The record-union., 1899-03-03
An Unjust Measure.

Eds. Record Union: The powers
that are behind. Assembly bills 63S and
639 and their companion bills in the
Senate have consented to modify them
in several respects, eliminating several
features that are obnoxious to the
teachers of the State as threatening the
validity of their certificates, but the
influence that aims to make the State
Normal School close corporation still
holds stubbornly to other features.
One of these is the one introduced
and killed two years ago, and again
introduced in the same old bill this
year, reducing the examinations of APP
plicants for teachers certificates from
semi-annual to annual. The same old
argument is used, viz, that there are
so many teachers now who hold GER
tificates, but who are not able to hold
schools to teach. If this argument is q
valid one, why is it not applied to the
Normal Schools also, where classes are
graduated twice a year? If there are
too many teachers now, why do the
Normal Schools still keep grinding them
out twice a year, but insisting that
county boards shall not have an equal
privilege?
1t is more than probable that if a
canvass of the State were made. it
would be found that for every success
| full Normal School teacher there would
be found two successful teachers who
never were inside of a Normal School.
| This is no rsiection on the Normal
Schools, for with a County Board of
Education in every county many more
teachers must necessarily be certifi-
Gated than are graduated from the
Normal Schools. If the truth could be
ascertained, moreover, it would be
found that at least two-thirds of these
| teachers, who have made their voca-
| ton a success, would have been unable
| to spend the time and money to at
/ tend a Normal Schol for three years.
What, then, are they to do? Are they,
because Of poverty or other reasons,
to be denied the privilege of choosing
the vocation of teaching and making a
| living thereby, while their brothers and
sisters, more favored by fortune, are
to have the paths of life made smooth
for them by the removal of COMPETE
! ton? Can the advocates of these bills
show in what way the State would
have been benefited by depriving it of
! more than one-half of it's successful
| teachers in order to make room for
When the Normal Schools will propose
Ito have their semi-annual graduations
reduced to annual ones, some of the
suspicion attending the change contenl-
plated in this bill will be removed, but
! not before, for if there are too many
teachers now there may be some rea-
son for reducing the number all round,
Normal graduates and all, but not by
making the reduction all on one side,
| like the handle of jug.
There is another serious objection to
/ the same provision in the bills, and
which is manifest unfairness. That
! is. that it contempiates an annual ex-
animation in June, instead of semi
annual one The High School gradu-
ate obtains her diploma at the end of
| the term, about the LIST of July, or
possibly later She does not step out
of her school, like her more fortunate
| Normal School sister (who has the edu-
cation of less high grade, except in
pedagogy, equipped with a diploma
that entities her to teach without fur
Their examination. She must undergo
an examination before the County
Board Of Education or else go to the
Normal School to pursue lower
course of study, and a course in theory
and practice of teaching. She has grad
uated and wishes to teach, but finds
the annual examination has passed,
and that she must wait another year
! before she can pass an examination
and get her certificate. She does SO and
starts in search of an opportunity to
| make her living, and finds out that.
before she had passed the examination.
all. or nearly all, of the schools had
engaged their teachers for the ensuing