Grant County herald. [volume] (Lancaster, Wis.) 1850-1968, 1925-03-18
LETTERS FROM NOTED PEOPLE

/ schools, the City superintendent As
ISOLATION of Wisconsin, and the State
Superintendent of Public instruction
all urge that the present legislature
make an appropriation for the build
ing which shall house a Wisconsin
College of Education. We are asking
for $3.50, 100000. To emphasize the mod
esty of this request, l call your at
tention to the fact that Michigan is
planning a new home for it's College
of Education, which is to cost
100000, and is now erecting the
first unit of it at a cost of $1,000,000.
The teaching profession is the
greatest of all professions. 1t should
have a home and college of its own;
more SO than law, or medicine, or ag-
riculture or engineering.
Another need at the State Univer-
sity in connection with it's educational
activities is an addition to the exper-
mental and observation school. One
unit of this building was erected in
1912 at a cost of $4,000, and repeated
appeals to the legislature for money
to complete it, have yielded nothing.
This school should not be confined to
high school grades, but should con-
tain the grades of the common school
as well; and for this reason-because
it will be the laboratory of the future
college of education, and because a
college of education is concerned with
education in it's broadcast sense.
Teachers College, Columbia Univer-
sity, has two such schools-The Hor-
ace Mann School, and the Lincoln
School. l do not know the cost of the
former, but the latter was erected at
cost of $1,760,000. Even our own
Marquette University, at Milwaukee,
realizing the Importance of such an
institution, is now erecting Univer-
! sity School on Grand Avenue at a
cost exceeding 100000. We are ask
! ing for about $4,000 to complete our
present structure.
How to Organize College
The organization of a College Cf
Education, with it's University School,
should provide for at least the fol-
! lowing departments department of
j school administrations department
of methods, and the content of cours-
es for elementary education, secondary
education, industrial education, and
agricultural education; a department
of rural education; a department of
! educational research and a depart
ment of educational service.
Cut Down Waste Of Time
] Such a college would render to the
state great service in the training of
/ teachers, supervisors and principals,
and to the State superintendent of
Public Instruction the broadcast assis-
lance in his administration and super
vision of our fifty million dollar school
system But it's chief influence and SER
vice should be directed toward the
undermining of school administration
and organization, the Improvement of
teaching methods, and the revision of
the content of subjects taught, all to
the end, that the children may secure
better, more useful, more modern
education in six years, than they now
secure in eight years; or in ten years
than they now secure in twelve. 1t is
in the deplorable waste of childhood's
time and opportunity that our present
school system scores its most signal
failure.-You are right.-The public
is not getting a fair return for the
money which it spends.
What other states are doing, or
have done, we can do. We have al
ready waited too long. Let's go to it,
Very truly yours,
THEO. KRONSHAGE