Waterbury evening Democrat., 1906-11-16
IALEINC ABOUT SCHOOLS.
Ciy Rseslves ss7,ooo for ChndItl
 t Does Net Educate.

When the question of estimates for the schools came before the board of finance yesterday afternoon, Com missioner of the Board of Education J. J. Mcdonald, stood up and address ed the board to this effect: We are not asking generosity nor charity, all we want is our just dues. There are S,4OO children taught in the private schools of Waterbury for which the city receives money from the state every year for their education and yet they do not cost the city one cent. The parochial schools are ey. anywhere, if they were not every where the children now being elu. cated in them would cost the city $aO,OOO year more than the present total. The city would have to build sixty more schools. For these 3,4OO the city receives from the state every year something in the neighborhood of $37, 900.
 We do not class the High school as we do the grade schools, and by putting of from year to year the building of school-house you will only increase the expense and the confusion in the end.
 Now as to salary of the average teacher? The average girl working in a shop earns more than the average teacher does in the end. Mayor Thoms here remarked that in his trip through some of the schools yesterday he found twenty three rooms vacant and he could not see therefore why there should be lack of room in the schools. Commissioner Mcdonald said he has been on the board of cdu- cation some six years and he has yet to see a board that has been extra gant. As to the vacant rooms, per haps the mayor did not know that some of those rooms were closed for lack of power in the heating appara- tus, he said. The mayor remarked that Superintendent T1nker's report was rather cloudy. It said there was lack of room everywhere yet in a short time there will be rooms va- cant in the additions to the Bank and Webster schools.
 Commissioner Phelan said that some rooms are vacant for various reasons, but he did not think there are twenty-three throughout the city. He said that the grades cannot be mixed. With mixed grades a school could not be conducted properly. The mayor said there are three vacant rooms in the Dublin street school Commissioner Phelan admitted this is so, on account of the opening of the Sacred Heart parochial school, yet, notwithstanding that It was reces- sary to employ six teachers more than last year.
 The mayor thought the school boundary lines were wrong in some places. For instance Driggs school is crowded, he said, while the schools on each side of 1t, Lincoln and Bish- op street have plenty of room to spare.
 Commissioner Phelan explained that this was owing to the fact that parents will not send their children to either the Lincoln or the Bishop street schools. vAs for Dublin street school 1t will be filled next September. The mayor again remarked about twenty-three rooms being vacant and Commissioner Phelan asked him what was the city going to do about the high school for next fall Its ca pacity, he said is 45O, but there are bS9 pupils in 1t now and where will those go who shall graduate uext June. The mayor thought something could be done by turning the offices in class rooms. This practically closed the discussion.