Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1883-12-06

| officers III tnc cOUutitsi uub ei'e P",s
, proves that the plan would be uusatl'
factory. Comfy judges, as a rule, d's
like the duties made incumbent upo
them by the school law. Beside.
they have not the time from thci
other duties TO supervise schools. The.
cnu ONLY he the agents of the state 4
distribute the school fund. sugges
that the state be divided into districts
and that superintendents be ap
pointed or elected for them. A schol
astic population of two thousan'
would make u district to supervise
The schools In which would
take all of n superintendent
districts it would he necessary in som,
cases TO put two or more counties to-
gether. In the districts composed ol
large territory the superintendent
would have n good deal of territory &c
do, but would have no more schools to
supervise than others would have.
| They should examine teachers, grant
certificates and visit and supervise the
schools. They might be required to
| take the scholastic census. In that
case the fees paid county judges and
assessors would be saved to go to the
should also be required to approve all
drafts on the county treasures, and
discharge all duties now incumbent
on the county judges. My judgment
is that abe greatest need of our schools
is supervision, and i know of no other
plan that will secure it.
most respectfully recommend that
u "superintendent of public instruc-
ttnp u.nt, N N a f,f A ~
be provided for II 1t Is deemed best
not to provide for the election of such
office il would be vastly better than the
present arrangement if the board of
education be directed by law to APP
point one. He should supervise, man
age, direct and control the public
schools of the state and might do so
under the supervision of the board of
education. The governor, comptroller
and secretary of state cannot give the
necessary time from their own Offices
to manage the growing school
interests of Texas. Constant, care
full and onerous labor is
required for that purpose in this de-
partnent. The secretary of the board
of education is virtually the superin-
tendent. but he is without the neces-
y
necessary influence to make the man
ngement efficient The name itself
adds dignity to the department., and
he who overlooks the expenditure of u
million and u half dollars of the public
money should be in law as he is in
fact the head of the department. The
superintendent or ommissionershould
he cr-0ficjo secretary of the board of |
The board of education
must under the constitution continue |
% annually apportion the school fund,
out the management of the schools |
would in my judgment be more salts
actory under the officer mentioned.
The city schools might with propri-
'ty be left under the present manage
nent except that some provision
hould be made to compel reports from
hem to this department. In the
ase ofall officers required to report to
he state department there should be
liked a penalty of some sort for failure
N this point to do so. 70 determine
he manner in which books to be
aught in the schools should be estab-
ished is full of difficulty. To leave
ach teacher to select the books for bis
chool would keep him constantly at
var with his trustees and county oili-
ers and would result in too great
'ariety of textbooks used. 1t would
re equally unsatisfactory for he coun-
Y officer or the trustees to select the
looks. In my judgment the state
annot successfully prescribe the
looks, yet there should be
like uniform series
sed. The teachers might be
equlred to hold teachers Institutes in
ach county every year to determine
'hat BOOKS should he used the sue
eeding year in the county. This
'ould get uniform series for each
ounty ana would result in almost
inform series for the state. Whether
ne subject is legislated upon or not
here Will mosl likely be some dis
atlsiaction.
The Eighteenth Legislature appro-
rated $4,000 per annum for summer
ornal institutes. Your honorable
GARD fixed the salaries of the princi-
ais OF these institutes ut $50 each.
he Institutes now taught are shown
y the tables referring to them. No
lstitute for colored teachers was held
the Eleventh congressional district,
ecause there are only six or eight
olored teachers in that district and in
ONE instances they resided 500 miles
part from each other, and because no
pplication for an institute was made
y the district. The 5000 was equally
ivided between the forty-one princi-
ais, and the balance of The $50 due
hem will be paid from the Peabody
md when il is received. The table
eierred TO shows that very small
ercentage of the trustees attended Z
lese institutes. ! regard them as
Iighly important to the common
,hool interests, and confess that am !
tterly surprised that the teachers of ,
ne state cannot be induced to avail
themselves of the advantages !
he state seeks to bestow upon them.
he1nstitutes did much lasting good. {
nd would have been in every in
lance fully successful but for the fail !
re OF SO many teachers to attend
hem.
The term of the Sam Houston nor
AL institute, ending June Is, 1888,
'as eminently successful. 1t is in my |
ldginent the most valuable ally of the I