USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Milford > Town Annual Report of the Officers of the Town of Milford, Massachusetts 1856-1857 > Part 2
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30,00
Also the common supply of the necessaries for the Establishment; the Matron has on hand about eleven dol- lars in cash, and owes about one half of that amount for curing bacon, &c.
Total amount of Stock &c. $1469,50
We have paid out,
$3160,92
Received,
3010,22
Balance against the town,
$150,70
Charge against the Commonwealth for state paupers,
406,16
Charge to city of Roxbury,
10.00
Expenses of other state paupers,
593,26
Paid F. Whipple for last year, outstanding debts 1855,
30,00
Keeping oxen for town,
100,00
Paid for Seth Albee to Hospital,
6,00
for one yoke oxen,
137,00
for three cows,
116,00
for farming tools,
20,00
for repairs on building;
20,00
for one horse,
150,00
for one yoke oxen,
125,00
$1746,75
Whol e expense,
$3160,16
Deduct for the last charges,
1746,75
Town paupers.
$1413,41
Deduct for those supported out of the alms house,
337,00
Cash for supporting at the alms house,
$10,76,41
Received for produce,
$3,34
for calves,
80.40
for yoke oxen,
180,00
for horse,
60,00
33,33
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Received for 1 cow, 27,00
for 1 cow.
32,00
for 1-2 bushel beans,
1,33
for butter,
96,92
for oxen,
140,00
for boarding county convicts,
68,00
for state paupers,
133,00
from Hopkinton,
23,23
from Dorchester,
5.00
from orders,
2300.00
Total,
$3010,22
All of which the Overseers humbly submit for your acceptance,
JOHN MASON,
OVERSEERS
O. B. PARKHURST,
OF THE
LYMAN MAYNARD,
POOR.
Milford, March 2, 1857.
REPORT
OF THE
SCHOOL COMMITTEE,
OF THE
TOWN OF MILFORD, FOR THE SCHOOL YEAR, 1856-7,
"Passing away!"-How legibly upon all earthly things is writ- ten-"passing away!" The school year 1856 -- 7, for the short space of which you generously intrusted your School Committee with the guardianship of your schools, has passed away. If the effects of the efforts of that brief allotment of time, prove as tran- sitory and fleeting as the year-if your schools are no better, your children no further advanced in useful knowledge and goodness, then the year passed by unmarked by anything useful to your schools, and the $4500, the amount of your liberal appropriation a twelvemonth since, for the schooling of your youth, was spent to no good purpose. What the efforts of that year in behalf of your schools were, and what were their condition and progress it is now the duty of your Committee to relate.
You had fifteen public schools ; eight in or near the village, and and seven in other parts of the town, in various directions from the village, and about two miles from it. These seven schools are known as the "Purchase" in the north, "Wild Cat" in the northeast, "Bear Hill" in the east, "South Milford" in the south, "Hopedale" in the southwest, the "city" in the west, and "Silver Hill" in the northwest part of the town. These names were not applied to these schools by your Committee ; they are appellations, by which the severally designated parts of the town have been long known.
These schools were mostly small and ungraded, and for the last few years taught by females. Their respective lengths were, the Purchase 8 1-4 months, the Bear Hill, the South Milford, the City and Silver Hill, 7 months each, the Hopedale 5 3-4, and the Wild Cat, 5 months.
The Wild Cat was much the smallest of your schools, the whole
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number of scholars in winter being but 15, and the average attend- ance 10, while in summer, the number of scholars attending was still less, the average attendance being but 6. The city and Silver Hill schools were also very small, the average attendance out of the whole number (26) being 18. The whole number of scholars in these schools was 242, and the average attendance both summer and winter, 170. The teachers though generally young, were suc- cesful, and the degree of improvement realized commendable; and so far as known, with one or two exceptions, general satisfaction was expressed.
There are in the village, besides the High School, seven schools; five Primary, one Intermediate, and one Grammar. The distinc- tion however between the Grammar and Intermediate, it is believ- ed, is more imaginary than real. It is a distinction which does not exist elsewhere in your state, and in the judgment of your Com- mittee, one, that can be profitably dispensed with. All the benefits derivable from it, can be easily acquired, with proper classification and sufficient school room, in the primary schools. These schools were annual, and divided by former committees into four terms and vacations in a year; but from various considerations, your Commit- tee the past year, arranged the terms and vacations of these and tlie High School as follows :- Commencing the first Monday in Sep- tember, they continued twelve weeks, followed by a short vacation of one week-Thanksgiving-day week; then commencing the first Monday in December, they continued the same length of time, fol- lowed by one week's vacation as before; and then, beginning the first Monday in March, they were to continue uninterruptedly twenty weeks, and to be succeeded by a vacation of six weeks ; making three terms of schooling in the year, two of twelve and one of twenty weeks, and as many vacations, two of one, and one of six weeks.
The Primary schools were in as good condition, and the progress made in them was as great, as could be reasonably expected. The improvement made in them the past year, will compare favorably with that made in former years-and in most instances the same teachers taught, that taught them the year previous.
There were in them in all about 650 children, though the av- erage number attending through the year could not exceed 425.
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Some dissatisfaction was justly expressed against the Grammar School, but so far as known, it was confined to the school under a former teacher. Under the skilful and persevering efforts of the present teacher, your Committee have great confidence that the condition of the school will be speedily improved. This school was a large one-too large for one school room, or to be regulated and governed by one teacher.
It may be unnecessary to state that the Intermediate School, con- tinuing under the able guidance of its former teacher, fully main- tained its previous, justly deserved reputation. Both this and the Grammar School are too large to be profitable, and should be made into four schools.
Mr. S. J. SAWYER, the Principal of your High School for seve- ral years, about a week previous to the time for commencing the fall term, resigned, and was succeeded by Mr. GROVE P. JENKS. Mr. J. bas had considerable experience in teaching, and much is expected from his efforts. This school, particularly at the begin- ning of the terms, was very large, the room being filled to its ut- most capacity. The number of different scholars who were mem- bers the past year must considerably exceed one hundred, though the average attendanee for the year was not over sixty-nine.
It is evident that this school is not what the Legislature con- templated as a High School. It was never intended that the Eng- lish studies usually attended to in the common schools, should be the principal studies taught in the High School. This should be a school in which your youth can acquire a more extended educa- tion than in the common schools-a knowledge of the higher Eng- lish branches, and some knowledge of the Greek and Latin lan- guages, enough at least to fit them for college ; and this your statute provisions require. Such however has never been the character of your High School. Although the Greek and Latin languages, and even the French language have been taught to a few, and some of the higher English branches to many more in this school, yet in most instances it has been done to the injury of the more essential and rudimental studies. It cannot be profitable or desirable to one, to spend his time in acquiring a knowledge of the higher branches of the methematics, when he is ignorant of the first rudiments of arithmetic ; or to endeavor to follow the track-
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less orbits of the heavenly bodies, when he is ignorant of the com- monest things pertaining to that upon which he lives ; yet, in this school, such instances are numerous. The difficulty arises from the admission of scholars before they are sufficiently qualified. In this matter your School Committees have been: guided more by public opinion, than by their own judgment. Public opinion re- quires, and your school committees have been so instructed in town meeting, that the High School rooms shall be filled with such material as their is; that the capacity of your school room shall be the only limit to the admission. As you instructed your commit- tees, so they have invariably done-the capacity of your school room has fixed the size of your High School ; and your school room, though large and ample, more than sufficient for any num- ber of scholars who ought to be admitted, has proved wholly in- adequate to accommodate the numerous applicants for admission to it.
This public sentiment has been most pertinaciously followed by individuals. After every nook and corner in your school room has been filled with seats, and a pupil admitted for every seat, your Committee have been assailed and blamed by individuals, because their children, their friends were not admitted. They said-in many instances truly-"such and such persons were admitted and we know that our children were as well qualified to enter the High School as they." Persons well qualified to become members of the school, for want of room, must be rejected. This was manifestly unjust, and those suffering from it felt it deeply so; it was the natural, unavoidable effect of an erroneous system. It has inevi- tably followed, that the character of your High School in scholar- ship, has scarcely equalled that of a well regulated Grammar School, Many persons have obtained in the former the education which they should have acquired in the latter.
When your High School room is filled, the school is much too large for two teachers. Eighty or a hundred scholars with as great a diversity of scholarship as has existed in this school, cannot be profitably taught by two teachers. Fifty or sixty scholars are as many as two teachers can properly and profitably instruct in this school, and in the judgment of your Committee, as many as the true interests of education in this town require. In other words,
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the population of the town, as the state of education now is, is not sufficiently large to furnish more than fifty or sixty scholars prop- erly qualified at one time, to become members of such a High School as the provisions of your statutes require.
Education in this school, costs thrice as much as in any of your other schools. It costs the town about $21 a year for every schol- ar who constantly attends the High School, while in the Grammar school, the cost per capita, does not exceed $7, and in other schools it is still less. Now, those branches that can be equally well taught in both, should by all means be taught in the Grammar school. It would be foolish in one to pay A. $21 for an article, when he could purchase the same, equally as good in every respect, of B. for $7; yet this is precisely what the town has been doing, and is now do- ing in reference to education ; it has paid $21 a scholar in the High School, for schooling no better, than it might have had in the Grammar school for one third of that sum.
But the pecuniary view of this matter is not perhaps the most important. To educate in the High School those scholars who should more properly be educated in the Grammar school, injuri- ously effects both schools.' The common English branches can be more thouroughly and more successfully taught in a well organized and conducted Grammar school, than in a High School. In the former these branches are the exclusive studies of the school ; to them the education of the teacher has been mainly confined, and his duty as well as inclination, prompts him to give them his un- divided attention. In the latter it is not so. Here the teacher stands on different ground. He has long since passed from these primary, rudimental studies for which he now has no taste or in- clination, to higher regions of intellectual acquirements, and he will descend to the studies of his earliest school boy days, only when duty or necessity compels him. Here the common branches are not. the main and legitimate studies of the school; the higher English branches, and the Greek and Latin languages should take precedence. It consequently follows, that where taste, inclination and duty all combine in favor of one of two classes of studies, in any competition between them, the other must be essentially ne- glected. Hence those scholars, who are unfortunate enough to get into the High School before they are properly qualified to pursue
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the studies intended to be taught there, are doubly injured ; since if they attempt to acquire the qualifications which they should have obtained elsewhere, the teachers may feel little or no interest in them and neglect them ; or, if they enter upon the more difficult course of the higher studies, they soon discover to their deep dis- appointment and chagrin, that they have undertaken what they are by no means prepared for. They strive to get their lessons, but they strive in vain. They are kept after school, reprimanded, per- haps punished, to no purpose ; teachers are disturbed and vexed, and the whole school annoyed and discommoded by their presence. By humiliating experience they too soon find that their greatest efforts do not avail them; they become discouraged and either leave the school in despair, or sink down into a listless indifference, from which the greatest exertions may not be sufficient to raise them. Such has been the experience of your Committee ; and they would say by all, means, raise the qualifications of admission to your High School.
No scholar should become a member of the High School until he can read the English language fluently ; spell.all common words orally or in writing ; write a legible hand ; has a thorough knowledge of the elements of Geography; is familiar with the principles of Arithmetic, as far at least in your school arithmetics, as the rule of three or proportion ; and is thoroughly acquainted with the general principles of English grammar-can readily con- jugate the verbs in all their moods and tenses, and parse common prose and poetry unhesitatingly; all of which can be, and ought to be acquired before entering the High School.
Your Committee believe that much greater benefit would be de- rived from your High School, by establishing a course or courses of study adapted, as far as practicable, to the several wants and con. ditions of the scholars. What the course should be, would de- pend upon circumstances. It would be folly for a young lady, who is preparing herself to teach the common English branches only, and has scarcely time enough for this purpose, to commence the study of French or Latin, or even the higher branches of English studies. It cannot be profitable to any one, to commence the study of a foreign language unless he has time to spend, sufficient to ac- quire some lasting knowledge of it. What permanent benefit
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could acrue to one who has but one, two or three terms to spend in study, to commence Latin or French ? What useful purpose could be subserved, by permitting scholars whose time for attending school is not sufficient to acquire a knowledge of those branches of learning absolutely necessary to the humblest stations in life, to spend their brief allottment of time in the study of Algebra, Rhet- oric, and kindred branches ? Yet months and years have been spent in your High School regardless of circumstances, conditions or future purposes. Your young ladies who seek to become teach- ers of your children, have passed the best part of their school days in the study of French and higher branches of learning,. to the great neglect of all those essential, elementary principles which they now offer themselves to teach! Your young men have gradu- ted from your High School, by spending their last term, and that alone in Latin and French! The inevitable result is, they are well educated in nothing.
It has been thought that the facilities of acquiring an education are greatly increased by collecting and classifying scholars in large massess. The principle seems to be, that a teacher can instruct a class of fifty classified scholars as profitably as a class of twenty or ten. Experience has proved this to be fallacy. It assumes that one can learn as much by seeing and hearing others act, as he can by acting himself. It might as well be said that one could be- come an active, skilful gymnast, by witnessing gymnastic exercises; or, a master of eloquence by hearing the great Cicero speak. It was by daily carrying the growing calf until it became grown, that Milo was enabled to bear the ponderous ox. It is not what one sees others do that most improves him, but what he himself does. Take a class of fifty scholars in reading-they have time to read one short paragraph each ; but if the class was only half as large, each scholar could read twice as much and twice as long; so in a school. The teacher in a school of 80 scholars, can hear. them once a day; with half that number, she can hear them twice. It would therefore take one teacher about twice as long to educate 80 scholars as it would 40. Will you then employ another teach- er and educate the 80 scholars in three years, or with one teacher, be six years in doing it? It appears to your Committee that every consideration is in favor of the former course.
The number of scholars that one teacher can profitably instruct,
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will depend upon circumstances ; there should not be too many nor too few. Your Committee are satisfied that your village schools are much too large; and greater improvement would be realized by increasing their number even at the expense of their length ; this however is not necessary.
The practice, heretofore pursued, of employing assistant teachers in the manner which has been done, is not in the judgment of your Committee the most effectual. Instead of congregating a multi- tude of children into one large room, and keeping the whole school in constant commotion in going to the recitation room and return- ing, they should be accommodated with several smaller rooms, suf- ficient only to accommodate scholars enough for one teacher, who with her scholars should be confined to that room alone. Each teacher is then responsible for her own department only, and her own . doings. But this subject will be further pursued under the matter of SCHOOL HOUSES.
The time has come when the prosperity of your village schools demands more school room. The past year there were about 900 different scholars, and an average attendance of about 650 in six of your village school rooms or schools. In Primary school No. 3, the whole number of scholars belonging to it at one time was 200. Seats intended for only two pupils had crowded upon them four. Every part of the school room was filled to compactness with child- ren. A hundred and fifty or two hundred children, with faces and hands seldom, and bodies never washed; with garments saturated with dirt and the fetid humors of the body, crowded into distres- sing proximity in a school room moderate in size, and unprovided with suitable means of ventilation, form a school, which in an in- telligent community cannot be long tolerated. Those who regard the health of their children feel, that to send them to such a school, is offering them a sure sacrifice to disease, and they will not know- ingly do it, except under circumstances of the greatest necessity. No teacher can long breathe the tainted air of this school room and wear the hue of health.
Your village school houses were not constructed with the view of accommodating schools with principals and assistants. The rooms used as recitation rooms are small, inconvenient, uncomfort- able and wholly inadequate to the purpose ; they are mere entries,
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designed as places to deposite children's clothing. Primary school houses Nos. 1 and 4, are in a state of dilapidation, and need to be thoroughly repaired ; which ought never to be done for the pur- pose of using them as school houses. To make No. 4 at all suit- able for a primary school, the inside should be entirely reconstruct- ed, as it was always unfit for this purpose.
You Committee regret that Primary School No. 2, was removed to the New Town House; there are many considerations against it, and few if any for it. In the first place, the town cannot afford it. The new town house is a valuable building. The money which this building cost, would be more than sufficient to build all the school houses you need. It is located in the central part of the town on Main st., on land too valuable to be appropriated to the use of schools, to say nothing of its value as a place for business, for which no locality in town has greater natural facilities. The use of one of these rooms for a school is practically about equiva- lent to the appropriation to the same purpose of all the rentable portions of the building. Who would want one of the capacious rooms in the lower story for the purpose of trade, if the other must be filled with a hundred and fifty school children ? Who would take the basement for a grocery or other business purpose, if he is to be exposed to the daily incursions of a multitude of wild med- dlesome school children? No building can be easily used in a civilized community, for purposes more destructive than that of schools ; witness any of your school houses and their appurtenan- ces. With the damage accruing to the building from the fastening of the school fixtures; from turning into a school room, a place, designed and constructed in every particular for purposes incom- patible with that object; and from the ordinary destruction always going on in and about a school, it would have been far better for the town, had the building remained unoccupied. Besides, if it had not been for the school, some, if not all, of the rentable parts of the building, might ere this have been let to advantage. The interests of the town would have been more served, if there was to be a school on this common, to have had it in the old Town House, a place however wholly unfit for the purpose.
In the view which your Committee take of this matter, the time has come when there should be no school on either common. The school house on the upper common is far from accommodating the
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wants of that part of the village. Over three hundred scholars at- tended school in that building the past year. The recitation rooms there are nothing but little entries, hardly sufficient to deposit the clothing of the scholars, yet large classes are huddled into them to recite. Many of the seats in the primary school room were not constructed for the use of small children, and they are inconven- ient and uncomfortable ; and there is no means of ventilation ex- cept by raising or lowering the windows, or opening the doors, which exposes more or less of the children to sudden colds. In short you have not in the village-except the High School-a school house which ought to be used as such any longer, than un- til you can furnish better ones.
The question of building new school houses is a highly import- ant one, both in relation to the number and size of the houses, and to their location. In the consideration of this matter, the item of expense is material, but not the most so; a few hundred dollars additional expense should not weigh against additional con- veniences and facilities for schooling your youth. School room to accommodate 1200 or 1400 children, would be sufficient probably for ten or fifteen years to come. The location of the houses will depend upon their number, which is first to be considered.
As your Committee view the matter there should be two school houses. The territory embracing the whole village, should be divided into two compartments, about equal in population, and a house built in each on that site which will best accommodate. The only objection to this, which seems to be at all tenable, is that of distance ; some small children may have to walk too far. But this objection cannot be very material, when it is considered, that most of the children will have less than a quarter of a mile to walk, and very few indeed over a half mile, which is not farther than some of your children now walk ; in fact, the children in the aggregate, will be better accommodated in this respect by the proposed ar- rangement, than by the present one. Now, the Intermediate and Grammar school scholars in some instances are obliged to walk from the extreme outskirts of the village, to the uppercommon and to the High School House, more than a mile, while by the arrange- ment here suggested, none will have more than about half of that distance to walk. And when it is further considered tha. very few
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