The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1897-03-03
DON'T CRIPPLE THEM.

OON'1 CH1RRLE 4d Ems
The bill now before the legislature to
repeal the section in the act creating
the state normal school, which provided
that it's diploma should be a certificate
to teach in the schools of the state,
will certainly not become a law if prop
erly understood. 1t looks like a very
innocent bill to confer favor upon the
state normal school, the state UNIVERSE
ty and other colleges, when, as a matter
of fact, it confers no privileges on the
latter which they do not already have,
but destroys absolutely the certificate
value of the diploma of the normal
school.
For over 80 years this diploma certifi-
cate has been a great stimulus in the
hands of the state by which the young
men and women have been encouraged
to a more thorough preparation for the
teaching profession. The safe guards
thrown around it by the state itself
have always made the teaching profess
sion generally it's warm personal
friends
Why take away this privilege from
the students who are willing to spend
so much time and money to fit them
selves to serve the state? Over 80 diff
ferent states give recognition to- the
diplomas of their normal schools and
even the county high schools of Kansas
are empowered by law to award a di-
ploma which is second grade certih-
cate to teach The diploma of the state
normal school of Kansas is subject to
Endorsement in several other states, in
GLIDING New York and California.
Is the state normal school to be pun
ished simply because it has grown to
be the largest and one of the most hon
ored in all the land? 1t looks like child's
play.
This paper cannot imagine a more
unjust or more harmful measure toward
the state normal school than this pro-
posed law, to take from It's diploma the
authority it carries as a certificate to
teach in the schools of Kansas. This
point was in the very charter of the
! school. Since it's organization this one
privilege has been the great incentive
that has encouraged the thousands of
students to spend years in completing
the course. In his message to the legis-
lature, Gov. Leedy happily referred to
the wise provision of the certificate val
ue of the normal diplomas.
It is indeed difficult to see how any
influences could be induced to favor
measures which would stab the great
training school for Kansas teachers.
Strange, too, is the fact that these eff
forts against the normal school are
apparently coming from other colleges
| not state institutions.
| These schools foster a broad education.
| They should not be narrow in their own
actions. They have a grand record and
are deserving of high praise, but when
they join forces to cripple of the
| higher institutions of the state, it is time
{ to protest.
The state normal school was established
| for flo bo
! it to itself to protect it, Everybody who
! has visited these colleges easily sees that
| they give a general education, while the
normal is organized throughout for the
one single purpose of training teachers
If this bill passes, will not the legislature
| practically say: there is no such a thing
| as a profession of teaching?
| The normal school bears the same rela-
| ton to the teaching profession the law
| school to the practice of law, the medi-
| cal school to medicine.
| One of the friends of the normal school
pointedly says: 1.-The students now at
| tending the State Normal school have
| some claims which everybody will at once
| recognize valid. There are about one
| hundred of them expecting to graduate
| in June. Many of them have been work.
| ing for eight or ten years, teaching and
attending the normal alternately, as their
funds would enable them, in order that
they might attain this honorable recog-
milton which the state has been promis-
ing them. The bill makes their diplomas
void as certifica ties. 1t also permits only
| graduates in four years courses to take
the examination before the state board of
| education. This will wholly disbar two
thirds of them-students who have spent
more time in special reviews, and in fit
ting themselves to teach the subjects in
the public schools than would be required
to complete four year, so-called, normal
courses in many of the colleges. There
are possibly five hundred students who
have already completed the major part of
the required course, one-half of whom are
now out teaching in order to secure suffi-
cient funds to return and secure the d.
ploma of the school The opposition of
the great body of teachers of the state to
any bill repeating the certificate privileges
of the state normal school has been ex-
pressed so frequently that it is hardly
necessary to refer to it
The effort to convince the legislature
that the state university and state agri-
cultural college are in sympathy with
any such attack on the state normal
school will not succeed. Each has it's own
function in the great university system OF
the state and they should never clash.
Any movement which may be construed
as displaying hostility to the institutions
of learning supported by the state is
open to close criticism. In some
of the eastern states this antagon-
cause of education. The marvellous
growth OF our educational systems in the
west has been almost wholly due, as a
college president recently observed, to the
liberal maintenance of state universities
and colleges. The state has done in half
a century what private enterprise could
| not have brought about in a hundred and
| fifty years. No other investment has
been so profitable for Kansas as the
money it has put into the state univer-
sity, the state Agricultural college, and
the state normal school. They rank
among the best the continent and
ought to be the pride of every Kansan.
The legislature ought to strengthen them
in every way in its power.