WHAT HAS BEEN DONE 



Teachers' Cottages in Seminole County, Oklahoma 



buildings. The cottages are neat and homelike, although small. The 

 superintendent states that he has had the pleasure of taking dinner with 

 each of these teachers when visiting the schools. In one the home is 

 furnished by the teacher and his family, in the other the home is fur- 

 nished by the janitor and the teacher boards with his family. 



"Only one district in this county, McCurtain, owns a house for its 

 teachers to live in. This cottage is rented by the school board to the 

 teacher of the district. We are just introducing this plan hence do not 

 know how successfully it will work. The problem of suitable boarding 

 places for teachers in this new county is a serious one. In some instances 

 teachers have given up their schools on account of not being able to 

 obtain suitable accommodations in the district. It is our plan to induce 

 the districts in this county to purchase from five to ten acres of land, 

 which is now very cheap, near their school sites and to erect thereon 

 cottages for their teachers to live in, the plot of ground of five or ten 

 acres to be used for experimental and demonstration work. In this way 

 it is believed teachers can be induced to remain for a number of years 

 in their positions and thus become leaders in the rural life of their re- 

 spective communities. Living on the experimental farm adjacent to the 

 school premises, they will be able to care for the district's school prop- 

 erty, and attend to the giving out of library books. We believe this plan, 

 if properly carried out, will result in filling our schools with more mature 

 teachers, perhaps married people, who wish to remain in the community 

 and thus become identified with the rural life in their respective com- 

 munities." (U. S. Bureau of Education.) 



Page Forty-five 



