The commercial. (Union City, Tenn.) 190?-193?, 1909-05-14

more knowledge or skill any more than
weighing boys makes them heavier.
Boys must be fed and teachers must be
taught. The only way to improve them
Els to give them better opportunities for
preparation.
In most counties of the State a few
schools have competent teachers, edu-
Gated in private high schools or small
colleges or brought, at an increased sal
airy, from other States; but the majority
Of the teachers will never have better
preparation than can be had in the best
public schools Of their county. If the
highest public school is a primary or
grammar school, then the preparation
of these schools must be the minimum
standard Of preparation OF teachers, to-
ward which the larger number will grav-
itate. In a county in which one or
more public high schools are establish
/ ed, the minimum standard OF require
ment for teachers can be at once adj
lvanced to the equivalent Of one year of
high school work, then to two, three,
and finally to the completion OF the full
four years course After the school
has been in operation five or six years,
the County Board OF Education and the
County Superintendent may say to all
young men and women who apply for
the first time for examination for a.
teachers license, that it is useless for
them to attempt the examination I'M
less they have had the full course in the
public high school or its equivalent;
and in a county in which there are
few hundred public high school grad
yates it will be easy to fill the elemen-
tary schools with teachers far more COM
petent than the majority Of those now
in service.
In most counties in which high
schools have been established the Coun-
ty High School Board and the County
Board Of Education cooperate to offer
the advantages of the public high
schools to teachers already licensed and
employed in the elementary schools.
The high schools usually are in session
ten months; the elementary schools
from five to eight months. After the
elementary schools have closed, teach
ers are admitted to the high schools
free Of charge. Special courses are or
ganized for them and sometimes addi-
tional teachers are employed to teach
them. Those who attend are usually
rewarded with increased salaries the
next year. In some counties of the
State majority of the teachers have
attended public high schools for two or
three months each year for the last
three or four years, and the common
schools have profited greatly thereby.
One county superintendent says the eff
ticiency of the schools have been in
creased from forty to fifty per cent. in
this way
1t should not be expected that any
large number of young men and wo-
men will go out of the county, pay
expenses, board and high tu-
ition fees at private schools, and then
return and teach in the common
schools at the salaries which are usually
paid. But with public high schools in
every county, with free tuition, and the
cost of living reduced to minimum, it
IS not unreasonable to expect that in
lew years it will be possible to eliminate
rom the ranks of teachers in public
schools all who have not had at least
rood modern high school education or
nave attained it's equivalent by long ex- {
'erience and persistent study at home.
When this comes about, the value of all .
he public schools of the State will have /
,een more than doubled. For this rea- /
on alone, the State and counties might {
veil afford the expense of establishing
nd maintaining good public high !
chools. +
JORDAN