St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1915-01-16

excellent board. made up OF men WAC
have business and administrative
ability Again, he says, Drinking
water Of excellent quality Is almost
invariably gotten from surface and
artes!an wells; water from the latter
is especially fine, etc." He alao
commends our progress In the way
Of new and modern equipment. such
as new steel desks, window shades,
Smith sanitary. heaters and new IL
braries.N On the other hand he rec
ognizes the fact they we should give
more attention to the matter of sani-
tary cut-houses, and he reports as
follows regarding some OF the OF
schools: There are still number
Of schools that are Anticipated, poor
~ equipped and inadequate to pres
ent needs; among them are Sand
Hill, Ridge, Hickory Grove, German
Settlement, Madisonville, Abita and
Vaudeville"
feel that in this last paragraph
is conferred work for US for the next
few years. I realize, however, that
! we do not have the funds to make
| Improvements In any Of the above
mentioned schools, with the excep-
ton of the one at the Ridge. To Sc
cure the funds we must either close
their schools for term Of years and
thus save the teachers salaries to
make the improvements with, or we
must have special taxes voted in
those wards with which to build bet
ter buildings. There are no two
ways about It. We can't make the
improvements without the money,
and it is up to the taxpayers to de-
eide whether they will have the i'm
provements or let the schools stay
as they have been for the past ten
years. feel that the patrons OF the
schools of these wards are just as In
terested in the progress OF their
towns and schools as are any In the
parish, but they do not understand
the exact financial condition OF
school board, and it Is our duty to
insist upon their giving us chance
to report to them what has been
done with the money received by US
each year.
| l have made thirty-three school
visits since the first Of October. and
my expense account will be present
ed with this report.
In my report to you, at your meet
ing held on July 6. 1914, l made q
statement of the two mill special
school tax collected by the town OF
| Covington for two years. I stated
that as the assessment was then for
some over eight hundred thousand
dollars that l thought We were safe
in supposing that they had collected
somewhere about $4,000.
At my request and through the
kindness of Mr.. l.. A. Perreand. the
secretary of the town council. have
! had this account audited by Mr.. f
l.. ALBERT, and we find that only
S469.6O were collected by Mr.. N.
NJ. Hebert, Jr, who was then tax col
lector. and $19S6.65 by +. P. Del
croix, who followed him as collector.
This makes $2456.25 as the total col
lected by the town council instead OF
$1,000, as we had expected. With
the $500 paid by the former coun-
Gil We, have $1956.25 still IN the
hands Of. the council. This amount
! it appears is impossible to collect as
| it has been spent by the former
councils. If you have any ihstru.
tons to give regarding the dDlleo'
ton of money / desire to receive II
lat this meeting, as the Cow ngton
school still owes for the desks tina,
we're purchased upon the strength OF
several promises that we might have
this money. This debt is drawing
interest since last Septmeber, while
the money due us from the town IL
not. l shall be glad to give you any
| more information you may desire re.
garding this matter.
| On October 22d, was called tt
S.iiell by Mr.. Liddle because of sew.
eral cases Of diptheria in that school
We held consultation with DR.. Jno
Griffith who had the cases in charge
and decided to close the school FOL
a week. Realizing that this wotlf
do but little good if the pupils were
allowed to attend the picture shows
ETC., we suggested to Mayor T. j
Hand that they be closed for while
! This he cheerfully did, but l an
pleased to report that there were ne
more cases and that school was re
opened at, the end of the week.
| wish to commend the spirit with
which the people Of Slidell met thi:
closing Of their schools.
| As result Of some Investigations
that l have been making In ou1
schools ] have found the following
results to be true:
/. Six-tenths of one per cent Of
all Of our pupils are enrolled in the
eleventh grade &
| 2. Six and nine-tenths per cent
are in the high school.
3. Thirteen and eiglH-tenths pei
cent of these enrolled in the first
grade ever reach the high school
In other words only one out of every
thirty-six ever reach the eleventh
grade.
| a. We have more boys than girls
in our schools who are over eighteen
years old.
| 5. Sixty-two and seven-tenths OF
| all pupils enrolled In the first grade
have left school by the time they
reach the sixth grade.
l have given in more complete
form the results of these observa-
| tons in an article for the Louisiana
School Work for January, ana trust
| you will be interested enough to read
it. found that in nearly every
| grade we had pupils who were too
old for the grade and that the per
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