Apeil 20, 1917] 



SCIENCE 



371 



county or rural — and in a majority of our 

 states the little democratic school district, 

 inherited in the early days from Massa- 

 chusetts, is the prevailing unit for the or- 

 ganization and administration of educa- 

 tion, and nearly everywhere these little 

 self-governing units are but loosely bound 

 together in the county and state educa- 

 tional organizations. With regard to or- 

 ganization we do not have a national school 

 system, and, aside from the assimilation of 

 the foreign-born, it falls far short of na- 

 tional scope in either conception or pur- 

 pose. Even our state educational systems 

 exist rather in a uniform school code and 

 in clerical and inspectional oversight than 

 in helpful state supervision, and too often 

 consist largely in the imposition of a gen- 

 eral state uniformity on communities in 

 unimportant matters, while neglecting the 

 larger concerns of a broad educational pol- 

 icy for intelligent future development. 



It is to the school district, then — rural, 

 township, city or county — that we go for 

 the ultimate source of educational organi- 

 zation and administration in this country. 

 Some of our states have twelve to fifteen 

 thousand such little units, actuated by no 

 common purpose or policy and devoid of 

 any proper conceptions as to the nature or 

 purpose of education in a modern state. 

 Over these, as represented by their popu- 

 larly-elected trustees, is a county school offi- 

 cial with statistical and clerical functions 

 but with little real power, and over the 

 county organization is a state educational 

 ofScial with similar limited powers. In a 

 few of the North-Central states we find that 

 the township has replaced the school dis- 

 trict, with the county over it ; while in the 

 New England states the districts have been 

 abolished in favor of the town, this in turn 

 being responsible to the state. In a few 

 other states, mostly southern, the county 

 has been made the administrative unit, 

 while in all the states we find the separate 



city school district, with more or less inde- 

 pendent powers in organization and admin- 

 istration. Let us leave the city aside for a 

 moment and examine the obstacles to edu- 

 cational progress as found in rural and 

 county educational organization. 



That rural education almost everywhere 

 is in need of a radical reorganization and 

 redirection is another commonplace state- 

 ment. Too frequently our rural schools at- 

 tain to but a small fraction of their pos- 

 sible efficiency and render but small serv- 

 ice in improving the conditions surround- 

 ing life on the farm. Too frequently their 

 management is shortsighted, their equip- 

 ment poor, their instruction ineffective, and 

 adequate supervision is too often entirely 

 lacking. That such schools contribute but 

 little to the improvement of rural life is 

 well known. The trouble lies chiefiy in 

 that the system of organization and man- 

 agement still followed is half a century be- 

 hind the times, and that, in consequence, 

 there is no opportunity for men and women 

 of adequate training and capable of real 

 leadership to make themselves effective in 

 the improvement of rural education and 

 the conditions surrounding rural life. 



The so-called district system, with its 

 large powers for local control, represents 

 democracy gone to seed, and it stands to- 

 day as the most serious obstacle in the way 

 of the improvement of rural education. 

 What is needed is larger and more flexible 

 units for the organization of instruction; 

 larger units for taxation, with a resulting 

 more general pooling of both the biirdens 

 and the advantages of education; and an 

 administrative organization which will 

 make possible a more rational administra- 

 tion of the education of those who live in 

 the rural districts and small villages of our 

 country. Eural educational progress will 

 be promoted in proportion as the school dis- 

 trict is abolished for larger units of or- 

 ganization and control. 



