Better Schoolhouses 107 



sion for the truant. Truant officers, who may be re- 

 quired to serve only part time and who may receive 

 pay for actual services, are set over specified dis- 

 tricts and required to bring in all truant school 

 children. Although this compulsory attendance law 

 has been in force only a few years, reports show an 

 almost unanimous belief in its effectiveness. The 

 reader will understand the justification of such a 

 law to be this; namely, the inherent right of the 

 child to be educated whether he may appreciate such 

 right or advantage or not, and the implied right of the 

 community to have his best service as a well-educated 

 member of society. The effects upon crime and 

 criminality of the neglect of the education of the 

 young have been so thoroughly discussed of late as 

 to require no restatement here. 



BETTER SCHOOLHOUSES AND EQUIPMENT 



A survey of the entire country from one side to 

 another reveals a deplorable state of affairs in respect 

 to the conditions of the typical rural schoolhouse. 

 In thousands of cases, there is nothing more than a 

 dingy, little, old one-room building, scarcely suitable 

 as a place wherein to shelter chickens or pigs, and 

 with nothing in the surroundings to suggest or even 

 hint at a place where young minds are taught how to 

 aim at the high things of life. Now, these crude 

 structures were once a necessity. In pioneer days 

 the little, old box schoolhouse, or even the sod 



