The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1920-02-19
TOPEKA STATE JOURNAL
Information Bureau
FREDERIC j. HASKIN, Director.
Washington, d. @.
THE PAY OF TEACHERS

pay OF teachers - not raised SUD
stantiaIiy, and Immediately. is the
opinion of the best educators all over
the country.
Teachers as a class are thoroly dis
gusted with making over old clothes,
and living in third floor hall bed
rooms, while they wait for the coun- !
try to wake up and show appreciation
of their work. They are too proud
to strike. The only way out of an
impossible situation, they find, is
quietly to give up their chosen pro-
fession, and that is what the best
teachers in the country are doing by
thousands every month.
In New York state over 1000 rural
schools are closed for want of teach
ers, and this condition is repeated in
other states. The nations teaching
army of $50, 900 lost las, 600 members
last year, most of those who resigned
being experienced teachers, the kind
from which mothers like thier chill
dren to learn. Some of their schools
are closed. In other cases the vacan-
cies have been filled by young girls
with no professional training-someI
without even high school diplomas
THE people of the United States"
says Ernest L. Thurston, superintend-
ent of the public schools of Washing
Ton, do not understand how vitality
they are concerned in this school
problem. The other night, when I
was speaking before a body of citi-
zens, I asked them if they realized
that their children will be taught less
we'll next year, and the year after
that. and If they understood that
fewer courses Will be offered in the
high schools unless something is done
to attract competent men and women
back to the schools. Apparently they
did not. Before the meeting was
over, however. they were alive to the
personal side of the proposition. They
a
teachers was a desirable thing from
the standpoint of the citizen and tax
payer.
1.-THE school teacher probably sees
more Of the child during its active
waking hours than it's mother does,
and she has nearly as great an influ-
ence on its character and ideals. So
! that if the children of today and to-
| morrow are to be taught by young
| girls who carelessly take UP teaching
until they find something better, or
| because they are not mentally
equipped to do higher paid work. We
can only expect a lower class of citi-
zens in the next generation"
! Mr.. Thurston believes congress can
| materially help the national campaign
for better paid teachers. Congress-"
said Mr.. Thurston, Controls the pay
| of teachers in the national capital. and
when congress fixes the wage scale for
the teachers of the District in the bill
now pending, it will show the entire
country just how 1t evaluates the
| teaching profession
| Where the legislators stand on the
matter of teachers pay, it is not easy
| to prophesy. So far, no great cham
| pion of the teachers has arisen to de-
| fend their rights, in the present con-
| gCess. The mind of congress is dr.
vided between a vague understanding
| that something ought to be done, and
| its well defined ideas of economy. The
| result. probably; will be a compromise
between the $1,000 minimum which
the teachers ask. and the present pay
scale that is wrecking the morale of
| the schools.
The action of congress on this bill
will set an example for the states, and
will have somewhat the effect of a
supreme court decision on other
bodies that consider advances for
teachers. If congress does not meet
the demands of the Washington teach
ers the shortage will grow more and
more acute. until in the end strenuous
measures will be needed to bring the
schools back to any semblance of the
old time efficiency.
| 1t is no longer matter of offering
the teachers living wage, Mr.. Thurs
ton believes, but the country must at
least give proper recognition to a pro-
fession that is the very foundation of
national life. Raising the teacher to
the pay of an elevator boy or a lunch
room waitress might have relieved the
difficulty once. Now the situation has
gone so far that the best teachers see
no future in their work, and can be
held in the service or called back to
it only by much larger increases than
have hitherto been offered. No one
can blame the teachers for giving up
what every one knows is a hard life
and a ridiculously poorly paid one.
The stories of teachers pay are
equalled in no other profession, unless,
perhaps, the ministry.
/ One of the newest stories on this old
theme is that of a little high school
girl in a South Carolina town. This
girl had been studying shorthand as
an elective course for several months.
when a business man asked her to go
into his office at $1,000 a year for
teaching this and various other sub
jects.
The difference between the pay of
. teachers and office workers is so great
that in some cities the teachers have
begun to demand "aS much pay as
. the stenographers" discounting entire
t ly the fact that a business college
. turns out a stenographer in six OF
, eight months, while it takes a two OF
three years normal coure to make an
efficient teacher.
The governor of North Carolina has
: started a campaign in behalf of the
teachers OF his state IN Whlcn he ue-
mands equal pay for teachers and
stenographers.
But how much pay do the steno-
graphers' get?" protested one states
man to whom the comparison sug-
+, gested unheard of salaries for teach
I ers.
1T doesn't matter how much they
get" retorted the governor, teach
z ers are certainly worth as much
/ whatever it is"
AS a matter of fact, the pay of the
teachers of the state will be doubled
E if the governor carries his point, an(
e even then the teachers will not enter
, the wealthy class.
= In Ohio Governor Cox has issued :
L proclamation for the week of Februar,
S 1921 to be Teachers Week." wheI
I our churches. clubs. and other organ
izations are to consider the problem
of bringing the schools up to a higher
I standard. Ohio needs 1000 trained