A school building program for cities

Front matter

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COEHUGHT DEPOSm

A School Building Program

Introduction

That the city planning movement in this country is of comparative recency may be judged from the available literature on this subject. Of six hundred titles relating to city planning and allied subjects appearing in a list compiled in 1913 by the New York Public Library, the large majority were first issued within the present century. Of these six hundred titles, none concerns itself completely or in large part with the problems connected with the outlining of school building programs.

A broader concept of what a city should be has gradually been dawning on the American people. A city is now conceived as a cprporation working for the common good in a businesslike way. This implies adapting for city development the methods employed by the successful commercial and industrial corporations of the country. Part of the program followed by such organizations has been the study of the future needs of the people they expect to serve, as well as an attempt to discover the increase in growth of population in the communities in which they are doing business. The business corporation serving a widely scattered public which does not build in terms of the future development of the territory which it serves soon fails to make adequate dividend returns to its stockholders.

The development of the school systems of the majority of American cities has suffered much from a lack of continuity in plan or program. Only recently has the practice been pursued of placing the control and responsibility of management of school systems in the hands of professionally trained executives. Where the responsibility for the progress of school systems or the building of a school plant has been vested in lay boards of education, whose interest in educational matters has been secondary and temporary, one may not expect to find school plants which are wisely planned, adequately housed, and economically maintained. The pernicious policy of appointing superintendents of schools for a term of one year or two years that still prevails in many cities destroys all possibility of a consecutive building program. Such a program involves the viii A School Building Program for Cities

adoption of standards, absolute and comparative measurement, and the recognition of future as well as present needs. Complete analyses of school plants in various cities have demonstrated the universal need for periodic inventories or surveys.

A part of the findings reported in this work is the result of the writer's personal participation in six extensive school building surveys. The communities surveyed varied from the small New York suburban community of Great Neck, Long Island, to St. Paul, a city of 250,000 people. Omaha, Neb., Paterson, N. J., Framingham, Mass., and Pelham, N. Y., were also included in the list. These surveys have been drawn upon for much of the illustrative material.

The development of a school building program involves three distinct problems in measurement: First, the measurement of population, second, the measurement of the school plant, and third, the measurement of the ability of a community to pay for needed extensions to its school plant.

Under the Measurement of Population have been treated such essentials as the growth in American cities, the relationship between adult and school population, the methods of measuring population growth, and some of the methods that may be employed in measuring school population. With the latter is coupled the consideration of elements essential in the locating of school buildings.

Under the Measurement of the School Plant some of the possibilities of measurement of a school plant with and without the aid of a building score card are presented.

Part III has been devoted to the measurement of the ability of a community to pay for school plant extensions. Financial tabulations have been provided which will assist a superintendent of schools in his presentation of arguments for additional school funds. Discussions on types of bond issues, the prevailing rates of interest on school bonds, and the present indebtedness of communities incurred in the extension of school plants, are also embodied in this section.

Throughout this study it has been the aim of the writer to suggest and perfect ways and means of measurement which may be utilized by superintendents of school systems in the development of their school building programs. For the elevation of the profession of school superintendent much in the way of standardization

Introduction ix

and scientific procedure remains to be done. Past failures in accepting standards and adopting businesslike methods have proven disastrous financially as well as educationally. With constantly mounting costs in school maintenance, as well as in school building construction, the need for economy in planning and for systematic rather than haphazard development of a school building program is for the first time becoming apparent to many local educational authorities. If this study assists in the solution of important problems connected with this development, the aims of the writer will have been achieved.

PARTI STUDIES IN POPULATION

I. THE MEASUREMENT OF POPULATION

The need for school building programs becomes evident only as cities grow. That growth is not identical in all cities, nor developing at any uniform rate, is quite certain. That growth in individual cities and sections of cities can be predicted with the assurance of a reasonable degree of reliability has been proved by the success achieved by many of our public service corporations. It has been apparent to the writer that all too frequently cities have been saddled with school plants expensive in their maintenance and even in original construction because of the lack of any population prognosis in the development of the plant. It is quite evident that a similar omission on the part of large private corporations might result in financial disaster.

A close study of the growth of American cities brings to light three distinct types which may be classified as follows: First, those that are static or retrogressive as to their growth; second, those that are exceptionally rapid in growth and have not as yet settled down to what might be termed a normal pace; third, those whose growth has a fair degree of regularity and may hence be classified as normal.

Inspection of Table I will show only eight cities of the 1 890-1 900 decade and only three cities of the 1900-19 10 decade falling into the first group. Cities of this type may have passed through an unnatural boom period. Others may have depended for their growth upon a supposedly unlimited supply of natural resources which has suddenly become exhausted. In some instances, a promising industrial development has collapsed because of the lack of market, while in other cases remoteness from the more recently developed highways of travel has prevented either a mercantile or an industrial growth.

In the second group may be classed those cities in which predictions concerning growth have been surpassed. It may be also evident in the cases of such cities that no reliable predictions for future development can be made. Cities which have been developing normally may receive an unexpected impetus and thus be thrown into this group. That relatively few cities have in the past two decades had great variations in their rate of growth may be seen from Table II. Cities which may be used as illustrations of extraordinary growth are Birmingham, Ala., Los Angeles, Cal., Flint, Mich., and Seattle, Wash., with percentages of increase of 245 per cent, 212 per cent, 194 per cent, and 194 per cent respectively. In such cases as these extraordinary measures must be taken to provide sufficient civic and educational advantages.

In the third category may be classed those cities in which a reasonably regular and clearly explicable growth has been made over

TABLE I

Growth of Population in American Cities over Three Decades Grouped According to Percentages

Based upon the United States Census Figures of 1880, i8qo, iqoo, igio

Percentages of

Number of cities which have grown according to percentages growth during indicated from the decade

1880-1890

1890-1900

IQOO-IQIO and below to 20 loi to 120

I

I

I

I

Over 200

Median {on finer distribution)

50.5

32.5

32.0

Range of middle 50

30.05-92.12

21 .50-49.00

19.62-56.17

Sttcdies in Population 3

a period of years. The large majority of cities will fall into this class.

In Table I are distributed the cities of the United States according to their percentages of growth during the three decades from 1880-1910.

It will be seen that the median growth for cities during the decades 1890-1900 and 1900-1910 has been approximately the same, or 32.5 per cent and 32 per cent respectively. During the decade 1 880-1 890 the median growth was somewhat larger, namely, 50.5 per cent. During the decade 1900-1910, the middle 50 per cent of the 229 cities included in the study ranged in growth from 19.62 per cent to 56.17 per cent. Only 21 cities, or 9 per cent of the total number of cities involved, had a growth of more than 100 per cent in 19 10 over the census figures of 1900. Evidently growth in the majority of American cities is taking place at no phenomenal rate. The forces instrumental in producing such growth, since

TABLE II

Variation in the Percentage of Growth in the 226 Largest Cities IN the United States. Percentages of Growth, 1890-1900 AND 1900-1910 Compared

Differences in the percentages

in growth of 1890-IQ00

Number of cities having such differences

Percentage of cities having such differences o-io

11-20

21-30

31-40

41-50

51-60

61-70

71-80

I

I

81-90

I

91-100

I

Over 100

37% they act over long periods, may be studied and the developing needs anticipated and provided for.

That there is uniformity in the development of communities after they have passed through what might be termed their period of initial boom, may be seen from Table II. School authorities will have little difficulty in adjusting their building programs where

TABLE III

Population Growth of the City of Rochester, N. Y. on Various Census Bases 1830-1917

Year

United States

Federal

City

State census estimates directory census

9,207

20,191

36,403

48,204

62,386

24,644

62,424

81,673

89,366

34,355

133,896

57,046

144,834

162,608

74,262

181,666

218,149

106,121

225,577

110,038

230,967

112,667

235,000

241,000

249,067

248,465

258,000

260,000 differences of less than 25 per cent appear in the course of a decade. Table II gives the variations in the percentages of growth between the two decades 1 890-1 900 and 1900-19 10 for 226 cities. The median city of the group had a difference of percentages for the two periods of 15^ per cent. Of the 226 cities, 39 per cent had a change in percentage of growth in 1900-1910 of 10 per cent, or less, over the percentage indicated for the previous decade. Seventy-five per cent of the cities had a change of percentage of 37 per cent, or less, for the same two decades. It appears from these tables that increase of population in the majority of American cities permits of forecast with a fair degree of reliability.

In measuring the increase of population in any one city, a distribution of the figures for total population over a reasonably long period of years, as shown in Table III, may be considered the first essential. This table gives figures for the past eighty-seven years for the city of Rochester, N. Y. It includes the figures obtained by each decennial census during these eighty-seven years, the figures reported at certain five-year periods by the ofiicial state census, as well as figures reported in the official city directory. It may be

TABLE IV Growth of Population of the Town of Framingham, Mass.

Increase

Percentage of growth over preceding date

9,512

11,302

1,790

11.549