The Power of the Pebble HE power of the pebble is impressive. Throw it in a pool of water and its tiny splash creates giant circles. I hope that School Life, issued for the first time this month in a low-cost, simple format and with 2,000 free circulation, can create its own giant circles through reprinting in business, labor, and professional magazines. This and future issues of School Life will present summaries of Office of Education major publications; short articles on Office of Education planning and action in the three broad areas of educational research, services, and grants; illustrated statistical information; and reports on educational legislation of national interest. We expect, in this way, to broaden the appeal and useful. ness of School Life, so that school board members, teach. ers, and citizens generally will turn to it for solid but brief information on education. We plan, through the change, to make it useful to busy editors of professional, business, and labor magazines. Mainly, School Life will present digests of Office of Education publications, giving readers a taste of what they contain. If the taste whets the appetite, the reader may obtain the whole book either to swallow it, as Bacon says, or to chew and digest it. We all have less time for reading these days. We must husband it carefully. School Life will hold your reading time in highest regard, without showing disrespect to your intelligence and interest in education. School Life will try to run that narrow course between the succinct and the superficial; between the provincial and the universal. SM. Brownell Educational news EVENTS AND DEVELOPMENTS of national significance Pre-White-House Conferences As the date for the White House Conference on Education approaches, millions of Americans are having an opportunity to make an on-the-spot study of their educational needs and problems. Every new report from the States tells of more community conferences, some preceding the State conference, some following. As of the first of October, 32 State conventions had been held, along with 3,200 community and county conferences. By the time the White House Conference begins, on November 28, every State in the Union will have held at least one State conference, and about twothirds of the States will have held conferences at local levels. Appointments The immediate staff of the United States Commissioner of Education is now complete. On September 9 the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare announced the appointment of John Ralph Rackley as Deputy Commissioner of Education and of Homer Daniels Babbidge, Jr., as Assistant to the Commissioner. Dr. Rackley comes to the Office from the University of Oklahoma, where since 1949 he has been professor of education and dean of the col lege of education. Dr. Babbidge since 1945 has been secretary of the committee on scholarships and member of the Board of Admissions at Yale University. Another appointment in the Office is that of Lloyd E. Blauch as Assist Volume 38, Number 1 ant Commissioner for Higher Education. Dr. Blauch, who has been on the staff for many years as an authority in the field of higher education, has recently been Acting Assistant Commissioner. More School Buses More than ever before, pupils are being carried to and from their schools at public expense. That is the gist of data published in August by E. Glenn Featherston, Director of the Office of Education's School Administration Branch. Practically every row of figures on the subject gives 1953-54 an increase over 1952-53. The number of pupils transported is up 553,000, or 7 percent; the number of buses, 7,300, or 6 percent; and the public funds expended, nearly $21 million, or 7 percent. To put it in absolute terms: In 1953-54 some 8.9 million pupils were carried in 147,425 vehicles at a public cost of $308,700,000. States in which the largest number of children were served were Ohio, Pennsylvania, New York, and North Carolina; States in which the most money was spent were New York, California, Texas, and Pennsylvania. Back of the increases is a complex of factors, Dr. Featherston says. School reorganization is reducing the number of school districts in the United States. More schools, particularly in suburban areas, are offering rides to their pupils. And of course there is also the significant fact that every year more children are going to school. Teachers From Abroad Washington has been the first stop this fall for 600 foreign teachers and school administrators who have come to the United States under two international programs, either to spend the academic year teaching in our schools or to spend several months studying various aspects of our educational systems. One hundred and sixty of these are the teachers from the United Kingdom, Austria, Germany, Australia, New Zealand, Belgium, Norway, the Netherlands, and Canada, who this year, under the International Educational Exchange Service, Department of State, are trading their jobs with teachers from the United States. The other educators come from 50 other countries. Of these, about 250 are here under the teacher education program sponsored by the International Educational Exchange Service and by the Office of Education; and 200 are here under the technical cooperation program administered by the International Cooperation Administration (in the Department of State) and the Office of Education. The 250 in the teacher education program have now gone in 10 dif ferent groups to as many colleges and universities for 3 months of seminars, lectures, and school visitation. The elementary teachers have gone to Emory University in Georgia and Ball State Teachers College in Indiana; the secondary teachers, to the University of Buffalo, the University of Southern California, and the University of Oklahoma; the vocational teachers, to the South Dakota State |