Staunton vindicator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1860-1896, 1884-03-07

MIDDLEBROOK, VA,
March 8, 1854.
Last week had the pleasure of looking
in upon Teachers Institute held at the
Middlebrook Academy by Superintendent
Fl. S. Roller, for Riverheads aud Pastures
District.
During the proceedings. heard the dis
cussion upon one point, which if true, and
they say IL is. and l have found out that
they are correct, is a disgrace to The State
of Virginia. If upon the presentation OF
these facts to the legislature, it refuses
Or in any wise fails to have the odious
thing expunged Immediately from the
school law, it will be disgrace so deep,
and so dark. that all the waters of the
Mississippi could not wash away the stain
[ have reference to the teachers salary
being affected by the average attendance.
Having had my curiosity, interest and
sympathy aroused in regard to the sub
ject. l find upon inquiry and Investigation
that there are so very many things which
may affect the daily average attendance,
which no creature can prevent and which
the teacher, above all others, is least able
to prevent, that to hold him responsible
for it by deducting from his wages, which
at best are lameatably too meager, is an
iniquity, at the perpetration of which hon.
Or and Integrity mast stand appalled,.
If measles, or humps, or whooping
cough, or chicken-pox invade the neigh
borhood, or should any sickness whatever
come, so as to prevent a sufficient number
OF pupils from appearing at school for
certain average to be made, the teacher,
according to the school law of Virginia,
is held responsible and fined for it. If
father or mother or any relation die, and
it should be deemed more decorous for the
children to attend the funeral obstquies
than to- 60 to school, and thereby bring the
average below certain amount, the
teacher must be punished for it by having
part of his wages withheld.
II bad weather, cold. snow, rain, wind,
mud. or home duties, which may for
short season imperatively demand the
services of the children, detain them from
school, or the scores of other reasons, l
care not what they be, in consequence of
which the required average is not reached,
the teacher must submit to being robbed
of part of his hard earned salary, with
no ona to defend him. [ can now we'll see
why this word, average, is such sore
one to the teacher of Virginia; and why
his heart throbs with honest Indignation,
whenever the subject is considered in rela-
tion to himself. or his brother teachers.
Upon an examination of the school law, it
seems that the rights of the teacher are
entirely ignored. His natural rights are
trampled upon, and he is degraded.
felt exceedingly gratiied when l heard
the chairman of the Institute 8 committee
on resolutions, read resolution to the
effect that convention composed of all
the teachers in the county, be held in
Staunton On the 18th of March to take &C.
tive steps in regard to those things
which pertaiDed to their rights. The
teachers in Riverheads and Pastures
Districts having inaueurated this most
important movement. earnestly exhort
the teachers in the other districts to be
present at the convention, and to join
heart and hand with them.
am sure that every good citizen of the
State, if he understood this matter as 1
have learned to understand it, would say
that it is exceedingly wrong for any State
to subject her teachers to as many NOR
tilications, trials, and difficulties, and to
humble and degrade them as the State of
Virginia now does by her present school
law. l would add, that compulsory
attendance, is not simply an absurdity,
but gross and crying inlquity. And as
long as the State links the question of
average with the question of pay, she will
defraud her teachers. May God speed and
bless the right, and repress the wrong.
Y,