152 SEVENTH REPORT. 



THE PREPARATION OF TEACHERS FOR THE RURAL COMMON SCHOOLS. 



By Ernest Burnham. 



The greatest service at the least cost, which is largely determined by organization, 

 is a fundamental school problem just as it is a fundamental problem in the management 

 of any industry or institution. Another fundamental question has been clearly defined 

 by the late Dr. B. A. Hinsdale, one of the greatest American students of education, in 

 these words: "The provision of good teachers will be the vital educational question of 

 the twentieth century as it has been of the nineteenth century." 



The question of good teachers, for country schools repeatedly recurs in Grange, Fanner's 

 Club and Farmer's Institute programs and in general public and press discussions. The 

 discussion of this problem is increasing and it will continue to do so until the American 

 instinct for doing justice is given full expression in the provision of at least as many trained 

 teachers for country children as are provided for any other children. 



When it is knowTi that at present 75 per cent of the teachers in graded schools in the 

 villages and cities of this state have had some professional training by the state, while less 

 than 2 per cent of the teachers in the country schools have had such training, the fact is 

 patent to all that the campaign for professionally trained teachers for rural schools is 

 hardly begun. 



Before such a campaign can proceed there must be developed a sufficient demand, on 

 the part of the patrons and supporters of country schools, for trained teachers. A suffi- 

 cient demand will induce an increasing number of ambitious and worthy young people to 

 seek that particular kind of training which will prepare them for successful work in coun- 

 try schools. Such a demand has been created in recent years, by farmer's institutes and 

 other agencies, in many districts in various parts of Michigan; in fact this new demand has 

 outrun the supply and as a result, a study of the whole question of trained teachers is 

 being made. 



The brief study of this question here attempted is based upon the confident belief that 

 all honest, patriotic citizens, whether they happen to live in the city or in the country, 

 when they know the facts, will unite in the demand that our proud American boast of 

 equal rights to all and special privileges to none be made as true to children as to older 

 people. Public sentiment, the drawn sword of Justice in this country, will enforce the 

 demand for trained teachers for all boys and girls. 



A trained teacher is: First, one who has fullness and accuracy of knowledge in the 

 subjects which are to be taught and who is determined to become intimately familiar 

 with all the sources at his command to which he may go or send for the increase of his 

 knowledge and the proof of its accuracy; and secondly, he is one who by patient teaching 

 under competent criticism has been shorn of careless, haphazzard, slovenly, weak and 

 wasteful methods and has by observation, instruction and practice acquired efficient, 

 time-saving methods. Thirdly, a trained teacher is a manly man or a womanly woman 

 who, by association with nature and humanity through books and by personal contact, 

 has grown into a compelling soul-power sufficient to interpret, to cultivate, to >'ivify, to in- 

 dividualize, to inspire in children and youth the best ideals of life in general and of the 

 humanity and nature about them in particular; to banish laziness and self-satisfying 

 stagnation by giving the conscience a better grip on the will. 



Progress in the training of teachers for country schools must find its starting point in 

 existing conditions. There must be systematic study of these conditions. The facts 

 which underlie the present status of the matter must be discovered, correlated and proved. 

 This is too vital a cjuestion to find a basis for action in mere theory or speculative opinion. 

 The necessary facts may be known and only in so far as they are known can there be any 

 safe basis for the reasonably permanent, constructive work which the spirit of the times 

 demands. This work is sure to be done because the conditions are being provided which 

 insure to this great work the necessary able, trained, experience-proven constructive 

 leadership. 



Teacher training has been carried on successfully at state expense in Michigan for more 

 than fifty years and the agricultural population has cheerfully borne its 5 . 13 or more of 

 the taxation which has been necessary for the support of normal schools, without ever de- 

 manding with sufficient unanimity and emphasis that these schools try at least to solve 

 the problem of doing equal justice to both urban and rural population. 



It has evidently been thought by those in authority that the rural districts did not want 

 tra/ned teachers, and that even if they did they could not afford to have them. This 



