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schools in their cities and counties; and that city and county
superintendents of schools should hold meetings of their
teachers on Friday or Saturday of the week before for the
purpose of discussing these problems among themselves and
making definite plans for the proper observance of the week in
school and for Friday afternoon and evening meetings.

EDUCATION AND CIVILIZATION

By W. C. BAGLEY

Upon the trained intelligence, the clarified insight and the disciplined will of our people in all likelihood will depend the fate of the world in the decades that are to come. First, last, and all the time it is an educational problem. It is your problem and my problem; your duty and my duty. At no time in the history of our profession has the need for devoted, consecrated, and united action been so imperative as it is to-day. Let us stand shoulder to shoulder with unbroken ranks and see the battle through to glorious victory.

THE CRISIS IN EDUCATION

By P. P. CLAXTON

Largely because of the events of the war and the resultant conditions, there is more need for education of the best and most comprehensive type than ever before in this country, for the production of material wealth to meet the material losses of the war, for citizenship in a new and democratic era when the world looks to America as to no other nation since the fall of the Roman Empire, for the development of manhood and womanhood, and for culture such as a democratic nation like ours ought to make possible for all its people.

Increased Efficiency Required.

To meet these demands of the Nation will require large increases in the extent and efficiency of all grades and kinds of education from the kindergarten to the university and the professional and technical school.

If the cost of living and the value of money were the same as before the war, there would be need for immediate increases of not less than 50 per cent for the maintenance of schools, including the pay of teachers.

There is also great need for new buildings and equipment-more than in ordinary times-because for three or four years there has been little building.

Best Teachers Usually Go First.

In many States, cities, and communities a considerable increase has been made in appropriations for educational institutions. Salaries of some teachers have been increased from 20 to 60 per cent, but this is not sufficient. This country is now confronted with a great shortage of teachers; it is the best teachers rather than the poorest that are lost to the profession, and their places must be filled with those who are less well prepared, have less natural ability, less general education, culture, professional knowledge, and technical training.

In January of this year reports to the Bureau of Education indicated that between 18,000 and 20,000 schools were without teachers, and 45,000 schools supplied with temporary makeshift teachers whose qualifications were less than the qualifications regularly required by the States in which they taught, but who were given temporary licenses in order that schools might be filled in some way. More than 300,000 teachers are now teaching with less than the required minimum standard of qualifications.

County Schools Need Best Teachers.

A teacher in an elementary school, especially in a country school in which one teacher teaches all subjects to all grades and all ages in the only school that many of the pupils will ever attend, should possess at least a modern high-school training, with two years of college or normal-school education, including some professional instruction and training. More than half of the teachers in the United States have less than this.

This condition has always existed, but becomes more fatal now than at any time in the past. Under present conditions it must continue to exist. The normal schools and classes in which special instruction for teaching is given in colleges and universities have smaller attendance than at any time in recent years. The number of normal-school graduates is only 75 per cent or 80 per cent of what it was in 1916.

Conditions are not much better in the colleges and universities. The shortage is particularly great among teachers with special preparation for industrial-technical work. Industries are paying much larger prices for these than the schools pay.

For the increase of material wealth, for the citizenship and welfare of the Nation and the people, these conditions must be remedied as soon as possible. To do this will require from two to three times as much money as has been appropriated in the past for education.

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STATE OF Nevada

SPEECH OF

C. C. COTTRELL

State Highway Engineer

Before the Organization Meeting of the Highway Advisory Council at Reno, Nevada,

November 29, 1920

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