The weekly Iberian. (New Iberia, La.) 1894-1946, 1918-03-23
STATE TEACHERS
ANNUAL MEETING
More Money for Schools
More Pay for Teachers Top
les to Be Considered at
Teachers Convention.

Teachers Convention.
| Written for the March Number of
Southern School Work. by
| Pres Il. l.. Stephens of Lafay
cite Institute.
Thursday, Friday and Saturday,
the 4th, 9th and 9th of April, are
the days set for the annual con
vention of the State Teachers AS
sociation, and the place has been
changed from Shreveport to Baton
Rouge. Try to be there, fellow
teacher. Your country is calling
you. 1t may seem to you at first
thought that 1t is because your
country is calling you so hard,
that you are planning to stay at
home this time instead of going to
the teachers convention. But on
second thought you Will realize
that you are teacher, and that it
Is as a teacher or nothing that
you Will serve your country IN
this time of Its need: and that if
your profession is about to suffer
a mortal blow by reason of your
indifference or your absence from
It's counsels, your ability to serve
your country is about to be i'm
paired or destroyed.
The profession of teaching is
right now being seriously i'm
paired, and a terrible blow is
about to fall upon it. 1t is every
teachers business to swarm to
gether with all the rest to try to
ward it off. The blow referred to
is the reduction of the teachers
pay to what is called in economics
"the margin of subsistence"-and
below that. This reduction has
been going on steadily for ten
years past but has been greatly
accelerated since the beginning of
The great war-whlle the pay of |
almost all occupations has been
greatly increased. Aud the thing
has been done in such a subtle
and almost underhanded sort of
way, that we have not been
aroused to sense of the wicked
ness of it. 1t has been done in
directly. They didn't come right
out and reduce the amount of our
salaries--like a man. They secret
ly, surreptitiously, and like a
thief in the night, reduced the
value of the dollar hey paid us-
so that the food, clothing and
shelter we used to be able to buy
with oae months salary now cos 9
Us two months salary. We have
been robbed-just ss surely as if q
burglar had broken into the house
and walked off with our vaIua
bles-Qet US say, The Harvard
ClassicsD Let any teacher who
reads these lines make the appli
cation to his own case: make
list of the necessary and useful
things your salary could buy ten
years ago, and compare it with a
list Of what it can
buy today. You will find thai
your salary has remained almost
with perhaps a small
raise from time to time in cOnsid
of your increased efficien
~, experience and length of serv
ce, while the goods that your ga
ary could buy have been reduced
more than half. And you will re
alize that, in effect, this has been
al actual reduction of the already
small reward you received from
your profession. Aud on inquiry
you will find that most other Occu
patiOns have not been correspond
ingly reduced. They have man
aged through scme means or Other
to get more pay for their services
so as to meet the bigaer prices fol
the things they have to buy. But
the teaching profession has not
done So Why noii v hats the
matter with us9 Are We what
Ring w. Lardner would call "a
bunch of dubs"?
Well, that is the great question
which is going to come up at the
Baton Rouge meeting, Brother
Sister, and if you are not already
asphyxiated with the lethal POI
soning of the poor pay you have
been getting, you will be there
and shouting!