Superintendent of public instruction

“ In this capacity he was also ex officio the superintendent of common schools, and rendered valuable services to his state in perfecting and expanding the free public school system, and in establishing state normal schools. ”

“ The Superintendent is charged with and held responsible for the good order and discipline of the Academy, and it is made the duty of every officer, professor, and instructor, having knowledge of any violation of law or regulation, or of any crime, irregularity, neglect, or other improper conduct, of which any student or any other one has been guilty, to report the same without delay to the Superintendent. ”

“ Students will be appointed to the Normal Schools by the Superintendent, upon the recommendation of superintendents and school commissioners. These officers will be relied upon to properly represent to possible candidates the needs of the public schools for well-qualified teachers, and the necessity of professional and technical training on the part of all who intend to teach. No students can be admitted who have not already acquired a substantial elementary education. ”

“ In the growth of the educational department and in the purpose of the Committee to do the very best work in our institutions, it has been found needful to secure the service of an expert in school processes who should help to the most approved methods of organization, discipline, instruction and unification. Accordingly Mr. Albert Salisbury, who had been a Professor in the State Normal, at Whitewater, Wis., and a conductor of teachers’ institutes, has been appointed Superintendent of Education, and has already entered upon service, giving promise of great effectiveness in his line. ”

“ The superintendent of such an establishment must entirely renounce all visits to bar-rooms and coffee-houses. He must learn to impart to his system of instruction the elements of novelty and attractiveness, and especially learn to make friends of the children. It is utterly impossible in this country to manage a school by the mere force of power and authority, and the teacher attempting this, soon experiences a revolution by which indeed he is not exactly driven forth, but left alone on his cathedra. ”

“ To their influence must also be added the skilled patriotic service of such State Superintendents of Public Instruction as Mynders, Martin, MacMahan, Merritt, Whitefield and Joyner,—men who seemed to regard their office as peculiarly the most sacred of all trusts committed by a people to public servants. The people have listened to such as these when they might have turned deaf ears to voices from any other source. ”

“ For the town or city district is of small area, and the schools few and close together. If the number of teachers is large, the superintendent is assisted by principals of different schools, and by deputies. The teaching force is better prepared, and hence requires less close supervision. School standards are higher, and the coöperation of patrons more easily secured. The course of study is better organized, the schools better graded and equipped, and all other conditions more favorable to efficient supervision. ”

“ Add to this the fact that cities attract the strong teachers—the professionally trained teachers, the output of the professional schools—and we can see again how effective supervision becomes in the city as compared with that in the country. In the country we find only one superintendent for a county often as large as some of the older states, and the possibility of visiting each school only about once a year. ”

“ Within the system are employed supervisors who visit the schools, observe the teachers and advise with them in their work, assist them in improving their teaching methods, and who report to the superintendent their observations and suggestions for improvement. At the request of the superintendent or board they make rating sheets, on which they rate the individual teachers under their supervision for certain qualifications and abilities. ”

“ In every Sunday school there is need of an officer to aid the superintendent and to take his place when absent. Even in a small school the supervision can be more thorough and the teaching more efficient, if some one is at hand with authority to relieve the superintendent of minor details, and give him freedom for the general management. And in a large school assistants to the superintendent are an absolute necessity, for each department becomes in itself a school. ”

“ Your Committee believes that in many systems of elementary schools there is injury done by too much formality in ascertaining whether the pupils of a given class have completed the work up to a given arbitrarily fixed point, and are ready to take up the next apportionment of the work. In the early days of city school systems, when the office of superintendent was first created, it was thought necessary to divide up the graded course of study into years of work, and to hold stated annual examinations to ascertain how many pupils could be promoted to the next grade or year’s work. ”

“ Supervision has also become universal during the past quarter century. Springfield first introduced a superintendent of schools in 1841, Gloucester in 1850, Boston in 1851, and the other cities much later, but since 1888, through increasing state aid and the combination of 320 smaller towns into a district superintendency, expert supervision has become possible everywhere, and during and teacher training. the last decade it has been compulsory. The normal schools, which have now increased to ten, have brought about a striking improvement in teaching. ”

“ No matter how much the superintendent knows, or thinks he knows, he should hold his mind open to new knowledge. He should be on the alert for new ideas, from the periodicals, from books, and from his fellow workers, in conversation, at conventions and institutes; not that he may inflict every new method upon his school, but that out of many methods he may select the best. ”

“ The work of putting a large teaching force upon a professional basis, of making the teaching scientific and capable of arousing mind to action, is so difficult that a layman can scarcely appreciate it. It has hardly been 89 commenced, it has only been made possible, when the avenues of approach to the service have been closed against the unqualified and unworthy. After that the supervision must be close and general, as well as sympathetic and decisive. The superintendent must have expert assistants enough to learn the characteristics and measure the work of every member of the force. ”

“ Though the Superintendents as such, have necessarily speaking, no teaching to do, still they ought particularly to secure the progress of every pupil in what may be called the essential studies, such as reading, writing, and spelling. For this purpose they either see that their pupils are going on successfully in classes in school, in these branches, or they may attend to them in the Section, provided that they never allow such instruction to interfere with their more appropriate and important duties. ”

“ Superintendent of Schools.—Not every one is competent to teach, and to protect the children as far as possible from having their time worse than wasted by incompetent would-be teachers, is the very responsible duty of the county superintendent of schools. ”

“ Important.—Supervision is fully as important as teaching. The supervisor must be, to even a higher degree than the teacher, a strong personality, and this too implies a high standard and an attractive salary. The supervisor or superintendent must be somewhat of an expert in the methods of teaching all the common school subjects. Not only must he understand school discipline and organization in its details, but he must possess the ability to "turn in" and exemplify his qualifications at any time. It will be seen everywhere that the supervisor or superintendent is the expensive person ”

“ And in the increasing number of schools which are employing graded lessons, not uniform in the departments, the superintendent should have at least a general knowledge of the subjects studied in each department. The more thoroughly the superintendent fills his own mind and heart with the truth, the more efficiently will the truth be taught in his school. ”

“ These superintendents inspect the pupils during their studies and recreations, on rising and on going to bed and during the night... No pupil is allowed to pass the hours set aside for recreation in his own room without permission of the superintendent. No pupil is allowed to enter the hall of another division without the permission of two superintendents.... The director of studies must examine the books of the pupils whenever he deems it necessary, and as often as once a month. ”

“ What can a supervising officer do for a school or for a teacher under such circumstances? Practically nothing. The county superintendent is usually elected to office by the people and frequently on a partisan ticket. This method of choosing naturally tends to make him give more attention to politics than he otherwise would think of giving. So the supervision or superintendency of country schools is too often slighted or neglected—and who is to blame? ”

“ While we are not completely emancipated from the old rule of cut and try, from the old mechanical routine, the country as a whole has taken some long strides in advance. While some boards of education still look upon their superintendent as a chore boy, that idea has, on the whole, long since been abandoned. And the best educational thought of the country to-day regards the superintendent primarily as an educator, having to do with the inner, rather than the outer, phases of the school's activities. ”

“ The superintendent appoints the teaching force, the director all other employés; appointments are subject to confirmation by the board, and all employés are subject to removal by the executive officials alone. The “Cleveland plan,” in force in the public schools, minimizes school routine, red tape and frequent examinations, puts great stress on domestic and manual training courses, and makes promotion in the grammar schools depend on the general knowledge and development of the pupil, as estimated by a teacher who is supposed to make a careful study of the individual. ”

“ He should be a person of sympathetic attitude, of high qualifications, and of experience in the field of elementary education. The assistants should be carefully selected by the board on the recommendation of the county superintendent. Poor supervision is little better than none.
The Schools Examined.—The county superintendent and his assistants should give, periodically, oral and written examinations in each school, thus testing the work of both the teacher and the pupils. These examinations should not conform in any perfunctory or red-tape manner to a literally construed course of study. ”

“ Thus the superintendent will be capable of intelligent co-operation with all agencies, public and private, that may minister to the varying needs of the stranded men and boys, women and girls whom he is to distribute and start on their way to independent, economic usefulness in the community. ”

“ They were to use their influence to establish school libraries and promote the cause of education. District superintendents were limited to one hundred schools each, and were to receive one pound per annum for each school, [152] besides necessary travelling expenses. The Superintendent was no longer the custodian of school money, but gave orders to the Township Treasurer to pay to teachers their proper allowances. The Superintendent was to visit every school in his District once each quarter, and to deliver a public lecture in every school section once each year. ”

“ The school spirit is abroad in the consolidated school district; people are thinking and talking school. It becomes the customary and fashionable thing to send children to school.
Better Supervision.—There is also much better supervision in the consolidated school; for, in addition to the supervision given by the county superintendent or his assistants, there is also the supervision of the principal, or head teacher. This is in itself no small factor in the making of a good school. Good supervision always makes strongly for efficiency. ”

“ The sooner the high school suits its work to the needs of fourteen and fifteen-year-old boys and girls, the sooner it will be filling its true place in the community.” Such opinions, voiced in this case by a man whose national reputation is founded on his splendid work as superintendent of the school system of Newton Mass., bespeak the attitude of the most progressive American high schools. ”

“ The existence of State Normal Schools and City Training Schools side by side suggests at once a fact which has an important bearing on educational questions in the United States—viz., the absolute distinction, as regards jurisdiction, between schools outside the limits of a town or city, under the supervision of a State Board and State Superintendent, and schools within the city radius, and under the supervision of a Town or City Superintendent. ”

“ To keep in the school its children and youth, to keep them interested in its purposes while in the school, and to hold them untiringly to the true work of the school, needs fertility of brain to give proper variety to the conduct of the school, intelligence to discern the effects of all measures that are adopted, tact to change and adapt to the ever varying conditions of school life, and common sense to direct and govern the whole. The superintendent must therefore be (f) a person fertile in expedients and (g) a person of intelligence, tact and common sense. ”

“ It should be noted that, as in America schools when inspected are not judged by results, but by the methods used, and the general teaching efficiency, it comes about that the question of methods holds a more important place in educational thought than in England. More time, therefore, is devoted to their study in normal and training schools, and a superintendent has a wide field of influence in the matter of methods in the city or district over which he presides. ”