Of the standard reading courses, nearly 230,000 copies have been distributed through high schools, libraries, and other agencies, and 160,000 copies of six "After War Reading Courses" for soldiers were distributed to camps and cantonments in the United States and over

seas.

More than 10,000 readers are enrolled in the National Reading Circle. These are mostly in rural communities and villages and small towns, but are not confined to these. One of the most successful reading circles is one of 150 members in Glendale, Calif. In Cleveland and Pittsburgh there are reading circles having a membership of more than 150 and in the District of Columbia there is a circle of 90.

The purpose of the work of this division is fourfold:

1. To help parents in the care and training of their little children before the children become of school age. To this end the division has prepared a specially designed reading course for parents to give them knowledge of the duties of parenthood. It has also sent out public health bulletins on the diet and the care of babies and similar publications issued by the National Congress of Mothers.

2. To help parents further their own education. For this purpose the division has continued to issue a series of 10 reading courses designed largely for general information and cultural development. The division requires written summaries of the books and answers to test questions given for the purpose of determining how carefully the books have been read and how well they have been understood. When a course has been properly completed a certificate signed by the Commissioner of Education is issued to the reader.

3. To promote the education of boys and girls who have left school and of older persons. Two courses have been especially designed, a miscellaneous course for girls and a like course for boys, to be read by young people who have left school at an early age, but are still at home.

4. To promote a closer cooperation of home and school by the organization of parent-teacher associations. At the inception of this division the names were obtained of 60,000 women living near to country and village schools who would be willing to assist in bringing about a closer relation between home and school. These women have distributed material regarding the organization of parent-teacher associations, have assisted in placing information on the care of babies in the hands of mothers of young children, and have helped in maintaining the interest of parents in the schools. During the war the division extended its work to include several reading courses for soldiers in the camps. Since demobilization these courses have been continued for discharged soldiers in their homes.

ALASKA DIVISION.

During the year the field force of the Bureau of Education in Alaska consisted of 3 superintendents, 3 acting superintendents, 121 teachers, 8 physicians, and 11 nurses. Sixty-eight schools were maintained, with an enrollment of 3,700.

In October, 1918, following the line of steamship transportation from Seattle, influenza broke out in the coast towns of Alaska and rapidly spread to the interior settlements. Furnishing relief to the native races of Alaska is a duty of the Bureau of Education, but, in the great emergency created by the epidemic, the Bureau of Education could not, by itself, effectively cope with the situation. Gov. Riggs, therefore, as executive head of the Territory, accepted the responsibility of directing the fight against the disease, and took immediate, energetic, and effective action to check its ravages among the native races of Alaska, as well as among the white people.

The Surgeon General of the Public Health Service authorized Gov. Riggs to employ physicians and nurses and to purchase medicines. As a sufficient number of doctors and nurses could not be had in Alaska, 19 physicians and 3 nurses were secured in the State of Washington and sent to southern Alaska on the naval collier Brutus. All of the Bureau of Education's physicians, nurses, superintendents, and teachers were placed at the governor's disposal and rendered zealous service in fighting the epidemic in the native villages. White people throughout the Territory cooperated heartily. The assistance of the Red Cross was also secured.

Up to January 31, 1919, the epidemic had resulted in the death of more than 1,600 natives. At least 150 orphans were cared for and fed. About 90 per cent of the fatalities and of the indigency was among the native population.

The epidemic was especially severe in the Nome and St. Michael regions, where it resulted in the death of at least 850 natives, more than 150 children being left orphans. It will, however, be possible to find homes for these orphans among the Eskimos in the villages on the coast north of Bering Strait.

Among the victims of the epidemic were Mr. Walter C. Shields, who for many years had been superintendent of the work of the Bureau of Education in the northwestern district; Dr. Frank W. Lamb, physician in charge of the Bureau of Education's hospital at Akiak; and Mrs. Harriet T. Hansome, assistant teacher at Hydaburg.

In May influenza made its appearance among the Eskimos in the Bristol Bay region and among the Aleuts at Unalaska. As in the previous epidemic, vigorous measures were taken to combat the

disease. The Navy Department sent the Unalga, the Bear, the Vicksburg, and the Marblehead with physicians and nurses to the stricken districts. In the village of Unalaska the epidemic caused 45 deaths and in the Bristol Bay region 440 deaths.

An orphanage is being erected at Kanakanek, in which the bureau will care for about 150 destitute children who were made orphans by the epidemic.

In 1911 the bureau entered upon the policy of encouraging the establishment in native villages of cooperative enterprises, financed by native capital and conducted by the natives themselves, under the supervision of the teacher of the local United States public school. Such enterprises are now in successful operation in nine villages in widely separated regions. Each enterprise is bringing prosperity to the village in which it is located.

Conspicuous among these undertakings is the Metlakatla Commercial Co., on Annette Island, in southeastern Alaska, which was organized in 1916 with a capital of $2,295, and 30 shareholders. The auditing of the affairs of the company in January, 1919, showed a capital of $21,140 at that date, and a net profit of $13,721. The number of stockholders had increased to 156. The returns to the natives of Metlakatla from the Annette Island Packing Co., having fish-trapping privileges within the reserved waters adjacent to Annette Island and permission to erect and operate a cannery on Annette Island, amounted during the season of 1918 to $70,252.55 for fish royalties, trap fees, labor, and lumber purchased from the local sawmill.

The successful operation of the lease granted to the Annette Island Packing Co. at Metlakatla led to the adoption of similar policy at Tyonek, in southwestern Alaska. For several years canneries and packing companies have provided the natives of Tyonek with fishing equipment and have purchased the fish caught. Under this arrangement the Tyonek natives never realized more than $4,000 in a season. Under a lease entered into during January, 1919, with a Seattle capitalist granting him the privilege of operating a saltery and fish trap within the Tyonek reservation, the annual income to the Tyonek natives from royalties and wages paid will be about $10,000.

Congress appropriated $75,000 for the support of the medical work of the bureau among the natives of Alaska during the fiscal year 1918-19. Eight physicians and 11 nurses were employed; hospitals were maintained by the bureau at Juneau, Nulato, Kanakanak, Akiak, and Kotzebue; the hospital at Haines was operated in cooperation with the Woman's Board of Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church. Materials for use in erecting a hospital building at Noorvik, in Arctic Alaska, were shipped from Seattle in June,

1919.

As heretofore, all teachers in settlements remote from a

hospital, physician, or nurse were supplied with medicines for use in relieving less serious illness.

The policy of receiving native girls for theoretical and practical training as nurses, inaugurated in 1918, has been successfully pursued at the hospital in Juneau.

Reports from the reindeer stations for the past year have not yet been received. Assuming that there has been the usual net increase of 20 per cent in the number of reindeer during the year, there should be approximately 145,000 reindeer in the herds in Alaska, June 30, 1919.

The magnitude and value of the reindeer enterprise have rendered necessary the employment of an expert in animal industry, who has proceeded to northwestern Alaska, where he will carefully study the prevention and treatment of diseases among the reindeer, as well as scientific breeding, herding, butchering, and marketing.

On account of the vast extent of the Territory of Alaska, with its villages scattered at intervals along thousands of miles of coast line and on its great rivers, the taking of the census of Alaska is an undertaking of great difficulty. Through its district superintendents, physicians, and teachers, located in all parts of the Territory, with accurate knowledge of their respective districts, and with facilities for reaching the remote settlements, the Bureau of Education will cooperate with the Bureau of the Census in taking the 1920 census of Alaska.

THE DIVISION OF RURAL SCHOOLS.

In addition to the routine work of correspondence, keeping in touch with the progress of rural education throughout the country, noting the important legislation affecting rural schools, studying noteworthy departures in rural-school practice, including changes in courses of study and methods in organization and teaching, giving information and advice to school officers and teachers in response to thousands of inquiries by letter and personal visitation, attending and addressing teachers' institutes and local and State and national meetings of associations of teachers, school officers, and citizens interested in rural schools and the means of their improvement, the division of rural schools and its members accomplished the following work:

The division completed for publication the portions of the report of the educational survey of the State of South Dakota pertaining to the general school system and the rural schools and normal schools. This survey was made under the direction of the chief of this division in the winter and spring of 1918 at the request of the State Survey Commission created by act of the legislature.

At the request of the board of trustees and the superintendent of schools of La Crosse County and of the State superintendent of schools of Wisconsin, a study was made of the work of the county agricultural school of La Crosse County, Wis., and of its place in the county system of schools, and a report with recommendations submitted.

Studies of rural education in Nebraska were completed and a report prepared for publication as a bulletin of the Bureau of Education. These studies were made in cooperation with the school of education of the University of Nebraska.

A survey of rural schools of Walker County, Tex., and a report with recommendations were prepared for publication as a bulletin of the bureau.

A report of the survey of the rural schools of Falls County, Tex.,' made in the fiscal year ended June 30, 1918, was completed for publication as a bulletin of the bureau.

At the request of the survey committee of the State of Alabama, created by act of the legislature of the State during the first half of its quadrennial session, the Bureau of Education undertook a comprehensive survey of the State system of education and of all of its parts, including the higher institutions of learning, schools for the blind and deaf, and other exceptional children. The whole of the survey was made under the direction of the chief of the rural school division of the bureau, and other members of this division assisted in the survey of the rural schools, including the county high schools, normal schools, and district agricultural schools. The report of the survey was prepared and published as a bulletin of the bureau, and a great majority of its recommendations were embodied in a new and comprehensive school code during the second half of the session of the legislature. The entire report, with all of its recommendations, received the hearty approval of the State survey commission, and it is believed that further recommendations not embodied in the school code will be adopted as soon as necessary amendments to the constitution of the State can be had and when further developments of the system make their adoption advisable.

In surveys of this kind, it is not the policy of this bureau to make only those recommendations that can be put into operation at once, but rather to make such constructive recommendations as may serve for the improvement of the schools and the school system for 5 or 10 or more years.

A detailed study of the possibilities of consolidating seven oneroom one-teacher schools of Mount Joy Township, Adams County, Pa., into one school, and of the advantages that might be expected to accrue from such consolidation, was made at the request of the superintendent of schools of Adams County and of the State superin