The Fargo forum and daily republican. [volume] (Fargo, N.D.) 1894-1957, 1910-07-13
APPEAL
FOR RURAL SCHOOLS
MRS. JEAN M'NAuGHToN STE
VEINS, HEAD or THE RURAL DE-
PARTMENT OF THE N. .. Z. A.,
PRESENTS STRONG ARGUMENT
FOR A SQUARE DEAL.

Bantry N. d., July s.-To The
Forum: Any room at your round
table?
Now that the primaries are over and
the nominations for the legislature are
settled, we would like to set some con-
siderations before the elect.
Oh, yes, we know that there is an
other tussle to come in November but
in many a district Ii is a walkaway.
! The idea we wish to set before our
masters is-"Justice for the Rural
Schools"
| Why not treat the rural schools as
well as the high schools?
In what way? The state grant in aid
given to each high school as it reaches
a certain standard, and increased aid
as the high school improves its stand
| ing, has worked so well that our state
high schools have, as a whole, risen
from grade to grade
| They feel the honor OF being in the
| first grade, and the citizens point to
them with pride. Such excellent high
schools stimulate every interest in the
town and county that supports them.
| And the students they turn out into life
will repay North Dakota hundredfold.
High schools that climb into the Sec
ond class rejoice over the step gained
and reach out into a first class future.
Third class? They don't talk. They
| are too busy doing their duty always
with an eager eye fixed on the next
step.
Crowded at the bottom No, indeed.
For no school worthy of the name
stays there willingly. Only long enough
to get things into order, that first law
Of heaven.
But are our boys and girls, our most
valuable asset in North Dakota, all in
the high high school?
No; 70 per cent of the growing men
and women Of North Dakota, the power
of the next generation never enter the
high school.
Where are they? They begin and
end in the rural school.
Only per cent Of those who sit on
the benches there ever go to the high
school.
No, we are not leaving out the graded
schools in cities, towns and villages.
They are taking abundant care of
themselves.
Time was, in the early EOS, when
the common schools of North Dakota
included the conditions in the villages,
the budding towns, ambitious little
cities, and the fringe of farms border
ing our streams, lakes and rivers.
Many a man now high in the coun-
ellis of our state, pleading in our courts,
zif +rfc
served his community by teaching in
the common schools. But the prairies
showed waving yellow wheat, and blue
eyed flax, the railroads gridironed our
counties and dotted them with towns.
ara the busy men and women built up
the graded schools.
So our North Dakota Educational
association, keeping up with the times,
bettered and bettered its elementary
department and studied the conditions
Of the grades.
Meanwhile the rural schools have
been struggling, struggling, to work
out their salvation.
They had to contend with short terms
and be differed by teachers who could
not earn a living all the year round
in the same school. So they were al
ways on the move.
And the homesteaders were strug-
Cling, too.
Now We have terms of full length in
many districts-there is a steadily
growing body of professional teachers
staying in the counties-and the time
is ripe for standardizing their work
with a state grant in aid.
My lords and masters OF the state
legislature, please to spend some of our
own educational money in doing for
the sons and daughters of the farm
what you have done for the 25 per
cent in the high schools.
Then We will have county high
schools where busy, earnest fathers and
mothers will rejoice to see their sons
and daughters get a better and better
training until it is second to none-and
all gained without leaving the home, |
where chores beat staying on the
streets and birds are better friends
than loafers.
Help us to set UP a standard school
here and there which will be sur
rounded by grove, like the one in
which sit, fenced to keep out the stray
cattle that have so often ruined our
Arbor day and its fruits. Help us TO
have little red schoolhouse that shall
be social center, with a good library
where the young folks of the farm will
gather for debate or a literary, and
the Mothers club will meet OCCASION
ally, and even father will go once a
week anyhow to look at the milk tester
his boys talk about, the school gardens
or the fruit trees. He might find a
good paper or magazine on the table
while he compared notes with another
father and farmer.
Utopian? No, nothing is too good
for the rural school and its growing
citizens. One of these days they will
vote.
j. McNaughton Stevens,
President Rural Dept, N. d. E. A.