The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-05-20
Superintendents of Education
 Address the People of the South

At meeting of the Association of tht | Superintendents of Public Instruction oi l the Southern States in Atlanta, October 1908. committee Consisting of J. Y. Joy, ner, of North Carolina. Chairman; H | l.. Whitfield, of Mississippi. and S. A Mynders of Tennessee. was appointed tc prepare an address to the people of the Southern States.
 At a subsequent meeting of this As sociation in Birmingham. April 18th and Eth, 1904. the following address was re- I ported by the chairman of the commit | tee, and. after full discussion was unani- mously adopted.
 The address as given to the press yes | terday by Hon. l. w. Hill, State Super intendent of Education. Is as follows: With keen sense of the responsibili- ty laid upon us as heads of the Depart ments of Education by the people of our respective States, with a fixed faith in the active capacity of Southern chill dren through whose veins course the purest strain of Anglo-Saxon blood on
 the Continent-the strongest, cieanest
 blood on earth-with firm reliance in the patriotism. echivalry. courage. pride
 and sense of justice of the Southern peo-
 ple. with a profound conviction of the necessity of universal education for the preservation and perpetuation of Democ- racy, with an assurance born of the evidence of all past experience and all past history that the only means of universal education are the public schools, we are moved to lay before our people these facts about their schools and to make to them, in the childrens name, this appeal for those schools.
 Comparative Statistics.
 First.-The public schools of the South. the only hope for the education of nine-tenths of the peoples children, are still sadly inadequate to their stu pendous task, unequal to the educational demands of this century fo education and inferior in most respects to the public schools of other sections of our common country. Comparative statistics of un- doubted authority show that of all sec
 tions of our country the public schools of the South have the poorest houses and equipment, the most poorly paid teachers, the shortest school term and the most inadequate system of supervision The average salary of teachers for the
 country at large is s49.o0 for mon and s4O.00 for women, while the average sal ary for teachers in the Southern States is ss5.Ss for men and s3oE for women.
 The average length of the public school
 term for the country at large is 14S
 days. The average length of the public school term for the North Atlantic States
 is 177s days. the average length of the
 public school term for the Southern
 States, including Tennessee. Mississippi.
 North Carolina, South Carolina. Loulsi-
 ana. Arkansas. Georgia, Alabama. Texas. Virginia and Florida Is 30 days. Outside of the larger cities and towns there are few high schools in the Southern States worthy of the name. and the work done in most of the public schools Is neces- sarily so elementary in character as to fail to furnish adequate preparation for college or university. or for civic, social and industrial service for the thousands | that must depend upon them for such preparation. For every man, woman and child of its population the country al large is spending $2ss for the education of it's children. the South is spending l barely ss cents. The country at large
 is spending s2o2s for every pupil en-