The Lake County star. [volume] (Chase, Mich.) 1873-current, 1877-09-27

'gWhat tax.payets DO complain Of Is q
systeul az education which has bb Arm
l6undation TO rest upon, and which is'
aTinost useless In the everyday husi-i
iess of llifeg AS an 1ipstepce, 10 al
H{bst. Impossible to ind q boy vhOl has
4fri3Sd Ats a& q HSysatS fit' 70 be-'
come a., Apprentices Ina pfinthig-of-
lfice. for. The reason that he Ecannot
snen correctly or read manuscript 18th
sny. sort OF readiness. With Alt our
bossted graded and high schools, this
Iisla painful assertion to make !, but, as
We have already stated, facts are stub
Born THINGS. This ia not confined to
Michigan alone. On the contrary she
1fAnds foremost, az -anys state in the
talon In her Rerfect system and the
means provided fdr the ,educstion Of
her youth. TIE existence OF such .
condition Of things within her bdrders
81 all the more humiliating. When
William Henry passes through the
district, the graded. and high kehDOls,
knd then through one OF the foremost
tolteges,in the state, and returps home
After years of toll with all thel hnnors
81 those Institutions clustering about
hm, we naturally expect that be Is
sdpplied with a store Of knowledge
Which will be useful. to him ID all the
Syaths Of DC, but when he pens ten
sssgsg s sns s5l %s'ts:
"wsshington's Birthday" and spells
Ispdops l'spsnesi = I'VE fyslcthst there is
something radically wrong In the
-t2aa6ih3s o. the 1nstitllttuafs through
which William Henry passed. This
IA; hot an isolated case. Hardly q day
passes I'm the life of a newspaper man
without seeing just such instances. 9
q The me- st startling array Of facts IL
revealed In the examination Of young
men for Submission TO West Point All
that is required Of q candidate Is that
he shall be swell versed In arithmetic,
reading and writing, including ortho-
graphy, and have q knowledge OF the
elements, of English grammar, OF de-
scriptive geography, especially or his
own county, and OF the history ofthe
United States, Every grammar grade
/ boy ought to be able to pass this exam.
ination at the age of Is. The averagf
age of the nominee for West Point Il
nineteen years, and what Is the result !;
In June last, out OF 116 nominees, In.
Guiding the Presidential nominees al
large, IS, or just one-half, were rejected
by the. examiners. AT the nava
| academy at Annapolis, SO per cent. o
the whole number were rejected.
| What is required for admission q
| West Point is what every American
! citizen ought to have and what ou
common schools are designed to teach
When we consider that these candi
dates for West Point are nearly al
chosen from congressional districts b.
competitive. examination, and on
brightest boys usually enter the lists
4 and perhaps the best in ten selected
the proof is all the more convincing
that our common schools are not per
1 forming their mission. !.
!, The epithet 'sold fogy" il applied y
everybody who does not admit tina
great progress has been made In GU
| systeYn ofeducation, but 1t Is nsverthe
less true that with all our fine schoo
houses, costly apparatus and elaborat
textbooks. the true idea OF the common
school has been almost forgotten, an.
1 IL is safe to say that sound Engiisl
education was better supplied I'm tn
l-simple roadside school house Of gen
Grafton back than In our $50, 600 build
ings of to-day.-Ld,asing Republican