Corvallis gazette. [volume] (Corvallis, Benton County, Or.) 1900-1909, 1904-02-26
ADDRESS ON EDUCATION.
AS Delivere1 i by T. B. Williamson
at Last Parents Meeting.

! at Last Parents Meeting.
Mr.. President, L ,dies and Cen
tlemen.
First-Does not the state be-
lieve it pays to educate? If it is
not profitable investment to the
state the funds ought not to be
appropriated; but as all the states
of the Union app opriate funds S
especially tor common schools,
1t is hardly ,essary to discuss
this portion of-the apportionment
but simply to say that part OF
the common sclool is the base
of all the educational system, it
should receive the primal and
chief attention, and not only is it
the base of the school system it
is the base of our social fabric.
From here springs our political
majority, from hare springs all
students for high schools, and
these schools make college and
universities possible, from here
come all labo1ing classes and all
must pass through these schools.
Therefore it is the best policy of
the state to appropriate its funds,
not only where they will reach
all, but reach them at time
when they are most easily mould
ed and when their whole life is to
be infu enced by impressions to
be recei we'd here. Then if legis-
lators wish good high schools
must they not commence by
furnishing funds for good priz,
mary schools? Here then is the
foundation of the whole matter
and with out these the structure
must tall.
Second-The community is
the generalissamo of the common
school. the commander-in-chief
of all its forces, the source of all
its power, the very author of its
being. In view Of this relation
why should not the community
be responsible for the nou-em-
cheney of the common school ?
When we hear gloomy reports
of the public schools how very
ready, from habit I suppose, do
we charge the teacher with being
the responsible party and at once
we pile upon his or her shoulders
the odium of failure. Is this
lust? Is it true that any one
who is recognized as teacher,
not a shift remember, receiving
the intelligent support of the
community should prove a fail
ure? Hire a man and put him
to work on your farm or in your
shop, Withhold from him all
sympathetic appreciations that
might be expressed concerningl
his daily round of toll, hedge|
him round about with suspicionl
with regard to his intention and
with doubt as to his ability to|
perform we'll the task assigned
him, make all the work hard and
bitter, so as to be doubly sure
|he will earn his money, create
confusion among the implements
with which he is to labor by
|overhauling, misplacing and mis-
matching just because you do the
hiring, you know; do all this
and then because everything
does not go smoothly say your
man is failure. The very fact
that he does not commit suicide
under this complication of diff
culties is prima faeie evidence
that the man himself is grand
success. This is a simple par
allel of the average community
and the common school teacher.
What teacher of the common
school has not been crippled and
|hindred in his work by the
critics and wiseacres of the
community who in a thousand
nameless ways try to convey the
impression that although the
teacher may have a certificate,
that he is hardly capable of teach
ing their children. How often
has the teacher struggled and
bufeted against a flood-tide OF
lawlessness as it sweeps through
the juvenile portion of the
community, receiving momen-
tum from the place where the
wise do congregate and give
utterance to such expressions as
"That fool of a teacher ought
t. have his head broke'' and eff