The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1909-09-01
EDUCATIONAL RALLY.
Fine Speeches Heard by Fairly Good.
sized Audience. MANY Ladies. in
Attendance.

Pursuant to the notices of the same,
the educational rally for Lexington
county was held in the courE house on
Monday. The audience, while not as
large az could have been desired, was
interested and attentive through the
whole proceedings. County Superin-
tendent of Education A. D. Martin
called the meeting to order at eleven
o'clock.
The first speaker was DR.. D. B
Johnson, president of Winthrop, VINO
dealt largely with statistics, which,
to report, would do violence to the
value of his address, quoting largely
from leading educators throughout
this and other lands in proof of his
contentious. He showed, in dollars
and cents, the value of an education,
by contending that the earning ca
pacity of the average college-bred
man, upon basis of forty years &C.
tivity, was $40, ,OGo, while the average
of an uneducated man ranges at about
$1,000. The great advantage, there
fore, of education was made apparent
by figures that fairly bristled with in
struction. He argued that when you
educate man that you educate an
individual, when you educate q wo.
man, you educate family, because
whether she be able to supply col
lege education to each member of her
household or not, she as mother. will
spare no pains in instilling that knowl-
edge into her children which Is the
preparation for complete living. His
speech was not only entertaining, but
instructive as we'll.
Mr.. J. Frank Foosbe, editor of the
Winsboro News and Herald, was the
next speaker, and he contended that
the forerunner of all good schools was
good roads. Give good roads and
good schools will follow rather than
good schools being the necessary
cause of good roads. Good roads not
only enhance the chances for educa-
tional progress, but they ton h vitally
all material development and pros
perity. - - 1852. :..:
Congressman A. F. Lever, more
perhaps than any other Of the speak
ers, deplored the fact that the audi
cnce was not so large as it should
have been. This was due to the fact
of his being at his home and he, being
keenly alive to the progress of his
home county, would have preferred t
have had not only q larger, but a
more representative audience. His
first point was that politics too fire.
quently played part in the working
of our school system as it is at present
constituted. He suggested reforms
which undoubtedly would minimize
these political influences very much
indeed if not wholly eradicate them.
The school is what the teacher m axes
it. The teacher is the creature Of the
trustees. The trustees are appointed
by the superintendent of education,
who in turn is elected to Office. It is
perfectly clear, therefore, that the
chances for politics to play its part
are unhindered. He suggested re-
stricting the powers of the trustees
and placing the responsibility upoI
the superintendent OF education who,
in turn, should be appointed to office
by the state board or education with
the advice and consent of the COVER
nor, thereby taking him out of the
primary and removing him as far as
possible from all political interferences
with his work. He would increase his
term from four to six years and charge
him primarily with the responsibility
of efficiency in every department. Of
education in the county. Another
point in his speech was that the rural
schools undertake to prepare 8, a lente
for entrance into college, while statis-
tics showed that only six per cent. of
tt.eir pupils ever reached college.
Ninety-tour per cent. of the students
in the rural schools enjoy no other ed
ucational advantages than those re-
ceived in such Schools, hence to ex-
pend energy and labor to technically
prepare for entrance into college is a
| waste Of time aud talent that should
be employed wholly in preparing stu
dents for the broader duties Of citizen
ship and practical living.
Mr. W. 3. ID we was the next speak
! er. He showed how it would COST nu
1