The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1869-09-10
WHAT THE NORMAL STUDENTS OWE
TO THE STATE.

| [Extraets from MIR. EeIlogg-s address the last
graduating Glass;
GENTLEMEN AND LADIES OF THE CLASS
OF 1869: Since you are a little in debt
to the State of Kansas, and are, as we
trust, honorably intending to cancel all
just obligations held against you, n
statement of your account will be salts
factor;' to you at this time.
! In the first place, you, in common
with all of US, every citizen of the State,
owe to it just appreciation of our
free government. You owe obedience
to its laws. You ought to practice vfr-
tuous acts, and ought to refrain from
criminal ones. But in addition to these
common duties, there are certain specific
obligations resting upon you, because
of your attendance here, because of
your membership in this school. At
the beginning of your work in the In
stitution you signed your names to a
written agreement with the State, pledg-
ing yourselves, in consideration of the
educational advantages offered at this
place, to become teachers in the public
schools. The pledge was accepted in
good faith as an honest expression of
your intention. The time has now
come for its fulfillment. You are now
to enroll yourselves among the teachers
of this brave young State. AS teachers.
therefore, as co-wOrkers in the educa-
tional work shop, now greet you.
welcome you to your chosen calling. l
welcome you to all there is of the
teachers profession, its nobility and its
responsibility, of which one of your
number has so well spoken, its requited
and unrequited labor, its sunlight and
shadows, its ups and downs, its ex-
actions and recompenses, the sowing
and the reaping, the carrying of heavy
burdens and the laying them down, the
evil repute and the good repute, the
curses and the blessings,-I welcome
you to it all, for know that the recon-
pense outweigh the exactions, that there
is more sunlight than shadow, more of
good repute than evil, that the reaping
is commensurate with the sowing.
But it is not enough, my friends, that
you simply teach school certain length
of time and draw your pay. Unless
the normal schools are founded upon
false conceptions of education, unless
its theories are all wrong. unless teach
ing throws mp all claim to be ranked
among the professions, unless all the
advances i'll educational work for the
last twenty years, founded as thew are
upon the idea that professional training
is necessary for teachers, are delusions ::
or, unless the State of Kansas be con-
victed of incapacity in the organization
and management of this Normal School.
it is fair to expect of you, not simply
teaching, but good teaching. 1t is not
enough that your work be sufficient to
preserve you from actual dismission
from your school by the large boys, or
the directors. You may teach in this
tolerable, or intolerable, manner until
you are decrepit with age, until YOU
wear spectacles and vainIy strive with
ear trumpets to catch the mnmbling of
your dull pupils, and you will still be
in debt to the State for your instruction
at the Normal School.
This isn't the sort of teaching that is
expected of you. The State has higher
claims upon you than can ever be can
celed in this manner.
Ihave no fears that your teaching will
be third rate; but should be sorry to
learn at the close of another year that it
has been second rate. I want to hear
your schools have become generators of
educational enthusiasm, that they are
centers from which lives of influence
extend across the country at least. Do
you know that some teachers are so
weak in power to govern, to dissemin-
ate what little stores of knowledge they
have accumulated that their influence
is cut off short at distance of ten feet
from them, that it extends scarce more
than half way across the school room,
that the pupils sitting in the corners
near the door are as practically removed
from humanizing, educating influences
as they would be if banished to the in
terror of Stewards Russian Purchase.
Do not add your names to the number
of incompetent teachers. Do not be a
Cram or Squeer. Your teaching, if
of the right kind, ought to improve the
schools of all adjoining districts.
But need not multiply statements
l trust it is clearly understood that the
State has a right to demand of You
good teaching in her public schools,
and that you are in debt to her until you
pay it in this manner.