USA > Massachusetts > Essex County > Newburyport > City Officers and the Annual Reports to the City Council of Newburyport 1910 > Part 10
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Such slight investigations as have been possible, regarding the causes for non-attendance, have revealed some interesting facts.
Out late the night before; did not get up in time; had to stay home to help mother; had to go on errands; stayed at home to take care of the baby. These few will account for a large portion of our absences.
Add to the above the fact that there were over seven hundred cases of measles during the year and our somewhat low attendance records should be largely explained.
PARENT-TEACHERS' ASSOCIATION.
During the year four associations have been formed which have for
*The aggregate referred to is found by multiplying the number of rooms by the number of days (about 184) each room has kept.
. .
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ANNUAL REPORTS
their avowed objects the general interests of the schools and helpful co- operation with the teachers in their particular work.
The associations are as follows:
1-The Belleville Parent-Teachers' Association.
2-The High School Parent-Teachers' Association.
3-The South End Parent-Teachers' Association.
4-The Kelley Parent-Teachers' Association.
These organizations hold meetings once a month with cerefully planned programs which often include speakers from out of town.
Two of them, the High School and the Kelley associations, meet in the High School Hall; one in the assembly room in the Jackman School and the fourth at the Belleville Chapel.
The Parent-Teacher movement in this city has already made itself felt, particularly along the lines more closely related to the public school interests. Parents have become better acquainted with each other, teach- ers with each other and teachers with parents. There is evidence of a closer alliance than ever between the school and the home. These condi- tions bring about a better spirit in all the work of the school room, and it is hoped that they will go far toward eliminating truancy, and toward cor- recting all the evils of irregularity in attendance.
TEACHERS.
Few changes in the teaching force have occurred during the year which has just closed, a fact which is usually indicative of contentment on the part of the teachers, also of greater efficiency which comes with length of service.
One teacher, only, retired from the faculty of the High School.
Because of a desire to take civil service examinations in Washington, Mr. Hearne, who had served since September, 1909, resigned June 1st. Mr. Harold C. Faxon, an instructor in the Massachusetts Institute of Tech- nology, substituted most successfully during the remainder of the term. Later Mr. J. Albert Brack was elected to fill Mr. Hearne's position. This he has done most acceptably. The growing spirit of industry and good will lead one to feel that he is the right man in the right place.
The growth of the school and the greatly increased demands on the teachers in the English department made the employment of another teacher imperative. Miss Lucy B. Morse, a resident of this city and a grad- uate of Boston University, was chosen to fill the position. By taking classes in French, mathematics and history, she has lightened the work for the teachers in each of those departments.
The recent appointment of Miss Mary A. Jones as assistant in domestic science, and the election of Miss Julia M. Hopkinson represent the only other changes of teachers in the city during the year.
After a year of absence from her school on account of illness, Miss Grace E. Bartlett, teacher of the second grade in the Curtis School, re- signed in June. For many years she had been a faithful and efficient teacher in our public schools. In her retirement the city lost an influence for good which will not be easy to replace.
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SCHOOL COMMITTEE
Miss Hopkinson was given the position which Miss Bartlett left.
The appointment of Miss Hopkinson was no experiment, as her work was known. She had practically filled the position to which she was ap- pointed since the preceding December while completing her course in the Training School.
The serious illness of Mr. Brown early in the fall made it necessary to secure some one for the Jackman School to assume the duties of the Principal. The task was not easy. Any one of the nine assistants could have done the work, however, and would have done it well. It would have been gladly offered to one of them but for one reason; two rooms would then have been disturbed in place of one, in the event of a subtsitute from outside the school being employed. Mrs. Ella B. Stevens, whose excellent work in former years is well known to the Committee, has been employed. She has filled the position with tact, skill and with entire success. Mr Brown's early return to work is hoped for and expected.
EQUIPMENT.
The buildings which for five hours in the day are occupied by the more than two thousand of our children, are an important part of the school equipment.
For many years back appeals have been made to city councils and com- mittees on public property for such repairs and alterations as seemed to be absolutely necessary. These appeals have for the most part been respect- fully read, duly recorded, and quickly lost. Not so this year. So far as can be learned every request sent to the Committee on Public Property by this Board has been listened to, granted and the work authorized.
Not for years have the school buildings been in such excellent condi- tion as they are at the present time. Not for years has the attitude of the entire City Government been so much in sympathy with the work of the schools, and never so generous in appropriations for their maintenance.
Every building used for school purposes in the city has received some attention from the Committee on Public Property, either in the form of re- pairs or permanent improvements.
The High, Kelley, Curtis, Johnson, Bromfield Street, and the Purchase Street Schools have particularly effective and much needed work done in them. With the thorough work which has been done this year, a moder- ate amount of money expended on two or three buildings each year, will keep all our buildings in excellent condition.
In accordance with the law, sanitary drinking fountains have been installed in every school. All but three of our buildings, the Currier, Moul- tonville and the Storey Avenue, are connected with the sewer and are sup- plied with sanitary plumbing.
The Committee has been generous in the matter of text books and mis- cellaneous supplies.
The growth of the Commercial Department in the High School has made necessary the purchase of five new typewriters, two of which were in exchange for old machines. In this department there are now fifteen Rem- ington typewriters, nine of which are the latest visibles.
New texts have been authorized in the subjects of language and his-
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ANNUAL REPORTS
tory. By vote of the Committee the Emerson and Bender, the Webster and Cooley, and the Gilbert and Harris language series were adopted on trial for one year. Following out the suggestion of the Committee on the Course of Study, these books have been supplied respectively to the pupils of the Jackman, the Kelley and the Currier Schools.
Eva March Tappan's "Our Country's Story" was adopted for the use of grade seven in the place of Montgomery's Elementary History, and has been supplied to that grade.
Several new texts have been adopted for and supplied to the different departments of the High School.
The contract to furnish the supplies for the year 1910-1911 was awarded by the Committee to the Milton Bradley Company of 120 Boylston street, Boston.
These changes in text books and the liberal purchase of supplies will account for an increase in the expenses of this department over those of last year.
During the month of May the work in testing the eyesight and hear- ing was completed by the teachers with the following results:
No. pupils Examined
Found de- fective in Eyesight
Found de- fective in Hearing
No. of parents notified
Per cent of defective Vision
High School
436
59
31
24
11
Currier School
146
20
8
15
13
Jackman School
360
80
1
22
Kelley School
215
31
10
17
14
Bromfield St. School.
139
26
1
27
18
Curtis School
129
11
2
6
8
Davenport School
116
16
6
20
13
Johnson School
123
15
4
13
12
Purchase St. School.
27
6
6
1
22
Temple St. School .
91
18
5
23
19
Training School .
135
9
2
6
6
Moultonville School .
43
5
2
11
Storey Av. School
27
6
1
2
22
Ward Room School.
20
3
. .
3
15
2007
305
79
157
15
For 1909
1956
276
71
193
14.1
For 1908
1981
353
297
81
18
For 1907.
2053
419
127
378
20
How much these figures really mean, and how far they signify actual conditions it would be difficult to say. It will be noticed that for the first three years on which the tests were given there was a steady lowering of the percentage of defective vision from 20 to 14.1 percent. This year there is a slight increase to 15 per cent.
In May, your Superintendent and Truant Officer attended the meet- ing of the Massachusetts Truant Officers' Association held at the Lawrence Training School. A special invitation was extended to several of the Essex County Superintendents to attend this meeting by the County Commission- ers, that they might demonstrate to men particularly interested in work- ing out school problems, the wisdom of their reformatory methods.
Who was the promoter of the particular methods in use in that school
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SCHOOL COMMITTEE
I am unable to say. One thing is sure. There can be no doubt of the suc- cess of the plan which involves those methods.
I speak of our visit to this school and the methods used because in those methods there is a lesson for us here in Newburyport.
Twice during my service in this city, in either annual or monthly re- ports, I have suggested the advisability of establishing at least one school, to be used as a special school of discipline.
The idea has not been acceptable to the Committee because there seemed to be a notion that a pupil who was sent to such a school would be forever labelled "bad." That this would not be the case if the school was rightly managed has, I think, already been shown by the work in the Law- rence Training School.
As I have interpreted that school, the one predominant idea is not so much one of repressing the bad which may be innate in the character of a boy, but one of expressing and encouraging the good. In this respect it differs from most institutions of the kind and from all institutions of the kind of which I have had any personal knowledge. Several boys who knew of the time which was to be made of the visit to the school by so many truant officers and others, begged to be allowed to return to the school for that day just to help in those duties which they had been taught to per- form while in the school as compulsory members.
If we could have such a school in our city, not of course on such ex- tensive lines, but managed on similar lines, taught by a teacher whose aim and ambition was to elevate and reform the characters who might be sent to her for treatment, I believe most excellent results would follow. I would make it a place to be desired rather than dreaded, to build up rather than smirch a character, to be loved rather than looked back upon with regret.
MANUAL TRAINING.
The recent action of the Committee in endorsing the report of the Special Committee on the Course of Study, more particularly that portion of it wherein manual training was advocated, ought to be followed up with an early working out of a definite plan which would give our boys the ad- vantage of such a course.
For a long time it has been a difficult problem for the teachers of those grades in which the girls attended classes in cooking and sewing, to know what was best to do with the boys. Some have done some work with their classes in brass; some in wood; while still others have used the time for making up delinquent work. Several teachers have used the opportunity to visit some of the industrial plants of the city, much to the enjoyment and, it is thought, to some profit of the boys.
Manual training will solve the problem in the grammar grades. It is the one thing we have needed for many years.
For more than a dozen years this city has been one of only four mu- nicipalities in Essex County to support a full course in domestic science. By this is meant cooking and sewing. In this movement Newburyport is a pioneer in the county. It is most gratifying that we can now begin a work which will be correspondingly beneficial to the boys of the city.
We ought not, however, to stop here. A very large number of boys in
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ANNUAL REPORTS
the High School never finish the four years because they do not find there the course which seems to them that they need.
A glance at the following table will show that only one-half of the girls and one-third of the boys who entered the High School during the twenty years beginning 1890, persevered to the end of the course.
Of the girls who entered, three hundred twenty-seven graduated, and three hundred forty-seven did not. Of the boys who entered, during the same twenty years, two hundred twenty-eight graduated and four hun- dred thirty-three did not. Sixty-five per cent., or nearly two-thirds of the boys in the High School, do not find what they need.
TWENTY YEARS OF HIGH SCHOOL ENTRANCE AND GRADUATION.
Entered
Graduated
Girls
Boys
Girls
Boys
1890
23
21
10
5
1891
40
17
15
1
1892
30
50
14
10
1893
23
30
13
13
1894
29
22
13
12
1895
28
27
13
9
1896
24
27
16
8
1897
33
21
16
18
1898
35
27
13
14
1899
40
34
14
15
1900
37
27
24
12
1901
30
40
14
9
1902
31
31
7
11
1903
46
50
21
11
1904
37
39
14
18
1905
24
40
11
7
1906
34
13
25
11
1907
41
44
24
9
1908
44
51
22
20
1909
45
50
28
15
Totals
674
661
327
228
Sixty-five per cent. of the boys who enter never graduate.
If the facts could be known, it would probably appear that a large .
majority of this sixty-five per cent. of the boys who left school before grad- uation went into some of the industries in this city. If this supposition is correct, would it not be to the advantage of our manufacturers if some skill in the different lines could be acquired during attendance at school?
Some of our manufacturers have already signified their willingness to co-operate with the School Committee in a joint arrangement of shop and school, similar to the Beverly and Fitchburg plans. There would be no added cost of maintaining such a department except such as would result from an increased enrollment. It is hoped that a Special Committee may be appointed to consider the whole subject as connected with the work of our High School.
SALARIES.
During the last three years the maximum salaries of grade teachers has been increased by this Board so that now we are nearer to the limits
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SCHOOL COMMITTEE
paid by other communities. In this time teachers of both grammar and primary grades have been raised to six hundred dollars.
This action of the Board has placed our schools on a basis which com- pares favorably with those of other cities and towns. Teachers are bet- ter satisfied, and it is far more difficult for other school officials to induce our teachers to leave us. This is as it should be.
THE TRAINING SCHOOL.
For a specific report on the Training School, the Committee is referred to the later pages, written by the Principal.
The question of separating this school from the grammar grades is one which ought to be considered.
There is a need in the central part of the city for increased accom- modations in the primary grades. This is felt most keenly in the Temple Street School, where one hundred children have to be crowded into two rooms. The present City Council has seen this and referred to the matter as a pressing need for a new school building in Ward Three. This was said in a discussion of the building for the upper wards of the city, which is now in process of building. The problem could be settled by a combina- tion of the Temple Street and the Training School if a suitable building could be provided. A four-room addition to the rear of the Temple Street building, with some alterations of the interior, would provide the opportu- nity of removing the primary grades from the Kelley School. This would leave the Kelley free for the use of the grammar grades. Aside from the need of separating the primary from the grammar grades, this would give the room which will be necessary for installing manual training in that building in accordance with the recent vote of the Committee.
STATE INSTITUTE.
On Friday, April 22, the State Board of Education held an institute in the local High School, to which were invited teachers and all school of- ficials from the surrounding towns, as well as from our own city.
The following is the program:
9:15 a. m .- Opening exercises.
9:25 a. m .- General address, "The New Basis of Method," David Snedden.
10:25 a. m. to 11 :: 15 a. m .- Drawing, grades 1-3, Frederick L. Burn- ham, Agent of the Board; Geography and Nature Study, grades 4-6, Charles P. Sinnott, Bridgewater State Normal School; Language and Grammar, grades 7-9, William D. Parkinson, Superintendent of Schools, Waltham; History, High School, Albert Perry Walker, Principal Girls' High School, Boston.
11:25 a. m. to 12:15 p. m .- Hand Work and Games, grades 1-3, Miss H. Grace Parsons, Assistant Superintendent of Schools, Brockton; Arith- metic, grades 4-5, Lincoln Owen, Principal Rice School, Boston; Geography, grades 7-9, Mr. Sinnott; Science, High School, William Orr, Deputy Com- missioner of Education.
Intermission.
1:15 to.2:05 p. m .- Story Telling and Dramatization, grades 1-3, Miss
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ANNUAL REPORTS
Parsons; Language, grades 4-6, Mr. Parkinson; Drawing, grades 7-9, Mr. Burnham; English Literature, High School, Mr. Walker
2:15 p. m .- General address, Charles A. Prosser, Deputy Commissioner of Education.
DAVID SNEDDEN, Commissioner of Education.
JOHN T. PRINCE, Agent of the Board.
In this meeting, together with the five held by the Newburyport Teachers' Association, the teachers of this community have had the oppor- tunity to listen to the best educators in the state.
The meetings of the Association this year have been addressed by meu and women of national reputation. A greater interest on the part of people outside of the teaching force, would have its effect on the work of the schools themselves.
Another way in which added interest might come to the work of the schools is by visitation on the part of parents. A superintendent recently said in his report "There is no doubt but that publicity that comes from parents visiting the schools can be made the most powerful factor in mak- ing these schools what they should be. In my own town of fourteen thou- sand people, a father never visits a school, and it is a most rare occasion when a mother does so; even members of the board of education do not make visits of inspection."
So far as these things may be true of our own city they should be cor- rected. No one thing will keep up the tone of any line of work so much as the knowledge that it is closely and frequently scrutinized by those in au- thority.
THE WORK.
Early in the year the Committee authorized the appointment of a spec- ial committee to consider all matters pertaining to the management of the schools, particularly with reference to the course of study.
This committee has made investigations covering the entire field of ele- mentary school work. The general recommendations of this committee, which consisted of Mr. Berry of Ward One, Mr. Wright of Ward Five and Mr. Little of Ward Six, are as follows:
Your Committee on the Course of Study is prepared to make at this time a preliminary report, and requests that it be given authority to try out in the school rooms its plans, before they be adopted in a formal course of study.
We offer the following general recommendations:
1-That in all the primary and grammar schools, there shall be a fifteen minute out door recess in the middle of the morning session, and that in all but the first grade the morning session shall close at twelve o'clock.
2-That there be always one teacher, and in buildings of more than . two rooms, two teachers on the playgrounds during the recess and fifteen minutes before both the morning and afternoon sessions.
3-That no home study be required in the first eight grades and in the ninth grade not more than one half hour per day, and then only such subjects as do not involve any mathematical exercise.
We further recommend:
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SCHOOL COMMITTEE
1-That an amount of time equal in all to one period per week be as- signed to physiology and nature study.
2-That writing, music and drawing continue as at present, the teacher of music devoting four days and the teacher of drawing five days per week to the necessary supervision in all the schools.
3-That sewing be offered to the girls of the sixth and seventh grades as at present.
4-That cooking be offered to the girls of the eighth grade as at pre- sent and to the girls of the ninth grade once in four weeks.
5-That steps be taken to provide manual training for the boys of grades six to nine during the time that the girls are engaged in domestic science.
All of these recommendations were unanimously adopted by the Board. All but one have already been put into operation. While the recommenda- tion of the special committee relating to manual training was unanimously adopted, the work itself has not yet begun.
Owing to the changes made necessary by the work of this committee, the curriculum and text books, having been revised to fit the new require- ments, the work of the schools has of necessity been somewhat interrupted. The course is now rapidly adjusting itself, and before another year will show the good effect of added attention to the fundamental things in the school curriculum.
The adoption of the Aldine System has been a definite advance in our method of teaching reading. The work has been taken up with a great deal of enthusiasm on the part of the teachers. Its success was assured from the start. The wealth of material so interesting to the children of the primary grades, has been a source of much inspiration not only to them but also to the teachers.
In closing I wish to recommend that manual training be installed in the grammar grades at the earliest possible opportunity; that industrial and vocational work be correllated with some of the courses in the High School; that the work in our evening school be broadened so as to secure the co-operation of the State; and finally, that a text book in physiology be adopted for the grades.
I wish to recognize the helpful attitude the teachers have always mani- fested toward me and express my gratitute for the continued confidence of this Committee.
Respectfully,
EDGAR L. WILLARD, Supt. of Schools.
November 28, 1910.
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ANNUAL REPORTS
HIGH SCHOOL REPORT
To E. L. Willard, Superintendent of Schools:
I submit the following as my annual report:
School opened in September with 440 pupils, 15 more than last year. The question of ample accommodation has been pressing the past few years, but by shifting some departments and using the basement for school rooms, we have been able thus far to find a place for everyone. Every available place seems now to have been used and should there be an increase next year, accommodations must certainly be found outside the building. Such crowded conditions attended by very large classes, are not conducive to good discipline nor to good work. Proper housing of the High School has become an urgent question.
Last year a class of 56 was graduated; of this number 14 entered col- lege, and 13 entered the Training or Normal Schools, while six returned for further preparations for college. There were 144 pupils admitted to the first year class. Twenty of these came from the adjoining towns, and five pupils from other towns left their own school for the purpose of get- ting ready for college. There are at present in the school 22 who are pay- ing the full tuition, besides those provided for by the Putnam School.
The faculty continues much as last year, there having been very few changes. Mr. Hearne resigned and Mr. J. Albert Brack, a graduate of Har- vard, the principal of the High School at Ashland, Mass., has taken his place. Mr. Brack's work gives promise of success. Miss Lucy B. Morse was added to the teaching force and is now teaching French, Algebra and English History. Miss Morse graduated last June from Boston University and while without experience, has quickly and easily taken up the work. We regret that Miss Robinson was compelled by illness in her home, to withdraw for the time being. We hope that she will be with us after Christmas. Her work is taken care of meantime by Miss Sally Batchelder of Peabody, Mass., a graduate of Boston University. The recent resigna- tion of Miss Sullivan is greatly regretted. A teacher of successful expe- rience is needed to take her place.
On March 29, we gave our fifth annual concert, assisted by Lida Shaw Littlefield and the Boston Festival Orchestra Club. The High School gave Barbara Frietche, Galla and a miscellaneous program. The work of the cho- rus received much commendation, but the support given was such as to compel us to discontinue this work. The music in the school has been
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