The Glenwood post. (Glenwood Springs, Colo.) 1897-current, 1920-03-13
VOTING OF BONDS FOR
NEW SCHOOL BUILDING
(Mrs. Nellie D. Brown)

NNuS. 4NC1lC Il. oAOWAJ
You have just been told about
the new school house we are to
have, how necessary it is, the old
one being both inadequate and
unsafe, but there is a phase of
the school question, generally
speaking, that is of far more i'm
portance than new buildings and
adequate equipment, and that is
the spirit of cooperation and
support. Our public schools have
always been looked upon as the
bulwark of the nation; they are
the nurseries of patriotism and
democracy, and when we can re-
alize that in them, not your child
or the neighbors' children are be-
ing educated to earn their living
in the world, but that the future
lawmakers, rulers and citizens of
our country are to get their train
ing, then, and then only, will we
comprehend the full responsible
ity resting upon us. We must
get away from the factional feel
ing that the schools are for the
benefit of their particular COM
munitv alone, and realize that
they are merely units fin the ma
tional system. Too long have
our school been retarded by the
old long haired, conservative, fos-
SLICED idea that they are purely
local affairs in which personal
prejudices may enter. If there
is public institution of any kind
from which the personal ele-
ment should be eliminated, it
would be the public schools, yet
how often, generally speaking, is
teacher employed, not on ac-
count of their qualifications for
the position. but perhaps because
some member of the school board
is personal friend; how often
the element OF sympathy enters
in-the feeling that the teacher
needs the employment 1t is alt
right to be sympathetic, but be
sure your sympathies are placed
rightly. My sympathies are with
the children who are forced to
attend school to some teacher sol
poorly prepared that the time is
practically lost-precious time,
the most receptive years of theil
life Our children are helpless
in our hands, neither knowing or
being able to demand their rights
in the matter OF education, So
upon us all devolves the neces-
sity of demanding the best for
them. Only teachers of the high
est type of education and patrio-
tism should be allowed to mold
the character of the youth of our
nation, but back of it all must be
the support and cooperation of
every person in the community,
and especially the support of the
home, for the child cannot be
properly educated unless the
home co-operates with the school.
Old quarrels must be forgotten,
we must work only for the COM
mon good, for you, or or any
individual, is less than a grain OF
dust when compared with the
welfare of our nation, and the
welfare of our. nation is the well
fare of the child. Never before
in the history of the world has
the need for men OF vision been
so great as today-men broad
enough to forget self in every
way in the general readjustment.
During this period OF reconstruc-
ton more is being demanded Of
every one in every way than ever
before and still more will be de-
handed in the future. But the
present shall be known as the
Age Of the Child. Child welfare
has taken the world by storm.
People have just awakened to the
fact that children cannot be brot
up in hit or miss way and turn
out well. and the manner in
which we perform our duties to-
ward the "resent generation will,
in the light of the future, reveal
us as people with a vision or
without. and the prophets of old
in the bible have told us, with
out a vision, the people perish"