Public school administration; a statement of the fundamental principles underlying the organization and administration of public education

Front matter

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Class i3_^/i?^ Book - ^ T

CHAPTER I. Origin and Development of Schools . . 3

Early attitudes — Schools at first community undertakings — — The district unit — Evolution of district organization — Early district oflScers — Rise of state systems — Early state organizations — The first school laws — The change in attitude — The present conviction — Questions for discussion.

CHAPTER n. State Authorization and Control . . 14

The State the unit — Court decisions — Delegated authority — The recovery of state sovereignty — Examples of such transference — Advantages of state control — Disadvantages of state control — The State's proper functions — A state educational policy — Questions for investigation and discussion.

CHAPTER m. State Educational Organization . . 27

Evolution of forms of control — Chief state school oflBcer — The office an evolution — Duties of such an official — New demands for leadership — State boards of education — Types of state boards — Good state educational organization — The problem at hand — Questions for investigation and discussion.

CHAPTER IV. County Educational Organization . . 35

The county in school administration — Evolution of a county school officer — Early duties of the office — New and changed duties — New demand for educational leadership — County boards of control — The educational problem involved — Questions for investigation and discussion.

CHAPTER V. Town, Township, and District Organization 44

County subdivisions for administration — The town — Marked features of the town system — The township — Disadvantages of the township unit — The township unit not fundamentally necessary — The school-district unit — Bad features

X CONTENTS

of the district unit — District system not necessary — A fundamental reorganization needed — Questions for investigation and discussion.

CHAPTER VI. The City School District 55

The city district a special case — The city district an evolution — Recent rapid growth of city school systems — Prominence of city administrative problems — The city's distinctive contribution — State vs. city control of the school district — Protection instead of bureaucracy — Other problems of relationship — To study the city first — Questions for investigation and discussion — Selected references covering Part I.

PART n. THE CITY SCHOOL DISTRICT AND ITS PROBLEMS

CHAPTER Vn. Evolution of City School Organization AND Administration 71

The original town control — Subtracting powers from the towns — Rise of the school committee — Two centuries of evolution — Massachusetts a type — Types of development elsewhere — The separate school board — Development of the ward and committee systems — Evolution of professional supervision

— Further differentiation of executive functions — Present conceptions as to school control — Selected references.

CHAPTER Vni. Organization of Boards for School Control 85

Special governing boards — Recent reorganizations — Tendencies in recent reorganizations — Size of school boards — Basis of selection, wards vs. at large — Appointment vs. election — ,Term of office, and elections — Pay for services — Origin of pay proposals — Commission form of government and the schools — Dependence on vs. independence of the city government — The ordinary citizen and the schools — Disadvantages of city control

— Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER IX. Functions OF Boards FOR School Control 109

The board as a body — Boards continuous and changing — Types of school-board members — The committee form of control — Committee control applied to hospital management — Conunittee service time-consumiag — Committee action illus-

CONTENTS xi

trated — A confusion in functions — The real work of the board — Legislative and executive functions — Selection of executive officers — Bases for selection — Types of board members — Results of faithful service — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

lJHAPTER X. The Superintendent of Schools . . . 130

A new profession — Importance of this official — Large duties of the office — Education and training — The years of apprenticeship — Learning and working — Dangerous pitfalls — Personal qualities necessary — The qualities of leadership — Questions for discussion — Selected references.

CHAPTER XI. Threefold Nature of the Superintendent's Work 143

Three types of service — Time for the larger problems — Loss of balance and perspective.

1. The superintendent as an organizer — A policy for development — Educating a board — Importance of such service.

2. The superintendent as an^executive — Proper personal and official relations — Mutual trust and confidence — Appealing to the community — Relations with the community.

3. The superintendent as supervisor — Dangers faced by the superintendent — Questions for discussion — Selected references.

CHAPTER XII. City School Department Organization 160

Size and distribution of cities — The small city school system — The comprehensive type of superintendent — Dangers of such a position — Organization in a small city — The place of the superintendent in the scheme — Expansion as the city grows — Proper administrative organization for the larger city — Guaranteed powers — Educational organization in the large city — Central position of the educational department — Executive heads of departments — Faulty educational organization — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XIII. Organization of the Educational

DEa»ARTMENT 177

The superintendent as a department head — He gives character to the department — Sensitiveness of teachers to leadership — Characteristics of a good supervisory organization — Responsibility of all for successful work — A weak supervisory organization — Personnel of the supervisory organization — Assistant xii CONTENTS

superintendent and supervisor — Cabinet solidarity — The personal equation — Relations of superintendent and assistant — The special supervisors — The school principals — Increasing their effectiveness — Underiying purposes of supervisory organization — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XIV. The Teachinq Corps 198

I. Selection and Tenure.

1. The selection of teachers — The eariy method — Defects of this method — Importance of guarding appointments — Fundamental principles of action — Standards which should prevail — Methods of selecting teachers — Right rules of action — Bases for selecting teachers — The competitive examination — Electing applicants vs. hunting teachers

2. The tenure of teachers — The usual plan — The uncertain tenure of teachers — The life-tenure movement — Effect of life-tenure on the schools — A middle ground — Terminating the contract — Supervisory officers and tenure — Assistant superintendents — Assignment of the teaching staff — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XV. The Teaching Corps 225

II. Traininq and Supervision.

1. The trainmg of teachers — Leavening the teaching corps

— Professional standard for entrance — The local training-school — Limitations to such training — Effect of such courses on the school system — Training vs. attracting teachers — Training of teachers in service — Teachers' meetings — Reading-circle work — Leaves of absence for study.

2. The super\dsion of teachers — Deficient supervision — Supervision of the wrong type — Need for helpful supervision

— Purpose of all supervision — Means to this end — Distribution of time and effort — Demonstration teaching — Placing for effective work — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XVI. The Teaching Corps 25C

III. Pay and Promotion.

Low standards and compensation — Adequate pay necessary

— What such pay is worth — Reasonable salary demands — Automatic increases — Rewards for growth and efficient service

— Stimulating industry and individual improvement.

CONTENTS xiii

1. Graded salaries based on positions — Defects of such schedules.

2. Additional salary grants for study.

3. Salary grants based on grades in service — Promotions on recommendation — Promotional examinations.

4. Salary grants based on efficiency — Criticism of the plan — Plan right in principle — Type plans for estimating efficiency — Incentives to growth — Essential features of a good salary schedule — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XVn. The Courses of Instruction . • .274

I. Construction and Types.

The superintendent and the courses of study — The superintendent's guiding hand — The construction of courses of study.

1. Information or knowledge courses — Dependence on textbooks — The administration of such courses — Effect on the instructing body. ^

2. The development type of courses — The principal and teacher in such a school system — Such courses growing courses

— CoSperation of all needed — Variations between schools — Experimental rooms or schools — Study of local problems and needs — Economy of time in education — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XVm. The Courses op Instruction. . . 294

II. Adjustments and Differentiations.

1. Retardation and acceleration — The average course of study

— A poorly adjusted course of study — The results of non-promotion — The effect of such conditions. — The super-normal chUd.

2. Promotional plans — More frequent promotions — The Batavia plan — The Pueblo plan — The new Cambridge plan — The differentiated-course plan — The Baltimore experiment — The Mannheim plan of grading.

3. Differentiations in school work — New types of schools.

4. Fundamental reorganizations — Reorganizing the upper grades — Theory of the intermediate school — A reorganized and expanded school system — A reorganized and redirected school system — The Gary plan — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XIX. Efficiency Experts; Testing Results 325

A new movement — Meaning of the movraaent — The scientific purpose — Measurement by comparison — Units or standxiv CONTENTS

ards for measurement — Need for standards as guides — Importance of such standards — EflSciency departments — Lines of service; experimental pedagogy — The clinical psychologist and his work — A continuous survey of production — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XX. The Department of Health Supervision S44

Health supervision a necessity — Three stages of development — Scope of the work — Control of the work — The large-city plan — The smaller-city plan — The teacher and health service — Importance of the service — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XXI. The Attendance Department . . . 357

The compulsion to attend — Differences and difficulties — The attendance department — Increased school attendance — The registration of school children — A continuing school census — Further obstacles and needs — Types of schools needed — The educational opportunity — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XXn. Business and Clerical Department 375

Department organization — Work of such a department — Purpose of the department — Misdirection of the business department — Purpose and position of such departments — Intelligent expenditures — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XXm. The School-Properties Department 384

The superintendent of school properties — Purpose and place of this department — Responsibility of the superintendent of schools — A new type of building needed — The new Pittsburg type of building — Larger use of school-buildings — Costs for buildings — Payment for by tax or by bonding — Large future educational needs — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XXIV. Auxiliary Educational Agencies . 397

1. The public library — Efforts toward cooperation — Administrative control — Unity of the work of library and school — The library in the future school.

CONTENTS

2. The public playgrounds — Playground organization — Importance of directed play.

3. School gardening — School gardening and the school — New educational agencies and purposes — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected refer-

CHAPTER XXV. Costs, Funds, and Accounting . . 408

Constantly increasing costs -—A cheap school system — The problem of increased funds — Funds independent of the council — The competition for city funds — A better school budget — Better accounting methods — School accounts and unit costs — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

CHAPTER XXVI. Records and Reports 423

Good records a necessity — PupU records — School-system records — The annual school report — Effective presentation. of information — Enlightening the public — Selected referencesu

PART in. CITY ADMINISTRATIVE EXPERIENCE APPLIED

CHAPTER XXVII. City Administrative Experience Summarized 433

The city an educational unit — Administrative organization — Diversity as a result of unity — Teaching and supervisory organization — Business organization and finance — Initiative and educational progress — Clear and unmistakable lessons.

CHAPTER XXVni. Application to County Educational Organization •. 441

City and county administration contrasted — District trustee control — Need for a fundamental reorganization — Rudimentary county-unit organizations — The county superintendency — Why trained men go to the cities — The way out — Details of a county-unit plan: (1) General control — (2) Educational Control — (3) Business and clerical control — (4 ) Powers and duties of the superintendent — Such a reorganization not easy — Steps in the process — Questions for discussion — Topics ;fof investigation and report — Selected references.

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CONTENTS

CHAPTER XXIX. Application to State Educational

Organization 458

State organization undeveloped — The chief state school office — Potential importance of the office — State departments of education — Controlling principles: (1) General control — (2) Educational control — (3) The chief state school officer — Purpose of such an organization — State administrative problems — The State to establish minima — State stimulation vs. state uniformity — Questions for discussion — Topics for investigation and report — Selected references.

INDEX 473

LIST OF FIGURES

1. Early Organization of School Districts • •

2. Later Organization and Reorganization 7

3. New England Towns and Western Townships compared ... 48

4. Units for School Organization and Administration . . , , 61

5. City and School-District Boundaries compared 62

6. Chart showing the Development of Special and Professional Con-

trol in the Administration of City School Systems between 76 and 77

7. Growth of a Professional Consciousness facing 80

8. Tendencies of Twenty-five Years (1895-1920) in School-Board

Reorganizations 88

9. Frequency of Size of School Board 91

10. A City of Nine Wards 94

11. Illustrating the Process of Educating a School Board . . . 146

12. Plan of Educational Organization for a Small City School Sys-

tem, and showing Proper Relationships 167

13. Plan of Educational Organization for a Medium-sized City School

System, and showing Proper Relationships . between 170 and 171

14. Plan of Educational Organization for a Large City School Sys-

tem, and showing Proper Relationships . between 172 and 173

15. An Incorrect Form of Educational Organization between 174 and 175

16. Teachers' Salaries and Pay in the Trades compared . • . 254

17. Tendencies in the Distribution of Teachers under Different Types

of Supervision and Different Salary Schedules .... 256 17x. A Teacher-Efficiency Score Card 266

18. Promotional Results in a City follo\\ang a Course of Study ad-

justed to the Average Capacity of the Pupils 295

19. Promotional Results in a City following a Knowledge-Type Course

of Study, and with Quarterly Promotional Examinations . . 296

20. Retardation and Acceleration in the Grades 297

21. The Batavia Plan 302

22. The Pueblo Plan; Individual Progress 303

23. The Pueblo Plan; Group Progress 303

24. The New Cambridge Plan 304

25. The Portland Plan 305

26. The Differentiated-Course Plan 306

£7. Class Organization of the Volksschule at Mannheim, Germany . 309 xviii LIST OF FIGURES

28. The Transformation of the Newton, Massachusetts, School Sys-

tem between 314 and 315

29. Result of the Redirection of the Newton Schools .... 316

30. A Courtis Score Card in Arithmetic 334

31. Effect of Absence on Promotion Rate and Dropping from School 361

32. Showing Decline in Attendance after the Sixth Grade . . . 370

33. Principal and Interest Cost for a School-Building .... 892

34. Showing the Competition for City Funds 414

35. County-Unit Educational Organization . . . between 448 and 449 80. State Educational Organization between 464 and 465

PUBLIC SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION PART I

OUTLINES OF STATE EDUCATIONAL ORGANIZATION

PUBLIC SCHOOL ADMINISTRATION CHAPTER I

Early attitudes. Everywhere, with us, the school arose as a distinctively local institution, and to meet local needs. The Federal Constitution made no mention of any form of education for the people, nor does the subject occur in the debates of the Federal Constitutional Convention. By the terms of the Tenth Amendment to the Federal Constitution,^ ratified in 1791, education became one of the many unmentioned powers " reserved to the States.'*

Of the fourteen state constitutions framed by 1800, six made no mention whatever of schools or education, and in a number of the others the mention was very brief and indefinite. 2 Nothing which could be regarded as even the beginnings of a state system or series of systems of education existed. Nine colleges,^ a few private secondary schools, and a number of private and church schools offering some elementary-school instruction of an indifferent character, constituted the educational resources of the new nation. Even in New England, where a good beginning had

* "Article X. The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."

2 See Cubberley and Elliott, State and County School Administration, vol. II, Source Book, pp. 12-17.

' Harvard, William and Mary, Yale, Princeton, Pennsylvania, Columbia, Brown, Rutgers, and Dartmouth. Thirteen additional colleges were founded between 1776 and 1800.

been made in the seventeenth century, the educational enthusiasm of the people had largely died out and the schools had sadly degenerated. In the rural districts, where the greater number of our people then lived, there were practically no schools of any kind, while in the towns and cities ignorance, vagrancy, and pauperism went hand in hand.

Schools at first community undertakings. For some decades after the estabUshment of our RepubHc this condition and attitude continued. The apprentice system and the school of experience, rather than the school of books, ministered to the needs of the people of the time. We were a simple and a homogeneous people, devoted chiefly to a subsistence type of agriculture; the old aristocratic conception of education still prevailed; and there was Httle in the political, economic, or social life of the time which made education at pubhc expense seem important.

Many of the earUer schools were private imdertakings, though, not infrequently, these were aided by public support. Sometimes the people of a community built a schoolhouse and then permitted a teacher to conduct a private school in it, and later on the school was taken over and made a public school. In still other cases the first schools were distinctively voluntary community undertakings, owing their origin and maintenance to the voluntary action and contributions of parents who sent their children to them. In still other cases the first of the early schools were estabHshed as public schools in response to direct legislative permission, though many of these were at first only subsidized private schools, or the " rate-bill '* — a per-capita tax levied on the parents of the children attending — was for years used to supplement the tax levied by the community for their support. Many of the city school systems in the territory north of the Ohio and the Potomac and east of the Mississippi River trace their origin from some one of these forms of early community endeavor.^

The district unit. These early community efforts show how natural it was that the school district should have become the unit for educational organization. Though the town to the eastward and the congressional township in the new States to the westward were early made the unit for civil administration, such units soon proved unsuited to the school needs of the early pioneer, and, as the schools developed, the smaller and irregular school district, rather than the town or the township, became the imit for educational organization and administration.

As a unit for school organization the district was well suited to the somewhat primitive needs of the time. Wherever half a dozen famiHes lived near enough together to make organization possible, they were permitted, by the early laws, to meet together and vote to form a school district and organize and maintain a school. Districts could be formed anywhere, of any size and shape, and only those famiHes or communities desiring schools need be included in the district organization. The simphcity and democracy of the plan made a strong appeal. Communities desiring schools and willing to pay taxes for them could organize and maintain them; communities not desiring them or unwilHng to support them could let them alone.

1 In Buffalo, for example, a schoolhouse was built privately in 1806. This was burned in 1813, and in 1818 the town levied a tax to rebuild the school, but city maintenance and control did not come for some years thereafter.

In Cincinnati, private-venture schools existed before 1800; in 1817 a private Lancastrian school was opened; and in 1818 a wealthy banker left a bequest of $1000 a year "for a charity school." It was not imtil 1825 that a public-school system was organized.

In Chicago, on the sale of the school lands in 1833, grants were made, until 1844, to the teachers of the existing private schools, who in turn certified attendance to the public-school trustees. The first city schoolhouse was not built until 1845.

Evolution of district organization. Organized at first only where there were settlements, in time all the area of a county, and eventually of a state, came to be included in some school district. The evolution of districts is well shown in the illustrations on this and the following page. These show the process of district formation within a county. At first, during its period of settlement, only a portion of the county was organized into school districts;

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Fio. 1. EARLY ORGANIZATION OF SCHOOL DISTRICTS later on, all was so organized, and towns, with their graded school systems, began to develop. Still later, the increase of population led to the development of a central countyseat city and two towns along the line of the new railway, and to a subdivision of nearly all the larger rural districts; and, still later, the changes in the distribution of the population have led to the abandonment of some of the district organizations, the consolidation of eight others into one rural and consolidated school, and a very material enlargement of the school system of the central city and the two towns. The process illustrated here is typical of the evolution which has taken place in all parts of the United States.

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PiO. 2. LATER ORGANIZATION AND REORGANIZATION

^Early district officers. Each school district, once legally organized, became " a body politic and corporate," and possessed of certain legal powers. For the government of the school created, members of the community, usually three in number, were elected by the people as district trustees, and they, guided by the people in the annual and special school-district meetings, managed the schools as best they knew.. As a simple and democratic means for providing schools for the children of people living under somewhat primitive pioneer conditions, the district system rendered a useful service. In the days before modern school systems were developed, when there were no courses of study, no supervisory officers, no sanitary regulations, and almost no organized body of school law or pedagogical knowledge, these local representatives handled the schools in a manner which gave reasonable satisfaction to the people they represented. So well was the district unit

8 PUBLIC SCHOOL ADMINIBTRATION

adapted to the educational needs of an earlier and more primitive society that it has, in many of our States, persisted to the present, though most of the conditions which gave rise to it and gave it its earher importance have since largely passed away.

Rise of state systems. In time, the national land-grants for public schools, which began with Ohio in 1802, came to exert a stimulating effect on the new States to the west of the Allegheny Mountains. The different States early provided for the election or appointment of trustees to care for the school-section lands, and, after permission to sell them had been granted by Congress,^ to see that the proceeds were husbanded and the income properly spent. The creation of the so-called " Literary Funds " was also begun by the older States to the east. The permanent school fund of New York dates from 1805; that of Maryland, from 1812; New Jersey, from 1816; North Carolina, from 1825; Pennsylvania, from 1831; and Massachusetts, from 1834.

It was some little time, however, before the demand for a system of pubHc schools, to supplement and in part displace the private, charity, and church schools of the time, made itself felt. The simple agricultural life, the homogeneity of the people, the isolation and independence of the villages, the hard life of the time, and the absence of important political questions to be settled at the polls made the need for schools and learning a relatively minor one. It was not until after about 1820 that the development of manufacturing, the extension of manhood suffrage, the action of the labor unions, the rise of the many humanitarian movements, and the introduction of the Lancastrian system of instruction began to awaken a demand for

1 First granted by Congress to Ohio in 1826, followed by permission to Alabama in 1827, Indiana in 1828, and, Arkansas, Illinois, Louisiana, and Tennessee in 1843.

public tax-supported schools, under the authority and partial support of the state. The " charity-school '* conception of education, under which free tuition was to be provided only to the children of the deserving poor; the plan of turning education over to the churches and reHgious societies, with some aid from the public purse; and the earher aristocratic idea that education was an individual rather than a pubhc matter; — all these had to be met and eliminated. Gradually, however, the people of the different States were converted to the idea of adopting pubHc education as a state function, and state after state began to provide for tax-supported schools.

Early state organizations. The first permanent law for the organization of schools in the State of New York was enacted in 1812; New Jersey first provided for the education of pauper children in 1820, and created schools for all in 1838; Ohio first authorized taxation for education in 1821, and the law of 1825 made the real beginning of a school system for the State; the first school law in Illinois dates from 1825; Baltimore began schools in 1825, and Maryland enacted an optional school-organization law in 1826; Rhode Island first organized schools in 1828, though the city of Providence had organized schools as early as 1800 and Newport had provided for its pauper children in 1825 ; Philadelphia was permitted to organize free schools in 1816, though the first Pennsylvania school law dates from 1834; the creation of the Massachusetts State Board of Education in 1837 made the beginnings of state oversight and control for that State and greatly stimulated schools there and in neighboring States; North Carolina enacted an optional county school-organization law in 1839; and the Indiana school system really dates from 1849, though the first permissive law goes back to 1824.

Many of the cities began schools at about the same time.

The pubKc school system of Cincinnati dates from 1825; Chicago's first public school, from 1830; Pittsburg's school system, from 1835; Cleveland's, from 1836; Buffalo's, from 1837; and New York City's, from 1842; while Washington did not free itself from the pauper-school idea until after 1844. In most of the smaller cities and villages free public schools did not begin until after they had been ordered estabhshed by the school law of the State.

The battle for the establishment of tax-supported public schools was a bitter one, but after about 1850 it had been won in every Northern State. The new States to the westward have all inaugurated a free public educational system, as a part of the State's public service to its citizens, either at the time of their creation as States or during the previous territorial period. In the Southern States, with two or three exceptions, Httle was accompHshed until after the Civil War and the period of Reconstruction were over.

The first school laws. Many of the earHest state laws relating to education were purely permissive measures. They merely granted to the people of the different communities in the State the right to meet and form a school district, and to levy, legally, a property tax for schools. Such laws frequently merely permitted a change in form from private community effort to a legal organization under the authority of the State. Of such a nature were the first laws in Ohio, Indiana, and some other States.

Still other of these early laws were even more special, being, in effect, an authorization to certain specified cities within the State to form a public school system and to levy a tax for schools, but without granting such power to the State as a whole. Of such a nature were the early laws permitting of the formation of pubhc schools in Providence, Newport, and Philadelphia. After schools had been begun in places under these permissive laws legislation was then secured, though usually only after much argument and effort, requiring the establishment of schools throughout the State.