Los Angeles herald., 1909-05-16


this most important work, vital to the
best citizenship of the future, is left
largely undone (as indicated by school
examinations, both by the home and
the schools of the nation).
Certain cities east and west are act
lively beginning this work.
Here, then, is one marked need OF
the public schools which calls for Wig
orous action and for which the new
law provides:
Second-The requirement of physi-
cal examinations of all candidates for
teachers positions in the public schools
to determine vitality and efficiency,
and further examination of accepted
teachers as may be advisable to deter
mine continued fitness for work.
This second provision of the law is
protective to both the schools and to
teachers.
1t protects the schools against inef-
fciency of teachers by the requirement
of good health and vigor as the first
essential of the teachers profession
1t protects the teacher in that when
physiological strength and vitality as
an entrance to the teachers profess
sion. Teachers can likewise demand
that the work required of them shall
not be such as to unduly deplete vital
ity and efficiency.
Causes of Defects
Undoubtedly lack of a vigorous in
heritance accounts for considerable
percentage of these defective condi-
tions.
The inheritance cannot well be
changed for the children and youths
of today; but we can shape the en-
vironment and right living of today
and largely stop the manufacture OF
defective conditions; also to a greater
or less extent we can overcome many
of the evils of unfortunate inheritance
and we can remedy artificially the de-
fects which already exist.
The environment of pupils at schoo
is made up of the school building and
yard school furniture, school teacher
school activities and the atmosphere
about them.
Many defects of boys and girls are
due to unsuitable school buildings and
school furniture, to poor sanitation, tC
insufficient provision for physical activ-
ity-manual training, physical train
ing, play, and for out-of-door occupa-
tions.
The building of school house is not
a simple matter of raising some money
and then turning over the contract tc
a builder. The large number of un'
suitable school buildings recently erect
ed justifies the statement that devel-
opmental needs of pupils were not Civ
en- due consideration.
The school building that provides
rightly for the developmental needs oil
children and youths will be markedly
different from the majority of schoo
buildings today.
Defective eyesight, poor breathing
capacity and poor circulation and de-
formity are manufactured by schoo
fttY ffrYf. Ia nj
Fifty schools in different parts o.
New York city were examined las
year with reference to conditions likely
to manufacture physical defects of pu
pills. The results were stated as fol
lows:
MANY school houses are so built anC
constructed; many school houses ar
so directed and so executed that chill
dren are inevitably injured by the en-
vironment in which the compulsor.
education laws force them to spent
their formative years."
At a recent lecture on the physica
welfare of children the needs of the
schools was urged in the following
language:
OF course we need physicians to ex.
anime our children and teach parents
but many of us principals believe that
our school environment manufactures
more physical defects in a month thar
all you physicians will correct in a
year.
The Cost of the Work
The cost of establishing health and
DEVELOPMENT supervision in the public
schools will be the salaries paid the
examining staff and other employees
necessary to secure a good "follow-up
service" and attend to other necessary
work.
This cost of course will vary with
the amount of work to be done. In
Cleveland, Denver, ETC., from $4,000 to
$25, 900 per year for excellent and suf-
ficient working force. This is con-
siderable sum of money.
But let us consider one cost of not
maintaining such supervision of the
schools. The cost of re-educating pu-
pills who fail in their work and must
repeat it in the schools, necessitating a
repetition of the first cost of the edu-
cation of pupils.
This "cost of repeaters," as 1t has
been called, has been estimated with
care at from IS to IS per pupil.
For Cincinnati (40,2S6 school popula-
tion), $350,000
For Denver (35, 600 school population),
5000, 000
For Los Angeles the cost at this rate
would be approximately $3.50 900.
Assuming that so per cent of the
repetition of school work may be due
to other causes, the cost of not estab-
fishing health and growth supervision
is still enormous-over 100000 for the
CITY per annum, to say nothing of the
loss of health and efficiency to the fu-
ture citizenship of the state.
The value of the project is shown by
the following summary of the first
seven months work of the current
school wear in the Los Angeles public
schools:
Mass Teaching
The schools throughout the nation
contain large numbersssof pupils I'M
necessarily delayed in their progress
and advancement because mass in
struction of the schools has not met
their individual needs.
When Individual variation shows it.
self in the shape of native bent or ma
tive endowment, at nascent periods OF
otherwise, it must be given expression
if more or less of degeneracy is not to
stamp itself upon the child.
Individual variation is the very basis
of evolutionary advance, and yet this
is the very thing the school makes but
little allowance for.
The true function of the educator is
to develop to it's fullest the basic, racial
life of childhood and then at the emer-
gency of each variation give the COM
ing individuality its rightful express
sion.
To have a school organization flexible
enough so that development opportuni-
ties could be utilized regardless of what
the usual order of school work may
be would be a long step forward in
educational progress.
The problem of excellence, the prob
lem of retardation and degeneration,
the problem of individual development