"We in England have tried, have ransacked every form of contrivance in order to make the movement pay itself-I mean pay itself out of the fees and tickets of the students who attend the lectures-and we have failed." So general has been this failure in England that dependence has been largely had upon private benevolence and endowment, and now the promoters of the movement are turning to the Government for financial assistance. In 1889 a national committee was appointed "for obtaining a grant in aid of university extension." In 1890 the local taxation act gave permission to English county councils to apply a certain part of the proceeds of a tax on spirits to technical education under university extension courses, and one county alone has this year appropriated £1,500 for this purpose. Even this indirect government assistance has not satisfied the friends of the movement, however, and in June last, at a meeting attended by many prominent educators and others, it was resolved to petition for a government grant to properly organized local bodies for the conduct of university extension teaching. This direct grant is desired not merely to pay supervisory expenses, but to meet part of the cost of teaching. There seems every possibility that the government in England will soon be bearing the greater part of the expense of this movement.

Is the prospect any better for abstention from seeking a larger share of government aid in this State, especially when the entering wedge has already been inserted?

Clearly it is not the intention of the promoters of university extension in this country to make it " pay itself." The American Society for the Extension of University Teaching says: "No great work in education along higher lines has ever been self-sustaining, in the ordinary sense of that term, and the society will be obliged to rely on the public spirit of all citizens, rich and poor, for funds to carry on the work." A writer in the Popular Science Monthly for November last, after discussing the cost of the movement, says: "The possibility of enlisting Goverment aid opens a larger question. University extension is a national movement which is intended to reach all classes and to promote the most vital interests of the nation. It has, then, as large a claim upon the national pocketbook as any interest which the Government can recognize." Even the regents of the university, in their extension bulletin, invite contributions to the movement, saying: "While the feeling seems to have generally prevailed that the funds of the State, raised by taxation, should not be used for the expenses of local work, however beneficent, and in that spirit the legislative appropriation in behalf of university extension was limited to general supervisory uses, still the cause of public education could be greatly advanced if it were possible to supplement and aid the work with judicious appropriations of money in the poorer and sparsely populated localities."

With such conditions prevailing further recourse to State assistance would not be unnatural, and I submit the question to your practical judgment whether it is wise for the State to continue to bear this questionable and in the future perhaps awkward responsibility.

The limit of public free education.-W. T. Harris.: In America we explain our public-school system by saying that a nation of voters must be an educated nation. Where ignorance prevails, either an absolute monarchy is necessary to restrain the people, or else in case of a democratic form of government the demagogue will have the political control. We say that in a democracy each person is interested in the enlightenment of all his fellow-citizens. In a monarchy all the people are interested in the education of the monarch; their welfare depends on his goodness and wisdom. In a republic, where each is governed by all, it is the interest of each that all shall be wise and good.

Without education in literature, in science, and in history, the individual will be prone to superstition and intolerance. The selfishness of sectionalism and the selfishness of individuals will triumph over patriotism and personal integrity. It is a necessity for us to see to it that our rulers, the voters, are enlightened by schools and other civilizing influences.

This idea determines also the limit of public free education. Where the people are to obey laws made for them by an hereditary ruling class it may be necessary that the people shall be taught in the schools so much as will enable them to read and understand those laws. But where the people are to make the laws as well as obey them, what limit can there be to the school education required except the full preparation of the individual citizen to carry on his education for himself?

No person completes his education at school. For the nature of spiritual life is to be a perpetual education unfolding eternally. Man's ideal is the divine

human Exemplar-all-knowing, all-powerful to do, and all-benevolent. The most the school can do, therefore, is to teach the individual how to carry on his education by the aid of the printed page and the proper use of his social opportunities.

Extent to which the authority of the State should be exercised.-State Superintendent A. S. Draper, of New York: The legislative power in our several States has been content to exercise very little general or decisive control over the schools. Provision has been made for schools, but little or nothing has been done by the lawmaking power to determine the character or direct the work of the schools. If you will examine the statute books of all the States of the Union with this matter in mind, you will stand amazed at the almost entire lack of enactments, directing what shall be taught in the schools, or insuring instruction by persons of sound character and established competency, and you will wonder, as I have, that voluntary associated effort, unauthorized and practically unsustained by law, should have been able to accomplish what it has in the way of systematic organization and intelligent advancement.

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Now, suppose we take our system of public instruction as we find it, and inquire what needs to be done to qualify it for the thorough and complete work which the developing circumstances of the country seem to require. I apprehend we shall not differ widely in our conclusions.

BUILDINGS AND APPLIANCES.

In the first place, the whole subject of school buildings and grounds, furnish ings and appliances, needs attention. The people fail to appreciate the moral and educational influence which a good house has upon the school. A comforta ble, wholesome, attractive building is certainly a condition precedent to the best school work. Yet our educational plan, the country over, leaves this matter wholly to the intelligence, the wealth, the generosity, the business thrift, or the poverty, the ignorance, the parsimony, the whims and caprices of local settlements. Does experience show that it may be safely left there? In some cases, yes. In more, no. In our largest and weathiest cities there is frequently lack of suitable school accommodations. Even at the popular centers buildings are found to to be out of date, badly worn and defaced, imperfectly warmed and ventilated, poorly lighted, deficient in furnishing, wanting in appliances to do with. And how is it in the country? How many towns and districts have schoolhouses and outbuildings unfit for any use, houses which are a constant menace to health and morals, because of indifference, or because to build new ones will increase the tax rate? How many lack proper seats and desks and blackboards, and globes and maps, and all the things which contribute to the efficiency of a school? Of course, this is not so in all places, but that it is so in some places is enough and too much. A chain is no stronger than its weakest link. Will any of us admit that anywhere in America a public schoolhouse should by any less comfortable and complete than the average American home? But there is another consideration. This matter does not rest upon sentiment alone. There is responsibility somewhere. When the public takes the children of the people into its keeping during six hours of each day for forty weeks of the year, it is bound to give them the best possible care. It is bound to make the environment such as will promote the normal and healthful development of their bodies, while it cultivates their minds and hearts. Again, when the public maintains any building, it is bound to make it a model-one which will attract attention and cultivate æsthetic tastes, one which will stimulate a desire for improvement and lead out in the way of progress.

Who of us does not know that the schoolhouses of the land do not in general come up to these standards? So long as they are wholly left to ward aldermen, village boards, or district school meetings, they never will. What reason exists, in law or in fact why the buildings of a public and common school system should not be subject to public and general inspection and supervision? Why should not competent general authority inspect all the schoolhouses of the commonwealth, and require that in size, manner of construction, condition and equipment, all shall conform to such regulations as modern experience and scientific knowledge have shown to be necessary to the fullest accomplishment of the purposes of the State in providing by law for a public school system? *

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THE TEACHING SERVICE.

If the American school system is to successfully cope with the circumstances which confront it, and the still more trying circumstances which will confront it, it must be equipped with a more substantial teaching service. Perhaps one teacher in five or one in four is a professional. The force is too largely cónstituted of young girls or persons who are unable to prosecute any other employment successfully. Changes are frequent and constant. Two-thirds of the number who are now teaching will have ceased to teach in five years. Fourfifths of the newcomers are immature, physically and mentally, and are inadequately prepared for such a trust.

You may tell me that the law regulates this thing; that it determines who may teach in the schools. It assumes to, but it does not. A law is good for nothing that does not operate effectually. What does the law do? Ordinarily it confers upon city boards of education and county or district commissioners power to certify teachers. The members of the city board are not professional school men. How are they to intelligently determine who are qualified to teach school? But that is not all, nor is it the worst of it, for if it was they could employ a competent person to determine for them. They have the authority to employ teachers. They have aunts and cousins and daughters and nieces who want employment. And they also have personal and political friends with retinues of relatives, friends and acquaintances. They are human. They like to please. Only the strongest of them dare confront the misunderstandings and enmities in which a refusal to aid their friends will involve them. The greater number will use their opportunities to help those about them, even at the expense of the school system. And how much of a breakwater is the county commissioner against immaturity and incompetency in the schools? He is nominated at a political convention and chosen at the general election. He is under political obligations. If he does not pay them on demand, he is considered mean. The more honest and efficient he is, the more people there will be to engage in the enterprise of taking off his official head. He, too, is human, and he will ordinarily and almost necessarily be influenced by these considerations. But that is not all in his case. What reason is there to suppose that the county commissioner is competent to examine and determine who may properly teach in the schools? He may be, but there is nothing to assure it. Everybody is eligible to the office. The qualifications which secure it are the ability to compass a nomination and gather in enough votes at the polls. These are not the qualifications requisite to the efficient administration of the commissioner's office. It would be as sensible to elect a man at a general election to manage a railway or construct a cantilever bridge.

There are no effectual statutory limitations upon the action of this commissioner. Possibly he may be required to certify teachers only upon examination. But what sort of an examination? Except through the constant and strenuous exercise of the legal authority of the state superintendent, it may be only a form; it may be conducted in the roadway. The world has no statutory guaranty of its substantial character and good faith. If experience in this connection has. proved anything, it is that before an examination can be credited with any value it must be held at a stated time, in a public place, upon papers which are preserved, and by competent authority.

Indiscriminate licensing must cease. The age at which a person may begin teaching must be advanced. Professional training must be insisted upon whenever practicable, and where not, then at least a minimum standard of intellectual qualifications must be attained at a stated public examination. Examinations must be in competent professional hands. The authority to certify and the power to employ must never be lodged in the same persons. The certificate must be gained before employment is legal. Teachers must be treated better and their rights must be more thoroughly protected. They must be paid as well as equally qualified persons in other employments. Their tenure of position must be more secure. More men must be kept in the work. In short, a policy must be pursued, a plan must be devised, which will cause the teaching service to become broader, more substantial, more self-respecting, and equal to all the demands which may be made upon it no matter how exacting those demands may be.

THE WORK OF THE SCHOOLS SHOULD BE DEFINED.

Again, it seems to me, it is important that there should be an authoritative determination of what the common schools should do. The statutes are nearly silent in this connection. This matter is also left almost entirely to local author

Ex

ties. We are living in times of marked activity, if not of feverish unrest. perimentation seems to be the order of the day, and everybody has something new to propose. The schools do not escape these influences. Indeed, they reflect any popular disposition or caprice more quickly than any other of our public institutions. The result is indefiniteness and confusion in the public mind. This must be corrected or the end will be uncertainty and distrust.

The authority to levy and collect taxes is a high governmental power. It can not be exercised capriciously. The purpose for which it is exercised must be clearly understood and the object to be attained must be of such transcendent importance to all the people as to unmistakably justify the proceeding. One may properly gratify his fancy, he may speculate and experiment to his heart's delight, with his own money. But he has no right to do so with the money of the people. That must be put only to uses which benefit all, and then it must be used in sufficient quantity, and in such a way as to accomplish the object in view. These trite propositions relate to public educational work as to any other public undertaking.

I apprehend there are certain things which the schools must do to justify their existence, that there are other things which they need not do and yet may do with propriety, and that there are still other things which they ought not be permitted to undertake.

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The schools must be within reach of every home, and they must provide at least the fundamentals of an education to every child. They must put every child in possession of enough learning to enable him to act intelligently and understandingly in his social relations and as an American citizen. They must train his mind to act for itself, and they must, at least, go far enough with the work to enable that mind to stand alone and begin to walk on its own account.

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I entertain no doubt of the right and propriety of the support of high schools at common cost at the option of the qualified electors of each municipality. But there are evils resulting from the introduction of public secondary schools which need attention and which it will take time to correct. They attract public attention. They gratify local pride. They absorb the best teachers. Service in them is more remunerative and deemed to be more honorable than in the ele

mentary schools. Their buildings are more magnificent, their equipment is more complete. Their curriculum rivals that of the best colleges thirty years ago, and what they do not feel justified in undertaking is not mentioned in even the Sunday newspapers. In the minds of educators, in the public esteem, they too frequently overshadow and dwarf the necessary and essential schools of the realm. The educational pyramid had better stand upon its base and not undertake to poise upon its apex. The best building and equipment, the best teacher, the best methods, should be provided for the beginners. The most generous support and the most alert attention should be given to starting the multitude rather than to decking out and polishing off the individual. The relationship should be more evenly and nicely adjusted by law, and the great mass of pupils who never get beyond the grammar grades should have most serious consideration of the law makers and of all interested in the well-being of the masses.

There are some things which have no legitimate place in our educational work yet which wedge their way into it. The educational theorist outruns all other theorists. The educational philosopher reaches after the unattainable and dives into the unfathomable even more than other philosophers. Speculation is without limits. There is no breakwater. He will suffer no layman to dispute him. He will speculate with other doctrinaires, and each will, in his own estimation, get the advantage in the contest. Then he will insist on his distillations being condensed at public expense. Commonly they refuse to materialize at all. All changes and innovations crowd along together in the name of progress and reform. The result is confusion and sometimes chaos.

The waste of educational energy and effort in consequence of the speculative mania and because of the clashing of different interests is great. The cost is greater than necessary, if not unreasonably abnormal. At least there is no reason why better and more telling work should not be performed with the money at the disposal of the system.

In my opinion this subject is one of pre minent importance. The school sys tem must settle down and become a system in fact as well as in name. When it does it will the more effectually perform the work expected of it, and it will disarm the critics or be the better able to withstand the assaults which will be made upon it. It never will until competent general authority intervenes to define and limit the scope of its operations, to say what it must do in all places, what it may do in some places, and what it shall not undertake anywhere.

COMPULSORY ATTENDANCE.

I offer one more suggestion in support of my general proposition. After providing the means to do with, after securing a competent teaching service, after defining the work which the schools shall do in order to justify their existence at general cost, it is imperatively necessary to exact the attendance of the children for a sufficient time to accomplish the object in view.

Of course, if any parent prefers to educate his child at home or in a private school, no one can object, if this is not a mere pretext and a sham, and if the education so provided is at least equivalent to what the public requires. But the public has the right to know that it is equivalent and to exact information which will justify a public acceptance of its work. No responsible institution can have the least difficulty in establishing this fact. There is no other way of insuring general results.

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We have legislated upon this subject, it is true; but we have legislated in a dilettante, milk and water fashion, which has been practically barren of results. There is almost an entire failure to appreciate the importance of the subject, or how to meet it. Legislators fear that they may offend some one who has a vote. America is not to be the refuge and stamping ground of socialists and communists and anarchists. It may be well to hang bomb-throwers and murderers, but is is better to prevent boys from growing up into thugs and outcasts.

Troublesome social disorders can be best met by early and alert legal regulations, and by none more effectually than by such as will bring all children under the instruction and discipline of the schools. The children of the depraved and indifferent are the very ones whom it is most important we should reach, if we expect to accomplish the end we aim at, and justify the theory upon which we are proceeding. It can be done, but only through practical and stringent legislation. We have had enough compulsory attendance laws with no one to execute them, and which no one could execute; let us have some which will compel, and will provide that some one shall compel.

Now, these four matters which I have mentioned, viz, suitable buildings and appliances, a professional teaching service, a defined course of study, and compulsory attendance upon the public schools, or upon other instruction of equivalent value for a fixed time, are vital to the success of our educational plan, and the safety of a social compact based upon the principle of universal suffrage.

Where is the authority which is competent to regulate such matters and insure decisive and necessary action? It is not in the Federal Government. Our governmental plan does not cede the control of educational interests to the national organization. It is not in county, or town, or district authorities. It is wisely and fortunately so, for many and obvious considerations. They are mere creatures of statutory law without original legislative or executive powers. The only authority which can act for this people is the imperial Commonwealth of New York, through the law making power which sits at Albany.

Functions of the State in relation to education.-President Seth Low, of Columbia University: It is every way becoming that the State, not the locality, should make the standard and should see that the standard which it makes is everywhere upheld. The question becomes, in substance, the practical question, what part of the work can the State do best, and what part the locality? It would seem to be clear that the minimum standard should be fixed by the State. If any locality cares to carry its work beyond this general standard, that privilege may cheerfully be conceded. But the general standard certainly should be fixed by the State; first, because the State is likely to fix it most intelligently; second, because only in this way can there be any uniformity of result, and third, because when education is shaped with reference to the work which is to follow, a result which the State alone can secure, the best results are reached.

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The scholar is threatened at every stage of his school life with an uneconomic use of his time, unless the steps of his progress be timed as well as directed by the best wisdom of the Commonwealth. There is always danger that the effort will be made to teach too much, to teach a smattering of too many things, instead of laying solid foundations broad and deep, and instead, above all, of teaching the pupil himself to observe and to think. I plead for an active oversight, at least, on the part of the regents, of the curriculum of every school in the public-school system of the State, I would have it a part of their duty to maintain such an oversight of the system in every locality that the results obtained in all places should measure up to the ideal, at least as well as the results in any other State; or rather, as a citizen of New York, I prefer to say, such an over