The RURAL NEW-YORKER 
39 
Views on 
School Bill 
[-The following letter was written by a well-known 
educator to the Assembly member for his district, on 
request of the latter.] 
HAVE given rather careful attention to the pro¬ 
posed rural school law, a copy of which you sent 
me, and have come to the conclusion that it is an 
unwise law. and in my judgment it should not be 
passed by the Legislature. My reasons are as fol¬ 
lows : 
1. The whole scheme of community and interme¬ 
diate districts, and the method of forming them, and 
the educational results looked for, are almost purely 
experimental, untried, and theoretical, at least in 
relation to the conditions in this State. Nor have 
■we any reliable data from other States in which sim¬ 
ilar conditions exist to guide us, or make us sure 
that the proposed radical change is a wise one. The 
law proposes changes that are too radical, and that 
will cause too much of an upheaval to he safe to 
some slight experience on the relation of taxation to 
the formation of large graded schools. Our taxes 
have been nearly doubled, and beginning with next 
year they will be actually doubled. What the taxes 
will become during the coming years I am unable to 
predict. We shall probably have to start one or two 
lines of transportation next year, which will be an 
expensive matter, and I am not at all sure that it 
will be a satisfactory one. In every case of which 
I have actual knowledge, the transportation of 
pupils during our New York Winters has been unsat¬ 
isfactory, and has generally been abandoned after 
one or two years of trial. 
4. Whether the great l-esults in the advancement 
of elementary education looked for by this consoli¬ 
dation of districts and the formation of large graded 
schools will be realized is a debatable question. 
My experience leads me to believe that the cur¬ 
ricula of the graded public schools of this State are 
districts and such schools in the direct and immedi¬ 
ate hands of the people concerned. If it be pleaded 
that such a law now exists, my reply would be that 
the evidence seems to indicate that the people do not 
desire the system proposed in the new law. In all 
probability the present law is inadequate to the situ¬ 
ation. In any event, it seems to me, that improve¬ 
ment in our educational system must come slowly 
and by degrees. It should be a healthy growth, not 
a revolution. 
Personally I should like to see the Legislature em¬ 
power the istate Department of Education to estab¬ 
lish five experimental consolidated community school 
districts in the State, two in the eastern, one in the 
central, and two in the western part; and to appro¬ 
priate money to build and equip each district an 
adequate schoolhouse, to be turned over to the people 
to establish and maintain a graded school with the 
sympathetic guidance of the State Department of 
SSBgE 
This picture was taken at the meeting held in Fonda, Montgomery Co., N. Y„ on Dec. 21. The big banner, 24x3 ft., made a sensation. There were about 300 people pres¬ 
ent, representing every part of the county. Mr. Hutchinson, the introducer of the school bill, was present, and made an argument for the bill. The audience listened and 
then voted 300 to 1 against the bill. At Rochester, on Dec. 26, about 300 people met and discussed the bill thoroughly. The sentiment of the meeting was practically 
unanimous in opposition. Committees were appointed to meet with others to help frame a new bill, and to secure representation at any Albany hearing. The representa¬ 
tives in the Senate and Assembly from Monroe County were present and much impressed. If the friends of the bill claim that these meetings' were packed or “poisoned,” 
it is their privilege to call similar meetings of their supporters if they can get them together! 
enter upon suddenly and without previous reliable 
experience. 
2 . The system of the formation of the community 
and intermediate districts is too mandatory, too au¬ 
tocratic and too far removed from the people them¬ 
selves. 
1 believe this mandatory, autocratic feature of the 
law is the most fatal defect in it. The whole pro¬ 
posed scheme is certainly an experimental one, yet 
the law leaves no opportunity for experiment and no 
alternative. 
In a democracy like ours the public school systei 
is unquestionably the greatest single source of infli 
ence in amalgamating the people, in fostering lil 
erty and equality, and in preserving the institutior 
and ideas of our forefathers; but the public school 
will fulfill this function only so long as they rernai 
ia the immediate and personal hands of the peopl 
whose children attend them. My faith in the abilit 
of the men and women living on farms in the Stat 
of New York to manage intelligently their own edi 
cational problems when wisely and sympathetic-all 
directed is still unshaken. 
Taxation will certainly be greatly increased. 
As a member of the board of education in a larg 
Combined urban and rural school district in which w 
h,n e just built a $35,000 schoolhouse and started ; 
lom-loom, four-teacher school, I can speak witl 
tremendously overcrowded with a mass of irrelevant 
and unimportant material, to the very great detri¬ 
ment of the fundamental, basic subjects of education. 
This trouble- is not so characteristic of the rural 
schools. There, more attention and drill are cen¬ 
tered on the fundamentals—arithmetic, reading, 
writing, spelling and geography. The rural schools 
tend to remain more simple and nearer the funda¬ 
mental requirements of children than do the larger, 
more complex, graded schools. I do not mean to say 
that improvement is not possible or not needed in 
the rural schools. I would certainly be the last per¬ 
son to harbor such a thought; but I would like to 
emphasize the fact that the argument is not all one¬ 
sided—that the rural schools are all bad. and the 
large, consolidated, graded schools are all good. If 
the upheaval comes there will still be serious un¬ 
solved educational problems. 
My purpose has been to point out objections to the 
proposed law and to show why, in my judgment, it 
should not be enacted. My criticisms have been de¬ 
structive, necessarily, and I would like now to offer 
some constructive criticism. It seems to me that it 
would be very much wiser to formulate an elective 
law. That is to say, a law that will provide a 
method of forming consolidated districts and graded 
schools if the people concerned elect to do so, and a 
law that will leave the machinery of forming such 
Education. If the experiment succeeded and demon¬ 
strated its value, we should see a steady, healthy 
growth of the scheme, engaging the loyalty and hold¬ 
ing the interest of the people because its value would 
come by conviction rather than by force. 
That Rural School Bill 
Two weeks ago I visited a local H range to talk 
on the rural school bill. During the evening I was 
asked why no one had made any reply to the argu¬ 
ments that had appeared in your paper against the 
bill. I responded that I did not know of any such 
arguments, but that possibly articles in favor of the 
hill might not be welcome. Your editorial of Dec. 
22, replying to Mr. Tliew, seems, however, to be a 
sufficient answer to that surmise. So I am acting 
on the invitation implied in that article. 
I do not know Mr. Thew of Dutchess County, and 
have no disposition to defend him; apparently he 
is amply able to take care of himself. But I do feel 
a measure of sympathy with anyone who is “riled 
up” over the ignorant complacency which presumes 
that New York’s rural sckools are just about as 
good as they can be. Your own proposition to co¬ 
operate in trying out this new bill in Dutchess 
County, and perhaps a few other counties, before 
“thrusting” it upon the whole State, soumls good; 
but in reality it is merely a proposal for local option 
