one agency.
Illinois is organized on the district basis, the district being
usually in rural territory, the area served by a single school.
Each district has three trustees to manage the affairs of the

* Later returns may be obtained from the State Department of Education.

114 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

single school and to regulate the work of the teacher. The
State has more than 10,000 one- teacher schools; these
10,000 schools with 10,000 teachers are managed by 30,-
000 trustees, three directors for each teacher. Consolida-
tion under such conditions is difficult, since it means the
formation of new districts out of two or more old districts,
which is accomplished only after an adjustment of the
business affairs and of the jealousies of the old districts has
been reached. Experience shows that sometimes the dis-
trict trustees are the most difficult persons in the district
to convince of the advantages of consolidation. The honor
of serving in their position is sweet to them and given up
reluctantly. Many States are coming to the conclusion that
three strong men are not necessary to hire and manage
every young-woman teacher and are getting boards of five
for units as large as counties.

The two States organized for the management of rural-
school affairs on the single-district basis which have made
notable progress in consolidation are Washington and
Minnesota. Washington has paid from the State school
funds to consolidated schools an annual bonus of $170 for
each school abandoned less one. To illustrate, if six dis-
tricts combine and establish a single consolidated school,
the new school has received each year from the State five
times $170. In Minnesota, previous to 191 2, practically no-
consolidations were effected. In 191 1 the legislature passed
the Holmberg Act, under which consolidated schools are
classified and aided from State funds. The first year un-
der the operation of the act 141 old districts were formed
into 60 new districts. In 191 6 the State had 220 consoli-
dated schools which replaced 454 schools of the old type.
North Dakota, Missouri, Wisconsin, and Iowa adopted, in
the 19 13 session of their legislatures, measures somewhat
similar to the Holmberg Act. North Dakota had at this
writing 401 consolidated schools, Missouri 122, and Iowa
211. The greater progress in North Dakota is due to the

A Wyoming consolidated school

A type of many abandoned pioneer schools

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLmATION II5

fact that the State is organized for school administration in
nearly all counties on the larger township basis.

Union Schools of North Carolina and Tennessee, — Both
North Carolina and Tennessee made much progress in
consolidation immediately after the adoption of the county
unit of administration. In ten years, under the county
system, North Carolina abolished 1,200 small districts and
replaced 1,200 small one- teacher schools with less than 500
** union" schools, each with tv/o or more teachers. To such
consolidated schools public transportation was not neces-
sary, as the districts were but from eight to ten square miles
in area. Other consolidations with larger districts have
taken place since, and transportation is furnished to about
50 schools. The union schools frequently draw in sufficient
one-room schools to become first-class consolidated schools.

Tennessee, after giving up the district system in 1903,
aboHshed more than 1,000 small country schools and re-
placed them with less than one-half as many union schools,
of the same type as those in North Carolina. The larger
consolidated school has been established also in many in-
stances, approximately 60 requiring transportation at public
expense.

IV. Consolidation in Semimountainous Regions

Consolidation in Anderson County, Tennessee. — An-
derson County recently completed an extensive plan of
providing consolidated schools for all children in the county.
This is an east Tennessee county, directly west of Knox
County, in which the city of Knoxville is located. It is
semimountainous. In the southern part the valleys are
broad and there are good agricultural lands ; in the northern
part the valleys are narrow and the tillable land small in
proportion to the total area. Coal is mined in parts of the
county. In the northwest part of the county is located the
coal village of Briceville, which became well known on ac-

Il6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

count of two separate explosions in mines in the neighbor-
hood, resulting in heavy loss of life. The county-seat is at
Clinton, and Clinton has its own school corporation. The
rest of the county in school affairs is under the county board
of education.

In the county there are now in operation i6 consolidated
schools, the last 9 of which were constructed and put into
use the ist of September, 191 5. Most of these buildings are
6-room buildings and serve a territory of from 8 to 14
square miles. There is much land on the tops of the ridges
on which no one is living. The population is therefore col-
lected in districts smaller than the total areas served by
the schools. A total of 7 transportation wagons are used
for the 16 consolidated schools. The greatest distance that
children may be required to walk in the State is two and a
half miles. These buildings are so located that compara-
tively few children will be required to walk more than two
miles. The territory served by each school stretches along
the valleys between the mountain ridges, the children com-
ing almost wholly from two directions.

All but 2 of the consolidated schools are brick buildings.
The 9 buildings recently constructed cost approximately
$50,000, exclusive of equipment. Eight of them are ex-
actly ahke, with 4 classrooms located on the ground floor
and 2 basement rooms half above ground, designed for
manual training, agriculture, and cooking. From 4 to 9
teachers are required at each school. Provision is made for
two years of high-school work at each school, in addition to
the elementary work. Manual training, agriculture, or
household economics is required of all children. The school
lots are from 5 to 14 acres in extent, the land in every case
being donated by persons living in the neighborhood. On each
school site will be provided a cottage for the principal and
his family, and they will be expected to board the other
teachers. In several instances old schoolhouses are being
converted into cottages. A part of the school grounds will

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLIDATION II7

be used for school gardens; a large part, however, will be
given to the principal for his own use with the understanding
that it is to be cultivated as a model farm for the commu-
nity and as a demonstration for the classes in agriculture in
the school. The principals receive about the same salary
as principals of similar schools elsewhere, but in" addition
are furnished the cottage rent free and the land for farming.

The school buildings and as many of the teachers' cot-
tsiges as are in use serve as demonstrations. Each build-
ing is supplied with running-water piped from springs on
the neighboring hills. The teachers' cottages are equipped
with modern bathrooms. The people living in the district
served by the school have an opportunity to see how houses
may be provided with running-water, bathrooms, and sani-
tary closets, and it is expected that the example will cause
the installation of similar conveniences in many homes.
Two of the largest school buildings are heated by steam, the
others by hot air.

In one of the new buildings a separate auditorium has
been built from money subscribed by persons living in the
neighborhood. In all of the other buildings an auditorium
is provided by throwing together two rooms ordinarily
separated by a movable partition. The seating capacity of
the auditorium in the eight buildings is about 200 each.

Each county in Tennessee is a unit in the administration
of rural-school affairs. The county board of education has
power to locate schools wherever it deems best and the
schools are built from county funds supplied usually by bond
issue; the bond issue, however, must be authorized by ma-
jority vote of the qualified electors of the county. At the
regular election in Clinton County, November, 19 14, a
bond issue of $50,000 for new school buildings was author-
ized. These bonds were sold to the highest bidder, one
broker buying the entire lot at nearly $400 premium. The
county board determined where the new buildings should be
erected and the kind of buildings to be supplied. When

Il8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

these buildings were opened in September, 191 5, 16 con-
solidated schools replaced approximately 58 one and two
teacher schools. The county board is following a definite
plan for the consolidation of all schools in the county.
Its plans call for 28 buildings for the entire county; that
is, there are 12 more to be built at a later date. It is
probable that another bond issue for these 12 buildings has
already been voted. The area of the county is approxi-
mately 350 square miles. Each of the 28 schools will serve,
therefore, a territory of approximately i2>^ miles. On ac-
count of the mountainous character of much of the coun-
try, the inhabited territory served by each school is less
than this amount. Thus the argument that consolidated
schools cannot be established in mountainous regions falls
flat through the force of this and similar examples. A long
mountain valley with a trading village may be an ideal
consolidated-school community.

V. Recent Rapid Progress

The consolidated-school movement in all but a rela-
tively small number of States is less than two decades old.
In 1900 there were very few outside of Massachusetts, New
Hampshire, Ohio, and Indiana. Since 1900 there has been
an awakening; results came slowly at first, but have come
very rapidly since 19 10. From 1910 to 1916 there were
probably twice as many consolidated and union schools
established as in the sixty years before that period. The
year 191 1 is notable in school legislation, because of the laws
passed by a large number of States in that period intended
to promote consolidation. Among these is the legislation in
Minnesota referred to above; also of importance legislation
in Wisconsin, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Georgia,
and Kentucky. In 191 2 and 19 13 other favorable legis-
lation was passed, several States, notably Iowa, Wisconsin,
Missouri, North Dakota, and South Carolina, passing laws

A consolidated school, Woodslown, X. J.
Not as desirable as the one-story type where land is comparatively cheap

^^P^

ni

^^^^^^~i^uia,

P

From five to twenty such structures may be eliminated by one consolidated

school

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLIDATION II 9

similar to those of Minnesota, under which special State
aid is given.

The results in several of these States have already been
noted. In others it is as follows: Arkansas had at this writ-
ing 125 consolidated schools, practically all having been
established in the past five years; South Carolina had 700
rural graded schools receiving special State aid under the
act of 191 2 to encourage consolidation and graded schools
in country districts; Kentucky had 41 consolidated schools
which replaced 140 one- teacher schools. Transportation
was furnished to 14. Georgia in 191 5 had 159 consolidated
schools to which 3,123 pupils were transported. There
were approximately 40 more in 19 16.

VI. The Movement in Other States

How Louisiana Began Consolidation. — The following in-
teresting statement of the beginnings of consolidation in
Louisiana is by the State superintendent of public instruc-
tion. Louisiana is organized on the county basis, the parish
(county) board of education having complete control of
the educational affairs of the parish.

The consolidation idea in Louisiana had its birth in 1902, and was
due to a cyclone. In the parish of Lafayette a cyclone destroyed a
one-room schoolhouse located about six miles from the town of Scott.
This occurred during the session, and as the building of a new school-
house would cause the children to be out of school for a month or so,
two pubHc-spirited citizens, members of the school board, Doctor Moss
and Mr. Judice, proposed to furnish a wagonette temporarily at their
own expense to be used in transferring the children who had been at-
tending the little school that was destroyed to the school located in
the town of Scott. Their proposition was accepted by the board and
the new plan put into operation. The idea worked out so success-
fully that the board decided not to rebuild the house, but to put in a
permanent wagonette. Other communities in Lafayette heard of the
new plan and petitioned the school board to place their children in
central graded schools. In a year or so Lafayette parish had made
practically every consolidation that was possible and was operating a

120 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

large number of wagonettes in which children were transported to
central schools. Gradually the idea worked out through all parts of
the State, and other parishes began trying the plan. The system now
is general throughout Louisiana, practically every parish in the State
having consolidated schools and most of them operating school
transfers.

The number of strictly consolidated country schools (in 191 3) is
210, and the number of school wagonettes in use is 259.

Since the above was written the number of consolidated
schools has more than doubled.

Consolidation in Mississippi and Missouri. — The rapid-
ity of the movement in the past few years is indicated by
data from a few States. That of Mississippi is interesting.
In the fall of 1907 the State superintendent appointed a
committee of three county superintendents to prepare a
report on the subject of the consolidation of schools. This
report was adopted by the association of county superin-
tendents, and a bill prepared providing for consolidation and
transportation for the 1908 legislature. It failed to pass.
The bill was reintroduced in 19 10, amended and strength-
ened, and passed. Further amendments were found neces-
sary, and these were provided in 191 2. As the result of the
1910 bill and the 191 2 amendments the State has estab-
lished more than 290 consolidated schools and has more
than 725 wagons in operation.

In 191 2-13 there were organized 75 consolidated schools,
with the children transported in 100 wagons. The average
area of these 75 consolidated districts is 30 square miles;
the 75 buildings erected cost approximately $140,000.
During the year Pearl River County replaced 31 schools
with 6 consolidated schools, to which children are trans-
ported in 21 school wagons; Harrison County, one of the
largest in the State, had 15 consolidated schools, and only
30 one-teacher schools were left at this writing.

In 1 91 5 there were 192 consolidated schools to which
7,788 children were transported in 426 school wagons. By

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLmATION 121

191 7 there were 290 consolidated schools with 14,643 children
transported in 725 school wagons. This is less than one-
half the enrolment, it being approximately 33,000 or an
average of 112 to each school.

The story in Missouri is of similar interest. In August,
191 2, Mr. W. P. Evans, then State Superintendent of Public
Instruction, wrote:

The story of consolidation in Missouri is a short one. The laws
are ready and nothing is needed but that they be taken advantage of;
yet practically no consolidation exists. The laws of Missouri permit
three or more common-school districts or a village district with two
or more common-school districts to unite into a consolidated district.
By a law passed in 191 1, if two-thirds of the voters authorize it, trans-
portation may be provided for from the school funds. While common-
school districts are not authorized to maintain high schools, such con-
solidated districts may maintain high schools as well as elementary
schools. Comparatively little has been done toward consolidation
under these statutes, although the law permitting consolidation has
been on the statute-books for eleven years.

Since this was written the State legislature, in 19 13,
revised the laws on consolidated schools and now special
State aid to urge consolidation is given. By January i,
1914, 29 consolidated schools had been established. Two
years later Missouri reported 122 consolidated schools to
which 7,000 children were transported in 400 wagons.
Three of these have first-class approved high-school de-
partments, 10 have second-class high schools, 50 have third-
class. State aid brings results.

Activity in North Dakota. — North Dakota reported 333
consolidated schools in 1915, 205 of which are in towns and
128 in open country. This was an increase of 60 during the
past year. In 191 7 there were in operation 401, which have
replaced 1,200, one-teacher schools. The records of the
State inspector of rural schools show that the proportion
of pupils enrolled in the eighth grade in the consolidated
schools of the State is twice as great as in the eighth grades

122 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of the other rural schools; also, that on account of these
consolidated schools, the high-school enrolment of country-
children has increased over threefold in the past four years.
Consolidation in North Dakota has been stimulated by the
vigorous educational campaign conducted by the State De-
partment and by special State aid during the past two years
In 1 9 14 there were 271 legally consolidated schools in th^
State, 170 of which were located in villages and loi in the
open country. In addition there were 683 schools, each
serving a large territory with pupils living more than two
and a half miles from the school. Of these 683 schools, 263
transported pupils at public expense. Only 53 of them were
commonly spoken of as consolidated.

Iowa Consolidations. — In 191 2 Iowa had 47 consolidated
schools with approximately 1,600 children transported.
This was about one-fifth of the attendance at these schools.
In 1 9 13 legislation was secured to assist the movement.
During the year following 55 were established, nearly all
with two to four year high-school departments. These
schools have been established under the provisions of an
act of the legislature of 1913, giving special State aid for
departments of agriculture, domestic science, and manual
training in consolidated schools. Each school has a site of
from 4 to 10 acres for agricultural teaching. In order to
receive State aid the consolidated schools must meet the
requirements of the State Department of Education concern-
ing buildings, grounds, course of study, and qualification of
teachers. All of these buildings have been approved by
the department; all have satisfactory equipment for work
in agriculture, manual training, and domestic science.
Several of them have teachers' cottages on the grounds.
The total number of consolidated schools in the State at
this writing is 211.

The following statement, prepared by A. C. Fuller, State
Inspector of Rural Schools, gives suggestive details of later
date:

THE OROWTH OF CONSOLIDATION 1 23

Consolidation of rural schools in Iowa means the organization by
vote, town and country voting separately, of a district which shall
contain at least sixteen sections of land. If a town is included in the
district the building must be located there. Transportation along the
pubhc highway is provided for every child outside the town. If a
school so organized possesses five acres of ground for playground and
agricultural demonstration, plus suitable buildings and standard
teaching force. State aid is given.

State aid and the steady promotion and publicity work of the De-
partment of Public Instruction and allied agencies are responsible for
the great interest and activity in forming consolidated districts.

For twelve or thirteen years a few communities maintained suc-
cessful consolidated schools, new ones organizing near older centres.
In April, 1913, there were seventeen schools. At that time the law
authorizing aid went into effect and a field force was added to the
State Department. Since then consolidated schools have been added
at the rate of fifty-five annually, two hundred and thirty-nine being
the number at date.

The following condensed statement indicates the present status:

1. Number of consolidated districts prior to April, 1913 17

2. Total number of consolidated districts August i, 1917 239

3. Number of consolidated districts established in open country 28

4. Number of consolidated districts including towns over one

thousand population 4

5. Number of consolidated districts including towns between one

thousand and five hundred in population 27

6. Number of consolidated districts including villages less than

five hundred in population 180

7. Average total enrolment in the consolidated schools 180

8. Average total enrolment in the high-school department 35

(Every consolidated school will have a standard four-year

high school.)

9. Percentage of pupils from rural districts 57

10. Average size of consolidated district, in sections of land 26

11. Minimum district receiving State aid, sections 16

12. Maximum district at date, sections 48

(Recent tendency is to form the larger districts.)

13. Average size of school ground in acres 5-\-

(Many schools have eight and ten acres, and have employed

landscape architects to lay out premises.)

14. Number of consolidated districts providing a principal's

home and a teachers' home 15

15. Average number of rooms in school buildings 12

124 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

(Nearly all the buildings are new, provide modern facilities
for teaching agriculture, manual training, and domestic
science, include a gymnasium and a room for community-
centre activities.)

1 6. Increased school facilities provided by consolidation,
(a) Standard school work for i8o instead of i6o days.
(J)) Twelve years of work instead of eight.

17. Increased cost per acre, in rural portion, for consolidated

schools 1 2 to 18 cents

18. Number of one-room schools already closed through con-

solidation 1200

19. Number of consolidated schools disbanding after once trying

out the plan thoroughly o

ConsoHdation in Iowa is a success. It is regarded as the only
satisfactory solution of the rural-school problem. These schools are
forming more rapidly than leaders and principals who have the vision
and rural-mindedness required to carry on the work are becoming
available. Normal schools, educational departments, and all agencies
concerned with the development of rural life should stress the prepara-
tion of leaders for consolidated schools.

No more potent activity exists than that which affects the welfare
of our rural-school population. Every boy and girl should be within
easy daily reach of a standard twelve-year school.

" Graded Rural " and " Intermediate " Agricultural
Schools. — Wisconsin reported a considerable number of new
consolidated schools. The State superintendent says:

The interest in the subject is continually increasing, and the senti-
ment is growing more and more favorable.

One phase of the consolidation question that is frequently over-
looked is the rather marvellous growth of State graded schools. We
have now in Wisconsin almost 600 of these institutions, employing
1,450 teachers, scattered over the State. About one-half of them are
doing some work beyond the eighth grade. Each of these schools
really becomes an educational centre which in many cases is equiva-
lent to a consolidation centre. Another phase of the consolidation
work is quite prominent in the State, namely, the estabhshment of
joint and union high schools. This is essentially a phase of consoli-
dation for high-school purposes. In these places the elementary edu-
cation is taken care of in the local one-room district schools, while the
secondary education is taken care of by the large high-school district.

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLHiATION 1 25

New York State reported that about 100 consolidated
schools have been established during the past year. In one
instance 1 1 districts have been consolidated at West Chazy,
Clinton County, in the Champlain Valley; and a philan-
thropic citizen of that vicinity is erecting an endowed
building which will be one of the most completely equipped
school buildings in the State.

Deputy Commissioner of Education Thomas E. Fine-
gan points out that as a result of this movement in the
consolidation of one-room schools several schools have been
organized which will do the usual work of the eight grades
in the elementary course and two years of high-school work.
He says:

These schools are generally known as intermediate agricultural
schools. The courses of study are along the lines of agriculture for
boys and domestic science and home-making for girls. Teachers of
agriculture have been employed in these schools on the understanding
that they do continuation work during the summer vacation. The
whole general trend in the courses for elementary schools is to include
some work along agricultural lines so that the work of the school is
brought into closer relation and has a direct bearing on the life on
the farm. Special effort has been made to organize new schools.

Other States. — The number of consolidated schools in
a few other States as reported by the State departments of
education is as follows: California 27, Colorado 21, Dela-
ware I, Kansas 94, Nebraska 26, Nevada 3, South Dakota
24, West Virginia 24, with transportation and many with-
out. In 191 5-16, 250 one-room schools were abandoned
and consolidated into small graded schools. In Wayne
County 60 one-teacher schools have been replaced by 26
graded schools, with from two to four teachers.

VII. Consolidation of Rural Schools, 191 7

On February 13, 191 7, a request was sent to each State
superintendent, asking the number of consolidated schools
in the State at that time and the number that had been

126 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

established during the past three years. Answers were
received from all except Arizona. The following is digested
from the answers received from 30. The 17 not included
reported that no data were available or their answers were
too indefinite to be used. These 17 included Connecticut,
Idaho, Maryland, Massachusetts, Montana, New Jersey,
New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Texas,
Utah, Vermont, Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming. Of course,
the war slowed up or stopped building operations.

Of the 30 mentioned below, 26 report 5,132 consoli-
dated schools. The number in Maine, Florida, North Caro-
lina, and West Virginia is not given. These latter three,
together with Massachusetts, New York, Texas, Utah,
Virginia, and Wisconsin, have many consolidated or
schools similar to consolidated schools. A conservative
estimate of the total number in the United States, includ-
ing "consolidated," "centralized," and "union" schools, is

7,500-

Alabama. — Total, 69 consolidated schools, 61 of which
were established during the past school year; 166 schools
were abandoned in making these consolidations; 48 of the
consolidations were efifected by bringing together two
schools, 16 by three schools, 3 by four schools, and 2 by
five or more schools.

Arkansas. — Total, 125, of which 86 were established
during the past three years.

California. — Total, 27.

Colorado. — Total, 21.

Delaware. — Total, i.

Florida. — The State Department has no record of the
total number; approximately $50,000 was paid in 191 5-1 6
for transportation to consolidated schools.

Georgia. — In 191 5-16 there were 159 consolidated schools
to which 3,123 pupils were transported at public expense.
"The number of consolidated schools is increasing approxi-
mately 25 per cent each year."

THE GROWTH OF CONSOLn)ATION 1 27

Illinois. — The State Department reports 10 consoli-
dated schools, three of which were established during the
past three years by abolishing 11 district schools.

Indiana. — Total, 706, 41 of which were established in
the past two years.

Iowa. — Total, 214, 181 of which were established in the
past three years. The number of schools abandoned for
consolidated schools is 1,284; the average area for consoli-
dated districts is 24 square miles.

Kansas. — Of the 94 consolidated schools in the State, 1 2
have been estabHshed during the past three years; 236 dis-
tricts were consolidated to form these 94.

Kentucky. — Total, 41, 36 of which were established dur-
ing the past three years. The 7,6 replaced 120 one-teacher
schools. Only 14 of the consolidated schools furnish free
transportation.

Louisiana. — The State Department reports 818 consoli-
dated schools, of which 580 were established during the
past three years. Included in this total number, however,
are "all rural schools having two or more teachers, that is,
all such schools located in communities of 2,500 population
or less."

Maine. — No statistics are available relative to the total
number; the number of one-room rural schools has de-
creased in the past three years from 2,459 to 2,358.

Michigan. — Total, 8.

Minnesota. — In 19 16 there were 220 consolidated schools,
of which 140 were established in the past three years. The
consolidated schools replaced 454 schools of the old type.

Mississippi. — Nearly all the consolidation has taken
place in the last five years. In 1916 consolidated schools
were found in 64 counties. There were 290 schools with
977 teachers, 725 wagons, and 14,643 pupils transported.
The enrolment in the schools was 33,037.

Missouri. — Total, 122, all consolidated within the past
three years.

128 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Nebraska. — Total, 28.

Nevada. — Three consolidated schools effected during
the past three years take the place of six schools of the old
type.

North Carolina. — In the year ending July, 191 6, 84 dis-
tricts were consolidated into 36 new districts. Since 19 13
the number of one- teacher schools has decreased 516, or
14 per cent.

North Dakota. — Total, 401, 211 having been established
in the past three years. The 401 replace approximately
i,2cx) schools of the old type.

Ohio. — Ohio in 19 14 had 358 consolidated schools; in
1915, 468; in 1916, 539.

Oklahoma, — Total, 103, of which 19 were established dur-
ing the past two years; 77 of these consolidated districts re-
place 215 old districts.

Rhode Island. — In the State there is one consolidated
school established by the union of four ungraded schools;
23 other ungraded schools have been closed and the pupils
transported to graded schools already established.

South Carolina. — Four hundred "rural graded schools"
were in operation in 1914-15, 562 in 1915-16, and 700 in
1916-17. These are the schools receiving special State aid
under the act of the State legislature of 191 2 "to encourage
consoKdated and graded schools in country districts."

South Dakota. — Total, 24, of which 20 were effected dur-
ing the past year.

Tennessee. — Total, 404, of which 261 were established
during the past three years.

Washington. — June 30, 1916, there were 161, 39 of which
were established during the past three years.

West Virginia. — There are 24 consolidated schools which
provide transportation, and a considerable number of others
without transportation. In 191 5-16, 250 one-room schools
were abandoned and consolidated into small graded schools.
In Wayne County in six years 60 one-room schools have

THE GROWTH OP CONSOLIDATION 1 29

been consolidated into 26 graded schools of from two to
four rooms.

Thus we see that this movement is rapidly spreading
over the entire country. Good roads, the increased use of
automobiles, the county unit for school administration,
State aid, and teachers better educated for rural-life leader-
ship will greatly accelerate the movement.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. Study the growth of consolidation in some one county if possible

and note particulady the factors that promote and retard the
movement.

2. What is the record as to the giving up of consolidation after it has

been established in this country?

3. What States have most consolidated schools of the highest type?

4. What type of region had best not attempt consolidation?

5. Are there any typical regions in the United States where there are

not now successful consolidated schools — thus, mountainous, cold,
blizzardy, bad-roads, long-haul, backward-population, poor, and
other regions?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The bibliography here is mainly in the form of State, national, and
other reports. A few writers have given brief histories of consolida-
tion but the essential facts will be found in the writer's "Consolida-
tion of Schools and Transportation of Pupils at Public Expense."
The reports of the United States Bureau of Education should be
watched for resumes of the spread and development of consolidation.
Just now it is spreading more than developing. Later will come a
period of improvement in which the best schools that have started well
and grown by experimentation and study will become the standard for
all to attain.

CHAPTER VII
A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL

Preliminary Problems

1. "Get yourself ready" for a delightful visit with Mrs. Cook, of the

United States Bureau of Education, to a progressive consolidated
school in the West and secure also a bird's-eye view and the
concrete detail necessary for a close study of many aspects of the
consolidated school in succeeding chapters.

2. If possible, visit a consolidated school within your reach.

I. Location and History

After the preceding discussions of the practical problem
and the social and administrative setting of the consolidated
rural school, the reader will be interested to visit with us
such a school.

The "crossroads" village of La Porte, Colorado, con-
tains a blacksmith-shop, post-office, and store combined,
and a few houses, and is located about three miles north and
west of the city of Fort Collins, the seat of the Colorado
State College of Agriculture. The village does not present
a dignified appearance from an architectural standpoint,
although it has a distinguished history, for at one time it
aspired to be the capital of the State, an honor which it
lost by but one vote to the neighboring city of Golden; and
it was for some years the county-seat of Larimer County.
While the village itself, judging from its present appear-
ance, has degenerated somewhat from those illustrious days,
the surrounding country has not suffered a similar experi-
ence. It is one of the most productive sections of northern
Colorado. Orchards line the roadways and apple-laden
hay-racks pass the visitor on the way; small fruits, sugar-
beets, alfalfa, and grain are raised in abundance, and stock

130

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL I31

and dairy products help to make a thrifty and prosperous
community.

Near the village trading centre in the midst of farms and
orchards located in the open country is the Cache La Poudre
Consolidated School. Less than four years ago five one-
teacher schools and one three- teacher school in four differ-
ent districts served the educational needs of the farm peo-
ple living in the vicinity of the village of La Porte. About
that time the State College gf Agriculture near by was
moved by the spirit of better country life and appointed a
*' rural-school visitor '* as a member of its faculty. The
visitor in December, 191 2, on the invitation of the principal
of the school at La Porte, spent several days visiting and
interviewing the people in the homes of the neighborhood
and collecting statistical data on attendance and financial
conditions and possibilities, from the schools and from the
county superintendent's office. According to the investi-
gator, the buildings were in bad condition, four of them un-
fit for use; the majority of the teachers were such as you
usually find in country schools of this kind; the attendance
was poor and the schools in general woefully inefficient.

A Survey and Publicity. — The result of this survey of
the districts seemed to the majority of the leaders in the
community to justify immediate consolidation. The weeks
following the survey were devoted to a campaign of educa-
tion for the community during which meetings were held
in all of the districts involved and the matter of school con-
solidation enthusiastically agitated. In April, 1913, an
election was held to decide the question and the majority
voted in favor of the new plan. In June bonds were voted
for a $26,000 building, the corner-stone of which was laid
July 2, 1 9 13. In the following September the new building
was opened to the children of the combined territory of
the four districts immediately surrounding it and was named
from a near-by river, the Cache La Poudre. The consoli-
dated district is approximately 25 square miles in area,

132 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

contains 170 families and 325 census children. The school
building, while not in the geographical centre, is strategically
located with reference to the population. The visit here
described was made when the school was in its third year.

II. The School Plant and Transportation

Rarely does one find a more beautiful natural site for a
school building than that selected by the trustees in charge.
Majestic old cottonwoods are lined in rows at each side and
at the back of the building and massed at one side in the
rear near the playground. In the background, less than
fifty miles to the west — seeming, in the clear atmosphere
of the November day, not more than ten — is the main
range of the Rocky Mountains, capped in the distance
by three of its highest peaks. From the athletic field, from
the front entrance, from the west and south windows there
is, at all times, for the delight of the nature-lover — and all
country dwellers, especially children, should be nature-
lovers — a magnificent view of more than one hundred miles
of perpetually snow-covered mountains.

As the visitor enters the building from the road he may
notice among the tall trees at the left swings and other play
equipment. Still at the left and toward the rear of the
building is the manual-training shop. At the right are more
trees, a larger playground, the athletic fields, and the super-
intendent's cottage. Surrounding the school grounds are
farms and orchards — apples and small fruits being important
products of this section.

The building itself is a substantial brick structure of
two stories with a commodious basement. The latter is
almost entirely above ground, and the schoolrooms proper
must, therefore, be reached by a number of stone steps
leading directly to the wide hallway. In the centre of the
hallway a staircase leads to the upper floor. On either side
are two classrooms for the elementary grades. Ascending

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL I33

the stairway one passes on the landing and at the rear of
the building a small sunny sewing-room whose sashed win-
dows shut it from view from the stairway and at the same
time proclaim its purpose to the visitor. Continuing to the
second floor there are two small rooms at the front. One
serves as library and superintendent's office and one as the
teachers' retiring and rest room. The high-school assembly-
room occupies one entire side of the upper floor with the door
entering it near the head of the staircase on the left. On
the right are the laboratory and a large classroom.

The assembly-room is lighted from the south and west.
The side nearest the hall has a movable wooden partition.
This can be so raised as to form, with the hallway, an audi-
torium of reasonable size. The school owns a supply of
folding-chairs, and comfortable seating arrangements can
thus be provided for the various recreational activities of
which the school is the centre.

The rest-room is furnished with a couch, rug, table, and
chairs, and is comfortable and inviting. The library is not
large at present but the books are well selected and will
form a nucleus for a reference and circulating library of
more pretentious size when circumstances permit. The
laboratory is supplied simply with the usual apparatus for
chemistry and physics, a separator, and an eight-hole Bab-
cock milk-tester.

The basement contains two large rooms, one at each side
of the front entrance. These serve as lunchrooms and
stormy-day playrooms. One side is assigned to the boys
and the other to the girls. Adjoining these rooms are the
toilets, which are of modern sanitary type and are kept
clean and wholesome. The floors in the basement are of
cement, and the rooms here are all light, dry, and "airy."
At the rear of the building and near the foot of the inside
stairway is the kitchen, equipped with individual cooking-
tables and closets; cupboards for supplies, sink, water, oil-
stoves, and other necessaries.

134 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

The outside manual- training shop, previously mentioned,
is a commodious frame building remodelled from one of the
old schoolhouses. The benches are of simple home-made
variety and the equipment is adequate but not elaborate.
This shop is made to approximate as nearly as possible the
better type of workshop of the ordinary farm. It is heated
with a stove and contains two rooms.

The superintendent's home is also a remodelled build-
ing, being one of the best of the old abandoned frame school-
houses. It has large, pleasant rooms, a screened porch along
the front and rear, and a bathroom. This ^'teacherage" is
part of the school property, built especially as the home of
the superintendent. No rent is charged, its use being al-
lowed by the board in addition to the regular salary paid.

The school board has also a three-year lease on a small
orchard, house, and barn which adjoins the school grounds.
This is subleased to the eighth-grade teacher, who is a mar-
ried man and who occupies the cottage and cultivates the
ground. During the year preceding the time of visiting the
school this teacher sold almost enough from the land to pay
the rent in addition to supplying his own table. In addition
to these two residences controlled by the school board, four
rooms in the basement of the main building were finished
and set apart for the janitor^s residence. So the district
really houses three of its employees with their families.
The janitor receives $45 per month, house room, light,
water, and fuel. He lives in the building throughout the
year and is responsible to the board for its proper care at
all timps. According to the rules of the board published in
pamphlet form for general distribution, the "janitor shall
be the assistant executive officer of the superintendent to
help carry out all the rules and regulations of the board
and superintendent so far as they may apply to the build-
ings, grounds, and discipline. When school is not in ses-
sion he shall be in complete control of the building, subject
only to the orders of the school board."

^

^

^^

^ji

1^

m

h^fd

^m

.m

i F^^^B

wmlM

■

Jttk

If.-M

■R'' ' ' "■

The Colorado school visited by Mrs. Cook
Two-story building of old-style architecture, but good school work within and without

A movable partition for auditorium use, Cache La Poudre school

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL I35

The classrooms are all large and well lighted. There
are cement walks, oiled floors, and adjustable desks of a
modern and approved type. There are sanitary drinking-
fountains on both floors. The water is piped from the Fort
Collins city system and is pure, soft, mountain water. The
walls are finished in hard plaster and in each room is hung
at least one good picture, several of which are copies of
well-known masterpieces of art. The woodwork is in natural
finish; the windows are fitted with shades, and in general
the interior has the appearance of simplicity, appropriate-
ness, and comfort.

The play and athletic grounds are marvels of good sense
in selection. The plant, exclusive of the leased orchard,
covers four and one-half acres, including a half-acre orchard
and garden used by the superintendent and the janitor.
The grounds are made not alone beautiful but cool and in-
viting by the shade of majestic trees, and the play apparatus,
all of which is home-made, is so placed as to utilize this ad-
vantage. There are two swings, two giant strides, and eight
teeters, all placed about the building close to the trees and
out of range of the ball-fields. The accompanying pictures
give some idea of the distribution. On the athletic field are
two basket-ball fields, football gridiron, and baseball dia-
mond. The principal says they are all in constant use, in-
cluding the apparatus for play.

Transportation. — Transportation being the rock on
which so many thriving consolidation schemes have split, it
is a real pleasure to find that there are no complaints and
no dissatisfied murmurs in regard to this phase of the school
management. The district owns seven substantial covered
wagons, each of which cost approximately $200. The teams
are owned by the drivers and are valued at about $400 each.
The district, as related above, covers twenty-five square
miles, and the wagons transport the children distances vary-
ing from three to five miles. The number of children carried
in each wagon varies from seventeen to twenty-four or

136 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

more, the aim being to keep the number below twenty-four
if possible. The total number transported averages 160
pupils daily. The school board awards a contract to the
lowest bidder, providing he is a satisfactory person, but re-
serves the right to reject any or all bids. The qualifications
required are very exacting, only mature, responsible men
being eligible, and a $500 bond required. By the terms of
the contract the driver is to take entire charge of the chil-
dren on his route, to be accountable for their welfare, to
see that they conduct themselves in a proper manner,
and to report all misconduct on the part of the chil-
dren to the principal. The contract also stipulates that no
profane language shall be used either by driver or the chil-
dren and that the driver maintain a time schedule and
provide proper housing and care for the wagon. In ad-
dition to these stipulated regulations the rules of the school
before referred to provide that there shall be two time-
tables furnished to patrons on a "route-sheet,'' one for good
roads and one for bad roads; that the driver must not vary
from the time-table once established and must not pass the
point of stopping if the pupils are not ready until five min-
utes after the time scheduled, unless he be notified that the
pupils will not attend school that day.

Pupils are required to remain seated while the wagon is
in motion; to be at the proper pl'ace on time; to refrain from
boisterous or profane language. The use of tobacco by
pupils or driver is forbidden while on the wagons. Even
parents may not censure drivers on penalty of having their
children excluded from the privilege of the wagons. All
necessary complaints must be made to the superintendent.

The routes are so planned that no child rides in a round-
about way. When he enters the wagon he is headed di-
rectly for the schoolhouse. In the morning the drivers go
to the end of the route and pick up children on the return.
After school the children are taken directly home. The sala-
ries of drivers and distances travelled by each are as follows:

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL

-^d,!

SALARY

DISTANCE

No. I.

2.

3
4.
5-
6.

7-

Average .

$40.00
37.50
49.00
39.80
34.00
47.50
49 50

$42.47

7,yi miles

5
4
3
3
4

3^ miles

III. The Work of the School

During the last two years under the old system, with
four districts and six schools, the territory now comprised
in the consolidated district had a school census, enrolment,
and attendance as follows:

Year

1912

230

238

155

65

0

1913

269

228

138

60

0

Census

Enrolment •

Average daily attendance

Percentage of attendance to enrolment

Enrolled in high school in district

For the year 19 16, in the consolidated school, corre-
sponding figures are as follows:

1916

325

198

90

45

Here we see a high-school enrolment raised from nothing
to forty- five pupils, and an attendance increased 30 per cent.

For the month of December, 191 6, the principal reports
no tardiness in the elementary school and but six cases in
the high school. There are relatively few foreigners in the
district and Americans predominate in the school enrol-

138 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ment. There are, however, about 22 per cent of Mexican
and 12 per cent of German parentage.

The increase in attendance and percentage of attendance
to enrolment since consolidation has continued very marked.
Before the consolidation was effected there was no high
school nearer than that located at Fort Collins, a city of
about 10,000 inhabitants, at a distance of more than six
miles from some of the homes. At the time of the visit
there were 45 pupils enrolled in high school and 175 in the
grades. In June, 191 5, twelve pupils finished the eighth
grade, ten of whom entered high school the following au-
tumn. In June, 1916, ten completed the eighth grade, all
of whom entered high school in the fall of 191 6. Others
from outside the class entered high school, giving the en-
tering class an enrolment of 18. The school's ability to
hold children through the grades is represented roughly by
the following data showing enrolment for all grades for the
four months preceding January, 191 7. Little decrease in
grade enrolment as we go upward through the grades is
present.

Year i 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 I II HI IV

Enrolment 29 25 25 30 37 19 16 12 18 11 19 8

Teachers. — Including the superintendent, who teaches
mathematics and agriculture, nine teachers are employed.
Of these, three are men and six are women. Three women
and one man devote their entire time to the elementary
grades, two grades being assigned to each; three devote
their entire time to the high school, and two special teachers
divide their time between the high school and the elemen-
tary grades. All of the teachers but one are graduates of
normal school or college, five having A.B. or B.S. degrees.
Four receive $75 per month, one $80, and three $85 per
month. The seventh and eighth grade teacher is paid for
twelve months in the year, the others for nine months. The
superintendent was serving his second year of a three-year

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 139

contract by the terms of which he was to receive $1,300
the first year and $100 per year increase for each of the re-
maining two years. He was then getting $1,400 and the
use of a house and orchard. Two of the men teachers, as
related above, have homes on the school grounds. One un-
married man and three women board in the district. The
other three are permanent residents in the district and live
in the homes of their families. The cost of board and room
is about $22.50 per month.

Organization. — With respect to the organization of the
work of the school we have stated that the school includes
the eight regular elementary grades and. four years of high
school. Manual training, cooking, and sewing begin in the
sixth grade and continue through the remainder of the ele-
mentary course and high school. Agriculture begins in the
seventh grade and continues throughout the remaining six
years of the course. The sixth-grade girls have one recita-
tion per week of ninety minutes' duration in domestic
science, while the boys devote the same period to manual
training. The pupils of the seventh and eighth grades and
high school devote two periods of one and one-half hours
each per week to these subjects. In addition to manual
training and household economics, agriculture has a promi-
nent place in the curriculum. In the seventh and eighth
grades a course in elementary agriculture is given; in the
ninth grade physical and commercial geography and soils;
in the tenth grade animal life and agricultural botany; in
the eleventh grade advanced agriculture and stock-judging;
in the twelfth grade rural economics. Special attention is
given to milk-testing for neighboring farmers and to testing
cream and skimmed milk.

Drawing and music are taught throughout the grades
and high school. One half-hour period per week in the
grades and one forty-five-minute period per week in high
school are devoted to each of these subjects. There are
four sections in the elementary school, two grades in each,

I40 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

and one in high school for this purpose. The teacher in
charge of manual training also teaches history and algebra
in the high school. Another special teacher has charge of
all the music, drawing, cooking, and sewing in the grades
and high school. This arrangement allows the inclusion in
the curriculum of a variety of special subjects at a mini-
mum cost. The high school is one of the 70 high schools
(of the total of 247 in the State) which are on the accredit-
ed list of the State University.

Six-Six Plan. — After 191 7 the superintendent expects to
adopt the six-six plan of organization. At the time of our
visit the following subjects were offered in the high school.
Electives are placed in the second column. It should be
noted that history, four years of English, and drawing and
music were then all required subjects:

REQUIRED

ELECTIVE

General history.

Rhetoricals.

American history.

Latin.

Civics.

German.

Algebra.

Chemistry.

Geometry.

Physical geography.

Rhetoric.

Commercial geography,

English composition.

Agriculture.

English literature.

Animal husbandry.

American literature.

Farm arithmetic.

Physics.

Farm management.

Zoology.

Rural economics.

Agricultural botany.

Cooking.

Sewing.

Manual training.

Drawing.

Music.

As an illustration of the organization for the instruction
in manual training, sewing, cooking, music, and drawing, a
portion of the daily schedule of the seventh and eighth
grades is appended. The full programme for the sixth grade
is given as an illustration of the division of time possible in

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL

141

a consolidated school as compared with that of a one-
teacher school in which there are from 25 to 40 recitations
daily:

Sixth Grade Programme

A. M.

9.00- 9

9.15- 9
9.40-10

lO.IO-IO

10.30-10
I0.45-II
II.I5-II

1 1. 40-1 2
P. M.
I.OO- I
1.20-
1.50-
2.00-
2.10-
2.30-

2.45-
3.10-
3.20-
3.35-

Music and drawing on
Wednesdays and Fridays

1 5 — Music — Opening exercises

40 — Recite reading

10 — Study geography

30 — Recite geography

45 — Recess

15 — Study arithmetic

40 — Recite arithmetic

00 — Study physiology. (History first half year)

Noon
20 — Penmanship
50 — Study language
00 — Grammar drill
10 — Physical exercises
30 — Recite language
45 — Recess
10 — Study spelling
20 — Recite spelling
35 — Recite physiology.

(History first half year)

Seventh and Eighth Grade Programme

30, Mon., Tues., Wed., and Fri. — Reading and arithmetic

Thurs. — Music, drawing
00, Fri. — Sewing and manual training
45, Mon., Tues., Wed., and Thurs.— Civics and history
00, Mon and Wed. — Physical exercises

Tues., Wed., and Thurs. — Physiology

30, Mon., Wed., Thurs., and Fri. — Reading, language, writ-
ing
Tues. — Sewing and manual training

Course of Study. — The course of study followed differs
from the conventional course in the emphasis placed on
manual training, agriculture, cooking, and sewing, and the
opportunity which the inclusion of these subjects gives to

A. M.

9.00-10.

10.50-12.
10. 50-1 1.
11.45-12.

p. M.
I.OO- 2.

142 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

correlate the traditional topics with matters concerned with
home and farm work. The course offered is highly voca-
tional from the point of view of the boys and girls who are
to make farming and farm home-making a life-work. In or-
der that the work given at school may reflect as correctly
and as closely as possible that which should be carried on
in the homes and on the farms, not only are the projects
given in the vocational subjects of a highly practical nature
but the equipment used, tools, benches, cooking utensils,
materials used in making articles and in preparing foods,
are such as are at hand on the neighboring farms. In the
manual-training classes, planing, joining, squaring, and the
fundamentals of primary woodwork are taught to the
younger boys; the making of milk-stools, benches, wagon-
jacks, letter-boxes, chicken-coops, yard^gates, bookcases,
cement work, and other projects of a similar nature are
carried through the upper grades. The cooking is of the
practical every-day foods used on the farms in the commu-
nity and a very close estimate of costs and food values is ad-
hered to. The visitor found each girl in the sewing-class
making a different garment or working on a different ar-
ticle. The girls are required to do home sewing, and must
bring materials from home for making articles which are
needed and used after completion in the home. They have
freedom of choice as to styles, materials, etc., under the
guidance, of course, of the teacher in charge. The aim is
both to fit for and to help improve the customary activities
of the home and farm.

Another departure from the traditional rural-school
curriculum is the teaching of music and drawing throughout
the course and the emphasis placed on games and athletics.
The high school offers also not only the vocational subjects
mentioned but also a reasonable variety for selection of his-
tory, science, languages, and mathematics which must be
studied to prepare for the professional or liberal-arts college
courses. The student who wishes to enter a higher institu-
tion and prepare for a profession or for a vocation other

Girls gaining domestic efficiency-

Practical sewing for Colorado girls
Cache La Poudre School

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL I43

than farming has the opportunity by a wise selection of
subjects to obtain full preparation. The high-school depart-
ment offers four years of English, two of history, and two
each of Latin and German, besides four years of music and
drawing.

In these practical days when so great emphasis is being
placed on the education which leads to better and more
intensive soil cultivation and a higher state of productive-
ness, it is well not to lose sight of the fact that improved
rural life is not all mere bushels to the acre. The highest
mission of the school is but partially accomplished when this
end is reached. Vocational efficiency is but one of the five
social aims previously stated. Economic prosperity must
be accompanied by spiritual and ethical development and
the ability for enjoying refined leisure before the country
school will produce an intelligent and contented farm popu-
lation. To this end more emphasis will probably be placed
in the future on such subjects as literature, civics, ethics,
and avocational subjects.

Supervised play and school athletics also receive care-
ful attention in both the high and elementary school. The
grounds are well equipped with home-made apparatus for
the small children and are carefully supervised by the
teachers. Both boys and girls have basket-ball teams which
are shown in the accompanying photographs, as is also the
football squad. We have mentioned the baseball diamond
used by pupils from the grades and high school. The high-
school boys are expected to spend one-half to one hour each
day in some form of athletics. The girls have gymnastics
three days a week and glee-club work two days.

IV. Community Service

The influence of the school is not confined to the walls
of the building or the boundaries of the campus, but ex-
tends to the limits of the district and even beyond it into
other rural districts of the county. The community gath-

144 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

erings begin in September with the annual county play-
festival for third-class (rural) districts and continue until
the commencement programme closes the ''season" in
June. The programme for the 191 6 county play-festival is
given on the opposite page. Worthy of special note are the
community singing, high-school orchestra, and the basket
lunch. The inside gatherings begin in November and are
held in the auditorium previously mentioned. A lecture
course of seven numbers begins about November 3 and ends
about March 17. Reproductions of handbill announce-
ments are given on accompanying pages.

Besides the festival and lecture course the year's enter-
tainment programme includes seven literary society eve-
nings, which are, according to the superintendent's descrip-
tion, "old-fashioned lyceums," a box supper, ladies' aid
supper, Hallowe'en social, Christmas programme (school),
a lecture and play by home talent, four political meetings,
eight parent-teacher association meetings, two plays, a
public auction, two receptions, and two commencement
programmes. The announcement of the parent-teacher
association for 191 6 is appended:

November 8
Uniform Dress in School and Graduation Mrs. W. Mullen

December 6
Demonstration of School Lunches Miss Clara Mellor

January 3

Mission of the County Superintendent

Larimer County Superintendent

February 7
Teaching Children Thrift J. A. Sidney

March 7
Rural Life in Home and School Mrs. H. T. French

April ^
Care of the Children's Teeth Dr. H. J. Livingstone

May 2
Special Programme by Girls* Camp-fire Organization.

Larimer County's Second Annual Play Festival for
Third Class School Districts

SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 16, 1916

Cache La Poudre Consolidated School

Teachers, Parents, Pupils and Friends are Cordially Invited to

Attend. Come Early, Bring Your Lunch

and Spend the Day

PROGRAM, 10 A. M.

MUSIC _. High School Orchestra

ADDRESS OF, WELCOME Emma T. Wilkins

MUSIC— THE COLORADO STATE SONG

School Children

THE VALUE OP THE PARENT-TEACHER ASSOCIATION.

. ....... . . . .Mrs. John H. Weldon, District No. 8

MUSIC . . High School Orchestra

A TALK AND DEMONSTRATION ON EDUCATIONAL

GYMNASTICS IN OUR SCHOOLS

.-,. .Mrs. Hiram T. Pirench, Fort Collins

STORY TELLING ..^......^^ «.,

MUSIC — ~^.,^. ...^.^.. „^^ Community Singihg

(Noon Hour— Basket Lunch)

PROGRAM, 1:30 P.M.

50 YARD DASH-^mLS \ a R«« For F^-h Pr^rf*
50 YARD DASH-BOYS J ^ Race For Each Grade

100 FT. RACE . .....^^^,,^Member8 of School Board

HIGH JUMP.
BROAD JUMP.
BASKET BALL GAME.
CAPTAIN BALL GAME.
TUG OF WAR.

SWINGS, TEETERS, GUNT STRIDES, ETC.
VARIED GAMES FOR HOME, PLAYGROUND AND NEIGH-
BORHOOD.
FOOT BALL GAME.

Reproduction of handbill

145

Buy a Family Ticket

TO THE

CACHE LA POUDRE

Lecture Course

All Your Family to be Admitted

to the Seven Numbers

for $1.00

Dr. E. D. Phillips, "What Everybody
Likes," November 4.

C. A. C. Conservatory Faculty, Music and
Reading, November 25.

Prof. Jno. R. Bell, "The Significance of
Attitude," December 16.

Colorado Agricultural College Band,
January 13,

Prof H. D. Black. •'The Cliff Dwellers."
February 3.

C. A. C. Ladies' Glee Club. February 24.

C A. C, Men's Glee Club. March 17.

BUY YOUR TICKET NOW

Th« Mernint Sxprct* Print

Reproduction of handbill

146

A VISIT TO A CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL I47

Up to the date of writing (February, 191 7) the various
entertainment features have attracted during the present
year an aggregate attendance of 3,000 people. Family tickets
at $1 each for the lecture course have been sold to 120
families.

Besides these activities, the regular school election day
in May is made the occasion of a kind of spring festival.
It has become the custom since consolidation to include
among the board membership a resident of each of the old
districts as they existed before consolidation in order to
keep the board as representative as possible. A half-holiday
is declared and a programme is given by the school. An ex-
hibit of the year's work, both manual and academic, is
shown; articles made in the manual-training department are
auctioned off, and a food sale is managed by the cooking
classes. The proceeds of this sale supply much of the ma-
terial used during the school term for cooking and manual
training. The voting for school-board members follows the
above programme. It is not difficult to see how community
spirit is preserved and promoted in the district, co-operation
between parents and teachers encouraged, school pride
strengthened, and the spirit of fellowship which fosters the
desire to keep the board representative of the whole of the
consolidated territory maintained. Altogether we have here
the beginnings of a type of school far superior and infinitely
more progressive than the type of schools displaced. As
an experiment in a new type of rural education the con-
solidated school is very promising. That it will immensely
improve as time goes on is to be expected in democratic, pro-
gressive America.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What features of this particular school most appeal to you as

worth while?

2. What features would you condemn?

3. If possible, learn of later improvements in the school.

148 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

4. In the first edition of the editor's " Educational Hygiene '* the

school building of this school is by a typographical error called
model instead of modern. In what ways do you consider the
lighting arrangements inferior to the Jordan school of Utah, the
Sargent of Colorado, or the one-story type suggested in Chap-
ter IX?

5. Read Doctor Foght's account of the Jordan and other consoli-

dated schools in his "The Rural Teacher and His Work,"
chaps. IV and V.

6. Other members of your study group may report on other con-

solidated schools, such as the Sargent School at Fort Collins,
Colorado, the schools described in Monahan's bulletin on
consolidation mentioned previously, and any that are described
in State and county school reports. Many States have special
bulletins on consolidation with descriptions of some of the best
schools. What are the advantages of the one-story school
building in the country?

7. Why do children attend the consolidated school better than the

one-room school ? Give reasons.

8. Is this school at Cache La Poudre a true community-centre school ?

9. What does it do for the recreation of the community? Why

should the rural curriculum include cultural, or avocational,
as well as vocational and other subjects?
10. How does it attempt to improve home and farm conditions?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

The bibliography has been indicated in the problems in applica-
tion. See also bibliography at end of the volume.

CHAPTER VIII
THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE

Preliminary Problems

1. What out-of-door activities are desirable at a consolidated school?

2. For what purposes is a school-farm desirable?

3. What should be the size of such a farm?

4. How much space is desirable for a playground, athletic field, and

out-of-door recreation centre?

5. What kinds of soil are unsuited for such activities?

6. What are some of the principal mistakes made in selecting con-

solidated-school sites ?

7. What types of sites should be avoided?

8. Describe the uses to which a good consolidated-school site of

which you have knowledge is put?

9. What play apparatus is desirable for such a site?

10. What buildings are desirable at a first-class consolidated school?

I. The Larger School Plant

The Modem versus the Old Consolidated-School Idea.
— In discussing consolidated schools in the introductory
chapter of his annual report for 1913, Doctor P. P. Claxton,
United States Commissioner of Education, says:

When such consolidation is made, a good schoolhouse should be
built, attractive, comfortable, and sanitary, with classrooms, labora-
tories, and library, and an assembly-hall large enough not only to
seat comfortably all the pupils of the school but also to serve as a
meeting-place for the people of the district. For the principal's
home a house should be built on the school grounds. This house
should not be expensive, but neat and attractive, a model for the com-
munity, such a house as any thrifty farmer with good taste might hope
to build or have built for himself. And as a part of the equipment of
the school there should be a small farm, from 4 to 5 acres if in a vil-
lage or densely populated community, and from 25 to 50 acres if in

149

150 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

the open countiy. The principal of the school should be required to
live in the principal's home, keep it as a model home for the commu-
nity and cultivate the farm as a model farm, with garden, orchard,
poultry-yard, dairy, and whatever else should be found on a well-
conducted, well-tilled farm in that community. He should put him-
self into close contact with the agricultural college and agricultural
experiment station of his State, the departments of agriculture of
State and nation, farm-demonstration agents, and other similar agen-
cies, and it should be made their duty to help him in every way possi-
ble. The use of the house and the products of the farm should be
given the principal as a part of his salary, in addition to the salary
now paid in money. After a satisfactory trial of a year or two a con-
tract should be made with the principal for life or good behavior, or
at least for a long term of years.

In this way it would be possible to get and keep in the schools
men of first-class ability, competent to teach children and to become
leaders in their communities. The principal of a country school
should know country life. A large part of country life has to do with
the cultivation and care of the farm. The best test here as elsewhere
is the ability to do. The principal of a country school in a farming
community should be able to cultivate and care for a small farm
better than, or at least as well as, any other man in the com-
munity.

This summarizes some of the principal considerations
relative to the site and the uses of the site of the modern
consolidated school established to teach country boys and
girls in terms of rural Hfe and industries. Most of the
earlier consolidated schools were located in villages. This
was particularly so in Massachusetts, where the term in gen-
eral use, "town school" instead of consolidated school, in-
dicates the location. It was a school to serve the entire
town or township, and was as a rule located in the village
at the most central point so far as the population was con-
cerned. It meant that the school in the village was en-
larged and schools in the surrounding farming sections were
closed, and the children brought in to the town. This was
true also in Indiana and in Ohio, where the term centralized
school was adopted instead of consolidated. The tendency
in the past few years is to locate the consolidated school in

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE 151

the country where several acres of land are available for
playground and for agricultural purposes. It usually must
be adjacent to a village, as has been clearly indicated in
preceding chapters, but so located that it may become a
real rural school, teaching in terms of rural life and giving
opportunities for vocational education in rural occupations
to boys and girls of twelve to eighteen years of age. It is no
longer merely a city school for country boys with city text-
books, courses of study, and city methods. The trading-
centre people working with and for the country can and
should be educated with those with whom they are to live
and co-operate.

A Tennessee Consolidated-School Site. — An excellent
example of a consolidated school with an ideal site put to
good use is the Farragut School of Concord, Tennessee. It
is in the open country, a mile from the nearest village.

II. The Building and Its Site

The Farragut School. — The building is a two-story
brick structure with basement, and cost, with the original
equipment, $12,000. Additional equipment and a water
system installed since have brought the total cost of the
school up to about $17,000. The high-school department
occupies the second floor, one large room on the first floor,
and part of the basement. Three other rooms on the first
floor are occupied by the elementary school. The household-
economics room, the girls' lunch and toilet rooms occupy
one-half of the basement. The manual-training room, the
boys' lunch and toilet rooms occupy the other half. On the
second floor nearly one-half of the space is occupied by a
study hall, in which all high-school pupils are assigned desks.
There is space for additional seats whenever it is desirable
to use the room as an auditorium or assembly-hall. When
properly arranged as an assembly-hall, it will seat 300 per-
sons. The renjiainder of the second floor is divided into a

152 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

hallway and three rooms — two recitation-rooms and a li-
brary.

On the school grounds is located a cottage for the prin-
cipal, the use of which is given to him rent free. The build-
ing is plain and simple, but well arranged and adequate for
the purpose for which it was built. It is equipped with a
complete bathroom, private toilet for servant, and a ''cool
room," with concrete sink, through which water is kept
running in warm weather. This serves as a refrigerator.
The cost of this cottage was very small, as the main part of
the cottage consists of one of the abandoned schoolhouses of
the district moved here and remodelled.

At the junction of the Kingston Pike and the Concord
Pike, at the corner of the school grounds, a concrete water-
box for horses and a public drinking-fountain with concrete
bowl and base for people have been erected. The fountain
has proved to be of great convenience, not only to the com-
munity but also to travellers on the pike. The money for
the water-box and fountain was subscribed by the pupils,
teachers, and patrons of the school. Every pupil subscribed,
and has therefore a feeling of ownership. As much of the
work as possible was done by the high-school boys in the
manual-training classes. On the water-box, in brass letters,
are these words: Erected by the Farragut School and Com-
munity, 1 9 10. On the fountain are the words: Farragut
Drinking Fountain.

In addition to the school building and the principal's
home, situated on the school grounds, there are a barn and a
chicken-house. The school owns a brood mare and several
Percheron colts; it also owns a flock of pure-bred Plymouth
Rock chickens. The mare, colts, and the chickens are the
only animals owned by the school, and are used for teaching
the principles of breeding and for other instructional pur-
poses. The chicken-house is fitted with good, substantial
equipment, including trap-nests, so that it is possible to
keep a careful record of the number of eggs laid by each

A model barn in North Carolina

i

iilli 1 llr feirr^ilBi^JiiiliililM

M|MH||g H- ^l^Hi

m

::mJ

m-liliK^'^. ' 'VMB|

1

liNfll^

A model barn at a country-life school

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE 1 53

hen. The principles of selection and breeding, which may
be demonstrated so easily with poultry, apply with equal
force to all kinds of animals.

The School Grounds. — In addition to the 12 acres
which the school owns, it has leased for a period of years 8
acres adjoining its property.

The lot owned by the school is divided into two parts;
6 acres about the buildings are in permanent grass for play-
grounds; the other 6 acres are used for demonstration pur-
poses. The school employs one man by the year to serve
both as janitor and farm laborer. The grass-plat immedi-
ately surrounding the buildings has been beautified by the
addition of shrubbery and flower-beds. Part of it is laid
out for a baseball-field, for tennis courts, and for an out door
basket-ball court. These playgrounds are used by the com-
munity at any time, and their use constitutes one of the
principal contributions of the school to the community.

Demonstration Plats. — The chief aim in the demonstra-
tion work has been to show the farmer and the pupils in the
agricultural courses how to bring the soil from a state of
low fertility to a state of high fertility in the shortest possi-
ble time. The plats are used for demonstration and not for
experimental purposes. One demonstration of particular
interest is conducted on a half-acre of land divided into 40
plats. The half-acre is divided first into four ranges. Each
range is divided lengthwise into two parts. One-half of each
has had an application of two tons of ground limestone per
acre. On these ranges are conducted a rotation and a fer-
tilizer demonstration, planned to show side by side the
four phases of a four-year rotation. The following is a de-
scription by the principal:

In the summer of 1913 range A has rye ploughed under for cow-peas.
Range B is in wheat, seeded with clover and timothy. Range C is in
clover and timothy. Range D is in corn. The cow-peas of range A
will be turned under for wheat in the fall. Thus the crops follow one
another in regular succession, each range bearing the same crop once

154 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

in four years. The ranges are divided crosswise into lo parts of one-
eightieth of an acre each. Plats 5 and 6 receive no fertilizer and serve
as checks. Each of the other 8 plats has a different application of fer-
tilizer. From this demonstration the students and people of the com-
munity are learning two very important lessons: First, that the soil
is very poor in nitrogen, and that the quickest and most economical
way to increase the nitrogen supply to the soil is to grow and turn un-
der large crops of leguminous plants, such as vetch, cow-peas, and soy-
beans, which gather and convert into plant food the free nitrogen of
the air. The second lesson is the value of an application of ground
limestone. The difference between the limed and unlimed sections of
the ranges is very apparent at any time during the growing season
and is also apparent at the time of harvest. Many farmers in the com-
munity have profited by the lessons; some have not. The great value
of rotation demonstration is that the demonstration keeps going on
and on. It tells its story each year. The story is more impressive
each succeeding year. The lesson becomes plainer and more valuable
as the time goes by.

Another part of the 6 acres is used as a model garden.
It is known in the community as the "principal's garden."
The rest of the land is used for general crops, particularly
to furnish fodder for the horse, colts, and poultry. The
model garden and the use made of the rented land are de-
scribed by the principal as follows:

The most important field on the farm is the home garden. The
principal's garden consists of one acre of land enclosed by a woven-wire
fence. It is planned as a model for the busy farmer who must do as
much of his work as possible with a horse. Everything is in rows far
enough apart for the one-horse cultivator. All of the common vegeta-
bles and small fruits are planned for. Here intensive tillage, crop
rotation, the use of fertilizers and stable manure, and the ploughing
under of leguminous cover crops are all practised to a great extent.

Four acres of the rented land have been divided into one-acre plats,
upon which is to be carried on a four-year crop-rotation demonstra-
tion. The idea in this is that not only shall the plats be large enough
to be cultivated with two-horse implements, hke the fields of a farm,
but that there shall be measured equal tracts which may be used as
a basis to compare the results at the school with the results obtained
by the boys in the agricultural course who are members of the boys'
corn club and with those of farmers in the community who are carry-

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE 1 55

ing on co-operative demonstrations. The other four acres of rented
land will be devoted to pasture demonstrations. One-half of the field
will be seeded for permanent pasture. The other half will be used to
show how, by proper selection of cereals, clovers, and grasses, good
pasture may be obtained for nearly all seasons of the year.

Community Service. — The Farragut School means more
to the community than the ordinary school which confines
its attention to instructing the boys and girls who come to
it as pupils. It is attempting to be an institution of the
widest use and of direct value to every man, woman, and
child in the community. The following are some of the ways
in which the school is serving the community:

On the last Friday night before each full moon there have
been held at the schoolhouse, for the past eight years, meet-
ings called "moonlight socials." These are community
gatherings to which all are welcome. The programme varies
from meeting to meeting. There is always a liberal allow-
ance of music and usually a talk on a subject of general in-
terest pertaining to some phase of farm and home life.
Sometimes the talks are given by outside persons, from the
State Agricultural College or elsewhere. More often, how-
ever, there is a general discussion of a selected subject, led
by a few members of the community selected before the
meeting. If the subject to be discussed deals with tech-
nical phases of agriculture in which they are not interested,
the women will meet in another room and discuss some prob-
lem of housekeeping. The discussions are made as prac-
tical as possible. After the regular programme is over the
evening is given to general sociability, playing games, and
singing familiar songs. Usually some sort of lunch is served.
The domestic-science room has facilities which make the
serving of a lunch very easy. The meetings are well at-
tended and have become a very important part of the com-
munity life. Other evening meetings are held in the school-
house on many special occasions. If the people of the com-
munity desire to get together for any purpose, the school-
house is always designated as the place of meeting.

156 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

The biggest meeting of the year, however, is on Com-
mencement Day. The programme lasts all day. In the
forenoon the graduating exercises take place, with essays
or short talks by members of the graduating class. These
essays and talks are usually upon subjects pertaining to
farm and country life, and are therefore of more interest to
the audience than the ordinary high-school graduation essay
or oration. At this forenoon meeting the graduates receive
their diplomas. At noon a basket-dinner is served on the
grounds under the large shade trees. The food contributed
by each family is put in a common lot and served as a com-
munity dinner. The domestic-science room is utilized to
make the lunch more complete. This plan helps make the
lunch hour a real social hour. After dinner the visitors in-
spect the plat demonstrations in rotation of crops, and the
progress of the various crops under the different treatments
is noted. The features of the demonstration are explained
by the principal of the school. At two o'clock the people
assemble in the school, and there is a commencement ad-
dress, usually by some prominent outside speaker. Follow-
ing this is a baseball game between the high-school team
and either a team from some other school or a selected team
from among the farmers of the community. In the evening
a drama is presented by the students of the school. This
part of the programme creates great interest and is always
well attended.

Another service of the school is in furnishing agricultural
reading for the farmers and their wives in the community.
The school library contains about 200 books and a large
number of government reports. It also contains about
4,000 bulletins from various experiment stations in the
United States. There is an abundance of valuable reading
in these bulletins which is not ordinarily available for
farmers, because they have no way of determining where
the most valuable material is to be found. This school has
been very successful in its attempts to overcome this diffi-
culty. One teacher of the school examines all bulletins re-

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE 1 57

ceived. He notes particularly what in the bulletins is of
value to the farmers and housekeepers in the territory
served by the school. He therefore not only has informa-
tion on the particular subject discussed by the bulletins but
also is able to put into the hands of the people of his com-
munity the material which will be of most value to them.
All the bulletins and books of the library are constantly in
circulation in the community and are available for young
and old people alike. The school building is open on
Wednesdays and Saturdays throughout the summer vaca-
tion for those who care to visit the library to consult the
books and bulletins in the library or to get books, reports,
bulletins, or periodicals for home reading.

During the vacations the school playgrounds are used
freely by people in the district. They are, in fact, commu-
nity playgrounds, on which the boys gather for baseball and
other games whenever their duties permit. The tennis-
courts and basket-ball courts are in considerable demand.
The school and its property are regarded by the individuals
of the community as belonging to them, and they are wel-
come at all times to make any use of them which does not
work injury to the school. On days during the summer
vacation on which the school library is open the shower-
baths are also open and many visitors use them.

The school grounds and demonstration plats are open
to inspection at all times, and farmers driving by frequently
stop to examine the crops. Many of them visit the plats
at regular periods and study carefully their progress.

Another important community service comes through
the outside activities of the principal of the school. He has
become an expert adviser in agriculture to all the farmers
of the community. He is employed throughout the year,
and a horse is furnished him. When school is not in session
he spends much of his time in driving about the commu-
nity, visiting the farmers on their farms, and getting in touch
with local agricultural conditions and problems. This en-

158 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ables him to know well the agricultural conditions of the
community, to adapt the work of the school to the needs of
the community as he finds them, to bring to each farmer
expert advice for his own particular needs, and to give to
all information in regard to the best things done by any.
It also enables him to keep in touch with the boys' corn-
club work and other agricultural work, and to see that in
their practical work on the farm they apply the principles
learned in school.

III. Wake County (N. C.) School-Farm Movement

Another Example. — A unique plan for the use of the
school site was developed five years ago in Wake County,
North Carolina, under the leadership of Z. V. Judd, then
county superintendent of public instruction. The plan is
called the ''School-Farm Movement," and comprehends the
establishment of a small farm of from two to ten acres in
connection with every country school. This farm is culti-
vated by the children and their parents, working together
on certain days in what Mr. Judd terms "school-farm work-
ing bees." The working bees are gatherings for social pur-
poses, as well as for the cultivation of the school land. Each
school-farm is usually given to one crop. A regular system
of rotation is planned. The agricultural work is done un-
der the supervision of the best farmer in the community, so
that good methods are used. Every person, therefore, tak-
ing part is given the opportunity to observe the most suc-
cessful systems of raising the crops under cultivation. The
income received from the sale of the products raised on the
school-farm is used for general school purposes.

It is hoped by this movement to accomplish three
things: first, to make money to be used in supplementing
the school fund; second, to offer an opportunity to make
the teaching of agriculture in the rural school entirely prac-
tical and to illustrate how pleasant farm work can be made

Play at a consolidated school, Preble County, Ohio

Supervised play at a consolidated sjhool in JNlarion County, Ohio

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE 1 59

under proper conditions; and, third, to offer rural commu-
nities opportunities for gatherings to develop the social side
of farm life, with the schoolhouse the social centre of the
community and the principal occupation of the people,
farming, the centre of interest.

The first work was done at Holly Springs, where seven
years ago two acres of land were planted in cotton. The
lighter work was done by the women and children. A
community dinner was a part of the programme for each
gathering. Two bales of cotton were raised, netting the
school $119. The next year the plan was tried at eleven
schools, the crops raised including cotton, corn, tobacco,
and wheat. On the eleven farms 1,200 persons participated
in the work. The net profit was nearly $1,200. The next
year six additional farms were established, making a total of
seventeen farms.

The children of the county want these school-farms, and
the older people are in sympathy with the idea. The re-
sults have been an increased interest in the schools and the
school work, an improvement in the appearance of the
buildings and grounds, and the lengthening of the school
year; also the development of a better community spirit
and an improvement in general farming in the county.

Information concerning the Wake County plan has
spread to all parts of the country and it has been adopted in
many other places.

Character of the Site. — The site of the Farragut School
was well selected. The country is rolling, the school build-
ing and principal's cottage stand on an elevation 25 or 30
feet higher than the roadway, 100 feet in front. The entire
20 acres have good natural drainage. The elevation is not
high enough to be too exposed to winter winds. The soil is
a sandy loam with fertility enough to make cultivation
profitable. The principalis garden and the demonstration
plats are in an excellent state of cultivation. The site, in a
word, includes all the essentials that the desirable school

l6o THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

site in the country district should include. Its location at
the crossroads of two main pikes makes it accessible from
four directions.

If the site of the building were not perfectly drained by
natural drainage, considerable expense would have been
necessary to lay tiles. It would be exceedingly unwise to
build a structure of the size of the building needed for a
consolidated school with from four to a dozen classrooms
without substantial foundations, and such cannot be had
except with good drainage, natural or otherwise.

Water-Supply. — The Farragut School has an excellent
water-supply, although the cost was greater than is ordi-
narily necessary, if available water is considered in the selec-
tion of the site. The new system was installed in 191 1
at a cost of $3,000 after well-water had been used for seven
years. Water is taken from a spring 1,200 feet away from
and below the school building. It is pumped to the building
and into two 1,000-gallon tanks in the attic by a No. 40
double-acting Rife ram, with a capacity of 3,600 gallons
per day. The ram is driven by creek-water, but delivers
only spring-water to the buildings. From the tanks, water
is conveyed to all parts of the school building, to the prin-
cipal's house, the barn, and to the drinking-fountain on
the pike. In the hall on the second floor are two sanitary
drinking-fountains for the high school. On the lower floor
there are two more for the elementary school. There is a
drinking-fountain in each lunch-room. There are two sinks
and one wash-bowl in the domestic-economy room, one
wash-bowl in the manual-training room, and three sinks in
the science laboratory.

Each toilet-room is equipped with six Douglas-siphon- jet
closets, two wash-bowls, two plate-glass mirrors, and two
shower-baths with dressing-rooms. All sinks and wash-
bowls are furnished with liquid-soap dispensers and paper
towels. The partitions between the closets are galvanized
iron painted with white enamel. The girls' shower-baths
are enclosed with white enamelled iron; the boys' shower-

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE l6l

baths with white enamelled wood. The walls of the base-
ment are all painted white. The floor is of concrete. All
sinks, bowls, and showers are supplied with hot water, the
former from a 300-gallon hot-water tank connected with a
coil in the furnace and also with a special tank-heater, with a
capacity of 250 gallons per hour, to be used when there is
no fire in the furnace.

If a site as good otherwise could have been found with
water available by digging or driving a well, the water-
supply would have been secured at a less expense. The
driven well is as a rule very satisfactory, and for storage
and pressure the pneumatic tank is more satisfactory than
the tank in the attic or cupola.

IV. Factors in the Selection of the School Site

Many of the most important factors in the selection of
the school site are discussed above in the description of the
Farragut School. One consideration not mentioned is in
regard to the surroundings. Particular care should be taken
to see that the school is not located adjacent to ill-smelling
places, such as stables, nor near noisy disturbances, such as
cattle-yards and railroads. Not only is the noise of passing
trains distracting but there is danger, particularly during
play hours, of children in their games running upon the
tracks and, because of the noise and excitement of the play,
not hearing approaching trains.

The Playground. — The need of a good playground can-
not be overemphasized. It has been generally assumed in
the past that for the country school no playground need be
provided, because country boys and girls do not need to
play, as they have plenty of physical exercise in their home
work. This shows no real conception of the value of play.
Its chief value is its socializing effect and the pleasure that
it gives. Both are especially needed in the life of the coun-
try boy and girl.

l62

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Farming in the past has been an individualistic life; the
farmer's most prominent characteristic has been individ-
ualism. Most games teach team-work and co-operation.
Such things learned in play in early life become in later
life a factor in work and living. Besides, co-operative play

Total area of
School Orounds

QneRoom
Tovmship
Schools

Area avail&ble
for organized iflfly

B

Ornamentation of
School Orounds

Centmlizcdt

Schools

nn

■less then 1 acre
Ol acre and more

Proportion having
■llesjtHan-J^acre

131^ acre and more

School Sites in Ohio
From The Rural School Survey

Proportion ie^
■Poor B Fair
OOood

teaches the proper attitude toward fellow players and
workers; it develops grace and suppleness, it quickens the
wits, and it creates a joy in living.

The school site should be of ample size so that good play-
grounds may be provided. There should be separate sec-
tions for the younger children, the older boys, and the older
girls. There should be a space large enough for a baseball-
field, so that baseball may be played without danger to the
little children. There should be space for basket-ball and
volley-ball for both boys and girls, and other space for
playground apparatus, such as swings, seesaws, sand-boxes,
etc., for the smaller children. Altogether, at least five

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE 1 63

acres should be provided for playgrounds for the consoli-
dated school with 200 to 3cx> children of from 6 to 18 years
of age.

On the days when the school is in session the playgrounds
should be for the exclusive use of the pupils. In the eve-
nings, on Saturdays, and during vacations they should be
open to the boys and girls of the entire district. In fact,
special efforts should be made to encourage the young men
and older farm boys to meet upon the school ball-field for
baseball and athletic contests as often as possible. It not
only is of benefit to those making such use of the grounds
but it is of direct value to the school in keeping it promi-
nently before the people. When the people of a country
district use the school grounds for all kinds of assemblies,
baseball games, community picnics, farmers' conferences,
etc., the school becomes an institution of greater importance,
and as a result receives better support both moral and finan-
cial than it does otherwise.

SUMMARY

1. The site should be dry with natural drainage if possible, preferably

gravel or sandy-loam soil, but should be near a source of supply
of water for drinking and other purposes.

2. The site should contain from 10 to 25 acres of land for the school

building and surrounding lawns, the principal's cottage, play-
grounds, demonstration plats for teaching agriculture, the prin-
cipal's garden, and the farm.

3. The buildings should be placed away from unpleasant and unde-

sirable surroundings, such as ill-smelling barnyards and noisy
traffic, either on the railroad or highway.

4. The playground should be ample in size so that separate parts can

be assigned to the younger and to the older children. Base-
ball-fields, basket-ball and volley-ball courts, tennis-courts, etc.,
should be provided. The playgrounds should be used by all
residents of the community, as much as possible, when school is
not in session.

5. The demonstration plats should be conducted to show the boys

studying agriculture and the farmers of the district the value of

164 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

scientific cultivation, of various kinds of treatment of soils, of
different fertilizers, and of new varieties of farm plants.
6. The principal's garden and the farm should be conducted as nearly
as a model as possible. In order that this may be done the prin-
cipal should be a man with agricultural training; he should be
employed for twelve months in the year; and should be furnished
a cottage, rent free, in which to live.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What requisites of a good school site are discussed in Dresslar's

"Rural Schoolhouses and Grounds," a bulletin of the U. S.
Bureau of Education?

2. Note the requirements of a school site as given in Ayres and Wood's

"Healthful Schools." Houghton Mifflin Co.

3. Judge the site of some available school site by the standards

suggested. Criticise the plan for a complete school plant given
in the last chapter.

4. Would it be possible to rate a consolidated-school site on a score-

card as buildings can now be rated, each point receiving a score
and the combined scores being the rating?

5. How can a school site in your home State best be beautified?

6. What suggestions for landscaping a school site are made in bulletin

form by your State department of education?

7. What suggestions along these lines are made by Dresslar in his

bulletin mentioned above?

8. Describe some noteworthy school-site adornment, as given by

Kern in his "Among Rural Schools" (Ginn), by King of the
University of Iowa in his bulletin on "Hygienic Conditions in
Iowa Schools," or some other writer of a book or report.

9. What do the school surveys usually find regarding the size, charac-

ter, equipment, and adornment of school sites (e. g., the Ohio
School Survey) ?
10. What can pupils and parents be led to do voluntarily for school-
site improvement?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Dresslar — "Rural Schoolhouses and Grounds." U. S. Govern-

ment Printing Office.

2. Challman— "The Rural-School Pant." Bruce Publishing Co.

3. Rapeer — "Standardizing the Rural-School Plant.*' School and

Society for Feb. 13, 1915.

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL SITE AND ITS USE 165

4. "Rural-School Hygiene," a survey. (Section of the Penn-
sylvania Rural-School Survey, published by the editor.)

5. Ayres, Williams, and Wood — "Healthful Schools." Houghton

Mifflin Co.

6. Dresslar — "School Hygiene." Macmillan.

7. Rapeer — "Educational Hygiene." Scribner.

8. Kern — "Among Country Schools." Ginn.

9. Arbor-day and special bulletins on improvement of school grounds,

the school farm, the school manse, etc.
10. See the American School Board Journal (Milwaukee, Wis.) and
the American Journal of School Hygiene (Worcester, Mass.) for
occasional suggestions on sites. The State departments of ed-
ucation of a number of States issue bulletins dealing with the
school site.

CHAPTER IX
THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING

Preliminary Problems

1. How are the needs and conditions of a consolidated school diflfer-

ent from those of a city school?

2. What differences in the building might grow out of adaptation to

the needs of proper transportation?

3. What advantages and disadvantages come from having elemen-

tary and high-school pupils in the same building ?

4. What adaptations in the building should be made to bring a maxi-

mum of advantages and a minimum of disadvantages where
children are of all ages from six to eighteen?

5. Describe the best school auditorium you have seen.

6. What are the relative advantages of one-story and two-story school

buildings for rural education?

7. What rating would you give a four-room school building with no

special rooms except cloak-rooms, standing out in the open coun-
try, as a consolidated rural-school building — first, second, third,
fourth, or fifth, on a five-point score-card?

I. City versus Country Buildings

The heart of the consolidated-school plant is the build-
ing. It should be thoroughly adapted to the purposes for
which consolidation has been made. It should be neither
a city school set down in the country or village trading
centre nor a building of the traditional type, since the pur-
poses of these are so different. Less scientifiic thinking and
experimentation have been carried on in adapting the build-
ing to consolidation than to any other feature. Transporta-
tion, teachers' cottages, barns, the curriculum in relation to
country needs, and the rural school as a community centre,
have all been less on a dead level of mediocrity than the
building. Educators have introduced or developed the

166

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING 167

former; educators, unfortunately, too frequently have little
or nothing to say about planning and constructing . rural-
school buildings.

A man who has built a few barns and country or town
houses frequently gets the contracts for architectural plans
and construction. He knows nothing of education and has
never heard of school architecture and expert school archi-
tects. Often he cannot read blue-prints nor follow printed
specifications. Frequently the State has done little or noth-
ing to standardize and suggest good plans for school build-
ings through the State school superintendent's office, al-
though conditions in this respect are changin^g. The school
directors blunder along in the dark and the results of their
blundering stand as monuments to democratic stupidity at
its worse for fifty years or more — woefully unadapted to
country educational needs, crippling rural schooling at the
very first, and growing worse each year with the progress of
educational thought. It would really be far better if the
school building could be constructed fifty years in advance
of educational thinking rather than fifty to a hundred years
behind it.

To be sure, there are a growing number of hopeful ex-
ceptions to the above statements. School architects who
are specialists in their profession are becoming every day
more in evidence. State laws and State departments of
education are gaining more power over school-building
operations; and a number of excellent examples of what
consolidated rural-school buildings should be are in evi-
dence in several States. The national government is also
helping in schoolhouse improvement, and a great many
valuable suggestions are being brought together by the
National Bureau of Education and other organizations.
Yet, on the whole, it is still very discouraging to look over
the bulletins on school architecture prepared by most States
for the help of school boards and note the poverty of con-
structive ideas in evidence.

1 68 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Contrasting Consolidated and City Buildings. — The
differences in purposes and conditions between the city and
the consolidated school are worth noticing. Frequently
overlooked, some of these distinctions which must be kept
in mind may be summarized as follows:

1. Land is more plentiful and available in the open
country or adjacent to a village trading centre. The build-
ing may spread out more and thus obviate the necessity of
second and third floors and basements with their greater
cost, needless stair-climbing, and sanitary and educational
disadvantages. A one-story building with no basement
and no part below ground is possible in the country and is
educationally much to be desired. The city school is more
or less of a monstrosity because it has had to adapt itself
to too small a site.

2. The building must provide for growth and exten-
sions. The unit building plan must be utilized and plans
for growth to the fullest consolidated size must be made at
the outset. The one-story building makes these extensions
rather simple. A two or three story building complete at
erection is an architectural bar to building growth. The
consolidated school of the future will probably be but one
story in height.

3. The rural-school building is commonly without fire-
fighting departments within easy call, such as the city pro-
vides, and must thus be constructed with particular adap-
tations to the fire hazards. Two school buildings are now
burning each day of the year. In the Collinwood fire, in
a typical two-story building, one hundred and seventy-three
children burned to death in a few minutes. The one-story
plan is desirable here and this should be as completely fire-
proof and panic-proof as possible. One row of rooms with
a corridor about a large open space, and constructed largely
of concrete, gives a good type of fireproof building.

4. No city-water or lighting systems for the building will
usually be available in the country and these will have to be
supplied within the building itself as independent systems.

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING "169

5. Transportation for a number of children in school-
owned automobiles or other vehicles and in private vehicles
of all kinds will, in the complete consolidated plant, be in
operation. The building should be adapted to the loading
and unloading of children in such a way as to prevent ex-
posure to rain, snow, and cold winds. Some have suggested
that the building should be constructed with an arcade in
order that the vehicles might drive right through the build-
ing; but usually a driveway covered with a wide porch on a
protected side, probably the south or east, will be sufficient.
Buildings for storing the vehicles and any horses or other
animals used will also be necessary.

6. Modern country life is based on science, largely agri-
cultural science and home science. AppHed botany, zo-
ology, chemistry, and physics will be central subjects.
These subjects require proper laboratories, beginning for
the pupils at least with the fifth or sixth grade. These
rooms require more than ordinary planning to meet country
conditions. The old classroom in which country children
were persecuted with studies such as Latin, Greek, German,
French, algebra, and geometry will not be much in evidence.
The rooms must be adapted and equipped for helping coun-
try people solve country problems.

7. The consolidated building serves more Junctions for
the community than the city building. There is practically
no institution frequently to compete with it.

8. The city has many places for recreation and social
meeting. The consolidated school is the only centre to
which the whole community may turn for community-centre
activities. The churches are for sections of the people; the
school is for all. The auditorium is central in such a build-
ing.

9. Similarly, the city has fine public libraries and many
easily accessible opportunities for reading. The consoli-
dated-school library for the entire community within the
transportation area is essential. Such a room requires
careful planning.

170 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

10. The consolidated school is about the only public
building in the open country. It should be attractive and
dignified, in keeping with its high educational and social
purposes. Beautiful grounds and suitable architecture are
essential for this central civic institution. This does not
mean high steeples, Grecian columns, and "gingerbread"
decorations. Most rural-school buildings are hideous. It
does mean simple beauty and appropriateness.

11. In the city the high school j except at Gary, Indiana,
and a few other cities, is separated from the elementary
schools. Some cities have also separate buildings for the
intermediate and junior high-school grades, sixth to ninth,
or other combination. Manual training and domestic
science are frequently given at central points in the city
but not at every school. Pupils frequently have to go some
distance to their athletic fields or school gardens. In the
country, however, all these features can and should be
combined in one school plant. High-school and elementary-
school pupils are housed in the same building. All other
features are concentred, consolidated. The laboratories,
library, shops, and grounds can be used early in the ele-
mentary school as they are in the Gary system. The audi-
torium will be used by all for all. Each group can help the
other. The school life of the child may be kept continuous
rather than disparate. Everything must be adapted to
this wider use. Along this line the consolidated school has
a unique opportunity to work out experimentally a superior
type of education for our democracy. The Gary plan and
school plants may be studied with profit by consolidated-
school leaders. Being in the city, so far, the Gary type of
building is of two or more stories, but there are many features
used by all the children.

12. The school should be an object-lesson in its water,
lighting, and toilet systems, and in its landscaping and other
features. A pressure- tank, force-pump, gas-engine, or elec-
tric motor, flush toilets, independent lighting system, and

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING I71

other modern features that should be installed on our farms,
frequently go out from the consolidated school to the home-
steads by the contagion of example. In the city these things
are taken as a matter of course, in the home and in the
school.

13. In the city, too, the building must frequently be
located without reference to light, noise, wind directions,
etc., because of the small size and shape of the building lot
available. In the country the long outsides of the class-
rooms can be made to face the east and the west and thus
obtain desirable sunlight and other factors and avoid the
disadvantages of north and south exposure. In the South
and the tropics the classrooms can be placed broadside to-
ward the prevailing winds, such as the trade wind in the
West Indies. Overhead lighting helps solve this problem.

14. The consolidated school is a year-round plant for at
least the younger children and the principal and his family.
The building must be adapted to summer uses and must be
built with the thought in mind that it is always to be under
the watchful eye of the principal of the school. In foreign
countries it is quite common for the home of the principal
to be in the school building, a custom growing out of board-
ing-school times and a wider use of the principal as a com-
munity secretary arid leader. The one-story building with
a single row of classrooms flanked by a corridor meets sum-
mer conditions admirably because it is so open to the breeze.
Care must be taken not to get the auditorium too much
closed about by classrooms, although this may be neces-
sary in cities.

15. The building must be as inexpensive financially as
possible. Our distribution and apportionment of the bene-
fits of taxation are still so unequal and unjust that the
locaKty has frequently to bear more than it should of the
financial burden. Consequently, money comes hard and
must reach as far as possible. High roofs and fancy dec-
orations may well give way to more room for library,

172 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

auditorium, laboratories, teachers' retiring-rooms, etc. The
flat roof with some overhead lighting, not omitting plenty
of window ventilation, may well become typical of the
country school — a low, flat building it would seem to many
until they were used to it and had been on the inside and
seen its educational advantages. However, financial sacri-
fice on the part of a community, with some county and
State aid in putting up a first-class building, completely
fireproof and thoroughly adapted to rural-life needs, is one
as worthy as any to be made in this life. Many communi-
ties are making noble sacrifices and are reaping almost
immediately the full rewards of such sacrifices.

1 6. One further difference may be noted in closing.
The consoHdated school with possibly but one row of class-
rooms and a corridor, or even with two and a corridor be-
tween, may have bilateral or trilateral and overhead light-'
ing, and thus have desirably wider and shorter classrooms.
The unilateral-lighting fad has made schoolrooms too long
and narrow for the best teaching.

n. General Standards Applied

Thus the consolidated rural-school building is unique and
in a class of its own, requiring its own architecture and
adaptations. Certain great standards that govern all schools
should be applied, but in the main it is an original con-
formity to new conditions and needs. The opportunity for
careful experimentation and climatic and other adaptations
is before us in this era of reconstruction. Great opportu-
nities for American inventive genius are bound up in the
consolidated-school building.

The details of consolidated-schoolhouse construction can-
not be entered into in this volume. The theme is one
fit for a volume by itself. The writer has dealt with the
matter at greater length elsewhere.^ Challman has dealt

^In "Educational Hygiene," Scribner's Sons. See also the last chapter in
this volume.

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING 1 73

briefly with the matter in his volume on **The Rural-School
Plant" and in bulletins of the State Department of Public
Instruction of Minnesota. *^ Healthful Schools," by Ayres,
Williams, and Wood, and Dresslar's *^ Rural Schoolhouses
and Grounds" and "School Hygiene" are suggestive.
Betts and HalFs "Better Rural Schools" deals with the
building problem. Most valuable are the actual schools
that progressive leaders and communities are constructing,
such as the Sargent and the Jordan schools described in
this volume. The various plans of one-story and other
buildings appearing almost monthy in the School Board
Journal and the plans to be published in the large bulletin
on rural-school consolidation by the Bureau of Education
will prove helpful. Some of the advantages of the one-
story type of building are given in our final chapter.

Lighting and Orientation. — The whole problem of ven-
tilation is as yet unsolved. Present scientific investigation
has about proved that the important factors in good and bad
ventilation are not the chemical composition of the air — rel-
ative amounts of oxygen, carbon dioxide, and organic mat-
ters— so much as its relative condition as regards movement
of the air, temperature, and humidity. Other factors, such
as relative amount of exercise of the occupants of a room,
their physical condition, and clothing and bathing, enter in.
Ventilation affects the heat-regulating mechanism of the
skin rather than the lungs. Respiration and ventilation
must be kept separate. Since windows are also wind-ows
for wind as well as light to enter, the problem of lighting is
inextricably bound up with ventilation, except in those as
yet largely non-existent schools where a good fan system of
ventilation is in operation every day of the school year.

To avoid the shadows of the little fists of right-handed
pupils on their writing, and for other reasons, we have as a
standard to-day that at least most of the light of a class-
room should enter from the left of the pupils as seated.
Many schools have all the light of a room enter from the

174 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

left and a number of educators have by various adminis-
trative and publicity devices enforced the standard. But
they tend to overlook the ventilation function of windows,
or assume that *'the fans will be running all the year," or
that sufficient movement of air is produced by opening
windows on but one side of a room. Both assumptions are
practically universally contrary to fact, and this strict uni-
lateral-lighting fad has done much harm, not only in the
tropics where Northern schools are copied but everywhere in
our own country. The writer has dealt with the problem
more at length in "The Case Against Unilateral Lighting"
in the School Board Journal (Milwaukee, Wisconsin) for
July, 1918, and "Summer School Sanitation" in The Amer-
ican Journal of School Hygiene (Worcester, Massachusetts)
for June, 191 8. The ventilation problem was dealt with
under the title of "Changing Standards of Schoolhouse
Ventilation" in the first-named journal for April, 19 19.

In order to give each regular classroom of the typical
elementary school size (about 24 to 25 by 30 to 32) the ad-
vantages of largely left-hand lighting and east or west*
sunshine, the typical building is coming to be one with the
longer axis running north and south with a corridor be-
tween the two rows of rooms. In the West, but one row of
rooms with a long porch is a type. For hot climates the
writer has advocated one or two rows of classrooms, end to
end, covered by a single roof and flanked by porches on
both sides and the whole at right angles to the prevailing
winds. A single row of rooms is better than two rows with
a hall between, for several reasons.

High windows on the rear and right of the pupils we be-
lieve are also desirable. These windows, about the size of
the upper sashes on the left, are desirable for ventilation if
not for light. Where there is a central corridor it will be
very much better lighted by this system than by the uni-
lateral-lighting plan. Of course the system provides cross-
ventilation, the only kind possible much of the time, the

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING 1 75

breeze going entirely through the building across the cor-
ridor. No injurious cross-lights or shadows are to be antici-
pated by this plan. As suggested above and later, the
classroom may be wider and shorter than the above dimen-
sions and partly lighted from above.

The windows on the left of the pupils should extend from
about the level of the pupils' eyes entirely to the ceiling. A
twelve to thirteen foot ceiling is high enough. These win-
dows, five or six in number usually, should have as little
space between them as possible and should extend from
about six feet from the front of the classroom entirely to
the rear of the room, and practically as a single window.
Steel muUions instead of brick piers between the windows
are best for this purpose. In some schools a large third
sash or transom is used to get a full-length window. The
sashes should usually be wide and with single panes of glass.
The steel window is being widely used to-day.

The single-sash windows on the rear and right may be
about as close together as those on the left. If they are put
on hinges at the rear (if opening to the outer air instead of
into another classroom or cloak-room) and if those on the
right are on pivots, top and bottom, these windows may be
easily managed even if above the blackboard level, as they
should be. In very hot climates or in rooms used for summer
classes, ventilators which admit air but not light (horizontal
boards set at an angle near together) may well be put in for
ventilation, even in the front of the room.

Overhead lighting may be utilized to good advantage in
all one-story schools, but should not lead to fewer or closed
windows on the sides, because this cuts down opportunity
for natural ventilation, the only economical and practi-
cable kind during warm weather.

Shades. — The best shades are poor indeed. They fre-
quently obstruct both light and air. The ordinary dark-
green shade, which has become so common because of the
theory that "green is good for the eyes," has ruined more

176 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

eyes than it has helped, by making rooms dark and cave-
like when pulled over the window in order to cut off the
blinding rays of the sun. This color should practically
never be used except for stereopticon purposes. Light tan
is a much better color. The shade should be translucent,
letting in plenty of light but toning down the intensity of
direct rays. Cloth shades are probably the best for schools.
The folding-shade has the disadvantage of cutting out light
if pulled to the top of the window, since it can be folded no
narrower than about a foot to eighteen inches in width.
The roller cloth shade with the roller hanging by a single
cord from the middle top of the window is good. The
roller cloth shade with the roller attached at the ends to a
cross-stick and this attached by a cord to the middle top of
the window is the best the writer has seen for combining a
number of advantages with the fewest disadvantages.

Various hanging slat devices, like Venetian blinds, which
are supposed to admit plenty of gentle air-currents and
sunlight and to keep out too much light, wind, and rain, are
splendid in theory but usually poor in operation. Teachers
must be trained and supervised continually to keep shades
properly adjusted for the best light conditions in these book-
reading school-days. Defects of vision increase in prac-
tically every school upward through the grades. It is time
that this crime against childhood be stopped.

Workrooms, libraries, laboratories, auditoriums, and
other rooms should have plenty of light and be governed by
about the same principles, although the different seating
arrangements may make north or south light satisfactory.
Below-ground rooms should not be tolerated in such schools,
not even two or three feet below the surface. If this is
avoided the lighting problem will not be serious. In a one-
story building the auditorium and gymnasium wing is usually
two stories in height and semi-detached.

Ventilation and Heating Devices. — The consolidated
school that deserves the name and is in a latitude where

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING 1 77

considerable heat must be furnished during the winter has
a central heating-plant — vapor, hot water, steam, or hot
air. The first three require a separate ventilating device
and air-ducts through which air is forced by a fan run by
steam, gas, or electricity. The hot-air furnace alone should
not be relied upon entirely in cold climates, since the air
must be overheated and made too dry. Radiators must be
used also. The fan system is by far the best ventilating
system — fan ventilation and the temperature of the in-
coming air kept rather cool and stimulating and hot-water,
vapor, or steam heating in classrooms. There is great danger
of overheating the air in the fan-room, thus depriving it of
moisture and the stimulation of coolness. Each system of
this kind must have a thorough humidifying arrangement,
its effect being to aid the body in eliminating excess heat.

The air-washing system by which the air after passing
through the fan is forced through a small room in which
there is a shower of water forced out of brass nozzles in a
fine spray or mist is necessary for humidifying and cleaning
the air. In such a building the outlet ducts should be con-
nected with the inlet ducts to permit of recirculation of air
when desired. The plan has not been tried out yet to any
considerable extent, but where tried saves about half the
coal, takes out odors of the air from classrooms, puts in
moisture, and gives the three great essentials of ventilation:
moisture (about 50 to 70 per cent of saturation which can
easily be measured by a simple hair hygrometer), tempera-
ture (about 65 to 68 degrees, with above-stated humidity),
and movement of the air (not drafts but perceptible mo-
tion). Changing temperatures are more stimulating than a
steady one. Perkins suggests several modifications of the
usual heating and ventilating arrangements for one-story
schools. Vernon suggests others. Some schools have elec-
tric fans in the walls of each classroom, which force air
through radiators into the rooms, under control of the
teachers.

178 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Some schools use jacketed stoves, but these have no
place in a real consolidated school. Of course the consoli-
dated school frequently has to go through a period of in-
fancy in which the school is small because of incomplete
consolidation of the district, a small but growing popula-
tion, etc. In such cases these stoves may be used but are
not recommended for even a two-room building. Where
there is a furnace for a central system and several rooms, it
should usually be placed in a detached fireproof building,
not in a basement. The small heating-pla»t behind the
school building is best. Of course a good janitor and man-
of-all-work will be provided for a real consolidated school.

III. Rooms

The Classrooms. — The standard classrooms are the
most important features of a school building and nothing
should be permitted to interfere with them in planning the
architecture. Frequently an architect plans the outside of
a building with respect to appearances and then puts rooms
into such a structure wherever he can. A better plan is to
provide the desired number of standard classrooms and add
such high-school rooms, auditorium, etc., as are desired, and
then make the exterior as attractive as possible consistent
with good taste. Standard essentials come first.

A very desirable form for the classroom is oblong with
a cloak-room at the front end, behind the teacher ^s desk,
where she may supervise it. The latter may be six to eight
feet wide and have two doors entering the classroom, but
none opening into the corridor or porch. Perkins has an in-
teresting variation as shown in the accompanying plan with
cloak-room at the rear. It leaves more blackboard space at
the front. The size of the standard classroom is about 24 by
32 ; but if the right-hand and rear-lighting plan recommended
here is used, the room may be much wider and need not be
so long. In fact, for even interior classrooms with the usual
twelve to fourteen foot hall where there will be no light

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDENG

179

from the rear unless it be through high windows on both
side walls of the cloak-room of another classroom, the room

Floor plan of Holly high and elementary school, Holly, Mich. For the con-
solidated school the editor recommends two spaces about the width of a
classroom, or wider, between the two long corridors and the assembly-
room, and wide, short classrooms. See his floor plan in the last chapter.
Perkins, Fellows & Hamilton, architects, Chicago.

may be about square, say 27 by 27. This is an advantage,
since most teachers divide the pupils of the classroom into

l8o THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

two sections, right and left; and the wider room makes
each class group more compact and better to handle for
recitation and for general management than three long
rows of children on either side. A classroom seven rows
of seats wide and six rows long is better than its opposite
for most teachers and pupils. The personality of at least
the ordinary teacher is of short range. The farthermost
*'big boy" should be well within the magnetism of her per-
sonality. Overhead lighting plus the bilateral or trilateral
lighting here advocated makes a very wide classroom pos-
sible. In fact, the customary standard dimensions given above
(24 by j2) may well be reversed for educational purposes, and
no less light, but more in most cases, for each pupil than in
the "standard" unilateral-lighting plan be secured. What
the best width is we do not attempt to say. We greatly need
first-class experimental study, with easily modifiable rooms
and types of porches, on these problems. See last chapter.
The seats may well be of the movable kind for many edu-
cational and hygienic reasons. Dresslar offers some good
standards for seating in Monroe's "Cyclopedia of Educa-
tion" (Macmillan). The writer inchnes strongly to mova-
ble school furniture as opposed to the screwed-to-the-iloor
variety. The blackboards should be of slate and prefera-
bly four feet wide, low enough for the pupils and high
enough for the teacher. They should extend around three
sides of the room, front, between the cloak-room doors,
right side, and rear. The ceilings should preferably be
white and the walls light tan or cream color down to a level
with the bottom of the blackboards, and dark tan or buff
below. Other combinations that provide a light and cheer-
ful room on even cloudy days are possible. The floor should
be of hard non-splintering wood and double. If the build-
ing is of two floors, at least the second-story floor should
be soundproofed with deadening quilt of some kind. No
platform is needed in the modern democratic school. Hard
chalk only should be allowed. A large window should light
the cloak-room. Reference to some of the best books on

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDLNTG l8l

school hygiene should be made in planning the artificial
lighting of schoolrooms. Not only the character of the
light but the placing of the lights is important. In the
high school, rooms of different sizes are desirable, and the
cloak-room problem may be solved in another manner. One
of the best ways is to provide a steel locker for each pupil.
^ Other rooms. — A complete consolidated school, one that
has grown up or has been made a complete plant from the
start, will have also a good farm- carpentry room, a forge
and auto-repair room, nature-study and agriculture room,
home-economics room and lunch-room, applied chemistry
and physics laboratories, a library, an assembly-room and
study hall, a gymnasium, a teachers' room for each sex, a
principal's office, a medical supervision and retiring room,
and suitable classrooms for art and other subjects that re-
quire special adaptation. A swimming pool has been found
indispensable in rural consolidated schools of the west.

The toilet-rooms will, of course, be indoors unless water
is absolutely unobtainable. Even then chemical closets are
better than the abhorred outdoor privies. Few schools will
be placed in such locations as to be without plenty of water.
A good septic tank, or cesspool, with a force pump run by
a motor of some kind, and a large pressure- tank easily make
modern sanitary toilets in most regions possible. They
must also be placed in farm homes if the latter are to be
redeemed from constant medieval drudgery, and the school
must lead and set the pace. The toilets should not be in
basements. There should be no basements, remember.
They should be well lighted and of the very best. A good
book on school hygiene which covers this phase of sanita-
tion acceptably, such as Dresslar's book by that name,
should be consulted. Note the location of toilets in the
accompanying plans and the last chapter. They are well
placed for convenience, separation of the sexes, future ex-
tensions of the building, etc.

These rooms cannot be too well lighted and adapted to
sanitary requirements. The number of stools and urinals

l82 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

and their arrangement have all been worked out carefully
and the best of modern help is none too good here. The
old outdoor privy must be banished. It is only the incom-
plete, unfinished consolidated school that has this, and it
is questionable whether the school deserves the reputation
of a consoHdated school with such pioneer inconveniences.
The cost of first-class outdoor privies with concrete wells
and septic tanks, such as are described in Dresslar's bulle-
tin, '* Rural Schoolhouses and Grounds," for both sexes is a
considerable share of the cost of an indoor water-system.
The principal disadvantage of constructing such outdoor
buildings at the outset of consolidation, aside from sanitary
ones, is that they tend to prevent the installation of proper
and modern facilities when the building is enlarged.

Such privies, if found inescapable, should be models for
those at the farms — absolutely flyproof, decent, comfort-
able, screened by vines and hedge or bushes, and protected
from vandalism. Usually such buildings at single-room
schools cultivate typhoid-spreading habits, since frequently
no toilet-paper is furnished, and no warm water, no paper
towels, and no soap are available to make cleanliness and
sanitation habitual. The outdoor toilet is far below mod-
ern standards for even the single-room school and the best
country homes. It certainly is entirely out of place at a
consolidated school. The modern octuple presses of our
city printing-plants which turn out a hundred thousand
folded, complete newspapers an hour are not associated in
the same building with the hand-press of Benjamin Frank-
lin's time. Such presses as Franklin's are seen to-day only
in museums. Yet at consolidated schools it is sometimes
proposed to build outdoor toilets, even where a good water-
system is easily available and there is no danger of pipes
freezing at night. Up-to-date business scraps outgrown
machinery and plans. The business of education in a
democracy needs a large scrap-heap. Outdoor privies
should be scrapped first. Septic tanks and, where neces-

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING 183

sary, cesspools are as much beyond the outdoor privy as is
the rotary beyond the hand-press. See reference 12.

The assembly-room is the centre of rural community
life and of the consolidated school's activities. A school
that does not come together daily, or at least two or three
times a week, is hardly a school. It is a collection of sepa-
rate rooms of pupils and teachers that cannot well be
moulded into an organized, common-group consciousness,
with a strong spirit of loyalty, responsibility, and common
purposes. A rural community that does not meet thus at
least once a month is not a community. It is a largely in-
dividualistic collection of persons living in the same region,
unorganized to a great extent and perhaps at variance with
each other.

The Gary school system uses the auditorium all day
long. In the Froebel and Emerson schools at Gary the
auditorium is a fine theatre with a large stage in each, with
motion-picture apparatus, etc., and used by different groups
of pupils all the day and week. The uses of these audi-
toriums is described in the recent survey of the Gary schools
by the General Education Board (New York) and in various
bulletins and books on the Gary system. But the expense
of such a room in the country is justified if it is used but
three half-hours and one night a week. In a one-story
building the auditorium can have a ceiling of any height
and can thus extend well above the classrooms and secure
light, ventilation, and assembly space. It should be thor-
oughly fireproof and easy of access both from without and
within the building. For evening use it should be so ar-
ranged as to make possible freedom from interference with
the classrooms, laboratories, etc. Usually the gymnasium
may be in the same wing as the auditorium. It is hard to
use a suitable auditorium as a gymnasium, yet it may be
done where a sacrifice is necessary.

In many schools this room can be utilized as a study
hall and in some cases as a lunch-room. In small buildings

184 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

two or three classrooms may be thrown together by movable
partitions into one assembly-room. In some cases movable
school desks are used, and in others, where schools are still
using the old variety, the desks are screwed to strips of
wood which rest on the floor. Thus three or four or more
desks can be pushed out of the way to give room for chairs
for adults. In some cases a space under a permanent stage
is arranged for storing temporarily small desks and chairs.
The assembly-room feature deserves a special bulletin of
the government. We cannot take the space here to do more
than mention and recommend some of the features which
help to make the consolidated school building a productive
rural educational plant.

in. Good Buildings for Different Conditions

Types of Buildings. — Remembering that a consolidated-
school building in its infancy may be but a four-room build-
ing and that it may be a long time in growing up, we realize
that the types of buildings will range from the small three-
teacher graded school with few rural-education conveni-
ences up to those complete plants that vie in cost and scope
with the best city schools. In standardizing consolidated
schools these types must be arranged for. Standards for
the building alone, for the building and entire site, and for
the building, site, teachers, and instruction may be set up
and promulgated and enforced. Plans for several different
sizes of buildings must be prepared. All must be devised
with reference to future extensions, both of classrooms and
of the other features suggested above, such as assembly-
room, gymnasium, high-school department, with labora-
tories and library, agriculture and home-economics rooms,
indoor toilets, etc. Plans now on foot would place the post-
office in many schools of the country and make the post-
master not only a community secretary, helping the school
principal, but a community middleman for marketing and

L.E_E_.ffi-.

|Lffl4

An attractive building and site. Room at ends for extensions to the

A neat example of the two-story type with basement,
provision for extensions

Poor

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING 185

purchasing commodities. Public libraries and voting-rooms
are being provided in many city schools.

We offer herewith some plans for schools of different
sizes and educational scope. It is recommended that wher-
ever possible the taxing and transportation area be made
large enough at first to make possible the erection of not
less than a four-room graded school with auditorium, hot-
water or other central heat, indoor toilets of the water-
flush type, a library, home-economics and agriculture rooms,
and a teacher's room. To insure proper care of the build-
ing and the full utilization and care of the plant, not less
than fifteen acres of land should be purchased and a home
for the principal teacher, preferably a man with a family,
provided. Products of the farm should be at the princi-
pal's disposal to add to his income. Transportation should
be provided in school-owned automobiles. A good barn
should be provided for housing vehicles and animals. This
should stand as the minimum consolidated-school plant.

Where the district at first brings in only pupils for two
rooms, the other two classrooms suggested may be used in
place of the agriculture and home-economics rooms, but
there are serious disadvantages here. The equipment may
require moving later, and if pupils are put into the rooms
as regular classes, as the district grows in size and perhaps
in population there may be no extensions provided for these
most necessary features of rural education until a high
school is needed. There will also be other types of build-
ings of three kinds, namely, as to size, climatic variation,
and inventive variation. New types will long continue to
be invented. North Dakota and Louisiana will have con-
siderable climatic differences. There will be almost as many
types as to size as there are rooms and special features.
There may also be one-story, one-story and basement, two-
story, and two-story and basement types, but the one-story
type should be kept if at all possible. There will also be
types as to materials of construction and cost. These

i86

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

cannot be discussed. A further statement of the advan-
tages of the one-story building will be found in the last

I »0Y| TO«XT ,

x^^-i

ic 1;

'(CLA5S RfOi3M<

» I D O
rt :t wipe

kjndi:rcaktcn

LI BRAKY

I I OmcC IKMIft MOM i; _ t

i CLASS M^

LJP.-J (

...J

ONE STORY TYPE

%W— y ]90UX M ruT

This is an elementary school devised by Perkins for a town. The auditori-
um-gymnasium seems to be too closely surrounded for good natural ventilation.

chapter. Help in school planning can usually be had from
the U. S. Bureau of Education and from the State depart-
ments of public education in the capital cities. No consoli-

1 88 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

dated school should be erected without the full approval of
the State department mentioned, and this should have in
its employ a school hygienist who is conversant with the
details of consolidated-school architecture and practical
building problems in the State.

Teachers should use every effort to secure truly educa-
tional school plants and rigid supervision and inspection
from the educational point of view. Most so-called con-
solidated rural schools to-day are doomed to disappoint
the community and teachers from the first by the lack of
plant and equipment suited to the needs of the problem.
Something may be reasonably expected from consolidation
only when we have real consolidation. We can thresh grain
with a flail but our results cannot be compared with those
of the best modern threshing-machines. Let no one say
consolidation is a failure until he knows not only what kind
of teachers and curricula are used but with what kind of
a building plant they are either helped or hindered. The
well-set-up school plant contributes to the spiritual as does
the well-set-up body. In the words of Browning:

"And soul helps not body more
Than body helps soul."

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What phases of the consolidated rural-school building need

further explanation than here given?

2. Describe in detail the method of providing a satisfactory water

and toilet system (including drinking-fountains, wash-bowls,
swimming pool, and sinks) for an eight-room consolidated
school-building provided with a good well.

3. Describe in detail a good artificial lighting system, preferably elec-

tric, for such a school.

4. What advantages and disadvantages do you see in the plan of

having the auditorium, with possibly the library and some other
special rooms, along the front of the building, and with the
elementary school extending back from one end and the high
school from the other U shape) ? See final chapter.

THE CONSOLIDATED-SCHOOL BUILDING 1 89

5. Give a list of some of the best books to use in studying consoli-

dated rural-school architecture.

6. What educational magazine gives most attention to such archi-

tecture ?

7. What are the arguments for and against a lunch-room in such a

school? Should the assembly-room be used as lunch-room or
library? Why?

8. Should the gymnasium and assembly-room be combined as the

same room? Can they be combined satisfactorily? May the
floor be of cement or composition material in the gymnasium
and halls?

9. Report on at least one of the one-story school buildings described

and illustrated in the American School Board Journal.
10. What are its advantages and disadvantages as a rural consoli-
dated school ?
Note : The final chapter may well be read before chapter X.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Dresslar — "Rural Schoolhouses and Grounds." Government

Printing Office.

2. "School Hygiene." Macmillan.

3. Rapeer — "Educational Hygiene." Scribner.

4. "Standardizing the Rural-School Plant." School and

Society for February 13, 191 5.

5. Challman— "The Rural School Plant." Bruce Publishing Co.

6. Bulletins on school architecture and on consolidation of schools

published by many State departments of education.

7. Ayres, Williams, and Wood — "Healthful Schools." Houghton

Mifflin Co.

8. Sargent — "Rural School Improvement in Colorado." Bulletin of

the State College of Agriculture, Fort Collins, Colorado.

9. A forthcoming bulletin on consolidation by the U. S. Bureau of

Education.

10. Arp — "Rural Education and the Consolidated School." World

Book Co.

11. Perkins, D. H., architect, Chicago. Pamphlets on one-story

elementary and high schools.

12. Lumsden, L. L. — " Rural Sanitation." Public Health Bulletin No.

94, of the U. S, Public Health Service, and published by the
Government Printing Office, Washington, D. C.

CHAPTER X
THE TEACHERAGE

Preliminary Problems

1. What are the principal advantages and disadvantages of requiring

teachers to board with any who will keep them?

2. What retarding influence, if any, has this plan had on rural schools?

3. What are the advantages and disadvantages of providing a teacher-

age for the principal of the consolidated school?

4. Why should the principal usually be a married man who is em-

ployed for twelve months in the year?

5. What is the argument for providing school homes on school prop-

erty for the other teachers?

6. Do you know of any instance where such homes have been pro-

vided for the man-of -all-work and caretaker of the school also?

I. What Country Teachers Need

The Present Status of Rural Teachers. — The annual
wage of teachers is so far below a professional and necessary
salary, not only in war-times and periods of rapidly advanc-
ing prices, but at all times, that everything must be done to
make the conditions of work and living as attractive as
possible. The community must get together and obtain
superior teachers at whatever cost and then must use every
device possible to make them happy in their work. Good
teachers must be treated as honored guests in the neighbor-
hood. All gossip and petty, injurious talk and tattle about
them must be rigidly stamped out. Never should the chil-
dren be allowed to hear adverse criticism of teachers by
parents and others. Loyalty to those who are trying to do a
noble work, easily ruined, should be the watchword. The
building and grounds should be made as inviting and at-
tractive as possible not only for the children but for the

190

THE TEACHERAGE 19I

teachers. There should be in each building teachers' rest-
rooms for both sexes, furnished in a homelike way with
easy-chairs and other comforts.

Why does the country lose its best teachers to the city
so rapidly, usually after they have served their apprentice-
ship by practising on country children? Simply because
the country has been so blind and stingy that it has saved
pennies to lose dollars, stinted the children and teachers by
a parsimony that stopped or reversed the wheels of progress,
employed poor, unprepared teachers, given them meagre
and unsatisfactory accommodations, and then wondered
why "city folks" always get ahead of "country folks.'' The
city that understands the problem attracts teachers and
the country must do the same; for our democracy will not
be "safe" with poor country teachers and superior city
teachers.

The Opportunity. — The consolidated school furnishes a
rare opportunity to provide suitable working conditions.
It also offers more promise than any other plan for the pro-
vision of satisfactory living conditions. The consolidated
school can provide a good building with all modern con-
veniences for pupils and teachers, can give teachers good
salaries and all the encouragement, hospitality, and loyalty
desirable, and still fail to keep good teachers year after year
in its service. In European countries this problem has been
met by providing homes for teachers, or at least a home for
the principal and his family, frequently as part of the school
building. Many of the early schools grew out of the church
and nearly all the schools for the upper classes were, until
recent times, boarding-schools, institutions to which people
came from a distance and remained day and night for weeks
or months at a time. Frequently, too, the only church of
the community abroad is provided for under the same roof
as the school and teacher's home.

It is customary in France, Germany, and elsewhere to
find both the head teacher and his wife employed by the

192 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

government to manage such a rural social centre even where
the pupils come daily from their homes to the school. Where
the church is a part of the general educational institution
the district is usually all Catholic or all Protestant, and the
Protestants are of but one sect, say Lutherans. The com-
bined building is often a beautiful rural structure with a
red-tiled roof showing from afar, and the principal is usually
almost, if not quite, as important a man in the church, where
he is frequently chorister, violin-player, or organist, and
teacher of ethics and religion to the children. Where com-
munities can abolish their sectarian differences, usually
petty, if not actually based on superstitions long since dis-
proved by science, why would it not be a good thing in this
country to connect the general religious work of a community
with the consolidated-school centre as at the Sargent school ?

Photographs and floor plans of buildings for teachers'
homes, entirely separate from the schoolhouses, in the Brit-
ish Isles show an attractive architecture characteristic of
modern England, and a consideration for teachers as highly
important government officials that compels admiration.
It seems strange that in this country we should have to
invent the idea of the publicly provided teacher's home and
have it grow from such primitive experiments as were carried
on near Walla Walla in the State of Washington in the year
1905. Many schools connected with churches as private
ventures in our own country were long before this provided
with a parsonage or teacherage for the teacher.

In the experiment at Walla Walla, which seems to be a
typical, if not the first, instance of the kind, the teacher for
whom a home was provided was a public-school teacher.
Unable to obtain board and room at the home of the only
family that had been prepared and willing in the past to
give teachers lodging, because the people had "moved to
town to educate their children," this teacher made the as-
sociation between an old cook-wagon she had noticed on a
visit to the school community and a place in which to live.

^ Doable Cottage
S«c(Mtd floor

A good type of teacherage

194 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

She secured the wagon and in company with a small brother
lived all year in this makeshift ''kitchenette apartment."
Rain and cold assailed it and conditions were far from pleas-
ant much of the time; but this hypothesis led the next
summer to the construction of a neat two-room cottage in
which this teacher lived two more years, when she went
away to complete her schooling at college. Since then the
teacherage movement has grown in Washington, and other
States have provided "teachers' cottages," until, at this writ-
ing, there are several thousand, both in connection with small
one to three-room schools and with consolidated ones. The
teacherage is highly desirable in many communities, but with
the consolidated schools, especially those situated in the
open country, it is indispensable to real consolidation.

II. The Reasons Why

The arguments for the provision of one or more teacher-
ages at the consolidated school may be abbreviated as follows:

I. Dignity and Independence. — Persons who must de-
pend upon the hospitality of others in limited circum-
stances cannot obtain the freedom and dignity necessary
to a great profession. The teacher must have the home of a
teacher, which must contain among other things a room for
quiet study, with books, magazines, possibly a typewriter
and duplicating machine of some kind (if only a hecto-
graph); and further than this the teacher himself must
be able to secure there certain periods of freedom from in-
terruption, such as the life of scholarship and professional
service necessitates. The teachers who are compelled to
live as boarders in the homes of the people sometimes have
very desirable surroundings and study conditions conveni-
ent to the school, and frequently they learn much of the
intimate life of their people that it is well that they should
know. Yet this is not a stable, independent existence, such
as could be obtained when the principal and faculty live in
suitable homes provided by the school. Frequently the

THE TEACHERAGE I95

differences in standards of living of the farmer's family and
the teacher lead to friction and misunderstanding. In
order to do really professional work and hold up high
standards the teacher should be enabled to develop well his
own powers, support himself in dignity, and lead a self-
respecting, superior life. The school home as a regular
part of the educational plant helps to give the respectability
of a definite social status in the community. The physician,
the lawyer, the pastor, all have their homes. In the federal
government service, wherever it is, and especially in for-
eign countries, where it is hard to get satisfactory living
conditions such homes are furnished to many officials.
England and the United States have entered into a great
development not only of single dwellings for government
workers, but even of entire cities, well laid out and attrac-
tively constructed, and these are for both clerical workers
and other employees in munition factories. Wholesale strikes
occurred or threatened at first at many great government
plants because of impossible housing conditions. Since the
erection of such cities the workers have been enabled to
live peacefully, happily, and decently in their homes, as
they should. No silly cries of paternalism, socialism, or
other arguments have retarded these democratic govern-
ments in such developments. The other government
workers of the country must have standard living conditions
also, and everything in and about their homes must likewise
contribute to happiness, dignity, self-respect, and indepen-
dence. The several admirable homes at the consolidated
school at Franklin, New Jersey, are as much or more needed
in our public consolidated rural schools managed by the
government as in other important public work. They lift
the profession to a higher standard.

2. // Makes Possible a Fair Salary. — The first essential
in improved rural education as clearly demonstrated in
former chapters is a salary commensurate with both the
cost of living and high types of principal and teachers.

196 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Many factors contribute to make the annual salary of
country teachers far below what is necessary to procure
professional educators. A small money salary in the coun-
try seems larger by far than it actually is, since farmers get
their annual salaries in other forms than money, such as
house rent, fuel, food, transportation, and other factors of
living. They handle less money by far than that which
represents their entire living and income. Thus they come
to regard a small salary as a big outlay. The homes for
principals and teachers can be built at the consolidated
school as part of the initial outlay for the school plant, and
the difference in the total outlay, in bonds or otherwise, is
not large. A thirty to sixty thousand dollar outlay is little
increased by three to ten thousand dollars for teachers'
dwellings. When erected, however, they, like the school-
farm, provide a definite part of the annual income for the
schoolmaster that lays little burden on the community and
dispenses with much of the psychological agony which
would annually attend the problem of paying a fair and
sufficient salary, including house and farm rent. Just as
the church with a parsonage is relieved of much struggle in
money-getting and can procure better pastors, so the school
will find itself at an advantage in obtaining good teachers
if house and farm rent can be included with a fair salary.
The city will then lose some of its advantage as it does now
in those counties where country teachers get from five to ten
dollars more a month than town teachers.

3. Good Boarding Places Are Hard to Find in Many
Rural Communities. — The location of the new type of con-
solidated school must be determined scientifically in full
consideration of many factors. It may be in the open
country. A village may in time grow up about it; but at
the time of erection no convenient boarding places are avail-
able. The large and relatively expensive building and
grounds need the solicitous care of one or more schoolmen.
An ordinary caretaker is insufficient. In the open country,

THE TEACHERAGE 1 97

as at Franklin, New Jersey, tjie only thing to do is to pro-
vide homes, even if they must be erected by a private
building company, receiving a long lease from the school
board. At other times there may be several convenient
homes but no satisfactory accommodations. In many
places the landowner has moved off his farm and has ''gone
to town to educate his children,'' and the old farmhouse
has either run down or a new and much smaller renter's
house has been built. Tenantry management does not pro-
vide the type of household of the old days. In other cases
the distances to the homes are too great, and while teachers
might ride long distances each day in the school hacks or
busses, this would be unsatisfactory and undignified com-
pared with a government home on the school property.

In the reports of State superintendents of public in-
struction and in the several pamphlets published on the
school manse, the teacher's cottage, or whatever it is called,
there are many dark pictures painted of the unsatisfactory
conditions of boarding out in the homes of the pupils or
others of the district. Frequently teachers resign because
of the impossible living conditions to which they must sub-
mit. The people of this country are to be commended for
their hospitality and care of teachers in their homes. They
have usually given them the best they have. In former
days they even "boarded the teacher 'round," as described
in ''The Hoosier Schoolmaster," by Eggleston. But coun-
try life is changing; the teachers are changing in their
standards and ideals and standards of living; and the de-
mands of the times are increasing. Without painting the
black picture of how much below the right living standard
for the country many teachers are compelled to live, when
their domiciles should instead be fine examples of what is
possible, we leave this argument with only a mention of
some of the sources of dissatisfaction with the boarding
place: the poorly chosen food unsuited to brain- workers and
perhaps to any workers, poor cooking of the food furnished,

198 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

uncultured people, no room in which to study, and no pri-
vacy, no opportunity to entertain friends, the necessity of
regulating hours of eating, rising, and going to bed by those
of the farm instead of by those of school Hfe, etc. Where
the consolidated school is located in a trading centre village
or adjoining one the problem is not so great, but many con-
siderations still point to the advisability of considering as a
necessary part of the school plant the homes of the teachers.
4. The Teacherage as an Example. — The teacherage pro-
vides a possible example of a good country home. We have
experimental and demonstration farms and stations in many
sections of the United States and we need them in every
rural community. The consolidated school and home must
have a modern water-supply system from springs, wells, or
cisterns and supplied by gravity, pressure-tank, engine-
pump, or other method. This home should be a model in
kitchen, bathroom, outdoor, and barn conveniences. The
architecture of the home should set a standard for the com-
munity and should be adapted strictly to local conditions.
It is hardly possible that a cottage for Arizona, Florida,
California, Missouri, Maine, and Montana should be the
same. A good plan for one region might be a poor one for
another. Of course, the home must be for a schoolman's
purpose as well as for a farm-home example. Where a farm
is provided the home can be a real farmhouse. Otherwise
numerous compromises must be made between adaptation
to school and farm uses. The home-economics depart-
ment of the school must always find the cottage a good
place for demonstration of modern domestic science and
art. Any one who has seen farmers^ wives tramp through
such a school home on opening day by the hour and any
one who has seen the daily demonstrations of modern
planning, decoration, and home-management devices in
these schools, either established independently or partially
endowed by the General Education Board, will realize the
important function of the school-farm home as a demon-

THE TEACHERAGE

199

stration and domestic experiment station. The home is
justified on these grounds alone.

"^"^'-""V^^ ^/^

An Artistic
WeU«ArraBged,
and 8ubttantt«
■lly^Built P*nn ^^

Residence of " ^^
Moderau Cost

CASEMeNT Plan

TMCUMN THOONI, TULM, ClOA*

riast>>ru}OP Plan

Artistic home for the progressive farmer. Teacherages lead to such homes
by the force of example

5. Full-Year Service. — The home helps to make possible
year-round service. Former chapters have emphasized the

200 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

desirability of service for twelve instead of from three to
ten months a year. Home projects must be carried out
largely in the summer, a costly school plant requires care
in summer as in winter, the people need their meetings and
recreation at the school centre as in winter. The principal
should be at work on his own school-farm and should be in
intimate connection with the work of the county agent, the
teacher of agriculture, the experiment-station workers, and
other experts on farm problems. Moreover, teachers have
to eat and meet the high cost of living just as other people
do in summer as well as in winter. When we get year-
round workers and year-round salaries we may hope to get
into rural-school work permanent, skilled workers who, as
the years go by, can be of increasing service both winter
and summer. The varied work that has been done in
summer projects in Cook County, Illinois, and other
places is suggestive of increased developments of this kind
in the future. The consolidated school is a year-round in-
stitution with its work closely related to the needs of the
people at all seasons of the year. The teacher's cottage
makes it easy for the community to retain expert services
in educational leadership twelve months in the year. Vaca-
tions can, of course, be more easily provided for teachers
and principals when most convenient for the community.

6. The Elimination of Gossip. — The school home helps
eliminate gossip and small talk about teachers that fre-
quently arises when they are scattered about among the
homes of the community. The teachers are supposed to be
an educated, cultured, honorable group of people, living up
to high standards and free from many of the artificial re-
strictions and customs inherited from previous times in-
tended to hedge about and to guard relatively ignorant and
uncultured youth and older people. The college or normal
school graduate would like to live a life where he can apply
himself with whole-souled devotion to his task, free from
the danger of gossip which constantly threatens teachers

THE TEACHERAGE 20I

ana other put)lic officials. The one, two, three, or more
homes on the school campus provide a place somewhat re-
moved from this menace and irritation caused by differ-
ences in standards and occupations. The present term of
service of rural teachers in one school is very short, Kttle
over one school year. Gossip on the part of patrons, teach-
ers, and others is one of the chief reasons given for moving
on. A degree of seclusion, professional association with
other members of his craft, and abihty to live a life accord-
ing to his own standards, yet with full respect for and
deference to country standards, will help save many a teacher
for a number of years of service to the community. The
typical rural teacher to-day is, unfortunately, a young girl,
a novice in the service, with barely a high-school education,
who will stay in the work but two to four years. Half of
the more than two hundred thousand rural teachers have
not so much as a high-school schooling, and the whole stand-
ard of what the rural educator must be is, therefore, ludi-
crously low. No other business in the world would succeed
on such a basis. The standards for public-school service
should be at least equal to those of banking, grocery, and
drug-store work, and farming itself. Young girls in their
teens cannot be typical of public-school workers, neither
can immature young men, or older men who may know
farming but not the teaching profession. Married men
with families in any business make possible a solid founda-
tion of first-class service and lasting efficiency. The condi-
tions of living in the teaching profession must be adapted
to make possible a settling down in the work on a perma-
nent, life-work basis. The home for the principal and his
family promotes this elevation of the profession, and of
course other cottages can be provided, as they now are in
some places, for other married teachers. Marriage here
between teachers need not mean their elimination from the
profession. The teachers' home or homes for unmarried
teachers of each sex, with long terms of service, naturally

202 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

promote that acquaintanceship that leads to marriage,
which is rather to be encouraged, as it is abroad, than con-
demned by the community. The teacher is to become a
normal adult member of the community in which he lives,
broadly socially efficient, not a transient young celibate
employed at a servant's wage for a short time. The con-
solidated-school home is the best means yet devised for
promoting this noxinality and efficiency of living. That
such homes can be provided for other workers, such as
janitors and drivers of school hacks or motor-busses, goes
without saying. In some cases old school buildings can be
utilized and remodelled; in others the boys in farm car-
pentry can build one or more cottages; in other instances
building companies may be given land leases and permitted
to charge rents; and in others the school board may erect
the cottages, as in most cases they should.

8. Easy to Obtain. — The cottages are not as difficult to
obtain as may be imagined. As suggested above, the
needed increase in the bond issue or tax levy to secure cot-
tages in a community possessing upward of a half million
dollars in taxable wealth is not great. Outside companies,
or student or adult volunteer labor may be utilized. I have
seen admirable concrete, wood, and brick structures put up
by students of no higher grade than those attending a con-
solidated school. Frequently old schools may be utilized
in one way or another, and sometimes the land obtained as
a site may have on it an old rural home and outbuildings.
When the national and the State governments come to the
rescue of public education for such features with large fi-
nancial appropriations, as they must (and are now coming
for vocational education), a large share of the cost of such
homes may be borne by the people generally. Education
to-day is a national as well as a State function.

9. A Visiting and Social Centre. — The teacher *s cottage
may be made a dehghtful visiting and social centre apart
from the school itself. When the teacher is either a boarder

THE TEACHERAGE 203

or comes into the district from a city each Monday and
leaves promptly each Friday afternoon, there is hardly any
family visiting with the teacher. Such contact is the prin-
cipal bond of sociability in rural regions, and when the
school teachers are cut off from it, a chasm exists between
the "school people" and the "country people." We have
read a number of interesting accounts of how teachers' cot-
tages, even in connection with single-room schools, have
been used to bring young and old together occasionally in
small groups and thus closely bind the school to the life of
the community. One principal reported that twice during
the year his family had entertained the pupils of the high
school and eighth grade, including some young people not
members of the school. He could not have afforded to do
this entertaining, he said, if he had been required to pay
rent in a private dwelling. Pupils and parents drop in occa-
sionally at such a cottage for a social visit, to play and sing
the good old community songs at the piano, and to meet
the teacher on the familiar footing of a man rather than a
schoolman. There can be no doubt that this simple social
function of the consolidated-school home is of prime im-
portance to the success of the institution as a rural edu-
cational force.

10. ^ Happy Life. — Finally, the school home helps to
make the teachers happy in their work. A group of like-
minded people, highly trained, and at work in a nerve-
straining profession, can become either very miserable or
very happy. It is the duty of the rural-school boards to
provide for the happiness of their workers, since they thereby
increase greatly the efficiency of the work which they do.
Social happiness is the goal of life for teachers as well as
farmers. If a small addition to the general cost of the
consolidated-school plant will add greatly to the happiness
of the teachers and their famihes, giving them a settled,
dignified social position in the community where they can
live, teach, farm, and rear their families in ease of mind and

204 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

with reasonable comfort, farmers will not deny their most
important officials the right to life, liberty, and the pur-
suit of happiness which they claim as their own. Those
who have most to do with the very characters, lives, future
happiness and ability to promote social happiness through
social service, of their boys and girls, the progressive country
family will support in their effort to perform this service
well.

In general summary, the ten arguments settle the claims
for the school home as a regular part of the consolidated
rural-school plant, and meet the objections which some
may bring against it.

III. The Prospects Good

Doctor George E. Vincent, President of the General
Education Board, New York, formerly President of the
University of Minnesota, reports as follows on the teacher-
age:

A teacher's house or school manse is peculiarly necessary to the
success of the consolidated rural school, which, it is now agreed, is
to be the typical country school of the future. There should be built,
in connection with the consolidated school, on the same grounds
with the school building and heated by the same plant, a permanent
house for the use of the teaching staff. This building should con-
tain a wholly separate apartment for the principal and his family,
living-room and bedrooms for the women teachers, laundry, kitchen,
etc. It should be equipped with a view to providing in the com-
munity a model of tasteful and economical domestic furnishing and
decoration. The rentals and other charges should be so regulated
as to provide for the maintenance, insurance, repairs, and renewals
of equipment, but not for a sinking fund. The house should be re-
garded as a part of the school plant and included in the regular bond
issue for construction. A privately owned manse in Illinois is net-
ting eight per cent on an investment of $10,000.

The manse has a bearing in several ways upon the educational
work of the school. Flowers and vegetable gardens are natural
features of school premises which are also residence quarters. The
domestic-science work of the school can be connected in valuable

•So

THE TEACHERAGE 205

ways with the practical problems of manse management. The cost
accounting offers a capital example of bookkeeping. The use of the
school as a community centre is widened and its value enhanced.
The school as an institution takes on a more vital character in the eyes
of the countryside.

Most of all is the effect upon the teacher. Comfortably heated,
well-lighted quarters, comradeship with colleagues — and at the same
time personal privacy — a satisfying, co-operatively managed table,
independence of the petty family rivalries of a small community, a
recognized institutional status, combine to attract to the consolidated
rural-school manse teachers of a type which will put the country
school abreast of the modern educational movement. It is futile to
preach the gospel of sacrifice for the cause of rural education. There
is no reason why rural teachers should be called upon to sacrifice
themselves. They ought not to do it, and they will not do it. The
school manse is not a fad, nor a luxury; it is a fundamental necessity.

The General Plan. — The architecture and location of
the home, or homes, should be pleasing and convenient.
A landscape artist should plan the location and beautifica-
tion of the various buildings, the farm, the playgrounds,
and other features. If the principal's home alone is con-
structed at first, space in the ground-planning should be
left for the other homes for teachers and men-of-all-work
about the school plant. The school building also should be
erected with the future extensions plotted so that the whole
plant and site will be planned with reference to possible
future developments. Many general designs for such plants
have been printed in the reports of various State superin-
tendents and students of this question. The United States
Bureau of Education has a model of a complete plant which
was exhibited at the Pan-American Exposition, and is
published in its volume on the exhibit there. A reproduction
of it will be found in the last chapter of this volume. With
not less than twenty acres of land, a school building as de-
scribed in Chapter IX, and modern homes for teachers and
caretaker, such exhibits might well be set up in every county
seat. One of these may be taken and adapted, or used

206 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

merely as a suggestion. Our plea here is for forward look-
ing and consistent planning, which at present is an almost
entirely absent quantity in the work of perhaps most school
boards in the United States.

Herewith we present a few suggestive plans with photo-
graphs of exteriors of school homes that have been erected.
The best is not too good for the teacherage. Less than the
best is a poor investment if it is to function as an example
and an inspiration or the contrary to country folk for fifty
or more years. Enterprising communities will soon go far
beyond what has already been done in this new and very
interesting line of development in American rural education.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Josephine Corliss Preston — "Teachers' Cottages in Washington."

Bulletin No. 27, 191 5. Olympia, Washington.

2. "Cottage Homes for Teachers." Southern School Journal^ 24 : 11-

12, May, 1913.

3. Southern School Journal, 24 : 11-13, July, 191 3.

4. Mary B. Flemington — **The Teachers' Boarding Place." Amer-

ican School Board Journal, 50 : 18, February, 191 5.

5. "Homes for Rural Teachers." North Carolina Educationy 9 : 18,

March, 191 5.

6. Mrs. Percy V. Pennybacker — "Need of Teachers' Homes."

Ladies' Home Journal, 32 : 25, February, 191 5. Illustrated.

7. "Teacherage." Ladies' Home Journal, 31 : 5, September, 1914.

8. Mrs. Mary I. Wood— "The School Manse in Reality." Ladies'

Home Journal, 32 : 25, February, 191 5.
Other publications which will be found particularly helpful in
this connection are:

9. Fletcher B. Dresslar — "Rural Schoolhouses and Grounds."

Bulletin, 1914, No. 12, U. S. Bureau of Education.

10. Wm. L. Hall — "Tree Planting on Rural School Grounds." Farm-

ers' Bulletin, No. 134, U. S. Department of Agriculture.

11. A. C. Monahan and Adams Phillips — "The Farragut School."

Bulletin, 1913, No. 49, U. S. Bureau of Education.

12. A. C. Monahan — "The Status of Rural Education in the United

States." Bulletin, 1913, No. 8, U. S. Bureau of Education.
13. "County Unit Organization for the Administration of

THE TEACHERAGE 207

Rural Schools." Bulletin, 1914, No. 44, U. S. Bureau of Edu-
cation.

14. R. S. Kellog — "Teachers' Cottages." The National Lumber Manu-

facturers' Association.

15. L. L. Lumsden, M.D. — "Rural Sanitation." U. S, Government

Printing Office.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. Look up the work and success of the General Education Board

in establishing model consolidated-school plants, including
teacherages, in various parts of the country, as at Alberta,
Minn. Should teacherages be rented by school boards or pro-
vided free or as part of the salary?

2. In the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social

Science, September, 191 7, President Vincent, as quoted above,
shows what a profit a private corporation is making on a teach-
erage costing $10,000. Would it be desirable to encourage
building firms to put up such teacherages adjoining consolidated
schools and rent them to teachers?

3. Report on the Alberta teacherage, gathering data from several

sources, such as a letter to the principal, Arp's book on "Rural
Education and the Consolidated School" (World Book Co.), etc.

4. Get reports on the teacherage, teacher's cottage, or school manse,

from such States as Washington and Texas, each with several
hundred teacherages at this time of writing. Select the best type
for your part of the country and give reasons for selecting it.

5. What advantages and disadvantages would accrue from having

such a teacherage as the one at Alberta in connection with a
consolidated school situated, not in the open country, but in a
village trading centre?

6. What help can you obtain in settling on the best type of teacher-

age from your State Board of Education or the U. S. Bureau of
Education?

CHAPTER XI
TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE

Preliminary Problems

1. What are some of the chief advantages and disadvantages of pupils

walking to the one-room schools?

2. What effect does it frequently have on attendance? On health?

On morals? On punctuaHty?

3. What is the difference in these respects arising from transportation

of the right kind?

4. In what ways may consolidation be a means of obtaining better

roads ?

5. What regular routes of wagon and automobile travel and trans-

portation are maintained throughout the year by the government
post-ofhce and other agencies?

I. When Transportation Is Necessary

Public transportation of pupils is not always a neces-
sary part of the programme of consolidation. It depends
upon the size of the district to be served by the consoli-
dated schools. If the district is not greater than 10 square
miles, and nearly as wide as long, with the school located
near the centre of the territory, no child under ordinary
conditions would live beyond walking distance. A square
3 miles on the side would contain 9 square miles of terri-
tory, 80 per cent of which would be within 1.5 miles of the
centre. No point of the square would be farther away
from a school if located at the centre than 1.73 miles. Of
course the distances by travelled roadways would be greater
than this. If no rural school served a territory of less than
9 miles, however, there would be but approximately one-half
of the present number of rural schools in the half of the
United States east of a line extending north and south to
our borders, through the centre of Nebraska and Kansas.

208

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 209

In many parts of the United States (in most of the
strictly farming country) districts larger than 9 square miles
will have to be taken to secure enough children to make a
school large enough to require the services of three or more
teachers — the minimal number of teachers if the school is
to be really satisfactory. To obtain large enough taxing
areas to provide not only sufficient pupils but enough money
to provide a first-class school plant and upkeep, a larger
area is desirable. Transportation then becomes necessary,
although there are many consolidated schools in all parts
of the country serving much greater or larger districts than
9 square miles that do not furnish public transportation,
the parents making such arrangements as they see fit to get
their children to school.

II. Requirements

Importance of Satisfactory Transportation. — Without
doubt the question of transportation is the most difficult
one connected with the consoHdation of schools. The
transportation furnished must be absolutely satisfactory or
there will be constant dissatisfaction with the school. Fifty
years of experience in transporting country children to pubUc
schools in the United States has shown quite definitely the
essentials that must be provided if the transportation is to
be satisfactory. These essentials are:

1. A route not too long to be covered in reasonable
time.

2. A definite time schedule for each wagon.

3. A comfortable and safe vehicle.

4. A satisfactory driver.

The Transportation Route. — The length of the satis-
factory route cannot be stated in miles — the important con-
sideration is the time element, and this of course depends
upon many things besides the distance. No route should
be longer than can be covered under average conditions in
45 minutes, or in bad conditions in about an hour. This

2IO THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

means usually with good roads and horse vehicles not over
6 miles. If automobiles are used, the distance may be
greater.

The transportation wagon should run on a fixed schedule,
leaving certain points along the route at the exact time
announced. Children will then know at what time to
leave their homes to meet the wagons without being re-
quired to stand and wait. Wagons should not wait for the
children if they are not at the proper places on the scheduled
time. The condition of the road should not be allowed to
interfere with the schedule; the contract with the driver
should require him to furnish the necessary ''horse-power"
to get through on time. Of course, two different schedules
may be arranged — one for good travelling and one for the
bad road season. Where children live off the road at some
distance a small shelter-house may be erected. A mail and
parcel-post box may be placed in the shelter.

Whether the wagons should follow the main highways
or should go to the homes to pick up the children is a ques-
tion which has caused considerable trouble. In the early
experiments with transportation, the conveyance was from
the abandoned school building to the new school, the
children assembling at the old building. Later, starting-
places were established at points nearer the homes of the
children who lived farthest away from the school, and the
other children were picked up along the route. To settle
difficulties which arose over arranging the routes nearer to
one home than to another, the practice began of having the
school wagons leave the main road and travel in and out
byways to the homes. Such practice lengthens greatly the
time required to cover the route, and is never satisfactory.
The most satisfactory plan is to arrange the routes in such
a manner as to accommodate the majority of children, re-
quiring all to meet the wagon at fixed places along the
route. For children living more than a mile from any route
special arrangements must be made. A suggestion is given

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 211

later in discussing the practice more or less common of
paying the parents who provide transportation for their
children.

The Wagon. — A comfortable and safe wagon is ab-
solutely necessary. In the earlier days districts did not fur-
nish wagons, leaving the matter to the persons awarded the
contract. This necessarily limited the number who would
undertake the job, as the cost of a satisfactory wagon was
too great. It resulted in the employment of unsatisfactory
drivers and in the use of many unsatisfactory conveyances.
Now the majority of schools own the wagons, hiring the
drivers, who furnish the teams. Some of the essentials of
a good wagon are given below. So important is the kind of
wagon that Minnesota, which gives special State aid to assist
transportation, requires the use of wagons answering definite
specifications as a condition upon which State aid is received.

Essentials of the Wagon. — The wagon must be well built,
strong, safe, and warm. It must be covered and equipped
with side-pieces to keep out wind and storm. Glass sides
are much better than curtains, since the children then
never sit in semi-darkness, and in addition they can see the
country as they pass along. This results in better conduct.
Doors should be provided at both ends, and the front wheels
should " cut under," making turning easy. The best wagons
are built so that the driver sits inside with the children.
He is then in a position to require proper conduct and con-
versation on the part of the boys and girls under his charge.
In cold weather the floor is covered with rugs or with straw,
and lap-robes are provided. Often wagons are heated by
coal or oil stoves placed sometimes inside and sometimes
outside, and under the wagons. Footstones or planks of
hardwood are sometimes used, being heated by parents at
their homes in the morning, and again on the school stove
for the return trip. In the West bags of heated wheat are
sometimes used. Artificial heat, however, is unnecessary
except in extreme cold, or on long routes.

212 THE CONSOLroATED RURAL SCHOOL

The Driver. — Among those who have had experience
with transportation in school wagons and in other public
carriers, the sentiment seems to be much in favor of the
wagon when properly managed. The trip in the steam or
electric trolley car is made more quickly and in greater com-
fort, but the conduct of the children on public carriers is
not always so satisfactory as in school wagons where com-
petent drivers are employed. The children recognize the
right of the school directors to dictate their conduct while
they are riding on wagons owned or leased by the school
and driven by men or women who have the same authority
over them as their teachers. When riding in other public
carriers, children, as a rule, feel that they are outside the
authority of the school directors.

Satisfactory transportation is obtained only when com-
petent drivers are employed. Great care must be taken to
select drivers who are trustworthy, temperate, careful, and
whose words will be respected and obeyed. In some in-
stances, older schoolboys living near the end of the route
drive the wagons, keeping the teams in the vicinity of the
school during the day. The plan is seldom satisfactory.
In many cases wagons are driven by women, particularly
during the busy seasons on the farm. In bad weather their
places are taken by their husbands. This arrangement is
usually satisfactory. The use of a farm teamster or ''hired
man" is not to be recommended. Whenever a parent of
one or more of the children transported is employed the ser-
vice is usually satisfactory.

As evidence of the importance of proper wagons and
drivers the following from the Carnegie Foundation Report
on Education in Vermont is given:

In places where transportation has not been satisfactory the diffi-
culty is often due either to the driver or to the conveyance. Parents
charged that a rough boy driver had taught their boys to smoke, and
tolerated and even encouraged disorder. Older drivers were sometimes
intoxicated. Satisfaction almost always follows when a driver is

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 213

either a father or a mother of some of the children. A second source
of difficulty is the type of wagon or sleigh used. Wagons may be so
crowded that the children are uncomfortable. . . . Sometimes other
loads also are carried, and the children are made to walk up hills and
over bad roads. Sometimes sufficient blankets are not supplied.
The greatest satisfaction has been experienced with the ''school
barges" purchased by some of the towns. For fall and spring these
are spring wagons with top and sides curtained for protection from
rain and sun. The seats extend along the sides and are cushioned.
For winter use there are sleighs with closed tops. In none of those
observed was there provision for heating, but the drivers had often
procured soapstone or pieces of hardwood, which they heated over
the school stove and placed at the feet of the pupils on their way
home. These same objects were heated in the homes of the pupils
in the morning and used on the way to school.

The following also in reference to Vermont, but not
from the report just quoted, is further evidence:

It is gratifying to report that several towns during the past bien-
nium have purchased barges specially constructed for the conveyance
of school children. In consequence the opposition to consolidation
in those towns has been greatly reduced, as parents in general are not
so much exercised over the question of transportation as they are
over the kind provided. The experience of those towns which have
provided proper and comfortable conveyance ought to be suggestive
to the towns which have not so provided.

The Automobile for Transportation. — The automobile
is being used in large numbers for transportation of school
children in many sections of the country, particularly in the
Eastern States and in California. It is exceedingly satis-
factory under proper management, and with good roads
much more rapid than the horse-drawn vehicle. In many
instances where ''auto-busses" are used, it is found neces-
sary to use horses and sleds during the heavy snows, and
wagons for a short while during the muddy season. This
plan is very feasible, since the time of the year when the
automobile cannot well be used is the time when farm
teams have the least work and can be obtained most easily.

In several places where automobiles are used one car

214 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

brings to the school each day two separate loads. The
writer is familiar with a consolidated school located at a
cross-roads. There are no children on the road to the north.
Twenty-five children from the west are brought in in one
wagon. There are thirty on the road to the east, the
farthest living 4 miles from the school. An automobile-bus
leaves the end of this route at 8 o'clock, reaching school at
8.30. It immediately departs to the south to the end of the
route 3 miles away, bringing in on the return trip twenty
children, who arrive at the school before 9.10. School opens
at 8.45 and closes for those on the route from the east at
3.00 p. m., for the others at 3.30. The first period in the
morning and the last in the afternoon are devoted to indus-
trial work, so that the "graded" work is not in any way in-
terfered with by the absence of part of the school these two
periods. In many places, of course, automobiles are used
every day in the school year, are heated by the exhaust,
and are entirely satisfactory. In numerous consolidated
areas the automobile is displacing the wagon.

Transportation and the Roads. — Transportation is, of
course, much easier in a district with good roads than in
one with bad roads, and there are many roads in the coun-
try so bad that transportation of school children is impossi-
ble over them during certain seasons of the year. However,
if the roads are good enough for the children to pass over
on foot they are passable for wagons, and the wagons would
bring them to the school with dry feet and clothes. In
muddy and wet weather many children who walk to school
over bad roads are required to sit with wet feet during the
day. Much ill health is undoubtedly due to this exposure.

The large number of wagons used in all parts of the
country, and over all sorts of roads, is the best evidence that
the consolidated school with public transportation may be
established in a section with poor roads. Mr. J. B. Eggle-
ston, formerly State superintendent of Virginia, speaking of
the success of transportation in that State, says:

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 215

During the fifth year (191 2) of this policy we have over 200
wagons running in all sections of the State and under almost every
possible condition. We have routes as long as 8 miles and as short
as 2>^ miles. We have wagons on good roads and bad roads, on level
roads and mountain roads, on rocky roads and sand roads, on mac-
adam roads and red-clay roads. We have transportation wagons
of the latest and most modern type, and we have ordinary farm-
wagons fitted up for the new and precious freight. We have one-
horse and two-horse wagons, and in one instance we have a four-horse
transportation wagon, or "kid cart," as it is called, which hauls be-
tween 45 and 50 children to school every day.

The Minnesota commissioner of rural schools says:

For a considerable period of years, too, children have been suc-
cessfully transported in this State, in widely separated portions, under
road and weather conditions about as favorable and about as unfa-
vorable as the State affords. Personal investigation of the situation
has shown that transportation in Minnesota is entirely practicable
and generally satisfactory.

Nothing stimulates good-road building like the necessity for road
travel. Consolidation has fairly intoxicated communities with a
zeal for road-building. Some districts still have very poor transporta-
tion routes; but many miles of road previously impassable in wet
seasons have already been put in good condition, and the good work
will be taken up again with the next open season. In a word, poor
roads can be made into good roads and this transformation will be made
with promptitude where transportation of school children is in vogue.

Thus consolidation brings good roads, and a community-
need not refrain from consolidation because of poor roads.
The consolidated school is the best device for promoting
good roads.

Payment to Parents in Lieu of Transportation. — The
plan of allowing parents or guardians a certain amount per
day for providing conveyance for their own children is in
operation to a certain extent in many States. It is proba-
bly the only plan feasible in sparsely settled districts, and
where roads are very poor. In such cases children journey
to school in buggies, on horseback, or on bicycles. Often
the school furnishes a shed for the horses. The amount

2l6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

allowed parents in South Dakota, Wisconsin, and a few-
other States varies from lo cents per child per day to 25
cents, the amount depending upon the distance from the
home to the school. Allowance is made only for the actual
number of days attended.

The plan has several advantages and several disadvan-
tages. Its principal advantage is that children ride from
their own homes to the school by the most direct route and,
as a rule, in less time than would be taken by a school
wagon. One of the principal disadvantages is the expense.
It does not require a larger expenditure of school funds, but
the total expended by the school patrons is much greater.
A large amount must be invested in horses and vehicles,
and stabling and feed for the horses provided. If the chil-
dren themselves drive, the horse is not available for other
work on school-days. Another disadvantage is that it does
not assure the regularity of attendance and the freedom
from tardiness resulting from the use of transportation
wagons, or of public electric or steam railroads.

III. General Considerations

The Success of Transportation. — The success of furnish-
ing transportation seems to be universal wherever properly
handled. An interesting study made in Connecticut by
the secretary of the State board of education is reported
in his annual report for 19 13.

The expense per pupil for conveyance to elementary
schools in Connecticut for 1911-12 was $23.69 for the school
year of 184 days. The total number of children conveyed
was 3,481; the total expenditure, $82,465.97. This does
not include $42,968.83 paid for the transportation of high-
school pupils. The elementary children were transported
by school wagons, trolley-cars, steam railroads, and by pri-
vate conveyances. In many cases parents are paid a cer-
tain amount per day in heu of transportation.

The report mentioned gives for each .township in the
State the number of elementary school children transported,

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 217

the cost for the year, and whether or not the transportation
is, on the whole, satisfactory to the parents and beneficial
to the schools. There are 120 townships in the State that
reported children transported. Of these, 8 failed to report
on the last item. The others reported as follows, the re-
ports being made by the local school authorities:

Satisfactory to parents and beneficial to schools 95

Unsatisfactory to parents but beneficial to schools 9

Unsatisfactory to parents and not beneficial to schools 4

Unsatisfactory to parents and no report whether beneficial or not 4

Professor A. B. Graham, formerly at the head of the
agricultural extension service of the Ohio State University,
made a study of the satisfaction to school patrons of trans-
portation to Ohio consolidated schools. He states that:

80 per cent of the parents report that their children attend more
regularly xinder transportation than they did previously.

90 per cent report their children more interested in school than
before.

95 per cent think their teachers show more interest in their work.
100 per cent practically agree that the social and educational inter-
ests of the township consolidated have greatly improved.

75 per cent of those who were formerly opposed to consolidation and
transportation are now in favor of it.

Miss Mabel C. Williams, superintendent of Shelby
County, Tenn., writes as follows:

The transportation of pupils in public-school wagons has proved
to be a great success in Shelby County. The system was instituted
eight years ago. We now have 15 wagons running, with petitions for
many more as soon as we can build the consolidated schools. It
would be impossible to persuade the pupils who ride in the wagons
to leave the consolidated schools and go back to the one-teacher or
two-teacher schools from whence they came. The parents and
teachers appreciate the greater advantages which the large school
offers. We find that the attendance is better on the wagon routes,
as the children do not have to consider the weather. Only one child
has ever been hurt on the wagons, and that was not serious. We have
carried as many as 50 in. one wagon. I do not remember that we have

2l8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ever had a complaint of drunkenness, profanity, tardiness, or care-
lessness on the part of the wagon drivers. In fact, most of the trouble
which is anticipated from the adoption of the public-school wagon
never happens.

Seymour Rockwell, in 1893, wrote as follows regarding
the Montague consolidated school in Massachusetts, men-
tioned in a previous chapter:

For 18 years we have had the best attendance from the trans-
ported children; no more sickness among them, and no accidents.
The children like the plan exceedingly. We have saved the town at
least $600 a year. All these children now attend a well-equipped
schoolhouse at the centre. The schools are graded; everybody is
converted to the plan. We encountered all the opposition found any-
where, but we asserted our sensible and legal rights and accomplished
the work. I see no way of bringing the country schools up but to
consolidate them, making them worth seeing; then the people will be
more likely to do their duty by visiting them.

With its largest attendance the school enrolled about
175 pupils, more than one-fourth of whom were in high-school
grades. Pupils came to the high school from neighboring
districts, which were able to take care of elementary pupils
locally, but wanted the special high-school opportunities.
The children were transported in six school wagons, and
later in five wagons and one trolley-car.

The total number of children transported in 191 2-13
was 85, at a total expenditure of $1,550.82, or 10 cents per
pupil per day. Each driver received an average of $1.70
per day, or $312 per year, and carried an average of 17
children. The shortest route is 2 miles, the longest 4.5
miles. The drivers furnish their own wagons and teams.
The wagons must be enclosed in stormy weather, and
equipped with straw or rugs under foot, and with robes.
The drivers are under contract with the school authorities
and must cover the routes on schedule time. They have
full authority over the children while on the road, and en-
force good conduct. The wagons do not stop at all the
houses where pupils live, but follow routes laid out by the

A good barn for horses, vans, bicycles, auto-busses, and other vehicles,
Preble County, Ohio

Ten in a row ready for the home trip, Preble County, Ohio. Automobiles
are rapidly replacing these

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 219

school authorities, picking up the children along these
routes.

The 41 years of its existence have given ample oppor-
tunity to compare the value of the consolidated school with
the one-teacher school and to work out satisfactorily many
of the problems in connection with public transportation
Also there has been afforded an opportunity to study the
advantages and disadvantages of transportation in school
wagons under school authority and in public electric cars.
The experience has resulted in a sentiment in favor of the
school wagons. Little disorderly conduct or improper
speech ever occurred on the wagons, while both occurred
more or less frequently on the cars. The wagon drivers,
because they were engaged by the school board, were recog-
nized by the children as in authority; the carmen were not
so recognized.

W. L. Eaton, formerly superintendent of schools of
Concord, Mass., wrote about the same year of the Emerson
ConsoHdated School of that town, established in 1879, with
transportation to the school, as follows:

The natural reluctance of parents to send their young children
so far from home and for all day, to attend the centre school, has
vanished. The children are conveyed in comfortable vehicles fitted
up for their accommodation. They are in charge of trusty drivers
en route, and at noon they are under the especial care of one of the
teachers, who has an extra compensation for the service. When it is
practicable, a farmer living near the extreme end of the district is
employed to convey the children. Often the farmer's wife drives
the conveyance — an arrangement that meets the entire approval of
the school committee, and is, perhaps, the most satisfactory one pos-
sible. As a rule the committee do not approve of intrusting the duty
to the hired man. Three 2-horse barges and two i-horse wagons are
in use at present. All these vehicles are fitted with seats running
lengthwise and are closed or open at sides and ends as the weather
requires, and in cold weather are provided with blankets and straw.
The driver starts from or near the remote end of his district and drives
down the principal thoroughfare, taking up the children at their own
doors or at cross-street corners.

The attendance of the children conveyed is several per cent better

220

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

than that of the village children, and it is far higher than it was in
the old district schools. This is not strange when one reflects that
the children are taken at or near their own doors and conveyed to
school without exposure in stormy weather and with entire comfort
in cold or snowy weather. Discipline in the carriages is maintained
readily, as the driver has authority to put out any unruly child.
The children are conveyed from i>2 to 3^ miles.

Contract with Driver. — A definite written contract with
the driver is very important. The following is in use in
.Randolph County, Ind.:

CONTRACT FOR HAULING SCHOOL CHILDREN

Route No.

Township

Contract entered into on 19 • • , between ,

party of the first part, and , trustee of

school township of Randolph County, Ind., party of the second part.

The party of the first part (for the sum named below to be paid
by the party of the second part) agrees to perform the following work:

To drive the school wagon on route No in school

township of Randolph County, Ind., and haul all the children of
school age now residing and adjacent to said route (or who may be
along said route during the life of this contract) to and from the school,
according to the following schedule. The said schedule to be as fol-
lows unless changed by the trustee:

Commencing at the —

Standard sun.

Returning.

Standard sun.

Thence to the ....

Leaving School at

School arriving at.

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 221

Said work is to be governed by the following conditions:

1 . The said school township is to furnish the wagon

to be used and keep it in repair.

2. The said party of the first part is to furnish, keep, and feed all
the horses, and furnish harness, necessary to haul the wagon on the said

route, without any expense to the said school township,

other than the pay agreed upon for the party of the first part in this
contract. (Here insert conditions as to stable)*

3. The party of the first part is to have control of all the school
children so hauled to and from school, to keep order and maintain
discipline while in the wagon or along the route, and to treat all chil-
dren in a gentlemanly and civil manner and to see that no child is
imposed upon or mistreated while in his charge, and shall use every
care for the safety of the children under his charge. All school hacks
shall come to a full stop immediately before crossing steam or electric
railways and the driver shall ascertain positively as to the approach
of any danger. The party of the first part hereby agrees to prevent
the use of tobacco in any form, by himself or any other person upon
the school wagon while under his charge.

4. The party of the first part is to drive the wagon and take the
children along the route every day that school is in session during the
school year of 19. . and 19. ..

5. The party of the first part shall inform the parents of the school
children as to the time he will arrive at the place where the children
are to take the school wagon each morning, so that the children can
be ready to get into the wagon with the least possible delay. He shall
wait a reasonable length of time for the children in case they are not
ready when the wagon arrives in the morning, but he will not be re-
quired to so wait over two minutes. Said party of the first part is
to use as many horses as necessary to haul the wagon on the schedule
as laid down in this contract. The party of the first part is to per-
sonally perform all the said work as laid down in this agreement,
unless permission for a substitute be given by the trustee, who shall
designate who such substitute shall be. This contract shall not be
assigned to another person to perform without the written consent
of the said township trustee, as party of the second part, and to be
so written upon the back of this contract. The party of the first
part is to wash and clean up the wagon at end of term and place it
in the school barn, or elsewhere, as directed by the trustee without
extra compensation.

6. Party of the first part hereby agrees to make all reports called
for by the trustee or anyone authorized by the trustee to call for them.

222 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

7. The party of the second part hereby agrees to pay the party

of the first part the sum of dollars ($ ) per day

for every day such work is performed. Pay for such work can only
be drawn each month during school term or at the end of the term,
or on the same plan and terms as with the school-teachers if the
trustee so desires.

8. The wilful violation of any of the provisions of this contract
shall be cause for its forfeiture.

9. In case anything should arise not named or covered by this
contract, the matter shall be adjusted by the township trustee, whose
decision shall govern all parties concerned.

To all of the above we do hereby agree in every particular by
signing our names on this, the day of 19. . .

Party 0} the First Part.

Trustee of School Township, Randolph County,

Ind., and Party of the Second Part.

Legislation Permitting Transportation at Public Expense.
— Authority is given to school ofliicers by the State legisla-
tures in at least 44 States to expend public school funds for
the transportation of children to schools, provided the chil-
dren live outside of a reasonable walking distance. Such
authorization is necessary before large consoHdated districts
can be established. In certain States transportation at
public expense is permissive only, in others obligatory.
Ohio, for instance, requires free transportation to be fur-
nished to all children living 2 miles or more from the school.
Children living nearer may be conveyed free at the option
of the school board. In Missouri free transportation must
be provided to children living 2}4 miles or more from a school.
Colorado school districts may furnish free transportation
to children whose homes are i}i miles or more away. The
consolidated district boards of Kansas must furnish trans-
portation to children 2 miles or more from school, those of
Oklahoma to children i }i miles or more from school. Penn-
sylvania provides that ^'no pupils of abandoned schools

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 223

shall be required to walk more than i}4 miles to the new
school building." Indiana requires all schools with fewer
than 12 children to be closed and education for the children
provided elsewhere. Children are transported at public
expense to neighboring schools. The State has had much
experience, therefore, in transportation, and realizes the
seriousness ot the problem. The Indiana State superin-
tendent of public instruction, in a chapter on consolidation
in his annual report for 191 2, discusses it as follows:

The great objection which must be met in consolidating our rural
schools is transportation. Many parents object, and with good cause,
to the fact that their children are transported too great a distance
and that they are compelled to leave home too early in the morning
and are returned too late in the evening. This demonstrates that the
unit of consolidation is too large. A readjustment of the consolidated
area should be made, and the pupils affected should be transported a
reasonable distance. In rural communities where good roads cannot
be maintained throughout the year the people must be content with
the district school. Where the unit of consolidation is not too large
transportation of pupils has made attendance larger, more regular,
and eliminated tardiness. Transportation has been a great aid to
the health of the children. They are not compelled to walk through
the rain and in the mud, wearing wet shoes all day. In the majority
of places where we have consolidation the school officials have been
very careful to get responsible men as drivers of the school wagons.
Consequently, the pupils are under the care of some responsible person
all day, and the girls are protected on the way to and from school,
and the boys influenced from the temptation to quarrels and other
misconduct.

The success of the consolidated school depends in very large
measure upon transportation. If the transportation is safe, comforta-
ble, rapid, and in charge of men of high character, no troubles result
from it. When men of low ideals are in charge of transportation or
when transportation is slow, or when the distance is too great, then
certain evils are at once seen, and just complaint is made against the
consolidated schools. These evils, however, are all remediable. If
the people demand drivers of high character they can be secured.
If the officials insist upon rapidity of transportation that too can be
done. None of these evils in any way affect the real work of con-
solidation.

224 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

rV. Transportation Experience

To give further concreteness and serviceableness to our
discussion of this very important phase of consolidation,
we print here by permission a discussion by W. S. Fogarty,
county superintendent of Preble County, Ohio, entitled:
''Transportation of School Children."

The Ohio School Awakening. — In the past three years
Ohio has had an educational awakening which has been
unparalleled. One of the greatest opportunities of the new
county system is that of awakening the rural people to a
realization of the condition of their schools and the possi-
bilities of improvement. One of the best compliments paid
me was spoken by a very angry farmer because we were
trying to consolidate the schools of his township, when he
said: "You go around over the county stirring up things."
The tragedy of the educational situation in Ohio was the
country school. Three years ago as we went over Preble
County and saw forlorn and dilapidated one-room school
buildings, with ill-kept grounds, while just across the road
could be seen beautiful homes with all modern conveniences
and fine barns for the stock, we knew that the good rural
people of this wealthy agricultural county needed to be
''stirred up." The dismal one-room, box-car type of school
building, with the old, unsightly stove in the centre with its
whitewashed walls, cross-lights, window ventilation, with
its dreary grounds and its insanitary condition in general, a
disgrace to the community, soon will be only a memory in
this county. Consolidation is the key-note of rural-school
improvement. In the past three years 65 one-room school
buildings have been abandoned in our county, and next
year we expect to have only 25 one-room schools. We
now have 10 consolidated schools, and next year will see
another in operation. These buildings cost from $10,000
to $75,000 each, and are modern in every respect. Our
purpose has been to consolidate in as large areas as possi-
ble, so that the best high-school advantages may be given

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 225

all the boys and girls. All of our consolidated-school dis-
tricts are 18 to 36 square miles in area, and every one
maintains a three-year or a four-year high-school course.

The limits of this chapter do not permit a discussion of
the value of the consolidated school as to a modern build-
ing, adequate equipment, better teaching, larger socialization
of the community, better facilities for play, maintenance of
health, and a richer curriculum. One phase only, trans-
portation of the children, will be treated.

The Routes. — It is no small problem to arrange the
routes in a township to the best advantage. We have found
that the best plan is to drive over every road and find out
where each pupil lives, and the number of school children
in each home. A plan of the township is then drawn show-
ing all roads, the location of the homes, and the number of
school children in each. With the plan and data before one,
he can run the routes to the best advantage. This work
cannot be done quickly, as many trial routes must be drawn
before the best plan for all routes is found. Wagon routes
should start at the edge of the consoHdated area and take
as direct route to the central building as possible. Very
little, if any, retracing should be done.

Of course the number of routes in a school district is de-
termined by the number of children to be carried. In our
county the average number of routes in a township is twelve.
A route travelled by a school-van drawn by a team should
not be over six miles long from the place where the first
child enters the wagon, and if possible it should be less.
Auto routes are sometimes longer. We have good gravelled
roads with about 30 miles of macadamized roads. The
average length of the routes in our county is 5.7 miles. The
conveyances pass by nearly every home, so that there are
very few children who walk any distance. Children living
off the pubHc road must meet the conveyance. With autos
frequently two trips can be made both morning and eve-
ning. At some Western schools the autos are even using
''trailers" to carry more pupils.

226 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

The character of the driver has much to do with the
success of transportation. Only men who are rehable are
employed. The profane or vulgar, the reckless and the
drinker are rejected. Parents trust their children to these
drivers as they do to the care of teachers. Boards of educa-
tion should use great care in the selection of both. A few
of our drivers are trustworthy young men attending the
high school. On the whole they prove to be satisfactory;
yet all in all we prefer reliable older men for this service,
men who are considerate of the welfare of their children,
and conscious of their great responsibility.

Before the war drivers were paid from two dollars to
four dollars per day, depending on the length and character
of the route. The cost for this service has increased the
past year, and will be more next year, due to the rising cost
of living. They are paid by the day, and in most cases are
not paid for time lost when the school is closed on account
of epidemics or lack of coal. Since the fuel shortage of last
winter considerable disagreement has arisen over the ques-
tion of paying drivers when school is closed for the above
reasons. The attorney-general of Ohio has ruled that the
terms of the contract determine what shall be done. We
believe that drivers should be paid for the days only on
which service is rendered. Probably in time they will be
paid as are the teachers, by the year, and "whether school
keeps or not.'' All of our boards require drivers to give
bond for the faithful performance of the contract. The
amount varies from $ioo to $200. The contract and bond
used in this county are here given:

PREBLE COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS

Contract

Transportation of Pupils of Schools

Tms Contract made by and between the Board of Education

of , Preble County, Ohio, party of the first part, and

, party of the second part.

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 227

WITNESSETH, That said party of the second part agrees to trans-
port to and from the Central School Building the pupils along the
route known herein as Number for the full school year, in ac-
cordance with the specifications which form a part of this contract,

for the sum of $ per day, payable monthly, which sum

said party of the first part agrees to pay for services well and truly
rendered in accordance with specifications of this contract.

Specifications
Said party of the second part agrees

1. To transport all pupils to and from the Central Building along
Route No which route is described as follows:

Beginning at the home of and thence to

and thence to the Central School

Building.

2. To cause conveyance with pupils to start for the Central School
Building not earlier than 7.00 A. M. Standard time, and arrive between
8.00 and 8.20 A. M.

3. To use the conveyance furnished by the Board of Education
and to furnish a shelter for said conveyance and to place the same
there over night, or when not in use.

4. To keep the conveyance clean and to furnish robes and blankets
to keep the children comfortable, and in cold weather to keep con-
veyance heated.

5. To abstain absolutely from the use of profane and immoral
language, and from the use of tobacco and intoxicating liquors in any
form and prevent others from using them about the conveyance while
the children are therein.

6. To provide a good team of horses. Said team must be gentle
and not afraid of cars and automobiles, and must be acceptable to the
party of the first part.

7. To perform personally all duties laid down in this contract,
unless permission for a substitute be given by the party of the first
part. Said substitute must be acceptable to the party of the first
part,

8. To exercise full control of the children while under his charge
and be responsible for their conduct.

9. To come to a full stop at each place where children are taken
into the conveyance or let out.

228 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

lo. To follow a regular time schedule in driving the route.
II

President

Clerk
Parties of the First Part

Party of the Second Part
, Ohio, , 191 . .

Bond

Know All Men by These Presents, That we

as principal and and as

sureties are held and firmly bound unto the Board of Education of

, Preble County, Ohio, in the penal sum

of $ for the payment of which we jointly and severally

bind ourselves.

The condition of the above obligation is this: That the said

has this day entered into the above contract

to transport pupils along Route No of said township to

and from the Central School Building. Now if the said

shall well and truly perform the conditions of said contract,

on his part to be performed, then this obligation shall be void. Other-
wise to remain in full force and virtue in law.

Bond approved this day of ,

191....

Principal

President Surety

Clerk Surety

The above rules are for drivers of teams. Auto drivers
have the same rules modified to suit their conveyance.
Transportation of children has proven entirely satisfactory,
both as to the safety of the children and as to the care exer-
cised by drivers. Seven steam and electric railroads cross
our county. We have not had an accident of any kind,
which is remarkable when we remember that nearly 1,700
children were transported to school last year.

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 229
JACKSON IP.. PREBLE CO. OHIO

TXDWNSHIP IS 6 Ml SQUARE
•i«*CEhiTRAL SCHOOL

■ • ABANDONED SCHOOL

■ • HAMLET

— > • DIRECTION OF ROUTE.

CONV. NO. • STARTING OF ROUTE:

O • SCHOOL CHILDREN

12 WAGON S AND 272 PUPILS.

MtP Of Wagon Routes in a Typical Consolidated Township of Preble County. OMo

The Vehicles. — Most of our 91 conveyances are horse-
drawn, and are specially built for school use. These cars
seem to be as perfect cars as can be constructed. It is a
great mistake to buy cheap school conveyances. Good
school wagons cost from $200 to $250. Most of our wagons
are 12 feet long and carry 18 to 24 children. We demand a
vehicle strong enough to support the load on any road, with
close-fitting doors and windows that will keep out wind and
rain, provision for heating and ventilating. In our cars ven-

230 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tilation is assured through overhead enamelled ventilators
which can be adjusted from the inside and allow protection
to the children from the elements. The heating is done by-
heaters placed beneath the body of the wagon with a regis-
ter in the floor, by foot-warmers or by coal-oil stoves. With
blankets the wagons are always comfortable even in the
severest weather. Seating requires deep-angled seats and
backs with leather upholstery, and wide aisles between.
Proper lighting is given by glass windows all around. The
driver sits inside with the children, supervising their con-
duct. Our auto school cars are proving entirely satisfac-
tory, and several boards expect to use this conveyance en-
tirely in a short time. If roads permit, automobile trans-
portation is preferable. Motor transportation is quicker,
equally reliable, and usually more economical. The chief
advantage of this method lies in the quickness of the ser-
vice. Children are on the road about half as long as when
carried in wagons. It is usual for each motor-driven car
to make two trips — a long one first and then a short trip.
In the evening the children Hving on the short route are re-
turned home first, and those on the long route next. At
the Leesport school in Pennsylvania, the wide auto has
seats on each side and a double one in the middle, thus
seating forty or more children. A photograph of it is shown
in the editor's ** Teaching Elementary-School Subjects,"

p. 378.

Owned by the Community. — All of our conveyances are
owned and operated by the school district. Any other plan
would surely invite disaster. If the driver furnished his
own van, naturally it would be cheap, as he would want to
make the greatest profit possible, and, moreover, he does
not know how long he will hold the contract. Such a plan
would call out strong protests from parents and would cause
a condemnation of consolidation. For the same reason our
conveyances are maintained by the district. As soon as
repairs are needed they are made, and our conveyances are

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 23 1

kept in good condition at all times. However, it is found by
experience that where breaks or injuries are due to the care-
lessness of drivers, the cost of these repairs should be borne
by the driver. Some drivers are careless of public property
and under this plan breakage is greatly reduced. The drivers
must house their conveyances when not in use, and during
the summer the wagons are stored in the school barn.
Superintendent C. R. Coblentz of New Paris, who has been
unusually successful in working out transportation of school
children in Jackson township, this county, says: ^'With
proper care these wagons will last a long time. In Jackson
township, some of the wagons have been in use now for
eight years. Two or three have had new sets of wheels,
they have been painted twice, I think, and retired about
twice. The cost of maintenance has not been as much as
was at first anticipated."

All of our consolidated schools except those located in
villages have a barn on the grounds to house the horses and
the conveyances. These barns vary in size. A typical
barn is 130 by 40 feet. Stalls for 32 horses are built on
one side and the other side is left for wagons and auto-
mobiles. The barns are well lighted and arranged. The
cost of a barn is about $2,500.

Management. — The success of transportation depends
very largely upon its management. This problem is largely
solved when we secure a spirit of helpful co-operation
among parents, teachers, drivers, and children. Definite,
sensible rules must be formulated. The rules for drivers
are given above in the contract. Drivers should under-
stand that they are working under the direction of the super-
intendent and that all rules are subject to reasonable modi-
fication by the board of education.

Rules for children should be printed and distributed
among the parents. Children while in the conveyance must
be subject to a wise disciplinary power exercised by the
driver. This discipline, however, must always be under the

232 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

guidance and control of the superintendent. A few neces-
sary rules for children are: To be seated in the conveyance
where placed by the driver, to refrain from all profane and
indecent language or actions, to be respectful to persons
whom they meet or pass on the road, to never get into or
out of the conveyance while it is in motion, to neither leave
nor enter the conveyance except with consent of the driver,
and to know when the conveyance is due and be ready for
it. Penalties for disobedience should be fixed by the super-
intendent. The right kind of consultation with parents
nearly always secures their co-operation.

One boy in one of our townships persisted in not being
ready when the wagon arrived, causing quite a Httle delay.
The superintendent instructed the driver not to wait. The
next morning the boy did some yelling when the wagon
drove on and he was left for the day. He was cured.

Teachers should assist pupils in getting on their wraps
and in doing whatever is necessary to be ready to leave
school on time. Teachers should send pupils to the toilets
before starting home, and parents should be equally thought-
ful mornings. They both should talk to their children
about their conduct in the conveyances.

Parents should co-operate with drivers and teachers in
having their children ready on time and insist that their
conduct in conveyances be proper. Parents are duty bound
to have a friendly and helpful attitude toward the whole
system.

Definite time schedules are arranged. Our contract
with drivers of wagons requires them not to take on the
first child before seven o'clock standard time, which is
twenty-two minutes slower than sun time. The above
time is that which we had before the government ordered
the clocks moved up one hour. For shorter wagon routes
and automobile routes the time of starting is later. Con-
veyances should not vary in time of starting regardless of
roads and weather. It is better that the opening of schools

CONSOLIDATED SCHOOLS IN
PREBLE COUNTY OHIO

JEFFERSON

♦55.000 BLO6
414 PUPILS

MONROE

■fsCOOO BLDC
554 PUPJW

2.000 BLDG
PUPILS 7Z

JIS2.0
j 195

m

JACKSON

tiOiOOO 6LD0.
tli PUPILS

WASHING

THE COUNTY SEAT

DIXON

|4C\00O &LDG
203 PUPILS

CA

LANIER

■

I40.000 euxi

510 PUPILS

*IO.OOO BLDCl
112 PUPILS

f dO.OOO BLDG.
JfcO PUPILS

225 PUPILS

ISRAEL

m

CAMDEN

GRATIS

^10000 8L06
150 PUPILS

^20,000 BlM.
152 PUPIp

la TOWNSHIPS - EACH 6 Ml. SQUARE EXCEPT THE TWO !N THE CENTER
SHAPED PART IS NOT CONSOLIDATED ■'CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL ^-VILLAGE

Map of Preble County, Ohio, showing Consolidated Schools

234

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

should be delayed a few minutes than for conveyances to
be irregular in time of starting. Every parent should have
a time schedule at home showing exactly when the con-
veyance is due to arrive at his home. Many conveyances
in this county run so regularly that they are not more than
two or three minutes off schedule for many weeks at a time.
The average time in this county for driving a horse-drawn
van a mile is thirteen minutes. When the roads are heavy
it takes two to five minutes longer. With this data it is
not difficult for parents to calculate closely the time of
arrival of the conveyance in any kind of weather. During
the short days of winter the noon recess is shortened and the
children are started home at 3.15 p.m. Data that may
prove suggestive are submitted herewith.

No. of
convey-
ances

Children
carried

Av. length
of routes

Av. time to
drive routes

Av. cost
per child

Camden

Dixon .

II

II

6

8

12
12
13
15

3

213
189
107
120
215

239
242

323
41

5. miles
6.6 miles
4.6 miles

6. miles
5 . 4 miles
6 . 2 miles
5.4 miles
6.8 miles
5.6 miles

ihr.

I hr. 28 min.

ihr.

I hi". 17 min.

I hr. 12 min.

I hr. 12 min.

I hr. 17 min.

I hr. 28 min.

I hr. 3 min.

$ .153
.177
.132
.185
•139
.15
.156
.156
•25

Gratis

Israel

Jarkson

JefiFerson

Lanier

Monroe

West Elkton . . .

Total

91

1,689

5.7 miles

I hr. 13 min.
Average for
the County

$ .166

V. Conclusions

Advantages. — When consolidation is first broached in a
community, it is found that conveyance of the children is
responsible for much of the opposition. Many will not
investigate communities where the system has proved a

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 235

success, others fail to see the numerous advantages of the
larger rural school which can be secured only by conveying
the children. Where consolidation has been tried a few-
years 90 to 95 per cent of the patrons give it their hearty
support. Before the system is tried there are many wild
statements about never seeing your children in daylight,
teams running away, and trains crashing into vans, etc.
Our answer is that these disasters don't happen. Of course
no sensible person expects perfection in a system that in-
volves so many persons and conditions. A careful superin-
tendent in possession of the facts should have Kttle trouble
in starting a consohdated school.

The health of children is provided for better when they
are carried to school. The children come to school in con-
veyances which are well ventilated, heated, and lighted.
Their clothing and feet are dry. They are not exposed to
wind, snow, and rain. The larger school building is properly
heated, ventilated, and lighted. Those of us who attended
the one-room country school remember how we trudged
through snow, mud, and rain, and sat in a poorly heated
room until feet and clothing were dry. Our experience is
that there is less sickness in the consolidated school than
there is in the one-room school.

Transportation is an advantage in taking care of morals.
Children carried in wagons have no opportunity of fighting
or hearing bad language on the way to and from school.
One of the greatest difficulties of teachers of one-room schools
is the behavior of children on the way to school and home.
While under the care of the driver there is no misbehavior.
In the consolidated-school building the toilet-rooms are kept
in the best condition. Every parent knows that satisfac-
tory conditions in such matters is of vital importance.

To convey children to school makes the attendance far
better. Hear what one farmer says: "Think of the Kttle
children plodding schoolward in cold and wet and mire —
when they go at all! Then count up the number of days

236 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

they are kept home altogether because of bad roads and
severe weather! " Read what the records show in one town-
ship of this county the next year after the schools were con-
solidated. ''The consolidated system of managing the
schools showed many improvements over the old way. One
of these was in attendance. The attendance the last year
of the rural schools was 81 per cent, while this year it was
92 per cent — an increase of 11 per cent. Another was in
regard to tardiness. During the last year of the rural schools
in one month in one of the schools there were ^^ cases of
tardiness. This year, under the consolidated system, we
had scarcely that number for the entire year." Who can
figure the value of such an increase in attendance and punc-
tuality?

Those who are sceptical should visit a consolidated school
and see the interest on the part of the children. Why do
so many boys and girls drop out of the one-room school be-
fore completing the work ? The answer is: Few or no play-
mates of the same age and sex, school work mostly memory
work and from the book, not enough attention from the
overworked teacher — witness the carved desks in the coun-
try schools — unattractive building and grounds, and no
high-school provision. The school should be a pleasant
place. The attractive building, good equipment, pupils of
the same age for games, and time for study of things as well
as books make the consolidated school a place of interest to
boys and girls. The organized athletics, Hterary and music
work, and social Hfe of such a school have a large influence
in creating interest and securing the best educational results.

These suggestions from Ohio experience should make
plain the details to take into consideration in providing
transportation in any State. A point to remember is that
transportation not only requires good roads but that it
brings them. The community meetings and larger view
will soon secure good roads. We may collect some of the
main principles in the following:

TRANSPORTATION OF PUPILS AT PUBLIC EXPENSE 237

SUMMARY

1. Many consolidated schools with from 3 to 6 or more teachers could

be established in the eastern half of the United States in dis-
tricts of approximately nine square miles, for which public trans-
portation would not be necessary.

2. In districts large enough so that transportation must be furnished,

too great care in its arrangement cannot be exercised. Unsatis-
factory transportation will cause constant dissatisfaction with
the school.

3. Dissatisfaction always results if routes are too long. No route

should be longer than can be covered under average conditions
in an hour, or better, 45 minutes, the transportation wagon or
automobile travelling on a fixed schedule.

4. In order that safe, comfortable, suitable wagons and automobiles

shall be used, they should be purchased by and remain the prop-
erty of the school district.

5. The driver must be a reliable person, able and willing to keep dis-

cipline in his wagon, and have the same power to do so as is given
to teachers in the school building.

6. Transportation cannot wait for good roads; the two come together.

Wherever the roads are so bad that it is not possible to furnish
transportation, they are certainly too bad to ask children to walk.

7. Transportation to public schools has been furnished in the United

States for over 40 years. It can be made entirely satisfactory
from every standpoint. Wherever it has not been satisfactory,
the fault has been the school directors who failed to make proper
arrangement for it. It causes better attendance, it keeps chil-
dren out of mischief on the way to and from school, and it is
safe. Very few accidents have ever happened to children in
school wagons.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. Secure or make a good map of your county, or a part of it, and

locate the best sites for consolidated schools.

2. Trace the transportation routes of each vehicle. Plan for auto-

mobiles if they are feasible.

3. What are the best types of modern roads for your county, and by

what procedure are they obtained?

4. Is the supervision of pupils in the transportation van less im-

portant than on the playground, in the classroom, or at home ?
What virtues may be cultivated in pupils by efficient drivers?

238 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

5. Should pupils with homes far from the routes be encouraged to

build waiting shelter-houses at the roadside, or are these un-
necessary ?

6. How should a school be built to provide for loading and unloading

pupils without exposure?

7. Are parents ever paid for the transportation of their own children ?

Is this desirable?

8. Could the repair of the transportation automobiles be profitably

undertaken by high-school pupils as a phase of science or voca-
tional work?

9. Cite any instances of the use of transportation hacks being used

for the carrying of patrons to social-centre events in the evenings.
Is this feasible?
10. What types of school transportation have failed to give success ?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Monahan — "Consolidation of Schools and Transportation of

Pupils at Public Expense.'* Government Printing Office.

2. Betts and Hall— "Better Rural Schools." Bobbs-Merrill Co.

3. Arp — "Rural Education and the Consolidated School." World

Book Co.

4. Monroe — "Cyclopedia of Education." Macmillan.

5. Cubberley — "Rural Life and Education." Houghton Mifflin Co.

6. Bulletins on transportation and consolidation published by various

State departments of education.

CHAPTER XII
METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. What is a satisfactory cost for a first-class consolidated school, with

auditorium, gymnasium, laboratories, and necessary workrooms
for about three hundred elementary and high-school pupils ?

2. How can the community be brought to wish and to will the con-

solidated-school plan into existence?

3. What is the cost of transportation of pupils per day and per pupil?

4. How does this cost compare with the cost of running a one-room

school ?

5. What would it cost in a consolidation area to provide first-class

one-room schools, and how does this combined cost compare with
that of a first-class consolidated-school plant?

6. Relate the methods used in accomplishing consolidation in a par-

ticular instance of which you have direct or indirect knowledge.

I. In Preble County, Ohio

A Campaign for Consolidation. — The great school code
of Ohio became a law in 19 14. The corner-stone of this
excellent new school code is compulsory county and district
supervision.

Some conditions before the consolidation movement
began in Preble County were: a wealthy agricultural county
with good roads, seven villages with modern schools, many
poor *' box-car," one-room buildings in rural districts, and
only one of the townships with full-time supervision.

Six district superintendents giving full time to supervi-
sion, and all in favor of consolidation, assisted me. Our aim
was to improve the rural schools of the county. Believing
that the strategic point in this movement is consolidation,
we began our campaign.^iSS^ planned to consolidate as

V ^^^ /

240 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

large areas as possible, and in no case has the territory con-
solidated been less than one-half of a congressional town-
ship. If a village was located right, the rural district about
and the village were consolidated.

In conducting our campaign we had a general plan, but
it varied to suit the local conditions. First we sought the
help of the school officials, the teachers, and some influen-
tial patrons. Elections were called upon petition of the
people, and not by the county board of education, nor the
local board of education. This method has two advan-
tages: first, the movement apparently comes from the
people, and second, those who carry the petition become
active supporters, and also learn who favor and who oppose.
Both consohdation and issuance of bonds were submitted
at the same election. This method saves the expense of
two elections.

Our policy was to conduct an educational campaign for
about ten days immediately preceding the election. The
people must be shown the advantages. Of course, we have
those who will not be shown; some who wish to keep taxes
to the lowest limit, who believe that the cheap school is the
best; and some who have so much sentiment for the "little
red schoolhouse" that they can endure no change. Both
superintendents and interested patrons got out and did
personal work from house to house. Some of the campaigns
were so organized that no voter was missed. A card index
was made, and every voter's name was Hsted upon a card.
If he was doubtful, he received several different calls. We
converted some farmers in the corn-field.

Public meetings were held in the schoolhouses. These
meetings were advertised, and in almost every instance drew
a good crowd of interested men and women. Two speakers
were assigned to each meeting. We used superintendents,
available men from the State Department, and patrons.
The people were invited to ask questions and to take part
in the discussions. Some lively meetings were held.

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 24I

About two days before election we mailed every voter
a bulletin which contained a cut and description of the pro-
posed building, gave some of the advantages of consolida-
tion, and furnished financial data to show that they could
build and consoHdate their schools. Sometimes we sent a
personal letter to each voter. We believe these circulars
had great influence.

Jackson township, shown on page 229, had been central-
ized with great success for four years. The transportation
problem there had been worked out to entire satisfaction.
We made good use of this example in our propaganda.

To secure consolidation we stressed these advantages:
A modern building, adequate equipment, better teaching,
larger socialization of the community, better facilities for
play, and a good high school for all.

Good Results. — Consolidation became the fashion in our
county, and the epidemic helped us. Ten elections were
held within five months. Eight new school buildings were
constructed within two years; the ninth has recently been
completed. These school buildings cost from $10,000 to
$60,000 each, and their total cost is $371,000. See page 233.

Eleven consolidated schools in this county are giving
the children the best advantages of a modern education.
These schools make for efficiency by division of labor, they
provide for maintaining good health, they offer opportuni-
ties for good science work through their laboratories, they
provide ample grounds and equipment for play, and through
the auditorium they make possible good community work.

Significant Facts. — The following data are taken from
this year's annual report of the schools in Preble County:

Before Con- Since Con-
County solidation solidation Increase
1914 1917

School property $374,925 $601,120 60%

Volumes in school libraries 14,881 20,836 40%

Enumeration of school youth 5, 13 5 5j076 less

Total enrolment 4,374 4,508 3%

Before Con-

Since Con-

solidation

solidation

Increase

1914

1017

523

698

33%

108

52

less

92

34

less

I

II

1100%

10

91

900%

16

63

400%

112

122

9%

i68

28s

70%

242 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

County

Enrolment in high schools

School buildings used

One-room schools in use

Consolidated schools with high school

Wagons carrying children

Teachers graduates of college or nor-
mal

High-school graduates

Eighth-grade graduates

Domestic Science and Manual Training

Before Con- Since Con-
solidation solidation Increase
1914 1917

Pupils in domestic-science work 121 392 224%

Manual training 61 155 154%

EXfflBITS AT THE CoUNTY FaIR

1914 1917

Value of exhibits $25 $800

Educational hall provided No Yes

Annual County Play Day

Before Con- Since Con-
solidation solidation
1914 1917

People present None 3,000

Entries None 1,494

Different pupils entered None 524

Transfers of Territory by County Board
About 58 square miles.

One village.
Two townships.

Districts Dissolved

Interschool Contests

Baseball, football, basket-baU.
Literary and music, spelling.

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION

243

Play-grounds

Landscaped and part of them planted.
Play apparatus provided.

Teaching

Consolidation of schools is giving us better-trained and more ex-
perienced teachers, with a longer tenure of position. These teachers
working together have all the advantages of close association that
comes from frequent teachers' meetings, and also the advantage of
close supervision.

Teachers who are college graduates .
Teachers who are normal graduates .
Graduates of first-grade high school

One-year certificates

Three-year certificates

Before Con-

Since Con-

solidation

solidation

1914

1917

13

28

3

35

98

124

89

52

16

S6

High-School Education

Before Con-
solidation
1914

High-school enrolment in county 523

Lanier township 22

Jackson township 32

Monroe township 27

Since Con-

solidation

Increase

1917

698

33%

44

100%

65

100%

71

163%

Startling High-School Facts

Washington inrtcon

Graduates — eighth grades in last 4 years 80 60

Number of them in high school 33 55

Per cent going to high school 41 91

Careful investigation by many able men, as stated above, proves
that every day of a boy's high-school education is worth more than
$10. Then the loss to Washington township every year is (47 pupils
at $10 per day for 160 days) $75,200. The money loss in this town-
ship every year is astounding. The loss in happiness and success
in life is a tragedy.

244 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Boys' and Girls' Club Work
14 clubs.
200 members.
3 boys and i girl sent to Washington, D. C.
I boy and 2 girls sent for a week at State university.
$68 in cash prizes distributed.

School Community Meetings
January i, 1917-June i, 1917

Lanier Tp. S°r^n

(ConsoUdated) (Not^Con-

Attendance 2,625 890

Money raised $225.90 $3.75

Jackson Tp. ^^^i^g?"*
' (ConsoUdated) cdSl^dltLi)

Attendance 2,833 657

Money raised $183.20 $10.30

Cost

Subdist.

Monroe Tp. ^"'JiTf''"
(ConsoUdated) (-^.cn^^ii.

dated)

Average annual cost for tuition and trans-
portation $37.62 $50.90

Somers Tp. Somen Tp.
(Before Con- (Since Con-
solidation) solidation)

Average daily attendance 81% 92%

Money spent for education is an investment in boys and
girls. Men are investing more in wheat-sowing that they
may reap larger harvests, and they are putting more money
into the housing, feeding, and breeding of stock that larger
returns may be attained. Our cities and more progressive
villages are making very large investments in the education
of their boys and girls, beheving that no money spent for
the public brings such large returns as that invested in edu-
cation. It is common knowledge that the farmers of Preble
County are very prosperous. Is there any good cause

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 245

why they should not have the best modern school for their
children ?

The country can produce its share of socially efficient
men and women best by providing the best kind of school.
The consolidated school as it will inevitably be developed is
this school. Some of the advantages as given in my recent
annual report are as follows:

II. Advantages of the Consolidated School

Building. — Who can measure the uplifting influence
upon the child who for twelve years goes to school in one of
our beautiful modern consolidated school buildings instead
of going to a dreary one- room school building ? The school-
house should be the best building in the community and
should meet the requirements of a modern school. Such
a building in this twentieth century must consist of more
than one room. Our cities and villages have fine buildings
constructed to carry on the work in education of the age
in which we live. There is something wrong with a com-
munity where you find the average barn more commodious
and better fitted for the purpose for which it was built than
is the schoolhouse. What is said in Chapter IX and the
final chapter of the volume points the way to an ideal
consolidated-school building.

Health. — Our new buildings have regard for the eyesight
of pupils, providing for better lighting than in one-room
schools. The consolidated school has a modern system of
distributing heat evenly over the building. Even yet in
this progressive county one may see in one-room schools
some children roasting near the unjacketed stove and some
freezing near the windows. Our new buildings have excel-
lent systems of ventilation by which air is supplied continu-
ously. The one-room school was constructed without any
provision for ventilation. The consolidated school employs
a janitor who keeps the building clean. The children come

246 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

to school in wagons that are wanned arid ventilated. Their
clothing and feet are dry. They are not exposed to wind,
snow, and rain. The health of our children should be of
prime importance and we should give large attention to
their welfare in the school building.

Morals. — In the new school buildings toilet- rooms are
kept in the best condition. Every thoughtful parent knows
that satisfactory conditions in this matter are highly desira-
ble. Children carried in wagons have no opportunity of
fighting nor hearing bad language on the way to and from
school. One of the greatest difficulties of teachers of one-
room schools is the behavior of children on the way to school
and home. The question of morals is of vital importance
to all.

Beauty. — The beautiful has always been associated with
the good, and the ugly with the bad. The question of beauty
never entered into the construction of the old *' box-car''
one-room school building. To-day people are building more
beautiful houses, barns, and school buildings. The archi-
tectural beauty of our new school buildings and their well-
landscaped grounds will prove to be silent and powerful
forces influencing the characters of the boys and girls.

Teachers. — While there are many good one-room schools
and some capable and experienced teachers are working
therein and doing their best for the children under their
charge, yet the fact is that a large per cent of the teachers
of this class are inexperienced and are poorly equippec?.
Teachers of experience and training leave the one-roor.i
school because of lack of association with other teachers,
and because there are so many grades and classes. The
teachers in a centralized school form a congenial, happy
group. By meeting every day and through discussion of
mutual problems they stimulate one another to the best
efforts. Having one or two grades, they become efficient
in that line of work. This is an age of specialists, and no
teacher should teach more than two, or at the most three

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 247

grades. Children of different ages need different methods
of instruction and leadership and should have teachers
specially prepared for certain grades. In the consolidated
school, the teacher of the primary grades is chosen because
she is naturally fitted to teach little children; the teacher of
the upper grades because he is equipped as a leader of
boys and girls. The increased value of the teaching is un-
told. No teacher with eight grades and the enlarged cur-
riculum demanded in this age can do effective work.

Class Work. — The larger school means larger classes.
One of the most important things in the education of the
child is to come in contact with children of his own age.
In many one-room schools this stimulating influence is en-
tirely lost. One may see class after class called up with
only one or two pupils. Such children are very unfortunate.
Ten to thirty pupils in a class is far better. In the one-room
school the teacher has twenty to thirty classes a day and
has from five to fifteen minutes for a recitation. In our
larger schools the teacher has one or two grades and the
recitation will be twenty to thirty minutes in length. In
the one-room school of eight grades the teacher gives one-
eighth of her time to your child, while in the centralized
school she gives one-half or all of her time to your child.
This fact alone justifies the new plan of giving better schools
to the country children.

Curriculum. — The one-room school has an overworked
teacher, too many classes, and no laboratory facilities. The
consolidated school has teachers qualified for the special
work required by a modern curriculum, has fewer classes
and longer recitations, and has good laboratories. One of
the great faults of the one-room school is the predominance
of memory work taken from the text-book. The fault is
caused by too many classes and an overworked teacher.
In the consolidated school there is opportunity, not alone
to teach text-book facts, but to take up such subjects as
will acquaint the child with his environment. He will learn

248 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

something of the great laws of nature. The boys and girls
who are to mould the rural life of the next generation are
in the rural school to-day, and most of them will go directly
from this school to their life's work. Agriculture, domestic
science, and manual training cannot be taught successfully
in a one-room school. In the new schools the old funda-
mentals will not be neglected, but a new emphasis will be
placed upon them. Education now is not thought of as
mere culture or discipline of the mind. To-day it includes
these and more. It deals more with practical concrete sub-
jects and prepares for vocational life. The centralized
school teaches the ^* three R's" better, gives more culture and
discipline, and also offers the opportunity for study of farm
crops, the farm stock, and the farm home. For ages agri-
culture has been thought of as an art only, but it is a sci-
ence and a business as well. Home-making and agricul-
ture are the biggest vocations in our country and they in-
volve more complicated problems than do any other two
vocations. The influence of the centralized school in offer-
ing a more practical and interesting curriculum cannot be
estimated.

Interest. — Those who are sceptical should visit a con-
solidated school and see the interest on the part of the chil-
dren. Why do so many boys and girls drop out of the one-
room school before completing the work? The answer is:
Few or no playmates of the same age and sex, school work
mostly memory work and from the book, not enough at-
tention from the overworked teacher — witness the carved
desks in the country schools — unattractive building and
grounds, and no high-school provision. The school ought
to be a pleasant place. The attractive building, good equip-
ment, pupils of same age for games, and time for study of
things as well as books make the consolidated school a
place of interest to boys and girls. The organized athletics,
literary and music work, and social life of such a school
have a large influence in creating interest and securing the
best educational results.

A start toward farm carpentry

Bird houses constructed in Preble County schools, Ohio

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 249

At one time it was generally thought that education was
a study of books. To-day we know that the child is edu-
cated by all of his activities and his environment. So we
provide for the best play -and social Hfe, we provide oppor-
tunities for such expressions as will educate, and we give
the child a school life which prepares him for more complete
living. The successful farmer is a man interested in his
farm, the successful business man is one interested in his
business. The consolidated school in every way is suited
to make children interested in their school life.

Play. — Our consolidated and centralized schools are pro-
viding from six to ten acres of land for buildings, play, school
gardens, and other agricultural experiment work. These
schools are putting out playground equipment, such as
swings, sHdes, seesaws, giant stride, and horizontal bars.
Some of this apparatus is made by the manual-training class.
In addition, we find baseball diamonds, basket-ball, lawn-
tennis, and volley-ball. Teachers are more interested and
learn new games to teach the children. In many of the one-
room schools not enough boys are found for a good baseball
game. In fact, there is little organized play, because there
are not enough children of the same age to have a good
game. They stand around in small groups and plan some
mischief. Organized play is a great help in saving our boys
and girls. On stormy days the children play in the gym-
nasium or in play- rooms.

High Schools Made Available. — Clearly it is our duty
in this twentieth century to provide a good high school
within easy reach of every boy and girl. One of the big ad-
vantages of the consolidated system is the provision for a
rural high school. In 19 14 the high-school enrolment in
the Preble County school district was 523, and last year the
enrolment was 698, an increase of 175, or 33 per cent. This
increase is remarkable when it is remembered that the
enumeration of school youth has decreased by 59 in that
time. The great increase is due mostly to consolidation of
schools. Two years ago, before Lanier township central-

250 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ized, she was sending 22 pupils to neighboring high schools,
and now her enrolment is 44, which is just double. Previous
to consolidating her schools, Jackson township had 32 pupils
in high school, and now under the consolidated system she
has 65 pupils in high school. Two years ago the Monroe
township school district had 27 pupils in high school, while
now 71 of the 94 pupils enrolled in the consolidated high
school come from the township district. This is an increase
of 163 per cent. In the light of the times in which we live
these facts are startling. Our progressive farmers are re-
solved that a high school shall be accessible to all.

Probably 90 per cent of the boys and girls in the country
will remain on the farm, so the rural high school should em-
phasize the life of the farm in its curriculum and in its teach-
ing. To a large degree the rural high school should be a
vocational school, preparing for the occupation of the farm
and the farm home. In our cities, schools are preparing
boys and girls for the great occupations of the city. They
are endeavoring to give them the education that prepares
them best for the life a majority of them will lead. A very
large per cent of their pupils will engage in the industries of
the city. Should not the rural high school prepare for the
farm life in place of preparing for college and the profes-
sional life? The emphasis of the curriculum of the rural
high school should be placed on the scientific and industrial
side and not on the Hnguistic and mathematical. One of the
great advantages of the centralized township over those not
centralized is the fact that it gives practically all of their
boys and girls a high-school education.

Let us compare Jackson, a township centralized for four
years, with Washington, a township not centraHzed. Jack-
son township maintains a first-grade high school. Wash-
ington township does not maintain a high school, but within
the township district is the county seat, Eaton, which has a
first-grade high school. In the past four years there have
been graduated from the eighth grade of the Jackson town-

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 25 1

ship school 60 pupils and from the Washington township
schools 80 pupils. Jackson township has 55 of the 60 eighth-
grade graduates in high school, while Washington township
has 33 of her 80 graduates in high school. In these four
years 91 per cent of the Jackson township eighth-grade
graduates have entered high school, while only 41 per cent
of the Washington township pupils have gone to high school.
What is the result? In the past four years in Washington
township, with her one-room schools, 47 pupils were deprived
of a high-school education. These boys and girls are handi-
capped for life. Careful investigation by many able men
proves that every day of a boy's high-school education is
worth more than ten dollars. The financial loss in this
township every year is astounding. The loss in happiness
and success in Hfe is a tragedy. Why is there this differ-
ence? In the consolidated township the children are accus-
tomed to going to the central school, and when they are
ready for the high school they are acquainted and do not
feel timid about entering. In the second place, they are
carried free to the high school. In townships not consoli-
dated they must provide their own conveyance. In some
cases parents cannot afford the cost of keeping an extra
horse for this purpose, and in some cases a girl cannot be
trusted to drive alone five or six miles.

In the larger school there is a better organization and
classification of the work which also is being modernized to
meet the intellectual, industrial, and social needs of rural
community life. In our consolidated schools there are
courses in agriculture, manual arts, domestic science and
household arts, and commercial subjects. In 1914, before
consolidation, we had 121 pupils in domestic-science work
and 61 in the manual-training courses. In 191 7, after con-
solidation, there were 392 pupils taking domestic- science
work and 155 taking manual training, an increase of 224
per cent in domestic science and 154 per cent in manual
training.

252 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Costs and Returns. — Good consolidated schools cost
more money than ©ne-room schools. The houses and barns
being built to-day cost more than they did forty years ago.
The farming implements now used cost more than they did
in the days of the scythe and the cradle. We are buying
expensive automobiles instead of using the cheap convey-
ances of many years ago. Shall we not have a modern
school even though it costs somewhat more?

Money spent for education is an investment in boys and
girls. Men are investing more in wheat- sowing that they
may reap larger harvests, and they are putting more money
into the housing, feeding, and breeding of stock that larger
returns may be attained. Our cities and more progressive
villages are making very large investments in the education
of their boys and girls, believing that no money spent for
the public brings such large returns as that invested in edu-
cation. It is common knowledge that the farmers of our
county are very prosperous. Is there any good cause why
they should not have the best modern school for their
children ?

In comparing the cost of a consolidated-school system
with a one- room system, there are several facts other than
the total cost to be considered. One fact is the per capita
basis for cost, which is an accurate method of comparison.
Let us compare Monroe township, which is centralized,
with the nearest one-room school, sub. district No. 10, in
Washington township. In Monroe township the average
annual cost for both tuition and transportation for each
child in the elementary school is $37.62. In the above-men-
tioned one-room school in Washington township, where the
enrolment is 11, the average annual cost for tuition is
$50.90. Another fact to be kept in mind is that attendance
of children in consolidated schools is much better and more
regular. The attendance in Somers township was 81 per
cent for the last year under the one-room system; the next
year under the consohdated system the attendance was 92

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 253

per cent. With several hundred pupils enrolled an increase
of II per cent in attendance means that the total amount
of schooling was increased many hundreds of days. In one
month one rural school had as many cases of tardiness as
the whole consolidated school had in the whole year. Not
only is there the loss of school attendance but the work of
the school is greatly crippled by the irregular attendance of
children. Another fact to be considered is that boys and
girls remain in school longer. The enrolment of both upper
grades and the high school increases when schools are con-
solidated. In most of our consolidated schools the high-
school enrolment has more than doubled. This increased
attendance in high schools has a money value of almost
unbelievable size. What shall we say of the value to the
boys and girls in greater usefulness and happiness? Still
another fact to be considered in comparing costs is the greater
interest in school work. The value of interest in one's work
cannot be estimated in dollars and cents, and yet it is of
the highest value. Many a child has quit school because
the work was poor and uninteresting. The larger teaching
force, better building and equipment, larger number of
pupils, and more work with things of vital interest as found
in the consolidated school are surely bringing a more abun-
dant Ufe to many communities. Then transportation saves
for parents in clothes and shoe-leather. One mother in a
centralized township in this county estimated that her
family was saved not less than $25 a year in this way. All
of the above facts must be kept distinctly in mind when we
compare costs of consolidated and one-room school systems.
In this progressive age who wants cheap rural schools?

In this chapter there is no space for a discussion of such
value of the consolidated school as building, equipment,
play, auditorium, socialization, better teachers, better class-
work through division of labor, modern curriculum, and
closer supervision. They are treated in other chapters.

In general, it can be asserted truthfully that consolida-

254 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tion improves the whole community. Land values increase
because of better school advantages. Such a school draws
the people of the whole township together and awakens a
deeper interest not only in the school but in every activity
of the community. It helps to keep people in the country.
It brings better roads. The old-time one-room school must
give way to something better, to a more efficient school in
keeping with the progressive age in which we live.

Social. — The consolidated school has an enrolment large
enough to give the social and cultural contact with agree-
able associates necessary for the best development of every
child.

The social life which one time centred around the coun-
try school in spelling-bees, debating, singing-schools, etc.,
has passed. The drift of the country population to the
city is partly social. To-day the social life of the rural
community must be reconstructed. The new social life
will find its best centre in the consolidated school. Here
will be held farmers' institutes, lectures, concerts, socials,
and entertainments of various kinds. The schoolhouse has
been a monument of neglected opportunity. It is used by
about one-fifth of the people about six hours a day for about
half the days of the year. The people pay taxes for the
school and it belongs to them; they should use it more.
It is too valuable to stand idle so much of the time. The
large auditorium and gymnasium offer facilities for gather-
ings, both social and recreational, which cannot be obtained
in the small school. In this day of good roads, telephones,
automobiles, and traction-cars, a township is a social group
no larger in area than was the subdistrict fifty years ago.
The larger social group has many advantages. More talent
is found for conducting social and recreational events, and
the whole township is united as never before. The cen-
tralized school is a great means of developing a spirit of co-
operation among the people of the township. As the people
of the various communities become acquainted at the school

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 255

meetings, a feeling of fellowship and common interest is
developed which is of much value to all. A township li-
brary may be maintained at the school building. The data
given below should be noted for the purpose of comparing
the community work of the consoHdated school and the one-
room school.

Community Meetings. — In the past three years a great
many community meetings have been held by the schools.
With all schools under supervision and nearly all consoli-
dated, the number of community meetings has increased
many hundred per cent, and this movement will increase
in extent and effectiveness. The resulting advantages to
both school and home are invaluable. Some results are en-
tertainment and recreation, intellectual improvement, moral
uplift, social intercourse, encouragement and inspiration in
one's daily vocation. A comparison between townships
with one-room schools and consoHdated townships is very
interesting in showing the value of the consolidated school
in sociaUzing the community. In a period of five months'
time last winter our records show that Twin township with
one two-room and eight one-room buildings had 890 persons
present at community meetings, while Lanier township,
her neighbor on the south, a centraHzed township, had 2,625
present. Compare the amount of money raised to help the
school. The uncentralized township received $3.75 and
the centralized school received $255.90. The two townships
have about the same school population, and are of the same
area.

Washington and Jackson are two adjoining townships.
Washington has eight one-room schools, while Jackson is
centralized. In topography, occupation, and wealth they
are very similar. Washington's school population is just a
little larger. Jackson, the centralized township, held 20
school and community meetings, with an attendance of
2,833, ^^^ received $183.20 to improve the school; Wash-
ington, with her one-room schools, held 18 meetings, with

256

THE CONSOLmATED RURAL SCHOOL

an attendance of 657, and received $10.30 for school improve-
ment.

Every school should have a permanent organization such
as community club, literary society, parent- teachers' associa-
tion, mothers' club, country life club, singing school, read-
ing club, etc. In almost every community there is much
music talent, dramatic talent, and speaking talent going to
waste. And how important it is to give the opportunity of
expressing this talent, especially among young people.

The following brief summary of school and community
meetings held in the schoolhouses in the last five months of
the school year from January i, 191 7, to June i, 191 7, is
taken from reports submitted by the superintendents. The
character of these meetings was quite varied. The more
important meetings were entertainments by the school,
interschool literary contests, illustrated lectures by the
school, community patriotic sings, class plays, commence-
ment exercises, interschool athletic contests, lyceum num-
bers, socials, spelling schools, class parties, teachers' asso-
ciations, junior receptions, parent- teachers' meetings, school

School

Superintendent

Number of
Meetings

Number
Present

Receipts

College Corner

Dixon township

Gasper township

Gratis

L. D. Brouse

J.W.Smith

E. E. McClellan. . .
E. E. McClellan. . .

Reuben Koch

E.E. McClellan...
C. R. Coblentz. . . .
E. E. McClellan. . .
H. A. Hoffman. . . .

L. F. Schieser

Reuben Koch

Reuben Koch

Reuben Koch

C. A. Matheny. . . .
E. E. McClellan. . .
Reuben Koch

10

6
12

5
18

5
20

15
14
22
12

7
18

17
8

I

1,190
960
494
950

1,212
762

2,833
2,625

2,935
2,600

890
1,025

657
6,505
1,415

250

$245.50

86.55

34-65

245.00

6.20

91 50

183 . 20

255 90

270.50

200.00

3-75

36.00

10.30

736.85

200.00

50.00

Harrison township

Israel township

Jackson township

Lanier township

Lewisburg

Monroe township

Twin township

Verona .... ...

Washington township. .

West Alexandria

West Elkton

West Manchester

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 257

exhibits, fanners' improvement associations, mothers' meet-
ings, and school home-comings. Many Red Cross meetings
and farm bureau meetings were held in the school buildings.
In the report below, lyceum lectures are given if the lyceum
course was conducted by the school. Admission was charged
for some of the meetings and the receipts are for such meet-
ings. Of course, many of the meetings were free. One
school used 800 slides with their stereopticon in community
work.

Supervision. — The consolidated school has the advantage
of more and closer supervision. In such a school the super-
intendent may inspect the work of the teacher every day.
He can give the advice and help to the teacher just when
it is needed. He can take care of cases of discipline at once.
The superintendent of the one-room schools necessarily
must lose much time in travelling to and from schools, and
he cannot be in as close touch with the work as the superin-
tendent of the consolidated school.

The above facts must be kept distinctly in mind when
we compare costs of consolidated and one-room school
systems. In this wealthy country and in this progressive
age, who wants cheap schools?

Transportation. — When consolidation is first broached
in a community, it is found that conveyance of the children
is responsible for much of the opposition. Many fail to
see the numerous advantages of the larger school which
can be secured only by conveying the children. As shown
in the preceding chapter, where consolidation has been
tried for a few years, 90 to 95 per cent of the patrons
give it their hearty support. This system has been thor-
oughly tried out in many States and is proving a great
success.

Some children live two miles from the one-room school.
Who has not seen them trudging home through mud and
snow as the shades of night were falling? A prominent
farmer in Washington township near the Monroe line lives

258 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

two miles from the nearest subdistrict school in his town-
ship and four and one-half miles from the Monroe town-
ship centralized school. He recently said that his boy
started for school in the morning at the same time a Mon-
roe township school wagon came past his place. The boy
arrived at school about the same time the wagon reached its
destination. In the evening his boy arrived home about
ten minutes before the wagon arrived. This farmer at one
time opposed centralization, but now has petitioned to be
transferred to the Monroe consolidated school nearly five
miles away.

It is rather strange that farmers living within a few
miles of transportation routes of consolidated schools will
not go near enough to investigate rumors about unsatisfac-
tory hauling of school children, but will beUeve some wild
statement of some irresponsible person about transportation
in such a system. No sensible person expects perfection
in a system that involves so many persons and conditions.
On the other hand, let us not forget the disadvantages of
walking to the one- room school.

A route travelled by a school bus drawn by a team should
not be over six miles long from the place where the first
child enters the wagon. If possible it should be less. No
child should enter the school wagon earher than seven
o'clock, standard time. On shorter routes the time should
be later. Wagons should not vary in the time of starting
regardless of roads and weather. It is better that the open-
ing of school be delayed a few minutes than for wagons to
be irregular in time of starting. Every parent should have
a time schedule at home showing exactly when the wagon
is due to arrive at his home. Many wagons in our county
run so regularly that they are not more than two or three
minutes off schedule for many weeks at a time.

It is likely that in a few years most of the children in
this county will be carried to school in motor school cars.
The motor-car has many advantages over the wagon drawn

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 259

by horses. Of course, the chief advantage is that a route
can be travelled by the motor-car in less than half the time
it takes a team. Such cars are being used successfully in
several States where roads are not as good as they are in
Preble County.

In our centralized townships more than 60 per cent of the
children ride but three miles or less. The children like to
ride. The wagons are enclosed with glass sides, have
cushioned seats, and are heated and ventilated. The chil-
dren are protected from cold, rain, snow, and mud.

Drivers of wagons sit inside and have the same control
over pupils as the teacher and are under bond to give ser-
vice according to contract. The drivers should be men
carefully selected.

Transportation of children does away with fighting, bad
language, and other misconduct on the way to and from
school.

There is a saving to parents in clothes and shoe-leather.
One mother in a centralized township in this county esti-
mated that their family was saved not less than twenty-five
dollars a year in this way.

To convey children to school makes the attendance far
better. Hear what one farmer says: "Think of the little
children plodding schoolward in cold and wet and mire —
when they go at all! Then count up the number of days
they are kept home altogether because of bad roads and
severe weather ! " Read what the records show in one town-
ship of this county the next year after the schools were
consolidated: "The consolidated system of managing the
schools showed many improvements over the old way. One
of these was in attendance. The attendance the last year
of the rural schools was 81 per cent, while this year it was
92 per cent — an increase of 11 per cent. Another was in
regard to tardiness. During the last year of the rural schools
in one month in one of the schools there were thirty-three
cases of tardiness. This year, under the consolidated sys-

26o THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tern, we had scarcely that many for the entire year." Who
can figure the value of such an increase in attendance and
punctuality ?

In general, it can truthfully be asserted that consolida-
tion improves the entire township or consolidation area.
Land values increase because of better school advantages.
Such a school draws the people of the whole township to-
gether and awakens a deeper interest not only in the school
but in every activity of the community. It helps to keep
people in the country. It brings better roads.

The old-time one-room school must give way to some-
thing better, to a more efficient school in keeping with the
progressive age in which we live. The answer is consoli-
dation.

III. In Randolph County, Indiana

Randolph County is situated in the east-central part
of Indiana. Its surface is somewhat level, being, however,
easily drained, making good roads easy to secure.

Consolidation first began in this county at Losantville,
Nettle Creek township. The school authorities thought it
wise to transport two small district schools to this place.
Although this brought about a storm of opposition, the ex-
periment was tried and has proved a great success. The
building was erected in 1905, and is of concrete, costing
$14,000. It has since been equipped at a cost of about
$1,000, including desks, globes, maps, library, laboratories
for manual training, cooking, sewing, and agriculture. For
the first time in the history of the county schools the flush
system of toilets was installed in a township building. A
high school was established with a three years' course of
six months each. This has been increased to a four years'
course of eight months, and is now a commissioned school,
meeting state requirements. From the very first this school
has been a success, which is shown by the fact that 94 per

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 261

cent of the eighth-year graduates have entered high schools.

The school corporation of Lynn was laid down, and the
township took charge of its school and built a six-room
building at a cost of about $24,000. At the dedication of
this building Doctor Hurty, of the State Board of Health, in
making an address, spoke of the "large and commodious
building, sanitary in every part, large enough to meet the
needs of the community for years." The people of the com-
munity, realizing the advantages of such a school, abandoned
two of the district schools, and it became the duty of the
same Doctor Hurty to condemn the building because of its
lack of room in 1909. A six-room addition was built to
meet the growing needs of this school, but again we find
an insufficiency of room, as the building is now crowded in
every part. This shows the importance of planning for
all extensions at the start, an object attained readily by
means of the one-story school as shown in Chapter IX.
Laboratories for physics, botany, agriculture, manual train-
ing, sewing, and cooking are installed. From a school re-
quiring but six teachers and having a high-school course
of three years this one has quickly grown to a school requir-
ing thirteen teachers, and is commissioned. The enrol-
ment of eighth-year graduates has increased from 80 per
cent to 97 per cent.

In 191 2 five districts in the north part of this same town-
ship petitioned the trustee to abandon the district schools
and consolidate them. To this end the Beech Grove, a
$15,000 five-room building, was erected in 191 2.

In 1908 a four-room dilapidated, insanitary fire- trap of
a schoolhouse in Greensfork township gave way to a mod-
ern ten-room building. This building is not only sanitary
and modern in every particular, but is an architectural
beauty. It is situated in a maple-grove near the centre of
the township, and accommodates the pupils from six dis-
tricts.

The high school maintained here has grown from a three

262 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

years' course of six months to a four years' course of eight
months, and was commissioned in 191 1. The per cent of
attendance of the eighth-year graduates has increased from
60 per cent to 97 per cent since the erection of this build-
ing.

In 1908 the trustee of White River township found him-
self facing the problem of several small schools and poor
buildings in the western part of his township. It was
deemed advisable to build a consolidated school. To this
end a four- room building was erected at a cost of $14,000.
Many people looked upon it as a foolish undertaking, as it
is situated entirely remote from any town or village. In
fact, at the dedication of this building, known as the "Lin-
coln," prophets were heard to say that the time would never
come when the building would be half filled. This school
began with an enrolment of 43. Its advantages were soon
seen by the people of the surrounding districts, and the fol-
lowing year three heavily populated districts petitioned to
be abandoned and transported to this school. Many others
from surrounding districts, also, seeing its advantages, trans-
ported their children at their own expense. This reduced
the attendance in the other schools until three went down
for lack of attendance. The high school was established in
1 9 10, and is now commissioned.

The experiment was so successful and the attendance
so large that the building soon became inadequate. As
some of the high-school children were transported from the
east end of the township, it was thought that the situation
might be relieved by erecting another large building in the
eastern part of the township. This was done in 191 1, but
so great was the demand and need of more room in the
"Lincoln," that 97 patrons out of loi petitioned the trus-
tees and advisory board to double the capacity of the school
building. This was done in the summer of 191 2, and in-
stead of a failure, as was predicted by some, we find it a
ten-room building equipped for botany, agriculture, manual

I WASHINGTON

3 NEWVORK

4 CALIfORNtA

5 CONNECTICVn
b OHIO

7 N£W JERSEY

8 ILLIN015

9 colorado

10 Indiana

1 1 RHODE. I5LAWD

12 VEPMONT

»3 NEW HAMPSHIRE I

14 UTAH
J5 OREQDN

16 MONTANA

17 MICHIGAN

15 N &AKDTA
19 IDAHO

» MINNESOTA

21 IOWA

2^ MAINE.

a PENN5YLVAWIA

14 KAN5A5

W/////Ay/////A ^'/m.v''/v^vy^^M
\w//XA\v/?///Ay///jm I

v//y///A/ \y/////AV//////A\

f^'^^fWIW^\'m<mA-y//////A

is NEBRASKA
Zb 5 DAKOTA
^T NLVADA
2fi WkiCONSlKI
10 WYOMING

30 ARIZONA

31 OKLAHOMA

32 MCSSOU^I
35 W VIRGINVA

34 FLORIDA

35 DELAWAPE

36 MARYLAND

37 TtNNE5St£

38 TEXAS

39 IO0I3IANA

40 NEW MEXICO

41 VIRGINIA

42 KLNTOCKY
4i ARKANSAS

44 GEORGIA

45 M»^*^^PP»
^ N CAROLINA

47 C). CARDL»NA

48 ALABAMA

Rank of States in Each of Ten Educational Features, igio.
White indicates that the State ranks in the highest 12 of the 48 — Black ranks
in the lowest 12.

263

264 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

training, sewing, cooking, and attended by 257 pupils.
There are five acres in the school lot. This does not in-
clude a one-acre lot upon which the school residence is
located.

The other building referred to in the above paragraph is
known as the ''McKinley," and is situated on a six-acre
lot one mile east of Winchester. It is an eight-room build-
ing, costing $28,000, modern in every particular, and fully
equipped for all the needs of a modern school. Pupils of
seven abandoned schools are being transported to this
building. The enrolment for the current year is 215.
The high school maintained here is also commissioned.

For five years previous to the establishment of the town-
ship high schools in this township the enrolment of eighth-
year graduates was 53 per cent. Since these high schools
have been started, 93 per cent of the eighth-year graduates
have been enrolled in the high school.

In 1909 Parker abandoned its school corporation, and its
management was assumed by Monroe township. A new
building was necessary. Four acres of ground near town
were purchased by the trustee, and a building costing $34,500
was erected. This is also well equipped, maintains a com-
missioned school, and has twelve teachers. The children in
the western half of the township are transported by wagons
and interurban trolley-car to this school. This building is
equipped for manual training, sewing, cooking, botany,
agriculture, and physics. The per cent of attendance of
eighth-year graduates has increased from 67 per cent to 90.
The children in the eastern half of the township are trans-
ported to Farmland joint consolidated school. This build-
ing was erected in 1908 at a cost of $45,000. It is equipped
similarly to the one just described.

The banner year for schoolhouse construction was 19 10,
when three townships erected consolidated buildings.

Green township erected a six-room $19,000 building upon
a three-acre school lot in the centre of the township.

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 265

This was the first township in the county to have complete
consolidation. All of the eight schools were abandoned and
transported to the central school. For five years previous
to the establishment of this school but 21 per cent of its
eighth-year graduates enrolled in high school. This low
per cent is perhaps due to the fact that no high schools were
near this township. The growth of this school has been
remarkable, and a four years' commissioned high school is
maintained. The per cent of attendance of the eighth-
year graduates has increased from 21 to 92 per cent.

Jackson township is another that built in the year 19 10.
Its building was erected in the centre of the township, and,
like the others, is modern in every particular. It had six
rooms and was built at a cost of $18,000. Two rooms were
occupied the first year, but in 191 2, every nook and corner
being filled, a three-room addition was built. This build-
ing, like the others in the county, is complete in every
respect. Consolidation of the township is complete. The
high school is commissioned and has an attendance of 63
pupils.

Ward township had a high school at Saratoga previous
to the year 19 10, but Saratoga is in the extreme corner of
the township, which made the high school inaccessible to
most of the children of the township. Two schools aban-
doned for lack of attendance, together with three abandoned
by petition, were centraUzed in the "Jefferson," near Deer-
field, in the western part of the township. This building
has six classrooms and two recitation rooms, and was
built at a cost of $17,000. The high school is now commis-
sioned and is growing very rapidly. The attendance of
eighth-year graduates in the territory covered by this school
has increased from 31 per cent to 92 per cent. An addition
is now being built.

In the spring of 191 1 the State Board of Health con-
demned the joint school building between Nettle Creek and
West River townships at Modoc, and the trustees of these

266 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

townships built a seven-room building at a cost of $18,000.
During the summer three district schools petitioned to be
abandoned and consolidated with the school at Modoc.
The high school, which had been a two years' course of seven
months, was put upon a commissioned basis immediately,
and has grown from an attendance of 1 5 to 40. The sqhool
is now commissioned, and the per cent of enrolment of
eighth-grade graduates in the territory covered by this
school has increased from 68 per cent to 96.

At the same time in which the Modoc school building
was condemned another structure in West River township
at Huntsville was also condemned, but the Board of Health,
realizing that a township would be burdened by erecting
two buildings during the same year, extended the time of
condemnation to 191 2. In the summer of 191 2 a four- room
building was erected at Huntsville at a cost of $15,000.
This school, like the one at Modoc, has been increased from
a two years' course of seven months and placed upon a
commissioned basis. Pupils of four abandoned schools are
being transported to this school, leaving but two district
schools in the township. The eighth-year enrolment has
increased from 68 per cent to 92 per cent.

In the spring of 191 2 four districts in the central part of
Wayne township petitioned to be abandoned and consoli-
dated in a central school. To this end five acres of ground
were purchased and a contract let for a seven-room build-
ing at a cost of $23,000. The old school building is converted
into a teacherage and is occupied by the principal of the
school. The school has an attendance of 225. The high
school is commissioned, with an attendance of 40. The per
cent of enrolment in the high school has increased from
44 per cent to 95. A seven- room building is now being
built in the northern part of this same township. All of
the district schools have been abandoned.

The last building to be constructed is in Stony Creek
township. This is an eight-room building, like the other

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 267

schools, equipped in every particular for complete com-
munity service.

Construction. — In mentioning the number of rooms in
each of the buildings named above we have made no at-
tempt to enumerate such rooms as might be termed recita-
tion, library, laboratory, rest, or play rooms. Each build-
ing has from two to six such rooms, which are as valuable
in their place as the rooms mentioned in the description.
During the war building ceased, of course.

These buildings have been built according to the rules
and regulations of the State Board of Health, as to lighting,
heating, and ventilating. The heating is by furnace and
steam, the ventilation being by fans. Automatic regulation
is installed in most of these buildings, thus insuring a con-
stant temperature. The flush system of toilets is made
possible by cesspools, which are easily drained, and which
have proved very satisfactory.

The cost given is in most cases the contract price, and
does not include any improvements or equipment.

In some cases the old school buildings are used for barns
and in others new barns have been built. These are used
for the horses of the hack drivers and of children who fur-
nish their own transportation.

These barns are constructed so that by removing a
temporary stall the school hacks may be stored during the
summer.

Transportation. — The greatest problem in consolidated
schools is the transportation of the children. The testi-
mony in preceding chapters is convincing and sufficient.
Emphasis has been laid on securing the best men as drivers
with the best teams to be had, and these attached to the
best hacks possible. Too great care cannot be taken to
insure the best service in this line. The hack routes must
be as short as possible, so that children may be in the
wagons for a minimum period only. The hacks should be
commodious, warm, and well ventilated. To this end the

268 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

trustees of this county are purchasing only hacks that have
glass sides and ventilators. They should be heated by
coal-stoves and thus eliminate any fumes.

The glass sides give good opportunity for ventilation and
insure plenty of Hght, both of which are not only essential
to good health but are conducive to good deportment.
Hack drivers who formerly drove the hacks with curtained
sides report that the discipline in the modern hacks is
much better. This is due largely to the fact that the hacks
have plenty of light, and that the children can see over the
country as they pass along. This is also an insurance
against accidents while crossing railroads.

The hacks used here have double floors, which also adds
much to the comfort of the children.

To reiterate, good roads are a necessity to successful
transportation. Since these hacks have to go over the roads
at all times of the winter, they are equipped with wheels
having two-and-one-fourth-inch tires, to prevent any un-
necessary wear upon the road. Hack routes, like mail
routes, bring about good roads, since the best service is
only possible under the most favorable conditions.

Only men of the highest moral worth should be employed
as drivers. As much care should be exercised in the selec-
tion of a hack driver who has charge of the children to and
from school as in the teacher who has charge of them while
in school. The best of men can qnly be secured when the
position pays the price demanded by a first-class man.
Bids for driving a hack should never be taken by a trustee,
as this brings about unsatisfactory complications.

The rules and regulations of the hack service should be
a part of the contract into which the hack driver enters
and in which he gives bond for the successful performance
of the work. The contract here shown is the one used in
this county, and attempts to reach and overcome some of
the difficulties encountered in the past.

Each hack driver is required to make a daily report to

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 269

the principal of the school. This not only secures his co-
operation but the children in this way learn of their re-
sponsibility to the driver. A report is also required of each
driver to the county superintendent in order that he may be
made acquainted with prevailing conditions.

Community Centres. — These buildings are constructed
for a broader purpose than mere school buildings. They
have become the centres of community interests because of
their facihties for the accommodation of public gatherings.
Many of the townships have no other public buildings of
sufficient size to accommodate general meetings of the com-
munity. Without exception these buildings have audi-
toriums which are made by combining two to four rooms,
and sometimes the corridor. Folding-doors of unusual height
are used for this purpose. These auditoriums vary in size,
depending on the size of the building, but in most instances
will seat 300 to 600 people. These facihties have brought
about many entertainments such as are given in lecture
courses of high quaUty. Commencements, township insti-
tutes, both teachers' and farmers' poUtical meetings, Sunday-
school conventions, farmers' organizations, parents' and
teachers' meetings — in fact, all meetings found in any high-
grade community are being held in these buildings. This
has brought about a closer relation between patrons, chil-
dren, and the schools, and this alone is well worth the extra
cost of any auditorium.

These schools have also brought about a higher appre-
ciation of school work beyond the eighth grade. Families
are now represented in the high schools of the townships
which were never represented before. Children no longer
discuss the question of stopping at the eighth grade, be-
cause they have in their own midst an institution of higher
learning. We know of no more convincing proof of the
above-mentioned influences than a reference to the statistical
report of this county. In 1908-9, the year before these
schools were started outside the towns, this county had 371

270 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

eighth-grade pupils enrolled, 61 high-school pupils, in com-
missioned high schools. In 191 5-1 6, by a strange coinci-
dence, the report shows the same number of eighth-grade
pupils, but the enrolment in the high school has in-
creased from 61 to 657. Eighty-seven per cent of the
pupils of the townships of the county are in consolidated
schools.

This influence not only reaches to those of the eighth
year, but extends entirely throughout the grades, and the
general attitude of these lower grades toward the, schools
and school problems is perceptibly better. As one reflects
upon the schools of the past and compares them with those
of the present with all their advantages, the question arises :
"What great things are in store for the children of the next
generation?"

IV. Jordan Consolidated Rural High School

The Jordan school district is situated in the southern
part of the fertile Salt Lake Valley, nine miles south of
Salt Lake City, Utah, and embraces within its boundaries
2,800 square miles of territory, which includes the follow-
ing communities: Bingham, Riverton, Sandy, South Jordan,
Union, West Jordan, Bluffdale, Butler, Crescent, Draper,
Granite, Herriman, Lark, and Midvale; it is traversed by
the Oregon Short Line, Denver and Rio Grande, Bingham
and Garfield, San Pedro, Los Angeles, and Salt Lake Rail-
roads, and the Orem Electric Interurban Line.

The district is reached and traversed for a short distance
by the Utah Light and Power Railway Company, which is
the street railroad operating in and around Salt Lake City.
There are 100 miles of railroad in the district. The as-
sessed valuation of the district in 19 18 was $49,000,000;
population estimated, 20,000; the school population was

5.307-

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 271

The school district maintains two high schools, the Jor-
dan high school at Sandy and the Jordan high school at
Bingham. The latter accommodates the students of the
two mining towns of Bingham, population 5,000, and
Lark, population 500; the remaining part of the district
being largely agricultural, supports the Jordan high school
at Sandy.

The building shown elsewhere is the home of the Jordan
high school at Sandy. It stands near the geographical
centre of the Jordan district, the southern part of Salt Lake
County. It is 235 feet long by 166 wide and 45 feet high.
It contains 40 large, well-lighted rooms, adapted to various
high-school acti\dties. The auditorium is 60 feet by 90
feet, has a large stage, a commodious balcony, and is
equipped with 900 opera-chairs of the best design. It is
well adapted for assemblies and dramatic activities. The
gymnasium is 60 by 90 feet, the standard size, and has a
balcony for spectators, a balcony music-stand, and com-
modious dressing-rooms and showers adjoining, for both
boys and girls. The building is well adapted to social
and physical activities. The study hall is a well-lighted
room containing 100 seats of the best modern type; ad-
joining the study hall is a small but very choice library.
Besides the rooms described, there are 35 rooms adapted to
recitation and laboratory work. These have been especially
designed for domestic science, domestic art, mechanic arts,
agriculture, physics, chemistry, biology, and other class-
room activities. The building is thus well adapted for
modern high-school activities.

The heating and the ventilating plants are likewise well
equipped. The former has two 80 horse-power boilers that
are fed by electric stokers. The latter has a large electric
fan connected by air-ducts with all the rooms. The boilers
heat the rooms by means of steam radiators, while the fan
draws in pure air from a height of 25 feet on the outside, and
sends it wanned to all parts of the building. The tempera-

272 THE CONSOLroATED RURAL SCHOOL

ture is regulated automatically, so that it ranges constantly
between 65 and 68 degrees Fahrenheit.

The campus has twenty- three acres of ground. This is
devoted to agriculture and to athletics. A small model
dairy farm is maintained in connection with the courses
in agriculture. Football-courts, tennis-courts, baseball dia-
mond, and running courses are laid off for use in athletics
and sports. Around the building the ground is devoted
to appropriate landscape-gardens. On one corner of the
campus is a new brick cottage for the principal and another
for the superintendent of schools; another corner is occu-
pied by the custodian, who is engaged the year round and
supervises the building and grounds.

This plant is that of a consolidated rural high school.
Located in the open country as it is, it is not in any sense
local. The nearest community, Sandy, is one mile away.
Other communities that patronize the school range from
one up to twelve miles distant. These communities sepa-
rately are too small to maintain a first-class modern high
school; conjointly in consolidation they have estabhshed
one of the largest and best high-school plants in the
State.

The cost of this plant has been high. To date the sum
expended is about $165,000. When completed it will go
over $200,000. This could not be met even by all the
prosperous communities of this district by direct taxation,
so the district was bonded, thus giving the generation that
receives the educational benefit an opportunity to help pay
the expenses. Consolidation and bonding thus enable the
building of big institutions without the assumption of an
unbearable burden.

This building will accommodate 750 students. It will
probably meet the needs of the district for the next eight or
ten years. The school now enrolls about 400 students.
We present herewith the names of the contributing towns
with distance from the school and approximate population.

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION

273

Town

Distance in Miles

Approximate
Population

Midvale

Union

Butler

Granite

Sandy

Crescent . . . .

Draper

Bluffdale

Riverton ....

Herriman

South Jordan
West Jordan.
Welby

3
3
6

5

I

3

5
1
6
12
3
S
7

1,100
700
400

275
1,07s

350
900
250

975
300
600
900
100

The transportation is free and is carried on by the dis-
trict mostly in automobile vans.

Coming as these students do from small communities,
ranging from 1,000 inhabitants down to 100, high-school
opportunities would not have been accessible to them had
it not been for consolidation.

The school is large enough to give breadth of scope to
its activities. It has the usual social and athletic activities.
In addition it has a broad curriculum, flexible enough so
that students can find something to fit their native bent.

The school here represented and all the elementary
schools that feed it are administered by a board of five
broad-minded men who work not for particular constitu-
encies, but for the people of the entire county.

Under the old district system over fifty men as trustees
would have administered separate schools without -even a
possibility of high-school work. This administration of
the education of all these communities with one central
high school by a board of five big men who engage a com-
petent superintendent is attained in these rural communi-
ties only by means of consolidation.

Consolidation thus enables rural communities to estab-

274 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

lish modern high schools. The plant including campus,
building, and equipment is of the best type. The curriculum
is broad enough in its scope to give opportunity for the
development of individuality. The curriculum and social
activities of the school are adapted to the environment and
to the needs of the community. Without consolidation
high schools of any sort are beyond reach of the smaller
communities. The so-called one and two teacher high
schools in the slightly larger communities are not modern,
because, even if the administrators are converted to modern
ideas, they are limited in their power and cannot embody
the features named above that characterize a modern high
school. Schools may exist in the twentieth century in coun-
try or in city and not be modern. But, with the proper
view-point, and with an enabling law such as is now in effect
in our State, a modern high school ought shortly to be within
reach of every eligible child in Utah. For other counties
and States it may be better to have several consolidated
schools in each county and not have such large, separate
county high schools, but here the people nearly all live in
the towns mentioned, not in the open country, and the little
children are well cared for in the elementary town schools.
We have met the situation as we found it, and have an
almost unique high school.

V. The Sargent CoNSOLroATED School and Com-
munity Church, Colorado

One day in the simimer of 191 6 more than 100 people
from two communities in Rio Grande County who were
interested in consolidation visited the La Jara consolidated
school. The trip was made in autos and some of the people
came more than 50 miles. They took lunch-baskets and
spent the day inspecting this remarkable school. At noon
they were served hot coffee and cocoa by the domestic-sci-
ence class. After a pleasant and profitable day they re-

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 27$

turned home. One of the communities is situated eight
miles north of Monte Vista. All were convinced of the
merits of consolidation. An election was immediately called
in five districts and carried by an overwhelming majority.
By this time it was too late in the summer to think of get-
ting a new building ready for the approaching school year,
so school was opened in the old buildings while the school
board was completing its plans. In February, 191 7, a bond
issue for $35,000 carried without opposition, a competent
architect was employed, plans were drawn, a ten-acre site
was donated, the contract was let, and building operations
were begun. In the summer following, a superintendent
was employed who had already made a reputation for start-
ing one famous consolidated school, and from this time on
everything moved like clock-work. People living in ad-
joining districts saw this fine school nearing completion
and were anxious to share its benefits. In a short time four
large transfers of territory from contiguous districts were
added by petition, making the equivalent of nine districts
in the enlarged consolidation. Never in the history of
rural-school improvement in Colorado have such united
efforts been put forth to complete a school building, nor
has such enthusiasm been displayed or more complete and
hearty co-operation been shown in any community than
there was in this case.

It takes time to complete such a building as this, and
it was not until January, 191 8, that the new building was
occupied, being then unfinished. It was dedicated and
christened April 23, at which time fifty autos were parked
on the campus, and more than 300 enthusiastic country
people were packed into the large school and community
auditorium to witness the event to which they had looked
forward with so much pleasure.

This fine modern $35,000 school building was scarcely
finished when another bond issue for $18,000 was voted.
From this, an eight-room building was erected to serve as

276 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

a home for the superintendent. A ten-room teacherage
for the other eight teachers and a garage 40 by 70 feet
were constructed and a gymnasium was finished in the
school basement.

In this, one of the most modern and up-to-date rural-
school plants in the United States, $72,000 have already
been expended. These people have not only provided for
the present, but have anticipated their future needs for
years to come.

The building itself is complete in every detail. It is a
beautiful structure, well designed for all the Unes of work
that should be carried on in a modern rural school. It
has standard classrooms sufficient to accommodate 500
children. It has a large school and community auditorium
for both school and neighborhood meetings. It has well-
equipped agricultural and domestic-science laboratories and
a manual-training shop, these three lines of work being in-
troduced the first year. Thirty boys, each of whom owns
a registered gilt, have organized a pig club. Already pig-
pens and chicken-coops dot the rear of the ten-acre school
site. A gasoHne-engine furnishes water under pressure for
drinking-fountains, lavatories, and toilets, and generates
electricity for lighting the building as well as for charging
the storage batteries of the auto-busses used in transporta-
tion. It is still further utilized as laboratory equipment in
the study of electricity and auto repair.

Two hundred and eight children enrolled the first year,
30 of these being in the new high school.

About 350 school children now live in the district, and
it is estimated that over 300 of these will be in school next
year with about 50 of the number in the high school.

Last year 180 children were transported to and from
school in five large Studebaker busses, a few riding 14 miles
each way. Three more busses of the same kind have been
purchased, and next year at least 300 children will be trans-
ported.

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION

277

All of the nine teachers, each of whom has had either
college or normal training, are nicely and comfortably pro-
vided for in the two large new teacher ages. No more
itinerant teachers, coming into the district Monday morn-
ing and returning to some town early Friday afternoon,

Basement Plan of Sargent Consolidated School.

will be tolerated in this district. They will be expected
to live in the district and to identify themselves with the
community life therein. Moreover, each teacher will be
employed because of special preparation and fitness for
work in a rural school and rural community. The superin-
tendent is a young man with a vision and has already earned
a reputation as a community builder.

This school has also been approved for federal aid in
home economics under the Smith-Hughes Act.

Community Co-Operation. — The people of this remarka-
ble district have not been content in just improving their
school, even though that improvement far surpasses any

First Floor Plan.

1

U

Second Floor Plan.

Sargent Consolidated School, Monte Vista, Colorado.
John J. Huddart, Architect.

278

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION 279

other district of which we know, but they have already
actually gone clear *'over the top'' in community co-opera-
tion. As soon as the new building was occupied, they or-
ganized a union Sunday-school, which grew in attendance
rapidly until on Easter Sunday the enrolment was 299, the
average Sunday attendance being in the neighborhood of
225, with a men's Bible class of 40, a women's Bible class
of the same number, and a cradle roll of 30, which seems
to guarantee future attendance.

The next step was the organization of a union com-
munity church. A pastor who gives his full time to this
field was called and his salary of $1,500 was raised by vol-
untary subscriptions. He reached the field in April, 191 8,
and began work at once. The church organization was
perfected in May, and on June 9, 70 members, representing
some ten or a dozen different denominations, were received
into membership, 11 of these being upon confession of faith.
On July 7, 20 more were received into membership in the
new church, making a total of 90 members. Twenty-four
of these are adult males and 38 adult females. There is
also a Christian Endeavor Society with an attendance of 50.

This magnificent rural-school building is used five days
in the week during the school term for the regular school
work, and on Sunday for Sunday-school and church services.
The large assembly-room is used for preaching services and
the classrooms for the Sunday-school classes. It is ad-
mirably adapted to serve this double purpose, thereby effect-
ing a great saving to the people of the community, who do
not need to expend additional money for a separate building
which could only be used a few hours each week. Besides,
the fact that the church services were to be held in the school-
house, a neutral building, open to and belonging to every-
body in the district, made it easier for the people to forget
their denominational differences and unite in one organiza-
tion, to worship at one altar and to bring up their children
in the "fear and admonition of the Lord," instead of trying

28o THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

to maintain some half-dozen competing organizations, none
of which could ever hope to be strong enough to be self-
supporting. For if any one of these had ever tried to
erect a building of its own it must have solicited the sup-
port of the entire community, and then have had a building
similar to some of the old schoolhouses which they have
already abandoned.

One year ago this community had only one-room schools,
a struggling little Sunday-school with but few in atten-
dance, and no church organization. There was no central
community meeting-place and no community solidarity.
To-day these people have a modern school plant and an
efficient school organization, a community church and
Sunday-school that all can take pride in helping to support,
and the entire community is learning to co-operate in the
solution of its problems. The parsonage has been com-
pleted, making the total cost of this real consolidated-school
plant to date about $72,000. The people seem to be a unit
in the support of both the school and church, and no objec-
tion has yet been raised to bond issues or tax levies. The
people seem to have real inspiration, the kind that is con-
tagious, for other communities near by, seeing the good work
already accomplished by this district, are planning to do
likewise, and one large consolidation north and two south
of it are now developing. This is perhaps the most con-
spicuous example of complete community co-operation that
can be found in Colorado. They have made more real
substantial progress in two years since the movement first
started than many rural communities make in a quarter of
a century.

VI. Consolidation Plan Makes Good

Each successive year for nine years consolidation has
become more favorably fixed in the minds of the people
until now, in Granite school district, , Salt Lake County,

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLmATION 281

Utah, opposition to it is considered a thing of the past.
Looking backward upon these years of experience, it can
be said that consolidation has accomplished, among other
things, the following:

1. Established a deeper confidence in the schoolman's
most vitalizing agency.

2. Brought first-class schools to the country pupils and
overcome the necessity of country pupils leaving their
homes to go to city schools.

3. Made homes in the country more desirable and
thereby raised the value of rural real estate.

4. Erased boundary-lines and worked for the common
good of all the people.

5. Stimulated the " getting- together " habit.

6. Introduced the "transportation idea" and supplied
better means of travel.

7. Caused, and is causing, better roads to be built.

8. Equahzed taxation for school purposes and the ad-
vantages which result therefrom.

9. Provided more funds for school purposes.

10. Expended school money more judiciously.

11. Awakened as keen, or keener, interest in school elec-
tions, though non-partisan, as in general elections.

12. Eliminated a multitude of district trustees of but
ordinary qualifications.

13. Created in their place a board of education con-
sisting of five very competent members.

PI4. Abandoned poor, isolated buildings.
15. Erected new, modern, central school buildings, with
improved lighting, heating, and ventilating systems.

16. Furnished these buildings with large halls, tinted
walls, and ample blackboards; and equipped them with
pianos, single desks, working-tables, and other desirable
furniture, as well as adequate apparatus, material, and
supplies.

17. Kept these buildings in first-class condition.

282 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

1 8. Expanded school grounds to a size which encour-
ages organized outdoor play and the planting of school-
gardens.

19. Graded these grounds, put down cement walks, and
installed sanitary drinking-fountains.

20. Sought the assistance of the ablest specialists in
rural education that our nation affords.

21. Introduced a high quality of school supervision.

22. Employed expert supervisors in primary methods,
music, art, physical education, manual training, agriculture,
and domestic crafts.

23. Retained special help of the juvenile court in work-
ing with delinquent pupils, and engaged the services of
trained nurses to examine each pupil at least once each week.

24. Raised the standard of efficiency of the whole
teaching force.

25. Held a liberal number of male teachers in the gram-
mar grades, most of whom are making teaching their Hfe-
work.

26. Put fewer pupils with each teacher, thereby giving
the pupils more personal attention.

27. Resulted in enrolling a larger percentage of the
school population.

28. Increased the percentage of daily attendance of this
increased enrolment.

29. Increased the percentage of promotions of this in-
creased attendance of this increased enrolment.

30. Added at least an average of 10 days' attendance
per pupil per year.

31. Reduced the percentage of failures and retentions
more than one-third.

32. Overcome, to a considerable extent, the tendency
to quit school before graduating.

33. Made a standard rural high school possible.

34. Inspired a high percentage of eighth-grade graduates
to attend high school.

METHODS AND FACTS OF CONSOLIDATION

35. Reduced truancy to a minimum.

36. Classified and graded the schools better.

37. Came closer to the real interests of the children.

38. Obtained the good- will and co-operation of patrons.

39. Economized the time of pupils, teachers, and patrons.

40. Overcome local petty prejudice; made the remote
country child associate with children of other localities;
gave him a broader view, and extended his circle of friends
and acquaintances.

41. Created social centres, with their libraries, Hterary
societies, business and industrial organizations, athletic asso-
ciations, and amusements.

42. Fostered a taste for the best that life can give, and
enriched the whole life of the people.

43. Placed strong class leaders in every school.

44. Aroused enthusiasm for healthful rivalry and fair
competition in all school work.

45. Made pupils progressive, contented, comfortable,
and happy.

46. Taught punctuality and dependability by example.

47. Safeguarded the health of the children.

48. Emphasized a high moral tone.

49. Formed a better basis for the study of the school as
a factor of economics and sociology.

50. Made better school legislation necessary.

PROBLEMS AND BIBLIOGRAPHY

We leave the problems and bibliography, if any, here to the in-
structors, reading-circle directors, or others to devise if they think
them desirable.

CHAPTER XIII

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL

Preliminary Problems

1. How should a consolidated school be distinguished by its pro-

gramme of studies from city schools, elementary and high?

2. What important rural needs for knowledge, habits, and aspirations

not obtainable outside of schools are unmet by the present con-
solidated-school curricula ?

3. What advantages has a school for sequential curriculum-making

in which both elementary and high schools are in the same
building? Need there be a sharp mark of cleavage between ele-
mentary and secondary education? Why?

4. In what ways is the consolidated school like the Gary schools in

organization and possibilities ? (See bulletin on the Gary schools
published by the U. S. Bureau of Education through the Gov-
ernment Printing Office, and the survey of the Gary schools, in
several volumes, published by the General Education Board,
New York City.)

5. If possible, examine the programmes of study of several consoli-

dated schools and test them by the principles expressed by
Doctor Bobbitt in his book on "The Curriculum" (Houghton
Mifflin Co.).

I. General Principles of Curriculum Construction

The activities in which children engage by which are
produced the educational changes, physical and mental,
which society needs for the accomplishment of the social
purpose constitute the curriculum. Society desires "life,
liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" for each of its members
individually, and for itself as a co-operative organism. It
must create individuals possessed of social knowledge, habits,
and aspirations developed in the direction of vital, voca-

284

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLn)ATED SCHOOL 285

tional, avocational, civic, and moral efficiency. Thus will
the highest good of the individual and of the entire group
be progressively promoted. To acquire these efficiencies for
promoting general welfare and happiness, the young are
stimulated by various means to gain social insight, ability,
and responsiveness. They gain these through co-ordinated
and purposeful activities, mental and physical, of the senses,
the emotions, the remembering and thinking abilities, and
of the various parts of the body.

Growth in these efficiencies through these activities
must be progressive and sequential. Such sequence and
progress are provided for many important social efficiencies
by the ordinary activities of the home. The child learns
how to act by acting, how to live by living. Thus he learns
to walk and to talk, two great accomplishments, to partici-
pate in many home activities, and to "be good to live with.'*
His instincts of play, imitation, curiosity, communication,
and many others lead him to do many things that provide
him with definite and necessary forms of social efficiency.
In the colonial rural home, or "household,'* practically all
the abihties needed for promoting individual and social
happiness were acquired at an early age. There was little
need for specialized institutions to add to this training.
Half of the American homes to-day, however, are city
homes, and lack most of the opportunity for broad home
education through participation. The farm home has lost
much of its educative value, both because of the growing
speciahzation and reduction in the breadth of training, and
because of the tremendous increase of scientific knowledge
and complexity of human life, for much of which the home
alone cannot well prepare. These facts might be proved
beyond the patience of any reader.

The school is a specialized institution, usually of the
government, which should do for children educationally
what other institutions are not doing to help them grow
best in social efficiency — ^power to promote the general wel-

286 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

fare, or universal happiness of the finest kinds. It is a
supplemental institution. Children who are being more
adequately and economically educated at home for social
efficiency than they could be at school need not go to school.
If the church does a large share of educational training, less
is required of the school. The superior school investigates
social needs and desires; it studies the nature of the chil-
dren; it learns what is being done and not being done for
them educationally out of the school; it determines the
limitations under which it operates; it then attacks the
problem of selecting the most fundamental types of effi-
ciency which it should and can undertake; and finally ar-
ranges these most essential activities, "the studies," pro-
gressively and psychologically for the learning and teaching
processes. These most needed and most feasible activities
undertaken by the school constitute the curriculum, or the
*' course of study," as it is frequently termed, and, more
scientifically, the programme of studies which may contain
several curriculums, or courses.

In recent years we have developed printed courses, or
curriculums, of study, or activity, for many types of effi-
ciency. Frequently, the course for each group of abilities,
such as a statement of desirable knowledge, skill, and ap-
preciation in music or reading, is printed in a separate vol-
ume, or even in three volumes — one for the lower grades,
another for the upper grades, and another for the high school.
In some cases each of these volumes is quite large and in-
dicates what activities to encourage, in what order, in what
manner, or methods, and how to test results of teaching in
the form of socially desirable efficiencies. Recently pub-
lished volumes are also setting up reasonable standards of
attainment for children of different grades and kinds. A
certain degree of speed and comprehension is, for example,
sought in reading for each grade for each natural grouping
of time, such as first term, second term, etc., for each year.

All of the determinants of the public school vary greatly

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 287

from place to place. The country child, the country life,
the country needs, the other educational institutions of the
country, such as the church and motion-picture show, differ
widely in different sections of the nation. The minimal
essentials of educational activities of the public school as a
universal, supplemental, compulsory, and free institution,
dedicated to the welfare of the whole people, can hardly be
the same for a community of foreign coal-miners living in
miserable shacks as for a community of settled American
landowners in a farming community when we consider that
these essentials must relate to vital, vocational, avocational,
civic, and moral efficiency. A certain core of essentials
will be common, of course, but this will probably not be
large. Even the educational needs of cotton-raisers, wheat-
growers, fruit-raisers, and gardeners differ greatly, although
they fall into common groups and a certain core of minimal
essentials within each group is to be discovered.

In another place the writer has attempted to state the
leading principles underlying the course of study, or cur-
riculum of activities, for public schools ("Teaching Ele-
mentary-School Subjects," Chapter I). The principles are
many, and are as broad as social philosophy and as prac-
tical as current school procedure, yet very unsatisfactory at
present since we know so little about either the nature of
the child and his growth toward social efficiency, of society
with its various needs and modes of development, and of
the best methods and activities for bringing about mutual
adjustment between the two determinants of the process.
Most of the people of the world to-day believe in that type
of social Ufe which we term democratic. We have waged
a war to "make the world safe for democracy"; we are
constantly improving the methods of democracy itself, and
thus making democracy safe for the world; the public school
is the principal institution for making the people safe for
democracy and democracy safe for the people by bringing
up the young in the democratic mode of life. This should

288 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

be its chief and broadest aim. We must have individuals
from our schools in great numbers who can both live suc-
cessfully the life of freedom and responsibility, of democracy,
and to help make that democracy better suited to the nature
and needs of human life. A summary of such principles
follows, not in full, but those of most significance.

1. The school curriculum of activities must be adapted
to the nature and needs of society and the children.

2. The aim of education and society is individual and
social happiness through social efficiency of all members.

3. The factors of the aim of social efficiency may be
stated as vital, vocational, avocational, civic, and moral
efficiency.

4. The changes which can be made in children in the
direction of these aims are both physical and mental in
character, the latter being changes in knowledge, in habits,
and in feelings; or, in Dewey's language, in insight, power,
and responsiveness, or again, knowledge, habits, ideals, and
appreciations, all of these classifications being unsatisfactory
but helpful to a degree.

5. The public school is a supplemental institution and
consequently must do what other institutions are not doing
in promoting social efficiency within the limits of its powers.
No traditional notion of what a school should be must limit
it. Its function is that of adapting the present child as he
is known and understood to the present and future society
as it is known and understood. In the farm community
there are usually few educational functions performed by
other institutions than the school and home.

6. Needless to say, the rural consolidated school must
help young and old to live efficiently in a rural environment,
and particularly in the environment of the school. Whether
it should prepare the young for city life even though some
undoubtedly will later spend much of their lives in cities
is a question of social policy. Training in open-mindedness
and adaptability, and in such knowledge^ habits, and feel-

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 289

ings as country people need for the best co-operation with
cities may be all that is justified. In some cases, of course,
a class may be formed of those surely going to the city, and
this work, say a course in commercial work, may be worth
more to the State than what it eliminates. However, much
of the money now spent on rural education benefits the city
rather than the country, since so many leave the farm in
early life for the city. Perhaps rural education should be
strictly rural, and devoted to adapting most children to
country and rural village life. This is certainly its dominant
and essential aim, but not to be interpreted too narrowly.
Each person must be a citizen of his State, his nation, and
of the world.

7. There should be eliminated from the course, or not
included, all that is

(a) Not plainly and directly related to furthering the
fivefold aim of education.

(b) Less valuable for promotion of the aim than any-
thing that can be substituted,

(c) Not highly useful to a majority of the pupils or to
the majority of a group that is legitimately specializing in
some field of study.

(d) Being effectively taught to all or a majority of the
pupils by outside institutions such as the home, the voca-
tion, the church, the recreational activities of the com-
munity, the Y. M. and Y. W. C. A.'s, and the government
through military drill, agricultural agents, etc.

(e) Not comprehensible nor interesting to pupils, except
as it is a minimal essential and so must be taught whether
interesting or not, and may be retained until it becomes
comprehensible later in life.

(/) Isolated and irrelevant, or cannot be connected up
in the mind in such organization as will insure its retention
until used and fixed.

(g) Detrimental to initiative evoked in pupils and teach-
ers, to the development of the scientific attitude and habit

290 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of mind, to training in judgment of relative values, and to
following worthy purposes.

(h) Of such character as cannot be adequately taught
in a school.

To these other principles may be added, but these cer-
tainly provide for the elimination of most relatively unde-
sirable subject-matter.

8. Arrange the subject-matter selected on the basis of
the above principles as

(a) Minimally essential subject-matter, or activities,
surely needed by all.

{b) Alternative subject-matter where choice of several
required groups of subject-matter is left to teachers.

{c) Optional subject-matter, which may or may not be
taught, as the teacher chooses, as time permits, or individual
ability and preference of pupils indicate.

9. The following principles must also be kept in mind:
{a) The ability of the teachers available must be consid-
ered; the amount of teaching they can do in a given time,
their need of detailed or general directions and suggestions
as to aims, methods, topics or problems, devices, etc.

{b) The most economical, pleasant, and natural methods
and sequence of learning and growth, physical and mental,
on the part of the children must be paralleled by the or-
ganization and sequence of the curriculum.

{c) The arrangement should promote, not hinder, the
best methods of teaching, such as the problem method, in
which a problem or project rather than a topic is the basis
of learning; and such as the group, co-operative, or demo-
cratic, method of study and recitation instead of the indi-
vidualistic, strongly or exclusively competitive methods so
much in vogue.

{d) Where there are grades and terms, "years" and
"half-years," as customary, the work should show approxi-
mately these divisions of progress expected in general, with
large freedom for individual and particular-class variation.

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLmATED SCHOOL 29I

{e) The arrangement should foster iextended appliccition
of what is learned to the every-day practical affairs of living.

Home and farm projects should go along with school learn-
ing. Civic projects will also be used more than in the past.

10. The curriculum should lead teachers to place em-
phasis not so much on ground covered, pages studied, things
made, songs sung, experiments written up, and problems
solved as upon the chamges of an educative character in the di-
rection of the five aims made in the children and in social life,

11. The curriculum should be so expressed, selected,
arranged, and printed as to make it a convenient and easily
used tool in the teaching process, guiding effort, furnishing
suggestions and inspiration, correlating the activities of a
number of persons who must work co-operatively on the
joint problem of child and nation building. Growth in
power of complete living, in ability to promote one's own
and the world's highest happiness and well-being is the
broad test of the child's profit from the use of the course of
study. Rapidity and normality of such growth may be
secured partly by use of the rapidly improving standardized
tests of educative changes along lines of the school studies
and activities. The immediate future is bright with promise
for an education that the common man can see at a glance
is vital and essential, and that can be objectively tested to
prove the character and degrees of progress made.

To apply these principles in the selection, organization,
and application of a rural curriculum is very difficult be-
cause such a course must be worked out over a number of
years experimentally, and because the principles are so
numerous and comparatively vague. The federal Bureau
of Education has been struggling with the problem for some
time. We imperatively need to-day fifty avowedly experi-
mental consolidated schools in various parts of the country
for the discovery of what rural education should be. If our
classification of the problems of life, or factors of social
efficiency, is correct, namely, that of vital, vocational, avoca-

292 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tional, civic, and moral efficiency, we should expect some
activities in the school corresponding to each division and
contributing to each type, if outside agencies are not sup-
plying the training for one or more entire aims.

We offer below a few suggestions for each group of these
social aims of education in country communities:

A. Vital Efficiency.^ — i. Medical supervision of the chil-
dren by doctors, nurses, and teachers, with such instruction
and training of the children as shall be found necessary to
help them do and understand what they should do to co-
operate best to improve their health is necessary and essen-
tial. This instruction and training must go into the home
and help the child wherever he is to practise such curative
measures as may be necessary, and to prevent disease and
defects. Vital efficiency is the first aim of education, the
corner-stone of the structure.

2. School sanitation and home sanitation afford a field of
practice in which the children can learn "the reason why"
and "do the deed through which to understand the doc-
trine." All can be led to co-operate to make the school,
home, and community environment sanitary. Eliminating
conditions making for the spread of hookworm, typhoid, bad
colds, tuberculosis, malaria, and other ailments in a practical
manner through actual participation would be a part of the
school's purpose and curriculum. The congressional hear-
ings on rural sanitation and the various reports on the
subject by the federal Public Health Service should be
used and applied to the locality.

3. Physical education must in some form be a part of
the activities of every school through play, physical work,
Boy-Scout and Girl-Scout activities, gymnasium training
of a more formal character, etc. Excellent physical-educa-
tion curricula are being introduced in the schools of
many States by the departments of education (as in New

^The writer's volumes on " Educational Hygiene " (Scribners) and " Rural
School Hygiene " (in preparation) deal with this fivefold problem.

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 293

Jersey) for use by all schools. Special adaptations of these
for the consolidated school and country conditions are being
made by progressive educators in many States. Rural
recreation and physical development can be combined, and
will do much to raise the present low standard of physical
development of country people disclosed by surveys and
army examinations.

4. Hygiene instruction through definite and practical
teaching of knowledge, habits, ideals, and appreciations ap-
plied to life situations and problems of health, facing pupils
and country people in general, must also be emphasized, since
"health is the first wealth," and our people perish for want
of health knowledge and training. Personal, public, voca-
tional (agricultural), and domestic hygiene must be taught
and practised. Selections of subject-matter must be made
from the stand-point of rural problems and needs. A knowl-
edge of reading is a necessary basis for such teaching in the
upper grades as it is for other forms of efficiency to-day.

5. Hygienic methods of teaching, managing, and guiding
pupils must be taught teachers, and these must teach pupils
and train them in mental hygiene and the psychology of
healthy-minded living. The hygiene of joy, the philosophy
of "being good to live with," the spirit of "sweetness and
light," "power through repose," making others in the school
happy, and thereby healthy, and the entire influence of
mind over body must in some way, without sentimentality,
be made a living characteristic of the school. Formal,
mihtary, slave-driving, prescriptive, inquisitorial, and con-
demnatory methods must be changed for those that are
democratic, optimistic, co-operative, generous, gracious, and
encouraging.

B. Vocational Efficiency. — i. Domestic efficiency is the
efficiency of the members of the home, and especially of " the
woman of the house." Supplementary to and correlated
with the home, this work for the girls must take in the
entire range of activities of the home, not alone cooking and

294 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

sewing, and help where help is needed. Necessarily such
work will vary much in its optional and fringe content from
community to community. In Porto Rico, for example,
much or most of the content found desirable in American
courses is found undesirable and unrelated to human needs.
How to cook and can apples is of little significance to those
who have no apples. How to purchase and care for carpets
and rugs is of little or no value where such things are not
used and are undesirable or impossible of use. Parts of the
United States vary almost as much from each other as
Porto Rico does from the continent.

2. Agricultural efficiency depends upon a common basis
of agricultural knowledge and practice, closely related to
conditions for both sexes and for various groups, and upon
specialization for groups requiring different kinds of school
help because they have different kinds of farm problems.
One group of pupils may well spend considerable time on
the raising of potatoes, while another group in the same
school may need little instruction in detail on potato-raising,
but much, for example, on fruit-raising or corn culture.
Such specialization may be made possible especially for
those of the upper grades and high school. Dairying, animal
husbandry, gardening, bee-keeping, fruit culture, raising
cereals, rotation of crops, recovering old soils, irrigation,
dry-land farming, and hundreds of other topics suggest
problems of intense practical value in many parts of the
country. How much time can be devoted to such activi-
ties, including home projects and other applications, must
be solved with all social needs before one. The social sur-
vey of the rural community is coming to be the best single
instrument for discovering these needs for vocational and
all other aims. The elementary essentials of arithmetic,
closely applied, will be needed here, also simple reading,
writing, and the spelling of words needed in letter- writing.

3. Teaching efficiency may be an aim for a special division
of the rural high school in many consolidated communities.

Agriculture is the central subject in rural education

A class in botany at a summer school

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 295

In a number of States the rural schools have been so poorly
provided with teachers by the normal schools that teacher-
training departments have been instituted in hundreds of
high schools in the last few years. Where there are many
single-room schools still in use, as will be true for much of
the present century, and while normal schools are so few
and inadequately supported, these divisions may be of as
much value to the community and the nation as anything
they displace from the curriculum or school. They cannot
be provided, of course, where there are only sufficient teach-
ers to handle the non-specialized branches, the "core cur-
riculum." Minnesota and other States have solved this by
designating one high school in each county as a teachers'-
training school, to have such a department, and provide
generous State aid therefor.

4. Professional preparation may in some cases be pro-
vided also for those who are going to higher schools, and
thus require subjects required for entrance. Only when a
sufficiently large group make a fair-sized class should such
work be provided, unless the school is much larger than
usual, with a number of elective courses. In certain cases,
too, commercial courses can be provided, but are not funda-
mental to the big aim of the rural school, which must be
dominantly and concentratedly directed toward rural life
and country needs. Force the higher schools, especially
the State colleges and universities, to admit graduates of
four-year high schools when their work has been good,
regardless largely of subjects taken, and this problem is
solved. This great problem of the hampering of all high-
school development is candidly dealt with in the following
chapter.

C. Avocational Efficiency. — Avocational efficiency is a
term used to apply to that efficiency which makes for the
right use of leisure, ability to enjoy life and to engage in
worthy recreations and wholesome enjoyments. In a
democracy, as Inglis has pointed out, a person is first of all

296 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

a citizen with the problems of good citizenship in a democ-
racy; secondly, he is a worker and producer of wealth for
himself and others, and thirdly, he is an individual with
certain personal interests and activities, a consumer of goods,
and an enjoyer of pleasures.^ One has relations to himself,
to his work, and to his country, so to speak. Training for
avocation, for the eight hours or so of leisure apart from
work and sleep, we have discussed in two later chapters.
Here we may call attention to it as a factor largely over-
looked in American rural education, although it was the
chief aim of the glorious Athenian education of old. A
teacher of a rural school was once asked by the writer why
she did not use an organ stored in a back corner of the
school, and why she did not have singing at opening exer-
cises. She replied that the parents of that district '^did not
believe in such things" — that they thought that such
*' things" were a waste of time, and that, although she could
play the organ and sing, she didn't dare to take the time of
the pupils for such activities, because the patrons wanted
her to put the time in on arithmetic and such studies. Yet
country people frequently slave themselves to an early
death, or to lives of only partial happiness and real efficiency,
because of a lack of a training and appreciation for avoca-
tions and suitable enjoyments.

Country children need to know how to play and enjoy
many games, to learn the delights of reading and how to
continue these pleasures after school-days are over, to get
esthetic satisfaction from the many things of beauty in the
world, to learn to enjoy the natural and social sciences and
intellectual activity for self -development and pleasures in
the every-day world, to gain the delights of imagination
and its aeroplane flights over the noisy world — in short,
to gain happiness very immediately and directly in accord
with the natural instincts of life and social necessities. Such

Un "Principles of Secondary Education." See also Bobbitt's volume
on "The Curriculum" and Parker's "Methods of Teaching in High Schools."

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 297

recreational and avocational activities should make the labor
side of life more pleasurable and efficient. Joy in work is
impossible when the latter is degraded into drudgery by
overspecializing in this one phase of life. The eight-hour
day, improved farm machinery, the growing number of
holidays and more recreational use of Sundays, the auto-
mobile, and many other similar factors are forcing schools
to give more attention to education for avocation. How
much of literature, play, athletics, constructive work, dram-
atization, music, dancing, motion-pictures, festivals, fairs,
entertainments, assembly exercises, "socials," receptions,
parties, travelogues, speeches, debates, oratoricals, nature-
study clubs, camera clubs, literary societies, spelling and
ciphering matches, etc., are needed by the community
and how much can and should be encouraged at the school
is a matter of careful study and good judgment. The
tendency is for much more time to be spent in these direc-
tions which are so valuable for personal and social culture and
happiness. Happiness is the goal of life, not a stolen sweet.

D. Civic Efficiency. — Civic efficiency in a democracy is
second to no other efficiency, and is probably more neglected
in American education than any other, with the probable
exception of vital efficiency. General, unapplied education
will not produce citizenship and save the world through
democracy any more than general unapplied education will
make physicians and lawyers. Training for democracy is
like training for any profession or trade, and definite knowl-
edge, skill, and attitudes are necessary that are closely re-
lated to co-operative effort for community and national
progress. Pupils will not know how to work together, will
not have skill to work together, will not have the ideal and
initiative for working together without special training be-
yond what is given by customary non-school agencies.

Community civics is now coming to be an important
subject and activity in all grades, for study, for practice,
for every-day living. Co-operative methods of study, of

298 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

play, of constructive work, of community improvement,
beginning with the school environment, are to-day in the
best schools working the spirit of democracy into the very
warp and woof of the children's lives. The work of the
school as a social centre is keeping the habits and spirit
alive in those who have left the school and engendering it in
the lives of others who have not attended in the days since
schools have begun to carry on a democratic Hfe. There is
hardly anything good that can be conceived as practically
desirable for a community that cannot be started and
pushed through to realization by a school working in the
spirit of democracy. Good roads, consolidation, co-opera-
tive stores, creameries, elevators, and laundries, better
churches, improved recreational facilities, better govern-
ment officials, improved methods of farming, greater use of
the State and national governments for helping farmers,
and so on — all may spring from proper civic education in
schools. North Dakota is setting an example.

Citizenship courses, Hterature developing high and at-
tainable civic ideals, emphasis on the social and civic aspects
of several subjects, such as history and geography, as well
as actual learning to do by doing, becoming a citizen by
being a citizen up to one's powers, must in some way be
incorporated in the curriculum even at the expense of some
of the old-time formal grammar, impractical arithmetic, the
non-English languages and non-arithmetical mathematics,
rhetoric, and the spelling of long lists of words never used
in letter-writing. Ability to speak and to write simple
EngHsh correctly will be desirable here. Training in public
speaking will be a regular part of the school Hfe. The U. S.
Bureau of Education has been doing excellent work in this
field, and has printed valuable pamphlets on the subject.
Some opposition to these community lessons issued by the
federal Bureau of Education was made by a manufacturers'
association, but civic instruction and the people's rights
cannot be successfully denied. Civic efficiency will grow

a\l ' *^M OCMONSTRATtON ^^PlB W 1

■•■■-" ^M^.

1 MK^ttt^

Members of the Boys' Corn Club with agent explaining the root system,

Alabama

^' ''*' '1

f^il^-

^•A^^^A^:-

,' ■' :". I

^.,;

P

^^i^liSamnitS^^^^

l^iii^iM^iiliiiASHHi

?yrfr..

^iV|

%^&l

«•

A school agricultural exhibit in the PhiUppines

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 299

up as naturally in the civically directed consolidated school
as will vocational efficiency, or any other, when proper time
and attention are devoted to it effectively.

E. Moral Efficiency. — Moral efficiency probably re-
quires special attention in most schools, although the ideal
is, perhaps, to gain morality by living morally and gaining
the precepts incidentally in connection with ever-recurring
moral problems. However, accurate ethical knowledge,
habits, ideals, and appreciations are undoubtedly promoted
very much by something more than incidental attention.
As citizenship is acquired through careful, sequential educa-
tion, so morality can and must be strengthened by moral
education. Here the co-operative training and study for
citizenship also plays into the hands of morality. Literature
may be selected for reading, as shown in a later chapter, that
tends to develop each of the great racial ideals necessary for
the common Kfe, the life of the present-day rural community,
and for meeting the great temptations as well as opportuni-
ties in modern complex civilization. In some schools se-
quential courses in moral training, or moral instruction,
have been successfully introduced.^ While there is danger
of making little prigs and "goody-goodies" with poor teach-
ers, yet with able supervision, carefully prepared curric-
ulums, and a great deal of attention to texts, devices,
methods, selections, and suggestions, much can be accom-
plished not now being attempted by either home, church,
or school to raise the level of moral efficiency in the greater
rural neighborhood. At present, considerable attention is
being paid to moral instruction. The United States Moral-
ity Codes encouraged by the Bureau of Education will be
of help in this movement, as are also the various texts de-
vised for morning exercises and classroom instruction.

Without going into further detail, we can illustrate the
method of keeping educational aims and the changes which

^ See Sharp, " Moral Instruction," Bobbs-Merrill Co.

3CDO

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

can be made in children, physically and mentally, before one
by the accompanying chart. At the left are the five great
phases of social efficiency as aims of education, while at the
right are some of the appropriate general changes to be pro-
duced in children in the direction of these efiiciencies. The
chart is largely self-evident after the preceding explanation.
The essentials of the three R's, or tool subjects, are neces-
sary, of course. Other classifications of both the aims and
the changes are possible. At the left might be individual,
civic, and vocational ejQ&ciency, and at the right the changes,
physical and mental, the latter stated as changes in knowl-
edge, skills, and feelings.

EDUCATIONAL AIMS AND EDUCATIONAL CHANGES IN PUPILS

Social
Efficiency

Physical
Changes

Mental Changes

Knowledge

Habits

Ideals

Appreciations

I
Vital

efficiency

n

Vocational
efficiency

ni

Avocational
efficiency

IV

Civic
efficiency

V

Moral
efficiency

Removal of ade-
noids, building
up physique

Physical prepa-
ration for voca-
tion

Physical changes
due to right
avocations

Any physical
changes related
to citizenship

Any physical
changes related
to moral living

Hygiene.
Health in-
struction

Economics
and occu-
pations

Knowledge
of avoca-
tions

Civics.
Rural citi-
zenship

Ethics.
Social ser-
vice

Training in liv-
ing hygienic-
ally. The hab-
its of health

The habits and
skills of the vo-
cation

The habits and
skills of avoca-
tions and use
of leisure

The habits of
civic participa-
tion

The habits of
the moral life

The ideals of
health and
physical effi-
ciency

Ideals related to
industry

Ideals of recrea-
tions and avo-
cations

Ideals of citizen-
ship

Ideals of moral-
ity, religion,
and social ser-
vice

The interests
and attitudes
of health

The interests
and attitudes
of vocation

The interests
and attitudes
of avocations

The interests
and attitudes
of citizenship

The interests
and attitudes
of the moral
life

CHAPTER XIV

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL

(continued)

II. Programmes of Study

The curriculum for the elementary school would contain
subject-matter selected and arranged on the above prin-
ciples, and would be selected from hygiene, physical training,
play activities, elementary rural economics, agriculture,
domestic science, home projects, gardening (except in regions
where gardening is impossible or is being provided by out-
side agencies), farm arithmetic, simple English composition
with emphasis on letter-writing, spelling of one or two
thousand words most used in rural correspondence by chil-
dren and adults, such few elements of grammar applied as
really help children in improving oral and written composi-
tion, probably not to be taught at all as a separate subject
but in close connection with composition and ordinary
speech, the most usable and attractive phases of geography
and history, elementary science for vital, vocational, and
avocational efficiency, especially music, including par-
ticularly ability and delight in singing fifty or more of the
great "community songs," such elements of drawing and
fine art as can successfully compete for a place in the school
and home lives of country boys and girls in competition
with other subjects, civics, biography, reading, writing,
thrift, good roads, rural sanitation, elementary ethics, farm
carpentry, elementary blacksmithing and auto repair, methods
of co-operation for community enterprises, life insurance,
taxation, and other subjects, problems, and topics.

We can point to hardly any curriculum in the United
States at the present time satisfactorily adapted to country
boys and girls in consolidated rural schools. The courses

301

302 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

published for the rural schools (largely single-room schools)
of Baltimore County, Maryland, are of the new order, but
thoroughgoing courses worked out on the basis of a sound
philosophy of education and the essential needs and prob-
lems of a country community educating its children in con-
solidated schools are yet to be developed. Here is a great
opportunity for an organization of consolidated-school prin-
cipals of various States. A curriculum for the rural ele-
mentary and high school properly developed would make a
large volume, and must be created by years of study, adapta-
tion, and experimentation, leaving much opportunity, of
course, for local initiative, adjustment, and modification.

The elementary-school curriculum would necessarily have
to be organized with reference to the high-school curriculum,
especially since the two schools are usually in one building
in the consolidated school. In this, the plan resembles the
Gary system, in which pupils go to the same building for
twelve years if they graduate from high school, and in which
teachers teach more by departments of work, caring for
both elementary and high-school pupils, than by strict
horizontal divisions, including certain years. In fact, many
of the important and best features of the Gary system fit in
well with the consolidated rural school. We should, then,
expect most of the work in the consolidated school to be
departmental, thus making provision for individual differ-
ences and for specialization by teachers. The ordinary
country-school teacher is so overburdened with a great
number of subjects to teach that she can become highly
efficient in none. Yet the rural teacher, because of insuffi-
cient normal-school and other preparation, needs such op-
portunity most.

The entire curriculum could be organized into four cycles
of three grades, or years, each: primary, upper, junior high,
and senior high. Probably all but the first three grades
should be placed on the departmental plan, by which, as
suggested, each teacher teaches one or more subjects to

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 303

several classes instead of all subjects to one class. Further
investigation of individual differences may even lead to the
desirability of providing departmental work for all grades.
The first six grades would be the elementary school and the
last (five or) six the high school. Perhaps a year in the
child's school life can be saved by such improved organization.

The accompanying programme of studies is for the upper
five or six grades, and is merely suggestive of a very general
plan. In the consolidated school several of the alternative
courses, such as the industrial and college-entrance courses,
will ordinarily be omitted, and greater differentiation may
be made in the agricultural courses. In small schools with
few teachers little more than the common, "core'' curric-
ulum should be attempted.^ The vocational work for boys
in the common course would be agricultural training in
an agricultural region. In a cattle country it would be
more of the nature of animal husbandry. No languages
except English, and no mathematics except arithmetic (the
non-English languages and the non-arithmetical mathe-
matics), would be studied by pupils unless a group large
enough for a class, say seven to ten pupils, required them,
either for daily use or for entrance to a higher school, and
then only when the school had the teaching force to do so,
and these subjects were certainly preferable to any that
could be put into their places. The economics taught
would, of course, be rural economics. The commercial and
the normal courses should be given in but few schools, the
latter preferably in but one high school in a county. Excel-
lent developments of this teachers'- training course have
been made, as suggested, in several States, such as Minnesota.

The chief limitations of the present consolidated rural-
school curriculums at present are that they too often are
merely college-entrance courses, and are thus suited to but
very few pupils, or none, and that they have little conscious
adaptation to the principal problems of rural life. Universi-

1 See page 314.

304

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

A SIX-YEAR PROGRAMME OF STUDIES
(upper six grades of twelve- year school)

Seven 40-minute periods daily

I

II

III

IV

V

VI

Assembly — 20 minutes daily, or study

S

S

5

5

5

5

Study period for all pupils daily

5

5

5

5

5

5

Hygiene and physical education

3

3

3

3

3

3

Agricultural and home education

5

S

S

5

5

5

Arithmetic and farm accounts

5

S

Community civics and current events

3

3

S

Advanced civics and rural economics

5

United States history

3

3

General history

5

S

English: Literature, composition, public
SDeakiner

5

S

S

5

S

5

Music, drawing, esthetic appreciation

2

2

2

2

2

2

Rural sociology and applied ethics

S

General science

5

Physics and chemistry

5

S

Geograohv

4

4

Total required periods, excluding study. . . .
Number of elective j)eriods

30
0

30
0

25

5

25
5

25

5

25

5

ties and colleges, especially agricultural colleges, must come
soon to an understanding that their entrance requirements
of non-English languages and non-arithmetical mathematics
defeat the very purposes for which they stand, the enlight-
enment, training, and inspiration of rural life, and that they

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 305^

must help rather than hinder the close adaptation of high
schools to their tasks. Engineering schools within colleges
may, of course, require mathematics and classical schools the
languages; but it would be far better for most States to
have these taught in colleges than in the typically small
high schools where the teaching staffs are but large enough
to teach the vital essentials for rural social efficiency. Pro-
fessors of education in colleges and principals of high schools
must band together to lead and to force, if necessary, the
colleges to make the four-year high-school curriculum, what-
ever it may best be, sufficient (with good scholarship and a
principaFs recommendation) to satisfy the entrance require-
ments. The lamentable inefficiency of the present rural
elementary and high school, consolidated or not, is, in these
times, so dangerous to democracy and intolerable as to re-
quire forceful measures. The highly specialized profes-
sional or academic subjects must not be imposed on our
prospective farmers.

We present herewith two suggestive programmes of
study. The short, single-course one above attempts to pro-
vide the upper six grades of a twelve-year consoUdated
school with a rural education along the line of the five aims
of education. It is arranged for a small school with few
teachers, the minimum number possible. We do not suggest
the elective subjects. Few can be given. If we assume that
teachers should not be required to teach more than twenty-
five class periods a week, with possibly five more periods for
library or study-hall supervision, we have a need here at
once for about six or seven teachers, including the principal,
who would be responsible for class- teaching not more than
two-thirds of the time, say not more than twenty hours
a week, preferably fifteen. Of course, two of the teachers
will take the place of seventh and eighth grade teachers.
When fewer teachers are provided it will be desirable to
omit one or more of the last years of the course, and not
attempt to teach them. By carrying probably too heavy

3o6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

a load one teacher for each year can handle the work, but
this is not recommended.

The class periods are shorter than desirable for a con-
solidated or any other secondary school, perhaps. There
should be little home study required for pupils, a number of
whom are long on the road each day, some upward of an
hour each way in many places. The longer class period up
to an hour gives opportunity for supervised study, say the
first half of the period for recitation and the second half
for study, or other methods as suggested in Hallquest's and
other books on the subject. Fifty or fifty-five minute periods
are desirable. A good plan has been found to have fifty-
minute periods and have pupils change on the hour with
the intervening ten minutes for social intercourse, relaxa-
tion, conferences with teachers, an out-of-door walk or run,
etc. However, when elementary and secondary school are
in the same building, as usual in this type of school, these
free periods may disturb the elementary school and the
elementary-school recesses may disturb the secondary
school. If so, elementary and secondary school pupils may
have recesses at the same time, and little time may be per-
mitted for passing from room to room between periods. It
is difficult to arrange a daily programme that will coincide
well with such arrangement, but it is being done. The one-
story building is a help here. Elementary pupils may
play on the opposite side of the building from the high-
school wing, and each classroom opens to both the corridor
and playground. There is quite a movement on foot to
lengthen the school-day where considerable motor activi-
ties such as manual training, physical education, laboratory
work, etc., are furnished. Some consolidated schools start
work at 8.30 and close at 4. Little children are let out to
play or go home, if they live near, at 3.30.

Assembly is provided for each day. The time should
be thirty minutes, but we have suggested twenty here. For
programme convenience it may be well in some cases to

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLn)ATED SCHOOL 307

have it the first thing in the afternoon, when it is harder to
do class work. A study period for all pupils daily is pro-
vided. If necessary, some of the assembly periods may
each week be devoted to study, but such a procedure would
indicate that the principal and teachers do not know how,
or lack skill, to make the assembly one of the most educative
meetings of the pupils in the day. Here all get together,
and the possibilities for social training, singing, orchestra
music, public speaking, debates, speaking by outsiders,
ethical readings, current events, community problems, Httle
plays, and general social intercourse and friendhness in a
joyous, co-operative manner are educationally very great.
With an able singing leader and good community songs as are
published in such song-books as are published by Birchards
of Boston ("Fifty-five Community Songs'')? 3- school of
pupils may be lifted up and unified spiritually by music
alone. What they have done for foreign groups and for
our soldiers is well known. A large assembly-room is de-
sirable, and the least that can be done is to provide a com-
bination assembly, study-hall, and gymnasium. Throwing
two classrooms together by a movable partition will hardly
solve the problem, although this may be done for the ele-
mentary school for separate assemblies at times.

Hygiene is an important subject that lies at the basis
of a needed health revolution in the country. It may well
be studied each week, and closely related to life for enough
years to give a thorough grounding in its principles and
ideals, and especially in the habits necessary to health.
One hour a week for this and two for play, physical training,
and athletics are satisfactory if no more time can be ob-
tained. Of course a good gymnasium is desirable, but the
out-of-doors furnishes a good place, too, much of the year.
If possible, obtain the gymnasium and develop our young
people better than previous generations. In Utah, the
swimming-pool has been proved indispensable. When nearly
half of our recruits must be rejected for preventable physical

3o8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

defects and ailments in country and city, the schools should
wake up to their national responsibilities. Personal hygiene,
rural hygiene, rural sanitation, public hygiene, and voca-
tional hygiene as relating to country conditions should be
studied and practised. Coleman's "The People's Health,"
the O'Shea-Kellogg series, the Gulick series, the Ritchie
series, Tolman's "Hygiene for the Worker," and Richards'
" Hygiene for Girls " are of the new order. Ditman's "Home
Hygiene and Prevention of Disease" is probably the best
book for the home, and should be at hand always for refer-
ence. Hygiene is rapidly being socialized. The physical-
training manuals, in three volumes, of the State of New
Jersey are probably the best published for all grades as yet.
The latest books on rural sanitation should be on reference.
Texts in hygiene are yet to be prepared for rural schools.^

Agricultural and home education has as much time in
this common curriculum as has EngHsh, and it certainly
deserves it. Vocational education for home and field is a
minimal essential to take no second place. For boys, farm
manual training and carpentry and concrete work, home
projects, fruit-raising, care of farm animals, and the various
phases of agricultural instruction that can be separated and
taught to boys alone may be given. For girls, sewing, cook-
ing, laundry-work, home decoration, the care of children,
home literature, home projects, poultry-raising and care of
the dairy, and so on, may be provided. For boys and girls
in common classes the subjects of botany and elementary
agriculture, household accounting, and others, may be pro-
vided. If the botany and agriculture take two years of
about five hours a week, and the separate subjects three or
four years, the pupils should get rather definite training for
the vocations of farming. Perhaps rural economics and rural
sociology may be put in here for one year instead of sepa-
rately, according to our plan. Of course five periods a week
is only a suggestion. Double periods or half days may be

* " Health Education in Rural Schools " is recommended for teachers.

A domestic arts exhibit

A day of recreation in the mountains

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLn)ATED SCHOOL 309

arranged. Short courses for those who have left school are
being provided in many consolidated schools.

Arithmetic, farm accounts, and bookkeeping, and all
the applications of arithmetic needed for good farming and
home-keeping, should be given. Much of the ordinary
arithmetic can be cut out and rural arithmetics used, of
which there are several. The work of the national com-
mittees in selecting the essentials of arithmetic should be
studied in making the course. Much of the work will be
devised by the teacher in connection with practical activities.

Good penmanship, or handwriting, up to a reasonable
standard of efficiency in speed and quality of writing is
desirable. By use of the Ayres, Thorndike, or other scales
of quality, and the most desirable standards of speed, those
pupils may be selected who need regular drill. Fifteen
minutes a day may be taken from some other subject for
those pupils who need drill. Other pupils of a class may
advance beyond the minimum standards set for ordinary
correspondence, or study something else in the time.
Spelling, writing, and English should be considered, cor-
rected, and marked in all courses and subjects. A few
minutes a day may be taken for spelling drills from EngKsh
or other studies. All pupils before entering the upper six
grades should be a hundred per cent correct on most of the
thousand words given in Ayres' spelHng scale, or the larger
number in the Pryor list.

Rural-community civics is of prime importance in democ-
racy's schools and has in the past been criminally neglected.
Field and Nearing have a delightful little book on the sub-
ject for rural schools, which, with current events and library
and magazine readings, will furnish work for the first and
second (seventh and eighth) grades. It really could be
handled in the sixth grade of the elementary school, and thus
catch many pupils who drop out early. Dunn's *'The Com-
munity and the Citizen," Towne's *' Social Problems," the
community-civics lessons in pamphlet form published by

3IO THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

the Bureau of Education, and other volumes rapidly ap-
pearing may be desirable. The third year should be a solid
grounding in the subject, but leaving state and national
civics and government largely to a later time. Beard's
"American Citizenship" and such books fit the latter
course, which here is put into the last year with rural
economics. Carver's "Rural Economics" and separate
volume of "Readings in Rural Economics" is somewhat
heavy, perhaps, for a class not prepared by social studies,
as this will be. Burch and Nearing have a good elementary
book on "Elementary Economics," but not especially
adapted to rural schools. If the teacher and principal are
graduates of an agricultural school they will know of good
volumes on the subject for their own personal use.

United States history has now good texts like Muzzey's
and James and Sanford's, and there are good books on the
teaching of history (as well as most other subjects), such as
Johnson's. Three times a week for two years are sufficient
to cover the subject fairly well. Some put the course in
again in the last year, as I have done in the second and
larger general programme presented later.

General history with its broad social studies, when well
taught, gives an international breadth to the pupil's experi-
ence. In the new internationalism of our country two years
could be said to be desirable, five hours a week. Of course
this will include another survey of United States history as
a part of the general. Good history teachers are very hard
to get, and too many let the subject (and the pupil's interest)
die on their hands. Yet they have a wonderful opportunity.
History should be used as a means of explaining and sim-
plifying modern complex social life. The growth of rural
life, inventions, and institutions will be emphasized.

English is discussed later in a separate chapter, as are
also the non-Enghsh languages. The non-arithmetical
mathematics (algebra and geometry) are also discussed
briefly. Our programme permits of some elective periods.

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 3 II

and more may be provided for a group going to a college
that still demands these subjects. Well-taught and selected
English literature and composition, with all it may include,
is a minimal-essential subject. The non-English languages
and non-arithmetical mathematics are not, I believe, al-
though some feel that they may possibly be worth what
they cost, if not what they exclude. Public speaking and
the use of magazines, the methods of organizing community
literary, reading, and improvement clubs, letter-writing
which is the minimal essential of written composition, and
so on, may be thoroughly treated. Letter-writing may be
made to include all forms of composition and can hardly
be overemphasized. Some professors in agricultural col-
leges have recently put excellent stories and essays on coun-
try life in volumes for classes in English in country higher
schools.

Avocational efficiency demands many types of activities,
such as music and recreation. The various fine arts can be
treated in close connection with country problems, and per-
haps not only art and nature appreciation may be developed
but regular classes in drawing and painting, or other types
of artistic expression, may be provided. Music should be
given to nearly all pupils one or two periods a week through-
out the course for technical knowledge and skill and for
the appreciation and dehghts afforded. The old-fashioned
singing-schools are being revived as community singing.

Moral efficiency, with the general breakdown of the
rural church (at least a common church which all attend),
demands special attention. The subject has been given
great attention in recent years. Much can be done through
the previous courses, and some would omit moral efficiency
as a separate aim, but a separate course for a half year,
gradually merging into rural sociology, is undoubtedly de-
sirable. Sharp of Wisconsin, Fairchild, and others have
recently been elevating this study. Sharp's book is pub-
lished by the Bobbs-Merrill firm at Indianapolis. Mrs.

312 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Cabot^s books on ''Everyday Ethics" (Holt) and other
similar subjects are valuable texts.

General science has a great message and service to ren-
der modern life, and especially the country. A renaissance
of science teaching has taken place and the subject is being
hooked to the practical problems of life along the great lines
of health, vocation, avocation, etc. Elhuff has a valuable
text and manual (Heath), but I know of no book especially
for rural schools. General physics and chemistry are each
given five hours a week for a year later. They also must be
profoundly influenced by farm needs and the great aims of
education. The teacher should have good laboratories
and a demonstration room with raised seats for the pupils.
I hesitate to name a text even as an example, since change
is taking place so rapidly. Botany we may put in with the
vocational subjects, if six years are too much for the more
purely vocational subjects. It should have at least one
year, and of course be especially full of help and suggestion
for people living by and among a world of plants. The avo-
cational value of the sciences is also very great. One may
study the stars, not to know when to plant his corn or kill
his hogs, according to old superstitions, but to increase his
enjoyment and harmless happiness through life. The mys-
teries of nature are instinctively matters of great interest.
The elements of zoology may be connected with the one
hour a week devoted to hygiene and its basis of physiology
and anatomy. Perhaps a good half-year course or longer,
five hours a week, may be found for it elsewhere. It may
be that a half year of botany and a half year of zoology may
well be provided. The elementary course should be full of
nature study and thus prepare for these high-school studies.
These sciences may well be classified about life problems.

Geography may minister much to man's understanding
of his scene of action and the great natural and social forces
at work in the world. Physical, commercial, and political
geography from the standpoint of the mjodern rural worker

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLn)ATED SCHOOL 313

and citizen, who has world-wide relations along many lines
especially economic, are all desirable, not as technical, highly
classified sciences, but as selections of matter of most worth
to country people, and organized on the basis of interest, the
psychology of learning, and of human need. Dodge and
Kirchway have a good book on the teaching of the sub-
ject. Twiss has a very good volume on "Teaching the
Natural Sciences'' (Macmillan). The writer's volume on
"Teaching Elementary School Subjects" gives rather com-
plete bibliographies on the elementary-school subjects dis-
cussed above. Inglis' volume on "Principles of Secondary
Education" (Macmillan) and Johnston's volumes on "High-
School Education" and the "Modern High School" (Scrib-
ners) treat well of the high school.

The second programme of studies offered herewith is
much more ambitious, and requires a larger staff such as
could probably be provided in a large village or small city
with consolidation. It was developed originally as a gen-
erally suggestive programme of studies for all secondary
schools, and as here modified it perhaps would fit no local
situation. A longer day is here suggested, but the periods
may remain the same as in the previous one. An eight-
period day is, I believe, a mistake, and one of six periods
would probably be highly desirable if each were longer.
To avoid so many studies a week for each pupil the future
will undoubtedly provide extensive correlations. The social
sciences might be organized as one continuous subject, for
example, and the natural sciences and the vocational sub-
jects will probably be given in less disjointed form than
usually. Of course most good consolidated and rural-
village schools, as previously suggested, will give a good deal
of extension and demonstration work, and will provide short
courses in the winter for those who can attend the entire
school year. The large programme gives, also, alternative
curriculums differentiated for seven different groups. The

314

THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

A FIVE OR SIX YEAR HIGH-SCHOOL PROGRAMME OF
STUDIES!

THE SIXTH YEAR HAS INTENTIONALLY BEEN LEFT VACANT

Probably Seven 40 to 50 Minute Periods DaUy

I
(7)

II

(8)

Ill

(I)

IV

(2)

V

(3)

VI

(4)

Assembly — 30 minutes dailv

S
5

5
S

S

s

S

s

Study period for all

pupils daily

Required oe
Most Pupils

" Core Curricu-
lum " or " Com-
mon Curriculum"

English — comp. lit., pub. speaking

Hygiene— personal, public, vocational. .

Physical education and recreation

Music, fine art (drawing), appreciation. .
Vocational, ed'n, incl. household arts. . . .

Arithmetic and farm accounting

Geography and elementary science

History, U. S

S
I
2
2
4
S
4
4
3

5

s

I
2
2

s

s
s
s

s

I

2
2

s
s

5
2

2
2

Community civics, survey of vocations.
General science

Applied ethics and el. sociology

General history, or to 1700. . .

Another science, or more general science
United States history or general history .
Gov. civics and el. economics

Total required periods, excl. of study.

30

30

30

20

0

0

0

10

I. General
Course

Probably largely optional, with educat
Ten hours in fourtn and fifteen hours in

ional
fifth}

guid
.rears.

ance.

10

5
5

2. Agricultural
Course

Farm arithmetic and accounts

Rural economics

3. Home-Economics
CoimsE

Sewing

5
S

S

s

S

s

5

s

Cooking

Household accounts and laundry . .

Home management, bacteriology, literat

ure. .

4. C0MMERCLA.L
Course

Business arithmetic and business Englisb

....

Stenography

Typewriting . . .

5. Normal CoxTRSE

Elementary educational i)sychology

Class management and school subjects . .
Observation and practice

Elective

6. Industrial
Course

Business arithmetic and accounts

5
5

S

5

7. College-
Entrance
Course

A foreign language: Sp)anish, French, etc

Algebra

Geometry

Elective

» Revised from one published in School and Society for May 12, 19 17.

THE CURRICULUM OF THE CONSOLn)ATED SCHOOL 315

industrial group may, in most rural regions, be omitted,
although farm blacksmithing and other such work may be
provided in the vocational course and be termed shop work.
We cannot take space to discuss the second programme,
nor can we suggest desirable programmes of recitations for
different numbers of teachers for either programme of studies.
We only hope that some valuable suggestions may arise
from perusal of the different chapters. A college-entrance
course is provided, but this does not mean that the former
course prevents preparation for the conservative college
that still requires languages and mathematics for entrance.
The pamphlet on "Cardinal Principles of Secondary Edu-
cation '' by the National Committee on the Reorganization
of Secondary Education, published by the Government
Printing Office, should be read in this connection. My aim
here is to lead to experimentation and original study, not
to settle this most important question in any particular.

After securing able teachers the most important problem
of rural education is the programme of studies. Yet the help
one can secure on making such a programme from responsible
educational bodies is almost insignificant. The writer at-
tempts to plough but a few outlining furrows in this '^stumpy"
ground. A crop of experimentation and vigorous adaptation
of the school to the farm is all that may be expected.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What principles of curriculum-making may desirably be added

to the list given in this chapter?

2. What practical suggestions on curricula for the upper grades and

high school are given by Doctor Inglis in his volume "Principles
of Secondary Education," chap. XX?

3. Read chap. VIII of Arp's "Rural Education and the Consolidated

School," entitled The Rural Community and Its Needs, and
then read his chaps. VI and VII, deaHng with curricula, and de-
termine whether these needs would be met by the types of cur-
ricula he recommends.

3l6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

4. What suggestions for rural high-school curriculum-making can

you find in Lane's bulletin on "Agricultural Instruction in the
High Schools of Six Eastern States"? Government Printing
Office.

5. What further suggestions do you obtain from Nolan's volume on

"The Teaching of Agriculture," chaps. Ill and IV? Houghton
Mifflin Co.

6. When do people need to know how to spell words? If we pre-

pared pupils to spell the words most frequently used and mis-
spelled in letter-writing, what eliminations could be made from
the ordinary spelling courses ? See chaps. I and III of Rapeer's
"Teaching Elementary School Subjects" (Scribner).

7. If the aims of education are vital, vocational, avocational, civic,

and moral efficiency, what types of knowledge, habits, and ideals
are of most worth to country boys and girls? Put them in a
large chart. A group of teachers may well work on but one
square of the chart such as the health or the civic ideals or
habits desirable in a particular community.

8. What subjects have been emphasized as of little and of great

comparative value by the war?

9. What per cent of time have the rural public schools, elementary

and high, given to instruction and training along health lines?
See report of investigation in School and Society magazine for
December 18, 1918. See also Bobbitt's "The Curriculum."
10. What per cent of school time from the sixth grade on may legit-
imately be devoted to direct vocational education (agricultural
and domestic), partly on the farm and partly in school? Does
this exclude or minimize real cultural and avocational prepara-
tion?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Note. — So little of value has been written on the curriculum for the
consolidated school, apart from the references in the chapter, that no special
list is here given.

CHAPTER XV

RURAL-LIFE NEEDS AND COLLEGE-ENTRANCE
DEMANDS

Preliminary Problems

1. What per cent of the graduates of some well-estabHshed consoH-

dated school of which you have knowledge go to college?

2. To what colleges in the same State do they go?

3. What subjects are required for entrance by these colleges?

4. What subjects do these requirements indirectly force high schools

to teach ?

5. What is the average, or median, number of teachers in the rural

high schools of your State?

6. If the college-entrance requirements name subjects that are not

of most worth to rural youth, how can the typical high school
with very few teachers provide both college-entrance curriculums
for the few and rural-life curriculums for all?

7. What steps have been taken by colleges in your State to make it

easy for pupils to make thorough preparation for meeting the
most pressing problems of life, and at the same time to enter
college if they are able to do so on graduation?

8. What effect have the requirements of colleges without your State

on your rural high-school programme of studies?

9. Is a rural consoHdated school justified in attempting to meet

the non-English-language and non-arithmetical-mathematics re-
quirements of conservative Eastern colleges, considering the
percentage of high-school graduates who go to them?
10. What has Professor Bobbitt to say on the non-English language
question in his volume on "The Curriculum"? Houghton
Mifflin Co.

I. The Essentials and the Requirements

A crucial problem in American education to-day is that
of adjusting the conflict between giving our pupils a real
education and of preparing some of them for college. In the
rural consolidated school this problem everywhere is acute

317

3l8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

because this type of school must not fail to give boys and
girls a thoroughly efficient rural schooling. In the history
of education new schools have failed the people by becoming
formal and aristocratic, catering to a few instead of the
many. The gymnasium, the real school, the academy, and
the ordinary high school have each started as a popular
reform school, and gradually lost their early high aim. The
educator who has studied the psychological, historical, and
social aspects of the curriculum sees that a natural, tradi-
tional association has to-day grown up in the minds of
many between the idea of secondary schooling and a curric-
ulum made up of such subjects as Latin, Greek, algebra,
geometry, French, German, etc. Many think of the sec-
ondary school as being the institution which teaches these
subjects, and that a six, five, or four year secondary school
would lose its identity if it taught others instead.

The educator looks upon schooling, however, not as a
traditional, static, fixed thing, so far as subjects of study
go, but as a vital agency for helping the people to meet in
the most effective manner their principal problems of life.
He is interested in the dominant unmet needs of our civiliza-
tion, in the social composition of the student population,
and in the types of knowledge, habits, ideals, and apprecia-
tions which will best contribute to the solution of grave
individual and social problems. Latin, geometry, algebra,
German, and other subjects are to him but tools to be used
only when they fit the purpose of education better than
any others which may possibly be selected or constructed.
There is to him no sanctified subject-matter to question
the relative value of which is sacrilege. All phases of a
curriculum are to be submitted to the test of relative con-
tribution to the dominant purposes of schooling in our
present-day complex and rapidly changing industrial democ-
racy.

The social composition of the high school has within a
few years vastly changed. From being an aristocratic in-

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 319

stitution fitted for the few who went to college, the high
school has in the last fifteen years doubled its number of
pupils, over 90 per cent of whom will never attend a college.
From being an institution which could not well be tested by
its serviceability in meeting the pressing needs of life (since
the children of well-to-do parents have many means of suc-
cess aside from their schooling) , it has become one in which
such fallacies as those of broad "formal discipline" cannot
be disguised by fine words and phrases, such as "culture,"
"discipline," "preparation for college," and the like. We
are to-day facing the problem of giving a secondary educa-
tion to nearly 2,000,000 children from all ranks of society
instead of merely to those of the "upper crust."

Life Problems and Educational Problems. — The prob-
lems which most of these pupils face when they leave school
are the common problems of life rather than the artificial
demands of an academic college. These principal life
problems, about five in number, form the chief aims of edu-
cation about which we are practically all agreed. These
aims of public education, as we have previously suggested,
are the following forms of ability or efficiency:

1. Vital efficiency — health and physical development.

2. Vocational efficiency — agricultural, domestic, and
others.

3. Avocational efficiency — right use of leisure, wholesome
enjoyment, recreation.

4. Civic efficiency— citizenship.

5. Moral efficiency — morality, true religion, and social
service.

These are the chief social aims of all phases of educa-
tion from the pre-school period upward. Knowledge, habits,
ideals, and appreciations (including attitudes, prejudices,
tastes, points of view, etc.) must be developed along all of
these five lines and also for such fundamental tools as the
three R's. Placing at the left of the page these seven com-
monly accepted aims, and at the top of the page the four

320 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

types of psychological changes which can be made in indi-
viduals, as shown in the previous chapter, we may form by
horizontal and vertical lines a chart, in the squares of which
we may place the minimal essential of an education, ele-
mentary, secondary, higher. Some of the general subjects
and activities (greatly modified, rearranged, and stated)
which we shall require in the rural school corresponding to
these aims, as above given, are those of

Hygiene and physical education.

Agricultural training.

Rural economics.

Arithmetic.

Home education.

American citizenship.

History.

Introductory social science.

Introductory natural science.

Applied ethics.

English language and literature.

Music.

Drawing.

Public speaking.

Avocational and recreational activities.

Rural sociology.

It can be seen that these subjects are, or can be, closely
related to the five dominant classes of needs of our people
as individuals and as a nation and thus to the five dominant
aims of schooling. The Hst is noteworthy for two great
omissions, covering six to eight subjects, namely, the ** non-
English languages " and the ''non-arithmetical mathematics.''
These cannot in America be justly required of any large
proportion of our pupils. . They are highly specialized sub-
jects, meeting the dominant and fundamental needs of ex-
ceedingly few persons. They cannot be listed with the
minimal essentials of a commonly required education. If
we were a European country in close association with peo-

Grading and lesting corn in a school laboratory, West Virginia

A class in soil studv in Wisconsin

Reproduced by courtesy of Division of Agricultural Instruction, U. S. Dept. of AgricuUure
Farm mechanical drawing in a Maryland school

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 32 1

pies using other languages than our own, if all our students
went into engineering, foreign service, or translation, if there
were not so many mechanical substitutes for calculation in
use, if we could depend upon training regardless of subject-
matter (formal discipline), if all students had from ten to
fifteen years for secondary and higher education, if the
problems of life were not so insistent and pressing for our
people, if our students were all exactly alike, and if the added
cost for teaching such subjects to all were not prohibitive,
we might entertain the suggestion that these five or more
subjects might well be kept as the staples, or staple electives,
of secondary education, and be required for entrance by
all colleges, even State agricultural colleges.

Traditional Subject-Matter vs. Essentials. — As it is
to-day, the omitted subjects are usually required for entrance
to colleges, and our great popular high schools, with their
thousands of students to the college's hundreds, must, willy-
nilly, in many cases, and because of the force of aristocratic
and traditional standards in others, teach the non-essential
instead of the essential, since algebra, geometry, Latin,
French, German, Greek, Spanish, etc., are not minimal
essentials of an education. They are the tools of a very
limited group of persons, and most who study them to-day
in our rural or city schools have much better use for their
time.

Even where a high school has a large teaching force it
is difficult to make up a strictly, and effective, educational
course for a student, and at the same time provide a college-
entrance course for the few who propose going to college.
But the typical high school of this country has but two to
four teachers. It cannot give a separate course for those
going to college and at the same time take up the courses
that are closely related to the fundamental needs of our
students and the country at large. Out in the cactus and
sage-brush regions of the West, in the little '* God-forsaken"
Eastern village which so much needs intelligent study and

k

322 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

citizenship alive to its needs, and scattered over the broad
agricultural valleys, as well as in the high schools of our
cities, we find pupils droning over Caesar's wars in ancient
Gaul, covering blackboards with relatively meaningless
algebraic or geometric symbols, and vainly endeavoring to
gain a respectable knowledge of one or two non-English
languages. This is the greatest tragedy witnessed by the
educator as he visits the schools of America to-day. A few
decades more and a social, truly American education will
have been provided, and these anomalies will not be seen.
To-day our problem is to connect education with life. Let
the few colleges adjust themselves to the many high schools
rather than the opposite, and proper sequence in studies will
be naturally arranged.

Nearly a million preventable deaths occur each year
in our country, and yet our secondary pupils study little or
no hygiene; and almost no time is given to physical develop-
ment. The pupils may, after several years' study, be able
to translate the legend on the medal presented to Colonel
Gorgas, "Salus Populi Suprema Lex," but the preventable
death, illness, and physical-defects rates remain uninflu-
enced by such study. No country ever had a greater need
of energetic and enlightened citizenship, and yet but a small
proportion of our high-school students get even the usual
desiccated half-year course in "dry-bone civics." Indus-
trial and domestic intelligence and skill the typical small
high school leaves very largely, or entirely, undeveloped,
even though self-preservation is the first law of life, and no
real ''culture" can omit such fundamental development as
that connected with one's life calling. Pupils do not have
time for essentials, since the college and tradition demand
much time on non-essentials.

The serious recommendation of the educator to the col-
lege is that it either demand the minimal essentials needed
for American life, or free the high school entirely by making
no conditions beyond graduation from , a four-year high-

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 323

school course for entrance. No college can afford to injure
and handicap American education in these stirring and ex-
acting times. No college will fail to profit by helping the
high schools as much as possible to meet directly the domi-
nant needs of American life for real culture and real efficiency.

That evolution is all in the direction outlined above we
have many indications. High schools are in many places
finding ways and means by which to make of themselves
real "people's colleges '*; the rapidly coming six- six plan of
organization is sure to help; colleges are modifying entrance
requirements in the right direction, several of the best in
the country already meeting fairly well the demands of this
chapter; and advanced students of education are everywhere
practically unanimous in this requirement of "hands off.*'
The recent surveys of secondary-school systems contain
strong indorsements of this policy, such, for example, as
Larned's investigation of secondary education in Vermont
for the Carnegie Foundation, and Davis's investigation of
the high schools of New York City for the School Inquiry.
The surveys of higher education by the U. S. Bureau of
Education suggest greater freedom and adaptation to life
needs. The recent books on secondary education are prac-
tically unanimous in this direction, as is also the report of
the National Committee on the Reorganization of Secondary
Education. Yet all of these will probably be considered
conservative in a brief time because of the present rapid
advance.

In response to a letter of inquiry a number of leading
educators have expressed to the writer their best judgments
on this general problem; and, as can be seen by the following
quotations, the general verdict is that the college must help
education toward a fundamental reorganization to meet
the needs of life by accepting the product of the four to
six years' course with little or no qualification outside of the
five fundamental lines above mentioned. If algebra and
geometry are a part of the necessary technical preparation

324 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

for engineering, if Latin and other non-English languages
are needed for teachers of these languages, or for academic
specialization, let these subjects be taught as a part of the
regular technical courses in either the college, or, by option,
in the high schools with large enough groups specializing
in these lines, and with sufficient teachers and money to
give fundamental education for all as well as technical or
academic preparation for the few. Beyond requiring Eng-
lish and recommending sequence in courses, perhaps little
should be demanded along other than absolutely essential
lines. On the other hand, every American college should,
as soon as possible, refuse to accept students who have not
studied hygiene, citizenship, appHed ethics, elementary ap-
plied economics, English, general science, and perhaps a few
other fundamental subjects. It is both safe and patriotic
to demand essentials for democracy and rural life. If col-
leges will study the causes of failure of students, and will
report to the high schools on the relative success of their
former pupils, giving reasons for failures, if they will in-
sist upon good methods and high standards of work, and
if they will use their great power to influence rural high
schools really to do something socially effective for the
country, most of the necessary readjustment between the
two institutions will be easily effected.

II. What Leading Educators Say About Entrance
Requirements

From a professor of education in a Western State uni-
versity we obtained the following judgment on this question;

A State-supported institution must admit to its student body
students of moderate ability who would properly be excluded by in-
stitutions established and financed by private or denominational
agencies. It cannot establish an intellectual aristocracy. If this
principle is embarrassing because of the presence of students who are
unable to take advantage of traditionally scholarly lines of work,

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 325

other lines of work must be established better fitted to such students.
... I believe in differentiation of entrance requirements for the sev-
eral courses. ... In this connection it should always be remembered
that high-school students often fail to know until late in their high-
school work what they wish to do in the matter of further education.
. . . When a student wakes up to the idea of taking a course in the
university for which his high-school course was not exactly the best
preparation, he should be allowed to match up in the university. . . .
Our State universities should not refuse to accept any student who is
approved for higher educational work by a high school in his State.
... I think high-school men ought specifically to express an opinion
as to the ability of a student to take up this or that course. ... As
to what subjects should be accepted, . . . university men should be
liberal in allowing high schools to meet local demands.

From the dean of the school of education in an Eastern
university:

I am committed to the policy of admitting to college any stu-
dent who has completed, with creditable grades, any good four-year
high-school course, regardless of the studies, and who has the recom-
mendation of the faculty as one fit to profit by college work. Further,
I would admit any student past twenty-one years of age, without a
full secondary course, on probation, and if he proves in the course of
the first year that he is able to carry college courses with credit, I
would cancel all conditions against him.

From the dean of the school of education in a central
State university:

The school of liberal arts in any State college should accept for
entrance four years of high-school work without specification of what
the units studied in the four years should be. . . . It has been my
impression for some time, and this impression is supported by some
figures collected recently, that the university can get as good results
in particular fields as at present by having the student begin work in
those fields without preliminary work in the same fields in the high
school. . . . The high school should determine what subjects best
fit the student for life; the university should accept these for entrance,
and should in the first two years supplement the work of the high
school.

326 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

From the dean of the college of education in a far
Western State university:

The high schools know better than the college what work they
can do, and the colleges should take the graduates of the high schools
where they find them. The work prescribed for graduation from the
college can be made whatever the college desires, but there should be
abundant opportunity to get into college after taking practically any
of the courses in the ordinary high school.

From the dean of the division of education in a far
Eastern university:

It seems to me that the entrance requirements of the University
of Chicago embody the important characteristics of a good plan for
admission to college. The features of this plan that seem to me es-
pecially desirable are as follows:

1. No subject other than English is prescribed.

2. The candidate is required to do a certain amount of consecutive
work in the high school in order that he may meet the requirement
of a major of three units and a minor of two units.

3. A free margin of five units is permitted, whereby progressive
schools may develop courses of instruction that seem particularly
valuable either for the purpose of meeting the needs of individual
pupils or for the purpose of meeting special demands in the com-
munity.

(The editor considers even this plan too conservative
and expects more liberality at this university soon. Even
Yale and Princeton have recently shown a disposition to
meet the high schools half-way.)

From the head of the department of education in a
Western university:

It has always seemed to me that our entrance requirements are
based on the right principle. The only fixed subject is the use of the
English language. For the remainder a wide choice is offered, the
university taking the ground that while the high schools may need
to set certain fixed requirements, it is not the province of the univer-
sity to say to the high schools what these fixed requirements shall be.

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 327

On the other hand, we feel very strongly that it is best for each high
school to do those things which in its community seems most worth
while, and that the university entrance requirements should be shaped
so as to permit of such a condition of affairs. The university later
may pass on the quantity and quality of work done when the student
comes to enter the university; but it ought not to prescribe its char-
acter for all the high-school students.

These statements may stand as the general judgment of
our educational experts. The writer would go beyond these
and urge colleges to require students to present evidence not
only of English study but of knowledge, skill, and ideals in
each of the five lines of social demands of our democracy.

III. Non-English Languages Amy Non-Arithmetical
Mathematics

The alternative of eliminating all requirements that do
not relate closely to the five factors, frequently reiterated,
of (i) health, (2) vocational (including domestic) efficiency,
(3) citizenship, (4) morality (and social service), and (5)
harmless enjoyment, has hardly been considered in this
country. Colleges have been more concerned with devising
means by which to hold the high school in the ruts of tradi-
tion rather than in stimulating them to do their share in
educating the youth of the land. Many would even try
to use the junior high-school movement to thrust the non-
English languages and non-arithmetical mathematics down-
ward upon elementary-school boys and girls. When the
entire history of college-entrance requirements is better
known, the truth of this statement will be recognized. Col-
leges of the future may be found, however, giving special
credit for health and physical development (or for definite
training in these lines), for general knowledge of the world
in which the high-school graduates live, for experience and
power along the lines of the principal problems of life which
all people must face, and which they are to-day facing

328 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

poorly because of the lack of a thoroughgoing socialized and
American education. Students of education do not object
to college requirements. They object to requirements of the
less valuable in place of the absolutely essential.

Arguments for the Non-English Languages. — It seems
desirable to outline briefly some of the reasons for the
elimination of the requirements of the variously stated
number of "units" in algebra, geometry, Latin, Greek,
French, German, etc., both for the general student body
and for college-entering students. We shall examine more
particularly here the great burden of language study. Latin
was practically the entire curriculum of the Latin-grammar
school out of which finally came the academy and the
modern high school. Some time after the Renaissance it
was the principal college subject. Modern languages and
mathematics had to fight for college credit for a long time
before they got it. But once in, the latter have, for dis-
ciplinary reasons, held their own. French and German
were not counted for admission until the seventies. The
influences which have put the modern languages, for the
most part German, into the American high schools were
many, but chiefly the following ten sets of facts and notions:

1. The rather servile imitation of the German gymnasium
and the French lycee.

2. The desire of many Germans in this country, hy-
phenated and unhyphenated, to keep alive here the lan-
guage of the Fatherland. As a boy in Cincinnati, the writer
studied in the public schools under an English teacher in
the mornings, and under a German teacher, speaking only
the German language, in the afternoons. In certain cases
one or both of these languages has been helped into our
schools by foreign money and influence. Thus in German
centres a large amount of time has been misspent in teach-
ing German to many who could have little use for it.

3. The doctrine of "formal discipHne," namely, that the
value of the mental training which one gets from certain

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 329

subjects is sufficient to justify them even if they have little
or no content value for meeting any of the great needs of
life; i. e., that one need not use these languages in speaking
or otherwise in childhood or later Hfe to get more educa-
tional benefit than could otherwise be obtained for the
same expenditure of time and effort.

4. The theory that a person can learn the languages in
school better early in life than in the period, say, from
eighteen to twenty-two, a very common notion.

5. The fallacious idea of certain teachers that all or
most college students should study French or German,
because they will need to read in these languages for ad-
vanced scholarship.

6. The fact that the methods of teaching these languages
were organized, easily followed without much knowledge or
skill, and that until recently the sciences of hygiene, eco-
nomics, civics, ethics, vocational studies, home education,
etc., were largely "without form and void," or not yet or-
ganized, selected, and adapted for use in teaching secondary
students.

7. The notion that students would probably need these
modern languages for harmless enjoyment of leisure — in
travel abroad, in reading Moliere and Goethe, in singing the
songs of these countries, and in interpreting quotations or
menus.

8. The theory that a knowledge of these languages along
with Latin and Greek contributed considerable ability in
the use of EngHsh.

9. The notion that students may just as well as not
take these languages while in high school or college, since
they have the time, and many rather enjoy studying them
— that this is a satisfactory use of the time.

10. The conventional idea that pupils should study these
languages because the ''best people" do so.

Refutation of These Arguments. — What can the edu-
cator say when faced by this formidable array ? Our ques-

330 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tion here is not exactly whether modern languages have any
value. The question always is what knowledge, habits,
ideals, and appreciations are of most value for meeting the
fivefold aims of education in this country to-day, the ques-
tion asked so ably years ago by Herbert Spencer, and pre-
viously by Benjamin Franklin (in his 1789 protest against
the classical degeneration of the academy he had started
with such high hopes in 1750). Not what we should like
to have all pupils study if they had twenty years for educa-
tion and a life of leisure ahead of them as in ancient Athens!
But what our great democratic institutions filled with stu-
dents from all ranks of society, most of them never entering
colleges, need to help them and America meet effectively
the issues of preventable poverty, disease, crime, vocational
and domestic inefficiency, degradingly used leisure, and a
generally low status of educational and scientific opinion!
Not what a child of a large polyglot city filled from many
lands by almost unrestricted immigration may be able to
use if we wish to cater to the use of foreign tongues in
America! But what the country and village boy and girl
in more typical American communities must have to help
the country people provide a balance-wheel to degenerative
and unnatural city tendencies.

But let us look at this decimal array, anyway, and see
what these opinions and facts amount to.

I. European Ideals. — There can be no doubt that the
great group of schoolmen who went to Germany for their
higher education a few decades ago came back filled with
the desire to get into our high-school curricula the subjects
which they found there. Some of these men, in high places,
still revere the German gymnasium curriculum. The falla-
cies here were those of thinking that the schooling devised
to accentuate class distinctions and fit an aristocracy for
awing and ruling the masses should be appropriate here,
and that our country, separated by an ocean far from
France and Germany, should have any such need of ability
to use in intercourse and reading the languages which these

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 33 1

peoples, in close and intimate relationship, in peace or war,
very much need. No. Our pupils have always needed
English, more and better than they obtained. Our teaching
of modern foreign languages has taken valuable time much
better spent on this and similar American problems. They
need Spanish more than they need German or French, and
Spanish should be made elective in only a relatively few
high schools of the land. " Go slow about introducing sub-
jects not found among the minimal essentials'' is a good
conservative rule. We are opposed to any of these subjects
as general requirements for all students.

2. Immigrant Demands. — It was probably unwise to
let the sentiments of even very desirable alien peoples here
dominate curricula enough to make possible the recognition
of German and French as staple subjects. This has tended
to obstruct the Americanization of our aliens by eliminating
from their possible courses subjects which function directly
in Americanization, such as American citizenship, and by
cultivating such close attachments for foreign countries as
to prove a menace to us in our international crises. Why
not teach Spanish, Itahan, Japanese, and Russian in all
high schools? Simply because we have not had powerful
groups of sentimental zealots and outside forces to push
them in ! Once get a subject into the schools and the ten-
dency is for the schoolmaster and the pubhc to fall down
and worship it as one of the indispensable pillars of the
school edifice! Our language and our curricula must be
American. Through a very few linguistic speciaHsts America
may, as Professor Snedden points out, keep thoroughly
in touch with France and Germany. This group may be
smaller than one one-thousandth of the number of high-
school students who are now compelled to study these lan-
guages, even though exceedingly few learn them well enough
to use them.

3. Formal Discipline. — The doctrine of broad formal
discipHne is also untenable. We probably get a modicum
of general discipHne, or training in ^'reasoning," in "mem-

332 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ory," in "will-power," etc., in any of the supposed *' facul-
ties," from any similar groups of purposive activities. The
teachers in a large number of Eastern secondary schools and
colleges, for example, as shown in a study by Thorndike,
recently attributed little less *' discipline," so called, to
waiting on tables and playing on the college football teams
than to the old "classical" or "cultural" subjects.

The literature on this subject is quite extensive, and
we have many psychological experiments to test the old
theory. Judd, in his " Psychology of the High School Sub-
jects," expresses the most conservative views on the problem
and becomes almost reactionary in meeting the arguments
of Thorndike, who expresses, in his "Educational Psy-
chology," the more progressive views. A sound middle
position would be to teach no subject unless it can be justi-
fied in content, or subject-matter, as being clearly and plainly
worth more than anything that could be put into its place
for meeting the principal aims of education. "Formal dis-
cipHne in its sweeping interpretation is an unproved hy-
pothesis for which there are more refuting than supporting
data."

We cannot take the time of students in our schools to
teach them subjects, costing more per pupil-hour than others
more essential, which have little more than vague opinions
and tradition back of them.

Farm carpentry, agricultural, domestic, and commercial
subjects are costly because of the equipment necessary and
supplies used, but the studies of Professor Bobbitt show
that the non-English languages and Latin cost per pupil-
hour of instruction in a typical city as much as or more than
do shop work, mechanical drawing, and commercial subjects
(10.3 cents of a dollar each), while the modern languages
cost even more (11.4 cents), the average of all the other
subjects being only a little over seven cents. Greek was
put out of the Newton, Massachusetts, high school only a
few years ago because, as Superintendent Spaulding said,

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 333

his cost accounting showed that Greek was costing far more
than it was evidently worth to the people supporting the
schools, considering what other education might be pur-
chased with the money.

Wait until the people generally learn of such facts, and
their present distrust of the formal-discipline notion will
lead them to challenge effectively this overburdening study
of "words, words, words," especially foreign words. We
need some of the wisdom of Horace Mann, who early pro-
tested against putting the cart before the horse in education
— in requiring what should be electives and making elective
or non-existent what should be required of all. If we could
compute the number of preventable deaths caused by the
crowding out of hygiene from our high schools in the last
fifty years, and see the miles of dead march by for months
in columns of four, we should possess in this alone sufficient
proof and intense realization of lamentable waste.

4. Is Childhood the Best Time ? — For those who believe
that "the only time to learn languages is in childhood and
not in the college period, '^ we refer to the studies summarized
by Professor Parker, of the University of Chicago, in his
volume on "Methods of Teaching in High Schools" (Ginn)
in a chapter entitled The Influence of Age on Learning.
Here again naive opinion based on isolated or peculiar in-
stances falls before expert psychological tests. The ability
to memorize and retain a language vocabulary increases
gradually with experience and age up to about twenty, as
does the ability to reason or any other mental trait. It cer-
tainly does not decrease. Parker speaks ably against hav-
ing any large proportion of high-school students studying
foreign languages on the grounds that they can learn them
much better in less time and with less loss in relearning if
they postpone them until the college period, and that such
high-school teaching is poor social economy. We can here
do little more than refer to the chapter. More of such open-
minded investigation and analysis of this problem is needed.

334 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Practically all colleges now have beginning courses in French
and German. Why not have them for practically all stu-
dents who will be required to study these subjects in college ?
(And why not have Latin and non-arithmetical mathe-
matics also begun there instead of requiring them as we now
do of about a million high-school students ?) We must con-
clude that the time to study foreign languages for those who
are going to college is in the college period. Practically no
others will need them sufficiently to exclude other subjects
by taking them.

S' Are They Needed for. Advanced Study? — Parker meets
well also in the above-mentioned chapter the fifth argu-
ment, that students need to study the non-English modern
languages in high school because they will need to read these
languages for advanced scholarship. We beg to quote his
words:

Let us consider i,ooo students who enter high school. Of these,
probably 500 will not continue to graduation. Practically none of
the non-graduates will have occasion to use French or German as a
practical tool for further study. Of the 500, 250 may go to college.
Of these, 100 may graduate and be eligible to become candidates for
the doctor's degree. But as a matter of fact only 10 out of the orig-
inal 1,000 will ever do serious graduate study to the extent of receiv-
ing the master's degree (that is, one year after graduation from col-
lege). Probably not 5 out of the original 1,000 who entered high
school will become serious candidates for the doctor's degree. Of the
5, some will try to choose topics for dissertations in connection with
which they will not have to use French or German. Of those who
secure the degree, very few will continue to do productive research
work which will require a reading knowledge of a foreign language.
Many of them will get positions as professors in small colleges, normal
schools, or high schools, and do routine teaching the rest of their
lives.i

The professors of chemistry and of engineering in the
college could be answered in much the same way. Their

^ I recommend for reading also the passages in Professor Bobbitt's "Sur-
vey of the School System of San Antonio, Texas," on these phases of wasted
effort, as well as his volume on "The Curriculum'.' of later date.

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 335

students after years of study do not gain facility in reading
these languages. They drop them as soon as the professors'
backs are turned. They sensibly depend upon translators
to put into the English technical journals and books the
most valuable writings of the foreign investigators. Most of
them cannot keep up with even the Hterature of their pro-
fession published in English, let alone the foreign technical
journals. A questionnaire sent by the writer to five hun-
dred graduate engineers all out of college over ten years
showed that this is true for them and that they regard time
spent on French and German as largely wasted. Soon we
should have to read Japanese, Russian, Spanish, Italian, and
other languages to get in the original the chief scientific
productions. The whole ideal is largely impractical and the
extremely few really benefited will not warrant wholesale
required-foreign-language study in high schools. A few
specialists who really know the languages can each month
review for engineers and technologists the principal foreign
works in our EngHsh journals of technology.^

6. Are There Unmet Demands ? — These languages need
not now be taught because there is nothing else to teach.
Excellent courses in American citizenship, in applied ethics,
in elementary sociology, in industrial, agricultural, and home
education, in hygiene and physical development, and so on,
have been well worked out. Their pedagogy is being de-
veloped, some now being organized as a series of projects,
or problems, almost as closely chiselled as the "pure'' (un-
applied and inapplicable) mathematics of the old mathema-
tician, and at least as well organized for any kind of "men-
tal discipline" as foreign languages.

Besides, these socially directed subjects possess the tre-
mendous psychological advantage of having a content that
is full of suggestions and associations with the affairs of life,
making possible the recall, use, and functioning of knowl-

^ See Professor C. R. Mann's bulletin of the Bureau of Education on
"The American Spirit in Education," No. 30, 1919.

^;^6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

edge, habits, ideals, and appreciations gained, whereas the
pure mathematics and non-EngKsh languages connect ex-
ceedingly little with the concrete lives of most people out of
the academic world. It could be truthfully said of many
high-school courses of the type which conforms most closely
to the Unguistic college-preparatory ideal, that there are more
socially valuable, educative, teachable, and interesting sub-
jects outside the curricula than within them. We live at a
fortunate time when first-class text-books have been worked
out for most of the subjects which need to be taught in the
high school and when each year sees many marked improve-
ments. The organization of introductory economics at the
University of Chicago as a series of problems by which stu-
dents gain power to think on the economic problems of life,
rather than on those of abstract mathematics, is very sug-
gestive. Professor Parker has set a good example to writers
of books for teachers, which in the past have been very
unpedagogical and hard to learn or teach, by furnishing
with his volume on ^'Methods of Teaching in High Schools'*
a volume of projects and problems in application. The
new general science texts and laboratory manuals are also
of a new and vital character. Professor Sharp's work at
the University of Wisconsin in the field of high-school ethics,
or moral instruction (taboo for a long time), is highly sug-
gestive in another field. (See his volume on "Moral In-
struction," Bobbs-Merrill.) The books by Beard and by
Dunn on citizenship are of a new order. The right use of
leisure, recreational and avocational activities, are being
developed and made available for school procedure.^ A
great wealth of educative material closely related to the
aims of education lies before us. Why remain bound to
the curricula of those who were without a knowledge of
psychology, without subject-matter outside of the "classics,"

^ See, for example, the recreational surveys of Springfield, Ipswich, Madison,
and Cleveland, all made within recent years and the first of their kind.
(Recreation Division of the Russell Sage Foundation, New York.)

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 337

and were ''hard up'' for something to put into the high-
school course to fill up four years of time?

7. English for Harmless Enjoyment. — The a vocational,
cultural, or leisure argument for the study of foreign lan-
guages by high-school and college students is about the only
one which seems to have any weight. We are not speaking
of a refinement of mind, a *' discipline," but of such harmless
enjoyment as that of reading French or German plays and
novels in the original, of singing French and German songs,
being able to interpret quotations in a foreign tongue, un-
derstanding French fashion-terms and menus, being able to
talk the language when abroad, and so on. The answer here
is that the pedantic habit of sprinkling pages with a foreign
tongue is rapidly dying out, that the average high-school or
even college student will never see the Rhine or the Rhone,
that admirable translations of the worthiest foreign litera-
ture soon appear — far more satisfactory for study than the
results of the kind of knowledge of these languages even the
best type of student usually obtains — that we can get along
with the fashions and the menus pretty well without sacrific-
ing years of time in foreign-language study, and that in the
years spent in such study we could be gaining education in
many types of avocations and harmless enjoyment which are
now denied us. We are not organizing our high-school or
college courses especially for academic specialists, for the
leisure classes, nor for any who can afford to fritter away
precious time and energy. Education in America means
something else. Our schools have not yet proved themselves
very able at teaching essentials.

8. Need They Be Taken as Electives? — The eighth ar-
gument, that students may just as well as not take such sub-
jects while they are in high schools, shows a lack of knowl-
edge of what should be done in the high school, how little
time there is for extras, and how much time and money is
lost by taking them. Many speak for these languages in the
high school with as little comprehension of purpose and

^^8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

relative value as the girl who on being asked why she was
studying French and German in the high school said: ^'Oh,
I don't know, really. People ask you what language you
have studied, you know, and you Hke to have something to
tell them."

We shall let Professor Parker meet this argument. In
the above-mentioned chapter he says:

Putting together the psychological evidence concerning the fa-
cility with which a reading knowledge or the vocabulary of a language
is acquired at different ages, and the facts concerning the enormous
social waste that is entailed by requiring or advising students to begin
the study of foreign languages early, we feel justified in maintaining
that in most cases the study of a foreign language should be begun in
later adolescence (from eighteen to twenty-two years of age), when
the few students who will use the language begin to arrange their
elections of studies with definite reference to a practical goal in con-
nection with which they will use them. . . .

Inasmuch as over 90 per cent of high-school students will Dot
have occasion to use a foreign language as a practical tool in later
life, we shall avoid an enormous social waste (of community money,
teacher's time and energy, and student's time and energy) by making
little or no provision for the study of a foreign language by most
students in American high schools. Those who will use it as a prac-
tical tool in reading may begin to learn it when it becomes reasonably
certain which students they are. If they are to be candidates for the
degree of Doctor of Philosophy, as many of those are who use the
language as a tool for studying, they can learn French in one year
and German in two years during their college course.

Moreover, learning the language at this period will obviate the
waste of time ordinarily entailed in relearning the language when it
has been studied early in life. That this necessity of relearning is a
serious fact is shown by the large numbers of failures in efficiency and
reading examinations in French and German by students in college
who have studied the languages from two to ten years before taking
the examination.

Our own argument has been stated. American high
schools are typically very small and poorly supported, with
only time to teach some of the essentials. These languages
are not essentials. Time is the most precious thing in the

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 339

student^s life. It would be desirable if the elementary
and high-school period could be reduced from twelve to
eleven years and the college period to three.

9. Do They Help Much in Use of English ? — The ninth
argument is that a study of the non-English languages gives
one proficiency in the use of English. Professor Starch has
met this argument by a scientific investigation. And one
ounce of accurate scientific investigation is worth tons of
opinions, resolutions, and surmises. In his article entitled
''Some Experimental Data on the Value of Studying For-
eign Languages, '* in the School Review , of recent date, he
gives the results of extensive investigations in this field.
The average marks of students in high school and college
failed to increase significantly with the number of years
the various students had studied foreign languages, from
o to 15, in actual tested ability to use the English language,
''good usage." In fact, the average scores for correctness
of usage of university juniors and seniors decreased with
the number of years they had studied foreign languages.
The more they studied French and German, the less ability
they showed in correct usage.

Professor Starch necessarily attributes some increase of
knowledge of ''grammar" shown to the influence of the
foreign-language study, but this may largely be accounted
for by the fact that many students study English grammar in
the high school and that the rhetoric in high school and col-
lege and the constant writing of themes gives considerable
insight into grammar aside from foreign-language study.
Furthermore, he finds that "Latin obviously has no advan-
tage over any other foreign language in increasing gram-
matical knowledge or usage of English." The reader is re-t
ferred to the statistics in the article itself. Such tests may
readily be repeated at other institutions. On this and
other similar evidence we may conclude that knowledge,
skill, and taste in Enghsh evidently cannot be obtained by
studying something else, and that even if there are slight

340 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

additions to ability in English from foreign-language study,
they are bought at an exorbitant price. And if there is an
increase in grammatical knowledge, such knowledge, as
shown by many tests, does not correlate with ability to use
good English.^

Other data appearing in School and Society for August 14,
1915, and November 20, 1915, bear out the same general
conclusion. A little more scientific investigation of this
group of problems will be sufficient to prove the general
proposition. The efforts and pleas of Benjamin Franklin
and of those who started high schools here to achieve real
democratic secondary education may yet be realized. The
rural consolidated school with its probable six-year high-
school course must fight for the essentials of rural educa-
tion or degenerate into formalism like all its predecessors,
the grammar-school, the German gymnasium, the French
lycee, the English public school, and the old American
four-year high school of the time of the "Committee of
Ten."

10. Should They Be Required or Elected Because It Is the
Thing to Do? — The "conventional" value, although strong
for getting students to take foreign-language studies includ-
ing "the classics," has no weight as an argument for costly
courses in our American high schools. Booker T. Washing-
ton said that after the Civil War the negroes had but two
great aims in life. One was to hold office, thus reahzing their
sovereignty as free citizens, and the other was to study
Latin. The latter meant to them a liberal education. The
"young folks" of their wealthy owners had been going North
for Latin, with some French and German, and had come back
able to chant certain cabalistic conjugations, thus striking
awe into those who knew not the charm ! We have not the
time, energy, nor money to waste in meeting such conven-
tional, traditional, aristocratic aims as this in our schools and

1 See chapter on Grammar in the editor's volume on "Teaching Elementary
School Subjects" (Scribner).

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 34 1

colleges when real culture and real efficiency must be de-
veloped for meeting the stirring problems of life which press
on all for solution.

Such doctrine is not utilitarian in the sense of a mere
bread-and-butter aim. It is a plea for ''culture." Let us
make neither academic nor vocational specialists of our boys
and girls without furnishing first a broad cultural foundation
meeting the first aims of education. We want American
boys and girls to get an American education, not a wooden-
nutmeg substitute. The ten arguments for the modern
foreign languages when examined are found without force.

IV. The Outcome

What has been said above applies largely also to the study
of the dead languages, Latin and Greek, and of abstract
non-arithmetical mathematics, i. e., algebra and geometry.
We cannot here take up the arguments given for these
studies. We should attempt to prove by analysis and verifi-
able data that these subjects give no special ''disciplinary
effects" which are more valuable to young Americans than
they could obtain by other use of their time, that they do not
especially develop the "memory" or the "reasoning powers,"
or those of "accuracy," "discrimination," and the long Hst
frequently mentioned by those with vested interests in the
subjects.^

We should attempt to demonstrate that the thinking in
mathematics is unlike that which we must use in meeting the
problems of life, as analyzed by Dewey and others, both in
method of mental activity and in the content or subject-
matter. We can gain power in solving the manifold prob-
lems of life by solving them, by dealing with them in class
or community, and not by deahng deductively with x, y, z,

1 See Moore's new volume on "What Is Education?" (Ginn), chapter on
The Doctrine of General Discipline ; also Moritz's article in School and Society
for May, 1918. Bobbitt's "The Curriculum" has been favorably men-
tioned.

342 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

or the lines and angles of geometric figures. But we must
leave these subjects for further examination by our readers
and the investigators who are to-day busily studying subject
values.

Why did the schoolmasters of the past fasten upon our
school traditions the method of attempting to educate
children backward, indirectly, abandoning the near and
the evidently educative, and seizing upon far-off, hypo-
thetical subjects which only a remoteness from the experi-
ences of real life and a very vivid imagination would ever
lead one to regard as educative in any large degree? The
history of education reveals that many Hues of non-reason in
the form of blind imitation, mere tradition, and other-
worldly aristocracy gradually converged to bring about this
anomalous situation to-day. Fixing our eyes on the social
aims of education, on the nature and needs of the youth to
be educated, and perseverance in the scientific evaluation of
subject-matter, results, and methods are the only means
which will help us to break away and inventively and cre-
atively to construct the cultural^ education of future Amer-
ica. For rural education in consolidated schools, the need
of constant use of such a method of establishing a real
country education for country people constitutes nothing
less than a social emergency in these early years of its de-
velopment. We urge Uberty for experimental adjustment.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What special applications to the consolidated rural school can you

make from the principles developed by Professor Bobbitt in
his volume on "The Curriculum"?

2. What important domestic problems which women meet on taking

responsibility for a rural household are untouched by the or-
dinary home-economics' curricula for girls? Could the school
wisely undertake to prepare girls for these responsibilities, con-
sidering other demands on the time available for schooling?

1 See Dewey's definitions and discussions of culture and character in Mon-
roe's "Cyclopedia of Education."

RURAL NEEDS AND COLLEGE DEMANDS 343

3. Which of the college-entrance plans suggested by the writers of

the letters in the chapter fit best your own State colleges ?

4. What additions to the argument for the elimination of so much

foreign and dead language study in rural high schools can you
make?

5. Which of the arguments of the editor would you contest?

6. What phases of history are of most value to rural-school pupils,

elementary and high?

7. What recreational, avocational, or cultural needs of country folk

as you know them are poorly met by the typical rural high
school? Do algebra, geometry, Latin, French, and German
satisfy these needs?

8. If possible, secure a survey of rural recreation made by some com-

petent persons, and note the cultural needs there set forth.

9. What parts of the United States are most progressive in experi-

mentally developing real American and rural curricula for meet-
ing dominant rural-life needs?
10. How can you explain the great surplus of books and articles on
methods of teaching, and the very few until recently on cur-
riculum-making ?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Bobbitt— "The Curriculum." Houghton Mifflin Co.

2. Inglis — "Principles of Secondary Education." Houghton Mifflin

Co.

3. "Cardinal Principles of Secondary Education." Government

Printing Office.

4. Parker — " Methods of Teaching in High Schools." Ginn.

5. Johnston — " High School Education " and " The Modern High

School."

6. Monroe — " Principles of Secondary Education." Macmillan.

7. Moore — " What Is Education? " Houghton Mifflin Co.

8. Vogt— " Rural Sociology." Appleton.

CHAPTER XVI

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP— RELATIVE VALUES
IN ENGLISH INSTRUCTION

Preliminary Problems

1. What types of fiction and essays have been collected that develop

high ideals of country life ? (See, for example, Bowman's books,
published by Scribners.)

2. Do any of these compare well in their contribution to the funda-

mental aims of rural education with "selections" now used?

3. What books and magazines could well be incorporated in the read-

ing courses of junior and senior high-school youth ?

4. What is the most common form of writing, of "composition," that

people do in ordinary rural life? Where could these letters be
found ?

5. What per cent of the composition time in school is devoted to

training in letter-writing? Would the defects and merits in the
collected correspondence of a typical rural county for one year
indicate that the time spent was sufficient for ordinary people?

I. The New Aims of English Teaching

One of the former '^best sellers'' by a well-known author
bears the curious title, **The Inside of the Cup,'' which he
justifies by an apt biblical reference. This suggested the
title for the present chapter, which is incorporated here more
as an illustration of how to use the social aims of education
in selecting all subject-matter than because of the supreme
value of English. My text is taken from the writings of a
modern religious teacher and diplomat. He says somewhere
that we should all drink deep from the cup of knowledge, but
warns us that we must not become so deeply engrossed in
the beauty of the tracery and the coloring of the designs on
the cup as to fail to drink and pass on refreshed and in-
vigorated.

M4

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 345

The peculiar temptation and sin of the teacher is to be-
come engrossed in the study of the vessel of knowledge and to
forget his function as the nourisher of souls. It is especially
the temptation of teachers of English, although the mathe-
matician, the historian, the linguist, and the scientist in
their teacher's chairs all likewise succumb. Teachers of
English have before them a multitude to be fed with Kving
education; they have the greatest opportunity available in
the schools of to-day to mould the character of the American
people; their chief fault, which we attempt here to dissect
and diagnose in order to cure and prevent, is that of not dis-
covering and reaUzing their peculiar social function. Too
often they are not guided by the great aims of education,
but, turning away from Hfe, they fix their gaze on the tech-
nical linguistic properties of the so-called classics and of the
compositions they teach. They become engrossed in the con-
templation of the outside of the cup.

Relative Values and Educational Aims. — An understand-
ing of relative values in the teaching of English can come only
from a study of educational purposes and aims. A thing is
good or bad, valuable, less valuable, or valueless, in so far as
it functions more or less efficiently in the achievement of the
purpose for which it is used. The teacher of English, in the
upper-graded or six-year high school especially, performs
part of the work of educating boys and girls in early adoles-
cence. Her work must contribute to the aims of education
in this period. If we can get before us the principal purposes
of schooling, we can obtain standards by which to judge the
relative values of all teaching and of the special work of the
teachers of English.

The traditional aim of schooling inherited by the high
and upper-grade school is that of formal discipline, which
impKes that it does not matter what we study, provided
that we agonize over it sufficiently. This relic of medieval
asceticism was originally brought forward to justify the ped-
ant schoolmasters in holding the only subject which they

34^ THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

could teach, namely, Latin grammar, in the Latin-grammar
schools after the time of Elizabeth, Bacon, and Milton,
when Latin went out of use as the language of scholarship
and diplomacy. Other names for this aim of teaching, such
as "mental discipline," "mind- training," "culture," "de-
velopment of the mental faculties," "training of the powers
of reasoning, concentration, discrimination, memory, etc.,"
were, and are still, commonly used. The principal of a large
secondary school said to the writer only recently that he
wanted algebra and Latin taught in the first year in order
to give his students "minds to work with," to "develop
their power to remember and to think." It is little wonder
that the English teacher, who for a long time was not recog-
nized by classical teachers and the colleges because she did
not hold to this doctrine, finally came around to the same
false standard that English is to be taught as a discipline
and that all other values are by-products.

This aim for both elementary and secondary schooling
has been rejected by all modern educators. We can get
training and valuable subject-matter at the same time; and
the training which is divorced from its concrete applica-
tions will largely fail to function. We must look elsewhere
for the aims and purposes of modern education. Any
scrutiny of the quadrupling of attendance from all ranks
of society in our high schools in the last two decades, of the
manifold types of work now being carried on in them, and
of the numerous grave social problems curable by sound
schooling, will show that the aim of formal discipline is no
longer an actual or sufficient guide for democracy's public
schools. Out in the country, where people are so close to
nature and the great vital facts of life, such an aim for the
consolidated school is farcical and ignoble.

The Fivefold Aim. — The chief social aims of education,
which the leaders in education from Spencer down have
recognized, and which the recent great educational surveys
are bringing out clearly into the lights are about five in

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 347

number. They form the principal aims because they furnish
the principal problems of the American people. These
five aims, stated before as phases of social efficiency, may
be reiterated here as follows: (i) Vital efficiency — health
and physical development; (2) vocational efficiency — agri-
cultural, domestic, professional, industrial, etc.; (3) civic
efficiency — citizenship; (4) moral efficiency — morality and
social service; (5) avocational efficiency — recreation, harm-
less enjoyment, and the right use of leisure.

Most teachers in public schools or elsewhere will readily
accept these five great purposes as the purposes of educa-
tion. But these are not the aims which have established
either our curricula or methods of teaching. Our schooling
is not yet based on them. For instance, about a million
people die each year in the United States of preventable
diseases due largely to preventable ignorance, and yet our
schools (especially the high schools) give little or no effective
education in hygiene and physical development for all.
The status of our vocational (including domestic) efficiency
is about as low as is our citizenship, and yet most public
schools give little or no effective training along these lines.
In general, a statement of the pressing problems of the
American people which can be solved largely by means of
an education that hits the mark, when compared with the
subjects and methods of a majority of our high schools, will
instantly show that we are doing other things than putting
first things first and meeting the dominant unmet educational
needs of our people. A number of English teachers realize
this, and their meetings and journals are taken up to-day
with statements of dissatisfaction with the results of their
work, a most favorable sign, since out of such dissatisfaction
grows better adjustment. The best results so far are such
studies as the national report on the reorganization of English
in secondary schools, new and practical texts, and sociaHzed
courses.

348 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

n. Readjusting the Subject to Rural Needs

Application to English. — Now what can be done to pupils
to help them to produce the changes which will promote
this fivefold aim of education? The psychological changes
which can be produced in pupils are about four in number:
out of our golden cup we can pour, to all, educational nour-
ishment which makes for changes in knowledge, in habits^
in ideals, and in appreciations. With the five aims arranged
vertically at the left of the page, and the four types of
psychological changes which we can make in individuals
at the top of the page, we may make, by means of vertical
and horizontal lines, as shown in a previous chapter, a chart,
into the twenty squares of which we can write the minimum
essentials of an education.

Then we can ask of each subject and course of study
now in the programme of studies this question: What are
you contributing in the way of knowledge, habits, ideals,
and appreciations? What are you doing for health? For
making the home life of our people better and brighter?
For solving our grave vocational problems? For improving
harmless enjoyment and the right use of leisure for our people
who are to-day struggling for the eight-hour day? What
do you, Latin, Greek, French, German, algebra, formal
grammar, or geometry, taken one at a time for scruti'ny,
contribute to these five great aims? What courses must
we throw out entirely, or, at least, greatly modify ? What
must be put into our courses to meet the great problems of
morality and social service? Do we need a course in ap-
plied ethics? What about citizenship? Can we meet this
problem effectively by giving only a portion of the high-
school students a brief half-year course in desiccated ^'dry-
bone civics,'^ or do we need courses at least a year in length,
with such beginning texts in the grades as Field and Near-
ing's "Community Civics" and Dunn's ''The Community
and the Citizen," and in the high school with Beard's '' Ameri-

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 349

can Citizenship" and others? What about the methods of
teaching and relative emphasis on different phases of sub-
ject-matter and training? Is it more valuable to know-
how to be a citizen at home and to help to clean up the
community and to work for its welfare, or to pass good
examinations on the tenure of office of judges of the United
States Supreme Court, the process of impeachment of a
president, and on the details of the Constitution?

Now, bring English up to the bar. What aims are you
promoting? Do you put first things first? You are the
only subject required without alternatives in all high schools.
From being a despised creature, unrecognized by the col-
leges, and even by other teachers of the school, you have
crowded in until in the high school you take three or four
years of each student's time. You are the chief educator
of the child at this age in point of time available. What
have you to show in the way of that knowledge and those
habits, ideals, and appreciations which will most effectively
meet the five principal educational needs of our people, or
has English no responsibility for helping the people solve
these five principal problems of life connected with health,
vocation, leisure, citizenship, and morality?

Do we need you at all, Miss English? It was formerly
thought that the other teachers of the school could do your
work, and they did it. Cannot children be pretty well
understood, and do they not get along fairly well in the
world, without you, i. e., if they miss high school or drop out
in the first year, as a large percentage do ? Cannot all high-
school teachers be trained and compelled to correct gram-
matical and other errors in the speech and writing of pupils,
and thus save much time now spent on EngHsh teaching
in one class, with a comparative neglect of it in all others?
If we can get into the six-year high-school courses the essen-
tial educational subjects relating closely to the five great
aims of education, and then train our secondary teachers to
develop not only changes in the information or knowledge

350 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of pupils but to develop also habits, ideals, and apprecia-
tions (including attitudes, tastes, perspectives, prejudices,
etc.) for each of the essential subjects, shall we find it
necessary to have teachers of English at all? Probably
not. Some of these schools are already trying the experi-
ment of using good literature in connection with other sub-
jects, and providing composition and oral English correction
in connection with all school work. But that time is far
in the future; we yet have a great immigrant population
for our melting-pot, and more will follow the war unless
immigration is restricted; and we confront a present situa-
tion. Undoubtedly it will be of great service for the Eng-
lish teachers, however, to look upon themselves for the
moment as assistants to the other teachers of the school,
who are more or less directly serving the ends of health,
citizenship, morality, vocational efficiency, and so on. The
teacher of EngHsh thus has the opportunity to complement
their work and do the phases of the general task which they
cannot well promote.

Her activity would then probably be directed more
along the following lines: (i) The cultivation of those great
ideals and appreciations which make for social efficiency
and social happiness along each of the five lines indicated
above; (2) assistance in the development of certain abili-
ties or habits along the lines of both reading and expression,
such as the ability in public speaking for the aim of citizen-
ship, and the reading of literature which promotes the five-
fold aim; (3) assistance in methods of study, in outlining
and organizing tasks, finding references and seeking data,
getting the kernels out of paragraphs, chapters, books, and
so on; (4) especially perhaps, the cultivation of habits of
harmless enjoyment for the right use of avocational interest,
of leisure, which along with ideals is apt to be neglected
by other agencies of the school, this cultivation being,
however, largely along lines of the use of the English lan-
guage (including study of the drama, goo.d literature, etc.);

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 351

(5) seeking, by the use of suitable literature, to strengthen
the children along lines neglected by other teachers. Thus
the English teacher can develop the emotional life of pupils
largely neglected by other teachers, promote the great ideals
of the race, and help in all five lines in fundamental and
supplemental ways.

III. Looking Forward

Prospective Changes in English Instruction. — Some of
the principal changes which will take place in English teach-
ing of the next decade or two, following such educational
principles, we may, for brevity, venture to state as follows:

1 . The literature selected for reading will be chosen on a
social rather than on a technical, literary, or craftsmanship
basis. From the great treasury of literature available for
education along the five lines, those productions will be
selected which function best for children and adolescent
youth (the psychological basis), and from the latter those
which are the best examples of literary art. Last and least
will technique be the basis; this will be, not the outside
of the cup, but what it contains for American boys and girls.
First get literature promoting the fivefold aims of educa-
tion; second, sift it psychologically, using pieces which
have great interest and moving power for different indi-
viduals and groups, and, third, choose, if possible, good
examples of literary art.

2. Literature will probably not be selected for the reason
that it illustrates the history of English literature. The
latter subject, sometimes taught as a separate course
termed "the history of English literature," will probably
not be given, since it does not meet the pressing needs of
our people along the five dominant lines as well as other
more social and less technical subject-matter. General his-
tory will thus have more time for such literary history as
relates closely to the aims of history teaching.

352 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

3. The literature selected will probably be largely mod-
ern literature, dealing with modern problems in a modern
setting such as confront the American people to-day.
^'Comus," ^'L'Allegro," ^'Lycidas," ^^1 Penseroso/' ^'Para-
dise Lost," Burke's ^'Speech/' the ''Sir Roger de Coverley
Papers,'^ the ''Essay on Lord Clive," and others of this type
will probably be displaced, to the horror of the stylist and
literary historian, by the literature of the future written in
the last few decades. Current magazines and newspapers
will be used even more than six to ten minutes a day, as
they are now so well being used in many schools. Of course
we may go to ancient Greece for some literature that gives
by contrast and novelty great ideals of health and citizen-
ship, but not necessarily. We are to choose the literature
that does the work, and are thus interested rather in the
psychological and sociological effects of these selections as
taught in the school than in the selections as archeological
specimens.

4. Citizenship. — A reasonable share of this literature
will promote by interesting and familiar exa,mple the great
local and national ideals of citizenship. Several years ago
the writer went as a school principal to a large Western city
immediately after the horrifying exposures of civic indiffer-
ence and political rottenness there. Steffens had published
"The Shame of the Cities"; and the shame was there.
Did the people of that city afterward rise up and demand
that the public high schools, in which the leaders are trained,
begin at once to engender ideals, attitudes, tastes, and
appreciations along the lines of effective local citizenship?
They did not, at least not directly. They became vaguely
dissatisfied with the schools. They had intelligent people
go and visit high-school and other classes and see what
kind of education was given there, which has finally led to
considerable reorganization. But little increase of direct
civic education or of civically directed literary education
has yet resulted because the guiding aims set up above

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 3 S3

were not consciously used as guiding standards for the
selection of matter and methods. The fundamental sub-
jects are those most closely related to fundamental human
needs, and these are, therefore, those closely related to the
five aims, like hygiene, and civics, and the minimal essen-
tials of the tool subjects, like reading, spelling, writing, and
arithmetic, necessary for these. The reader is urged to
obtain from the Bureau of Education the recent co-opera-
tive volume produced by the leaders in this field on *'The
Reorganization of EngHsh in Secondary Schools." Al-
though conservative and not fully directed by the great aims,
it will insert a great entering wedge into the traditional
English instruction. This is the first and best effort in the
direction of English instruction guided by the aims of edu-
cation. The bulletin on "Cardinal Principles of Secondary
Education " and Professor Bobbitt's volume on "The Cur-
riculum" will also be of value.

In what way does your state, your county, and your
community. Miss English, need a development of civic
ideals? Discover these weaknesses, find these needs, and
then look about for literature that will do the work desired.
We need not look far. The ideals and efforts toward better
conditions of Hfe to-day have found expression in as noble
a literature as has ever graced a previous age, and in far
richer abundance. This literature has for most adolescents
a stronger appeal and a far richer and clearer suggestive
value for present life-guidance than most that the more re-
mote past has furnished for other times, valuable as some
of it is. For good content and technique as well as interest,
Bruere's articles in Harper^ s Magazine, for example, will
probably be far more educationally influential than Burke's
"Speech on Conciliation," used as an example of exposition.
Away with our subserviency to those estimable college pro-
fessors of English who, interested rather in literary technique,
dissection, and the craftsmanship feelings aroused in them-
selves by certain selections than in the use of literature as

354 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

an educational instrument for the American people, have
from their high chairs handed down certain technical master-
pieces for all high-school students, willy-nilly, to study ! We
very much need a large committee of high-school teachers
to discover and to try out experimentally a great many
selections which tend to leave a deposit of civic ideals and
attitudes in our pupils, such literature as Mrs. Cabot and
others have collected for the elementary school, for instance,
in their volume on '' Citizenship." What a great work for
American citizenship could thus be done, and how well then
could the several years of required EngHsh be justified.
Any one studying the various civic leaflets issued by the
United States Bureau of Education from the standpoint of
English can readily see that English instruction can do very
much to promote directly civic efficiency and still not in-
vade the field of regular civic instruction. In the rural
consolidated school the English teacher has practically a
virgin field, and should be bound neither by college nor
city precedents. The needs of the country community in
the way of ideals and aspirations, of civic and other social
standards, are the bases of selection.

5. The Ideals of Our Democracy. — If teachers of Eng-
lish were to make a survey of the dominant unmet needs
of the American people, and were then to make a list and a
classification of the ideals which, if made common, would
best meet these dominant needs, we should have a good
guide for the selection of literature for our high-school pupils.
A very helpful list will be found in Doctor Bagley's volume
on *' Educational Values'' (pp. 175-179 and 214-215). We
can only mention them here, leaving out his descriptions
and definitions. Among those great ideals which he claims
must be made the driving forces of all Americans we find
the following: respect for the feelings and rights of others,
tolerance, equality of opportunity, property rights, chastity,
monogamy, parental love, respect for the aged and woman-
hood, sympathy with suffering and affliction, self-sacrifice

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 355

and self-denial, personal integrity, loyalty, friendship,
cleanliness and personal purity, altruism, achievement,
truth loving, simplicity, work, health, initiative, indepen-
dence, patriotism, national unity, local self-goveriunent,
right use of property, ennobled ideals of sexual love, ambi-
tion of the right types, peace and good-will, unprejudiced
observation and inductive thinking, scientific method, effi-
ciency and expertness, respect for authority, and human
brotherhood.

The pedagogy, or methods, of imparting ideals Bagley
and others have also treated, and we cannot discuss this
here. Parents send their children to school to be lifted up
and inspired by such ideals. English teachers can from
such a list get a sense of relative values in their work that
the old-time teacher, using selections largely for their his-
torical or technical qualities, never attained. Such an em-
phasis upon the essentials of education will, moreover,
greatly increase their dignity and the respect for our pro-
fession. It is certain that the Boy Scouts, Girl Scouts,
Camp-Fire Girls, and other similar movements, have first
picked out the great ideals found imperatively necessary in
our people and have then sought literature and devised
methods to establish them deeply in the souls of our people.

Many are the illustrations which might be given, if
necessary, of the power of ideals in life and of our ability to
transmit these ideals through educative instruments. A
teacher in a school of which the writer was once principal
used with success carefully selected literary productions for
meeting, generally well in advance, cases of discipline.
She used, I remember, among other books. White's ''School
Management," which contains such selections to meet many
kinds of disciplinary problems in and out of school. Tem-
porary and life-long ideals were undoubtedly there culti-
vated in many different groups of pupils. Professor Sharp's
books on ** Moral Instruction" suggest many pieces of litera-
ture that will meet specific needs through inculcating spe-

356 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

cific ideals and aspirations. There is a ridiculous irony in our
method of criticising people who are products of our school
systems for conspicuous lack of certain ideals which in no
part of the school organization from kindergarten upward
have been taught, and yet which children ten years of age
can possess for life when properly taught. What we want
in society we must put into the schools, and any elimina-
tion of dead-wood must be rigidly made to make this pos-
sible.

6. Avocational Training. — Training in the right use of
leisure, in avocational activities, or, as Parker terms it,
harmless enjoyment, is rapidly coming to be a very important
educational aim of the public school. Two chapters in
this volume are taken to deal with it because of its com-
parative neglect in rural regions. The late State Superin-
tendent SchaefTer, of Pennsylvania, a few years ago made
an address in many places against giving the eight-hour
day at once because our people, untrained in the right use
of leisure, would misuse it and bring about their own degra-
dation. Here is a great truth. The eight-hour day of
work, the eight hours of sleep, and the eight hours of leisure
are, however, rapidly coming. The Saturday half-holiday
and various picnic and other days are now here for many
country people. A life of constant labor defeats the end of
existence. Happiness and self-realization are impossible.
*'Life as a fine art" is out of the question. We are going
to obtain leisure, and the school and the English teacher,
especially, must train for this phase of life. The county
and state travelling, circulating, and school libraries must
be made to do their share.

How can literature be used to promote the harmless en-
joyment of leisure ? Undoubtedly a reasonable and health-
ful amount of reading of the right kind would, for enjoy-
ment alone, be desirable for most persons. This reading
will be of the most varied kind, because of the great natural
variability among individuals, and because of the many

Reproduced by courtesy of R. E. Staley
The library wagon of Washington County. Maryland, stopping at a farmhouse

A well used library room

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 357

artificial variations brought about by the manifold occupa-
tions and environments of life to-day. People who do not
like the Atlantic , Harper^Sj and Scrihfier^s, but who do care
for the newspapers, Adventure, Detective Stories, The Ar-
gosy, the Scientific American, the Saturday Evening Post, or
Modern Electricity, cannot be classed once and forever by
the EngHsh teacher as perverted, hopeless, and uncultured.
A number of the stories in cheaper magazines are of a far
more healthful mental tone and better for invigorating and
emotionalizing for a time the life of multitudes of young
people than are many of the stories in either Harper's
Magazine or the Atlantic. The best farm papers are to-day
securing literature of prime value for rural ideals. Yet
many times these papers are unknown to pupils and parents.
"Many men of many minds" need literature of many kinds,
Many teachers have shown that these magazines and
newspapers of many kinds can be procured by the average
school, and that pupils and parents may gain habits of harm-
less enjoyment through reading initiated by those English
teachers who follow the ordinary laws of habit formation,
starting with the natural instincts and interests, giving much
practice and repetition in a favorable social situation, and
studying the social situation in order to insure that the
habits shall find stimuli in the outside envirormaent away
from the classroom. Other teachers have done the same.
I look forward to the time when such teaching may be or-
ganically related to the English work, so that six or more
minutes may not have to be taken out of the regular lesson
as somewhat extraneous work. The reading habit is im-
portant for the social welfare. It is far more valuable than
many of the habits inculcated in the ordinary routine school
work of the usual type. Let us have the courage to put our
work in touch with the world to-day, and be proud of it.
Harmless enjoyment and recreation are great needs, as our
*' movies," dance-halls, and many other institutions thriving
on this interest indicate. Here we find English in touch

358 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

with the old cultural, aristocratic ideals of the subject, and
at the same time becoming democratic and social. It is
bringing leisure and culture rightly used into the home of
the many, which is a large part of the mission of America.

7. Moral Efficiency. — What are the moral problems of
your community and of modern life? What examples can
you choose from literature which will function in helping
high-school graduates, or leavers-before graduation, to meet
the insidious and character-straining temptations of the
world of industry and social life to-day? Do we possess
any literature dealing effectively and artistically with these
problems, that will arm pupils beforehand to meet the foe,
under whatever guise, with the right attitude? Undoubt-
edly any one month's issue of the magazines will furnish
several such. ''Seek and ye shall find.'' We do not need
to rub in the moral. The right literature does its own work,
without extensive moralizing and ''intensive" dissection.
At present many great moral and social problems of rural
communities are untouched by any school literature. In
fact, much of it points to the city, and is the very same as
used in the largest cities! We as much need literature in
schools that relates closely to rural moral problems as we
need texts that relate closely to rural civic problems.

The average man and woman engaged in a vocation to-
day is engaged in social service. The butcher handing meat
day by day over the counter is feeding and making strong
and vigorous the men and women of his community, who
are also working for him in return. The farmer is nourish-
ing the world. But such an attitude toward his work, such
an ideal of his daily business, seldom glorifies the worker.
To him "business is business," which means that it is, in
spirit, an individualistic war to the knife for advantage,
supremacy, and financial gain. The laborer watches the
clock through the irksome and uninspired day; the em-
ployer speeds him, fights shorter hours of labor, "boodles"
the legislature to beat out workingmen's compensation and

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 359

child-labor laws, and so on. The farmer is often an unin-
spired drudge, very sordid, overworked, reactionary, and
individualistic. Those who rise to the dignity and pro-
fessional spirit of servants of the public weal are vastly in
the minority. But these few have made professions of their
trades. Wholesale arrests of butchers recently occurred
because they had put poisonous preservatives into their
meat products which destroyed rather than restored the
strength of their neighbors and fellow servants. Farmers
have been found who have fought or been indifferent to
community improvement, who have, figuratively and actu-
ally, put their larger potatoes and apples at the top of the
barrel, who have done right only as a policy, not from a
dynamic ideal of service. Many blindly oppose any school
development, and then wonder why their children so early
wish to ''break home ties." Cannot the generous social-
service spirit be inculcated in the pupils of the consolidated
school ?

You will answer that it can, and that these acts typify
too large a part of the spirit of the work of our present
high-school graduates and leavers. We are certain that
these ideals can be engendered and that ideals do function.
We know that abundant literature, current and more re-
mote, can be found to promote this particular ideal. The
Sunday-school and the churches have no such educative
opportunity as we possess with our three or four years of
each graduate^s time. Here we have another standard as a
basis of selection, the choice of those literary forms that most
affect our pupils for good, and the test is not how much
they know about the author's life or style, but how much
they are affected and what they do.

We cannot take time here to discuss each of the five
aims from the standpoint of the selection of literature to
be read in English courses and elsewhere. But we can see
what an interesting and fruitful reorganization of the work
would result from such a sense of relative values — from get-

360 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ting our eyes off the outside of the cup and on those things
which must be put inside the cup for the nourishment of
men and women. Our young women of to-day are fortu-
nately studying not so much china-painting and cut-glass
as the relative values of foods and how to make balanced
and attractive rations for people at various kinds of work.
They are interested in facing well the big problems of life
of whatever type rather than in the mere decorative aspects
discussed by Herbert Spencer in his "What Knowledge Is
of Most Worth." Art and avocations are highly important,
but they must be essential parts of the daily life on the
farm, not something plastered on and merely decorative.

8. Technical Aspects. — What shall we say of formal
English grammar, the old-style technical works on rhetoric,
and the spelling-book with its fifteen to twenty thousand
words, formerly required of all in either the elementary or
the high school or both ? The principles of grammar which
function enough to be worth as much to students as other
changes they could make with other available subject-
matter and activities are very few in number. Doctor
Charters has reported the results of his studies along this
line, and Hoyt, Briggs, and the writer have tested results
of the teaching of formal grammar. The few most valuable
phases of the science, which function more in meeting our
problems than anything else, we shall keep and use, but no
more. Perhaps even less of the old science of rhetoric will
be kept, and then not as a science apart, pure, abstract, and
logical (like the mathematics to which the old mathematician
aspired), but in direct usable relationship to problems of
expression and interpretation. These subjects will certainly
not be studied because they are assumed to "discipline the
mind," "form the will," and give a general phrenological
development.

Doctor Ayres's scale for measuring spelling, with its
thousand words most used and most needed by our people
in their correspondence, will be utilized to help determine

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 36 1

minimal essentials in spelling for all. Bailouts studies of
the vocabularies of students will be extended to the high
school. The dictionary habit will be inculcated for that
great list of occasional words required so infrequently as to
free us from memorizing them all except as they come by
use, thus saving us time for training of greater relative value
according to our life-standards. Ballou's Harvard-Newton
scale and others for measuring results in English composi-
tion will also be utilized, until superseded by better ones,
in this period of rapid progress. Some study of the deriva-
tion of words, not as etymology, but as the words come up
with separate lessons on principles, will be given, and
obviate the need of studying Greek and Latin.

Formal dissection and extreme pedantic attention to
literary trivialities of style will give way when the teacher
gets her eyes on what she wants to do and starts to do it.
"The devil finds work for idle hands to do." And many
of our able high-school students who have read widely of the
best literature at home have regarded the teacher of English
in her dissection and perfunctory theme-assigning laboratory
in about as favorable light as that suggested. There will
be much reading and a minimum of style analysis. We are
not producing critics and authors. Students are to be fitted
for a different life and for facing a great common host of
clearly foreseen problems. The methods outlined above
will, however, prove a better preparation for those who
would essay authorship. The mere critic is barren; the
real author is filled with life everlasting.

9. Expression and Methods. — Now what shall we say of
relative values in expression and in methods of teaching?
Much has already been indicated, and the process of deter-
mining what knowledge, habits, ideals, and appreciations
are of most worth to the American people which the teacher
of Enghsh may well undertake to develop without conflict-
ing with, but supplementing, the work of other teachers
has already been suggested. Since most of our expression

362 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

in life beyond and in the school is oral expression, we should
develop ability especially along this line. Since democracy
progresses by the self-organized group work of citizens meet-
ing in assembly and since community organization and co-
operation fostered by public discussion is an emergency
need of the rural population to-day, as suggested in preced-
ing sociological chapters of this volume, ability in public
speaking, before a real audience, the "audience situation and
audience motive,'* will be cultivated with particular care.
English teachers have burdened themselves unnecessarily
with re-inking written themes. A greater proportion of time
may well be given to oral expression, to providing something
to say and a good excuse for saying it. Further, all teach-
ers will be supervised and held responsible for cultivating
good expression in all classes. Since most of the writing
done by most people is in letters, motivated correspondence
will be emphasized far more than at present. In fact, is
not letter-writing the first minimal essential of written com-
position ?

Next, themes may well be written on topics related to
the five aims of education as set forth above, not forgetting
the leisure side of life to which the English work, if directed
at all, has been in the past too much directed. '' How We
Girls Organized and Carried On Successfully a Food Sale
to Raise Money for the Boys' Football Suits,'' for example,
deals with community co-operation of a vitally important
sort. Papers written for the teachers of other subjects will
be sent to the English teacher, often as substitutes for her
own "themes."

IV. Emancipation and Experimentation

The Outcome in Socialized English. — We need not offer
further suggestions. Needless to say, evolution is rapid
now in the direction indicated in this chapter. We are
bound in the direction of a socialized education, and, in the

THE OUTSIDE OF THE CUP 363

country, a ruralized education. If what has been said
helps to emphasize this social aim of education in the selec-
tion and use of subject-matter in English in the country
and rural village, helps to free the teacher somewhat from
the college classics, promotes intelligent interest in rural-
community problems as the guiding stars of teaching, and
helps to keep the gaze of the English teacher away from
the outside of the cup, more than could well be hoped for
will be accomplished.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What recommendations for the course in English is offered in the

government bulletin on "Reorganization of English in Secondary
Schools"? (Report of the Commission on Secondary Educa-
tion, James F. Hosic, Secretary, Government Printing Office,
Washington.)

2. What applications are made in this report to the rural-school needs ?

3. What additional modifications for a rural high school of six years

would be desirable?

4. Make a list of suitable subjects for debates in a consolidated rural

high school.

5. Do you know of any book on English for the rural high or elemen-

tary school ? What does the dearth of such books indicate with
respect to the dose adaptation of rural schools to rural-life needs?

6. Where would you find a list of good books from which to choose

the beginnings of a consolidated-school library?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. "Reorganization of English in Secondary Schools.'* Government

Printing Office.

2. Bobbitt— "The Curriculum." Houghton Mifflin Co.

3. The English Journal^ Chicago.

CHAPTER XVII
LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN

Preliminary Problems

1. Which is more important for the teacher, a study of what is best to

teach in a given community or a study of how to teach what-
ever is provided by text-books and courses of study? Why?

2. What do rural boys and girls commonly know on entering school?

3. What are they able to do? That is, what skills and habits have

they?

4. What is the character of their ideals, following the list quoted from

Bagley in the previous chapter?

5. How have they gained these types of knowledge, habits, and ideals?

6. At what age are country youth with only home education able to

take fairly complete responsibility for a farm?

7. Can this concreteness of motivated learning through actual par-

ticipation under sympathetic guidance be continued in the
school, or must the school be predominantly abstract and re-
mote from daily life? Suggest more vital methods of learning.

I. Learning and Education*

The Problem of the Learning Process. — After consider-
ing the nature and demands of present-day American so-
ciety upon the public rural school as a supplemental public
institution, the type of buildings, and the curriculum, one
must study the nature of the children in whom educative
changes must be made. We cannot hope for great success
in achieving the purposes of democracy's rural schools if we
are ignorant of the methods of change and development in
immature mankind — the most delicate and highly complex

^ A preceding discussion of "The Educative Process" has app>eared in the
writer's volume on "Teaching Elementary-School Subjects" (Scribners).

364

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 365

living material in the world. A group of novices in paint-
ing may satisfactorily keep before them the ideal and model
of the desired finished product, but their efforts, no matter
how well-intentioned, will result in mere daubs, and waste
of canvas, time, and supplies, if they do not know how to
use their materials skilfully to achieve their purposes. The
plant and curriculum are necessary, method is essential.

The waste of the most precious possibilities, in the form
of children sent by compulsory laws for a number of years
to our country schools, caused by teachers who have neither
definite knowledge of rural social conditions and social needs
nor of child nature and children's needs, is to-day stu-
pendous and inimical to the progress of civilization in our
land. Heredity, of course, plays an important part in de-
termining the general trend and outcome of development
in children, but the modifying influences of an educative
environment yet remain incalculable.

Our first great function as teachers, after learning rural
social needs and the subject-matter and school plants neces-
sary, is to discover as soon as possible the nature and technique
of the learning and development process, the nature of men-
tal and physical growth in children. In view of the present
world-wide evil results of miseducation abroad and at home,
we can view the need of more accurate and wide-spread
knowledge of human development as nothing less than a
social emergency. The future belongs to the nation, or
part of a nation, that has the thoroughly socialized and effi-
cient schools.

Fortunately, we have to-day for the scientific study of
the learning and development process in children a thousand-
fold more agencies than were but a few years ago at work.
A higher professional spirit begins to animate teachers; the
influence of such leaders as Thorndike, Dewey, Montessori,
and others, who hold up the ideal of teachers as researchers
in methods of child growth, is at work; the former child-
study movement has been transformed into a host of organ-

366 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ized agencies for more scientific inquiry into child nature
and child needs; investigations and experiments by a num-
ber of individuals have been made of methods of tuition of
individual children who early have become especially able
along social lines (''geniuses '0, and even more studies have
been made of the education of backward and feeble-minded
children; a great awakening is imminent in the home educa-
tion of children, and we may yet expect to find parents who
can add much to our recorded knowledge of the best ways of
guiding the fluid life of children in the best directions.
Every teacher a natural and a trained student of the learning
process in children is a most desirable motto for our profes-
sion. To-day every thorough examination of large numbers
of children, such as the simple Courtis tests in arithmetic
and other subjects or the Terman intelligence tests, for ex-
ample, plumbs deeper the depths of our ignorance of how
children actually are changed toward increased social effi-
ciency. The most hopeful outcome of the remarkable and
successful movement for measuring results of teaching and
of learning is the increased knowledge of how various re-
sults worth obtaining are to be achieved. ''The psychology
of a ten-year-old boy," says Professor Thorndike, "would
probably involve as much subject-matter for investigation
as the astronomy of the solar system or the geology of a
continent."

II. The Physical Basis

The Physical Basis of Learning. — The modifiable changes
which take place in individuals are both physical and men-
tal, but it has been the mental side of the process which has
hitherto almost obsessed the schools. The most charac-
teristic and striking phase of development which actually
goes on in children is physical in character, and fundamen-
tally this growth and development of the body in health,
grace, skill, and vigor is more important to the individual
child and to the attainment of social ends than the added

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 367

psychological development. Both are necessary and should
be developed together, mental activity ensuing naturally in
purposive action, but we must always insure the minimum
bodily essentials which make the sound mind possible.

On the physical side we are but beginning to obtain facts
regarding the actual health and development conditions of
American children and how these conditions are correlated
with school progress and methods of mental development.
Only a dozen years or so ago such facts were not available.
Recent studies indicate that our homes are relatively in-
efficient in caring for the children in that they lose in the
first year of life, largely by preventable death, about one-
sixth to one- tenth of all persons born, and that before the
kindergarten period or first grade of school age they lose
from one-fourth to one-sixth of all those who have entered
their midst. Of the eighty or more out of a hundred who
manage to pass safely through the first two or three years of
life, many are in fair physical condition, but soon thereafter
deterioration sets in, and by the time children enter school
more than half in any one school year will be found seriously
in need of medical, dental, or psychological care. The Great
War has shown that the health status of our people is very
low. Hoag and others have found that these losses and de-
teriorations are due principally to profound ignorance on
the part of parents with respect to the feeding, clothing,
regimen, and general upbringing of their offspring.^

A very large proportion of the children who finally enter
our schools each year are in very poor condition for engaging
vigorously and successfully in the learning process. Other
investigations indicate that in any one school year about
one- third of the children of our elementary schools will be
found relatively free from serious ailments and defects,
about one-third will be found suffering from dental defects
only, and a final third will be found suffering from dental

^ See Rapeer, " Educational Hygiene," chapter on The Home Hygiene of
Children, and " School Health Administration," chap. II.

368 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

defects also and from other ailments of a serious character.^
Unless the schools have thorough medical supervision, in-
cluding regular inspection and examination, follow-up work
by nurses and teachers, school clinics, open-air schools, and
so on, the elementary teacher of any grade may thus ex-
pect to find a large proportion of her class each term
seriously lacking in the physical basis of learning.

A growing number of carefully controlled investigations
witness to the fact that there is a close relationship between
physical efficiency, the health foundation, and mental and
moral efficiency. A large share of non-promotion, retarda-
tion, and elimination from school (probably at least one-
sixth of each) are due directly and indirectly to these bad
preventable health conditions of children.

Prevention and Cure. — That teachers and the schools
can do much in many ways to ameliorate such obstructions
to learning without loss, and with measurable increase, of
school efficiency has been amply proved in many places.
As the official representative of the state and of the home
in the scientific care of future citizens, teachers thus have
as great a responsibility for ministering to the children from
the standpoint of health and school efficiency as from the
intellectual and moral standpoints. That teachers have
not recognized such conditions in the past and have done
little to ameliorate them except in sporadic instances is,
however, not seriously to their discredit. The facts have
been but recently ascertained on a large scale; the normal
and other professional training-schools for teachers have
been giving little or no preparation along school-health
lines; and the public has until recently made but few in-
sistent demands of this character.

To-day, before they enter and while in service, teachers

are equipping themselves in increasing numbers for this

fundamental service, not only to increase their teaching

efficiency but to help the community to meet one of the

^ Rapeer, "School Health Administration."

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 369

most serious problems of life — one of the five large aims of
the educative process.^ They do this new work, moreover,
not merely from their instinctive and sympathetic love of
little children, but as state officials engaged in a public so-
ciological work, holding as its motto Emerson's truth that
''Health is the first Wealth." Of the motor basis of learn-
ing, of growth in muscular efficiency, and of the general
educational movement to follow nature by making school
life less sedentary and bookish and more free and physical, as
in the Gary and other experimental schools, we have treated
under the following heading, and in other volumes. The
time has come for constructing physical scales with which
to measure the health and development of pupils and for
determining the minimal essentials of physical education.^

Administratively, there is need of a director of educa-
tional hygiene in each county who should probably perform
also the duties of county health officer. His assistants
would be nurses and one or more physical- training super-
visors. We provide both a health-supervision room for the
use of nurses, doctor, and teachers, and a gymnasium, as
well as emergency retiring-rooms, in the plans of a model
consolidated school given in the final chapter.

III. Principles of Learning

Fundamental Principles of Learning. — Some of the funda-
mental principles which control our guidance of the learning
process to-day are as follows: i. The mind is fundamen-
tally the activity of a connecting organism between stim-
uli, or situations, largely without the nervous system, on

1 The elements of social efficiency, namely: vital, vocational, avocational,
civic, and moral efficiency. Vital efficiency includes health, physical develop-
ment, etc., through the following five types of effort: medical supervision,
school sanitation, physical education, teaching hygiene, and hygienic methods.

2 See writer's report on " Minimal Essentials of Physical Education and
a Scale for Measuring Physical Education" (Public-School Publishing Co.,
Bloomington, 111.). .

370 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

the one hand, and with the muscles, on the other. That is,
mental activity is for the purpose of adjusting the individual
to his environment, and the learning process is fundamentally
one of making, preventing, and controlling the development
of our motor responses to environmental stimuli, the life
situations about us. Simply illustrated, an example of
the mind as such a means of connection would be the tip-
ping of a man's hat to a woman. Here, a connection has
been made through the nervous system, and especially at
the synapses or points of connection between nerve-cells with
their extensions, giving the man the sight of a woman whom
he knows, with the muscular response of tipping the hat.
Ability to control and inhibit this response on seeing a woman
would come under the same principle. One would not do
this instinctively; it has been learned by the man at some
time, and has been drilled, or practised, until it has become
habit.

Instincts are also such nervous connections, inherited,
and thus unlearned. But these may be modified and re-
directed. A child's natural inclination, or inherited mental
connections, lead him, for example, to snatch candy from a
box before him and get it all for himself, but he may learn
to modify this connection, or the response to it, by learning
to pass the box first to others before he takes from it a
reasonable portion for himself. Other examples would be
the certain recall of the correct spelling of the word receive
when one is writing a letter, or responding with the answer,
ninety-two cents, when one is purchasing two pounds of
meat at forty -six cents a pound. We know that
throughout life individuals are confronting situations real
or imagined in school or out, and we know also that the
manner in which they respond to these situations, efficiently
and socially or not, is determined by the kind of connections
which already exist, or can be made on the spot through
thinking, by the individual in question. Teachers must
study the situations in which they place, children or which

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 37 1

thfe latter are meeting outside the school, or will meet later
in life, and they must study the responses in conduct which
they and society wish to secure if they are to be successful
in making the right nervous connections.

Thorndike on *' Educational Achievement"

From this point of view educational achievement consists, not in
strengthening mystical general powers of the mind, but in establish-
ing connections, binding appropriate responses to life's situations,
"training the pupils to behavior" ("behavior" being the name we
use for "every possible sort of reaction on the circumstances into
which he may find himself brought"), building up a hierarchy or habits,
strengthening and weakening bonds whereby one thing leads to an-
other in a man's life.

The first suggestion resulting is the obvious and simple but profita-
ble one that nothing is achieved by schools unless some connection
is influenced, that we cannot assume change in any pupil unless bonds
have been made or broken so as to cause him to respond as he did not
before. The connection may be one leading only to an attitude, say
of interest or enjoyment. It may be only partly made, guaranteeing
the possibility of a certain response, not its surety. It may be hidden,
showing itself only indirectly, or only after years, or in some subtle
modification of intellect or character. It may lead from some elusive
element or feature of a situation, such as the "place-value" of a num-
ber or the subjunctiveness of a subjunctive, to some general element
or feature of many responses, such as open-mindedness or cheerful-
ness, or readiness to do what one accepts as right. But if anything is
achieved, some actual connection or bond has been made, strengthened,
weakened, or broken. A child's mind is never a witch's pot to be set
in action by educational incantations. Its defects are not curable
by faith. To discipUne it means to improve its specific habits. To
develop it means to add bonds productive of desirable responses and
to awaken their opposites. Learning is connecting. It never be-
comes so spiritual, so general, or so involved as to evade expression
in terms of concrete couplings between real happenings to a man and
real responses by him. Of any educational achievement that does
evade such expression we should be suspicious. Probably its only
existence is in our hopes and fears.

The teachers, then, must know just what mental con-
nections will, insure the conduct that will promote the ends

372 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of education, such as health, economic and domestic effi-
ciency, citizenship, etc. She must also study the order of
connections to be made so that one will lead naturally into
the other. In the article quoted above, Thorndike shows
how many of our arithmetic texts and other books fail to
consider the actual life situations of children and the bonds
which they should make, and also fail to consider the order
in which one should follow the other. Texts in arithmetic,
for example, require a reading knowledge beyond the attain-
ments of the children in reading, and require a vocabulary
which should not be made a part of the child's connections
at the time. Four first books in arithmetic examined showed,
in the first fifty pages, for example, at least four hundred
words for which children were not prepared and for which
they probably should not be prepared. In his own set of
arithmetics he has tried to make essential the kinds of con-
nections which will fit in best with school life and the many
practical situations to be met by all. Nearing and Field's
^'Community Civics" is another illustration of producing
connection in the minds and bodies of children that are
directly related to rural civic efficiency. Not only must a
proper selection of mental connections be made, but the
proper correlation and organization of the learning process
must follow. Education is becoming specific and practical
in the best sense. This is made clearer in later sections.

I. Individual Differences. — While children are sufficiently
alike to be considered a single species, yet mentally and
physically they are extremely variable in most characteris-
tics. The individual differences in children were largely
overlooked in the schemes of education, or schooling, by
large classes or groups devised by Lancaster, Bell, and
others, in contrast with earlier methods of teaching which
were almost purely individual, one pupil at a time. But
mass instruction has, through its cheapness, led to the uni-
versal and compulsory elementary school with its close to
twenty million pupils and but a half million teachers, an

Pig-club work in Pennsylvania

Studying a milking-machine

A lesson on tli ;

Coming in touch with real problems of life

LEARNING PROCESSES OE COUNTRY CHILDREN 373

average of nearly forty to the teacher. Now that the public
has been led to feel the prime necessity of thoroughgoing
schooling for all, it is time that we regain some of the ad-
vantages of recognizing the infinite variety of traits in in-
dividuals, instead of attempting to teach whole groups as
one person. In many ways we are discovering more fully
the extent and variety of these individual differences and
the ways of combining the advantages of individual and
group methods of instruction. The scientific knowledge re-
lating to individual differences is of quite recent growth and
has come mainly from psychological and pedagogical in-
vestigations. Thorndike's small volume on ''Individuality "
may well be read by all teachers.

One of the illustrations of scientific measurement in our
volume on ''Teaching Elementary- School Subjects" clearly
shows how the individual difference in ability to solve sim-
ple examples in arithmetic of pupils in the fourth and eighth
grades widely overlap, i. e., pupils in the fourth grade do as
well as many in the eighth grade in these fundamentals.^
If we test, or measure, pupils in nearly any abihty or char-
acteristic the range of variation will be found immense.
These differences are, moreover, highly specialized. A
child may be very quick and accurate in multiplication, for
example, and be poor in subtraction.

In recent years much attention has been paid to sub-
normal and "exceptional" children who are able to do little
in the average class at school, and we have special schools
or rooms for the mentally defective, the incorrigible, the
pretuberculous and anaemic, the crippled, the bUnd, the
deaf, the defective in speech, and others. Attention is at
last being focussed upon the necessity of giving superior
children advantages commensurate with their exceptional
abilities instead of having them drag along in what has deri-
sively been termed the "lock-step" of class or mass instruc-
tion. "Genius will out" is but half a truth. Genius can

^"Teaching Elementary-School Subjects," chap. XXIII (Scribners).

374 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

be ''born to blush unseen'' or be stultified by what Welton
calls an ''education in stupidity/' in which the guidance of
the learning process is so little individualized as to be of
Httle value to many of a class. The ideal is to combine the
social and economic advantages of class instruction with
teaching that will make it possible for each individual to
develop as nearly as possible at his normal or maximum rate
along the lines in which he most needs development. This
need furnishes one of the chief arguments for placing chil-
dren of the seventh, eighth, and ninth grades in so-called
junior high schools, intermediate schools, or regular high
schools with five or six year courses.^ Greater possibilities
for individualizing instruction are undoubtedly thus pro-
vided. Courtis has shown that thirteen per cent of the time
devoted to arithmetic could be otherwise utilized by excus-
ing pupils from further drill who had reached a reasonable
standard in class work.

Teachers must not let the fact that they have classes
to teach stand in the way of providing in all possible ways
for individualizing the development of the children and
meeting the varying needs of each and all within the class
organization. The successes mentioned above which many
persons, largely unversed in educational psychology and
principles of teaching, such as the father of Karl Witte,
have achieved in training very young children along many
lines so that at an early age they are as far along, seemingly
with little or no loss, as most children twice as old, suggest
many possibilities of educational progress through individu-
alizing our teaching and helping each to grow in the way he
as an individual should — as rapidly and as economically as
he can. The advantages of permitting children up to the
age of twelve or so to grow almost as young colts in a field,
as little animals, as Rousseau advocated, may well be com-
bined with the necessities and advantages of helping children

» See " A Core Curriculm for High Schools," by the writer, in School and
Society for May 12, 1917, and the preceding chapter on the curriculum.

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 375

quickly and easily along their way into the mysteries of the
complex civilization in which they must so early play an
active part. In practice, we have many interesting experi-
ments started in the public schools, as described in Dewey's
volumes entitled "The Schools of To-Morrow" and ''New
Schools for Old " (Buttons) and recent government reports
such as organizing the school-day into three parts, play,
manual work, and regular studies, with much freedom
and individual guidance, dividing classes into slow, me-
dium, and fast sections, each going at its optimum rate, ex-
cusing certain pupils from recitation and providing for them
special supplementary assignments, the Batavia system
with two teachers to the room, or with supervised study
where a fourth to a half of a class period is devoted to direct-
ing the study of pupils, division of the sexes in upper grades
for certain work, departmental work in upper or all grades,
each teacher teaching but one or a few subjects to pupils of
several grades, school credit for home work, dividing sub-
ject-matter into minimal essentials for all and optional work
for some, and many others. The great mental, physical, and
social differences must be taken into account in any study
or guidance of the learning process. Perhaps the outcome in
the country will be consolidated schools containing high
schools as in the Gary plan, with much motor work and play
and academic work correlated with these, and departmental
work in all or most grades from kindergarten through high
school.

2. Instinctive or Inherited Mental Connections. — There are
two chief classes of mental connections, inherited and ac-
quired. The former are for the most part instincts, and
the latter are for the most part habits. The tendency to
perform a certain act or system of acts under the stimulus
of a certain situation, without learning to do so, may stand
as an explanation of instinctive behavior. Here nature is the
schoolmistress and makes the mental connection between
the stimulus and the act without the drilling of the school

376 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

or home. Were we living a simple, savage existence, such
instinctive connections would largely suffice, for most of the
needs of life would be satisfied without the intervention of
the learning process. We should hardly need to be taught
to get our food and shelter, to play and become strong,
healthy, and joyous, to protect ourselves, to mate and care
for our offspring, in short, to meet most of the fundamental
needs of life as do the animals, because we are built that way.
This original nature of man, which Kirkpatrick and Thorn-
dike have in their books analyzed and described for teach-
ers, has been found to be a tremendously rich and varied
endowment of natural resources which civilized man must
utilize in creating the superman.

Were the child to be deprived of these inherited, instinc-
tive connections by some nervous paralysis, he would lie
inactive and uninterested in anything — a piece of clay in-
animate. As a city depending entirely on electricity lies
cold and dark after a storm in which the lightning has blown
out the fuse connections in every house, so even more com-
pletely, without the inherited synapse connections which
make the lines of communication between sense organs and
muscles, is the individual without the light of life. A child
that will not or cannot eat, talk, walk, play, or respond by
manifold mental and physical activity to the life stimuli
about him is cut off from the possibility of becoming a hu-
man personality; he cannot learn.

There have been two principal extreme points of view
with respect to the educative treatment of instincts: first,
that the original nature of human beings is inherently bad
and depraved; and, second, that it is inherently ideal and
good. Under the old theory, discipline and ascetic rooting
out of natural tendencies was the way of teaching. *'Go
and see what Johnnie is doing and tell him to don't" and
^'Find out what people naturally desire to do and then
help them to root out these desires" are types of the old in-
junctions. "Make little men and women of children and

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 377

force them by military driving into the desired type of
adults" has resulted in national systems of education based
on this policy. '* Formal discipline of the mental faculties"
and complete suppression of individuality in pupils (and
teachers) have been fallacious results of the doctrine. A
world war has been fought between those holding to the
two opposing methods.

At the other end of the scale have been the child "nature
fakirs," idealizing the primitive savage, "soft pedagogy,"
and the freedom of children to the extent of permitting them
to follow every whim of uncontrolled fancy. Rousseau was
the leader of this group. Wordsworth, also, in his "Inti-
mations of Immorality," expresses something of the same
attitude toward the infant in the lines

"But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:
Heaven lies about us in our infancy !
Shades of the prison-house begin to close

Upon the growing boy. * * *
At length the man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day."

The common sense of most people is sufficient to guard
against both extremes, although both have had their vogue
and are now discernible in many homes and schools. The
truth in each extreme has been well sifted from the untruth
in each by Dewey in his little volume on "Interest and
Effort in Education" and in his "Democracy and Educa-
tion" (chap. X), and Thorndike has well expressed the mod-
ern point of view as follows:

Such problems as these in mental mechanics — problems in choos-
ing, ordering, and manipulating the mind's connections— are now the
growing point of experimental education. By skilful analysis of
human learning into the millions of elementary connections between
situation and response which constitute it and by experimental study
of the ways in which these connections are best formed, preserved,

378 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

organized, and used, the psychologist hopes to get both comprehension
and control of the foundations of educational achievement.

The foundations of educational achievement are these connec-
tions or bonds or habits of response, but these habits themselves lead
us back farther to the unlearned, original capacities and tendencies
of man. Human beings, as you well know, are not indifferent clay to
be moulded at will by the teacher's art. They are themselves active
forces to help or hinder. They inherit as a human birthright instincts
and interests of which education from the start and throughout must
take account. Educational achievement is small or great in propor-
tion as it neglects these natural, untaught tendencies in man, or utilizes
them to further his ideal aims. And educational science needs as its
basal equipment an exact and adequate inventory of the original
nature of man as a species and of the idiosyncrasies of individual man.

No choice of habits of thought or action to be formed by schools
is sound which gives technic irrespective of needs felt by the pupil,
or adds knowledge without any motive for its use, or tries to cultivate
artificial virtues in disregard of the crude forms of courage, kindliness,
zeal, and helpfulness which nature already affords.

No arrangement of the mind's connections is economical which
fails to use the inborn organizing power of curiosity, the problem atti-
tude, and the desire to test and verify or refute by eyes and hands.

No manipulation of bonds in learning is efficient which disregards
the pupil's own sense of sociability, kindness, and achievement dur-
ing the learning process. The original proclivities of the human
animal are as real as its laws of learning and condition these through-
out. Every habit is formed in the service of some instinctive interest.

The inborn interest of man in movement, novelty, color, life, the
behavior of other human beings, sociability, cheerfulness, notice,
approval, mastery, and self -activity, are not ultimate aims of educa-
tion, nor is their presence a guarantee that school work is well directed
and efficient. But we double achievement if we get them on our side
and we enrich life enormously at little cost if we turn these fundamental
passions into line with higher nature and the common good.

I hold no brief in favor of avoiding in schools anything necessary
for human welfare, either because it is hard or because it is disliked.
I find many of the tendencies born in man to be archaic, useless, im-
moral, adapted to such a life as man lived in the woods a hundred
thousand years ago, when affection had not spread beyond the family,
or justice beyond the tribe, or science beyond the needs of to-morrow,
and when truth was only the undisputed, and goodness only the un-
rebuked. That the natural is the good is a superstition which psy-
chology cannot tolerate. Still less, however, can psychology tolerate

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 379

the superstition that there can be any other foundation for educa-
tional achievement other than the best that human nature itself affords.
Truth is only what the best in human nature accepts; goodness is
only what the best human nature craves. We mean by the rational,
ideal, and impersonal aims of education, only the nobler inborn human
interests purified of their crude accompaniments and broadened to
harmonize with the common good. We must not find too much fault
with human nature; for ultimately it is all we have. Its best ele-
ments are the best the world has or ever will have.

In short, the various instinctive tendencies of children
to respond in various ways to life situations are to be studied
and utilized, guided and directed toward social efficiency,
as natural resources, like a great gorge of running water
which can be controlled and guided into turning the wheels
of industry, lighting towns miles away, and irrigating vast
stretches of waste land. The playground movement, for
example, which, since 1907, has spread over this country
like fire in prairie-grass, has released milHons of horse-powers
of energy in children, which previously would have been
largely misdirected and wasted, and has diverted them into
the most educative activities contributing to health, grace,
ability, knowledge and training in getting along well with
one's fellows, leadership, practical morals, right use of lei-
sure, constructive and manual- training activities — affecting
directly in some measure most or all of the ends of educa-
tion. As Bagley says:

The task of education with reference to the instincts is three-
fold: (i) Certain instinctive controls must be ^^ sublimated" ; that is,
the energy that they release must be directed to ends other than those
indicated by the primitive instincts themselves. The few but trouble-
some unsocial or antisocial impulses are in this class — the impulse
to appropriate what pleases one; the impulse to inflict bodily injury
upon those against whom the feeling of resentment has been aroused;
the impulse to follow the strongest external stimulus regardless of its
remote bearing upon the remote ends that one seeks to attain; the
impulse to seek change and variety; and, in the ever-lengthening
period that elapses between physiological and economic maturity, the
imperious sex and parental instincts.

380 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

(2) In the second place, certain instincts must be confirmed and
given the sanction of repeated experience. Chief among these are
the comparatively weak ipstincts of co-operation and sacrifice.

(3) Finally, certain instincts form the basis of incentives or natural
interests which may be directed toward the acquisition of controls
that may be quite unrelated to the instincts employed as means.
Among these are the instinct of emulation, the "property" instinct,
and especially the adaptive instincts — play, curiosity, imitation, and
repetition.

The chief warning vi^hich teachers must regard in utilizing
instincts is probably along the line of the place of interest
in teaching. Dewey, the great modern exponent of educa-
tion by natural development, warns teachers again and
again to avoid the pitfalls of divorcing interest and effort
by making the work of education so soft and easy as to
encourage mental laziness, physical flabbiness, and inability
to do anything that needs to be done if it does not strongly
appeal to the child as temporarily interesting. The danger
lies in encouraging the attitude which waits for work that
attracts, and discourages the appropriate and only rational
attitude toward work — namely, putting forth the effort to
make the work attractive. It makes one the slave of one's
desires and enthusiasms rather than their master. Teachers
should read also the chapter on Discipline and the Doc-
trine of Interest in his volume on ** School Discipline,"
by Professor Bagley, who is the chief exponent in this
country of the *' Gospel of Work" in education.

^^ Motivation of School Work^' has been a popular cry in
many schools in the last few years. Children have a right
to live as naturally now as they will when they grow up —
to understand why they do this and that, and to have
some legitimate desire which they themselves feel as a
prompting to the work. Teachers have gained excellent
results with delight to the children by this method. In-
stead of reading aloud with no one to learn or to get thought
from the reading, no audience situation, children are taught
to face the class and read to them — they with their books

LEARNING PROCESSES OE COUNTRY CHILDREN 38 1

closed. More naturally still, the child reads matter un-
known and interesting to his class in such a way as to fur-
nish them delight. The children write, not so many pages
on duty, patience, etc., as in days gone by, but real letters
to children absent from school or others in schools far away,
to the school directors words of appreciation for improv-
ing their playground by apparatus, trees, or grading, and
so on.^ The play and competitive instincts are used to
provide motives for participating vigorously in the drill of
arithmetic and spelling by holding ciphering and spelling
matches. In the Gary, the Fairhope, the Speyer, the Francis
Parker, and other such schools described by Dewey in his
*' Schools of To-Morrow," children learn important lessons
closely related to the great aims of education by natural
constructive activities in the shops, laboratories, on the
playgrounds, on excursions, and everywhere. Those newer
rural-school movements which base the learning process
more fundamentally on the natural instincts of childhood
are showing us that the gospel of interest and happiness
can be lived along with the gospel of work and duty. In-
terest and effort can be harmonized. The child can learn to
do by doing. Thus the farm at the school and home proj-
ect work, agricultural, domestic, and closely related train-
ing, fit our modern theories of child psychology and hygiene.
4. Self- Activity. — A fourth great principle of the learn-
ing process is that of self-activity. The learning process
is, when operating at all, one of self-activity. "Teaching
is but providing situations for educative self-activity,"
said Francis Parker. ''You may lead a horse to water but
you can't make it drink " and "learning by doing'' are old
sayings. The Bible says: "Ye must be doers of the deed
if ye would understand the doctrine." Unless we get the
right responses from children, our incentives, stimuli, or

1 Wilson's "Motivation of School Work," chaps. V and VI. Isn't the
minimal essential of composition the art of letter-writing ? What else do most
people write in this world?

382 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

situations are not educative. "Students are educated by
their own mental responses, not by the stimuli or influ-
ences provided by the teacher. The latter are influential in
determining the individual's character only through the
responses they arouse," says Professor Chester Parker.
Children can learn both by direct and by communicated
experience, more from the former than the latter, but the
test is always the actual experience and the reaction to it.
Since .^the time of Rousseau and Froebel and especially
since modern educational psychology has begun contribut-
ing to educational science, in the last few years, the impor-
tance of this law of self-activity has gradually been increas-
ing. Children learn to appear attentive, docile, and engag-
ing in the learning process when their minds are "o'er the
hills and far away." Day-dreaming and mental laziness are
fostered by methods that do not provide for energetic self-
activity on the part of the pupils. The ideal is to get chil-
dren as happily, energetically, and persistently engaged at
the most educative activity for them all the time in the school
as they engage in their games of baseball, marbles, and hide-
and-seek outside. Too often our methods foster the sit-
ting-on-the-bleachers-while-the-game-goes-on habit. We
must get educative activity that is really educative and that
is adapted to the age and needs of the individual pupils and
community and then get all into this activity all the time,
whether it be making a chair or repairing a shoe in manual
training, solving real problems in arithmetic, engaging in
play and co-operative group games on the playground, or
simply lying at rest on the reclining chairs or mats of the
open-air school, or in the ordinary seats of the classroom.
A hundred-per-cent teacher is one who can get all pupils thus
engaged all the time. A thirty-per-cent teacher is one who
can get all thus engaged thirty per cent of the time. Mere
self-activity, however, is not the aim, although this seems to
be the only aim of much of the so-called busy work. " Noth-
ing is so terrible as activity without method." The most

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 383

useful, educative, self-activity guided by social purpose is
our goal.

5. Habit-Building. — The learning process consists prin-
cipally of the formation of habits. The millions of habits
which should be formed by teaching can be named and classi-
fied as Bagley has listed and classified the ideals which
should be made a part of each child's make-up in varying
propositions according to his needs. The home has a very
large part to play in this process from the earliest weeks of
the child's Hfe in creating the habits of feeding, sleeping,
and playing at regular hours, such habits as the "knife-
hand," the "fork-hand," the "spoon-hand," and the hun-
dreds of other habits of the table, for example, the
thousands of habits in the use of language, the habits
connected with putting on and taking off clothing, and the
habits of behavior in the house for providing the greatest
satisfaction to the individual and least injury and greatest
good to the other members of the home. Each one of these
is a mental connection or system of connections between a
situation and a form of behavior which is, through the learn-
ing process, estabhshed in the nervous system. James and
other psychologists have said that 999/1000 of our daily
activity is made up of habits, and this is literally true.

A process is educative while it is being learned, i. e.,
being made habit. When habit breaks down or we find
we have no habits to fit the new and strange situation,
then thinking, with its active attention, arises to build the
new connection systems. When we describe the ideal man
or woman we tell what this individual habitually does in
various given situations. A great law of learning habits
is that of vigorous attentive repetition. Fortunately, chil-
dren have an instinct for repetition which helps them to
take great pleasure in repeating many acts until they have
been made established mental connections, or habits. A
child will fill a cup with sand and pour it out again by the
half-hour, or will similarly button and unbutton its shoes,

384 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

or do anything, practically, which instinct or acquired in-
terest leads it to do until the act has been fairly well or
completely learned. Pupils need skilful guidance, however,
in getting them to go through the drill for which they do
not have such instinctive promptings, such as the forty-
five addition and forty-five multiplication facts, for example,
or the habit of washing their hands before coming to the
table. Here is where motivation and real-life situations
play their part in stimulating the necessary repetition and
attention. Usually the principles of habituation are given
as focalization, repetition, permitting no exceptions, and
providing for long-continued use of the needed activity.
They will be discussed and applied in the following chapter.

Formal discipline is a doctrine closely related to the
habit-forming process which has had a great and largely
injurious effect upon education. The thought has been that
if one drills himself in one Hne of activity he will develop
a general power of this type, i. e., if one drills himself in
reasoning out the answers to puzzles and algebraic problems,
that he thereby gains more than the ability to solve such
puzzles and such problems, that he gains a general power
of reasoning in all fields and with any material. *'If he per-
sistently works hard at the drudgery of formal grammar
he will gain the power to work hard at any line of work."
*'If he memorizes all the words in the spelling-book, regard-
less of his need for ability to spell them all or a twentieth of
them in letter-writing, he will by this exercise strengthen
his memory for any or all other things." ^'In the primary
grades we are to develop powers of observation, perception,
concentration, reasoning, and attention." These are such
expressions as we have probably all heard supervisors or
others say in the past.

The truth probably is that in memorizing the spelling
of words we gain ability to spell the words which we mem-
orize, and that our memory for the number of days in a
month, for the facts of arithmetic, and for other matter

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 385

has not been especially helped. When we come to attack
the memorization of these we go through about the same
amount of memory activity as if we had not previously
memorized. There is a certain identity of processes in many
similar lines of mental work; and certain notions of how to
do a thing and certain ideals of what to do and how to do
it arise in many persons' minds in transferring from one to
another; we may have "general discipline'' when we have
not formal discipline; we do get certain attitudes of mind,
a certain readiness or unreadiness to cope with situations,
a certain way of responding, and a certain character, in
short. ^ But a great wrong has been done entire nations
of individuals through the extreme applications of this
theory. Educators and the public have thought it possible
to work out certain formal mental and physical gymnastics
which could be drilled into pupils in some sequestered spot,
entirely apart from life and its manifold situations, and
thus give general mental ability, the millions of separate
habits in response to given and unique life situations which,
if the individual is to gain habits fitting him for this world,
can be found nowhere except in the life of the world itself.
The parts of formal grammar which do not function in im-
proving children's speech, obsolete and never-used phases
of arithmetic, algebra, geometry, Latin, Greek, formal
technical science, deductive logic, modern languages other
than English, and many other subjects have been put in
or kept in courses of study largely regardless of any direct
and plain relation which they bear to any of the large aims
of education, all because of the superstitious beHef that
these in some mysterious manner "disciplined," "trained,"
"cultivated" the mind, "developed the mental faculties,"
and "made keen the understanding."

This danger is so great that the wise teacher will limit
her teaching, not merely to what is "practical" in the
narrow sense of having an easily observable relation to

^Yocum, "Culture, Discipline, and Democracy," chaps. II and III,

386 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

bread-and-butter aims, the making of a living, but prac-
tical in the sense that the habits she cultivates have a plain
and observable relation to all the great aims of education,
such as health, right use of leisure, citizenship, moral effi-
ciency, etc., with the foundation habits, carefully selected,
that give one ability to communicate with one's fellows, to
meet the few and simple number relations of Hfe, to get
along well socially with one's neighbors, habits of harmless
enjoyment, etc. We have attempted educational systems
here and abroad on false hypotheses held as dogmas and
have failed in educating our publics; let us to-day analyze
our life and teaching situations until we are able to say
definitely that the habits we inculcate are surely needed by
the child and society in definite and clearly perceived situa-
tions. We need fewer theoretical bubbles and more of sci-
entific brass tacks in our great business of nation forming.^
The social survey of the community and state gives us our
social aims and needs; scientific study of children gives us
.knowledge of how to help them to form necessary life habits.
5. Knowledge, habits, ideals, and appreciations are four
of the principal psychological factors in learning. By
knowledge we usually mean all four — everything one gets
by the learning process. But most habits are easily dis-
tinguished from knowledge, or information, and ideals from
either. The laws for learning, or gaining knowledge (ideas,
facts, information, principles), are the laws principally of
memory and the simple associations of meanings or ideas
with symbols. What knowledge is of most worth has been
discussed in previous chapters. How the child gains knowl-
edge, communicated or vicarious experience, is our present
problem. Facts get into the mind by simple sensing, per-
ceiving, and interpreting. The child gains the meaning

^ The aim of education is growth in social efl&ciency, the factors of which
are: (i) vital, (2) vocational, (3) avocational, (4) civic, and (s) moral efficiency.
We repeat this in order that it may become fixed. The student should mem-
orize the factors in the order here given.

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 387

of the word dog and the word pat by seeing and perform-
ing the action in close association with hearing the words
naming the act. By repetition, the mental connection be-
tween the word and the action are made habit, here termed
memory. The command, **Go, pat the dog," is similarly
learned by simple mental association. Gradually, as the
child grows older, this command may be so fixed by drill
and by vividness, including the awakening of desire and
interest or fear of punishment as incentives, that, inhibit-
ing all calls on his attention by objects and activities along
the way, he may walk some distance holding in memory
the command, and at the end of the little journey pat the
dog as commanded. This is connection-forming involving
ideas, a higher type than the simple connections of the
animal type such as that of the child learning to button his
shoes.

We have not attempted to discuss all types of learning
separately. Parker distinguishes five types: (i) gaining
motor habits or skill, (2) associating symbols and meanings,
(3) gaining power in reflective thinking, (4) gaining habits
of harmless enjoyment, (5) gaining skill in expression.

The hierarchy of mental connections which can be made
are given in the next article. Thorndike distinguishes four
types of connection-forming in learning: first, that of the
simple animal type as when a baby learns to beat a drum
with no thought of the process; second, that involving ideas,
as when an older child learns to think of candy on hearing
the word, or to say candy on thinking the idea; third,
analysis or abstraction, as when the child learns to pick out
its mother's voice in the babel of sounds of a roomful of
company; and fourth, selective thinking or reasoning, as
when a person learns to meet a given new problem or situa-
tion by testing out various methods of solving it which occur
to him.

The second and first have been discussed; the third and
fourth will be treated in the following chapter. Under the

388 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

head of habit-formation and the recitation lesson we shall
treat further of the type of learning in which ideas are
used. The learning of ideals, attitudes, and appreciations
will also be treated under topics of the teaching process.
Teaching is but the supervision of the learning process, and
any discussion of the one process involves discussion of the
other. In his "Psychology of the Common Branches,''
Professor Freeman has discussed the learning process in
direct connection with the elementary-school subjects. In
his "How Children Learn," he has covered the ground of
this chapter and more. In his volume on "The Learning
Process," Professor Colvin has treated the more general
aspects as has Thorndike in his "Educational Psychology."
Each teacher can and must be a first-hand student of this
most interesting and important process in the world. It is
said that Germany spent a hundred million dollars in pub-
licity work that changed the minds of the Russians and led
to easy victory. The science of mind-building in children
and adults has all the fascination of invention and discovery.

SUMMARY

1. Knowledge of the nature of children and the learning process is

extremely important and rapidly increasing.

2. Learning is largely physical and it has a health and development

basis.

3. The physical basis of learning has been sadly overlooked and from

one-third to two-thirds of American children to-day are seriously
hindered in their growth, both mental and physical, by serious
ailments and defects. Teachers must learn to help discover,
cure, and prevent such hindrances to the learning process.

4. The learning process is fundamentally one of adjusting oneself

mentally and physically to life's needs and situations.

5. It is always a mental and physical process when at its best. We

learn to meet life's needs and situations by meeting them.
Guidance, reflection, and study of the situations and conditions
help to economize and hasten the process.

6. The great individual differences in the nature and in the life needs

of individuals must always be studied and considered.

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 389

7. Instincts, natural impulses, and interests are the natural resources

of education. These inherited mental connections keep the
child alive and ready to be doing things to learn. Put children
in the best possible environment and help them to learn to
respond to it socially.

8. Children learn best by meeting situations themselves through

their own self-activity. Most teachers err in doing things for
children and telling them what they think they should know.
Education is a constant self-active reconstruction of experience
in the direction of a socialized, cultured, efficient individual.

9. Habit and thinking are two important types of adjustment or

mental connection. When habit breaks down, thinking arises.

10. The old faculty psychology has gone, but the theory of formal

discipline lingers. The wise teacher learns to guide activity
toward more realizable ends than a training of "the reason,"
''memory," will-power, concentration, imagination, etc.

11. Knowledge gained by mere memory without reference to doing

something, guiding conduct, meeting a situation, is not power.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. Make a list of the principal mistakes made in handling pupils.

2. What facts and principles of child nature and growth in social

efficiency are overlooked by those making these errors?

3. Is the fact that a large proportion of boys and girls desire to

"leave the farm and go to the city to live" due to poor educa-
tion in the home or in the school, or is it desirable or inevitable ?

4. What methods would you suggest for insuring that pupils learned

how to write effective letters to mail-order houses with reason-
able legibility and correctness of spelling and that they would
not find letter-writing so repugnant in adult life that they would
fail to make use of it when desirable for communication?

5. What great principles of method are followed in your statement of

ways and means?

6. Read Strayer and Norsworthy's "How to Teach" as soon as

possible in this connection. The volume is really one on child
psychology and methods of learning.

7. What phases of method do farmers ordinarily stress in speaking

of teaching? What ones do they usually overlook?

8. What effect has the transportation of pupils to a consolidated

school on their opportunity to study?

9. Read the chapters relating to rural-school hygiene in the writer's

volume on "Educational Hygiene," or the volume on "Rural

390 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

School Hygiene," as it relates to the health and physical devel-
opment of country children,
lo. Why is habit so important in promoting health in pupils and the
community ? Do the sanitary features of a consolidated school
favor the development of hygienic habits? What is the rela-
tion of indoor flush-toilets at consolidated schools to the incul-
cation of anti-typhoid habits of cleanliness?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Bachman — "Principles of Elementary Education." D. C. Heath

&Co.

2. Bagley — "Educational Values." The Macmillan Co.
3. "School Discipline." The Macmillan Co.

4. Colvin — "The Learning Process." The Macmillan Co.

5. Colvin & Bagley — "Human Behavior." The Macmillan Co.

6. Dewey — "Democracy and Education." The Macmillan Co.

7. "Interest and Effort." Houghton Mifflin Co.

8. "The Schools of To-Morrow." E. P. Dutton & Co.

9. Freeman — "The Psychology of the Common Branches." Hough-

ton Mifflin Co.

10. "How Children Learn." Houghton Mifflin Co.

11. Hoag and Terman — "Health Work in the Schools." Houghton

Mifflin Co.

12. Kirkpatrick — "Fundamentals of Child Study." The Macmil-

lan Co.

13. Klapper — "Principles of Educational Practice." D. Appleton &

Co.

14. Parker — "Methods of Teaching in High Schools." Ginn & Co.

15. Rapeer — "Educational Hygiene." Chas. Scribner's Sons.

16. "Teaching Elementary School Subjects." Chas. Scribner's

Sons.

17. Sandiford — "The Mental and Physical Life of School Children."

Longmans, Green & Co.

18. Thorndike — "Foundations of Educational Achievement in 1914."

Proceedings of the National Education Association and the
Educational Review for December, 1914.

19. "Individuahty." Houghton Mifflin Co.

20. "Principles of Teaching." Seller Co.

21. "Original Nature of Man." Teachers College, Columbia

University.

22. "The Psychology of Learning." Teachers College, Colum-
bia University.

LEARNING PROCESSES OF COUNTRY CHILDREN 39 1

23. Wilson — "Motivation of the Elementary School Subjects."

Houghton Mifflin Co.

24. Strayer and Norsworthy — "How to Teach." The Macmillan Co.

25. Vogt— "Rural Sociology." D. Appleton & Co.

26. McKeever's books on farm boys and girls.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE TEACHING PROCESS IN THE CONSOLIDATED

SCHOOL

Preliminary Problems

1. What advantage has the country teacher using a text like Field

and Nearing's "Community Civics" (Ginn) over the teacher
using the ordinary old-type texts?

2. Make a list of some of the important good points of the teaching

you have observed as a pupil and student.

3. Could children be successfully taught how to invent? Can in-

vention and originality of thinking be developed? How?

4. What are the possible advances in teaching which may be expected

from such experimental schools as the Lincoln, in New York
City, under the General Education Board?

5. What are some of the chief sources of waste of time in teaching?

6. What books on methods of teaching have you seen or read? Do

they compare well with text-books on method for physicians and
lawyers ?

I. The Teaching Situation

The Child, the School, and Society. — The public-school
teacher of our democracy should be thoroughly equipped
with experience relating to the nature of children and to
the nature of present-day American and especially rural
society. He will realize that his pupils have both private
and public functions, and that the work which they do in
the world, whether specifically private or public, should be
social service — honest and efficient contribution to the wel-
fare of society. The principal positive and negative prob-
lems of the individual and of society will be his problems.
The failure of democracy in his own community and state,
as shown in the forms of poverty, disease, . crime, social in-

392

THE TEACHING PROCESS 393

justice, industrial inefficiency, lack of desirable leisure,
appreciation, culture and avocations, etc., and the needs
of individuals, community, and state in the way of positive
conduct-controls that will promote the values of health,
morality, and general social efficiency necessary to the pro-
motion of universal happiness and self-realization — these
he understands, is keenly responsive to, and is daily grow-
ing in efficiency to meet as a servant of the public good.

Devine has offered some valuable suggestions for im-
proving the social function of the schools in the proceedings
of the 1 9 14 National Education Association. He shows
the serious limitations under which most of us as teachers
work, and how easily we become pedantic when not con-
versant with social needs and not continually on the alert
to adapt means to social ends. It is only by the aid of more
socialized teachers, curricula, and a more vital connection
with social needs and conditions that we can perform the
service for which we are employed. The ideal rural teacher
is thoroughly conversant with rural needs and conditions
by direct experience and reading, and is also acquainted
with the problems of cities and the world in general. Rural
sociology, economics, and civics will be a large part of his
academic knowledge. The natural sciences and the social
sciences directly related to rural life will displace much of
his language and mathematical studies.

We fail also when we do not know children thoroughly,
not only in a personal but in a scientific manner. Rous-
seau may have overstated it when he said that whenever
he was in doubt as to educational procedure the teacher
should study his pupils in order to learn the answer. But
there is much of truth in the proposition. One may have
profound insight into modern rural social conditions and
problems, and the relation of his particular pupils to these
problems, but unless he knows the nature of childhood and
the learning process he will make a very common and la-
mentable failure when he proceeds to teach. The technic

394 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of teaching stands on two legs, the nature of society and the
nature of children.

The most important reform and the most fruitful de-
velopment toward teaching efficiency since the time of Rous-
seau has been that of sympathetic and scientific child-study.
The reaction against the demands of society and the result-
ing specializing of all emphasis on the child went too far
in the direction of individualism, perhaps, but the focus of
attention of several generations on the child as the centre
has led to a use of both limbs of the process again in a more
harmonious manner. Some of the principal facts regarding
the nature of children have been sketched in the preceding
chapters under such headings as instincts, habits, knowl-
edge, ideals, etc. But along with this knowledge and con-
stant study of a technical character on the part of the
teacher go a spirit of love, of reverence, and sympathetic
open-mindedness such as characterized super-teachers like
Pestalozzi among his orphans in Switzerland and the Great
Teacher among the fishermen of Galilee.

The factors of teaching efficiency, in the third place,
are not hard-and-fast matters, and are only now being sci-
entifically determined. The great need has been for definite
social standards and goals toward which to aim, such as
health, citizenship, morality, vocational ability, and avoca-
tional efficiency, and carefully derived minimal essentials,
and for scientific standards arid units for measuring the
results obtained. When we can measure in the light of
recognized social aims the work of teachers, then we can
make more definite the factors of teaching skill. The meth-
ods of those who obtain superior results with a minimum of
expenditure of time and energy will be studied as will those
of poor teachers, and from these empirical and scientific
data more helpful principles of teaching will be derived.
What we have to offer now in the way of definite guides
to success is not very extensive or scientific, although such
books as Charter's ''Methods of Teaching,'' and others

THE TEACHING PROCESS 395

mentioned later, any one of which would be an excellent
introduction to the study of the writer^s volume dealing
with the various school subjects, are approaching what is
desired. Teaching is the guidance of learning. If no one
has learned, no teaching has been done. If the child be-
comes a good learner, his teaching has prt)bably been good.^
Teaching is the guidance of learning, and learning is the test
of teaching.

II. Classroom Management

Good class management and sound health on the part
of the pupils are fundamental requisites to good class
teaching. As suggested before, the health basis, with many
exceptions, is still woefully neglected in American schools.
Tuberculosis and typhoid, diphtheria and scarlet fever still
slay their thousands unnecessarily, while multitudinous
physical defects make for serious retardation and defeat of
the teacher's best efforts. Parker reports in his volume on
"Methods of Teaching in High Schools," a common judg-
ment of pupils grown up: "On no one point is there more
unanimity than the want of attention to bodily health and
exercise; not one (of the college students reporting) has any-
thing favorable to say on this point, and many accuse the
(high) school in extenso of its dereliction in physical educa-
tion." One student writes: "During the first three years I
do not recall a single suggestion by any teacher to get out
in the open air — or anywhere else. At noon most of us
stayed indoors and either strolled up and down some very
dark corridors, or sat at our desks and studied. The self-
ventilating heating system was then in vogue, and the teach-
ers had orders not to open the windows, so that the rooms
were stuffy, and the pupils drowsy." ^ Another chapter

^Strayer and Norsworthy's "How to Teach " is a very helpful dis-
cussion of educational psychology for teachers. It treats of recent prin-
ciples of educational psychology.

2 From Sisson's article on " College Students' Comments on Their Own
High School Training," in the School Review for October, 191 2.

39^ THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

brings forward this general health basis, and suggests how
some of the principal conduct-controls, especially habits,
may be established that will help insure health. The gen-
eral care of environment through class management also
can hardly be termed teaching, and yet lies at the basis of
teaching efficiency.

Discipline, order, scientific management in the more
mechanical phases of classroom procedure, proper arrange-
ment of the programme, keeping the schoolroom sanitary,
and many other phases outside of teaching itself are of great
importance, not at all to be lightly considered by the teacher.
In business as well as in some of our best schools, many of
the most profitable increases in efficiency and decreases of
waste and lost motion are attained by painstaking analysis
of such seeming trifles as how, with less labor and better
results, to paste labels on cans, or to lay bricks with fewer
motions, and in schools by investigation of such problems
as the proper planning of the programme, the passing out
of books, taking of records, correlating subjects, reducing
tardiness and absence, seating pupils, preventing disorder,
etc. Such books as Bagley's *Xlassroom Management"
and "School Discipline '^ the teacher should be famihar with,
and she should get from them the attitude of careful study
of the practical classroom problems which are not an in-
tegral part of teaching in the narrow sense.

III. Principles of Teaching

Some of the general principles of teaching now coming
commonly to be accepted and supported by a growing num-
ber of scientific investigations may be summarized as follows :

I. The natural child, as Rousseau and his followers
have emphasized, must, as suggested in the previous chap-
ter, be taken into consideration. Education is a process of
growth, not of accretion. The instinctive tendencies ar».
not, however, to be merely coddled and pampered. They

THE TEACHING PROCESS 397

are, as Dewey suggests in his "School and Society/' the
natural resources which stimulate the child to activity
along a number of different lines, many of them leading to
habitual activities of much, little, or no value at the present
time. The instinct for repetition is valuable in that it
makes possible a natural way of getting the training neces-
sary to the formation of desirable habits. The instinct for
physical activity and play can, with little loss of energy,
be directed into types of activity that make for firmly estab-
lished habits, knowledge, ideals, interests, prejudices, tastes,
and attitudes that will help the individual and his fellows
to make for a higher type of community well-being. The
constructive interest can be guided into artistic, avocational,
and industrial lines. In general, "take the power otherwise
going to waste or causing damage and utilize it for educa-
tive ends" would be a first principle of method. Get
pupils to want the right things by the help of instinctive
interests and then help them to obtain them.

2. Motivation. — ^A corollary is the law of motivation,
namely, that other things being equal, mental connections,
the prime factors in education, will be more likely to be
made with economy and hooked up with the life situations
in which they are needed if the interest, motives, and de-
sires of children are aroused or utilized. Dewey started his
laboratory school with the intention of discovering how far
the work of the school could be as naturally motivated as
is the play life of children outside of the school, or as is the
self-directed activity of adults at their daily activities.
Thorndike shows that "the prime law in all human control
is to get the man to make the desired response and to be
satisfied thereby," and that satisfying results strengthen,
and discomfort weakens, the bond between situation and re-
sponse. The way to get the right response to a stimulus or
situation is to provide motivation.

3. Repetition is both an instinct and a most important
teaching factor in establishing habits, fixing knowledge so

398 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

it may be recalled, and furnishing the basis for attitudes
and ideals. It rests on the fundamental laws of learning.
Have pupils repeat the acts, principles and facts which you
would have them master. See that they have a good stir-
ring motive for the repetition. Give opportunity for the
use and exercise of knowledge and skill gained, not only at
or near the time of learning, but throughout the years of
school life thereafter. Distribution of repetition is as im-
portant as initial repetition, because of the tendency for
mental connections or modifications to be weakened or
broken with time, occasioning loss of skill and forgetting.
Not only drill at the time of initial learning, but frequent
repetition and practical use over months and years of time
are necessary.

4. Learning With Life Situation. — The response must be
firmly connected with a specific stimulus or stimuli, such
as the response thirty, when " five- times-six " is the stimulus,
and this stimulus must be like that or those which should
call it forth in the life of the individual. As spelling is
principally used in the writing of letters, it is desirable to
have much of the spelling learned and drilled in script form
and in the writing of letters. We want pupils to be able
not merely to spell in the classroom under given conditions
or stimuli, but we want them especially to know how to
spell correctly when they are seated before letter-paper
and are engrossed with the thought they are trying to
communicate.^ The nearer the school situation is like the
life situation, the more surely will correct spelling be the
result. Tuskegee Institute is one of the best illustrations
of the application of this principle. Recent changes in our
rural schools have been very largely in this general direction.

5. Attention. — All teachers are concerned with getting
and holding the attention of their pupils to the learning

^ Judd's " Measuring the Work of the Public Schools " seems to show
that for Cleveland children, at least, isolated words are spelled about as
correctly as they are when used in sentences, but our thesis holds good.

Teachers learning vegetable gardening at a summer school

Giving the girls a chance at West Alexandria, Ohio

THE TEACHING PROCESS 399

process in which they must engage. When the work is
closely related to the natural tendencies of the children, as
in an arithmetic game, or "ciphering match,'' the problem
of getting all to participate with their best efforts is not so
great, but with an idea or purpose which requires effort not
lying along the path of instinctive or acquired connections,
attention on the part of all is harder to get. The types of
attention are three or four: passive, active, secondary pas-
sive, and, as the writer has termed it, dynamic zealous.
The first is the instinctive, spontaneous type; the second is
the active, voluntary type in which we must make an effort
against natural or other tendencies, to hold our attention
and activities to the line of our purpose; the third is the out-
come of voluntary or active attention, a kind of attention
which comes through the struggle of active attention, as
when we learn to like composition writing, which we had
disliked, after sticking to it long enough; and fourth, as an
example, we should probably name the type of attention of
the zealot, the genius, the person of tremendous concentra-
tion and zeal who puts emotion, enthusiasm, and dynamic
energy into his line of activity. Most teachers wish they
could get the baseball, football, and basket-ball teams to
engage in class recitations and in study as they participate
with frenzy in these games. We all know persons who are
marked by the concentrated, energetic manner in which
they hew to the line of their purpose regardless of how
naturally distasteful the activity may be. How to rise
through these levels of attention, how the child learns to
attend, are problems of educational psychology and teach-
ing, but these are the phases which must be distinguished. ^
Discussions of interest, instinct, purpose, habituation, and
the types of lessons discussed elsewhere will clarify somewhat
these problems.

400 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

IV. General Methods

Types of Teaching. — There are frequently many methods
of accomplishing the same result, and there are various
special methods of accomplishing different results. We
can without much trouble see how each of the four conduct-
controls, distinguished by Bagley and others, may by ap-
propriate methods be established along the special lines re-
quired to promote each of the five ends of education so
frequently reiterated in this discussion. On the left, if shown
diagrammatically, we would have the five ends such as
health, citizenship, morality, etc.; to the right of each we
would place the four conduct-controls, such as habits,
knowledge, ideals, etc.; and to the right of each of these
twenty items the methods that should be used to help insure
these ends. For health, or vital efficiency, as a first aim,
e. g., we should have to show how specifically useful health
hahits, for example, could, by skilful teaching, be established
in children, such as by asking children how many had slept
with their windows open the night before, how many had
used a tooth-brush, etc., personal examinations of hands,
hair, clothing, etc., for cleanliness and for putting the
stamp of class, teacher, and social approval on right health
practices and the stamp of disapproval on their opposites,
until these habits were fully set — attention by teachers to
such matters to continue, however, until the child has
passed beyond the years of school life. Then, second,
would come the methods of giving sound and applicable
health knowledge in such a way as would make it permanent
and easy to recall when needed, such as the right use of
hygiene text-books, of illustrations, of stories, of visits to
places that show good or bad sanitary conditions, getting
pupils to work to help solve some problem of home, school,
oi community health, etc. Then would come the develop-
ment of proper health ideals, and finally, prejudices and atti-
tudes j or appreciations, through developing a feeling of ad-

THE TEACHING PROCESS 4OI

miration for those who live healthily and of disgust for those
who do not, general repugnance to stuffy rooms, to flies,
to dirt, to the use of alcohol and tobacco, and to general
uncleanliness and poor regimen.

Thorndike discusses the following seventeen phases or
types of methods of teaching, about which there has been
considerable discussion: Methods for drill, or habituation;
methods for reasoning, or analysis; realistic versus verbal
teaching; laboratory or experimental methods; inductive
methods; teaching by action and dramatization; the lec-
ture method; object-lessons and demonstrations; telling
versus questioning: The Socratic method; "developing"
methods; education by self-activity; the methods of dis-
covery; teaching pupils how to study; example and pre-
cept; imperative, persuasive, and suggestive methods;
evasive, suppressive, and substitutive methods; reward and
punishment.

General Method. — If we were to compress in a nutshell
the general method of teaching it would he, first, to get the
child (or class) by some form of motivation to desire to do
or to accomplish what is desirable for him to do or accom-
plish along the lines of some aim of education; second, to
get him to get the purpose and plan of what he is attempt-
ing to do clearly in mind; third, to get him to engage ac-
tively and energetically in this educative activity; fourth,
to persist in practice and drill until he has accomplished
what he set out to do, e. g., to make a pair of skis in manual
training, or, after he has accomplished successfully his aim,
to write a composition, for the benefit of another boy, on
how best to make skis; a,nd fifth, to verify or test his product
by applying it or using it in some manner to see if it satisfies
his original aim. Our knowledge of the extent of individual
differences will, of course, help us to avoid the narrow for-
maHsm of putting every child in every lesson through the
same steps.

" Strictly speaking," says Dewey, " method is thoroughly

402 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

individual. Each person has his own instinctive way of
going at a thing; the attitude and the mode of approach
and attack are individual. To ignore this individuality of
approach, to try to substitute for it, under the name of
* general method,' a uniform scheme of procedure, is simply
to cripple the only effective agencies of operation, and to over-
lay them with a mechanical formalism that produces only
a routine, conventional type of mental quality." In his vol-
ume on *'How We Think" and elsewhere he gives also, with
certain warnings thrown out, excellent outlines of general
method. In the paragraph following the one quoted above
we find, for example, this excellent analysis of the general
method of efficient teaching, following closely the general
method of learning:

The primary factor in general method, so construed, is the exist-
ence of a situation which appeals to an individual (the pupil) as his
own concern or interest, that is to say, as presenting an end to be
achieved, because arousing desire and effort.

The second point is that the conditions be such as to stimulate
observation and memory in locating the means, the obstacles, and
resources that must be reckoned with in dealing with the situation.

The third point is the formation of a plan of procedure, a theory
or hypothesis about the best way of proceeding.

The fourth is putting the plan into operation.

The fifth and last is the comparison of the result reached with
what was intended, and a consequent estimate of the worth of the
method followed, a more critical discernment of its weak and its
strong points.

These five points may be reduced to three more generic ones.
The first and fundamental condition of right method is the existence of
some concrete situation involving an end that interests the individual
and that requires active and thoughtful effort in order to be reached.
The second is consideration of the nature of the problem, the difficulty
or perplexity involved in reaching the end set, so as to form a sugges-
tion or conjecture as to the best way of proceeding to solve the diffi-
culty. The third is the overt effort in which the thought of the plan
is applied and thereby tested. Scientific method will be found to
involve exactly the same steps, save that a scientific mode of ap-
proach implies a large body of prior empirical and tentative procedures

THE TEACHING PROCESS 403

which have finally been sifted so as to develop a technique consciously
formulated and adapted to the given type of problem.

These principles of procedure most in accord with the
learning process of the student deserve wide illustration
and application to the various types of teaching, (i) The
first principle is that of motivation, or providing the situa-
tion. The little child who, for example, suddenly notices
on the piano a box of candy which he immediately wants
very much to get has before him, or is immersed in, a natural
situation where the motive for action is very real. If the
parent had placed the candy there and then had led the
child to notice it, we should have not a purely "natural,''
but a teaching, situation. (2) The conditions here are such,
especially if this is a new situation to the child, as to "stim-
ulate observation and memory in locating the means, the
obstacles, and resources that must be reckoned with in
deaHng with the situation," for the child naturally sizes
up the situation, probably looking at the piano-bench or
stool, at a low chair, or his high chair, and thinking vaguely
that these might be utilized in reaching the candy. (3)
Next comes a plan or theory of action, a tentative solution
to the problem. He thinks of climbing upon the piano-
bench, perhaps, and trying to reach the candy, or he hesi-
tates between the use of the bench and the chair. (4) He
tentatively decides upon and tries out one of his methods,
say the use of the bench, gets upon it, probably with some
effort, and reaches upward. (5) If he finds he is too short
to reach the candy, he instantly estimates the value of that
plan at zero. Other natural steps may here be added:
(6) He next gets his high chair and (7) with it reaches the
candy, and (8) credits the plan one-hundred-per-cent good.
The method is one of self-activity, and the teacher is not
obtrusively present. What is true of the little child is true,
in general, of the adult.

Teaching as the Supervision of Learning. — The ideal of
the best teachers is to make the teaching process the unob-

404 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

trusive guidance of the learning process, as natural as the
undirected activity of the little child in solving a problem
by adapting means to ends, by weighing alternatives, and
by putting forth persistent effort of a self-active kind. In
the ordinary artificial type of school it takes great ingenuity
on the part of teachers, principals, and supervisors to ap-
proximate the lifelike naturalness of the situations of the
child in the home and of the man and woman at their daily
work in the natural life of the world. One of the greatest
changes taking place in methods of teaching and adminis-
tration is just along this line of making more natural, mean-
ingful, and lifelike the learning process of children in school.
Instead of spending their time in making merely formal
technical joints of wood in manual training, for example,
children are more and more given the opportunity to make
things, often in co-operative groups, which they really de-
sire to have, as they desire and make their kites, dolls, base-
ball diamonds, wagons, caves, playhouses, and the like,
outside of school. They are put into natural situations
where they will wish to solve problems involving arithmetic,
and where they want to write plans for, work out, and test
letters and compositions. Through careful guidance of
this kind children are gaining habits of independence in
working out the solutions to practical problems as near like
the problems of every-day life as possible. We must train
children to be effective in life by placing them in life situa-
tions and guiding them to power and control over them as
unobtrusively and as much behind the scenes as possible.
The educational weakness of the average life situation out
of school is that it lacks either in skilled guidance, progressive
sequence, breadth of outlook and connections. The teach-
er's aim is ultimately to make herself useless. When she
is forever at the centre of the stage doing all the talking,
acting, experimenting, illustrating, and thinking she is not
guiding the learning process and she is not educating

THE TEACHING PROCESS 405

children, except for a certain ^'education in stupidity."
The happy mean here is difficult of attainment in most
schools.

V. The Types op Teaching

Although they all follow a somewhat general plan, dif-
ferent phases of teaching and learning may be emphasized.
One writer discusses several phases under the following
headings, to which we add briefly their several meanings.

^^ Expression,''^ giving children opportunity to learn
through self-expression and doing things rather than being
mere passive listeners and manipulators of second-hand
knowledge.

^^ Practice, ^^ encouraging children to perfect themselves
by repeated efforts in the various skills which they must
obtain.

^'ObJ edification/^ making the learning of children con-
crete in the sense of being objective, ^' object- teaching, ''
laboratory apparatus, demonstrations, excursions, use of
material things, pictures, etc., for illustrations.

^^ Induction, '^ helping children to do their own thinking
through the discovery of principles from particular facts,
finding similarities which embrace many experiences, learn-
ing through the use of type studies, following the five formal
steps of Herbart as refined by Dewey in his ''How We
Think.''

^' Deduction, ^^ giving children ability to select the prin-
ciples which govern particular cases which are problematic
to them, to apply general principles to particular problems,
and to gain pow'er in guiding conduct in the light of general-
ized experience, and reciting by topics under certain condi-
tions.

^^ Formal Association,'^ helping children to learn the
meaning of words of language and formal linguistic symbols,
by associating symbols with meanings, if possible in their

406 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

concrete life settings rather than in a highly artificial man-
ner.

^^ Study, ''^ giving children ability and opportunity to
get knowledge, develop habits, gain ideals, and establish
interests, attitudes and appreciations through their own
independent efforts, training in the technique of the learning
process, including, for example, memorizing in the quick-
est and most economical manner, and getting command of
the various tools of study such as the use of dictionaries,
cyclopedias, references, etc. — teaching as the supervision of
learning.

^' Discipline,''^ so guiding the life of the school as to pro-
mote the best working spirit on the part of all and as to
avoid disorder and the breaking down of the learning proc-
ess: by holding up good examples, by giving clear ideas of
the meaning, value, and purpose of conformity to the social
order of the school and community, and by expressive con-
trol, such as giving opportunity to act out, to work off,
wayward emotions in desirable ways, rewarding desirable
actions and expressions, neglecting undesirable actions and
robbing them of their stimuli, surrounding children with in-
centives and stimuli to worthy efforts, and removing tempta-
tions to undesirable actions, putting the stamp of disap-
proval of school and teacher upon unworthy action, and by
substituting channels of desirable response for those which
are offensive. (Also used in the sense of training.)

^^ Appreciation,^^ cultivating the esthetic feelings and re-
sponses of children, such as a sense of humor, love of the
beautiful, spirit of sportsmanship, taste in dress, love of
good music, love of desirable forms of recreation and harm-
less enjoyment, etc., and furnishing ways to provide esthetic
expression along the various lines these responses are to be
cultivated. (Also used to cover interests, tastes, prejudices,
points of view, etc.)

^^Instruction,''' giving information to children directly
by short talks, reading, etc., in which the children take the

THE TEACHING PROCESS 407

part principally of listeners and the teacher that of the
story-teller, the lecturer, the instructor — the principal
method in German and French schools.

^^ Investigation j'^ encouraging children to learn things for
themselves, to go to sources and facts and interpret them
for themselves, to gain power in independent study.

'^ Development y'^ a blend of the two types above, in which
teachers and pupils co-operate, and there is more of ^^give
and take" in the lessons — large use of question and answer,
or Socratic, method, and careful guidance of the pupils*
self-activity.

^^ Recitation,''^ in the present restricted sense of the term,
hearing the children report on what they have studied, a
memory lesson largely. (Frequently used for any lesson
not a study lesson.)

^^ Examination j*^ testing rather large units of subject-
matter in a more or less formal manner, frequently by having
pupils write on what they have learned and have been taught
— desirable as an incentive and review, especially for older
pupils; gives pupils educative opportunity independently
to organize and clarify their knowledge or improve their
habits.

''Review,''^ fixing learning by repeating, applying, and
reorganizing it at less frequent intervals than the brief recall
of related, apperceptive knowledge at the daily recitation
or lesson.

^' Assignment,''^ helping children when left to themselves,
to take up new work or to drill on old work in an effective
and economical manner, without, however, robbing them
of their own opportunities to grow unaided — usually slighted
as a phase or type of teaching.

Other Lists. — Such a list of important phases and types
of teaching is valuable in calling attention to the richness
and variety of methods by which to achieve the various
educational aims with the manifold types of children at
various times. ^ The most important of these types are each

4o8 THE CONSOLIDATED RUILA^L SCHOOL

given a chapter in Earhart's volume on *' Types of Teach-
ing/' treating each of the following topics:

The nature, development, and purposes of subject-
matter, the ideas, attitudes, and feelings, and the instincts,
and habits with which children come to school, what school
education should accomplish in remaking, extending, so-
cializing, and individualizing the child's experience, the
various types of class procedure such as the telling exercise
or lecture type of method, the object-lesson, inductive and
deductive lessons, the appreciation lesson or exercise, habit
formation, study, the assignment, the recitation lesson, re-
views, socializing phases of school work, and making lesson
plans.

Strayer, in his volume in "The Teaching Process," deals
with the various phases of teaching under nineteen differ-
ent headings, such as:

The aim of teaching, the instincts, attention, drill, in-
ductive and deductive lessons, appreciation lesson, study
lesson, review or examination lesson, the recitation lesson,
questioning, social phases of the recitation, the physical wel-
fare of the children, moral training, class management, lesson
plans, the supervision of teachers, the course of study, and
measuring results of education.

Each of the authors distinguishes seven different types
of lessons: inductive, deductive, drill, study, review, ap-
preciation, and recitation (memory) lessons.

Charters, in his "Methods of Teaching," has a different
organization of material, but treats in close relation with
the school subjects much of the same matter, stressing very
helpfully the structure, function, value, and treatment of
subject-matter. If possible, every teacher should read and
digest at least one of these three different treatments and
test out, phase by phase, the different principles advanced.
Each is written by practical teachers in touch with actual
school problems who have studied scientifically the tech-
nical principles underlying teaching.

THE TEACHING PROCESS 409

High-school and upper-grade teachers will find Parker's
''Methods of Teaching in High Schools" (Ginn) and Col-
vin's "An Introduction to High-School Teaching" (Macmil-
lan) very helpful.

VI. Types of Lessons

Lesson Steps. — The contribution which Bagley, Strayer,
and others have made in analyzing and isolating the various
(7) t>TDes of lessons should also be made the heritage of every
teacher. Herbart and his followers devised one scheme or
series of steps or stages to be used for practically every
lesson. It is of the inductive type and follows methods of
teaching used in Germany where text-books are little em-
ployed and, in a rough way, the steps described by Dewey
above as a general method. These "five formal steps" of
preparation, presentation, comparison and abstraction, gen-
eralization, and application, were long used by professional
teachers for most types of school work. But we do not
wish a child always to be thinking through for himself the
solution of a problematic situation, since there are many
other than problematic situations in life and many other
needs for teaching. We may, for example, wish to cultivate
appreciation and love of good music, and may therefore
have musicians, pianolas, or victrolas perform before classes,
with no thought on the teacher's part of developing ability
to solve problems in music or in any other fields thereby.
The aim is appreciation, not thinking ability. Other aims
such as habit formation, training in study, testing results,
review, gaining information largely through memory, and
so on, are largely overlooked by those who would apply
slavishly these five formal steps to all lessons. Even Dewey's
general method cannot be used for every lesson, or as a
method-whole covering several class periods, although it is
of the greatest value for a large share of the best teaching.
Neither Dewey nor Herbart intended, however, such slavish

4IO THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

application of the steps and the former specifically warns
against such wide use. As we shall show, the problem is a
very valuable centralizing factor for making purposive and
organized the development of many types of knowledge,
habits, ideals, and appreciations. Frank McMurry and
Dewey speak of it as the fundamental stimulus and guide
to learning, and would organize most subject-matter of a
course of study not as a series of topics in outline but as
a progressive series of problems, projects, and questions.
Our point is that it should not be used exclusively, and that
many types of lessons are desirable.

In general, we can teach pupils to think and to work
things out for themselves along various Hues; we can de-
velop their ideals and appreciations in many directions;
we can drill them in habits which are necessary and which
they would not get without such drill; we can furnish them
with knowledge or information of the complex world in
which they live; we can provide them with recreation;
we can organize, correlate and unify their mental connec-
tions of whatever sort; we can help them apply their knowl-
edge, skill, and ideals to life situations they will be sure to
meet, and are meeting, and we can test, measure, and sum-
marize their mental and physical attainments.

Teaching Children to Think. — To attain the various
social aims of education no ability on the part of children
is regarded, in theory, with more approval than the ability
to think along various lines. *^The life of reason," or the
life guided by reason, is the goal of our democratic schools
in these changing times. Even in a primitive, static, and
monarchical system or society, ability to think well is of
great value to the individual although not encouraged by
the state along social and political lines. If America is to
solve the problems, individual and social, which now beset
her, she must rear a thinking population. If the indi-
viduals are to attain the goal of life they must have this,
their highest capacity, developed and made habit along the

THE TEACHING PROCESS 4II

lines of the principal problems of life. General thinking
ability we may not be able very fully to develop, but we
can give power along many specific lines such as those of
health, the calling, citizenship, recreation, and morality,
by guided exercise in these fields.

In studying the methods of training children to think
in the past, teachers have been much confused and hindered
by artificial and needless distinctions between inductive
and deductive thinking. They have frequently spent more
time and effort in attempting to distinguish the two types,
often indistinguishable, than in learning the important
thing — how to teach pupils to think. We shall attempt here
to point out no more than the general method.

The Problem. — In his masterly attack on formal logic,
entitled, "Formal Logic," Professor Schiller asserts that the
answer to the question, "Why do we think?" was first dis-
covered by Professor John Dewey. The fundamental
stimulus and provocative of thinking Dewey found to be
the problematic situation, in other words, the new and
strange situation, the difficulty, the doubt, the perplexity,
the crisis, the dilemma. The task of devising a way by
which to get some candy from the top of the piano was to
the little child before mentioned a problematic situation,
a problem. Had he obtained candy several times in that
precise way he would not have needed to think at the time
mentioned. His habits of pulling up the high chair, climb-
ing on it, and reaching for the candy would have sufficed
without thinking. Thinking arises, if it arises at all, when
our customary habits fail to enable us successfully to meet
a life situation. To plan and to make a chair is a problem
to a boy in the manual-training shop, but to a chair-maker
in a chair factory it is mere habit. To the untrained teacher,
the arrangement of the school programme, the provision of
suitable ventilation, the treatment of a sick pupil, the ar-
rangement of the daily lesson plans, ^ the refractory pupil,

1 Doctors Earhart's and Strayer's books give practical suggestions for
making daily lesson plans.

412 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

and so on, are all problems. By experienced, professional
teachers these situations are met almost entirely on the basis
of routine habit.

When travelling over a new route, for a further ex-
ample, we come to a fork in the road and know not which
way to choose, we are in a typical thinking situation, al-
though commonly there are more than merely two alter-
natives. But in this forked-road situation, unless we are
impulsive, heedless, obstinate, thoughtless, we stop and
consider, '' wonder, '' ''reflect," "reason," "investigate,"
''thinkr

The first principle of teaching children to think is to put
them into a problematic situation, and since we wish to
give them ability to think on the affairs of life, not on Chi-
nese puzzles, we have the corollary that this problematic
situation must be, not some problem of x, y, and z, how
Caesar could build his bridge, or his indirect discourse,
"how many angels can stand on the end of a pin," or any
other remote situation unrelated to the main life needs and
problems of our people, but must be as real and concrete a
problem as children and grown-ups are meeting all the time
out of school. The problem is the worWs greatest educator.

The Tentative Solutions or Hypotheses. — When we are
confronted and stopped in our daily habitual activities by
a problematic situation, such as, shall I buy a new hat,
what kind of hat shall I buy, what shall we do this evening
for entertainment or profit, where shall I go this summer,
shall I open and shut the school-windows or have a pupil
do it, etc., our minds naturally dwell on the alternatives
before us. The summer may be spent at many places,
each with its good and bad features from our point of view.
By looking over the situation more thoroughly we may find
a way in which to spend the summer more profitably and
pleasantly than ever before. If we are at the forking of a
road into two or more branches we try to see what each of
these alternatives would mean if followed up. If the prob-

THE TEACHING PROCESS 413

lem is what are the causes of deserts we encourage the
pupils to give several alternative answers or tentative solu-
tions, without letting them know what we think the causes
are. We encourage them to think of several possible solu-
tions to the problem, and we usually find it easy to get them
from a wide-awake class. Here arises a second great rule
of thinking: when confronted hy a difficulty , or problematic
situation, cultivate a variety of alternative solutions to the
problem.

By cultivating such variety we vastly increase our, or
the class's, chances of thinking out, or hitting on, the right
or best solution. The boy who knows of the possibilities
of but one or two occupations will not be as apt to choose
the best occupation for himself and the public as one who,
by some kind of vocational guidance, learns of several or
all of the various opportunities before him. Many of us
spend much of our time foolishly or in mere drifting because
for the various hours of the day or week we do not con-
sider the many profitable ways in which such time may
be spent. People say we lack imagination or that we do
not think. When we urge a class or an individual pupil to
suggest other possible solutions to the problem before it,
we shall frequently get silly or stupid answers, especially
if the children have never had any training in thinking in
school. But some of the seemingly silly answers may turn
out to be correct, and these silly or weak answers, if sincere,
show that others than the best pupils are trying to con-
tribute to the class product; and moreover, these answers
provide good training in testing and caution for both those
who make them and for the others. The number and
quality of the suggestions will depend upon our experience,
our memory, our imagination, and our ability to get from
others tentative solutions.

Testing the Hypotheses. — This comes out in the third
step of thinking in which we test our various tentative solu-
tions, conjectures, guesses, hypotheses, alternatives, the-

414 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ories, notions, ideas, or whatever we may call them. We
examine each alternative critically for advantages and dis-
advantages. The infant trying to get the candy considers
more or less carefully the relative advantages or disadvan-
tages of the piano-bench, another chair, the high chair, etc.,
for helping him solve his problem. We let our minds go
along the various roads before us trying to discover which
will best lead to our destination. We consider the various
possible ways of spending the summer and balance advan-
tages and disadvantages. The class offers in step two sev-
eral reasons or causes for deserts which the teacher writes
on the blackboard, perhaps, as a Hst of possibilities, and
which the class now criticises. It may find on considera-
tion of the merits and demerits of the various answers that,
for example, a combination of causes named is in their best
judgment the correct solution. The teacher may leave them
for a time with this notion, or she may lead or help them, or
tell them outright the correct answer. If she does this be-
fore the pupils have done this testing work, however, she
has defeated their thinking and robbed them of the oppor-
tunity. This is, perhaps, the worst single fault of teachers,
considering the importance of such training.

The great principle here, then, would be to lead the
pupils to test out in several ways, or in all possible ways,
the tentative solutions which they can summon out of their
experience, their imagination, or from their authorities.
A corollary would be to get them to take a pride in avoiding
jumping at a conclusion, in keeping their minds open, real-
izing that a better answer may yet be given, in cultivating
the scientific habit or attitude of mind which Dewey in his
preface to ''How We Think " says is one thing most needed
in American education. Too many of us make hasty con-
clusions, fail to test with any care the few or many hy-
potheses we bring to birth, gather from our friends, or from
our reading, take things on hearsay without test, close our
minds to new suggestions, thinking we have the one and

THE TEACHING PROCESS 4x5

final answer to anything or everything, fail, in short, to
control, and guide the thinking process.

Concluding. — The final step is the conclusion. We pass
judgment or decide that the answer is so or that we cannot
discover the answer. The class finally concludes that the
cause of deserts is so and so; we decide that we shall go to
a certain place next summer because it outweighs all in a
surplus of advantages over disadvantages; we decide to
start our auto, our wagon, or our feet along the road which
we think is better or best. Our thinking stops when we
make the decision. After that, habit sets in and our walk-
ing or driving is merely habitual. It takes time for a class
to go through such a process, perhaps several days or weeks
for the entire "method- whole.'' Several good pieces of
wood may be spoiled by the boy who is working out the
way to make a table. We do not naturally take easily to
thinking. It is travail and hard work. It is easier to fol-
low the crowd, to read from the book, to follow our first
impulse or piece of advice from another, in short, to dodge
thought. But only by thinking do we gain power to solve
problems along the line of our life problems — by solving
them, not by accepting ready-made answers which our
teachers, our books, and our friends are so ready to furnish
us. These we frequently solicit and use as mere hypotheses
to test, but not as substitutes for our own educative self-
activity. Frequently, in a class it will be desirable to make
an explicit statement of the problem with which we start.

Appljring. — A fifth step, not in the thinking, but in the
lesson or series of lessons, and practically always taking
place in a real-life situation, is that of going on and applying
the principle arrived at as the conclusion. We have thought
out the best way to make a table and now proceed to make
it. We have come to a conclusion as to where we shall
spend the summer and proceed to go there or make prepa-
rations for spending it as decided. Frequently this step
of application shows us that we have erred in our thinking

4l6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

and usually points out exactly where we made our error.
Our plan when carried out gives us a very poor table, a con-
clusion that will not work, a principle that fails to square
with the facts. After considerable thinking, a graduating
class, for example, decided that the members would pur-
chase a piano for the school. But when they attempted
to raise the needed contributions only a few were willing
to pay the proportionate amount. It was then too late to
think out another solution. They failed in not testing
this hypothesis by seeing if a sufficient number would pay
the proportioned amount at the earlier date when they
did their thinking. We older people frequently, and some
continually, bitterly regret our neglect of important phases
of thinking which •we could easily have worked out had we
been more systematic, more energetic, and more conscious
of, or better trained in, the technique necessary to good
thinking; examining carefully our problq^, rousing as many
good tentative solutions or suggestions as possible, testing
each of these suggestions and comparing, contrasting, and
weighing them for preponderance of advantages over dis-
advantages. It is fortunately the able and worthy, usually,
who think well and succeed, and the weak, defective, and
unworthy, who think poorly, or not at all, and fail. The
steps many follow in class are: (i) problem, (2) hypotheses,
(3) tests, and (4) conclusion. Our mission as teachers is to
increase vastly the number who can use this highest instru-
ment of evolution, the ability or abilities to reason along the
several Unes desirable for ourselves and the public.

The Limits of the Problem Method. — Shall we then at-
tempt to arrange all of our school work as a series of prob-
lems, or can we depend upon mathematics to give us such
general abilities? As suggested, some seem to incline to
the former view in the previously quoted selection. To
both, the answer is no. Much of the work can be arranged
as problems for thinking. The department of economics
of the University of Chicago, for example, has recently pub-

THE TEACHING PROCESS 417

lished a book of problems for class use covering the entire
subject of elementary economics and providing practically
little other reading matter in exposition of the subject,
although sources are utilized. History, geography, hand-
work, hygiene, and other subjects, may be, and are being,
largely organized on the problem or "project" basis. Arith-
metical problems are becoming more Ufelike, dealing with
number relations which pupils meet with or will very prob-
ably meet. Mathematics can hardly get over the weak-
ness, however, of making necessary a certain type and order
of thinking, largely deductive, which is different from the
kind of thinking described above, which we carry on accord-
ing to the natural way in which the mind functions and
according to which it is best to meet the problems of hfe.
Furthermore, ability to think, even exceptionally well,
which many may gain by perseverance in one field, is no
guarantee that one will be a good thinker in other fields.
We have tested the theory (hypothesis, suggestion, or con-
juncture) of formal discipline and have so far found it
wanting. Our minds as teachers are open, but wisdom
indicaj;es that we can get both valuable information about
the world in which we live and power to think in that world
better, or only, by getting our training in solving, not formal,
symbolic, or unlifelike problems, such as those of cube root,
and rowing a boat, etc., but the actual problems of life.
All teachers should study Professor Dewey's little book on
this subject mentioned above, "How We Think." Strayer's
two chapters in his "The Teaching Process" on the inductive
and deductive types of lessons are helpful short statements
of methods. Freeman's book on "How Children Learn"
contains a valuable chapter on "Problem Solving or Think-
ing."

The Drill Lesson. — Thinking takes place when our al-
ready formed mental connection between situations and re-
sponses are not adequate to promote satisfying conduct.
Life is so complex and new situations are so frequent to-day

41 8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

that the practical needs of life demand in all an ability to
think and adjust themselves to changing conditions. After
we have thought through a situation and adjusted ourselves
to it, we have also practically thought a connection through
our minds. Practice and drill make the connection rela-
tively permanent. For example, a teacher or pupil in a
strange city or locality is in doubt as to the best route to
the school the first time he is to go to it. But after con-
sidering and testing alternative routes, a way is decided on
and finally taken each day. In a short time teacher or
pupil leaves his home and walks to school unconscious of the
route taken and with his mind probably busy with some-
thing else. The connection made by conscious, attentive,
vigorous thinking is the wire or wires laid by the master
lineman, which are hereafter to carry automatically the
stimuli from the given situation, the street, over to the
muscular responses which control taking the proper route.

Both with children and grown-ups we do not always
find thinking forging ahead of habit and making the con-
nection. We have not time, opportunity, nor ability to
rediscover all knowledge and invent all answers to all the
problems of life. Much is furnished us outright as the out-
comes of others' thinking, as vicarious experience. We are
heirs to millions of connections which we simply must or
do take and make. We merely appropriate the connection
which binds temporarily the response 30 with the situation
— the teacher, class, and conditions making for an attitude
of interest, confidence, and obedience — and the stimulus,
five times six; and the teaching and study processes make it
more or less permanent. The tool subjects, or the tool
phases of subjects, like writing, reading, spelling, the funda-
mentals in arithmetic, drawing, construction work, and so
on, are practically all habits to be formed. The laws of
memory and of habit formation are practically the same in
essentials and for many purposes can be treated together.

Drill may be defined as the systematic endeavor to fix

THE TEACHING PROCESS 419

firmly habits or associations between stimuli and responses.
The stimuli may be either outer sense situations, or inner,
mental situations, or ideas. The mental connections or
associations may, then, be formed automatically between
the following sets:

Sense Stimuli tied to Movements

Sense Stimuli tied to Ideas

Ideas tied to Movements

Ideas tied to Ideas

Some of the leading laws and factors of so-called drill
may be stated as follows;

1. Decide very carefully in the light of educational
principals what habits and associations should be made
automatic or habitual, the minimal, essential habits neces-
sary, and those which are optional or alternative. Avoid
drilling on non-essentials. Twenty per cent of the usual
conservative schooling is probably relatively non-essential.
We have not yet selected the essentials of democratic edu-
cation in either urban or rural communities.

2. Arrange the matter — facts, habits, skills, knowledge
— in order best suited for economical habituation or memori-
zation. Be consistent and systematic in drill.

3. Be sure in most cases that pupils have a good motive
for drill, that they understand and feel the need of making
habitual certain mental connections. Put vigor, enthusiasm,
and vividness into the drilling. If possible, avoid lifeless,
monotonous, undesired drill.

4. Have the connections, the responses to the various
stimuli, repeated in an unvaried form. Avoid attempting
to make habits or permanent associations by even a few
repetitions.

5. Have repetitions carried on for an optimal period or
periods daily, and over weeks and months of time, until
learned as well as is desirable, or reasonably possible, with
the given pupil or pupils and under the given conditions.

420 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

If possible have standards of achievement such as the
Courtis tests in arithmetic, the Ayres, Thorndike, and
Freeman scales and standards in penmanship, and in
spelling, the Courtis and Thorndike rates in reading, and
so on. Excuse pupils or give other work to pupils who are
up to or above the standard for their grade. Get pupils
to compete with themselves by trying to better their past
performances. Avoid failing to distribute the automatic
learning over considerable periods of time, attempting too
much or too little, and do not fail to give opportunities to
use in practical ways, or in life-situation ways, the connec-
tions being formed.

6. Permit no exceptions or inaccuracies to occur until
the habits or ideas are firmly established. Avoid "break-
ing training" and doing things in other ways than in the
ways in which they are to be firmly established. Afterward
is the time for innovations.

7. Get pupils to take a pride in the firm estabhshing of
their own habits when they are not under the teacher's
care.

8. Give additional attention and emphasis to connec-
tions of especial difficulty.

9. Be sure that pupils are in right physical and mental
health for drill and choose the best times for it.

10. Use your examinations, reviews, tests, and measuring-
of-results periods partly if not largely for educative, distrib-
uted repetition and drill.

The Recitation, or Memory, Exercise or Lesson. — This
rather poorly named phase or type of the teaching process
is quite ancient and refers not to the class period in which
teacher and pupils get together, as it is commonly used, but
to only those types of class periods or instruction periods in
which pupils report, recite, or repeat what they have learned
in study, and consequently deals more with the content
phases of study than drill phases. The old plan, still
widely used in some parts of the world, was to have pu-

THE TEACHING PROCESS 42 1

pils repeat word for word what they learned in a book or
had been told. It is desirable for children to gain facts
and to possess in memory and to be partially acquainted
with a wide variety of accurate information. A lack of
information or first-hand experience handicaps one greatly
in his thinking, for he has few sources of suggestions and of
various ideas of accomplishing things. But to teach in-
formation in such a way as to give pupils not ideas which
they can profit by but mere *' words, words, words," is to
commit the common error.

Some of the factors of success in the use of this type of
exercise or lesson as one of several other types to be used in
the period are to use topics and hold pupils responsible for
reciting on them, clearly, accurately, and at some length,
using the best principles brought out on memory in such
volumes as Strayer and Norsworthy's *'How to Teach,"
and to drill on the facts that are to be thoroughly and
permanently learned after they have been carefully and
conservatively selected.

We cannot treat of all the seven types of lessons at length
here, but the most important have been considered. The
lesson in appreciation should be studied in this connection.
In general, teaching is an art which is more intricate than
the art of medicine; and the science supporting it is only
partially discovered, organized, and applied. A good teacher
will study the process as she would any other problem of
science. Certain sex differences in teaching country children
will be brought out in the following chapter.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. Into what three "fundamental methods of class instruction"

does Professor Colvin classify ways of teaching? (Chapter
VIII and the six following chapters of his volume on "An In-
troduction to High-School Teaching" (Macmillan).)

2. What specific rules does he give for testing the knowledge of

pupils, drill, and adding new knowledge?

422 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

3. How does this classification compare with that made by Professor

Parker in his ''Methods of Teaching in High School" (Ginn)?

4. How do you account for the great amount of space taken by the

above writers in telling how to train pupils to think?

5. What are the seven types of lessons given by Stray er in his ** Teach-

ing Process" (Macmillan) and Earhart in her "Types of
Teaching"? Do these authors name any types not covered by
Colvin's three and Parker's five?

6. As a principle of teaching why does Parker furnish a book of

"Exercises for 'Methods of Teaching in High School'"?

7. What are the psychological bases for the "project method," or

use of projects in teaching? Compare your answer with that
given by Professor Kilpatrick in the Teacfters College Record for
November, 191 8 (published by Teachers College, Columbia
University, New York City).

8. What educational magazines do you take or propose to take as

a teacher? Have you seen the Elementary School Journal for
elementary teachers, and the School Review for secondary teach-
ers, both published by the University of Chicago Press? What
rural-school magazines are pubUshed? Are they as yet of
value on methods of teaching?

9. What suggestions da you obtain twice a month from School Lije^

published since August i, 1918, by the U. S. Bureau of Educa-
tion? If you do not have it, send to Washington for it. (Free
to administrative educational ofl5cials; fifty cents a year, twenty-
six numbers, to others.)
10. Apply the principles of method given in this chapter to the sub-
jects you expect to teach or are teaching.

SUMMARY BY POINTS

1. The teaching process is controlled by the nature of children and

of society. Present-day educational science is helping to give
definiteness and precision to methods of teaching.

2. Classroom management is a corollary of the teaching process in

schools and deserves more attention and study than it usually
receives. Some of the principal aims of education are furthered
by scientific class management.

3. Teachers should make the natural child and his interests the

point of departure in teaching.

4. Motivation of teaching along the many lines suggested by Wilson

helps children to grow up naturally, guided and energized by
worthy purposes. The main problems of attention are met in
this way.

THE TEACHING PROCESS 423

5. There are many types of teaching. In general, we are developing

knowledge, habits, ideals, and appreciations of service to the
individual and society in meeting the fivefold aim of education
for social efiiciency.

6. The elements of general method are (i) a motive or felt need,

(2) consideration of ways of meeting the need, and (3) effort
put forth to test and apply the plan decided upon.

7. The guidance of the learning process should be unobtrusive on

the part of the teacher.

8. Several lists of types and phases of teaching frequently discussed

by teachers are briefly examined.

9. The seven types described by Strayer in his "Teaching Process"

and Earhart in her "Types of Teaching" are recommended for
study and guidance.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Alderman — "School Credit for Home Work." Houghton MifHin

Co.

2. Bagley — "Classroom Management." Macmillan.

3. "School Discipline." Macmillan.

4. Betts— "The Recitation." Houghton Mifflin Co.

5. Brice — "Measuring the Efficiency of Teachers." Public School

Publishing Co.

6. Colvin, A. R. — "An Introduction to High-School Teaching."

Macmillan.

7. Dewey — "Democracy and Education," also articles in Monroe's

"Cyclopedia of Education." Macmillan.

8. "How We Think." D. C. Heath & Co.

9. "School and Society." University of Chicago Press.

10. Freeman — "How Children Learn." Macmillan.

11. Earhart— "Types of Teaching." Houghton Mifflin Co.

12. Hall — "Educational Problems." Appleton.

13. Judd — "Measuring the Work of the Public Schools of Cleveland."

Russell Sage Foundation.

14. Kendall & Mirick — "How to Teach the Fundamental Subjects."

Houghton Mifflin Co.

15. McMurry, Chas. — "Conflicting Principles of Teaching." Hough-

ton Mifflin Co.

16. McMurry, F. — "How to Study, and Teaching Children How to

Study." Houghton Mifflin Co.

17. "Elementary School Standards." World Book Co.

18. Monroe's "Cyclopedia of Education." Macmillan.

424 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

19. Parker — "Methods of Teaching in High Schools." Ginn & Co.

20. Rapeer — "Teaching Elementary-School Subjects."

21. Strayer — "The Teaching Process." Macmillan.

22. and Norsworthy — "How to Teach." Macmillan.

23. Thorndike — "Education." Macmillan.

24. "Principles of Teaching." Seller.

25. Suzzallo in Monroe's "Encyclopedia of Education," article on

Teaching, Types of.

26. Wilson — "Motivation of School Subjects." Houghton Mifflin Co.

27. Yocum — "Culture, Discipline, and Democracy." Christopher

Sower Co.

CHAPTER XIX

THE COUNTRY GIRL AND THE CONSOLIDATED

SCHOOL

Preliminary Problems

1. What disadvantages has ordinary country life for girls and women?

2. What measures would you propose for remedying these conditions?

3. What might a school thoroughly adapted to the needs of country

girls and women do for them that the single-room school is not
doing ?

4. What organizations for girls and young women have proved of help

in the country?

5. What books and magazines would you suggest for the country

girls ?

I. The Larger Outlook

A New Problem — The Country Girl. — The industrial
history of the last decade in the United States is marked
by the way in which the farmer is rapidly coming into his
own; his welfare and the cultivation of his broad acres
are receiving an unwonted share of public attention. The
government of the United States has assigned, for the
farmer's welfare, a Department of Agriculture, at the head
of which is one of the eight members of the President's
Cabinet. For the use of this department Congress annually
appropriates vast sums of money and employs an army of
experts and experimenters. Probably no interest, indus-
trial or commercial, receives more appreciative attention
or more generous monetary assistance or has easier access
to the ears of the country's lawmakers than that which
concerns the cultivation of the soil.

The teacher and the preacher, the lecturer and the
author, have helped sound the call for the better country-life

425

426 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

movement, and the farmer has been the centre of interest
in it all. Next to him in public concern are the farm boys,
their clubs, their education, their training for better farm-
ing, and last but by no means least, the methods by which
the promising ones are to be kept free from the influence of
the city attracting them away from the farm. Very re-
cently, in a corner of the magazine or farm paper, the farm
woman is receiving a share of attention. The Department
of Agriculture not long ago started an investigation of her
special needs. Through it all, even when the spot-light
centres on the farm home, very little has been said of the
country girl. She has not yet greatly impressed the book
writers, the social inquirers, or the lecturers as a fitting sub-
ject for investigation. She has as yet received little inspira-
tion to take her place in the movement and assume her
share in the effort to find solutions for the manifold rural
problems. Yet one need not have prophetic vision to see
that unless she assumes her portion of the new responsibili-
ties and shares the benefits of the new prosperity and the
advantages of the generous endowments, these services to
the country can have little permanent effect. Only a short-
sighted policy would neglect the mothers of the race.

Despite this apparent oversight on the part of the re-
formers there are several millions of country girls working
industriously and, let us hope, happily on the farms of
America. They are helping their mothers in the kitchen
and the household, not only sharing with them the ^'hewing
of wood and the drawing of water" but too often carrying
both to the remote kitchen. They are gardening and can-
ning; cooking and sewing; caring for the cows and the
chickens and the younger children; sharing the barrenness,
the drudgery, the poverty, and the isolation of the country
women in the home. Yet with all this, it is not the work
nor the hardship, difficult as it is, but the systemless, ob-
jectless, drudgery; the lack of appreciation or value placed
upon their contribution in the economic scheme; the con-

THE COUNTRY GIRL 427

tentment with methods as they are, craving no alleviation,
that most tries their souls. It is not strange that many
of them, like their brothers, are drawn by the lure of the
towns and the cities; for the country girl shares the burdens
that fall to her brother and receives relatively few of the
advantages the country-life movement is bringing to him.

II. What The School Can Do

The Schools Responsibility. — ^Americans are committed
to the belief that the safety of the republic is in the keeping
of the public schools. Instinctively, almost, we look to
them to carry out if not to initiate the reforms we believe
necessary for our civic preservation. What more natural,
then, than our belief that the ultimate solution of the rural-
life problem must come from the rural school ? And where
may we hope for adequate education in the country except
in the consolidated school? What then can it offer to the
country girl that she, too, may find the possibiHty for a
happy and contented life on the farm; one that satisfies
the American girl's longing for economic independence
and her craving for the broader outlook and the abiding
satisfactions? What are the causes of the country girl's
discontent and how can the consolidated school help her
to eliminate them? What are the limitations of her en-
vironment, physical, moral, and esthetic, and how can the
school help her to remove them? What can it supply
which will add to her possibiUties for a happy and serviceable
life as a country girl, and what shall it offer to prepare her
for her Hfe work, whether it be as a farm-home maker or
as a wage-earner in an industry or profession to which her
inclination may lead?

The majority of women, whether in the city or the
country, will doubtless continue to devote a great portion
of their lives to home-making. But the country girl's
prospects for the future should be no narrower than her

428 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

reasonable hopes and desires. In the short time that
women have been permitted to take a place in the economic
world outside the home, few of the gainful occupations have
not been successfully invaded by them. In all of these the
countryside has been drawn upon to fill the demand for
women of character, talent, and ability. There are many
illustrious examples to inspire the country girl. Jane
Addams and Clara Barton, George Eliot and Harriet Beecher
Stowe are among the many country girls who have added
lustre to philanthropy and literature. The recent war has
added a whole new chapter to the possibility of women in
all fields of enterprise.

The Educational Scheme. — Before attempting to for-
mulate a scheme for the education of the country girl, it is
well to inquire as to her needs and aspirations. Happiness
is a legitimate end of education; it is the goal of social,
civic, and economic endeavor. We have been accustomed
to look upon the country as the ideal rearing-place for the
young; surely nature intended it to be, and a civilization
which crushes or stifles its possibiHties for childhood and
youth deprives them of their richest inheritance. But is
the country girl happy in her surroundings and is she
effectively creating happiness for others? We have had
our eyes opened of late to the isolation of the farm home;
to its lack of the comforts and <:onveniences most ordinary
to the city dweller; to the dearth of social intercourse and
the lack of recreation in the country, and to the absence of
the possibilities for cultivating and satisfying the esthetic
and spiritual tastes of the young.

The country girl during the swiftly changing years of
her young womanhood is keyed to a higher emotional
pitch, has a more sensitive nervous structure, and feels
more keenly the elation or depression of her environment
than her brother. She is confined to the house more
closely, has fewer activities, and less freedom and fewer
opportunities for expressing her imaginative and emotional

THE COUNTRY GIRL 429

nature. She is inclined to feel the full loneliness and dep-
rivations of her environment and, unless wisely directed,
even to exaggerate them. Thus the country girl is not
always the happy, bright-eyed, care-free, and contented
person that we wish her to be, and the consolidated school
may well direct its efforts to help her to achieve and create
individual and social happiness more efficiently.

Health. — The first essential to happiness and service-
ableness is the achievement and conservation of buoyant
vitality and perfect health. This should be the heritage of
every country girl. Recently, however, our attention has
been called to the lamentable fact that country children are
less healthful and that more of them suffer from preventable
diseases than the children of the cities. Round shoulders,
narrow chests, bad teeth, imperfect eyesight, and even
anemia, are common among country girls. The drudgery
of housework in farm homes without modern conveniences
for lightening it is often too great for their strength. The
physical labor of the outdoor work often left to the women
is too great a tax on the growing girl. Insanitary conditions
around the home, polluted water-supply, lack of fresh air
in sleeping-rooms, the hardship of cold rooms, and long walks
over wet roads in the winter time often impair the health
of the young girl who lives in a home or attends a school
in which hygienic regulations are not heeded.

To such as these the consolidated school should open
the door and point the road to renewed health. This must
be done in general by the extension of the school influence
into the homes and among the adults of the community.
It must be done in particular by systematic training of the
girl in the school. Modern schools in the country as well
as in the' city should contain a gymnasium with equipment
for physical exercise, games, and folk-dancing. The whole
health problem should be in charge of a physical director
who may, or may not, devote part time to regular courses,
who should have charge of the instruction which the school

430 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

offers in personal hygiene, and who should be physical in-
spector and adviser to the girls. The physical instructor
should be able to devote some time to work in the com-
munity, including visits to the homes and lectures on home
and community sanitation.

The health of the country girls is of the utmost impor-
tance, not alone because of their own welfare but because
they are to be the mothers of the coming generation. They
should, therefore, have careful instruction in all that relates
to the acquiring of physical perfection and the preserva-
tion of good health. Of what use are the larger crops and
the richer fields if the health of the mothers and children
does not justify their enjoyment of these benefits?

Recreation. — Equally essential to the young girVs hap-
piness is the opportunity for wholesome and enjoyable recrea-
tion in the society of her friends and companions. Country
life in many communities offers far too httle opportunity
for refined leisure; the means of enjoyment and social re-
laxation are far too meagre to satisfy the yearning which
all young people have for pleasure. Too often there is no
common meeting-place of easy access; there are few forms
of entertainment available or accessible to the young people
of the countryside, and this dearth of possibilities for social
intercourse drives many young girls to long for and if pos-
sible to seek the more appealing and attractive amusements
of the near-by town or city. Here is a great opportunity
for the consolidated school to fill the aspiring and hopeful
hearts of the young girls in the community with wholesome
happiness. With its gymnasium for basket-ball and other
co-operative social or team games; for the artistic folk-dances
of the nations; with its auditorium for plays, lectures, pic-
tures, musical and literary entertainments, and the like,
it can be of inestimable value and enduring service to the
community. A good swimming pool is especially desirable
for girls and women and has proved its value in many country
schools.

THE COUNTRY GIRL 43 1

These activities have a social value by no means con-
fined to amusement. Character is formed during one's
leisure far more than during one's working hours; oppor-
tunity for civic and community service usually occurs out-
side the working day. The habits for spending leisure in
noble and elevating or useful pursuits, the habits which
result in an avocation, are acquired in childhood and youth.
The woman is largely what she has learned to be during
the hours outside her working time in her youth. Recrea-
tion has a broad and powerful moral aspect. Nearly every
girl has a talent of some kind and delights in expressing
and cultivating it. If in the arts, music, literature, the
drama, painting, lace-making, it may offer an outlook for
an avocation of a highly profitable and pleasurable nature
as well as be a means of culture. Good taste in amusement
is a bulwark against the temptations of the cheap theatre,
the public dance-hall, and the sensational motion-picture
show. The pleasure of companionship, the friendships
based on mutual interests formed and fostered through the
social life of young girls at school, the little talents, the
special abilities that come to hght during these associations,
are permanent sources of enjoyment throughout adult Hfe
as well as in youth.

Few games or exercises give more pleasure or offer better
advantages for developing grace, lightness, and agility than
the beautiful folk-dances now in vogue in city schools.
Besides, they are especially adapted to the country; they
originated among country folk and express many of the
ideas and emotions of the country people. They should
have a place on the schedule of every consolidated school
for both boys and girls in the lower grades and for girls
through the high-school years. The folk-dances are free,
vigorous, wholesome, modest, and graceful, and are the
best possible antidote for the questionable taste cultivated
by the ultra-modern ballroom dances, from which recent
wide-spread interest not even the remote country districts

432 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

have altogether escaped. Too many country communities
are now confined to dancing for amusement. Even for these
the folk-dances may at least add some variety, and new
standards of deportment. Supervision and training are es-
sentials.

Every country girl should have a knowledge of music,
at least enough to enable her to enjoy and appreciate it,
and she should be familiar with some of the masterpieces
of music. She should also know the world's great pictures
and something, perhaps, of the lives of the artists who cre-
ated them. The school auditorium should by all means
have a piano where the young student pianists may have
the opportunity to express themselves through their devel-
oping musical talent. There should be a school chorus,
one or more quartets, and if possible an orchestra. Phono-
graphs are now procurable at a relatively small cost, and
excellent records, some of great artists, can be had to ac-
company them. These records reproduce the world's
greatest musical selections and may be had in such variety
as to please every kind of musical taste. The possession
of a phonograph with well-selected records not only adds to
the pleasure of the girls at the schools but offers an excel-
lent method of cultivating their taste for good music.

Lightening Household Tasks. — The consoHdated school
should devote itself to freeing the farm woman from the
drudgery of an endless round of monotonous duties which
could be avoided by the installation of modern conveniences
in the home. This is the special duty of the school because
every subject in its curriculum, if related properly to the
practical things concerned with the girl's life, will lead
directly to this result. Its full accomplishment may, and
probably will, mean educating the rural community to better
methods of living and more economical means of working.
Only as country people rise above monotonous routine can
they have an intellectual and spiritual outlook. Fortunately,
there are thousands of country girls gifted either by nature

THE COUNTRY GIRL 433

or education who love the glow of the sunset, the songs of
the birds, the smell of the fresh air, and the growing things,
and who have the leisure and the developed appreciation
to enjoy them. But there are others, if not an equal num-
ber at least the ''vital minority" whose testimony Mrs.
Craw gives in "The American Country Girl," who work
from five o'clock in the morning until nine at night in dull
routine. Their days are endless rounds of milking, churn-
ing, baking, dishwashing, sweeping, and carrying wood
and water. Night finds them too tired to do more than
tumble "wearily into bed until the next morning." Their
work has no intellectual stimulus, no acknowledged ideal
purpose. They are, as Mrs. Craw says, "too tired to go
out even if there were some place to go, and too destitute
of initiative to seize on any form of pleasure."

The wave of progress toward efficient housekeeping
which has swept over the country has not yet impressed
the country people. Labor-saving devices for the out-of-
door work are not matched by others for within doors.
In some way the farmers must be brought to realize that
water piped into the house, a lighting system, a heating-
plant, a vacuum cleaner, and similar labor-lightening ar-
rangements are as necessary as mowing-machines, separators,
and similar machinery for facilitating the farm work. There
is a home workshop as well as an outdoor one, and neither
should be equipped entirely at the expense of the other.
Both should be equipped well. The country girl needs to
learn the value of organization; how to systematize the
work of the home; to keep accounts carefully; to know the
value of the card catalogue; in short, how to conduct the
work of the household on a scientific basis. Of still greater
importance, the country girl should be educated to a realiza-
tion of the broader meaning of Hfe. Not all the training of
farmers should be concerned with growing better crops
and making more money. Better living, especially for
those within the homes, is of greater importance, if the best

434 THE CONSOMDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of the young men and women are to be retained to build
up the farms of the future. For all of these purposes the
school, through its regular and special courses, is peculiarly
adapted and every day becoming better equipped.

Economic Independence. — Another important factor in
the happiness of the country girl is the gratification of her
desire for economic independence, not necessarily complete
independence but enough to enable her to earn a reasonable
amount of spending money and to have the privilege of
spending it in her own way. Every self-respecting girl
needs some money and she doesn't want it doled out
grudgingly by the farmer, who had no spending-money
when he was a boy and believes that what he had is good
enough for his children. This type of farmer often thinks
that the same type of school he attended is good enough
for his children. It isn't; times have changed with the
young people's needs as well as with the instruments the
farmer uses to till the soil and harvest the crops. The
country girl should be given a fair money allowance for her
share in the house or farm work. Unfortunately, many
girls are not. These girls the consolidated school can make
happier by teaching different ways of making spending-
money.

The canning clubs have helped many girls to do this
and have helped the parents to appreciate the necessity of
allowing their daughters to have money in order that they
may learn to spend it wisely. The girl who has a clear
idea of the value of money and knows the wise relationship
between income and expenditure has advanced morally as
well as economically. A significant story is told of a small
club girl in one of the Southern States who earned over a
hundred dollars in tomato canning but was not allowed
any of it to spend. "Pap" used it all, she explained to the
club director. The next year the wise director sent out
cards for the parents' signature, exacting a promise that
the girls should have the money they made for their own

Outdoor group games for girls at the Cache La Poudre consolidated school

A canning-club girl, Oregon

THE COUNTRY GIRL 435

use. This father refused to sign, until a letter from the di-
rector came explaining why the girl should have the proceeds
of her work and declining to admit her to membership
unless with the promise that she be given the profits. This
time ''Pap" signed. There are many other ways of making
money which the country girl could learn at school. Lace-
making or fine sewing, trimming hats, laundering delicate
waists and fine linens, supplying tables from the home gar-
den, and making jellies or home-cooked foods are some
sources of income now being utilized by ambitious country
girls.

These requisites are but the minimal essentials for the
country girls if they are to find happiness in the farm com-
munity— health, recreation, freedom from drudgery, and
reasonable independence. With this accomplished the mis-
sion of the consolidated school is not ended — ^it is merely
begun. For it must supply to the country girl an education
which fits her to carry her share of the burden of the new
movement for an enriched country life, and it must offer
to her a continuing source of spiritual inspiration; and in-
tellectual and social satisfaction to her successor, the farm
woman.

Education for Life. — What can the consolidated school
offer besides the narrow curriculum of the one-teacher school
with its many grades and small classes and its narrow op-
portunities for acquisition of culture and of practical knowl-
edge to fit the country girl for her ''place in the sun'' of
the new life on the farm?

We have spoken above of education for the leisure of
life, the art subjects, play, recreation, the joy of an avoca-
tion, all of which it should be the privilege and responsi-
bility of the consolidated elementary and high school to
supply to the farm girls. There is also the education in-
volved in the subjects commonly known as practical, which,
with the foundation laid by instruction in "the three R's,"
give the girl an equipment which enables her to make her

436 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

own living either in a wage-earning capacity or as a help-
mate in the home, according to her circumstances and
position in life.

Home-Making. — The workshop of the woman is said
to be the worst workshop in the world, and nowhere is this
more true than in the country. The farm homes are the
last to install electricity, bathrooms, and heating-plants,
and the farmers the last to profit by co-operative endeavors
which make these conveniences possible at reasonable cost.
The consolidated school will be a great factor in promul-
gating what has already taken root and in extending the
propaganda for better and more convenient homes until
modern equipment becomes as universally adopted in the
country as in the city. The farm girl must learn scientific
home-keeping, and the school is the place in which to
teach it. As compared with housekeeping, commercial
efficiency is relatively easy. It is not difficult for the expert
to standardize the movements involved in putting together,
say, the fifty parts of a certain portion of the automobile,
but it is different, for example, to standardize the making
of puff paste for an apple- tart or the act of concocting an
old-fashioned mince pie. The work of caring for and
building up a home is a complex process, and teaching it
may involve the whole curriculum. It is economics chiefly
— the income, the expenditures; it is simple mathematics
very largely — adding, subtracting, and dividing; it is the
sciences — all of them, physics, chemistry, the study of so-
ciety and community service; the arts, all of them — of ex-
pression, design, and decoration; it is music and poetry,
literature and religion; it is all of education and the best of
life — a field quite big enough for worthy endeavor if there
were no other demands for consideration.

The consolidated-school curriculum must organize all
of these for school purposes in order that the country girl
may have the largest chance to realize her fullest possibili-
ties. The foundation for many of these subjects should be

THE COUNTRY GIRL 437

laid in the elementary school and carried through as elec-
tives or required branches, according to community require-
ments, in the high school. The best consolidated schools
now offer excellent practical courses in some or all of the
following: household management; laundry work; cooking
and chemistry of food; biology; house-planning and interior
decoration; household and community sanitation; economics;
nursing; social science. The majority of these are, of course,
electives. Household administration and mechanics, gar-
dening, poultry, and bee-keeping, are eminently practical
subjects, and may be offered for both boys and girls in the
consolidated school equipped as it should be with labora-
tories, shops, and experimental farm. The girl equipped
with a knowledge of any group of home-making subjects
in which she can specialize according to her ability and
which she can continue through the agricultural college
will be in little danger of a monotonous Hfe. There will be
for her the joy in work which comes from constantly meeting
and solving problems which test her intellect, what Pro-
fessor Fiske calls the '^challenge of the difficult."

The minimal training which the country girl should have
for home-keeping should include plain sewing, cookery, the
study of foods, household accounting, home decoration, and
sanitation. With a knowledge of these essentials, a devel-
oped intellect, and a desire to grow, the country girl should
find happiness and a Hfe of service in her farm home.

Other Vocations. — The consolidated school will also
include among its duties the responsibility of preparing
young women for the vocations. Not all country girls will
wish to remain in the country; not all of them to prepare
to be housekeepers. The high school in the country,
through differentiation of courses and by offering a wide
range of electives, may at least start the girls on some wage-
earning vocation of their choice and for which they are
fitted by natural ability. There are a variety of occupations
from which to choose, a foundation for which can be laid

438 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

in the country high school. A few are suggested in the
enumeration of subjects for home-making courses, for ex-
ample, nursing, home decoration, gardening. Many young
women with talent for any of these find pleasant and profita-
ble employment in their home neighborhood, or in the cities
of the county.

Teaching offers an attractive field to many young women
who feel the call for work which involves the missionary
spirit. Many forces are now at work for the upbuilding of
rural schools and for improving salaries, living conditions,
and school housing in rural districts. This field ought to
have a peculiar attraction for the country girl with a spirit
of loyalty to the soil and a sympathetic insight into the
needs of rural life. Rural-school work is a splendid field for
service, and the regular academic courses in the consolidated
school admit directly to the first-grade normal schools,
where the country girl should specialize by taking at least
her major courses in the department of rural education.

For those girls with talent in music or art, the consoli-
dated school can offer intelligent direction and an oppor-
tunity for enlarged appreciation. To those who wish to
enter business — to be stenographers, clerks, milliners, dress-
makers, or enter other commercial pursuits — the school may,
if it is large enough, offer special courses. It can at least
foster the talent for these which girls among its pupils
possess, and advise and assist them in regard to further
training, and it can help them in selecting the courses which
will be most serviceable when they enter industrial life.
For example, the girl who plans to be a stenographer and
typist needs all the English, composition, Hterature, spelling,
social science, history, and current events which the school
can give, at the expense of such courses as algebra, German,
Latin, French, and perhaps even the ordinary old-line
physics. Similar emphasis and eliminations are possible
for girls preparing for other occupations.

THE COUNTRY GIRL 439

III. Associated Activities

The Teachers' Cottage. — Each year sees additional rural-
school plants equipped with the teachers' cottage or teacher-
age. Its use came about because of the necessity of pro-
viding better homes for rural teachers than the community
in many instances afforded, the desirability of securing
permanent rather than itinerant teachers, and because
there is general agreement that a revised curriculum which
embodies the material suited to the needs of rural communi-
ties requires that the school grounds be cared for through
the summer months. But the cottage was so obviously
useful for demonstration purposes and as a model example
in good housekeeping for the community and as the labora-
tory for study of the household arts and sciences that its
function is rapidly being extended. In many instances
the teachers' cottage is serving the schools' girls as it should
practical training in household work of every nature — fur-
nishing, decorating, sanitation, cooking, sewing, and the
allied branches.

Whether the cottage is the home of the principal or super-
intendent and his family, or, as in many instances, it serves
as a co-operative housekeeping plant for several teachers,
its hospitaUty should, from time to time, be extended to the
pupils of the school. This, of course, is applicable chiefly
to high school, because pupils of high-school age are most
susceptible to the influence of the social graces and con-
ventionalities of refined entertainment and the virtues of
unobtrusive, unaffected, and wholesome hospitaUty. The
teachers' cottage is, of course, expected to be only the
background for the class, club, or school affairs, the pupils
themselves acting as hosts and hostesses and assuming the
responsibility of any decoration, entertainment, and re-
freshments, or the like, as are desirable for the occasion.
The arrangements should not be elaborate except in very
special cases, but should emphasize the unassuming nature
of genuine social gradousness.

440 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Social Activities. — The American high school has been
defined as the people's college, and the consolidated high
school must surely realize this function. Not only should it
educate the young people of the country, but it must serve
as their centre of social relaxation and be a continuation
and extension school for all the community. Many con-
solidated rural high schools are now realizing all of these
functions. They are advisory and experimental stations
and social meeting-places, not alone for farmers and their
wives, but for the farm girls who have finished school, or
those who have been deprived of the opportunity to attend
school. The consolidated school should have a circulating
library, either on its own accord or serve as station and dis-
tributing centre for the country or town library. A school
which fosters a love for good reading and supplies the books
is a high type of continuation school. The services of a
travelling instructor in home economics, made possible by
the Smith-Lever Act, can be placed at the disposal of enter-
prising rural communities, and what place is more fitting
or so well equipped for lecture and demonstration work as
the laboratory or kitchen or demonstration cottage of the
consolidated school? Sewing classes or clubs, gardening
clubs, or groups interested in any phase of practical or cul-
tural education may meet in the social rooms of the consoli-
dated school for conference and improvement, and enjoy
the advice and counsel of the specialists engaged by the
school, or of visitors who can be brought there for special
occasions. Such meetings give an opportunity for the de-
velopment of leadership, which is needed among country
women as well as men. The regular courses of the school,
the games and social organizations are all fitted to train for
the leadership which should manifest itself later in the
adult groups.

The school auditorium should be used for community
singing for adults as well as for school children, and by a
community orchestra, where one can be organized, under

THE COUNTRY GIRL 44I

the directorship of local or imported musicians. Branches
of such organizations as Y. W. C. A., Girl Scouts, women's
section of the International Congress for Farm Women,
Camp-Fire Girls, and the like, may be formed among the
young women in and out of school, with the schoolhouse
as a meeting-place. The Y. W. C. A. has taken a serious
interest in the life of the country girls, has organized many
clubs among them, and provides special workers for rural
districts.

We have previously discussed the social possibilities of
the school auditorium, and all that has been said of its
necessity in behalf of the country girl appHes equally to
the farm woman. The musicals and dramatizations, en-
tertainments, the lectures and picture-shows form another
phase of her continuation school, and also supply social in-
tercourse and refined amusement. No one needs this re-
laxation more than she, for on the isolated farm she is usually
the most lonesome person. Her work is the most monoto-
nous and her monetary rewards at least the most meagre.
These will be dealt with in the next chapter. Great are the
possibilities of the consolidated school for the country girl !
It can fit her for a happy and useful life in her chosen field
of endeavor. It can bring to her when her school life is
over the fulness of culture from the outside world and the
richness of life's most abiding satisfactions.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. Make a list of difficulties which farm women face that could be

better met by means of improved home education in consoli-
dated schools.

2. Secure Dr. Lumsden's bulletin No. 94 from the U, S. Public Health

Service on "Rural Sanitation," and from it make up a list of
things that an organized group of girls and women could do for
health in a consolidated district.

3. Secure Evelyn Dewey's book on "New Schools for Old," published

by Dutton & Co., New York, and from a close reading of it make

442 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

4. Secure one or more of the surveys of rural life by the Presbyterian

Board of Home Missions, and list in a note-book the principal
needs of the country women surveyed and the suggestions made
for meeting these needs. What applications of these surveys
can you make to a typical rural district with which you are ac-
quainted ?

5. Read Crowe's "The American Country Girl," given in the bibliog-

raphy below. What phases of the volume impress you as most
helpful and practical ?

6. Make a list of the chief "modern conveniences" needed in most

country homes for making the life of the farm woman less of a
burden. How much would these cost to introduce into a typical
country home in your section ? What would be the best methods
of securing them ?

7. What subjects which country girls study could best be displaced

by other subject-matter and training? What phases of elemen-
tary and high-school work are usually of little comparative value
to country girls and prospective mothers and managers of house-
holds? What subjects should girls be taught separately from
boys in the consolidated school ?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Allen, W. H.— "Woman's Part in Government." Dodd, Mead

&Co.

2. Bailey, L. H. — "Woman's Contribution to the Country-Life Move-

ment," in his "The Country-Life Movement in the United
States." The Macmillan Co. •

3. "Woman's Place in a Scheme of Agricultural Education,"

in his "New York State Problems." J. B. Lyon Co., Albany,
N. Y.

4. Broadhurst, Jean — "Home and Community Hygiene." Lippin-

cott.

5. Butterfield, K. L. — "Opportunities for Farm Women," in his

"Chapters in Rural Progress." University of Chicago Press.

6. Cabot, Ella L.— "Volunteer Work in the Schools." Houghton

Mifflin Co.

7. Carver, T. N. — "Principles of Rural Economics." Ginn & Co.

8. Crowe, Martha F.— "The American Country Girl." Stokes Co.

9. Denison, Elsie — "Helping School Children." Dodd, Mead & Co.

10. Dewey, Evelyn — "New Schools for Old" — the story of Mrs. Har-

vey's noteworthy work for the Porter School. Dutton & Co.

11. Field, Jessie — "The Corn Lady." Flanagan.

THE COUNTRY GIRL 443

12. McKeever, W. A. — "Farm Boys and Girls." The Macmillan Co.

13. Presbyterian Board of Home Missions — "Rural-life surveys of a

number of typical counties in the United States." New York.

14. Quick, Herbert— "The Brown Mouse." Bobbs-Merrill Co.

15. "The Fairview Idea." Bobbs-Merrill Co.

16. Richards, F. H.— "Hygiene for Girls." D. C. Heath & Co.

17. Vogt, Paul— "Rural Sociology." The Macmillan Co.

CHAPTER XX
RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. What part does the lack of suitable recreation and wholesome en«

joyment play in the reasons given by our youth for leaving the
farm ?

2. What types of recreation are common in the part of the coimtry

with which you are most familiar?

3. What types could well be added?

4. How do you account for a very common antagonism to play and

recreation, and especially to organized purposeful effort to pro-
mote it in the country?

5. What are the verdicts of the Roosevelt Country-Life Commission,

the National Country-Life Association, and other organizations
and surveys respecting avocational efficiency in the country?

I. Problems of Avocational Efficiency

In an analysis of social efficiency into the five great
aims of education, namely, vital, vocational, avocational,
civic, and moral efficiency, we can see that one of the great
purposes always to be held before a system of public schools
is that of promoting avocational efficiency. ''The right use
of leisure" is one of the great aims of life, and one of the
leading problems of life is to use wisely and well the leisure
period. For most workers in our country the eight-hour
daily period of work is becoming standard. One of our
state superintendents of public instruction made an address
not many years ago in which he spoke vigorously against
granting the eight-hour day to laborers, because it gave
them too much leisure. He argued that it is necessary first
to train people to use their leisure wisely if they are to be

444

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 445

granted much freedom from toil. To throw open suddenly-
large periods of the day for a great population that has not
previously been trained to use this leisure well would only
mean the degradation of that people.

On the farm the period of leisure is just as important as
in the city, but cannot always be provided for in the same
way that it is there. It must come more according to
seasons rather than being provided for during each day
perhaps; but Sundays and winters, Saturday half-holidays,
and other times are available for considerable recreation.

The ordinary attitude of a great many people in this coun-
try is that time not spent in work or sleep is largely wasted.
They look upon play as something unnecessary. They con-
sider work the big important thing in which one can engage
in this world. Little preparation or thought is given to
recreation, to wholesome enjoyment, to the right use of
leisure; and the consequences to individual and social
welfare are not good.

Let us examine this ordinary attitude and point of view
and see if it is sound, either philosophically or historically.
What is the goal of life, anyway ? For what are we living ?
Are we *'here because we're here,'' as the boys in college
sometimes sing, or can we see some deeper motive and
purpose in Hfe? Most persons who have not thought on
the problem answer very vaguely, indefinitely, and unsatis-
factorily when confronted by this question. The answers
are various and often self-contradictory. They are un-
satisfactory both to the one who makes them and to the
examiner.

The best answer we can give to this question, to state
the matter briefly, is that the goal of living is individual
and social happiness. Christ said, you will remember: "I
came that ye might have Hfe, and that more abundantly."
The goal of living is living, as our very instincts tell us. To
make this living more abundant, richer, and happier is the
goal of all of our endeavors. We engage in work for the

446 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

purpose of making happier and better our daily living.
We must make work as much as possible a direct means to
happiness through the democracy of industry, but this is
of itself entirely insufficient. We are not living a Hfe of
slavery and toil in order to prepare for some distant future life
beyond the grave. The only way to prepare for a future
life is to live well this life. Education is not a preparation
merely for a life to come when the individual is an adult;
it is life here and now, and the child has just as much a
right to and need of happiness in his child's life as he will
ever have; and the best way to help him to promote the
greatest happiness as an adult is to give him training in
attaining and promoting happiness as a child.

There are two extreme points of view with respect to
this matter. There are first those who make the individual
and his pleasure the centre of all efforts, and fail to train
him to get his pleasure and recreation in a manner that pro-
motes the highest social good. On the other hand, we have
the Spartan-like philosophy, in which the individual is sub-
merged and subjected to the demands of the state. He is
put into a machine and made to conform with no regard to
his own individual pleasure, but to the needs and demands
of the social system. Neither one of these attitudes is cor-
rect. The only true social philosophy is the philosophy that
finds the goal of life in the processes of normal, happy, effi-
cient social living. It is to promote this that schools and
all other social institutions are founded. We work not to
discipline our souls, nor to pile up money; we work to pro-
mote life more abundant — a richer, happier, better living,
not only for the individual, but for all humanity; and not
merely for our nation, but for all nations.

On the psychological side we see that the expression of
the inherited tendencies and instincts with which people
are born usually have as their emotional accompaniments
happiness and pleasure; but since we live among a congested
world of people, and since these instincts were developed

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 447

for a very primitive type of life, it is necessary for us to
guide these instincts along lines of habit and efficiency that
will promote the greatest human welfare.

The best kind of social life is that which provides for
the most harmonious expression of the natural instincts of
the individual, for only along these lines shall we obtain
the greatest amount and finest quality of individual and
social happiness. There is no finer sight in the world than
to see the happy, joyous pleasures of children at play.
The satisfactions of the instincts of construction, of rhythm,
of communication, of curiosity, of mental and physical ac-
tivity, are among the greatest pleasures of life. In the
innocent recreations and enjoyments of living we attain
the goal of life very immediately and very directly. Most
of us would spend more time in recreation than we do, but
usually as we grow older ''the prison house of flesh begins to
close us in." We get bound up in the habits of our daily
work, and we become so changed that we are hardly normal
individuals. It is necessary for us to preserve our normality;
it is necessary for us to remain young and to keep the
youthful point of view. It is highly desirable that we get
more happiness and thorough enjoyment in life very im-
mediately and directly, if we can get it, both in our work
and apart from our work. We must become as little children
if we would enter the Kingdom of Heaven.

Historically, it is very interesting to see how the com-
monly held attitude toward recreation in this country has
come about. The American people have been (i) a pioneer
people hard up against the struggle for existence. They
have been (2) a Puritan people, a people inheriting a form
of theology that is a direct outcome of the medieval world,
and the doctrines of other-worldly-ism and asceticism. We
are the lineal descendants of people who were extremists
along these lines and protested against the levities of the
upper classes in the old world.

The attitude of mind that our forefathers brought here

448 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

and which became the common public opinion of this coun-
try was, first, that of middle-age asceticism. Very largely
this old attitude was that man, instead of coming from the
hands of his creator pure and undefiled, as it was claimed,
was naturally depraved and vicious, that all his instinctive
tendencies and emotional delights were debased and wrong,
and that the only way by which one could climb up to
real spiritual perfection was to subjugate, repress, and drive
out his instinctive tendencies. Those who went to extremes
along these Unes strove to repress and kill their most funda-
mental and personal instincts. The monks and nuns of
the old monasteries and nunneries, and many others follow-
ing them, as you know, swore the vows of poverty, obedi-
ence, and chastity.

One of these companies of people, for example, were the
group of religious zealots who came to Pennsylvania and
founded the village of Harmony, and later the village of
New Harmony in Indiana, and still later the village of
Economy in western Pennsylvania. They practised the
doctrine of celibacy, and of course gradually and inevitably
perished from the face of the earth. No more surely does
some other kind of death ensue from the attempt to destroy
by repression almost any other of the natural instinctive
human tendencies. But these are the traditions and habits
of mind which we inherit, and which dominate, especially,
our country people.

This philosophy made a school system, a government, a
church, a family life, and all other types of life too repres-
sive, unattractive, and unhappy.

The Puritans. — Those who have given us most of our
traditions were not only ascetics to a degree, but also Puri-
tans. The Puritans were so sure in their beliefs, so vigorous
in their dissent from the rather happy-go-lucky laws and
Hcenses of the upper classes of England, that they were
willing to give up home and country, and brave the dangers
of an Atlantic voyage and the privations and the enemies

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 449

of a new world to carry out their puritanical principles.
The old "blue laws" of the East, under which a man could
be thrown into prison for whistling on Sunday, or a young
couple punished for conversing together on Sunday, in which
the burning of witches and other forms of narrow-minded
persecution and self-punishment were legalized, are all evi-
dences of this type of mind. It led to that horrible, narrow-
minded monstrosity which we call the New England con-
science and which has been so often described to us and
held up to our horror by literary men.

Effects of Pioneer Life. — Secondly, we have the habits
and customs established by our pioneer forefathers still
with us. They came here and left their folk-dances, games
and pastimes, and recreations of the old world behind them.
They entered into the wilderness of woods and rocks, and
hardships; they fought the Indians and conquered nature.
They lived a hard life, a serious struggle for existence. It
was necessary for them in many cases to cut out of their
lives much or most that people had held as a normal part of
living, a reasonable amount of recreation, hoping that thereby
they would provide homes and settled abodes and the com-
forts that would enable their children or their children's
children to have what they denied themselves. But they
overlooked the great principles of social custom, social tradi-
tion, and social habit. These things eliminated recreations
from the population and left little or nothing in their places.
The habits of working as many hours a day as there was
daylight became a fixed rule and custom. In his home
country, the Enghshman stops his work at four o'clock in
the afternoon, has his tea, and goes out and plays his game
of cricket as a regular part of the day's activities. He re-
gards recreation and the right use of leisure as a highly
essential part of life, second to none in importance. These
customs and these traditions have here all been forgotten,
and the average farmer to-day in the United States accepts
this social custom with respect to recreation as his mental
heritage.

450 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

If we are going to build up the right use of leisure and
normal amount of wholesome enjoyment and recreation
among country people, we must start with the more unbiassed
children in the public schools and cultivate in them a re-
spect for these things, and train them how to use their
leisure wisely, and how to achieve real avocation^l efficiency.
Certainly the life which is now lived does not promote the
highest type of living; it does not make for the attainment
of the goal of life, for which we all more or less bhndly strive.

Why Do the Boys and Girls Leave the Farm? Why
do they crowd into the cities? Why do they leave the old
folks and "break home ties" ? On the farm they would usu-
ally obtain a good start in life, very often a farm of their
own to till, property of their own which they probably will
never get in the city. They have the habits that enable
them to succeed on the farm, whereas in the city they will
have to learn a new industrial trade or profession. Out on
the farm they have all of nature over which they may
roam, the most dehghtful place in which to live that could
be conceived, and yet they turn their backs on it and go
to the dusty, smoky, dirty city, and live for years in a hall
bedroom, taking small wages for their indoor toil, and pay-
ing out all or most of what they earn for the bare necessi-
ties of living.

The desires for novelty and for change and variety will
account for much of this migration. Many of the city boys
wish to go to the farm, and in many cases we find in our
agricultural schools and colleges that a large number of
the students are city-bred. In some cases, too, there is no
good opening on the farm any more for one or more of the
children of a large family. In other cases the children's
natural tendencies and abilities are very clearly away from
the farm, and toward business or professional life in the
city. But even after we eliminate all of these and many
more, we have accounted for only a small proportion of the
boys and girls who leave the farm. When we follow them

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 45 1

up and ask them what it was that they disliked on the
farm they usually reply: ''There was nothing doing."

They mean by this that they have not the same oppor-
tunity for the satisfaction of their various instincts and for
the normal human delights and pleasures which youths so
naturally and rightfully claim; and it is probably this
failure to provide opportunity for plenty of wholesome en-
joyment on the farm, as much as almost any other cause,
that has led to the tremendous stream from country to
city. Whereas in 1790 but 3 per cent of our population
lived in cities, to-day 50 per cent of the people of the nation
live in these small spots scattered over the surface of the
whole United States — in some cases gathering together in
great congested hordes, living like cliff-dwellers, one over
the other, in cities of one to several millions.

The cost of farm products, of foodstuffs, and of living has
steadily gone up for a number of years. There is a great
economic opportunity on the farm; scientific agriculture
is making it possible to do much that never could have
been done in the past; but still our boys and girls continue
to leave.

In the city, recreation has been exploited. Many who
have seen this natural hunger of the young (and of the old)
to obtain the natural and normal instinctive delights and
satisfactions have provided amusements of one kind or
another in manifold profusion, and have charged people for
the privilege of enjoying them. The public dance-hall, the
theatre, the motion-picture, the bowling-alley, the billiard
and pool hall, the saloon, roller and ice skating rinks, the
dime museum, the "slide for life," and a thousand and one
other "attractions" have all been cunningly devised to
furnish a certain kind of excitement and stimulation of in-
stinctive tendencies in such a way as to provide for the pro-
moters of these recreations the greatest amount of money.
To bring in the most money they have made their appeals
usually to the strongest and most fundamental instincts,

452 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

in many cases in such ways as to injure people as much, or
more, than they have helped them through providing the
recreation.

The dance-hall and the saloon and den of vice have readily
become connected. The recreations are carried on fre-
quently in ill- ventilated and unwholesome rooms. In most
cases they are entirely sedentary, the people who have been
seated around their indoor tasks all day going to indoor
sedentary recreations at night. The baseball game is par-
ticipated in only by crowding on stuffy street-cars and by
sitting on the bleachers, not in playing the game. The
cities have allowed mercenary individuals for the sake of
the game to exploit, and in many cases to degrade, the young
people of our land who should have been provided normal
wholesome, social recreation through some other agencies.

Certainly it is true that if country people had held differ-
ent notions of the importance of avocations and had be-
stirred themselves to provide for them, there would be
to-day far more happiness both in the country and in the
city. The problems of recreation are to discover the best
forms, to socialize them, and to get all people to participate
reasonably in recreation of the forms which they most need.

II. Surveys of Recreation

A great awakening has taken place in the United States
in the last few years with respect to this great avocational
problem. Never before, probably, in the history of the
world have people so suddenly realized that the goal of life
is not ''the getting of a little more land to raise a little more
wheat, to get a little more money, to buy a little more
land"; that it is not a vicious circle of money-making, nor
merely the getting of property, but that it is normal growth
and happiness, the enrichment and refinement of living
itself. But a few years ago, nearly all of the recreations
of the nation were in the cities, and these under private

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 453

control with no supervision, practically, by any city or local
officials interested in the welfare of the whole people.
Recreation was something which one could get if he were
able to get it. It was not a right which every one should
have for his own happiness and educational development.

The results of this system have been made notorious by
many noted writers and investigators. Jane Addams in
her *' Spirit of Youth and the City Streets" has shown the
hideous forms which the natural instinctive cravings of
youth take when they are under the blight of a false economic
and social regime. Great recreational surveys have been
made for multitudes of cities, of counties, and of whole
States. We have begun to inquire into the means of pro-
moting the best life of the race through other means than
labor.

The Recreation Movement. — In 1907 the writer was a
delegate of the Minneapolis Board of Education to the
First Playground Festival of the United States, held under
the auspices of the National Playground Association of
America, which had just been formed. There on the great
playgrounds and recreation centres of the South Parks of
Chicago, wonder-provoking activities along many lines of
recreation and avocation that were desirable and delightful
for young and old were witnessed by many thousands of
people. At that time play was a thing which was gener-
ally considered of little importance at the school, in the
home, or anywhere else. The school was frequently placed
on a site of land that either allowed little room for the
natural play of children, or was so rough, muddy, or in
such a dangerous locality as to preclude any possibility of
real play. No money was spent at that time, practically,
for play apparatus, for the enlargement of school sites, for
supervisors of play and recreation, or for anything else of
the kind.

Since that time the playground movement has spread
over the country like fire in the prairie-grass. Millions are

454 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

to-day spent for play and recreational activities by public
governing boards for the people's benefit where nickels
were spent as recently as 1907. We have certainly awakened
to the fact that all work and no play not only makes Jack
a dull boy but robs him of the means of obtaining directly
and at first hand those things for which we live and move
and have our being. Recreation in the cities is rapidly
coming under city control. The saloon is being eliminated,
and various institutions are springing up to serve its social
function. Vice has been driven out, and the dance-hall
has been made a place of true enjoyment and education,
rather than a means of degradation. The theatre is rapidly
being improved, and parks and other recreational centres,
libraries, outdoor swimming-pools, free indoor gymnasia,
and many other private and public enterprises, consciously
directed toward the people's good, are being provided. In
the army the most valuable service rendered the youth of our
land was in the many forms of education and socializing
avocational activities.

Scientific Studies. — In much of this work we are being
guided to-day, not by mere sentiment and "common sense,"
but by first-class scientific experts who have gained their
skill through rigid investigation and research. Cities,
awakening to the problem of a degraded childhood and youth
through misused leisure, and criticising very largely the work
of the public schools for not uplifting the people, have de-
termined in many instances to get at the root of the matter
by making scientific surveys of their recreational problems
through the employment of experts in this field. In these
cities all of the many types of recreation have been studied.
We need not detail the whole, although few people realize
perhaps how many classes of recreation there are and how
many types under each class. Our problem here is not
so much the city survey and what has been discovered in
these investigations as it is to get some light on the coun-
try problem. But any careful study of" the Springfield

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 455

survey, of the Ipswich survey, of the Cleveland surveys, of
the Madison survey, of the California survey, or of the recrea-
tional phases of the various country surveys made by ex-
perts of the Presbyterian Church, will open one's eyes con-
siderably to the opportunities and possibilities in country
recreational development, and the eyes of rural leaders and
the people generally must be opened if the country is to solve
this great problem of promoting avocational enjoyment and
true avocational efl&ciency.^

III. A Programme of Recreation

The investigations of country conditions show that
much awaits to be done and that the people are about ready
to take up this newer point of view, and to bring into life
that which has been so long eliminated — normal, whole-
some recreations. All they need is leadership and training.
Give them these and the happy enjoyment of the children
in the schools, in the homes, in the country picnics, and on
the farms will do the rest.

Some of the great instincts of life which have worked
themselves out in forms of avocations are the social instinct,
the sex instinct, the instinctive delight in rhythm and music,
and the instincts of physical and mental activity.

Practically all of these instincts the psychologist shows us,
for example, find normal satisfaction and expression in the
dance. But dancing has long been taboo in country districts.
''It has rarely been a means for good," the country people
say. ''It has been a means of injury rather than a help.''
But the old ascetic, puritanical, pioneer doctrine has had
more to do with this attitude than anything else, and there
is no good reason why dancing should not be a means of
the greatest happiness and purest pleasure and satisfaction
for both young and old in the country. To thrive, the danc-

1 A bibliography of surveys may be obtained from the Recreation Di-
vision of the Russell Sage Foundation of New York.

456 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

ing should be managed by people who see to it that the dance
is conducted in the right way, and who will insure that it
is made an educational agency. This has long since been
discovered in the city. If those who are interested in the
happiness and welfare of the young people will get up the
dance themselves; will see that the right kind of people are
invited; will provide for the right kind of music; will pro-
vide the right kind of room, and other conditions in which
to have the dance; and will give as much attention and super-
vision to it as is given to the supervision of the children at
school, then good and only good will come out of it.

To-day we are bringing back from **the old country"
hundreds of the simple folk-dances which our ancestors
danced on the village greens in the olden days. They got
from them normal, natural delights and satisfactions.
They were considered an important part of the daily life
activities. They were combined frequently with reHgious
festivals, and had in many cases a religious spirit and motive.
The music breathes a spirit of innocence and purity, quite
in contrast with many of the filthy *' rags'' that one may
hear in the dance-hall run for private profit in our day.
These old folk-dances we are teaching the children of the
cities. Young and old engage in them. They have few
or none of the objectionable features of the social dances
that are criticised by those who speak of dancing as some-
thing to be kept taboo. If we brought back only this one
activity into the lives of the country people, throughout
the long winter months, at least, there would be a great
deal more of wholesome social intercourse among the people
of the community; the young people would stay young
longer on the farms, and the delights of the farm would be
sufficient to hold a great many adult people who find it
at present an intolerably sordid bore.

The consolidated school is the natural place for the
radiation of this gospel. It is the natural social centre of
the community. Where it is, as it should in most cases be,

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 457

a first-class consolidated school furnishing free transporta-
tion of the pupils, a good auditorium should always be
provided. This auditorium can be used as a recreation
centre and put to many uses. A dance learned here as
physical education, in the auditorium used as a gymnasium
or in a separate room kept for the special purpose of a
gymnasium, and provided for the children of the high school
and their relatives and friends, can be made a very fine
educational feature.

We do not need to start with the dance, of course.
Many other social and recreational activities can be en-
gaged in. But the dance is one of the fundamental recrea-
tional inventions of the human mind, and we are discussing
it here as a type of amusement that has been frowned upon
in the past which can be magically transformed into some-
thing noble through the agency of the public schools. Chil-
dren who learn to dance the natural roundelays and folk-
dances will not have the same morbid attitude toward such
recreations as they have when they are carried on with most
of the people of the community frowning upon them as
illicit activities to be engaged in either by stealth or in de-
fiance of social usage. Health, grace, courtesy, physical
education, recreation, and normal human delight can be
promoted by this one activity alone.

An auditorium or gymnasium of this kind can be used
for a great many other recreational purposes. There should
be an assembly period of all the pupils every day of the
school year and this period should be made one of the most
important phases of the school work. This period should
usually be not less than thirty minutes in length. Here
the whole school comes together as a body each day, and
gets a unity of feeling and aspiration which is second to
nothing in educational value. Here the young may learn
to engage in public speaking, in singing together in chorus
the good old songs of all the ages. Here beautiful and in-
spiring literature may be read or recited by the pupils and

45^ THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

teachers. Here the young may express their dramatic in-
stincts in little plays and dramatizations in which they so
naturally delight. A thousand and one beautiful and attract-
ive uses of this assembly period could readily be related.

Francis Parker in his wonderful school of the olden days
in Chicago made this assembly period a great educational
force, and all of the newer schools that have been springing
up in this country in recent years have been putting strong
emphasis upon this feature of school life. One of the best
phases of the lives of the children in the Gary school system,
for example, is the assembly activities of the pupils which are
carried on all day long, the assembly-room never being
empty, different groups of pupils having their assembly
exercises there at different hours of the day.

This room, too, can be made a delightful recreational
and social centre for the life of the whole people. In the
evening, the school vans that have been used for transport-
ing the pupils during the daytime can be used for carrying
the children and the adults to the meeting-place at night.
If the auto-van, heated by its own exhaust, is used as a
carrier, it can in many cases, as it does in the daytime,
carry not one but two loads of people to the social centre
for their evening's recreation. Many more, of course, will
come in their own conveyances, since the horses on the farm
have not appreciably decreased in number, and the Fords
and other cars have immeasurably increased. The many
ways of spending a pleasant and profitable evening, for the
people of a rather large community in such a social centre,
world fill a good-sized book, a book which very much
needs to be written to-day to show the opportunities and
possibilities in this direction, and to describe in some degree
the wonderful achievements which are being made in this
direction by many enterprising school leaders in all parts
of the United States. We can only suggest them here, and
refer our readers to other articles for further explanation
and suggestion.

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 459

The outside activities of the children on the playground,
too, are a great means of recreation. The grounds should
be at least ten acres in extent, over an acre for front lawn
and building, about two acres for play apparatus and games,
a baseball diamond on two acres, two acres for teachers'
cottages, and for more than three remaining for gardens,
demonstration farm, and a decent living for the principal
and janitor. We have suggested twenty acres in our final
chapter. No gymnasium activities should be engaged in
when children can be taken out-of-doors and given the
benefit of exercise and play there. Here all of the good
games that every boy and every girl should know, that
girls and boys can play with either a few or many children,
should be learned. A turning pole or two, basket-ball goals
for the boys and perhaps for the girls, swings for all the
children, the climbing spar for the boys, and perhaps a
jumping pit, will furnish endless delight, recreation, and
successful education. These activities are pretty fully de-
scribed elsewhere. The Boy Scouts and the Camp Fire
Girls are splendid recreational inventions of the last few
years, inventions which appeal to the natural instinctive
life of the children in a rare way, and which direct instinc-
tive tendencies and activities along lines that produce social
habits of the greatest value to old and young.

Why were they not discovered and invented years ago
by psychologists and educators who knew the instinctive
nature of the child we may well ask. The child's original
nature and acquired interests crave the activities that are
both delightful and socially useful in the long run.

Handicrafts. — Various forms of craftsmanship have their
avocational value, and the manual training and farm car-
pentry will not be without their recreational uses. Here in
the social centre, too, is the best place for the school library,
the library of the whole community, affording good litera-
ture as a means of avocation and education which may
radiate to all the homes of the community. These and

460 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

many other forms of recreation and avocation may well
be promoted in the country school.

Recreation Secretaries. — In a number of city communi-
ties recreation secretaries have been employed to give their
entire time to such activities. A county might well employ
such a person to promote these activities. Some of the work
now carried on by such secretaries has been listed as follows
by the Playground and Recreation Association of America:

Organization and executive management of outdoor playground
system; selection and training of play leaders; selection, purchase,
and installation of equipment; planning of buildings and alteration
of buildings for recreation purposes.

Responsibility for evening recreation centres.

Responsibility for children's gardens.

Responsibility for conducting athletic badge tests for both boys
and girls throughout the city.

Arrangements for the celebration of holidays.

Arrangements for pageants.

Co-operation in the promotion of Boy Scout activities.

Co-operation in the promotion of Camp Fire Girls activities.

Arrangements for summer camps.

Provision for band concerts and other music.

Responsibility for encouraging wholesome home recreation, ar-
ranging that games be taught which can be played at home, providing
places where parents and children take recreation together.

Studying recreation conditions in different sections to attempt to
meet any special conditions found.

Studying private recreation agencies to find recreation furnished,
and number reached, to avoid duplication, and find possible ways of
assisting by furnishing places for games and meetings.

Supervision of commercial recreation.

Promotion of play away from playgrounds.

Arrangements for ice-skating in winter, if necessary through
flooding of vacant lots.

Arranging coasting places, if necessary by having certain streets
set aside and properly guarded.

Placing recreation workers in actual contact with homes of the
neighborhood.

Promotion of school athletics, of school baseball, basket-ball,
volley-ball leagues, and of all recreation activities for school boys
and girls outside of regular school hours.

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 46 1

Arrangements for tramping trips.

Interpreting to the public through addresses, through public
press, the recreation work which is going on in the city.

Co-operation with other agencies such as the juvenile court, set-
tlements, libraries, churches, and various social organizations.

The country Y. M. C. A. and Y. W. C. A. are to-day
doing a great work along this Hne. The churches are be-
ginning to wake up and give some assistance in the field of
recreation, and other agencies are helping the movement
along. But it is probably the special privilege, opportunity,
and responsibility of the public school to promote this more
abundant living. If one of the great aims of education is
the right use of leisure, recreation, wholesome enjoyment,
or avocational efficiency, then it is one of our principal
duties as educators in the public schools, dedicated to the
welfare of the whole people, to devise ways and means to
bring back into the lives of the people this happy, joyous,
esthetic spirit and life which ages of asceticism, of pioneer
struggle, and of puritanical narrow-mindedness have too
largely driven out of the rural public mind.

To make more concrete these principles of rural recrea-
tion we add a typical example of what can be done for
recreation and education through one instrument, the
motion-picture show. It is contributed by B. A. Aughin-
baugh, principal of the rural-school district at Mingo,
Champaign County, Ohio.

IV. Motion-Picture Project Conducted by a Consolidated
Rural School

Getting the Recreation Machinery. — Statistics inform us that a
larger per cent of the inmates in our insane asylums come from the
rural than the urban population. Experts do not hesitate to place
the blame on a lack of wholesome recreation in the rural communi-
ties. To overcome this unfortunate state of affairs various projects
have been attempted with more or less success. The failure of most
of these projects has been found in the fact that they were not sus-
tained enough in their efforts to make the attempt worth while, or

462 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

else they failed to realize what recreation really was. Many of the
projects also failed to take note of the fact, that the farmer of to-day
is not the farmer of the comic sheet, and that he is just as bored by
out-of-date entertainment as any city man would be.

Having carefully observed these conditions for a number of years,
and watched the trend of times, the writer determined that not only
would a motion-picture project be a paying proposition in a rural
community, but that it would do a very needed work as well. Con-
sequently, when our community voted to erect a new centralized
school and auditorium, I saw to it that the architect, in making the
plans and specifications, included in same, provisions for special wir-
ing for operating a motion-picture machine. This consisted in having
a number five copper wire run directly from the engine-room to a
theatre plug-outlet-box at the back of the auditorium. I did not
know just when I would have an opportunity to put my plan into
execution, but I intended to be prepared when it did come.

The opportunity, like most opportunities one is looking for, came
sooner than I had hoped for. Shortly after the schoolhouse was com-
pleted a picture-house failed in a neighboring city, due to poor manage-
ment and severe competition. The equipment was offered for sale
at a ridiculously low figure — one machine, aluminum-treated screen,
and booth, for $1 10. On a note, secured by the president of the school
board, I procured the money from bank and bought the outfit.

On May 31st, 191 7, we gave our first show. The electric current
supply is derived from a 125 volt, direct current, 60 ampere, 7>^ kilo-
watt, Fairbanks-Morse generator in the school engine-room. The
motive power for the generator is a 10 horse-power oil-engine. The
generator also supplies the building with electric lights. It requires
at least 30 amperes of direct current at no volts to get a good picture,
if the screen is seventy feet from the machine, as is ours. We however
use forty amperes, and this assures us of a brighter, steadier picture with
no blue spot in it. The usual light plant equipment found in most
modern schoolhouses, where city current is not used, is ample for run-
ning a picture-machine arc, that is if at least 3300 watts can be ob-
tained from it (found by multiplying voltage by amperage). Four
thousand four hundred watts is better. The amount of light required
may be reduced by three things; first, a good reflective screen (a mere
muslin sheet is not suitable for motion-pictures as it does not give
definition to the pictures and absorbs too much light) ; second, dark-
ness (darkness is cheaper than light and by contrast assists in pro-
ducing just as good a picture — stray daylight or lamplight turns the
blacks of the pictures into a neutral brown) ; third, proper lense system
(a bad lense is a poor investment at half its cheapness for it fails to

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 463

let through the essential light rays). I would advise no one to attempt
a picture-show on a commercial basis, as we have, unless he expects
to give as good or better screen results than the regular picture houses.
He may expect failure if he does. The pictures must be clear, steady
and interesting. The small portable machines, intended only for
cl?.ssroom use, are not suitable for public exhibitions of a commercial
nature. New machines can be bought for $300 or less.

The Method. — Our first show was procured from Paramount
Company and consisted of Mary Pickford in "Cinderella," a Burton
Holmes travel picture, and a Bray cartoon. The programme consisted
of seven reels at one dollar per reel. This price per reel will differ in
various communities, depending upon the population of the com-
munity. But in no case should one leave the determination of this
price entirely to the distributors for they are going to get all they
can for their films. It is best to find out what some regular theatre
is paying, and then work out a little proportion problem based on
the population of the city where this picture-show is as compared
with your own place. I do not advise persons desiring to try this
plan to procure their films from any exchanges but the regular com-
mercial concerns or such as have an equal standing and equal business
methods. Inferior companies that pretend to cater to schools and
churches, for the most part do not have pictures made by well-known
actors, and they usually try to charge most unusual prices. The best
exchanges will gladly supply release lists giving the titles of their pro-
ductions and make quotations. The films of these concerns will be
found to cover completely the fields of entertainment, travel, geogra-
phy, science, literature, etc. Moreover their films are well produced
and physically in good condition. The last is a most important item
because badly torn or soiled films will never give good screen results.

We have been now operating our show for one year, and in that
time we have not only paid for our original equipment, but have
bought a second machine in order to give a continuous picture on the
screen; erected a new booth; bought a $700 player-piano; helped a
$300 lecture course out of the hole; procured many additions to our
talking-machine and piano records and have done many other things
for the benefit of the school and community. We put on a programme
each Friday night throughout the year, summer and winter, thus
affording continual recreation for this rural community — not the
once-a-month sort. The before-and-after-show-visiting of the farmers
is a real help in itself. Then, too, we have been able to assist in war
and charitable propaganda and also assist the various agricultural
societies, and officials educate the farmers through the medium of the
screen. Our regular price is ten cents although occasionally we in-

464 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

crease this a nickel for something very special. We have never lost
on but one or two shows and then it was due to extremely bad weather
conditions. Our community numbers only 500 people, but we are
Able to draw on a much larger patronage due to the fact that we have
attained perfect projection and offer clean, entertaining shows. I
might mention as examples of the features shown, David Harum, Tale
of Two Cities, The Crisis, The Fall of a Nation, Twenty Thousand
Leagues Under the Sea, The Man Without a Country, The Re-Making
of a Nation (Government Camp Sherman pictures), EvangeHne, The
Prince and the Pauper, Oliver Twist, etc., etc. We have also taken
our audiences around the world with so noted a traveller as Burton
Holmes and given them glimpses into the animal world with Dr.
Ditmars. We have also provoked them to laughter with Charlie
Chaplin, "Fatty Arbuckle," Mutt and Jeff, Bobby Bumps, Douglas
Fairbanks, etc.

The Results. — I really feel that we have accomplished our original
intention of relieving the monotony of farm life by supplying whole-
some entertainment and I do know that the value of farm land has
gone up in this vicinity due, as one man put it, to the fact that this
place is "alive."

V. Methods of Organizing a Community for Recrea-
tion AND Social Development

The importance of organization of the community for
recreation and social development cannot be overestimated.
The same group that promotes avocational efficiency for the
school and the community can work for all of the other
four types of efficiency given as the aims of education: vital,
vocational, civic, and moral.

The two following practical plans for this work have
been prepared by the U. S. Bureau of Education {School
Life, August 16, 1918) and the State Department of Pubhc
Instruction of Idaho (Constitution, in "Handbook for Rural
Teachers")'

A, How to Organize a Community Centre

Membership. — The first step in organization is to define the
boundaries of the community. These ought to be determined along
natural lines, such as the territory from which the children in the

RURAL RECREATION AISTD CONSOLIDATION 465

school are drawn, or a district in which the people come together
for other reasons than the fact that an artificial line is drawn around
them. It ought not to be too large.

Being a Httle democracy, all adult citizens, both men and women,
living in the prescribed territory are members of it. It must be com-
prehensive if the public schoolhouse is to be used as its capitol. It must
be non-partisan, non-sectarian, and non-exclusive. You do not become
a member of a community by joining. You are a merhber by virtue
of your citizenship and residence in the district. Everywhere else
men and women are divided into groups and classes on the ground of
their personal taste or occupation. In a community centre they
meet as ''folks" on the ground of their common citizenship and their
common human needs. This is the distinguishing mark of the com-
munity centre.

The Community Secretary. — Nothing runs itself unless it is run-
ning down-hill. If community work is to be done somebody has to
be the doer of it. The growing realization of this fact has led to the
creation of a new profession. The term applied to this profession is
"community secretary," "a cooper of secrets," a servant of the whole
community. This community executive should be elected by ballot
in a public election held in the schoolhouse and supported out of
public funds. There are now four such publicly elected and pubHcly
supported community secretaries in Washington, D. C, and eight
more such ofiices are in the process of being created. It seems cer-
tain that it is destined to be one of the most honored and useful of
all pubHc offices.

The qualifications for this office are manifestly large and its duties
complex and exacting. The ablest person to be found is none too
able. The function of the secretary is nothing less than to organize
and to keep organized all the community activities herein described;
to assist the people to learn the science and to practise the art of living
together; and to show them how they may put into effective opera-
tion the spirit and method of co-operation. Who is equal to a task
like this? In addition to intellectual power and a large store of
general information, one must be equipped with many more qualities
equally important. The seven cardinal virtues of a community secre-
tary are: Patience, unselfishness, a sense of humor, a balanced judg-
ment, the ability to differ in opinion without differing in feeling, respect
for the personality of other people, and faith in the good inten-
tions of the average man. Where possible, the community secre-
tary ought to be the principal of the school. But where the principal
cannot be released from his other duties sufficiently to undertake the
work the secretary ought to be a person who is agreeable to the prin-

466 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

cipal, in order to insure concerted action. In thousands of villages
and open-country communities the teacher's work lasts for only part
of the year and the compensation is shamefully inadequate. This is
a great economic waste as well as an injury to children. If these
teachers were made community secretaries, were given an all-year-
round job, and were compensated for the additional work by a living
wage, it would mean a better type of teacher and a better type of
school. The bigger task would not only demand the bigger person,
but the task itself would create them. Moreover, when the teacher's
activities become linked up with life processes the community will be
the more willing to support the office adequately. It seems clear that
the office of community secretary is the key to a worthier support of
the school. It will magnify the function of teaching, give a new civic
status to the teacher, and make more apparent the patriotic and con-
structive service which the school renders the Nation.

The Board of Directors. — However able a community secretary
may be no one alone is able enough for the constructive kind of work
which the community centre requires. Since it is a co-operative en-
terprise, it is necessary that it be democratically organized. The next
step in its organization, therefore, should be to provide the secretary
with a cabinet. It may be called a board of directors, or a community
council, or an executive committee. These names suggest its various
functions. Its first function is to give council and advice to the
community secretary, to act as a little forum for discussion, out of
which may develop wise methods of procedure. Its next function is
to share with the secretary the responsibility for the work, the burden
of which is too heavy to be borne by any one alone. But the cabinet
is not a legislative body alone, to determine what is to be done, but
also an executive body as well. It is not only an executive body, to
carry out the general plans of the association, but also a body of
directors to plan and conduct special kinds of activities. In every
community there are men and women who have the ability and
leisure to render public service. As directors they would have a recog-
nized position and channel through which they can more effectively
render such service.

Each director ought to be the head of a department of work, or
at least the head of every department of work ought to be a director.
The head of each department ought to choose the members of his
own committee. Thus, by having the heads of departments work
on the board of directors the entire work of the association can be
frequently reviewed, and the departments of activity can, by co-
operating, not only avoid needless waste through duplication, but also
stimulate each other. The board of directors ought to hold regular

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 467

meetings in the schoolhouse, and in order that the work may be re-
sponsive to public opinion the meetings ought to be open to any who
wish to attend them, just as the meetings of a town council are open.
The community centre stands for visible government and daylight
diplomacy.

The Trouble Committee. — It is not so diflGicult to organize a com-
munity centre; the difficulty is to keep it organized. By no means
the only one, but the chief means of securing a permanently useful
community centre is to have a wise and constructive programme,
big enough to merit interest. A good way to formulate such a pro-
gramme is to appoint a permanent committee which we may call
"the trouble committee." The ftmction of this committee is not to
make trouble, but to remove it. Its task is to discover the causes
of trouble in the community, to learn the reasons for dissatisfaction,
to state the problems which ought to be solved, to exhibit the thing
that needs to be done.

The function of the trouble committee is to furnish nuts for the
community association to crack. No one believes in diagnosis for
the sake of diagnosis any more than he believes in "amputation for
the sake of amputation.'* Its only use is to reveal the disease and to
point the way to a remedy. The aim of the trouble committee is to
point out the difficulties at the bottom of our social problems for the
sake of removing them. Whenever they are removed, the problem
vanishes. The method of the committee is constructive democracy.

Public and Self-Support. — The finances of an organization usually
constitute its storm centre. Money is the kind of thing it is difficult
to get along with and impossible to get along without. After a com-
munity centre determines its plans and policies, the next question in
its organization is finance. But since money is the root of so much
trouble, it ought to be kept in the background. It is properly called
"ways and means." It is not the end; human welfare is the end.
Money is a detail and ought always to be treated as such.

The superior advantage of a community centre over private or-
ganizations is that it does not need an amount of money sufficient to
cause it any distress. To begin with, there are no dues. They are
already paid when the taxes are paid. The schoolhouse, together
with heat, light, and janitor service, and in some places a portion of
the secretary's salary, is provided out of public funds. Thus the over-
head charges are comparatively small. The time will doubtless come
when the entire expense will be provided out of public funds, but the
movement is new, and for the present and immediate future if the
building, heat, light, and janitor service are provided it is all that can
reasonably be expected.

468 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

A Working Constitution. — What's constitution among friends?
It's a necessity if they are to continue to be friends. As the word
itself suggests, a constitution establishes the basis on which friends
may stand for the accomplishment of their common purposes. Its
value is always to be measured by the importance of the purpose to
be accomplished. Inasmuch as the purpose of a community centre
is of the highest value not only to the welfare of the local community,
but also to the welfare of democracy in the Nation and in the world,
the making of its constitution is a highly important item in its organ-
ization.

As regards the work of the community centre, the constitution is
a working agreement, a clear understanding as to what is to be done
and who is to do it. A clear statement will prevent needless friction
and confusion. As regards the growth of the work in the community,
the constitution will serve the purpose of propaganda. If a new or
uninformed member of the community should ask an active member,
"What is a community centre and what is its purpose?" a copy of
the constitution ought to furnish a full answer to his question. There-
fore, it should not be too brief, if it is to answer this purpose.

Each community ought to draft its own constitution, not only
because the needs of communities vary, and not only because it should
be the honest expression of the community's own thought and purpose,
but especially because a constitution brought from outside and dropped
on the people's heads has little value for the community.

The Ten Commandments. — While the types of constitutions will
be very various, yet there are certain formative principles which are
basic in the structure of a community centre. They are so essential
to the life of the community ideal that the writer has called them
"The ten commandments for a community centre." They are as
follows:

I. It must guarantee freedom of thought and freedom in its
expression.

II. It must aim at unity, not uniformity, and accentuate re-
semblances, not differences.

III. It must be organized democratically, with the right to learn
by making mistakes.

IV. It must be free from the domination of money, giving the
right of way to character and intelligence.

V. It must be non-partisan, non-sectarian, and non-exclusive both
in purpose and practice.

VI. Remember that nothing will run itself unless it is running
down-hill.

VII. Remember that to get anywhere it is necessary to start
from where you are.

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 469

VIII. Remember that the thing to be done is more important
than the method of doing it.

IX. Remember that the water in a well cannot be purified by
painting the pump.

X. Remember that progress is possible only when there is
mental hospitality to new ideas.

B. Constitution

ARTICLE I — NAME

The name of this club shall be The

Community Club.

ARTICLE n — OBJECT

The object of this club shall be: Conducting public meetings for
the presentation and open discussion of live subjects; the physical
improvement of the community environment; and the social, moral
and educational development of the people.

ARTICLE III — MEMBERSHIP

Section I, Associate Members. Every person living in the

vicinity of is considered an associate member

of this club.

Section II. Any person sixteen years of age and over living in

the vicinity of is eligible to become an active

member of the club upon giving his or her name to any member of
the executive committee.

ARTICLE IV — OFFICERS AND ELECTIONS

Section I. There shall be the following officers: President; First,
Second and Third Vice Presidents; Secretary, and Treasurer.

Section II. The officers shall be elected at the annual meeting of

the club which shall be held on , to serve for a

term of one year each. Only active members shall be allowed to vote
for officers, and only active members are eligible to office.

ARTICLE V — DUTIES OF OFFICERS

Section I. President. It shall be the duty of the President to
preside at all meetings of the club, and also to serve as chairman of
the executive committee of the club.

Section II. First Vice President. It shall be the duty of the
First Vice President to preside at the meetings of the club in the

470 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

absence of or at the request of the President. He shall also be chair-
man of the Programme Committee.

Section III. Second Vice President. It shall be the duty of the
Second Vice President to serve as chairman of the Improvement Com-
mittee of the club.

Section IV. Third Vice President. It shall be the duty of the
Third Vice President to serve as chairman of the Social Service Com-
mittee of the club.

Section V. It shall be the duty of the Secretary to keep the
minutes of the proceedings of the club; to keep a list of active mem-
bers; to receive names of new members; to carry on the correspon-
dence of the club, and to fulfil such other duties as usually pertain to
this office.

Section VI. It shall be the duty of the Treasurer to collect and
disburse the money of the club; to keep a record of all money re-
ceived, spent and on hand, and to report upon the state of the trea-
sury at the annual meeting or whenever called upon to do so.

ARTICLE VI — COMMITTEES

Section I. Executive Committee. The Executive Committee
shall consist of the elected officers of the club. It shall be the duty
of this committee to confer upon questions regarding the welfare of
the club; to consider and recommend matters of importance to the
club, and in unusual matters requiring haste to act for the club.

Section II. Programme Committee. The Programme Com-
mittee shall consist of the First Vice President of the club and two
other members chosen by him. It shall be the duty of this committee
to arrange programmes for all the meetings of the club; to secure
speakers; and to suggest topics for discussion, which shall insure
profitable and interesting meetings; to promote the publicity of the
club through the local papers; to announce programmes of the meet-
ing of the club, and otherwise to carry on the work of publicity for the
club.

Section III. Improvement Committee. The Improvement Com-
mittee shall consist of the Second Vice President and two (or four)
other members appointed by him. It shall be the duty of this com-
mittee to investigate and bring to the attention of the club all matters
pertaining to local community improvement, and to act by direction
of the club, in consummating such improvement. (This committee
shall look after business needs.)

Section IV. Social Service Committee. The Social Service Com-
mittee shall consist of the Third Vice President and two (or four)

Junior orchestra, ages 6 to 1 2

Vital efficiency through physical education is emphasized in all Philippine

schools

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 47 1

other members appointed by him. They shall have supervision of all
social, moral and educational activities of the club for the community.
(This committee shall look after the social needs.)

ARTICLE VII — MEETINGS

The club shall hold regular meetings each

evening, in the , between the hours of 7:30 and

10 o'clock.

ARTICLE VIII — DUES

The dues of the club shall be per year for each active

member, to aid in meeting the local expenses of the organization.

ARTICLE IX — QUORUM

Eight active members of the club shall constitute a quorum for
the transaction of all business.

ARTICLE X — AMENDMENTS

The Constitution may be amended by two-thirds vote of the
active members present at any regular meeting.

ORDER OF BUSINESS AND BY-LAWS

The order of business in all regular meetings of the club shall be
as follows:

1. Social half hour.

2. Call to order.

3. Song.

4. Reading minutes of previous meeting.

5. Report of special committees.

6. Report of standing committees.

7. Treasurer's report.

8. Unfinished business.

9. New business.

10. Special programme.

11. Discussion.

12. Adjournment.

I. The meeting shall be called to order so that the business rou-
tine may be disposed of and the special programme of the evening
begun by 8:15 o'clock. This part of the programme, including the
general discussions, shall not usually exceed one and one-fourth hours.

472 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

2. The chairman of the meeting may leave the chair in order to
engage in discussion.

3. In speaking from the floor in the open discussion which fol-
lows the main address or in any other event, the parliamentary rules
of addressing the chair, etc., shall be strictly followed.

4. Speeches from the floor are limited to five minutes and the
time may be extended only by unanimous consent.

5. No speaker may have the floor a second time, unless all others
who wish to speak have had an opportunity to do so.

6. Speeches from the floor must deal with the subject chosen for
discussion.

LIST OF TOPICS FOR COMMUNITY MEETINGS

A suggested list of topics for consideration and discussion. Many
others will occur to the programme committee who know the local
situation. All matters for reports and discussions should be of a
constructive nature and of special value to the entire neighborhood.
The watchword in every undertaking and in each programme should
be co-operation.

The following list of subjects may be used for community meetings:

1. The kinds of waste on the farm.

2. The kinds of waste in the home.

3. Value of neighborhood entertainments.

4. How to exterminate the typhoid or common house-fly.

5. Relation of the house-fly to contagious and infectious diseases.

6. The value of playgrounds for country children.

7. Women's clubs in the country.

8. How to make poultry pay on the farm.

9. Pure-bred versus scrub dairy cows.

10. Should Agriculture, Manual Training and Home Economics
be taught in our school?

11. The Farmers' Institute.

12. Boys' and girls' clubs.

13. How best to use the Extension Department of the University.

14. The value of demonstration work in Agriculture and Home
Economics.

15. The relation of water-supply to contagious diseases.

16. How to use the "State Free Travelling Library."

17. Things that every taxpayer should know about local govern-
ment.

18. How to improve production in our community.

19. The problem of our roads.

20. The need for more social advantages in the country.

RURAL RECREATION AND CONSOLIDATION 473

21. Why farmers move to the city.

22. Modern conveniences on the farm.

23. The business side of farming.

24. The products we can market best.

A SUGGESTIVE PROGRAMME FOR A COMMUNITY MEETING

Subject: "Reading Matter in the Home"

1. Music.

2. Paper — The Magazine I Like Best, and Why.

3. General Discussion.

4. Recitation.

5. Paper — What makes a good children's book, and where can it
be found?

6. General Discussion.

7. Round table — (a) The papers that should be in every home.

(b) Influence of an early reading habit.

(c) How to satisfy the love of adventure in boys'

reading.

(d) Recent books on farm life that are worth

while.

8. Music.

PROBLEMS IN APPLICATION

1. What steps could be taken in the district where you teach or

some other similar district to establish a community organiza-
tion?

2. What are the principal pitfalls encountered by such organizations

and how may they best be avoided?

3. Review one of the bulletins of the U. S. Bureau of Education on

the Community Centre.

4. Review the chapter on Play and Recreation in Country Schools in

Rapeer's "Educational Hygiene."

5. Make up a list of the five best pamphlets and books on play

and recreation for country people.

6. What could such an organization do for civil education?

BIBLIOGRAPHY

1. Curtis — "Play and Recreation for the Open Country." Ginn

&Co.

2. Perry — "Wider Use of the School Plant." Charities Publication

Committee, New York.

474 THE CONSOLroATED RURAL SCHOOL

3. Foght— "The Rural Teacher and His Work," part III, chap. VI.

Macmillan.

4. Bancroft — " Games for the Playground." Macmillan.

5. Parker— "Methods of Teaching in High School." Ginn & Co.

6. Stern — "Neighborhood Entertainments." Sturgis & Walton.

7. Ward— "The Social Centre." Appleton.

8. Jackson — "A Community Centre, What It Is and How to Or-

ganize It." Government Printing Office.

9. "Recreation Manual for Teachers." State Dept. of Public In-

struction for Oregon.
10. Rapeer — "Teaching Elementary-School Subjects," chaps. I, XIX,
XXI, XXII. Scribner.

CHAPTER XXI
THE DIFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION

Preliminary Problems

1. What are some of the reasons why the facts and promises of con-

solidation are not brought to the attention of many communi-
ties that would profit by it?

2. What are some of the faults in the methods of presenting this

reform to rural communities?

3. What are some of the leading reasons for not acting on consolida-

tion after the matter has been presented?

4. Give some of the arguments usually advanced against consolida-

tion.

5. Name the points over which naost care must be taken in consoli-

dation to avoid complaints and reaction.

Source of Material Used. — In studying the problem
suggested above an attempt has been made to learn what
the leading rural leaders of to-day are thinking and saying
about rural school consolidation. Accordingly, the State
Superintendents of Public Instruction and the State Super-
visors and Inspectors of Rural Schools have been requested,
as the persons who would perhaps be best prepared to give
opinions of value, to report on the consolidated school as they
found it. The discussion which follows is based very largely
upon the contents of the letters which these leaders were
kind enough to write in response to a questionnaire.

Our first impression in going over the large number of
letters received from these state leaders is that probably
no single scheme or plan of consolidation of schools can
be followed by all, or even by any very large number, of
the states. It is a matter which depends upon the kind
of school organization in a given state, the topography of

475

476 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

the country, the condition of public highways and of other
means of transportation, the attitude of the people toward
progress in general, their past experience with schools, and
upon a number of other conditions peculiar to a given state
or section of the country. If one should take a report of
what one state, or what a group of states, is doing by way
of consolidation and undertake to duplicate closely that
system for his own state, he would probably fail in his
undertaking. Consolidation of schools must be the result
of years of study, invention, experimentation, and adapta-
tion, on the home grounds. But, of course, the experiences
of others are of incalculable value to the one who plans for
the consolidation of schools, particularly so if plans are
being laid upon state-wide proportions.

Four Fundamental Problems. — The reports from the
several states are extremely interesting. Whether expressed
or implied, a few points stand out boldly as constituting
the fundamental problems of the consolidation of rural
schools. They are (i) the conservatism and the prejudices
of the people, (2) the transportation problem, (3) the added
expense, and (4) the character of the teaching in this new
type of public school.

From Massachusetts, the mother of the consolidated
school, comes a summary by Mr. Francis G. Wadsworth,
Agent of the State Board of Education:

DANGERS

(a) Inadequate provisions for transportation.

(b) The unsupervised noon hour.

DIFFICULTIES

(a) Securing appropriations for new buildings.

(b) Bad roads.

(c) Finding competent drivers for barges.

(d) Satisfying parents whose children are required to walk to
meet the school barges.

(e) Providing warm luncheons for children at the schools.

THE DIFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 477

SHORTCOMINGS

(a) It takes the children away from home for a longer period of
the day, and limits the working time of boys and girls on the home
farm.

(b) It makes it difficult for parents to visit the school so as to
become intimately acquainted with the work therein.

A moment's thought upon these statements will indicate
the wide range of possible dangers, difficulties, and short-
comings of the rural consolidated school. That the argu-
ments are not all on the positive side of the question is clear.
But no scheme is without shortcomings.

State Superintendent Chas. A. Greathouse, of Indiana,
where consolidation has been effected on a very large scale,
has this to say: "The only real objection raised by the pa-
trons is the matter of transportation, usually the fault of
the township trustee in allowing too long a route. When
this is adjusted, I think I can safely say there is very little
difficulty."

Let us consider the four principal points stated above.

I. The Conservatism and the Prejudices of the People. —
We do not mean to imply that these two terms are synony-
mous. They are, however, very closely linked together.
In the first place, rural people are characteristically conserva-
tive. They require some time to think things out and reach
new conclusions. The danger is that the rural leaders
may be overambitious to get results quickly. To act, or
to lead the people to act before public sentiment approves,
will probably result in failure, or at least in disappointment.
The possibility of going too fast, or of going too far, in a
consolidation project constitutes a very serious danger of
the consolidated school. A great many readjustments
have had to be made and in some cases the consolidated-
school buildings have actually been abandoned, and the
little neighborhood schools again opened. Sometimes we
literally make haste by going slowly.

Furthermore, one failure of this kind will be so adver-

47^ THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

tised for miles around that it becomes more difficult than
ever to effect consolidation in other places. Unless public
sentiment has been cultivated, as indicated above, the
management of a new consolidated school is likely to ex-
perience great difficulty at first in "making good" with the
people.

In the second place, the rural adult population have
very strong prejudices. The minds of a good many of them
are made up for all time. Things are thus and so, and they
could not be otherwise. There will be found another group
who are open to conviction, but who do not have very
positive views upon such questions as the consolidation of
schools. They await, with more or less indifference, for de-
velopments before making up their minds. And there is a
third group, usually in the minority, who are strong advo-
cates of consolidation and of every other progressive measure
calculated to improve their schools and the community in
general. The second group mentioned, the open-minded,
hold the balance of public sentiment. The whole proposi-
tion will rise or fall in accordance with the way they make
up their minds on this innovation suddenly sprung upon
them by the last-named group, the leaders.

Any one who has had experience at first hand in pro-
moting consolidation of schools will agree that there is an
almost universal prejudice against giving up the neighbor-
hood school. Several years ago in his "The State and The
Farmer," Dean L. H. Bailey made the following comment
upon this phase of consolidation:

The greatest difficulty in bringing about the consolidation of schools
is a deep-seated prejudice against giving up the old school. This
prejudice is usually not expressed in words. Often it is really uncon-
scious to the person himself. Yet I wonder whether right here does
not lie a fundamental and valid reason against the uniform consolida-
tion of rural schools, a feeling that when the school leaves the locality
something vital has gone out of the neighborhood. Local pride has
been offended. Initiative has been removed one step farther away.
The locality has lost something.

THE DIFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 479

In December, 191 6, Superintendent Edward Hyatt, of
California, expressed the same idea in his report:

The principal dangers seem to be that the people do not willingly
give up their little rural districts. It is a species of religion or patri-
otism to stand up for one's own school district and to combat its loss.
This and the bad feeling growing out of it hinder the success of the
consolidated school.

Matter for Serious Consideration. — Statements of this
kind coming from authorities so eminent as are Dean
Bailey and Superintendent Hyatt call for our most careful
consideration of this aspect of the rural consolidated school.
Some of our more ardent advocates of consolidation seem
to think it almost unbelievable that persons can be so
lacking in public spirit, in patriotism, and even in common
sense, as to stand in the way of so fine a means of improv-
ing their educational facilities. As a matter of fact, most
of these *^ standpatters" are absolutely honest in their con-
victions.

We should bear in mind that the consolidation of a
group of country schools is a pretty radical change to be
brought about in a comparatively short time. Since the
earliest settlements, the children at any given time have
attended the little neighborhood school. It required
perhaps not over thirty minutes for the farthest ones to
walk to or from the school. They carried their lunch-
baskets with them. The little school and its routine work
have been a fixed part of the community. Now, rather
suddenly, the doors of the home school are closed. Wagons
come along, pick up the children and drive them off from
three to six miles to a strange school situated in another
community. Instead of thirty minutes it may require
from one to two hours to make the drive. The lunch-basket
is often replaced at the school by the warm lunch, which
the mother has no part in preparing. Up to this time the
traditional course of study has prevailed. Now domestic

480 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

science, manual training, agriculture, commercial subjects,
music, and drawing are studied, subjects which many of
the parents do not know how to appreciate. It is perhaps
the greatest and most sudden change that these small
communities have ever experienced. Is it any wonder that
the consolidation of schools meets with opposition from some
of the people?

Furthermore, as Dean Bailey points out, the neighbor-
hood may indeed be losing something valuable for all time.
Unless the several neighborhoods whose schools are con-
solidated can also be consolidated into a correspondingly
larger community, I think all will agree that each neigh-
borhood will have lost something. But, even at best,
there are likely to be a considerable number of families
who are unable to take their places in this enlarged com-
munity. They will fail, for one reason or another, to adjust
themselves to the new conditions which have been created
by the consolidation of their schools. This failure of the
people to adjust themselves is apt to harden their prejudices
against the whole proposition and at the same time to stir
them up to active opposition.

We should keep in mind also that prejudice against the
consolidation of schools is just the same kind of thing that
has always stood in the way of progress of whatsoever kind.
It is peculiar neither to rural-school progress nor, for that
matter, to the rural people. I beUeve President Eliot has
been quoted as having said in effect that it took him the
first ten years of his administration as President of Har-
vard University to win over the faculty of that institution
to his programme for progress. It may be well also to re-
call in this connection that the first city superintendent in
the United States was appointed on trial at Springfield,
Mass., in 1849, ^^^ ^^^^ 2,fter two years the office was
abolished for the reason that it was believed to be a useless
expense. Nearly all new inventions and discoveries have
been scoffed at at first. Unless the conservatism and the

THE DEFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 481

prejudices of the people are recognized and skilfully and
patiently reckoned with, any new consolidated school is
in great danger of becoming a failure.

2. The Transportation Problem. — The problem of trans-
portation is perhaps the greatest difficulty of, and may
result in the greatest danger to, the consolidated school.
Doctor Thomas E. Finegan of the New York State De-
partment of Education (now the State Superintendent of
Public Instruction in Pennsylvania) says: "In my judgment
the principal difficulty is the question of transportation."
Superintendent W. D. Ross of Kansas says: "There is only
one real difficulty in this state and this in the western part
where it is sparsely settled, the districts there being very
large; and any move to consolidate any number of districts
or at least a sufficient number to make it economically
worth while would be impossible, owing to the distance chil-
dren would have to be transported."

What Superintendent Ross says of the western part of
Kansas describes the transportation problem over a large
area of the United States, particularly in mountainous
states.

Superintendent H. C. Morrison of New Hampshire
throws such a flood of light upon the consolidation of schools
in New England that I have taken the liberty to quote at
length from his letter under date of December 8, 1916:

I was an enthusiastic believer in that plan (consolidation with
transportation) ten years ago, but as experience has accumulated it
turns out to be feasible only in rare instances. You see nearly all of
Massachusetts east of the Connecticut river, the southern part of
New Hampshire, the western part of Maine, and practically all of
Rhode Island and Connecticut have been settled for neady three hun-
dred years. The rural life of the region has gone through several
phases which have resulted in creating one set of conditions at one
time, subsequently revolutionizing those conditions and leaving a
wake of abandoned farms in the trail; again establishing an entirely
new set of conditions on the old, and so on. The result is that in a
hilly country very much cut up by watercourses, we have public

482 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

highways running in every direction and farms so scattered that it is
ordinarily pretty nearly impossible to collect children with the trans-
portation system without great expense and without starting some of
them to school very early in the morning. This is particular!)' true
of nearly the whole of this state.

What we do find is this. Occasionally the topography of a region
is such that a consolidated school can be established at a central
village which is approached from all parts of the township by two or
three radiating lines of highways, or sometimes the village is on a
trunk line which is the only highway. Under these conditions two or
three barges will pick up all the children in the outlying regions,
bring them to the village in an hour or less, and carry them home with
the same facility and expedition at the end of the day. There are a
few cases in which this works very well, and in such cases the consoli-
dated school is a much better solution of the rural-school problem than
is the one-room schoolhouse. On the other hand, in the great majority
of townships such a practice means hardship to the children. It means
that the young people with growing famihes of children will move
out of town, and do move out of town, and that others will not come
in. Consequently the economic basis of the whole social fabric, in-
cluding the school system, falls to pieces.

Furthermore, the transportation system under such conditions
gets so complicated that it is beyond the capacity of the average local
board of officers to manage. They easily fall into ways of paying
parents for carrying their own children to school, and this often leads
to the said parents holding up the town for what is substantially a
rake-off. Furthermore, it must be remembered that the one-room
school, in a wholesome and sanitary building, with a course of study
adapted to the conditions, with a daily time-table arranged as it can
very easily be arranged so as to be manageable, with a trained teacher
in service, is a very much better, because a very much more flexible,
institution than the so-called graded school, which is a city device
with its lock-step and general overloading with system and rigidity.

So this department is advocating to-day, for the conditions in this
state, the following plan: A thoroughly good one-room school within
walking distance of as many children as possible, with a course of
study which will keep the children there as long as is consistent with
their continued progress, and a secondary school within driving dis-
tance of as many children as possible. We are now just beginning to
work into an occasional one-room school an adaptation of the junior
high school.

It ought to be said, however, that the principles which I have
suggested above are very largely dependent upOn the peculiar topog-

THE DimCULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 483

raphy of this region and the peculiar conditions of its settlement.
I should expect to find somewhat similar conditions in parts of your
state, but perhaps not. Certainly in many parts of the west, with its
flat country, rectangular system of highways and scattered population,
I cannot see how they could manage schools effectively in any other
way than through the device af the consolidated school and a trans-
portation system.

Superintendent Francis G. Blair of Illinois has been
good enough to write also at length upon the situation rela-
tive to consolidation in his state and my readers will wel-
come his wise counsel:

The arguments offered against consolidation have usually taken
substantially the following forms:

(i) Consolidation, to be effective, requires that children be trans-
ported in wagons. This presupposes a condition of roads which will
permit of transportation throughout the school year. In Illinois, and
especially through the black belt, the country roads are practically
impassable for loaded wagons during about two months of the school
year. With the coming of hard roads, this objection would entirely
disappear.

(2) The fact that the transporting wagon does not come to the
door of the homes of the children, but picks up the children at certain
points along the main highway, does not impress the parents favora-
bly. They feel that it will require as much care on their part to dress
their children and send them to a certain point on the highway as it
would to dress them so that they may walk to the near-by school.
This objection, while not a serious one, has a great deal to do in de-
termining the attitude of the parents.

(3) A great many parents who have had no experience whatever
in the transporting of children in wagons see all sorts of dangers in
such an arrangement. They know how difficult it is for the teacher
to control the children in the schoolroom. They cannot understand
how the driver of a wagon can control a group of those children under
such circumstances as will obtain in a wagon traveUing along the
country road. These fears can only be allayed by the presentation of
a sufficient amount of evidence that no serious disorders arise out of
this plan.

My own belief is, that wherever the people of a large community
have become conscious of their community interests and community
needs and are sufficiently committed to a community programme to

484 THE CONSOLIDATED RITRAL SCHOOL

give assurance of success, in such a community a consolidated school
is not only possible, but desirable. Those who would use the consoli-
dated school as an instrument for community soHdarity have much on
their side. The serious objection to it is, that there must be a cer-
tain amount of concord before the school can be established, and a
very great degree of it in order that the school may be continued.

Misconception a Factor. — To be sure, a great many
objections to transportation are raised that have their
existence only in the imaginations of the people, particu-
larly of the mothers. For example, mothers wonder what
would become of their children if they should fall ill while
so far from home. Nobody will blame a mother for feeling
such anxiety as this about her children. Of course, in the
best managed consolidated schools provisions are made
for the care of any who may fall ill while at school, and usually
it is possible for the driver to take such pupils home im-
mediately, with less danger than if a sick child should un-
dertake to walk home from a school a half-mile away. But
the mother cannot at first see just how this could be pos-
sible. She is especially anxious about her children, if she
does not happen to know, and have confidence in, the
principal and teachers of the school, and the driver of the
wagon.

In the colder climates parents fear that their children
will suffer from the cold while in transit, or while waiting
for the wagon or bus. And, indeed, unless proper precau-
tions are taken such fear may be well founded. There are,
of course, suitable devices for warming and ventilating the
conveyances, and where these devices are installed there
can be no serious danger to the children's health, certainly
not so much danger as would be the case where the children
walk muddy, snowy roads, or trudge through the rain.
Nevertheless, it is not an easy matter to convince parents
that this is so. And suitable little storm protectors may be
built with a few boards at the end of the customary lane
where the children wait for the wagon. to appear. How-

THE DirnCULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 485

ever, it has been found that such vehicles seldom vary
more than five minutes from schedule, much less time than
it would take to trudge to the abandoned one-room school
over muddy or snowy roads through sleet and rain.

The attempt to transport children too far is another
serious danger of the transportation of pupils. In a level
country, where roads are good enough to transport by means
of the auto-bus, fifteen or twenty miles may not be too
far to transport the children. But where hills and ravines
have to be crossed, and where wagons or vans have to be
drawn by horses or mules, three or four miles may really
be a pretty long route. The late Doctor N. C. Schaeffer of
Pennsylvania stated: "Auto- vans should bring the children
to school within an hour after they leave home. The plan
does not work well when children must leave home before
daybreak and return home after dark.'' I am sure we all
agree with Doctor Schaeffer. And no one can fairly blame
parents for objecting to any plan that puts so much hardship
upon the mother as getting the children ready to start to
school as early as that. Furthermore, under these condi-
tions the children are unable to help their parents in the
least with the chores about the home.

Bad Roads a Bar. — I have referred only indirectly to
perhaps the most serious difficulty of all, namely, bad roads.
Transportation cannot be successfully effected except by
trolley or railroad, unless the public highways are in fairly
good condition. They may not necessarily be hard roads,
but they must, at any rate, be passable with a loaded wagon.
I am convinced that a great many mistakes have been
made by undertaking to transport children over almost im-
passable roads. Consolidation projects are usually boosted
at the time of year when the roads are at their best, with
the result that when winter comes on and the roads get at
their worst the troubles begin in earnest, and the plan is
then laid open to serious criticism. It has been found that
consolidation of schools helps to promote the improvement

486 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of the roads, and doubtless there are many such cases on
record, but if one is charged with the responsibility of a con-
solidation project, he would prefer to have the roads in
fairly good condition before the consolidation took place.
Afterward, consolidation could be made a great means of im-
proving them still further.

Pupils' Conduct on the Road. — Fear of bad conduct
among the children while being transported is another
difficulty to be met. Parents are not willing at first to re-
pose the same confidence in the driver of the conveyance
that they have been accustomed to place in the teachers.
And unless boards of education are very careful in selecting
drivers there may be sufficient grounds to justify the fears
that naturally arise in the minds of parents. This mis-
giving is the more plausible because of the existence of
different classes, even of different races, in almost every
community. Some parents do not want their children to
be so closely associated with certain other children as
travelHng together in a closed wagon or van would make
necessary.

I mention these contingencies not because I believe
that many of them may not be successfully met, particularly
if sufficient time be given, but because I regard them as
some of the real prejudices against the consoUdated school.
To many persons they may seem, indeed, to be minor
difficulties. But I would remind them that these are pre-
cisely the points that parents are most likely to pick out as
the most serious obstacles. For they think most seriously
of the things which touch them personally through their
children, and in the homes. They are points which must
not be treated lightly, or with indifference. The transporta-
tion of pupils, I repeat, may present the greatest difficulties
to be met by the consolidated school.

3. The Added Expense. — The increased cost of the con-
solidated school over the one-teacher schools is another
consideration of serious danger to the success of the rural

THE DIFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 487

consolidated school. In almost every community there are
a few citizens who object strenuously to any proposition
which would probably increase their taxes. These persons
may be outvoted or overruled in the decision of a com-
munity to consoUdate its schools, but they stand ready at
all times to ''strike back'* at the majority by finding fault
with the consoHdation plan. This attitude of the mi-
nority toward the increase in tax rates for the support of the
school, no matter what the increased advantages purchased,
is a constant source of danger to any consolidation project.
Persons who take this attitude must be reasoned with,
and this can be done only by finding ways of convin(;ing
them that their money is really yielding them and the com-
munity greater returns in terms of educational facilities.
And this cannot be done by merely telling them of the
advantages of the new over the old. They must be shown.
Pictures, stereopticon views, moving pictures, and the like
can, of course, add to the concreteness of the propaganda.
The U. S. Bureau of Education will lend slides for a stere-
opticon. Later, their interest must be aroused by deeds,
not by preachments.

Consolidated Schools Generally More Expensive. — I
am assuming, of course, that the consohdated school is
going to cost more than did the one-teacher schools which
have not been consolidated. My position on this question
may be open to question. For example, Major A. C. Mona-
han, in his bulletin on "Consolidation of Rural Schools,"
published by the United States Bureau of Education in
1 9 14, puts it this way:

Experience in consolidated schools proves conclusively that the
cost of education per child per day in such schools as a rule is much
less than in one-teacher schools, provided that largely increased salaries
are not paid to the teachers in the consolidated schools. The consoli-
dated school may be, and usually is, made more expensive, due to the
fact that consolidation follows an educational awakening which de-
mands not so much centralization of buildings as the educational ad-

488 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

vantages made possible through centraHzation: Longer terms, better
equipment, trained teachers, supervising principals, and the addition
of high-school grades.

But it is evident that it is necessary to pay higher
salaries in the consolidated school if we would have better
teachers, and that if the consolidated school is going to do
all the things we promise, it will at least have ''longer terms,
better equipment, trained teachers, supervising principals."
For unless such an awakening as Major Monahan describes
does follow or accompany consolidation, it would be doubt-
ful whether the consolidation would be of itself worth the
trouble and expense which are required to establish and
maintain it.

In the same bulletin Major Monahan reproduces statis-
tics taken from the report of the State Superintendent of
Indiana for 191 2, from which he deduces the following:

The cost of schooling per child, when the expense of transportation
is not included, is $2.42 greater in the district schools than in the
consolidated schools, showing that the district schools are not as eco-
nomical, as far as the cost of education itself is concerned, as the con-
solidated schools. When the transportation is included, however, the
consolidated schools cost $12.81 more than the district schools.

This point is not entirely conclusive. Of course, the
actual teaching would cost more for sixty children in six
separate schools than it would if these sixty children were
taught by two teachers in a two-room consolidated school.
But if consolidation means also transportation of pupils,
then we must include the item of transportation in our
budget of expenses. Likewise, we must include the items of
the teaching of special subjects, higher salaries for trained
teachers, modern equipment, and all things else that go
with a modern consolidated school. As to equipment,
modern practice demands a well with a force pump, base-
ment, pressure tank, indoor toilets, drinking fountains,
cesspool or septic tank, etc., at every school. To make

THE DITFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 489

really modern the single-room schools will cost far more than
one new consolidated building.

My conclusion is, therefore, that the consolidated school
will cost more than the present one-teacher schools left as
they are. We shall then have to prove to the people that
our new plan is better than the old. This we can do (a) by
everlastingly '^making good'' with the children them-
selves, and (b) by making the consolidated school a social
centre for the whole community.

Making good with the children is discussed in the fol-
lowing paragraphs, and since a separate chapter of this
book is devoted to the social and recreational activities of
the consolidated rural school, we shall let this consideration
pass at this time with a mere statement.

4. The Character of the Teaching. — There seems to be
a tendency among many to criticise the character of the
teaching in many consolidated schools. The consolidated
school is essentially a rural school. Therefore, its teaching
should be closely correlated with rural Hfe, particularly with
the life of the immediate community. Furthermore, if the
teaching be correlated, then the teachers must have knowl-
edge and appreciation not only of the philosophy of rural
hfe and its conditions, but also of the rural people them-
selves, their outlook upon life and upon the world, their
attitude toward the city, their habits of thought, their tra-
ditions, their occupations, and their prejudices. The con-
solidated school is not merely a city-graded school set up
in the country, but a new and separate institution, having
new and different opportunities, responsibilities, and de-
mands.

Doctor Thos. E. Finegan of Pennsylvania expresses this
sentiment forcibly in a letter dated December 11, 191 6:

Simply consolidating schools does not make good schools. If
schools are consolidated, qualified teachers must be employed, and the
work of the school must be adapted to the needs of the community.
Our experience is that when the farmers realize that the school is an

490 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

asset to the farm, that it is preparing the boys and girls for farm work
and home work, and that the school is actually related to the life and
work of the farm, improving rural conditions, increasing the bulk of
the farm crops, and rendering many other benefits, the school will be
well supported. However, if poor teachers are employed, if the same
old courses of study are continued, and if all the sins and shortcomings
of the one-room school are continued in the larger school, on an en-
larged plan, the school will be properly condemned.

Superintendent C. H. Lugg of South Dakota expresses
the same sentiment in his letter of December 13, 191 6:

This school should be distinctively a rural school dealing with
rural motives, rural conditions, rural topics, and rural life in general.
There is danger that much of the good work the school ought to do
will be spoiled by the introduction of city ideals, city motives, and
commercial training for which the children are not yet prepared.

The chief difficulty lies in getting the proper equipment to begin
with, and then in securing teachers trained for, and experienced in,
rural-school work.

The principal shortcoming is an outgrowth of both the conditions
just mentioned. It is the introduction of city ideals under the guise
of culture, while instead of culture, the thing introduced is an arti-
ficial glamour that does not really exist in the city, but which tends to
render the country pupil dissatisfied with country life, and to make him
blind to the great opportunities which lie round about that life, op-
portunities for culture of no less degree than the city can ofifer, oppor-
tunities for enterprise that excel anything the city can ofifer, oppor-
tunities for real living which the city will never know.

Mr. J. A. Woodruff, State Inspector of Rural Schools
of Iowa, says:

We are meeting with some difficulty in securing a sufficient num-
ber of men who seem to have the proper view-point. There seems to
be a danger that young men who have had their preparation along
classical lines will emphasize this line of work to the detriment of sub-
jects usually classed as practical.

These statements, coming from such authorities as they
do, are significant to those of us who have the responsi-
bility of directing the work and general character of the

THE DIFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 49 1

consolidated school. In general, it seems that unless the
consolidated school can be made a different school from the
city ward school, thoroughly organized to achieve a different
purpose, then we had better not abandon the Httle rural
school. And unless the teachers have the view-point of
the rural people among whom they work, or unless they can
acquire this view-point quickly, then the consolidated rural
school will probably be in effect a failure, even though it
may continue to work indefinitely.

Dearth of Trained Rural Leaders a Handicap. — Perhaps
the most serious difficulty of the consolidated schools, so
far as the character of the work is concerned, is the dearth
of trained rural leaders to put in charge of them. If only
the principals of these schools were properly trained, this
dif&culty would be very largely removed. For the prin-
cipal has an opportunity to train the other teachers, or to
eliminate and select until he shall have built up a strong
corps of teachers who understand the very hearts of the
country people, and the soul of the school itself. But if
there be no leader of this kind, who can direct and redirect
the policy and work of the school in accordance with its
responsibilities, then the situation is pretty nearly hope-
less.

The departments of education in State universities and
the State normal schools have a grave responsibility at this
point, which, I think we must admit, is not met in every
instance. We may not hope that all of the teachers can
be trained in universities and normal schools. But we may
well expect that these institutions will give a little more
attention to the training of rural leaders, who may in turn
train the teachers under their direction, and at the same time
lead the people of the rural communities to a better under-
standing both of the conditions surrounding them and of
the opportunities that are theirs, if only they know how to
take advantage of them. However, it is encouraging to
note that more than formerly these State institutions are

492 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

undertaking to do just this thing, and, indeed, with fine
results.

As has already been stated, the consolidated school is
essentially a rural institution. Its primary aim is to train
for country living. But there seems to be a sentiment
among many rural life leaders that in many instances this
aim is not followed; that instead of training for country
Hfe, the consolidated school trains away from the country
to the city. This sentiment is expressed by State Rural
School Inspector W. S. Dakin, of Connecticut, in the fol-
lowing statement of the dangers, difficulties, and shortcom-
ings of the consolidated school:

Tendency to arouse love for excitement and stimulate interests
that draw children from the home toward the town and city, this par-
ticularly true of upper grade and high-school students.

Tendency to cause concentration of homes in the community.
The estabhshed poHcy of transportation is Hable to result in a move-
ment from back farms to those on the transportation lines or actually
in the central village, and discouragement of purchase of farms where
children will have long distances to travel.

I believe that in this latter point, the tendency toward concen-
tration, lies one of the most serious objections to the consolidation of
rural schools. It touches on a matter of vital economic and political
significance. We lament the growth of city and town life, and yet
by the rigid enforcement of state-wide compulsory attendance laws,
and the transportation of children to large centres through consolida-
tion of schools, we are quietly but most assuredly depopulating country
districts, drawing in the outsiders who might and should remain in
the rural districts.

The policy which induces the railroad to run hnes into open
country as a preparation for settlement might well be followed by
state school systems through the establishment in remote districts
of excellent, well-equipped schools, these to be placed not according
to the actual enrollment at the present time, but according to the
general economic possibilities of the section. Only in that way will
people ambitious for the welfare of their children be induced to occupy
lands remote from live cities and villages. We have brought to them
the rural free delivery and the telephone, but have taken away a
highly-prized privilege, good local schools.

Students in costumes for a play which they produced in connection with
their graduation exercises, Manila, P. I.

Float representing the San Andres primary school in the floral parade, Philip-
pine carnival, Manila, 1915. Freed from many hampering traditions rural
education in the Philippines has made great progress

THE DIFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 493

The Little Country School Still Has Friends.— There is
danger also of attaching too much importance to the con-
solidated school as compared with the one-teacher schools.
I think very few students of rural-school organization fail
to recognize that the consolidated school, if properly di-
rected, is a better school than the average one-teacher school,
if for no other reason than the better facilities for teaching.
But since the advent of the consolidated school, the one-
teacher school has lost caste. We are apt to do and say
things to discredit it. As a result, the people come to be-*
lieve that their little school doesn't amount to much.
Teachers do not like to teach in a school which has fallen
into disrepute. But this type of school still has many
friends, and if we say too harsh things about it in our praise
of the consolidated school, these friends of their little school
may "strike back" hard at the newer t3rpe of school.

Furthermore, we must be mindful that the little country
schools far outnumber the consolidated schools, and will
continue to do so for many years to come. There are thou-
sands of one-teacher schools where there are only hundreds
of consoHdated schools. So long as the proportion is so
largely in favor of the little country schools, it behooves us
as leaders to have due regard for its rights and true recog-
nition both of its achievements and of its possibilities.

The Small Graded School. — Up to this point we have
constantly had in mind the consolidated school which has
been composed of several one-teacher country schools,
whose children are now being transported to the central
school. There is another type of consolidated school which,
in mountainous sections and in thickly settled communities,
may more nearly meet the real needs than the larger school
where transportation is provided. This is the graded school
of from two to four teachers, where all the pupils are so
situated that they can walk to the central school with a dis-
tance of not over about two miles. Some boards of educa-
tion have been trying to accommodate every family in their

494 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

districts, and have gone on building one-teacher schools
almost without number. Now we understand, and the
people pretty well understand, that there is a decided ad-
vantage in so organizing a school that one teacher shall
have not over three grades. It is comparatively easy for
rural people to understand what is meant when one explains
that no teacher can teach well the eight grades of the ele-
mentary school, and that the work can be done very much
better by two, three, or four teachers, each having from two
to three grades. It is also easy for them to see that one or
two miles is not too far for the youngsters to walk. This
proposition appeals to the people very much more strongly
than the proposition of establishing a large consolidated
school and hauling the children from three to five or six
miles at public expense.

Under such conditions it may also be possible to have
the older children go to a central school for upper-grade
work and to let the smaller children go to the school of their
respective neighborhoods. In this way the advantages of
a graded school will be gained and no hardships will be in-
flicted upon the little folks who are yet unable to walk to
the central school. In Wayne County, West Virginia, for
example, by petitioning boards of education the people have
secured the consolidation of sixty of their one-teacher
country schools into twenty-eight of these small graded
schools. And there are in the hands of some of the boards
of education petitions which have been waiting their turn
for as many as three or four years. The demand comes
from the people themselves, and the boards of education
have some hard times explaining why they find it necessary
to wait a year or two before the boards can grant their
petitions. A large number of the difficulties of the larger
type of consolidated school are not found in connection
either with the establishing or with the maintenance of
these smaller graded schools. Perhaps a very good way to
effect the more complete form of consolidation is by begin-
ning with the small graded school.

THE DIFFICULTIES OF CONSOLIDATION 495

Perhaps our greatest need in rural education is expert
and sufficient supervision of teachers. In the consolidated
school the principal has this responsibility. But, as shown
in Baltimore County, Md., sufficient expert supervision
can be had without consolidation.

RESUME

Stated briefly, the practicability of the consolidated rural
school lies in its adaptation to local, or at least sectional,
conditions.

That this type of rural school has its shortcomings ap-
pears to be the sentiment of our rural leaders throughout
the country.

Clearly it has also many dangers in its path, and many
difficulties to be met.

The ability to overcome its shortcomings, once it is
established, depends upon (i) whether it is wise to consoli-
date in the first place, (2) whether the administration of its
affairs is of the highest order, (3) whether its teachers are
persons inspired with the spirit of the country and pre-
pared for this peculiar kind of leadership, and (4) whether
the supervision and leadership which they get is of a high
order.

The consolidation idea is good. If the idea can be
successfully put into practice the country youth who come
under its influence will have such an educational oppor-
tunity as perhaps no other type of school offers. The fol-
lowing chapter takes up some of the leading constructive
features which will make of the consolidated school a real
rural-education plant.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Betts and Hall—" Better Rural Schools," part IV. The Bobbs-

Merrill Co.
Brogden — "Consolidation of Schools and Transportation of Pupils."

Department of Education, Raleigh, N. C.

496 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Burnham— "Two Types of Rural Schools." Teachers' CoUege, Co-
lumbia University.

Foght— "The American Rural School," part XV. The Macmillan
Company.

Knorr — "Consolidated Rural Schools and Organization of a County
System." U. S. Bureau of Education, No. 232.

Monahan — "Consolidation of Schools and Transportation of Pupils
at Public Expense." U. S. Bureau of Education, No. 30.

CHAPTER XXII
THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL

I. The Future of the Consolidated School

The future of the consolidated school is very bright.
It is rapidly winning its way into the hearts of rural people,
and it is each year adding considerably to its efficiency. A
pioneer movement must unfortunately present to people
for their approval only the primary stages of a new devel-
opment. The first automobiles were not highly attractive
and the first consolidated schools were by no means as
efficient and broad in their rural social service as such schools
will in fifty years become. Nine million dollars or more
should annually be spent by the federal government, and
the amounts should be more than equalled by the state
governments in establishing model and experimental con-
solidated schools in various parts of the country, from sea
to sea. From carefully directed experiment, wide and
thorough study of the movement, and from a high class of
inventive genius in the work, we should in a few decades
elaborate a type of consolidated rural school that would
be even more serviceable than the best city schools. The
rural school need prepare for but one principal vocation
in a community, while the city must prepare for very many.
Perhaps the ideal American school to be shown foreign
visitors of the future will be our rural consolidated school.

Roads. — Such a school needs good roads, and it will,
in turn, promote good roads. If the school bus has to
miss reaching the school a week or more each school year
because of the bad roads, the roads are bound to be im-
proved. The consolidated-school centre makes possible

497

498 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

effective public discussion and leadership in getting better
highways. If the snow-drifts bother, snow fences such as
are used along railways will be constructed. If deep mud
stalls the machine, the civics classes will have before them a
good practical problem. Some one has recommended a
kind of military training, without the "gun- to ting" features,
of all boys of high-school age, which will set such young
huskies at healthful labor for the public good. From one
to three months camping out and working in the construc-
tion of good roads each year might be a part of the pro-
gramme with benefit to all. Great national highways and
the principal arteries of transportation might be developed
as by-products of such military, physical, and civic educa-
tion. Let not the lack of the best roads too much retard
the consolidated school.

The consolidated-school plant will be worthy of the
large community which it serves. It will draw its support
from generous State, county, and local funds. Perhaps
federal aid may be also obtained. The assessed valuation
of the community territory will be little less than a half
million dollars, and the school population may confidently
be expected to increase far beyond the present. When
we see populations abroad as great as our own country
living in areas little larger than one or two of our States,
we may expect before long a doubling and a trebling of our
present hundred million population. Because of the grow-
ing high cost of farm products, and the great proportion of
city dwellers, over half of the population, the rural regions,
will get their full share of this increase of population. As
roads and automobiles improve, the distances pupils can
be hauled will be increased and thus double forces will in-
crease consolidated-school attendance.

The Farm. — There will be a farm at the school (i) to
furnish a definite means of keeping the principal and teach-
ers in close touch with farm problems, (2) to provide a de-
sirable addition to what is always the school-teacher's low

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL

499

OO GOAfi.eC OO O OeOCGM)^

bo O OGO«fi.eC»0

s

ib

VlGOABU OAROCM M..M* C ?

c

y . ^

cn

^

,

-Jh-P^i^

if^\

pLULULULU

Bcnmmm

mmmm
bmmmm

nuBCncrs mm*

•conaoLiBATt* • ScKoou ■ Plant

Plan of a twenty-acre site

•fedf

salary, (3) to retain a more permanent teaching force, (4) to
provide for a demonstration farm and home to show what
can be done in the country, (5) to provide for the equivalent
of an agricultural experiment station, (6) to provide homes
for the principal, teachers, janitor, and perhaps other
workers, such as those who drive the cars and work on the

500 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

farm, (7) to provide school gardening and other manual
labor for the children, (8) to provide an athletic, field-day,
picnic, and recreation centre for the community, (9) to pro-
vide grounds for a community fair such as the county fairs
in some sections of the country, and (10) to provide a central
meeting-place for both the people of the village trading-
centre and the farmers, whose interests are mutual, and who
greatly need such a place and excuse for getting together
in a wholesome, interested, co-operative manner.

The school-building will probably be a one-story struc-
ture, with a flat roof, partly lighted from above. It will be
located on the front part of the farm, with its long axis
running north and south to provide east and west Hghting
for the classrooms. Such a structure can be added to at
will, and has many otter advantages in cost, construction,
and adaptability. Sooner or later it will have a good audi-
torium, a first-class gymnasium with showers and a swim-
ming-pool, a good library, study halls probably in con-
nection with the library, a room for a permanent exhibit
of farm products, agricultural, botanical, chemical, and
physical laboratories, domestic science and manual-training
departments, teachers* retiring-rooms, principal's office,
regular classrooms for elementary and high-school pupils,
both groups on the six-six plan, a medical or health room
for the school nurse and county supervisor of health and
physical development, a lunch-room, motion-picture ap-
paratus, and good stage in the auditorium, and other features
as good as those provided as a matter of course in cities.

The Curriculum. — The studies will not be selected be-
cause some European school used them during the last
century, nor because a conservative or reactionary college
requires them for entrance. The passage from the high
school to the State higher institutions will be as simple and
sensible as the passage from the six-year elementary school
to the six-year high school. Neither will the programme
of studies be a cheap imitation of city-school curricula.

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 501

The consolidated school is to win a distinctness and self-
reliance that is based on a clear understanding of its special
function and of how its work should be done. Its text-
books will be written by successful teachers in such schools
who have for a number of years brought together and
psychologically arranged subject-matter that they have
proved hits the mark of the five great aims of rural education.
These texts will provide for much local adaptation and selec-
tion of community problems that especially need solution.
The courses of study will be full of suggestions and methods
of accomplishing and measuring results. It will not be a
bare, skeleton outline of dead subject-matter. In adminis-
tering the course no traditional and vague aims such as
formal discipHne, culture, scholarship, and other unanalyzed
aims either psychologically or sociologically misleading will
govern. Real culture of real rural people will be secured,
but it will not be divorced from the most technical and ex-
acting social efficiency in the rural environment. Neither
will it attempt to lead good prospective farmers and farmers'
wives away from the country by a schooling idealizing
only the overcrowded professions and the rather illusory
successes of city life. It will be a curriculum *^of the people,
for the people, and by the people.''

The drivers of the auto-busses or horse hacks will be
competent, dependable men or women who will, in many
cases, be permanently connected with the school. There
will be a good large garage for all the busses, hacks, horses,
buggies, bicycles, and motorcycles used. We shall not,
until the revised edition of this volume appears, suggest a
hangar for aeroplanes. No machine of man is, however,
being more rapidly developed to-day, and the aeroplane is
not obstructed by "bad roads and high hills." The lunch-
room in connection with the home-economics department of
the school will be used by most of the pupils and teachers
for the midday meal. The electricity used will be produced
in the building if it is not available outside. The heating

502 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

plant of the building will be somewhat separated from the
main building for greater safety from fires. The building
will be fireproof in construction because of the usual total
absence of a convenient or satisfactory fire department in
the small town. About two buildings destroyed by fire a
day is our present rate. Water will be pumped from deep
wells to a reservoir, and plenty of water will be furnished
all parts of the building for drinking-fountains, modern
toilets, cooking, agriculture and botany, drawing, and
other purposes.

The Teachers. — Here, with principal and teachers who
are normal-school and college graduates, thoroughly in
sympathy with and understanding farm life, happy, perma-
nent, and satisfied in their work, with school directors and
patrons who give encouragement rather than knocks, the
great efficiencies demanded by modern democracy will begin
to be developed for the first time in the history of education.
A nation of healthy, happy people, efficient in their voca-
tions, joyous in their avocations, progressive and skilled in
their civic relations, and filled with the social-service spirit,
will be the natural output of the consolidated school of the
future.

To emphasize our previous stress of the importance of a
suitable school plant we add here in closing a farewell word
on:

II. The One-Story School

As previously suggested, the consolidated rural-school
building that is thoroughly adapted to its purposes and
environment will probably be a one-story structure. The
sixteen principles or ** standards " which have been set up
in Chapter IX for such a school, combined with present
theories of lighting, ventilation, class management, and
child hygiene, point inevitably, it seems, to the one-story
type as the best solution. Up to the present, most of the

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 503

one-story school-buildings of any considerable size have
been erected in towns and cities where the cost of the land
is a deterrent factor, and where the building and play-
ground must in most cases conform to the shape and narrow
confines of a city block. In numerous instances not even
a full block (around 300 feet square) is acquired for both
building and playground. Nearly all the leading school
architects have made their inventions within such limi-
tations, and their buildings, although very suggestive, are
practically never suitable for rural conditions.

Out in the open country or near a rural village or town
where land is not divided into blocks, and where the land
cost is relatively a minor matter, the one-story school-build-
ing can grow naturally into the form best calculated to meet
the many requirements of twentieth-century rural hygiene
and rural education. The best one-story schools so far
erected in cities have many points of superiority over the
higher buildings with basements. But if a one-story build-
ing with proposed extensions robs children of needed play-
ground space, the city may well use the two-story-with-
basement type. If one will examine critically a number of
the best one-story buildings in cities or the plans which are
published, he will note a more crowded-together structure
than is desirable for the best ventilation by natural means.
And natural means of ventilation for a number of reasons
are, and will be, used much of the year in most schools,
especially in mild, warm, and summer weather. A country
consolidated school will, at the least, use its auditorium once
a week for community gatherings throughout the summer.
It would not be good economy to start the fans running
for the building or the assembly-room alone if this expense
could be avoided by wise provisions in building plans.

In these one-story buildings in cities, the auditorium-
gymnasium wing is usually built up against the corridors
of the end wings of the prevalent E-type building. This
construction cuts this middle wing off from exposure to the

504 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

breeze, except above the level of the classrooms, and means,
when fans are not running, dead air and a stagnation of ven-
tilation. For a community motion-picture or other meet-
ing, in the spring and summer especially, this plan would
be bad, resulting in all the evils of *' stuffy rooms.'' Some
of these country buildings are used, as they should be, for
community, non-sectarian ethical, social, and religious
meetings on Sunday throughout the year, as described in
Chapter XII. In the South and Far West it is especially
necessary to secure at all times free cross-ventilation, and
even with this, overhead, large-bladed fans in constant
motion are quite frequently needed. In the tropics they
are indispensable for effective educational work.

As permanent fixtures in warm climates, the writer has
seen the possible beneficent influence of auditorium meet-
ings of many kinds ruined by surrounding this middle
wing on three sides with a two-story structure even as far
away as forty feet, leaving a considerable patio on either
side. Were it not for the severe winters of many of our
States, and for the fact that school boards are beginning to
show hygienic good sense in installing and running fans,
either local for each room or one for the entire building, in
mild and warm weather, it would, indeed, be a good plan
to get the auditorium-gymnasium-library-lunchroom wing
out entirely free from any obstructions to the natural ven-
tilating forces in devising a common, standard type of build-
ing. Even though the auditorium group is two stories in
height, and the upper part of the high rooms is above the
rest of the structure, this is not suj65cient. Neither is a
narrow patio, or court, on either side enough. Probably
not less than thirty to forty feet of open space, measuring
from the inside corridors to the central wing of the E type,
on either side, will be found necessary with one-story class-
rooms. An alternative type of building would be one in
the shape of the letter U, with the auditorium group making
the junction along the front between the two end wings of

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 505

classrooms. How to make this architecturally attractive
might be somewhat of a problem, but it can be solved.

The single row of classrooms, flanked by a corridor
which may, if necessary, be enclosed in glass in severe
weather, and left quite open like an ordinary porch with
colonnade the remainder of the year, is desirable largely
for ventilation reasons, although it has its educational
advantages. The ordinary building with two parallel rows
of classrooms and a corridor between, lacks the means of
cross-ventilation, especially when there are no windows
opening from classrooms into the hall. In such a building
it is highly desirable to have above the blackboards, under
easy control by teachers, a row of single-sash windows open-
ing into the corridor. In many cases it has been found
desirable to cut such windows through these walls after
buildings conforming to the old standard of unilateral
lighting (and ventilation) have been erected. We have
contended in the American School Board Journal, The
A merican Journal of School Hygiene, and elsewhere for some
time that unilateral ventilation is, for much of the year,
in the typical school, exceedingly poor ventilation, since it
does not provide for circulation by cross-currents of air.
In most unilaterally lighted schools there are great dead-air
spaces in that third of each room at the rear and right of
pupils as seated. Even healthy, vigorous children should not
be compelled to sit in such stagnant, "stuffy'' air. In many
cases it will be found that teachers have more or less vaguely
sensed this condition, and have adjusted pupils to it. In
many cases the pupils in this third of the room are occasion-
ally blamed for listlessness or other symptoms of bad ven-
tilation when they would show no such symptoms if changed
to the front of the room where the windows on one side
and the door on the right front leading to the hall make a
cross-current of air. Teachers should demand windows
above the blackboard on the hall side under such conditions.
If the unilateral-lighting fad which has been so dogmatically

5o6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

standardized by administrators and theorists more efficient
in issuing edicts and ** standards" than in doing construc-
tive thinking and inventing must be followed, a second door
should also be added opening into the corridor near the
rear of the room in order to save the health of pupils much
of each year when fans are not running. One door near the
front with windows above the right-hand blackboard would,
for many reasons of hygiene and class management, be
preferable. With such high windows and with both windows
and a door on the left of pupils we have the best features of
an open-air school.

III. Advantages and Special Features

Some of the principal advantages and special features
of the one-story consolidated school may here, for brevity,
be stated numerically. Only the leading features will be
noted which apply especially to the consolidated rural
school. The matter has been dealt with briefly in Chapter
IX. The accompanying floor plan is based on these prin-
ciples, and would, if ably followed and adopted, to a large
extent bring about the following advantages and condi-
tions:

I. Greater safety from fire and panic is provided than in
buildings with two or more stories and basements. In
the country, without skilled fire-fighting agencies close at
hand, this precaution is fundamental. All walls and floors
can easily be made fireproof. No space is left for wood
construction or combustibles below the children, since there
is no basement, and the main floors may be made of con-
crete on a cinder or other filling. In classrooms this con-
crete floor may by proper prearrangements be covered
with ordinary wooden flooring. Each classroom has exits
directly to the playground {a) through a door on the left
of the pupils as seated, {h) through the door and corridor
into the court on the right, or {c) out of the windows scarcely

CONSOUDATn) ?URAL SCHOOL BaHlHW ai» COMMUNITr OKTrR

507

5o8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

four feet above the ground on the left. Such a sufficiency
of exits would meet the most stringent fire regulations of
cities, and would serve several other functions besides.
The short jump from the windows should be without in-
jurious effects to most country children, especially where
effective gymnasium training has contributed to agility,
hardihood, and courage in jumping such a slight distance.
Plentiful exits from the assembly wing can also easily be
provided, opening into the courts on either side.

The heating plant would be in a separate fireproof
room at the rear of the building, or separated, as in the
writer's floor plan presented later.

There is no good reason why most such schools should
not be built almost entirely of concrete. Farm people
to-day need constant building object-lessons in the use of
this indispensable ally of the progressive agriculturist. A
standard type of building such as is here suggested could be
designed, steel or cast plates made for it, and these moved
to different parts of a State whenever such a building was
to be erected. The concrete could be poured into the
moulds formed with such plates, and the latter would be
practically indestructible. Sand, gravel, and rock for crush-
ing are usually convenient, either on or beneath the surface
of the ground. In any event, complete plans and speci-
fications for such model, indestructible buildings should be
available free of charge at the office of the State Superin-
tendent of Education.

2. Overhead lighting can be provided for all classrooms.
Devices for such lighting have been perfected until it is
now safe to recommend the system strongly. The dangers
of rain coming in, of snow and dirt obstructing the light,
of too much light and heat, and of high winds or tornadoes
tearing off the apparatus, have all been successfully obvi-
ated. Window space should not be lessened because of such
top lighting, since windows are still necessary for ventila-
tion. There is danger of overlooking this- point, as demon-

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 509

strated by a number of ''closed-air chambers" constructed
as classrooms by men who considered the overhead lighting
sufficient, as it may have been as lighting only, but who
overlooked the needs of children for air-currents, "the breath
of Hfe," which can only be satisfied in most schools by
means of windows. Even closed windows with the constant
and never-failing use of central or local fans, either by
the recirculation method or that of introducing constantly
''fresh" air from outside, have other reasons against them
than those of economy. The writer is very much in favor
of wide-spread and scientific experiments with recirculation,
using the same air over and over again, with only such re-
plenishing as may come by opening doors, by leaks, and by
percolation through walls, coupled with a good fan system
and supplemented by an effective air-moistening and clean-
ing chamber. But he would not advocate erecting buildings
with few side-wall windows as if fhis principle had been
scientifically proved desirable, and its cost were inconsidera-
ble as compared with" natural ventilation at least part of
the year. Both are desirable.

The saw-tooth plan of overhead lighting used by Perkins
seems to be satisfactory for Eastern towns, but would prove
bad in a Western cyclone or very high wind. His plan
of controlling the amount of light from overhead by means
of hinged metal planes hanging from the ceiling under full
and easy control by the teacher seems successful. A teacher
may cut off the direct rays of the sun, let in a small or large
amount of light, or cut off all light when a stereopticon or
other similar instrument necessitating darkness is used.
This overhead system need not, of course, cover the en-
tire ceiling. A few large windows above the pupils in the
rear, right-hand corner will be sufficient. On a dark cloudy
day such supplementary light is a great vision saver. And
it may here be repeated that defects of vision, like cases of
tuberculosis, seem to increase, according to Ayres (but not
Kerr), in frequency as we go upward through the grades

5IO THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

and years of school life. In the accompanying plan, the
location of the skylight in each room is roughly indicated
by a rectangle drawn on the floor plan. We have placed
the top-lighting arrangements in a pitched roof. A flat
roof is usually very bad in overheating the classrooms in
hot weather. The space under the pitched roof should be
kept open by ventilators in warm and hot weather.

Top lighting frees us also to some extent from the rule
that usually the classroom windows at the left of the pupils,
for the sake of some sunlight each day, with its cheer and
disinfection, should face either east or west. This innova-
tion thus leaves us freer to make the building front toward
any point of the compass. If we wish the front where chil-
dren are loaded and unloaded from transportation vehicles
to be free as possible from severe winds and accumulated
snow, we can have it facing the south or east. We have
placed it torward the south. This has the advantage of
having the heating plant on the north, and helps in forcing
the air through the ducts toward the south, a "well-known
principle in our latitude. Orientation, usually a very im-
portant and much-neglected factor, is not so great an item
with this plan of lighting. For securing cheerful rooms,
and for the disinfecting influence of sunlight, it would of
course be desirable to have the two long wings of class-
rooms extend north and south, even with overhead lighting,
but this principle may now with more impunity be disre-
garded. We have all classrooms facing either east or west.
The physics and corner elementary room, which may be
used as a kindergarten, have also some south light. These
rooms and others on the front may be top lighted, as may
all others.

If the front of the building embraced several classrooms,
and the wings extended southward to secure east and west
sunlight from the side %vindows each day, these front class-
rooms would have principally north light, except for the
overhead lighting. If the front were faced south these

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 5II

rooms would have principally south lighting, which would
make it necessary to have shades covering windows much
of each day, and interfering with window ventilation.
With dark-green shades the room would thus be too dark,
except for the overhead lighting. Translucent tan shades
should be used. Windows may be made impervious to
glare by using proper glass. If the covered driveway is
extended along the entire front as a portico, corridor, or
porch, or if there are the driveway and right and left porches,
the latter would act as an awning to the southern rays of
the sun. The south is a better front than the north from
the standpoint of the transportation of pupils in winter in
the northern portions of our country, but not from the
standpoint of direct sunlight much of the time in classrooms,
to be avoided only by special devices such as a porch,
awnings over windows, selected glass or glass coating, or
shades covering the windows much of the time.

For the E type of building, the south exposure has a
disadvantage in that it places the open end of the courts
and corridors to the north. In our northern States and
Canada, such a frontage would probably mean drifts of
snow filling the corridors part of the year. Our plan shown
here has the E form much modified by the rear corridor,
which is partially closed, and would cut off drifts. If a
north exposure is chosen, the skylights of the classrooms on
this front may be made larger than those on the side wings.
In the plan here submitted for criticism and suggestion,
we have placed the front toward the north, eliminated class-
rooms here by putting in offices and other rooms, and have
flanked much of the front with a covered driveway for the
protection of pupils. The room marked post-office may be
used as a classroom. The possibilities of a building in the
country with overhead lighting must be given careful
study, and will only be disclosed after considerable such
investigation and the erection of a number of experimental
buildings in different parts of the country. Some means

512 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of collating and disseminating the results of such experience
nationally should be devised by some national committee,
or government bureau. To give the children in the elemen-
tary school (first six years) the advantage of east light the
elementary and high-school wings should be reversed.

3. A more educationally elective classroom may by over-
head lighting easily be provided with advantage to the
entire school. The unilateral-lighting standard, seemingly
so easily enforced on American city schools of recent date,
and many in the country, has made as a necessary con-
comitant a long, narrow classroom from front to rear.
Since light will not penetrate well for reading beyond twenty
feet on most days of the school year, rooms have been stand-
ardized little wider than this, say twenty-two to twenty-
four feet, the right-hand row of pupils sitting about three
feet from the wall. In order to seat some thirty to forty-
eight pupils, this room must be quite long, similar to store-
rooms with narrow frontage in cities. This type of room
provides about six long rows of pupils in a room about
thirty- two feet in length. Such long rows of pupils are by
no means as easy to teach and manage as shorter rows,
with pupils nearer to the teacher and the front blackboard,
on which much of the class work is written. Vision defects
among as many frequently as one-fifth of the pupils compli-
cate the difficulty. Large pupils must be placed in the
rear or sides to prevent their obstructing the vision of smaller
children sitting behind them. The pupils in the rear of the
room are very commonly out of range of the teacher's per-
sonality, which is frequently of short range, especially
among the novices employed at starvation salaries in most
country and village schools. Even the voice of the aver-
age woman teacher hardly carries well this distance. The
magnetism of the teacher's presence, if she has any, should
reach all pupils, and pervade the entire room. No pupil
should feel that he is merely sitting on the bleachers or side-
lines watching the real game from afar. Thus the long room

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 513

forced upon us by the evanescent god of unilateral lighting
and ventilation has many shortcomings.

Then, further, many schools have two or more groups of
pupils in a room who must be taught separately. Where
there are mid-year promotions, pupils of the same grade
are in groups a half year apart in advancement. They can
recite together in but a few subjects. Then, too, it is very
common in the ordinary small school to have pupils in one
room of two entirely different grades, separated by a full
year of study from each other, a fifth and sixth grade, for
example, and there may, in small schools, be three grades
in a room, say fourth, fifth, and sixth. Four principal ways
of having these different groups recite without disturbing
the others in the room have been devised. The old front
recitation-bench has about disappeared from graded schools.
The separate recitation-room, too, is little used for ele-
mentary children to-day. The plan of having pupils who
are to recite take the seats in the front half of the room,
while the occupants of these seats move back, has too many
disadvantages to be seriously considered, although seem-
ingly used successfully by a few teachers in graded schools.
The almost universal practice in good schools is that of
having the pupils sit in right and left groups, extending to
the rear of the room.

But these three long rows of pupils strung out down a
long room can scarcely be called groups. They are tenuous
lines, too long for an audience or reciting group on either
side of the room; the two or more groups are too close to-
gether to avoid disturbing each other; and are well arranged
and seated to destroy attention and interest. The room
is about wide enough for one group if it is at the front of
the room, as shown by those teachers who have hit on the
device of having front and rear sections with a movement
of all pupils between recitations. This disturbance with its
carrying of books, forgetting of pencils and books, the
bothering of other pupils' property in the desks, and other

514 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

features, shows the trouble teachers in many such long rooms
are willing to take to get a compact reciting group near the
front of the room.

The whole diificulty is easily solved by left-hand, over-
head, and right-hand lighting, as above described. The
limitation on the width of the room is immediately removed,
and the length may be greatly shortened. Probably a
complete reversal of the dimensions and the invention of
the wide-short classroom is the remedy "we long have sought
and mourned because we found it not." A room thirty to
thirty-two feet wide, and twenty-four to twenty-eight feet
from front to rear, keeping the area about 750 square feet
for forty pupils, makes possible two real groups of pupils,
one on the right and one on the left. With the pupils
brought forward, the teacher will no longer need to "screech,"
one of the common diseases of schools. Her pupils will be
near, even those at extremes of right and left. There is
more space for large pupils in the rear; there is a much
longer blackboard in front; there is a much longer space for
a cloak-room in front or rear. By placing the blackboard
in the rear, by the Perkins plan, the width of two doors
may be added to the front blackboard. We have thought
that the advantage of somewhat easier supervision of a
front blackboard by the teacher might offset the loss of
blackboard space. Yet the rear cloak-room, as Perkins has
devised it, may be better.

The old-style long classroom, with a wardrobe of six
to eight feet in width on the end, necessitates a very long
school-building, depending upon the number of rooms.
With a one-story building and a single row of classrooms on
either of two wings, the building may become, with large
numbers of pupils, interminably long, and thus almost as
inconvenient as stairs and second floors and basements.
The wide-short classroom abbreviates the building consid-
erably, and thus obviates this disadvantage of extreme
length. Other advantages of this new type of classroom,

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 515

yet to be constructed, will occur to all who have had con-
siderable experience in practical education.

4. Ventilation will he improved and heating will be
easier. The advantages of the one-story building of this
character with respect to ventilation are evident. A door
on either side of the classroom means cross-ventilation, at
least at the front of the room where the doors are opposite.
Single-sash windows above the blackboard on the right
greatly increase cross-ventilation, and these can remain
open much of the times when fans are not running, since
there is no classroom of pupils across the hall to disturb, and
the corridor roof shelters from strong winds, direct sunlight,
and rain. The vents in the skylight may be opened at
will to permit escape of heated air, and the plentiful windows
on the left, even with a shorter room, let in plenty of air-
currents when any are stirring outside. High windows on
the rear may be put into such rooms as open thus to the
outer air. They may or may not be used in the front cor-
ner rooms of the accompanying plan. They are not essen-
tial here and would interfere with the symmetry of the
front of the building. With movable seats the elementary
corner room may well have long windows on the north,
and the physics room likewise. The other rooms should have
full-length windows. Ventilation by fans for each room or
from a central source in the heating plant behind the audi-
torium wing may be as efficient as in a two-story building.
An air-washing room may be connected with the air-heating
C' coils") room, as shown in our plan. The short classroom
leaves less of each room exposed to the outer air to compli-
cate ventilation and heating. Other ventilation advantages
may yet appear. A disadvantage may lie in the difficulty
of forcing air long distances horizontally from a central fan,
but the south frontage facilitates this movement.

5. The one-story plan keeps the auditorium on the ground
level, and makes unnecessary the stair-climbing which is a
disadvantage from many points of view, especially from the
one of public meetings.

5l6 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

6. Dismissal is easier for any room or rooms without dis-
turbance of other classes. In a building containing both
elementary and high-school pupils such mutual disturbance
is easy. In the one-story consolidated building, the high
school, including the seventh and eighth grades, may be in
one wing (west) and the elementary school in the opposite
one beyond the auditorium wing (east), and thus widely
separated. Each classjroom of pupils can be dismissed
directly either into the corridor or to the playground.
The auditorium may as suggested above have a number of
exits into the courts at either side. We have located the
pupils^ toilets in these courts, but the assembly platform is
ventilated by high windows above them. The toilets shown
herewith have full partitions in each, with the doors for the
sexes far apart; and elementary and high-school toilets are
kept on their respective sides of the building.

7. The cost is probably not more than for a two-story type
in spite of the increased advantages. Architect Perkins
has made careful studies of comparative costs of one and
two story structures, and finds the difference usually in
favor of the one-story type, with equivalent facilities. The
elimination of stairways, of thicker walls to support sec-
ond stories, and of expensive fireproofing materials in the
ceiling and roof bring down the cost. The expense of adding
more rooms to the structure when necessary is very much less
than in case of a two-story building, and the resulting ex-
tensions make a harmonious building instead of a disfigure-
ment. All buildings are enormously expensive now, and
this complete building would now cost upward of a hundred
thousand dollars, although it may be built part by part as
needed.

8. This ease of extensions is a point particularly in favor
of the one-story school. The high-school rooms are not the
same size as elementary rooms, being usually smaller.
Fewer rooms at first may be needed by the high school.
But either wing may be any length without injury to the

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 517

plan. The auditorium or gymnasium, with perhaps a com-
bined lunch-room and library, may be erected after the first
rooms if desired. We have unfortunately failed to in-
dicate the swimming-pool in this plan. The lunch-room
space could be used, or it could extend back of the rear cross
corridor, and the other rooms could be set back to the
north farther. It is not necessary or desirable to dig a
basement for it.

9. The elimination of stair-climbing for teachers, pupils,
and patrons should receive separate mention here, although
mentioned above.

10. The greater ease of management of each classroom
and of the building as a whole is obvious. Where pupils
are scattered over two or three floors of a building with the
toilets probably in the basement, the difficulty is great.
The principal's room to the left of the entrance may be made
a part of the library, since he has another room across the
hall.

11. The greater ease of using laboratories and workrooms
for both elementary and high-school pupils is in favor of
the one-story type.

12. Educationally, the rural building should be as close
to outdoor life as possible. Here, in the one-story plan, the
entire school and each classroom is close to nature, and the
latter is very easy of access. In a two-story building
teachers very infrequently or never come down from the
second or third floors to supervise and join in the play of
the children. Where the playground is but a step outside,
hardly any person fit to be a teacher can keep from the
joyous comradeship so helpful for both young and old.
All teachers should go out frequently, as much for the sake
of themselves as for the children. Our building tempts
them into the open.

13. Such a school-building is easier to build for the ordi-
nary contractor obtainable in the country than a two or
more story structure. If concrete is used, and careful plans

5l8 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

and perhaps moulds are furnished, the specifications should
not be hard to follow. Brick also can be used. Some school
boards will be tempted to build a frame structure because
it is cheaper at first, but this temptation should be rigidly
withstood.

14. Protected play spaces for the little children are pro-
vided in the courts, or patios, on either side. Playground
supervision of all pupils is facilitated.

15. Other advantages of the one-story type would
cover such items as freedom from danger of falling from
second-story windows, ease of supervision of classrooms
and auditorium by the principal, ease of getting into the
machine-shop with an auto or tractor to be repaired, free-
dom from carrying things up and down stairs, and less danger
in case of cyclones in the West.

These, then, are some of the principal advantages to be
sought and gained by the one-story rural consolidated school.

IV. Possible Disadvantages

Some of the disadvantages might be greater heat of
classrooms in summer than for first-floor rooms of two-
story buildings if a flat roof is used, which we do not ad-
vocate, somewhat greater difiiculty in forcing heat and air
horizontally instead of upward from a basement as in a two-
story building, greater distance of travel in going about
through the halls, although this is cut down by shorter class-
rooms and a cross corridor from wing to wing between audi-
torium and gymnasium, and perhaps by other means to be
discovered by experience. That the advantages far outweigh
the disadvantages seems to be beyond question, and we have
no doubt that the one-story type will be the prevalent one
for country and village schools of the future. A few further
notes will conclude our examination of this type of building.
More shower-baths than the three here suggested should
be provided. The swimming-pool may take the place of the

THE NEW CONSOLIDATED SCHOOL 519

machine-shop and farm-carpentry room, and these may be
moved farther back. The showers could be placed at one
end. The library and post-office and community exchange
are in front, easy of access to the public. The teachers'
rooms could be placed across the rear corridor from the
pupils' toilets, thus giving more space in front. Folding
gates may be used to shut off classrooms for evening and
Sunday entertainments in the auditorium. The connec-
tions between elementary classrooms may be closets for the
teachers. A number of improvements and refinements will
be suggested, we hope, from time to time.

We may confidently expect great developments of this
style of building in the next two decades. No object is
better worth study, a large use of money, and careful experi-
mentation, than to provide a rural, social, and educational
centre, not only for children and youth, but of all people of
a community. On such centres the future of rural life
largely depends.

Wonderful is the spirit of cooperation and growth,
The consolidating of interests and the hopes of man,
Ideal is the vision of the new rural life,
But it needs must secure a structure and plan.

BIBLIOGRAPHY ON CONSOLIDATION ^

1. Aswell, Jas. B., State Supt. Pub. Ed., Baton Rouge, La.— "The

Consolidation of School Districts, the Centralization of Rural
Schools and the Transportation of Pupils at Public Expense."
Circular of information, 1906.

2. Barrett, Richard C. — 'Consolidation of Schools and Transporta-

tion of Children." Bien. Rep. Supt. Pub. Ins. of Iowa, 1901.

3. Bedichek, Una, and Baskett, Geo. F. — "The Consolidation of

Rural Schools With and Without Transportation." Bull. Univ.
Texas, No. 96, 1907.

4. Biennial report, U. S. Com. of Ed., pp. 2581-4. "Transportation

of Pupils to School." 1899-1900.

5. Carrington, W. T., State Supt. Pub. Schools, Missouri— "The

Rural School Problem." Mo. School Rep., pp. 4-1 1, 1902.

6. "Consolidation of Schools and Transportation of Pupils." U. S.

Com. of Ed. 2:2353-2369, 1902.

7. Connor, R. D. W. — "Improvement in Rural School Houses and

Grounds." Pamphlet, Raleigh, N. C, 1900-1906.

8. Davenport, E. — "Consolidation of Country Schools." Univ.

111. Bull., 1904.

9. Fairchild, E. T., State Supt. of Pub. Ins., Kansas, Ed. Com.

Bull. No. I, 1908.

10. Fall, Delos, Supt. Pub. Ins., Michigan. School Rep., pp. 5-34,

1 901.

11. "Consolidation of Schools." Rep. Supt. of Pub. Ins.,

p. 9, 1902.

iia. Foght, H. W.— "The American Rural School." Macmillan Co.

12. Folsom, Channing — "An Inquiry Concerning the Conveyance

of Scholars in New Hampshire." 51st N. H. School Rep., pp.
271-292, 1899-1900.

13. Fowler, Wm. K. — " The Consolidation of School Districts: the Cen-

tralization of Rural Schools." Pub. by State of Neb. Dept.
Pub. Ins., 1903.

14. Gass, Howard A. — i6th Mo. Rep. of Pub. Schools, 1908-1909.

* Prepared with help of the Library Division of the U. S. Bureau of Education.

520

BIBLIOGRAPHY 52 1

15. Harvey, Mrs. H. Clay — "School Problems in Adair County."

Bull, ist District Normal School, Kirksville, Mo., 1908.

16. Harvey, L. D. — "Consolidation of School Districts and Trans-

portation of Rural School Pupils at Public Expense." Michigan,
Bull. No. 7, 1902.

17. Jones, Frank L. — Ind. Rep. Supt. Pub. Ins., pp. 727-782, 1902.

18. Johnson, W. H. — Annual Rep. of Jackson County Schools, Inde-

pendence, Mo., 1907.

19. Jones, E. A., Stat^ Com. of Common Schools, Columbus, O. —

"The Centralization of Rural Schools in Ohio." Proceedings
N. E. A., 1908.

20. Joyner, J. Y., Supt. Pub. Ins. — "Consolidation. — Work to Be Done

and How to Do It." N. C. School Rep., 1902-3 and 1903-4.

21. "Consolidation of Districts." Ed. Bull. No. i, 1902.

22. Official letters, etc. "Consolidation of Districts."

23. Kelley, Patrick H., State Supt. Pub. Ins., Michigan — "Consoli-

dation of School Districts in Michigan." Bull. No. 19, 1906.

24. Matson, Clarence H. — "Country Schools. — The New Plan."

Outlook, p. 981, Dec, 1902.

25. McKenzie, Hector — "Concrete Examples of Consolidation of

Rural Schools." N. D. Pubsh. by Dept. Pub. Ins., 1905.

26. Nelson, Frank, State Supt. Ins., Kan. — "The Consolidation of

Rural Schools." Kan. School Rep., p. 38, 1901-2,

27. Olsen, J. W. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools, and Transporta-

tion of Pupils at Public Expense." Bull. No. i Reprint Bien.
Rep. State Supt. of Pub. Ins., Minnesota, 1902.

28. Pyne, R. A., Minister of Ed. Rep. Minister of Ed., Toronto, 1910.

29. "Report of Committee of Twelve on Rural Schools." N. E. A.,

1897.

30. Rep. U. S. Com. of Ed. 2:2353-2369, 1902.

31. Riggs, John F. — Bien. Rep. Supt. Pub. Ins., Iowa, 1905.

32. "Conditions and Needs of Iowa Rural Schools." Bull.

by Supt. Pub. Ins., 1905.

33. Southall, Joseph W. — "Consolidation and Transportation." Va.

School Rep., 1900-01.

34. Stone, Mason S. Cir. of Ed. Information No. 19, Dept. Ed.

Vt., 1906.

35. Upham, A. A. — "Transportation of Rural School Children at

Public Expense." Ed. Rev. 20:241, 1900.

36. Ustrud, H. A., Supt. Pub. Ins. — "Consolidation of Schools in

South Dakota, 1908."

37. Welch, W. W., Supt. Pub. Ins., Montana. Montana School Rep.,

pp. 13-20, 1902.

522 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

II

Arkansas, Education Commission — "Consolidation of Rural Schools."
Little Rock, Arkansas. December, 1910. 11 pp. 8°. (Its Bul-
letin no. 3.)

Bedichek, Una, and Baskett, G. T. — "The Consolidation of Rural
Schools With and Without Transportation." 2d ed. rev. by A. C.
Ellis. Austin, Texas, University of Texas [1907], 85 pp., illus., 8°.
(Bulletin of the University of Texas, no. 96.) Bibliography: p. 48.
A discussion of the situation in Texas and the practical experiences
with consolidation in other States.

Betts, George Herbert, and Hall, Otis E. — "Consolidation and Rural
School Efficiency." In their " Better Rural Schools." Indianapolis,
The Bobbs-Merrill Company, 1914. Pp. 215-325.

Brogden, Lautrec C. — "Consolidation of Schools and Public Trans-
portation of Pupils." Raleigh. Issued from office of superintendent
of public instruction of North CaroUna, 191 1. 135 pp., illus., 8°.
(Educational Bulletin XVII.)

Burnham, Ernest — "Two Types of Rural Schools, with Some Facts
Showing Economic and Social Conditions." New York City, Teach-
ers College, Columbia University, 191 2. 129 pp., 8°. (Teachers
College, Columbia University. Contributions to education, no. 51.)

Carney, Mabel — "Consolidated Country Schools." In her "Country
Life and the Country School." Chicago, Row, Peterson & Company,
1912. Pp. 148-187.

Carrington, George D. — "Consolidation of Rural School Districts.
Cost of Central High School. Free Transportation of Pupils."
Auburn, Nebr., 1908. 16 pp., illus., 8°. (Nemaha County, Super-
intendent of Schools. Bulletin no. 3.)

"Consolidation of Schools and the Transportation of Pupils." West-
ern Journal of Education, n. s. 8:421-501, June, 1903. Special num-
ber on this subject. Contains articles by Ellwood P. Cubberley, p.
421; Superintendent Kern, p. 437; Elmer E. Brown, p. 495; Hugh
J. Baldwin, p. 496, etc.

Cubberley, Ellwood P. — "Consolidation in Central Schools." In his
"Rural Life and Education." Houghton Mifflin Company, pp.
230-255.

"Consolidation of Schools." In "A Cyclopedia of Education."

Ed. by Paul Monroe, vol. II., pp. 185-189. The Macmillan Co.

[Davenport, E.] — "Consolidation of Country Schools." 2d ed. [Urbana,
111., 1904], 56 pp., 8°. (University of Illinois bulletin, vol. II, no. 3,
December i, 1904.)

BIBLIOGRAPHY 523

Eaton, William L. — "An Account of the Movement in Massachusetts
to Close the Rural Schools, and to Transport Their Pupils, at Public
Expense, to the Village Schools." N. Sawyer & Son, printers, 1893.
8 pp., 8°. Massachusetts school exhibit, World's Columbian Ex-
position.

Eggleston, J. D., and Bruere, Robert W. — "Consolidation and Trans-
portation." In their "The Work of the Rural School." Harper &
Brothers. Pp. 173-192.

Fairchild, E. T. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools." American Edu-
cation, 12:121-133, November, 1908. Reasons why they should be
consolidated.

Foght, Harold W.—" Consolidation of Rural Schools." In his
"American Rural School." Pp. 302-333. The Macmillan Co.

Fowler, William K. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools." In National
Education Association. Journal of proceedings and addresses,
1903. Pp. 919-929. Bibliography: pp. 924-929. Gives 29 argu-
ments for, 12 against.

"The Consolidation of School Districts; the Centralization of

Rural Schools; and the Transportation of Pupils at Public Expense."
Lincoln, Nebr., 1903. 24 pp., 8°. (Nebraska, Department of
Public Instruction, 1903.)

Graham, Albert B. — "Centralized Schools in Ohio." Columbus,
Ohio State University, 1909. 24 pp., illus., 8°. (Ohio. Agricul-
tural College. Extension bulletin, vol. i, no. 5, February, 1906.)

Hanifan, L. J. — "Facts and Fallacies About Consolidation of Schools
in West Virginia." Charleston, W. Va., Department of Free Schools
[1914], 16 pp., illus., 8°.

Hays, Willet Martin— " ConsoHdated Rural Schools." In American
Association of Farmers* Institute Workers. Proceedings, 1905.
Washington, Government Printing Office, 1906. Pp. 53-59. Bibli-
ography: 56-59.

Hugh, David D. — "Bulletin Concerning Rural Schools and Their
Consolidation." Greeley, State Normal School of Colorado, 1909.
$8 pp., illus., 8°. (Bulletin, series IX, no. 4.) Bibliography: pp.
32-38.

IlUnois, Department of Public Instruction. — "The One-room and
Consolidated Country Schools of Illinois." 4th ed., 1914. 120 pp.,
illus., 8°. (Circular no. 76.)

Indiana, Department of Public Instruction. — " Consolidation of Rural
Schools." In its Biennial report . . . 1911-1912. Indianapolis,
W. B. Burford, contractor for state printing and binding, 1913. Pp.
105-159-

Kansas, Department of Public Instruction.— "BuUetin^of Information

524 THE CONSOLIDATED RUllAL SCHOOL

Regarding Consolidation of Rural Schools." Topeka, Kans., 1908.
48 pp., illus., diagr., 8°.

Kentucky, Department of Education. — "Consolidation and Trans-
portation. . . ." Issued by Barksdale Hamlett, Superintendent of
Public Instruction, Frankfort. [Louisville, Ky., The Bradley &
Gilbert Co., 1913.] 93 pp., illus., 8°. (Bulletin, vol. VI, no. 3,
April, 1913.)

Kern, O. J. — "ConsoHdation." In his "Among Country Schools."
Ginn & Company [1906], pp. 240-281.

" ConsoHdation of Rural Schools." Education, 26:14-26,

September, 1905.

Report of a Visit to the Centralized Schools of Ohio." Oc-

tober, 1900. 2d ed. Rockford, 111., 1902. 38 pp., illus., 8°.

Knorr, George W. — "ConsoHdated Rural Schools and Organization
of a County System." Washington, Government Printing Ofhce,
1910. 99 pp., 8°. (United States Department of Agriculture.
Office of experiment stations. Bulletin 232.)

"A Study of Fifteen ConsoHdated Rural Schools; Their Or-
ganization, Cost, Efficiency, and Affiliated Interests." Washington,
D. C, Southern Education Board, 1911. 55 pp., illus., 8°. (Pub-
lication no. 6.)

Kunkel, 0. L., and Charters, W. W. — "Rural School ConsoHdation in
Missouri." Columbia, Mo., University of Missouri, 1911. 36 pp.,
illus., 8°. (University of Missouri bulletin. Education series, vol.
I, no. 2.) Bibliography: pp. 35-36.

Lake County, Ind. — "Consolidation of Schools." In its educational
report, 1913. Pp. 68-81.

Longsdorf, H. H. — "The Consolidation of Country Schools, and the
Transportation of the Scholars by use of Vans." Harrisburg, Pa.,
Wm. Stanley Ray, State printer, 1901. 89 pp., 8°. (Pennsylvania,
Department of Agriculture. Bulletin no. 71.)

Louisiana, Department of Education. — "The Consolidation of School
Districts and Centralization of Rural Schools and the Transporta-
tion of Pupils at Public Expense." [Baton Rouge, 1906.] 71 pp.,
illus., 8°. "References for Information": pp. 64-71.

Manitoba, Department of Education. — "Consolidation of Rural
Schools in Manitoba." Special report. . . . 1913. 43 pp., 8°.

Michigan, Department of Public Instruction. — "Consolidation of
School Districts in Michigan." [Lansing, 1906.] 23 pp., illus., 8°.
(Bulletin no. 19, 1906.)

Mississippi, Department of Education. Part I. — "Consolidation of
Schools and Transportation of Pupils." Part II. — "County
Agricultural High Schools, with Course of Study." Prepared and

BIBLIOGRAPHY 525

issued by J. N. Powers, State Superintendent of Public Education,

May, 1913. Jackson, Miss., Jones Ptg. Co. [1913]. 68 pp., illus.,

8°. (Its Bulletin no. 8, 1913.)
Monahan, A. C. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools." Atlantic Edu-
cational Journal, 9:169-172, 215-217, 247-249, 293-294, January

to April, 1914. Contents: I. History and Extent of the Movement.

— II. Advantages of Consolidation. — III. Transportation at Public

Expense. — IV. How Consolidation Is Effected.
Nebraska, Department of Public Instruction. — "The Consolidation

of Rural Schools." E. C. Bishop, State Superintendent. Lincoln,

1910. 39 pp., illus., 8°.
"Consolidation of Schools." In its "School Buildings and

Grounds in Nebraska." Lincoln, 1902. Pp. 228-265.
North Dakota, State Board of Education. — "The Consolidation of

Rural Schools in North Dakota." Prepared by N. C. Macdonald.

Devils Lake, N. D., Journal Publishing Co., State Printers, 1913.

33 pp., illus., 8°.
Nova Scotia, Superintendent of Education of the Public Schools. —

"The Macdonald Consolidated School." In his Annual Report,

1903. Halifax, N. S., King's Printer, 1904. Pp. xxv-xxxiii, illus.,

plans, tables.
Oklahoma, State Board of Education. — "Rural School Consolidation."

A bulletin of information issued by the Oklahoma State Board of

Education, 191 1 [n. p. 191 1]. 29 pp., illus., 8°.
Phillips, Eugene M. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools in Minnesota."

Issued by the Department of Public Instruction, C. G. Schulz,

Superintendent. [St. Paul? 1913.I 50 pp., illus., 8°. (Bulletin

no. 41.)
Prince, John T. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools." In National

Education Association. Journal of proceedings and addresses,

1903. Pp. 929-935.
Probst, Albert Frederick. — "Consolidation and Transportation."

Elementary School Teacher y 9:1-16, September, 1908. Illus.
Schmidt, C. C. — "The Consolidation of Rural Schools in North

Dakota." Grand Forks, N. D., University of North Dakota, 191 2.

85 pp., illus., 12°. (University of North Dakota. Departmental

bulletins. Education, no. 3, October, 1912.) "References":

pp. 84-85.
Sharpe, William F. — "The Housing of Consolidated Schools in Rural

Communities." Educator-journal , 12:3-17, September, 191 1, illus.,

plans.
Stone, Mason S.—" Centralization of Schools." Act of 1906. State

526 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

of Vermont. 6 pp., 8°. (Vermont Department of Public Instruc-
tion. Circular of information no. 43.)

Tennessee, Department of Public Instruction. — Bulletin of information
regarding consolidation of schools and transportation of pupils.
Nashville, Tenn., McQuiddy Printing Co., 191 2. 103 pp., 8°.

Texas, Department of Education.— " Consolidation of Rural Schools."
Austin, Texas, Austin Printing Company, 191 2. 67 pp., illus., 8°.
(Its Bulletin no. 15.)

True, A. C— "Some Problems of the Common Rural School." In
United States Department of Agriculture Yearbook, 1901. Pp.
133-154.

United States Bureau of Education. — "Consolidation of Schools and
Transportation of Pupils." In its Report of the Commissioner,
1 900-1 901. Washington, Government Printing Office, 1902. Pp.
161-213.

Upham, A. A. — "Transportation of Rural School Pupils at Public
Expense." Educational Review, 20:241-251, October, 1900.

Vermont, Department of Education — i. "Closure of Small Schools."
2. "Consolidation of Schools." April i, 1906. St. Albans, Vt.,
Messenger Company Print, 1906. 20 pp., 12°. (Circular of edu-
cational information, no. XIX.)

Washington, Department of Education. — "Consolidation of Rural
Schools and Transportation of Pupils." Olympia, Wash., E. L.
Boardman, Public Printer, 191 1. 120 pp., illus., 8°. (Bulletin no.
7, August I, 191 1.) Prepared by J. M. Layhue.

Winnebago County, 111., Superintendent of Schools. — "Consolidation
of Schools in Country Life Education." In his Report, 191 2. Pp.
47-66. See also earlier reports.

Wisconsin, Department of Education. — "Consolidation of School
Districts and Transportation of Rural School Pupils at Public Ex-
pense." Madison, Democrat Printing Company, State Printer,
1902. 20 pp., illus., diagrs., 8**. (Its Bulletin of information, no. 7.)

Ill
A. CONSOLIDATION OF SCHOOLS

Alderman, S. S. — "Consolidation and Transportation in North Carolina."

North Carolina Education, 8:3-4, March, 1914.
Arp, J. B. — "Rural Education and the Consolidated School." World

Book Co.
Bailey, Liberty Hyde. — "Danger in Rural School Consolidation." School

and Society, 1:315-316, February 27, 1915.
Brogden, L. C. — "Consolidation — An Effective Means for Making Rural

BIBLIOGRAPHY 527

Schools Grow." In "Conference for Education in the South. Proceed-
ings, 1913," pp. 200-206.

Buroker, A. B. — "Centralization of RuraK Schools." Journal of Educa-
tion, 81:237, 240, 242-243, March 4, 1915.

Button, H. O. — "Is Consolidation of Rural Schools Advisable?" In
Washington Educational Association. Proceedings, 1912, pp. 154-160.

"Consolidation of Rural Schools in North Dakota." School and Society,
3:273, February 19, 1916.

"Consolidation of Schools in Utah." Utah Educational Review, vol. 8,
nos. 9-10, May-June, 191 5.

Cubberley, Ellwood P. — "Consolidation from the Standpoint of Adminis-
tration and Supervision." In Utah Educational Association. Pro-
ceedings, 1915. Pp. 28^31.

"Consolidation In Central Schools." In his "Rural Life and

Education." Boston, New York, Houghton Mifflin Company, 1914.
Pp. 230-255.

Eggleston, J. D., and Bru^re, Robert W. — "Consolidation and Transporta-
tion." In their "The Work of the Rural School." New York and
London, Harper & Brothers, 1913. Pp. 173-192.

Finegan, Thomas E. — "The Township System and the Consolidation of
Rural Schools." In New York State Agricultural Society. Proceed-
ings of the 75th annual meeting, 1915. Albany, N. Y., Department of
Agriculture of the State of New York, 1915. Pp. 1 651 -1679.

Foght. — "The Rural Teacher and His Work." Macmillan.

"A Survey of Consolidation." (Bulletin of the U. S. Bureau of

Education.)

Grupe, M. A. — "How the Problems of the Rural Schools Are Being Met."
Popular Science Monthly, 83:484-490, November, 19 13.

Hall, Q. E.—" Consolidation of Districts." - In New York (State) Univer-
sity. Proceedings of the fiftieth convocation, Albany, 19 14. Albany,
The University of the State of New York, 1915. Pp. 100-116.

Hoist, J. H. — "Victor Consolidated Schools." Intermountain Educator,
8:5-7, January, 1913.

Describes the Victor consolidated district no. 7 of Victor, Montana.

Kentucky, Department of Education. — "Consolidation and Transporta-
tion." Issued by Barksdale Hamlett, Superintendent of Public In-
struction, Frankfort. [Louisville, Ky., The Bradley & Gilbert Co.,
1913-] 93 PPm Illus. (incl. ports.), 8". ([Bulletin] vol. 6, no. 3, April,
1913.)

Lake County, Indiana. — "Consolidation of Schools." In its Educational
Report, 19 1 3. Pp. 68-81.

Massachusetts, Board of Education. — Report of the Board of Education
in Accordance with the Provisions of Chapter 70, Resolves of 191 1, in
the Matter of the Support of Public Education; Including also Report
Required Under Chapter 39, Resolves of 1912, Relating to the Pay-
ment of Transportation Expenses of Pupils Residing in Towns Not
Maintaining High Schools and Attending High Schools in Other Towns

528 THE CONSOLroATED RURAL SCHOOL

or Cities. Boston, Wright & Potter Printing Company, State Printers,

1912. 74 pp., 8^
At head of title: The Commonwealth of Massachusetts.
Mississippi, Department of Education. — Part L "Consolidation of

Schools and Transportation of Pupils." Part II. "County Agricul-
tural High Schools, with Course of Study." Prepared and issued by

J. N. Powers, State Superintendent of Public Education, May, 1913.

Jackson, Miss., Jones Printing Company [1913I, 68 pp., illus., 8°. (Its

Bulletin no. 8, 1913.)
At head of title: State Department of Public Education, Jackson, Mis-
sissippi.
Monahan, A. C. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools. History and Extent

of the Movement." Atlantic Educational Journal, 9:169-172, 215-217,

247-249, January to March, 19 14.
Moore, W. Clement. — "The Consolidation of Rural Schools." American

School Board Journal, 46:8, March, 1913.
New Jersey, Department of Public Instruction. — "Improvement of Rural

Schools by Means of Consolidation." Trenton, 1916. 41 pp., plates,

8°.
Rapeer, L. W. — "The Consolidated Rural School Building." American

School Board Journal, Milwaukee.
"The One-Story Rural Consolidated School Building." Ibid., Sep-
tember, 1919.
"The Consolidated School Plant." School and Society, February

13, 1915.
"Rural School Consolidation and National Consolidation." Jour-

nal of Educational Administration and Supervision, June, 19 18.

"School Consolidation in Tennessee." School and Society, 1:923-924,
June 26, 1915.

Schwering, Benjamin. — "Consolidation of Country Schools." Progressive
Teacher, 19:33-35, April, 1913. Gives the advantages of the consoli-
dated school, taking as examples the John Swaney School of Putnam
County, Illinois, and the Lee's Creek School of Lee's Creek, Ohio.

Smith, Melvin C. — "Advantages of Consolidation." School News and
Practical Educator, 29:239-240, January, 1916.

Tennessee, Department of Public Instruction. — "Rural School Situation
in Tennessee; Bulletin of Information Regarding Consolidation of
Schools and Transportation of Pupils." Issued by the Department of
Public Instruction. Nashville, Tenn., McQuiddy Printing Company,
191 1. 103 pp., illus., 8**.

Texas, Department of Education. — "Consolidation of Rural Schools."
Austin, Texas, Austin Printing Company, 1912. 67 pp., illus., 8"*. (Its
Bulletin no. 15.)

Warner, E. P.— "The Centralization of Rural Schools." Ohio Teacher, 33:
316-319, February, 19 13.

Webb, J. C— "Early Consolidation in Indiana." Journal of Education,
83:318, March 23, 1916-

BIBLIOGRAPHY . 529

Williams, S. H. — "Errol Consolidated Rural School." Elementary School
Journal, 16:358-368, March, 19 16.

Winnebago County, III., Superintendent of Schools. — "Consolidation of
Schools in Country Life Education." In its Report, 1912. Pp. 47-66.

Winship, A. E. — "Consolidation and Transportation." Journal of Edu-
cation, 77:257-258, March 6, 1913.

Describes the ideal system of transportation as used in Burley, Idaho.

Wisconsin. Committee of Fifteen.-^" Consolidation of School Districts.
Report of a Sub-Committee of Fifteen Appointed by the State Super-
intendent of Schools to Investigate Conditions in the Rural Schools of
Wisconsin." Prepared by Pres. F. A. Cotton, Prof. M. V. O'Shea,
Inspector W. E. Larson. Issued by C. P. Cary, State Superintendent.
Madison, Democrat Printing Company, State Printer, 1912. 93 pp.,
illus., fold pi., 8**. ([Wisconsin, Department of Education] Bulletin
no. 17.)

"A reference list of books, pamphlets, and bulletins, dealing with the
subject of consolidation": pp. 89-90.

B. RURAL SURVEYS

Bailey, Liberty Hyde. — "The Survey-Idea in Country Life Work." 19 pp.
Address at Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y.

Bureau of Municipal Research, New York. — "Training School for Public
Service. Preliminary Report on Conditions and Needs of Rural Schools
in Wisconsin. Results of Field Study Reported to the Wisconsin State
Board of Public Affairs by the Training School for Public Service."
August, 1912 (New York City, 1912), 92 pp., 8°. (Efficient Citizen-
ship Bulletin, no. 587.)

Colorado State College of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts, Fort Col-
lins. Department of Rural and Industrial Education. — "The Rural
and Village Schools of Colorado; an Eight- Year Survey of Each School
District, 1906-1913, Inclusive," by C. G. Sargent, Colorado Agricultural
College, 1914. 106 pp., illus., diagrs., maps., 8°. ([Bulletin] sen xiv,
no. 5.)

Elliff, Joseph Dolliver, and Jones, Abner. — "A Study of the Rural Schools
of Saline County, Missouri." Columbia, Mo., University of Missouri,
1915- 32 pp., map., 8°. (The University of Missouri Bulletin, vol.
16, no. 22. Education ser. 11.)

Bibliography of school surveys: pp. 29-32.

Felton, Ralph A. — "A Rural Survey of Community, Prepared

in Outline." New York, Country Church Work, Board of Home
Missions of the Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. [i9i5]» 38 pp.,
97 forms, 8". Contains bibliographies.

Galpin, C. J. — "A Method of Making a Social Survey of a Rural Com-
munity." II pp. (University of Wisconsin. Agricultural experiment
station. Circular of information no. 29, January, 1912.)

Georgia, Department of Educatbn. — "Educational Survey of Bulloch

S30 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

County, Georgia." By M. L. Duggan, Rural School Agent. [Atlanta?],
1915, 72 pp., illus., 8°.

-"Educational Survey of Clayton and Taliaferro Counties, Georgia.

By M. L. Duggan, Rural School Agent . . . under the direction of the
Department of Education. M. L. Brittain, State Superintendent of
Schools. [Atlanta?], 1915, 23 pp., illus. (inch ports., plans), 8°. Num-
bers 2 and 3 in a series of educational surveys of the counties of Georgia.
"Educational Survey of Morgan County, Georgia." By M. L.

Duggan, Rural School Agent. [Atlanta?], 1915, 77 pp., illus., 8°.

-"Educational Survey of Rabun County, Georgia." By M. L.

Duggan, Rural School Agent . . . under the direction of the Depart-
ment of Education. M. L. Brittain, State Superintendent of Schools.
[Atlanta], 1914, 48 pp., illus., map, 8°. No. i in a series of educational
surveys of the counties of Georgia.

[Hill, Walter B.] — "Rural Survey of Clarke County, Georgia, with
Special Reference to the Negroes." [Athens, Ga., 1915], 63 pp., illus.,
maps, diagrs., 8**. (Bulletin of the University of Georgia, vol. xv, no. 3.)
Phelps-Stokes fellowship studies, no. 2.

Morse, H. N., Eastman, E. Fred, and Monahan, A. C. — "An Educational
Survey of a Suburban and Rural County." Washington, Government
Printing Office, 1913. 68 pp., 8°. (U. S. Bureau of Education. Bul-
letin, 19 13, no. 32.)

Survey of Montgomery County, Md.

Odell, Frank G., and Delzell, James E. — "Suggested Outline for a Rural
School Survey." Nebraska Teacher, 14:521, May, 1912.

Outline is divided into four sections, as follows: Physical Survey,
Social Survey, Educational Survey, and Economic Survey.

"Ohio Rural Life Survey." — Ohio Teacher, 33:49-50, September, 1912.

Ohio, State School Survey Commission. — "Report to the Governor of
Ohio by the Ohio State School Survey Commission. A Co-operative
Field Study of 659 Rural Village Schools in 88 Counties, and an Exten-
sive Study of 9,000 Schoolrooms and of 395 School Systems, January,
1914." Columbus, Ohio, The F. J. Heer Printing Company, 1914.
xxxviii, 352 pp., front., illus., plates, diagrs., 8°.
Oliver J. Thatcher, chairman.

Presbyterian Church in the U. S. A. — "Board of Home Missions. De-
partment of Church and Country Life. Ohio Rural Life Survey."
"Church Growth and Decline in Ohio." [New York, 1914?], 32 pp., 8°.

"Country Churches of Distinction." [New York, 1914?], 48 pp.,

illus., 8^

"Northwestern Ohio." [New York, 1914?], 70 pp., illus., 8°.

"Southeastern Ohio." [New York, 1914], 64pp., 8°.

"Southwestern Ohio." [New York, 1914?], 93 pp., 8°.

-"A Survey in Arkansas, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, Maryland,

Missouri, Pennsylvania, and Tennessee." [New York, Redfield Brothers,
Inc., 1911-1913], 8v., illus., 8°.

Rev. Warren H. Wilson, 156 Fifth Avenue, New York City, is super-
intendent of this department of Presbyterian mission work.

BIBLIOGRAPHY 53 1

"Rural School Survey In Nebraska." Middle West School Review, 8:32,
December, 191 5.

St. John, G. B. — "The Sag Harbor Survey." Report of the Presbyterian
Church Home Missions, 156 Fifth Avenue, New York, 191 1.

"The Survey of Huntingdon Presbytery." Presbyterian Church,

Board of Home Missions, Department of Immigration, 1910. 50 pp.

Thomson, Edward H. — "A Farm- Management Survey of Three Rep-
resentative Areas in Indiana, Illinois, and Iowa." [Washington, Govern-
ment Printing Office], 1914, 42 pp., incl. illus., map, tables, diagrs., 8°.

(U. S. Dept. of Agriculture. Bulletin no. 41.)

Contribution from the Bureau of Plant Industry.

Wells, Rev. George Frederick. — "Bibliography on the Rural Social Survey."
In Pennsylvania Rural Progress Association. Proceedings, 1912. Pp.
168-171.

"A Social Survey for Rural Communities." 191 1. 24 pp. Ad-
dress the author, 215 Fourth Avenue, New York, N. Y.

Wilson, W. H.— "The Rural Life Survey for Church and School." In
Conference for Education in the South. Proceedings, 1912. Pp. 87-97.

"Social and Educational Survey in the Country." In Southern

Educational Association. Proceedings, 1912. Pp. 115-121.

C. RURAL LIFE

Anderson, W. L.— "The Country Town." Garden City, N. Y.: Double-
day, Page Co., 1914.

Bailey, L. H. — "The Country Life Movement." New York: Macmillan
Co., 191 1.

"The Outlook to Nature." New York: Macmillan Co., 191 1.

"The State and the Farmer." New York: Macmillan Co., 1908.

-"The Training of Farmers." New York: The Century Co., 1909.

"York State Rural Problems, I." Albany, N. Y.: J. B. Lyon Co.,

1913.
"York State Rural Problems, II." Albany, N. Y.: J. B. Lyon

Co., 1915.
Butterfield, K. L. — "Chapters In Rural Progress." Chicago: University

Press, 1908.
Cabot — "What Men Live By." New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1916.
Crow, Martha F. — "The American Country Girl." New York: F. A.

Stokes Co., 19 1 5.
Curtis, H. S. — "Play and Recreation in the Open Country." Boston:

Ginn & Co., 19 14.
Field, Jessie — "The Corn Lady." Chicago: A. Flanagan & Co., 1915.
Fiske, G. W.— "The Challenge of the Country." New York: The Asso-
ciation Press Co., 19 12.
Holeman, C. W., and Murphy, C. D. — "Social Centers in the Southwest."

Dallas, Texas: Texas Farm and Ranch Pub. Co., 1912.
Hutchinson, F. K.— "Our Country Life." Chicago: A. C. McClurg Co.,

1912.

532 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Israel, H. (Editor) — "Unifying Rural Community Interests." New York:
Association Press, 1914.

McCormick, W— "The Boy and His Clubs." Chicago: F. H. Revel Co.,
1912.

Mason, W. P. — "Water Supply." New York: John Wiley & Sons, 19 16,
4 ed. rev.

Needham, Mary M. — "Folk Festivals." New York: B. W. Nuebsch, 1912.

Page, L. W.— " Roads, Paths and Bridges." New York: Sturgis and Wal-
ton Co., 1912.

Plunkett, H. C— "The Rural Life Problems of the United States." New
York: The Macmillan Co., 1910.

Powell, E. P.— "How to Live in the Country." St. Paul, Minn.: Webb
Pub. Co.

Robertson, J. W. — " Conservation of Life in Rural Districts." New York:
Association Press, 191 1.

Sims, N. L. — "A Hoosier Village." Longmans, Green Co., 1912.

Stern, R. B. — "Neighborhood Entertainments." New York: Sturgis and
Walton Co., 191 1.

Waugh, F. A. — "Rural Improvement." New York: Orange Judd Co.,
1914.

"Report of the Commission on Country Life." New York: Stur-
gis and Walton Co., 1912.

"Balancing Country Life." New York: Association Press, 1917.

-"Digest of the Federal Farm Loan Act." U. S. Treas. Dept.,

Federal Farm Loan Board Circ, vol. 4, 191 6.
Wilson, W. H. — "The Evolution of a Country Community." Boston:
Pilgrim Press, 19 12.

THE RURAL CHURCH

Ashenhurst, J. O.— "The Day of the Country Church." New York:

Funk & Wagnalls Co., 1910.
Bemies, C. O. — "The Church in the Country Town." Chicago: American

Baptist Publishing Society, 1912.
Bricker, G. A., et al. — "Solving the Country Church Problem." Cin-
cinnati: Jennings & Graham, 1913.
Butterfield, K. L.— "The Country Church and the Rural Problem."

Chicago: University Press, 191 1.
Earp, E. L. — "The Rural Church Movement." New York: Methodist

Book Concern, 1914.
Felton, R. A. — "Study of a Rural Parish: A Method of Survey." New

York: Board of Home Missions of Presbyterian Church, 19 15.
Gill, O. C, and Pinchot, G.— "The Country Church." New York: The

Macmillan Co., 1913.
Mills, H. S. — "The Making of a Country Parish." New York: Missionary

Education Movement, 1914.
Tipple, E. S. — "Some Famous Country Parishes." New York: Eaton &

Mains, 191 1.

BIBLIOGRAPHY 533

Vogt, P. L. — "The Church and Country Life." New York: Missionary
Education Movement, U. S. and Canada, 1916.

Wilson, W. H. — "The Church of the Open Country." New York: Mis-
sionary Education Movement of the U. S., 191 1.

"Rural Church and Community Betterment: The Country Church

and Rural Welfare." New York: International Committee, Y. M. C. A.
Press, 19 12.

Publications of the Association Press: "Unifying the Rural Community,"
"The Country Church and Community Co-operation," "The Rural
Church," "The Home of the Countryside," "The Rural Church Mes-
sage."

RURAL SOCIOLOGY AND ECONOMICS

Adams, E. F. — "The Modern Farmer and His Business Relations." San

Francisco: N. J. Stone Co.
Anderson, F. J. — "The Farmer of To-Morrow." New York: The Mac-

millan Co., 19 14.
Bailey, L. H. — "The State and the Farmer." New York: The Macmillan

Co., 1917.
Benson, O. H., and Betts, G. H. — "Agriculture and the Farming Business.'*

Indianapolis: The Bobbs-Merrill Co., 191 7.
Bookwalter, J. W. — "Rural Versus Urban: Their Conflict and Its Causes."

New York: By the Author, 191 1.
Brooks, T. J. — "Markets and Rural Economics." St. Paul, Minn.:

Webb Pub. Co.
Carver, T. N. — "Principles of Rural Economics." St. Paul, Minn.:

Webb Pub. Co.
Carver, T. N. (Compiler) — "Selected Readings in Rural Economics."

Boston: Ginn & Co., 19 16.
Coulter, J. L. — "Co-operation Among Farmers." St. Paul, Minn.: Webb

Pub. Co.
Fairchild, G. T.— "Rural Wealth and Welfare." New York: Macmillan

Co., 1909. 2d ed.
Gillette, J. M. — "Constructive Rural Sociology." St. Paul, Minn.:

Webb Pub. Co., 1912.
Green, J. B. — "Law for the American Farmers." New York: The Mac-
millan Co., 191 1.
Herrick, M. T., and Ingalls — " Rural Credits." New York: D. Appleton

& Co., 1914.
Hunt, T. F. — " How to Choose a Farm." New York: The Macmillan Co.,

1906.
Morman, J. B. — "The Principles of Rural Credits: As Applied in Europe

and as Suggested for America." New York: The Macmillan Co., 1915.
Myrick, H. — "Agriculture and Preparedness." New York: Orange Judd

Co., 1917.

"Co-operative Finance." New York: Orange Judd Co,

"How to Co-operate." New York: Orange Judd Co.

534 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Myrick, H. — "The Federal Farm Loan System." New York: Orange

Judd Co., 1917.
Nourse, E. G. — "Agricultural Economics." Chicago: University Press,

1916.
Phelan, J. — "Rural Economics and Rural Sociology." Eau Claire, Wis.:

Eau Claire Book Co., 1913.
Foe, C. — "How Farmers Co-operate and Double Profits." New York:

Orange Judd Co., 1915.
Powell, G. H. — "Co-operation in Agriculture." New York: The Macmil-

lan Co., 1914.
Taylor, H. C. — "An Introduction to the Study of Agricultural Economics."

New York: The Macmillan Co., 191 5.
Vogt, P. L. — " Introduction to Rural Sociology." New York: D. Appleton

& Co., 1917.
Weld, L. D. H.— "The Marketing of Farm Products." New York: The

Macmillan Co., 191 7.
Wiley, H. W.— "The Lure of the Land— Farming After Fifty." New

York: The Century Co., 19 15.

SANITATION AND HYGIENE

Brewer, I. J.— "Rural Hygiene." St. Paul, Minn.: Webb Pub. Co., 1913.
Bushore, H. B. — "Sanitation of the Country House." St. Paul, Minn,:

Webb Pub. Co., 1905.
Dodd, Mrs. Helen — "The Healthful Farm House." Boston: Whitcomb

& Barrows, 1906.
Harris, H. F.— " Health on the Farm." New York: Sturgis & Walton Co.,

1911.
Hutchinson, Woods — "Exercise and Health." St. Paul, Minn.: Webb

Pub. Co., 1915.
Lipman, J. G. — "Bacteria in Relation to Country Life." Chicago:

Breeder's Gazette, 1908.
Ogden, H. N. — "Rural Hygiene." Chicago: Breeder's Gazette, 191 1.
Santee, Dr. — "Farm Sewage." St. Paul, Minn.: Webb Pub. Co., 1915.
"The American Red Cross." Rural Nursing Service, Washington,

D. C.

D. AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION

Bricker, G. A. — "Agricultural Education for Teachers." New York:

American Book Co., 1914.
"The Teaching of Agriculture in the High School." New York:

The Macmillan Co., 191 1.
Cromwell, A. D. — "Agriculture and Life." Philadelphia: J. B. Lippin-

cott Co., 191 5.
Davenport, E. — "Education for Efficiency." New York: D. C. Heath

& Co., 1914.
Davis, B. M. — "Agricultural Education in the Public Schools." Chicago:

University of Chicago Press, 19 12.

BIBLIOGRAPHY 535

Eaton, T. H. — "Organization and Methods in Agriculture in Secondary

Schools." New York: Teachers College, Columbia University, 191 7.
Hart, J. K. — "Educational Resources of Village and Rural Communities."

New York: The Macmlllan Co., 19 14.
Hummel, W. B. and B. R. — "Materials and Methods in High School

Agriculture." New York: The Macmlllan Co., 191 3.
Leake, A. H. — " Means and Methods of Agricultural Education." Boston :

Houghton Mififlln Co., 1915.
Nolan, A. W. — "The Teaching of Agriculture." Boston: Houghton

Mifflin Co., 1918.
Thompson, F. E., et al. — "Teachers* Manual of Educational Agriculture."

Boston: GInn & Co., 1908.
Waugh, F. A.— "The Agricultural College." New York: Orange Judd

Co., 1916.

RURAL SCHOOLS

Alderman, L. R. — "School Credit for Home Work." Boston: Houghton

Mifflin Co., 1915.
Arp, J. B. — "Rural Education and the Consolidated School." Yonkers-

on-the-Hudson: World Book Co., 191 8.
Barry — "The Hygiene of the Schoolroom." New York: Silver, Burdett Co.
Betts, G. H., and Hall, O. E. — "Better Rural Schools." Indianapolis,

Ind.: Bobbs-Merrill Co., 1914.
Betts, G. H.— "New Ideas in Rural Schools." Houghton Mifflin Co.,

1913.
Burk, F. W.— " Health and the School." St. Paul, Minn. : Webb Pub. Co.
Burnham, E. — "Two Types of Rural Schools." New York: Teachers

College, Columbia University, 19 12.
Carney, Mabel — "Country Life and the Country School." Chicago:

Row, Peterson & Co., 19 12.
Challman, S. A.— "The Rural School Plant." Milwaukee: Bruce Pub.

Co., 1918.
Cubberley, E. P. — "Rural Life and Education." Boston: Houghton

Mifflin Co., 1914.
"The Improvement of Rural Schools." Boston: Houghton Mifflin

Co., 1912.
Culter, H. M., and Stone, Julia M.— "The Rural School: Its Methods and

Management." New York: Silver, Burdett Co., 1913.
Curtis, H. S. — "Education Through Play." New York: Macmlllan Co.,

1915.
"Play and Recreation for the Open Country." Boston: Ginn &

Co., 1914.
Dinsmore, J. W. — "Teaching a District School." Cincinnati: American

Book Co., 1913.
Dressier, F. B.— "School Hygiene." St. Paul, Minn.: Webb Pub. Co.
Eggleston, J. D., and Bruere, R. W.— "The Work of the Rural School."

New York: Harper & Bros., 19 13.

536 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Foght, H. W.— "The American Rural School." New York: Macmillan
Co., 1910.

"The Rural Teacher and His Work." New York: The Macmil-
lan Co., 1918.

Hart, J. K. — "Educational Resources of Village and Rural Communities."
New York: The Macmillan Co., 191 6.

Kennedy, Jos. — "Rural Life and the Rural School." Cincinnati: Ameri-
can Book Co., 19 1 5.

Kern, O. J. — "Among Country Schools." Boston: Ginn & Co., 1916.

McKeever, W. A. — "Farm Boys and Girls." New York: The Macmil-
lan Co., 1912.

Pickford, A. F.— "Rural Education." St. Paul, Minn.: Webb Pub. Co.,

1915.
Quick, Herbert — "The Brown Mouse." Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill Co.,

1916.
Robbins, C. L. — "The School as a Social Institution: An Introduction to

the Study of Social Education." Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 1918.
Seeley, H. H. — "The Country School." New York: Charles Scribner's

Sons, 1913.
Wilkinson — "Rural School Management." New York: Silver, Burdett

Co., 1916.

IV

WHERE YOUR COMMUNITY CAN GET HELP

The communities in your state have a number of agencies which they
may call upon for advice. Some of these are state-aided organizations,
boards, and institutions which send their representatives upon request
and entirely without charge. It is their purpose to serve the entire state.
They should be consulted freely. Assistance should also be sought from
publications of various sorts, many of which may be had on request.

Before advice is sought from state and county agencies there should be
a definite local group which will give responsibility to the request and a
reasonable probability that the advice will be acted upon. Some of the
agencies and publications are as follows:

A. Community Organization
Agencies

The Farm Bureau of your county.

The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.

The United States Department of Agriculture, Washington.

The Federal Board for Vocational Education.

Books

"Chapters in Rural Progress" — K. L, Butterfield — University of Chicago
Press, Chicago.

BIBLIOGRAPHY 537

"The Country Town"— W. L. Anderson— Baker & Taylor Co., New York.

"The Social Center"— E. J. Ward— Appleton & Co., New York.

"Community Rebuilding, How Can It Be Done" — E. L. Morgan — En-
cyclopedia Our Wonder World, Volume lo — Geo. L. Sherman & Co.,
Boston.

"The Evolution of the Country Community" — Warren H. Wilson — Pil-
grim Press, Boston.

"Constructive Rural Sociology" — John M. Gillette — Sturgis & Walton,
New York.

"Introduction to Rural Sociology" — Paul L. Vogt — Appleton & Co., New
York.

B. Farm Production

Agencies

The Farm Bureau or Farm Agent of your county.
The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.
The State Board of Agriculture, State House, Boston.
The United States Department of Agriculture, Washington.

Books

"Fertilizers and Crops" — L. L. Van Slyke — Orange Judd Co., New York.

"Productive Farm Crops" — E. G.Montgomery — J. B. Lippincott, Phila-
delphia.

"Principles of Fruit Growing" — L. H. Bailey — Macmillan Company, New
York.

"Dairy Farming" — C. H. Eckles — Macmillan Company, New York.

"Feeds and Feeding" — Henry and Morrison — Madison, Wisconsin,

"Farm Management" — G. F. Warren — Macmillan Company, New York.

"Equipment for the Farm and Farmstead" — H. C. Ramsower — Ginn &
Company, New York.

"Productive Poultry Husbandry" — H. R. Lewis — ^J. B. Lippincott, Phila-
delphia.

C. Farm Business

Agencies

The Farm Bureau of your county.
The marketing agent of your district.
The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.
The State Board of Agriculture.
The Chamber of Commerce of leading cities.

The United States Department of Agriculture, Bureau of Markets, 148
State Street, Boston.

Books

"Marketing Farm Products" — L. D. H. Weld — Macmillan Company,

New York.
" Principles of Rural Economics" — T, N, Carver — Ginn & Co., New York,

538 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

"An Introduction to the Study of Agricultural Economics" — H. C.

Taylor — Macmillan Company, New York.
"Co-operation in Agriculture" — G. Harold Powell — Macmillan Co., New

York.
"Co-operative Marketing" — W. W. Cumberland — Princeton University

Press.
"Rural Credits" — J. B. Norman — Macmillan Company, New York.

D. Conservation
AgeTtcies

The Farm Bureau of your county.

The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.

The Local or National Board of Food Administration.

The National Civic Federation, New England Section, 20 Ashburton

Place, Boston,
The Special Aid Society for American Preparedness, 142 Berkley Street,

Boston.
The Federation of Women's Clubs.
The State Forestry Association.

Books

"The Conservation of Natural Resources in the United States" — Charles

R. Van Hise — Macmillan Company, New York.
"Everyday Food in War Time" — Mary S. Rose — Macmillan Company,

New York.
"Nature and Man in America" — N. S. Shaler — C. Scribner's, New York.
"The Landscape Beautiful" — F. A. Waugh — Orange Judd Company,

New York.

E. Boys' and Girls' Activities
Agencies

The Farm Bureau of your county.

The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.

The State Board of Education, State Capital.

The State Y. M. C. A., Rural Work Department.

The State Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

The Boy Scouts of America, 200 Fifth Avenue, New York.

The Camp Fire Girls, 118 East 28th Street, New York.

The Girl Scouts, i Madison Avenue, New York.

Books

"Elementary Agriculture" — James S. Grimm — Allyn & Bacon, 172

Tremont Street, Boston.
"Handicaps of Childhood" — Haddington Bruce-;-Dodd Mead & Co.,

New York.

BIBLIOGRAPHY 539

"Reaching the Boys of an Entire Community" — Y. M. C. A. Press, New

York.
"Farm Boys and Girls" — Wm. A. McKeever — Macmillan Company,

New York.
"The Boy Scouts of America" (manual) — 200 Fifth Avenue, New York.
"The Camp Fire Girls" (manual)— 118 East 28th Street, New York.
"The Girl Scouts of America" (manual) — i Madison Avenue, New York.

F. Community Life

I. HOME AFFAIRS

Agencies
The Farm Bureau Home Demonstration Agent of your county.
The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.
State Branch, National Civic Federation.

The State Federation of Women's Clubs, Home Economics Section.
The United States Department of Agriculture, Division of Publications,

Washington.
The U. S. Bureau of Education.
The Children's Bureau, Department of Labor, Washington.

Books

"Feeding the Family" — Mary S. Rose — Macmillan Company, New York.

"Care and Feeding of Children" — Dr. L. E. Holt — D. Appleton & Com-
pany, New York.

"Training the Boy" — Wm. A. McKeever — Macmillan Company, New
York.

"Training the Girl" — ^Wm. A. McKeever — Macmillan Company, New
York.

"Cost of Living Series" — Ellen H. Richards — J. Wiley & Sons, New York.

"The Care of the House" — T. M. Clark — Macmillan Company, New
York.

"How to Live" — Fisher & Fisk — Funk & Wagnalls Company, New York.

"One Woman's Work for Farm Women" — Jennie Buell — Whitcomb &
Barrows, Boston.

" Home Hygiene and the Prevention of Disease " — Dutton (Duffield & Co.).

2. EDUCATION

Agencies
The State Board of Education, State Capital.
The Farm Bureau of your county.

The State Agricultural College, Extension Service. The State University.
The State Grange.

The Free Public Library Commission, if any.
Parent-Teacher Association.
The State Federation for Rural Progress, if any.
The United States Bureau of Education, Washington, D. C.

540 THE CONSOLIDATED RURAL SCHOOL

Books

"Among Country Schools" — O. J. Kern — Ginn & Co., New York.

**The Redirection of the Rural School" — L. H. Bailey — Macmillan Com-
pany, New York.

"Country Life and the Country School" — Mabel Carney — Row, Peterson
& Company, Chicago.

" Practical School and Home Gardens" — G. W. Wood — ^Long & Company,
Lincoln, Nebraska.

"Educational Resources of Village and Rural Communities" — W. R.
Hart — Macmillan Company, New York.

"The Village Library" — Mary A. Tarbell — Massachusetts Civic League,
Boston.

3. PUBLIC HEALTH

Agencies

The State Department of Health, State Capital.

The Health Officer in your district.

The State Agricultural College, Extension Service. The State University.

The State Anti-Tuberculosis League, if any.

Books

"The Sanitation of a Country House"— H. B. Bashore— J. Wiley &
Sons, New York.

"Principles of Sanitary Science and the Public Health" — W. Y. Sedgwick
— Macmillan Company, New York.

"A Manual for Health Officers"— J. S. MacNutt— J. Wiley & Sons, New
York.

"A Manual of Personal Hygiene"— W. L. Pyle— W. B. Saunders Co.,
Philadelphia.

"General Bacteriology" — Edwin O. Gordan — W. B. Saunders Co., Phila-
delphia.

4. TRANSPORTATION AND COMMUNICATION

Agencies

The State Highway Commission.

The State Agricultural College, Extension Service. The State University.
The United States Department of Agriculture, Division of Publications,
Washington.

Books

"Roads, Paths, and Bridges"— L. W. Page— Sturgis & Walton Co., New

York.
"Construction and Care of Earth Roads" — Ira O. Baker — University of

Illinois, Urbana.
"Railroad and Street Transportation" — R. D. Fleming — Cleveland

Foundation, Cleveland, Ohio.

BIBLIOGRAPHY 54I

5. RECREATION

Agencies
The Farm Bureau of your county.

The County Young Men's Christian Association secretary of your county.
The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.
The State Civic League, if any.

The Playground Association of America, i Madison Avenue, New York.
The Department of Recreation, Russell Sage Foundation, 103 East 22d

Street, New York.

Books
"The Unused Recreation Resources of the Average Community" — C. A.

Perry — Russell Sage Foundation, New York.
"Play and Recreation for the Open Country" — H. S. Curtis — Ginn &

Co., New York.
"Neighborhood Entertainments" — R. B. Stern — Sturgis & Walton Co.,

New York.
"The Home Playground" — Joseph Lee — Playground Association of

America, i Madison Avenue, New York.

6. CIVIC AFFAIRS

Agencies
The State Civic League or other similar organization.
The State Agricultural College, Extension Service.

Books
"Rural Improvement" — F. A. Waugh — Orange Judd Company, New

York.
"Town Planning for Small Communities" — C. S. Bird, Jr., Appleton &

Co., New York.
"Community Civics" — Field and Nearing — Macmillan Company, New

York.
"The Farmstead" — L P. Roberts — Macmillan Company, New York.

7. PUBLIC MORALITY

Agencies
The State secretaries or resident bishops of the various denominations.
The State Federation of Churches.
The State Young Men's Christian Association.
The National Committee of the Young Women's Christian Association,

600 Lexington Avenue, New York.
The State Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children.

Books
"The Priest and Social Action" — Charles Plater — Longmans, Green &

Co., New York.
"Problems of the Town Church"— G. A. Miller— Fleming H. Revell

Company, Chicago.

542 THE CONSOLroATED RURAL SCHOOL

"Institutional Work for the Country Church" — C. E. Hayward — Burling-
ton Free Press Association, Burlington, Vermont.

"The Country Church" — Gill & Pinchot — Macmillan Company, New
York.

"The Church of the Open Country" — Warren H. Wilson — Missionary
Education Movement, New York.

"Using the Resources of the Country Church" — E. R. Groves — Associa-
tion Press, New York.

"The Country Church and the Rural Problem"— K. L. Butterfield—
University of Chicago Press, Chicago.

"Vital Problems in Rural Leadership" — W. J. Campbell — International
Y. M. C. A. College, Springfield, Mass.

INDEX

Acquaintance group, 8

Administration of schools, 25

Advantages of consolidation, 8, 14, 46

Agricultural education, 308

Aims of education, 287, 300, 346, 369

Algebra, 327

Appreciation, 406

Architects, school, 167

Area of consolidation, 8

Arguments for traditional subjects,

328
Aristocratic aims, 340
Assembly, 306; room, 183
Attendance, 24
Attention, 398
Auditorium, 457, 5 iS
Automobile, 213
Avocation, 430
Avocational efficiency, 295, 311, 444;

training, 356

Bagley, on instincts, 379
Bailey, L. H., 478
Bemtz, 246
Blair, F. H., 483
Boarding place, 196
Buildings, 184, 500, 507

Composition, 311

Consolidation of school, definition, 7;

advantages, 280; city schools, 168;

facts, 241
Contracts with drivers, 220
Cook, County Superintendent, 7
Co-operation, 278
Co-operative credit unions, 52.
Costs, 258, 274; consolidation, 251;

transportation, 218, 487
Cottage, 439; plans, 193; teacher's,

190
County, orgam'zation, 34; minded-

ness, 64
Curriculum, 247, 284, 301, 320, 500

Democracy, 354

Determinants of the public school, 16

Dewey, on method, 401

Domestic science, 242

Differences, individual, 372

Difficulties of consolidation, 475

Disadvantages of consolidation, 15,

475
Discipline, 396, 406; formal, 381, 384
Drill lesson, 417
Drivers, 501

Camp Fire Girls, 441

Centralization, 2

Chautauqua, 53

Church, 276

Class, periods, 306; work, 247; stan-
dards, 178

Classroom, 572

Claxton, 5

College entrance, 317

Community centres, 270; organiza-
tion plan, 464; meetings, 244, 254;
ways, 61

Economic forces, 52; independence,

434; rural, 29
Electives, 337
English, 310, 337, 339; aims, 344;

requirements, 324
European ideals, 330
Examination, 407
Exhibits, school, 242
Expense. See Costs
Expression, 361
Exploiters of land, 56
Extensions, 516

543

544

INDEX

Facts of consolidation, 246

Farm home, 197

Freeman on psychology of common

branches, 388
Finigan, Dr. Thos. E.

Gary school, 183; system, 170
Geography, 312

Girl, the county, 425; scouts, 441
Gossip, 200

Habits, 383, 417

Handicrafts, 459; health, 245, 292,

322, 367, 429
Heating, 176, 273
High school, 170, 243, 249, 256; rural,

36
History, 310
Holly school, 179

Home, education, 308; making, 435
Homes, school, 190
Horn ^steading, 55

Household organization, 54; tusks, 432
Hygiene, 307
Hypotheses, 412

Inheritance, 375
Immigrant demands, 331
Improving rural schools, 45
Instincts, 375
Instruction, 293, 406
Integration, 59
Interest, 248

Junior high school, 304

Knowledge, 386

Latin, 327

Leadership, 9, 491

Lesson steps, 409

Letter writing, 311

Library, 169, 176

Life situations, 398

Lighting, 173; overhead, 171, 508

Management, class, 395
Manual training, 242

Market, the world, 52

Methods, 293; general, 400

Migrant farmer, 55

Morals, 246; efficiency, 299, 311, 358

Motion pictures, 461

Motivation, 387, 397

Music, 296

Non-arithmetical matterates, 327
Non-English languages, 327

Ohio school awakening, 224
One-room school, 493
One-story building, 506
Orientation of building, 173

Parker, on types of learning, 387
Perkins's building plans, 179, 186
Pioneer life, 449

Preble County, campaign, 239; con-
solidation, 233
Prevention and cure, 368
Principal of school, 9
Principles of rural education, 17
Problem, The, 411; method, 416
Program of studies, 12, 303, 314
Privies, 182

Professional preparation, 295
Pupils in rural schools, 23
Puritans, 448

Randolph County, 263

Reasoning, 410

Recitation, 407, 420

Recreation, 295, 311, 430, 397, 444,

455

Refutation of arguments for tradi-
tional subjects, 329

Roads, bad, 485

Route, transportation, 209, 225, 229

Rural education, principles, 17; prob-
lems, 6

Rural school needs, 31

Salary of teachers, 195
Sargent school, 276
Schedules of transportation, 232
School site, 161

INDEX

545

Science, 312

Seating, 180

Secretaries' recreation, 460

Self-activity, 381

Shades, window, 175

Site, of school, 161, 499

Six-six plan, 304; program, 304

Social activities, 440

Social centre, 12, 47, 57, 202

Social meetings, 253

Solitary framing, 54

Solutions of rural education problems,

6
Spelling, 309
Stair climbing, 517

Standards of consolidation school, 172
State administration, 36
Steps in lesson, 409
Studies, 12, 29, 37, 247, 284, 320
Subject matter, 37, 321
Subjects of study, 320
Supervision, 403
Surveys of recreation, 452
Surveys, rural, 38; rural schools, 28

Taxes, school, 33
Teachers, 9, 28, 41, 504
Teacherage, 190

Teaching process, 392

Teaching, principles of, 396

Tenure of land, 56

Terms of school, 24

Testing suggestions, 415

Thinking, 410

Thomdike, on achievement, 371

Time on routes, 234

Toilet rooms, 181

Transportation, 208; success of, 216,

258, 260, 269
Types of teaching, 405

Unit of support and control, 32

Values, relative, 345
Ventilation, 176, 273
Vernon's building plan, 187
Vincent, Dr. Geo. E., 204
Vital efficiency, 292
Vocations for girls, 437

Wagon, school, 211
Writing, hand, 309
Woman, the country, 425

Y. W. C. A., 289, 441, 461
Y. M. C. A., 289, 461

THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE
STAMPED BELOW

AN INITIAL FINE OF 25 CENTS

WILL BE ASSESSED FOR FAILURE TO RETURN
THIS BOOK ON THE DATE DUE. THE PENALTTY
WILL INCREASE TO 50 CENTS ON THE FOURTH
DAY AND TO $1.00 ON THE SEVENTH DAY
OVERDUE.

APR 13 1935

.lUL 29 1936

AUG 3 1936

^^^ ^ 1839

.

LD 21-100m-8,'34

YB 44An4

/; ()<)

U

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY