Walker Lake bulletin. (Hawthorne, Nev.) 1883-1926, 1892-05-25
THE PUBLIC SCHOOL MAP.

The public school map puts the Amer
lean educational sysuen in u striking
form.
Thirteen million pupils are now en-
rolled in the public schools of the United
States-that is, there are more than
three times as many pupils as the entire
population of tho United States in 1900.
The entire population in 1880 was 1885,
600: there is consequently larger ma
ton of children now in our free schools
than the whole nation of sixty years ago.
These 13,0O0.000 public school pupils
are one-fifth of our present population
of C5,000.0 goo. There are something over
u million more in private and parochial
schools. But it is this nation of our free
school youth, this nation within the
nation, that will be controlling the re-
public fifteen years from now. These
children of the states" imbued with
our Characteristic American spirit, will
soon be the leaders of the people who
are to solve the problems of the opening
years of the coming century.
! One-fith of our population in the pub
lie schools means that the American idea
is that childhood and youth shall enjoy
sacred immunity from labor while the
preparation for life is going on. In all
our states the age when children can be
employed for wages during the school
term is steadily creeping upward. The
| time is not far off when one-fourth in
stead of one-hfth of its population will
be enrolled in the schools. Here is the
, place for state legislation to make rapid
and sure strokes. When the children Of
poor family are hired out for wages
there comes an apparent relief to the
| family; but child labor invariably re-
duces the labor of adults. Raising the
school age always operates to raise the
wages of the men and women to whom
labor belongs. In the states not yet
+ awake to this the children who ought to
be in school are with their little hands
holding down the general rate of adult
wages. If fifteen were made the uni
versal school age. with strict penalties
] for hiring child under fifteen during
! school hours, millions of toiling chill
dren would be added to the hopeful ma
ton of pupils now in the public schools
Who are the instructors of this vast
democracy of youth? Three hundred
and tifty-two thousand teachers are en-
ployed. One-third of them are men,
two-thirds are women. The men are
usually we'll trained. The proportion of
trained female teachers is increasing
year by year, as the normal schools send
out their classes. Nevertheless, scores
of thousands Of these female teachers
are unframed, Forty per cent. of all the
female teachers teach for only one term.
Think what that means. In the rural
districts of many states teaching is
sob" to which almost any girl may
turn. Careful examinations of teachers
are not to be expected when the school
fund is SO penurious that the cheapest
teachers are the only applicants.
The faults of the American public
school system, however, are all on the
surface and can easily be remedied.
State superintendents and higher edu.
Gators generally are giving to all the
weaknesses discernible in our system
their careful attention. They are de-
termined that the new century shall
open upon an educational plant as near
ly without defects as progressive energy
can make it.
The public school is orr most distinc-
tive American institution. 1t is this
same public school which, more than
race, has made the difference between
this republic and the republics of South
America. When the world gathers here
AZ onn-4QOth anniversary to scrutinixe