USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Worcester > Town annual reports of the several departments for the fiscal year ending December 31, 1880 > Part 12
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That this example is worthy the imitation of all who have the ability to emulate it; and we take occasion to say that the fund of interest and profit which such good books furnish is a lasting benefit at a small cost.
That we extend our thanks to Mr. Curtis and enter these resolutions upon the records.
A SUGGESTION.
If there were a fund of $1000 or more belonging to each school, whose interest should be devoted to the purchase of books, supplementary reading, fresh and new, might easily be procured under the direction of the committee on books and apparatus. There is such a fund at the High School; it is named the Bullock Fund.
The names of our schools are taken from the streets where they are located. In Boston the schools are named for distin- guished citizens. It would be a pleasing duty to name a school from the founder of its library fund; and there is virtue in a name and in the example which it suggests.
Among the institutions of this city auxiliary to the public schools and named in the report for 1871 is the
NATURAL HISTORY SOCIETY.
This society has within the year displayed great vitality. The membership has largely increased from the teachers and pupils of the schools. Lectures and classes have been opened to pupils from our schools. The cabinet is used; specimens of the flora and the fauna, the minerals and the shells of remote regions are taken to the school houses to give a new interest to the study of geography. The cabinet will be arranged and opened for study by the older pupils; and a curator will be present to direct them at stated hours or days. Thus the cabi- net will become a library for the study of nature, as the public library is joined with our schools for the study of books.
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SCHOOLS .- SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT.
SOMETHING ABOUT WORK.
It is proper to consider the limitations of public school edu- cation in order that those in charge may not fail to secure what is within reach, in the attempt to get what is beyond reach; and in order that the schools may not be criticised for what lies be- i yond their province.
Let us consider for a moment some of the criticisms of the public schools; for I suspect they are not groundless. A keen observer will not fail to see that American youth of the present day frequently lack something which former generations had :- industry, frugality, self-denial, self-support. In early days families were large. From the age of ten on, the boy and the girl earned their own living. In these days, often the boy and the girl are supported till the age of eighteen or twenty- one, and then they feel abused and ill-treated if not set up in business with capital. In many cases they manifest no disposi- tion to care for themselves; and the fault is laid to the schools. The education is thought to be defective; and it is defective· Let us see whether the schools alone ought to cure the defect.
Formerly the simplicity of rural life, the struggle for a live- lihood with the forces of nature in the open fields, and the hab- its of society, made a place for a boy's work and a girl's work. They could be useful in many ways. People did not expect to give them the best fare nor the best clothes, they went to bed early where they had a chance to grow strong. They were boys till twenty-one, and girls till eighteen. They had to obey their parents. They had to do for themselves. It was best for them. They became sturdy and strong.
In the present urban life, a life that is not confined to the city at all but extends to the remotest hamlet, by railroads, tele- graphs, daily papers, -the case is reversed. The business of the parents in the complex machinery of society makes no place for the child's work. In the shops there is a division of labor. On the farm, machinery takes the place of hand tools. The mowing machine sweeps away the scythe; horse-power sup-
30
226
CITY DOCUMENT .- NO. 35.
plants men's muscles; and in the larger operations steam frightens off horses. The hand flail is a thing of the past. In the kitchen there is the same transformation. The spinning- wheel has spun its last thread. No busy loom employs the housewife. Even the cooking is largely done by proxy; and foreign Bridgets step in, where mothers and daughters once dignified work.
These improvements of modern life may be on the whole real improvements. But industry, thrift and frugality seem to have gone out with the old ways. Is there some way to bring these back without the drudgery?
Furthermore, luxury creeps in. Men look back upon the privations of their early life; and they forget that these very privations were the making of their manhood. Their natural affection for their children prompts them to shield those child- ren from hardship; and they do not realize that in the very lav- ishness of their provisions, they do harm rather than good to their offspring; while the children of the poor, and foreigners come in to do the work and reap the reward of labor, the re- ward that money cannot buy. Those parents, engrossed with their own business and cares, feed and clothe their children, deny them the discipline of work, and send them to school in the vain hope that the school will supply what they weakly neglected to give. This pampering of youthful appetite, this timid yielding to artificial wants, this fostering of inordinate desire to have without earning it, what other people have, is bringing on an age of luxury. The age of luxury preceded by only a few generations the downfall of Rome. Such an age when once fastened on us will lead to the nation's ruin.
This tendency of American life is seen in the impatience of restraint, in the chafing under wholesome discipline, in aversion to vigorous work at home or at school. Our feeble youth, many of them cannot stand the pressure of sustained effort in any direction. Why are they thus restive and thus feeble? For the simple reason that they have not been subjected, all their lives, to any thing which develops either muscle or intel- lectual fibre. A whole community can be wrought into ecstacy
f
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SCHOOLS. - SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT.
at the recital of what seems the terrible hardship of a boy ex- posed for a few moments to a June shower, or compelled to go a quarter of a mile to school in a snow storm. Facing storms and braving the tempest is the very thing, both figuratively and liter- ally, which children most need.
It is this very wishy-washy sentimentality, this timid shrinking in the community, from the discipline of the disagreeable, which both causes the evil of indolence, inefficiency, and un- thriftiness among the pupils who leave school, and then criticises: the schools for the namby-pambyism which comes of itself.
If, now, the case has been made clear, the evil of our society here pointed out, can not be cured by the schools alone. It is the duty of those schools boldly to confront the evil. They do so no doubt to a considerable extent. But the complete cure they can not compass. They should be reinforced by the parents, the whole community, society, rising as one man to instil into the minds of the young the wholesome lesson which all true men sometime must have learned : That no man has any thing" worth having which he has not earned.
For the schools :- their province is, by studies more or less, and by discipline which means continuous work, to develop mind and character; to put the child in possession of his facul- ties and make him master of himself :- not to stuff him with knowledge, but to stimulate his desires to know, and to teach him how to learn; not to teach trades, but to develop the fac- ulty to learn any trade. This is our province. We may pass. the Rubicon and undertake all 'the rest; but if we. do so, our empire will crumble and fall by its own weight.
IN CONCLUSION.
It is impossible in a brief review to set forth all the work of the schools for the year. Nine or ten thousand pupils have given the most of their time to school; nearly eight thousand have been in constant daily attendance. More than two hun- dred teachers have devoted their lives to the welfare of these children with an assiduity which few people can comprehend.
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CITY DOCUMENT .- NO. 35.
We see the figures which show the cost, the attendance, the number of pupils who enter or graduate; but we do not see the result. That is hidden in the growing character of the young, and will not show itself till years after. An expenditure for streets shows itself at once in well-paved highways and substan- tial bridges ; its character appears on the surface. The work of schools, if poor, will display its weakness when it is too late to mend it; if good, it will bear a rich harvest in noble lives and in the prosperity of the community.
This work then should not be trusted to the empiricism of the novice, nor to the short-sighted direction of the ignorant. All the knowledge of the subject which can be commanded should be made available. Measures which have been found wanting should not be tried again :- there is no time for unin- structed experiments in our schools ; the school life of children is too precious for that.
The schools are the nurseries of the future Worcester. The wisdom of the founders has made her prosperous, well-ordered, and beautiful, as she is. Let no "'prentice hand" presume to subvert her schools. Let the faults of the system be approached with a wise and deliberate caution ; and let us advance to the better, that is to be, with a step, firm and steady, but slow and sure.
ALBERT P. MARBLE,
Supt. of Schools.
Worcester, January, 1881.
Superintendent's Report.
To His Honor the Mayor, and the School Board of Worcester:
In conformity to your regulations, I submit the following as my Thirteenth Annual Report; and by these regulations this report, which it is the duty of the Superintendent to prepare, becomes the report of the School Board to the public, and to the school authorities of the State.
ABSTRACT OF STATISTICS FOR THE YEAR 1880.
I. POPULATION.
Population, Census of 1875, 49,317
Population, 1880, . 58,295
Children between the ages of five and fifteen, May, 1880, . 10,988
Increase,
1161
II. FINANCIAL.
Valuation, May, 1880, $41,006,862 00
Increase for the year, 1,421,404 00
City debt, December 1880, less Cash and Sinking Fund, 2,265,914 50
State, County and City tax, 1880,
744,476 94
Rate of taxation, .0174
Value of school houses and lots, 877,347 00
Other school property,
64,089 87
*Ordinary expenses of schools, . 134,739 48
Per cent. of same to valuation, .00328
Per cent. of same to whole tax, .1.81
Decrease, .025
Repairs of school houses, furniture and stoves, 4,982 43
$139,721 91
*See detailed statement in Secretary's report.
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CITY DOCUMENT .- NO. 35.
Permanent improvements to school houses, . $1,465 55
New Furniture, etc., 1,411 35
Rents,
1,229 16
$4,106 06%
Expended for all purposes, . Charged by the Auditor in addition,
143,827 97
200 00:
Average cost per scholar for day schools, including ordina- ry repairs,
16 30%
Average cost per scholar for all schools, including ordina- ry repairs,
15 86%
Same last year,
16 61
Cost of evening schools,
1,589 0F
Average per scholar,
5 76
Cost of Evening Drawing schools,
895 57
Average per scholar, .
7 85
Cost of High school, .
16,237 08:
Decrease,
463 63
Average per scholar,
39 18
Increase,
2 94
Expended by City Council for school houses,
23,731 49%
III. SCHOOL HOUSES.
Number occupied December, 1880,
36%
Rooms, not including recitation rooms,
201
Rooms rented,
Drawing school rooms, recitation and Evening school rooms additional,
Whole number of sittings :
In High school, .
502.
Additional space for
97
Grammar schools, grades IX-VI, .
2,408:
Grammar schools, grades V-IV,
2,269
Primary schools, grades III, II, and I,
4,238,
Suburban schools,
417
IV. SCHOOLS.
High school, twelve rooms,
Grammar rooms, grades IX-VI,
49
Grammar rooms, grades V-IV, .
45
Primary rooms, grades III, II, I,
76
Suburban Schools, 11
Northville, Tatnuck, Valley Falls, Trowbridgeville, Blithewood, Bloomingdale, Adams Square, Burncoat, North Pond, Chamberlain, Lake View.
Evening schools, 4-
Washington street and Belmont street for boys; Wal- nut street for girls; New Worcester for both.
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SCHOOLS. - SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT.
Free Evening Drawing school, both sexes, . 5
V. TEACHERS.
Male teachers in High school, 6
Female teachers in High school, 7
Male teachers in Grammar schools,
6
Female teachers in all grades below the High School,
183
"Special teacher of Music, male, .
1
'Special teacher of Drawing, male,
1
Number of teachers in Day Schools,
204
‘Graduates of the Worcester Training School, or of one of the State Normal Schools, 116
7
Female teachers in Evening Schools,
3
"Teachers in Free Evening Drawing Schools, male,
3
Teachers in Free Evening Drawing Schools, female, .
1
Whole number of teachers, 218
VI. PUPILS.
Number registered in Day Schools,
10,887
Increase,
758
In Evening Schools,
436
In Free Evening Drawing Schools,
129
"Number registered in all schools, 11,452
Increase,
612
Number over 15 years old,
1464
Increase,
169
Estimated number in this city in private schools here, (inclu- ding 1,000 in St. John's Parochial,) 1400
¿Pupils in State Normal School, this city,
109
Average number belonging to Public Schools, Increase, 529
8809
Average number belonging to Day Schools, Increase, 674
8419
-Average daily attendance in Day Schools, Increase, 527
7697
Average daily absence, Increase, . 147
722
Number at close of Fall term, 1879,
8159
At close of Winter term, 1880,
7910
Increase from last year, 186
-At close of Spring term,
S104
Increase,
441
„At .close of Summer term,
Increase, 277
7993
"Male teachers in Evening Schools,
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CITY DOCUMENT .- NO. 35.
8941
Increase,
782
Per cent. of daily attendance to average number belonging, 91.4
Decrease,
.011
Number perfect in attendance the whole year, Decrease,
70
Perfect three terms,
600.
Perfect two terms,
826
Perfect one term,
1927
Number registered in High School,
601
Decrease,
61
Boys,
285
Decrease,
49
Girls, .
316
Decrease,
12
Number at close of the year,
380
Decrease,
S8
Number of graduates, June, 1880,
57
Number left the school, 200
Increase,
69
Average number belonging.
414
Average daily attendance,
399
Average daily absence,
15
Per cent. of daily attendance to average number belonging, 96.2
Average age of pupils, December, 1880,
16.5
Average number of pupils to a regular teacher,
REMARKS ON THE STATISTICS.
The cost of schools for the past year has been $139,721.91, against the sum of $138,260 for the year previous, an increase of only $1,461,91, though the number of pupils registered in day schools, has increased by 758, and the average number belonging has increased by 674. The average cost per scholar has been $16.30 against $17.47, for the previous year, a decrease of $1.17. This cost per scholar is reckoned for the average number belonging ; if it were estimated for the whole number registered the cost would be only $12.60 each. That is to say if a school has 50 pupils registered, but only 45 on an average. belong to the school during the year, the estimate is upon the 45 and not on the 50. The cost of carrying on the school, however, is determined by the 50; seats, teaching force, and all,
At close of Fall term,
556
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SCHOOLS. - SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT.
must be provided for 50; hence it would not be inappropriate to average the cost among the 50. This reduction in the cost per scholar must be set down to the careful economy of the school committee. The aggregate cost of the schools must of necessity increase year by year in a growing city. The increase in cost this year has not been at all in proportion to the increased number of pupils. On the ratio of increase in pupils, the added expense would be, for the day schools, $16.30 for each 674 pupils, or $10,986.20, the actual increase, as above, has been only $1,461.91. This is equivalent to a saving of $9,524.29. This saving has been made possible by a crowded condition in many of the schools by which their efficiency has been greatly hindered; by low salaries which tend to the loss of our best teachers ; and by not purchasing so large a quantity of maps, books of reference, and illustrative apparatus, as would be not only useful but profitable.
By reference to the financial statement of the secretary, below, it will be seen that the entire amount expended by the school committee includes the cost of instruction, superintendence, truant officers, fuel, janitors, &c., as one item, and the ordinary repairs of school-houses, furniture, and stoves, as another ; a total of $139,721.91. This is all that properly belongs to the cost of the schools for the year; and it is upon this amount that the cost per scholar is based. To this expenditure has been added the sum of $4,106.06 for new sidewalks, furnaces, the construction of new rooms, and rents of school-rooms; which are no part of the ordinary school expenses of this year more than of any future year. They belong properly to the charge for school-house construction. The side-walk on Dix Street for example is not built exclusively for the children attending that school, but for the public; it is not easy to see why that expen- diture should be charged to schools at all; and it is not easy to see why the repairs on that street should be charged to the cost of education ; and if such charges as these are made against the appropriation for schools, it is not easy to see why one- sixth of the cost of highways, of side-walks, of police, of fire department, &c., should not be charged to schools, since one-
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CITY DOCUMENT .- NO. 35
sixth of the population are in the schools; but if the building of a side-walk in front of the Dix St. school yard is a proper part of the cost of education, it is still problematical why that expenditure should all be charged to the cost of education in this city for the year of grace 1880; for that side-walk, if well built, will serve the children next year, and several years after. The same is true of the other items of extraordinary expendi- ture.
By order of the City Council a steam boiler was put into the Belmont St. school-house at a cost of $200,-to last for an in- definite period, for we hope it will not be blown up. By the same order, three new rooms were added to the school-house at Edgeworth St. The latter was very properly charged to the appropriation for school-houses. The $200 should have been charged to the same account; it is no part of the school ex- penses for 1880.
The per cent. of cost of instruction to the whole tax is .181, a decrease of two and one-half per cent.
SCHOOL HOUSES.
For the last half a dozen years the new school houses built each year, would not accommodate more than one-half the in- creased number of pupils for the year. The want of room has augmented, year by year, all that time. As a temporary make- shift, all the available attics and basements have been converted into school-rooms; this has been done at South Worcester, Woodland St., Lamartine St., Ledge St., Belmont St., Dix St., Thomas St., Sycamore St., Edgeworth St .; and at New Wor- cester, where there was no basement or attic, two rooms have been hired. This attic-and-basement policy can not be contin- ued longer-there are no more attics to finish. In the mean time the school population continues to increase. The census of school children May, 1880, shows a school population from 5 to 15 years old of 10,988, an increase over the year 1879 of 1161. This does not include pupils over fifteen years of age, many of whom (1464) are in our schools. Of this increased
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SCHOOLS. - SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT.
school population, an average of 674 have belonged to the schools for the year, and 527 have been in actual daily attend- ance. The new rooms built during the year will accommodate at the most only 350, leaving 324 of the increase for the year unprovided for.
We have now reached the limit to which this state of things can be carried. Unless the heroic policy of building school- houses as they are needed, is at once adopted, it will be neces- sary to send some of the children home, or else to divide the schools of the lower grades and let one half attend school in the forenoon and the other half in the afternoon. It is doubt- ful whether this plan would be satisfactory to the people of the city.
There now seems to be an imperative duty to provide not only for the present growing want of school-room, but also to make up the deficiencies of past years. If the City Council which has shown a liberal spirit so often heretofore when they understand the needs of our schools, will arouse themselves to the present need and provide liberally, they will be approved by their constituents, even though the outlay be of necessity large. The School Committee will call for four new houses of moderate size. The expenditure of last year should be more than doubled.
The school-houses erected the past year are four new rooms at Oxford St. and three at Edgeworth St. These additions have been built in the most economical way and yet the con- veniences are excellent. At no time in this city or in any other, it is believed, have so large accommodations-equal to a house of seven rooms-been so well built, at so low a cost, $23,731'.49; no outlay for land, it is true, was in these cases required.
At Edgeworth St. an ell was extended to the north, three stories in height. The halls and passage ways of the old part answer, in the main, for both. The new rooms are light and well ventilated, and finished in the natural color of the wood. The furniture is of a superior pattern. The walls are substan-
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CITY DOCUMENT .- NO. 35.
tial, but with no tawdry ornament of pressed brick and hain- mered stone.
At Oxford St. the addition consists of two ells extending to the south and to the west respectively, in such a way as to pro- vide for the best light attainable. The finish, the furniture and the absence of ornament, as well as the substantial character of the structure, are like the Edgeworth St. house. The roofs are made to protect from the weather, and not to display the work of a fret saw. At this house the basement is a part of the play ground ; the building is heated by steam ; the water closets are located in a building adjoining and entered through the basement. A part of the basement whose floor is only a step or two above the yard, has been finished for use as a ward room, and a hall for teachers' and other meetings. It serves as a play-room for small children when not in use for the other purpose.
THE ORGANIZATION OF THE SCHOOLS.
remains substantially as last year, except that several new schools have been opened, and the grading has in some instances been changed ; as will appear by comparing the present list of schools and teachers with that of one year ago. The new schools are as follows :
Belmont Street, Grade I Oxford Street, Grade VII
Woodland Street, “
I Oxford Street, "
I
Lamartine Street, “
I Edgeworth Street,. “ VII
Thomas Street,
I Edgeworth Street, “ II
Sycamore Street, “
I New Worcester, “ I
Providence Street, "
VII
Quinsigamond,
I
In many of the schools having a single grade, the pupils are divided into two classes, one reciting while the other is prepar- ing lessons. This avoids study out of school, which should not be required of small pupils, nor too much encouraged in the higher grades. Five hours of vigorous work in school is enough for growing children. Indolent or careless pupils may be kept after school a reasonable time to do the work which
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SCHOOLS .- SUPERINTENDENT'S REPORT.
they neglect in the regular school hours; and this detention is needful not only to secure due progress in study, but as a measure of discipline. ' But faithful work at school entitles the pupil to recreation and a different kind of work at home; and some work of the hands and muscles, out of school, is as need- "ful as the study in school. Industrial education, some useful occupation, ought to be provided for children by their parents. Every boy and girl above ten years of age ought to do some- thing towards earning a living. Such employment the parents should provide. They should not leave this important matter to the schools ; but they should assume the responsibility them- selves, if they wish their children to become industrious, self- . supporting members of society.
At the same time it is the duty of all teachers to encourage industry in work as well as in study. This they have the oppor- tunity of doing by their own attitude towards labor; and for the time for study out of school, they may in many cases pre- scribe for the older pupils such reading as will improve them not less than the studies of the school curriculum.
THE EVENING SCHOOLS.
The period covered by the statistics of these schools is from December to December. The schools each year are opened in the month of November and close in March; hence a part of two terms, but only a small part of the present term are included.
In this city the evening schools took the place of the ap- prentice schools; these apprentice schools were opened for the benefit of young men who had been indentured, and on the condition that they be sent to school a certain part of each year. In the course of time the apprentice system fell into dis- use. There are, however, many young men and women of little or no education who need to study, and many of whom are glad to spend the winter evenings in this way. A part of them have moved into the State, and have not, therefore, had the privilege of the day school; others have left school at a very
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