Honolulu star-bulletin. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu, Hawaii]) 1912-2010, 1913-05-03
Maui Educator Points Out Rea-
sons for Agitation of Course
of Study Revision

of Study Revision
The ar.BuHetin has received the
following extremely interesting com
municatiol from Supervising Princi-
pal G. +, Copeland OF Maui Mr. Cope
! land is one OF the island educators
EHhO has figured prominently in the
agitation for revision Of the course OF
study iii the public schools:
Editor Honolulu Star-Bulletin.
Sir;-ln the newspaper controversy
which has lately been raging around
the report of the legislative joint
committee on education. frequent ref
erence has been made to the effort
of the supervising principals, at their
meeting held a year ago, to revise
the Course of Study. The statement
has frequently been made by those
who opposed revision that the ques.
tion at issue was one of reaction
against progress: Of obsolete ideas
against modern educational thought,
and of personal hatred against pro-
fessional competence. This view has
been so persistently paraded before.
the public, and the advocates of re-
vision have been so often held up to
derision and contempt that undoubt-
eddy many, who have heard only one
side of the question, have been mis-
informed and misled. As one of those
who advocated revision OF the
Course of Study, ! hope that your
sense of fairness will allow us an
opportunity of presenting to the pub
lie, though the medium of your paper,
some of the considerations which
impelled us to the course of action
which we pursued at that time.
We have been charged with per-
sonal motives, and particularly with
trying to Gust our superior officers
from their positions. In fact, an
evening paper headed its account OF
the first days proceedings with the
title, in capitals extended clear across
the front page, Copeland starts his
little war" Now, there were three
mis-statements in that headline First,
It was not l who started the war;
second, it was not my war; and, third,
it does not seem to have been lit
tie war. The Commissioners, at the
joint-meeting which they held with the.
supervising principals in Ma. nf last
year made it perfectly clear the
responsibility of the revisio. rested
with them. The report OF tie legis-
lative joint-committee bases one of
its recommendations upon this fact.
So it is evident that the supervising
principals, in trying to obtain re-.
vision of the Course of Study, were
merely carrying out the explicit di-
rections of the Commissioners of Pub
lie Instruction, our employers
Mr.. Wells and /, as leaders in the
movement for the adaptation of the
Course of Study to the needs of the
rural schools, represented in very
special manner the small schools of
the Territory. The county of Maui,
with less than one-sixth of the school
population of the Territory, has al
most half of the small one-and two
room schools, and not single large
school Only -four schools in the
county are large enough to permit
anything like proper grading. Two
thirds of the pupils of Maui schools
oIC OouShI lOOIllO vi IWO, IlIc6
four grades. Not ten per cent of our
pupils are in schools which have a
teacher for each grade. We contend
ed that these small schools demanded
a special course of study and that 2
course suitable for large, well.grad-
ed and we'll organized urban schools
was no. the proper course for sman,
ungradcd rural schools. We may
have been wrong in our belief. If
so, however, we had plenty of good
company. All over the Union the
consolidation of the small rural
schools into district or township
schools is proceeding more and more
rapidly every year. Some states, not
ably Michigan, have special course
of study for the rural schools Mod
ern practice is to consolidate the
small schools when possible, and
when impossible, to provide separate
courses Of study for them. AS che
consolidation of Hawaiian small
schools is not feasible at present, the
only alternative is to make some al I
iteration or adaptation of the Course
of Study to fit the needs of such
schools. In their recommendations
for such change, both the Board OF
Education and the Legislature have
shown themselves in accord with mo-
dern American practice in this regard. |
1t would not seem, therefore, that we
revisionists were very much to blame
in trying to do what is being done in
progressive educational systems else-E
where.
Again. we have been called hay
seeds, reactionaries and mossbacks
because the course|we recommended |
made larger use OF textbooks |
than did the old course. In schools |
which can afford teacher for each !
grade oral instruction is practicable T
to a far greater extent than in mixed !
schools. In the former. the ta9cher !