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more practical education in rural communities. The consolidated rural school, where 

 the expense can he borne jointly by the locality and the State, thus makes it possi- 

 ble to introduce more of tlie studies in agriculture and home making. It can not be 

 hoped that a suthcient nund)er f)f those who teach in the isolated rural schools will 

 be trained to teach these practical sul)jects. Where six or eiglit schools are consoli- 

 dated into one, only one teacher is needed who knows how to teach of the farm and 

 one of the home making. 



The supply of teachers so trained for even this small num])er of schools will be 

 short, and the combined efforts of all schools which teach agriculture in long courses, 

 in short courses, and in special teachers' courses will be re(]uired to furnish such 

 teachers in response to a normal and healthy growth of the consolidated movement. 



The opportunity to serve his community wliich is offered to the principal of a 

 consolidated rural school organized as above should not be underestimated. The 

 tactful teacher who can unite all the available sources and use to advantage all the 

 facilities of the school and of the farm conununity, and who can be a leader in the 

 industrial thought and plans of the community, can do much to establish country 

 life on a t)etter basis. The teacher who thus has the opportunity to lead in the 

 thought relating to the making of country homes also should not underestimate her 

 opportunities. The higher standards of" farming and of country living once estab- 

 lished will be kept alive by custom. xModern advancement needs this better agency 

 to bring more rapidly to the farm and the farm home the results of the world's 

 genius. 



Districts with lands not sufficiently productive to support consolidated rural schools 

 will be greatly benefited by consolidation where consolidation is practicable. Not 

 only will the centralized school serve as a place in which methods of teaching rural 

 industrv will be so worked out that much of this work can be placed in the smaller 

 rural school, but these larger schools with longer and more complete courses of study 

 will do nmch toward sup]ilying teachers so trained that they can successfully teach 

 the special as well as the general subjects in the smaller schools. 



Those who are so situated that they can experiment with instruction in rural 

 schools, who can devise new methods, and prepare and publish helps, have most 

 important opportunities. The successful elementary texts which may be sold in 

 hundreds of thousands or nnllions of numbers is a most important agency. The pio- 

 neer who may work out the basic plans for managing rural school gardens will have 

 the satisfaction of having done a most useful work. Those who make material 

 advancement in devising plans under which the rural school-teachers and the par- 

 ents can make the home duties a part of the school instruction will have done most 

 worthy service. Those who successfully arrange normal and secondary school 

 courses which combine education in general studies, in technical subjects, and in 

 normal training so as to provide a competent corps of teachers for rural schools, cen- 

 tralized and isolated, will have done the greatest service of all. If the next forty 

 years witness as great advancement as has been seen since the first agricultural col- 

 leges were started forty years ago, we shall have instruction in agriculture and home 

 economics ])laced on an even basis with education in any one of the three R's. Even 

 the mountaineers will have some knowledge of the soil, of the plants they grow, and 

 of the animals they use. They will have the three R's keys to knowledge, and will 

 share in the flood of treasured printed matter on all phases of life, including their 

 own environment. The mountain sides will yield them more bread and more meat, 

 and the mountain home will take on more of "the modern spirit and he supplied with 

 more of modern conveniences. The farms in the regions of rich soils will continue 

 to develop as they have developed in tlie jiast forty years, and American country life 

 will grow and keep apace with the better side of our city life. 



Our national and State governments have done much toward formulating and 

 directing country-life education. Funds from the larger pul)lic organizations can 

 have two functions. It can help to actually pay the cost, and it can be judiciously 

 handled so as to encourage the larger more local organization, as the county or the 

 local district, to supply more funds and to use it in more jjractical lines. 



The consolidated rural school movement is of i)rime importance in districts with 

 rich lands, because consolidation makes jiossible many other things, including the 

 enrichment of the soil, making larger the net profits per acre, and giving above all 

 this a broader civilization, better homes, and a Ijetter crop of young men and young 

 women to become managers of our farms and farm homes, with a small surplus to be 

 sent into city life. 



F. H. Hall, of Illinois. We have only one single instance of school consolidation 

 in the State of Illinois, and that was only brought about after many years of effort. 

 The county superintendent, of whom you have all heard, I am sure, Mr. Kern, went 



