UC-NRLF ji THE SAN ANTONIO PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM A SURVEY CONDUCTED BY J. F. BOBB1TT OF THE SCHOOL OF EDUCATION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO JANUARY. 1915 AUTHORIZED BY RESOLUTION OF SAN ANTONIO SCHOOL BOARD PASSED DECEMBER 16, 1914 PUBLISHED BY THE SAN ANTONIO SCHOOL BOARD SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS, MAY, 1915 GIFT OF THE SAN ANTONIO PUBLIC SCHOOL SYSTEM A SURVEY CONDUCTED BY J. F. BOBBITT M OF THE SCHOOL OF EDUCATION OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO JANUARY, 1915 AUTHORIZED BY RESOLUTION OF SAN ANTONIO SCHOOL BOARD PASSED DECEMBER 16. 1914 PUBLISHED BY THE SAN ANTONIO SCHOOL BOARD SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS, MAY. 1915 TABLE OF CONTENTS Page LIST OF TABLES AND CHAETS Ill CHAPTERS AND MAIN DIVISIONS I. PREFATORY STATEMENT 1 II. THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS 7 The Place of Scholastic Education ^ 10 III. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 16 The Factors of Vocational Efficiency 21 Vocational Training in San Antgnio 26 Commercial and Clerical Training 28 Training for Household Occupations 34 Education for Mechanical Occupations 42 Gardening, Agriculture, Etc 50 IV. EDUCATION FOR CITIZENSHIP 58 V. EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 71 VI. EDUCATION FOR LEISURE OCCUPATIONS 91 VII. ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 99 Reading 99 Spelling 103 Vocabulary and Pronunciation 112 Handwriting 113 Grammar, Language, Composition 127 VIII. THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 136 Geography 136 History 141 Mathematics 147 Science 153 Drawing in the Elementary Schools 157 Latin 158 Spanish 159 German 165 IX. GENERAL ORGANIZATION AND ADMINISTRATION 167 Division of Responsibilities 168 Educational Science as it Applies to San Antonio 176 The Superintendent 179 The Assistant Superintendent 181 The Building Principal 182 The High School Principal 183 i /f A \ />-/-%. ^j ii Supervisors of Special Subjects Teachers - ----- The Business Agent . Superintendent of Buildings and Grounds Janitors The Medical Department ...189 X. THE STUDENT POPULATION 190 The School Census 190 Retardation ...194 Present Grade Distribution of Pupils 199 XL ELEMENTARY TEACHERS 201 Amount of Training of Elementary Teachers 201 Experience of Teachers 205 Tenure of Teachers... 206 The Training School 207 Appointment of Outside Teachers 209 Substitute Teachers 210 Training Teachers During Service 211 XII. 'iHE HIGH SCHOOL 212 Cost of Instruction by Subjects 213-15 Time Devoted to Each Subject.. 214 Average Size of Classes 216 Average Hours Taught Per Week Per Teacher 216 1 Training of the Teachers Supervision 218 The Library 219 High School Building Accommodations 220 XIII. BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 224 Building Plans...., 224 Heating and Ventilating 234 Lighting 236 Cloak Rooms and Wardrobes 241 Furniture and Equipment 241 The Buildings as an Educational Influence and Oppor- tunity . 243 XIV. FINANCE 246 Cost of Janitor Service ....247 Cost of Supplies for Instruction ...248 Cost of Buildings per Class-room ....249 Cost of Operation and Maintenance 251 Cost of High Schools ....252 Cost of Elementary Education 253 Property Tax Per Capita for All Purposes 254 Total City Debt Per Capita ...256 TABLES AND CHARTS PUPILS ~N T o. Page 1. Ages and nationalities of children as shown by last school census 7 7. Age-progress situation in the schools of San Antonio - 195 8. Progress through the grades relative standing of the respective elementary schools of San Antonio 197 9. Present grade distribution of pnpils in San Antonio... 200 1. Spelling ability by grades in San Antonio as compared with about no Illinois cities 105 2. Handwriting average quality of in 33 American cities 11.5 4. Handwriting anality of in San Antonio as compared with 32 American cities H9 6. Hand writing quality of in different ward schools of San An- tonio (relative standing) 121 3. Handwriting speed of in 33 American cities 117 5. Handwriting speed of in San Antonio as compared with 33 American cities.. 119 7. Handwriting speed of in the various buildings in San Antonio (relative rank) 123 10. Retardation relative standing of the respective schools in San Antonio - 198 Costs per pupil, etc. (See financial.) TEACHERS 10. Training of Snn Antonio as compared with 22 smaller cities. ...202 11. Training of relative standing of the respective schools in San Antonio - 204 12. Experience of San Antonio as compared with 27 cities ...205 13. Tenure of San Antonio as compared with other cities 206 14. Salaries of San Antonio as compared with other cities. 207 High school teachers. (See high school.) HIGH SCHOOL 21. Cost of high school education San Antonio as compared with certain cities - 252 A. Cost of instruction the portion of each $1000 expended for each subject 213 C. Cost of instruction cost per 1000 student-hours for each, sub- ject taught ,-215 B. Time allowed per subject distribution of each 1000 student- hours over the various subjects 214 D. Average size of classes and average teaching time for each full- time teacher 216 E. Training of teachers San Antonio as compared with other cities 218 iii iv FINANCIAL 5. Expenditures per capita for street maintenance 62 6. Expenditures per pupil for promotion of health 87 18. Expenditures per pupil for supplies for instruction 248 20. Expenditures per pupil for elementary education.. .....251 22. Expenditures per pupil for elementary education in other cities 253 21. Expenditures per pupil for high school education 252 17. Expenditures for janitors per school room 247 19. Valuation of buildings per class-room 250 23. Total property tax per capita, all purposes, Southern cities 254 24. Total property tax per capita, all purposes, cities of same popula- tion class as San Antonio 255 25. Total city debt per capita, compared with other cities 256 A. Cost of high school by subjects taught 213 B. Cosl; of high school by student-hours 215 GENERAL ORGANIZATION AND ADMINISTRATION 8. Distribution of responsibility among the various authorities 168 9. Educational science as it applies to San Antonio 176 THE COMMUNITY 1. The scholastic population showing ages and nationalities 7 2. Vocational distribution of each 1000 men employed in gainful occupations in San 'Antonio 17 3. Number of males per 1000 employed in each important vocational field in San Antonio, and in Texas cities in general 19 4. Number of women employed in certain gainful occupations per 1000 employed , 21 5. Annual per capita expenditures for street maintenance 62 15. Mean hourly temperature in San Antonio, for each month 226 16. Number of January days at each level of mean daily tempera- ture 227 17. Mean hourly wind velocity in San Antonio 228 PREFATORY STATEMENT Chapter I. PREFATORY STATEMENT. School surveys are of different types. They vary with the purpose in view. The most helpful kind probably is one: (1) that sympathetically looks to the good that exists in the school system; (2) that sees this good not as the end of progress, but as gains made that are steps toward further gains ; (3) that suggests constructive plans for further progress ; and (4) that shows the reasons for the plans recommended so as to permit verification of their validity. In public-spirited communities everywhere and only a little observation is required to show that this includes San Antonio education is at present undergoing rapid changes. Schools are reaching more people, are affecting them for a longer period, are called upon to do more things than formerly, are try- ing to adapt the school-work to the real needs of men, and are searching out more effective means and methods. Both lay- men and schoolmen are somewhat bewildered at present at the multitude of proposals being made, and of new educational movements inaugurated. There seem to be so many diverse purposes and so many cross currents that it is sometimes diffi- cult to know in just what direction our educational craft is being steered, or in what direction it ought to be steered. It is prob- able, however, that the changes now taking place are only in their beginnings ; and that they will be pretty far-reaching before stability is attained again. In such a time of change and transition, cities are very frequently nowadays calling in the help of what we may call the consulting educational specialist. He is called in just as a physician calls in the consulting physician ; or a construction manager, the consulting engineer. In one sense he is an out- sider, and his ability to advise is largely dependent upon this very fact, since he comes with fresh vision and unprejudiced mind. In another sense he is not an outsider, since he is for the time being as much an employe of the Board as is the superin- CHAPTER I tendent or the business agent. Simply, he is a temporary em- ployee. This, I suspect, is the justification for my temporary employment in San Antonio. Upon my arrival in the city, I inquired of the Chairman of the Survey Committee as to the purpose of the survey, replied that the one thing desired was an increase in the effici- ency of the school system ; that I was to study the situation 11 my own way and to make any recommendations that in my judgment would promote the efficiency of the schools. Beyond this no instructions were given nor suggestions made, given a perfectly free hand to conduct the work as I saw \ I wish to express my appreciation of the way this absolute free- dom was combined with a universal courtesy and willing help- fulness on the part of every one in any way concerned in the work. In every contact with school board,, survey committee, superintendent, business agent, superintendent of buildings and grounds, office staff, principals, teachers, janitors, and repre- sentatives of the general community, there was invariably that courtesy and hospitality for which the South is renowned- certainly justly so if San Antonio is representative in this respect. ( The report is based upon personal observations and con- ferences covering four weeks, and upon facts derived from numerous documents.) Nineteen out of the twenty-nine ele- mentary schools of the city were visited while classes were in session, a half day at a building being the usual length of visit. Several other elementary buildings were visited during the vaca- tion week when the schools were not in session. An aggregate of more than two full days was spent at the Main Avenue High School ; about one and a third days at the Brackenridge High School ; and about one-half day at Douglass High School. It is felt that the amount of visiting done in the elementary schools was sufficient for a fair understanding of the general nature of the elementary work in the city. There is a rather fully detailed course of study which prevails with certain modi- fications in all of the elementary schools. This course, although it is continually being modified, is in its main outlines a thing PREFATORY STATEMENT of several years standing. This has brought about a large degree of uniformity in the work of the various buildings. Moreover, the grade-leader institution which provides that one of the build- ing principals shall be responsible for the teaching of a given subject in certain of the grades throughout the city further re- sults in a fairly large uniformitization of the work. Then there is the uniform textbook series. With so many things making for uniformity, it is felt that a visit to nineteen of the buildings was sufficient for showing the nature of the elementary work done throughout the city. Visits were so distributed as to reach schools of the various races and nationalities. Before entering upon findings and recommendations, I wish to anticipate two or three objections that are sure to arise upon the reading of my report. fOne is that things are often recom- mended which are clearly impossible./ It is quite true that many things are recommended that can not be accomplished suddenly. A ship sailing from Galveston for Australia can not arrive in one day, nor even in one week; but because it can not arrive suddenly is no reason why it should not set out. In one day it can be expected to cover only one day's journey, and in one week only one week's journey ; but it can rightly steer the first or any successive day's journey only as its far-distant destina- tion is held in mind by captain and helmsman. And so it is with educational progress along most lines. The journey ahead of our profession by way of modernizing our labors, making them efficient, and making them serve twentieth century needs is yet a long one. The various ends in view can usually be attained only after many years of continuous labors toward those ends. Next year's moderate progress can be rightly accomplished, how- ever, only as it keeps the more distant ends in view. Educational progress to be solid and substantial must generally be reasonably slow. This does not mean, however, that it should be blind ; nor even that it should be near-sighted, looking only to those things that can be quickly and easily reached. There is nothing in man's world that should be more far-seeing than education. Since this report is for the layman of San Antonio as fully as for the school people, a second objection that will arise is CHAPTER I. that the discussion often is unnecessarily complicated and tech- nical. In reply let me say that it is writtten from the simple point of view of community needs. From beginning to end, edu- cation is looked at as a very practical common-sense kind of community service. The matters are set forth as fully as pos- sible in common everyday terms. The trouble is that the field of education is itself complicated and difficult ; and any language that shows the field truly must show it for what it is. To evade the complications is to slight the work. Naturally a report can be simplified by leaving out everything that requires mental ef- fort ; but it could not be a very searching or effective piece of work ; and it would under-rate the intelligence of the layman. f Statements are sometimes rather fully at variance with con- I ventional or traditional educational thought. Occasionally to those of a pre-social educational point of view, judgments will appear to be so wide the mark as apparently to discredit the judgment of the writer. All that is asked in such cases is that appeal be made not to tradition nor to special interests but to unbiased common sense on the one hand; and on the other, to twentieth century leaders of social thought and action in this country. Generally in a city so large as San Antonio, the issue /nvolved w r ill be of sufficient importance to warrant such appeal and investigation. If my report can bring about such contin- uing investigation, it will have accomplished its largest purpose. > t A third objection will be that there is too much educational interpretation and discussion in this report. On the contrary, in my opinion, there is too little. Things called into question in whole or in part involve an annual expenditure on the part of the city of not less than half of the school budget, let us say $250,000; or a million dollars every four years. Our discussion relates, therefore, to policies of large moment both to taxpayers and to children and youth. The relatively few pages given to things involving such large expenditures of time and money and effort are really inadequate for proper community understand- ing. The whole discussion of these momentous questions is covered in a space equivalent to that of a single issue of a Sun- day newspaper, for the printing of which the people are willing PREFATORY STATEMENT to pay the entire bill once every week. Instead of this report's presenting too much discussion of these educational problems, it really presents but a beginning of discussion for the pur- pose of precipitating further discussion. Just enough is said to introduce the problems. It is for the community itself to carry forward most of the discussion. The newspapers in all probability will be glad to aid in carrying it on very much further. Finally, a fourth objection to be made is that I have been so busy in looking for the places where the work might be tightened up and made more efficient that I have tended to lose sight of the great amount of good and even excellent work that h going on in the schools of San Antonio. My method of treatment actually lends color to this objection, since I usually give a small amount of space to pointing out the gains that have been made and then a fairly large amount of space in pointing out further gains yet to be accomplished. As we point to things not yet done and which need yet to be done we are pointing to things which may be called shortcomings or defects in the school system. In my opinion they can not be rightly so called. When a ship sailing from Galvcston to Australia does not reach its port in a week this can not be imputed to the ship as a short- coming or a failure. Likewise, the falling short of the desirable in San Antonio's school work is to be looked upon simply as incomplete progress ; as a journey that is only half traveled. After the ship referred to has covered half its journey, captain and helmsman can drop from view most of the things behind them. What they must keep in mind very fully is that portion of the journey that is yet ahead of them. And so in discussing the school-work of the city. Much progress has been made; the schools are in a healthy growing condition; in many respects they are fully abreast with the best work going on in any portion of our country. The city will have to be numbered among cities of the educationally progressive type. This progress that has been made, however, is already a matter of history. It need not bt set down in a report in any full fashion because it exists in actual concrete form within the city, and it can be seen by any- CHAPTER I. body who has sufficient interest to look. The thing- that the city needs to give its attention to and to keep fully in mind is not that part of the journey which is behind them, but that portion of it which is ahead of them. It is for this reason that we are mostly concerned in this report with pointing out the lines of incomplete growth and to pointing the directions along which further growth needs to be guided. It is well to remember also that as one points to the needs of advance in the schools of San Antonio, one is usually point- ing to things such as found in almost every city in the country. Only the particular mode of manifestation is peculiar to any one city. Neither the laymen nor the teachers of San Antonio need feel in the slightest chagrined at having the defects, or I would call them, the needs of further growth, pointed out in this report. The city that has reached the point of searching self-examination is farther along the road of progress than those content to let things drift without incurring the trouble of taking their bearings. In various sections of this report I shall have occasion to point out what appear to be a number of seriously wasteful shortcomings, as we shall have to call them for convenience. Most of them, however, can not be laid at any one man's door. Responsibility in most cases is fairly widely distributed; and present conditions have grown out of previous ones in which the responsibility was equally widely distributed. For this reason we have made no attempt to locate personal responsibility for educa- tional deficiencies. In order that our examination of the fundamental aspects of education in San Antonio should not be lost in a multitude of details, we have held fairly consistently to a discussion of these main outlines of the work. We have puropsely refrained from entering into a discussion of the details of which the larger things are made up. If these latter are properly taken care of then, the details will fall into their places in perfectly natural ways. Respectfully submitted, J. F. BOBBITT. University of Chicago, March 27, 1915. THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS Chapter II. THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS. According to the last school census there were in San An- tonio 21,983 children of school age. They were of diverse races and nationalities. The number of children of the different nationalities is shown in the following chart : Ages Americans and Europeans Mexican Negro Total 7 years 1,456 1,076 267 2,799 8 years 9 years 1,386 1,192 1,016 898 240 234 2,642 2,324 10 years 1,207 889 212 2,308 11 years 1,138 838 191 2,161 12 years 1,174 847 182 2,203 13 years 1,078 798 172 2,048 14 years 1,116 830 210 2,156 15 years 845 627 164 1,636 16 years . ... 869 652 179 1,700 Total 11,461 8,471 2,051 21,983 To these we must really add the number 17 and 18 years of age, now that the high school training, full time or part time is coming to be looked upon as a necessity. And as kindergartens are introduced those 6 years of age are being included among the number for which the city admits educational responsibility. The number of children needing education is therefore consider- ably larger than shown by the census, probably above 25,000. Now what should be done by the schools of San Antonio, public and private, for these 25,000 children? What are the re- sults to be achieved that are deemed so important that the people of the city are willing to spend $500,000 a year upon the public schools, and another quite large amount upon the parochial and private schools? It may at first seem unnecessary to raise such a question. In the minds of many, the schools have long known 8 CHAPTER II. what to do ; the central problem is merely one of getting it done efficiently. As a matter of fact, neither in San Antonio nor in any city have the purposes of education been clearly defined. The ma- jority of the weaknesses in any system trace back directly or in- directly to this vagueness of purpose. Communities generously provide funds for the work, but nowhere have definite plans and specifications been drawn up that fully and completely define the results that are to be achieved by the public schools, in terms of what the community needs. If a man should set aside $500,000 for constructing a building, and then furnish no definite plans or specifications as to the particular things to be done, there is small probability that he would get what he needed. There is large probability that much of the work would be badly adapted to his purposes ; that it would be of inferior quality ; and that there would be a large waste of money. If he built a new $500,000 building each year in this same unspecified manner, the losses would be cumulative. It is just as necessary in carrying forward the labors of a school system to know what things need to be done and what things need not to be done. Unless the clearly needful things are definitely set down for the work of the schools, there is extremely small probability that an annual expenditure of $500,- 000 of the people's money will secure a maximum of what might be obtained for that money; or anything near it. The waste is likely to be just as large as in the case of the building referred to. Where educational purposes are not clearly defined in terms of community needs, a city is indeed fortunate if the annual waste is not less than one-fifth of the amount expended, or in this case $100,000. And the losses are cumulative. And the losses to the children are far greater than this mere financial loss. Let us here enumerate some of the educational needs of San Antonio wh'rh probably can not be called into question by any thoughtful indvidual ; and then in succeeding chapters dis- cuss the situation with reference to these matters in somewhat greater detail. THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS The community money is spent and the sacrifices made for the purpose of fitting the 25,000 children for effective perform- ance of their adult activities. A fully rounded educational pro- gram should therefore be designed : (1) To fit the children and youth for effective performance of the labors of their life's callings. (2) To lay a broad and secure foundation for sound judg- ment as to the various social, economic, and industrial problems with which one is concerned as a citizen in a democracy. (3) To lay a secure foundation in knowledge and in habits for life-long health and physical vitality. (4) To develop habits of healthy and socially desirable leisure occupations. (5) To give effective training in the means needed for social intercommunication ; namely the language or the languages that one actually needs. (6) To train individuals for the activities concerned in the rearing and education of children ; or in other words, the func- tions of parenthood. (7) To train one for his religious activities. Except as education seeks to make one more effective in performing his activities in one or another of these various fields, there can be no sound reason for expending the people's money for its support. Whatever is done in school must be seen definitely to further one or another of these seven purposes. Whatever can not be seen to further some one of these pur- poses has no place in the schools. It should not be permitted to live parasitic upon the funds provided by the community. Whatever is now left out of the course of study which is needed for promoting effective training in any one of these seven fields should be included at the proper age and under the proper circumstances. Naturally in our public schools for well-known reasons the trair mg for religious activities can not be included under present conditions Until the elements of the community can agree 10 CHAPTER II. among themselves, naturally they will have to find some other means of taking care of this training. That it must be left out of public education is the fault of this sectarianism and not of the schools. In discussing the work of the public schools in San Antonio, we shall assume that unless a thing done can be justified on one ol the six bases enumerated, it has no business there. We shall have occasion to point to a number of things that should be re- duced in amount or dropped altogether. We shall also have to point out many additional things that ought to be included in the course of study since they are needs for the effective train- ing for activities in one or another of these six fields. The old educational doctrine that there must be studies for strengthening the mind contains nowadays as much truth as it ever did. But with the growing complexities of modern life and with the enormous amount of real knowledge and real training for sound judgment in the six fields of practical affairs enumer- ated, we are coming to see that in getting the necessary knowledge and judgment in these fields, we have nowadays enough mental work for all of the necessary strengthening of the mind, and even some to spare. So much useful knowledge is now needed that there is no longer any necessity of including ancient, musty, useless studies merely for the intellectual gymnastics that they provide. They are no more needed than are dumb-bells by a blacksmith, or back exercises by a coal-heaver. THE PLACE OF SCHOLASTIC EDUCATION. The most substantial and fundamental portions of one's education are obtained out of school. As one looks at the fields of human vocation, of civic activity, of caring for one's health, one's recreations, etc., it is quite clear that it is through observa- tion and participation on the part of children and youth in the real activities as found in home, shop, store, club, church, street, etc., that one gets the foundation of all of his training in each of the several fields enumerated. Not only does he get his basic training through such actual participation, but it is in fact the THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS 11 only way in which it can be had. Only through the real ex- periences of life can one come to know the nature of the realities of life. This must be clearly realized before one can understand the place of scholastic education. The educational work of the schools is only supplementary. It can not be rightly judged except as it is seen to be merely supplementary. The schools add to the knowledge obtained in one's social contacts. They round out this knowledge; they complete it ; they correct the errors. As living conditions nowadays grow more artificial and complicated, the amount of knowledge required is greatly in- creased. Much of this knowledge does not lie clearly upon the surface of affairs, is not generally diffused through the adult community, and cannot be got through social contacts, observa- tion, and participation. The supplementary training by the schools grows more and more necessary, and greater in amount. It cannot be genuine or useful, however, except as it is supple- mentary to the fundamental training of the world itself, and fitted to the latter as exactly as a house is fitted to its founda- tion ; or a tree to the roots out of which it grows. Two complications of this simple relation need to be men- tioned. In the first place, certain fundamental activities of the community are nowadays being transferred in part to the school itself, and carried on under its direction in order that the supple- mentary training may be intimately related to the fundamental portion. Garment-making, embroidery, cooking, canning, laun- dry work, the making of furniture, the construction of sidewalks, fences, buildings, etc., are actual vocational activities which are in some part being transferred to the school premises and done under the direction of the teachers. There is no intention of making the school a vocational institution in itself. These por- tions of community labor are transferred merely for administra- tive convenience in order to bring the foundation close to the educational superstructure which the schools are commissioned to build. Because of the necessity of having such foundation close at hand it is probable, even certain, that a much larger por- tion of practical, vocational production will in time be accom- 12 CHAPTER II. plished under educational direction for training purposes. Many such activities have to be transferred to and developed at the schools nowadays in order that children and youth may even have access to the fundamental activities. So specialized is in- dustry becoming, so shut up within high walls with "No Admit- tance" posted on every door that the fundamental contacts with industry, once so easy for childhood, are being withdrawn. The school has to make good the deficiency. As fundamental con- tacts are narrowed outside, the scholastic supplementary must be correspondingly widened inside. There are many fundamental matters of a type that cannnot be transferred bodily to the schools, as for example factory work, mercantile work, specialized work in printing, house-cleaning, much of cooking, etc. For these, our progressive cities are com- ing to establish what is called part-time work so that the students may go out to the fundamental labors under the direction or at least advice of the teacher, and in this way lay the proper founda- tion and keep the proper intimacy between fundamental aspects of the training and the scholastic, supplementary aspects. There 13 also coming to be devolped the plan of giving credit for many kinds of home-work, a growing recognition that there is and should be a connection between foundation and superstructure. There is a second complication entering in, which is very much more difficult to explain. An understanding of it is in- dispensable, however, before one can begin to discuss the effici- ency or inefficiency of the school-work in San Antonio, or in any other city. The conception is simple after one gets it. Perhaps it can best be made clear by means of an illustration, even if a somewhat extended one. Take, for example, the case of a civil engineer who is called upon to draw up plans for straightening, grading, and paving the crooked, irregular streets of a town in which he grew up as a boy. Such a man without touching his surveying instruments has already in mind the basic knowledge needed for his work. As a boy at play, roaming the streets on a boy's multifarious activities, he came to know every curve, street and alley, every angle, offset, hillock, depression, elevation, creek-bank, creek-winding, etc. At the time that he THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS 13 learned these things, he learned them for no conscious or serious purpose ; simply, he was a boy at play, conscious of nothing more than the immediate activities of the moment, following his in- terests and his pleasures, and looking forward to no serious ap- plication of his knowledge. Yet out of this relatively aimless ex- perience came his very thorough and secure knowledge of every geographical matter within the town. Had the knowledge been systematically gone after, with all the aimless play element left out, it could not have been anything like so well done. When the engineer so brought up comes to the work of surveying the city, his activities take on an entirely different character. His surveying is for the purpose of getting facts. But the purpose is wholly conscious. His facts now must be complete, exact, and systematized. He must be careful, intensive, thorough. Everything must be carefully controlled for practical ends. Yet after all, his work on this level involves but a refining, completing, and ordering of the knowledge got as a boy at play. For purposes of our discussion we shall call his first type of learning the Preliminary ; and the later type, the Practical, or the Functional. This illustration shows two kinds of learning, both of which are absolutely indispensable for all our education. On the one hand, with only the play motive, following only the lines of in- terest, should children and youth, it appears, become acquainted with the general outlines of every important field of human knowledge and experience. Simply by wandering through the fields of knowledge without any particular consciousness of the serious values or purposes of the learning, they lay the wide and secure foundation for the exact studies that must necessarily come later. They read their history, for example, for the sake of .their interest in the human story, the anecdotes, the biog- raphies, the adventures, the struggles and conflicts, etc., etc. ; and all without any consciousness that they are laying the founda- tions for later civic knowledge and judgment. In their geograpi- cal readings, they imbibe the gossip of how people live in other lands and climes, or they follow geographically the campaigns of the present armies and navies in Europe, without any thought 14 CHAPTER III of the fact that they are laying a geographical foundation later to be used for an understanding of industrial and commercial relations. All such preliminary studies, like children's play, need to be rich in detail, full of human color, infinitely varied, touched lightly and then left behind, taken up as prompted by interest not by logic, superficial, omnivorous, repititious, and loosely organized. For such are the ways of childhood ; and even of youth and adulthood in the hours of one's freedom. To say that the preliminary portions of serious education are to be on the order of play no longer shocks the proprieties as it once did. Nowadays we better understand the serious values of play ; and we recognize the value of harnessing up the play-motive when we wish strenuous exertion. It does not mean a lack of effort. It means an intensification of effort. It is the boy who wants to win in the spelling match who will man- fully master the entire spelling book as a part of the game. It is the boy who wishes to surpass his mates in arithmetic, who takes it as a game, who will come nearest to mastering every difficulty. That which one enjoys is the thing at which one will work the hardest. Given a healthy play-motive and the right opportunities, and it is like having a high-power engine and a straight track ahead. Education must not stop on this level, however. This is only preliminary to higher educational levels of a clearly practi- cal functional character. Unless this higher level is reached and covered, half of education is not accomplished. After one has acquired preliminary familiarity with the field of history, for example, one is ready for taking up such civic questions as railroad regulation, or conservation of our natural resources, or control of public utilities, or any other of our thousand civic problems, and study their historical background by way of discovering their nature. No longer will he spontaneously fol- low the lines of interest. His studies must be held strictly to the topic in hand by the serious purposes involved. He is getting practical information to be used for judgment upon questions daily presented to the citizen in a democracy. Studies on this level must be careful, systematic, exact, thorough, and fairly THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS 15 complete. Serious practical motives now entirely replace the play-motive. It should still be so done as to be enjoyable ; but the question of its enjoyableness is not now the primary one. It is to be done because one knows the information is needed, whether one likes it or not. Now let me indicate in a few words why I have given so much space to sketching the meaning of education of Funda- mental and Supplementary, Preliminary and Functional : 1. The supplementary relation of school work to community life in San Antonio is not greatly taken into account in drawing up the courses of study. As a result .there is a considerable quantity of useless and wasteful work. Even when the material is of a kind needed, the failure to build it into the pupil's funda- mental experiences, brings much of the teaching to naught. It is feebly learned, loosely held in mind, and quickly forgotten. Also, much needed teaching is left out because of the work's not growing naturally out of fundamental realities. 2. Except for the teaching work of shop, sewing-room, kitchen, and commercial department, practically all the work of both elementary and high schools is of the preliminary pre- functional type. The purpose is to give pupils over-views of the general content of history, geography, grammar, physics, etc. This is very necessary, certainly, as part of the work ; but the functional half to which this should lead is mostly omitted. The preliminary, too, is over-systematized, over-abstract, too technical, the work too slow /id intensive for this stage of progress. In other words, there is too much time given to work of the pre- liminary level, and much of it is done in a manner unsuitable tc this level, and the larger portion of the functional training lost sight 01. Where inefficiency is found in the schools of San Antonio, it can usually be traced to one or the other of these two errors. 16 CHAPTER III. Chapter III. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION. Most of the 22,000 children of school age in San Antonio will in time be obliged to earn their living. The school should therefore deal with every pupil on the theory that he will be obliged to earn his living. Since one's work is as important as any other function that one will ever perform, if public money is to be expended for education at all, this should doubtless have a share proportionate to its value. A city should expect full returns for this investment through the increased productiveness of labor efficiency. We cannot know what vocation any given child will follow ; but we do know that the labors which are done today must be done tomorrow. The vocational distribution of the present adult population shows the approximate distribution of the popu- lation ten or twenty years hence, when the pupils now in school shall have taken up their adult responsibilities. However much parents may wish their sons to take professional or managerial courses, as a matter of fact there can be no greater proportion of lawyers, doctors, journalists, or engineers, in the next gene- ration than there are in this. There must in fact be just as great a proportion as now of plumbers, carpenters, mechanics, mer- cantile employees, railroad men, factory operatives, etc. While it is the school's duty to help those who are to enter professional and managerial callings as fully as possible, it is none the less the duty of the school to provide equally for effective training for those who enter every other useful calling. Since compara- tively few students will ever enter the professions, the chief vocational responsibility of the schools lies in helping those who are to enter agriculture, manufacture, mechanical trades, commerce, transportation, public service, mining and clerical occupations. The vocational distribution of the men in San Antonio ai, shown by the occupational census of 1910 is shown in Table EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 17 II. The figures denote the number of men per thousand who were gainfully employed in each of the various occupations listed in the schedule. Table II. Vocational Distribution of Each 1000 Men Employed in Gainful Occupations in San Antonio. San Average of Antonio Cities Manufacturing and Mechanical Industry 336 43 Trade 226 175- Transportation 129 1 19 Domestic and Personal Service 120 69 Clerical Occupations 69 82 Professional Service 56 43 Agriculture, Gardening 32 10 Public Service 28 23 Extraction of Minerals ... 4 6 Total 1000 1000 If all of the new generation remains in San Antonio the boys now growing up would have to distribute themselves among the various occupational groups about as shown by the figures. Some of these groups will probably grow in the relative num- bers of workers, while others may decline somewhat. On the whole/however, the figures of today show about what conditions must be twenty years hence when the present generation of boys shall have taken their place in the world of adult affairs. If all of the boys remain in San Antonio the list shows the things in which vocational education is most needed. The second and third columns show that whether they go to other cities or re- main, about the same things are needed. The table does not con- sider the case of those who go to the farm. Doubtless in a country where agriculture is and probably will be the chief in- dustry, many of the boys will go to the farms. This should be studied, but at present we have no figures bearing upon the matter. 18 CHAPTER II. Whether a young man growing up in San Antonio remains in the city or goes to another city the chances are about 34 in a hundred that he will enter some manufacturing or mechanical pursuit; about 20 in a hundred that he will enter trade; about 12 in a hundred that he will be engaged in the transportation of persons or commodities ; about 10 in a hundred that he will perform domestic or personal service; about 7 chances in a hundred that he will do clerical work ; about 6 chances that he will enter one of the professions ; 3 chances that he will re- side in the city and carry on agriculture or gardening work; and about 3 chances in a hundred that he will be engaged in public service. The figures can be made still more concrete. The num- ber of boys leaving public schools each year at all levels is at the present time in the neighborhood of 1000. Of these 1000 San Antonio boys leaving each year, about 80 will become sales- men or helpers in stores ; about 70 will become wholesale or retail dealers ; 50 or 60 will become teamsters or deliverymen ; 60 others will work on the street and steam railroads ; another 60 still will engage in carpentry, cabinet-making, and other wood- working industries ; about 35 will become agents of one kind or another ; 30 or 35 will enter industries involving work with iron and steel; 25 or 30 will carry on agriculture or gardening; 15 or 20 will become painters, glaziers, or varnishers ; an equal num- ber will become bookkeepers and accountants ; and about the same number, builders and contractors. Here we have a rather long list of occupations into which the number of boys enter- ing each year is sufficiently large to warrant the formation of vocational classes of a rather specialized sort. The number going into each other important vocational field can be read in Table III. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 19 Table III. Number Males per 1000 Employed in Each Important Vocational Field in San Antonio, and in Texas Cities in General. Occupational Census of 1910. San Antonio gs Is ll 50 Salesmen and helpers in stores 8S 80 66 Wholesale and retail dealers 71 67 SS Servants waiters porters 61 S8 ?7 Teamsters delivervnien livery stables 60 S4 40 Steam and Street R. R. employees SQ 73 ss Wood-working industries (skilled and semi-skilled) Agents real estate insurance, etc 59 39 53 34 54 18 Iron and Steel industries (skilled and semi-skilled) Clerks (excepting clerks in stores) _ Agriculture and gardening 31 26 31 35 43 18 83 31 13 Painters glaziers varnishers .; 18 1S 16 Bookkeepers and accountants 18 25 17 Builders and contractors 16 13 10 Manufacturing officials and overseers Barbers 16 11 18 11 30 8 Printing 1 industry 10 12 15 Kxpress post telegraph, telephone 10 13 8 Lawyers Q Q 6 Clothing industries q 8 q Stationary engineers and firemen 8 11 17 Rlumbers gas and steam fitters 8 7 10 Hotel, restaurant boarding-house keepers 8 8 6 Police, watchmen, detectives, etc Brick and stone masons 8 8 8 7 9 q Physicians and surgeons 7 8 6 Klectricians 7 7 7 Leather industries ... 7 6 16 20 CHAPTER II. Janitors and sextons 555 Stenographers and typewriters 573 Metal workers (other than iron and steel) 5 6 10 Laundry workers 554 Musicians and music teachers 543 Clay, glass, and cement workers 448 Civil and mining engineers 453 Teachers 443 Clergymen 454 Fire department employees 3 4 3 Editors, reporters, authors 222 Dentists ,. 2 2 Draftsmen and designers 113 Mechanical engineers 1 Unskilled labor, and scattering 230 244 263 Enough boys leave each year who are to enter printing in- dustry to warrant the introduction of this training into the schools. It would more than pay for itself. It will be noted that the number of boys entering clothing industries each year is fairly large. This would indicate that perhaps some scholastic training is needed by boys as well as by the girls. Only nine of the boys leaving school each year, out of the thousand from all grades, will become lawyers. Only seven will become physicians. Only four will become teachers ; an equal number cleryymen. Only two will become editors, reporters or authors. Only two will become dentists. Only one a draftsman; and one a me- chanical engineer. The figures show clearly that the vocations for which training is needed by the large numbers are not the professional. Into the professions only about five percent of the men go. Table IV shows the number of women, ten years and over who were employed in certain gainful occupations in 1910. These figures also refer to the number of women per thousand employed. They refer only to women employed in gainful oc- cupations, and do not include women employed in their own homes where no remuneration is paid. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION _ 21 Table IV. The Number of Women 10 Years of Age and Over Employed in Certain Gainful Occupations per 1000 Employed. Census of 1910. 00 Servants, cooks, waitresses 242 247 202 Laundresses, etc 215 247 93 Clothing industries 113 99 128 Saleswomen 71 61 61 Teachers 54 49 52 Boarding house, hotel, restaurant 54 53 2>9 Nurses and midwives 40 37 34 Stenographers and typewriters 35 51 47- Bookkeepers and accountants 23 20 31. Employed housekeepers 14 13 20 Musicians and music teachers 14 12 13 Retail dealers 13 9 12 Telephone, etc 12 19 18 Food manufacturing industries 11 8 17 Clerks (excepting clerks in stores) 9 12 17 Manicurists, hairdressers, etc. 6 5 r 1 3 Printing industries 5 5 6 About one-tenth of the population of San Antonio is Negro. The census bureau does not furnish separate figures for San Antonio. A few of the occupations listed in the tables are entered largely by negroes. Most of them, however, are re- cruited from those who pass through the white schools. THE FACTORS OF VOCATIONAL EFFICIENCY. The first question that arises is, What does one need in order to be efficient in one's calling? This answered we can mention the training needed, and judge of the effectiveness of the work now being done. There are a number of things of which we can be fairly certain : 22 CHAPTER II. I. One needs to know the nature of the factors that enter into one's work, know how to control each of them, and to have the necessary skill for such control. In other words, one needs to know the technical science concerned in one's labors; to know how to make practical application of this technical science to one's every-day problems ; and to be skillful in doing each kind of task of which the work is made up. Illustrations of these things will be given when we come to discuss the work of training for garden and kitchen, for shop and sewing-room, etc. II. A man needs to understand the work that is being done by his co-workers in the same general field, in the same factory, the same store, the same railroad organization, etc. The work of each man must fit into the large general scheme, along with the work of each other man. This is needed for purposes of efficient industrial co-operation. For vocational stimulation, a man needs also to be conscious of the fact that his own work is well-known and understood by each of the other workers of his vocational group; that they are in a position to appreciate superior work on his part ; and that they are equally in a position to condemn inferior work. Such mutual understanding is one of the large purposes of systematic vocational training. It is generally accomplished during the learning period by putting the man to work at first one and then another of all of the various kinds of tasks performed within the establishment ; and of giving him the necessary techincal science concerned in the performance of each of these various types of labor. III. The worker needs to understand the points of view, the standards of judgment, the rights, responsibilities, etc., of the management. On the other hand, he needs to know that the managers thoroughly understand the nature of the work that he is doing, the conditions under which the work is being done, his duties, resposibilities, and rights. This is only a wider ex- tension of the matter referred to in the previous paragraph. Management and men are engaged in carrying through a single scries of labors. The efficiency of either is dependent upon the efficiency of the other; and it is dependent upon mutual co-op- eration. This can be based only upon mutual understanding. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 23 This third necessity of vocational efficiency is not everywhere recognized ; but it is being shown clearly in the recent testimony before our U. S. Industrial Commission. One of our great captains of industry, testifying before this Commission a few weeks ago said : "I favor the democratization of industry absolutely, and whatever intelligent legislation may be directed to that end. The industrial worker does not want merely an increase in wages. He wants something more something higher And he will get these things. He should have them But legislation cannot accomplish all this alone. There must be co-operation of the employer, the employed, and the public- spirited citizen . . ... . ." There can, however, be no efficient and genuine co-opera- tion except as it is based upon intelligence and full mutual un- derstanding. In a later section we shall point out what history, geography, general reading, civics, etc., ought to be taught by way of taking care of this great national vocational need; and how these subjects now fall short of their high mission because of their dealing so much of the time with mere erudition and pedantic trivialities. IV. A worker should know the community needs as re- lated to the labors of his calling. He should be conscious of the fact that the community in general knows the nature of his rights, duties, and responsibilities ; that his work is not unrecog- nized ; that they are willing to reward him for efficient service, and to withhold reward for ineffecient service. Each vocational group is turning out some necessary commodity used by all of the other groups^ and in turn all of the other social groups are turning out commodities that are used by him. Just as the men within a factory need to understand each other as the basis ot co-operation, so within society as a whole, the various voca- tional groups need to recognize the ways in which each group supports the labors of each other group, and thus through ef- fectively serving others most effectively serves itself. The need 24 CHAPTER II. of this wide vocational enlightenment has not been very fully recognized. Most education is only dimly conscious of the need. Many facts relating to these wider relations are taught in our nistories and our geographies, but they are generally badly taught because schools have not clearly defined the purposes for which taught. These subjects, however, together with civics, econ- omics, and perhaps a portion of literature, should be organized and developed so as to serve this fourth highly necessary pur- pose. V. Before there can be permanent vocational efficiency within a man, he must possess high standards of living so as to want to succeed in full measure and upon a high social level. The man who wants little will do little. The man who wants much will do much. One who wants little will be satisfied with things that are meager in quantity, cheap in quality, and inex- pensive in money and labor. The man of high standards of liv- ing who wants much is never satisfied with meager quantity, nor cheap quality; and the things cannot be had inexpensively. He must think and think hard ; he must work and work hard, in order to get the things that he wants. High appreciation, high desires and ambitions, high standards of living are therefore the most powerful motive forces for driving men to becoming effi- cient, forceful thinkers and workers in any occupational field. Whatever the school can do that will raise standards of apprecia- tion and standards of living will act indirectly in producing vo- cational efficiency. Although the action is indirect, it is funda- mental. When these five things can be fully developed within the people of a community, they will be fully trained for their various callings. Whatever training will promote one or another of these five things is justifiable educational work. If it is already in the curriculum, it should be kept there, expanded, and perfected. If anything can be found which will promote one or another of these things which is not already in the curri- culum it should be placed there. Anything which is now in the course of study for vocational purposes, but which cannot be seen to serve in any one of these five ways, should be excluded EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 25 from the course of study. These principles of judgment and selection are general and can be applied continuously by teachers and supervisors. The applications made in this chapter to the work in San Antonio are to be looked upon only as illustrations of the work to be done. The fundamental aspect of the training of children and youth along each of these five lines takes place in the home, on the street, in one's play activities, one's observations, and participation in the human activities that surround one within the community. During earlier conditions in this country all of this portion of one's vocational education was accomplished with very little scholastic help. Labor was simple rule-of-thumb. Technical science had not been greatly applied. The processes were easily observed, since they were not greatly complicated. The apprentice could learn as much as the master through mere participation and observation. The fundamental out-of-school aspects of education were then sufficient for all practical pur- poses. There appeared to be no scholastic supplementary train- ing needed. At the present time, however, processes have grown highly complex; and in certain callings at least, a very great amount of technical information is needed for success. This cannot be learned through mere looking on, or even by working as an apprentice. The processes are too complicated, and the science is hidden in the minds of the workmen. Moreover, as organizations have grown nation-wide, the understanding and the control of the social relations referred to especially in the third and fourth factors enumerated above have become endlessly complicated. At the same time, the need of an understanding o these social relations has been greatly increased. The funda- mental understanding of social relations got through community contacts must be very greatly supplemented and completed and filled out by the schools, in order that men who live within narrow communities may be brought to understand the large nation-wide industrial and economic movements. The fundamental vocational training must still be accom- plished outside of the school just as fully as ever; or by trans- ferring a portion of these fundamental labors to the school for CHAPTER II. educational purposes because of the difficulty of access to them in the community. The more the work can be accomplished under the real conditions of the practical world, rather than under school conditions, the better the work will be, all things else being equal. Under present conditions the more the funda- mental activities have to be transferred to the school for teach- ing purposes, the poorer the work is likely to be. It is at pres- ent so very difficult to develop an actual vocational atmosphere within the school. Before organizing vocational training within the schools on any level and for any one of the purposes above specified, teachers and community should search out the fundamental vocational influence with which the children are already in actual contact. These should be used as the foundation upon which all later building is accomplished. Generally they will have to be broadened and deepened so as to give a broad and secure foundation for the supplemental training of the schools/ After they have been found, then the work of the class-room, shop, kitchen, garden, etc., should be built definitely upon these community foundations, rounding out and completing knowledge already possessed. This is the only way to keep the school work anchored to reality ; the only way to be sure that it is useful and serviceable, and worth paying for. VOCATIONAL TRAINING IN SAN ANTONIO. In this field of training, in very many respects, San Antonio must be ranked among the more progressive cities of the coun- try. In the variety of occupations already introduced in some degree, in the practical quality of the work, and even more in the general spirit and purposes actuating those in charge, the city has taken a very advanced position. The high school takes care of four years of commercial training. Shop-work is given to the boys in the two upper grades of the elementary schools and through the four years of the high school, covering carpentry, joinery, furniture-making, wood-turning, pattern- making, foundry practice, forging, machine shop work, and EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 27 mechanical drawing. In the vocational and Negro schools it is given in a larger amount of time and begins earlier in the grades. For the girls of the regular courses, sewing begins in the sixth grade and continues to the end of the high school ; cooking is given to all grades beginning with the eighth. In the vocational and colored schools, sewing and cooking begin as early as the third and fourth grades. At the new Negro high school the city is introducing gardening, poultry raising, horticulture, floriculture, bench work with wood, iron work, forging, auto- mobile operation and repair, cement construction, sewing, cook- ing, laundry work, manicuring and hair-dressing, and a course in cooking and catering for Negro boys. Not many of our pro- gressive cities can provide a longer list. We shall observe as we take up some of these matters one f by one that much yet remains to be done by way of developing the work; but San Antonio is not alone in this respect. This is really the situation in every city where such work is being introduced. We shall have occasion to point out two or three principal kinds of defects in the present work. In the first place, it will be found that the work at the schools consists sometimes or little more than merely a transfer. of fundamental community activities to the school premises. This is good certainly ; and often altogether necessary, since if it is not transferred to the school, students have no way of getting into contact with it any- where. But when so transferred it must not be left too fully upon the rule-of-thumb level of community work. The supple- mentary training portion should be fully developed ; the science, the drawing and design, the mathematics, the economics, and the studies of a social nature relating to each calling. A second defect often to be pointed out will be the lack) of normal basic foundations for the supplemental activities in the class-rooms. There is often too little related fundamental experience, either at home or at school ; or it is a pretended, devitalized, artificial, make-believe, foundation for the vocational training. A third kind of failure is the teaching of the supposedly technical information, mathematics, science, drawing and design, 28 CHAPTER II. i together with social studies like history and geography, without any real or vital relation between these studies and the funda- mental things of the vocational world to which they are supposed to refer. i COMMERCIAL AND CLERICAL TRAINING. Courses having definite clerical and commercial reference are confined to the high school. There is one semester of com- mercial arithmetic, three of bookkeeping, two of stenography and typewriting, and one each of commercial geography and commercial law. The courses are in the hands of able teachers and are developing along thoroughly modern lines. Three questions arise: (1) Are there any other subjects presumably of a technical or vocational nature that are required ol these same students for graduation? (2) If so, are any of these presumably vocational matters unnecessary, irrelevant, and waste of time? (3) Are there other matters of a voca- tional nature not now included which ought to be incorporated into the course? In presenting partial answers to these ques- tions in the following pargraphs, we are more interested in mak- ing clear the nature of the problems than we are in answering them. The real responsibility for the solutions rests upon the principal of the high school and the heads of the departments concerned. Are there other subjects presumably vocational required of these commercial students? The high school course of study requires of them one and one-half years of algebra and one year of plane geometry. Presumably these are vocational studies. If one will refer back to the seven fields of human activity specified in Chapter II, it appears rather clear that neither algebra nor geometry can be of functional service in any of the other fields. So it must belong here, if anywhere. But clearly, neither study is of any vocational service to clerical or commer- cial people. No bookkeeper or stenographer, no buying or sell- ing agent, no manager of a commercial house, ever has any need for either algebraic operations or geometrical demonstrations. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 29 To force them upon commercial students with the plea that it will be of service is to obtain their time and labor upon false pretenses. To hoodwink a community into paying for such use- less subjects is to obtain and to spend their money under false pretenses. The teaching of these useless subjects to commercial students is now costing the city several thousand dollars a year. The community would do better to save its money, and use it along useful lines that are not yet sufficiently developed. The chief loss is the loss of opportunity to the students because of this needless waste of their time. Two years of science are also prescribed for commercial students. The science thus forced 'upon them seems in no wise designed to further their vocational labors. It is just as diffi- cult to see how it is consciously designed to further any of their other activities, a portion of the physiology excepted. It seems to be forced upon them not so much for their good as simply for filling out a four years' course. Such aimless prescription of work cannot be justified. There are too many things seri- ously needed by these students. They cannot afford to have their time wasted in ways that do not count. And a community ought not to pay hard-earned money for work unless it knows just how that work is to count, and whether it is to count in desirable ways. Such irresponsible work is now going on, how- ever. A further question is, What studies are left out of the training of commercial students that ought to be included in order to take care of the five aspects of vocational efficiency enumerated above? First, I would mention commercial history. Commercial geography is already included and this is so organ- ized as to give a wide and very necessary survey of commercial relations throughout the world of the present time. Rightly ti understand these relations, however, they should have his- torical background. For example, properly to understand the world's cotton industry in the various realms of production, manufacture, and commercial distribution, it is necessary not only to view the industry as it now exists in the United States, England, Germany, Egypt, India, Japan, etc., but also to under- 30 CHAPTER II. stand through history the nature of the social, industrial, and economic forces that have been at work bringing about the present world-situation in this industry. This is true of every other commercial and industrial situation treated in the commer- cial geographies. These two subjects fully developed in their economic aspects are particularly necessary for developing the third and fourth factors of vocational efficiency set down in our list. For developing these same factors there ought also to be a full and concrete study of economics. We do not here refer to the abstract economics that is usually taught in our colleges, but rather to what might better in the high school be a large ex- pansion of the economic side of the commercial geography and commercial history. The three things ought certainly to b(. taught together. The mode of organization is easy. Simply organize the industrial and commercial courses in the field by situations. That is to say, treat the cotton industry in all of its various aspects geographically, historically, economi- cally. Treat the sugar industry in the same way. Then the steel industry; and so on through the entire list. We are not here referring to any pedantic scheme of so-called correlation. We simply refer to the necessity of finding the fundamental situation in the fields of practical commercial affairs and then in the schools of giving such technical and social information about each situation as any practical man needs to have. There is nothing abstruse about the plan. It is simply every-day com- mon-sense. The two chief difficulties in the way of getting it properly done are : the traditional attitude of subject-teaching schoolmen, whether in city schools or colleges; and the text- book situation which at the present time so largely follows the dictates of these same subject-teaching schoolmen. It is not always possible therefore to find a study of the cotton industry, for example, or the sugar industry, or the lumber industry, which properly develops alongside each other in an organic way all the various lines of needed information. Generally it will be found divided up, a part of it in one book, and a part in another book. The situation is sufficiently irrational ; but school people EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 31 for the present can organize materials in a syllabus, and furnish the reading in the library. There is another aspect of this training for clerical and commercial occupations which is as yet insufficiently developed. There is not enough practical work, not enough actual contact with clerical and commercial realities on the part of the students. So far as I was able to observe, the drill work in the classes in typewriting, stenography, and bookkeeping, seems to be of commendable quality, so far as it can be made such by energetic teachers under conditions that are too exclusively scholastic. Students in these subjects remained at their practice labors after school was dismissed in greater numbers than any other class of students observed. They were trying strenuously to attain definite objective standards in the way of speed and accur- acy. These standards were based upon the actual needs of the commercial world into which they wish to go in the near future. This is naturally one of the best possible modes of anchoring the practice work of the commercial course to the fundamental realities of the commercial world during the period of training. It is, however, insufficient. One's imagination is not a sufficient substitute for reality. High school commercial courses through- out the country are notoriously ineffective in developing that necessary feeling of responsibility that is an indispensable factor Oi vocational efficiency. For clerical or commercial people, it is worth as much as speed or accuracy on the typewriter. Schools are greatly deficient also in developing actual business points of view, standards of judgment, appreciation of commercial relations in the concrete, etc., etc. These are not things that can be adequately learned through telling or reading. They are not things in which students can be drilled in a class-room where commercial realities or clerical realities are non-existent. The responsibility, the judgment, and the other things are developed only by putting people into positions that demand responsibility, good judgment, etc. In other words, in the commerical educa- tion the work is a bit top-heavy on the side of the scholastic supplemental, and is lacking in ballast on the side of the com- munity fundamental portion of the student's education. 32 CHAPTER II. How can the schools introduce more contact with funda- mental community activities? Several things can be done. The school system is the largest single institution in the community ; and it is the most complicated one. On the material side it has a plant in the care and equipment of which are involved many score separate items. As school work is developed in ways daily becoming more pressing, many other items will have to be in- cluded. Now, the efficiency in the management of the material aspect of the school plant involves necessarily much accurate bookkeeping and accounting. Our progressive cities at the present time are introducting what is called the Bureau of In- vestigation and Appraisal. The work of such a bureau must be based upon accurate accounting of very many kinds. The details o.r this work constitute a rather extensive series of complicated bookkeeping and accounting problems. San Antonio has a suffi- cient number for several score clerical students, for a portion of their practice work. Such work need not in any wise elimi- nate or curtail the drill work that is now done. It ought to stimulate it, and it ought to bring about the development of a number of things that cannot possibly be accomplished in an atmosphere of pure abstract drill work such as now obtains in altogether too great measure in the commercial training room, for the simple reason that nothing else has been found of a serious nature to do. The clerical work referred to is what is coming to be termed in the educational world "part-time" work. Both business men and schoolmen in our more progressive cities nowadays are introducing part-time work along many lines. In San Antonio there are probably small commercial and manufacturing estab- lishments in which the business is not large enough to warrant the employment of a stenographer, typewriter; or bookkeeper, but where there is a considerable amount of work to be done which the proprietor would gladly turn over to part-time student- workers if he could be assured of competent supervision and confidential relations the latter a necessary part of vital train- ing, which the purely gymnastic clerical class-room work wholly lacks. Business men are naturally suspicious of immature work- EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 33 ers of this type, at present, because of the general irresponsibility of students. They generally are irresponsible, chiefly because they have had no practice in bearing responsibility. Students, sixteen years of age and over, are in fact capable of bearing such responsibilities, when conditions permit this side of their training to be developed. A third suggestion for fundamental part-time work is home- accounting. When done adequately this is anything but a small piece of work. It might be continuous for high school students throughout the entire high school course. It might be of large practical significance to those concerned. It is, however, a piece of work that cannot be transferred to the school. Like house- cleaning or home-gardening, it is a type of work that must be done wholly at home. The facts are of an intimate family nature that forbid their being taken away from the home. Here, as in many other things, we are coming to see that teachers must direct work where it can best be done, not where it best suits their personal convenience. There are perhaps other fields in which part-time clerical and accounting work could be devised. The schools for pur- poses of civic education need to be in pretty close contact with the fundamental governmental activities of the community. Could part-time clerical work be, arranged in connection with certain city offices, the work would be excellent for the clerical students on the side of both vocational and civic training. Through connecting it with a type of civic training later to be re- ferred to, it might incidentally be salutary for city offices. The fact that partially trained students are in need of checks and supervision can be made use of educationally in arranging any such system of training. When different sets of students do the same task independently, each serves as a check upon the accuracy of the work. Also, one set of students can be employed t) inspect and check up the results of practical work done by other sets of students. To inspect work and do it effectively is sometimes as good training as to do the work itself ; and it is a part of both clerical and commercial labors. 34 CHAPTER III. TRAINING FOR HOUSEHOLD OCCUPATIONS. This field of vocational training has been better developed than any other within the system. It is rather more easily developed than any other because of the facility with which so large a part of the fundamental activities can be transferred to the school premises without loss of vocational atmosphere. All of the sewing can be transferred bodily. Some of the canning, preserving, jelly-making, will also transfer. Some of the bak- ing would transfer if the school made up its mind to it. But even better than this, the whole student body finds itself at school as much in need of its noon-day meal as if at home ; so that the luncheon problem will transfer itself wholly and bodily to the school in so far as the schools care to undertake it for training purposes. Where real work can be carried to the school in this fashion, the educational problems become relatively easy. House-cleaning, household decoration, the care and feeding of babies, etc., are matters that will not transfer in such simple fashion, and which require the school to go to the homes for finding the foundation activities for its technical scholastic la- bors. Training is given at present in sewing of many kinds, both hand and machine, simple millinery, simple household decoration, plain cooking, invalid cooking, household sanitation, marketing, home nursing, care of children, etc. The list is unusually com- plete. Since the practical labors of the household training are for perfecting the fundamental labors that the girls perform in their homes, and since the practical labors of home and school are integral portions of one educational task, two things are to be said: (1) The conditions of the practical school training should be considerably better in every possible way than those of the homes in general from which the children come ; (2) The school conditions must not be made so different from those of the home that they are severed, one from the other, the methods taught in the school being impossible in the home because of differences of equipment, materials, etc. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 35 The physical conditions provided by the school board in the recently equipped household training centers, pretty ade- quately meet these demands. The accommodations provided at the Highland Park School, at the Crockett, etc., are light, sani- laiy, well-aranged, orderly, well-equipped, and pleasing. The city is making very commendable physical provision for this highly necessary field of training. It is possible, however, to point out work observed that was being done under undesirable physical conditions ; as for example, the sewing in the unneces- sarily darkened room at the Brackenridge High School. When lighting standards for sewing rooms are so well known as at present, and when there are so many persons bearing responsi- bility for pointing out such a condition, principal, superintend- ent of buildings, expert adviser of the board as to buildings, supervisor of sewing, teacher of sewing, school physician it is but surprising that so exceptional a condition could be per- mitted to exist so long. On the side of technical information for the girls in house- hold occupation courses, what subjects are now taught that should be taught? What ones are not taught that should be taught? And what ones of ostensible vocational value are now required that are of insufficient vocational service to warrant their teaching? To begin with the first, quite a wide range of related technical science is now being developed. The most complete at present is that of household bacteriology which is given to all classes where cooking is taught. Others are the chemistry of foods, dietetics, hygiene as related to food, hygiene as related to dress, design as related to garment-making, physi- ology and hygiene as related' to the care of children, household accounts, cost accounting in each of the fields of household ac- tivity, etc. These matters are all desirable. Most of them are in need of much further development than that now reached. Perhaps if we were to add the physics of the household, the list would be fairly complete in range. Most of these subjects are not well taught for the simple reason that the necessary facilities are not sufficiently provided; and where partially provided, are not turned toward the specific needs of household training. 36 CHAPTER III. For the elementary cooking, the necessary science is yet largely undeveloped. There is no course in elementary science in the elementary school, nor are the kitchens equipped for very much laboratory study of the scientific factors entering into the pro- cesses. In the Main Avenue High School two years of science are required of all of the girl students who desire to graduate. Many take physics or chemistry. The courses at present offered, however, have not been drawn up with a view to meeting the vocational needs of these girls, nor for specifically meeting any other kind of vocational needs. These high school courses are offering supplementary training to girls without any par- ticular consideration of whether it relates the fundamentals or not, a clear violation of the very first principle concerned in drawing up a science course for public education. Such required science courses of abstract irrelevant type are for high schools survivals of a form of science-teaching that is rapidly growing obsolete. Science for women should relate definitely to situa- tions in which women actually find themselves. Naturally there should be science study of the preliminary over-view type ; but it will be only introductory. The real work should come in con- nection with the practical situations. The high school science work for these girls now does give the preliminary over-view. But it does it badly because as introductory work it is so much overdone and uses such unsuitable methods and materials. And the broad range of functional science is pushed out and omitted altogether. A generous estimate will not allow more than fifty percent of the useful in such high school science teaching. The city is in all probability wasting half of the money that is now being spent on the teaching of this irrelevant introductory science to girls. And this at a time when there is a crying need in so many departments of woman's affairs for a fuller under- standing of practical applied science. The loss of several thous- and dollars annually expended for this fifty percent of wasted science-teaching is not the serious part of the matter. The serious thing is that girls can take so-called science courses without sufficiently acquiring the scientific attitude of mind and points of view with reference to the specific problems of EDUCATION FOR VOCATION _37 woman's complicated labors. The divorce of the technical and practical enfeebles both. The chief waste is the waste of op- portunity. The high school needs to furnish well-developed and well- oiganized courses for the girls in the physics of the household, the chemistry of the household, the bacteriology of the house- hold, etc. The laboratories, the equipment, appliances, materials, etc., should be of a sort that is related to practical household situations. Household physics, for example, should deal with heat as related to the conductivity of different metals and other substances used in the utensils actually employed in the house- hold, such as glass, porcelain, chinaware, earthenware, asbestos, wood, etc. The apparatus should be the utensils themselves. In the same manner it should deal with the mechanics of plumb- ing fixtures, window fixtures, ventilation, sewing machines, etc. ; with the mechanics and the electricity of electric motors, electric irons, electric fans, toasters, electric bells, batteries, etc. ; with color and color harmony as related to household decoration, garments, furniture, etc. ; and so on through a long list of physical matters. In the same way the work of the home abounds with situations involving chemical relations, so that a very elaborate chemistry of household matters is possible and highly desirable. The same can be said for bacteriological study. It is recommended that the science work required of the girls in the high school be thoroughly over-hauled, and reorgan- ized so as to relate it as fully as possible to practical affairs. The preliminary introductory surveys of each science should be con- ducted in a manner appropriate to such pre-practical or prepara- tory science. Another subject indispensable for the household arts is a fully developed course in drawing and design. There is draw- ing now in the manual training department for man's shop- labors. There is no special teacher of drawing and design at the present time giving corresponding work to the girls, although it is needed for woman's household labors as fully as for man's shop-work. At the present time the matters of design, color harmony, etc., are taken care of incidentally by the teachers of 3S CHAPTER III. household arts. The work requires a large amount of specialized training, and it requires certain specialized points of view. It would, appear that there should be employed a teacher of art and design as these apply to the work of the girls, who would give time to the art side of the girls' work in the high school and through the elementary schools. It is probably not desirable to have courses in general art and design in either elementary school or high school, except of course for the preliminary aspects of the study. Beyond a little of this, to be introduced incidentally, all should probably bt applied art and design. There should be art for the girls in connection with the making of garments, curtains, hangings, embroidery, work bags, satchels, home decoration, home furnish- ings, etc., etc. All of the general principles of design can be de- veloped in connection with these special applications to this wide variety of work. Primarily the teacher of art for the girls should know the fundamental nature of the household occupations. She should see her drawing and design not as a thing in itself, but only as an aspect of the fundamental labors and thinking of the girls in carrying forward the occupations of the homes, or the same oc- cupations as they are specialized and commercialized outside the home. The art motive may well be strong. In fact it should be strong; but it should not be the dominant one. The latter place should be reserved for the vocational motive with art en- tering in only as the hand-maiden to labor. This is already the attitude of the department of household occupations. The art side simply needs the means of development. The women of the community should see that it is developed. The present art work of the schools is in serious need of development. It is especially needed in the high school. There is a further question. Are any subjects required of the girls that are ostensibly for vocational purposes only, but which really are not worth the time, labor and cost? This is true of a good part of the applications of arithmetic in the ele- mentary school. The textbook taught is unnecessarily full for the girls who are not going into commercial occupations. For EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 39 those who are going into these occupations and need the more specialized portions of the arithmetic, the subjects should be taught in the specialized commercial course of the high school. Certain portions of commercial arithmetic need not be forced upon all elementary school girls merely because some of them will later go into commercial labors. The city has already recog- nized the over-abundance of materials in the text and has already cut out matters like domestic exchange, foreign exchange, cube root, compound proportion, compound interest, annual interest, the introductory algebra work, etc. A committee of intelligent women of the community who are not teachers but who are familiar with the fundamentals of household occupations should be asked to go through the arithmetic text now taught in the upper grades and to point out the matters that have no sufficient connection with or relation to the labors that they perform and which could be omitted without loss from the work of the girls in their training for household occupations. The more such a committee of women could forget the arithmetical mattters that they themselves studied in elementary school years ago, the bet- ter perhaps would be their judgments as to what is actually needed of an arithmetical sort for household occupations. In the high school all of the girls who graduate are re- quired to take one and one-half years of algebra and one year of demonstrational geometry. Such a requirement is absolutely inexcusable. The algebra is an absolute waste; the geometry is almost wholly waste. The form studies that the girls ought to have should be found in connection with their drawing and design and their construction work. The city is now paying several thousand dollars for the wasted teaching of a subject ostensibly vocational which can be of no value in their labors. The matter should be left to a responsible committee of lay- women to decide. Let the mothers of the girls who are going through the high school select such a committee. Let the mem- bers of the committee divest themselves of all academic precon- ceptions, and look at the situation through the eyes of straight- forward common-sense. 40 CHAPTER III. The problem is one of large moment to the city : because of the money cost to taxpayers; because of the financial sacrifices of families to keep their daughters in the high school ; because of the great amount of labor done by the hundreds of high school girls ; because of the things of worth that have to be omitted to teach this algebra and geometry. Where so much is involved and where the waste is cumulative the city cannot afford not to investigate. The investigating committee should find out what the leaders of social thought and action through the United States think of the necessity of algebra and demon- strational geometry for girls and women. They should learn whether there is a tendency to omit these subjects, in forward- looking high schools, from the courses of the girls. The girls need mathematics. They need to think mathe- matically accurately in matters of household accounting, buying problems as related to the grocery, the dry goods store, etc., rent, insurance, durability and depreciation, saving and waste, rational distribution of the family income as related to different stand- ards of living, etc., etc. As we shall point out in the discussion on civic training, this newly developing type of education must include a large quantity of cost-accounting and mathematical economic study. To drop out mathematics useless to women will not really mean less mathematical thinking than in the past. It will mean time saved for a valuable kind of mathematics rather than a valueless kind. Certain of these necessary mathematical matters are now being developed along right lines by the house- hold arts department in conjunction with the accounting division of the commercial department. This development should be pushed with vigor. All applied mathematics should be taught in the departments in which it is applied ; and not be segregated in the mathematics department. The girls in training for household arts should be given a large amount of social information pertaining to home activities and conditions. At the present time one of the books taken up for study relates to woman's share in primitive culture. This needs to be continued down through the historical period as well. Other matters studied relate to the cost of living and the EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 41 factors of control, to the social responsibilities of women in expending the family budget, the conditions of domestic service, social consideration of the various factors entering into house- hold administration, etc., etc. The history, the civics, and the geography teachers of the high school seem oblivious of their opportunity just here. They have not seen that these subjects are valueless except as they are used to illumine, to help one tc see in large social ways, the things of the practical every-day life of today. Much of the high school geography, physiography, as it is called, now given to the girls, is of about as much real value to them as would be the geology of the farther side of the moon. Of about equal value is much of the ancient and medieval history now given ; and much of the antique civics. These subjects need to be organized in ways discussed in later sections of this report. When so organized, they should include large quantities of information for the purpose of giving large historical, geographical and social background and per- spective to the present-day situation of the household. On the side of practical work, the sewing is well developed. The girls are making garments that are to be worn. On the side of cooking, the work needs development. They have less opportunity for cooking actual meals. The best place for the girls to put their domestic science information to practical ser- vice is in preparing the meals at their homes. The schools can- not count on their doing it, however, unless there is full co-opera- tion with the homes, and supervision of some type. The school crediting of home-work is an entering wedge. Contact of domes- tic science teacher with the mothers at school meetings and in their homes is necessary also. The supplementary information: given in the school must be brought to function under normal conditions, or the education is not accomplished. If not so ap- plied the information is forgotten, and the work has been wasted. A community generally has too much faith in the schools' ability to educate under artificial isolated conditions. It simply can- not be done. It is but building on shifting sands. In some part this problem will transfer to the schools. The ptnny luncheon or nickel luncheon now coming into elementary 42 CHAPTER III. schools may well be prepared by domestic science classes. Let the girls do the planning, the marketing, the cooking, the sewing, the collecting, etc., and the chain of real responsibilities will be fairly complete. The school kitchen will not then be a play- kitchen, but one of real work. The high schools offer still better opportunities, and to the girls of a more responsible age. Both high schools must now and perhaps always must have their noonday luncheon at the school. At present it is but a hurried feeding time under highly undesir- able conditions. At one of the high schools everything is purchas- ed from itinerant street vendors or the little local shops along the street ; and it is consumed mostly on the street and in the school- yard as the pupils return to the buildings. It has to be bolted because of the brevity of time. At the other high school, certain basement rooms are improvised for luncheon purposes; but no thought has been taken, it appears, on the part of the adminis- tiation towards using the opportunity for educational purposes. It is sufficiently absurd for the high school to teach textbook dietetics at one hour in the day, and then violate every dictum of such dietetics at the luncheon hour. The domestic science people need to be put in charge of the preparation and the serving of the luncheon. The schools cannot afford to throw away such an excellent training opportunity. Naturally any excess purely routine labor might be done by hired help. But the head-work, so to speak, and the responsibility needs to be carried by the girls themselves for the sake of their education. EDUCATION FOR MECHANICAL OCCUPATIONS. Taking cities in general, more men are employed in mechani- cal occupations of one kind or another than in any other group. The proportion in San Antonio is not so large as in cities in general. It is, however, a class that will probably grow in num- bers ; and moreover, the boys of San Antonio in considerable number are sure to distribute themselves among many cities. The city is justified in laying large stress on training for mechni- cal labors. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 43 In this department, as in those of commercial subjects and of household arts, the city has been fortunate in finding strong heads of departments who are able fully to take the practical vocational point of view. Teachers employed are generally those who have had practical trade experience. An excellent arrange- ment is found in the case of a certain teacher, who after teach- ing in the schools for nine months in the year, works at his trade during the three months of summer. Such a plan would be sal- utary for every teacher of vocational subjects. The boys are generally found making things of use, per- sonal use or school use. One finds them making tables, chairs, office-desks, cabinets, porch swings, writing-desks, book-cases, piano benches, medicine cabinets, towel-racks, easels for relief maps, shoe-shine boxes, benches, etc. For the play-grounds the shops have constructed in certain cases giant-strides, horizontal bars, teeter-boards, flag staffs, basket-ball and volley-ball ap- paratus, together with tables and benches for the outdoor luncheons. Certain of the play-ground apparatus observed, as for example, that at School No. 2, possess a solidity and dura- bility that is often lacking in the output of our commercial houses. At one of the schools, the students in the manual train- ing shop were engaged in making an elaborate play-ground slide, ladder and all, of maple and ash. All this is real work under real shop conditions, since it is turning out a product that is to be of service. A rather unusual form of training, unusually superior I should say, was found at two elementary schools. At each of these, the upper grade boys in the carpentry class had con- structed a complete portable three-room cottage, of a type very much used in the neighborhood of the school. When the building is sold it will be moved away from the school premises and the next carpentry class will continue its training by constructing another. One of these cottages was thirty-three by sixteen feet in size, with three rooms, two porches, six windows, three doors, shingled, glazed, and painted. All the work was done by the grammar school grades. This is what we have termed the trans- fer of a real work situation to the school premises for training 44 y CHAPTER III. purposes. When such a practical task can lie at the foundation of the architectural planning, the mechanical drawing, the studies of mechanical relations, etc., no better form of carpentry train- ing can be devised. In such training, San Antonio has about reached the high water mark of excellence. Work of this same high type, lying close to the vocation itself needs also to be in- troduced into the two high school manual training courses, for those who wish to specialize in this general field. On the basis of such practical foundation, what desirable studies of a technical nature are given? To begin with, there is a very fully developed course in mechanical drawing given in both of the high schools. It is very closely related with the work in the shops. During the past year mechanical drawing has been introduced into the seventh or highest grade in the elementary school, and is being developed in connection with the manual training work of the boys. This elementary course needs to be under the full control of the manual training department rather than a general elementary arts department. It is not art primarily, although the aesthetic considerations of design should enter fully. It is primarily a technical shop subject, needed for guidance of shop labors, and should not under any circumstances risk divorce from the shop by putting it in the hands of another department. For the girls of the seventh grade the work should be different from that of the boys and directed by the household arts department. Other technical matters are mathematics and science. In the elementary grades most of the elementary science that should be taught has not yet been developed. It should be taken in hand, however. Perhaps most of the arithmetic needed by mechanics is given in the arithmetic course. In the high school the boys in training for mechanical occupations are compelled to take two and one-half years of algebra and demonstrational geometry, and two years of any science that they may happen to choose. There are no regulations that will keep them from choosing zoology and botany, neither of which can be of any particular vocational service. If they choose physics and chem- istry, many things will be introduced that are of service; many EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 45 things, that can never be of any service ; many things needed are not introduced ; and all of it is given out of relation to the practi- cal situations into which science enters. While all students should have general preliminary over-views in perhaps most or all of the usual high school sciences, when it comes to the detailed in- tensive work of the sort which one does when one gives a full year to a science, most of this should take a definite functional point of view. If we were to say that the science as now taught possesses fifty percent value for the boys in mechanical train- ing, we should be perhaps sufficiently liberal in our estimate. The science work for these boys needs to be completely over- hauled and reorganized. On the side of the algebra and geometry for mechanics, something can be said ; especially for the geometry. Most of the necessary geometric relations should be developed in the mechanical drawing classes rather than in the demonstrational geometry classes. After deducting this part it is probable that the high school mathematics as at present organized is, most of it, of relatively low value even for mechanics. If they reach that level of the work when they use handbooks, formulae, and need to make algebraic reductions of these formulae, then they need some algebra. All that they need, however, for this work can be taught in half a year. The other year represents waste, unless they have decided to go on to a technological institu- tion where the shop work will require a fuller knowledge of mathematics. For such relatively few individuals naturally the high school ought to give the preliminary portions of such higher mathematics. Because a few need a thing is no excuse for the city's forcing it upon all. To take an exactly parallel case, it would be pretty blind management that forced a full course in shorthand upon every student in the high school simply because a minor portion of them need it. For those boys whose education is ended at the high school stage, and who intend to enter mechanical industry, it is a perfectly safe estimate that the waste in the high school mathematics is not less than fifty per- cent. 46 _ CHAPTER III. Mathematics for mechanics, and science for mechanics, need to be developed in much the same way as the school has developed drawing and design for mechanics. In this connection there is a sound educational principle that needs to be stated: The department which is responsible for the practical labors em- ployed in vocational training should be responsible for the teach- ing of that mathematics, science, drawing and design, etc., that is concerned in the guidance of those labors. In the ultimate vo- cational analysis it is the head-work that is more important than the hand-work. The vocational department should be re- sponsible for the head-work of the vocation as well as the hand- work of the vocation. If delegated to general workers, it should be in the sense that there are certain teachers who do work for different vocational departments, but who while working for any particular department will take the point of view fully of that department. A teacher of mathematics, for example, might be sufficiently versatile to take the point of view of the com- mercial department while teaching commercial arithmetic to commercial students ; to take the point of view of mechanics when teaching mathematics to prospective mechanical workers ; to take the point of view of household workers when teaching the necessary mathematics to these; to take the civic point of view when teaching the mathematical and economic relationships of civic problems. The principle would apply in the same man- ner to the teaching of art and design, of science, and of social studies. On the side of social studies in the training for mechanical vocations, the schools are doing practically nothing. The study of labor conditions as these are found distributed geographically over the surface of the globe, or as they have been historically developed during the past two or three centuries, is not given. There should be, however, a strong and fully developed course in Industrial History. The subject is very large, very interest- ing and highly profitable, in this age of industrial misunder- standing, when the workers need to know the basis of industrial democracy. There should also be an equally full course in in- dustrial geography, showing the industrial stresses and strains EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 47 of the present. These two studies would necessarily include most of the industrial problems faced by workers in the field of mechanical industry, and faced by the community in general in the regulation of industry. Some of the things to be covered in such social vocational studies are : the development of mechnical inventions, the development of the factory system, the growth of corporations, labor organizations, industrial insurance, employ- er's liability, the ' relation of wages to production, etc. More specifically it should take up the growth of the manufacture of steel, of lumber, of furniture, the growth of railroads, railroad regulation, etc., etc. If the thing looks difficult as compared with the safe and lazy teaching of the labor struggles of ancient Rome between plebian and patrician, it is largely because we have not yet collected for our use, a proper body of informational materials to be used. On the side of practical application certain further develop- ments seem desirable. The carpentry classes might take care of certain portions of the building repair and building construc- tion on the school grounds. The school board should never hire work done when it can be done by pupils in training for educa- tional purposes. Repairs to buildings and equipment, for ex- ample, last year amounted to over $20,000. In looking over the records of the superintendent of buildings and grounds, one finds such items as the following: New fence needed south of front yard. Calcimining needed in the north corridor. Black-boards need to be re-slated. Walks are needed around the old build- ing. Inside blinds in need of repair. Fence should be built upon the west side. Walls of class-rooms should be re-tinted. Desks and shades are in need of repair. Fences need to be re-set. Putting up new black-boards. Repairing plaster in Room No. 5. Fixing the cellar so water will not seep in. Re-varnishing the school seats and desks. Twelve yard fences are needed very much. Repair of window casings. Glass needed for windows and transoms. Need a ladder for trimming trees. Need a new and higher fence. Trees need trimming. Bat entrances should be stopped in both buildings. Fences need re-painting. Two new windows need to be opened in the small buildings. Doors 48 CHAPTER III. need repairing and re-painting. Screens are needed for the south rooms. Ward-robe dqor and Venetian blinds in need of repair. Need a map cabinet in the upper hall. A gate is needed t j the boys yard. Repairs to curb and to the iron fence. Window cords need replacing. Doors needed for the toilet. All wooden buildings need painting. Latches and locks in all buildings need attention. Cement floors should be painted. Screens for toilets should be higher. Hallway floors should be re-laid. Porch needs to be re-built. Need new outbuilding. Double desks should be cut in two. Repair of teacher's desk and two chairs. Leaky window casings need attention. Tool sheds should be en- larged. Need 161 feet of new black-board. Steps need repair. New ceiling in cloak-rooms of old buildings. Picture moulding needed in the main building. Mouldings on black-boards need painting, etc., etc. Out of so great wealth of opportunity, the shop department ought to be able to find certain things that can be done for training purposes. It must be kept in mind always, however, that the primary ends of using this fundamental practical labor is training, training to understanding and appreciation of struc- tural matters, more than training for skill. Such work cannot be educationally justified except as it is filled as full as possible with the intellectual and aesthetic content of mechanical draw- ing, structural science, structural art and design, structural mathematics, etc. The head-training, so to speak, must loom larger than the hand-training. The hand-training, however, is a necessary foundation for the head-training. The two must go together. Mind-training cannot be solidly accomplished except as one's feet are kept on the ground of practical reality. Here again we must mention that labor organizations should very carefully consider the entire situation before making objec- tion to valid educational policy. Understanding and appreciation of and desire for proper housing conditions constitute the source of prosperity to the building trades. So long as people are ignorant or unappreciative or satisfied with poor housing con- ditions, they will have little work to give to the building trades. When they have placed high their standards of housing condi- EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 49 tions, they will have much work to give to the building trades In proportion as this appreciation exhibits itself in the building of a more attractive city, the more will San Antonio thrive as a city of homes, and the more will the building trades thrive. For building trades organizations to prohibit the training that will create a higher type of building demand for the sake of the more immediate profits is like killing the goose that laid the golden egg. If it is objected that students cannot do good enough work, it must be observed that if their work is not good enough for the schools, then they are not sufficiently educated to turn out into the world of economic industry. Simply their education is incomplete. Responsibility rests on the schools to perfect it. And the having of such real work to do offers the best possible educational opportunity. The school city may also object that such work is slow. If well-done, it usually is. The city must exercise foresight, and plan a long way ahead. Educa- tional opportunities must not be thrown away merely because it i-s easier to throw them away than to utilize them. Such action is an evasion of responsibility, and done merely because the work would be difficult. It is difficult, it is true. The world presents no tasks more difficult than those of real education. To direct a group of embryo workmen, using valuable material that must not be wasted, turning out a product that is to be permanent, intellectualizing all the processes as the work pro- ceeds so as to build at the same time permanent educational structures within the boys, so to speak all this constitutes a form of labor immensely more difficult than the labors of the usual construction foreman who is looking to but one-half as much product and is getting that half from men already trained. If the community is wise, however, it is not going to permit our profession to shirk responsibility merely because it is difficult. It will not permit us to palm off a combination of book-work and play-shop work as "just as good," when really it is an inferior and ineffective substitute. 50 CHAPTER III. GARDENING, AGRICULTURE, ETC. Texas is and of necessity must always be primarily an agricultural state. The prosperity of the cities will always be dependent upon the prosperity of the agriculture of the region which they serve as distributing centers. A moderate fraction of San Antonio people at the present time are gardeners or agriculturists ; and there must be another considerable num- ber in the schools who will leave the city and enter into such occupations. For social or community co-operation between city and country, it is highly desirable that the inhabitants of the city in an agricultural region should have some appreciation and understanding of those labors and those conditions upon which they are ultimately dependent. A further reason for teaching gardening in the city schools is the fact that the City of San Antonio is and always ought to be, for obvious reasons, spread rather sparsely over the city area, with large intervening spaces given over to grass and trees and shrubbery. City of homes is San Antonio; and upon its success in being an attractive city of homes must in large measure depend its future prosperity, with its delightful winter climate, its perennial green in garden and park, and with its never-ceasing breezes during the warmer months, the city is sure to be sought in ever-increasing numbers by a class of people of the type who now spend their winters and their years of retirement so fully in Florida and California. Success in this respect depends upon the city's presenting an attractive appearance throughout. Much of the city does not now present a face of this character, for the reason that the yards, the gardens, the vacant lots, the strips of green along the streets, the trees, the shrubbery, etc., have, over large areas, been neglected, and have been permitted to remain in an unsightly condition. In a city of such promise, in the case of things which could be so easily corrected, a vigorous campaign of education is needed. The results to the city can- not but pay for the expense many times over. Where nature is herself so bountiful and beneficent a relatively small amount of labor on man's part often brings forth results of an incom- mensurably large character. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 51 The need of such a campaign is at present being voiced by the San Antonio Real Estate Exchange. The realty men have recently been discussing the organization of vacant-lot clubs such as are now found in numerous cities. There is no reason, they say, why San Antonio should not be the first Texas city to organize for a move of this kind. To quote from an article in one of the local papers : "Minneapolis, Minn., is dotted with gardens until the vegetable peddler is finding it difficult to stay in business. Long stretches of vacant property, high in grass and weeds and littered with tin cans, rusty stove-pipes and general refuse of the neighborhood, are not in evidence there. The city authorities are behind the movement for gardens. Minneapolis is rapidly being transformed into a city of flowers. "San Antonio has many advantages over Minneapolis. Mild climate here makes flowers and shrubs flourish nearly the year round. One rule of the vacant lot club is that the first four or five feet of a lot be planted in flowers or shrubs. Beyond that practically anything can be grown in the way of vegetables, etc." "The importance of the garden in the income of the family is great," said government expert Hand. "There is no invest- ment of the same time and labor which will pay greater cash dividends than the home garden, and every family can have one. The returns in better health, in outdoor exercise in man's most ancient employment and from a food supply made better by the addition of the right vegetables are in addition to a considerable monthly saving of family expense." The Secretary of the Texas Industrial Congress in a letter to the San Antonio Real Estate Exchange announces : "It is our intention to offer approximately $500 in cash prizes for the best results in school gardening, and the same amount for results by individuals. Contestants will probably bo required to cultivate not less than three vegetables; though they may cultivate as many more as they desire. There will 52 CHAPTER III. be no restrictions as to the size of the garden plots. This will enable boys and girls to make use of back yards no matter how small, as well as of vacant lots. "It is hoped that the schools generally will take an active part in this work, and that each one will make an entry in the school garden contest. Then we want if possible to have the pupils in these schools make individual entries of home gardens of their own, so they may make practical application of the in- formation and lessons in gardening learned at school. Super- vision and inspection of the work done will be had as far as possible through teachers and school superintendents." Experience teaches that the fundamental gardening work needed for training does not transfer easily to the school premises. The school-garden is not usually very successful. Generally there is too little space for individual gardens that are large enough for the pupils to take seriously. In the spring they are too much like play-gardens; during the summer they grow up with weeds ; and the work too often comes to naught. They are necessarily more or less exposed; and when the work is well done and they are successful, they are so often ravaged by vandals, which destroys the pupil's interest. The school garden probably has a place only for demonstration and labora- tory purposes, except in so far as the gardening relates to the permanent decorative arrangements of the school grounds in the way of flowers and shubbery. These latter naturally should be planned, planted and cared for by the children themselves for educational purposes. This opportunity should not be thrown away by giving it over to the janitor. Outside of this school landscape gardening which also should be used largely for de- monstration purposes, perhaps only a very small school garden is needed. The fundamental aspects of the garden training should be at the homes. There is plenty of space. San Antonio aver- ages only five individuals to the acre. The city is not densely populated. Houses are well removed from each other, and back yards, side yards, front yards, sufficient for flowers, shrubbery EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 53 and vegetables are the rule everywhere. There is no lack of opportunity for training in gardening. The plan of work to be pursued may well be something like the following : The schools should take up the task of land- scape gardening for the school premises. The art, science, and physical training departments should lead in the work ; the art department to take care of design and aesthetic effects ; the science department to take care of the technical, plant-growth considerations ; and the physical education department to see that the gardening does not encroach unduly upon the necessarily large play spaces of the school grounds and to see that the shrubbery and trees are not planted so as to obstruct the light of the windows. The schools would need to study and experiment as to the kinds of flowers and shubbery and trees that can be profitably grown in San Antonio for the purpose. They should search everywhere through the flora of milder climates so as to formulate as long a list of possibilities as can be found. This is largely a matter for the science teachers. While this is being done the classes in the art department will be designing the aesthetic arrangements to be employed in the school grounds, along the walks, in the corners of the yard, along the fences, arbors, trellises, hedges, etc. It is a rich field for the teaching of applied art. Finally the school will have a small kitchen garden in which will be raised as large a variety of vegetables as can profitably be grown in the San Antonio region. Both the landscape gardening and the kitchen garden will be taken care of co-operatively by the classes and not divided up into little individual portions as is so often the case with school gardens. The purpose of all of the school gardening is but to give the preliminary ideas and suggestions for the home gardening which is to constitute the real training in the matter. The school garden suggests what can be grown, what processes have to be performed, shows the best ways of doing the work, shows to all the pupils how difficulties are to be overcome, furnishes material for the laboratory work that needs to accompany the teaching of the gardening science, etc. In a word, the school gar- den is a small fraction of the fundamental field of gardening that 54 CHAPTER III. i: transferred to the school to be used as a foundation for the supplemental training in the science, design, and other matters of technical information, which are then taken back to the home gardens for that serious application which alone accomplishes the education of the children. Their fundamental training must be in connection with these home gardens. The front and side yards will be given to grass, flowers, and shrubbery, ideas and methods having been contributed by the work at the school. In the back yard or in the vacant lots can be developed the funda- mental training in kitchen gardening. Not only would we urge the introduction of this form of training into San Antonio in very generous measure, but we are willing further to state that the city cannot afford not to de- velop such gardening. The prosperity of the city depends in larger measure than is the case with the majority of cities upon its development into a city of flowers and shrubbery, of pleasing homes and gardens, of pleasant avenues and parks and park- ways. The properly guided labors of 10,000 school children can accomplish a great deal immediately on the side of home, street, and civic beautification. But even better than this, the training will develop an appreciation for civic beauty and an understanding of the problems entering into it; so that after the schools have turned out children so trained, for a decade or two the adult generation of the city will be filled with men and women who are appreciative of the possibilities of making San Antonio, and of keeping it, a garden city. So profuse must be the reward to the city for development of this field of educational activity that the city ought to be pretty generous in developing the gardening work of the schools. Special teachers should be employed who would be expected to be in charge of the work twelve months in the year, teaching at the schools for a portion of the time and keeping in contact with all of the home gardens of the pupils for another part of the time. Where the work is being wisely developed the immediate results are more than enough to pay all of the bills, not to mention the ultimate and abiding results for a city in having its population appreciative and intelligent in the matter. EDUCATION FOR VOCATION ______ 55 In connection with the discussion of gardening teaching as a basis for city improvement one should also consider the desirability of introducing instruction in cement construction and of introducing such practical matters as the building of fences into the carpentry course of the elementary and high schools. The city cannot be highly attractive during the winter until it is possible to walk along the streets and to enter the dwell- ings, from almost anywhere without wading through mud of un- certain depth and of a rather remarkable tenacity. The general population appears to need some teaching as to the possibilities of brick, cement, and asphalt construction. Improvement can come only as appreciation and understanding are developed. It can come economically only as people are informed as to costs, materials, methods of work, which will mean the ability on the part of large numbers to build their own home walks of brick or cement. The schools need to understand the desirability of giving short intensive courses like cement construction using the opoprtunities at the school for building school walks or repairing walks for demonstration purposes in the way of ma- terials, methods, etc., and then under the direction of the shop teacher, care being taken that no mistakes be made, nor material wasted, let the boy's education be continued in such home cement construction as happens to be needed. If labor unions will con- sider the matter in all of its bearings they will find that they have more to gain than to lose from such a policy. The amount that can be done for training purposes is necessarily relatively small. The development of an understanding and appreciation of such work in the community through education will create a much larger demand for such work on the part of the trades as more than to overbalance the amount that can be done for training purposes ; and moreover, located as San Antonio is, increase in the city's attractiveness through improvement means city growth and increased labors for the trades organizations. Further, it is the sons of the tradesmen who will most benefit from this training. Portions of San Antonio are not attractive because of the nature of the fences about the usually fairly generous home lots. 56 CHAPTER III. In most cases the fences about the schools are altogether un- attractive in design and finish ; and often are in a state of dis- reputable disrepair. In a reading of the minutes of the school board it was found that the board had taken the position in cer- tain cases that the classes in carpentry in the school should under- take the repair of certain of the school fences. Looked at from every point of view the suggestion is a thoroughly sound one. In return for providing accommodations, equipment, tools, teach- ers, etc., for training in carpentry, the board should require that the classes in this subject should take care of as much of the car- pentry repair work on fences and buildings as can be done for training purposes. The art department in connection with the mechanical drawing department should take the matter of fence design in hand. The possibilities on the side of attractive de- sign are very numerous. As a field of practical training relating to the aesthetic aspects of construction work, it offers large op- portunities to a well-informed art department. After the designs are made, the shop department should take up the work of carry- ing out the labors on the side of cement foundations, cement posts, the metal work, the woodwork, the finishing, the painting, etc. This work done at the schools should be, however, regarded simply as a small piece of the large fundamental training oppor- tunity that has been transferred to the school premises for edu- cational purposes. It is the home fence building, fence repair, etc., that should, so far as possible, be looked upon as constitut- ing the basic portion of the training. The shop teachers need, therefore, to be employed for the twelve months in the year and to keep in constant contact with the home training labors, in this as in other fields. Of practical matters, there is just one other thing that we would recommend developing in the shops of San Antonio as early as conditions will permit, namely, printing. It is a manual training activity valuable for both boys and girls. It represents a trade field entered by both men and women. It is a fundamental activity that provides a foundation for a large amount of technical training, drawing and design, color re- lations, mathematical computations, practical commercial activi- EDUCATION FOR VOCATION 57 ties, composition as related to the school paper, etc. The work can be made to pay fully for itself. The press, for example, can print arithmetic drill lesson papers, sentences for grammatical analysis, special reading exercises used in the primary grades, outlines of work for history, geography, science, etc. ; manuals, recipes, etc., for shop kitchen and sewing room ; invitations and programs relating to social functions, etc. Where are the schools to find time for all this expansion of training both technical and social. It is to be had by eliminat- ing present waste. In previous paragraphs we have eluded to waste in the teaching of certain portions of mathematics, science, and social studies. In later chapters we shall point to the desira- bility of eliminating certain wastes on the side of English gram- mar, foreign languages, history and literature. It must be re- membered too that in proportion as education Is made active, it can be made more effective. When fully organized, students can go over the ground morfe rapidly and the results once at- tained are relatively permanent, and less in need of reviews and drills and examination wastes. These are largely necessitated by the unrelated book teaching. Also waste due to the short school day and the short school week in the upper grades and high school can be utilized when work can be made less sedentary and therefore healthy and stimulating, socially and physically. There are serious problems involved in the introduction of such training; but the question of finding the time is not one of these. 58 CHAPTER IV. v Chapter IV. EDUCATION FOR CITIZENSHIP. Reading, writing, arthmetic, and the preliminary under- standing of geography and history are necessary in every de- partment of human affairs, citizenship among the rest. So far as San Antonio is taking care of these primordial systems of knowledge, she is taking care of the training for citizenship. For the moment, however, we take all these matters for granted. /Our purpose here is to examine those elements of education that I are chosen, or that should be chosen for the purpose of training one to the understanding of the problems, duties, rights, and re- \sponsibilities of the citizen. The basic training for citizenship has always been through observation and participation. In the early days of our republic this was sufficiently simple. Wealth was not abundant. The citi- zens therefore were relatively equal in their political power. Communities were small. It was possible for everybody to be acquainted with what was going on in the community. Public opinion and the simple governmental machinery of that day brought about a reasonable efficiency in governmental matters. Any wide-awake man or woman received most of the necessary civic training through active observation and participa- tion in the general, community affairs. There appeared to be nothing additional for the schools to do. For this very good reason little or nothing was done. vart,_ of the totaTcTvic striving o f the community. In proportion as the school isolates itself from the community and finds mere textbook matters of study that are in no wise related to the conditions within the city, the school work drifts from its proper moorings and becomes use- less. Only in proportion as it keeps its feet upon the solid earth of community problems, does it remain educationally worth while. In addition to the ways mentioned, another method of keeping the school civic work grounded in reality is to jnake the schools, as fully_as possible, the civic forums of the city, especially tfie high school^ FoFexampIe7wTien The ; Topic :"of "s'tfeet paving is being considered in the high school civics class, the chairman of the committee of the city council which has charge of this particular aspect of civics work should be invited to dis- cuss the whole situation before the high school, meeting as a body in the auditorium. When the subject of taxes is taken up, the chairman of the finance committee of the city council, the 66 CHAPTER IV. city tax collector, the county tax collector, the chairman of the finance committee of the school board, etc., should be invited to discuss the problems of taxation in San Antonio before the high school classes. When community sanitation is the topic, then it is the board of health and its inspectors who have an op- portunity of disseminating necessary sanitary information. There is no civic function being performed but what is being trusted to somebody. Those to whom it is entrusted are the ones who in a democracy should feel responsible for keeping the general public enlightened as to their work. It is necessary for their own effect- iveness, and for the success of their labors in the community. The plan as sketched in the preceding paragraph is incom- plete, imperfect, and unworkable. If undertaken in a period of zeal, while it may be continued for a while, it probably can- not in any such form become permanent. The officials referred to under present conditions, will not and perhaps cannot take the matter sufficiently seriously. It may be done once in such a man- ner; but there is likely to be little thought of the continuance of the matter year after year, as a regular portion of the duties of the office. There is a feeling of the artificiality and the insub- stantiability of the thing. This is because of the relative artifi- ciality and isolation of school activities as at present conducted. Present teaching is so much in a vacuum that live men cannot seem to breathe naturally in any such atmosphere. The informa- tion that these men have should be for the whole community. Yet here within the school we have separated out only the chil- dren and youth of the community. Those to whom they should give it naturally and normally as a part of their serious func- tions, namely the adult leaders of the community, are not pres- ent at the school when these talks are made. These officials are not reporting to the men who are holding them responsible, but are reporting only to the children in a comparatively artificial situation. Now as a matter of fact these officials referred to can- not talk to the youth of the city in normal fashion if they are talking only to the youth of the city. They can talk normally to the youth of the city only as they are addressing the adult leaders of the city, their peers, those to whom they owe their responsibil- EDUCATION FOR CITIZENSHIP ity. Then as they talk to this adult portion of the community the children can hear and in this way can learn in a normal fashion. Youth must learn in large measure not from being addressed directly, but from listening to adulthood talking to adulthood. It is for youth one of the normal modes of participation in adult affairs. This being the case, civic education demands that there be meetings of adults where trie youth of the city can attend, which are being addressed by the members of the board of health, the chairman of the council committees, the officials of the county and city, the leaders of every civic movement within the com- munity, etc. The high school and every school is in need of an auditorium large enough to seat at one time a large part of the school and a large part of the community. Here should meet regularly City Improvement Associations, Civic Leagues, Par- ent's Organizations, etc., to be addressed by leaders of community labors. The children and youth should then attend and listen tc these discussions in as full a degree as possible as a part of their necessary education. Auditoriums for such purposes cost money. But they can be paid for out of the savings to the city that can come from such civic enlightenment. When the things above recommended are accomplished, the fundamental civic activities of the community will have been brought into such close relation with the necessary scholastic activities that the latter cannot well drift from their moorings into mere irrelevancy and abstract nothingness. The debating societies will have something to debate that will be taken seri- ously and serve as the centers for the organization of large masses of technical, economical, historical, and geographical facts. The public speaking work can be given vitality by giving it serious aims. The composition classes can deal with the solid realities of the real world and less with the mere imaginative trifles. The comparisons of city with city, of state with state, that will be made necessary by such work will give the geography a vitality that at present it does not possess. And the history in showing how these various problems have grown up in San 68 CHAPTER IV. Antonio, in Texas, in other states, in other countries, in other ages of the world, and how they have been solved under differ- ent conditions, the history can be given vitality by giving it a useful work to do. At present so much of the history and geo- graphy hangs limp and loose and worthless merely because it consists of tissues of academic abstractions, related to nothing in man's present world. Mathematics too, can be given vitality. Economics is a branch of applied mathematics ; and in so far as civic problems are developed fully, they must be developed on their economic side. The street maintenance illustration shows that the basis of facts required for understanding must be of a mathematical sort. The same is equally true of taxation, insurance, management of public utilities, and of every other civic topic that may be studied. Civic teaching on its economic side must be as mathematical a study as engineering; though the mathematics will be only applied arithmetic. The quantity that is needed is large. The science work also, both in elementary and secondary schools can be vitalized. The anti-rnosquito campaign referred to is a fair example. There is no better possible way of teach- ing the biological science relating to mosquitoes and to malarial germs, their life-histories, their relations to disease, and their other scientific relations. In the same way there is a great wealth of science necessary to a proper understanding of tree planting and tree care as an aspect of city beautification, of the city milk supply, the city water supply, the economic value of birds, the sanitation of public buildings, the disposal of garbage, city dust, etc., etc. When one views the wide range of science which people need to know in order to understand their actual problems, the tragic waste of opportunity represented by the present abstract science of the high school appears. We are not here denying the necessity for certain preliminary study of physics and chemistry, botany and zoology, physiography and physiology, etc., by way of sketching the outlines of science needed as keys to interpretation of specific situations. We are saying that there is altogether too much time given to this pre- liminary study of these various abstract sciences, and practically EDUCATION FOR CITIZENSHIP 69 a total neglect of the science that lies about one in concrete form on every hand. The facts that enter into these concrete situations near at hand are just as scientific, just as real, and of incalculably greater value to the people of the city. In my opinion, the tax-payers of the city should refuse to pay their money for science that cannot be demonstrated to be related to problems of men as these are found in the practical situations in which people find themselves; and they should insist that all that is needed should be taught. This would not mean less science than is now taught; it would mean more. It would not mean merely local science. The need of comparisons with con- ditions in other cities and countries, keeps the wide outlook. It would mean, however, that it would have to be anchored to and grow out of local needs before it could be justified. The educational problems here suggested are many and large. The educational responsibility, however, cannot be shifted merely because the problems represent work. They are at the present time being attacked and being solved in many cities. They are not things that can be solved by theorists. Nor can they be solved byjDn^cityjmd borrowed by another. Each city has its own peculiar set of pro^ems,~a^Tl^^ejpojis^ilityires on^the people of eaclTTu77^b^!Trlay^Tid professional, ^o~work outThe" problems involved. It will require years. It must be a process of growth. Such problems should be introduced at once as can be introduced. Others should be added as it becomes possible. The studies will not be revolutionized in any sudden way ; but only changed gradually. The science work will be changed here and there so as to relate it more and more to the actual problems of the city. The historical materials will be chosen more and more for the purpose of showing the social background of present-day social problems. The geographical materials will be chosen more and more for similar purposes. The things of history and geography and other studies that are of only pieliminary value or which are of no value, will be given less and less time and will be gradually pushed into positions commensur- ate with their worth. Such a gradual reformulation of the work is the only kind of reformulation that can be healthy and that i 70 CHAPTER IV. can be permanent. An attempt to make changes too suddenly or changes of too great degree must necessarily result in a greater or less degree of demoralization. The rate of growth must depend in chief degree upon the width and strength of pro- fessional and social vision on the part of the supervisory workers in the school system ; superintendent, high school principal, ele- mentary school principals and head of the department of civics ; and also upon the width of social vision of the lay leaders of the community. Recognition of the needs of relating the teaching of the schools to outside social matters is indicated most clearly in the use of Current Events. In the beginning of several history and civics recitations visited, a few minutes were given to the presentation of two or three topics of current interest, the facts being taken from current newspapers. This work represents a very healthy development. The facts are chosen at random, how- ever. They lack sequence; they are not connected up to prob- lems that are being studied intensively by the class. They are mere extras, in no wise related to the rest of the recitation. For effectiveness the classes need to have such a long list of civic /topics for perennial study as we have mentioned. Then current / events can be brought to bear upon topics which have been studied and which are occasionally taken up for such further elucidation. When this is done, each current event reported by the daily press has significance, and its importance can be rightly valued. Such accretion to the body of thought system- atically developed in the civics classes should be constant and should in fact constitute a continuous review of the various topics that have been covered. It is the normal method of in- tellectual digestion and assimilation. It is the normal method of review. EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 71 Chapter V. EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY. The physical aspects of one's home life one's play, sleep meals, the personal hygiene and sanitation of the home, ;=wJiL constitute the basic aspects of one's education in this field. The school will take these various prrysrcat activities i of the chil- dren as the starting-point for increasing their information as to the various things and for perfecting their habits. Wherever the child goes, he takes his problems with him The fundamental activities relating to the physical training therefore transfer to the school, so long as he is there. These can be used as the basis of his physical education. The ventilation problem for example, exists at the school as fully almost as at the home. The responsibility for taking care of the ventilation in the school room can be placed upon the pupils, beginning with a rather early age. They can be trained to habits of watchfulness as to the condition of ventilation. They can be made sensitive through this watchfulness. Then with this as a basis the necessary technical information can easily be given. Having entered into the practical and the technical in so large measure at the school, it is then possible to extend the consideration of ventilation to the home living rooms, dining rooms, and especially the sleeping rooms. This j)art of their fundamental^ activities cannot be transferred to the school; but^ after students are macte~Fensittye^to trigproblerns~aTthe school, they can_do the same things at home ; and through doing them, get their education. Only as knowledge is used, is it properly assimilated. The placing of the school ventilation responsibilities upon .the pupils in San Antonio for purposes of their education is especially facilitated by the fact that in practically all of the schools, ventilation is by means of windows. For reasons to be pointed out in a later chapter, it is probable that ventlation of school rooms in San Antonio should always be chiefly by means of windows. The teaching opportunities -should not be thrown 72 CHAPTER V. away by leaving the ventilation to the janitor, the teacher, or by turning it over wholly to a mechanical ventilating system. The work should be assigned to the pupils by relays. Training in the hygiene of the eye is in a large measure training one to a proper control of the light in which one works Like ventilation this is a problem that transfers rather largely to the schools. The children should be required for purposes of education to take care of the blinds and other matters in- volved in the control of the light of the school rooms. The tech- nical matters relating to the intensity of light, proper direction of light, the elimination of shadows in one's work, the nervous harmfulness of glare and eye strain, etc., can be easily taught in direct connection with the practical situations. Owing to the fact that San Antonio school rooms for the most part, have windows on two or three sides, the control of the lighting is a continuous problem, throughout the day and the year, and can be made the basis of practically all the training needed for this topic. Physical upbuilding exercise, which is one of the most important things in the physical training of children, can be transferred in a very large degree to the schools. Because of the fact that play activities are better when social and varied, they can be carried on better at school than at most homes, if the school desires it. This subject of education is coming to be recognized as legitimate in San Antonio CeTtaln~s^tlooT,^a^rticttlarly certain outlying schools like the^Highland Park, or the Beacon Hill, are fairly generously supplied with outdoor play space. On the play-grounds at quite a number of schools, one finds giant strides, swings, teeter-boards, basket-ball outfits, volley-ball outfits, horizontal bars, childrens' slides, and occasionally certain other play-ground equipment. The movement thus begun needs to be continued in a num- ber of ways. Every school in the system needs such an outfit of playground apparatus^as is now being developed at certain of the schools; and in addition to the things named, there perhaps ought to be certain other matters like a sand-bin for the little EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 73 children, a croquet ground or two with its equipment, a tennis court or two, indoor baseball outfits to be used outdoors, a tether ball equipment, etc. The largest and most difficult prob- lem in this connection for San Antonio relates to the surfacing of the school grounds. Most of the school grounds require filling and draining. After this is done there is the problem of providing a surface that will not be muddy in rainy weather; that will not be dusty or stony in dry weather ; that will not be too hard or stony for children to fall on ; and which at the same time is durable and requires relatively little care. No such sur- face has yet been discovered that is sufficiently inexpensive. The city ought to investigate and experiment with different pos- sible surfacing by way of finding improvements over present conditions. -^?titer grounds are equipped for proper physical education, At is desirable that they be used for this purpose. The play ac- j tivities for physical education need to be just as much a part i of the regular daily program as the arithmetic drill for vocational ^-training, or the grammar drill for one's language training. Well-developed health of body is fully as important as well- developed language. The play needs to be a part of the daily program of every child. It is too important to be left simply to the voluntary activities of children at the inadequate recess periods, or to the unsupervised before and after school periods. It should be left unsupervised no more than arithmetic is left unsupervised. There is a great variety of games open to boys and girls. Generally however, they know relatively few, because of lack of teaching and other lack of opportunities. Just to illustrate games that children should know, the following list is presented : Children 6 to 9 Years Old. Crossing the Brook, Circle Ball, . Charley Over the Water, London Bridge, Farmer in the Dell, Fox and Squirrel, Cat and Rat* Nuts in May, 74 CHAPTER V. Ring Call Ball, Shadow Tag, Stoop Tag. Arch Ball, Hunt the Fox, Roley Poley, Dodge Ball, Captain Ball, Club Snatch. Prisoner's Base, Curtain Ball, Keep Moving, Black and White, Bombardment, Basket Ball, Round Ball, . Volley. Ball, Square Ball. Puss in a Corner, Water Sprite, Shuttle Relay. Children 9 to 12 Years Old. Cross Tag, Drive Ball, Stride Ball, Three Deep, Black Tom, Duck on a Rock. Children 12 to 15 Years Old. Whip Tag, Zigzag Overhead Toss, Double Relay Race, Pig in a Hole, Circle Race, Dumb Crambo, Fox and Geese, Forcing the City Gates, Pass and Toss Relay. In the later grades and high school, the games and athletics of the boys will differentiate more and more in kind from those of the girls. Most of those given above are good for either boys or girls. Certain games like baseball, football, tennis, hockey, shinney, leap frog, badminton, tug-of-war, duck on a reck, tetherball, prisoner's base, scrimmage ball, forcing the city gates, bombardment, relay races, etc., etc., are particularly valuable for the older boys. r Especially desirable for the girls but valuable also for /the boys are the rythmic folk games and rythmic gymnastic [games, usually to the accompaniment of music. A few of the Imore valuable of the gymnastic and folk games are the following : V .* EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 75 Folk Games Suitable for Small Children. Hey, Little Lassie, Csardas, How do you do, my Partner? Today is the First of May, I see you, Shoemaker's Dance, Mountain March. Nigare Polska. Folk Games Suitable for Older Girls. Csardas, Reap the Flax, Fjalnas Polska, Komarno, Harvest Dance, Strasak, Laudnum Bunches, How Do You Do, Sir? Trollen. Varsouvienne. The school buildings in San Aotonk) ...have_never j>een planned to take care of the physical education of children through exercise. Owing to the mild climate it is generally felt presum- ably that the outdoor play on the playgrounds is sufficient. While outdoor play should constitute the major portion for most boys and girls, yet there^ are certain jiesirable rythmic fclk and gymnastic games that can^J3jMtajcen^care~bT indoors. For these reasons the buildings ought to be constructed or furn- ished so as to provide opportunity. At the Crockett or build- ings on the type of the Highland Park building, the fairly wide corridors can be used to very good purpose at certain times of the day. If care is taken to secure good air, and to prevent dust at the Crockett School, the large open spaces in the basement can be so used. One of the best suggestions to be found in San Antonio is at the Smith School. If the large pavilion there possessed a good floor, it would be a relatively inexpensive method of providing for all such gymnastic, folk, and other in- door games in a climate like that of San Antonio. It could be used almost every day of the year, and the play classes could go there for regular play exercises on the program in just the same way that they go to their manual training and domestic science classes. Naturally such a pavilion would need to have a very small room in which a piano could be kept, but which when opened would permit the use of the piano for the pavilion with- 76 ' CHAPTER V. out moving it. Such an inexpensive pavilion consisting of little more than roof and floor could be of very large service at every school in the city, not only for physical training purposes throughout the entire day, but also as a social gathering place for the community for eight months of the year. It is probable that the open air gymnasium of this type, will be the kind of most practical value for both elementary and high schools in this mild climate. Another suggestion as to the method of finding floor space for the folk and gymnastic games is to be found in the new mathematics room at the Main Avenue High School. This room has been seated with a modern type of chair-desk, which is alto- gether suitable for the scholastic labors of the school room, but which is movable. A class can clear the floor in thirty seconds, and make it ready for indoor exercises. Owing to the development of activity and of variety in school work, it is altogether probable that in the school rooms of the not greatly distant future it will be found desirable to have them furnished in such a way that one can change easily from one type of activity to another. At present with their fixed desks and seats the rooms are equipped for little more than simply book work ; sitting, writ- ing, reading, and listening. The use of the chair-desk, however, permits readjustment without difficulty, so that a room can be used for first one thing and then another. The city would do well it seems to consider the advisability of purchasing^mpvable chair-desks or simtlarjgovable furTuluTe^ofriew buildings and new rooms that are being^eo^uipped, and for replacing furniture in buildings wherejhe^ldejr^equipmen^sbe There is another type of physical play which is highly valuable for such a climate as that of San Antonio, but which has not yet been sufficiently valued. It is a thing too, which can be transferred to the school, and in fact thrives rather better when transferred to the school and properly supervised by adults. Reference is made^to the swimming pool There are things of which San Antomo~~schools have' greater immediate need ; but it should not be lost sight of in plans that look some- what to the future. EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 77 A glance of the list of plays enumerated in the preceding paragraphs, which are being introduced as a necessary part of the physical education in our progressive cities, shows the need teaching. The children do not know the games naturally any more than they know their grammar naturally. There must be teachers to take care of this aspect of education. They are better called play leaders, and they perform their services more effectively when they are actually play leaders. While the usual opinion has been that chilren play without teaching or leadership, yet as the result of practical experience everywhere, it is coming to be learned that the play of children thrives best under proper leadership. It is especially difficult to turn this type of education over to the regular teacher at the present time. Generally she does not know the games, especially those of boys. She does not usually look upon it as a legitimate portion of educational labor, and is not apt to take it seriously. Such work on her part re- quires a special physique, a special point of view, special knowl- edge, often a special form of dress, things that the grade teacher does not generally possess. In developing such work within a building, it will be found best to give the work over to special teachers so far as possible. Until work is more departmentalized than at present, this will scarcely be practicable. For the present mosf~pf 'if wilt ha~ve~ to be taken care of by the grade teachers under the supervision of the physical training director. At the present time physical education in the San Antonio schools takes the form of Swedish -gymnastics. This is not a thing thatlifmade to grow out of the natural life of the children within the community. It is not an enlargement, an expansion, and refinement of fundamental play activities found in the actual population of San Antonio ; and since it does not relate to the childrens' general out-of-school life as a natural supplementary portion, it is a thing that remains to them foreign, meaningless, and uninteresting^ In the classes observed both the teacher and the pupils were going through certain lifeless mechanical, per- functory exercises that were sufficiently joyless to all concerned, and which certainly were not bringing about any physical ed- 78 CHAPTER V. ucation. Everything wa^Je^bb^SIld^assiveJ^dQne^ There was none of the exuberance of muscular expenditure that one sees in childrens' play. The only thing that approached real exercise observed in such classes was when a primary class of about the third grade, after closing their Swedish gymnastic posturing, ran briskly once or twice around the class-room. This running was something like dropping down to fundamentals. It seemed to be appreciated, and although lasting for only about thirty seconds, was certainly more valuable than the entire preceding ten minutes of posturing in response to commands. One would be safe in saying that if the physical culture work of the schools in general was fairly represented by the four exercises observed, that it is certainly worth only a very small percent of the $22,000 that is annually being paid for it by the city. The efficiency of the exercises was so low that it would be a per- fectly safe estimate that the city is annually investing $15,000 for which it receives no return. A committee of laymen, physi- cians, public-spirited women, etc., people who are able to see education more clearly from the point of view of fundamental human needs and whose vison has not been so distorted by the academic atmosphere, should be invited by the school board to visit some of these physical education classes as they are con- ducted by the regular class room teachers throughout the city in the absence of the supervisor and to report whether in their opinion the large expense of this type of physical education is justified by the results. It would be better if the time and money now being ex- pended upon this so-called physical education should be turned into the development of the natural fundamental play activities of children along lines which they can understand, which they appreciate and into which they can enter with vigor. The schools should add much of a supplementary nature. It should look forward definitely to the developmn1^_of_cecreational play habits on the part of adults. In an industrial age like"burs when special izatiorTTs becoming so narrow and when men in large numbers are old and thrown on the scrap heap at the age of forty because of their lack of physical and mental flexibility, EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 79_ we are coming to discern the great need of continuing play activi- ties through adulthood for the sake of keeping normal. The automobile for example, which is mostly a pleasure vehicle is serving a very important function in this field for those who can afford them. It is forbidden to most because of the expense ; but when a city has the meeting centers for social purposes of a type that could be easily had in San Antonio, and when its popu- lation has beenjtrained to healthyjdsure occupations in the way of rhythmic gymnastics and folk games, in tennis, basketball," volley ball, the so-called indoor baseball which should be played outdoors always in San Antonio, in swimming, running, jumping and other athletic contests, when the adults of the city are trained to these things, and at the same time provided with the necessary recreational facilities, then men may easily retain their youth and vigor and plasticity through an entire lifetime. Until recently we have looked upon play as a thing proper only for children and the wealthy leisure-classes. They indulged not because they needed it, but because they liked it. In these later days, however, we are coming to see that relaxation and recrea- tion for our manual laboring classes, both men and women, are not only desirable for the pleasures that they give but are absolutely indispensable for continuing vigor, physical and social normality, and for continuing youth and adaptability throughout an entire lifetime. Proper leisure occupations of the type de- scribed are mqrejiecessary for the laboring classes of our popu- lation than for the well-to^dfll The Tatter~cla"ss finds plenty of social relaxation, etc., in the course of their regular labors. This is not the case, however, with those that do the monotonous, heavy work which is every whit as necessary. Before leaving this topic of bodily development through physical recreation, we should call special attention to the situa- tion at the high school. Here we find the best of the city's children. Work begins at 8 :30 in the morning and runs practi- cally without intermission until 2 :00 in the afternoon. Except for certain shop-work, it is all of an academic character. There is no gymnasium, no athletic field, no physical training teacher, no systematized training of any sort. At the close of the after- 80 CHAPTER V. noon session, there are still four hours of daylight in San Antonio on the shortest day of the year. The children are turned out of the high school with this long stretch of time before them and sent away to their homes. While the high school Has considerable out-door play space, inadequate for so large a high school, but yet considerable, it is not utilized for physical education. It is used only voluntarily by certain students when the uncared- for grounds will permit. Some of the high school boys and girls are able to find away from the school sufficiently desirable opportunities for physical recreation within a social atmosphere necessary to the proper education of youth at this age. The majority of them, however, cannot do so. This^isjlie_social age\ par excellence and_4>hy^ic^j]ecratk)ns of these ^adolescents j should be social. Moreover, it is the age when they will develop/ the habits, social and recreational, that are certain to presisfm the majority of cases throughout life. When this necessary por- tion of their education is left only to the random opportunities of the homes and streets and the occasional public dance hall or other public recreation places, the necessary education in the majority of cases is not accomplished, or it is badly accomplished. The loss is a serious one of which communities in general are not yet sufficiently conscious. They have not usually studied the developmental values of physical recreational exercises. If a community, however, will lay aside all of its prejudices and pre- dilection and will look upon these various matters from the point of view of plain common-sense, they will see that such socialized physical training is of incalculably greater value than the rela- tively useless algebra and Latin for which the community is pay- ing so much. If a city cannot afford both, it should choose the one of greatest value. Only those who have not yet suffici- ently considered the question in all of its bearings can fail to see which this is. With its present grounds, the high school might do a great deal, if it set about it, by using the three hours between two and five in the afternoon, and also by introducing certain periods during the regular scholastic day for physical training in the way to be found in the majority of well-developed high schools, where EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 81 the gymnasium is generally used for this purpose. There is no reason why the San Antonio high schools jtnight_not^employ what we call an outdoor gymnasium. \The groundsnee facing. In the recent recognition by the city of the need of proper surfacing for the streets for traffic, it should also be recognized that there is an equal need for proper surfacing of the school grounds which are used for just as important pur- poses and by just as large a fraction of thg population) With properly surfaced grounds, with proper sprinkling to keep down the dust during certain portions of the year, the outdoor grounds in this city might be made to serve practically every purpose of the indoor gymnasium in colder regions, and at the same time possess certain physical features of great value that cannot be had in the indoor gymnasium. One of the benefits of such outdoor physical education would be perhaps a greater tendency toward athletic games, and less tendency toward mere mechanical gym- nasium exercises which should be for most youths avoided when games and athletics can be made to take their place. There is no reason discernible why the carpentry classes of the high school might not construct a roof and floor of such a pavilion as is found at School No. 15. To carry out such work, the high school needs two physical directors, who have been fully trained for work in this field, a man for the boys, and a woman for the girls. The extra period of time can be found in the high schools either by cutting down the amount of time now given to book work, or by introducing the physical period into the regular program and thus extending, the day to 3 :00 o'clock. One cannot speak arbitrarily as to the desirable length of the high school day. It all depends upon what is being done. If the work is developed so that much of it is active: shop-work, laboratory work, games on the play field, folk games, music, public speaking, etc., a longer day than the present one for those who have no great amount of home work to do, is certainly desirable. When the work is over-academic, as it is at the present time, even the five and one-half hour day may be too long. 82 CHAPTER V. When the city, a few years hence, sets about building its new high school, provision for physical education should receive long and serious attention. If an attempt is made to utilize present facilities as fully as possible, by the time the city is planning its new building and grounds it will have developed a fund of practical experience that can serve in large degree as a practical foundation for judgment in deciding what should be done. As we shall have occasion to point out in the chapter on buildings, San Antonio conditions are very different from those of the colder cities of the north and northeast in connection with whose buildings most of our books are written. It is not possible simply to borrow their modes of construction and apply them to San Antonio conditions. This city needs more open air facilities. Serious mistakes can be made from such an attempt to borrow ideas from a different climate. Things for San Atnonio must be worked out in San Antonio and in cities similarly situated. To try out the plans suggested is one way of finding out how to plan for the new building. Thus far we have been considering only the practical ex- ercises. In connection with these, there should be introduced a large amount of technical, scientific information relating to the physiology and the hygiene of muscular exercise. There is a great wealth of such scientific information relating to the ef- fects of exercise upon respiration, expansion of the lungs, de- veloping healthy conditions in the lungs, rendering them less sus- ceptible to disease, the effects of exercise upon the heart, upon the arterial and venous circulation, upon digestion, upon the health of the various digestive organs, upon assimilation within the tissues, upon general nervous tone, effects upon the kidneys, relation to wastes, upon resistance to bacterial attacks, upon relation to balanced dietary, to sleep, to periods of work and rest, to fatigue, to nervousness, to organic diseases, and to a large number of other things. The physiology of the schools which at the present time is so abstract and so little related to the actual problems of life can be given functional virility only as it can be directly related to such fundamental physical activities. EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 83 This is stated in full view of the excellence of the textbooks now used in the elementary school on this subject as compared with the type of textbook commonly used until recently. But even a good text after rapid preliminary reading is best used as a reference book in connection with practical situations. It should not be a thing that is merely to be learned and recited without reference to the human situation in which children and teachers pass their days. The high school which needs the heavy work in the hygiene of exercise is not so fortunate in its textbook. It is more along the line of the old-fashioned physiology. The Jii^h school needs a better texJ L jmji_JJLjiejids_ library facilities which will permit teachers and pupils to_gather__ up the various needed items of physiological and ^ hjg;ienjcjnfor^ mation. TTie~~ ^amount that should be gathered together and taught upon this one topic alone is larger than the whole sum of information now to be found in the textbook used in the high school. ^ Social as well as technical understanding of the topic is needed. This, like civic and industrial topics, should be given wide social perspective through history, geography, econonv ics and Sociological studies/ In the reading of the pupils, they should come to see and understand the way the physical play impulse has worked itself out in the various nations of the world, past and present. A knowledge of the physical training of the Greeks before and during their Golden Age has for our times as much significance as a knowledge of their art and their political adjustments and problems. One'a__s_tudies^_should . show that it has been during medieval and modern jimes one of the largest factors in the development of national virility and strength. The studies of a social sort should show the obstructive influences that are growing up in our cities, which must of necessity lead to national degeneration of our population unless by taking thought we provide for corrective training and corrective oppor- tunities for the population. Studies should enter into the econ- omic costs of such humanitarian provision in many cities of the United States and in cities of foreign countries ; and into the methods that are being employed. 84 CHAPTER V. A further major topic in this general field of physical edu- catiqn_Js_rjersjQnal cleanliness. The practical activities in this training can be only in part transferred to the school. The build- ing and grounds can be made as perfect a living place as possible on the side of cleanliness. Then to live five or six hours a day in a building that is as clean and sanitary as a hospital, is uncon- sciously to develop within one an understanding of the nature of housing cleanliness an-1 sanitation and of an appreciation of its desirability. Everything about the school should be so clean and so attractive to the eye as to suggest the desirability of cleanli- ness of clothing, of person and belongings, because of the in- congruity of anything else within that situation. The ugly and unclean within ugly and unclean surroundings appear perfectly natural and congruous; but when the unclean and ugly are set down in the midst of a situation that is clean and attractive in every way, the undesirable stands out in repellant contrast. The indvidual who is responsible for this contrast, if he has any social or aesthetic sense and there are few that lack it is impelled of his own accord to make such correction as he can. One's prac- tical education in cleanliness should so far as possible take this social form. In neighborhoods where the homes do not furnish necessary facilities for personal cleanliness, where the standards are low, it is desirable that a portion of the practical activities be trans- ferred to the school, and opportunities provided for promoting personal cleanliness. Certajr^choolsJn_gan^Antonio need_hath- ing facilities more than thTTjieecrtcchnical grammar. It would be a very easy matter toTThe carpentry shop boys to construct buildings which contain shower baths which might be used as a regular portion of the class education of the children. In a num- ber of cities this feature of education is obtaining a regular place upon the program. In those schools in San Antonio where the work is needed most of the children do not go to the high school. The facilities are needed within the elementary schools. It is needed as a portion of their training. / ^ We have discussed^ thesef our topics of ventilation, ligjitirig, ^physical exercise atSFpersonal d^nlineiirby^way of indicating 3^ / ' ' EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 85 how training can be made to grow naturally out of practical situations. They are merely illustrative. Those responsible for education in each school should assemble the list of matters in which the pupils actually need training in order to promote health and physical efficiency. The schools should not get the topics from reading the textbooks. They should be got from reading the conditions within the district about the school. After training for physical welfare is developed as fully as possible along desirable lines, it still remains that the major portion of one's actual physical training must take place under out-of-school conditions. At present the pupil cannot be at school more than thirty hours a week, while he must be at home, upon the street, etc., for the other one hundered thirty-eight hours each week. The things done during this one hundred thirty-eight hours may be more powerful in determining health habits, points of view, standards of judgment, than the thirty hours at school. If the short time at school can be knit up with the long time at home so that the child or youth remembers the technical teach- ings of the school and uses these for the practical guidance in his out-of-school activities, then such practical use of his knowl- edge educates him in desirable ways. But children are short- sighted and prone to forget. The teacher needs to be in contact with the parents and with the home-life. No one ever expects long-range work in the curative labors of a physician; he must be in intimate contact with the situation where the cure is ef- fected. It is no more possible to do constructive physical teach- ing labor at long range ; teachers must be in intimate contact with the situations where the educatio^ can be effected. And this is where the knowledge is put into practice. In addition to that just mentioned, there is needed another link in the situation. In more than a hundred cities in our country this is the home-visiting health nurse. The work of the nurse is being developed in connection with the physical educa- tion and medical inspection activities of the school. It is found that these latter activities largely fail of their purpose unless the link between home and school is greatly strengthened so that the supplementary teaching and advice of the physician and 86 CHAPTER V. teacher can be made actually to bring about results in the funda- mental activities of the home. The child cannot be expected to make the connection in sufficient degree. The "follow-up work" of the health nurse is a mode of helping the supplementary teach- ing to make the right connection with the fundamental applica- tion. In going to the homes, in visiting and advising with the parents, in becoming an advisory of the home, so to speak, the school nurse is coming to do for physical education in one of its aspects what the visiting argicultural teacher is coming to do in many places for the home gardening. We are learning that education must be accomplished in the ways and in the places where it can best be done, and not merely where we think it most convenient to do it. The school house is not the best place for much of it. In fact it is not the place at all for a good deal of it. The sooner this is realized by a com- munity, the sooner will it be able to put its education upon a sound and effective basis. So long as our schools are expected to do everything at the school house, the work degenerates into mere subject- teach ing, some of which is of value, much of which h of no value. The community gets about fifty cents value for every dollar spent ; and the school remains within its proverbial atmosphere of impracticality. We are learning thaj^edu^ationjmistbe^arrnmpl ished by the one ^who knows fnTvarious^problenjs^ and not raerely^by one who happens_to have itteacher's certificate. For a certain part of the work of personal hygiene and civic sanitation, the school nurse is the best teacher. As a matter of fact, it is alto- gether probable that a trained school nurse who has had a proper medical course, a proper course in social and personal sanitation is the one who should do the major portion of the teaching of these matters, both within the school and within the general community. In the immediate present, however, there are not enough nurses properly qualified to take the educational point of view as well as the hygienic; and generally a city does not employ a sufficient number. As a result their teaching must be mostly through individual advising of pupils and parents, with occasional talks to them upon important health topics. They EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 87 should, however, be very fully the intermediaries between the home and the regular teachers as to the teaching needs. In their visiting of the homes they come to know exactly what is to be found on the side of the fundamentals. They need to keep the teachers within the schools definitely informed as to what is needed on the side of the supplemental ; and they should be the supervisors of the content of the work. The visiting school nurse has functions beyond the mere physical ministration to children's needs within the home. She needs to perform a large quantity of intellectual ministration as well. This brings us to a discussion of the medical department as a portion of the school work. At present the medical department is only in the beginning of its development in San Antonio. An able and well-trained physician is being employed for a part of his time. There are, however, no school nurses yet employed. Their employment constitutes one of the next necessary steps. To indicate the posi- tion of San Antonio in the matter of money expended for this branch of educational service as compared with the amounts ex- pended in other cities of the same population class, the situation is presented in Table VI. . Table VI. Expenditure per Pupil for Promotion of Health, City Schools. City Amount Spent. City Amount Spent. Hoboken, N. J. $ 78 Oakland $ .66 Duluth, Minn. .44 Trenton N. J. .43 Richmond, Va. .42 Camden, N. J 41 Toledo, O 40 Jersey City, N. J. . 40 Scranton, Pa. $ .38 Providence R. I 36 Norfolk Va 36 Lowell. Mass. .34 Srmnp-field. Mass. .34 8S CHAPTER V. Atlanta, Ga 32 Erie, Pa 31 Des Moines 30 Nashville, Tenn 28 Harrisburg, Pa $ .27 Spokane 25 Elizabeth, N. J 25 Lynn, Mass 24 Youngstown, 23 Hartford, Conn 22 Houston, Tex 20 Dayton, O .*. 19 Grand Rapids 18 St. Paul $ .18 Birmingham, Ala 17 Akron, 16 St. Joseph, Mo 14 Columbus, 12 SAN ANTONIO 10 Wilkesbarre, Pa 10 Salt Lake City 08 Tacoma 05 The table shows that San Antonio after less than two years of attention to this department, finds itself in advance of cer- tain other cities, but very considerably below the average prac- tice of the cities in the country. Experience indicates that in cities where there are 10,000 to 12,000 children in the schools, as in San Antonio, there is needed the full time of one physician ; and for the usual routine work, the full time of two or three nurses. It is felt to be better to employ one physician for full time than to employ two physicians for half time. The one physician on full time can specialize on this aspect of educational labor and can have no distractions and calls upon his time of the sort that are unavoidable in the case of the physician who is at the same time carrying on a private practice. Naturally in employing a competent physician for full-time work it is neces- sary to pay a salary sufficient to secure a high type of man. A city of the size of San Antonio will not be able to secure ef- fective full-time service on a salary of less than $2500. Two properly trained school nurses ought to be had at salaries similar to those being paid to teachers. The medical arm of the service should examine every pupil in the schools at stated intervals and any other pupil whenever any suspicious development presents itself. Such examinations EDUCATION FOR PHYSICAL EFFICIENCY 89 always reveal a large number of incipient troubles practically all of which can be remedied, if taken in hand in time. Then it is the business of the school nurses to follow up the cases that require attention through consulting with the parents and ad- vising with them so as to bring them to give to the children the necessary medical attention. Without the school nurses not a great deal can be accomplished by the school physician except the examination for and the isolation of contagious diseases. For other troubles, the physician working alone can make out formal cards and notify the parents ; but it has been found from experience that such notifications are neglected in ninety pre- cent of the cases. The result in such cases is that nothing comes of the examination by the physician ; his time and labor and the community expense are wasted. Except for the contagious disease side of the situation the work of the medical inspector cannot be made profitable unless nurses are employed for fol- low-up work. All physicians, dentists, and nurses, engaged in this work should in time be employed and paid by the school city. In the immediate present, however, in the development of the work, the city should make use of any voluntary medical and dental associations that might be willing to donate their services. In many cities, for example, free dental clinics have been carried on by the dental fraternity which are for the purpose merely of finding and recording dental defects. Parents can treat or not, just as they wish. In such preliminary dental examinations there is absolutely no danger of dentists manufacturing defects for the sake of manufacturing work for their own profession. Wherever medical inspection has been well developed it has been found that from sixty to eighty percent of the children are in serious need of dental attention. The real needs are so very many that it is not necessary for the dentists to point out in their examination defects which do not exist. They exist in over- abundance and parents need to have them pointed out. Parents are negligent of their childrens' welfare generally because of ignorance of conditions. It is a service to them to have defects pointed out. If they have doubts as to the actuality of any 90 CHAPTER V. defect found, they can examine for themselves. Such things are usually visible when one gives attention to the matter. While this is not by any means the best mode of taking care of teeth- inspection, yet its advantages "far more than offsets its disad- vantages. It should be taken advantage of until the city is ready to employ a school dentist for the work. This plan of voluntary examination is one that can be em- ployed also in the general medical examination which should cover all the children in the city. It is less easy to verify the results and recommendations of the examining physicians in the case of very many kinds of defects, and this perhaps is why such examination by voluntary medical associations has been less employed than the dental examination. But where there is a school physician employed by the city, in all cases examined where recommendations for treatment are made, their findings can be checked up by the school physician. We would recom- mend such a plan only until the city could have its own em- ployed physicians and school nurses to do the work. Until such routine examination has been made of all of the children of the city it will not be possible for San Antonio to know the extent of the need of dental and medical attention on the part of its children. The need is always found to be far Isrger than the city suspects. The city can afford the expense. Table VI shows that the school boards of most cities are' of that opinion. The work is not only profitable for the physical education of the children; but it lays the necessary physical foundation for efficient educa- tional work in all subjects. Ill-health necessarily slows down the work in the class- rooms. Let us suppose that it is slowed down one percent. The cify is paying $600 per hour for every hour that schools are in session. They are in session about 170 days or 850 hours. Every one percent slowing down of the work means a loss of $5,000 of money actually spent. If it were spent on school physicians and school nurses, their work would save far more than one percent of the school's time; and far more than their cost. EDUCATION FOR LEISURE OCCUPATIONS 91 Chapter VI. EDUCATION FOR LEISURE OCCUPATIONS. Exercise alone will devlop a man, and this alone will keep his powers up"tQ normal strength. Kverbody recognizes that this i^ true of his muscular development. It is just as true of his mental and social development. When not exercised these powers dwindle and become enfeebled in just the same way the muscles grow soft and flabby and feeble. Men are old before their time and thrown upon the scrap-heap because the mechan- ization of industry combined with the lack of stimuli to other kinds of mental exercise have left them mentally weak ond flabby. The corrective to specialized industry is the possession of a variety of leisure occupations and recreations on a proper social and mental level to which one can turn for his enjoyment, and in the enjoyment of which he keeps his mind fresh and vigorous. Recreations that involve social and intellectual ele- ments bui]d_ him out ajong the Hnesjhat are left -neglected by his narrowing vocation^ TKeTkiiids of normaling recreations for which he needs training are such as the following: (1) Read- ing concerning matters that touch all the important angles of human life ; reading about industry, commerce, inventions, applied science, travel, biography, history, literature, geographical and social relationships, etc., etc. (2) Conversation, discussion, debates, lectures, etc., involving more personal contacts than i:i the case of reading, but touching the same fields of ideas. (3) Avocations or hobbies, things that lie ouside of his regular vocation7~eitHer~^Iosely related to it or in an entirely different field. The man who is continually taking up and mastering new things during his recreational hours will keep himself intellectually exercised in highly desirable ways. (4) Travel and observation of humaji_aff_ajjcs-. (5) Sports, plays,_games,_ and other things already discussed in the section on physical education. In discussing leisure occupations, recreations and play, we are treating things of serious adult necessity. They are neces- 92 CHAPTER VI. sary normalizing influences under conditions of our specialized age. Fortunately one enjoys them; but if there were no results other than mere enjoyment perhaps the whole matter could be left to individual initiative. But the values are deeper than mere enjoyment. The whole character of the^ man jsjiri lar^e_jneas- ure the result of his leisure occupations. If these are low, petty, or sensuaTTthen in character, he becomes low, petty, and sensual. If on the other hand he lives in a world of at least moderately high thinking and enjoys living in such a world; if his recrea- tions, his conversation, his reading, his observation, his sports, games, etc., are upon a proper humanistic level, these things make him an entirely different type of man. What a man does makes him what he is. Here we find the justification for the teaching of so much literature in the schools. But when one looks at the materials used, and at the methods of work, one wonders if those in charge of the work have consciously defined their purposes. The pur- pose evidently should be the habit of doing much reading of a varied character. The way to develop any habit is to do the thing for a long time in just the way one wants the habit forrtied. The schools need therefore to offer the necessary facilities for interesting reading of a varied character touching upon the entire round of things which the adult should be habituated to read. There should be literature in abundance of varied types, suited to the comprehension and interests of the pupils. It should be read just as the adults out of school will be ex- pected to read, for the sake of the interest in the substance of the reading of the story. The reading should be continuous and moderately voluminous. It should not be much dissected, analyzed, or recited upon. The literar^reading of the elementary schools^ should_be rescued_from the said slough of methodology m which_it^now lies m_San^ Antonio, the four "attacks," the dictionary study, the diacritical marks, the syllabification, the "interpretation of thought getting," the extraction of the thought from the pupils by minute piece-meal quantities, the "expression or thought giving," etc., etc. The mince-meat method of study- EDUCATION FOR LEISURE OCCUPATIONS _ 93^ ing literature_destr.ays __all_the Jife_of^it. A selection to be ap- preciated should be taken up and read through continuously and enjoyably from beginning to end. The thing is not read to be "learned." Most literature reading .should be silent reading and home reading. If the children will not do the reading with- out the heavy recitation driving, then the wrong selections have been chosen for those children. They must do it all with a rea- sonable degree of spontaneity, or it will never develop a per- manent leisure occupation. In the lists of reading needed by men for their leisure hours, reading of so-called good literature is but one of many things. The world of literary art is mostly a world of fiction. Much of it is so-called, but the poetry, the drama, the stories, in large measure relate only to things and incidents that have their exist- ence in the world of art. In a complicated world of serious affairs, ii is probable__lhat^ one's leisure reading should _relate-4tself much more with thelBings dT~serroiIg~~affairs, than with the things that exisF"on1y~m the worl 5O-^ X* 60 *W x' -^ ^ S " 45 - x^ ^i- /? X ^ -45 x** do ,x 40 Chart IV. 6" /=* ~ -& ^/ /7 ^ /V2 Ot *^ ?/ r/> v< Gr-a,* -1 Z r -Z 7 J3 r J ? I 2T. I zr. \ 1 95 -"? - -- 9< s\ f ^ OJ x' X** x' .i/ 1 ff_ (iff _x^ 45 2 ! . / /* / / ? X <45- -^ \ -^ X +S -f<* f s \ ! , s / - if 1 _ = _. F J t ' _ . Chart V. 120 CHAPTER VII. It is valuable for the supervisory officials of San Antonio to observe the difference of standing in handwriting quality and speed in the different buildings in the city. Chart VI shows the variation in the fifth and seventh grades. The standards used as background for the comparisons are those of the thirty-two cities. ENGLISH LANGUACxE TRAINING 121 4 c Q t a ? v s X * l\ ^ *! ) | J ^ K^ - \ 1- > ll|n X 1 ^ | JjJI N ^ s I s. ^ 0, | cr cr 1 x o S.gi 5! D ' i v 4 ? ^ to w o "k J K V ^ i> ^ ^' S. A EL w crq X Gfq rn n> w \ US O> O C ' ' c I ? v! f \ 5 ^ X & Q ' 1 ? j r ^ ^ % ^ V ft * ? ^ > 5 ! f ! M (o ^ M u K | 1 122 CHAPTER VII. Chart VII shows corresponding differences of schools on the side of speed. The number of letters written per minute in certain schools is remarkable. Teachers in the slower schools ought to visit them and see how it is done. The results ought first, however, to be verified by a more carefully controlled test. ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 123 & ( ! K ^ S? Se ' u? ^ ^ ^ fc * s Cj Jl I! Oj i $ ih r> V, > 1 ( N V - X i) 4 i! o o'S cr3 1F ( < r , J v l 1 k ^ ^ 5 B't- 1 (K! w v> *'f *$! *; b 5 H It T?s- ^ *q l 5 e | N QO g ^ : V fj f s O L ^) ^ ? ^ sV V3 V Si v V 10 * i i l $ 1 X * 1 124 CHAPTER VII. For the formal training in. handwriting the city has adopted an excellent system. Although there is no special supervisor to look after the writing, yet it appears that the teachers are informed as to the mode of procedure. The city has not, how- ever, set up speed standards or quality standards for the various grades. Such standards are desirable for defining the ends of one's labor. Naturally the standards would be for the average of classes and not for the individual attainment of pupils. More- over, such standards would naturally be different for different buildings in the city. People should be taught at public expense to write only so well as they need to write for carrying on their various daily affairs. This means that clerical people, bookkeepers, account- ants, clerks, copyists, etc., should be trained to high quality and high speed. At the other end of the scale we have unskilled labor, factory workers, farmers, carpenters, plumbers, black- smiths, seamstresses, laundry workers, housewives, etc., who need only to write a simple plain hand with only a moderate amount of speed. They do little writing and if the school ex- pends time, labor and money in bringing them up to a high standard, they will naturally sink back to a relatively low level because of their little need of this accomplishment. The city is justified in spending money for the actual educational needs of the whole population. It is justified in spending more to teach handwriting to certain classes of the population than to others. It is not justified, however, in spending money on any class for a quality of writing in excess of real social needs. The city is now doing this. Democratic education does not mean identical education for everybody. It means only giving everybody an equal opportunity for the education which he actually needs. While this will mean expending more money upon one social class for handwriting than upon a second class, the matter will be balanced by spending more upon this second class for certain other things which they actually do need and less upon the first class for those things. In the elementary schools the fundamental training in hand- writing should be the practice that the pupils get in connection ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 125 with all of the written work that they do. The work in the various subjects should involve a fairly generous quantity of paper work, the solving of problems, the writing of reports on various topics, compositions, letters, outlines of work, etc., etc. All such written work of pupils should be kept in perma- nent note-books. Every paper written should be in good form, whatever the subject. The pupils should be required to re-write it if it is not in as good form as he has done in previous papers as shown by those in his note-book. The best that he has done is the standard to which he is to be held. When held to that standard he will every once in a while go beyond it, and produce a paper that is still better. This better one becomes then his standard. And so he climbs on the basis of his own work step by step to a standard of quality that is considered satisfactory by the teacher. From that point forward in that particular grade all that is required of him is that he keep all of his written work to that one standard for the rest of the year. This plan permits different standards for different pupils within a class. It per- mits a standard that the pupil can understand and appreciate and know is actually attainable for all time. Standards of writ- ing developed in this way should be accumulated and kept per- manently within the class-room as objective standards that can be examined by the children of that grade for a comparison of their work with what is deemed desirable for that grade. These permanently kept standards should be those that have been em- ployed for various types of pupils ranging from those poorest in their writing to those that are the best. They should be ranged in a series in such a way that any pupil can see whether his work is most like that at the poor end of the scale, or whether it is like that at the best end of the scale. When all of the written work of the pupils is used in this way as the basis of their training in quality of writing, much, even most of the writing drill that is now given can be dis- pensed with. Certain preliminary writing teaching is absolutely indispensable in the lower grades. A very small amount of this preliminary training perhaps needs to be continued throughout the grades for the sake of keeping fresh in mind the elements of 126 j CHAPTER VII. handwriting, ideas as to speed, movement, letter formation, qual- ity of line, spacing, etc. It can be safely said, however, that half of the time that is now given to the writing drill beyond the pri- mary grades may well be dispensed with if only all of the paper work of the pupils is made the basis of their training in hand- writing. The writing needed for the class papers of the children is really as good as will ever be needed for anything that ninety percent of them will ever write. The majority of the children in school after they leave the school will write nothing more than letters, certain personal accounts, memoranda, etc. The writing need be no better nor any more rapid than that needed for the actual paper work in the school classes. If, therefore, practically all of the special writing drill work of the grade above the pri- mary were dispensed with and the pupils held only to careful work in their current paper work, enough writing training would be given to the majority. Most people do not need to write very well. The main thing is the habit of writing carefully and plainly. A small percent of the pupils need to be thoroughly drilled in speed, quality, proper movement, and all of the other things. Writing is for them a vocational need. Training for this writ- ing is special vocational training. It is not necessary that all of the children shall become specially skilled in the elements of clerical vocations simply because a few are in great need of this skill. In the elementary school it is not generally known into what vocation one is to go. For this reason it is not possible for the elementary schools to begin to give specialized vocational training in any great measure. The elementary schools can only take care of the usual needs that are common to the entire popu- lation. This means the development of a good plain hand of moderate speed in connection with the general paper work. It is in the high school where students should receive their special vocational training, some in one field, some in another. Those who are to go into clerical vocations should be given most rigor- ous and intensive handwriting drill in the high school commercial department. The thing is not now done. It should be, however, ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 127 si as not to force the elementary school to do a wasteful quantity of vocational drill work for classes that do not need it. Schools are often accused by business men of failure to bring up the writing quality of the pupils to a sufficiently high standard. This accusation comes because the pupils who are going into clerical vocations are not brought up to sufficiently high standards. The attempt to bring all to the same standard necessitates one that is too low for one type of pupil and much too high for another type. It means failure and inefficiency of the schools in taking care of the needs of the clerical pupils, and it means waste of time and money in taking care of the needs oi other much larger classes. For the relatively small group of people that enter clerical vocations the business man's accusation is justified. For the eighty or ninety percent of the people who do not go into such vocations, an exactly opposite complaint is the one that would be justified. GRAMMAR, LANGUAGE, COMPOSITION. The current annual investment in these matters in San An- tonio is about $50,000. What is the purpose of this investment? It is that the people growing up in San Antonio shall not make mistakes in their oral and written speech. It has no other purpose. One's fundamental grammatical habits are learned through one's social associations. On the side of positive help in their speech or writing, grammar can do little or nothing. Its sole value is the negative one of aiding in avoiding errors. What mistakes do the young people growing up in San An- tonio make that the city should think it advisable to invest so ex- travagant a sum in corrective grammar? It appears that the city is teaching the grammar without having made any attempt to find out. At present San Antonio is simply administering a"\ good-sized dose of grammar from every bottle in the grammatical/ pharmacopoeia without any previous diagnosis of actual com- munity needs, simply hoping that some of the things will find the right spot. Perhaps some of them will ; but it is a tremend- 128 ' CHAPTER VII. otisly wasteful way. Many of the things given certainly will be of no service and time has been lost which ought to have been devoted to useful matters ; and children are driven from the schools by maddening abstract useless things before their essen- tial education is complete. Until diagnosis is made of the kinds of errors that need grammatical treatment the city might do well to borrow the re- sults of such a diagnosis made of conditions in Kansas City, Missouri. It was there found that grammar-grade children in oral and written speech made twenty-seven kinds of grammatical errors. With the exact errors known, a city can easily choose those portions of grammatical knowledge needed for the pur- poses of correction ; and the city can know equally well just what portions of grammar need not be taught. The city can choose the kinds of things needed for correcting errors made by chil- dren who come from homes in which a good quality of language is spoken. They will find different kinds of errors and needs of different kinds, in the case of children of the Mexican schools. Still different will be the errors and the grammatical needs of the Negro schools. The present method of administering the same grammar to everybody is no more wise than for a physician to prescribe the same series of medicines to all people however different be their diseases. The schools should clearly note the purpose of the grammar, teach just what is needed, teach all that is needed, and teach no more than is needed. From the Kansas City study it appears that the grammar classes might dispense with a fairly large portion of the things that are now being taught. The schools of San Antonio should not only know the nature of the errors in the speech of the children and of the adults of the city and the proper corrective grammar that needs to be given, but they should also see that the two *are brought together in the way to secure the correction of the trouble. The gram- matical knowledge in the children is for the purpose of helping" them to watch their own language and for guiding them in their efforts to keep speech and writing correct. This grammar takes effect only as the pupil uses it to keep his speech correct. Educa- ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 129 tion is accomplished not in the abstract learning of the grammat- ical facts, but in putting them to practice. If the learning of the school is not closely related to practice, it quickly evaporates and disappears ; and the work is mostly lost. The time and the money and the labor are wasted. One large criticism of the grammar work in San Antonio is that it is not brought into such relation with the language uses of the children as to enable them to put it into practice. Each thing is simply taught in the ab- stract at a certain time of the year because it is laid down for that time of the year in the course of study, and is met with at that time in the textbooks. It is not brought up in connection with the troubles to be corrected just at the time that these troubles occur; yet this is the time and the only time when the grammar can take effect in such way that it will accomplish its purppse. Naturally certain preliminary grammatical teaching is neces- sary, which will cover lightly and rapidly all the various neces- sary portions of the subject. When the schools use materials suited to the preliminary type of teaching, and suited to the degree of maturity of the children, they can cover a great deal o ; ground in a comparatively short time. It is necessarily super- ficial. It is unapplied. It is merely an over-view of the whole subject to provide vocabulary, perspective, and foundation. Probably one lesson a week to the subject so organized for pre- liminary purposes is sufficient. Beyond this the training should consist mainly of application by the pupils, the teacher's work being simply for stimulation, encouragement, diagnosis, prescrip- tion of actually needed corrective drills, checking up the expres- sion of the pupils so as to hold them responsible for making ap- plication of their grammatical knowledge, etc., etc. How and where can children make application of their gram- matical knowledge so as to drive it home? Children recite in all of their subjects. They need, therefore, to express their thoughts clearly, effectively, and. correctly in all of these sub- jects. They should be held for correct grammatical oral speech in all their subjects. This gives them very large opportunity 130 CHAPTER VII. for applying their grammatical knowledge and for fixing good grammatical habits. Let us remark parenthetically that this does not necessarily imply that all recitations are to be in complete sentences. In natural conversation elliptical expressions are very common. It is only an artificial pedanticism that will freeze up the natural flow of the children's speech by insisting on the elimination of natural ellipses and the use of complete sentences on all occas- ions. Elliptical speech is grammatically just as correct as any other ; and since people are going to use it when they go out into the world, they may as well get practical training in the cor- rect use of it in the schools. Much of the recitation work, however, will consist of con- nected oral discourse. In history pupils should stand and relate in connected manner the series of events making up an entire historical movement. They should often talk two, three, or five minutes connectedly. In geography work rightly taught, in civics, in literature, in applied science, in industrial studies, etc., where schools are supplied with a proper abundance of reading material, it is, possible to have individual pupils bring to the class a great wealth of facts unfamiliar to the other mem- bers of the class which they will report orally. These reports constitute the very best means of training in oral expression. Naturally here the complete sentences are the only ones that are proper and natural. In most of such recitations the thought of the subject under consideration is the main thing; the language is but the instrument of expression. The attention of the class must not be diverted from the principal line of thought. When the reciter therefore, makes a grammatical mistake the main recitation topic must not be temporarily side-tracked and attention given to the individual error of a single pupil. This is to keep the entire class waiting while individual attention is given to an error that pertains only to the speech of the one pupil. Such dropping of the class work wastes the time of the class and produces an un- warranted confusion of dissimilar threads of thought. The reci- ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 131 tation topic has the right-of-way for the class, and it should not be side-tracked for anything of lesser importance. During the recitation the pupil must do his own watching over correctness of his language. This is the only way he can get the necessary practice training that will give him independent power to keep his language correct. He cannot always expect to have an instructor at his elbow to do his grammatical thinking for him. As he recites he must know that his language among other things is being watched by the teacher, and that opposite his name in her note-book any errors that he makes are being set down ; and that before the day is over, at least before he has for- gotten his recitation, he and the teacher will have a private con- ference about how to correct the particular types of error that he has made. This after-class personal conference consumes the time of only the pupil who needs the attention. It centers his thought on the trouble when there is nothing else demanding his attention. It helps him to realize that the thing is regarded as an important part of his education, and not a mere recitation incidental. This realization helps him to remember and to keep a closer lookout next time. It also incites him to get clear in mind the necessary grammatical knowledge to apply in time of need. Then after a few victories on his part, the teacher's part is mostly done so far as that particular error goes. From that time on he can do his own watching and fix the thing in irrevoc- able habit. He is always aware of course that the teacher's ear will continue to note any slip that he may make ; as well as appreciate his victories. Since there are only some twenty-five or thirty different kinds of errors usually made, and since most of these require comparatively little teaching and chiefly atten- tion and care on his part, the length of the task need not be such a very long one. Many students will require very little of the teacher's time. They are the type that come from good homes in which the fundamental education of family associations has accomplished most of their language education.. These are the exceptions, however. The majority will require considerable personal atten- tion to keep them to their application of their grammatical 132 CHAPTER VII. knowledge. The amount of work demanded of the teacher will depend very largely upon the spirit in which it is done. If the pupil feels and knows that there is on the part of the teacher a real interest in his problem, and if as a consequence of this in- terest on the part of the teacher she is sympathetic and personally stimulating, a little individual attention may go very far. If, however, the teacher's work is impersonal, perfunctory, mechani- cal ; or worse, if she is nagging and querulous, a great deal of work may do but little good. It is economy in the end to employ only strong, sympathetic, inspiring teachers even though a much higher price has to be paid. But after all is done, even in the best spirit, there will be certain pupils who will not be very successful in keeping their language straight. Let it be set down in their case that nature never intended them to be speakers ; and that it is presumptuous for man to try to undo nature's decrees. It is like attempting to make a heavy-weight pugilist or a piano-mover out of a man normally only five feet tall and weighing a hundered pounds. Weakness should be respected. It should be recognized by teach- ers as a perfectly normal thing. The weak should be brought up to a degree of strength normal for them, but with no attempt to bring them to the strength of the strong. In the plan of gram- mar-teaching here recommended, the teacher will not be over- worked in trying to bring up all of the weak. To twenty or thirty percent of the pupils she will leave a sufficiently recogniz- able measure of their natural weakness, knowing that they will never enter into walks of life demanding more correct speech. Even among the most cultured classes, if one has ideas to ex- press, and agreeable manner of utterance, good taste in the choice of his words, etc., a moderate amount of grammatical incorrect- ness is of little or no consequence. This is much more the case with those who are to be unskilled laborers, factory workers, farmers,, carpenters, etc. Another field of application of their grammatical informa- tion will be the written work of the pupils. There should be some of this in connection with every subject, history, geog- raphy, literature, arithmetic, science, civics, hygiene, etc. And ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 133 this writing should be their composition. In keeping all of it correct, their grammar is applied. It can be done much more slowly by the pupils than oral work. They can revise it and correct it in a more leisurely way. For this reason, pupils can here be held far more strictly responsible for the application of their grammatical knowledge. Every piece of written work that they produce which contains so much as a single grammatical eiror should be re-written entirely. The main thing is that the pupil be stimulated to keep a watch upon the grammatical cor- rectness of his utterance as he goes along. Merely to erase and correct an error here and there that is pointed out by the teacher does not get at the difficulty. Weeding out incorrectness is not the end in view. The end is the development of a habit of watch- fulness. The keeping of all papers that the student writes in per- manent note-books can be made a great aid in carrying out this work. The other details will be much the same as already men- tioned in connection with the oral training. In certain of the buildings visited in San Antonio, the upper grades in connection with their composition work were preparing outlines, developing subjects in the class, then writ- ing them out, the original draft of which is corrected, and re- written by the pupils. These compositions are then all kept in a losse-leaf note-book, a highly commendable feature. The thing which seems to be specially needed is a development of such work in connection with the history, geography, physiology, civics, etc, so that these subjects may furnish the thought that is to be expressed, the composition being only the writing up of this thought. This would permit the complete elimination of the present composition class. The composition teacher who was securing the best results that I saw said: "I don't like the com- position work. I can't get the children to respond. It does not seem to go. There is something the matter that needs to be solved." This is very true. The thing the matter is that the com- position work is done in a class where the children have nothing to say. Such a situation is the worst possible one for expression. The prime condition of expression is the having of something to say. Therefore, most at least of the composition class-time 134 '' CHAPTER VII. should be dropped from the program and the time added to the content subjects for written expression there. What has been said with reference to the technical informa- tion and its application in the elementary school is generally applicable to the high school as well. At present one year and a half of the high school English class-work is devoted to gram- mar and composition-rhetoric. The course prescribes one com- position a week in the first year, one every two weeks in the third year, and one a month in the fourth year. The high school grammar and rhetoric training have much the same weaknesses as the grammar training in the elementary school. It is_simply taught in the abstract; and this is to miss the whole purpose of the t^Chinji? Composition worTTTs developed in 'the classes where the pupils have nothing to say. It needs to be developed ir, the classes in science, in history, in industrial studies, in com- mercial geography, civics, household occupations, etc., etc., where the children do have things to say, if the work is properly done. Four-fifths of all of the training in English expression in the high school should be accomplished in connection with the oral and written work of the content-subjects. But high school teachers are specialists in other subjects, we are told ; and they refuse to accept the responsibility for train- ing pupils in correctness and effectiveness of expression. This i?> not what they are employed to do. Moreover, they are not specialists in English and claim that they cannot do it. In this connection three things need to be said : (1) Effective thought in a subject is the thing desired by the special teacher of that subject. To be such, it must be clear, orderly and sequential. If the pupils are successful in thinking through the topics covered, then they must think them through clearly, systematically, and sequentially. The teacher can know that their thinking is of the right type only as they express it in careful, exact, orderly fash- ion, either orally or written. As they accomplish their work best for him, they attain the best type of expression of that thought. Orderly thinking and orderly expression are different phases of the same thing. Effective expression, therefore, is in fact a part of his work. Effectiven^^rr5iressiQEu4s-4iie only thing- aimed ENGLISH LANGUAGE TRAINING 135 a in the teaching of rhetoric and of composition in the English classes. TrTfT'special teachers of content-subjects are better in position to teach it than the English teachers. (2) It is only when the pupils have something to express that conditions are normal for training in expression. Only the content-subjects afford them this opportunity. (3) Special teachers in the high school are apt to look upon their work as subject-teaching rather than the education of youth. Even if convinced of the truth or the two foregoing propositions they will still tend to neglect the expression side of the work as the basis of training. When they do s^they^aj^_jie^edn^the thougl^^ida.s__well. Here we find a fundamental task for the highschool principal. It is his business to keep the balance true and to keep every kind of work going on in every department that needs to go on in each of these departments. He is employed to hold the various high school teachers responsible for doing the things that they should do. If he is unable to do so in any specific case, then either he needs to get a new teacher for that high school position or the high school needs to get a new principal. 136 fc CHAPTER VIII. Chapter VIII. THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS. In previous chapters certain subjects have been sufficiently discussed as to both content and method; others have been touched upon insufficiently or not at all. We wish in this chapter t> call attention to certain matters that have been insufficiently treated. GEOGRAPHY. Geography-teaching in San Atnonio is textbook-learning. The textbook used is as good as any upon the market. The plan ot teaching is the one that is usual in most cities. The chief dif- ference perhaps is that San Antonio has a somewhat smaller supply of the so-called supplementary geographical reading than the average cities of her size. But on the whole there is no rea- son to think that the geography results obtained are either better or worse than the average of results in cities in general. To say that the geography work is about average in quality is not to commend it as one would wish. Taking cities in general, the subject is barrenly handled and badly taught. Without stopping to discuss weaknesses observed, let us proceed at once to sketch a better plan. The city's current annual investment in this sub- ject is at least $30,000. The city can well afford to study methods of making the work more efficient. The efficiency of the work can be doubled in my opinion by taking care of two things, both of which involve a third : (1) Employing the method of geographic experience instead of the method of textbook learning. (2) Choosing geographical topics on the basis of social needs. (3) The possession of an abundance of reading materials which reveal human situations in a human way throughout the world; and incidentally, enough pictures and other objective materials for showing details of such situations. Let us illustrate first the difference between experiential learning and textbook learning. It is clear to any resident of THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 137 San Antonio that the way for any outsider to learn their city is not merely to have a map and one textbook page of condensed information concerning the industries, inhabitants, commerce, races, the river, etc., of San Antonio. Such skeleton reading is a pretty poor substitute for experience. It can be read and re- read until the words are remembered; but the city will not be known. The way to actually learn the city is to go through the streets, see the people, the houses, the yards, the shrubbery, the parks, the street cars, the business houses, etc., etc., and to mingle \\ih the people in their affairs. One must come into intimate contact with reality. There is no short and brief fifteen-minute book-and-city-map way of doing it, as everybody knows. In learning the geographic world which lies beyond the horizon, the same thing holds. Teachers do not deal in magic. They cannot by means of a few passes with a textbook bring children to a real understanding of that farther world. The only way really to learn the outer geographic world is still the plain matter-of-fact one of experiential contact with it. Few indeed can get this through actual travel. But with reading of a proper type it is possible through imagination to enter intimately into the life of the people of distant lands. One can do what they do, see what they see, be interested in what they are interested in, come into close contact in a human sympa- thetic way with the things of their situations. Take as an example the teaching of the Mississippi river flood plains. In the brief geography textbooks one can be shown on a map a strip of lands that is subject to floods. The books mention the fact that there are destructive floods which certain years destroy much property and many lives ; and tell in a passing sentence of the dikes that have been constructed along the river for protection. The information given is all true. The words and statements may be learned by the pupils and recited upon ; but words so learned in the brief textbooks are relatively empty of meaning. They do not arouse interest or human feel- ing. They can make but a faint impression and have therefore little effect in shaping the mental life of the pupils. The things evaporate and are forgotten. They may re-learn it later in more 138 CHAPTER VIII. effective ways from reading newspapers and magazine's in times of flood; and then not forget it. But if the scholastic learning is only textbook learning, there remains almost no residue in memory. The human mind is so made. Rightly to learn the nature of the flood situation in the Mississippi valley, pupils need to see everything in the same human way in which it is seen by those who live in that region. They need to enter through reading and pictures into the agri- cultural life of the people of the flood plains. They need to read a concrete human story of an actual rise of the river ; to feel tHe uneasiness of the people as they see the rising of the waters and read of the rain and melting snows in Pennsylvania and Ohio ; tij feel their anxiety as the waters creep slowly but resistlessly up the dikes ; to feel the alarm that runs through the whole region as the waters approach the danger point and threaten to break through ; to enter sympathetically into their frantic struggles to get their families, their live-stock, their belongings, to places of safety ; then to enter into their grief as they see their farms submerged, their homes swept away, the long year's labor of their hands destroyed; to watch the subsidence of the waters, to note the lands enriched by alluvial silt, to enter into the reconstructive labors of the farmers, etc., etc. Rightly told, the story pulsates with human interest; feel- ings are aroused ; pupils actually enter into the life of the people. So vivid is the human imagination, when the facts are properly presented, one can actually see the things almost as well as if one were present. In such a story the pupils learn of the na- ture of the Mississippi river in this region ; learn of the dikes, how constructed and where constructed, of the melting snows in northern states, of the rate of rise of the river, of the degree of the destructiveness of the river, of the real nature of silt and the flood plain land formations, etc., etc., the same matters aimed at by the bald and experientially forceless statements of the textbooks. Learned through reading of the type here described they are learned once and for all time. Whatever comes through one's vivid experience is not forgotten. The method means less teaching by the teacher, provided the necessary helps are at THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 139 hand. Where effectively led by interest, the pupils can be brought to take care of more of the matter themselves. It means an economy of time and labor. And further, what is done is not done in vain. Naturally the schools must have the necessary books, news- papers, and magazine articles for the pupils to read ; and they must have an abundance of pictures. Although the reading is the thing of fundamental value, yet the pictures supply neces- sary details. It will be found the highest 'economy to buy these necessary helps, even if something else has to be cut out. A few dozen geographical topics carefully chosen on the basis of the needs of the people of San Antonio, and handled in the way men- tioned will give more actual geographic results than several ele- mentary years of dawdling over the geographic textbook. The school city cannot afford to neglect the purchase of an abundant supply of the necessary reading and pictorial materials. To build an expensive school plant such as that found in San Antonio, to employ several hundred high-priced people to work within the school plant, and then not to furnish it with' the necessary mater- ials for effective work, is like building an expensive factory, hir- ing a high-priced body of workmen, and then nullifying their labors by failing to furnish them with the necessary tools and machinery. A large part of the annual investment of $30,000 in geography at the present time is wasted because the brief, ab- stract textbook stuff cannot be learned economically or effect- ively. It is a safe guess that half of the investment is waste. The textbooks present about 600 pages of condensed reading matter, after subtracting the maps and the pictures. This amount of reading can be covered in thirty hours. The whole can be read in six weeks by any bright pupil reading only one hour a day. It is, however, spread over four years and a half. It has to be read and re-read, and then read again, in order to make sufficient impression for recitation purposes. The thing needed is not dawdling over empty abstractions, unlearnable as they are presented. Pupils need to have fullness of reading, fullness of imaginative experience in connection with every topic taken 140 CHAPTER VIII. ^ up. Pupils need to do twenty times the reading that the text- books present; but of a wholly different sort. The textbook has an important part to play. The human reading described must be the basis of any real fundamental teaching. But places mentioned in the reading need to be seen in their place relationships ; the maps are indispensable helps for keeping these place-ideas in order. Also the reading matter of the texts, if well organized, helps one to a quick summary over-view of the entire field, and serves like the map to give outline and perspective in one's real geographical learning. The geography teaching in the schools should be in part preliminary and in part functional. The text is about the only thing we have now for the preliminary over-view. It should be covered rapidly so as to get the necessary over-view. There should be little stopping to fix things that are not learned easily i passing. A large amount of learning should be gathered in a r one goes along, but for the most part only that which sticks easily. There should be no stopping for intensive drill. To do this is to lose sight of the field as a whole. The preliminary over-view should look to wide vision of earth relations, and not to the details. The study of the latter belongs to the functional portion of the work. The functional studies should be by topics, industrial, com- mercial, civic, etc. The reading work on each topic should be full, intensive, thorough. It should, however, be of the human type v/hich we have described, with the textbook used only for refer- ence. In this functional field should be placed most of the teach- ing. It is not so now in the elementary school. The preliminary work is much over-done, wastefully over-done. Little is actually organized on a functional basis. The teachers in general have not the practical point of view. After the tools of learning, this is probably the most important subject in the entire curri- culum, yet the practical opportunities are neglected. In the high school the commercial geography is organized from the functional point of view. The amount of reading at the disposal of the high school student is very insufficient, but the instructor has the point of view^ and needs only the necessary THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS * 141 material equipment. It would be well if the teacher of com- mercial geography in the high school were made the supervisor of the geography work in the grammar grades, after the plan now employed by the city in securing supervisors for the grades in German and Spanish. In the high school also human geography of the industrial-commercial-civic type should by all means be substituted for the elementary geology now taught, called physiography. The intensive work given in this subject is wholly unwarranted for city children. In this field of physiography they should read the book rapidly to get the preliminary over-view o f it all ; they ought to have even more reading than the text now presents, two or three times as much. But it should be read i i a quarter of the time now devoted to the intensive study of the subject. The main thing then should be the study of industrial, commercial, political, and other topics of value, with the geogra- phic situation as a background. Any needed details of this back- ground can then be studied as they are needed. It is the only normal way to study them. HISTORY. The history taught should likewise have a practical pur- pose. No history should be taught except that which can be seen to have a purpose. The purpose should be to give one an understanding of the things with which men have to do in this present age ; commerce, railroads, manufacturing, city-building, sanitation, literature, agriculture, trade unions, religion, taxation, tuberculosis, insurance, public utilities, quarantine, political states, music, art, political parties, etc., etc. In these and a thousand other things, history shows how present conditions have come to be. It shows better than anything else the influences that have been at work, and which are yet at work. All the history studied should be chosen to give background to such present- day problems. Naturally the first history given should be of the preliminary type. Its purpose is to give an over-view of the world's history ; an over-view of the history of the United States, of the history 142 CHAPTER VIII. of Texas, or whatever country is studied. These various fields of history should be covered through rapid reading. There should be much of this reading. It should throb with human interest. It should be at every stage of the work on a level with the understanding and degree of maturity of the pupils, so that they can read it rapidly. These conditions being met they can ccver a large amount of ground, obtain a great wealth of his- torical experience, take in a great quantity of information the main outlines of which are remembered without difficulty, and all without the nerve-racking strain upon the teachers incident to the present slow, intensive method of covering the preliminary portion of the study by means of skeleton-outline textbooks. This preliminary reading should be biographical, anecdotal, and thrilling with adventure and conflict and human action. Along with this there will be interwoven the solid outlines and back- ground of history ; but these things will not be analyzed out nor studied intensively during this preliminary work. The latter will be rapid and superficial. One must not condemn superficial work when in its rightful place, nor value intensive thorough work when in a wrong place. There is a proper time for light surface ploughing, and a time for sub-soiling. While the history textbooks now in use are not altogether suitable for these preliminary overviews, yet taken in connec- tion with certain biographical readings and certain popularized supplementary historical books, etc., they can be made to serve fairly well for the preliminary treatment until books primarily designed for this work can be at hand. The first half of the history of Texas which is now being used indicates better than any of the other texts the kind of reading that is needed for the preliminary survey in every historical field. The one criticism to be made of this Texas history is the brevity of treatment. In proportion as it is condensed it becomes abstract and impersonal and loses in human interest. The result is that it cannot be taken IP with sufficient ease of understanding as to permit rapid and copious reading. The work tends to be slowed down. There is dearth of the experiential element. The pupils are expected to learn the text, to memorize all of the details, to give them forth THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 143 completely in their recitations, and upon their examinations. In the preliminary stage of learning, such intensive analytic study paragraph by paragraph is altogether undesirable. In order to use the textbooks for the preliminary portion, they can be read much more rapidly than at present, and then supplemented all along the line with three times as much addi- tional reading from historical readers. Then taking the entire history course, elementary and high school, the whole of this preliminary study should be done in but a fraction of the time now given to it. Children can do it when reading is provided that is adapted to their natures and interest. The time _sa^d.is_to be g[iven to functional historical work, the study of the historical background of the thousand and one present-day conditions. This should perhaps begin in the gram- mar grades in some degree, and expand rapidly through the high school. History of what we have called the preliminary type might well occupy all the history time in the intermediate grades, most of it through the grammar grades, and but a minor fraction of it in the high school. A good example of the functional problem is the history of the Texas school system. This is a topic of large present social significance to Texas people. It is very complicated as it now stands. These complications cannot be properly under- stood except as one studies the influences that have been at work in the state, which have brought the present situation into being. For example, to understand the present enormous school fund of Texas and fully to appreciate it, it is necessary to go back to the provisions for education made by the early Texas Republic ; to note the way it was taken care of in the first Texas state con- stitution and to note how it has grown step by step from these early beginnings to its present gigantic proportions. In the same way, to understand the present situation, it is necessary to trke up the history of school taxation in the state, the history ol the growth of school buildings, of school attendance, of normal school education, of university education, of agricultural and mechanical education, etc., etc. The problem is a worthy one for the high school. It would be infinitely better than wasting 144 CHAPTER VIII. time over the intensive study of the political struggles of ancient Rome, or the details of the savage campaigns of the Middle Ages. Other possible topics have already been enumerated. The school people ought to take the list of civic topics, health topics, industrial topics, etc., the understanding of which appears desir- able for the community, and provide library reading materials for giving each of them, so far as practicable, a historical back- ground and setting. A practical community should see that the work is rightly purposeful and make this one of the conditions cf financial support. To the specialist in history the preliminary and the func- tional for his own special labors are one and the same thing. The historian^ therefore^ almos^without_exception ovejjivalues the preliminary, and over-develops it, and insists that it shall be intensively and thoroughly studied and digested without in- quiring whether there is any practical relation to current-day problems. He grows eloquent over the demoralization of history that will grow out of such a plan as recommended here. If such a plan is introduced, unless supervised by superintendent and principal, he is apt usually to continue to overdo the preliminary and to neglect the functional. The most progressive leaders in the historical field, however, are changing their minds on this particular point. The recent National Education Association Committee on the Reorganization of the History Teaching in the High School, recommends that first year of work be a pre- liminary over-view of all of the world's history down to about 1700. They then recommend a more intensive study, more nearly of the functional type covering the last two centuries by way of showing the historical background and genesis of present-day conditions. These leading historians have come practically to the plan of work which we have above described ; not wholly, how- ever, because of the administrative division between elementary and high schools. They probably are not placing the preliminary quite properly, probably somewhat over-developing it, and some- what under-developing the functional. It is, however, a long step in the direction that San Antonio ought to take in its history teaching. THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 145 The San Antonio high school is wastefully overdoing the preliminary hisj:oncjj_jtudies~of ancient medievaTjindjnodenx European history. This history is required of all students and takes two years of their time. This amount of history should be required of all high school students ; and in their preliminary over-view of the world's history they should perhaps read very much more than the twelve hundred pages of their present text- books. They should do it, however, in one semester, and not in four. Twelve hundred pages of historical materials, written. in a manner suitable for students of the high school age, can be read in sixty hours, that is to say, it can be read in three school months, if read at the rate of one hour per school day. It is wrongly using such preliminary material to spread it out over two full years. This is prescribing about ten minutes of reading for each school day of the two years. To have it read and re- read, swallowed and regurgitated, is to miss the right use and right method to be employed with the preliminary aspects of the study. Until the elementary school can take care more ade- quately of the earlier portions of general world-history, leaving the functional studies for the high school, we recommend that the general over-view of the world's history now accomplished \ in two years, in the high school be reduced to one year, covering J the same ground. When this same material is spread more thinly so as to cover three semesters, the law of diminishing returns sets in heavily, so that not much more actual results can be accomplished in the three terms than in the two semesters recom- mended. A fourth semester to this same body of material is mostly wasted unless the whole is heavily supplemented with further historical readings. This is not now done because of the almost total lack of library books of a historical nature, and the lack of library space for so many historical students. The city is now investing in the preliminary teaching of history a fairly large sum. It is a safe gi i e s s i\\y^\\nder^e_^\r^ \ 1 rns ta nceg half of this is waste. This is not mcriticism of the ability~~of nTe~^feachers. They impress one as distinctly capable. Simply, they are using a wrong plan and lack necessary material helps. Blame for such a situation 146 . CHAPTER VIII. must be pretty widely distributed. Perhaps there should not be any blame. One should look at the present situa- tion as one stage of growth in which most of the high schools of the entire country are found ; a stage of growth through which the high schools must necessarily pass before reaching the next one. The next one is now clearly in sight, and is being pointed out by many of the leaders of our profession. Primary responsi- bility for taking the next step rests upon those in supervisory authority, whom the city has made responsible for the general plans of the work. Only secondarily does it rest upon the special teachers of the subject. We are not here recommendingV that the historical course in the high school be reduced to one/' year. It should be as long as at present. In fact even though! impossible under present administrative conditions there ought\ to be in time history work for every high school student in each of the four years ; but after the first year of general historical survey, we would recommend for the other semesters historical studies of the functional type such^_aj_^j^unmended by our National Education Association Committee, such as exemplified in certain of our industrial histories, histories of commerce, etc. An objection that will be urged is that this mode of teach- ing will involve one in difficulty who is going to college. It may. It certainly will in some cases. There is a good deal of mediaevalism yet in the college field, but I can see no reason why the business men of San Antonio should pay their much- needed money for the continued support of college mediaevalism. Even if they wish to do so, they should remember that the large majority of the high school students of San Antonio do not go to college. The high schools might at least prepare functional and purposeful history courses for this majority. To modernize the history in San Antonio and to save half the waste that is now going on, the first necessary thing is that the supervisory officials get the functional point of view ; a second thing is that the teachers acquire the functional point of view; and the third is that the necessary books, maps, pictures, be. supplied in sufficient abundance to take care of the needs of all of the students. For its new buildings the city at the present I THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 147 time is buying the most modern type of furniture and appliances. For the instructional work the city should likewise purchase the I most modern type of educational tools and appliances. Let the city economize on buildings, on furniture and material equip- \ ment ; on abbreviation of the course of study so that children can finish somewhat earlier and thus the city need fewer class-rooms * and fewer teachers for a given number of pupils ; but let them not economize on the indispensable materials of instruction. For the history the major things are properly written books, maga- zines, newspaper articles, government bulletins, etc. Second after these for purposes of making clear the details of the read- ing, are an abundance of maps, charts, pictures, models, etc. MATHEMATICS. Arithmetic. The textbooks in arithmetic in the elementary school are of standard quality. In the fundamental operations, much additional work is given by way of rapid intensive drills for speed and accuracy. Considered simply as textbook and drill teaching, the city is certainly doing as well as cities in general. One observes in the buildings about that same proportion of superior work and of inferior work that one expects to find where average work is being done. The results of the training in the fundamental operations of arithmetic, both whole numbers and fractions, were measured by means of tests made up of standard units. The average ability of the San Antonio children in performing the various op- erations is shown in the following tables. They are so arranged that comparisons can be made with the identical tests made in certain large buildings in Chicago. Each San Antonio grade it compared with the Chicago grade next higher in number, seventh with eighth, sixth with seventh, etc., without any re- ductions as in the case of the spelling and handwriting. The numbers represent the average number of standard problems solved correctly in the allotted time. 148 . CHAPTER VIII. Column Addition. IV V VI VII San Antonio 7.8 7.8 9.2 9.5 Chicago 7.3 7.9 9.7 10.3 Subtraction, long problems. IV V VI VII San Antonio 4.8. 5.4 6.6 7.2 Chicago : 3.5 4.8 5.4 7.0 Multiplication. IV V VI VII San Antonio 3.9 4.7 5.9 6.2 Chicago , 4.3 5.4 6.1 6.0 Short Division. IV V VI VII San Antonio 1.5 2.6 4.0 4.7 Chicago 2.8 3.5 4.4 4.8 Long Division. IV V VI VII San Antonio 1.0 1.3 1.9 2.5 Chicago 1.2 1.5 1.8 2.3 Addition of Fractions. V VI VII San Antonio 7.4 9.0 8.6 Chicago 7.1 8.5 10.7 Subtraction of Fractions. V VI VII San Antonio 9.2 10.9 10.5 Chicago 8.3 10.6 12.3 THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 149 Multiplication of Fractions. V VI VII San Antonio 4.9 7.9 10.6 Chicago : 3.2 7.0 9.0 Division of Fractions. V VI VII San Antonio 4.6 7.6 10.2 Chicago 3.9 6.1 6.5 The results of the tests were equated with those of Mr. Courtis in the four fundamental operations with integers for Boston, New York, Detroit, Butte, and other cities. It appears that San Antonio is getting about average results as compared with other cities in the country. This is being done in a seven- year course, too, instead of an eight-year course ; although the children are of the same degree of maturity, a year being saved by entering one year late; at seven instead of six. This does not mean, however, that the work is all that it might be. It is far from that in the cities in general of the United States. Throughout the country the supplemental arith- metic work of the schools does not grow sufficiently out of the fundamental number-thinking of the community; the prelim- inary work tends everywhere to be over-developed by including too many kinds of topics ; by using numbers that are too large and complicate*! for children's thinking; by introducing prob- iems of a subtlety and degree of complexity that have no place in the rapid preliminary training ; and finally, the functional arithmetical training which should be the largest and most serious part of the study is almost wholly non-existent; in its place there exists the false substitute of imaginary so-called reasoning problems with which the arithmetic books are so full. A good quantity of these imaginary problems actually belong in the rapid preliminary work, easy problems using small num- bers for the sake of learning the operations. Such problems, however, cannot possibly be made to serve for functional supple- 150 ' CHAPTER VIII. mental training. This latter must grow out of the fundamental number thinking- of the community. The city is doing a large part of the preliminary work in very effective fashion ; much rapid oral work with tables ; rapid practice with easy problems in all the fundamental operations; rapid oral reasoning problems using numbers of manageable size ; using the reasoning problems of the textbooks for expla- nation of the processes without performing the operations with the large numbers involved; much oral arithmetical drill, etc. All this naturally should continue. The classes, however, should be supplied with certain printed helps for the work, which they do not now have. For drill in speed and accuracy in multiplica- tion, let us say, there should be at the disposal of the class printed sheets containing the problems ready for the solution. Each pupil is given one of the sheets containing on it a large number of problems with space for the multiplication. He gets a large amount of drill by working all the problems on the page before him. The advantage of having the problems ready printed with spaces for the solution are : (1) The teacher does not have to copy the problems on the black-board and thus her time is saved for needful work. (2) The time of the pupils is saved, since they do not have to copy the long list of problems. This copying is not of educational value. (3) With such an abundance of helps, less oral work is needed. This further saves the expensive time of the teacher. (4) All of the pupils can bt: actually working at one time, and not merely passively list- ening to what others are doing when the work is of the oral type. The paper used for such work need cost no more than paper used for arithmetic work at present. The added expense of the print- ing is small when done in large quantities. The twenty-five percent increased efficiency in the drill in fundamental opera- tions will pay the added expense many times over. The same results now had can be had in considerably less time. In certain cities these drill helps are in part supplied by the school printing presses used in the manual-training printing work. In other cities the helps are obtained from certain publishing houses. THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 151 After the preliminary work has laid a solid foundation in speed and accuracy in the performance of the basic operations of arithmetic, the practical or functional arithmetic should be developed. This should grow out of things with which the chil- dren have to do. Many of the school yards, for example, require filling and leveling. Let the pupils calculate the cost of the work. Let them calculate the number of cubic yards of gravel needed, the capacity of the wagons used for the hauling, the number of loads to be hauled, the cost of the hauling, etc. Let the girls in the domestic science classes do the marketing, the cooking, the serving, and calculate accurately the cost of pro- viding the meals they serve to each other, to the teachers, to the school board, etc. Let the boys in constructing a school fence perform all the various calculations connected with the work. Let the pupils make arithmetical studies in connection with such matters as the following: the family grocer account, the family fuel supply, rent, taxes, insurance, illuminating gas, electric light, water supply, street paving, street cleaning, city lighting, etc., etc. The possible list is a long one. Much of the functional arithmetic will develop better in the civic and vocational classes than in the arithmetic class. But it cannot be developed except as these subjects are rightly de- veloped at the same time. Arithmetic should not be mainly a matter of solving hard problems. After a certain point in the course is reached, it should be mainly a matter of accurate numerical thinking. The problem-solving normally is incidental, by way of making reductions, summations, etc., needed in one's thought and in one's work. A banker or a contractor, a mer- chant or real estate man, must do very much of his thinking in exact mathematical terms. Certainly he must be able to make any necessary computations with a fair degree of accuracy and speed. But these are not for him the principal things. While they are important they are still incidental to the main current of his thought and his work. The computations are meaningless except as they are part of this real thought and work. High School Mathematics. The mathematics needed by the majority of high school students consists of numerous applica- 152 ' CHAPTER VIII. tions of arithmetic to the multitudinous problems of practical affairs. For the girls there can be no justification for any other kind of mathematics. For the boys going into agriculture, commercial, clerical, transportation vocations and most of the trades and professions, the same thing can be said. The city is now investing a large sum in high school algebra and geometry. Eighty percent of the boys and one hundred percent of the girls upon whom this money is spent would be ten years hence just as well off if the money were saved. They would be much better off if it were expended upon the study of the practical civic, social, industrial, recreational, and other matters which are greatly needed by this rising generation of young people in San Antonio. This recommendation will appear so absurd to many that I make this further recommendation : Get the opinion on this topic of intelligent leaders of thought in this country, educational leaders as well as leaders among public-spirited, social-minded laymen. The amount of money annually invested and the amount of teacher and student labor annually consumed in what is here pro- nounced unjustifiable studies for most students is large enough to justify such an investigation. Also, consult any group of lay- men of San Antonio who are graduates of the high school as to the degree in which they have ever used their algebra or the demonstrational aspects of their geometry. Of course many will refer to the disciplinary value of algebra for strengthening the mind. Naturally it has a little value of that sort, but there is no reason to think that the learn- ing of useless things is any better for strengthening the mind than the learning of useful things. Quite the reverse. There are some who should study algebra and geometry for vocational purposes. For these, much the same thing can be said for the higher mathematics that was said for arithmetic. There should be in both subjects certain preliminary work giv- ing an over-view of things that lie within these mathematical fields, for the sake of perspective. This preliminary study will necessarily be without reference to practical application. It should be rapid. It should not be deep or intensive. It will be preparatory for practical application. After this basic founda- THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 153 tion is laid, then, the algebraic and geometrical work should cer- tainly be of the practical applied type. The preliminary will not close at any certain point in the course and the practical teaching continue from that point. The preliminary will be large ir the beginning and will gradually diminish throughout one's mathematical course. The practical should be introduced in some measure as early as possible, and gradually expand throughout the course. Recent books on shop mathematics give a minimum of the elements of algebra and geometry in the be- ginning; and after this basis if the subject is laid, the work is functional, applied, and practical. Is no subject to be taught merely for the municipal luxury of spending money upon useless things? If cities are to limit this form of indulgence anywhere, it would seem that it should be in the field of education. It is not so much a matter of the money wasted. It is youth that cannot afford to have its irre- coverable time so squandered. SCIENCE. One's fundamental knowledge of science is obtained from one's daily experience with things ; wind, rain, sun-light, grass and trees, electric light, fuel combustion, machines, phonographs, food and drink, dust, bacteria, organic decay, lenses, water mains, gas supply, etc., etc. Everything with which one comes into contact is a complex of materials and forces treated in science; and science treats of nothing else except these things that are interwoven in the experiences of daily life. While one gets acquainted in a rough way with the materials and forces of the world of science in this out-of-school experience, the various matters are so complicated that they need to be taken up one after another in the school and analyzed into their elements, and these elements studied in relation to the total situation be- fore one's knowledge is at all adequate or complete. It is how- ever, the fundamental things of one's own daily experience that should be the science matters analyzed and in connection with which all of the elements of the sciences are learned. The pro- 154 CHAPTER VIII. spective mechanic, therefore, will analyze situations relating to tools, machines, electricity, chemistry of metals used in mechani- cal industry, etc. The prospective housewife will find as science studies, the nature of food, heat, electricity, the physics, of house- hold appliances, bacteriological study of molds, yeast, mildews, the chemistry of cleaning, the physics of color harmony, etc., etc. All pupils will have experience and will look forward to experiences in connection with science situations relating to sanitation, hygiene, civic problems, etc. The number of analyz- able situations of vital interest to all boys and girls in the com- munity is practically endless. The science of both elementary and high school should be thoroughly practical, and be but an analysis and completion only of that vague unanalyzed science knowledge which is got in a wide daily experience. There is, however, the usual qualification. In proportion a:- situations are complex and difficult, it is necessary to have a sufficient mastery of certain keys for unlocking them. The science-complex situations are made up of materials and forces that seem organically related to each other in certain systems. Physics, for example, covers a certain field of forces and rela- tions. Chemistry covers a very wide field of different forces and relations. Physiography handles still a different series 01 matters. Biology, botony, zoology, entomology, bacteriology, physiology, etc., relate to fields each of which has within itself a certain unity. Since the analysis of the science complexes in- volved in the various practical situations is dependent upon some knowledge of the nature of the factors that enter into the situation, it seems clearly desirable to have certain preliminary studies which give a rapid over-view and perspective as to the materials and forces that pertain to each of the many fields of science. One should have some knowledge of the elements in their isolation before he can analyze them out of compounds. The schools ought therefore to give short, rapid courses i-i each of the various sciences. The work will be qualitative. It will show the main outlines of what is found in each of the various fields. It will meet with the complexities that lie within THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 155 this general outline; but it will not dwell upon the complexities in a degree beyond that suited to the maturity of the pupils. The preliminary work in large measure should come in the later grades of the elementary school. Where it has not been here given, it should be given fast and heavy in the first year of the high school, or first and second years. In the rapid preliminary studies of the various science fields the major part of the work should be in connection with things of common use in daily life. The study of electricity should be in connection with door-bells, batteries, electric lights, electric toasters, telegraph keys, etc. The studies of yeast, molds, mildews, etc., come naturally in connection with the situations where these things are met with. By organizing the preliminary studies in each of the sciences about the things of common life, it is possible to be developing the practical at the same time that the preliminary is being covered. A good deal of the preliminary work should be reading, relating to the things of each of the sciences, laboratory demon- strations, and laboratory experience on the part of the pupils, which will be altogether unapplied, or as we call it, pure science. It is not impractical, however, since it is the laying of the foun- dations to be used in the practical applied science. There ought to be very much science reading in both elementary and second- ary schools. The textbooks are of little value for this purpose. One needs to have the electricity treated in a readable popular way ; yet having the facts accurate in all respects. Pupils need to read in the same way a quite extended popular reader on each separate field ; bacteriology, insect life, the economic and sani- tary aspects of bird life, mechanics, heat, sound, light, chem- istry, plant life, etc., etc. Schools need to be equipped with ap- paratus, most of which should be made by the pupils for illus- trating the various scientific matters covered in the readings. The reading we may say is the pre-preliminary for demonstration laboratory work. The latter is the preliminary preparing for the functional analysis of practical situations. At present the science [ work in the schools of San Antonio is defective since elementary . science is not given in the grades, except for the hygiene, which < 156 CHAPTER VIII. i-*. mostly textbook work. Fortunately for this, the school uses a good textbook. The foundation work of each of the other sciences should also be developed in the elementary schools, in such degree as possible, both the reading and the demonstration work. In the high school, the preliminary work is much over- developed. Each unit is so over-developed that it is not pos- sible for students to get the desirable preliminary over-view of each of the various sciences. Two, years of scienceare_ > rjre- scribed for all students ; but five sciences, each on the prelimin- ary level, and each taught for a full year, are offered. Students cannot well take more than two or three. The list of five seems not sufficiently to include bacteriology, entomology, the civic, arid economic aspects of biology, etc. Because of the over-de- velopment of each of the units of preliminary training it largely fails of its purpose. Moreover, it takes up such a quantity of the time as to preclude the development of functional science based upon the practical situation in which the students pass their days. Neither the laboratory science, the reading material, nor the observation work in the science department relate in any considerable degree or in any conscious degree to the practical problems of the people of the community. The sciences taken by the high school student do give the necessary preliminary over-view; but certainly as much or practically as much could be had in a half year, were the work organized consciously for labors of the preliminary type. The law of diminishing returns enters in so fully into the second semester of this preliminary science that there are doubts of its advisability as now given. The time should be saved for func- tional science studies. The science teachers of the high school should be the super- visors of the science work in the grades. Naturally this will be only in the upper grades and carried on by specially trained departmental teachers. This method of organization will permit an organic unfoldment of the science work from the grammar giades through the high school. In the grades, the preliminary foundation will be broad and the functional applications will be THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 157 relatively narrow. As one grows up through the high school, these relative proportions will be just reversed. The plan presented is one that is being worked out in our most progressive school systems. It is not one that can be sud- denly inaugurated and introduced into a city. It must be a growth. One must, however, see the plan in total outline in o v der to provide for the few steps of growth next year, and the few additional steps the year beyond, etc., etc. If teachers will go only as far as they can see ahead, when they have reached that point, then they can see further ahead, and see what next to do. If asked to work the whole matter out within a short time, they would simply be bewildered and the work demoralized. We do not press the suggestion that these recommendations be adopted as they stand ; we present them rather with the sug- gestion that those in authority over the teaching of the science in the schools consult the leaders of educational thought, both the professional leaders and the social-minded lay leaders as to what they think of the validity of such recommendations. DRAWING IN THE ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS. Eight and three-tenths percent of the elementary school time ir devoted to drawing. The current annual investment is in the neighborhood of $35,000. The subject has not been long in the course. This may ex- plain its apparently very much undeveloped condition. I say apparently ; as a matter of fact, I was unable to observe much of it. The subject seemed very elusive and with two exceptions was never gofng on in a building during my visit. Children's drawing seemed not to have accumulated during the term in the school-rooms in the fashion that is usual where superior work is being done. The training is important. Applied design plays a large part nowadays in human life. For many labors it is as needful at mathematics or science. For all it is valuable for developing an appreciation of the aesthetic aspects of the visual world in which one moves and acts. 158 CHAPTER VIII. Although having seen too little of the work to pronounce judgment as to its efficiency, I am definitely of the opinion that the work in the subject should be carefully looked into by those in supervisory authority. The size of the annual investment and the probable degree of inefficiency are large enough to war- rant serious examination. The main thing probably is to get constructive advice as to what to do in such a course from suc- cessful drawing supervisors in cities that have had time for a full development of the subject. LATIN. The city is recovering normally from the Latin superstition. Twice as many students take modern languages instead. Owing to the subtlety of the educational questions involved, it is neces- sary to enter into them very fully or omit discussion altogether. Under the circumstances the latter seems preferable for the pres- ent. Let us merely state a few probable conclusions from such arguments : 1. The major portion of needed knowledge of Latin etymology as this exists in English words should be mastered in connection with English word-study. 2. It is admitted that professional men such as physicians, lawyers, pharmacists, etc., can master their Latin terminology directly without need of a long intermediary Latin course. 3. A moderate number of students should take some Latin. 4. Most of these should take but one year; or at most a year and a half. For these students' needs, the content of the course needs to be radically changed. The purpose of taking it must dominate in the choice of study materials and methods. 5. The high school should devise a profitable short credit course in this subject. The present three-years-or-nothing course is justified for very few students indeed. THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 159 SPANISH. Spanish is a living language in San Antonio. Because of the nearness of the city to Mexico the language will always be used by a considerable portion of the population for commercial and social purposes. There is a double problem. On the one hand, there are the children of Spanish and Mexican parentage, between the ages of seven and seventeen to the number of about 9,000. For these, Spanish is their mother tongue, and all that is needed is per- fecting and developing their use of it, and training in the read- ing and writing of it. On the other hand, there is that portion of the population to whom Spanish is wholly a foreign tongue, but who can see commercial and social advantages in possessing it. For both types of students the work is now begun in the fifth grade, and is carried on in the same manner. It probably should begin at different times for these two types of students, and be carried on in a somewhat different manner. It is alto- gether possible that the children in the Mexican schools such as the Navarro and the Brackenridge-Memorial should begin the reading, writing, and spelling of the Spanish in the first grade at the same time that they begin the reading, writing, and spelling of the English language. As they read a number of primers and first readers in English they might at the same time read a number of primers and first readers in the Spanish. The latter to them is more of a living tongue than the former and will serve in fact as a better basis for learning the mechanics of writ- ten language. As the work proceeds through second, third, fourth, and later grades in reading, there can be no visible rea- son why their reading might not sometimes be in Spanish sup- plementary textbooks. Since training in the correct use of a language as described in a previous chapter comes not so much from a study of the grammar as from actual use of the language for expression, it would appear that with these Spanish-speak- ing pupils the recitations in geography, history, arithmetic, etc., together with the written papers in connection with these sub- jects should often be in the Spanish language as well as in the 160 ' CHAPTER VIII. English. For these students, both are living languages and both should be taught in the way that is necessary for obtaining com- mand of a living language. After a certain point is reached for these people, not much would be required beyond a continuity of outside but supervised home-reading of Spanish books, news- papers and magazines. On the expression side, oral and written, the work might be confined simply to the elimination of errors of speech. The home life and general social life would take care of the fundamental practice training. To those to whom the Spanish is not their native tongue, the schools perhaps do well in beginning the work with the fifth grade. This is in line with common custom in progressive school systems. But wherever begun for these pupils, the schools labor under a tremendous handicap. A language is rightly learned only where it is naturally spoken in connection with the things and objects to which it refers. The school-world is an artificial world. Not a great deal of the world as a whole can be transferred to the school. Not a great deal of the natural conversational topics and objects of reference are found at the school. The teachers of the beginning Spanish classes are using excellent methods so far as it is possible to use them under school conditions. They have the school-rooms to talk about, the school buildings, the school yard, the furniture, the parts of the body, series of pictures, etc. There is a sufficient variety of these things at hand for the beginnings of the work in the fifth grade, and a good foundation can here be laid for a spoken un- derstanding of the language. This teaching conversation is, however, of nesessity a bit artificial. After the first few months of novelty wears off, and they have become familiar with the various objects in view and the simple actions that they can per- form, the active work palls and interest wanes. They need to go on to new things and new situations ; but they have used up all that are within scholastic reach. For these pupils 'there is often no outside fundamental Spanish language-experience in which they freely mingle. The whole thing, fundamental experience as well as supplemental training, must be developed at the school. This is a practical THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 161 impossibility. Much can be done, but there can be no adequate substitute for actual association with Spanish-speaking people as the fundamental basis of the training. The nearest substitute that can be had after the preliminary conversational work is covered is reading of a copious, interest- ing, and varied character. The children beginning with the high fifth grade and continuing on as long as they continue their Spanish studies need to have a great wealth of stories of a degree cf difficulty and of a quality or character fitted to their degree of maturity and their special interests. A part of their literary training should be arranged for in connection with this particular class ; and to give variety of topics covered in the reading, va- nety of vocabulary, and variety of expression, some of the his- tory reading of these students should be in Spanish and the reci- tations in the Spanish tongue. These recitations would probably best be partly oral and partly in writing, using the Spanish as the medium. To give other aspects of vocabulary and other kinds of serious practice, there should occasionally be long read- ings together with oral and written recitations in geography, in hygiene and sanitation, in popular sciences, in current events, even in arithmetic, etc. It can all be done by the Spanish teacher using supplementary textbooks in Spanish. The thing needed is a variety of contacts with reality which the students can take seriously. iWhen the class runs out of objects in the school-room and about the school grounds, they can get into contact with imaginary objects by looking beyond the school grounds into the objects of history, geography, literature, and other things. It is merely an imaginative extension of the logical beginnings in the fifth grade ; but a sound extension. Current events, using the local Spanish papers as the basis of the work, may probably be the most valuable of these various reading and discussion exercises. We are not recommending that more time be given to the subject than is now given. We are only recommending that more reality be employed as the basis of the teaching, so that the reading may be more interesting and the expression more vital. When this is done, the amount of time that is now used will bring forth larger results. As a matter of 162 CHAPTER VIII. fact too much time is now given to the subject by many pupils, because of this lack of vitality. There are students beginning with the fifth grade, who carry Spanish through the high school, devoting seven years to the subject. This is entailing an undue expense upon the city for what in many cases is a very proble- matical benefit. Spanish is one of the easiest of modern lan- guages. Most of those who take Spanish as a foreign tongue will have relatively little need of it, either commercially, socially, or for the leisure occupation of reading Spanish literature. The majority ought to get all that they need in much less time than is now devoted to it. For a few, however, whose vocations or social relations will bring them into frequent direct contact with Mexican affairs, the training needs to be full, bringing them to a high standard of fluency and accuracy. These are the exceptions and not the rule. For them the same kind of training is needed as for those whose needs are smaller. Simply, they ought to take the full length of the course, while the others should be com- pelled to stop, so far as the public investment goes, at a con- siderably lower level. Beyond a certain level the training is special vocational training. The city is justified in giving spec- ialized vocational training only to those who consider using such training. The need of employing some such method of giving variety of reading and of expression can be observed by anyone who will study the situation. I visited a certain fifth grade class that was being taught by an excellent teacher. The work that was being done was conversational, natural, and of a very superior character. The pupils were making large progress, although they had been studying the subject for less than four months. I visited another seventh grade class taught by the very same superior teacher. She was using as the basis of the work a widely used Spanish book especially prepared for elementary schools, which contains in a condensed way a little discussion about a very great variety of social, industrial, and domestic situations. These situations are chosen for the purpose of ex- panding the vocabulary. The reading, however, is didactic. It cannot possibly be interesting to any normal mind. The teacher THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS _ 163 tried to use the things there set down as the basis for conversa- tional discussion by way of practicing pupils in the uses of the new words there employed. The pupils, however, a superior grade of students from the best social class in San Antonio simply could not give their attention to things of no appeal. They could not take the things seriously enough for real con- versation. The teacher labored heroically and it seems to me a^ wisely as was possible under the circumstances to bring the students to a serious consideration of the things being read so as to permit the necessary conversational practice. Their rest- lessness and their indifference, however, seemed impervious to either artifice or persuasion. About all the teacher could do was to have them read and continue to read from the pages of the book. As training of these pupils the time was largely wasted, for the majority of them. Two things were mostly to blame. One was the use of reading materials that were meaningless and useless except as mere gymnastic drills. They needed reading materials that they could take seriously ; materials read for the sake of the in- formation to be obtained ; or readings for the interest in the story. When the reading materials are of these types it can be made to serve as the basis of discussion and recitation, just as history written in English can be used as the basis of discussion and recitation. The evil discovered could be cured by the city's purchasing for the library of every school where Spanish is taught a variety of easy stories for the pupils to read, and a variety of subject matter readings such as listed above; and by the students bringing Spanish newspapers to the school as the basis of a portion of the work. The two things needed in conec- tion with the reading are far greater copiousness and a far greater contact with actual realities. The second thing needed is a rigorous selection of the students who take the Spanish courses, whether in elementary school or in the high school. The course should be difficult to get into and easy to get out of. It should be difficult for a student to remain in the course if he is not taking the work seri- ously and making real progress. At the present time there is 164 a general regulation of a most unjustifiable character, to the effect that "all subjects begun by pupils below the high school must be carried through the prescribed primary and grammar school courses until the subject is completed in accordance with the course of study." Students often enter the Spanish classes because of a passing whim on their part or on the part of the parents. After beginning the work, they cannot drop it without leaving school altogether. The marks they make in Spanish have no effect upon their general passing grade. They simply pass on through the Spanish classes, fifth, sixth, and seventh grades ; passive, idle, careless, doing little for them- selves, wasting the time of the teacher, wasting their own time, acquiring vicious habits of study, acquiring a highly undesir able attitude of mind t and preventing good work on the part of the few who actually want to master the Spanish. The evil ed- ucational effects of such a regulation for half the students who lose interest and do not actually pursue the subject possibly off- sets the good effect of beginning the work in the elementary school for those who actually want to master the Spanish. The city is now investing about $8,000 a year in teaching Spanish in the elementary schools. Half of this is not given, however, to the teaching of Spanish. It is expended upon pupils who are making little or no attempt actually to learn the language, and from whom the expenditure ought to be withdrawn the instant that they decline to do the work in proper fashion. Were this done, and also were classes in the subject organized every year instead of every half year so as to permit larger classes in the elementary schools, or if the Spanish teaching was taken care of at certain centers only in the case of quite small classes, it would be possible to accomplish all the actual elementary Span- ish training that is now being accomplished with half the present community cost. The city should save the $4,000 that it is now wasting upon the indifferent ones and spend it for the necessary books and magazines for the actual training of those who are trying to profit by the facilities so generously offered by the city. For these diligent ones, actual results could thereby easily be quadrupled. THE TEACHING OF CERTAIN SUBJECTS 165 GERMAN. German is also a living tongue in San Antonio. A fairly large proportion of the children in school are of German parent- age. There is no reason to think, however, that German will remain a living language on the part of any considerable portion or the population of the city. The children now growing up are or' the second and third generations. Our American tongue is now more nearly their vernacular than the parental German. There is no nearby German border to keep the language alive, as in the case of the Spanish. The foreign commerce of San An- tonio is very inconsiderable, so that it is not needed as a com- mercial language. It is, however, a means of social communication on the part of German residents in the city with their relatives in Ger- many. It is a language in which much of the learning of the world is written. It possesses a large and valuable literature. Knowledge of the language on the part of the younger genera- tion keeps it in closer sympathy with the parental generation. All these are justifications of the city's course in giving German beginning with the fifth school grade to the children of Ger- man parentage. If parents are anxious that children learn it the work is greatly facilitated, since the fundamental knowledge is obtained in the general social conversation in the home and the wider social circle. Schools for these children need only to give that quantity of grammar necessary for correct use of the spoken and written German, to give practice in the writing of the lan- guage and to guide in forming habits of reading German litera- ture. For these children the work can be accomplished in a man- ner similar to that already explained for the teaching of English ai.-d of Spanish. For these children to whom German is a living tongue, there should be in the library of the schools a copious amount of German reading adapted to the level of maturity and t(, the interests of the children of the various ages, covering lit- erature, history, geography, industry, popular science, current events, etc. The grammar taught should be of the type explained 166 CHAPTER vni. in connection with the teaching of English, and employing simi- lar methods. If German parents are not sufficiently interested in the mat- ter as to use the German as a large portion of the language of the home, then it would seem strange if they should expect the S( hools to take up the full task of training the children in the spoken use of the tongue. Language teaching like certain other things we have discussed can only be partially transferred in its fundamentals to the school. Language lives naturally only where the things and the ideas are found to which it refers. One gets his fundamental language training only as his language experi- ences are in direct contact with living situations. The schools can take a living language so learned and perfect its use; but they lack the necessary conditions for effective practice. They Ir'bor under the large handicap referred to in the previous section. There is the same general handicap in the training in Ger- man of those of non-German parentage, to whom it is a foreign language. The method to be employed is wholly analogous to that already described in the section 'above concerning the Spanish. On the one hand, there should be provision for the necessary reading, recitation, discussion, debate, and social con- verse in the German tongue. This will mean a purchase by the city for the libraries of a large quantity of German reading ma- terial, both books and magazines. The children themselves ought tu furnish the constant current supply of German newspapers. On the other hand, the course for the non-German children should be seriously pursued by them or the privilege should be withdrawn. The regulation that the language once begun must be continued for the three years of the elementary school should bt rescinded. Instead of its being hard to get out of the work once begun, it should be hard to enter it, and easy to drop out the moment indifference appears. GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 167 Chapter IX. GENERAL ORGANIZATION AND ADMINISTRATION. As one reads the minutes of the Board for recent years and the published Rules and Regulations, it is clear that the school city is fortunate in having intelligent and liberal-minded general management. A city that can show so many progressive educa- tional developments is moving along the right road. And yet there appears to be some lack of balance in the distribution of responsibilities. The various individuals upon whom responsi- bility rests are shown in Chart VIII. 168 CHAPTER IX. Chart VIII. /W ofer^rxX^^j- \&*,L f I \S^',S*f,~\ I ' I ' GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 169 In the distribution of responsibility among the various in- dividuals represented in this chart, three things can be said with considerable confidence : 1. Certain functions are performed by the state that would better be performed by the school board and superintendent. This is notably the case in the choice of textbooks. These latter are the tools of instruction. Every city of the size and import- ance of San Antonio should have the right to choose the tools that are to be used. It is impossible to have one set of textbooks that will equally serve the purposes of all social classes within the scholastic population of even the city of San Antonio. The textbooks used in the Navarro School should many of them be quite different from those used in the Travis School ; and these in turn different from those used in the Grant School. When this is the case within a single city it js certainly very much more the case in a state so large as Texas, with its rural and urban population, its agricultural and its industrial regions. The state does not require uniform desks, uniform chalk, uniform build- ings, uniform qualifications of teachers, etc. Cities are permitted in these matters to fit means to needs ; but in textbooks alone which are the most immediate means 6f instruction, the state has unwarrantably interfered in the educational rights of the city That neither board, superintendent nor teachers are free to - choose the most essential tools that they are to use in the work for which they are held responsible is a most glaring absurdity. < There is only one way out, in all probability. The city will have to furnish the tools of instruction just as it now furnishes the buildings, fuel, chalk, teachers, janitors, repairs, etc. After spending so much on these matters, it is rather short-sighted not to furnish a proper assortment of the instruments needed for instruction. The result is that a very large part of the investment is wasted. Teachers' salaries in San Antonio are much higher than they were twenty years ago. New buildings and the up- keep of buildings and grounds are far more expensive than they .were then. It is probable that the quality of the results have not kept pace with the increase in cost. This is largely due to the . fact that the textbook situation has not improved in any extra- 1/0 _ CHAPTER IX. ordinary degree. The situation in fact is not greatly different from what it was twenty years ago. The schools have been making rapid progress on the side, of those matters that are taken care of at public expense. Schools have always been backward and always will be backward in improving those things that are left as individual burdens upon the parents. The tools of in- struction of a twentieth-century character should provide for ten times as much reading_matter as th_jjitiquated tgxtbooks of the past which linger into the present. They do linger and they will linger' so long as they must be individually purchased by the parents. For the school city not to improve the means of instruction is to throw away a third at .least of the large ex- penditures already made. If the school city should set to work t investigate and to put into practice every kind of improvement possible in the various instruments of instruction, it is altogether probable that the city could get done all that is now done in half the teaching time that is now expended and at not more than two-thirds of the expense. Outside of the choice of textbooks, it seems that the state has given the education functions rather liberally over to the school city. 2. A second thing that can be said with reference to the distribution of educational responsibilities is that the school board and the general community have given over certain essen- tial functions in altogether too great measure to the superintend- ent, principals, and teachers. Chief among these delegated re- sponsibilities which oiight not to be so fully given over to the professional people is the formulation of the curriculum. So completely has the function been given over to the school people that the schools have in much of the work been permitted to drift into academic eddies apart from the currents of practical affairs. The schools have been permitted to teach a number of expensive things that can be of little use to anybody. They have been left too much to give what they pleased, without looking to what the men and women of the city actually need. In previous sections we have pointed to the waste that results from letting the schools force algebra and geometry upon all GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 171 high school students ; in requiring three years of Latin if any is taken ; in giving portions or kinds of history, science, civics, etc., which are not sufficiently related to the world in which men and women actually move and act ; in the growth of an artificial, wasteful methodology in the elementary school. But these wastes constitute only half the story. ' For the other half, there is the failure of the schools to put into the training of a twentieth-century generation so many of the additional things that they are going to need for meeting present-day problems. The things have been pointed out rather fully in previous chap- ters. The schools are agents of the public. The general public directly and through the school board should keep the schools informed as to what the youth of the city are going actually to need when they arrive in the world of affairs. It is the business men of the community who ought best to know what is needed by those who are to enter business. The committees on education of the business men's organizations should formu- late statements of needs and give them over to the schools. The tradesmen, members of trades organizations, etc., are the ones who know best what is needed by those who are to be success- ful in the various mechanical, factory, and building trades. They should likewise feel their responsibility for voicing the educational needs of their class. In the matter of home work, it is intelligent house-wives who ought to know most. They need to be concerned in the drawing up of the system of train- ing that will actually reach the needs of their daughters. It is the civic and social leaders of the community who ought to know best the actual needs of the city on the side of civic and social training of youth. It is the physicians of the city who ought to be able to say with the greatest authority what train- ing in hygiene and sanitation should be given to the children. It is the guardians of law and order at the head of which stand the judges who ought to know most about the things in which men need training in order that they may be self-regulating. In general, communities do not look at their schools in a sufficiently matter-of-fact way. There seems to be a certain 172 CHAPTER IX. superstition in most communities as to the magical power of schools to use certain kinds of useless flummery in bringing forth things of superior value. Communities, however, are re- covering from this superstition. They are coming to see that the development of such powers as are needed is as much a productive task as the labors of a factory or a farm. The factory will produce only the things that are aimed at. The farm will produce only the particular things that are cultivated. A school likewise will bring forth only the things that are aimed at de- finitely. These should be just the things needed ; and the com- munity should not be willing to accept a substitute with the usually deceptive statement that it is just as good, or even better. 3. Third, in the distribution of responsibilities, there are very many easy routine functions performed by the board and its committees which ought to be given over to the executive em- ployees of the board. For these executives the board will lay out the lines of general policy. It will expect its agents to administer the routine matters in accordance with these general instructions. In reading over the minutes of the board for the last two years, one meets with such matters as the following, which are taken care of by the board in their meetings, but which would better be taken care of through general legislation : 1. Approval of the high school commencement program. One would think that if the school principal and superintendent cannot be trusted to approve the high school commencement program the board has made a mistake in its choice of these officials. 2. Permission for the expert adviser of the school board from the State University to deliver a free lecture in the high school auditorium. It would seem that a principal or superin- tendent ought to be able to make such decision in ten seconds as a non-debatable routine duty. 3. Making emergency repairs of a minor nature. If .the superintendent of buildings and grounds cannot be trusted to use his discretion and judgment in the making of minor emer- gency repairs, he ought at once to be replaced by somebody in whom the board can have confidence. GENERAL ( )kr, ANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 173 4. Consideration of requests for distributing advertising mattter in the schools. Consideration of requests for announc- ing things of a commercial nature in the schools. These matters ought to be covered by general legislation of the board. The business agent ought to be able to answer any such inquiries a^ a portion of his routine duties. 5. The high school asks permission to use its own audi- torium for repeating an entertainment designed to raise funds. Considering the fact that the board expects the principals of the buildings to raise funds for supplementary books, pianos, etc., through entertainments, the thing in the abstract is approved of. It seems strange that the board would hire a high school prin- cipal of such calibre that he cannot be trusted to make decisions ae to the giving of entertainments in his own building. A high school principal ought to be a man of as sound judgment as school board members. 6. The principal of one of the elementary schools peti- tioned the board to give the usual Christmas entertainment at his school. This could easily be covered by general legislation. A better plan would be to hire only principals who possess dis- cretion, and let anybody go who knows himself not to possess it. 7. The girls of an elementary school presented a petition for laying out a tennis court upon the grounds at one of the schools. The principal ought himself to be able to make de- cisions. I went through the minutes of the board for the last year and a half, and classified matters covered under two headings : (1) Things that should be taken care of by the board; (2) Things that might be delegated to executive officials. Of mat- ters of the first type which the board should retain, the list of items comprised 35 percent of the whole. Of things that might well be delegated, the list comprised 65 percent, or twice as many. These latter are routine matters that can be taken care of rapidly and easily by responsible executive officers. They need supervision, certainly ; but the board has chosen the wrong men if they have to do more than supervise. The agents 174 CHAPTER IX. ought to be more expert than the board ; and to be able to make right decisions more expeditiously and with fewer mistakes. Laymen can supervise intelligently many things that they can- not do intelligently. We do not recommend that the school board have fewer meetings, or shorter meetings, or that it. take care of a less amount of business.. In my opinion the serious matters con- fronting the school city of San Antonio cannot be adequately taken care of by the board in less than the liberal amount of time that is now given to it. They need to place the routine functions into expert executive hands, in order that they may have more time for the larger board functions to which we re- ierred in the previous section. Many things have been delegated to the school people which ought to be kept in the hands of board and community ; and many things have not been delegated to the school people which ought to have been. We are suggest- ing that the board give up the petty routine things to which they hold and undertake the matters of large serious responsi- bility relating to the curriculum and the provision of the means necessary for efficiently carrying out the work. We recommend that the board take care of the large problems of general policy rather than the little problems of specific application. By giv- ing so much time to the latter, the board consumes time needed by the former. Such weaknesses as exist in the schools of San Antonio stem to be due in large measure to the state of tutelage in which practically everybody from superintendent down has been held. The state has decreed the studies that shall be taught in ele- mentary schools; and the textbooks that shall be used. The colleges have decreed the subjects and the units which shall be given in the high schools. The board has held most powers of initiative except as to the routine class-room teaching. Teach- ers and supervisors have had too much to go like children and get permission to do almost anything that they do. They have largely been forbidden the exercise of individual responsibility and initiative. Visible responsibility is not a thing that will grow in such an atmosphere. Things will not be corrected until GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 175 responsibility can be so distributed that everybody can bear his due share. What ought to be the relation of the various members of the school organization to each other? What is the proper subordi- nation of the various individuals ? In this age of scientific management, it can be partially represented by the diagram in Chart IX. 176 CHAPTER IX. Chart IX. 7-0 4. * crcs I if 7 /?*> GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 177 Over all of the individuals concerned in the education of the children of the city, there is the body of scientific educa- tional information as it applies to conditions in San Antonio, Efficiency of labor consists merely in obeying the dictates of that science. The much-heralded scientific management is noth- ing- but the management by science. Officials do not obey the arbitrary dictates of other officials ; they obey that which is over and above all officials. Further, officials do not act only as they are ordered to act by persons above them ; they act in obedience to that which incessantly sits in authority and cease- lessly gives its orders. With scientific management, there is diminished need of the subordination of persons to other persons. Instead of this, there is the subordination of all to impersonal dictates. This is one of the most striking features of organization under scien- tific management. The other most striking thing is the dis- tribution of responsibility for the details of the work. This responsibility is distributed to those who are in a position to be most familiar with the work to be performed. In the man- \ agement of a school system, certain functions should be held by / the community because they are the ones in a position best to know those things. Other matters should be given to the sup- / erintendent because he is in a more advantageous position for \ understanding those things. Initiative in other matters belongs to the principals and special supervisors because of their prox- imity to the facts. Responsibility for still other things must necessarily be placed upon the teachers, because they are nearest to the facts concerned. Still other things, even, must be left to the pupils for the reason that they know most about certain things involved. We are thus given a criterion of judgment as to the right placing of every function that is to be performed. Yet they are not shifted from the shoulders of all others merely because they are placed upon specific ones. Scientific management pro- vides a democratic co-operative arrangement. All are special- ists within the field, working side by side for common ends. As in the co-operative carrying of any burden, when one fails 178 CHAPTER IX. to perform his function adequately because of a lack of under- standing, responsibilty for performing this function falls auto- matically upon those who do understand. Making responsibility definite under this plan does not relieve -the other members of the organization. When a teacher fails, the responsibility falls back upon the principal to get the work done, by bringing up the teacher's knowledge, by disciplining her, or by replacing her with someone else. When a principal fails to live up to the responsibilities which the scientific demands place upon him, the responsibility falls automatically upon the superintendent. If the superintendent fails, then the responsibility automatically falls upon the board. If the board fails, the responsibility rests back on the generaLpublic to make good the deficiency. Scien- tific management is no respecter of the legalities of the place- ment of functions. The total responsibility for the work is placed upon all ; and when one fails anywhere along the line, the total responsibility distributes itself over all the others. Looking at the matter from the other point of view, if the school board and community fail to do their part in defining the educational needs of the children of the community, then the superintendent and teachers do not escape the responsibility simply because they have not received their orders from their employers. The body of educational science is commanding them to their labors just as fully as if the community was per- forming its part. What the community does not perform, it is incumbent upon them to undertake. The responsibility falls heavy upon the superintendent in such a case. He not only has his own legitimate labors to carry but also the arduous and pro- fessionally dangerous task of educating the community to a realization of its responsibilities. When the superintendent fails to perform his portion of the educational task, the principals and teachers are not thereby relieved of their responsibility. The body of educational science commands them to their labors just as fully as ever. Simply, they lack certain overhead help which they must make good in some other manner if it is not extended. If superintendent and principals are both inefficient, this in no wise relieves the teach- GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 179 ers of their responsibility. They must none the less do their labors in full obedience to the educational science as it applies to them. Each individual, wherever he is along the line, reads his orders, not in arbitrary instructions from officers, but in the educational science as it applies to their labors. The assembling of this science and the making it clear to the various persons concerned is no easy task. It alone, however, can be the basis of educational efficiency in a democracy, if this is ever attained. THE SUPERINTENDENT. The superintendent occupies a position of peculiar respon- sibility. He is the intermediary between the public and their schools. His function resembles that of the architect as in- termediary between owner and contractor. He must verify the validity of the demands of the community. He must then reconcile the demands with educational possibilities. He must take all the suggestions given by the community and then em- body them in a workable educational program. This the com- munity cannot do ; neither can it be done by the board. Just as an architect in the case of a building, they lack the special qualifications for the expert adjustment of the details. Com- munity and board can tell what they want; then under their supervision the superintendent will draw up the courses of study, select the textbooks to be used, select the supplementary books, apparatus, equipment, select teachers who have the neces- sary qualifications for doing the work desired, etc. Recurring to our former principle of scientific management, it is he who is in a position best to understand these various technical educa- tional matters. The responsibility for the labors should neces- sarily be placed upon his shoulders, with those less expert sit- ting in supervisory capacity. In thus placing responsibility upon the superintendent, the board is not thereby relieved. They must approve or disapprove of the results of his labors. In order to judge wisely, they must be in contact with the schools. They must* know his actual 180 CHAPTER IX. labors, not his mere statement of them. They should visit the schools, observe, discuss, and lead in community discussion. Unless they know rather intimately the way their suggestions work out in actual educational practice, they are not in a position to approve or disapprove of the decisions of the superintendent/ School board members are not supposed to be mere rubber- stamps, blindly approving or disapproving. They must know what is going on. The responsibilities of the superintendent indicate the quali- fications that he should possess. He needs to know the world of men and of affairs as fully as he knows children and books and educational processes. He must be an expert in the needs of society and in the means and methods of education, a scien- tific specialist with wide social vision and understanding. In the performance of what kinds of duties wrll the super- intendent spend most of his professional time? On the one hand, he will mingle with men of all social classes by way of familiarizing himself with the educational needs of all social classes. Second, he will study the workings of education pro- cesses as these exist in the various school-rooms in the city. Third, he will adjust the educational processes to the needs of the population as fully and as accurately as his studies of both will permit. Like the expert hospital physician he will spend most of his time in studying the factors of the situation and in making decision as to what is to be done. - He will be an observer, an investigator, and a director. Most or all of the routine labors will be carried out by others. He will spend little time in his office. He will spend little time in actually direct- ing the work of the class-room teachers. He will, however, spend very much of his time within class-rooms by way of seeing how general policies are being carried through by principals, special supervisors, and teachers. For this direction of the situation and for these expert judgments as to things to be carried out by his assistants he must also read widely as to the practices of other cities; and he should have opportunities for visiting the work of progressive cities for the sake of ideas. In a word, the superintendent of the schools in San Antonio must be the r.KNERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 181 specialist par excellence in all the wide range of educational science, as this applies to conditions within San Antonio ; and out of this superior knowledge it is for him to make the decis- ions used for guiding the work within the schools of the city. As related to persons, his supervision will have chiefly to do with the principals and special supervisors. His function will be to keep the work of each of these up to standard. Princi- pals and supervisors will then pass the things on to the teachers. Investment in this expert direction is the one thing in which the school board can least afford to economize. THE ASSISTANT SUPERINTENDENT. San Antonio needs an assistant superintendent. In order that the superintendent be relieved of routine responsibility it i-j necessary that there be someone of large educational under- standing to take care of the routine work of the office; the correspondence; the consultations with parents, principals, teach- ers, etc., concerning personal or other minor matters ; consulta- tions with supply agents ; consultations with prospective new teachers by way of weeding out all of those except the promis- ing ones who naturally would go before the superintendent ; and, in co-operation with the business agent of the board, drawing up forms and taking care of the work of statistical investigation and appraisal. For a fairly large portion of his time, the assist- ant superintendent would be engaged in active supervision of the work of the buildings of the city. With the primary supervisor looking after the first three grades, as it might well be arranged, the assistant superintendent might look after the other four grades as his special supervisory responsibility. Since the assistant superintendent along with the business agent will be responsible for conducting what is in certain cities now called the Bureau of Investigation and Appraisal, it is de- sirable that he be not only a man of practical experience, but also be well-informed as to the latest developments in the applica- tion of measurement to the problems of supervision ; an expert in educational accounting of every type ; and also trained in ed- 182 CHAPTER DC. ucational psychology, educational methods, and in the problems o* educational administration. The chief problem is finding a man for such a position. To get a cheap man for the work would be mostly a waste of money. While there are many men who are well-equipped for the task, they generally prefer college and normal school positions because of the uncertainty of tenure in our city systems as at present managed. THE BUILDING PRINCIPAL. Each principal should be to his district what the super- intendent is to the entire city. It is desirable that he have within his district the same type of social outlook, the same variety of social contacts, and that he should exercise the same kind of social leadership. He should know the social condi- tions and the social needs of his district in order rightly to adjust the work. Covering a smaller area, his knowledge of people and their affairs is necessarily much more detailed and exact. Within his special district, he is more an authority upon social needs than can be the superintendent. In the adjustment, therefore, of the educational work to his building, the recom- mendations of the superintendent must in part be classified along- side those of the laymen. They represent the general outlines of things desirable to be done. The specific form of application, however, needs to be decided by the principal himself from his more intimate knowledge of the situation within the district. The principal will, therefore, take the recommendations of the super- intendent as to courses of study ; and within limits there set down will work up details of the course for himself so as to fit his own special problems. Likewise the principal should be per- mitted to choose those textbooks that will best adapt themselves to his particular courses of study; also the necessary supple- mentary books, as they are mistakenly called; the necessary printed helps; so far as administratively possible, choice of the teachers to be employed in his buliding so as to have teachers who are fitted for his special problems ; and the specific methods of work. GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 183 The superintendent's decisions should be sufficiently gen- eral and flexible as to apply to any school. The principal of that school will be the determiner of the details, all within the outline limits set by the superintendent's interpretations and decisions. And yet when the superintendent fails to do his part correctly, the responsibility for the general outlines falls ir: part upon the principal. This does not mean insubordination. It means only that discussion on the part of all concerned out of which alone the truth and the correct methods will be dis- covered. This needs to be emphasized because of the undesirable effects of the over-subordination so clearly discernible in the school organization. Efficiency and democracy are both pos- sible at the same time. At the present time the principals are limited in too many ways. Principals of Mexican and Negro schools are required in too large measure to teach the same grammar, the same read- ing lessons, the same handwriting, etc., that is given in all schools. The work is often wastefully ill-adapted to the needs of the pupils. Instead of limiting the principal's freedom, he should be forced to take the initiative ; and then held responsible by the others in supervisory authority. THE HIGH SCHOOL PRINCIPAL. The high school principal occupies a position of great re- sponsibility. Within the high school is accomplished the most vital portion of the education of the best youth of San Antonio. Previous to entrance into the high school they have been master- ing the tools and rudiments of knowledge. As they enter upon adolescence they begin to take on the adult points of view; and their serious education for adulthood may be said to begin. The four years from the age of thirteen or fourteen to seventeen or eighteen are the most critical of their educational years, even though they go on to college and professional school. It is at this age that their general outlook upon life will be shaped, their social and moral standards formed, their habits of body and mind largely fixed. The large majority of them will go 184 CHAPTER IX. direct from the high school into the world of affairs without further training; and will therefore need to be well-equipped for their, vocations, for their civic functions, their leisure occu- pations, etc. While the superintendent bears large responsibility here, yet he has many other important things to do. The high school principal needs to see the situation of youth in the city in the same wide social way required of the superintendent. No less than the latter he needs to be a man among men, mingling with all social classes. On the other hand, better than the superin- tendent he should know the needs of adolescence. He should be concerned with laying out the details of the courses of study in all subjects in the high school. He is responsible for the totality of the work ; he must therefore, lay down the lines of general policy for each of the high school departments. Within any given department, the head of the department and the teachers will take their readings of the community needs and the recommendations of the building principal, and they will embody them in more detailed courses of study for the use of their special classes. They will, however, confine themselves within the limits laid down by the principal himself. His super- vision will hold them there, so long as he is right. When he is wrong, responsibility automatically falls back upon them, and upon the superintendent. The high school principal should spend little time in his office during school hours. He should have no routine office work to do. The city cannot afford to pay $3000 for work that can be as well done by a $1200 clerk. The large problems of high school supervision are endlessly complicated and require the full attention and the full energies of the principal. SUPERVISORS OF SPECIAL SUBJECTS. The supervisors of special subjects will look to the needs of the entire city, just as does the superintendent; but each looks to but a special aspect of the city's life. This they will know intensively and minutely. Each should be the first author- GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 185 ity within the city as to the details of his subject. In a sense the superintendent approaches the special supervisors from the same direction as the layman. The superintendent sees the whole field in balanced proportion, and seeks to adjust every portion of the work to every other portion. But after laying out the general outlines, he has to leave to these assistants the ar- rangements of the details within the general outlines. Just as the general community and school board will supervise the superintendent, so the superintendent will supervise these special- ists, to see that in the detailed workings of their department they are actually carrying out the general policies that he has from his wider interpretation of the science laid out for them. At present certain of these supervisors appear either to have too 'much freedom or the superintendent has not laid out the general outlines of policy within which their work must find itself. Several of the special supervisorships in the city have grown out of extensions of the work of heads of departments in the high schools to the work of the grades. This is a thing that ought to be carried further. The heads of the high school science work might well be the supervisors of science teaching in the grades ; the heads of the history work might well supervise history work all the way down ; and so on with geography, civics, hygiene, mathematics, etc. It is a method of introducing vertical supervision alongside the horizontal supervision of primary supervisor, grammar grade supervisor, and principals of elementary and high schools. If they can get the scientific attitude of mind, there is no reason to fear conflicts of authority. Every difference of interpretation means friendly discussion until the truth can be found. TEACHERS. The teacher is to the families of the children in her charge what the principal is to the district, or what the superintendent is to the city. The teacher needs to be in social contact with the families so as to know the special problems relating to the 186 - CHAPTER IX. education of their children. She stands to them educationally in the relation that the family physician stands to them on the side of health. She cannot know how to adapt her labors to the situation of the children without being in contact with the fam- ilies. She cannot rightly control motives. She cannot properly relate the supplementary work of the school with the funda- mental educational influences about the children. The teacher should generally live within the district where she works ; and she should know the district intimately. ; This is, said with full knowledge of the suprise with which such a recommendation is viewed by teachers. Education has for so long been within a social vacuum, and with such indif- ference as to whether the work of the school relates itself to the life of the community, that to teachers at least this absurd isolation seems perfectly right and normal. The discussion of previous chapters shows why teachers should know the lives and home conditions of the children as fully as she knows books and educational methods. THE BUSINESS AGENT. Of the various employees of the board the business agent appears to be the one best informed as to principles of modern management. His system of financial accounting is thoroughly modern. He is carrying the same principles into the other fields of educational accounting as they refer to pupils, teachers, bulidings, supplies, etc. He is attempting to set up standards of various kinds in the light of which to judge the efficiency of the work in its various aspects. More than any other within the system he appears to realize that impersonal standards of judgment and impersonal science should control in the making of all decisions. The question of the proper subordination of the business agent in the literature of school administration remains un- settled. One writer would have him a co-ordinate of the super- intendent under the board, looking after the physical administra- tion; another would have him a subordinate of the superintend- GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 187 ent, looking after the material aspects of the things for which the superintendent is responsible. As a matter of fact, the ques- tion is of importance only so long as management is personal and arbitrary. In proportion as management becomes the appli- cation of impersonal scientific standards, the problem of the official subordination of the various individuals diminishes in importance. It is transmuted into the problem of the co-ordina- tion of specialists of equal rank. The business agent then be- comes simply one specialist among many, each having his special division of the work. Subordination is not a question that often needs to enter in. So long as his labors are in obedi- ence to the dictates of the best information relative to the things with which he deals, there can be no personal authority that can be so good as the dictates of this well-studied information. Those in supervisory authority will keep in touch with his labors to see that it is so controlled. SUPERINTENDENT OF BUILDINGS AND GROUNDS. There is a fairly large quantity of pretty well-defined science nowadays relating to school buildings. This science refers to drainage of grounds, surfacing of grounds, school fences, arrangements of trees and playgrounds, the lighting of school rooms, heating, ventilation, cleaning of buildings, the| control of blinds, the arrangement of the furniture in the rooms, the cMrection of light upon the desks, means of increasing the light where it is deficient, the height of black-boards, the quantity of black-boards, color arrangements of school rooms, aesthetic lines and proportions, etc., etc. These matters of science as they relate to school buildings are pretty well laid out in our books on the subject. Further, it is possible to have standards as to the number of square feet of black-board that can be repainted in a day, standards as to the cost per 100 square feet of calci- mining rooms, etc., etc., which should control in the supervision of the work. While things are generally well done, there was frequent evidence that this science is not always in active control of de- 188 CHAPTER IX. cisions. The quality of the lighting could not remain such as it it in certain of the rooms if the obtainable information were actually at work. The color schemes now so often found would not longer exist after the first re-decoration. Black-boards would not be placed too high in certain rooms, too low in others, and superposed one over another in such unsightly fashion as in School No. 6. The stove jackets would not lack their asbestos lining. New additions to buildings would not be placed so as to destroy the lighting of the original building, etc., etc. A superintendent of buildings and grounds needs to be pretty well-informed as to architectural science and design, sanitary science, particularly as related to schools, landscape gardening, and the relation of the buildings and grounds to the processes of education. JANITORS. In large measure the work of principals and teachers is the setting of conditions of right living as a fundamental means of education. Indispensable in this setting of conditions is the work of the janitor. He has much to do with the attractive- ness of the rooms, the school grounds, and the general surround- ings. He has large control over the lighting of the rooms, the ventilation, the sanitation of the buildings and grounds, etc. He has the task of keeping down dust, of disinfecting toilets and school rooms, of placing and adjusting school desks, of caring for the black-boards and erasers, of the general management of the basement in those schools that have basements, or regulating the temperature of the class-rooms. He needs to know the theory and management of .systems of ventilation ; how to oil floors and keep them in condition ; the necessity of sweeping compounds and how to make them; the control of plumbing fixtures; precautions to take against the spread of fires, etc., etc. Merely to be able to sweep a room does not make a janitor. He too needs a fairly large amount of technical information. Science should rule in the janitorial department just as fully as in any other. The superintendent of buildings, the school GENERAL ORGANIZATION & ADMINISTRATION 189 physician, etc., need to call the janitors together for instruction occasionally just as superintendent and principals call teachers together in .Saturday institutes. THE MEDICAL DEPARTMENT. The medical department has been sufficiently discussed i i the chapter on physical education. We wish here simply to point to the fact that this department is automatically disposed to follow the dictates of medical science as the basis of all of its work. In this obedience to science as the basis of its labors i^ sets a good example to the other departments of the educa- tional organization. It is not true that science ought to rule here in larger measure than in other departments. It ought to rule equally throughout all the work. 190 CHAPTER X. Chapter X. THE STUDENT POPULATION. No attempt was made to ascertain the effectiveness of the schools, public, private, and parochial, in reaching all the chil- dren in San Antonio. The task is the elaborate one that con- fronts the census-attendance department, now that the legisla- ture has passed a compulsory education law, The School Census. t The nature of the school census will depend upon the pur- poses that it is to serve. Hitherto, in San Antonio, about the only purpose of the annual enumeration has been the apportion- ment of the state school fund. For this purpose the only in- formation really needed was the number of students between the ages of seven and seventeen. Certain other facts have been obtained and tabulated, as for example: race, nationality of children, and distribution by wards, etc. These additional facts have been little used, however. So long as there has been no compulsory education law there has been little reason for collecting other facts beyond the mere enumeration of children. With the passage of the present compulsory school law, however, there arise other purposes for taking and keeping the school census. These new purposes will demand other facts not hitherto necessary. More- over, there will be a need of greater accuracy than that found in the usual school enumeration; and it will need to be a con- tinuous twelve months accounting of the children, instead of merely a one month affair. The attendance department will need records to show where all the children of the compulsory school ages are to be found in any week of the year ; records that will show for each pupil in what public, private or parochial school he is to be found ; or if of compulsory school age and not in school records to show why he is not in school. THE STUDENT POPULATION 191 More than in the past the school-city will have to adjust the size of buildings and the number of sittings to the total school census population. They will need to know with accuracy the number of children in the -district served by each school; and the number of children of the district that can be counted upon as a rule to attend private or parochial schools. As the population shifts and changes in different parts of the city, this continuous school census registration will permit the board to know beforehand how many rooms and * seats will be needed for the work of any term. The course of study, we are coming to see quite clearly, should be different for different races and classes of people, for reasons discussed in previous portions of this report. The census should show the nationality and occupational status of the people of each school district. Districts largely Mexican will need a curriculum that is in many respects different from that used by schools attended by children that are chiefly of Ameri- can or German parentage, and vica versa. Different treatment should also be accorded to children of abnormal type, the cripples, the tubercular, the mentally subnormal, etc. The census should show the numbers and the location of all of these abnor- mal and subnormal children. On the census chart no facts should be gathered except those for which there is seen to be a useful purpose. San Antonio is already gathering for that portion of the children now in the public schools about the proper assortment of facts ; and is already using the greater part of such a perma- nent and continuous registration of school children as is needed by the census attendance department. The work now done simply needs to be built out so as to serve all of 'the different purposes. On the present card Form B, Application for Admis- sion to School, are now obtained and on Forms D and E are now recorded the following^facts: (1) Name of child (surname first). (2) Sex of child. (3) Certified date of birth. (4) Age in years and months. 192 CHAPTER X. (5) Place of birth. (6) Name of parent or guardian. (7) Occupation of parent or guardian. (8) Residence, street and number. (9) School that he is attending. (10) Grade in school. (11) Physical condition. (12) Vaccination record. On the census attendance record chart should be recorded the above facts and only about four others : (13) Race or nationality. (14) Mental condition, when other than normal. (15) Reason, if not attending school. (16) If employed, where and at what labor. While such a list of facts is quite an extension of the num-. ber hitherto obtained on the census blanks, the purposes of obtaining them are now more numerous. It must be remembered further that for the 12,000 children now in the public schools these facts have already been gathered, excepting only the last four. The work already done should not be duplicated. For those 12,000 children the first census under the new law should simply be for the purpose of checking them up to see that they are accurate. Original records need to be obtained only from those children between seven and sixteen who are not in the public schools. For those beyond the compulsory school age but within the census age used for state apportionment, little is actually needed beyond the enumeration. When this work is done the census attendance office will have as the basis of its accounting of the school children a card record of every child of compulsory school age in the city. The card lists should be classified by schools, one set for each public, private and parochial school in the city; and one for children not in any school. The permanent and continuous census will then present a record for each school that will be an exact duplicate, so far as the list of facts extend, of the principal's office record cards, the face side of the white cards Form E as revised. When a pupil is transferred from one school THE STUDENT POPULATION '_ 193 to another, when he leaves for a private school, leaves school to go to work, or leaves for other purpose, notification will be sent in to the census attendance offices and this particular pupil's card can be removed from the office file of the school where it has hitherto been. When the report reaches the office of the pupil's enrollment in the school to which he goes the cards can then be re-filed in the proper place. Thus if the pupil does not report to the school to which he claims to be transferred the fact automatically registers itself in the office of the attendance offices. He can thus know exactly and at all times just where his efforts are needed for those already enrolled. The plan here recommended is simply an extension to the central office of the plan which is already in operation within the school be- tween the classrooms and the principal's office. It is thus pos- sible to keep an accurate up-to-date record of the children of the whole city that is to the entire city just what the principal's record is to his entire school. Private and parochial schools need to be furnished with the necessary duplicate record cards so that their records may at all times exactly parallel those of the permanent census at- tendance records. This record will be indispensable for the issuance of work certificates to those who have graduated from the elementary schools, are fourteen years of age or over,or who are otherwise exempted for this purpose from the action of the compulsory school law.- The continuous accounting of the school children herein recommended does away with the necessity of making an en- tirely new record of the children -in the census enumeration of each year. For the present, however, it appears from the terms of the city charter and of the state school law there must be a complete census each year. This can be used for the purpose of checking up the continuous census and for correcting it by adding the names of all children found of compulsory school age who* have not hitherto been registered, and for dropping off the list all who have left the city or who have attained an age beyond the upper limit of the compulsory school age. 194 CHAPTER X. Between these annual corrections of the census list the city will find at first a large and in part insoluble problem connected with keeping the list accurate. Families moving into the city having childern of school age may not report, and they may easily not be discovered. Children coming of school age during the year may not be discovered until months afterwards. Fami- lies may move without any notice of destination, and children may be lost from the records. Naturally the officer in charge of attendance will keep a lookout for all such unregistered children. He has no machinery however, short of a new complete census that will gather in all of these unregistered children. There is need of co-operation on the part of teachers, principals, supervisory officers, city police, owners of licensed moving and express wagons, etc. Until parents can be compelled under penalty to keep the author- ties informed as to the whereabouts of all children of school ages a continuous census record can be kept moderately accurate only with a very considerable amount of labor. Retardation. In certain schools, owing to the influx of non-English speaking Mexican children, the number of retarded and over-age children is very large. For some time the city has been employ- ing for certain schools a special teacher to take care of the ii -dividual needs of specially retarded children. In this respect, San Antonio has been following the best practice of the country. The new plan of employing the regular grade teachers for an extra hour per day for the work has much to be said in its favor. One of the practical questions that arises is, What are the buildings in serious need of this work ; and what are the ones that have little need of it. Table VII shows the percent of chil- dren over-age and under-age, rapid and slow, in each of the buildings. THE STUDENT POPULATION 195 Table VII. Age-Progress Situation in the Schools of San Antonio. Percent Percent Young Normal Old Rapid Normal Slow Svst em 5.3 44.2 50.5 13.8 40.6 45.6 Avenue E ... 14.0 50.0 36.0 49.1 21.9 28.9 Eleanor Brackenridge 16.2 61.8 22.0 24.3 45.6 30.1 Riverside Park 8.5 62.7 28.8 22.7 50.0 27.3 Crockett 8.8 53.1 38.0 30.7 40.6 Travis 10.3 60.6 29.1 21.4 41.3 37.3 Highland Park 10.3 52.1 37.6 23.4 38.3 38.3 Bonham 8.7 65.6 25.7 12.9 46.8 40.2 Fannin 6.5 58.9 34.5 13.3 53.0 33.7 Roberts-Beacon Hill 5.5 61.4 33.1 11.3 52.6 35.8 Burnet 9.4 51.4 39.1 18.2 40.3 41.5 Collins Gardens . .. 3.4 42.6 54.1 33.8 29.7 36.5 Manril 5.0 45.1 49.9 24.3 39.6 36.1 De Zavala 5.3 50.4 44.3 17.0 46.3 36.7 Smith 4.7 55.3 40.0 14.7 43.5 41.8 Ruiz 2.9 59.6 37.5 7.7 54.8 37.5 Harris -- 5.2 48.4 46.3 11.8 44.3 43.9 Herff - 7.5 53.0 39.6 7.2 44.1 48.6 Bowie 2.1 39.1 58.8 24.4 30.4 45.2 Austin - 6.9 46.3 46.8 4.8 52.0 43.2 Lamar. 8.6 42.9 48.4 11.7 33.2 55.2 Johnson .. 1.9 31.1 66.9 17.4 33.3 49.2 Milam 4.8 43.2 52.1 8.9 31.1 60.0 Briscoe 2.0 39.6 58.4 7.2 37.0 55.8 Houston 24.2 75.8 2.9 42.3 54.8 Brackenridge Memorial .4 21.1 78.6 3.2 36.6 60.2 Gonzales 1.6 22.4 76.0 1.6 31.2 67.2 Navarro . .3 19.5 80.2 2.3 31.7 66.0 196 CHAPTER X. Table VIII shows the excess or deficit in the progress of the pupils as compared with the average of the city. The buildings are arranged in the order of rank, those in which the progress is greatest being at the top. The last column shows the relative excess or deficit of progress as related to the average for the city. THE STUDENT POPULATION 197 Table VIII. Relative Standing of the Twenty-Seven Elementary Schools in the Progress of the Pupils Through the Grades Excess or deficit of percent Young Old Rapid Coeffici- ent of Slow Stand'* Avenue E 8.7 14.5 28.5 21.7 12.5 21.4 12.9 24.8 16.0 17.4 11.4 -3.6 .6 6.2 10.5 13.0 4.2 10.9 -8.3 3.7 2.3 -16.4 -1.6 -7.9 -25.3 -28.1 -25.5 -29.7 35.3 10.5 8.9 16.9 7.6 9.6 -.9 -.5 -2.5 4.4 20.0 10.5 3.2 .9 -6.1 -2.0 -6.6 10.6 -9.0 -2.1 3.6 -4.9 -6.6 -10.9 -11.6 -12.2 -11.5 16.7 15.5 18.3 16.9 8.3 7.3 5.4 11.9 9.8 4.1 9.1 9.5 8.9 3.8 8.1 1.7 -3.0 .4 2.4 -9.6 -3.6 -14.4 -10.2 -9.2 -14.6 -21.6 -20.4 75.2 65.4 52.1 49.8 42.3 34.8 32.7 28.6 24.9 24.0 23.6 20.3 18.3 146 12.6 3,8 3.5 -.5 -1.3 -6.1 -19,8 -21.4 -28.0 -50.7 -59.2 -63.0 -666 Eleanor Brackenridge Riverside Park 10.9 3.2 Crockett 3.5 Travis 5.0 Highland Park 5.0 Bonham 3.4 Fannin 1.2 2 Roberts Beacon Hill Burnet 4.1 Collins Gardens -1.9 Margil -.3 De Zavala .0 Smith -.6 Ruiz -2.4 Harris -.1 Herff 22 Bowie -3.2 Austin 1.6 L,amar 3.3 Johnson -3.4 Milani -.5 Briscoe -3.3 Houston -5.3 Brackenridge Memorial Oonzales -4.9 -3.7 Navarro -5.0 Deficit indicated by minus sign; excess, without sign. 198 CHAPTER X. Chart X. J6 ///// -*c Shows relative standing of schools in the matter of retardation. THE STUDENT POPULATION 199 ( )n Chart No. 10 is shown graphically the relative position 01 the various buildings in San Antonio. One can see at a glance where the pupils are backward in progress ; where they are moderately forward; and where they are highly successful as compared with the usual practice of the city. Clearly it is at the Navarro, the Gonzales, the Brackenridge Memorial, the Houston, the Briscoe, the Milam, and the Johnson, where the heavy work with retarded children is most needed. Now that a compulsory education law is passed, the city cannot escape car- ing for these retarded children who are within the prescribed ages. The economical thing to do fs to provide means for push- ing them through the grades as rapidly as possible consistent with proper work. At the other end of the scale, not a great deal of such work with retarded children needs to. be provided at the Eleanor P>rackenridge, the Riverside Park, the Crockett, Travis, Highland Park, Bonham, Fannin, Beacon Hill, etc. Since there are re- tarded children at each of these schools, there should be some provision for their needs, both for the sake of the children and for the sake of economy. The quantity of the provision should be adjusted to the quantity of the needs. In these schools less is needed. In taking care of this matter, it should be kept in mind that the needs and standards of attainment are somewhat, or even considerably, different in different schools. The curriculum should therefore be adjusted to needs as a part of this work of accelerating the progress of the retarded children. Even in the same school, not the same standards of attainment should be set up for all the pupils. Present Grade Distribution of Pupils. The number of pupils on the class registers for November, 1914, by grades, is shown in Table IX. 200 CHAPTER X. Table IX. Present Grade Distribution of Pupils. Grade Number of Pupils High Eleventh 77 Low Eleventh 60 High Tenth _... 121 Low Tenth 1 50 High Ninth 145 Low Ninth \ 21 1 High Eighth '. 289 Low Eighth .'. 377 H igh Seventh , 27& Low Seventh 398 High Sixth 429 Lo w S ixth 5 54 High Fifth : 572 Low Fifth 787 High Fourth 629 Low Fourth 858 High Third 779 "Low Third 1040 High Second 926 Low Second ~ _ ... 1 132 High First 1 192 Low First 2499 The table shows clearly that two things are needed, both of which are being provided at the present time. One is care for the retarded children to relieve the congestion in the lower grades. The other is the enforcement of the compulsory education law so as to prevent the pupils of the later elementary grades drop- ping out before their education is completed. ELEMENTARY TEACHERS 201 Chapter XL ELEMENTARY TEACHERS. The elementary teachers of San Antonio are much under- trained. They have had on an average only 4.6 years of train- ing beyond the elementary school. This is about a half year of normal training beyond a four years high school course. This is a full year of normal training less than the average practice of cities of the size and importance of San Antonio. Proper comparative data for cities of this class are not at hand at present. But Table X shows the average amount of training in twenty-two smaller cities (except Chicago) from which we have the facts. 202 CHAPTER XI. Table X. Training of Elementary Teachers. Citp Population in 1910 Years of Training Gary 17,000 7.0 Norfolk, Neb 6,000 6.5 Morgan Park 4,000 6.3 Winnetka 3,000 6 Booneville 4,000 5.8 Chicago 2,185,000 5.8 Oak Park 19,000 5.6 Russell I.. 2,000 5.6 East Chicago 19,000 5.5 Norfolk 6,000 5.5 Aurora 30,000 5.4 Leavenworth 19,000 5.4 Mishawaka 12,000 5.2 Noblesville 5,000 4.9 Rockford 45,000 4.9 joliet 35,000 4.8 South Bend 53,000 4.8 Harvey 7,000 4.7 SAN ANTONIO 96,000 4.6 Mt. Carroll 2,000 4.4 Granite City 10,000 4.3 Junction City 5,000 4.1 Mt. Olive 4,000 3.3 ELEMENTARY TEACHERS 203 That the teachers of San Antonio are interiorly trained is not a necessity. A later table shows that the salary standard is high enough to attract teachers who have h#d an average length of training. Simply the city has not set up entrance standards that are high enough. Graduates of the high school of the city are permitted to enter upon teaching practically with- out training. The amount of training is quite different for the teachers of different buildings. In the Collin's Gardens School, the aver- age training beyond the elementary school is 6.7 years, which is almost as high as that of the highest city in Table X. In the Highland Park School the training is 5.2 years beyond the elementary, which means an average of a full year and a quarter of normal school training. The city might well use the same method of getting teachers for all the schools that has been used in the case of these. The schools where attention to getting better trained teachers is shown in Table XI. 204 m CHAPTER XL Table XI. Amount of Training of San Antonio Teachers, 1914-1915. School Years of Training. Collins Gardens 6.7 Highland Park , Houston - 5.2 Harris _ 5.0 Ruiz 5.0 Bonham : 5.0 De Za vala ' 5 .0 B r i scoe 4.8 Avenue K 4.7 Burnet * 4.7 Milam _ 4.7 Crockett _ - _ 4.7 Austin 4.7 Gonzales 4.6 Travis 4.6 Eleanor Brackenridge ,: 4.4 Fannin 4.4 Roberts-Beacon Hill 4.3 Navarro ..... _ 4.2 R i ver side Park 4.2 Brackenridge Memprial 4.1 Johnson 4.1 Bowie 4.0 Smith _ 9 4.0 Margil = 4.0 Lamar _ 4.0 Herff 37 ELEMENTARY TEACHERS 205 EXPERIENCE OF TEACHERS. The city has a moderately young body of teachers. They , average 7.5 years of teaching experience, total experience was counted. Relative standing as compared with these other cities is shown in Table XII. Table XII. Length of Experience of Elementary Teachers in 27 Cities. Years of Years of City Experience. City Experience. Chicago 13.7 Greensburg, Ind 13.0 Morgan Park 12.5 Rockford 1 10.9 Winnetka 10.8 Oak Park 10.7 Booneville, Mo 10.3 Junction City 10.1 Joliet 9.9 Russell, Kan 9.9 Mishawaka 9.7 De Kalb 9.5 Aurora 9.3 Leavenworth, Kan 9.2 Mt. Carroll .. 8.4 Gary, Ind 8.2 Harvey 8.0 Mt. Olive ,. 7.6 SAN ANTONIO 7.5 Norfolk, Neb ., 7.0 East Chicago 6.9 Granite City 6.9 South Bend 6.7 Noblesville, Ind 6.2 Whiting - 5.8 Maple Lake, Minn 5.2 Bonner Springs, Kan _. 3.7 206 CHAPTER XL TENURE OF TEACHERS. While legally teachers are employed for yearly terms, actu- ally their tenure is permanent. None are dropped from the rolls unless guilty of gross misconduct or inefficiency. In this respect the teachers of the city are altogether favorably situated; in fact too much so. Notwithstanding this permanence of tenure, the teachers do not remain long in the service* in San Antonio. Table XIII shows an average tenure of only 3.5 years. This is very low in- deed. I lack the information that will account for it. Table XIII. Average Tenure of Elementary Teachers. Years taught Years taught City in City. City in City. Chicago . .....11.1 Aurora 9.1 Rockford 9.1 Joliet 8.7 Leavenworth, Kan 8.0 Greensburg, Ind 7.6 Morgan Park 7.0 Mishawaka 6.6 Mt. Olive 6.6 Russell, Kan 6.5 Winnetka 6.4 Mt. Carroll 6.2- Junction City, Kan 5.8 Noblesville, Ind 5.5 Booneville, Mo 5.4 Oak Park 5.2 De Kalb 5.2 Harvey 5.8 Granite City '. 4.2 South Bend 4.0 East Chicago 4.0 SAN ANTONIO 3.5 Bonner Springs, Kan 2.4 Norfolk, Neb 2.0 Maple Lake, Minn 1.4 The brevity of tenure appears not to be due to the salary situation. Salaries are about on a level with average practice in cities of the country of the same population class as San An- ELEMENTARY TEACHERS 207 tonio. Table XIV shows that salaries in San Antonio are sligthly in advance of those in Dallas, and very much above those of Houston. Table XIV. Salaries of Elementary Teachers. Denver $960 San Diego $935 Salt Lake City Grand Rapids 830 800 Youngstown Lowell 800 800 Des Moines 800 Nashville .. 780 Albany 750 Covington 750 Duluth 750 Evansville 750 Cambridge 750 Lawrence 750 SAN ANTONIO 720 Dallas 704 Dayton 700 Utica 700 Fall River 700 Canton 700 Kansas City, Kan. 684 Trenton 680 Savannah 675 Trov 650 - iyj j Houston 630 Schenectady 600 Saginaw 600 Richmond 595 Charleston 572 Manchester .. . 550 South Bend 540 Reading . 510 THE TRAINING SCHOOL. All the discussions of this report indicate the desirability ol having teachers who are intimately acquainted with the city. Naturally it is those who grow up in San Antonio who ought best to know the city. Training and supervision being equally efficient, the so-called home-teacher is preferable to the transient teacher who comes usually with no intention of making the city her home, nor of allying her permanent interests with those of the city. Under such circumstances her work tends naturally to be abstract and unrelated to the needs of the district of the city to which she is employed to minister. With a tenure in the city 208 CHAPTER XL of only three and a half years, it would take a good part of this time to get acquainted ; so she neglects to do so usually, satisfied with a world of her own apart from the community world in which live the children committed to her charge. On the other hand, the authorities tend to be far more leni- ent in setting up and holding to standards of preparation for the "home-teachers" before letting them into the service; and also under usual conditions superintendent and principals are less free to enforce high standards of work on the part of the "home-teachers." Influential members of the community are often more interested in the personal wishes we cannot say wel- fare of their friends than they are in the welfare of the schools. San Antonio is clearly suffering from both of these evils. The so-called "Training class" which supposedly trains the graduates of the local high school for the grade positions is scarcely a class in the usual sense of the term. It has no study- place, no regular teachers, no textbooks, no assigned library reading. It is simply a loose apprenticeship system, in which the teachers-in-training pick up what information they can through observing and helping in the class-rooms for a half year. They come with no previous professional study whatever. They cannot observe intelligently since they do not know what t^ look for nor how to judge what they see. They can learn how to do things rule-of-thumb. The plan offers nothing more. Such a system of inducting unprofessionally taught high school students into the elementary schools accounts for much of the mechanization of the work observed. The mechanical aspects they can see and imitate. The reasons for it all, the possibilities of adjustments to meet the needs of different types of pupils, they cannot see. The thing needed is clear. As the city develops strong vocational courses in the high school for merchants, clerical workers, household workers, mechanics, laundresses, manicurists, etc., it would be advisable that they also draw up a parallel high school course for those who are to be teachers; and to accept no graduate from the high school as a teacher who has not taken that course. ELEMENTARY TEACHERS 209 The general high school work for these students could be condensed into a three-years' course, and the fourth year given wholly to professional studies. When they entered then upon their half year of observation they could have something to look for, some power of judging what they should see, and some power to profit by what they see. This half year of observation and class-room assistance should be under the joint direction of the teacher of the subject in the high school and the building principals of the buildings where they are sent. Though scattered among buildings while observing, they . should still remain a class for periodic meeting at the high school for discussions and conferences. The instructor in the high school should be in ability and training about the fourth man in the system from the top. He ought to be the second assistant-superintendent having special supervisory charge of the first-year teachers. With this arrange- ment each teacher entering from the San Antonio high school would have had two and one-half, years of systematic training but without taking any more years for it than under present plans ; one year in the high school ; one-half year observation and practice- teach ing, and one year probationary teaching under the supervision of the man responsible for her continuing train- ing. * APPOINTMENT OF OUTSIDE TEACHERS. It was observed that even in the case of teachers employed from outside the system, there is the problem of holding to sufficiently high standards. These outside teachers are so often induced to come to the city by friends living in the city who have influence with the authorities. The remedy is pointed out in Chapter IX, of this report. The city should make definite decision as to the minimum of normal school training that will be accepted; then place upon the superintendent all responsibility for decision as to whether this minimum has been reached in the case of any applicant ; and all responsibility for judgment as to attainments. Since the superintendent is to be held responsible 210 CHAPTER XL for the work of the teachers, responsibility for initiative in ap- pointment and for recommendation should be definitely placed upon him. SUBSTITUTE TEACHERS. It is much more difficult to go day after day into unfamiliar rooms to teach strange classes than it is to teach a regular class. It seems strange therefore that this most difficult type of work most difficult of all if it is well done should be given into the hands of those who are confessedly the least trained, the least experienced, and the least qualified teachers in the system ; namely, the apprentices just entering the service. Two things can be said with absolute confidence: 1. Substitute teachers should be strong experienced teach- ers. A certain number of such teachers, based upon the number of calls daily received should be assigned to this service. This number can be chosen so as to have them employed in substitute work most of the days. On the occasional days not called for, they can be required to do special individual work with retarded children at those buildings that are specially in need of it. It is generally possible to have a reserve corps of capable experienced substitute teachers made up of former teachers in the service, married or unmarried, who yet live in the city but who do not wish full time service. 2. Beginning teachers should be placed so that their first teaching should be under the most normal and regular conditions possible. In the beginning especially their work should be care- fully planned, orderly and sequential. They should, by doing superior work from the first day of their service become hab- ituated to doing nothing other than superior work. Above all things < their professional conscience should be fortified against doing careless, unplanned, slipshod, purposeless work. They need to take a professional pride in the fact that they began on a high level and have held consistently to it. To take young teachers in professional need of such auspicious and favorable beginnings and then to demoralize them by substitute work in which they are forced into daily ELEMENTARY TEACHERS 21] tasks that are of necessity for them unplanned, time-marking, and purposeless, is to do just the thing that of all things should not be done. To call it professionally criminal against both the teachers and the children is to put the thing sufficiently mildly. TRAINING TEACHERS DURING SERVICE. The chief training during service occurs in connection with the monthly Saturday all-day institute. For most of the time the teachers are receiving instruction from the supervisors of special subjects from the grade-leaders, who are principals assigned to special supervision of regular subjects. From in- quires it appears that no institute occurred during my visit that the time is largely devoted to detailing the course of study topics in each subject that are to be covered during the succeed- ing month. The same thing is given to all teachers, experienced and inexperienced, those coming from American schools and those from immigrant schools. This plan of work takes vital responsibility for thinking off individual principals and teachers, and tends to uniformatize and mechanize the work. It is my opinion that each principal should be pretty fully responsible for the training during service of the teachers within his building; and that the superintendent should be just as fully responsible for training his principals so that they can in turn train their teachers efficiently. Responsibility for thinking should be taken off neither teachers nor principals. The training of teachers in service by principals and the training of principals by the superintendent should deal chiefly with the principles of educational science which are to be used by all concerned in guiding the details of their work. The present methods of training produce mechanical rule-of-thumb teachers. In an age of science it would appear that that profession which is set apart to teach science to the world in general should use it themselves as the guide to their labors. We cannot here go into details of the plan. A superin- tendent and principals who have the ability to do the work will have the ability to plan it. 212 Chapter XII. Chapter XII. THE HIGH SCHOOL. The main aspects of work of the high school have been pretty fully discussed in the various chapters of this report. We wish here to touch only upon a few matters that have not been mentioned. The city's annual investment in the high schools, including interest and depreciation, is well above $80,000. Men in a busi- ness community do not usually invest $80,000 a year without knowing pretty definitely what they are spending the money for. They must know this before they can give their approval. Presumably, therefore, the people of San Antonio have formu- lated in their own minds the purposes for which they are invest- ing so large a sum of money. It is always -interesting to know what the public values most highly in the high school work. This can be learned by examining 'into the way they distribute their investment. The things in which they invest heavily they value highly ; to the things in which they invest but moderately they ascribe but a moderate value ; and to the things of little investment they ascribe but little value. Now, in what things is San Antonio investing her money, and how is the money distributed ? Our interest here is not financial ; we wish merely to find relative community valuations of the different portions of the high school work. Using the most accurate figures available, covering instruction only for the past year, it appears that San Antonio is distributing each $1000 over the different high school subjects in about the proportions shown in Table A. Til 1C HIGH SCHOOL _____^ 213 Table A. The portion of each $1000 expended for instruction in each of the high school subjects. English Composition and Literature :. $ 204 Higher Mathematics 170 The Sciences , 131 I listory and Civics 106 Modern Languages 103 Household Occupations . 97 Shopwork and Mechanical Drawing , 63 Commercial Subjects 53 Latin , _ 52 Public Speaking 19 Music 4 Physical Training Drawing and Design (not mechanical) Total $1000 This distribution of the community investment over the high ifchool subjects raises many questions which a community ought to answer for itself. Why should literary analysis and expression so greatly outrank everything else in value? Why is it worth twice as much as history and civics? Why fifty per cent more than science? Why is an understanding and appreciation of literary art worth fifty times as much as an understanding and appreciation of musical art? This ought td be challenged by the musical organizations in San Antonio. W T hy is abstract higher mathematics of a type that is used by very few considered of much more value than anything else, except English ? Why is it worth twice as much as household training, and three times a c much as shop or commercial training? Why should a city's money be invested so heavily in mathematics of little value and not at all in physical training, a matter of high value? Is not music really worth as much as Latin? Are not drawing and design as valuable as Mediaeval history? 214 . CHAPTER xii. It is not for an outsider to suggest answers to these ques- tions. The community, however, that pays the bills should not rest easy Until it has carefully considered whether it is distribut- ing its money wisely or not. Another* basis for judging the community valuation of the different studies is the distribution of the time of the high school students. Presumably these students are distributing their time in ways approved by their parents. The total time ex- penditure in class during the past semester was 431,956 student- hours, a student-hour being the class-time of one student for one actual hour of sixty minutes. The distribution of each 1,000 student-hours over the different subjects was as shown in Table B. Table B. The distribution of each 1,000 student-hours over the various subjects. English Literature and Composition 243 student-hours Algebra and Geometry _ 200 student-hours The Sciences 1 54 student-hours History and Civics 102 student-hours Household Occupations 92 student-hours Modern Languages 73 student-hours Shop work and Mechanical Drawing 48 student-hours Latin 40 student-hours Commercial Subjects 41 student-hours Music 7 student-hours Drawing and Design (not mechanical) student-hours Physical Training .' student-hours Training of Elementary Teachers student-hours Total ! 1,000 student-hours There are some reasons for thinking this a better index of community valuations than the investment-index. It represents what the community actually demands in terms of units of work. THE HIGH SCHOOL ' 215 If not this, it does represent what the community actually chooses or at least accepts for its children. It shows that the balance of student-time expenditure is about the same as that of the financial expenditure. About the same series of questions again arise. How economical are the expenditures for the various sub- jects ? Taking cost of instruction only, the cost per 1000 student- hours for teaching the various subjects is shown in Table C. Table C. Cost per 1000 student-hours of instruction in the various high school subjects. Modern Languages $114 per 1000 student-hours Latin 103 per 1000 student-hours Shopwork and Mechanical Drawing 103 per 1000 student-hours Commercial Subjects 103 per 1000 student-hours Public Speaking 98 per 1000 student-hours History and Civics 83 per 1000 student-hours Household Occupations 83 per 1000 student-hours Mathematics 69 per 1000 student-hours Sciences 68 per 1000 student-hours English Literature and Composition 67 per 1000 student-hours Music 40 per 1000 student-hours The city is paying very different prices for the same amount of work in different subjects. The price paid for modern lan- guages is 70 percent higher than the price paid for an equal amount of English. It is 68 percent higher than an equal amount of science ; 65 percent higher than mathematics ; 37 per- cent higher than household occupations or history and civics ; considerably higher than commercial and shop subjects. Is this because modern languages are worth so much more, or because of maladjustments in the work of the high schools? It is dif- ficult enough in our previous discussions to grant the equality of value of foreign languages for most students ; it certainly is not possible to grant this superiority of value. 216 ; CHAPTER XII. Latin also is another drain on the community. Why should the city have to pay over 50 percent more for Latin than for English, 'science, or mathematks? Why pay 25 percent more than for household occupations or history and civics ? The value of the Latin is actually far less than these other subjects. Is there mismanagement in the high school, or is somebody "putting something over" on the city? Is the burden of the work equitably distributed among the teachers of the different departments? To answer this question we must note the length of the teachers' working week, and the average size of classes. It is not possible at present to measure that portion of -the teacher's working week that is spent outside of the class-room. We have, however, the number of hours per week assigned to regular work in the class-rooms. Table D shows the relative burden. Table D. Average size of classes and average number of weekly teaching hours (full 60 minutes) for each full-time teacher. . v No. Student- hrs. per week per full-time teacher Average No. of Average hrs. taught per Size of week per full- Class time teacher Music (823) 38 28 27 25 24 22 19 18 17 14 15 12 (21.5) 22.4 23.4 22.0 20.8 20.0 21.5 21.8 20.7 23.1 20.8 229 English 629 Mathematics 622 Science 543 History . 489 Public Speaking: ... 440 Latin 402 Commercial Subjects 386 Modern Languages 343 Mechanical Drawing 321 Household Occupations Shoo-work .. 316 . 266 THE HIGH SCHOOL 217 The classes in half the subjects average fewer than twenty students per class. With proper accommodations and equipment, there can be no justification for this. It is difficult to see any reason why the Latin and modern language classes should run smaller than science classes. If the language classes were so increased, more than two full-time teachers could be dis- pensed with, and two class-rooms saved for other uses. This one adjustment would save the city $3,000 a year. Not only would two rooms be saved, but enough money to build an additional room each year. When the high schools are becoming so con- gested, the thing is worth considering. With classes a half-year apart in progress, and with few sections on each level, teachers will generally say that it cannot be done ; or that it is education- ally inadvisable to do it. The contention will usually mean that it is easier not to make such adjustments than to make them. To let things drift mechanically requires neither thought nor labor; to adjust the size of classes to the demands of efficiency requires both thought and labor. But with both thought and labor,desirable adjustments can always be made. In certain subjects on certain levels, new sections will begin yearly, not semi-yearly. Where small classes are unavoidable, as will oc- casionally occur, they can meet fewer times per week for the same amount of work ; or they can meet for shorter periods for the same amount of work. The unnecessary foreign language waste can be saved by such adjustments ; and the community should see that it is done. The small size of most of the vocational classes has been necessitated by the size of the rooms supplied them.. With the completion of the new practical arts building, the defect can be remedied. These classes ought to run on an average as large as twenty students per class. If they are compelled to run smaller because of a lack of sufficient equipment, it is very false economy. The cost of extra teachers is in the end far greater than the cost of equipment for an additional five students per class. 218 CHAPTER XII. TRAINING OF THE TEACHERS SUPERVISION. The average amount of training of high school teachers in the Main Avenue high school is six and one-half years beyond the elementary schools. This is a year and a half short of a full college course, which is coming to be regarded as the minimum desirable training of high school teachers. The thing desired of course is teaching efficiency ; and the efficient teacher with no higher training is to be preferred to an inefficient college graduate. But all things else being equal, a teaching corps that averages eight years of training beyond the elementary school is to be preferred to one that averages six and one-half years. How San Antonio stands as compared with certain cities from which I happen to have figures is shown in Table E. Table E. Training of High School Teachers. Years beyond Elementary School. Des Moines : 8.9 years Peo r i a 8.3 years Gary, Ind 8.1 years Aurora, 111 8.1 years Indianapolis 8.0 years Rockford 8.0 years Elgin 7.5 years St. Joseph 7.2 years Leavenworth 7.0- years Oklahoma City 7.0 years SAN ANTONIO 6.5 years Kansas City, Kan _ 6.4 years THE HIGH SCHOOL 219 Deficiency in the usually accepted amount of collegiate training should be considered in relation to the effectiveness of the work of individual teachers. Where the work of a teacher is efficient, the work is not demanding further training. - Where it is inefficient, then further training of some kind is needed. Sometimes they should be encouraged or even required to take summer courses, or take a leave of absence for further training. More often, however, for experienced teachers long in the service, the thing needed is supervisory training. The supervision on the part of principal and head of department that will strengthen the weak places in a teacher's work is the best possible training for that teacher. The best place to train one to do efficient work is where that work is being performed. The principal has a large opportunity, and bears an equally large responsibility. At present there appears to be very little super- vision of the work of the high school. The thing most needed is not more training of the teachers but a larger quantity and a more intelligent quality of supervision by the principal of the high school. Since the Junior high school constitutes the first semester or two of the total four years high school course, the two schools should be organic parts of one organization. One principal should be responsible for both schools ; though a vice-principal would be needed at the Junior school. The head of each depart- ment should be responsible for the work of his department in both schools; and should actively supervise/ THE LIBRARY. Attention has been called in other chapters to the library needs. At present the Brackenridge high school has no library worth mentioning ; and the Main Avenue very little indeed except for the fairly generous supply of supplementary literature sets for the English classes. The room used is so small as almost to render useless the small amount of library actually possessed. The room seats only sixteen students. The entire study-room should be the library reading room. This could be managed with 220 CHAPTER XII. entire ease if the high school authorities made up their minds to make the library as serviceable as possible. One of the absurdities was to find the library closing at two o'clock .in the afternoon. As a matter of fact, it is from two to four, the two hours just following the close of the daily session, that ought to be the busiest hours for the library. With the pupils taught how to study, and with the necessary study ma- terials supplied by the library, and the necessary study-room, these two hours of use ought greatly to increase the effective- ness of the high school work with a very little increase of the cost. The high school libraries should not be made -the deposito- ries of old and worthless books given by well-intended but mistaken patrons. The choice of all books should grow naturally out of the high school work ; and every book should be retired from the shelves that is not actively used in furthering the work. Benevolence should be encouraged to sell its obsolete books at the second-hand store and donate only new and modern books demanded by the school work. HIGH SCHOOL BUILDING ACCOMMODATIONS. The Main Avenue high school is running full capacity, it is claimed, and will need a considerable increase in the num- ber of rooms for the coming year. The high school principal is recommending* that a large neighboring dwelling-house be rented for the purpose. This is not the entirely inevitable solu- tion. The high school buildings "are not now running full ca- pacity. The daily session closes at 2:05 P. M. Owing to the city's being so far west of the meridian of central time, this is as early as 1^30 P. M. in St. Louis, or 1 :00 P. M. in Columbus, Ohio. The high school session closes with full four hours of daylight ahead on the shortest day of the year. There is no reason why the sessions might not continue for an additional two periods, or until 3:35. This would permit an additional 60 classes per day at the present time; and an additional 80 classes when the new building is completed. This will take care THE HIGH SCHOOL 221 of an increase of 300 students. Were the session continued until 4 :20 P. M. and there is no reason why not, then the buildings might take care of an increase of 400 students. In extending this time of use of the building, it is not necessary to extend the teachers' work-day. As judged by usual practice throughout the country, this is now long enough for those whose class-work requires outside labor. Simply, certain teachers will report at 8:30 as at present, and finish their periods at 2:00 or 3:00 P. M. Others will not report until the beginning of the third morning period, their day then con- tinuing until the end of the daily session. < )ther teachers whose work is of a type that requires little outside preparation of materials and little paper work can be given a six or seven hour day without making their labors any heavier than those of teachers who must give from two to four hours a day to out-of-class labors. There should be some such equation in the labors of the different departments. With present study-room and library accommodations, the plan recommended is more difficult to manage in the matter of handling the students in the middle of the day, if they are expected to remain at the building as many hours as at present. 1; is possible to permit many students, those who have learned how to study to return home at the end of five periods. Those of this type who come at 8 :30 may well leave at 12 :30. Those who first appear at 12 :30 can have another five periods before 4 :30. Such a plan would fit in well with the needs of students who desire to give a half day regularly, morning or afternoon, to remunerative labor. For obvious reasons many students would have to be at the school six or seven periods, appearing early and leaving early, or appearing late and leaving late. In proportion as this number is large, fairly large study-room ac- commodations would be necessary for the middle periods of the day. Under present conditions it is this perhaps that will deter- mine the maximum number of students that can be handled with present buildings if the sessions were extended two or three periods. If the school city will add teaching equipment so as to 222 CHAPTER XII. facilitate the work, books, magazines, maps, charts, apparatus, etc., it will often be possible to increase the size of classes with- out detriment to the work or without adding- to the burdens of the teachers ; and thus gain additional rooms. While various adjustments. ought to be made in the immedi- ate present, yet it remains perfectly obvious that the time has come for the city to study the problems of housing the high schools with a view to planning the construction of modern high school buildings in the near future. The problems are very numerous and complicated. They ought therefore to be dis- cussed very fully by the city before decision is made. Any sug- gestions made here are merely for contributing to the discussion ; we have not the facts sufficient for making definite recommenda- tions. The problems may be indicated by a series of questions. 1. Shall there be one very large central high school, or shall there be two schools, one on one side of the city, and the other on the other? The size and importance of this problem be- comes evident as one looks to the future, ten and twenty years hence. 2. If two high schools, shall they be of similar type, each offering a full round of opportunity to its side of the city? Or shall they be somewhat specialized, one being of the so- called English-classical type, and the other of the scientific- technical type? 3. How far shall the uses of such biuldings as civic and social centers be influential in determining the location of the buildings ? 4. How make sure that the grounds are selected and the buildings designed so as to take care of the .full round of educa- tional needs of the youth of the city, vocational, physical, civic, social, recreational, etc.? This is in fact the central problem. If the educational experts in the system will carefully analyze out all of the educational factors entering into the problem and on the basis of such scientific information will formulate well- rounded constructive plans and policy, they can get what the city needs. If they have nothing to present but wishes, general impressions, and unsystematized personal opinions, they are likely THE HIGH SCHOOL 223 to be in large part over-ridden by those who are seeking personal advantage. 5. How prevent the sacrifice of educational utility in the interest of building symmetry and of imposing architectural proportions? There is but one way, general intelligence as to educational needs, and an abundance of specific intelligence on the part of the school people. Art, simplicity, and utility thrive well together where cultivated intelligence can hold sway. 6. Would it not be advisable to arrange for a half dozen intermediate schools scattered judiciously over the city, each containing the seventh, eighth, and a portion, at least, of the ninth grades ; and then a central specialized high school for the final years of training? In very many ways this plan would be a distinct improvement over the usual one. Its value is not so evident on the surface at the present moment ; this will appear ten and twenty years hence as the high school develops, differ- entiates, and becomes a people's college. 224 ._ _ CHAPTER XIII. Chapter XIII. BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT. The city has a considerable building program immediately ahead of it. The rapid growth of the city is necessitating quite a number of additional rooms each year. The passage of the recent compulsory enducation law also will bring into the schools a considerably increased number of children. The present high school plants are altogether outgrown. In a short time one or two new high school buildings will be required. Building Plans. One of the most serious "building problems confronting the board at present relates to the general type of plan of building best adapted to San Antonio conditions. After looking over the buildings of the city, it appears that the experience of the past forty years of school house construction, has gradually evolved a type of building in the Crock'ett School which points clearly to the. next step in the evolution of building types. Buildings must be adapted to climatic conditions. They should look primarily to those climatic conditions that are the most trying; and only secondarily to those less so. In a cold cli- mate the most trying conditions are the rigors of the winter. Buildings must therefore be adapted primarily to the demands of winter conditions. They can then be made to serve sufficiently well for the relatively few weeks of hot summer weather. Since they are built for winter conditions, it is desirable to have as little outside exposed surface as possible. Especially is it desirable that there be only enough window space for light. Since windows are not to be much used for air, they may best be all on one side of the room. The familiar square type of building will serve, since it is compact. Rooms are expected to be kept closed nearly all of the time, both those that open out of doors as well as those that open into the corridors. Ventila- tion is to be by forced draught, and the lighting is to be unilateral. BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 225 Most of the books on school buildings treat only the requirements of buildings in a cold climate. In a Southern climate like that of San Antonio, the most trying- conditions are not those of the short, mild, winter but those of the long sultry summer. Buildings must therefore be primarily adapted to the demands of the trying summer condi- tions. They can then be made to serve sufficiently well for the relatively few weeks of cool weather and the relatively few days of actually cold weather. For most of the year rooms are to be kept well opened. Ventilation is not mainly a question of the me- chanical delivery of thirty cubic feet of air per pupil per minute for the sake of atmospheric purity. It is mainly a question of get- ting all the air that is moving for the sake of coolness and physi- cal invigoration. Rooms cannot well be placed in double series along a central corridor, since each series shuts off the air of the other. If both open full into the corridor and also outside, so that air currents can sweep freely through the building, air conditions can be made entirely satisfactory ; but the problem of noises and visual interferences then enters in. The Southern climate does not demand the compact, small surface building; quite the contrary, it demands a building in which the rooms open out upon the free air on as many sides and as fully as possible, consistent with other necessary conditions. School building theory relating to general plans, as written in our books on the subject, do not generally relate to climatic condi- tions like those of San Antonio. San Antonio must be studied in and for itself in determin- ing a general type of building that is satisfactory for its own peculiar conditions. In considering these conditions, there are certain climatic factors that must especially be kept in mind. These are : (1) Climatic temperature; (2) direction of the wind; (3) velocity of the wind; (4) the relative percentage of days of sunshine; (5) the direction of the sunlight through the school hours. We must examine each of these as they apply to the building situation in order to find out what appears to be a building suited to the climatic conditions of San Antonio. 226 CHAPTER XIII. Table XV shows the mean hourly temperature for each of the months of the year as furnished through the kindness of the San Antonio Weather Bureau: Table XV. Mean Hourly Temperature in San Antonio. A.M. P.M. 9:0010:0011:0012:00 1:00 2:00 3:00 4:00 January 48 51 54 56 58 61 62 65 February 49 51 54 57 58 60 63 64 March 57 62 65 68 70 72 74 75 April 64 67 70 72 74 75 77 77 May - 71 74 76 78 80 82 83 83 June . . 78 81 84 86 89 91 92 92 July 79 81 84 87 89 90 91 Ql August 80 83 86 88 89 92 93 93 September 76 79 82 85 87 88 89 89 October 66 69 72 74 76 78 79 79 November 56 60 63 65 67 70 70 70 December 49 51 54 56 58 60 61 62 Temperatures for the entire year are shown because of the fact that with the introduction of summer schools, the school is becoming a twelve months affajr. This is a condition that is sure to increase rather than diminish, since as school work is made active, normalizing, and healthful, the school is as good a place for city children in the summer as anywhere else ; it should be better. The table shows that the school should be as open as possible for at least eight months of the year. It shows that the weather in January, the coldest month, is really on the whole very mild. Evidently biuldings that are constructed to take care of the trying summer conditions, can rather easily be adapted to the conditions of so mild a winter. The temperature of winter occasionally goes considerably below the mean shown in the table; but it is rare that it goes below freezing, and then the cold is of sfrort duration. This is BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 227 shown by the figures of the weather bureau covering the ten year period from 1900 to 1910. During the ten years there were of the months of January 310 days. On one day out of the 310 the mean daily temperature was 23 degrees. On one other day it was 31 degrees. These are the only two days in the ten years when the mean daily January temperature of San Antonio was below freezing. The number of days having each level of tem- perature is shown by Table XVI. Table XVI. Number of January days, 1900-1910, at each level of Mean Daily Temperature. Temperature Number of Days. 75 to 79 degrees 70 to 74 degrees 22 65 to 69 degrees 25 60 to 64 degrees 47 55 to 59 degrees 54 50 to 54 degrees 70 45 to 49 degrees 38 40 to 44 degrees _ 26 35 to 39 degrees 16 34 degrees 3 33 degrees 4 32 degrees 3 3 1 degrees ; 1 23 degrees 1 The table shows that the temperature for most of the days was between forty degrees and seventy-five degrees ; that in only a relatively small percent of the cases did the temperature drop down below forty degrees. While the colder months are on the whole very mild, it must be noted on the other hand, that the warm months of the long summer are sufficiently sultry during the mid-day and afternoon. If we take seventy-five degrees as 228 CHAPTER XIII. the point at which the heat begins to become oppressive and physically undesirable unless the rooms are well opened and the air in motion, then Table XV shows that for 45 percent of the school hours of the entire year the heat is such as to demand the greatest fulness possible of open air conditions. The figures of the Weather Bureau show clearly that build- ings in San Antonio must look primarily to provision against sultriness, and only secondarily to provision against cold. The almost universal remedy for sultriness is keeping the body bathed in moving' currents of air. It is by so controlling conditions as to keep the air in motion. An electric fan does not cool the air ; it simply sets it in motion. Electric fans for the purpose at the present time are scarcely practicable for schools. Even if they were, San Antonio does not need them, where buildings are con- structed so as to permit the free passage of the invigorating south-east Gulf breeze. During the warm months of summer this breeze is very constant. The records of the Weather Bureau show that from April to October the prevailing wind is from the south-east every hour in the day. Only at rare intervals and for very short periods is this almost absolute uniformity disturbed during these summer months. The mean velocity of the wind is shown in Table XVII, for each of the hours of the school day. Table XVII. Mean Hourly Wind Velocity. Mar. Apr. May Jun. July Aug. Sept. Oct. 8:00 A. M. 7 7 7 6 6 5 5 6 9:00 A. M. 9 9 9 8 7 6 6 6 10:00 A. M. 10 10 9 8 8 7 7 8 11:00 A. M. 11 11 10 8 8 7 8 8 12:00 Noon 11 11 10 9 8 8 8 9 1:00 P. M. 11 11 10 9 9 8 8 8 2:00 P. M. 11 11 10 9 9 8 9 8 3:00 P. M. 11 11 10 9 9 9 9 8 4:00 P. M. 11 11 10 9 9 9 9 8 5:00 P. M. 11 11 10 10 9 9 9 8 BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 229 This table shows that for every hour of every sultry day, ii is possible to have an invigorating breeze through the school rooms if only they are constructed so as to permit the free pas- sage of the air ; and if the arrangements of trees, shrubbery, and neighboring buildings are such as not to obstruct the free pas- sage of the air. Returning now to the topic of building plans it is felt that the recently introduced "square" plan of building does not suf- ficiently take into consideration these climatic factors. It is an imported northern building, good for a cold climate only. Not enough of the rooms are open toward the south-east, east, and south. But even when open toward the south-east, this alone is not sufficient. Rooms must also be equally open on the opposite side. Air can enter only in so far as there is provision for its exit on the opposite side. The partial provision of a sin- gle transom on the opposite side of the room is insufficient for two reasons. It is not large enough. It is placed so high above the pupils' heads that they must sit in still air while the currents pass over their heads from window to transom, or from transom to window, according to the location of the rooms. To sit near ar electric fan, but outside of the current will not cool one in the slightest degree. One must sit within the air-current. It is not different in the case of the south-east air current from the Gulf. The pupils during the hot months must sit in the currents 111 order to secure any of the physically beneficent cooling effects. The air should pass level across the room where the pupil sits. However sufficient unilateral windows may be in a cold climate where lighting is the only window problem, it cannot possibly be sufficient in a city located like San Antonio. Here rooms must be open on two sides at least, on the level of the pupils. This does not necessarily mean bilateral lighting. It is possible to construct rooms so that they can be open on both sides but shaded on one side, thus adapting them for both light and air. If in a building of the recent type the corridor walls were open on the levels of the pupils' desks so that the breezes from the south-east could sweep through and bathe the pupils continuously ^.where they sit, both the lighting and air problems would be 230 CHAPTER XIIL taken care of in the case of those biuldings where the windows face east and west. Although the rooms would be open on both sides, they would be lighted on but one. A little observation of such a building as now constructed, will show that such a plan would not be practicable. With class-room doors open into the corridors and the work of the various rooms in full blast it can be noted at present that the corridors are resonators and that the sounds from any part of the building penetrate to every class- room. Were corridor walls further opened, the interferences of sounds would be aggravated and the work of the class-rooms too much disturbed. Classes moreover, in opposite rooms would be visible to each other. Such auditory and visual distractions tc attention are highly undesirable. As school rooms are made to open on both sides they must not be made to open into each other. It certainly appears that the square type of building recently introduced into San Antonio cannot be made to take care of the air needs without introducing other very undesirable features. Another of these indesirable features inherent in the present type of building is the direction of the lighting. South lighting as in the New Beacon Hill School or the Douglass School is scarcely permissible. If during the hot months one shuts off the glare by means of translucent blinds, one gets the light but the air is shut off. If awnings or Venetian blinds are used so as to permit the entrance of air, then the light is shut off. It is scracely possible to manage the windows facing the south so as to make them fully available for both light and air. Because of the great amount of sunshine in San Antonio and the general clearness of the skies, windows receiving north light can always be full open without ever permitting the glare of direct sunshine. Such windows can be used equally for light and air. Owing to the outer brilliance of Texas light most of the year, the objections to north lighting mentioned in the books that are reasonably valid for northern cities do not hold for San Antonio. By employing a large window surface as is now used in the new type of building, the north light will be suffi- cient even for the relatively short periods of cloudy weather. 1 U i I 1.DINGS AND EQUIPMENT 231 East lighting is not good for this city. San Antonio lies so far west of the meridian that the sun finds itself about forty minutes behind the clock. Since the schools open at the usual hour, this means that they open very early as judged by the sun's position the equivalent of opening at 8:20 in St. Louis, or 7:40 in Columbus, Ohio. In other words, San Antonio schools have a very great amount of morning sunlight. In the warmer months, the rooms should be well open. If they face the east, the difficulty is like that of facing the south. It is practi- cally impossible to provide equally well for both light and air. West lighting is good just because of the fact that the sun runs so far behind the clock. This means that on the basis of the sun's position the schools close very early. Windows open to the west can be open full almost all of the school day for both light and air. If in the middle of the afternoon the sun sometimes troubles, it is more easily managed than in the case of the east windows because of the schools closing while the sun is yet high. Just as it is evident from wind conditions that the. rooms should be opened toward the east, the south-east and the south, so looking at the matter from lighting conditions it is equally clear that rooms should be open toward the north-west, the west, and the north. The side best for light entrance is worth- less for air entrance; and on the other hand, the side best for the inlet of air is poorest for the entrance of the light. Since air conditions, however, make it imperative that rooms shall be opened upon two sides these double demands for the light and the air create no difficulty. The solution is to have the rooms open on the north-west for the light, and upon the south-east for the air, but shaded upon the south-east side. If climatic conditions must be taken into consideration in the ways here mentioned in the construction of school buildings, then it is possible to point out two types of buildings that will apparently satisfy the demand. In a type that most perfectly meets climatic demands, each story of the building consists of a single series of rooms. These rooms open full toward the north-west for light. They open full toward the south-east into 232 CHAPTER XIII. a corridor which runs along the entire south-east side of the building so as to shade the south-east opening of all of the class- rooms without interfering with the currents of air. The windows of the outer walls of the corridor are as large as the windows for lighting purposes to the north or west. Since these corridor windows are chiefly for air and not light, they may be partially closed during the colder months of winter, with solid panels which can really have all the solidity and offer all the protection of permanent structures, but which are removable for summer conditions. If such large openings from class-rooms into the corridors tend to produce noise-interference, this must be looked after in the mode of designing the corridors ; but hav- ing the outer corridor wails open during the summer months, creates corridor conditions that are not greatly different from the outside gallery conditions of many of the present schools. A building constructed on the plan described, would be long, narrow, and straight. Owing to the way that San Antonio is laid out, it would be difficult to place upon most of the blocks such a long building facing the south-east. A more practical type of building plan would be the L-shaped building with the opening of the angle toward the south-east, and with the corri- dors within this angle, on the south and east sides, lighting being from the north and west. By placing the angle of the building at the north-west corner of the school block one wing will lie east and the other south. It may not be possible to give this type of building the structural proportions of the superb Crockett Building. Still almost any type of building can with care be made architecturally pleasing. But whether this be so or not, the physical welfare of the children demands that utility shall come before beauty, but in case either must be sacrificed, it is architectural beauty rather than the welfare of the children that should suffer. As one examines the buildings at the Milam, the Burnet, or the Crockett schools, it is quite clear that the building evolution of the city has recently reached this L type of building. These buildings show that the city in carrying out the building evolu- tion begun forty years ago, needs to take just one further step BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 233 in the way of the general plan to be used ; this is to place the L- shaped type of building upon a block so ^that the full air open- ings to all the rooms shall be toward the south and east, and so that all of the light openings of the same rooms shall be to- ward the north and west. The city has actually evolved out of its experience the type of building here described. Perhaps we should call attention to the fact that in buildings so constructed the second-story rooms are better than those of the first-story; and that, leaving aside the climb,after they are reached, the third-story rooms are better than those of the second-story. We are not here advocating a third-story. We would only call attention to the fact that where perfection of conditions is not attainable, we are sometimes confronted with the problem of choosing the lesser of two evils. San Antonio will sometime probably have the problem of choosing between an un- desirable, enervating sultriness, and a somewhat undesirable amount of stair-climbing. While neither is desirable, it must be kept in mind that the sultriness continues through the entire long school day ; while if toilet and rest rooms are properly placed, the day's amount of stair-climbing to one extra story may be accomplished in an extra minute or two. Naturally where possible, both evils will be avoided ; but when confronted with a choice, it should be made upon a basis of San Antonio climatic conditions. The type of building described provides in the simplest way for additions to the building. It is simply extended at either end with a minimum of expenditure and including only a mini- mum of extra ground space. The method of the past, of scat- tering buildings rather generously over the school grounds has resulted in a diminution of play space at a time when the in- crease in the number of pupils was increasing the need of such play spaces. Building plans should provide for additions with- out unnecessarily disturbing the play spaces. As the school comes to be more and more used for com- munity gatherings, community music, evening entertainments, etc., the advisability of providing a gathering place like that upon the roof of the Travis Club building will become in- 234 CHAPTER XIII. creasingly evident. During the day, such roof spaces can be used for, folk-games, ior gymnastic exercises, for both directed and free play of certain types, for the lunch room period, etc. While cities of colder climates are developing the indoor school auditorium and general meeting place, it would appear that San Antonio, taking into consideration climatic differences, will pro- vide more of the open-air spaces. Heating and Ventilating. In all buildings at the present time, except the Crockett and those finished within the past year, heating is by means of stoves, and the ventilation by means of the windows. Visits to more than two hundred class-rooms while classes were in session showed no noticeably bad ventilation. The stove heat was sufficient to break the chill of the air. The windows without difficulty pro- vided for sufficient change of air. The air generally felt like "live air" rather than the dry, parched, "dead air" so common in school rooms where windows are kept tightly closed and the air supplied by a mechanical ventilating system. The rooms seemed to be suffering neither from dryness of the air, lack of movement of the air, nor undesirably high or low temperatures. Since many of the buildings of San Antonio must continue to use this mode of heating and ventilation, it is perhaps well to state here that for a city so located it will be very difficult greatly to improve upon the method. As a matter of fact, no method of mechanical ventilation has yet been invented that is so good as window ventilation when outside temperatures are so mild as forty degrees or above. It means moving air ; it means desirable variation in the room temperature; it permits "live air" ; it permits sufficient exit of foul air ; and in an atmosphere like that of Texas it sufficiently provides for the humidity most of the time. No mechanical system can do more. Where a me- chanical system is employed in San Antonio, it can safely be asserted that there ought to be window ventilation also for almost every day in the year. This is stated in spite of the general re- quirement that windows be kept strictly closed in order not to derange the mechanical ventilating system. This is in fact de- BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 235 sirable in a cold climate where ventilation must depend upon such a system. Such a requirement cannot be imposed upon the buildings in San Antonio, however, except for a relatively few days in the year. The nearest approach to really bad ventila- tion observed, was in a recently-built addition in which had been installed a stove and an automatic ventilating system with the requirement that the windows be kept closed in order not to derange the ventilation. Such automatic modes of ventilation which must depend upon gravity for the circulation are satis- factory only where the difference in temperature between out- side and inside is very great. They are satisfactory for very cold weather in the north. They cannot provide satisfactory ventilation for a mild climate. The chief objections to heating the rooms with stoves is the interruption caused by the entrance of the janitor for re- plenishing the fire occasionally ; the space taken up by the stove, together with its jacket; the disfigurement of the room produced by this extra piece of furniture with its appurtenances; and the uncleanliness. There are also certain other remediable objec- tions. At the present time the opening into the stoves very often faces the seats of the children, so that either the jacket has to be removed every time the fuel is replenished and then replaced, or the open side of the jacket is left facing the children a 1 their seats. This condition can be remedied merely by revers- ing the direction in which the stove faces. When this is done, the open side of the jacket can always be turned away from the seats of the children and the jacket need not be moved in order to replenish the fire. At the present time, also, the jackets in general are unlined so that the children who sit nearest the stoves are often unduly warm. The jackets should by all means be lined with asbestos. If then they were fastened to the floor during that part of the year when the stoves must be left stand- ing in the room, there is no reason why the asbestos might not last indefinitely. All stoves should be removed from class- rooms during those portions of a year when stoves are no longer required. This removes most of the other objections to the stoves for the major portion of the year. 236 _ CHAPTER XIII. Each room should be supplied with a reliable thermometer. The ones now found are generally too cheap to be reliable. One's feelings constitute a better guide than a thermometer that reg- isters several degrees above or below actual temperature. Care should also be taken in the placing of the thermometer in the room, so that it will provide a fair indication of actual room temperature. In one case a thermometer was observed fastened within the window frame with cold air blowing in on it through the chinks. The instrument registered a temperature fairly low, when as a matter of fact, the room was too warm. Lighting. With the introduction of the newer type of building rep- resented by the Crockett or the Highland Park building certain aspects of the lighting problem have been completely solved. Lighting is now unilateral, the light entering from the left. The lighting surface is large, being entirely sufficient in every one of the newer rooms examined. The tops of the windows are straight and extend to within six inches of the ceiling, thus permitting the light to carry easily to the farthest row of desks in the room. The walls are tinted to harmonize with lighting needs. In these mattters the most modern experience has been followed. The orientation of the buildings seems not to have been so carefully studied. In the Highland Park, the Douglass, and the Beacon Hill schools, for example, the same general plans have been followed. In the Highland Park school, however, the windows face east and west ; while in the case of the other two, the windows face north and south. The buildings named, are placed as though it were a matter of indifference which way they face; yet, as a matter of fact, the light coming from certain directions is much more easily controlled so as to pre- vent the glare than that coming from other directions. It is felt, however, that for San Antonio conditions, the lighting prob- lem cannot possibly be solved satisfactorily in the case of a build- ing of the square type, such as these. Rooms must of necessity BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 237 face either the east or the south, hoty directions being undesirable for San Antonio conditions. Recommendations as to lighting -have already been made with reference to future buildings. Certain recommendations are needed in the case of the buildings now in use, which must con- tinue to be used for many years to come. In most rooms, the lighting is, or by means of certain minor adjustments, can be made quite satisfactory. Here and there, however, certain ad- justments by way of improving the light are very desirable. In a certain very few cases attention is more than merely de- sirable. The welfare of the children makes attention imperative. At the Bonham School for example, the two primary rooms to the west on the first floor of the main building are examples of highly defective lighting. There are 125 square feet of window space for the 1.000 square feet of floor space. This ratio is much too small under the best conditions ; but in each of these rooms, the windows to the side have two-thirds of the light cut off by the recently erected additions to the building. ' At the back of the room, fully half of the light is shut off by the wide second floor gallery, by the trellis and vines, and by the foliage of the trees in the back yard. The intensity of the light in these two primary rooms is certainly less than a quarter of what it ought to be, and is highly prejudicial to the eyes of all the children except those seated near certain of the windows. In time these rooms may probably have to be condemned and used as store rooms. In the immediate present, however, certain adjustments should be made by way of doubling or trebling the quantity of light in the rooms. This can be done by painting the walls and ceiling pure white ; by cutting down the quantity of black-board space in the rooms so as to have less black wall ; by clearing away all vines and trellis from the veranda, and paint- ing the ceiling and posts of the veranda pure white ; by raising the tops of the three side windows to the ceiling with as large transoms as possible, and by trimming some of the trees immedi- ately west of the rooms. Merely to have open windows is not enough for light. There must be freedom from obstruction for both direct and diffused light; and where difficulties are ex- 238 CHAPTER XIII. perienced, the walls and furniture of the rooms should be so cared for as to absorb as little light as possible. The Navarro School presents still worse examples of the harmful effect upon the lighting of constructing additions with- out a due consideration of the effect of these additions upon rooms already built. Certain rooms in the Navarro where the window area is already too small relative to the floor area, the windows have been rendered largely or wholly ineffective by the luilding of wings which cut off large portions of direct and diffused light from the outside, and by the planting or the contin- uance of foliage trees where they shade such windows. I visited these rooms on a fairly bright afternoon, and found certain of them so dark that it was impossible to read my notes in certain portions of the rooms without holding them up so as to get a specially favorable light from the windows. In certain of the rooms, the ratio of effective window space to floor space was less tl an 1 to 10. Since many of these rooms must be used for many years to come, the school city should take advantage of as many ways as possible of relieving the situation as already specified in case of the Bonham. By properly controlling the various factors that enter into the lighting situation, practically every room in all the schools can be lighted sufficiently for immediate purposes. In practically every case of insufficient lighting as in the primary rooms at No. 4 and No. 5, in the sewing room at -the Brackenridge High School, in the study room at the Main Avenue High School, in the central second-story room at school No. 21, etc., etc., by taking the matter in hand in ways already suggested, a suffi- cient amount of light can in most cases be provided at compara- tively little expense. It appears evident that the lighting factors have never been properly studied. In the case of the relatively few rooms where the lighting is questionable, it would appear that the Board ought to send its medical examiner and an ex- pert optician to make careful examination in the light of well- accepted standards of lighting, and to report conditions to the board. Were this done, inexcusable conditions now existing could not well continue. BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT In considering increasing the intensity of the light in any room the board and the superintendent of buildings and grounds should keep in mind such factors as the following : (1) The possiblity of whitening ceilings, walls, doors, door and window trim, space covered by a portion of the black- board ; and of using lighter colors of wood in desks, furniture and floors. (2) The possibility of raising the tops of the windows, or of introducing transoms above windows. In the poorly lighted rooms often there is abundant space above the windows. For room lighting, the top part of the window is worth two or three times as much as the lower half of the window. (3) The possibility of opening double windows in place of the single ones. A slender steel mullion can easily be placed in the middle of the present window and windows opened on either side of it, thus doubling, at very small expense, the light- ing surface of the window. (4) The whitening of surfaces of wings of buildings, of verandas, etc., so that they may aid in the transmission of dif- fused light from the outside. (5) The cutting away of all vines and shade trees or por- tions of such trees as unduly interfere with the lighting of the windows. It is possible to plant trees, shrubbery, vines in such portions of the school yard that the lighting of the rooms will not be unduly interfered with. (6) The use of translucent curtains for breaking the glare from transoms and high small windows, the glass of which is now often painted to prevent the glare. The use of translucent curtains would permit a clear light on cloudy days and would shut out the glare without shutting out the light on bright days. (7) The occasional use of artificial lighting of a type that is steady and which does not consume the oxygen of the rooms. We have thus far discussed the control of light where there was a deficiency. Another large problem discovered everywhere in the schools of San Antnio was how to control the light when there was an excess of direct sunlight. Most rooms secured some 240 CHAPTER XIII. of their light at least from the east, south, or west windows through which at some portion of the day the direct sunlight enters. The city appears to be trying out quite a variety of blinds, no one of which is altogether satisfactory for this par- ticular problem. When the dark cloth curtains or the Venetian blinds are used to shut out the direct sunlight, they usually shut out the diffused light as well, and the rooms are made unduly dark. The rooms are then compelled to secure too much of the light from the back or the wrong side of the room. The ques- tion is how to have the light without the glare. The best solution thus far found is the use of a white translucent shade, which gives a soft, ground-glass effect when lighted by the direct sunshine and thus affords an abundance of good diffused light without permitting the glare. When the direct sunshine does not enter or upon cloudy days, these translucent shades can be thrown up and the full clear diffused light from ouside permitted to enter. Such translucent shades should be used in certain rooms ifl practically all buildings. In the warmer months when the windows to the south and east must be open for the sake of the air and yet protected from the direct sunlight, it is possible to use the translucent shades at the top of the windows and the open Venetian blinds for the bottom half of the windows ; or to use awnings protecting only the lower half. In very many of the rooms visited improper lighting condi- tions were found because of a lack of attention to the blinds on the part of the teacher and pupils. In one room visited where they were having trouble with the morning sunlight through the east windows, a student was sent to lower the east blinds so as to shut out the glare. He also lowered the blinds from the north and west from which there was no direct sunlight. These latter blinds should have been opened full instead of being drawn down. The result was that the room was unnecessarily darkened; and the teacher seemed not to notice. If a teacher knows what ought to be done in the regulation of the blinds, it requires very little thought or care to keep them properly regu- lated through the day. It is a task that should be given over, BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 241 however, to individual pupils, each serving a limited time, as a portion of their training". Cloak Rooms and Wardrobes. An examination of the book, "Grade School Buildings", by Wm. C. Bruce, of the American School Board Journal, shows that the so-called sanitary wardrobe, such as employed in the newer buildings in San Antonio, is not much used. The cloak- room is almost everywhere considered the better arrangement. It is a little more expensive, since it takes up a little more space. It is generally Considered enough better to warrant the cost. When the sanitary ward-robes are used they ^certainly should not be placed at the teacher's end of the room, as in some of the rooms in the Highland Park Building and the others of the same type. One of the obstacles to rational building plans so often cropping up in the system is an inordinate love of symmetry. Symmetry is not always necessary to good appear- ance; and in any case, the welfare of the work of the school is a thing of greater need than mere building symmetry. Furniture and Equipment. The new buildings and the additions are being equipped in the most modern way. Only the most improved and adjustable desks are being purchased. Black-boards are of slate and pro- vided with sanitary mesh-protected ledges. The manual training rooms are being equipped with the very best quality of work benches, and with a full assortment of tools and appliances. The domestic science rooms are being equally well equipped with both furnishings and utensils. Every school, whether domestic science center or not, is amply supplied with sewing machines. The toilet fixtures that are recently being installed are thoroughly modern and sanitary. Furniture and equipment for the schools have already been pretty thoroughly studied by those in charge. There are a few things, however, that ought to be mentioned. 242 CHAPTER XIII. Buildings should be supplied with telephones. The schools need daily communication with the school board office, with the school physician, with officers of parents' or other associa- tions co-operating with the work of the schools, etc. The fact that principals, teachers, and janitors, are all putting in tele- phones and paying for them at their own expense is clear proof that the need exists. Such telephones need not be listed in the city directory. The recently-constructed schools are well supplied with superior types of automatic drinking fountains, both within the buildings and in the school yards ; and they are also supplied with a fairly generous number of standing wash basins. Many of the schools, however, are in need of the lavatory facilities and improvements of the improved drinking fountain so as to make them sanitary. These are matters in which the school physician should have a voice. At a number of the buildings in primary rooms permanent lines have been drawn upon the black-board with either white or green paint. This is an excellent device which ought to be extended to all buildings. Lines should not be so far apart as in certain buildings observed, nor so near together as in one of the buildings observed. The green line is much better for the purpose than the white line, since the white lines do not clearly distinguish themselves from the white lines of the chalk. The lines are only to be seen during the writing. They are not to be easily visible to the class reading the work. The green lines will be found to be unobtrusive. In the high school, in rooms where mathematics is taught or where graphical work of any sort is done, as for example, in classes of physics or civics, cross section lines, preferably in green, should be permanently placed upon the black-board. They will be found useful in a. variety of ways, and are great time savers for certain types of work. Reference needs to be made to the placing of black-boards. Cases were found where the boards ~in the primary rooms were too high for the pupils' convenient use, and in upper grade rooms, where the boards were placed too low for proper use. Judging BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 243 from current practice, it would appear that black-boards in the first two primary rooms should be placed about twenty-six inches from the floor ; in the third and fourth grade rooms, about twenty-eight inches from the floor ; in the fifth and sixth grade rooms, thirty inches from the floor ; in the seventh and eighth grade rooms, thirty-two inches -from the floor; and in the high school grades, about thirty-six inches from the floor. The width of the board should be adapted to the uses to which it is to be put. The front board that must be used by both pupils and teacher should be fairly wide, extending upward as high as it is con- venient to use a board. Other black-boards in the room, how- ever, should not be wider than the pupils' use demands. For the lower grades they need not be more than thirty inches wide, for the grammar grades thirty-six, and for the high school, forty-two. There should not be more black-board space than is actually needed for the work because of its absorption of light. Many San Antonio rooms appear to be over-supplied with black- board space. The Buildings as an Educational Influence and Opportunity. Where children spend their days, month after month and year after year, in a building such as the Crockett with its im- posing lines within and without, its spacious and tastefully ap- pointed rooms and corridors, its sanitary accommodations, etc., a higher appreciation of housing conditions unconsciously and without effort grows up in the pupils. Without knowing why they tend to become more impatient than they would otherwise be of disorder in housing arrangements, of cluttered-up rooms and corridors, of uncleanliness, of unsightly color schemes, of darkened rooms, of insanitariness, etc. No part of their educa- tion that they get from books is any more important or more far-reaching than this. From the first grade to the end of the high school, they are being taught literature, and music, and drawing, the purpose in large degree being the development of aesthetic appreciation. These studies can be no more influential probably than attractive and pleasing buildings and grounds, 244 . ^ CHAPTER XIII. in the actual midst of which they must spend their formative years. ^' If on the other hand, the pupils must spend their days, month after month, and year after year, in class-rooms in which every aesthetic line is broken by the arrangements ; the furniture, the so-called sanitary ward-robes, undesirable color schemes, mouldings of black-boards and window panes dashed with the wall tint, broken plaster, new black-boards superposed over old ones with the old ones showing out at the botton for six or eight inches in most unsightly fashion, black-boards placed in the walls as patches with plastered spaces between, etc., etc., if every law of good taste is broken by the arrangements and appointments of the room, the education is no less effective than in the former case. It is, however, education to slovenli- ness, to contentment with ugly and even insanitary housing con- ditions. Such a powerful education influence as one's environ- ment can not be counteracted by the mere dosing of students with things out of books. The conditions under which one lives, are the things that mostly educate one. Book work can only bo supplementary. We are not here advocating an extravagant outlay of money in the construction of new buildings and the condemning of old. As a matter of fact, most of the buildings now in use must be made to serve for many years to come. The thing we are referring to is the making the best of the old buildings. Most of them present sufficient dignity from the outside. Very many of the school-rooms, however, need to be studied by the art department as part of their applied studies in household decora- tion and arrangement, and recommendations made for improve- ments on the aesthetic side, matters of line, and form, pro- portion, and color. Many of the rooms at the present time in- excusably ugly are not so because of any present building neces- sity. They are simply so because the principles of household decoration and arrangement have not yet filtered ^through to them. It has reached the newer buildings, because experts have been set to work, and their ideas have been moulded into the BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT 245 structures. The same kind of ideas need to reach every room in the old buildings, even as much as in the new. After the planning is done by students and teachers, a large portion of the actual work should be done by these same students and teachers, by way of putting into effect things that have been wrought out in the studies. Character is shaped chiefly not through thinking alone but through putting into effect the re- sults of our thinking. The shop classes, the sewing and em- broidery classes, students of mechanical drawing, those engaged in mattters of color harmony, painting, stenciling, decoration, need for educational purposes to embody their ideas into perma- nent form. They need to do the work for educational purposes. This is not mentioned here merely because it saves money to the community. It ought to save community money, will not properly be done unless it does ; but the primary purpose of put- ting the work as largely as possible into the hands of students and teachers, is the educational one. In my notes I find reference to scores of minor matters that need attention and correction. It is not really the business, how- ever, of an outsider to go into these relatively detailed matters. Perhaps I have done so to too large an extent as it is. The central thing to be recommended here is that the school city get its teachers and students to making surveys of the detailed needs, drawing up detailed plans as to how each specific thing is to be corrected, and finally setting the various manual and art workers to the task of making the corrections as far as possible. When this is done it is felt that the old buildings can be made attractive and sanitary for as long as they have to be used. 246 CHAPTER XIV. Chapter XIV. FINANCE. The business agent is using the thoroughly modern system of financial accounting that is being standardized in the school accounting offices throughout the country. ' No attempt was made to examine the accounts in detail. So far as my informa- tion goes, there is no reason to call them into question. More- over, such an auditing of accounts is a task for an experienced expert accountant. We wish to call attention to but a single thing : the need of having standards of financial .expenditure based upon the ex- perience of similar!^ situated cities as the basis of judgment in connection with each item of expenditure. For example, how much should a city spend annually for janitors per class-room? A reply can be found in the experience of many cities. Table 17 shows the practice in 19 southern cities. A medium amount is $53.00 per class-room. San Antonio expends $71.00 per class-room per year. This is $16.00 per room greater than required in Dallas; $22.00 more than in Fort Worth ; twice as much as in Atlanta, etc. F I NANCE 247 Table XVII. Annual Cost of Janitors per School Room. St. Joseph _ ! .$ 105.00 Kansas City 1 96.00 Memphis 91.00 Oklahoma City ', 71.00 SAN ANTONIO ... 71.00 Louisville _ 68.00 Norfolk . _ : 63.00 Houston _ 58.00 Dallas ... 55.00 Birmingham 53.00 Richmond 52.00 Fort Worth _ _ 49.00 New Orleans _.... 48.00 Nashville _ _ 43.00 Atlanta _. 35.00 Savannah _ 32.00 Charleston 24.00 Mobile _ _ 24.00 Jacksonville _ _ _ 21.00 Such a situation does not prove that San Antonio is spend- ing too much. Conditions may be sufficiently different; or standards in the quality of the work may be higher. If so, these things should be known before the city is satisfied with the present situation. 248 CHAPTER XIV. How much should the city expend for instruction supplies per pupil? Again it is the general practice of cities that will serve as a basis of judgment. The general practice of cities of the same population as San Antonio is shown in Table 18. Table XVIII. Cost of Supplies for Instruction, per Pupil. Springfield, Mass .$ 2.92 Spokane _ ...._ 1.81 Grand Rapids _ 1.74 New Bedford _ _ 1.48 Houston _ 1.41 Camden 1.25 Trenton , 1.11 Hartford '. 1.04 Cambridge 91 Dayton . 75 J Fall River 74 Albany 70 Omaha 70 Dallas . _ 47 Lowell 43 SAN ANTONIO , 1... .31 E r idgepo rt 3 1 Nashville _ 25 Fort Worth ... .23 FINANCE 249 San Antonio is expending thirty-one cents per pupil while Houston spends $1.41, or four and one-half times as mu'ch. Dallas is expending fifty percent more. San Antonio is not doing well in this aspect of the work. As we have tried to point out in the report, it is probably vejy false economy after ex- pending so much to try to economize on the indispensable things used by the pupils. Often it is anything but economy for the parents. Take, for example, the matter of ink. If each pupil buys a bottle per term, ten cents per year, the cost to the parents is $1,000 a year. If the school city purchased ink crystals and made their own ink the same amount of ink would cost about $125.00 a year, and paid ultimately by the same parents. Besides the desks would not be littered up with ink bottles tied on their tops with string to keep them from being knocked off, with perfectly good patent ink-wells in their desks. We referred to the need of new buildings in a previous chapter. Has San Antonio been spending as much as she ought for buildings? Actual expenditures covering many cities for, let us say, the past thirty years, for comparative purposes are not at hand. The figures of the Commissioner of Education are too incomplete. We have an index of past expenditures in the pres- ent valuation of buildings. Table 19 shows in some degree how much San Antonio has been exerting herself as compared with other southern cities. She is far behind Dallas, Houston, or Fort Worth. When one considers further the number of buildings that have been given to the city by Col. Brackenridge, in actual effort shown, the city should be placed very much lower on the list, in fact pretty near the bottom. The city should remember that it is hard-headed business men behind the support given in Houston, Dallas, Galveston, El Paso, and Fort Worth, all of which stand high on the list. 250 CHAPTER XIV. Table XIX. Present Valuation of Buildings, per Class-room. Newport - - $ 7675.12 Oklahoma City , - 6138.31 Fort Worth 5698.99 Chattanooga - 5495.03 Austin _ 542 1 .3 1 Memphis '. .'. 5415.61 Little Rock _ 5000.00 El Paso 4886.57 Galveston - 4789.47 Dallas _.... _ _ 4757.98 Savannah 4695.74 Charleston _ 3983.36 Houston .' 3922.75 Nashville \ - 3729.75 Louisville 3657.17 Covington . % * 3653.33 Richmond _ 3626.33 Norfolk 2 3157.57 SAN ANTONIO 2997.48 Augusta _ _ ;. 2965.26 Mobile _ _ 2875.00 New Orleans 2747.88 Portsmouth .; 2738.88 Tampa 1 2486,86 Lexington 22 1 1 .76 Jacksonville 1876.95 Macon 1724.24 Charlotte .. 1090.68 FINANCE . 251 In the matter of current operation and maintenance of schools, is the city doing its duty? Is it investing in public education a sufficient amount per pupil ? Table 20 shows that the city, as compared with other southern cities is fairly generous in the support of the elementary schools. In spending thirty-one dollars per pupil, the city stands very near the top of the list. Table XX. Cost of Elementary Education, per Pupil. Kansas City - _ .$ 35.00 Memphis 35.00 New Orleans .' 32.00 Houston '. _.... _ 32.00 St. Joseph _ i , 32.00 SAN ANTONIO 31 .00 Oklahoma City 30.00 Louisville 28.00 Little Rock ;.: _.. 28.00 Nashville _ 28.00 Fort Worth ..._ _ 27.00 Birmingham ,. 25.00 Richmond ........ _ _ 25.00 Norfolk 24.00 Atlanta : 21.00 Mobile , L. 20.00 Charleston ...: 20.00 Savannah 20.00 Jacksonville .... 16.00 252 CHAPTER XIVT How is it in the case of the high schools? The figures given in Table 21 are for the year 1912, as reported in the "Financial Statistics of Cities," published by the Census Bureau. Relative to what other cities are doing, San Antonio is not doing nearly so well by its high schools as it is by its elementary. Table XXI. Cost of High School, per Pupil. Oklahoma City , $ 108.00 Charleston 91.00 Kansas City - - - 84.00 New Orleans .... ........~ 81 .00 Louisville ..., 79.00 Jacksonville _ - _ 74.00 Savannah .... - 7 1 .00 Atlanta , - 71.00 Memphis _ . - 64.00 St. Joseph , 61.00 Fort Worth ...._ _ 60.00 Houston _ 56.00 Richmond 55.00 SAN ANTONIO 53.00 Birmingham 50.00 Little Rock 48.00 Mobile _ 46.00 Nashville r j. , ,. 41.00 Norfolk... 31.00 FINANCE 253 As compared with cities through the country in general of the same population class, how well is San Antonio doing .by her schools? Table 22 is of the type that can be used with profit by the city when considering such a question. The stand- ing as shown in the table may be justified ; or it may not be. I: needs at least to be explained. Table XXII. Cost of Elementary Education, per Pupil. Spokane $ 44.00 Salt Lake 42.00 Springfield, Mass 41.00 Grand Rapids 40.00 Camden ^ 39.00 Tacoma 38.00 Albany 8 38.00 Trenton .. 37.00 Hartford _ 37.00 Lowell ; ,......., 37.00 Fall River 36.00 Omaha _ 35.00 Dayton _ _ 34.00 Cambridge J. _ _ 33.00 New Bedford 33.00 SAN ANTONIO - 3 1 .00 Nashville 28.00 Reading, Pa , 28.00 Bridgeport, Conn 24.00 254 CHAPTER XIV. In explaining the relative position of the city in the fore- going table, one thing to be examined into is the size of the burden of taxation that is being bourne by the city. Are the people of San Antonio heavily taxed? Table 23 shows relative burden per capita as compared 'with southern cities; and Table 24 shows the same for cities in general of the same population class. Table XXIII. Total Property Tax per Capita, all Purposes. Oklahoma City $ 18.89 Dallas _ ..:. 1... - 16.96 Kansas City _ ~ _ 16.51 Houston _... _ . - 16.10 Richmond _ ...- 15.94 Louisville ~ _ 14.77 New Orleans >._ _...._ _ 14.56 Ft. Worth 13.47 SAN ANTONIO _....:. _ 13.34 Norfolk _ 12.56 Memphis - .-. 12.44 St. Joseph ;... r ..._ _ _ 1 1.59 Atlanta .-. :. 11.14 Savannah Si ~ 10.61 Nashville :. 10.00 Jacksonville ~ 9.41 Charleston ....._.......;.;. ;. 9.16 Mobile ......:............; :. 6.49 B i rmingham ...._.. . _ 5 .83 FINANCE 255 The tables show that the city is neither backward nor ad- vanced in willingness to bear a heavy tax burden per capita, but simply average, neither high nor low on the scale. When one considers, however, the large proportion of propertyless Mexi- cans who make up the population, it is possible that those actu- ally paying the taxes should be ranked higher than shown in these tables. Table XXIV. Total Property Tax per Capita, all Purposes. Hartford $ 22.48 Springfield, Mass _ 21.33 Cambridge 19.15 Dallas _ 16.96 Omaha 16.39 New Bedford .: 15.86 Albany 15.75 Bridgeport - ~ 14.94 Salt Lake City 13.38 SAN ANTONIO ! 13.34 Grand Rapids 13.14 Fall River _ _.. 13.05 Dayton _ 12.84 Lowell _ 12.68 Spokane 12.28 Trenton 10.21 Nashville ...:. 10.00 Reading 8.30 Camden . 778 256 CHAPTER XIV. Is the city able to distribute the building outlays needed in the near future by further bonded debt? Adding the recent bond issues to the previous debt, the city stands relatively about as shown in Table 25. The total city debt is not much more than half that of Houston ; considerably above that of Dallas ; of medium size in fact. * Table XXV. Total (Net) City Debt, per Capita. Rank. 1 . New Orleans $ 121 .00 2. Houston , 97.23 3. Norfolk 93.66 4. Memphis 73.78 5. Charleston _ 69.01 6. Richmond 68. 5 5 7. Oklahoma 67.42 8. Fort Worth ... 55.92 9. Mobile _ 53.57 10. SAN ANTONIO 50.17 11. Nashville _ 49.55 12. Louisville 49.30 13. Savannah 42.94 14. Dallas _ 42.88 15. Birmingham 36.61 16. Jacksonville - 32.04 17. Kansas City, Mo 31.32 18. Atlanta 29.12 19. St. Joseph 27.98 FINANCE 257 Naturally, with so limited knowledge of the financial situa- tion, we are making no recommendations in connection with these things. We wish only to point to the need of objective facts relative to current practice as basis of thought in considering financial problems. We have presented only a few sample illustra- tive tables merely to show what might be done. The city needs such comparative tables in connection with every important aspect of financial expenditures. Where a city is investing over half a million dollars annually in public education, the size of the outlay is sufficient to warrant the current accumulation or the necessary comparative facts. It is a task that should be carried through currently under the direction of the business agent, the assistant superintendent, and the head of the high school commercial department. TTNIVEBSITY OF CALIFOENIA LIBEAEY, BEEKELEY THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW Books not returned on time are subject to a fine of 50c per volume after the third day overdue, increasing to $1.00 per volume after the sixth day. Books not in demand may be renewed if application is made before expiration of loan period. JOL 17IS2S f .rT 4 f*i4. Sfp 2* \ JM. 18 t0 10m-4,'23 VC UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY