The Portland daily press. [volume] (Portland, Me.) 1862-1921, 1889-09-19
NO STEP BACKWARD IN TEN YEARS.
Commissioner Dawson's Report on
the Public Schools of America.
Marked Improvement In the Systems
of the Southern States.
The Infant Mind Well Taught But the
Body Sadly Neglected.

WASHINGTON, September 18-Hon n. r.
Dawson commissioner of education, has
filed with the Secretary of the Interior, his
annual report for the year ending June 80,
1889, in the course of which he says that
from an analysis of the statistics of the pub
lie schools for the decade from 1S76-77 to
1SS6-S7, it appears that the growth of the
system, considering the whole country, has
outstripped during that period the growth
of the population, the excess of the increase
Of enrolment over the increase in the popu-
lation between six and fourteen years of
age, being 1.6 per cent. This gain, the COM
missioner says, is due entirely to the pro-
gress of the public schools in the more south
ern sections and more especially in the
south central division. Here the increase
of enrolment shows an excess over the in
crease of population probably never before
paralleled in country so long settled. The
sentiment in favor of free schools, supported
by public funds, he says, is becoming each
lie school systems of the Southern States
have been undergoing unprecedented devel-
opment. Col0red children are apporti0ned
an equal share of school funds unless in the
State OF Delaware and there the schools are
kept open as long and under as well paid
teachers as those of white children. The
funds for the support of these schools are
furnished mainly by white inhabitants.
Compulsory education, the commissioner
says, forms no feature of the southern
school system. 1.-THE arbitrary proceed
ings," he adds, (which compulsory attend
ance by law suggests. its inquiSitorial meth
DDS and theiinhuence OF state in the parental
control of children, the effect upon the pa
rents of sending their children to school
under compulsion in impairment of that
self respect which lies at the basis of charac-
ter and good citizenship, seem to render
compulsory attendance by law an instru-
mentality to be resorted to only to suppress
great and crying evil"
In the course of his remarks upon the pub
lie schools in our principal cities, the Com
missioner says: I'm no department of the
city school work is improvement more mani
fest than in the primary schools and this for
the reason, perhaps, that in them there was
the greatest room for Improvement" The
commissioner regrets his inability to report
the general adoption of physical training in
the public schools and says that though
thousands of dollars have been invested in
apparatus to be used in the development of
the mind, no provision worthy of serious
consideration, has been made for strengthen
ing the body, upon whose sound condition
effective mental effort depends. In con-
Guiding his report the commissioner says:
I'm ending my official connection with this
office, it Is a source of great pleasure and
cation in the United States have taken no
steps backward during the last decade, but
that the cause of general education is
stronger than at any previous time in our
history and still growing in public estima-
tion" 4"