Perth Amboy evening news., 1920-03-22
CRAVE FAMINE
FOR TEACHERS
1929 Schools Closed in.
Country impossible to Get
Good Teachers at Present
By-w. &. Mann.

lICopyright, 1920, by The Washington
Starr
WASHINGTON. March 22.-"They
are killing off the heifers and grinding
their seed corn" This alarming an
nouncement in these days when n
problem of supplying the world with
food has laid heavy upon the unlteo
States. is used to emphasize the dam
gerous situation with regard to the
public school system of this country
unless the enticing of school teachers
and potential school teachers into
more lucrative employment is stopped.
THE only way to do this Is by giving
them decent pay in the schools.
There is such a famine of teachers
that 1920 schools have had to be
closed. 1t is so impossible to get good
teachers that in Al 900 school teachers
who are below standard" have had
to be employed. The scarcity OF teach-
ers is increasing because more and
more of the best teachers are leaving
the jobs at which they cannot get a
decent living and going into other
lines of work at greatly higher salaries.
This menacing condition VIII grow
worse because the normal and other
teacher-training schools are getting
only 80 to so per cent. OF the NUMBER
Of pupils they did before the war
and so there are few teacher recruits
dIOllHs Xix "a -
authorities calculate that there Will be
1000 fewer trained teachers from the
normal schools this year than a couple
of years ago.
Because they realize hat the public
school system OF this country Is not
only necessary to educate the mothers
and statesmen of the future, blu Is
the best safeguard against the spirit
of ~bolshevism and the swarming In
- I'm "a ornpt frnTn tho I'm nnVPrtSn-
ed and revolution-ridden countries OF
Europe, members Of Congress and the
educational officials of the Nation and
states are greatly concerned.
There Is only one way, they say,
in which the boarding UP many thous-
ands more schools can be averted,
and that Is by making 1t financially
possible for the teaching talent OF the
country to continue their sacred pro-
fession, as the best guarantee of the
perpetulty of American institutions
and ideals.
Teachers today are getting only
one-fourth the wages tina hod-car-
riers get" pionts out Representative
Simeon d. Fess Of Ohio, chairman
of the House committee on education,
who is preparing a speech to impress
the need for prompt and effective ac-
ton upon Congress. Representative
L tSS lldS uONoLCu Hi Will ~ ~ NAAN
profession of teaching and before COM
ing to Congress was for five years en-
gagged in university extension work In
the University Of Chicago and then
for 10 years was president of Antioch
college.
The teacher must live-and eat
365 days in the year. An annual sal
airy of $3.50 gives S2.06 a day for liv-
ing expenses,-not a living wage for
n ifn6-1ioGrnr on nXrnn also yer
the U. s. Commissioner of Education
after a careful canvas finds that in
1918 the average salary of all elemen-
tary and secondary teachers was $3.50,
in Wisconsin 1t was only $421. The
average of 26,721 high school teachers
in 16 states and the District Of Column
bia was $1,031. and for 141,1S9 ele-
mentary teachers in the same states
1t was $606. In the rural schools
some white men got only $385 for a
| whole years work and white women
got 1927.
These are only casual examples, but
the condition exists throughout all the
states and Is contantly growing worse.
Many teachers In the colleges and nor
NAL and other misunderstanding schools
are quitting to get several times the
salary in business enterprises. The
U. 8. Bureau of Education has a long
list of typical cases where such teach
ers quit jobs at a few hundred dollars
to take places In the business life pay
ing from $4,000 to $4,000.
Representative Tess contends. and
leagues, both Dmocrats and Republi-
he is strongly supported by his COL
cans, thai 1t Is a public necessity to
make 1t attractive for the teacher to
remain in the schools, If we believe in
our public school system. which Is
the very foundation of the hopes of
thiS natiOn."