Morris tribune., 1911-01-27
HAVE BOARD ELECT.
Best Way of Choosing County
Superintendent.

main contention of an address made
by J. C. Morrison last Friday before
the Western Minnesota Teachers AS
sociation at Granite Falls. His sub
ject was County Boards of Educa-
tion." He said in part.
During the 1905 session of the leg
islature, Representative Biorge intro
duced bill providing for the selec-
tion of county board of education by
the school trustees of the county.
This board was to take over the school
matters at present under the control
of the county commissioners and was
also to select the county superintend-
ent of schools. The bill failed of pas
sage. In 1909, Mr.. Robertson intro
duced similar bill except that the
board members were to be elected by
the people the same as county COM
missieners are chosen, but some prov
isions of the bill were said to have
been unconstitutional and it was in
ueuulIely pOS&polleu.
The great object of both of these
bills was to provide for the selection
of the county superintendent of schools
in manner different from that now
used. l am not here for the purpose
of calling attention to the alleged
shortcomings of our present county
superintendent and in this connection
let it be sufficient for me to call your
attention to this fact. In the average
county seat we have school attend
ance of from 500 to 1000 and we
have at the head of the schools a
practical school man who commands
salary of from 81. 500 to $4,000. In
that same county there is rural
school attendance twice as large and
yet the man at the head of the coun-
try schools draws only $1,000 or
thereabouts, while his salary should
be larger than that of the city man.
In this world we usually get about
what We pay for and so long as we
are willing to turn over our rural
schools to $1,000 men we will get
about 81. 900 service. The time has
come when conditions demand that the
rural schools should have at their head
1000 men.
The only way that this can ever be
done will be by a radical change in
the method of selecting the county
superintendent and the removal of the
present residence qualification. Coun-
ty superintendent should be selected
from among practical school men es-
pecially trained for the work without
regard to where they live. When we
want president of the university we
pick man in Chicago, when we want |
city superintendent we take a
school man from any where in the !
country and the same is true of teach !
ers. All we require is that the per-
son shall have training and experience
in this line Of work. But when we
select county superintendent we re- |
quire that he meet the demands Of |
county politics and select him as we
do other county officers rather than |
select him as we do school men in |
other lines of school work.
But we have many good superinten-
dents and the great drawback of the
present system is that they are now
prevented from making life career
of the work. Sooner or later he is
defeated for reelection or sees that |
there is no promise in the future and
quits the work. All Of his experience
goes for naught and the country
schools are so much the poorer as a
result. 1t should be possible for
man to especially fit himself for coun-
ty school work with full assurance
that he could devote his life to it and
that merit would bring the same de-
gree of promotion as that which comes
to the city school man.
In order to accomplish this reform
~ 10 l1OC lCAOo0a1J IAOL q SONhty OOaAd |.
of education be created, for the essen
tial thing is that the county superin-
tendent be selected without residence
qualification and that can be done as
we'll by the county commissioners. A
county school board would have the
usual shortcomings and the usual vir-
tues of the average board.
The enemies of this proposed re- |,
form will cite you to the fact that 35
years ago county superintendents in
this state were selected by the COM
nissoners, but the commissioners were !
oy inference at least required to make !
the selection from among the resi- J
dents of the county, and the essential
matter Of selecting a school man was
lost sight of.
An attempt has been made sto raise