The Marietta journal. [volume] (Marietta, Ga.) 1866-1909, 1880-02-12
OUR SCHOOLS WHAT ARE WE
DOING FOR OUR CHILDREN.

EDITORS JOURNAL The article o
your correspondent "Dumas,' il
your last issue, presents a seIf,evi,
dent proposition in asserting the i'm
portauc, of education. No sane
person in this progressive and en-
Iightened age will underate The ad
vantages of properly cultivated
mind. Some there may be, who
dwelling i'll that Utopia, which they
only find in dreams of a past social
system, may fancy that a knowledge
of the arts and sciences, or &C DO,
lite literature is MT necessity for
personal prosperity or individual
happiness, but these dresmers come
to a sad realization of a practical
present when necessity brings them
10 contact with this progt essive age !;
an age whose gerius is development
and whose resistless motive ,wer is
ever advancing the standard of ex>
cellence.
The educated man now, whether
he be mechanic, farmer, merchant,
or in the learned professions has of
necessity every advantage ever those
who haye neglected the culture
of their minds or who have
not kept pace with the progress
of the age. 1t is not my pur
pose, however, to make an argument
upon the Importance of education,
but simply to bring home to your
readers, 10 Cobb county and about
Marietta, the very practical and i'm
portant inquiry Are we doing our
duty in the matter of educating our
children and preparing these, our
successors of another generation, for
the responsible duties which must
devolve upon them The boys and
girls, now about our fresides are one
day to bless or curse another gener-
alton, they are to live 10 another and
a yet more active and progressive
era of history. What are ne doing
for them 2
Admitting the necessity fo7 edu
eating them are we using such sys-
tematic means, such rational appli
anceo for the development of their
minds as are calculated to accom-
plish the object we desire?
We provide teachers and estab
fish schools, are we certain that
these teachers are competent and
that these schools are so systematic>
ally graded as to impart properly
the education we desire to give?-
These are indeed important ques>
tons, matters of vital concern to US
as pa1ents and citizens, and demand
ing our careful consideration. The
time has been when Marietta was
Justly considered a center of educa-
tional enterprise, place of high cul
lure in all the departments of kno~l,
edge and the time n0,0 IS, that our
5oodly city must awake to the inns
portance of re>establishing her rep
ltatfon in this respect. We have
he means of doing SO. All that is
wanting is for proper system to be
adopted and the proper enterprise
% be displayed in carrying it out
In Cobb county, including our city,
here are fifteen hundred children
who should be daily receiving in
from competent teachers
As the interest of the county, is, or
should be, identical with tina; of Ma
rietta in this matter, | will, in en-
~ to poiot out defects, con
ne skfgelf to the city.
ETS, permit me to say that our
system of education is grossly defec
i've. 1t is just no system ct ALL
Here and there are q few private
schools under the supervision Of
eachers, who manage them as pri>
vate enterprises for a season, and |
hen, for want Of encouragement, or
other considerations less justidable,
cave them to die out, and be resur
rected again for a short season by !
some one, who in turn follows the
example. 10 this way few chill
1ren have received a mere smatter-
ng of information and have filed
our shelves of our book cases with a
varietysof school books. If these
schools have done more except in /
lew instances, it does not appear 10 +
he conversation of our children or
n their ability to anwser questions
% the elementary branches of the !
sciences. The boy, or the girl, will
bring you geOgraphys, grammars,
arithmetics, aud works upon litera
.ure, from half dozen different au
thors, ordered by a half dozen diff
ferent teachers, and convince you in
a twenty minutes conversation that
he knows nothing Of the principles
contained in either. Now this is
not the fault of the teacher so much |
as it is our fault in not having fixed |
in the community regular uniform
yraded system Of instruction, based,
not upon the whim Of any single
teacher, but upon the experience of
other communities who have been
long acting with the happiest results
on this plan. For all necessary pur
poses we want now first class high
school for boys, one for girls, and a
grammar school of two grades for
smaller children. The supervision