Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1906-02-25
FOR COMP Ill sorry LAW
Result of Inquiry Regarding
Public Education.
TRUANcY IN THE SCHOOLS
Report of Committee of the Associated
Charities.
THE ALLEGED BAD CONDITIONS
Enforced Education Regarded as
Remedy for the Existing Idle
ness of Children.

| The special committee OF the Associated
! Charities which has been taking a caucus
of children out of school, has discovered,
1t is said, such deplorable conditions that
! 1t has prepared "a new petition or argument
with fresher statistics In favor of the bill
| for compulsory educati now pending be-
| fore Congress
According to the COMMITTED composed OF
| DR.. Emily Young O'Bren, Mrs Richard
| Wainwright, F. g. Coldren, Mrs. Ellen
| Spencer Mussey. Rev. Ulysses G. B. Pierce,
| Mrs. Henry t. Rainey, William H. Bald
win, Mrs. Grace Porter Hopkins. A 4.
| Stewart and Miss Ida a. Green, there
more than 5000 children out of school IN
| Washington. The chief reason for these
| absences is not to be found in the necessity
of the support of widowed mothers and
| on, but in an absolute indifference to
| school.
| The chief argument alleged by those who
| hold that this is rot an urgent matter is
| the plea that widows and other dependent
| women must put their little ones to work
| to help support the family.
Two Answers Given.
There are, the committee says, two
| swers % The testimony OF charities agents
| social settlement workers and others who
| are In constant touch with the situation
| in that the chief reason for trdancy is ndif-
| ference, and that a very large number OF
| children are allowed to stay out of school
simply to loaf about the streets to so
| little chores around the house or for other
unlmportant reasons. In many cases the
! child s labor merely increases the irrespon-
| sibility and self-indulgence of a lazy
| father. There are few legitimate cases
where dependent women absolutely require
I or I1ch rpn-
uine cases the Associated Charities is ready
TO provide generous assistance, and if nee
essary, to raise special school pensions"
which shall replace the weekly earnings OF
children under fourteen years of age. AS
for children who are kept from school by
lack of proper clothing the Associated
Charities has long since established the
practice of providing appropra tely for
them.
As for accommodation for these truants
In the schools, says the committee, even
now the superintendent of schools is quoted
as saying that the present school buildings
could take care of a considerable number
of those who would be brought in by conf
pulsory education law after the LIST of July
next, and that the effect of the law would
be naturally cumulative, and gradually all
would be taken in who would come under
Its operation. He suggests that many of
the absentees would be provided for by pri-
vate and parochial schools and he states
that 1t has not been necessary to turn away
any applicant for schooling because of lack
of room. While there are -252 halliday
schools tclasses), these all for the first
three grades, strictly primary work. and
there are only twenty eight halliday schools
Cor cclasses) above the second grade.
School Attendance.
Many of the school rooms are full already.
but, the other hand, a very few are not
occupied at all. and many rooms can take
from two to eight or ten more children than
they already contain. The average number
Of pupils to each room in the District Is
forty-three, this average being based on
the whole enrolment, which takes into ac-
count not only the aggregate days In school
but also the aggregate days absence. The
average number OF pupils per room, based
on the average enrolment is only thirty
six to thirty-seven, and this is larger than
the average number in daily attendance.
So it can easily be seen that there are
many places here and there in the various
school rooms, containing forty-eight seats,
where the children can be taken care of If
they can be brought to the schools. There
are about one thousand school rooms,
elusive of rooms in high schools and manual
training schools. Three or four extra chill
dren in each room, or its equivalent, would
provide for all the children out of school
who would come into public schools, and
this with no extension of the halliday
school system.
National Capital Should Lead
Thirty-four states have compulsory edu-
cation laws and the fact has been stated
in President Roosevelt's message that in
telligent citizens of this and other commun-
tiles surprised and shocked to learn
that the national capital, which should be
q model city, has no means whatever of
forcing any child to attend school, Teach
ers complain that they are even restrained
from urging some of their present pupils
as they should for fear that the child will
q a 81 a ant
of school. In such cases, especially If the
parents indifferent. as they often are
there is no way in which the lad may be
held up to the training he needs.
In one block in Washington where there
Is a good deal of poverty and the agent of
the Associated Charities is called frequent
ly, there were last month thirty-two white
children out of school and ten children
who might have been in kindergartens IL
they had lived in a well-to-do neighbor-
hood, where there was a kindergarten and
where the mothers and fathers appreciate
the training Ii gives This means that In
this block there were forty-two children
out of school who would have been in
school if their fathers and mothers were
resourceful, vigorous people. or these chill
dren only eight were at work.
On the same block there were only TWEEN
ty-seven white children in school, OF the
ch4idren out of school nineteen were from
eight to fourteen years of age, that the
proposed law would put in school .on this
one block nineteen white children. None
of the children out of school on this block
who would come under the compulsory law
were at work. The discipline and training
OF these nineteen chiidren alone would