The Emporia weekly news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1881-1889, 1881-11-24
DEFECTS OF OUR SCHOOL sYs-
TEN

proving the means for educating the |
children of the country, In the time
above named, no doubt the figures would |
be startling. Now a wave of inquiry as
To the result of this vast expenditure |
seems to be sweeping over the country. |
The people are saying, "What
are we getting for our invest
menis in school houses, in
improved furniture and apparatus
in educating teachers, and for the mill
ions given 10 school book publishers! ~
The inquiry is a very proper one, and
very important one, also 1t is gather
ing strength every day. While the ques-
ton was whether the funds should be
raised To improve the facilities for edu-
eating the children of the country, those
who criticised were regarded with sus-
picion. LiberaliIy and the advanced
and enlightened civilization of the time
won the victory. That fight is over.
The policy Of literally supporting COM
mon schools by taxation is No longer
questioned in this union, except in very
limited and obscure sections. The
time las come when the exposure of all
that is wrong or defective in school man.
agemeni, can only inure To the benefit of
tine schools, and hence the press is de-
manding reform. The uniformity of the
complaints is the most striking thing
about the demand. This results from
the fact that the common schools, espec-
tally in all our cities, are of one stereo-
typed pattern in organization and rou-
tine, slavish limitations to model 10
which all the teachers are trained till
they seem welded to its defects and in
capable of suggesting or asserting any
change. Reform must, therefore, come
from without, and the journals of our
leading cities are handling the subject
energetically.
There is great dissatisfaction with that
system of grading which requires the
pupils TO advance in platoons exactly
abreast in each of half dozen stu
dies at once, or not to be advanced at all.
But the universal complaint is that the
course of study in the graded schools is
arranged primarily for the text book
publishers, and that, whether so intend
ed or not, it does wrest from three
fourths of the children the benefits
which they might receive, and which
they should receive from the schools.
Instead of giving these little ones the
key to knowledge and sclEimprovement
Il 81, To- tr,
receive it-instead of teaching them
reading, writing and arithmetic between
the ages of six and tcn-the course of
study is begun upon foundation as
broad as if they were to remain in the
schools from six to twenty. They are
required TO begin a multiplicity of
studies which they can never complete,
and arc thus deprived of tuition and op
pOrtunity in the essential branches they
might master before the poverty of the
family withdraws them from school and
puts them at work. In regard to the
public schools in that city the Phila-
delphia Record, says:
OF the t6.OO0 primary scholars barely fifty
two per cent OF the scholars who get from the
primary schools into the secondary never get
any farther. They do not reach the grammar
schools. and, worse yet, they do not reach a
well-groGnded knowledge In reading. writ
ing and arithmetic. They arr made tolerably
ready to be educated; but they are not as
ready they should be TO get about their
business In the world. These are the young
sters for whom the common schools were pro-
Vidcd, but Tor whom the common schools of
Philadelphia do not adequately provide.
Money that should first be dedicated to the
proper housing and schooling OF these infants
between the ages or six and eleven years is
devoted to furnishing q higher education for
scholars who should be otherwise provided
for ut private expense. The difference in the
average yearly cost of teaching the pupils in
the primary schools and the pupils in the
high schools Is the difference between $40 per
heat and $50 per head. The money that IS
poured out like water by the people of Penn
Sylvania for tho maintenance of public
schools is very much OF 1t squandcred in the
effort to reach beyond what is practical for
all school children into u system which is pos
siblc or desirable only for few. As we
said at lrSt We say again-.he system is top
heavy.
ty per cent. of the children in the Phila-
delphia schools, though they are in
school about five years, have to be with.
drawn before they reach well ground
ed knowledge of reading, writing and
arithmetic! The Chicago Tribune al
leges a still worse state of affairs in that
city. 1t says:
The present system. which costs the tax
payer so dearly. is largely q failure. Be-
tween so and 90 per cent. of the children who
attend the public schools of this city leave
them rs soon as they can real and wr lite. Be-
yond that point, the time spent at school is re-
garded by many parents pretty much
wasted. They see their children tied down to
u routine car which moves on but little faster
than n snairs pace. Boys who could master
their arithmetic in one session are held back
so as to consume several Girls who could go
through their English grammar in few
months are kept at It for several years. simply
because some scholars can go no further in
those studies. The school history OF the Unit
ed States can be succinctly studied by many
quick and apt pupils in one term. but they
are not permitted TO do It In less than several
term, and so OF all the studies. This bad
system must DO broken up and common sense
be permitted to take its place. The teachers
are not earning their wages in the education
al results they are accomplishing for the ris-
ing generation.
The Inter Ocean of the same city
says:
The course OF study in connection with the
grades OF classes is made up on a theory that
every child spends more years in school than
IA To- ho fail a IN . he
facts in onc-third or one hslr the cases, and
yet the course OF study does not bend 10 the
requirements OF the boys and girls who are
compelled to begin the struggle in life early.
Citizens associations are forming to
devise and apply some remedy for this
evil. The remedy may yet take the
form oil u positive law, forbidding the
waste Of child's time upon any other
study till he is we'll drilled in reading,
writing and arithmetic. AS it is his
precious years are frittered away with
drawing lessons, geography got by rote,
dull collection of jejune facts and
dates called history, ETC., so that the
school funds are practically admins
tered and applied for the benefit of the
favored few who have means and leisure
to complete a thorough educational
course, while the very classes of children
for whom the common schools were pri-
marily intended are cut off from the
feast. II is evident there must be a
change.
From Edmund Ydres.-Asche wives
and daughters of second-rate Americans
are quite as pretty, clever and accom-