Albuquerque morning journal. [volume] (Albuquerque, N.M.) 1903-1926, 1919-11-25
which will insure a reasonable ant
living.
Teachers Leaving Profession.

which will insure reasonable and
comfortable living.
Teachers Leaving Profession.
Every avenue of trade offers op
portunities for successful teachers
to leave the profession, with hundreds
of industrial concerns bidding for the
services of men and women with Just
the equipment which teachers train
ing gives, with salaries in most school3
far below even the teachers modest
level of subsistence the teaching pro-
fession is bound to undergo rapid de-
teriOration.
The men and women upon whom
rests the responsibility of training
the future citizens of America are
treated with less consideration than
are the scrub women and janitors.
Statistics show that normal school
graduates receive less salary than
street sweepers; high school prinei
pals less than section foremen; coun-
try school teachers less for instructing
farmer children than he pays his
hired men to feed his hogs.
Railroad section men represent
about the lowest degree of unskilled
labor yet. The report of the railroad
wage commission shows them to be
better rewarded than teachers
1t certainly is not an inducement
| for people either to enter or remain
! in the teaching profession when we
read that So per cent of the cities
Of the country establish the minimum
wage at less than $500 and 81 per
cent set the maximum below that
| figure Ninety seven per cent of the
cities expect teachers to begin teach
ing at salaries which are less than
their expenses and reports from To-
600 individual cases show that nearly
half the teachers cannot live 10y
twelve months upon the wages when
they receive.
Is it to be wondered at, in the
light of such figures that the hlgh
school girl who was being urged by
her aunt, who was q teacher, to train
for the teaching profession replied
why should l go to college and pre-
mare to be a teacher, when 1 can get
right now, by working in the mill.
more than you are making when you
have been teaching twenty years
No wonder that the normal schools
show a startling decrease in Their
number of graduates; to wonder there
are fifty thousand vacancies in the
teaching force of the public. schools
no wonder the places are being fillee
by weak men and women and 30,00t
so-called teachers who possess nj
more than eighth grade education. :.
1t is all very we'll to appeal to ones
personal spirit in urging him to re.
main in the work, but professional
spirit does not compensate for the
gradual wearing down of ones cul
tural and professional equipment, II
the struggle to make ends meet.
Few people are capable of doing thu
best that is in them when they must
of necessity, do other work at night IL
order to keep up the struggle Tor ex
istence. The results of the SITUATION
are already making themselves felt
a large number of the ablest men
who have these last few years inter
rupted their teaching by war service
refuse to return to a profession who's
conditions have become Impossible
If the teaching profession needs tn
= very hest minds and the very best NOR
ais of the country they must be pal
! for. The teaching profession is build
ing the character of our children. l
4 is exercising an influence even create
& perhaps than that of the church.
Trustees for Future of America.
i Into the hands of the teachers ar
committed the keeping of the nina!
the bodies the very souls of our chilu
4 rem and these hands, of necessity, mol
in follow, the future of America.
If salaries be adequately increase
4 and if unfortunate internal condition
q be reformed, the teaching professio
II can soon be made to offer ono
more an attractive career for apl
4 earnest, ambitious men and women.
y The question, at bottom, is M
9 merely one of recognition and of ecor
omic justice for the teachers, 1t is or
of preserving our educational inst
y tutions as means to orderly progre'
and as a bulwark against the forces
anarchy, ignorance, passion and d
struction.
Is If these moneys for teachers sala
les are not forthcoming-and on
generous scale-America will fail
duty to the world as imperative
any that calls by starving out of 9
essential profession the ability whit
is indispensable to its success.
A further decline in its personn
S will not be easily remedied in our tin