46 Report of the President 



II. REPORTS OF THE DEPARTMENTS 



PUBLIC EDUCATION 

 DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC EDUCATION 



George H. Sherwood, Curator 



In reviewing the activities of the Department of Public 



Education for the year 19 14, interest centers in the plans pro- 



_ . posed for the extension of Museum 



Museum Extension f 



_ , , instruction to the public schools. 



to the Schools _ u . r , 



Ihese plans include three features, 



namely, the establishment of local lecture centers, the inaug- 

 uration of a system of loaning slides to teachers and the 

 opening of a branch teaching museum in the Washington 

 Irving High School. 



For more than ten years the department has been giving 



for the pupils of the public schools series of illustrated lec- 



_ , _ tures or talks especially designed to 



Proposed Local . . r 



r supplement the class-room work in geog- 



Lecture Centers , . . , . 



raphy, history and natural science. All 



these lectures have been given at the Museum after school 



hours, and, although attendance has been purely voluntary, 



nearly 40,000 children annually have visited the Museum to 



hear them. This large attendance is evidence that these 



lectures are of real educational value, for few realize the 



responsibility placed upon a teacher in bringing safely a class 



of twenty-five to fifty pupils to the Museum. In view of the 



severe nervous strain on the teacher, the dangers incident to 



the transportation of children through the city streets, and, 



most important of all, the fact that many parents cannot 



afford the necessary car fare, scores of teachers have asked if 



these lectures might not be repeated in centrally located 



schools for the benefit of the pupils who cannot make the trip 



to the Museum. To test the desirability of such a plan, the 



auditorium of the Washington Irving High School in East 



Seventeenth Street was placed at the disposal of the Museum 



