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going to b placed partly upon your shoulders. Art you going to met tbm 

 or not? 



Women, we have something to work for that is worth while, and I wish 

 all of the organizations of women in our state could at once place in action 

 their combined strength in the greatest co-operative movement ever started 

 in our state the movement for better rural schools, through consolidation! 



The things you will be working for are given in this summary of 

 advantages of consolidation by one of our state superintendents of schools, 

 who has had much experience in the field. I want you to let me read these 

 to you and let them "soak in" if I may use such an expression so you 

 will see how worth while they are to work for: 



1. Increases the attendance. 



2. Makes the attendance more regular. 



3. Increases the enrollment. 



4. Keeps the older pupils in school longer. 



5. Provides hierh school privileges at one-third the cost. 



6. Makes possible the securing of better trained teachers. 



7. Results in higher salaries for better trained teachers. 



8. Makes possible more and better grade work. 



9. Improves industrial conditions in the county. 



10. Enriches the civic-social life activities. 



11. Conserves more largely the health and morals of the children. 



12. Increases the number of eighth-grade completions. 



13. Provides adequate supervision. 



14. Reduces truancy and tardiness. 



15. Develops better school spirit. 



16. Gives more time for recitations. 



17. Increases the value of real estate. 



18. Produces greater pride and interest in country life. 



19. Prevents the drift to the larger towns and cities. 



20. Brings more and better equipped buildings. 



21. Eliminates the small, weak school. 



22. Creates a school of greater worth, dignity and usefulness. 



23. Makes possible a more economical school. 



24. Provides equal educational opportunities. 



25. Gives much greater and better results in every way. 



Recently I heard a man of position and recognized intellect say: "There 

 is too much false agitation against the little red school house. I received 

 some of my education there. It was good enough for me, and it Is still 

 good enough for the boys and girls." He may talk it, but the forces of 

 education and progress in every state are beginning to be arrayed against 

 it, and it must go. [Applause.] 



I am going to close with the indictment against it given in a recent 

 speech by President Harding. He says: "We have just awakened to the 

 fact that the education of the American child has fallen below the standard 

 necessary for the protection of our future. We have to face the fact that 

 our teachers are underpaid; that in physical training, in the teaching of 

 American civil government and American history, in the principles of 

 Americanism and Americanization we have been deplorably delinquent. 

 But nowhere is there more cause for alarm than in the fact that the rural 

 school term is far too short, and that four-fifths of the rural schools are 

 one-teacher schools, resulting in hasty and careless teaching; and that the 

 opportunity for country boys and girls to have high school education is all 

 too slight. We owe it to the childhood of the nation, and to the childhood 

 of the agricultural districts of our land, to place at its disposal the utmost 

 in educational facilities." 



Women, are we going to help? Let's sacrifice some of our time and 

 some of the things we can do without, and go back to our homes and 

 look over our community conditions and see if we are not responsible 

 for some of them because we are and let's pray as we have never prayed 

 before for God to give us strength and courage and power to go out into 



