THIRTY-FIFTH ANNUAL REPORT FROM THE DEPARTMENTff EDUCATION TO THE General Assembly OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA FOR THE School Year Ending December 3i, 1906 ATJ.AN'rA, GA. THE FRANKLIN-TURNER COMPANY PRINTltRS, PUBJ.ISHERS, BINDltRS 1907 OFFICEOFiSTATE SCHOOL COMMISSIONER, A1LANTA, GA., June 20, 1907. To:Hzs Excellency, Joseph M. Terrell, Governor of Georgia: DEAR SIR :-In accordance with the requirements of the law; I have the honor to submit to you the Thirty-fifth Annual Report from the Department of Education of the State of Georgia. Respectfully, WM. B. MERRITT, State School Commissioner. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION. STATE BOARD OF EDUCATION. Joseph M. Terrell, President W. B. Merritt, Executive 0tfice~ John C. HarL . PhiIiP Cook William A.. Wright. . _. Governor. State School Comm'r. Attorney-General. Secretary of State. Comptroller-General. J. N. Rogers, Secretary of Board__ .. Clerk to S. S. C. STATE SCH00L COMMISSIONER'S OFFICE. W. B. MerritL J. N. Rogers . Mrs. G. A. Alexander State School Commissioner. . . __. Clerk. Secretary. STATE EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS. University of Georgia Georgia School of Technology Georgia Normal and Indus~rial ~oi1ege State Normal School. ,.;.., North Georgia Agricult,u:a, College Georgia School for the Deaf Georgia Academy for tile Blind , Georgia State Indu.tn" I College for Colored Youths , A;hens .. , " ,.,..,IJ. C. Barrow. Chancellor. Atlanta :..,;.K~ Ct. ,Matheson, President. i!. Mi11edgeville :.:~i1: Parks, President. Athens E.. C. iIlr.!'llson, President. Dahlonega G: K. 1l<;nn, President. Cave Spring W. 0; g<:>;'''l.or, Principal. M'!CC'Il.. ; ; G. F. Olip,4ant Principal. 3ava""ah R. R. Wright, President. THE THIRTY-FIFTH ANNUAL REPORT FROM THE Department of Education TO THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF THE STATE OF GEORGIA Gentlemen of the General Assembly: The following report is submitted to the General Assembly in accordance with the law found in the Acts of the General Assembly, 1892, page 85, Section I : "That the State School Commissioner shall make an annual report to the General Assembly, in which he shall present a statement of the condition and amount of all funds and property appropriated to the purpose of public education; a statement of the number of common and public schools of the various grades, in the State; the number of scholars attending such schools; their sex, color, and the branches taught; a statement of the average cost per scholar of instruction under the common school system in each county; a statement of the plans for the management, extension and improvement of the common schools; a statement of the number of children of school age in the State, with as much accuracy as the same can be ascertained; also, a statement of the number of private schools and colleges of the different kin-ds in the State; the number of pupils in such schools or colleges; their sex, the branches taught, the average cost of tuition per scholar in said schools and colleges." The report presented for the year 1906 contains record of much advancement and progress along all lines of educational work. This does not indicate that our problems are all solved. I believe that the existence of problems and the recognition of them, together with the determination to solve them constitute the chief part of civilization and progress. I endorse the sentiment Dione who has said: 6 "The more radically you think of the problems of human existence, the more deeply you seek to penetrate them, the more insoluble they seem to become. Any final solution, even if possible, would not be desirable. It would be a calamity. Humanity would stagnate,. grow torpid and indolent; and its glorious evolution would be arested, if each new generation were not confronted with urgent riddles, both abstract and concrete, clamoring for solution. There is, however, no danger of our incurring degeneration and decay by guessing, once for all, the riddle of the sphinx. It is an evidence of our spirtual vitality that we have no lack of problems, and can not desist from persistent, though discouraging attempts to grapple with them. "The spirit that questions accepted truisms, that reveals pitfalls where we fancied ourselves safe, and feels the storm in advance, in spite of the official fair-weather signals, therefore urges its possessor to a thankless but by no means unprofitable labor." PROGRESS OF HIGH SCHOOL WORK. The progress of high schools throughout the Southern States is very gratifying. It is almost the universal policy of these States, and the fixed policy of States in other sections, to encourage the establishment of high schools by giving some aid by direct State appropriation. At present, the Constitution of the State of Georgia forbids the Legislature to make such appropriation. Gradually, the inconsistency of the State providing for elementary education, and maintaining institutions for higher learning, while neglecting the high school entirely, has been recognized, and is deplored by the people of the State. The time is ripe for a change in our Constitution that will permit State aid being extended to high schools. Fortunately many good high schools have been established by local school systems, and by several religious denominations of this State, but our high school work needs still fur- ther development. It needs and deserves encouragement until every county, and most of the rural districts have the advan- tages of a high school course. _ One of the best plans for encouraging high schools is that adopted by Virginia of appropriating a certain amount to high 7 schools of one grade, more to those of two, and still more to the three-grade high schools. State Superintendent J. D. Eg- gleston, Jr., elsewhere in this report states, relative to high school work: "The high school fund for this year has been distributed among one hundred and sixty-eight schools, in amounts ranging from $200.00 to $400.00 each. It is safe to say that the counties and cities have contributed not less than $200,000 additional for the pay of the high school teachers. Many of the old and established high schools have not asked for State aid." INCREASED APPROPRIATIONS FOR COMMON SCHOOLS AND STATE EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS. ' Alabama has set a precedent in this regard by the magnificent work done in their last Legislature. About two-thirds of the counties of Alabama have voted a local tax for their common schools. "In addition to the local tax, and the usual State appropriation, the recent Legislature made an additional appropriation of $300,000 to the public schools of the State for next year, and for each year thereafter an additional appropriation of $35,000. A bill was also passed appropriating $1,000 to each county of the State for the repairing and erecting of rural schoolhouses, making an annual appropriation of $67,000 for this purpose." More liberal appropriations were also made to the district agricultural schools than heretofore. The State University, the normal schools, and other educational institutions were given increased appropriations. The exact amounts of these appropriations will be found elsewhere in the statement furnished by Superintendent H. C. Gunnels. Other States have been taking notable strides along these lines, and all see;m enough interested in more efficient school work'and in the prompt payment of teachers to do just what Alabama has done. SALARIES OJ.<' TEACHERS. The consideration of our educational system will quickly reveal the fact that salaries of teachers are inadequate for 8 maintaining a standard of teaching demanded by our present state of civilization. The people of our State are giving more thought, and are applying the best business methods, more and more, to the matter of maintaining good schools. Tuition and local taxation are supplying some of the needed funds for this purpose. We may safely expect increasing funds from local taxation, but the people of the State expect the Legislature to increase the State appropriation for common schools, as the number of children are increasing. At present, there is a very acute need of a special appropriation to common schools which will enable boards of eoucation to pay teachers of the State more promptly. By prompt payment, teachers will be saved many thousands of dollars in the discounting of their claims; thus the prompt payment of salaries would be equivalent to an increase of salaries. The people of our State ar~ not indifferent to this crying need, and every now and then we have some expression in material help that shows their heartfelt appreciation of the noble work being done by the body of educational workers. vVe have had two notable illustrations of this fact within the past year. In Camden county, Mr. J. S. N. Davis, Jr., Woodbine, gave the board of education a sum suf.icient to pay the teachers' claims; and in Pike county, Mr. C. T. Smith, Concord, loaned the amount without interest. The following statistics on the subjects of teachers' insufficient salarIes, and the increased cost of living, are significant and self-explanatory. TEACHERS) PAY AS COMPARED WITH OTHER WAGEs. "The average monthly pay of women teachers in the United States is $39.77. The highest is in Arizona, $71.75, where all expenses are correspondingly high; the lowest is in South Carolina, $23.20, where illiteracy is common. Alabama, Mississippi, North Carolina, Virginia and Oklahoma pay less than $30 a month. Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont are in the same discreditable class. Pennsylvania, a low-pay' State, has just lifted herself a little above the $30 grade. "The commission appointed by President Roosevelt to settle the strike of the anthracite coal miners report these wages of laborers in Pennsylvania: 9 Stablemen Pumpmen Carpenters Blacksmiths . .. Lampmen Chute starters Laborers' . . . . .. Drivers Oilers Average days worked per year. 365 . 339 . 274 . 272 . 28 I . 229 . 23 I 225 242 Average annual earnings. $689 52 685 72 603 9 557 43 554 30 496 88 397 I9 380 57 336 45 "In sixty-four cities of America the average wage of all the educational workers, including the superintendent, is less than $300 a year: 95 cents a work day, 8I cents a living day. Rochester, Syracuse, and New Haven, university cities, pay some of their teachers less than $300 a year. In St. Joseph, Baltimore, Detroit, Toledo, Louisville and New Orleans many teachers receive less than $350 a year. In the same cities, laborers on street and sewer work, ditch diggers, road graders, mortar carriers, and the most ordinary unskilled laborers are better paid. The average earnings of American educators, including superintendents, regardless of sex, is $27I a year: 74 cents per living day, 86 cents per working day. The following wages for laborers, not superintendents, are paid: Bricklayers Stonecutters .. .. '" Carpenters Plumbers Hodcarriers Helpers. . . .. , .$5 00 to $5 50 per day. 4 00 " 4 50 " 4 00 " 4 50 " 4 50 " 5 00 " '" 2 00 " 2 25 " I 50 " 2 25 " In only four cities in the Union do the minimum salaries exceed those paid to street cleaners in the same municipality. In New York Oity the average yearly earnings of the street cleaner is $63I, in Boston $63, in Philadelphia $503. As would be expected, the comparison of teachers' wage with that of the higher grade laborers shows more strongly the disadvantages of education as a means of earning a livelihood. I I 10 TEACHERS' PAY DECREASING. The cost of foods for the average poor family has increas~d 35 per cent. Six years ago beans were 4 cents a quart; now they cost 6 cents-a. 50 per cent. increase. Eggs were sixteen for a quarter; now they are ten for a quarter-an increase of 60 per cent. Chickens were from 16 to 20 cents; they are now from 25 to 28 cents. Pork chops were 10 cents; they are now 16 cents. Butter and cheese products are higher. Flour is 35 per cent. higher, potatoes 15 per cent. dearet:'. . Coal in 1898, when teachers' wages were raised in New York, was 40 per cent. cheaper than it now is. Oil was 40 per cent. less expensive. Hardware was about the same; clothing, ditto; shoes cost more than they do now. The greatest increase has been in rents, which in Western cities have gone up 20 to 30 per cent.; in New York 50 to 75 per cent. Fredenck Boyd Stevenson in the Brooklyn Ealgle estimates the net increase of necessary living expenses at 40 per cent. Salaries of teachers in New York have increased 17 per cent., leaving the teachers 23 per cent. poorer than they were before the improved schedules of the Ahearn law of 1899. The teacher now receiving $600 a year in New York city is not as well off as she was in 1898 on $490 a year. Her $600 amounts in purchasing power to $426 of money of the year 1898. Instead of an increase, such teachers have suffered a decrease of $64 a year. The same is true of all New York teachers. The failure of the National Bureau of Education to reduce its table of teachers' monthly salaries to a yearly basis, or to any form permitting of comparison from year to year (the number of school months varying as it does), makes it impossible to estimate the percentage of increase of teachers' wages in America. In none of the cities studied has the schedule increase reached that of New York; in many cities the schedule increase is less than 6 per cent., so that unless there be some remarkable anomalies unnoticed by either Commissioner of Education or the National Educational Association Committee, the teachers of the country are from 18 to 30 per cent. behind the wages of 1876.-Edu,CQitionall Review, Ja1nuarry, 1907. TEACHERS' WAGES. Teachers, even more than Congressmen, deserve higher salaries. It is a material age. The man who fashions the walls 11 of a house is held to a higher test of skill, and is paid better for his work, than, he who molds the mind of a child. Bricklayers in San Francisco get $8 per day; Harriet Jones teaches school in Luzerne county, Pennsylvania, for the same sum per week, and is given employment only nine months in the year. Masons in Calgary, Canada, get $5-40 a day, or $140 a month; Lawrence Amos teaches school in East Brandywine Township, Pennsylvania, for $40 a month. Many teachers are paid less than hoq-carriers. College professors are worse off, in. proportion, than teachers. The average salary paid to 'professors in Columbia is $3,746.85, to adjunct professors, men between thirty and forty, with a dozen years of service to their credit, $2,126.92. Such figures are little less than a public scandal. No male teacher in any community should be paid less than enough to support decently a wife and five children. In every community the teachers should have a position of dignity and emolument equal to that of the banker and the professional man. Schools ought not to be the last refuge for economic dregs not wanted by business. They should attract and keep in their service the best talent. Facts dealing with this condition, both concerning communities where the rate of pay remains scandalously low and where it has been raised, should have wide circulation. 'rEACHERS AND WAGE-EARNERS. 'rHE PAY OF 'rEACHERS. In some cases these figures are the minimum rates in the localities named; in other cases they are the average rate. The yearly rate is, in every case, the entire sum that a teacher can earn in a year; there is no such thing as overtime for them, and they are employed only from seven to ten months a year. In this respect they can be compared with some outdoors artisans who can not work the year round. As to places outside of New York, some allowance must be made for differences in the cost of living. MON'rH. Bucks Co. Pa $35 00 Hazleton, Pa. '" 35 00 Chester, Pa. 40 00 Georgetown, Del. ~........... 35 00 All Idaho (male av.) 7I 03 All Idaho (female av.) 55 90 YEAR. $245 00 350 00 380 00 315 00 710 3 559 00 12 UNION RATES OF WAGES IN NEW YORK . These figures are official. In every case the figures are the minimum, the least amount which the union will allow a member to accept. As a matter of fact, many workmen make more than the figures given, for "overtime" (any time over eight hours a day) is paid extra at the rate of one~half more than the regular rate; and work done on Sundays and holidays is paid for at double rates. The yearly rate is based on three hundred working days of eight hours each. DAY. Bricklayer $5 60 Mason 4 40 Carpenter . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. 4 80 Plasterer 5 30 Hod-carrier 3 00 YEAR. $1,680 00 1,320 00 1,440 00 1,590 00 900 00 -Colliers Weekly, Jarnuall'y 12, 1907. LOCAL TAXATION. Local taxation is being recognized as the best business method of supplementing the State school fund. Counties and districts are continuing to vote local taxahcn for schools, and the people are delighted with results, and would not again be dependent upon the State fund alone for maintaining their schools. In several counties the grand juries have strongly endorsed their county system of local taxation. However, these funds have been paid largely in cities and towns, nearly all of which have voted local taxation. It has been most gratifying to note that in the rural districts, when the school term has been lengthened by local taxation, the attendance for the entire long term has been much better than it was for the short term. This seems an indication of an underlying principle that parents appreciate better advantages when they have had some part in bringing about this condition by contributing toward the support of the schools. COLLEGES. The courses of study in our colleges are conforming to progressive educational ideas, and they are now planned to meet the demands of modern life. Students are coming from these institutions of learning to take upon them the work we are now 13 engaged in, and more and more are the professors concerned with the fitness of these students for the work. The capacity of all our colleges is taxed. It is gratifying to note that new buildings are being erected, and it is hoped that ample means will be provided for the enlargement of all our colleges, that their power and usefulness may be extended to the greatest number of our young people, that they may all find in the State the educational preparation they may need. Our denominational, private, and State institutions are all advancing in every way, and the demand for the teachers trained in our normal schools is far in excess of the supply, owing to the limited quarters, and the fact that we have at present only two such colleges for the entire State. BUSINE;SS ME;THODS APPLIE;D TO E;DUCATION. School officials; business men, and legislators are studying educational problems as never before. The public mind is impressed that progressive, business methods should be applied to school systems in order to secure the best results. Thorough system and thorough supervision are as much needed in school work as in commercial and industrial enterprises. Many of our county school systems are so carefully planned and supervised that I do not hesitate to cite them as models. In many counties which are not so progressive there are individual communities which have realized the demands which the next generation will make upon their children, and have provided even in remote rural districts schools equal to any in the State. The great problem before the school officials, the General Assembly, and all our citizens, is the encouragement and stimulation of the people of every school district to appreciate education, and to establish schools which will bear the most careful and thorough inspection of educational experts, schools which are the best possible for that section. The value of the training which children receive in school is increased many fold if the training is done in perfect accord with the laws of mind-growth. The right food in the right season; the right amount skillfully offered; what a difference in the interest awakened, the stimulus imparted, the inspiration implanted, the thrirI of life created, the intellectual development secured! All work approaches the highest degree of excellence, as it is compared with the highest ideals. Every gifted artist, every 14 skilled artisan, wishes to compare his work with the best work in his line; so every school should be put to this test frequently. The plan adopted by the superintendent and board of .education of Richmond county should corrunend itself to those who are striving to make their schools most efficient. While the schools of Augusta and Richmond county rank among the best in the State, the officials of that system were anxious to have the opinion of an educational expert who was not connected with the system, and for the past two years such expert has spent a week in these schools for the purpose of inspecting the school work, making a report to the superintendent, and giving a series of lectures to the teachers on educational methods. INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION. With the establishment of our eleven agricultural schools, and of the magnificent secondary school in Columbus, where every child, both white and colored, is given an opportunity to secure a training which fits him to become a bread winner; with the introduction into most of our city schqols, and many of our rural schools, of manual training and domestic science, our minds naturally dwell just now on the importance of this work. I believe thoroughly in industrial training, and I wish to emphasize the thought that such training should educate for the surroundings, not out of them. Strive to make the farm boy love the farm, and choose to remain upon it; select such facts in nature study and agriculture as shall teach, besides the scientific knowledge, the beauty and use of the object itself. There is, however, a danger in our enthusiasm which must be guarded against. While all school work should fit a child for his environment, and harmonize with the occupations of the community, there should be ever in our minds a higher ideal than this; the purpose of education is to teach men the difference between a gladsome, enlightened acceptance of life and a hostile, gloomy submission; between a large and harmonious conception of life, and one that is narrow and stubborn; to inspire the children of men to possess ideas of their own. Our first duty, therefore, is not the materialization of education, but the idealization of it in the sense that we prepare in our souls a place of some loftiness, where the idea may be lodged. Only as we have stored in our souls eagerness, purity, 15 unselfishness, knowledge, can there be advancement in our spiritual life. "Humanity, up to this day, has been like an invalid tossing and turning on his couch in search of repose; why not turn man's thought to the belief that he is on the eve of great certitude, great joy?" Maeterlinck's vision of the destiny offered to man well expresses the contrast between the educated and the neglected. He says: "One evening as I stood on the hillside I chanced to espy a little, bewildered stream. I beheld it far down in the valley, staggering, struggling, climbing, falling; blindly groping its way to the great lake that slumbered the other side of the forest in the peace of the dawn. Here it was a block of basalt that forced the streamlet to wind round and about four times; there, the roots of a hoary tree; further on still, the mere recollection of an obstacle now gone forever thrust it back to its source, bubbling in impotent fury, divided for all time from its goal and its gladness. But in another direction, at right angles almost to the distraught, unhappy, useless stream, a force superior to the force of instinct had traced a long, greenish canal, calm, peaceful, deliberate, that flowed steadily across the country, across the crumbling stones, across the obedient forest, on its clear and unerring, unhurrying way from its distant source on the horizon to the same tranquil, shining lake. And I had at my feet before me the image of the two great destinies offered to man." SECONDARY INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL AT COLUMBUS> GA. This school can not be commended too highly, and it should be held up as a model for other towns and cities. It is accomplishing what no other school is, and is the subject of interest throughout the Union. The World>s Work for February, 1907, saYi of it: "The city of Columbus, Georgia, is the first municipality to meet the situation fairly. The superintendent of schools, Mr. Carleton B. Gibson, in 1904 told the school trustees (who are among the most prominent manufacturers of the city) that 'an industrial city of this section must have an army of tr~ined workers. If there is any excuse for the existence of schools, and the expenditure of large sums of money, it lies in the training of children to properly take their places in life. In an industrial community, very large numbers of these children must 16 become industrial workers.' The result was that Mr. Gibson was sent to inspect the trade schools throughout this country, residents and former residents of the town gave land and money, the town voted an extra tax, and the school was built. "In Columbus any white boy who has passed through the grammar school may be turned into a skilled mechanic or a cot- ton mill operative at the public expense. Any girl may learn to make her living at dressmaking, office work, or in the mills; and they are all taught how to keep house. When the plan is completely worked out, any negro boy who is willing, may be trained as a carpenter, a blacksmith, a cobbler, or a harness- maker. And the city is willing to pay the cost of making every unskilled negro girl into a good cook, seamstress or house- keeper. "This community has decided that aU its citizen!> shall be economically profitable. It is making finished workers of the school children, its most valuable raw material. It will have the reputation among the cities of its neighborhood that Ger- many holds among the nations. Columbus will be known as a producer of well-made goods and a city of prosperous work- men. "The scarcity of skilled workmen in all the trades; the impos- sibility of giving the masses trade-instruction in private schools, the ominous fact that we have to look to immigration for much of our skilled labor; the awakening of public opinion on the subject; the example of Columbus, Georgia; and the begin- nings made in the New York and the Philadelphia school sys- tems-all these things make it certain that there will soon be provision made in our. public schools in general for teaching the trades. This is the next step in making the system fill the needs of our time."-"Training for the Trades," by Arthur W. Page. DISTRICT AGRICULTURAL SCHOOLS. This State has taken a great stride forwaid in the establishment of the eleven district agricultural schools. Essentially an agricultural State, Georgia is providing for her sons and daughters the training necessary for them to inherit and to appreciate their birthright. Too long has the mess of pottage sufficed our children; they were hungry, and anything seemed good; but now, they are to be given the opportunity to view the promised land, and to enter into its delightful fields. Not ,' 17 many years hence the wilderness shall blossom like' the rose, and the uninhabited places shall teem with life and prosperity. Our children shall learn to do the greatest amount of labor with the least possible effort; they shall learn to make effort pay; they shall learn the perfect freedom and independence of farm life, together with the financial success that is possible for the diligent, scientific, interested farmer, and they will arise to call blessed those who made this ideal condition r<>ssible through the establishment C!f these schools. GRAND JURIES. A powerful factor in the educational work of each county is the grand jury. The grand jury elects the county board of education, examines the books and accounts of the county school comrpissioner, and their recommendations carry great weight in tl:te conduct of educational affairs in the respective counties. I have tried to secure the comments and recommendations of the grand jury of each county to print in this report. The reports I have received are printed elsewhere; together with a brief review of school work by the county school commissioner. It is gratifying to note that the judges of our superior courts are giving wholesome educational exhortations in their charges, and they seem anxious to bring before the minds of the jurors the value and importance of this subject. STA'l'IS'l'ICS. A considerable number of local systems in incorporated towns receive their share of the State funds through the county school commissioner. Only a small per cent. of these make monthly and annual reports to the county school commissioner. As a consequence, their enrollment, average attendance and amount raised by local taxation are not included in the statistics of this report. Also, many thousands of dollars which were paid by patrons to sustain long term schools in rural districts were not reported at all. As only fifty-nine commissioners answered this question, and as many of the counties where the largest private sUbscriptions are made each year failed to report this important item, it is left out entirely in the estimate 2 se 18 of total receipts. On this account the total receipts awear to be less than for last year. The proper keeping of teachers' records should be taught in our normal schools and in such high schools as train prospective teachers for their work. It is a fact not in keeping with the general intelligence of our high school teachers that many of them can not properly keep a record of their work and make a report of it at the end of the year. From all parts of the State come gratifying reports of improvement in school buildings, apparatus, grounds, etc. In the rural districts two hundred and twenty-two new buildings were erected during the year. By private sub-scriptions the patrons contributed more than ninety thousand dollars of the cost which was $186,565. Twenty-one buildings in towns and local systems were erected at a cost of $246,000. This latter amount includes some expenditures made in enlarging and improving old buildings. In round numbers the value added to the school property, during the year, was $693,000. There was an increased enrollment of 27,748, and the remarkable increase in daily attendance of 37,786. The average length of term was increased thirteen days, or nearly three weeks. This increase added to the increase in daily attendance, gives twenty-five per cent. more days of schooling than was given the children the previous year. .An increase of eleven per cent. in the salaries paid teachers, in large measure, accounts for much that bespeaks progress. There was an increase of more than forty per cent. in the number of libraries and an increase in the number of volumes, of 24,013, or twenty-two per cent. Much interest and enthusiasm has developed in this line of work. In many communities the school library is bringing the patrons in personal touch with the influences of the school. The compulsory district law which went into effect last fall, has reduced the number of schools in some counties, and in many instances the change has bee:1 productive of much good. Two teachers in one school can do much more than the same teachers and pupils could do in two schools. The number of country schools with two teachers has nearly doubled in the past few years. 19 ESTIMATE AND APPORTIONMENT OF SCHOOL FUNDS. I suggest that certain changes be made in the law bearing on the apportionment of school funds. In the Acts of 1894, page 62, will be found the following: "That the school fund for each calendar year shall be a fixed and specified sum, and in order to carry out this provision the State School Commissioner, the Comptroller-General, and the Treasurer shall, on the first Tuesday of December of each year, beginning with 1894, or as soon thereafter as practicable, make an estimate of what the school fund for the ensuing year shall be from the specific taxes, direct appropriations, and from any other sources of supply which now belong to the school fund, or may hereafter belong to the school fund, and said fund, when so estimated, shall be available and payable at the time specified in this Act; provided) that in the event that the said specific taxes shall fall short of said estimate, then the balance necessary to meet the provisions of said estimate is hereby authorized to be paid from any fund in the treasury not otherwise appropriated. "That when the State School Commissioner, the Comptroller-General, and the Treasurer shall meet on the first'Tuesday in December, or as soon thereafter as practicable, as provided in this Act, to make the estimate of the school fund provided for in section '1 of this Act, they shall base said estimate upon the amount of school fund coming into the treasury for the year preceding the year for which said estimate is made." In the Acts of 1898, page 67, will be found the following: "That from and after the first day of January, 1899. or as soon thereafter as practicable, the Treasurer of the State shall place to the credit of each county in the State, on his books, its proportionate part of the common school fund in the treasury on the first day of each month." The present plan of making the estimates is not entirely satisfactory. My attention was directed to this matter last December at the time of making the apportionment for 1907. The apportionment was delayed a month, and then the estimate could not be made to include definitely the fullest amount of school fund for 1907, because at this time the returns had not been received of "school funds coming into the treasury from the preceding year." I have investigated the matter as fully as my limited officr; force, and the pressure of business upon me, have allowed, and 20 lately I have found it necessary to employ the services of an expert accountant to continue this work. He has not completed his investigations at this time, but I am sure from my own investigations, and the data the accountant gives me, that there have been some losses each year to the common school fund by the present plan ,of estimating the annual apportionment. A full and further investigation will confirm this opinion. and will assist the Legislature in amending our present law so that all funds apportioned to the schools will either be included in the estimate at the usual time, or added to the apportionment of the next year. There are many reasons why the school year should begin September 1st, instead of January 1St. In making this po;oposed change, which has for several years been recommended by school officials and legislative committees, the General Assembly should enact such lawsas will make the common school fund an actual appropriation rather than an estimate. THE PRESS OF' THE STATE. The uniform courtesy, interest and generosity of the press of the State in freely printing all educational matter, and in throwing open the columns of the papers for everything of interest in our work, can not be too highly appreciated by educators. The press is one of the most potent factors for good, and the advancement of thought, and to it is due in large measure the progress and prosperity we now enjoy, not alone in business and commercial life, but in educational life also. PUBLIC-MINDED CITIZENS. As an indication of the faith 'which oUr business men have in education, and the faith which they have in the boys and girls of this State, I give the following striking instances of several liberal donations to schools given within the past year. Mr. J. L. Nash, of Gloucester, gave the Friendship Acad- emy one thousand dollars for the erection of a new building. Mr. J. B. Norman, and others, of Norman Park, have pledged themselves to raise fifty thousand dollars for an endowment fund for Norman Park Institute. Mr. S. M. Inman, of Atlanta, has offered Agnes Scott College fifty thousand dollars on the condition that other friends of the school duplicate the gift. 21 Judge Horace Holden, of Crawfordville, has contributed a notable idea and ideal for the future in the plan he suggests, which is here given in full, for a college founded to the memory of Alexander Stephens. We honor our dead heroes with poem and with song; we erect to their memories elegant statues of bronze and of marble; what more fitting than that to the man who spent his life searching for the struggling youth whom he might help acquire an education, the more lasting memorial of a college founded to his memory and bearing his name be erected? Judge Holden's letter on the subject is as follows: Crawfordville, Ga., May 8, 1907. Han. W. B. M errt:tt, State School Commissioner, Atlain.fa, Ga. DEAR SIR: As you know the Stephens Monumental Association was organized and chartered some years ago, having for its existence three objects: The first object was the purchase of Liberty Hall and its grounds. The second object was the erection of a monument to Mr. Stephens, on Liberty Hall grounds. The third object was the establishment of a school in honor of Mr. Stephens. The first two objects have been acomplished. We have purchased Liberty Hall and its grounds, and have built a beautiful monument to, Mr. Stephens on the grounds in front of Liberty Hall. It required a long time and much effort to do this. It required a long time and much effort to raise the money with which to purchase Liberty Hall and erect a monument. However, both of these objects have been fully accomplished, and the As~ociation owes no debts whatever. We have a school in Crawfordville, named after Mr. Stephens, called the Stephens High School, but this is mostly, and you might say entirely, a local affair. Having completed the first two objects of this Association, the purchase of Liberty Hall and its grounds, and the purchase of the monument to Mr. Stephens, we are now anxious to ac<;omplish the third object, to wit: the establishment of a college in honor of Mr. Stephens. The kind of a school which I would like to see established would take, in my opinion, about $150,000 or $200,000. My idea would be to have this 22 money invested, and only the income of it used annually in the operation of the school, and keep the principal intact. Out of this income each student should be furnished board, lodging, laundry, books, tuition absolutely free, without requiring any immediate payment for the same. Each student, however, should be required at the end of each year to give to the Association his note for an amount sufficient to cover all of his expenses incurred by the Association for the year in which he attended the school, together with the same amount of loan. This note should bear interest at 6 per cent. or 7 per cent. per annum, and be payable on the day that he arrives at twenty-one years of age, on which day an effort will be made to obtain from him another note for the amount then due, payable five years from'date, bearing the same rate .of interest. In my opinion most of this money would be paid back, and whatever amount is paid back could be used in paying the expenses of other students; and in this way, ill' the course of time, a considerable sum of money would be received by the Association arising from the amounts paid back by students. The number of students could be increased each year, according to the amount of money on hand, received from students paying back, which would be added to the annual income from the endowment fund. According to this plan you will see that the principal from the endowment fund is never to be touched, but only the inincome fund is to be used in the operation of the school. And,. as previously stated this income would not be the only money which would be had for the purpose of operating the school, but in addition to this annual income, the trustees of the school would have whatever amount was paid back by students. This amount would, in my opinion, in a few years, amount to a very considerable sum; in the course of time it ought to amount to a very large sum, 'even if only half of the students paid back the amounts which they would owe. My idea would be not to open the school to anybody and everybody who wanted to become students, but the selection of the students would be left to the President of the College, or the entire faculty, or to the trustees. In my travels over my own. circuit, embracing ten counties, and while holding court for other judges, I frequently hear of certain young boys, in towns or in rural districts, who are ltnUSUGllly bright, and the opinion is expressed that they ought 23 to have a better education than their parents are able to give them. Many of them are unable on account of the poverty of their parents to attend school beyond the age of twelve or thirteen years. It is such boys as these that I would like to see taken into the school and educated to such an extent at least that whatever talents they might have could be developed, that they and the world might have the benefit of them. There are many men now in Georgia who have done great service to the State, and who have become great men, because of the help given them by Mr. Stephens, in practically the same way that I now propose to establish this school in his honor. Mr. Stephens loaned these young men money with which to become educated. Many of them paid him back. Many of them succeeded in life by reason of his having educated them, and paid him back. They would perhaps have never made any success in life but by his help, as they would have never received an education if he had not furnished the money with which to obtain it. On account of the fact that Mr. Stephens spent much of the money he made in educating young men who were unable to educate themselves, and whose parents were unable to educate them, it seems to me that the greatest monument that could be erected in honor of his memory would be a" school estab~ lished on the plan which he used in educating poor boys. I do not think the school should be established as a complete college now, but should be designed to give to a boyan education that would carry him, say, to the junior class of some university. This would not give him a thorough and complete education,but would give him such an education as to develop whatever talent he might have. I write you because of the interest you feel in education, and because of your knowledge of the situation in Crawfordville, and because you may be in touch with some people who would be willing to aid the beginning of a movement for an endowment fund. If yjOU could induce some one to subscribe $50,000, upon the condition that $150,000 or $200,000 were raised from other sources, I believe that with your help I could raise the balance, by making the plans and purposes of the school known to some men of means. The grounds around Liberty Hall, consisting of about twelve acres, furnish an ideal place for the school; they are situated right in town, and yet removed from the business and maill 24 residence portion of the town. As you know, we keep Mr. Stephens' room as it was when he lived in it, and as it was when he died. The monument is on the grounds in front of Liberty Hall. It is quite a hista.ric place. The great men of Georgia met here during Mr. Stephens's life. I would greatly appreciate it if you would give this matter some thought, and aid me in establishing the school with the plans and purposes above outlined. Yours truly, HORACE M. HOLDEN. NEEDED LEGISLATION. The resolutions of the Georgia Educational Association and of the Georgia Business Men's Conference, both of which are published elsewhere in tHis report, embody the greatest needs of legislation. . In addition to the resolutions I have referred to, I hope the Legislature will enact into law several other important features not embraced in these resolutions, but included in the general education bill which was before the General Assembly last year, and which failed to become law because the confer- ence committee had not reached an agrement on one par- agraph when the hour for adjournment arrived. The following are the p'lrticular points of that bill which are not included. in the resolutions, and which are worthy of the consideration of our lawmakers: That the State School Commissioner shall report to the grand jury the funds 'sent to the county school commissioner during the previous year. . That certain qualifications shall be required of board mem- bers. That teachers shall report the number of pupils in each grade dor division of the common school course, the number and ages of children from six to eighteen years of age who reside within their respective districts and attend no school and the cause of non-attendance. That the duties of trustees shall be clearly defined. That -there shall be specific provisions for erecting school- houses and for buying school libraries, also for the consolida- tion of schools and transportation of pupils. That county boards shall have authority to punish for cer- tain offences, and that certain misdemeanors shall be defined. 25 That county boards shall have the authority to exercise the right of eminent domain in locating schoolhouses. That county school commissioners be required to make more frequent visits to schools under their charge, and that certain duties shall be prescribed as belonging to these official visits. That supplementary reading books may be selected by the teachers. That the maximum per diem of county school superintend- ents may be $4 (four dollars) per day-at present it is $3 (three dollars). That the county board may have the authority to pay the expenses of the county school commissioner, or one member of the county board of education, to the annual convention of the county school commissioners. That the county board shall have the authority to issue sub- prenas to witnesses, and to fine for failure to obey. That the salaries of teachers need not be itemized on monthly statements, except on the final statement, at present itemized each month. That the school year shall begin September Ist instead of January ISt. That the estimate of the school fund shall be made August ISt of each year, l1t present first Tuesday in December. That institutes may be from one to four weeks in length. That institutes may be held one day in each month during five months, and this shall take the place of five consecutive days of institute work. . That teachers who attend an approved summer school shall not be fined for non-attendance upon the,week of county insti- tute, with proviso: That the State School Commissioner may prepa,re more than one set of questions for applicants for teachers' licenses; at present only one set of questions is given for all grades of license. That applicants for State license shall be examined, in addi- tion to the questions required of applicants for other grades, upon English literature, rhetoric, algebra, physics, history of education and general history. That permanent licenses issued in other States, when ap- proved by the State Board of Education, be good in Georgia. That diplomas from the normal department of the State Normal School, and from the Georgia Normal and Industrial 26 College, shall entitle the holders to teach in the common schools of this State; at present no diplomas are recognized. That the basis of apportionment of funds to new local systems shall be upon the latest school census; if that is not obtainable, upon such estimates as the State Board of Education may determine. The following pamphlets have been issued by the State Department of Education, and by the Educational Campaign Committee: Plans and Specifications for School Buildings. Practical Suggestions to Teachers in Institute Work. Helps to Teachers in Institute Work. Revised Manual of Methods. Paramount Question. Discussion of our School Problems, by Educational Statesmen. Report of School Work and School Conditions.. The pamphlet, The Report of School Work and School Conditions. is the result of a conference of the State Educational Campaign Committee, consisting of Bishop Wan"en A. Can- dler, Hon. Hoke Smith, Hon. William J. N orthen, Dr. D. C.' Barrow. Han. M. L. Duggan, Prof. T. J. Woofter, and myself, where plans for the progress of schools were fully discussed, and the committee, acting upon my suggestion, advised that professional visitors be sent with pencil and kodak to the different grades of schools and their reports be embodied in a pamphlet to be sent' broadcast over the State. The citizens of our country pride themselves on being men of affairs. Practical business methods and good returns on investments are very dear to the American heart, and this principle is invariably, religiously observed, except in school affairs. In school matters many communities have not exercised that interest which good judgment would' require. Many parents ease their consciences of the solemn duty and obligation they owe their children by merely sending them to school. They manifest no deep vital concern as to whether the schools are always doing their best work for the children; as to whether the school is taught in a properly constructed, heated and ventilated building; as to whether the term is long enough to accomplish good results; as to the qualification of the teacher. This is the mildest form of indifference; the more radical kind is shown by those parents who must be induced 27 to send their children to school, after the State has provided aU school facilities. It is gratifying to know that there are many communities where the reverse of this picture is true; where the patrons take a deep interest, and the conditions are very nearly what they should be. In order to secure the best r'esults, whether it be a business enterprise or an educational undertaking, those who are concerned, vitally interested, must know what the actual conditions are and how the affairs of the undertaking are managed,. or conducted. If parents had their children read aloud at home; if they questioned them as to their school life, and if they visited, occasionally the school room,' much good could be accomplished. If county boards appreciated the value of expert supervision they would send the County School Commissioners oftener to schools. Legislators can render no more intelligent service to the State than by visiting the schools, observing the actual conditions, and then setting about with this new knowledge, and first hand information, to right the wrongs, and establish a good school in every community. I have recommended time after time that the county school commissioners select specimens of all work done in their various schools and keep an exhibit in their offices. ,Many of the commissioners have done this, and they now have creditable displays for the inspection of the Grand Jury, and of any citizen of the county. This has a most stimulating effect on every child in the county. One feature of good work being done is that of the county school exhibits. These annual exhibits have been most beneficial, and are to be encouraged more and more. In visiting the various counties, it is my policy to visit the different grades of schools of that county; the comparison is sometimes startling, and I wish for parents, and friends of education all over the State, who feel an interest, deep but distant, to see with my eyes and hear with my ears, knowing that their interest would be increased a hundredfold. Some of the finest work I have ever seen has been done in the rural schools, but it is distressing to know how far the children are failing in some schools' to accomplish what they should accomplish in the common school course; what the State should expect them to accomplish. The examination of seventh grade pupils, and the issuing of certificates to those who can pass a creditable examination, 28 has done much toward unfying our work, and stimulating ambitious effort. Many county school commissioners have reported good results from this work, and one of them tells of the progress his schools have made by showing that in the first of these examinations there wer.e only three children who could take the test; the next year there were thirteen, and last year there were forty. The pamphlet has a mission; it is a mirror held up in which the images of other counties are now reflected, but which will in turn reflect our own pictures, to help us to see ourselves as others see us. PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS. The purpose of the pamphlet, Practical Suggestions, is given fully in my letter to teachers, which I quote parts of: This pamphlet has been prepared with the hope that teachers may find in it some useful suggestions for their class-room work, and that the Institute Instructor, the county school commissioner, and the program committee may find it helpful in planning and preparing programs for institutes. As far as possible, the work of the schools and of the Institutes should blend and strengthen each other. Specimens of school work, and reports on general school work and special methods should be brought to the Institute by each teacheL Every teacher should strive to carry from the Institute to the schoolroom some helpful suggestion and fresh inspiration. Strive to bring to fruition the discussion of the Institute; beautiful thoughts on Arbor Day are of little value unless trees are planted; an essay on the pleasure and advantages of reading may entertain an Institute, but the real good that comes to the pupils will be found in the school library. Nothing so enlivens an institute, or a county contest, as singing familiar songs. A feeling of friendship and interest springs unbidden to the heart when the lip voices true .and patriotic sentiment. Often when our children come together in the ora.torical contests, or other gatherings, they are unable to sing, for the reason that they do not know the same songs, or perhaps, do not know any at all. This should constitute one part of Institute work; teachers should decide upon certain songs to teach the children in the county, and then practice these songs, and the proper way to teach them, at their institute 29 meeting. If possible, emulate the popular commlSSlOner of Newton county, and have a county song composed and put to the air of some familiar song. I should like to recommend a simple songbook, which I feel sure will prove of value to teachers who wish to teach music in their schools: "A Short Course in Music," Ripley and Tappan, American Book Co. Price, 25 cents. Teachers should endeavor to interest the patrons of their schools; the members of the board of education, and all the community in their schools, and also in their institutes. Invite these people to be present at your meetings, and do your part toward making them interesting. Perhaps the best good which comes from county contests is the general interest which is taken. At these contests all parents and school officials are thrown together, and with the teachers and pupils. The result is a better understanding on all sides, and many good resolves have been formed and carried into operation, afterward, through such simple means. See that the children are reading intelligently the books in the school library, and that they are devising means to buy other books. I'Talk to them and to their parents of the list of books issued as suggestions for Home Reading, and encourage them to buy these books, if only one at a time, to start a library of their own. Teach the value of books per se, and their bear iEg on the after-life. Do not neglect the seventh grade examinations which are sent out each spring. Make the child feel that a certificate is worth having, and that it means something to him. Do not scare him with the thought of an examination, but encourage him to want to tell what he knows, and to desire to' win a certificate of proficiency. In everything that you do, attempt a high order of work. Do the best that is in you, and unconsciously your pupils wiII strive for as lofty an ideal, and you will find a surprising development of mind and spirit, often where it is least expected. No striving is ever lost; always look ahead and around, not down. I am anxious to have a complete report of the work done in monthly and in annual institutes of each colmty for the year 1907. I wish the Secretary to keep the minutes of the meetings, giving a brief synopsis of the essays and discussions, as well as the regular subjects studied. I wish to offer to the 30 Teachers' Library in the county which makes the best record of institute work of five days' session, a set of books, ten volumes. I would urge teachers to use the columns of their home -papers to discuss topics of importance, and to arouse the general interest of the community. Have the compositicms of the chil<1ren published; give a report of the attendance in your school; report your Thanksgiving Day program; your Arbor Day work, and what your school is doing in the matter o-f school improvement. Also, get out a county annual, giving all school news possible, the photographs of schoolhouses, officials, groups of children, essays of teachers and pupils, etc. Do not neglect the simple means before you-the county paper, the exhibit in the county school commissioner's office, the issuing of the school annual~to keep alive the divine fire burning with its steady glow in each of your schools. HELPS FOR TEACHERS. Helps for Teachers in Institute \Vork was issued for the monthly teachers' meetings in November and December. This pamphlet includes programs for Thanksgiving and Arbor Day exercises. It also includes some of the questions used in the June examination, and full and concise answers to the ql:,es tions on grammar, and physiology. These answers were se- cured from distinguished educators by the Southern Educa- tionall Journa:l for publication, and through the courtesy of this journal they are used. These answers are good models, and teachers will derive great qenefit from them, as well as form a more correct idea of what is really meant by answering questions fully. - A list of books suitable for the home reading of the school children is in this pamphlet. If teachers will suggest these books to the pupils and their parents, many patrons will gladly buy them for their children. Two ends will thus be subserved ; the patrons will be brought into closer relation with the school, and the children will read good literature that has a direct bearing upon their school work. It will be a good plan for teachers to read these books also, and discuss them with the pupils. Teachers should take up this work with the intention of placing books in as many homes as possible, and ~o make a report of the number placed. 31 PLANS AND SPECIFICATIONS FOR SCHOOLHOUSES. There is a growing interest throughout the State in the matter of school buildings. This is manifested, not only through the large numbers of schoolhouses being built, but also in the many inquiries received at the State Department of Education for plans in building new houses. The supreme need in many communities is that of a comfortable and attractive house in which the children may be taught, and people are commenceing to realize this need. Feeling this deinand and the need and advantage of neat, attractive schoolhouses, the State School' Commissioner Hlid these needs before the Educational Campaign Committee of Georgia, and by their direction the pamphlet was prepared and presented to the school workers of Georgia. Comfortable schoolhouses will conduce greatly to good work on the part of teachers and pupils. It is a notable fact that in the oratorical contests most of the prizes are borne off by students who have attended school in attractive houses. The records also show that the per cent. of attendance is higher in communitie$" where the schoolhouses are well built and well kept. Trustees and other school officials should be interested not only in erecting attractive buildings, but in the character of work done; the work should conform to and be in keeping with the good building. THE PARAMOUNT QUESTION. Local taxation, wherever tried in this State, is solving most of the school problems. The pamphlet "The Paramount Question," answers many of the objections frequently brought against local taxation, and ha~ proved a good handbook for local tax workers. DISCUSSIONS OF OUR SCHOOL PROBLEMS. Another pamphlet on the subject of local taxation is "Discussions of our School Problems by Educational Statesmen." In this pamphlet the views of our distinguished leaders in prot11,ulgating the doctrine of local taxation, Dr. \Valter B. Hill and Dr. Charles D. Melver, are fully set forth in an attractive and forcible form. 32 There are as possibilities before us one of these three conditions: Balance, Elaboration, Degeneration. A noted scientist has brought out the fact of "The Principle. of Reversion to Type", in one of his best known books. This principle can be illustrated in the realm of animals, of vegetables, and of man. If a bird fancier collects a flock of tame pigeons, of all kinds and of every shade of color and marking, and turn them loose on an uninhabit~d island to found a colony, he would find, upon his return after many years, that the birds, or their descendants, have all become changed into the same co~or. If a garden planted in strawberries and roses is left alone, in process of time it will run to waste, not that the plants will really waste away, but they will change into something worse, namely into the small wild strawberry of the woods and into the. primitive dog-rose. This same principle holds good with man. If he is neglected he will change into a worse man and a lower man. The possibility of balance is precarious, and probably is either an imperceptible deterioration or a graclual growth. Degeneration is easy, and always accomplished if the natural is left to itself. Elaboration is difficult, and attainable only by cultivation, care and effort. Never before in the history of our State has the importance of education been so universally agitated. Our people are beginning to realize that while many of our progressive cities, towns and rural districts have fine systems of schools and are doing much for the children educationally, this condition is not universal. Our industrial and commercial awakening has commenced to make us alive to the fact that we must also have an intellectual renaissance. Our kindergartens for the care of the lit~le ones, our refonnatories for the wayward boys, our industrial schools for the boy and the girl who must early become bread-winners, our agricultural schools for the fitting of our boys and girls for fann life and comfort, our normal schools for the training of teachers, our technological schools for the training of skilled engineers, our universities with their classic lore for our future professional men, these, and countless other influences in our State, are making for the better citizen, the more loyal Georgian, the cultivated man who is able to produce, to enjoy, to attain. 33 CIRCULAR LETTERS FROM THE DEPARTMENt- ATLANTA) GA.) June 4, 1996. To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: Will you please answer the questions given be- low? , Of the amount paid teachers during 1905, what part was paid to white teachers? colored teachers? 2. What per cent of the white school population was en- rolled during the year? 3. What per cent. of the negro school population was en- rolled? 4. Above the fifth grade, how many white pupils enrolled?- 5. Above the fifth grade, how many negro pupils enrolled? 6. How much was spent during the year on white school houses? _ 7. How much was spent on negro schoolhouses during the year? Please answer and return to State School Commissioner_ Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT) State School Commissioner. ATLANTA) GA., July 3, 1906. To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: Members of the Committee on Education, of the House of Representatives, called on me for information rega,rding the administration of school affairs in the several counties. I am unable to furnish all the statistics demanded, as the d'ata requested of you some weeks ago to be reported 0n the form of blank inclosed, was not received at this department. The House Resolution printed below, shows you that I must have this information to be compiled for the committee at once_ These statistics are for the private use of members of the General Assembly and not for publication. Yours truly, W. B. MERRITT) S. S. C. 3 se 34 STATE OF GEORGIA. HOUSE of REPRESr~NTATIVES) ATLANTA) GA.) July 2, I906. HOUSE RESOLUTION. '''Resolved) That the State School Commissioner is requested to furnish to the Educational Committee of the House certain information compiled from special reports touching some phases of the administration of school affairs in this State, and that the county school commissioners and school superintendents who have not done so,. be requested to supply at once to the State School Commissioner, for use of the General Assembly, this information in regard to school statistics; the same having been requested of the county school commissioners two months ago, and only fifty-nine have as yet re:ported.. " ATLANTA) GA.) September 27, I906. To the County School Commissioner: \DEAR SIR: The Attorney-General has recently given to the Comptroller-General an opinion construing a paragraph of Section 5 of the Local Tax Act. I inclose a copy of this , cpinion. Only the local tax districts are affected by this opinion. All taxes can be collected in counties which have voted .local taxation for the entire county. ,I urge you and the friends of education to press with all possible zeal the advancement of educational work in your county. Local taxation is a most vital question, and will solve many of our educational problems. vil/hi1e local taxation by (counties is far preferable, as stated in my report for I904, pages I9 and 20, the districts should be encouraged to vote local taxation, if you can not include your entire county in this movement. The districts may vote on the question at any time. It would be well for you to hold educational rallies at an early date in every district in your county. One purpose of these rallies is to arouse interest in local taxation. If you will 1iotify me in advance, I can arrange to pay the expenses of -:speakers whom you invite to these rallies. Mrs. vValter B. Hill is doing valuable service in organizing 35 school improvement clubs. If you will arrange to place her on the program at some of your important educational rallies, she will probably be able to be with you, and her earnest appeals for school improvement will prove valuable assistance toward making the schoolhouses and grounds more comfortable and attractive. The price of the Wheeler Graded Primer has been reduced from thirty cents to twenty-five cents, and the publishers have notified our Text Book Commission that all further shipments of this primer to our State will be stamped "Retail price 25 cents. " I regret that there has been some ~lay in the printing of supplies for your office. I will be ready to fill your orders within a few days. The Jamestown Exposition Commission for Georgia have asked the schools of Georgia to prepare an educational exhibit for the Jamestown Exposition. Please let me know if any of the schools or educational institutions in your county will prepare an educational exhibit within the next six months? There are many reasons why our State should have a creditable educational exhibit at the Jamestown Exposition. The work of preparing for the exhibit will create interest, enthusiasm and higher educational ideals. If you have school exhibits to send to the Macon Fair, beginning October 2d, write to Mrs. M. A. Weir, Macon, Ga. If you are preparing an exhibit for the State Fair which will open in At1an!a, October 10th, or if any of your pupils expect to enter the contest in oratory you can get full information from Dr. W: B. Burroughs, Brunswick, Ga. If any of your colored schools are preparing to make an exhibit at the Georgia State Colored Agricultural and Industrial Exposition, which will be held in Macon beginning November 12th, you can secure all necessary information from Prof. R. R. \;Yright Savannah, Ga. If you desire to hold an examination in December for applicants for license to teach, please let me have your request for such examination promptly. I will not appoint dates for the examinaHon and send out questions unless there is a demand for the examination in a number of counties. Yours very truly, \V. B MERRITT, State School Commissioner-. 36 ATLANTA) GA.) October 22, 1906. To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: Since nearly all of the county school com~ missioners have asked for an examination for teachers in De- cember, I shall fix the date of this examination on December 21st and 22d. In making out your itemized statements please use the form that has been recently sent out. I have in press suggestive outlines for monthly teachers' meetings in November and December. This pamphlet includes programs for Thanksgi;ing and Arbor Day exercises. Please supply your teachers with these pamphlets as soon as they are received. You will notice that I ani including some of the questions used in the June examination, and full and concise answers to the questions on Grammar, Geography and Physiology. These answers were secured from distinguished educators by the Southern Educational Journal for publication, and through the courtesy of this journal I am allowed to use them. These answers are good models, and I feel sure that many teachers wiU derive great benefit from them, as well as form a more correct idea of what is really meant by answering questions fully. I hope that you will stress in your institutes school improve- ment work, local taxation and school libraries. County boards should not permit a school to be taught dur- ing the winter in a house that is not comfortable and well lighted; especially should the floors be air tight. Local taxation, wherever tried in this State, is solving most of the school problems. Our recent pamphlet, "The Para- mount Question," answers many of the objections frequently brought against local taxation. While teachers in some counties are discussing the value of school libraries, in other counties the teachers have begun their schools by requesting their county school commissioners to order for each a school library. So far as I know, the patrons have paid for these libraries, except in one instance, and that was where the teacher did not ask them to do so. . You will observe that I have included in the Institute pro- gram a list of books suitable for the home reading of the school children. If teachers will suggest these books to the pupils and their parents, many patrons w:U glarih buy them for their .' 37 children. Two ends will thus be subserved: the patrons will be brought into closer relation with the school, and the children . will read good literature that has a direct bearing upon their school work. It will be a good plan for teachers to read these books also, and discuss them with the pupils. Urge your teachers to take up this work with the intention of placing books in as many homes as possible, and to make a report to you of the number placed. Many of the rural schools will begin in November; it is very desirable that the county school superintendent confer with his teachers monthly. A meeting at the beginning of the term is especially desirable, for at such meetings opportunity is given to organize school work; to assign special studies and composition work to each grade in the schools; to prepare for county contests in declamation and other branches of study; to plan for exhibits of school work and products of garden and field. It will be a good plan for your teachers to issue next spring a county school annual. The annual should contain interesting items for each school, select compositions by pupils, and some of the essays read by teachers at the institutes. If you desire to prepare such a pamphlet, I shall be pleased to make further suggestions as to the matter it should contain. The Department of Education will issue some time soon Helps or Stlggestions for Monthly Teachers' Institutes, to cover the entire time of such meetings in 1907. As the pamphlet for November and December, the contemplated pamphlet is not intended to be complete, as it is considered wise to leave much that the county school superintendent and teachers know best to supply as regards their own special work. At the call of the State School Commissioner. the Educational Campaign Committee met at his office on October 12, 1906. There were present, W. J. Northen, D. C. Barrow, M. L. Duggan, Hoke Smith and W. B. Merritt. Chancellor Barrow has been recently appointed by Governor Terrell to take the place on the committee of the late Dr. W. B. Hill. Mrs. W. B. Hill was also present to give a report of school improvement work. Among the many interesting motions made were the following: On motion of Chancellor Barrow, the Commissioner was 38 authorized to purchase and present to each teachers' library a copy of Kern's "Among Country Schools." On motion of Chancellor Barrow, the publication of a pamphlet containing detailed plans for one, two three and four-room schoolhouses was authorized. Upon the suggestion of the State School Commissioner, the wmmittee strongly endorsed the plan of holding monthly institutes in each county, and requested the State School Commissioner to urge all county school superintendents to adopt this plan, not alone for the educational profit to themselves as educators, but also that the committee may have better opportunities for disseminating their literature, believing that much good must come through the concerted efforts of school com!liissioners, teachers and those interested in school improverrJent, local taxation and school libraries. Any institute or school rally that desires a speaker on local t:1Xation, or school improvement, may secure one by applying to the Educational Campaign Committee through me. Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT, State School Commissioner. ATLANTA, GA., December !O, 1906. To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: I take pleasure in calling your attention to the meeting of the Southern Educational Association, in Montgomery, Ala., December 27th and 28th. Also, I would call your attention to the excellent \iVinter Course in Agriculture at the State University, January 2d to March 31st, 1907. By writing to Dr. D. C. Barrow full information can be secured. I am gratified that so many papers have used so effectively the stereotype matter sent you for them, by direction of the Educational Campaign Committee. I hope that you will be able to use this matter several times in the various papers in your county. If you have not held monthly meetings for teachers during November and December, "Helps for Teachers in their Institute vVork," a pamphlet which has been sent you for distribution among the teachers, may be profitably used in planning your Institute programs for the next year. Another pamphlet bearing 'On Institute work for I 907 is /' 39 now in press. It has been prepared for the purpose of assisting teachers in Institute work, either monthly or annual, and it will give many suggestions and plans for work in the classes. There is also in press a pamphlet of plans for schoolhouses, one, two, three and four rooms, respectively, together with specifications of the same. It is hoped that this pamphlet will prove of great value to the many school people who are planning to build new houses. During the past year there has been expended in school buildings $35,000. If you need any further office supplies, please let me know at once. Yours very truly, W. B MERRIT1\ State School Commissioner. DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION,. STATE OF GEORGIA. ATLANTA, GA., January 14, 1907 To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: I am sending you, by express this week, a supply of the Manual of Methods, and Practical Suggestions for Institute Work. These, with the pamphlet, Helps for Teachers in Institute Work, which has already been sent you, will form the basis of Institute Work for 1907. There is also in the package a pamphlet of plans and specifications for schoolhouses. I suppose you have received a package of supplies sent you in November. This package contained some stereotype plates lor your county papers, and one copy of Kern's "Among Country Schools," for your county teachers' library. As some packages have been delayed, I shall, hereafter, send you a notice of each express package that is forwarded you. The law requires the county school commissioner to make a report of the condition and progress of school work in the county to the grand jury, at the Spring term of the ~uperior Court. Please send me a copy of your report to the grand jury, and also the report and recommendations of the grand jury touching the educational work of your county. Please send me a brief report of the progress of school work in your county during the year of 1906; this may in- 40 dude some of your plans for I907. See report from this Department, I905, pages 62-III. Have you received a supply of the new form of itemized statement blanks? If you have on hand any of the old forms used several years ago, please destroy them, and use the new form. It is very difficult to compile statistics when reports are made on blanks that are not uniform. I regret that we have been unable to make a satisfactory estimate of the common school fund for I907. In fixing salaries, and in making out a schedule of expenditures for I907, your board may expect an amount equal to the apportionment for I906. I hope we can secure a little increase in the apportionment, but the increase, if any, will be very small. Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT, State School Commissioner. ATLANTA, GA., January 28, I907. To the County School Commissioner, County: DEAR SIR: The apportionment of public school funds for your county, which will be sent you through this department, for I907, is $ '" This amount does not include the school funds apportioned to local school systems which receive their funds directly from this department. As usual, the con- vict hire will be sent by the State Treasurer to the county school commissioners of those counties whose share of the convict hire has been applied to the school funds. In these counties the county school commissioners will pay the local school systems the share of convict hire due to each local school sytem. Please let me know at once if there are in your county any new local school systems which will draw their school funds through this department. Itemized statements from several counties have been de- layed. Please send in your claims promptly. All claims ap- proved at one meeting of your county board may be included in one statement, and thus can be more easily and promptly audited. I shall be pleased to hear from you at an early date as to whether any schools in your county will prepare an educational exhibit for the Jamestown Exposition. In almost every county 41 there are some schools which will prepare an exhibit if their attention is called to the matter. Please distribute at once among your teachers the pamphlets which I have recehtly sent you by express. Many teachers write to this department for pamphlets when a supply has been sent to the county for them. I shall' be obliged if you will send a copy of the latest edition of the Manual of. Methods, and copies of the two pamphlets for teachers, to the superintendents of the local systems in your county. Mrs. A. W. VanHoose, Chairman of the Medal Committee, announcesthat the Daughters of the Confederacy have offered a gold medal to the student in our schools who writes the best c~say on the subject, "The Confederate Navy in the War Between the States." I trust that you will cooperate in this movement, and assist this noble organization in securing local prizes for essays in each county. There should be a number of essays entered in this contest from each county. Please read carefully the rules and regulations governing the contest, and acquaint your teachers with them. You can secure a copy of these rules and regulations, and all necessary information, by writing to Mrs. A. W. VanHoose, Gainesville, Ga. I have recently received some interesting and valuable reports from expert school officials who have visited several counties, with note book and kodak, for the purpose of reporting educational conditions in the several grades of schools in these counties. These reports are helping the people to gain a more correct knowledge of their true educational conditions and needs, and, I belieye, they will arouse interest, and a determination to have better schools. Should you like such reports to be made of the schools in your county? Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT} State School Commissioner. ATLANTA} GA.} January 28 ,I907. To the Superintendent of the Local School System: . DEAR SIR: The apportionment to the school system of . . . . . . . . . . .. for I907 is $. . . . . . . . . . . . . This does not in- clude any funds arising from the net hire of convicts to which your system may be entitled. As usual, the convict hire will be sent by the State Treasurer to the county school com- 42 li1lSSlOners of those counties that have applied their share of this fund to their schools, and the commissioners will pay the local school systems their respective share.of this money. This apportionment is based on the census of 1903. I shall be pleased to hear from you as to whether you con- template preparing an exhibit for the Jamestown Exposition. I have found in those schools that have monthly or annual exhibits that the preparation of these exhibits is an excellent means of quickening the interest of parents and of improving the work done by the children. I trust you will see fit to make an exhibit of some kind, as this is an opportunity for our State to take rank with other States which are preparing for such exhibits. Mrs. A. W. VanHoose, Chairman of the Medal Committee, announces that the Daughters of the Confederacy have offered a gold medal to the student in our schools who writes the best essay on the subject, "The Confederate N avyin the \Var Be- tween the States." There should be a number of essays en- tered in this contest, and I hope you will urge the children in your system to compete. You can secure a copy of the rules and regulations, and all necessary information, by writing to Mrs. A. W. VanHoose, Gainesville, Ga. I have asked the county school commissioner of your coun- ty to send you a copy of the latest edition of the Manual of ::\Tethods, and also two pamphlets which teachers will use this year as the basis of institute work. I wish to bespeak your cooperation with the county school superintendent and the tt'achers in institute work, in school libraries, in the subject of local taxation, in encouraging pupils to attend the high school, and in securing good teachers for the entire county. With best wishes for the prosperity of your system for the year 197, I am, Sincerely yours, 'vV. B MERR1Tl\ State School Commissioner. ATLANTA) GA.) March 6, 1907. To the COllllty School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: The annual examination of pupils in the seventh grade in the common schools will be held on March 22d. I shall send you, within a few days, a supply of these questions, together with instructions for holding the' examination. and blanks for reporting it. I suggest that you will find it a good 43 plan in some cases to combine the seventh grade e~amination of three or four school~, and hold the examination at one place. This plan will enable those pupils whose schools are not now in session to take the examination, and the supervisors of the examination, not having the care of other classes during the day, can more strictly superintend the examination. In this express package I 'shall include copies of a new edition of the Paramount Question, and another valuable local tax pamphlet containing addresses of Dr. \Valter B. Hill, and Dr. Charles D. Melver. You will find it worth while to have your people read these pamphlets. - I am pleased to inform you that the State Educational Campaign Committee can continue to pay expenses of speakers who discuss local taxation at your educational rallies. By securing speakers in your section of the State expenses will be lessened, and we shall be enabled to enlist more workers in the campaign. Please send me the expense accounts of your speakers. The annual convention of the county school commissioners will be held in Milledgeville, April 23-25. I shall send you a program soon. The Georgia Educational Association will meet this year in Macon, April 25-27. President D. C. Barrow will send you IJrograms for distribution among your teachers. The University Summer School will hold its annual session at Athens, July 1st to August 2d. The instructors secured tor the work are excellent, and the courses offered should induce our teachers to attend. The special feature this year is the inauguration of a four-years' course of study, for which credits will be given, and which will lead to a teachers' de- gree from the University. , The work outlined for this school is excellent, and I trust you will urge your teachers to attend one of them. Two scholarships are offered by the Western Reserve U niversity, Cleveland, Ohio, to the young men of the State. These scholarships will be awarded by competitive examination, which will be held the latter part of June, on the same days you hold your examination of applicants for license to teach. I enclose you a list of topics which may be helpful- to you in writing a review of the progress of school work in your county for 1906. Occasionally I hear of special movements 'which have never been officially reported, and I have endeav- 44 ored, in the sekction of these topics, to indicate work on which a report is especially desired. Please fill out the blanks on the enclosed postal card, and forward it to me by return mail. Yours very truly, W. B. MERRITT, State School Commissioner. ATLANTA, GA., March 8, 1907. To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: I have been requested by the State Exposition Commissission to secure exhibits of school work for the Jamestown Exposition. As I have stated to you in previous circular letters, I am anxious for your schools to make an exhibit. As I am enclosing a letter giving full details, from the superintendent of the Virginia Educational Exhibit to those intending to makes exhibits, it is only necessary for me to call your attention to a few special points: The Georgia color scheme is French gray, or deep cream, . and the cabinets and cases will be made of cherry. Exhibits should be made in cabinets and cases whenever practicable. Paper used for cabinet leaves should be of a size to look well or fit the leaves, which are 22X28. Please let me know Zit once how many of these cabinet leaves you wish. You are urged to report at once what you have for exhibition, and how you wish it arranged. Exhibits should be securely boxed and shipped to me, Atlanta, Georgia. I shall then ship the entire exhibit for Georgia to the Exposition grounds, where it will be properly arranged in the space assigned to our State. Your work should be sent in by the last of this month, as the Exposition will be formally opened in April. Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT, State School Commissioner. ATLANTA GA., April 8, 1907. To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: I am sending you a program of the annual meet- 45 mg of the county school commissioners, to be held in Milledgeville, April 23d, 24th and 25th. The Georgia Educational Association will convene in Macon on the evening of April 25th, and continue in annual session through the 27th. As the 26th is an annual holiday, I think the Boards of Education will readily excuse the teachers who wish to attend. School officials should encourage teachers to attend the meetings of our State associations. Teachers will return to their work with many new suggestions and renewed zeal for their special work and for the cause of education in the State. Please forward to this department the material your schools have prepared for the Jamestown exhibit. I hope many of your seventh grade pupils have made an average of 80 per cent. in the recent examination, and will receive certificates from you. A check with plue pencil opposite this sentence indicates that I have not received from you a review of progress of school work in 1906 for my annual report to the General Assembly. A check opposite this sentence indicates that I have not received a copy of your report to the grand jury. A check opposite this sentence indicates that I have not received the comments of your grand jury on the educational affairs of your county, as published in their presentment,s. Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT, State School Commissioner. ATLANTA, GA.JMay 24, 1907. To the County School Commissioner: DEAR SIR: The examination of applicants for license to teach will be held June 21st and 22d. Please urge all applicants to take the examination in the county in which they expect to teach. This will obviate some difficulties which arise each year. . There are many good teachers in local systems, and students in our normal schools and colleges, who will be available for teaching in the summer schools. If you have had such application, please notify the applicants of the date of the examination. Two scholarships are offered by the Western Reserve Uni- 46 versity, Cleveland, Ohio, to the young men of this State. These scholarships will be awarded by competitiveexamination. They are worth two hundred dollars per year, payable quartely. Will you please arrange to conduct this examination at the same time you examine the teachers? Kindly give this matter publicity, and direct inquirers to write to M1'. Paul Pope, Office of the President, Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio. Questions will be forwarded you in due L.me. In your teachers' institutes this summer, I think special attention should be given to the matter of the care of the health of school children. The Medical Association of the State, and many authorities, are working together to prevent the spread of tuberculosis; it will be a good feature to have this subject discussed by the teachers, and to have a physician give a speciallecture to the teachers on this subject. Also, have the matter of the care of the teeth of the children discussed, following the plan of having a dentist lecture on the subject, and have the teachers discuss it. The Georgia State Dental Association has recently given this matter much attention. So far, I have been unable to have a definite answer from the Governor and the State Treasurer as to when the next payment of school funds will be made. I regret the delay exceedingly, and suggest that your board arrange for payment cIaims due teachers, if possible. Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT} State School Commissioner. ATLANTA} GA.} June 3, 1907. To the County School Conlmissioner: DEAR SIR: The State Treasurer is making a payment of ten per cent. of the school fund for this year. This will amount to thirty per cent. of the apportionment for 1907. To those \'7ho have not already received thirty per cent. of this year's apportionment checks will pmbably be mailed to-morrow. Announcement of the courses of study offered by the Uni\ ersity Summer School, Athens, Ga., has already been sent to you and to your teachers. Please call the attention of your teachers to the excellent work 'offered this summer, and, for any specific details. ask them to write to the superintendent of the school, Prof. T. J\Voofter, Athens, Ga. 47 The Georgia Educational Conference of Business Men, recently held in Atlanta, composed of the fifty citizens appointed by Mr. S. M. Inman, was unique, significant and inspiring. Educational problems, especially those concerning the rural schools, were discussed in detail, with great earnestness, statesmanship and foresight. As one result, increased interest in education is manifested among school officials and business men in all parts of the State. The great impulse of the educational efforts of those who have a genuine interest in the training of the children bids fair to unify and improve all educational work and the workers as never before. From personal Gbservation, and from letters received at this department, I find that the influence of the Business Men's Conference is awakening and vitalizing interest in school work to the remotest district of the State. In view of this general awakening of interest in education, I suggest that you and the school officials of your county arrange a Fourth of July gathering, in which education shall be given a large part of the program you present, and in which every school district of the county may be represented. " Enlist the interest of the press, in your editors, the influence of your bomes, in the parents, the power of the church, in your ministers, the cooperation of your leaders of civic affairs, in your county officers, and the active support of the commercial element, in your business men. The founders of this nation, in their prophetic longing for a perpetual government of free people, believed profoundly in the education of the masses. They believed that a free people must be an educated people. Thomas Jefferson voiced the sentiment of our early statesmen when he said, "No surer foundation can be devised for the preservation of freedom and happiness than the diffusion of knowledge among the people." Yours very truly, W. B MERRITT) State School CommIssioner. 48 REVIEW OF WORK FOR 1906. APPLING COUNTY. H. J. Parker, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. ( 12) We recommend that the funds arising from the hire of felony convicts be paid into the Educational Funds of said county. (13) The committee appointed by the grand jury at the March term of the superior court of Appling, county, Ga., to examine the county school commissioner's books and records, have 'examined the same and find them them correct and neatly kept. BIBB COUNTY. C. B. Chapman, Superintendent. Complying with your request that I should report briefly special features of work done in the Bibb schools this year, I beg to say that the most important item is the extension of school facilities through the generosity of the board of education and the county commissioners. More than $14,000 was expended in permanent improvements, and $2,500 in general repairs. Consolidated schools were-built at Lizella and Bellevue, and seven rooms were added to buildings in other places. Ten new teachers were added to the fist, so that we were enabled to accommodate an increase in enrollment of 523 pupils. Several single-room_ country schools will be built during the next summer, and six more teachers. will be added to the list. All the schools in the county for negroes, as well as for whites, will then be conducted ,in attractive, well-constructed, up-to-date buildings. As for the character of the work in the schools, special attention has been paid to methods in reading, in language, and in arithmetic. Technical grammar having been taken from the lower grades, particular attention from the very first year is given to expression, correct speaking and correct writing. 49 Having become convinced that too little attention has been paid to mathematics in an age when this science pervades almost every line of industry, we are giving more attention to arithmetic in the grammar grades, and to algebra and geometry in the high schools. Problem work is begun in the first years where children are taught with simple numbers, addition, subtraction, multiplication, division, and something of fractions. In the Manual Training Course we have found color work and freehand drawing a most important feature. I believe that a reaction in manual training will gradually eliminate everything that can not be legitimately connected with other wbjects of the course of study. Freehand drawing can be cunnected in a natural way with several subjects, and I belleve that it will remain a part of the course of study when certain other features of manual training are forgotten. Our board of education has again offered prizes for the corn and cotton contest, and every school for whites in the county is interested in agriculture. Nature study in the lower grades affords an excellent beginning, more elaborate work being done in the upper grades. A committee of Macon ladies composed of Mrs. Mallory Taylor, Mrs. -E. J. Willingham and Mrs. Walter Lamar, has collected thousands of standard magazines and many books, which have been distributed among the rural schools. Respectfully submitted. C. B.CHAPMAN) Superintendent. BRYAN COUNTY. E. Benton, School Commissioner. J COMMENTS OF GRAND DRY. We found the cash book of this officer in an incomplete con~ dition. In a majority of instances it was necessary to have recourse to his itemized statements to find amounts which he should have charged himself with as balance on hand and received from the State and from other sources. It appears from documents in this office that the county school commissioner makes out monthly itemized statements showing amounts due and owing by the board of education 4 Be 50 for each month of the year. These statements are presented to the board of education and approved by them. \Ve finel several instances where the amounts approved by the board of education and ordered paid, are not paid by the commissioner. This is irregular and should be stopped at once. The commissioner has no legal authority or right to place in these itemized statements any amounts except such as are actually due and owing at that time for work actually performed or equipment actually furnished. As an illustration of what we mean we call attention to the fact that in one of these itemized statements the sum of $346 is passed for payment and is itemized as follows: "Furnishing seats fbr schools, Pembroke, $150; Lanier $41; Canoochee, $30; Middle Ground, $125." The cash book of the commissioner shows that he takes credit for all this money, but his voucher checks show that he has paid $ ISO for Pembroke and $4 I for Lanier for seats;< he shows no voucher for any expenditure for seats for Canoochee and admits to us that no seats have 1:)een furnished that school and that the thirty dollars is still in his hands unexpended. How could this amount be due and owing by the board of education in the face of the admitted fact that no seats for this school have been furnished? The commissioner presents us with vouchers showing an expenditure of $roO.43 of the' $125 alleged to have been due and owing for seats for Middle Ground school, but the vouchers show that this monev was not paid out for seats but for material for the constr~ction of the building itself. The board has the right to appropriate money for construction of school, buildings and for the purchase of school furniture, but when they do so this does not give their executive officer the authority to place such sums in an itemized statement before it is earned or due or to divert the money or any part of it to a different purpose even though it is expended for the benefit of the identical school for which it was appropriated. Of this item of $346, for which the commissioners' books show a full credit to him, he admits that $54.57 has not been paid out and is still in his possession. Your examining committee of a year ago submitted to the grand jury of the May term, 1906, of the superior court a detailed statement showing amounts audited and amounts paid to teachers for the year 1905. We have in our possession data from which a like statement can be compiled and which will show in some instances more money audited to a teacher 51 than the cash book shows was paid and in other instances more money paid than was audited. This information will be compiled for your information if you should, during your deliberation, desire it to be done by our chairman. Several vouchers for alleged expenditures were missing. These we have made a note of, and the commissioner promises to present them to us before you have finished the consideration of this report. vVe do not think that the books of this office are properly handled for the reason that it entails a great amount of labor to find what has been received by the officer and again they show according to admissions of the incumbent credits that should not have been taken. Books of account should show as debits moneys actually received and on hand, and as credits moneys actually paid out. We accord to the county school commissioner motives of the most absolute integrity and good intentions, but while we do this we can not fail to condemn and criticise his carelessness in the keeping of his accounts and the lack of business ability in the conduct of the affairs of this important department of our county government. Complaint has been lodged with the chairman of this committee with reference to the failure of the commissioner to provide seats for the schools for which he was given the money to purchase. The information we have before given in detail is all that we have been able to gather about appropriati6ns made for this purpose. BAKER COUNTY. Hon. J. H. Hall, Jr., County School Commissioner. REVIEW OF SCHOOL WORK. I will say that in reference to the progress of school work in our county for the past year I think we have been doing better work than heretofore, as we had more of our country schools to supplement the public term than we have had before. We have built one new schoolhouse and have added one room to another house and furnished the school with an assistant teacher and have repaired two other schoolhouses. We still, though, are behind with our school work and are not doing the work in that line I would like for us to do. 52 BALDWIN COUNTY. Hon. R. N. Lamar, County School Commissioner. REvIEW OF' SCHOOL WORK. Our teachers' annual institute was conducted at the Georgia Normal and Industrial College with Prof. Jere M. Pound as instructor. We spent a most pleasant and profitable week. The institute embraced the week from February 25th to March 1st, inclusive. BUTTS COUNTY. Hon. C. S. Maddox, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF' C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. (Statistics same as reported to State Department.) The schools were more prosperous than ever before. The time is ripe for a local tax election in this county. Such election will be called during the summer and it is probable our people will endorse the plan. CALHOUN COUNTY. Hon. J. J. Beck, County School Commissioner. REVIEW 01" SCHOOL WORK. We have a nice lot of country schoolhouses and at very little cost to the })pard of education, it being the policy of our board to expend every cent that we can on the children, and thus extend the term of the school to its fullest limit. Our people have not as yet caught onto the planting of trees. We have as good a list of country teachers as can be found anywhere. Our people occasionally visit "the schools and encourage the children by their presence. We have a fairly good library in each of our schools, but can furnish no specimens or pictures of them. Our teachers do not take much interest in declamations, and we will have no pupils contesting for prizes at the chautauqua. 53 Agriculture is taught in almost all of our schools, theoretically. We have consolidated, where it is practicable and best, the little schools and have one school with four teachers, several with two, and all with at least one good teacher. We expect to operate our schools for the present year for at least eight months, and we think that this is as long as the farmers, for we are all farmers, can spare their children to go to school. We hold monthly voluntary institutes, and nearly everyone of the teachers attend and all participate in the work and seem to be very much interested. I send you a programme of the next institute. I anticipate that this will be the best year of my superintendence of schools since I have been in this work. CAMDEN COUNTY. J. O. Mangham, County School Commissioner. REPOR:'I' 01" C. S. C. '1'0 GRAND JURY. In addition to the financial report, I am glad of the opportunity to tell you something of the schools of the county. In distributing the money each school had the same amount appropriated to it as was done in 1905. There being less of the school fund available for Camden county in 1906, than was used in 199'5, of course .the money was exhausted before all the claims were paid. The deficiency was generously donated by Mr. J. S. N. Davis, chairman of the board of education, so each teacher received every dollar promised. Your board of education is composed of earnest men who are anxious that every child in the county shall get the full benefit of every cent appropriated to him. Our schools need improvement, and you, gentlemen, can materially help us. You are representative men from all parts of the county. The people, as a rule, look to you for a certain class of information, and they will qe largely governed by your suggestions or directions. A recommendation from the grand jury or a suggestion by a juror always carries conviction with it. We confidently expect your cooperation in our efforts to get the schools on a higher plane. I beg to call your 54 attention to some of the most glaring needs. I ask your assistance in correcting some faults and in supplying these needs. We had last year twenty-eight white schools and twentysix colored schools. This is too many for our population. \Ve think it possible, by your help, to reduce this number tc forty schools. I am aware that to consolidate schools is more difficult of accomplishment in Carnden than in most counties, because we live in small communities. But even with the difficulties confronting us, we may do much if we will but work together. Whenever we think sufficiently to understand our obligations to the children we will devise means for their good. \Ve can not now supply the number of schools that we have with the best teachers. \Ve have some earnest, faithful teachers but we can not hope to get the best for the arnount we can pay them. Fewer schools and larger schools means betfer schools and longer term schools. If you think it impracticable to follow the suggestions of the McMichael bill, let us do the next best thing we can do, i. e., consolidate some of our schools. Of course it will be of inconvenience to some and may cost some money as well as trouble, but we should be willing to go to extra trouble for the sake of the children. By a concert of effort we can in a few years have better schoolhouses, larger schools, better facilities for teaching, and better trained teachers. For the little extra cost in money and the small sacrifice of time, there will be returned to us brighter boys and girls, and after a while, better men and women. Gentlemen, please think of these things, and for the sake of your children help us to improve their opportunities for training their minds. REVIEw OF SCHOOL WORK. A few of our teachers have tried to beautify the school grounds. But few of the schoolhouses have an enclosure around them. One school, at least, looks bright. It has pot plants, on temporary shelves at every window. The supply does not equal the demand, i. e., we have schools for which it is hard to get teachers. The locality of these schools and small salary prevents. us from securing good teachers. I am sorry to say, as a rule, that our teachers are doing little for their own improvement and are too little inter- 55 ested in school work to arouse parents. Some, however, are faithful, earnest, and progressive, and are willing to aid me in any effort for advancement. '-IVe have monthly institutes. A few meet me with bright, anxious faces. Others always send excuses. Those who come regularly are our best teachers. Parents need to be taught. It is hard to interest them, and to say "tax" to them gives many of them an ague, if not a "brain storm." Several schools are waking up to the value of libraries. On this line there has been considerable advancement. Some of the schools have very creditabJe libraries, both as to quality of books and number of volumes. I have issued certificates for five pupils who have completed the common school course. These gave very creditable answers. Some asked for certificates for pupils who I considered did not deserve them. Camden has no farming interests. People are indifferent; teachers and pupils are likewise. I have forced agriculture into the schools and am trying to get it to the front. A field of ten acres is a large field in Camden. A patch of two acres of corn, three or four acres of sweet potatoes, one of sugarcane, and one of watermelons is about an average. This is an apology for lack of teaching agriculture. My school problems-the most difficult ones-have not yet been solved. We mu'St have fewer schools, ,this can be done only by starting wagons, and many of the people are so much averse to such that they will not suffer their children to go even if the wagon were to pass by the door. I hope to get a few interested. Our communities are so small and so much scattered that it is hard to do anything for them. Anyinnovation on old plans, fills some of our folks with holy horror. Our county has been laid off in school districts. Weare trying now to revise the divisions, and improve th~. I can hardly outline plans, but we intend to push all along the lines indicated by the above. The chainnan of our Board of Education (Mr. J. S. N. Davis) is progressive, intelligent, and earnest, and the other members of the board are ready to do anything that promises improvement. 56 CARROLL COUNTY. Han. J. S. Travis, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. Realizing the importance and responsibility resting upon the citizenship of our county with its immense white population of schoolchildren to educate and having secured the . A. & M. College to our county through the earnest and unremitting efforts of some of the leading citizens of Carroll, and feeling assured that no sane man can doubt that to educate these children so as to develop their individual capacity and fit each one of them for his own or her especial place in life, is the best thing that a true patriot can do for them (it is a gift second only to that of life) ; and knowing that an education that we can use is an inestimab1le blessing, and that every dollar spent in the education of the young saves many hundreds of dollars in the increased efficiency of the working population arid in the absence of paupers in our workhous~s and criminals in our courts and jails, we believe that we represent the intelligence and patriotism of the people of Carroll county in recommending that the ordinary shall appropriate fifteen thousand dollars' ($r 5,000) to be used in erecting the buildings of the Agricultural and Mechanical school of. the fourth congressional district, located in Carroll county. CATOOSA COUNTY. Hon. 1. L. Magill, County School Commissioner. / REPORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. It is with deep~felt sense of duty and responsibility I make these reports, for in preparing to make these reports I review the past and am made to see the needs for the future. We have great reason to be thankful for the prosperity of the past year; fairly good crops and prices of produce fairly good. It is true we had an unusual amount of rain in the summer and fall which made it difficult for the farmers to get crops gathered, and corn and cotton was damaged to some extent, 57 but wages were never better than they have been for the past year and the laboring class have had more money than usual. It has had its effect on the schools, especially the larger boys, many of whom have been tempted to accept good wages rather than go to school and the unusual amount of rain made the farmers late getting crops gathered, therefore the average attendance was a little less than formerly. Most of our teachers did fairly good work, taking into con- sideration their surroundings. I regret to notice the small number of pupils who are study- ing physiology and agriculture, two very important branches lately added to the common school course by the Legislature. I would insist that parents furnish their children books and require them to study these as early as they are prepared for them. For lack of funds we have not been able to secure as good teachers for some of the schools as we would like, from the fact that men and women who are well qualified to teach school can command better salaries than we are able to pay, and get employment for twelve months in the year, therefore, they naturally drift away from the schoolroom to other occu- pations. " I am glad that our Legislature made provisions to remedy this condition by Acts looking to redistricting or consolidation of schools, and by Act providing for local tax to supplement the school fund. Some of the districts are smaller than they should be, but it is hard to make satisfactory changes, as each district has a schoolhouse not far from the center. About one in five of our schools have been lengthened by subscription, and the people are more in favor of local tax, and I hope that soon the county, or at least a majority of the sub-districts will vote for local tax. I am glad to present to you a copy of "The Paramount Question, Improvement of Rural Schools," which will be help- ful to you in thinking of this matter. Please read them care- fully and then let your neighbors read them. We earnestly ask the hearty cooperation of each of you with the Qoard of education in this important duty. Do not forget that from the schools are coming yearly the men and women who rule church and state. . More depends upon the education of our children, as to the 58 prosperity and happiness they and the people with whom they are to live are to enjoy than anything with which we are burdened. \Ve will be glad to have you visit the schools and encourage teacher and pupils as often as you can. vVe were able by combining our teachers' institute with Prof. \V. E. Bryan's normal to give each teacher two weeks valuable instruction free, and the other two weeks instruc- tion by paying ($2.5), if they chose to attend. \Ve also have a library of over four hundred books Nhich are free to be read by teachers, and to be taken by the teachers and loaned to pupils and patrons to read. . \Ve would be glad for each school to have a library of it~ own, which could be easily started by having fa box supper or ice-cream festival, and would be very helpful and encouraging to the young. I submit to your honorable body a copy of my annual report to the State School Commissioner, a tabulated statement show- ing the exact amount of money received, and date and to whom paid; also, my books and vouchers and will gladly assist in the examination if desired. I wiII also be glad to answer any questions you may wish to ask relative to the public schools to the best of my ability. CHEROKEE COUNTY. B. F. Perry, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. Owing to the continued sickness and death of our very ef ficient county school commissioner, John D. Attaway, we did not have an opportunity of examining into the affairs of that office. However, Mr. Ben F. Perry, the 'acting chairman of the board of education, came before our body and made a statement in regard to the office which was satisfactory and very much appreciated by the body, and the report of the. finance committee covers this department fuIIy. " 59 CLAYTON COUNTY. J. H. Huie, County School Commissioner. REpORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. (Statistics same as reported to State department.) The schools, with a few exceptions, were operated for five months and more; the long term schools were continued eight months. The teachers were faithful and efficient and were earnestly devoted to their work. The children seem to have taken on new inspiration about their school life, caused, partly, by the contests in our educational rallies. The result of the year's work is very gratifying. As the proper education of our children is one of the most if not the most, important subjects that could engage the attention of the grand jury, and as the State is doing so much to advance the cause of education, it seems to be up to you to take some action, or to make some recommendation to the board of education along the lines of the recent legislation on this subject. Some expression from your body on the enforcement of the late law, known as the McMichael educational law, would doubtless be appreciated by the board of education, and would stimulate the people to some favorable action. COBB COUNTY. Hon. W. R. Power, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. The grounds affecting the educational administration of the county we feel has been partly thoroughly and impartially threshed over by us. In the first place, we had a statement of the State School Commissioner of the funds sent by him to the county school commissioner; between which we have checked all disbursements and find in the apportionment an exact balance. In the second place, we have heard a number of teachers who had their complaints to make from which we have conscientiously endeavored to sift the real points. In the light of these facts it is vain to disguise the fact, however unpleasant, that there has been dissatisfaction, all but general among the latter, (I) at delay in making out their 60 written contracts, (2) at discrepancies between these, in actual payments of salaries, and at amounts they expected to receive, under the verbal ones under which they were engaged. This course certainly opens the door to misunderstanding and confusion, to discontent and heartburning among the one, and to charges more or less grave, against the other. Error, such as may be shown to exist, seems to our minds to be in management, certainly not in malfeasance, in enforced squaring of matters to the apportionment rather than to adherence to accepted cbnditions. With everything in view, therefore, we urgently recommend that the board of education formulate rules and regulations more comprehensive than before, in the event of such already existing, (I) as to the location of schools and engagement of teachers ; (2) as to contracts with the latter, setting forth in signature and writing what will be required and what given and received. From first to last let this be explicit. COFFEE COUNTY. Hon. Melvin Tanner, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. We find the books of the county school commissioner to be kept as near perfect as possible. We recommend that the ordinary be instructed and given authority according to law to fix a date and call an election, that the citizens of Coffee county may have an opportunity to vote for a local tax for supplementing the amount of school funds now received from the State, so that each school district may have a free school for at least seven months in the year, and also that the school buildings and other school property may be improved in keeping with the demands of the times. Realizing that every step wh'ich our COURty makes forward educationally means progress for our citizens morally, socially, mentally and financially, and that our people can never advance beyond the educational standard which we fix for the children of our county, and appreciating the great benefits to be derived to the people from the eleventh congressional district Agricultural College which has been secured by our county, we wish and desire to approve the faithful work of 61 all who aided in any way in securing this institution for our county. And we desire to thank the friends of our county, whether they be citizens of our county or other parts of the , eleventh congressional district, for their faithful work in this behalf. We further approve the action of the county commissioners, both of the present and retired board, for their action in carrying on and assisting in this matter and recommend that the present board carry out fully the work so nobly begun by their predecessors. We believe that the good to be derived from this institution will be infinitely greater than the sum of money which will be expended in this way. And that the children of our county will praise the memory of those who contributed to this noble institution, and call them blessed. COLQUITT COUNTY. John E. Howell, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. (Statistics included in tabulated statements in another part of this report.) Length of public term, five months. Appropriation from State, $9,885.7. An average of $3.16 per pupil enrolled. An average of less than $30.00 per month per teacher employed. Vouchers are on file in the office of the board of education for the money disbursed. I would call yo:ur attention to the fact that we are drawing funds upon the basis of the census of 1903 and can not get another census until 1908. Our school population has grown at the rate of fifteen to twenty per cent.-'per year since 1903. Our ,school population is practically all white, so that in communities where in the average Georgia county they would need one room and teacher each for white and colored children, we need two rooms and two teachers for white children. So that in almost every community the school buildings need additional room and teachers. When we get a new census (if the State continues her appropriations upon the present basis) the 62 situation can be gr.eatly relieved, but until then the struggle will be hard to maintain salaries for competent teachers. That you may see the situation in the various communities I append hereto some photographic views marked exhibit "A". I mean no discourtesy to the citizens of these communities, nor to say that the situation with them is any worse than in many others. To relieve the present need and to run their schools for longer terms, seventeen (17) districts, including thirty (30) schools have adopted local taxation and the sum of $5,400 was levied for 1906. It would be immeasurably better if we had local tax over the entire county. This is the term for your honorable body to direct the hire of the felony convicts into either the "school" or "road" fund of our county. Nearly every county in the State gets the benefit in their school fund. Every county adjoining Colquitt puts this money in the school funds. We never had it in ours; hence the adjoining counties pay better salaries, secure better teachers, have some money to help with school buildings and flJrniture and operate their schools six months, too. Our boardp'f education has never had a dollar that they could afford to appropriate for buildings or furniture, and, as compared with adjoining counties, are very much hindered in that respect. We can not spend one cent more than our annual appropriation and the "road" fund could very much more afford to borrow this money for the next two years than the "school" fund could afford to do without it. Therefore we ask that you direct this money into the "school" funds for the next two years. COMMENTS OF GRAND JUR,Y. With reference to Commissioner Howell's recommendation that the funds arising from the hire of felony convicts be appropriated to the county schools, this body is of the opinion that such would be unwise at this time because of the fact that the county is engaged in building good roads and the finances of the county are such that the deficit in the road funds that would be caused by diverting the funds arising from the hire of the felony convicts could not be met from the general funds. 63 REVIEW OF SCHOOL WORK. During the fall of 1905 and spring of 1906 I raised a fund, by public subscription, amounting to $50,. with which to place a circulating library in the county schools. I had thirty small cases made, of oak, to hold thirty volumes each, with additional room for supplies and current magazines and papers. I bought a library of 750 volumes, of standard literature, including many copyright qooks. These were in triplicates of each title, so that I had only three cases alike in the entire library. These I have been circulating among the schools, changing once each month, and teachers and children have been charmed, delighted, interested and benefited beyond measure. Seventeen (17) school districts, embracing thirty (30 ) schools (white and colored) have adop,ted local tax and the sum of $5,000 was added to the State fund in those districts for 1906, enabling them to operate high-school departments in some and long term schools in all. \Ve built entirely new five (5) good houses and put many other buildings in repair as to light and comfort. Three (3) were seated with patent desks, and we have ordered desks for four others. To buildings and equipment the board of education has not had a penny to contribute. If we had $1,000 per year that we could spare for that purpose we could have a good building in every community in three years. Our enrollment grows larger'each year on account of rapidly increasing population and for 1906 the enrollment was as large as our entire school population as per the census of 193; giving us but $3.16 per enrolled pupil. Unfortunately the road problem has been. so serious with us that our grand juries have never given us the convict hire. So with the large increase in school attendance our board has had a hard problem before them to secure pay for competent teachers, as the burden of extra compensation falls heavily upon our patrons, as compared to the average county in the State. But our people are loyally supporting our efforts in that direction and we have a fine body of teachers. We contemplate, in line with the advanced educational movement that seems to have permeated the entire country, to hold an educational conference in Colquitt county during the sum- 6-1 mer of 1907, to which we are going to invite all the business men of our county, first, and then all who are interested and then some strong speakers, at which conference we propose to show ail our people our exact situation and ask their cooperation in securing consolidation, local tax, better buildings and furniture, longer terms and better school conditions in every respect. COWETA COUNTY. V. A. Ham, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. The county has been laid off into thirty-one school districts. Four of these districts have already voted for local taxation and are now operating their school under that system. Some of these districts that have voted for local taxation, viz. : Moreland, Grantville and Union, are expecting to build and equip new schoolhouses during the year 1907, or in the near future. Throughout the county, there is a general feeling on the part of the people in favor of better equipped schoolhouses. During the year 1906, two new schoolhouses were built by the people of Rock Spring and Hutchinson school districts. In other: districts some of the schoolhouses have been repaired and made more comfortable, and furnished with better desks. The teachers' monthly institute is well attended, and much enthusiasm is manifested in the work of the institute. There is a plan now on foot, by the cooperation and help of the teachers, to put a library in each school. This work is progressing very satisfactorily, and several schools have already collected a flattering ,nucleus for a library. During the year there were sixty-eight schools in operation, of this number thirty-five were whites, with an enrollment of two thousand one hundred and twenty-eight pupils, which shows that 85 per cent. of the children attended school. There were thirty-three colored schools in operation, with an enrollment of three thousand, one hundred and seventynine pupils, which shows that 80 per cent. attended school. REVIEW OF SCHOOL WORK. The county has been laid off into thirty-one school districts. Four' of these districts are now operating their schools under 65 the system of local taxation. Several schools have been repaired and furnished with new desks. Two new schoolhouses in the Hutchinson and Rock Spring school districts have been equipped with new patent desks. Many of our schoqls now have libraries, and an effort is now being made to put a library in every white school in the county. We have a good supply of teachers in this county, and many of them are preparing themselves for more efficient work by taking a course at some normal school. Our monthly Teachers' Institute is well attended, and our teachers are enthusiastic in the work of the institute. DECATUR COUNTY. J. S. Bradwell, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF C. S. C. '1'0 GRAND JURY. . Since the last year's report was made to your honorable body, a part of the territory under the jurisdiction of this county has been cut off to form a part of the new county of Grady, taking from us twenty-seven white and thirteen colored schools, including what are termed county line schools, a total of forty. For that reason it is hardly practicable to draw a just comparison between the attendance of the past with that of the previous year as a whole. We give you herein, however, those statistics relating to the thirty-seven white and the thirty-eight colored schools which remain in this county. The white enrollment was 2,263, giving an average attendance of lA09. The colored enrollment was 2,600, giving an a.verage attendance of I ,63 I. The increase of white enrollment over the previous year was 274 and that of the average attendance 222. That of the colored was 290 and 246 respectively. The school term as provided for by the board of education was six months-l20 days. The per cent. on attendance of whites was 62.2; that of the col9red 62.7. The white enrollment was 75.2 and the colored 7'3.2 of the school population of 1903. These figures show that while much is being done towards reaching the children of the county with school privileges there yet remains much to be done to acomplish the task of blotting out illiteracy in our county. The main obstacle in the way of better attendance in the rural districts is the labor problem 5sc 66 and ~hile the people realize more and more th~ importance of educating their children, the sacrifice of their services on the farms is the price of their attendance. This is most unfortunately true regarding those between the ages of twelve and eighteen years and who are best prepared to receive the benefits of the schools. In order to remove this obstacle as much as possible, our board of education leaves it optional with each school to operate the term during any months of the calendar year which the trustees may deem most suitable to the conditions of the community. By the wise action of former grand juries in directing the use of the convict funds to the school funds of the county, our board of education, for the first time in the history of our county school system, is now able to meet our obligations in paying the teachers' salaries monthly as they fall due, obviating the former necessity of discounting their salaries or waiting until after the end of the year for their money. This will help us in the future in employing and retaining better teache"rs throughout the county. During the past year we had ten schools, viz. : Attapulgus, Brinson, Climax, Donaldsonville, EIdorendo, Faceville, Franklin, Iron City, Lela and Mariola, which extended the term longer than the six months provided for by the county funds by private subscription or municipal taxation. These schools were all under the management of competent principals and assistants and will compare favorably with any of the schools of their grade in the State. In proof of this statement we point with pardonable pride to the fact that a pupil of one of these schools won the gold medal offered last year by the Daughters of the Confederacy for the best essay by any pupil of the common schools of the State on the subject, "Tlhe Main Events of r86r-Their Importance and Influence." The prize was awarded to Mr. Charles M. Trulock,of the Climax public school by the State committee against many competitors throughout the State. In complianee with the law passed by the last legislature, our Board of Education has laid off the county into forty-four school districts in order to give the people in each the opportunity provided by the law to adopt a local tax for school purposes. It has been particularly gratifying to note the zeal with which the people in many parts of the county have availed themselves of the provisions of this law to improve their school facilities. Up to this date nineteen districts. viz. : Rey- 67 noldsville, Pine Grove, Martin, Humphrey, Franklin, Attapulgus, Faceville, Parker, Donaldsonville, Miriam, Brinson, Fairchild, West Bainbridge, Fowltown, Thursby, Bethel, Iron City, Matthews and Mariola have voted for a local tax and in a majority of them not a dissenting vote was cast. After these districts have put the law into operation and demonstrated to the contiguous districts the superior advantages they enjoy, there will be few if any others left unwilling to adopt like advantages for themselves. A very low rate of taxation on property values will be sufficient to provide for the building and furnishing of comfortable schoolhouses and the employment of teachers capable of educating the children free for nine months in the year. This provides for the only solution of the rural school problem that has had such a disastrous effect in the past in driving its most progressive citizens from the country to the towns where these advantages are open to them. When we see schools in the country of equal efficiency to those of the cities and towns, we will see this tide turned back to the farms that so much need the presence of an intelligent and progressive citizenry and the blessings of an enlightened civilization will dawn upon our 'Country beyond our fondest dreams. If we can educate our boys and girls to love their country homes they will not turn their backs on them to seek greater things in the cities and towns. With this law put into operation, there is no reason why any rural school district should not be able to offer the same educational advantages to its youth as are now enjoyed by the cities and towns. It is the country boys, who have been driven by unfavorable conditions surrounding them on the farms, that have built up our cities and towns and have made our country great in all of its greatest achievements. Why not change these conditions and thus induce them to remain on the farms and direct t.heir brains and energies to the upbuilding of their country homes that lie ready to respond most graciously to their intelligent efforts? No expense is too great to attain this end. To provide for the education of its citizens is the highest obligation of the State. Ignorance and its accompanying crimes are the most expensive burdens of any commonwealth. 68 DOOLY COUNTY. Hon. E. G. Greene, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. (Statistics same as reported to State Department.) Our rural schools are not what they ought to be, and it will be impossible to make them more' efficient with the limited amount of funds furnished by the State. We have employed in the county ninety teachers. Our school fund is about $12,000. After necessary expenses are paid, there is an average of about $125 for each teacher per annum. Farm hands are getting nearly that much and are furnished board, while the teacher must pay his own board. In all vocations, except that of teaching, the earning capacity has increased more than 50 per cent within the last five years, and the expense of living has almost doubled. The conSeljUenCe of this state of affairs is that most of our male teachers have found more lucrative employment in other lines of business. The wages are so small that not even lady teachers are able to spend a few weeks at the summer normals to better fit themselves for usefulness in the schoolroom. In order, then, to furnish our teachers better employment and to give our children better advantages, we need more money. Since the State is inclined not to increase the appropriations to the public school fund, it is folly to expect more aid from that source. There is, then, but one course left open to us, and that is to levy a local tax sufficient for the needs of our schools. Two school districts have already voted for local taxation, and others are arranging for an election under the local tax Act, and we hope the entire county will soon take the advantage of the Act and levy a local tax sufficient to make the rural schools what they should be. REVIEW OF SCHOOL WORK. We have had a good year for schools in our county. The enrollment was better, and the average attendance better, than ever before in the history of the county. Through the efforts of this office and urging of the board, ~ 69 the people have supplemented the funds so as to guarantee six months' school instead of five. We now have four consecutive months during winter session. We are now building two modern schoolrooms, by private subscription. Four more are planning to build this spring. Two districts will vote on local taxation in April. Local tax will win. We are stressing the importance of school libraries for every schoolin the county. With a few hundred books gathered from friends, and about one hundred magazines donated by publishers, we' are sending out a small circulating library. During 1907 we expect to continue pressing local taxation and better buildings. . EARLY COUNTY. Hon. Thomas F. Jones, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. We desire to express our appreciation for the report of our School Commissioner,T. F. Jones, showing the wonderful progress of our county in the great school enterprise; especially do we appreciate the transportation of the children to and from school, who would be so inconvenienced if not thus provided for, and in order to further the school interest of the county we recommend that a tax be levied as a supplement to the public funds. ELBERT COUNTY. Hon. J. N. Wall, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. We had eighty schools in operation during the year 1906forty-four white and thirty-six colored. We had 2,165 white children enrolled, a fraction over 97 per cent.; and 2,160 colored children enrolled, a fraction over 84 per cent. The average attendance of whites was 1,347, and of colored 1, 124. We find an unpardonable indifference, on the part of patrons, as to the condition of schoolhouses. 70 Discipline has not been enforced in all of the schools as it should have been. The Board of Education is striving to elevate the profession by paying teachers according to merit and fitness, as well as for natural aqility. There is great need of patrons supplementing the public fund in payment of teachers' salaries. 'vVe have a few teachers worth a hundred dollars per month. Two teachers are an absolute necessity in every school where the entire seven grades are taught, but, at the same time, the Board of Education should not put an assistant in any school where two good rooms are not provided for the teachers and pupils. REVIEW OF SCHOOL WORK. The attendance was not regular, but the enrollment of whites was nearly 98 per cent. - The colored not quite as much. Our people, as a whole, bitterly oppose the McMichael bill, and for this reason there is some dissension. They fear the change of location of schoolhouses, and on this account are not willing to spend much money towards the improvement of such as we have. We, however, are making some progress on educational lines. The poor pay of teachers, and the tardiness on the part of the State in paying such a pittance, make good teachers scarce, and in consequence of which I find it impossible to keep up as high standard as we need, but have to take such as we can get. ECHOLS COUNTY. J. G. Prine, County School Commissioner. ) REVIEW OF SCHOOL WORK. The year 1906 was a fairly successful year with us in the educational line, but not what it should have been. We need more money to run our schools, in order that we may have better teachers and pay the commissioner a better salary, so that he can devote his whole time to the cause of education in our county. The only way to do this is to work up local taxation. When this measure is put in operation in our county then we will have better houses, better teachers, and better attendance in our schools. 71 Two new schoolhouses were built in the county last year, and some improvement made on others. It is hard to get pupils interested in planting trees at home or at school. Many of our school grounds are shaded by natural shade trees, the oaks being trimmed and cut to right distance when houses were built. Teachers were difficult to get during 1906; this caused nearly all of the schools to be short-termed ones. Part of the teachers are trying to prepare themselves for better school work. Others are careless, don't seem to take much interest, mostly, I think, because they are using the schoolroom as a stepping-stone to some other avocation in life. Our county is so thinly peopled and it is so unhandy for teachers to get to county site, we do not have monthly institutes for teachers. It is a hard problem to get parents in Echols county to take much interest in school work. The majority do not seem to care much about school. We have no long-term schools, takes hard work to hold up short terms, but I am glad to say that some of the leading men of the county are taking more interest in school work. Local taxation is a hard problem in our county. Most of people are afraid that if they tax themselves for school purposes that the State will withdraw its aid. We need local taxation and compulsory education. Too many parents keep their children at home when they should be at school. We had only one library at the close of 1906, but plans are on foot to get up several in the school districts during 1907. Grading of schools is progressing slowly on account of irregular attendance. There was not a pupil that completed the common course during 1906. Specimens of school work collected during the year were very good. We had no contests of pupils in declamations. More interest was shown in the study of agriculture than in the past. My school problems for 1906 were securing better teachers, working up local taxation, and getting people interested in school work. I am sure that each of the three are on a higher plane than before. I could not work either as I would like 72 to have done, because I do not have time to work at it all the time. I am sure a commissioner should devote his whole time to school work, but in a small county like this the pay will not warrant it. We have to do something else t6 make expenses. We have consolidated our schools as much so as possible, not to carry the children. The school districts are but roughly laid out at present, but we are at work on boundary lines, so when we get local taxes we will be in shape for it. During the year 1907 I hope to make this the banner year in educational work. First, I want to get the best teachers possible for the amount we are able to pay them; second, to get parents interested in the education of their children, in the improvement of school buildings and grounds, in local taxes, so we will be able to get better teachers and have longer terms, and have better attendance in all the schools of Echols county. FANNIN COUNTY. J. M. Clement, County School Commissioner. REpORT OF c. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. In this report I have tried to lay before you as complete statement as possible, of the real educational condition of the county. I hope that this report will be studied by your body, and jf it is found worthy, that it will receive your hearty approbation, and that your recommendations will have a signal bearing on the future conditions of the common schools of this county. In order to ascertain intelligently and satisfactorily the actual educational oondition and the general environments of every school in the county, the law requires the county school commissioner to visit the schools of the county at least once during the school term, and oftener, if practicable. Owing to sickness I was unable to visit the schools as often as I contemplated; however, I made forty-one official visits, personally, and had the president and members of the board of education do some visiting. I consider these visits of the board valuable, as this gives them a better understanding of the actual workings of the schoolroom than could be had otherwise. Besides, it has a wholesome effect on the school and on the community. 73 In visiting the schools I deliver educational talks; encourage and stimulate teachers, pupils and patrons; inspect the modes and methods of teaching and government; endeavor to correct, if needs be, all features of undesirable bearing on the schools; and impart to teachers, pupils and patrons such information: and encouragement as seems needful, pointing to such incentives as are laudable and calculated to lead to higher aspirations, loftier ambitions and nobler living from which golden deeds are born and whereon real success in life is founded. During these visits and at every opportune time throughout the year, I have not neglected to make an earnest effort to ascertain fully and accurately the actual and real ueeds, conditions, environments and educational circumstances of every school in the county, and, although from a real educational standpoint, we are far below the standard of progress I most heartily desire, yet I am glad to report an ever-increising interest and many hopeful indications of an educational awakening in the county among teachers, pupils and parents, and that a favorable sentiment is growing among our people generally in favor of better schoolhouses, better equipment, better teaching, and self-help by local taxation. Although it i~ to our every interest, strange to say this great work is gradual and can progress only as public sentiment is developed in its favor, which development often seems of slow growth. Although our progress is gradual, it is permanent, and we to-day stand in the dawn of an educational era heretoforetinknown to our people, and which will still lead us onward and upward to nobler and greater achievements. In this, all the while, the standard of education is rising higher and higher, professional methods are more and more exacting, the demands of the times and of the people generally are more imperative, civilization and intelligence making strides the world has never before klllown, and if we are found in the grand march of human progress, we must rise higher and higher, year by year, untii we are fully abreast of this great work. Weare now realizing as never before, the importance of educating our children. We are realizing that intelligence everywhere is on the increase, and that right knowing is a prerequisite to right doing, and that so long as ignorance and oorruption walk hand in hand to the ballot-box and creep into all our homes and into all our social, political and religious institutions, so long must the sChools and the churches stand guard over American liberty and American interests. 74 The right education of our youth for future usefulness, for life's efficient service, and to prepare thinking, intelligent, upnght citizens for all the public and private stations in a great State, should be the highest ambition of us all, relative to this life, remembering that character is the real end sought, which is the sum total of the dispositions created in the mind mainly by teaching and training and of the habits which manifest themselves in conduct as a direct result. A right education is the best inheritance parents can leave their children, for knowledge, skill and character, the triune product of the school, stand alike for success, happiness and noble citizenship. Ignorance is the costliest thing in the county, and the county will live in the children of the county as it lives nowhere else. The perpetuity of our homes, and of all our social, political, civil and religious institutions, and our material advancement and growth as a people, and the increase of the taxable wealth of this county, all of these, depend more upon the foundation of the life and character which are now being laid in the public schools of this county than they depend upon everything else combined. Therefore, too much energy, zeal, thought and action can not be bestowed on this one great cause for the elevation and betterment of our people. Under the Act approved August, 1906, the county board of education has laid out the county into forty-two school districts, which have been mapped and now on exhibit in the Ordinary's office. Under existing difficulties, they did the best they could, and are aware that such a difficult task can not be performed without more or less mistake. But they did the best they could under the circumstances, and endeavored to do justice in every case. All corrections which come to their attention will be corrected in due time. The board of education and the county school commissioner are making an earnest effort to have at least ten new schoolhous~s built during the year 1907. The matter of schoolhouses has been a grave question with school matters all the past years, but we now have plans of operation by which we expect neat new schoolhouses throughout the county. We r.eed them and need them much, and until we get them the school work can not succeed in a satisfactory way. Weare getting the deeds in the name of the county board of education, and are securing as much land as possible in connection therewith, so as to give opportunity at improvement in various ways in connection with schoolroom work, and for beautifying 75 the school grounds and protecting the beautification with en- closure. County institute was held at Mineral Bluff July 9th to 13th, inclusive, conducted by Mr. W. M. Johnson, of Gainesville, Ga. The attendance was good, interest deep, work enthusi- astic and vigorous. Under the Act approved August 21, 1906, on November 24, 1906, elections were ordered held in the various school dis- tricts, under rules and regulations prescribed by the county board of education and those of regular county elections, at which time elections were held in most of the districts for school trustees. Several districts failed to hold any election on said date, and a second election was ordered held for school trustees in those districts on December 22, 1906, at which time not all held said election. Thereupon the board deemed it useless to order further elec- tions and are proceeding with the school work in a few districts without the aid of trustees. . Local taxation for school purposes is gaining favor through- out the county, and this we take as being indicative of a deeper interest in the cause of education; and when the whole county is dotted with neat new schoolhouses and votes local taxation for school purposes, we will have done two of the best things in the history of Fannin county for her children. FAYETTE COUNTY. W. N. D. Dixon, County School Commissioner. REVIEW OF SCHOOL WORK. The public schools of Fayette county are doing some good work and making some progress, yet they are far from doing what they should do. Each year we are trying to bring about more hearty co-operation on the part of patrons with the school board of the county. Many of our rural schoolhouses have recently been made more comfortable, and the patrons are becoming more interested in better schools and school improvement. Public sentiment in favor of "local taxation" is growing in parts of the county, and I think some of the rural districts will vote on this question this fall. We have the net hire of convicts added to the fund received from the State in this 76 'County, and our teachers are not complaining much about their salary. People are more interested in agriculture being taught, and some of our teachers are making much effort to interest their pupils and communities in this branch of school work. The greatest trouble we have is the irregular attendance of children after their names have been placed on the school roll. This, in a great measure, grows out of the lack of appreciation on the part of some parents. We hope to overcome this by personal appeals from commissioner and teachers. I think our standard of teachers is improving, and many of them are making much effort to have their schoolrooms sup- plied with suitable desks. The enrollment this spring (1907) is better than last. We will have one week institute the latter part of June. ' \Ve have school July and August. This, we think, should be done away with and let the entire school term come together, but we can not get the co-operation of the people on this~ The 'Outlook is encouraging for the future, and we hope to see our people make our public schools what they should ?e. FLOYD COUNTY. J. C. King, County School Commissioner. J REPORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND DRY. (Statistics same as given in tabulated part of this report.) The conformation of the county into school districts, which was approved by the Board of Education last July, gives the 'County 52 white and 27 colored schools. The school districts were carefully laid off, with the schoolhouse located as near the center as possible, and are clearly shown on maps hanging in the office of the ordinary and the county school commissioner. There being no colored school districts, the colored children residing in different white school districts are allowed to attend school at the nearest colored schoolhouse. The white children are not allowed, without obtaining permission from the county school commissioner, to attend school in any district except the one in which they reside. The advantages of the school district system are (I) a reduc- 77 tion of teachers, thus enabling the commISSIOner to secure better teachers; (2) a decrease of expenses in repairs, construction and equipment of schoolhouses; and (3) giving the commissioner more time to visit and superintend schools. Two school districts, Prospect and Crystal Springs, will be supported by local taxation after this year. The Board of Education, with the assistance of school communities, built during last year one colored and four white schoolhouses, with an expense of nearly four thousand dollars. The commissioner, in compliance with the schoolla.}'V, visited, with the exception of two schools, all the schools in the county. The County Contest and Educational Rally at Mobley Park last year was well attended, and showed that teachers and pupils were enthusiastic in the cause of improvement in education. At the combined annual institute of Polk, Floyd and Paulding counties, held at Rockmart, Ga., the teachers received practical and instructive knowledge in pedagogy. Monthly teachers' meetings are held during the public school session, which are usually well attended by the teachers, and at which special subjects are discussed by them. Several teachers were quite successful last year in getting up funds for establishing libraries in their schools. The Board of Education and the commissioner can not, on account of the shortness of the school term and the limited amount of money at command, build up and maintain the rural schools and make the system of education thoroughly effective. The only plan in my mind for the solution of the system is local taxation to supplement the school fund; but the minds of the people are not yet ready and educated to adopt it. In my candid opinion it is surely coming, and in no distant future will be adopted by every district in the county. FORSYTH COUNTY. F. T. Wills, County School Commissioner. REPORT C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. (Statistics same as reported to State Department.) The length of the public school term in this county for the year 1906 was fixed by the board of education at five months, or one hundred days, to be taught during the months of January, February, March, July, August and September. 78 The law makes it your duty at this term of the court to apply the fund arising from the hire of felony convicts either to the schools or the public roads. Although we have a surplus in the treasury, our school fund is inadequate to secure the service of first-class teachers. Teachers can not afford to teach at the salaries our board is able to pay, the board is handicapped for want of funds and can not pay the salaries asked. In a few instances salaries have been supplemented by the patrons, and we still have a number of experienced teachers in the county, bnt a number have sought other fields where more remunerative salaries are paid, and the exodus increases every year. The board sorely needs the hire of felony convicts, and I respectfully ask your body to seriously consider the educational condition of our county before again applying said fund to the public roads. FULTON COUNTY. M. L. Brittain, County School Commissioner. REpORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. GENTLEMEN: This month marks the co~pletion of seven years' work on the part of the present commissioner, and perhaps a review of what has been done may prove of value. In that time either by day or night he has spoken in nearly every schoolhouse, church, and public hall within the limits of the 'County, and has urged, perhaps too vehemently in some cases, an equal opportunity with the best for every child. Two campaigns have been conducted for longer terms and better school facilities. The first ended in defeat, but the second resulted in a victory for local tax by a majority of more than ten to one. He has been greatly aided in his efforts from the fact that the board of education, beginning with its former president, Gov. W. J. Northen, has always given him large liberty of action and responsibility and supported him in every instance. The people have responded better, perhaps, than could reasonably have been expected. As an illustration, three communities, remote from the city, with less than 100 children all together, built three two-room schoolhouses, costing over $3,000, to take the place of three one-room structures, worth perhaps $100 each. The property is deeded to the county, although the larger part of the money was raised among the patrons of these schools. As hereafter indicated in the detailed report, all 79 the white schools, with three exceptions, are in good condition. These three we expect to improve by the close of another term. Every school for white children is now painted and supplied with the best modern desks. In the last seven years seventeen schools have been built at a cost of $28,000. For this building the county appropriated $9,000, the rest being secured from the different communities. The county has the deeds to this property and keeps it repaired andinsu~d. Within the last twelve months, using less than $5,000 of the county funds, more than $15,000 has been raised and expended for new buildings and school improvement. This was secured from the patrons of five schools, Ormewood, Stewart Avenue, Morgan Falls, Grove and Faith. By calling on Jifferent communities to aid in building their own schools the Lax rate has been reduced to a minimum, and it has had its advantages in arousing local pride. 'Wherever a man has aided in this improvement a patriotic interest has resulted, while the grumblers have come from those who have helped least or lOt at all. Eight additional teachers have been provided re'_ently and more than 300 new desks bought, and still there is great pressure, particularly at two schools. People are moving into the county every day and where, as with us, almost in a night, real estate companies and manufacturing plants will locate dozens of families, the difficult task of the educational authorities is readily seen. In order that exact conditions may be seen cuts of the ,vhite schools built in recent years are shown in this report. The following comparison gives an accurate idea of the county schools for the years 1901 and 1907: 1901 1907 Annual income (State fund) .. $1 5,000 (Local tax) $43,000 Value of school property. . . . .. 22,000 51,000 Free school term. . . . . . . . . . . .. Five months. Nine months Teachers' salaries . . .. . . . . . . .. 10,300 29,000 Paid for new buildings . . . . . . . 600 5,000 Paid for repairs . . . . . . . . . 100 2,000 \Vith patent desks Eight schools, all white schools School gardens . . . . . . . .. . N one. Ten .Schoollibraries Nine. Twenty-five Normal class Five days. Nine days Training class N one. Ten days 80 The schools have been steadily improving since the founda- tion work was begun ten years ago by Major R. J. Guinn. Last year marked the greatest improvement in their history, mainly due to the aid which came from the local tax through the Mc- Michael ordinance. " In conclusion, I desire to thank those who have been of aid. First, the teachers, who have, for the most part, labored so conscientiously and well. More than three-fourths of them have received either college or normal training. Insome few cases they have suffered from the narrowest of prejudice. Those who strive to pull down their schools are a drawback to any section 'in which they live. In contrast, however, there are public-spirited citizens found in nearly every community who can always be depended upon to aid the teacher and school; who are far-seeing enough to know that such a course helps them as well as everybody else in the vicinity. We have always been particularly fortunate in having the sympathy and help of good men. A. p. Stewart and T. M. Armistead give their commissions on the school taxes; Cap- tain Tom Donaldson and the county commissioners help us with the grading; Hon. Hoke Smith has aided in the erection of three buildings. On one occasion the work on a house had stopped, the community claiming it could do no more. He was asked to help and his generous response was, "Complete the building and send the bill to me." Sympathy and support like this have gone far to take away the sting of misrepre- sentation and opposition which ignorance, covetousness and prejudice have sometimes thrown in the way of this work. For the assistance of such men, and especially for the never failing kindness and endorsement of the board of education, I am most grateful. J COMMENTS of GRAND DRY. 'vVe were highly pleased with the work of the teachers and pupils of the county schools. The teachers seem alive to their responsibilities and are doing excellent work. The system of reports showing record of every pupil is most complete. We find the school buildings in first-class condition, and with few exceptions the teachers and pupils showing much interest in the appearance of rooms and grounds, as evidenced by successful effort made at many to provide libraries for the use 81 of the students, pictures in class-rooms, and flower beds, shrubbery, trees, etc., about the school-grounds. From information gathered we note a disposition.on the part of the patrons of the schools to encourage the teachers and the superintendent in their work, while many seem to appreciate the nine months' free school system inaugurated by Fulton county, and are apparently awake to the importance of an education for their children. The report from Superintendent Brittain, which is attached, gives detail of enrollment and attendance, and indicates the suqstantial advancement that has been made. It also covers the financial condition, receipts and expenditure, disbursement of funds sent Fulton county by the State Treasurer for I906, which has been verified. The county is to be congratulated on acquiring so many new school buildings at such little expense-a result largely due to subscriptions made by citizens, patrons of the new schools, through the efforts of Superintendent Brittain. Superintendent Brittain's report shows schoolhouses to the value of $45,70, which dated as of January I, I907. The record now shows a little over $50,000, acquired at a cost of $I2,365 to the county, a condition Fulton county can be proud of. Consolidation of some of the smaller schools is desirable in-one or two instances, along the same line as has been done in other places in the county. A larger room for normal school gatherings at Superintendent Brittain's quarters would be of much benefit, and is recommended. We highly commend the faithful and efficient work done by Superintendent Brittain. FRANKLIN COUNTY. J. W. Landnun, County School Commissioner. REVIEW OF' SCHOOL WORK. For the purpose of encouraging industrial education in our common schools the board of education is offering certain prizes for I907. To the boy who raises the most corn on one-half acre of ground will be given a prize of $I5. To the boy who produces the next highest number of Qushels from one-half acre will be given $IO. To the boy who has the greatest yield from one 6 Be 82 stalk will be given $5. These are the conditions: The one-half acre must be measured by the trustees of the school which the boy attends, or some competent person whose measurement the board will accept. The land must be prepared, fertilized and cultivated by the boy himself. The boy must be a school- boy, attending the common schools of Franklin during the year 1907. The corn, when made, gathered and shucked, must be weighed by the trustees of the school which the boy attends, the weights sealed up and mailed to me by the trustees. The boys who enter the stalk contest must have their stalks on exhibition at Carnesville the day the prizes are awarded. Any hpy entering the half acre contest may also enter the stalk contest. Each and every boy who enters these contests must prepare a paper of three pages or more on corn culture, includ- ing his experience on the half-acre contest. Those who win the prizes must read their papers publicly on the day of award- ing the prizes. . To the girl who can best cut anll make a dress will be given $10. In this the grading will not be on the style of the dress, nor the material from which it is made, but on the skillfulness of the work in making the garment. The girl who makes for herself a calico dress has the same chance to win as the girl who makes a silk one. To the gir1,.. who presents one-half dozen the most nicely worked buttonholes will be given $5. To the girl who presents the most perfectly laundered shirt- waist will be given $5. For the best piece of fancy work will be given $5. For the best pone of loaf bread will be given $5 All these articles are to be on exhibition at Carnesville the day of awarding the prizes. Each article will be numbered, and the judges will make their decision by number without knowing to whom they are awarding the prize. A committee of ladies will be selected to decide in the contest for the girls. Any girl may enter as many of these contests as she likes. Each and every girl must prepare a paper of three pages or more on the article she is contesting with. The winners must read their papers publicly the day of awarding the prizes. After corn is gathered in the autumn, probably about the first of November, it is our purpose to have a great educational day at Carnesville. Every man, woman and child in the county is expected to be present with a basket well-filled with the blessings that reward the honest toil of old Franklin's inc1us- 83 trious men and noble wome~. May the year 1907 bring pros- perity to our farmers, progress to our schools, and happiness to our homes. J. WILL LANDRUM, C. S. C. GRADY COUNTY. J. B. Wright, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF' C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. During the year 1906 forty white and twenty-three colored schools were taught in the county, while there were pupils at nine line schools situated in other counties. The records show that 3,667 pupils attended school during the year, or seventy-one per cent. of the children of school age in the county as shown by the school census of 1903. Of the .above enrollment, 2,235 .were white and 1,432 colored. The schools were in operation five months of the year, which is all that our school fund justifies. A teachers' library has been started, which now numbers about 125 well-selected volumes. This is open to every citizen of the county. The regular teachers' institutes were held as required by law. The county has been districted by the county board of education in accordance with the provisions of the McMichael bill. There are forty-four of these districts, or an average of only a little more than ten square miles to each district. This is too small a territory to be covered by each school if the best work is to be done in the schools. The teachers have been fairly efficient; and considering effi,eiency, have been fairly well paid. But we need better schools; and in order to have better schools we must have better teachers and better teachers means better pay. The two greatest needs of our schools at this time are: (I) Larger schools, requiring the presence of at least two teachers during the whole term. Under this plan much more efficient work can be done. (2) As the State fund is not sufficient to maintain a first-class school in each district without supplemental help from the community, I most earnestly recom-mend that wme plan for securing uniformity in this respect 84 pe adopted. In my opinion the McMichael bill furnishes the best solution of this difficulty. REVn:w 01" SCHOOL WORK. No flew schoolhouses were built during- the year. Some oi them were repaired. Patent desks were added to one. Nothing substantial was done in tree planting. The supply of teachers was fairly good, most of the schoolshaving been taught in the spring. The work done by the teachers was, I believe, of a little higher order than that of the average country school. 'vVe had several teachers who attended normal schools during the year. A monthly institut~ from February to June was held, and with good results. The interest of parents in the schools was only medium, aswas also the attendance of pupils. There are two regular long term schools in the county, though several others have supplementary terms of varying length. Local taxation was adopted in one district, but failed of operation, owing to Supreme Court decision. A county teachers' library was started. Three schools have libraries of their own. Some progress has been made in grading the schools of the county. A few seventh grade certificates were issued. Specimens of school work have been received from only one school. No county contest. We are a new county, and have many "kinks" to straighten. Our teachers know a little agriculture, and are trying to' teach this: Problems~ (a) To interest the teachers. (b) To interest the pupils. (c) To interest the parents. Only partially solved by institutes, visiting schools, addresses, etc. Nothing done in consolidation and transportation. All school districts have been laid off. Plans for 1907: (a) Interesting the teachers more in their work. (b) Idem for the students. (c) Touching up the parents directly and through the local trustees. ( d) Pushing school improvement in each school district_ GREENE COUNTY. W. A. Parks., 'County School Commissioner. REpORT of C. S. C. '1'0 GRAND JURY. Number of white schools in the county, twenty-five and two county-line schools. Of these schools five run for eight and nine months, eight for six and seven months and the remainder for five months. N umber white teachers holding first-grade licenses, nineteen; second, seven, and third, four. The male teachers who have the management of the large schools are paid salaries ranging from $60 to $75 per month. All first-grade female teachers :are paid $40 per month, and in a few instances where the -schools are large they are paid $45 per month. The price paid -second and third grade teachers varies with the size and grade . Progress:- Old floor taken out and replaced with a new, well-fitted, dressed floof; the ceiling driven up and all the walls papered (not a good idea, but the best we could do there), board donated $50, house fitted with new, comfortabl<: desks, blinds on hinges. Outlook; A good fence and beautiful grounds. Long Branch: When we found this school a rough house was in course of construction. Progress; Three acres of 1and- donated, board appropriated $50, house completed and ceiled throughout. Outlook: Nothing definite but the summer will tell a tale in that locality. Perkins: At the beginning of 1906 there was no school 'interest and hard to keep a teacher. Progress; Just closed six months term with two teachers, a library in sight. Out- look: Better house and more lively school interest. Fair Haven: Here we found the best conditions to exist that we found in the county, and very good school building well ceiled and fairly well seated. Progress: A library started. Outlook: Nothing definite owing to the thinly settled com- munity. . Thrift : We found almost no house, a little woman teaching fifty-nine children, a thoroughly indifferent school sentiment, a people who seemed to think it was the duty of the county to furnish a teacher that would "take up school" and teach as long as the county would pay for it. Progress: Instead of six months and depending on the county to pay the teacher, a first-class male teacher has been employed for nine months and what the county fails to pay the patrons pay, $202.5; an assistant furnished by the county six months; $900 raised to build a new schoolhouse; a lively school interest. Outlook: A good two-room schoolhouse finished and painted and nine months of school every year. Lewis: We found a fa.irly good unceiled house; people con- tent with six months term. Progress: Board donated $50, house ceiled throughout, a new stove, window shades on roll- ers (before there were no shades or curtains except to one window), pictures on the walls, a first-class teacher for eight months this year. Outlook: A piazza and grounds improved and house painted. nine months next year, with local tax. Norwood: We found nothing here-even worse than that- 100 for there was the hull of a house that was in the way of building a better. Progress: A lively school interest and lumber sawed to build a good house. Outlook: One of the best schools in the county. Kent: Here, perhaps, is the community of greatest progress. I was informed that two months was as long as a school could be run in this community and my first teacher remained there just two months. We have just closed a successful six months' term there and the people have learned that the way to run the school is not to run it too much. This school will be moved this summer to a more central location. Rooty Branch: Since I began this review one of the patrons has come to the office and told me they have raised $400 to build a schoolhouse. It almost gave me a spasm, and I said to myself the day of miracles has certainly returned. Other schools in the county have remained very nearly as I found them; some from a chronic indifference and some because the schools were not properly located and feeling that any improvement would be money wasted, as the schools were likely to be moved. In this they were correct. JOHNSON COUNTY. L. M. Blount, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. We have examined the books and papers of the county school commissioner's office, and find them neatly and correctly kept, and also said officer has accounted for every dollar of the funds of this office as the law requires. This office has a neat set of books. Entered in itemized statements from teachers itemized statements to State by county school commissioner, both corresponding, $9,585.19. Received from State by county school commissioner, $9,586.19; appropriations for 1906, $9,500.92; to State treasurer from 195, to April, 1906, $730.93-Total$10,231.85. Per county~choolcommissioner's books and State school commissioner to grand jury, $646.66. 101 J01:'{ES COUNTY. E. W. Sammons, County School Commissioner. COMMENTS OF GRAND JURY. In examination of the county school commissioner's books we find that he received last year $9,568.81 and said amount was paid out as verified by vouchers, etc., and for the present year he has received the first payment from the State commissioner the sum of $2,221 and has paid out $1,988, leaving a balance on hand of $233. His itemized accounts against each teacher impressed us that it contributed in making plain his payments to teachers. We feel the county is fortunate in having so efficient and trustworthy an officer. The following report as presented to our body by the county school commissioner is so full of information to the public that we make it a part of our general presentments, and request that it be published along with same. Especially do we endorse that portion of his paper relative to local taxation. REPORT OF C. S. C. '1'0 GRAND JURY. (Statistics same as reported to State Department.) We believe that as good work was done in the schools as at any previous time; that we had as good and as competent a corps of teachers as ever; but it is a recognized fact that no class of teachers can do the work needed to be done in a short space of five months a year, the time we can run our school with the amount of money we have to use. The term should be extended at least to seven or eight months. In nine communities, by private subscription, the term was extended from two to four months longer at a cost of $720. But many could not pay the tuition and the schools did not enroll more than half . the number enrolled during the public term. The children would have attended, but their parents could not pay the cost. Shall we leave the poor children to suffer such neglect? No, no, let us have local taxation so that every child ~an have the benefit of an extended term. Local taxation is the only solution. We may not expect to receive much more than at present from the general State funds. Already we are now receiving seven or eight thousand dollars more in pensions to our old 102 soldiers and to the school fund than we are paying taxes into the State. Others will not help us more. We can help ourselves. Besides the railroads of the county would pay onethird of whatever tax might be levied. We have a splendid opportunity, at small cost to ourselves, to put our schools in a prosperous condition if we would use it. The people are asking the ordinary to order an election for local taxation. They want it, they are seeing the necessity of it. They will not cease to ask till it is obtained. A year ago there were thirty-eight children from this county seeking high school and collegiate advantages outside of the county at an expense to their parents of not less than six or seven thousand dollars. We need a high school at some central place in the county. Already we are spending more than' it would take to maintain a good high school at nome. Besides keeping the money spent abroad at home, 200 other children might have received, with the same money, the same advantage that it cost the thirty-eight to go abroad. Gentlemen, the people of Jones are already spending more money voluntarily upon a few school children than local taxation would cost that 900 children might be helped. This is an age of educational awakening. Others are moving forward. Let us fall into line. Let us not stand still. LAURENS COUNTY. J. T. Smith, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. (Statistics same as reported to State Department.) The County Board of Education, in accordance with the requirements of the late school laws, has divided our county into fifty-nine school districts, making eighteen districts on the east side of the river and forty-one on the west. In making the new districts, the board preserved as many of the old school sites as it could and at the same time carry out the requirements of the law providing for the division of the county into school districts. In some instances it became necessary to make new school sites, and in others to discontinue some of the old schools. This has brought about considerable dissatisfaction in some parts of the county, and so there is in some places more or 103 less fridion in the operation of the schools. But, after all, I believe there is more interest manifested in education now than has been heretofore, and it is to be sincerely hoped that much real good will result from that interest. The people are taking more interest in their schoolhouses and school grounds, and they are building b,etter houses than perhaps ever before in this county. This is one of the best indications of real progress, because it is impossible to have the best schools unless we have good, comfortable school buildings well furnished. Three districts in the county voted in favor of local taxation for school purposes last year, but just before the time for the collection of the school tax, even a.fter all preparations had been made for that purpose, the county school commissioner was notified by the State School Commissioner that because the railroads could not be compelled to pay last year no other peFsons could be forced to pay the school tax for 1906 in Laurens county; so there was no school tax collected, or what little was collected was ordered refunded to the payers. It is to be hoped that there will be nothing in the way of collecting the - school tax for 1907. Most of the schools of the county have commenced the session for the year 1907 with good prospects of success. One of the greatest difficulties with which we have had to contend is securing teachers. There seems to be a greater demand than usual for competent teachers. It seems that in times of financial prosperity the supply of teachers is small. Another matter to which I beg leave to call your attention, is the fact that the county commissioners of roads and revenues have ordered that the county school commissioner vacate the room designed, built, and so long used as the county school commissioner's office, in favor of the recently elected county treasurer. I have not yet vacated the office, but have requested that the commissioners of roads and revenues reconsider their action in this matter, on the ground that the law, at least, leaves it optional with the county officials as to whether they shall furnish the county school commissioner an office or not. I believe the commissioners of roads and revenues acted uncler the impression that the law compels them to furnish the -:ounty treasurer an office in the courthouse, even if they had to c1isfurnish the county school commissioner for this purpose. 104 I do not believe there is a single member of the county commissioners that would unnecessarily and willfully deprive the county school commissioner and the County Board of Education of an office in the courthouse. The law does not require the county treasurer to occupy a room in the courthouse, but says he must have his office in the courthouse or within a mile of the county site. In reference to the county school commissioner, the law says, in substance, that the county officials shall furnish hini an office in the courthouse, provided there is room when all the county officers have been supplied. (See sections 459 and 1375 of the Code of Georgia, vol 1.) These two sections seem to make it just as binding on the county officials to furnish an office for the county school commissioner as for the county treasurer. A reasonable and sensible construction to put on these two laws is that the county is to furnish an office for the county treasurer, either in the courthouse or within one mile of it, and that it is the duty of the county officials to furnish also an office for the county school commissioner, and, furthermore, that this office is to be in the courthouse, if there is room when the other county officials have been supplied, but certainly an office somewhere. N ow, I do not wish to do anything unreasonable or obstinate or that is either morally or legally wrong, but I consider that there is no secular or material interest more important than the education of the children of the county, and I wish to be true and faithful to tne cause which I represent, to the hundreds of, bright boys and. girls all over this grand old historic county, and I have called your attention to this matter of an attempt to deprive the county school commissioner of an office in the courthouse in order that you might make such recommendations as you in your wisdom might deem just and proper under the circumstances. I herewith present to your honorable body three copies of the report of the State School Commissioner for the year 1905, which I hope you will carefully examine. I call your special attention to the report from Laurens county, commencing on page 78 of the State School Comniissioner's Annual Report. The sympathy and co-operation of the grand jury and of all the good citizens of the county in behalf of the proper education of our boys and girls are most respectfully and earnestly solicited. 105 HISTORY OF THE POPLAR SPRINGS INDUSTRIAL SCHOOL, On October I, 1906, the first industrial school in Laurens county opened at Poplar Springs, eight miles from Dublin, Georgia. Misses Claude Martin and Emma Perry took up the work with twenty-three pupils. The enrolment reached sixty before the session closed, but there are a score more in reach of the school who should have the advantages offered. School averaged thirty-six for eight months. Some months before school opened, through the instrumentality of the teachers, a Rural School Improvement Club was organized. Soon after this the club met with several gentlemen of the community, numbering in all forty people, and the house was cleaned, window panes put in, stumps were pulled, and rubbish hauled out. Soon a new cottage in which to teach woodwork and cooking was begun. The teachers met later; put up blackboards, arranged and mended brol$:en seats. Windows were washed after school opened by teachers and pupils. OUR PURPOSE. We propose to build a school which tends to uplift the whole community and shall be duplicated by other sections of the county; to provide a course of training which shall be as good as that of the city, and thus keep the country boys and girls at home where they may not become contaminated. with the vice and crowded conditions of the cities. We believe, like Professor Dewey, that the school spould be the social center of the community, and our school has become just that. We are trying to make it the most attractive spot in the community. The patrons fenced the grounds, and teachers and pupils laid off flower beds. Friends gave flowers, and we have had blooming plants all along. 'vVe have decorated the walls with the Perry pictures at a small cost. THE LIBRARY. We gave two delightful entertainments for the benefit of our library. Raised during the year by entertainments and gifts about $40, with which we purchased books and a bookcase. Have one hundred and fifty books now. They have Poplar Springs School Buildings. Laurens County. School Gardening, Poplar Springs School. A Corner in the School Shop, Popl~r Springs School. Cooking Room, Poplar Springs School. 108 reached almost every home in the community, and have been a source of' joy to those who used them. We organized a Literary Society, which met at the school twice each month, and proved beneficial to those who could not go to school. Next year we shall have the society meet during an afternoon instead of night. REGULAR WORK DONE BY PUPILS DURING THE YEAR 1906-7. All grades have taken the literary course as mapp,ed out by out State School Commissioner. ADDITIONAL COURSES. All grades from first through eighth have been taught painting, drawing, sewing (including basketry), elementary agriculture, nature study. The girls in the four upper grades have been given lessons once each week in cooking. The boys in the four upper grades have been given lessons once each week in woodwork. LITERATURE. As a supplement to the regular course, we have laid particular stress upon literature. \Ve have had story-telling in all grades. The children have enjoyed it all, and have gone home to tell the stories to the brothers and sisters who did not attend school. The upper grades took the American authors and read sketches of lives of the most prominent. They have also read the works and memorized a good many selections. A good _ deal of this reading was clone 2t home. \Ve also have a Bible study course in all grades. Have lessons three times a week. l\IT:SIC. The musical advantages "re 25 good as any rural school ever had. Professor Hodnett is our teacher, and is master of his profession. . SCHOOL GARDEN. Our school garden has been well begun, but we were late in getting it fenced, so can not hope to do much before fall. Have flowers, vegetabies and corn planted. NEEDS OF THE SCHOOL. We need $500 to be used for the erection of a cottage to be 109 used' as a home for teachers, and to help pay the salary of an extra teacher. Next year we shall have a great many more pupils, and patrons have agreed to build another classroom. Three teachers are needed to carry on the industrial work properly, and they need to live at the school. We need more books in our library. We need a piano. We need the encouragement and support of strong, influential friends. WHAT PATRONS HAVE DONE. They built a two-room building at a cost of $1,000; an industrial cottage at a cost of $300; cleared and fenced the grounds; bought an acre of ground for a garden at a reasonable price; bought two stoves, which cost $17; helped the library fund; upheld and paid the teachers; paid an entrance fee of 50 cents; paid the shop and kitchen fees. They also made two unsuccessful fights for local tax. LIBERTY COUNTY. J. B. Martin, County School Commissioner. REPORT OF SCHOOL WORK. The progress of school work has been very commendable. Our high school building is finished and occupied, with an enrollment of 137 pupils and four teachers. Four others hav;e taught long-term schools. Ludowici has voted for local taxation. We have laid off our county in school districts. We have built one schoolhouse. We have one library of about fifty volumes. We have made some progress of grading the school work in our county. We believe in consolidation and transportation. We hope to get parents interested in the education of their children. 110 LINCOLN COUNTY. N. A. Crawford, County School Commissioner. (Extract from letter, April 4th.) "The grand jury made no recommendations or suggestions touching school matters. They said they had no time to hear from me on school matters, but took my report. They said they were ,willing to take my word for its correctness. No grand jury has ever examined my books, though the law is positive that they should do so." REVIEW OF SCHOOL \VORK. As to schoolhouses, I think Lincoln will compare favorably with any county in the State. While some of the houses are not very showy, they are comfortable, with good seats, desks and blackboards. Every schoolhouse in the county is well provided with shadetrees. Most of them are built in forests. Most of our teachers are above an average. Parents are taking more interest in the education of their children than I have ever known, and the attendance will be larger than heretofore. \Ve do not' hold monthly institutes: it is not practicable to do so here; teachers can't get conveyance and many are too far off to walk. About libraries, I am ashamed of our condition. We have none. But we are going to have them. vVhen our new district trustees are elected, which will be on the 30th of March, our schools will all close about the middle of April, and it shall be my business to get libraries ih every white school. I held a contest on 15th of March, or, rather contests, one in spelling from Swinton's \VorcI Book, one from spelling in Webster's Abridged Dictionary, and one for the best reader. I gave three five-dollar prizes in the way of gold medals to the wmners. This will do a great deal of good. Our school board will furnish $30 next year for prizes, and I will give $10 to the boy that writes the best article on farming, $10 to the girl that writes the best composition, and $10 to the best speller, boy or girl, under twelve. If this don't wake our teachers up, fir~ won't. 111 Agriculture has not received the attention it ought to. The school districts have been laid off, and are in the Ordinary's office. They have occasioned a good deal of profanity-but that is quite natural. I am preparing a county map showing school districts. I am making arrangements to have Commissioner Adams, of Newton, run our annual institute. He will make a good expert. Can't say when we hold the institute. I have left that to Mr. Adams. Lincoln is holding her own in the cause of education; only twelve illiterates of school age among whites at the last"census, and hope to have none at the next. Weare sending a host of young school teachers all over Georgia-and recollect, Dr. J. L. M. Curry, Otis Ashmore and Nat Ware were born here. You are doing your work well. LOWNDES COUNTY. REPORT 01<' C. S. C. TO GRAND JURY. During the .year 1906 the schools of the county were in session for six months. The spring term opened the first Mortday in January and continued for four months, closing in April; the fall term began on October 29th, and continued for two months, closing the Friday before Christmas. During the year 78 per cent. of the white children of school age and 67 per cent. of the colored children of school age entered the public schools, Gnd of those that entered the public schools, the percentage of attendance was 59 'per cent. of the whites and 44 per cent. of the colored. There were thirty-three white schools and twenty-four colored schools operated in the county during the year, and in these schools forty-three white teachers and twenty-seven colored teachers were employed. The board of education has divided the county into school districts, in accordance with the law passed by the last Legislature, and maps showing these districts have been made and are on file, as the law directs. The board of education proposes to have these maps published at an early date, so that the people of the county may know definitely where the lines of the various districts run. . It was the purpose of the board of education to submit to the people of the entire county the question of levying a small Shiloh Schoolhoute-Old Euildin~, Lowndes County, Ga New Building-Shiloh Schoolhouse, Lowndes County, Ga. 113 local tax to supplement the public fund received from the State,. the State fund not being sufficient to maintain the schools on: an absolutely free basis; but; after circulating petitions for this purpose, it developed that some of the school districts wanted longer terms than others, and, for that reason, they preferred: to vote on the question of local tax by districts, and several of the school districts are now preparing to have an election for this purpose. Some of them intend having nine months public term. The board of education is offering every inducement possible to get the people to improve the condition of their schoolhouses and is offering to pay one-half the cost of the building if the people pay the other half, provided the house does not cost more than $500 and is built in accordance with plans furnished by the board of education, and provided the title to the land on which the house is built is vested in the board of education. Under this plan five houses have been built this year, and threeor four others have been ceiled and put in firstclass condition. Almost all of these have been furnished with patent desks. The people in the Dasher, Naylor and Lake Park districts have taken hold of this proposition, and nearly all of the houses in these districts are in good condition. The people in the other districts of the county have not seemed quite so much interested, and very few houses have been built in theseother districts. In the Hahira district, however, the people of the Shiloh school have built a seven-room, two-story house, costing about $2,500. The board of education gave $700 on this building, and the title to the building and four acres of land are vested in the board of education. The board of education proposes to spend all of the money arising from the hire of convicts on schoolhouses until all of the houses of the county are put in first-class condition and are furnished with patent desks and other needed supplies. There is now a good surplus on hand from this convict fund, and the board of education is very anxious for the people to take advantage of this opportunity to build good houses where they are needed. In the meantime, the surplus enables us to pay the teachers promptly without the necessity of borrowing money. This has been one of the very best years in the history of education in Lowndes county, and I believe that we can boast of as fine corps of teachers as any county in the State. If the people in all the districts would levy a small local tax, under 8 sc 114 .j. the new law, it would not be long before the country schools would compare favorably with the city schools; and it would not be necessary for any of our people to leave their farms 2nd go to the cities in order to educate their children. I submit herewith all of my books and vouchers and such financial statement as will enable you to see how the money JOT the support of the public schools has been expended. , Any suggestion or recommendations made by you will be 2ppreciated by me and the board of education. MADISON COUNTY. B. N. White, County School Commissioner. REpOR'I' 01" C. S. C. 'I'O GRAND JURY. There are thirteen white and one colored school which ran ~.eight to nine months. Four of these were in incorporated . towns and nine were strictly rural schools. These long-term 'schools are the only ones that seem to work up any enthusiasm and do any permanent good. The average attendance in the short-term or five-months school, is not so good now during the months of July and August as it was twenty years ago July I to August 2, 1907. T. J. WOOFTER> SUPERINTENDENT. The University Summer School at its last session enrolled 300 teachers, and the work done was of the most substantial kind. The first sessions of the Summer School were looked upon rather as mere institutes, and were therefore attended by many teachers for a few days. The total enrollment of the school has been decreasing, but the number coming for the entire session has been gradually increasing. This has made the work more substantial. Last session the spirit of work and study in the school was admirable. Beginning with the session for this summer the work has been so planned that a progressive course of four or more years may be taken. There are every year in Georgia from 1,000 to 1,500 teachers who begin teaching without any professional preparation. The Summer School plans to reach many of these and help them to prepare professionally. This gives it a great work to do, and it will help greatly to professionalize the teaching in rural and in high schools. Courses are offered for high school teachers, rural school teachers, and teachers who would introduce agriculture, nature study, domestic science, manual training, or other modern educational work. As long as teachers' salaries are so meager, the Summer School must continue to be the chief agency for reaching many teachers with special training and improved scholarship. STATE NORMAL SCHOOL. H OtT. W. B. Merritt> S. S. C.> Atlanta> Ga: DEAR SIR: I have the honor to submit to you a report of the State Normal School for the thirteenth annual session, dosing May 27, 1907. Students registered for the year, 456; pupils in Muscogee Practice School, I 12; total registration, 568. Teachers in faculty, 29; teachers and officers, 40; counties represented by students, 99; students holding diplomas fl'Om other schools, 124; students holding first-grade licenses, 45; second-grade 207 licenses, 63; third-grade licenses, 40; students having experi- ence in teaching, 166; students who have earned the money they spend here, 186. The parentage of our student-body is as follows: Farmers, 269; professional men, 43; county and city officials, 13; mis- cellaneous, 74. , Total registration since founding of the school, 6,496. Total graduates to date, 336. Teachers called for by letter for the year closing June I, 1907, 140. These letters offer salaries all the way from $40 a month to $1,50 a year. Nearly half of these are calls for men who are graduates of the school, and the salaries are from $60 to $125 per month. \Ve could have put into good positions this year twenty times the 1).umber of men we are graduating. More and more the public wants men who have had the training of this school. Alumni-ce Bulletin-\Ve shall be sending you shortly a re- port giving a brief of information concerning every one of our 336 graduates. A glance at this bulletin will show you that the school is doing exactly what it was established to do. These graduates are a noble body of young people, and they are serving, the State with usefulness, and in many instances with distinction. The Growth of the School-The school has grown from eight teachers in the faculty to twenty-nine teachers. That is to say, the faculty has more than trebled in the last five years, during which time the State has given us an increase in main- tenance fund of only $2,50. The school has grown much be- yond the support it has heretofore received from the State. 'vVe shall be obliged 'to have at least $30,000 hereafter. The school started with one building-the old Rock College-which served as schoolroom, dormitory, kitchen, dining-hall and president's cottage. There are now three brick buildings used as dormitories, three used for class-room purposes, and one de- voted to kitchen and dining-room uses. These buildings are not yet properly or fully equipped, and two of them must be heated with steam heat another year. The school ought never to go through another session with- out an infirmary and a trained nurse. We have had a death in the student-body this year-the first in thirteen years among nearly 6,500 students. But our crowded dormitories, the heavy draft upon the time and energies of our matrons, leav:es the sick boy or girl with entirely too little attention. We must have in this school an official whose duty it is to look after 208 the comfort and health and outdoor exercise of the well, and the quiet and diet of the sick. A Successful Year-The classes and the teachers have this year done the best work in the history of the school. Fewer students in every class have failed in subjects, and a smaller percentum than ever will fail of promotion at the end of the session. The increasing public confidence in the school is shown in the call on us for teachers, and we think that the good work of our graduates has had more to do with this than perhaps any other one thing. I may add that the full register of our student-body appears in the general university cata- logue, and also in our special bulletin, both of which will reach you shortly. Respectfully submitted. E. C. BRANSON. GEORGIA NORMAL AND INDUSTRIAL COLLEGE. MILLEDGEVILLE, GA. Han. W. B. Merritt, State School Commissioner, Atlanta, Ga. DEAR SIR: In response to your letter, I take pleasure in pre- senting the following report of the Georgia Normal and Industrial College for the past year, the same being the sixteenth annual session of the institution: ATTENDANCE. During the past year we have enrolled students from 106 counties, the total number of students being 426. (This does not include the younger students in the Practice School.) The attendance this year is the largest in the history of the institution. Besides this, 179 young ladies have been refused admission to the college because of a lack of room in the college dormitories. COST 01" ATTENDANCE. The entire cost of attendance in the institution for the full session of nine months, including living expenses in the dormitories, matriculation fee, books and stationery, is about $120. This is a liberal estimate. Tuition is free to all Georgia students. 209 THE NEW INDUSTRIAL BUILDING. The Chappell Industrial Building was completed on May 7, 1907. A delay was occasioned by the failure of the contractors, but finally the work was vigorously pushed to completion under the direction of the board of directors. This structure is beautiful in architecture, and admirably adapted to the needs of the institution. The entire second floor of the building is devoted to the Household Arts and Sciences (including Sewing, Millinery, Dressmaking, Cooking, etc.). It is believed that the advantages offered in this department will not be surpassed in the South. "One of the prime aims of the college has been to fit the young women of Georgia for proper homemaking by giving them a careful and thot'ough course of instruction in such branches as Cooking, Household Economics, Home Sanitation, Sewing, Dressmaking, etc. It has been exceedingly gratifying to observe that these studies, which make for domestic utility, have become each succeeding year more and more popular with the students, and recently there has perhaps been more growth and progress in this direction than in any other department of the college." THE NEW DORMITORY. At the last session of the Legislature, $27,500 was appropriated for a college dormitory. The building is now in course of construction, and will be completed during the fall. The building is beautiful in design, and when finished will be one of the most attractive college dormitories in the State. PURPOSE OF THE COLLEGE. The object of the State in establishing and supporting this school is to provide for the young women of Georgia an insti- tution in which they may get such special instruction and train- ing as will prepare them to earn their own living by the voca- tion of teaching, or by those industrial and fine arts that are suitable for women to pursue. Subsidiary to these two main objects the institution also teaches those branches of learning that constitute a general good education. It furthermore in- structs and trains its pupils in those household arts that are essential to the complete education of every woman, whatever her calling in life may be, or in whatever sphere of society she may move. . , 1~ 14 se 21Q In other words, the purpose of the college is to prepare Georgia girls: I. To do intelligent work as teachers, according to the best methods known to modern pedagogics. 2. To earn their own livelihood by the practice of some one or other of those industrial arts suitable for women to follow. 3. To earn their own livelihood as instructors in music or in fine arts. 4. To exert an uplifting and refining influence on family and society by means of a cultured intellect, which can only be obtained by a systematic education in the higher branches of learning. 5. To be skillful and expert in those domestic arts that lie at the foundation of all successful housekeeping and home-making. To accomplish these several educational purposes, the courses of study pursued in the school are divided, in a general way, into the principal departments, namely: I. The Normal Department. 2. The Collegiate Department. 3. The Industrial Department. 4. The Music and Fine Arts Department. NORMAL DEPARTMENT. General Plan. The purpose of this department is to prepare young women for the business of teaching. In the proper preparation of the teacher there are three principal elements, namely: I. Broad and accurate scholarship. 2. Professional knowledge. 3. Skill in the practice of teaching. The first of these requisites, namely, broad and accurate scholarship, this College undertakes to give in the course of collegiate study as stated in detail in separate catalogue. The second requisite, namely, professional knowledge, it undertakes to give in the study of Psychology and Pedagogy, in the Junior and Senior classes, as stated in the catalogue of the College. The third requisite, namely, skill in the practice of teaching, it undertakes to give by a thorough course of practical training in teaching the children of the various grades in the Model School and by instruction in methods of teaching. 211 Course of Study. The course of study includes all of the studies of the Collegiate Department, except that in the Junior year Chemistry isomitted and in the Senior year either Trigonometry or Latin is elected, the other omitted. In the place of these omissions a second year of Free-hand drawing and the professional courses as outlined below are required. COLLEGIATE DEpARTMENT. The object of the Collegiate Department is twofold: 1. To give to those young women who wish to prepare themselves for the vocation of teaching that broad, liberal and accurate scholarship which is requisite to the education of every teacher. 2. To give those young women who have the time, taste and capacity for it, that high education that develops a cultivated womanhood. No attempt is made to advance the standard of learning bey-ond what is already established in leading Southern female colleges, but in thoroughness and accuracy it is believed the work of this school is superior to anything yet done in any higher female educational institution in Georgia. INDUSTRIAL DEpARTMENT. This department includes: I. The Business Course. 2. The Course in Sewing and Dressmaking. 3. The Course in Millinery. 4. The Course in Industrial Art. S. The Course in Domestic Science. The Business Course embraces the thorough practical teach- ing of stenography, typewriting, bookkeeping, business forms ;l11d customs. .- The Course in Sewing and Dressmaking includes instruction in plain or domestic sewing, cutting and fitting, finished dress- making, and a normal course in dressmaking. The Course in Millinery teaches the art of covering and trimming hats of all kinds for girls and women. The Industrial Art Course includes free-hand drawing-, color-study, design, modeling in clay, instrumental drawing, basketry, etc. 212 DEPARTMENT OF DOMESTIC SCIENCE. Character and Aitns of the VVork. That group of subjects which bears upon the life and administration of the house is coming into great prominence in educational work, and is known variously as household science, IJousehold economics, science of the home and domestic science. As the last named is the one generally used in schools which teach those subjects, it is adopted here for the sake of convenience. The name is not as formidable as it sounds, and the work itself is simply an attempt to organize and formulate the best and fullest knowledge that can be obtained, both from investigation and experience, concerning the wise and economic administration of the home. It includes some knowledge of Chemistry and Physics as applied to the operations of the household, of Physiology and Hygiene with special reference to the food question, household economics, home sanitation, sewing and some instruction in home nursing and emergencies. It aims to put this systematized kmwledge of easier, better and more healthful conditions of living within the reach of many women who "must be home-makers, instead of leaving it as heretofore in the hands of the few who are especially empowered for this work by reason of unusual aptitude or favorable opportunities. It does not claim to take entirely the place of experience, but it does make the gaining of that experiertce a :nuch easier and happier process for all concerned. In teaching the principles underlying healthful cooking and sanitan ; living, domestic science is lifting home-making out of the realm of drudgery, and making it intelligent, attractive and effectin:. Equipment for the Work. The Cooking School proper, with its new and fine equipment, will be utilized to the utmost in carrying on the different lines of instruction in Domestic Science. It occupies a neat frame building, and consists of a large kitchen and diningroom, both of which are well equipped for the work they are to do. DEpARTMENT OFMUSIC. The Georgia Normal and Industrial College offers splendid crclvantages in this department of female accomplishments. Only able teachers, those well versed in the best conservatory methods, are employed, and the course of instruction and train- 2Vl ing is thorough and complete. The wants and capacities of different pupils are carefully considered, and exercises for technique and' pieces for esthetic culture selected accordingly. Numercus opportunities are given for those auxiliaries, almost as essential as good instruction, namely, hearing good music, playing before audiences. The music-:rooms are of convenient size, well arranged, and are furnished with good instruments. TERMS OF ADMISSION. To be eligible to admission to the college a girl must be at least fifteen years old. She must be of good moral character and in sound physical health. Persons desiring to enter the college should write to the President at Milledgeville for a form of application. This paper must be carefully filled out and signed by the applicant and mailed back to the President. Unless some reason appears to the contrary, he will in due time send to the applicant a certificate of admission to the college and assignment to a place in the dormitory. Applicants are examined for class admission after they reach Milledgeville. SUMMARY OF CHARGES FOR THE ENTIRE SESSION OF NINE MONTHS. , Matriculation Fee $10 00 Board (including fuel, lights and laundry), about. . .. 94 50 Tuition Fee (charged only to students from other States than Georgia) 40 00 UNIFORM DRESS. Pupils are required to wear a uniform dress on all occasions while in attendance on the college. The several suits devised for this purpose, while very inexpensive, are exceedingly pretty and becoming. - Full instructions in regard to the several suits, with illustrative cuts, are given in the pamphlet issued by the College. COLLEGE CATALOGUE. For catalogue containing full p'atticulars concerning the College, address M. M. Parks, President, Milledgeville, Ga. Respectfully yours, M. M. PARKS, President. 214 GEORGIA SCHOOL FOR THE DEAF. CAVE SPRING) GA. REPORT OF THE PRINCIPAL. To the Board of Trustees of the Georgia School for the Deaf. GENTLEMEN: Not knowing that a change had been made in the State's fiscal year, the last report was made as usual,