PROBLEMS OF RURAL SCHOOLS 485 



genial companions, were not recompensed thereby. Moreover, the large 

 number of classes and subjects imposed upon one teacher will always 

 forestall any attempts to make the work equal to that of the city schools, 

 or to introduce a course of study especially adapted to the needs of the 

 country. Expert supervision can not be supplied because the many 

 schools, long distances apart, make the attendant expense prohibitive. 



In refutation of the above hopeless outlook for any improvement of 

 the one-room district school the optimist points proudly to one here and 

 there, modern in every respect, as an example of what may be accom- 

 plished anywhere. However, he forgets that these few schools were made 

 excellent through incidental or local enthusiasm and support. He for- 

 gets, or he does not know, that there are thousands of one-teacher schools 

 which can not be so reached. For example, in 1907 Texas had 2,668 

 one-teacher schools, in 1909 Kansas had 7,756, and Nebraska over 4,000. 

 Mississippi reports 75 per cent of her schools to be of this type at the 

 present time. 



Unconsciously a solution of the difficulty began early in Massachu- 

 setts along the lines that are being consciously pushed to-day. Parents 

 began sending their children from their own districts to larger and bett-jr 

 schools. This led to the abandonment of some and the joining of other 

 districts in order to have good schools nearer home. But natural evolu- 

 tion proved too slow a process, so we find as early as 1869 that the legis- 

 lature enacted a law empowering a town to raise money by taxation for 

 the transportation of children to larger schools. Thus consolidation for 

 the betterment of rural schools began. Later the state passed a law 

 extending the minimum length of the school year to thirty-two weeks, a 

 measure which materially helped to close small schools and to promote 

 the growth of larger ones. At the present time consolidated schools are 

 found in nearly every county of the state. By 1897 all the New Eng- 

 land states had adopted laws similar to those of Massachusetts. 



Since that time some form of consolidation has been tried in about 

 thirty-four states. A 1910 bulletin, by G. W. Knorr, special field agent 

 for the Bureau of Statistics, states that 95 per cent of the school 

 patrons trying consolidation are enthusiastic in its praises and not one 

 abandonment of a completely consolidated school was found among those 

 investigated. It is as successful in Idaho, Vermont or Florida as in 

 the prairie states of Indiana and Illinois. Superintendents of states 

 where consolidation has not been tried express themselves as believing 

 that it ought to be adopted. The large number of official bulletins on 

 rural schools attest to betterment along the following lines : building and 

 equipment, grading and course of study, length of term, attendance, 

 interest on the part of pupils and patrons, teachers, salaries, supervision 

 and administration. The growth of the local high school and larger 

 high school attendance is marked. The advantage which ought to make 



