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III. KRAL EDUCATION IN THE TERRITORIES AND INSU= LAR POSSESSIONS.

It is regrettable that all the Territories and insular possessions of the United States were not represented at the exposition through typical school exhibits. The work among the natives of Alaska was shown graphically in an exhibit collected by the United States Bureau of Education, while the Philippine Islands had a very complete exhibit prepared by the director of education in the Philippines and his assistants.

The Territory of Hawaii reported a school enrollment of 33,288 pupils in all its schools in 1913-14, distributed among natives and residents of foreign origin, with a teaching force of 713 instructors, of whom 200 are American. During the school year of 1914 $742,310 was expended for education, or about $30.36 per pupil. Recently the Hawaiian school system has begun to emphasize the preparation of its pupils for the various life vocations in the islands. The insular department of instruction is using all its wisdom and effort to organize this new system of industrial education. Under these circumstances it is unfortunate that this interesting experiment in school, reorganization in the insular possessions should not have had an educational exhibit to show the evolution of the new from the old system prevailing before the islands became annexed to the United States.

Porto Rico also has valuable lessons to teach in the remarkable progress that it has made in recent years in modifying its rural school system to meet the needs of its rapidly increasing population. During the year 1914-15, $2,498,585 was expended for school education of all kinds. The school enrollment was 270,000, being slightly more than 50 per cent of the school population. These pupils were instructed by 2,564 teachers, in 4,330 schools. The evolution of the Porto Rican rural schools is of particular interest to educators of the United States. Since the time of the American occupation in 1908 all the school buildings have been practically renewed. Frame and concrete one and two teacher buildings have replaced most of the former dilapidated, usually rented, structures. The agricultural phases of education, particularly, have received much attention. Forty-one special teachers have recently been appointed-one for

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every supervision district-to have charge of the organization of agriculture, home and school gardening, and industrial club work of all kinds. This makes one such special teacher for every supervision district of the islands. Under the direction of these specialists home and school gardens are making much advance. School fairs and agricultural exhibits are frequent in connection with rural schools. These fairs have awakened much interest in communities formerly untouched by such phases of school education. Porto Rico, like Hawaii, unfortunately was not represented educationally at the exposition.

ALASKA.

The exhibit of Alaskan education was limited to activities of the United States Bureau of Education among the natives, all of which

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FIG. 59.-School gardens and garden products from the Alaska educational exhibit. may be classed as rural. The schools in Alaska, other than native schools, are under the control of the Territorial governor, who issues certificates to teach and in other ways oversees the educational affairs. These schools are of two kinds the so-called Nelson schools outside of incorporated towns, for white children and children of mixed blood leading a civilized life; and the schools for whites within incorporated towns.

Wide scope of the schools for natives under United States Bureau of Education control. The natives of Alaska number approximately 25,000 people, distributed among numerous small villages scattered along thousands of miles of coast line and the great rivers. These

villages are isolated from one another and the outside world for fully eight months of the year, on account of the extreme severity of climatic conditions. But in spite of these almost insurmountable difficulties, United States schools have been established in 77 such native villages. The work of the Bureau of Education among the natives is very comprehensive and may be classified as—

School education for children and school extension work for adults.

Social economic activities dealing with personal hygiene, home sanitation, and morality; household arts, social intercourse, and promotion of native industries. Medical work and the stamping out of disease.

Reindeer service, primarily to provide a source for supply of food and clothing to the Eskimos living in the vicinity of Bering Strait.

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The Alaska service is administered by a special division of the Bureau of Education headed by (1) a superintendent of education, who works immediately under the direction of the United States Commissioner of Education; (2) five district superintendents; (3) an official force in Washington; (4) employees of the supply and disbursing office at Seattle; (5) 12 physicians and 12 nurses and teachers of sanitation; (6) 109 teachers, a few of whom are native. Character of the school work as disclosed by the exhibit.—The Alaska educational exhibit emphasized the practical character of the

schools among the natives. It included a large variety of activities showing how the teachers, physicians, and nurses strive to promote the physical, moral, and industrial welfare of the people-adults and children.

The regular school work includes elementary subjects, such as the rudiments of English, writing, and drawing, practical forms of arithmetic, some geography and history in story form, physiology, and personal hygiene. The industrial work of the schools is varied to suit the needs of particular sections of the territory, the purpose being to impart such instruction as shall enable the children when they grow up to live comfortable and independent lives in their

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own community. In general, the industrial work includes carpentry, cooking, and sewing, and agriculture in the form of school and home gardening.

The schoolhouses, all of them erected at Government expense, are planned as social centers. In addition to the customary classroom and quarters for the teacher, many of the schoolhouses have well-equipped quarters for industrial work of various kinds, a school kitchen and laundry and baths for the use of the entire community. The classroom is available for public meetings and for occasional social gatherings.

Work among adults.-The teachers of Alaska are obliged to undertake tasks quite unusual in ordinary teaching. Teachers and nurses are obliged to devote much of their time to doing what they can to establish sanitary conditions by inspecting and improving local housing conditions. Cleanliness is encouraged and a more wholesome diet attained by showing children and adults how to raise the common vegetables in order to vary the old meat and fish diet.

Tuberculosis, trachoma, rheumatism, and venereal diseases prevail to an alarming extent among the natives, due to their former promiscuous mode of living in poorly ventilated huts and subsisting on a diet of too little variety. To improve these unfortunate conditions, Congress has voted an annual appropriation under which the Bureau of Education employs physicians and nurses and contracts for the use of a number of hospitals.

The reindeer service. The value of this work among the natives is hard to overestimate. It means that the people who formerly were obliged to subsist almost wholly on a fish diet have obtained a new source of supply, both in food and clothing, besides obtaining a suitable beast for transportation and travel. The reindeer industry began in 1892 with the importation by the Bureau of Education of 171 reindeer from Siberia; 1,280 animals in all have been imported. Figure 60 gives the total appropriation in five-year periods for the schools in Alaska and for the Alaskan reindeer service.

Similarly figure 61 gives the number of reindeer in Alaska by fiveyear periods since the establishment of the service.

The Alaska educational exhibit attracted considerable attention to the heroic work being done by the white and native teachers in this remote Territory of the Nation and the very practical results obtained through their efforts.

THE PHILIPPINE ISLANDS.

The exhibit of Philippine education was exceptionally complete and showed in graphic terms the remarkable growth in school education since the system was reorganized by the American Government in 1908. Opportunities for school education are now open to the whole Filipino people, good schools being found even in the remotest rural districts. While school attendance is not compulsory, nearly 500,000 children are in school. A very important feature of this school system as emphasized in the educational exhibits is education for the uplifting of Filipino rural life, including every phase of agriculture and home industry.

The Philippine school system strongly centralized. The system in point of organization is unlike anything known in the United States. It has sprung out of the chaos which existed at the time

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