The Montgomery advertiser., 1908-08-23
The High Schools And
 Means to Promote Efficiency

Luther of Troy. Miss Booth of Montsom- cry. Superintendent stripiln of 0adsden.
 Prof. Stuckey of the University and Prof.
 Rutland of Auburn. has just issued ieafiet
 making a plea for the better teaching and
 speaking of English one paragraph there
 upon runs
 The determination of the college presi-
 dents of Alabama to demand fourteen units
 of work for entrance to their institutions
 at once lays a responsibility that falls most
 heavily on the teacher of the mother
 fact established beyond all hope of
 denial is that of all the studies in the
 school course. tho result of the teaching of
 English Is the most iamentabie After ten
 or eleven years In school. the average stud
 ent is unable to read intelligentiy. write
 easily. or spell correctly. Why is thisf
 Because he has not been properly taught
 to read. write. and spell: his work in Eng
 ifsh has been neglected. This defeect is pit
 fable and wholly unpsrdonable; the respon-
 sibflity to remedy 1t is on the teachers of
 the preparatory schools. and it must be
 met. or the expectations of our colleges will fall unanswered. our state will remain
 where it Is educationally. at the bottom. Now. sad to tell 1t is true that the re- suits of our teaching of English are la mentally poor. yet the entire blame and the teachers: the cause goes back of the school into the home. So long as children hear sioveniy speech. they wi.i use ir. so long they are allowed to read poor trash.
 they will write poor trash: 90 long as they are allowed to do no reading. they will Dc poor readers. Why is 1t that the South has ,. never had for any length of time a first class magazine of its own7 Why is it that today we can boast scarcely more than two
 names among men of ietters7 Why Is it
 that our boys and girls cannot stand the ex- aminations of the Eastern cofieRes3 The answer to these questions lie not in the teachers. nor in the schools. alone. The re- sponsibiiity must be shared by the public by the patrons of the schools
 Possibly no where in our social life of to- day is the doctrine of making haste, so fnsidious and fatal as in the education of our children Nature demands twenty-fiye years for the full development of q man physically; the state demands twenty-one years before a man may record his vote as citizen; these suggestivs facts We put aatdes and are so misguided as actually to
 boast If our boys and girls can ''graduate'' at seventeen or eighteen Nature to take twenty-five years to develop man physi. cally and the school 10 profess to '.edu- cate" him in less than half the tirnel Small wonder that the children ground oui ! of our schools are 70 lily equipped Small wonder, again. that this southland of ours can boast Of but two institutions that car be classad as universities. We have de- manded. educationaIIy. low standards. low ideals. and according to those demands have little things been given unto us.
 This state is spending vaster sums than
 ever before to educate her youth: VIII the returns he as all commensurate with the expenditure7 That rests with the parents of this state. the patrons Of our schools. Teachers may agitata lawyers legislats, but the schools will never educate as they should till the demands demand insist ent. Intelligent, courageous. .--ahaIl come from public sentiment that the best is none toe good for our children. and that our schools must abide by high standards. Let us have prepatory schools and prepare. ool- ed public whose patronage depends upon the seornins of little things in education. and the day sf them.
 Frances Higgins. Chairman of English Division Association. Alabama High Schools.