munities would not in the interests of the whole state consent to a change in their own methods. But in the rural districts we believe that the district system is responsible for a very considerable part of the evils which we find to exist.

It is further recommended that the state be divided into territories of convenient size, taking into account population as well as area, for adequate supervision, these territories to be called supervisory districts or by such other title as seems appropriate; and that a supervisor, who should devote practically his whole time to the work of supervision, should be appointed, by local authority, in accordance with the conditions now prescribed in section 132 of the school laws, for each such territory. These supervisors should be responsible to the state board, which board should prescribe their duties, receive their reports, and have the power of removal for cause. Such a step as this will make it possible to develop teachers and promptly to sift out the good from the bad. It is obviously impossible for the secretary of the state board to exercise personally the minute supervision over all the schools in the state which is distinctly required, and it is in our opinion highly desirable that a corps of competent supervisors should be immediately put in charge of the schools.

It will be seen that we recommend also the substantial abolition even of town lines in the matter of attendance. There is no adequate reason for compelling children to travel an unreasonable distance in order to attend school when another school is almost at their door, the other school being established and largely maintained by the authority and resources of the state in which these children are resident.

We recommend further and most earnestly that after a brief period no person be allowed to teach in any school in this state of whose qualifications for the work the state board is not well assured. The system of local examinations is in our opinion essentially bad in its results, though we cheerfully admit that persons so appointed are not invariably poor teachers. But in so many cases they are poor teachers that the demand for a different and more centralized system seems to us irresistible.

It is a simple matter of fact that the salaries paid to teachers, especially in the smaller schools in this state, are much less than the salaries paid for similar work in other and neighboring commonwealths. The result of this is that it is difficult to retain our better teachers. The obvious way to remedy this difficulty is to increase the salaries of our teachers so that they will be comparable with those paid in other states, and it is believed that the extension of the operation of the average attendance law will con

tribute to this end. Meantime, however, it may fairly be considered that the graduates of our normal schools, where tuition is absolutely free, may quite properly be required to teach within the state for a definite period. The men and women who receive this preparation at the expense of the state do now when entering upon their normal course file a declaration of their intention to teach in the state of Connecticut. This declaration, however, carries with it but little sense of obligation. It would seem desirable that such normal pupils should sign a definite contract to teach in the state for a specific period of, say, not less than three years. Probably such a contract would be difficult of enforcement if a teacher wished to violate it. Yet it would carry with it an emphatic suggestion of duty, and furthermore it is possible that the school authorities of other states would hesitate to employ a teacher who had, in order to accept their proposition, violated a written contract. In this connection the commission suggest, but without positive recommendation, that it might be desirable to establish a certain number of limited cash scholarships in our normal schools for pupils of special promise and who as a return for the pecuniary aid thus afforded would contract to teach for a definite number of years in any school in the state to which they should be assigned by the state board of education. It seems to us that in time this process might result in securing better qualified teachers in the smaller schools. The cash value of a scholarship need not exceed $150 a year.

We recommend that the operation of the so-called average attendance act be extended so as to include technically every town in the state. Such an enlargement of its scope will not, of course, include all or nearly all of the towns in the state. It will simply ensure this, that in no town in the state shall there be less than twenty-five dollars expended annually per pupil in average attendance in providing for his education. It will tend to even up the educational opportunities of the children of the state and it will do this at an expense which in view of the saving possible to be attained in other directions is entirely reasonable.

We recommend that whereas the school laws now provide (Section 169) "that the schoolhouse and out-buildings must be satisfactory to the board of school visitors," the law should provide that such buildings must be satisfactory to the supervisor appointed in accordance with the recommendation above submitted.

It is the opinion of your commission that no school in which the average attendance is less than twelve should be continued, but that in every case in which a school is closed for lack of reasonable attendance, the pupils should be carried when necessary to and

from some larger school in their neighborhood. And in this connection we feel it important that in those cases and in the cases already provided for the means employed for transportation should be subject to the approval and under the control of the supervisor. We are also of the opinion that either the state or the supervision district or the town should provide free text books for all the children. Under present regulations there is grave difficulty in the towns in which free text books are not yet provided. Some of the children have books, for some of the children whose parents are apparently unable to purchase books they are provided as an act of charity by the town, but there are many children whose parents though well able to provide text books do not as a matter of fact provide them. And the operation of the school is hindered or even made impossible by this condition of affairs.

The time is at hand when, in our opinion, the state must take up and consider seriously the problem of establishing state high schools in localities remote from the larger communities in which high schools now exist. It is certainly desirable that every boy and girl in Connecticut should have the opportunity to attend a high school, and it is probable that in state high schools carefully located so as to be accessible and convenient for relatively large rural areas will be found the only solution of the question.

Your commission are of the opinion that it is the duty of the state to provide to a considerable extent industrial education, including training in at least the elements of agriculture. Certain of our recommendations bear directly upon this problem. It is for the interest of the state that the successive generations of young men and women, as they take up their work in life, should be able to do something of more importance than the unskilled labor or the skilled labor unskillfully performed which now seems to occupy them as a matter of necessity. The reason for any public training is the desire of the state that its citizens should be competent; and no man or woman is competent to discharge the duties of citizenship or to contribute proportionately to the prosperity of the commonwealth who has not been taught how to do something which the commonwealth desires to be done, which indeed must be done if we are to maintain our civilization and improve upon it.

*

Your commission realize that if their recommendations are approved and made effective by appropriate legislation, the amount of the annual appropriation to education on the part of the state will be increased. Something at least will be saved if the three or four hundred schools above described are closed.

Yet as the children now in attendance at such schools must in most cases be transported at some expense to the larger schools, the saving in teachers' wages, while more, probably, than the cost of transportation, will ameliorate the financial situation but little. It seems to us that the state must face the necessity of spending more money on its schools, the necessity of providing the education which it compels its children to accept, the necessity of controlling those enlarged expenditures in such a way as will secure the highest advantages to the coming citizens of the commonwealth. It is but poor economy to spend money on the material necessities and luxuries of twentieth century civilization unless we are ready also to spend sufficient sums in the effort to ensure an educated and intelligent population to enjoy the material heritage which they are to receive from us.

Very respectfully

For the commission

FLAVEL S. LUTHER
CHARLES H. TIBBITS

MOSES E. BANKS

FRANK K. WARREN

LUTHER K. ZABRISKIE

CHAPTER VI

ORIGIN OF THE UNITS AND FORMS FOR LOCAL CONTROL

IN the Textbook which is to follow this collection of readings the evolution of the district system in New England, together with the struggle to subordinate and control it, are traced in some detail. In the Source Book in the History of Education in the United States which is to follow, documents illustrative of this process are given.

I. THE EVOLUTION OF THE DISTRICT SYSTEM

Materials on this topic will be found in the Source Book in the History of Education in the United States.

II. COMPULSORY TOWN MAINTENANCE OF SCHOOLS COMMONWEALTH versus THE INHABITANTS OF DEDHAM, 16 Mass. 141. (Supreme Court of Massachusetts, 1819)

At the Circuit Court of Common Pleas, April term 1817, the following indictment was returned by the Grand Jury, viz.

"The Jurors, etc., on their oath present, that the town of Dedham in said county of Norfolk, at said Dedham, on the 26th day of April, 1816, and from that time to the 26th day of April, 1817, did contain, and still doth contain two hundred families and upwards; and that said town of Dedham at said Dedham, did, during all the time from said 26th of April 1816, to said 26th of April, 1817, neglect, and still does neglect the procuring and supporting of a grammar schoolmaster, of good morals, well instructed in the Latin, Greek and English languages, to instruct children and youth in said languages; which is in subversion of