The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1912-12-09
IT'S A PECULIAR PROCEDURE
First We Strain the Eyesight of the School Children
Through Inadequate Lighting and Then We Pay
Two Doctors to Find Out What's the Matter

| And 1t has been known to work adj
versely in that glasses" have accentu-
ated the, defect rather than to have
corrected it.
| The eyes become SO accustomed to
the artificial medium that the genuine
one becomes atrophied.
In other words by putting spectacles
on children the latter's vision has been
permanently impaired instead of tenn
| porarily benefited.
This is not, of course, the rule, but
not infrequent exception.
The famous ounce of prevention is
always far better than the equally no.
torious pound of cure.
The easiest way for the city to con-
serve the eyesight of its embryonic
citizens is to wire it's school buildings
from attic to basement and to use the
lights the moment they are needed.
Money is being spent for far less es-
| sential things.
We have an excellent school system
but it has it's faults.
| And this is one of them.
The ventilation is another.
Ar, rather, the rigid hold to it's the
DRY as exploited by the managers of
the local schools
! Things have been said about this be-
! fore.
But they can be said again.
| No one will deny that the most per-
feet theory possible may not be with
out flaw in practice.
In the high school is installed one
of the most perfect ventilating plants
known to this date
1t is said, however, by those who af-
| feet to know, that the plant is too
small for the size of the building and
therefore the result is not what it
would be if the size of the plant and
the building were more nearly COM
mensurate.
| The air in these rooms is sometimes
fair, although it is stated, it is never
absolutely good.
And, often, it's bad.
| No theory Of ventilation can be in
vented that will ever equal the direct
application of fresh air.
! No system that pumps the air down
through the room or up by way of the
cellar can equal opening all the doors
and windows at certain intervals and
getting the "ozone" at first hand.
, No room that has thirty or forty per-
sons almost constantly in it can be
purified by pipes in the wall.
| Ordinary common sense will tell you
this.
! Enter one of these perfectly venti-
| lated school-rooms fresh from the out
side contact, and you will get an arc
ma of the human animal.
| Perhaps slight.
| But it's there.
| The rule that is objected to, howev-
er, is that which prohibits a teacher
from opening window if she thinks it
necessary.
Whatever teachers may or may not
say, this is rule that does hold.
/ The higher school powers point to
the perfect system of ventilation and
say, in effect, that however you may
! feel, the systems all right.
That if it seems wrong-its you
not the system.
This is the sort of petty tyranny
with which all institutions are rife.
This is our system. If it don't suit
you, go some place where there's one
more to your liking.
Windows don't need to be put up,
aren't going to be put up.
You have all the fresh air that s
necessary. We've got a system and we
must live up to it if we all get sick and
have to be sent home.
No doubt the latter works we'll en-
ough in the ordinary run of things.