The needs of the State of Oklahoma for Federal aid for education can be understood in terms of the tragic role played by the State in the Great Plains disaster of the early and middle thirties. The State has not been able to achieve social and economic stability since the Dust Bowl episodes. The dust Bowl areas have approached stability on the basis of a farm population reduced about a third. The State has lost population. On the other hand, one mountain county has increased 32 percent, another 29 percent. Eight of ten hill counties have gained about 20 percent. Increase of population in such areas is not a healthy increase.

About one and a half million of Oklahoma's two and one-third million people are rural. The status of rural Oklahoma is typically that of the Appalachian-Ozark dwellers, or of the southern cotton region where farmers have one-eighth of the Nation's children and one-fiftieth of the Nation's income. Our production pattern is still geared to waste and depletion of natural resources. Ad valorem valuations have decreased 42 percent in 10 years. Much of this represents actual dissipation of wealth. As population concentrates in areas nearly devoid of wealth the problem of school support grows increasingly acute. The State is now aiding local schools to the extent of 131⁄2 millions per annum, of which 111⁄2 millions is directly appropriated from general revenue. Over three-fourths of this money goes to rural schools because of their greater poverty.

The State taxes itself heavily. Only 11 States divert a greater proportion of private income into tax channels. Many taxes are levied. New taxes have predominantly been regressive.

The average salary of all teachers, supervisors, and principals-193738-in Oklahoma was $1,027, while for the United States it was $1,374. In Oklahoma 65.1 percent of total school expenditures is devoted to salaries of teachers, while for the United States it is less. than 60 percent. Oklahoma furnishes $20.50 from State sources for each pupil attending public school. Only 15 States in the Union furnish more. This is over 40 percent of the total cost of schools. From these figures it is shown that the State has attempted to provide a minimum of school privileges for all of its students.

(a) Need for reduction of inequalities: The minimum program provided in Oklahoma is almost exactly $1,000 per teacher for salary and all other purposes except transportation of pupils. This minimum obtains in about 11,000 of our 20,000 classrooms. Here teachers get $600 to $700 per annum; superintendents and principals are modestly paid; rooms are bare of equipment and books. Our 'minimum program alone should be augmented five to six million dollars. (b) Negro salaries in the minimum program are set by law to equal salaries of white teachers. A proper general adjustment of inequalities would therefore maintain this item on an equitable basis. However, in recent years it has been possible for Negro schools to have only one-third their fair share of new buildings. The need for resources for building Negro schools is acute.

(c) Facilities in defense areas and for Federal employees on Government reservations. Three large communities, Tulsa, Oklahoma City, and Lawton will be conspicuous in need for emergency school facilities. They contain 16 percent of the State's population. Inconspicuous dislocations of population due to defense activity in some small communities might add enough to involve some 20 per

cent of the population. Several hundred school children have been added to Lawton. The additions at Oklahoma City and Tulsa

should soon be quite large.

(d) Migratory workers: A family whose shelter represents a cash outlay of $5 to $10 plus some casual collection and fabrication of tin, tar paper, and sawmill slab is essentially a migratory family whether or not it has ever migrated. Oklahoma has thousands of such families. Our actual migrants return. Perhaps they should be encouraged to do so. There is much intrastate migration. The migrant class or type constitute a formidable part of Oklahoma's population. The migrant's common name is "Okie." Oklahoma must receive major consideration in any national program for providing educational facilities for migrant children.

If I might be permitted to make one statement, I would simply like to say this: That our people in Oklahoma are favorable to our educational program, and I think they have done all they can to support education during the depression years. When we were in the depression, not a single district in the State of Oklahoma failed to vote the excess levy that they should vote to qualify for State aid in the various districts for the support of education.

I think that is the best evidence that I can give that our people generally are for education.

And through committees, of which this report is partially representative, they have shown that they are heartily supporting this bill.

Our people, our administrators, and even school boards, and our State organization have studied the bill carefully since we were able to get a copy of it, and I would say that our people are for the bill as it is. We respectfully urge that it be passed.

The CHAIRMAN. Dr. M. D. Collins?

STATEMENT OF DR. M. D. COLLINS, STATE SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS OF GEORGIA

Mr. COLLINS. Mr. Chairman and gentlemen, I am heartily in sympathy with this bill S. 1313. I think it is definitely the responsibility of the Federal Government to endeavor to equalize educational opportunities of the children of the whole country.

În 1934 in Georgia we took $1,600,000 of W. P. A. funds. Technically our teachers qualified and received that proportion of money from the Federal Government.

Equal educational opportunities is sound. In our State we endeavor to equalize opportunities of children. However, our educational fund is not large enough to do so. We levy a 1-cent tax on every purchased gallon of kerosene and gasoline, which goes into our State equalization fund. Last year it amounted to $3,841,000.

I think we ought to equalize educational opportunities within the State and within the Nation. Our people have gone this far. More than 1,290 school districts have levied local taxes on themselves-not the other fellow, but upon themselves in order to lengthen the school term and to supplement the salaries of teachers. In our State we levy 5 mills county-wide taxes for school purposes, which is our constitutional limit.

Before the school system participates in the $3,841,000 equalization fund it must levy the maximum limit of county-wide taxes.

This year our State is doing more for education than ever before in its history, notwithstanding the fact that our budget is only $15,434,400. To equalize the educational opportunities so far as teachers' salaries are concerned, we should receive from the Federal Government $12,678,120.

Of course, that is only one feature of equalization-taking care of teachers' salaries, that is, elementary teachers with high-school teachers.

Senator ELLENDER. Is it for the equalization of salaries of the teachers in your State that it would require $12,000,000?

Mr. COLLINS. That is right.

Today, Dr. Dawson and other distinguished gentlemen have gone at some length into strong professional testimony. I know that you are interested in education, and I know that you believe that everybody is concerned; and we have to pay the expense for the training of our boys and girls either at the schoolhouse or at the courthouse. And I would rather pay at the school building. And we have to lose them or use them. And I am in favor of using them, in training them along vocational lines as well as the other lines which you suggested this morning.

I am heartily in favor of Senate bill 1313. I think it is decidedly the finest bill that has ever been introduced into Congress. I sincerely hope that it will be translated into realities, so that our children in the poorer States may have a larger educational opportunity, because it makes a tremendous difference in the kind of educational program that we have in Georgia, that we have in California, that we have in Utah, or that we have in Massachusetts, because a great many of our folk going to school there will go to the other places later, and the better trained they are the better assets they are. They will be either assets or liabilities. That is why I think it is fundamentally sound to make available Federal funds to equalize education. The CHAIRMAN. Dr. Parratt?

STATEMENT OF J. EASTON PARRATT, PRESIDENT, UTAH
EDUCATION ASSOCIATION

The CHAIRMAN. Doctor, will you please state your full name, address, and title?

Mr. PARRATT. My name is J. Easton Parratt. I am president of the Utah Education Association and a State director of school finance and research under the Utah State Board of Education.

Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, I will make my remarks very brief.

I represent the Utah Education Association and State Department of Education, including State Superintendent Charles H. Skidmore, all of whom heartily support Senate bill 1313. The statement which I have prepared in writing sets forth the Utah situation much more in detail than I will present it in this brief oral report.

The people of Utah have always been strong believers in education. From the time the pioneers first moved into Utah the people worked toward building a strong organization for education. We have shown leadership in consolidation. We have taken the lead in other administrative improvements. We are happy that our own Senator Thomas

is taking the lead, along with others, in providing Federal aid for education.

Utah is one of the States that has a heavy load and relatively low ability. An exceedingly large percent of our population comes within the school age classification. Not only do we have a large percent of children within the school age classification but these children are enrolled almost 100 percent in our schools and most of them stay in school until they graduate from high school.

The United States Office of Education statistics show that Utah has the highest holding power in secondary education of any of the States.

The CHAIRMAN. "Holding power" means that they stay in school longer?

Mr. PARRATT. Yes; that they stay in school longer. We have 75 percent as many students in the last year of high school as we have in the first year of the elementary school, which shows that practically all of our students complete high school. In turn, that increases the enrollment in the higher institutions, which requires a large expenditure for higher education.

The CHAIRMAN. By that do you mean that 75 percent of the persons in Utah who start to school finish high school?

Mr. PARRATT. Yes.

The CHAIRMAN. And they graduate?

Mr. PARRATT. Yes, sir.

Senator ELLENDER. How does that compare with other States? It must be tops, isn't it?

Mr. PARRATT. Yes; we are high.

Senator BUNKER. What is the national average?

Mr. PARRATT. I have it in the brief that I am submitting, but I do not have it in mind just at the moment.

Our experience in Utah has been such that it has led us to be strongly convinced of the value of equalization. Even our last legislature, the one that just adjourned, increased the amount for equalization. We have the same problem as other States, in that we have many districts with a low financial ability compared with other districts with 10 times the assessed valuation per child.

We have had enacted two equalization laws, both of which are working very well. For that reason the people in Utah are thoroughly in favor of equalization.

There is one point which has not been mentioned with regard to equalization that I would like to emphasize. The spreading of the tax base is a fundamental problem for stabilizing the education program. Our experience has been that the State-wide funds have proven a great stabilizer. In communities where agriculture or any other one industry is the chief source of revenue, the schools are always subject to a greatly uncertain situation. It was only 2 years ago that a severe drought hit many of our counties. This meant that the revenues were tremendously cut. It was only through outside financial help that the schools were able to remain open a reasonable length of time.

While it applies to the State, it applies nationally just as well. In a State that is primarily a one-industry State, such as agriculture, if the one industry is knocked out because of a drought or because of strikes, or something of that type, the financial ability of the districts goes

down tremendously. Through a Federal-aid program, where the tax base is broadened to include all industries and all geographical locations, the possibilities of this unstable situation can be greatly removed. We have gone through the bill carefully, and Dr. Zook has pointed out a number of things which I wished to discuss, but he has covered them amply. We are in hearty accord with his comments.

There is one item in which we are particularly interested, and that is in the term "schools serving rural areas."

In a consolidated district organization such as Utah's, very often we transport our children from these rural sections into communities which have a population of more than 2,500, such as in St. George. This permits better schools at less cost. For example, we have in Utah only 42 one-room schools at the present time. We have only 40 school districts.

We feel that it is only right to recognize such consolidation, even though in some cases the schools are located in these larger communities; that is, that they should be included in the apportionments or in the formula worked out. To penalize this type of consolidated school would be to slow down school consolidation over the whole Nation.

The CHAIRMAN. Then, you figure out your rural population on the basis of residence rather than on the place where the persons go to school?

Mr. PARRATT. On the basis of residence rather than upon the basis of location of the school.

I think this covers the main points that I have in mind in this connection with the equalizing features of the bill.

With regard to the defense program, we do have one situation that is becoming acute. Near Ogden we have three Government defense programs that have developed within recent times. We have the Hill Field Air Depot, the Ogden Ordnance Depot, and we have the Utah General Supply Depot.

These three cover a small geographical radius, and a real problem is created for that section of the State. From the best information that we can secure it would appear there will be about 3,500 additional students in that small area to be taken care of. Of course, we do not know where they will locate. The jobs are just getting under way and the families are not settled. But it means that on the basis of $65 per capita, the average amount being expended for regular operating expenses in that section, it will take approximately $230,000. While this does not sound like a very large amount, it really amounts to about 18 percent increase in school-district budgets for operation. The CHAIRMAN. What do you mean by $65 per capita? For what? Mr. PARRATT. Expenditures for teachers' salaries and other regular operating expenses. That is the average expenditure for that section

of Utah.

Senator ELLENDER. Per child?

Mr. PARRATT. Yes.

Senator ELLENDER. In school?

Mr. PARRATT. Yes, sir.

Senator ELLENDER. Per year?

Mr. PARRATT. Yes, sir. That does not include buildings and capital outlay. In addition to this, there would be the amount necessary for new equipment and for the buildings and additions to old buildings, and things of that type.