PROBLEMS INVOLVED IN STANDARDIZING STATE NORMAL SCHOOLS.

Chapter I.

INTRODUCTION: SCOPE OF THE BULLETIN.

Normal schools not now standardized.-Normal schools differ from each other very widely in organization, in admission requirements, in courses of study, and in modes of instruction. The explanation of this lack of uniformity is to be found in the fact that normal schools have never been a part of the system of higher education evolved in this country. Normal schools have grown up in isolation. While the colleges have been in the closest touch with each other through the organization of entrance examination boards and accrediting institutions, while high schools have been brought together by standard definitions of units, normal schools have stood apart. The typical normal school derives its financial support from legislative appropriations, receives its students without competition from a territory over which it exercises exclusive control, and has no difficulty in placing its graduates in positions which they regard as satisfactory. Furthermore, so urgent has been the demand in the country for teachers that school boards and superintendents have not been able to make rigid selections, with the result that standards of training have not been forced upon the normal schools from without. Organization determined by accidental causes, often personal.In a situation where relative isolation has not compelled normal schools to define themselves to others there has been the largest opportunity for the play of personal influences. A strong president has often dominated the policies of a normal school to a degree that is almost unbelievable. The faculty sometimes has little or no voice in determining the courses or the modes of admission. There is no State authority in most of the States which is strong enough to determine what shall be done in normal schools. The result is that within a single State there are the widest variations. One president with the ambition to develop his institution into a degree-granting university goes on his way, while his neighbor uses the funds granted by the same legislature to develop a normal school which loudly

announces its objection to granting degrees and limits its activities rigidly to the training of elementary teachers.

External causes stimulating movement toward standardization.In recent years a number of causes have begun to break down the isolation of the normal school. First and foremost is the desire of normal graduates to enjoy the advantages of higher education in universities and colleges. The growth of summer schools at universities and the frequent transfer of normal-school graduates to college and graduate courses show with clearness the desire of teachers to enjoy the advantages of all kinds of higher education. Normal schools, drawn into the current of higher education, have been called upon to announce more definitely their requirements for admission and to describe the content of their courses. What is a course in methods of teaching arithmetic? Is it a review of the course given in an elementary school or is it a discussion of the pedagogical principles on which such courses are arranged? What is a course in practice teaching? Does such a course require of the student any study of material, and does it afford him any adequate critical discussion of his work? There has been a sharp and at times unfriendly clash between normal schools and colleges in the effort to secure answers to such questions. The normal school often takes the position that it administers only high-grade courses, while the colleges express a frank doubt as to the value of these courses for mature students.

Traditions and relations of normal schools unique.-Perhaps the disagreement between normal schools and colleges can best be illustrated by the widespread dispute regarding foreign languages. The Lormal school has been historically related to the vernacular school, and its officers have had little patience with classical or even literary courses. The traditions of the college are of a totally different type. So long as no students passed from normal schools to colleges the normal schools were at liberty to hold to the vernacular, but as soon as normal-school graduates sought admission to higher institutions the controversy was on.

Effect of parallel development of departments of education in colleges and universities.-A second reason why normal schools have been called upon to define themselves arises because colleges and universities have in recent years entered the field of teacher training through the organization of departments of education and colleges of education. In the State universities the demand for preparation of high-school teachers has been heard, and generous provisions have in many cases been made for the work of preparing such teachers. The normal schools have looked upon this organization of teachertraining courses as undesired competition. Conversely, the university authorities have been critical of the courses in the normal schools,

and the issue has been sharply drawn. Incidentally it may be remarked that college departments of education have usually been subjected to the closest scrutiny and sometimes to violent criticism by other college departments because of their supposed inferiority. It may even be admitted that entrance requirements in the departments of education have sometimes been lower than those for other college departments in the hope of meeting the competition of normal schools, and courses of inferior standard in the college have been tolerated for like reason. All of these disputes and efforts at adjustment have aroused a general inquiry about teacher-training courses which a generation ago would have been without interest except to a small group of specialists. Now the problem is known to all who are interested in education, and the discussion must go on until some satisfactory conclusion is reached.

General demand in all social institutions for higher efficiency.-The explanation of the current demand that normal schools standardize themselves would not be complete without reference to the general causes which are leading all over the country to surveys and careful examination of all kinds of educational institutions. Costs of educational organizations are so high and the volume of educational activity is so great that society is demanding as never before a reasonable accounting. In the meantime the scientific methods of studying educational results have been so far perfected that the inquiry into educational efficiency can be made most pointed. Normal schools can not longer be isolated, even if they will. Society at large is interested in them as in other institutions.

Systematic surveys of normal schools. Survey of Pennsylvania normal schools.-Systematic surveys of normal schools are few in number. In 1912, E. O. Holland1 published the results of a careful study of the Pennsylvania normal schools. He describes the organization, entrance requirements, curriculum, examinations, student body, and faculty. The normal schools of Pennsylvania were at that time privately owned. Their entrance requirements were very low, demanding only elementary education of candidates for admission. The curriculum was elementary and administered with laxness. The examinations were perfunctory and excessively lenient. Holland makes it very clear that radical changes were imperatively demanded. Some of these changes have been made since the appearance of the report.

Survey of Wisconsin normal schools.-A second extensive survey was made by A. N. Farmer, under the direction of the State Board of

1 The Pennsylvania State Normal Schools and Public School System. By Ernest Otto Holland. Published by Teachers College, New York City, 1912.

2 Conditions and Needs of Wisconsin's Normal Schools. By A .N. Farmer.

Issued by the

State Board of Public Affairs, December, 1914. Democrat Printing Co., State Printer, Madison, Wis.

Public Affairs, of the normal schools of Wisconsin. This voluminous report contains a mass of details. It gives at great length extracts from reports and answers to questions. It presents in full recitations which were taken down by stenographers who visited normal classes for the purpose of reporting the recitation. In the appendix are tables giving the results of examinations of students, tables of costs, length of service, training of members of the faculties, and other matters. The body of the report gives an account of the organization and administration of the normal schools, the student body, the faculties, the training school, the course of study, and the mode of conducting instruction. There is a summary of findings placed at the beginning of the report.

History of the Wisconsin normal-school system.-The Wisconsin system is one of the best-equipped and most highly centralized normalschool systems in the country. In his historical sketch former President Salisbury has shown how this system grew up after repeated efforts to develop, in connection with the State university, such normal courses as the State needed. The present survey shows that there has been much confusion resulting from a division of interest within these schools between academic and normal courses. Furthermore, there are great variations in the administrations. There is evidently a marked preponderance of influence on the side of the president as contrasted with the faculties, and there is some evidence that standards are disregarded in the efforts to keep up numbers. In spite of the original close relation between the normal-training movement and the university, the present relation of the normal schools to the university is not clearly defined.

For the purposes of this report it will not be necessary to give any further account of the Wisconsin survey. The facts brought out in the later pages of this report confirm the impression made by the Wisconsin survey that there is almost entire lack of standardization of normal schools.

Statement by president of the Carnegie Foundation of the problem of teacher training.-It may be remarked in passing that the Carnegie Foundation is engaged in an extended survey of the normal schools of Missouri and Indiana, as set forth in the following extract from the report of 1914: 2

For several years the Foundation has considered the desirability of conducting a systematic inquiry into the present status of the training of teachers for elementary, secondary, and vocational schools. This problem, of vastly greater import to the country at large than any other existing phase of instruction, has presented a continuous challenge and, as a whole, has defied manageable analysis.

1 Historical Sketch of Normal Instruction in Wisconsin. By Albert Salisbury, 1893. Published in Whitewater, Wis.

2 Ninth Annual Report of the President and of the Treasurer of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. 1914. Pp. 19-21.

The training of teachers in some form constitutes the capital factor in the success of what is financially and socially the major undertaking of every community. It is a problem of enormous bulk. At the same time it differs from the same problem in such professional fields as law, medicine, and engineering in that among elementary and secondary school teachers professional consciousness is nearly lacking. No organized group of teachers speaks, plans, or labors authoritatively for the profession as a whole. Such State or National associations as exist are huge, vaguely constituted aggregates, wholly lacking in definition of aim and membership. Under such conditions the real problems of the teacher can not focus sharply and be clearly understood by the teachers themselves in their collective capacity.

This lack of professional consciousness is due, undoubtedly, to the meager training usually required as well as to the casual and temporary nature of the employment under the conditions prevailing in America. All of these elements unite to place the teacher in marked dependence upon local provision and circumstance; individual initiative is discounted, and reliance is placed upon a more or less readily regulated "supply" of passive-minded instructors.

It is this localized character of the task of preparing teachers that has finally determined the form of the contribution which the Foundation hopes to make to this subject. Little by little the States of the Nation are realizing the oneness of the educational undertaking which faces them and are discovering that they can expect to cope successfully with it only by creating a skillful and mobile central authority to operate and control the entire undertaking. Of this great single educational enterprise in each State, the portion that is most vital, that overtops all else in its decisive importance, is that of selecting and training teachers. The solution of the State's problem as a whole is measured largely by the solution of this portion of the problem. It is emphatically a State task to-day and will doubtless permanently remain so.

It would seem most helpful, therefore, for the Foundation to approach the question from a standpoint as nearly as possible identical with that of the State itself. If it can succeed in a few States, or in one State, in appreciably illuminating the situation in its legislative, administrative, and institutional aspects, the results should prove of value not only for the particular State concerned but by analogy for all States possessing similar conditions.

This it hopes to do. The governors and the department of public instruction of two typical States of the Middle West, Indiana and Missouri, have invited the Foundation to examine the situation that exists with regard to the training and supply of teachers in their respe tive Commonwealths. To these formal invitations have been added many requests and pledges of cooperation on the part of local authorities in schools, colleges, and universities. With the assistance of the institutions and officials involved and of the teachers themselves, it is believed that facts of great importance can be brought together and certain questions answered that are fundamental to the successful administration of the States' school systems: What is the source, the nature, and extent of the general and professional training of the teachers to-day employed? What are the circumstances of age, sex, experience, and reward? What are the facts in respect to the annual supply required in the various grades of position? What is the degree of adjustment between training and service? How do present institutional agencies meet the apparent demand of the State in point of character of material, of quality of training, and quantity of product? What, finally, is the legislative and administrative background that conditions the State's present management of its problem? In all the above particulars, what is the historical perspective, and what is the strength of present tendencies?