The Washington herald., 1920-01-16
Professors Starving as Dempsey
SITS Easy, Helen Taft Complains
Even Strike Might Be Bet
ter Than Quiet Submis-
sion By Educators, Says
Ex-President's S Daughter
At New York Meeting for
Bryn Mawr.

New York. Jan. ia scathins
denunciation of the economic sys.
tenn which has neglected school
teachers pay until a number ol
States are thrown into confusion By
an appalling scarcity of instructors
for the young served as the topic
for an address by Miss Helen H
Taft. acting president of Bryn Mawr
College and daughter of former
President Taft. before a gathering
of newspaper and magazine editors
in the Bryn Mawr Club here tonight
The writers were the guests OF
the Bryn Mawr endowment at q
dinner given in the clubhouse. Fol-
lowing Miss Taft's address the
guests participated in a discussion
distinctly favorable to the PROPOSE
ton of increased pay for teachers.
She Suggests Strike.
Miss Taft presented figures that
showed the serious lack of teachers
which is prevalent in many towns and
cities of the Middle Atlantic and New
England States.
1T would be better for the college
professors to unite to demand higher
Poy' anu CNch, perhaps, StEihc dS q
body, than that they should leave the
profession individually" Miss Taft
said.
THE discrimination against the
teacher is marked" she went on
Teachers are paid scarcely a living
wage. In some quarters they have al
ready begun to revolt.
"A few years will see us without
teachers and 1t will take years to build
up again the teaching profession and
to train teachers as they should be
trained. People will come to theiI
senses after II is too late. II they
are aroused now the catastrophe can
be averted.
Contrast to sportsmen.
The public will pay Babe Ruth
10000 for half a year and Jack Demp-
sey 100000 or 10000 for a single fight,
but they will not pay their college
professors. from whom necessarily a
great part of the intellectual inspira-
tion of the country must come. enough
to live on.
"A professional baseball player sells
for $4,000; a professor Is secured from
one of the Western colleges for a few
dollars more than he was receiving
therefor three or four thousand dol
lars a year. You pay your bankers
and brokers, your merchants and
business managers in salaries of tens
of thousands, while you expect a man
with better training and more thor
ough knowledge to teach economies
for two or three.
'In building army camps you paid
steam shovellers $50 a week. while the
college teacher. who Is to prepare
young men and women for the pur-
suits OF peace. has to accept one quar-
ter of that sum.
Students Must Pay More.
Miss Taft pointed out that the COL
leges are not at fault. as concerns
adequate pay for teachers. AS an in
stance, the speaker cited Bryn Mawr.
She said
Last year II cost Bryn Mawr near
ly 500 to teach each undergraduate
The tuition is only 5000. The cost to
the students must not be increas sed
If our colleges are not to become
purely fashionable institutions we
must not make the cost of education
prohibitive for all but the very
wealthy. The only solution is in new
endowment. Unless conditions i'm
prove the college in order to continue
to exist will have to double its tuition
fees. Students cannot continue to be
educated at the cost of the professor.
student and the students parents un-