HOW IT SHOULD BE BUILT 



enough, not only to seat comfortably all the pupils of the 

 school, but also to serve as a meeting place for the people of 

 the district. For the principal's home a house should be built 

 on the school grounds. This house should not be expensive, but 

 neat and attractive, a model for the community, such a house 

 as any thrifty farmer with good taste might hope to build or 

 have built for himself. And as a part of the equipment of 

 the school there should be a small farm, from 4 to 5 acres if in 

 a village or densely populated community, and from 25 to 50 

 acres if in the open country. The principal of the school 

 should be required to live in the principal's home, keep it as 

 a model home for the community and cultivate the farm as a 

 model farm, with garden, orchard, poultry yard, dairy, and 

 whatever else should be found on a well-conducted, well-tilled 

 farm in that community. He should put himself into close 

 contact with the agricultural college and agricultural experi- 

 ment station of his State, the departments of agriculture of 

 State and Nation, farm demonstration agents, and other simi- 

 lar agencies, and it should be made their duty to help him in 

 every way possible. The use of the house and the products 

 of the farm should be given the principal as a part of his 

 salary in addition to the salary now paid in money. After a 

 satisfactory trial of a year or two, a contract should be made 

 with the principal for life or good behavior, or at least for a 

 long term of years. 



In this way it would be possible to get and keep in the 

 schools men of first-class ability, competent to teach children 

 and to become leaders in their communities. The principal 

 of a country school should know country life. A large part 

 of country life has to do with the cultivation and care of the 

 farm. The best test here, as elsewhere, is the ability to do. 

 The principal of a country school in a farming community 

 should be able to cultivate and care for a small farm better, 

 or at least as well, as any other man in the community. It 

 may be true that 'those who can, do; and those who can't, teach,' 

 but it should not be so. It must not be so if the teacher is to 

 do the work and have the influence in the community that he 

 should." 



HOW IT SHOULD BE BUILT. 



The teacher's cottage will of necessity be within the boundaries 

 of the tract of land assigned for 'the school house, or on a separate 

 lot near by. The building site should be chosen so as to give the 

 cottage as good a setting and outlook as possible. It should contain 

 an acre or more to furnish room for a garden patch, a chicken house, 

 a cow or horse stable, and perhaps also room for some demonstra- 

 tion work where elementary instruction in agriculture is intro- 

 duced in the country schools. Such courses will increase in the 

 future, and it will be well to provide for them in selecting the site 

 and determining its size. 



The cottage should be of two or more rooms, depending upon 

 the ability of the district to build, or the possibility of combining 

 with another district for a union school with one or more teachers. 

 The cottage should be warmly and substantially built, for in the 



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