Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 40, Number 16, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 1 November 1907 — SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES [ARTICLE]

SCHOOLS AND COLLEGES

Three Chinese girls, wards of the Emperor, have arrived at Wellesley College, being the first Chinese women to be sent to America to be educated. Under Vermont’s new law common school districts are in process of enlargement and concentratio^fo^^ereve^wo I large part of the salary of“suwPfPJfc*. He Alumni Association of Houston, Texas, has raised funds and established a dining room in the high school, which is one of the best of its kind in the coun try. This addition gives the students who are talcing domestic science an opportunity not only to prepare the meals, but to serve them.

Editor Page of the World’s Work is advocating the establishment of a school for authors in connection with the universities. He holds that writing is a trade like any other, and that those who pro pose to follow it should receive a regular* course of instruction. lie would have each' poet student compelled to write a sonnet a day for one term, and each prose student 1,000 words, the course to extend over three or four years. In its annual report on the statistics of cities having a population of over 30,000, the Census Bureau presents a very interesting table showing the costs of free public schools, including in such costs the interest on investments in school buildings and grounds. These vary from 7 cents per capita in Charleston, S. C., and 22 cents in Atlanta, Ga., to $1.33 in Denver, Colo.; to $1.43 in Newton, Mass., and $1.53 in Spokane. Wash.

The New York City Board of Ediica tion has appointed a special committee of three to inquire of the teachers whether the abolishment of corporal punishment in public schools has been beneficial or detrimental in maintaining order and respect. Should the concensus of opinion be adverse to the present methods, it is proposed to rartdre the rod io its former position in the schools of the city. Complaints have recently come from some teachers that they are unable to maintain order because the supervising force la pojybrless to inflict punishment for offenses affecting general behavior.

In Missouri the condition of public School teachers seems even less satisfactory. J. M. Greenwood, president of the State Teachers’ Association, says the average pay of men teachers is $325 a year, and of women teachers $319 a year. The average for the country schools alone is considerably lower. In some country districts teachers receive less than half the compensation of unskilled labor. There is said to be a constant stream of the best of the Maine teachers going to other ?arts of New England, to New York and to _ the West. Presumably this stream does not head toward Missouri. The attendance last year at the Maine normal school was less than for several years. The reason for this is apparent.—Hartford Couract. According to a report of the Brooklyn (Mass.) Teachers’ Association, as published in the Lawrence Telegram, there is a decided sentiment throughout the State favoring a system of promotion by subjects instead of grades in the secondary schools. It is also felt that a liberal education course should be devised, to take fifteen years in its completion Instead of ten years, as at present. The Telegram remarks that if the> attempt to have the National Educational Association adopt tills report is successful a change nothing short of revolutionary will soon be in fora iv our national educational system.