USA > New York > New York City > New York panorama : a comprehensive view of the metropolis > Part 49
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The Superintendent of Schools serves in ex officio capacity on a Board f Examiners, the seven other members of which are appointed by the
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Board of Education. They receive annual salaries of $11,000, and ha An permanent tenure after a probationary period of 90 days. pid
The administrative division of the city's Department of Education co.co prises no fewer than 17 separate offices, bureaus and boards, which hand matters relating either to the department as a whole or to various speci ized fields within the department's jurisdiction. One of these units, t
fic Bureau of Libraries, exercises general control over the three great pub libraries of the city-the New York Public Library, with its 46 branch II sub-branches, a Municipal Reference Library, a Music Library and than Bronx Reference Center; the Queens Borough Public Library, with its main branches, 16 minor branches, 12 sub-branches, 6 community static: and 15 school libraries; and the Brooklyn Public Library, with its branches.
Under the general corporate title of The College of the City of N‹ York, a Board of Higher Education controls the educational policies am po general management of the city's four public colleges-the City Colleg Brooklyn College, Hunter College and Queens College. This board consi: of 21 non-salaried members appointed by the mayor for nine-year tern with the President of the Board of Education as an ex officio member.
A very considerable part (more than one-third in 1938) of the cost operating New York City's public education system is borne by the Stat which exercises important powers over that system through the medium its Education Department. At the head of the latter is a body known as they Board of Regents of the University of the State of New York; and t) chief administrative officer of the department is the Commissioner Education.
Educational Problems
Persons of foreign-born white stock, with their children, number New York more than 5,000,000, or roughly five-sevenths of the city's tot population. The foreign-born alone constitute nearly a third of the pop lation. These facts add greatly to the difficulties of developing an educ tional program and of gaining public support for such a program. In th connection, the Educational and Recreational Department of the Worl Progress Administration in this city has estimated that more than 250,00 persons of native or foreign birth in New York City cannot read, write ‹ speak English, and that another quarter million cannot read or write ar language.
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dheAnother extremely difficult problem for the schools has its source in the Didly accelerated emigration of Negroes from the Southern States, Puerto coco and the West Indies. In 1900 there were 60,000 Negroes in New hanbork City; in 1930, the number had increased to 328,000; and there has pecien a steady stream into the city ever since.
ts, The flow of population from one borough to another creates another puls ficulty with which school boards have had to cope. With the opening of nchch new rapid transit line, there is a considerable shift of population. nd iring the decade of 1900-10, Manhattan's population increased by more its in half a million, and gains were large in other boroughs, but during atime past decade the density of population in many sections of Manhattan its us decreased greatly. "The effect of this flow of population upon the ganization and administration of the school program is strikingly illus- Nated in data from two supervisory districts. One district superintendent S le nsi ter : ost Sta ım as d er ported that during a period of six years, eight school buildings had been osed in his district and that a number of others were shifted from ementary school use to other school purposes. During that time his dis- ct had lost more than 13,000 elementary school children. At the other treme, another district superintendent advised that during a period of six ars the elementary school registration of his district had increased from ,832 to 38,472. Eleven new elementary schools were organized. One of ese schools with a registration of fewer than 700 had drawn pupils from 9 different schools. In this and similar areas school building construction uld not keep pace with the increase of school registration." (Report of a udy of New York City Schools, State Education Department, 1933-4.) Small wonder, then, that the theories worked out for the public school stem are far in advance of its realities, especially since the New York ucational budget is so overwhelmed by special emergencies that it can ow only for a minimum of experimentation. Moreover, in times of de- ession the budget is pared to the bone, so that over-crowded classes, in- tock equate equipment, old-fashioned buildings and under-privileged chil- en are still to be found in many sections.
Teachers face serious classroom problems. Many have studied the most th vanced methods, are imbued with the idea of "individuation," of work- g out each child's problems sympathetically, apart from the mass; but so ng as more than 40 children of widely varying capacities are crowded gether on part time in one medium-sized classroom, the teacher is forced ck to regimentation methods. Under such conditions the pupils sit, much they did 50 years ago, with hands folded on the desks in front of them,
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knowing that certain dry facts will have to be memorized before they w be allowed to enter a higher class.
Considering these problems, together with the political interference th has greatly hampered the school system in New York, one may well wo der that things are as good as they are. But it is precisely because the prc lems are so formidable that progressive educators demand for the c: better teaching, better supervision and administration, the finest availal educational talent and the cooperation of the entire city.
Elementary and Secondary Education
In March 1938 close to 1,200,000 pupils were registered in New Yorl public school system-1,098,922 in day schools, 95,653 in evening schoo Of the day enrollment, 668,715 pupils were in elementary schools (i cluding nearly 120,000 in kindergarten classes), 130,494 were in juni high schools, 254,624 were in senior high schools, and 45,089 were vocational high schools. The evening enrollment comprised 27,393 pup in elementary schools (common branches, commercial subjects, trade su jects), 56,347 in high schools (academic, commercial, and trade subject and 11,913 in trade schools. A total of 728 buildings housed the activit of these groups-by far the largest number, 609, being in the elementa field. The others were distributed as follows: senior high schools, 7 junior high schools, 23; vocational high schools, 22.
A notable increase in secondary school attendance during recent yer has greatly overtaxed the existing facilities in this field. In both senior a: junior high schools the lack of housing has resulted in the use of a lar number of annexes, some of which are far from satisfactory, and ma pupils attend only part time because of inadequate space and teaching sta Thus, at the end of March 1938, approximately 77,500 pupils in seni and junior high schools, or about 20 percent of the total number register in such schools, were on short-time schedules, receiving limited and inac quate high school education. In the field of elementary instruction, t situation is much less serious, the short-time attendance in this classificati being only about 28,000, or a little more than four percent of the to elementary registration.
Some relief in the general situation created by a shortage of facilit came with the opening in 1936 and 1937 of several new and beautif school buildings, with such features as auditoriums, cafeterias, gymnasiun laboratories, libraries and model apartments for home-making and hor
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onomics courses. A huge construction program, involving no fewer than new buildings or additions to buildings, was under way in the spring 1938. Rooms with removable and adjustable furniture, to permit of ogressive experimental class procedures, are contained in the newer ildings.
Extra-curricular activities for pupil development-in music, art, dancing, letics, language, manual and motor activities, science, business, social idies and other fields- continue to develop, although all too slowly. The ite Education Department under Commissioner Graves is conducting luable research on the city schools, with recommendations for future licies and improvements ; and the city Board of Education has enlarged facilities for the appraisal of new teaching methods. Among other proj- 100 s, special regard is being given to the problems of retarded children, ,000 of whom were being helped in March 1938. Many schools have en-air classes for anemic and pre-tubercular children; sight conservation re Isses and classes for deaf or otherwise physically handicapped children ve been introduced. In September 1937, new health regulations and ysical education programs were adopted by the State Board of Regents, eci vit ter a five-year study by leading educators. These regulations are designed prevent physical, mental and social handicaps in young persons, and nte especially aimed at the physical care and development of the individual , Tild. la
Noteworthy is a recent tendency to organize segregated classes and Tools for children either with special interests, with physical or mental ndicaps, or with special artistic talents. The Building Trades School, the gh School of Music and Art, and the Speyer School for gifted and sub- rmal children exemplify this tendency. In March 1938 nearly 1,600 sick homebound children were being taught at home by public school sen chers. The first of two schools for superior students was opened in ste inaz 1, 5 ooklyn in February 1938. Nor is family life overlooked. The school sys- n is employing a number of psychiatric social workers as permanent embers of the teaching staff to give special attention to the maladjusted catid anti-social child. la ma sta
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uti New York's private schools, numbering more than 300 in the five siun roughs, with numerous others in the city's immediate environs, are of harried types, from nursery schools to college preparatory institutions. Pos-
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sessed of greater resources in money and equipment, and with a conside ably smaller student-teacher ratio, these institutions have so far had muc more favorable opportunity than the public schools for making innovation in educational procedure.
To the private as to the public school, the way to "learning for life" pointed out by the modern progressive experimental schools, many which began years ago as nursery schools and later expanded to include a grades and in some cases high school and college courses. Their progra and policy are in general subject to constant experiment and change, base on continuous research, their aim being to modify and expand the educ tional program in the light of the stresses and pressures of modern lif Most if not all of them are co-educational, non-profitmaking, and no discriminating with respect to race and color. In some, an effort is made approximate in enrollment a kind of cross-section of society, with hig tuition fees for some students and for others a sliding scale of scholarshi that at its lowest range involves no fees at all.
Private progressive schools in New York and vicinity include til Little Red Schoolhouse, the City and Country School, the Hessian Hi. School, the Manumit School, the Cooperative School for Student Teacher the Harriet Johnson School and others. The Lincoln School and the Hora Mann School are experimental laboratories for Columbia University ide: Among other progressive institutions are the Walden School, the Dalt School, the Friends Seminary and the Ethical Culture Schools. The famo Ethical Culture movement was founded upon a belief in the "worth, t potency and the promises of every child's individual nature." Its fii school was started by Felix Adler as a free kindergarten in 1878, in dance hall on the present site of the Hotel Astor. Today the main school in upper Manhattan near Central Park West, and the movement has a other center in the Fieldston Day and Country School at Fieldston Ro and Spuyten Duyvil Parkway.
The day may come when the public school budget of New York w permit the inclusion in every school of the excellent innovations made these more favored institutions, together with their type of highly train personnel.
Denominational Schools
Although several of the principal religious denominations conduct ec cational activities of one sort or another in New York City, the 01
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urch organization that plays an extensive part in elementary and secon- ry education outside the city's public school system is the Roman Catholic durch. With respect to the Catholic schools, as to private schools in neral, detailed and up-to-date statistics are difficult to obtain. But on e basis of such information as has appeared from time to time in recent ars, it is possible to give some tentative indication of the present-day ures in broadest summary.
Probably about three-fourths of New York City's private elementary d secondary schools are supported and conducted by the Roman Catholic urch. Most of the elementary schools are parochial institutions, operated connection with parishes; they are approximately 300 in number, with otal student enrollment of somewhere around 175,000. The secondary titutions (high schools and academies), which are conducted under cesan or private auspices, number approximately 100 and have an en- Iment of about 25,000 students; they include various types of schools- ior high, college preparatory, commercial and trade schools.
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The instruction given in both elementary and secondary institutions is e (except in a few private academies) and along the general lines of it offered in the city's public school system, plus certain religious Irses. Class-room work is in charge of women and men belonging to : teaching orders of the Church, together with some lay teachers-the mer predominating in a ratio of four or five to one.
Some of the New York churches supported by large nationality groups the city's foreign white stock population conduct Sunday classes in ich younger children are taught the history, language, folk-songs, etc., the countries in which these groups originated, or are given instruction the religions peculiar to some of the groups.
Special educational activities of various sorts, both religious and non- igious, are conducted by the Jews of New York-as described in the vish section of the article entitled "New World Symphony" in the sent volume.
ult Education
For years adult education was directed chiefly toward reducing illiteracy the city's vast immigrant population. Today it is a part of the regular tural and vocational program of many organizations. Men and women taught not only at evening public schools and university extension sses, but also in various lecture halls, forums, museums, libraries, trade
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unions, political and social organizations. One agency alone, the Adı Education Project of the Works Progress Administration, reported : attendance in February 1938 of more than 130,000 men and women in . total of some 8,800 classes, with the largest enrollment (more than 27,500 in vocational classes.
Various bureaus offer free information for adults on educational at recreational opportunities in New York. One of these, the New Yo Adult Education Council, aids about 1,000 persons each month, and kee a record of some 2,000 organizations offering adult education in numero subjects. It estimates that from 400,000 to 500,000 adults are annual taking advantage of such educational facilities in the city. It is interesting note that the first school for adults in New York, the Institute for Adu Education, organized by Professor S. Alexander Spear at DeWitt Clint High School in February 1932, owes its origin to the Parent-Teache Association.
Students in this field are representative of nearly all racial groups, ai range in age from 17 to 80; some are illiterate, some highly educate many are depression victims seeking economic rehabilitation in new trad others wish to supplement an academic education. The courses offere with respect to broad character and purpose, are thus classified in Lym Bryson's Adult Education (1936): Remedial education, bringing the ind vidual's standard up to minimum requirements; Americanization of t foreign born, reading and writing for illiterates, training in health, e mentary child care and homemaking; occupational, or improving ones to obtain a better job, rehabilitating the technologically unemployed, ai vocational guidance; relational, including parent education and stud: (psychology) to better understand one's own limitations and abilities, a: to develop the ability to get along with others; liberal studies, such as a music, philosophy and science, mainly for self-culture; political studies, educate the individual for intelligent political action.
The city's evening high, trade and elementary schools provide facilit for adult education, and a variety of courses is offered by New York U. versity with its Washington Square Center of Adult Education, by Hun College in 30 centers scattered throughout the city, and by City Colle; Not only are regular academic and vocational subjects available, but t problem of leisure time and how best to spend it is dealt with, and the are courses in handicraft, languages, instructive reading, music and the al
Notable for its interest in adult education is the New School for Soch Research, an institution interested in making the individual aware
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world in which he lives and his own part in its destiny. It swings dely away from the old theory that, in shaping social and political life, husiasm and action are more important than study and thought. The w School advocates that not only the scholar but also the intelligent lay- on must aid in shaping modern civilization. It stresses intensive cultiva- of the arts and sciences, particularly the social sciences.
Facilities for workers' education are abundant in New York City, where ndreds of thousands of wage earners are organized in trade unions, po- cal parties and fraternal and cultural organizations. Socialist, Commu- : and trade union schools conduct classes in labor history, principles of de unionism and economics, as well as in the arts and sciences. Espe- ly prominent in this field are the Rand School, a conservatively socialis- institution; the Workers School, which emphasizes the principles and olications of Communism; and the Educational Department of the ternational Ladies Garment Workers Union, a pioneer in trade union cation. The Department of Social Philosophy of Cooper Union carries an extensive work in adult education by means of lectures and open cam discussions. This department was known until a few years ago as People's Institute.
A in Education
ince late in 1935, the Federal Works Progress Administration has iated and directed a wide variety of educational projects, as a part of emergency relief program in New York City. During a single typical th (February 1938), well over 100,000 persons were enrolled in the s regular WPA classes; nearly 350,000 attended the various forums, itutes and health instruction centers conducted under WPA auspices; rly 25,000 received elementary instruction in reading and writing Eng- ; and within the city public school system, thousands of children icipated in many demonstration projects conducted by the WPA.
ne project provides a clinical program for problem cases, including lical, psychological, psychiatric and social investigation of various in- dual cases, together with experimental teaching and group therapy. er projects are concerned with remedial work in arithmetic and read- special methods of individuation, health work and examinations, group individual audiometer tests, the teaching of homebound children, nming instruction to crippled children, and vocational guidance.
'hree timely WPA aids to progressive education are the production and
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distribution of moving pictures, slides, models, graphs and charts a other objective cultural, scientific and industrial teaching material; 1 Field Activity Program under which groups of children are conducted museums, the planetarium, parks, and places of historical interest, awaken and develop individual appreciation; and the New Reading Ma rials Project, which creates illustrated matter designed to enlarge the o. and written vocabularies of children.
Hundreds of needy children between the ages of two and four from il poverished families have attended WPA nursery schools, where they w provided with nourishing food, supervised rest periods, recreational a educational play guidance and medical attention. Supervised play and ot] group activities for city children through the vacation months have a been a part of the WPA program.
To carry on all these and other similar projects, the Educational 2 Recreational Department of the WPA has given employment to a staff as many as 8,500 persons in New York, of whom about 70 percent actively engaged in teaching. In addition to the work of this departme the Art, Music, and Theater Projects of the WPA conduct numerous lc activities of an educational nature, some of which are described in ot sections of this volume.
Higher Education
Four public colleges, providing free tuition to residents of New Y City, are among the more important institutions of higher education the metropolitan area. The City College, with an average yearly enn ment of some 30,000 students, is the largest municipal college in country. Its College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, School of Technol and School of Education occupy a large group of buildings on Lov Washington Heights; its School of Business and Civic Administration i: Lexington Avenue and Twenty-Third Street. Brooklyn College, with m4! than 10,000 students, is a co-educational institution offering instruction to the liberal arts and sciences. Hunter College, housed in several buildi. about the city, is one of the largest colleges for women in the count originally a training school for teachers, it has in recent years shif emphasis in its curriculum to a general four-year course in the liberal a Queens College, in Flushing, was opened September 1937, with a nota faculty drawn from all sections of the country. In addition to the us college courses, its program stresses the acquisition of primary skills,
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iring of "tools for study," health and recreational activities, personal community hygiene, and vocational guidance.
New York University long ago outgrew its original home in Washing- Square, and now cares for a large part of its 38,000 students in build- in lower Manhattan, on University Heights, in the Bronx and at npstead, Long Island. It is a typically metropolitan institution of the gressive type, with liberal arts college, professional and graduate schools ubjects varying from medicine and law to business administration, re- ng and aeronautics, and a department devoted to adult education. Its vities include summer physical education courses at Lake Sebago and in sades Interstate Park, and extension classes in upper New York State, w Jersey, Pennsylvania, Connecticut and Delaware.
Columbia University, the oldest and best-known institution of higher ning in New York State, with its large liberal arts college and numer- graduate schools of advanced study, occupies the area from 112th to th Streets between Amsterdam Avenue and Riverside Drive. Its campus hronged yearly by an average of 20,000 full-term students and 12,000 imer attendants. It offers courses for men and women of all ages in es of subjects, from advanced calculus to plain cooking, from French ature to tropical medicine. Studying may be done either at the univer- or by means of extension courses conducted by mail.
The major divisions of the university, aside from the undergraduate Y ral arts college, include the School of Law, College of Physicians and geons, Teachers College, School of Engineering, New College, School Agriculture, School of Journalism, School of Business, Institute for Can- Research, School of Dental and Oral Surgery, School of Library Serv- and graduate facilities in political science, philosophy and pure science. Affiliated with the university are Barnard College, the College of Phar- ity, Bard College and the New York Post-Graduate Medical School; mal it cooperates with the University of San Juan, Puerto Rico, in its nool of Tropical Medicine. 1 ol 0
ifThe influence of Teachers College, this country's outstanding school of nta.cation, in developing and disseminating creative educational ideas and effect of its long fight against obsolete educational methods are felt abughout the world. Every year, students by the thousands absorb its gressive philosophy and practice.
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