The McCook tribune. (McCook, Neb.) 1886-1936, 1894-08-17
A Plea for the High Schools.

tHS bodru OF EuucatiOn: Gentlemen: The
report comes to this Office that because
of the financial depression and of the
sudden crop failure, you feel the neces-
sity of economizing in educational ex-
penditures; and that this action is likely
to take the form of reducing the force
of teachers in the high schools-possibly,
in some towns, of cutting of the last year
of the high school.
have no authority in the premises,
and no warrant for addressing you at
this time except my warm interest in
the system of education which prevails
in this state and in the young people
who are being prepared under and by
this system for better service to their
fellow men, and hence for lives more
satisfactory to themselves and to those
who SO lovingly strive to secure for them
successful future To this may be
added, perhaps, the excuse-if excuse be
needed-of the very pleasant personal
and official relations which have sprung
up between the boards in so many towns
and myself, as have sought to learn of
the higher educational needs and de-
mands of the various localities in this
state. This circular, then, is based en-
tirely on my earnest desire, as a citizen
of Nebraska, that not one of the chill
dren of this commonwealth shall be
either denied the much coveted training
of the high school, nor delayed in secur-
ing this.
For delay is dangerous. Youth comes
but once and passes all too soon. These
young people are now ripe for the train
ing which you have thus far offered
them. Turned from it now, once out in
the world and fairly engaged in the
bread-and-butter struggle. there is little
chance of their ever entering the school
room again. Even should they do so,
much will be lost; continuous work has
such vastly greater force and effect than
this disconnected effort
Moreover, the very fact of the present
commercial and financial depression
renders their completion of their course
wiser and more imperative than ever
before. Wiser, because to drop them
from the schools just now is in all prob
ability to turn them over to an idle life
Many are unsuccessful in securing work
at present To drop year of the high
school is simply to increase this number.
Now that these older pupils cannot Sc
cure work or can secure but small wages,
is the very time when it will cost them
less to abstain from labor and to continue
their schooling. If there was demand
for them at good wages, there might be
some hesitation about their going on
with their education. There certainly
can be no hesitation in such dull times
as these.
Again, the present condition of affairs
proves only too conclusively the practic-
al value of sound educational training.
Not every man who has graduated
holds out under the strain better than
those not schooled: but, all other things
being equal, the well-trained man sur
passes the man who has not been trained
can render better service, and so has
more staying power. You have only to
look about you and reflect, to be assured
of the general truthfulness of this prop
osition.
Finally, the amount saved by slight
reduction in the teaching force, or even
by dropping a year in the high school,
is almost infnitesimal when spread over
the entire tax list and applied to the re-
lief of each taxpayer. It is sheer and
wasteful folly to have crippled, curtailed
and inefficient schools at ninety per cent
of the previous tax, when ten per cent
more will keep them up to the standard.
Iventure to suggest therefore-and I
trust the suggestion will be received in
the same spirit in which it is offered
that you ponder this matter long and
carefully before you take definite action.
See if there are not other lines of munic-
ipal expenditure along which a saving
can be made. If you find that there
must be less revenue to the schools, then
begin at the bottom rather than at the
top. Put the lower grades on halliday
sessions; which is far better than depriv-
ing any higher grade of its entire work.
Better still, if the emergency is great,
suspend the first year, or even the first
two wears, rather than the last. Wiser
and more truly economic by far, that
the youngsters should have one more
wear of free, animal life, than that those
whose education is so well under way
should be turned from the schoolroom
door.
The free public school, and especially
the free public high school, is nearer and
nearer to the heart of the American peo-
Die every year. 1t is the inspiration of
the individual pupil, the hope of all
classes, the great leveler of all false stand
ards in social or individual life, the prom
Use of state or national perpetuity, the