School fee

“ The act of 1870 gave the various school boards power to compel parents by by-laws to send children to school between the ages of five and thirteen years, but it was not until 1876 that the legislature created the universal parental duty of causing all children to 'receive sufficient elementary instruction in reading, writing and arithmetic' This was followed in 1891 by an act granting to practically all the public elementary schools a fee-grant in lieu of the fees hitherto paid by the parents. ”

“ The Education Ordinance provided that the teachers' salaries should be defrayed by a tax not exceeding 20/-, to be paid annually by every male person resident in the Province. So strong and widespread was the resistance to the levying of this poll-tax, that no attempt was made by the authorities to enforce payment; the entire cost of the schools was met out of the ordinary Provincial revenue and the school fees, supplemented in a few instances by local subscriptions. ”

“ The introduction and implementation of free school education for schools providing continuing education as well as free teaching materials for all schools shall be regulated by law. Special income support shall be provided for the purpose of education as and where necessary. In so far as the state provides free school education for state schools, the private schools named in article 8, paragraph 4 shall also be entitled to forego the levying of school fees ”

“ The law school is open to students of all nationalities. The matriculation fee is $5.00 and there are similar fees for tuition and for each examination, which makes the total charge $15.00 for the first year. Parliament has passed a law authorizing the officials of the university to waive the fees of students who bring certificates from local magistrates that they are competent and worthy to attend the lectures, but are not able to pay the charges. During the year 1910, 40 per cent. of the students in the law department took advantage of this exemption. ”

“ Before the Act of 1891 children paid “school-pence,” from 1d. to 9d. a week. The Act provided for a Treasury grant of 10s. per head for each child, say 3d. a week, on condition that the school fees were reduced by that amount. Thus children paying not more than 3d. a week were relieved of all charge, and the managers were assured of a moderate income. ”

“ Every boy admitted into the School had to pay an entrance fee not exceeding £3 and a tuition fee not less than £12 or more than £24. Fees for boarding in the Hostel were not to exceed £45. Certain exemptions from tuition fees could be granted as the reward of merit, and in a few instances the boarding fees might be remitted for similar reasons and to a limited extent. If the state [Pg 177] of the Trust Funds permitted, a leaving Exhibition, to be called The Giggleswick Exhibition, might be awarded for the purpose of fitting the holder for some profession or calling. ”

“ So far has the nation gone in the path of State-aided and rate-aided education, and the question is whether it is not worth while to go the comparatively little way further which is needed to make elementary education free. For the fees which are now paid do not represent a quarter of the amount which the teaching costs. And not only so, but the existence of these fees is a continual hindrance to the working of the Act. The effect of the fee is to keep out of the board schools thousands of children who ought to be in them ”

“ A great boon to ladies anxious to qualify themselves for governesses, and who have not the necessary means, is the Teachers' Education Loan Society, which advances school fees upon certain conditions to persons over sixteen desirous of improving their education for purposes of self-maintenance as teachers. ”

“ Enrollments are going to double in our colleges in the short space of 10 years. The annual cost per student is skyrocketing to astronomical levels—now averaging $1,650 a year, although almost half of our families earn less than $5,000. They cannot afford such costs—but this Nation cannot afford to maintain its military power and neglect its brainpower.
But excellence in education must begin at the elementary level. I sent to the Congress last year a proposal for Federal aid to public school construction and teachers’ salaries. ”

“ It is sometimes very trying to feel that after long-winded eloquence, after citation and demonstration, you have made no more real impression upon the silent than upon the talkative, and that, indeed, the gentle reserve of some of your auditors is based upon the conviction that your own position is the result of indomitable ignorance. One of my friends has met this spirit in a class in the Manila High School. A certain boy insists that he has seen the iron head of a thunderbolt, and although he makes “passing grades” in physics, he does not believe in physics. ”

“ The multiplication of schools arising partly from the denominationalism which so largely holds the field is accentuated by the financial system which is adopted by the National Board. In all the schools under its control, with the exception of the 300 convent and monastery schools, where the State-aid takes the form of a capitation grant, the grant is ear-marked [129] for the payment of teachers' salaries, the largest charge incurred by the school ”

“ The scale of payments at the schools is moderate enough, but a large item of expense is in the school-books: they are dear, their use is compulsory, they have to be purchased by the scholars, and they are frequently changed by the Board of Education. ”

“ In 1816 an Act establishing common schools was passed and £6,000 were granted for their support. In 1819 an amending Act was passed requiring annual examinations in the schools; that reports to the district Board of Education should be made each year; that "ten children of the poorer inhabitants," to be selected by ballot, should receive free tuition in each Grammar School, and that trustees should give certificates to teachers. In 1820 the grant to common schools was reduced from £6,000 to £2,500 per annum. ”

“ For it has been found that, everywhere in the country, there is a larger and better attendance of pupils in the consolidated school, that more pupils go to school, that they attend more regularly, and that the school terms are longer. Therefore the proper test of expense is the cost of a day's schooling for each pupil, or the cost "per pupil per day." Measured by this standard education in the consolidated school is no more expensive than in the unconsolidated schools; indeed it is usually less expensive. It is a good thing for society to give a day's education to one child ”

“ By a recent Act of the Legislature the following appropriations are made by the State to Normal students and graduates.
i. Each student over seventeen years of age who shall sign a paper declaring his intention to teach in the Common Schools of the State shall receive the sum of fifty cents (about 2s.) per week toward defraying the expenses of tuition and boarding.
ii. Each student who upon graduating shall sign an agreement to teach in the Common [129] Schools of the State two full school years shall receive the sum of fifty dollars (about £10) . ”

“ Although education is free, the instruction department has a small revenue; this in 1905 amounted to £12,783, of which £6131 was derived from rents, £3630 from the sale of books and school material, and £682 from fees; the greater portion of the fees comes from the advanced school for girls, the remainder being paid by pupils attending classes in agriculture held in the public schools. The average cost of primary instruction to the state, including cost of school premises and maintenance, is about £3, 11s. ”

“ Our adoption of the rate to some extent, and in some form or other, can only be a question of time, for it is the only just method of supporting open schools; and the people will be averse to the schools in which their children are educated bearing an eleemosynary character. And when that day shall have come, then the majority of the rate-payers here, just as in America, will be in favour of the system, which, while it very much improves the teaching, will at the same time very much diminish its cost, by substituting where parishes are small one school for many. ”

“ The Governors may, with the approval in writing of the Board of Education, make special provision in or in connexion with the School for the education of boys who intend to qualify as teachers in Public Elementary Schools. For these boys, subject to the like approval, the Governors may make such modifications as they think fit in the foregoing provisions relating to ages, instruction, and examination, and the Rules for Payments may prescribe such tuition fees as may be thought suitable. ”

“ More study is given to the history and philosophy of education than ever before; and "on every side a new and healthful interest in public school work, on the part of those charged with the carrying on of that work, is apparent." The cost per capita of educating the children of the State is put at various amounts, according to the rule by which it is estimated, but the real cost, for the children actually attending the schools, is ultimately fixed at $15.19. ”

“ But free education will not get rid of these painful cases. Already arrangements are made by law for the payment of fees for very poor parents who make the proper application; and if there be any obstacle in the way of the smooth working of the law, the matter should be looked into and the law amended; but the great difficulty in the way of good attendance on the part of very poor children lies, as we apprehend, not more with school-pence, than with school-clothes, and school-dinners. ”

“ In not a few cases the problem of financing schools has in recent years become especially acute. Communities are in many cases at the limit now permitted by state laws controlling the levying of taxes. The maintenance of schools even at their present level is very difficult, and all the time there is the urgent push within the system for enlargements and improvements. Other communities which see the rapid increase in school expenditures, even while they are willing to tax themselves more for schools, are asking for clear evidence that school work is being done efficiently. ”

“ To guard against any competition with the public schools as now organized, a special tax should be levied for the support of vocational schools, which, with the State grant for their support, should not be taken from the funds now provided by law for the support of the public school system. ”

“ The curse of many of the rural schools is their easy money, for all the Southern states have a system of state school funds, the income of which is subdivided among the districts, and is in some of them about enough to keep up [Pg 298] school three or four months on the usual scale of payment to teachers. When the school fund is exhausted, great numbers of districts close their schoolhouses, and the result is that the average number of school days in a year is far below that of Northern schools. ”

“ The communes pay for the needed supplies, for the janitor, and for other local necessities of the elementary schools. They may also tax themselves to increase the salaries of teachers beyond the State allowance. Each community thus has the power to decide whether it will be content with an average school, merely fulfilling the State requirements, or whether it will have a superior school taught by the best teachers obtainable. ”

“ If at any time the funds at the disposal of the department from fees previously collected or from royalties, commissions or other moneys received in connection with the publication or sale of foreign language school text-books shall make it possible to fully and effectively carry out the provisions of the act with the permit fees payable by the schools based on a lower rate than one dollar per pupil, the department is authorized to make such a reduction in that rate as it may deem reasonable and expedient. ”

“ The actual mean average cost of the schooling of each public school scholar in the United States is about ten dollars. Assuming then that the adult population of each state bears the burden of educating its children, and that all the children of school age in each state are enrolled in the schools—as they should be—let us ascertain how much the tax per capita would be on the adults bearing this burden in each state and territory. ”

“ The pupil seldom thinks of costs. The teacher usually overlooks the fact that the community is interested in what schools cost. Yet funds are a prime necessity in organizing a public-school system. We turn, accordingly, to fiscal problems as among the first and most concrete examples of educational problems which must be studied by one who would be intelligent about the school system. ”

“ Under these circumstances it became advantageous to many citizens, especially those at the center of a town, to have the entire support of the school come through general taxation rather than partially by means of tuition fees. But the people in the more distant portions of the town refused to vote a rate from which they themselves obtained no profit. They demanded that, in return for their taxes, the public school should be Influence of ‘dame’ and private elementary schools and of parishes. ”

“ In his report to the Legislature made in February of that year, the State Superintendent of Public Instruction, Honorable Victor M. Rice, said: "The greatest defect in our school system is, as I have urged in previous reports, the continuance of the rate bill system. Our common schools can never reach their highest degree of usefulness until they shall have been made entirely free. ”