Connecticut western news., 1908-11-12
MIR. HALLS REPORT ON EDUCATION
 [Continucd from page IT.

Better schools, more attractive school houses, better teachers with better pay, interest instead of apathy, are the invar- fable results of right supervision. PROSECUTIONS
 Inasmuch as. under popular form of government, laws can be enforced only so far as public sentiment approves of such enforcement, the record of52 prose- cutions during the year, tor offenses against school attendance laws, would seem to prove that public sentiment fully upholds the reasonable enforcement of those laws.
 much greater number of such cases might have been brought into court but for the physical Limitations of u ne and distance.
 A noteworthy case. during the year, was that in which a parent refused to send his children to the school designated by the town school committee, but pcI- sisted in sending them to another-and more distant-school in the same town. At this latter school textbooks were withheld from these children and no in strution was given them. Suit was brought against the parent for failure to cause his children to be instructed ac- cording to law and the trial justice found the parent guilty. Tho case was ap- pealed to the Superior court of Litch- field county and there the first judgment was sustained: verdict which not only affirms the right of town school officers to designate 'a school, but also affirms the duty of the parent to comply with such designation.
 PERFECT ATTENDANCE CERTIFICATES
 The certificates of perfect attendance adopted by the State board of education and made use of for the first time dur ing this year have been found to be of much practical value in stimulating school attendance. Two forms of certifi- for perfect attendance during school term, and an individual certificate to pupil for perfect attendance during an entire school year. ...s
 There were issued during the year 277 separate term certificates to POS schools ill A towns, one or more going to each town in the territory assigned: these covered l, 1,298 cases of perfect attendance during some school term of the year.
 Of the year certificates 210 were issued. covering 80 schools in 16 towns.
 It is worthy of note that in Harwiu- ton, Leon and Clarence Scovllle, and in Winchester, Raymond Goodsnough, have each completed three consecutive years of perfect attendance, and in the New Lebanon School in Greenwich, Charles Christensen has completed eight success sive years of perfect attendance.
 - IN GENERAL
 The above are some special features of the years work. h general it is un- deniable that schools are better, that teachers are more capable, that school buildings are better cared for. and that there is gradual upward tendency in regard to public education in nearly all the towns. Constant observation of school conditions, during term of years, leads to the positive conclusion that much, if not all, of this decernable uplift is due to the unremitting efforts of the State board of education.
 CHILD LABOR
 Illegal child labor is not allowed to ex- ist ill Connecticut; that isto say children under the age of fourteen years are not employed here in mechanical, mercantile or manufacturing occupations. 1t is not probable that as many as twenty children under the age of fourteen are so employed at any time in this state.
 Children between the ages of fourteen and sixteen are reported as illegally employed" when found at work with out the certificate of age; and this omis- sion to procure and file the certificate constitutes violation of law on the part of the employer, but it is very different thing. in every aspect. from the employ ment of little children-a crime of which Connecticut IS not guilty.
 The friends of the children, interested in abolishing child labor in other states, could best prove their sincerity by bend Ing their efforts toward securing such legislation and such an enforcing system as Connecticut has; for if Connecticut child labor laws were in force through. out the United States, then the Uuited States would no longer have a child labor problem.
 The question may we'll arise whether or not the laws which have produced such desirable results should be ill any way amended or tempered with; but no harm could result from raising the age limit from fourteen to fifteen for boys and to sixteen for girls, and at the same time adding to the list of prohibited oc- equations such work as selling papers, blacking shoes, and driving livery or truck teams.
 It IS undeniable thnt girls should never be admitted to any of the prohibited oc- equations under the age of sixteen: it is ,1 NAnA ,,x hnx