Rhode Island : three centuries of democracy, Vol. I, Part 92

Author: Carroll, Charles, author
Publication date: 1932
Publisher: New York : Lewis historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 716

USA > Rhode Island > Rhode Island : three centuries of democracy, Vol. I > Part 92

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EVOLUTION OF THE STATE SCHOOL SYSTEM

Commissioner to General Assembly; (4) a tribunal, with the Commissioner as judge, to hear and decide school controversies; (5) allocation of school support to state and locality; (6) ample corporate and other powers for municipal school agencies; (7) measures for school improvement, including a minimum school year, maximum class, limitation on creation of weak districts, graded courses of study ; (8) measures for improving teachers and teaching, through (a) a normal school, and (b) institutes, meetings, etc .; (9) certification of teachers to estab- lish eligibility on the basis of adequate training. Barnard was appointed Commissioner under the new law, and held the office for four years; in 1849 he resigned because of poor health. He had labored faithfully, had created enthusiasm, and had persuaded the people of Rhode Island to carry into effect a program for the improvement of public schools so transcendental that some commentaries place the beginning of Rhode Island education in the Barnard era. Seven problems remained to be solved through experience, centering as follows: (1) Ade- quate support for schools; (2) abolition of tuition; (3) free textbooks; (4) attendance ; (5) teacher-training ; (6) municipal school administration, and (7) state school administration.

EDUCATION REORGANIZED-The Barnard law continued the state appropriation of $25,000 annually that had been made since 1839, and inaugurated an innovation in Rhode Island edu- cation in the requirement that towns supplement the state appropriation by raising and spend- ing of town money one-third as much as the town received from the general treasury ; it was thus mandatory in form. The law purported to impose upon towns the burden of supporting schools additional to the money received from the state, but actually failed to do so, inas- much as it suggested district taxation and tuition as additional permissible sources of revenue ; neither could be needed if the towns were obligated. The weaker construction was incor- porated in the revision of the statute in 1851, which read: "Towns may establish and main- tain .... a sufficient number of public schools." The interpretation of the statute as per- missive rather than mandatory was confirmed by the Supreme Court in 1881,* in a decision that the statutes permitted but did not obligate towns to maintain schools. The words "shall maintain" replaced the words "may maintain" in the revision of the statutes in 1882. The state had undertaken the solution of the problem by mandate imposing the duty upon munici- palities. The General Assembly has also recognized an obligation resting upon the state as a whole, through increase in appropriations, that for teachers' salaries, corresponding to the appropriation of $25,000 in 1839 being increased to $35,000, 1849; to $50,000, 1854; to $70,000, 1868; to $90,000, 1869; to $120,000, 1884. Dog license fees were appropriated for school support in 1869, and the registry tax of 1842 was replaced in 1888 by the poll tax. The general appropriation remained at $120,000 from 1884 to 1922, the General Assembly meanwhile beginning as early as 1884 a policy of making additional annual appropriations to promote and encourage particular school activities. The general appropriation was increased to a variable sum averaging $300,000 annually in 1922; the General Assembly makes addi- tional appropriations, from which money is apportioned to town public schools, for super- vision, high schools, graded and consolidated schools, apparatus, medical inspection, evening schools, and vocational education. Towns are required to raise and expend annually the amount of a tax of three mills on ratable estates, and to carry the additional burden. The town obligation is mandatory ; in instances of failure to make appropriations or of inadequate appropriations, school committees are required to conduct schools, and charge the expense thereof to the town.t

Older public schools might be tuition schools. The Providence schools of 1800 were remarkable as free schools, in spite of the fact that a fuel assessment was collected until 1833. The state school law of 1839, stipulating that state money must be used exclusively

*Wixon vs. Newport, 13 R. I. 454.

¡Gormley vs. School Committee, of Pawtucket, approved by Douglas, C. J. Hardy vs. Lee, 36 R. I. 302.

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for teachers' salaries, could be construed as imposing other school expenses on towns until a statute enacted in the year empowered school committees "whenever an amount of money sufficient to pay for fuel, rent and other incidental expenses of public schools shall not be provided by any town by taxation or otherwise," "to assess a sum sufficient to pay such expenses upon those who send scholars to the schools, in such manner as they may deem just, exempting from assessment such as they consider unable or too poor to pay." The statute did not inaugurate tuition; it recognized an established practice, and negatived an interpre- tation of the earlier law of 1839 as abolishing tuition. Barnard did not recognize tuition as an evil; he believed that a moderate tuition might create an economic interest that would induce parents to send children to school regularly, in order to obtain the largest possible advantage. Later Commissioners recognized tuition as an obstacle to enrollment and attend- ance. Commissioner Potter, 1850, recommended abolition of tuition, or rate bills, the common term for tuition, saying: "there can be no doubt that the present rate bill system is one great obstacle in the way of a more general attendance. In several of the larger towns the schools are now made entirely free by town taxation, but in many of the towns the state and town appropriations are insufficient and the remainder is assessed on scholars .... the greatness of the evil is apparent. It is for the wisdom of the legislature to devise a remedy." Commis- sioner Potter urged an increase in the state appropriation to offset the tuition collected by towns. The payment of tuition could not be avoided easily. Payment might be demanded and enforced in advance; payment could be enforced by arrest of the body of a delinquent parent and imprisonment. Parents who were willing to make an admission of poverty were relieved, but few parents wished their children and themselves branded as paupers. Three- quarters of the towns collected tuition in 1867-1868; in 1868 tuition was abolished with the end of the current school year. The General Assembly added $20,000 to the annual state appropriation to replace the tuition collected by towns. The spirit of free public education implied in the abolition of tuition, was advanced through the free textbook law, 1893, and a statute in 1922 forbidding sales and collections on school premises.

The textbook problem was threefold as it involved (I) supplying the books necessary for study; (2) reasonable uniformity of textbooks; and (3) reasonable restriction on fre- quent changes of books or editions. Updike in his address in 1843, advocating the appoint- ment of an agent for public schools, emphasized want of uniformity and frequent changes of books as among the sorest burdens imposed upon the parents of children attending public schools, because there was no end or limit to buying new books to comply with the requests of teachers, or to provide new books when families removed from one school district to another. The Barnard law directed the Commissioner to promote a uniformity of textbooks at least within each town, and authorized school committees to prescribe the textbooks to be used in all districts in the town. In the early history of the Providence schools, Oliver Angell, a schoolmaster, prepared a series of "union textbooks," to include within one set of paper covers all of the material needed for a grade in school, and to be sold at low prices. Still, while teachers were permitted to choose textbooks and editions for use in their own schoolrooms, and while school officers and teachers were permitted to act as agents for text- book manufacturers, and while there were no restrictions upon frequent changes, parents of school children were burdened not only with the primary cost of providing books, but with the additional and vexatious exaction of buying new books with every change of teachers, new books upon removal or transfer from one to another district in the same town, and still other new books when a change was ordered by school officers. A general law enacted in 1870 forbade superintendents of schools, members of school committees and other persons officially connected with public schools to receive any private fee, gratuity, donation or com- pensation, in any manner whatsoever, for promoting the sale or exchange of any school book,

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EVOLUTION OF THE STATE SCHOOL SYSTEM

map or chart in any public school, and other persons to offer fees, commission or compensa- tion to public school officers for promoting such sales or exchanges. Changes in textbooks may be made only by two-thirds vote of the school committees after notice in writing has been given at a previous meeting, and not oftener than once in three years without the consent of the State Board of Education.

The main problem, that of supplying textbooks, was as serious in its effect upon schools as upon the pocketbooks of parents. Assuming that textbooks are very desirable, if not abso- lutely necessary, accessories of efficient and economic instruction, the latter must await the time when pupils are amply provided; pupils not provided with textbooks are themselves handicapped and tend to retard the class progress that is promoted when all members have access to the materials of instruction and study. The schoolmasters of Providence were ordered in 1804 to "receive no scholars unless they are severally furnished with such books as are studied in the several classes to which such scholar belongs"; in 1822 they were directed to "attend personally on parents .... and others having charge of children who attend their respective schools and inform them that unless they are furnished with suitable books, or make it appear satisfactorily that they are not able to procure these, that they will be liable to be dismissed from school." Newport dealt with the textbook problem by supply- ing free textbooks and charging tuition to cover the cost. The Barnard school act required school trustees "to see that scholars are properly supplied with books, and in case they are not, and the parents and guardians or master have been notified thereof by the teacher, to provide the same at the expense of the district and add the price thereof to the next school tax or rate bill of said parents." The act safeguarded the children of the poor through its provision for exemption from tuition charges at the discretion of the trustees, and the posi- tive rule that no child should be excluded from school for inability of his parents or guardians to pay rate bill or other tax. Barnard explained the section of the law thus: "Nothing short of the power with which the trustees are here invested will do away with the complaints, and just complaints of teachers, respecting the inadequate supply of suitable books. In more than four-fifths of the returns which have been received from teachers a number of children are mentioned as not supplied with books. It would be better in most of the districts, and even the towns, to have the books purchased by or under the direction of the school committee or trustees, and furnished, when needed, to the children, and the expense put upon the tax or rate bill of the parents." Commissioner Potter recognized the expense of providing textbooks as one of the reasons for parents' neglect to send children to school. Commissioner Allyn advocated the supplying of textbooks by school committees, or the purchase by school officers of sufficient supplies of books, and loans to pupils at a small rental-perhaps free textbooks.

The most compelling reason for free textbooks is economy. In Rhode Island the total annual cost of free textbooks is less than the expenditure for current maintenance of schools for one week. If it could be assumed that children could be supplied with books through private initiative within one week of the opening of schools, then the taxpayers might choose betwixt supporting schools for a week while teachers and pupils marked time, waiting for books ; or paying for the books, so that schools might start on the first day for which salaries were paid. But the assumption of supply within one week is not justified ; two weeks would be nearer to facts and a wait of two weeks would involve for the taxpayers expenditures for cur- rent maintenance amounting to double the cost of textbooks and supplies. Free textbooks and supplies permit the beginning of instruction and study in the first minute of the first hour of the first day that schools are in session. Rhode Island solved the problem of supply by a statute enacted in 1893 that required school committees to purchase at public expense and loan free to pupils all books and supplies to be used in school. The free textbook law supple- mented the abolition of tuition; the latter permitted free attendance, the former relieved the

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pupil and his parents of any expense because of attending school. Both made straight the path to an effective compulsory attendance law.

COMPULSORY ATTENDANCE -- It was scarcely merely coincidence that Francis Wayland in 1828, the representative of the Providence Association of Mechanics and Manufacturers in 1839, Wilkins Updike in 1843, and Henry Barnard in 1844 found the deficiencies in the public schools of their time a reason sufficient to explain poor attendance. The facts that so many children in Providence attended private schools, and that public school attendance in Provi- dence invariably increased after reforms or improvements in the schools supported the posi- tion of Wayland and the Mechanics. Updike believed that improvements in rural schools such as would carry them to the standard maintained in Providence in 1843, would attract pupils to them and remedy evil school conditions throughout the state. Barnard's recommen- dations urged improved schools. None of the reformers mentioned urged compulsory attend- ance as a remedy ; that scarcely would be consistent with their opinions that the schools were not satisfactory. Enrollment in public schools was 20,096 in 1845; 24,743 in 1850; 26,883 in 1855. Average attendance was 13,282 in 1850, and 18,998 in 1855. School population was estimated as 33,958 in 1850, and 39,001 in 1855. Average attendance improved, but enrollment was not keeping pace with the increase of population, which meant that boys and girls who went to school were attending more regularly, but that not so many as ought to do so were going to school. Commissioner Potter urged abolition of tuition as a remedy ; and Commissioner Allyn was convinced that the cost of textbooks was a vexatious cause for poor enrollment.

Two bills dealing with truancy were passed by the Rhode Island House of Representa- tives in 1853, but failed of passage in the Senate. One empowered towns and cities to pro- vide by ordinance for the punishment of "truant children between the ages of five and fif- teen who are growing up in ignorance, are without regular or lawful occupation and are habit- ual truants from school," by fine or imprisonment in reformatory institutions. The other bill conferred similar powers upon the city of Providence. Commissioner Potter expressed his satisfaction at the defeat of both bills, which were intended to deal with the withdrawal of Roman Catholic children from the public schools of Providence after the opening of Catholic schools in that city. In May, 1851, the school committee of Providence noted "a consider- able diminution of the numbers attending several of the schools has recently taken place by the removal of children of Roman Catholic parents, schools having been provided for them under the immediate supervision of the clergy of their order and several of the Sisters of Mercy." In 1855 "this apparent decrease in the number of children attending our public schools, notwithstanding the large increase in population," was accounted for "by the fact that several hundred children have been withdrawn to attend the Roman Catholic schools." The several hundred were over 600, and in 1865 the number had increased to 1273. Com- missioner Potter's objection to the truancy bills was consistent with his firm opposition to any public action savoring of sectarianism or bigotry. To furnish a basis for sound public opinion in Rhode Island Commissioner Potter collected and printed with one of his annual reports voluminous extracts from discussions aroused in other commonwealths concerning diver- sion of public money to the support of religious denominational schools, and concerning "dis- establishment" in instances in which the public schools were practically controlled by predom- inating religious societies which insisted upon using the schools supported by general taxa- tion as agencies for teaching dogmatic religion. He held firmly that, provided a parent ful- filled his obligation to provide education for his children, the parent had a right to choose the school; he characterized compulsory attendance at public schools exclusively, as an invasion of the rights of individual liberty and the right of free and liberal thought. State control of

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EVOLUTION OF THE STATE SCHOOL SYSTEM

all education he characterized as a first step toward despotism. Commissioner Potter's views were substantially those that characterize Rhode Island's compulsory attendance laws, which require attendance on public instruction, but accept in lieu thereof private instruction or attendance on private instruction, provided either has been approved by the public school committee as substantially equivalent in time, content and discipline to public school instruc- tion. The bills that he condemned were of the type declared unconstitutional by the United States Supreme Court .* By his firm stand, Commissioner Potter was able to avoid in Rhode Island the consequences of a controversy that distressed other states. He was a Rhode Islander of a type that would warm the hearts of Roger Williams and John Clarke. He laid down the rule still governing devotional exercises and the reading of the Bible in public schools: "The reading of the Bible or conducting other devotional exercises at the opening or closing of schools is neither forbidden nor commanded by law, and rests with the teacher, who should respect his own conscience and the consciences of his pupils and their parents."

The General Assembly in 1853 limited the hours of labor of children employed in fac- tories, and in 1854 forbade the employment of minors under fifteen in factories for more than nine months in a year and unless the minor had attended school three months in the preceding year. Commissioner Allyn was ordered in 1855 to ascertain and report the number of chil- dren in the state between the ages of six and fifteen years who are habitual truants from pub- lic schools, with suggestions and recommendations. A law permitting towns and cities to "make all needful provision and arrangements concerning habitual truants and children between the ages of six and sixteen, not attending school, without any regular employment, and growing up in ignorance, and also, such ordinances and by-laws respecting such children as shall be deemed most conducive to their welfare and the good order of such town," fol- lowed. Such children might be committed to "any such institution of instruction or suitable situation as may be provided for that purpose," but not "to any place used for the reception of criminals or to any reform school." Ordinances and by-laws must be approved by the Commissioner. The law was clearly defective and scarcely likely to be enforced, for two reasons: (1) That it empowered, but did not require, towns and cities to act; and (2) that there were no "institutions of instruction . provided for that purpose," nor was it prob- able that any town or city would establish such an institution.

While Rhode Island was still struggling with the problem of attendance arising from neglect of opportunities for education, one class of citizen was demanding equal rights and privileges on the ground that it was discriminated against. As early as 1828 Providence established a separate school for colored children ; a second school was opened in 1837, dis- continued in 1839, reopened in 1842 and continued to 1865. Newport and Bristol also main- tained separate schools for colored children. The statutes provided no remedy for this "dis- crimination," for these children were excluded from attending the public schools nearest their homes by a "general regulation applicable to all persons under the same circumstances"; nor was there substantial objection as long as the schools provided were of a grade corresponding to other public schools. The situation changed, however, when colored children were excluded from the high school in Providence, which was supported exclusively for white children. Peti- tions praying for "equal rights" were presented in the General Assembly, and hearings were conducted ; in 1866, before the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, Rhode Island enacted a law declaring that "no person shall be excluded from any public school by reason of race or color." Providence maintained separate elemen- tary schools for colored children for several years after 1866 by withdrawing white children from schools in two precincts in which the colored population was segregated. No colored child, after the law was passed, was excluded from a school in violation of the statute; but

*Pierce vs. Sisters of the Holy Name, 268 U. S. 510 ; and see Meyer vs. Nebraska, 262 U. S. 390.

R. I .- 35

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white children were "discriminated against" by being sent to other schools. Even this dis- crimination ended when the colored population was distributed through the city.

Commissioner Bicknell in 1879 undertook a vigorous campaign to improve attendance, making his appeal to the people on census figures indicating that adult illiteracy was increasing in Rhode Island at an alarming rate. The number of adult illiterates in Rhode Island, as reported by Bicknell, was 3607 in 1850, 6112 in 1860, 10,181 in 1865, and 16,786 in 1870. Adult illiteracy had increased 367 per cent., while population had increased scarcely fifty per cent. in twenty years. Bicknell laid the blame for this situation upon the public schools and advocated seven "remedies" as follows: Excellent common schools, intelligent and inter- ested public sentiment strongly positive in favor of universal education, enforcement of a law forbidding the employment of children under twelve in factories, enforcement of a law com- pelling factory children to attend school five months per year, a truant and vagrancy law, eve- ning schools for persons over sixteen years of age, a literacy test as a qualification for suffrage rights. An analysis of the census figures shows, however, that native born adult illiteracy was decreasing in Rhode Island in proportion to population, and that the increase in adult illiteracy was among foreign-born residents. None of Bicknell's "remedies" dealing with common schools or children could affect this part of the population seriously ; the single remedy relevant to the educational problem lay in "evening schools for persons over sixteen years of age." The General Assembly was impressed by Bicknell's presentation of statistics, enacted an improved attendance statute, and began to make annual appropriations for evening schools.

The development of a model compulsory attendance law has been a matter of years of persistent persuasion by school officers and other persons interested in the welfare of children. The more significant advances have been the annual school census law of 1878; mandatory provision for truant officers, 1887 ; penalties for truancy and neglect to send children to school, 1902 ; increase in the period of required attendance annually to eighty days ( 1887), to one full term (1898), to every day and hour that schools are in session (1902) ; extension of school age to fifteen years as the minimum age for employment (1924) ; employment of children of school age, only on presentation of legal certificates of completion of school and other require- ments (1887). The law requires every child who has completed seven and who has not com- pleted sixteen years of age, except children over fifteen who are lawfully and regularly employed or engaged in business to attend some public day school in the town or city in which the child resides every day and every hour that schools are in session, but accepts attendance on private instruction approved by the school committee in lieu of attendance on public instruc- tion. For a child (I) who has completed fifteen years of age; (2) who can read at sight and write legibly simple sentences in the English language; (3) who has attended school eight years or completed the first eight years of school work, exclusive of kindergarten; (4) who has been examined by a physician and found to be in sound health and physically fit for employment ; (5) and who has found a job, an age and employment certificate may be issued to an employer. The child's age may be proved only by (I) birth certificate; (2) baptismal certificate ; (3) passport, or (4) other evidence satisfactory to the Commissioner of Educa- tion. The school record must be properly certified. The child is described in the certificate. The employer must return the certificate to the issuing officer within five days after the child leaves employment, so that the child's return to school may be checked. The superintendent of schools is required to keep in his office on individual cards provided by the Commissioner the names of every child disclosed by the annual school census, and on the same card a record of the child's attendance. Uniform attendance records are kept by public and private schools in school registers provided by the Commissioner, and reports of attendance are made to the superintendent by public and private schools. The system of child accounting indicates less than two per cent. of failure to enroll in school within the years of compulsory attendance, and the two per cent. includes children mentally or physically incapacitated or properly excus-

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Rhode Island : three centuries of democracy, Vol. I, Part 92

Author: Carroll, Charles, author Publication date: 1932 Publisher: New York : Lewis historical Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 716

Author: Carroll, Charles, author
Publication date: 1932
Publisher: New York : Lewis historical Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 716