USA > California > Los Angeles County > History of Los Angeles county, Volume I > Part 36
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From 1853 to 1866 the common council appointed the members of the board of education and the superintendent of schools. From 1866 to 1870 both the board and superintendent were elected by popular vote. In 1870 it was discovered that there was no provision under the existing law for electing a superintendent, so the office was abolished for a period of two years. Then, 1872, by a special act of the Legislature, it was made legal to elect a board of education consisting of five members with power to appoint a superintendent.
It was the custom from that time until 1881 to elect the principal of the high school to the office of superintendent of schools.
In 1903 the city charter was changed to provide for a non-partisan board of education consisting of seven members to be elected at large from the city. The first board members to be elected were John D. Bicknell, Joseph Scott, S. M. Guinn, Jonathan S. Slauson, Charles C. Davis, Emmett H. Wilson and W. J. Washburn.
The first annual school report was published in 1881, under the super- intendency of J. M. Guinn. Each year since then the record has been an eventful one. Every superintendent has matched with the progress of the schools in other states, and each one has left to the school system a wealth of organized ideas and fine ideals which have been followed. They have kept constantly in line with every advancement in ethics and science.
In 1884 the course of study in the high school, the only one at that time, was so graded that a graduate from the school could enter with full credits any department of the state university.
Until 1895 the only special branch taught was drawing. Many things are taught now from the kindergartens to the high schools, of which the philosophers of that day did not dream. Step by step they have been added as the progress of the world has made its demands.
The kindergarten was regularly established as part of the school system in 1889. Madame Severance, whose memory is still so highly venerated in the community, was instrumental in bringing the first kindergartener to the city in 1871, a Miss Marwedel. She came at the request of Madame Severance, and in her practice school was assisted by Miss Kate Smith, who afterwards became Mrs. Kate Douglas Wiggin, since a popular
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American author whose books are now on the shelves of all the school libraries.
Music was added to the list of recognized school assets in 1885. Today in every school of the city it has become an important branch of education. One has but to hear the orchestras, the glee clubs and the chorus of any school to know the value of the department.
In many cases, probably in most cases, this musical training is all that the children of many families are ever able to afford. This study is of economic value in affording joy in school work, recreation at all times, and often employment as the children grow older. The ever willing orchestra is present at every school function and aids much in the good fellowship. The study includes collaterally a knowledge of music, a familiarity with the great composers and much else of cultural value.
Night schools were established in 1887. The first idea in their estab- lishment was, to some extent, philanthropic. It has expanded far beyond this, and today the plan as carried out has become a civic necessity.
From a philanthropic standpoint, the plan was to afford a chance of continuing school to those who had been obliged to interrupt their educa- tion or had neglected earlier opportunities. It was soon found there were also many in the community who wished to add to their working efficiency a knowledge which was along more scientific lines. Many who are at work at various trades have availed themselves of the privileges and oppor- tunities of the night schools, and have appreciated the chance as perhaps only those can who realize what it means.
Among the many schools of this kind now in Los Angeles is one of special interest. It is called the Maple Avenue Evening High School and is conducted in the Labor Temple. The course of study is a typical one and embraces art, Americanization, music, electricity, mechanical drawing, plumbing, sheet metal work, power machine operation, Spanish, vulcanizing and welding. Those who avail themselves of this school are for the most part adults and fully alive to the democracy of the school and very much in earnest in the pursuit of their studies.
All the evening high schools are largely vocational schools, although not receiving state aid, as the day schools under the Smith-Hughes Act. Los Angeles in the field of these schools is unique in the localizing of voca- tional education. For example, the practical study of the oil industry as a vocational possibility, and the study of sugar chemistry, the production, and economic side of the raising of sugar beets and the commercial possi- bilities of the same.
The night school at Polytechnic High School is a beehive of varied industries. An infinite variety of subjects is taught to the classes, the mem- bers of which are either acquiring a vocation technically and academically or availing themselves of the opportunity to strengthen the weak places in their trades and vocations.
This is true, similarly, in the other evening schools which are adapting the course of study to the needs of the community.
The elementary evening schools are also most interesting. These schools are really community centers where a chance is given to adults to acquire an elementary education. The course of study in these schools is necessarily simple and elastic, adapted to the foreigner who does not
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speak English nor understand the laws of his adopted country. The teaching is a friendly step-by-step teaching of simple things and is, of course, the beginning of Americanization.
In addition to the classes held in the schools, many of them are in labor camps, laundries, factories and in large boarding houses of men.
Another feature of the Los Angeles schools is the well developed and scientific treatment of the various types of the backward child. Each child under this system who fails to fit in with the school's scheme of work is taken out of the regular grade and put in a special grade in a room some- times called an "opportunity" room, for here the backward child, the timid child or the child who is developed along one line and not another, may be brought into normality. These children vary in degree from a slight sub- normality to the so-called "defective." Each one has a chance, and by careful study and treatment the children frequently advance to their grades in the schools and become useful, normal members of the human family.
The first class in this department was started in September, 1900, and was called an "ungraded" class. There are now about 150 of these un- graded classes. There are also about ten classes of what come under the head of "defective" children. These are taught according to individual capacity and developed as far as possible. In this line of the care of chil- dren modern scientific tests are applied and the exact grade of mentality is ascertained. The teaching follows the grading of normality and sub- normality in the most careful and considerate manner.
There is also the truant child, who is often a lover of adventure and a rebel against conventions. The restraint of schools, with the necessary rules, irritates him into a state of absolute resistance to all law. If this quality can be corrected before it becomes chronic and develops into law- lessness, a fine member of human society may be saved.
There are others who need special moral teaching and for whom par- ticular classes are arranged. These children are by no means bad children, but they go through a time when the slant is not quite right, and when proper advice and sympathetic treatment and new outlook are necessary. Over 90 per cent of these children make good and are able to go on with school work, associating with other children and obeying the law which they have learned to respect.
In 1905 a class was started for deaf children. There are about seventy children in the city at this date needing this special education. There are a number of classes for them, where they are taught the oral system along the most up-to-date lines. It is gratifying to know that these children keep up with their grades and often reach the high schools, pursuing the course of study as effectively as the normal child.
There are also classes for the blind where the children are taught by the latest methods and develop as rapidly as their handicap permits. All the teachers of these handicapped classes must, and do supplement their ability as teachers with rare sympathy and understanding.
In September, 1899, what is called "domestic science," which includes cooking and sewing, was introduced into the schools. This has grown into one of the important branches of modern educational work in all the schools of the country. The plan is carried out from the lower schools to the higher, where in its scientific development it emerges into commercial application
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when desired, and at all times into the scientific management of the home. Every department of housekeeping is scientifically taught. The larger housekeeping, the economic questions in buying for the home, and outdoor work connected with the household, come under this study. Beautifying the home and interior decoration also belong in this department. The study of textiles, the prices and the principles underlying the clothing of the family, is incorporated also.
In 1907 the health and development department of the public schools was fully organized. As the name suggests, this department is concerned in the physical welfare of the children. A competent staff of physicians and nurses is maintained, whose duty it is to observe and care for defects of eyesight, hearing, breathing, posture and anything else that may not be normal.
Formerly a near-sighted child would fall behind for many school terms, because he had never been able to see properly. Adenoids and faulty posture prevented right breathing and there was a consequent loss of force. This department is one largely of reclamation. There are many children whose defects might never be discovered but for the watchfulness on the part of the doctors and nurses of this department, and the majority of cases are easily remedied. The children are thus given an opportunity to be normal and to pursue their studies under average conditions instead of below average.
Morally this medical and nursing staff is of great aid to the schools, for it is a vital necessity at times to interpret problems along scientific, pathological and medical lines.
During the influenza epidemics of the years 1918-19, the medical department of the public schools rendered great assistance to the city health officers.
Possibly growing out of this department, and certainly working with it, is the physical training department of the public schools, which was established in 1909. This extends from the grades to the high schools in an ascending scale, of application from simple gymnastics to the more elaborate work of the upper schools. Physical training directors with the older boys and girls are able to do much in the way of forming healthy minds as well as healthy bodies. Their work has decided ethical value in the making of a healthy citizenship.
In 1910 the manual training which had been introduced in the schools in 1896 was extended to include elementary schools. It now embraces all the grades from the very young children to those in the high school. An infinite variety of hand work is taught from very simple things to articles which might have a trade value. The wide range from cooking to carpentry includes all ages, and both boys and girls.
Manual training has definitely proven that a human being is never fully rounded out until he can co-ordinate both the brain and hands. To do hand work or brain work only is to do neither completely. There is a definite relation between hand and head which modern systems of edu- cation recognize.
The several neighborhood schools in our city are exactly what their name implies. Each school is a social center, a community house, and a place from which the American idea must radiate. The activities of each
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center might be called a "continuous performance"-all day and every day and during the vacations with the work of the supervised playgrounds.
These schools belong to all the people, including the family from the baby to the father and mother. Fathers come in the evening to learn the elements of reading, writing and arithmetic, mothers come in the daytime with their babies, if they wish, and learn to speak English, as well as how to take care of the baby, and how to make American clothes for the children and take care of the little homes.
Day nurseries are maintained where the mothers may leave the children, and where the "little mother"-the little girl who has to take care of brother or sister-may be relieved of care while she is at school. The studies are adapted to community needs, and the school becomes a kindly socializing agent.
In each school is a chart showing the housing conditions of the neighbor- hood, in all the details. These are guides in many ways and explain the conditions under which the school may often solve its problems. Cafeterias in these schools, in addition to the scientific feeding of the children, provide food at under minimum cost. There are open air rooms for the benefit of the tubercular and other delicate children, where they are fed three or four times each day. A careful record of the weight of a child is kept, and often by the feeding and care, it is restored to strength. There are, too, the ungraded rooms in which the individual development of the child is carefully considered.
These schools afford much in the way of community recreation in the parties, festivals, their own "movies" and the playgrounds.
Home teaching comes under the head of these neighborhood schools. The teacher is really a sympathetic visitor who goes to the home, enters into the problems of the father, mother and children, assisting them often in the complexities of life in a new and strange city. To bring all the family to the school is her main object. It is so often the case that a bright child who easily acquires a language and a knowledge of the country before the parents (especially the hard-working mother), has a sophisticated contempt for them. One of the great pleasures of the work is to realize the joy it gives a mother to stand well in the sight of her quickwitted children.
These schools are cosmopolitan to the last degree, and are the great "melting pots" of our Los Angeles.
In speaking of these special departments one does not forget that they are the modern improvements on the old academic system. The academic side of the schools has been correspondingly developed and always empha- sized. Foundation principles are the things that come first, and education and training of the mind is always the first consideration, as the courses of study so carefully arranged for each school amply testify. All other things follow.
To the elementary schools have come many improvements working out the theory of modern education. There is a growing conviction that the time to begin the work of making a good citizen is the first day the child goes to school. This day is a prophecy and promise of an all-around edu- cation which our democracy offers. The elementary teacher, therefore, and the elementary school are becoming more important each year.
Los Angeles is one of the first cities to have intermediate schools. To
POLYTECHNIC HIGH SCHOOL, LOS ANGELES
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these schools, children of the seventh, eighth and ninth grades go. The plan was an educational experiment which has worked successfully. The consensus of opinion among educators is that it has broadened the school and increased the activity. Fewer children, as a result, have dropped out of school at the end of the eighth grade. It is obviously much better that a child at the age which is average in the eighth grade should remain for another year with younger children. This bridges over the wide disparity between the grade child and the high school student.
Children of the usual ninth grade age require careful consideration which is somewhat easier when they are with younger children rather than older. From the standpoint of the adolescent child the school as adopted in Los Angeles embracing the three grades has been a marked success.
There is no city in the United States where so large a percentage of young people go to the high schools and finish the course as in Los Angeles. This has always been true here, but since the war there has been a marked increase in enrollment, due not only to the revelation of the draft showing the illiteracy prevailing in the country, but to the conviction now universally recognized, that the man or woman with an education is much more efficient.
Los Angeles may well be proud of the beautiful high school buildings and the work accomplished in the wide range of subjects in the various courses of study. The courses vary in the different schools, owing some- what to their localities. For instance, the course in shipbuilding is included in the San Pedro High School, at Gardena agriculture is specialized in, at the Polytechnic there is a wide range of technical subjects, while Los Angeles High and Hollywood pay special attention to academic work.
Even before the development of the vocational work which now exists in our public schools under the Smith-Hughes Act, the courses of study in the high schools had been worked out, which in a measure tended to lead up to the business of life both technically and academically.
Over the gateway of Lincoln High School is the most significant word in education, "Opportunity !" It is a word to thrill us who live in the United States where so much is offered free and where the most demo- cratic thing that exists is the public school.
Citizenship is the all-embracing subject from the kindergarten to the highest grade. It is taught to the little ones, beginning with the story of the flag and the oath of allegiance and follows through all the grades. Civics and statesmanship are studied in the upper grades, holding the ideal always of the duties and privileges of the American citizen. This study is the open door through which a foreigner must enter, and our schools are carrying the burden of Americanization of the country.
Los Angeles was the first city where the school training given along the line of Americanization was recognized by the Federal Government, and a certificate testifying to a certain course given in the schools entitles the foreigner receiving it to naturalization papers.
It is ancient history to speak of the mothers' clubs, which were first organized in 1898-9. From this beginning has come the Parent-Teachers organization, which has become a part of the school system. In recog- nizing this organization as a definite part of school work, Los Angeles is unlike most cities.
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This association in every way stands back of school work. The mem- bers take care of the poorer children in the way of clothing, and the clinics maintained by them have been of great value. They are generous in their gifts whenever needed, and have carried on many helpful things, especially in the neighborhood schools. The work they do is of great understanding, for only mothers can know the problems of other mothers. The various schools needing assistance on what might be called "motherly" lines, have only to appeal to the Parent-Teachers.
What the Los Angeles schools accomplished during the World war is a matter of school history and should be a matter of pride to the citizens. It demonstrated effectively the immense power of organization and system. The quickness with which it could be mobilized and the records of the war years show the enormous part the schools played in winning the war, both by way of the application of subjects taught to the needs of the hour and the larger opportunity the schools afforded for reaching the homes in lessons of patriotism, thrift and conservation.
It was a gratifying revelation to know what the schools are accom- . plishing all the time and an inspiration to observe how quickly the school power could be utilized and diverted in practical answer to the country's call.
In 1917, as soon as this country entered the war which was devastating the world, Dr. Albert Shiels, then superintendent of schools, appointed a general committee under which all other committees worked for the period of the war. He asked at once that the course of study, so far as possible, be diverted to patriotic lines. English classes were to develop the work along patriotic lines in the oral and written work. The manual training departments were charted, revealing young men and women who were fitted to assist in actual work. All the schools became 100 per cent workers and members of the Red Cross organization. The library became a center of education. Books on the various countries at war were displayed, bulle- tins issued by the various departments were kept on file. All patriotic literature in the way of various pamphlets on thrift and conservation were carefully collected and arranged.
A survey was made of the high schools at the end of June, 1917, and it was found that in the shops there were many hundred boys who had been trained for forge, foundry and pattern making. There were boys who were skilled in woodwork and boys who could be used in field work and surveying. There were many who were skilled in printing and who could prepare mechanical drawing for army equipment and apparatus. There were hundreds of girls and boys who were ready as competent stenog- raphers, typists, telephone operators, stock and routing clerks.
In the sciences several hundred were ready for wireless telegraph operators, others trained along electrical lines, installation of ground tele- phones, and still others who would be useful in higher chemistry depart- ments. This survey was of use to the Government, outlining the possibil- ities of the young men and women of the nation, and on whom it might rely for technical work.
Agricultural departments in the schools immediately became of the most vital importance, not only teaching conservation and thrift but promising actual supplies. Thousands of pupils in all the schools were engaged in school gardening. In the rural districts great things were accom-
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plished. The boys in one school, for example, began their school at seven in the morning in order that they might be ready to go to the ranches at 11 o'clock, where their labor was needed. Everywhere boys and girls worked for their country in the schools and after the school hours, accord- ing to the school plan.
The domestic science departments immediately turned their work into war work. All cooking was thrift cooking following the national plan. Sewing likewise followed the war outline. In the latter department the girls contributed their work in sewing to the making of children's dresses and other things needed at the Red Cross shop.
Lessons in first aid nursing were given to the older girls, and all the girls sewed on the usual Red Cross necessities and knitted the much-needed woolen articles.
In connection with the Red Cross shop, a notable achievement was the work by the boys in the manual training department in the making of toys for the Christmas trade and to be kept in stock.
Lessons as taught in the schools on thrift and conservation along intelli- gent and specialized lines, went directly to the homes, and the mothers were as earnest as the children in applying the principles learned to the daily life.
Salvage work in the schools earned much money. In this department as well as all other departments, the art teachers and pupils assisted with war posters. In the Liberty Loan drives and conservation the posters were most effectively used.
Each issue of the Liberty Loans and Thrift Stamps were sold in enor- mous numbers through the schools. The grand total of the second Liberty Loan bought by the teachers, the children and their friends, amounted to $1,178,150.
At the time of the war the military department of the public schools became more prominent. It has always been known that this department did much for the physical development of the boys, increased a certain manly outlook on life, made the boys more amenable to school law, giving them a rigid sense of obedience to a higher authority. Personal loyalty to the school was increased in the fine esprit du corps.
Since the war, military training has been put on a different basis with definite Federal encouragement and aid. The United States Government has taken over this department as far as furnishing instructors, equipment in the way of guns, uniform and all other expenses. The departments are still under school supervision.
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