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     The question of better schools for country children is the most important issue before us today. The lack of schools with modern facilities is the weakest point in the development of the best interests of the American people. Upon the solution of this matter largely depends the future welfare of the country people, which includes the welfare of all the people. What we need now more than any other thing is a system of schools which will educate the country people as successfully as city schools educate city people. The graded schools in cities and in towns of the better class are working toward a condition where their future success is assured. The country needs a system that trains for life and at the same time fits for college without destroying the home or taking the child away from its favorable influence during the period of his development when the home and the school unite In education, training and experiences for the formation of character, the foundation of education and development of ideals.

     Excepting in the most favored communities, satisfactory country schools cannot be established within walking distance of all the pupils. In any satisfactory system, transportation l5 necessary and must be provided. It is already here in many communities and it will come in all communities which are alive to the educational needs of the time.

     Consolidated or centralized country schools does not mean the abolition of the country school with the children taken to the nearest city or town to be educated. What will come out of this is a modern country school for country children; and whether it is located in a small village or at the crossing of the roads it must breathe the atmosphere of country life; it 'must create a love for country things and it must teach in terms of country life which the country child understands.

     In the study of this subject in Nebraska two facts are apparent:

     First that the farmers are really supporting a double school system, at home by the process of taxation, the other in the nearest town or city in the form of tuition paid for high school privileges. This tuition often amounts to more than enough to pay the salary of the superintendent of the entire city school system, to say nothing about the added expense and disavantage (sic) of educating the children away from home and home influence.

     The other fact is that in spite of all the arguments as to the impossibility of transporting pupils, pupils are new being transported in large numbers and have been for years in different sections of the state, often traveling as far as seven miles and back daily during an entire high school course. This is being done in many cases at private expense and often for several members of the same family and for several

families in the same school district. Many vehicles follow each other daily in all seasons, in all kinds of weather and over roads good and bad throughout the state leading to high schools.

     And so it is that the farmer not only supports his own school system, but because it is insufficient he also helps to support that of his city neighbors. The transportation that is necessary under any system that will provide good schools for country children of high school age is too often managed in the most costly and inconvenient manner that could be devised when the parent is forced to send his children to ether districts for education.

     Because of lack of modern facilities many pupils never finish the eight grades of the rural school. They either quit school altogether, never to re-enter, or after they have arrived at the age where they can see the less to them of a lack of a common school education are too old to go back into their own school. They must then leave home and at a greater expense attend some academy or preparatory school or too often take a short course in education which does not give them the education which every child in this country has a right to demand. Many of these pupils whose early education has been neglected when they arrive at the age where they can control their own actions get the education despite their handicap in being deprived of it in earlier years. They often make our strongest men and women in professional and business life, but such people should not be handicapped by this delay in education which was caused by a failure to provide the facilities for a country school education when they were at the age and were living at home under conditions which could have resulted in better results for them educationally if facilities for education had been what they should be.

E. C. BISHOP,          
Superintendent.     

     June 1, 1910.

     By consolidation of schools is meant the uniting of two, three, or more small and weak schools into one that shall be large enough in point of members to be interesting and strong enough in the way of money to afford a comfortable building, two or more good teachers, and reasonable facilities for work. It also means that outlying territory with but few children shall be combined with a near-by school that Is strong, rather than remain organized into a separate but weak district. In its fullest sense it means the uniting of all the schools of a township into one or two so located as to be most accessible, though not necessarily at the geographic center.

     Consolidation either in full or in part means the transportation of a portion of the pupils, and this is one of the problems. It is generally accomplished in covered wagons, artificially warmed when necessary,

holding fifteen to twenty children and driven by reliable men under contract and bonds as to regularity and good behavior. At first thought this would seem expensive, but experience has shown that this is not the difficulty for it is cheaper to transport a few children than to establish a school for them. This is because a wagon is cheaper than a school house, horses cheaper then fuel, and because drivers cost less than school teachers.

     1. It is much cheaper for the same grade of school.

     2. At the same expense much better schools can be provided, because fewer teachers being needed a better grade can be secured, a division of labor established, and at least some sort of supervision inaugurated.

     3. It makes possible a country school equal in every sense to the beat city schools, yet within reach of farm homes. No other system has been tried or even proposed that can accomplish this or guarantee to the country child the same educational advantages as are afforded the city child without taking him out of his home and to the city; or what is the same thing, preserve intact the virility of country life. All this can be accomplished without even a small village as a center, for some of the best schools have no connection with any town, but like country homes stand in the groves as a part of nature.

     4. The health of the children is better when conveyed in wagons and landed warm and dry than when sitting all day with wet feet and draggled clothing after tramping through all kinds of roads in all kinds of weather.

     5. Children are protected from the danger of those offenses to decency and good morals, so common on the road going to and from school, and that are so well understood by everybody who has ever taught a country school.

     6. The number who will attend school is found to be larger when children are conveyed; the attendance in more regular and tardiness is unknown.

     7. The health Is noticeably better, especially as regards colds.

     8. The inspiration that comes with numbers puts life into the school that is impossible in classes of one or two each. It also militates against that self-consciousness due to lack of association so often noticeable in country children as it does against the domineering influence of one or two "big scholars" in a small school.

     9. The teachers feel and exhibit the effect of contact with other teachers, a condition in marked contrast with that of one working alone month after month with no companionship but that of children.

     10. It makes possible the employment of at least one experienced, well-educated, broad-minded teacher, under whose supervision even young and inexperienced teachers covering fewer things will do far better than when working alone trying to teach everything.

     11. This makes possible the conduct of the school with the proper regard to the industries and professions of life, and it is the best way in which agriculture, nature study, and household science can be generally introduced into the country schools.

     12. It equalizes the cost of schooling, making it no more per capita for an outlying, thinly populated district thin for any other.

     13. It increases property values as a whole for those who care to sell, and it broadens life for those who stay.

     14. It eliminates illiteracy on the one hand and on the other the false views of city life, so commonly imbibed by school children, thus rationalizing the emigration from country to city.

     15. It makes unnecessary the sending of young boys and girls away from home for high school privileges on the one hand, or the breaking up of homes on the other, in "going to town to educate the children."

     16. It makes unnecessary the present costly system of sending the young men and women at private expense to village high schools, thus supporting a double system of education for country children.

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© 2003 for the NEGenWeb Project by Ted & Carole Miller