Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1909-02-19

its demand for professional training for
teachers; the increased cost of the new
offices created, which we believe will
much more than meet the saving in
| abolishing the offices of school treas
urer; and other Objectionable features.
The commission frankly says that ''the
certifcation of teachers should recog-
nize and place premium upon acad-
emic and professional preparation for
teaching.
Section 4s of the proposed law says:
mo person shall be eligible to any
state certificate who has not attended
and completed the equivalent of four
year high school course, and who has
not completed at least one year of pro-
fessional training in normal school,
college, university or city teachers
training course" Section 81 provides
that mo person shall be eligible to
teach in four year high school course
or act as principal or city or county
superintendent who does not possess
state certificate
Had those sections been the law in
the past, Cresco would never have had
three of its best principals, Weld,
Cooley and Ling, and will any one say
that they were failures in Cresco or
have been elsewhere? A collegiate
education and professional training is
desirable, but it is not necessary to
successful teaching.
AS a distributor of the peoples
money, the proposed bill is quite in
genious. 1t provides for Supt. of
Public Instruction at salary of So, 900
per annum. The Board of Education,
has secretary at 81, 200 per year and
travelling expenses. There is also a
state supervisor of schools at 81, 900
per year and expenses and also provis-
ion for assistant inspectors up to a
$1,000 annual limit The State Supt.
is allowed a deputy at $1,S00, and two
clerks and two stenographers at a total
salary of $4,000. The salary of the
county superintendent is fixed at 81, 500
and expenses. Pay is provided for ex-
animation readers, county boards of
education and perhaps others and to
offset this the Office of school treasurer
with its puny percentage is abolished.
Consolidation of the rural schools is
also provided tor and in their distrust of
J the people, the educational oligarchy
propose to do away with the 'school
on every hill top" abolish the humble
schools which have been the melting
J pot of our nation, into which the for
eigner and the native born, the Jew
r and the Gentle, the rich and the poor,
t have been fused and moulded into the
) citizenship of our country.
al We are just "far enough behind the
/ times" to prefer the old system which
t has produced nearly every great man
f of our country, to the proposed plan
which provides for rule by an aris.
| tocr.cy of education of the common
e schools in which the plain people re.
: ceive their education and of which they
Y should retain control
Members of the legislature have each
e received the following anonymous com
munication:
"To the legislators: Read this. Take
it home with you. Have it published
IN your home papers.
j Speaking of the school bill now be
II fore the legislature, j. Peasley, wh'
I'd has been city superintendent o
20 schools for twelve years. remarked
is that after reading the bill severa
j. times, he regarded it as an absolut
he invasion upon the school rights of ev
in cry citizen in the state.
he Il brand it, he said, ''as bi
le most drastic in its manipulation; as
bill most insidious in it's aim to estat
ID lish star chamber rule through stat
at and county commissions; bill mos
be bold in its attempt to place our school
Of under college control; bill most lii
n eral in its provisions for czar rule b
te state superintendent; bill most il
nd viting to vultures of graft throug
of teacher agencies, book companies an
colleges. Indeed, the time has com
b. when our common schools should b
,ol divorced from college control and free
er from deep scheming political scho
as managers. ~