School and Community Summer 2024

Pupils’ Reading Circle T he books added to the Pupils’ Reading Circle list this year are an admirable group and bring up the total to one hundred volumes. All but one are bound in cloth and are as substantial as necessary. Send for the complete descriptive circular. These books are not handled for profit but on a co-operative basis. The Board has no need of money beyond the necessities in the way of expense. Never before have books been offered so cheaply. Two purposes moved the Board to add the supplementary books: a wise choice and cheapness because of the amount of business. Children in elementary schools can not use profitably unabridged dictionaries or the common encyclopedias. Moreover, they cost too much for the average school board. Children in the 6th, 7th and 8th grades should be well supplied with the Secondary School dictionaries and taught to use them. These books are recommended by the State Course of Study and are all the dictionaries needed. Smaller and cheaper ones than these do not give such a meaning as to be of use. One city superintendent plans ordering 36 of these from the Board if he finds that the prices are right. Listed $1.50. R. C. price $1.27. There is only one low priced encyclopedia for children. This is the book recommended by the State Course of Study and by several other states. All libraries supply it for the children. The Board has arranged to furnish it to schools at a lower price than it can be bought anywhere else. There are five volumes of it, but each is complete in itself and is sold separately. One city superintendent said as soon as he saw the books that he wanted some for his schools. List S3 per-volume. R. C. price $1.92. Cromwell’s Agriculture and Life should be on the desk of every teacher, rural or town. Children in the 6th, 7th and 8th grades will read it with delight and their parents will be only too glad to get hold of it. The Board’s arrangement puts it in your hands at a very low price. List price $1.50. R. C. price $1.00. Guerber’s Story of the Great Republic is a too well known supplementary United States history reader to need any special mention here. It is recommended by the State Course of Study. The Board has a small number of Anne of Green Gables left and offers them very cheap to close them out. This is a delightful stor and well suited for a Christmas present. This is the regular $1.25 edition and cost the Board 81 cents f. D. b. New York. They will go at 50 cents while they last. 1915

1918

The Impending School Teacher Famine BY MARK BURROWS, KIRKSVILLE N ot only the state of Missouri, but the whole United States is facing a famine of public school teachers.

have found the rewards on the farm much greater with corn at $1.50 per bushel and wheat at more than $2 and other products in like proportion. A number of the women have found poultry raising and similar projects offered a greater financial return than teaching. In the towns corporations and other business agencies are making every effort to get able men and women. The financial advantages of a business career are stressed in a way that cannot be answered by those who would urge more to enter the teaching profession. A fourth cause, which is already making itself felt acutely, and which will be much worse by next September is the influence of the Great War. Within the last few weeks in Missouri dozens of young men are resigning because of the draft. Many women are also resigning to enter government service as stenographers or clerks. To illustrate by nearby towns to this normal school: Unionville has lost the superintendent, high school principal and manual training teacher in the high school; Kirksville has lost the high school principal; Milan, the superintendent and another teacher; Atlanta, Worthington, Clifton Hill and a number of others have lost one or more men. A woman teacher at Atlanta leaves a $65 per month position for a government clerkship at $1100; another woman, a commercial teacher at $90 at Hannibal, leaves for a $1200 government place, and so on. A fifth cause of the shortage in teachers is the fact that not enough is made of the fact that a large part of the rewards in the teaching profession come in other ways than by a direct salary return. We do not make enough of the inspiring and significant side of teaching. Not only are teachers makers of men, but they are determining the future policies of nations.President Woodrow Wilson is a teacher; so is his predecessor who is now a professor in Yale. Many other illustrations and a given. A large share of the successful men of every occupation have had a part of their foundation for success in teaching. All must make some sacrifices because of the unsettled conditions caused by the war, but teachers should not be called upon to make more than their share. And we cannot afford to sacrifice the children. They are the “seed corn” for a happy, progressive, and powerful nation of tomorrow.

The schools of the country are already suffering from a shortage of teachers. The writer for several years has been a member of the Committee on Recommendations for the Kirksville Normal School, and has thereby come into close touch with the question of teacher demand and supply. For the last two or three years it has been increasingly difficult to supply the demand for teachers. This year the situation has become acute, and many places have gone unsupplied. The present draft has lately called out of the profession many of the men, and there are but few to take their places. Five Causes of the Shortage of Teachers. The first cause of the shortage is in the low salaries offered. They do not bear comparison with other professions and occupations. In Rockford, Ills, a recent survey of occupations showed that the salaries of elementary teachers ranked just below maid service and just above washing by the day. In almost any town in Missouri the salary offered is less than obtained by a policeman or a janitor. In the rural schools many teachers receive less than farm hands. A recent report from the State Board of Agriculture shows that the daily income of farm hands for a year is at the rate of $1.44 per day. On the same basis that of a rural teacher is 92 cents per day. A second cause is the increasing educational requirements for certification. A high school teacher is expected to have finished a four year collegiate course, commonly known in the normal schools as the 120 hour diploma with the degree of B. S. in Education. This presupposes a time investment of four years, and a money outlay of not less than $1,200. An elementary school teacher cannot obtain, from now on, even a second or first grade county certificate with less educational qualifications than that offered in a standard four year high school course. A much less outlay of time and money fits young people for other occupations where the financial rewards are greater. The result is that in proportion to the demand a much smaller number are preparing for teaching. A third cause of the shortage in teacher supply is the competition of business. Here in Missouri a good many of the young men

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