Raised by Tax Voluntary Cont tions, etc. $795,854.58 854,166.81 1,087,886.55 1,305,036.39 Regis- Private tered. Schools Total pay of No. o con em 34.09 888,871.89 1 STATISTICS. The decennial tables on the two previous pages merit careful examination. They furnish ample encouragement to continue the efforts that helped on such results as these figures show. The Board of Education have aimed to come into direct fellowship, sympathy and coöperation, with the teachers and friends. of Education throughout the State. This plan has included. the personal inspection of schools, lecturing in every town, holding of Educational Conventions and Teacher's Institutes, the issuing of numerous circulars to teachers and school officers, visiting all our leading manufactories that employ children, conferring with school officers on various school questions and especially in regard to neglected children and the best means of securing their attendance at school, besides an extensive correspondence with school officers and teachers. These tables show that during the last decade, and especially during the last nine years, there has been gratifying progress. In the average length of schools the increase is more than fifteen days (15.08), in the number of teachers continuously employed, 327; in the pay of teachers, $475,632; in enumeration, 11,539; in the number of different scholars registered, 19,716; in the number registered in winter, 16,783; in the number registered in summer, 14,655; in the average attendance in winter, 14,880; average attendance in summer, 12,976; in the percentage of attendance in public schools, 7.72; in the percentage of gain in schools of all kinds, 2.76. The increase in the total receipts from all sources during the last twelve years, or since the organization of the Board of Education, is $998,323.66, and during the last decade the same increase is $576,758.74. These figures show a great advance of popular interest in public schools. That a people characterized by a wise frugality should choose to tax themselves to this increased extent for the improvement of their schools, shows a growing appreciation of their importance. While advocating rigid economy, the people of Connecticut do not regard the mere saving of money as true economy, when it involves a proportionate loss of something of greater value. The present financial embarrassments, though affect ing all classes, witness no diminution of popul public schools. Our statistics-dry as they may seem-furnish sons. Based upon returns made by the School Vi town, they comprise facts and figures which i school, every pupil and teacher of the State. have been made to secure the utmost accurac Attention is called to the statistical tables in the which are given the population of each town, its number of school districts, number of schools, nun ent departments, amounts expended for new scho library and apparatus, with many other particular proved to be a useful table in which all the towns are annually arranged according to the amoun property in each to every child of school age, sho ative wealth of the several towns as compared with of their children, and indicating which towns are provide well for their public schools. This compa both State-wise and county-wise. In like manner the State and of the several counties are arranged the percentage of their taxable property appropriate schools during the previous school year-and also raised for each child enumerated. There are oth which the towns are arranged according to the p attendance during some part of the previous average attendance in winter. These figures tell at non-attendance and irregular attendance are mos and facilitate our efforts in behalf of neglected child a town finding itself at the foot of the list in its the State, in some of these points of comparison, ha stimulated to new effort. Some towns thus admo risen from the lowest place to a good position in th evidence of the practical value of these tables is ma ୧୯୮ NEGLECTED CHILDREN. The gain in attendance already secured amply compensates for the work in this direction and invites its vigorous prosecution. In my visits to towns, schools, and factories, and in public lectures, the needs of the neglected children are kept in view. The cordial coöperation of the leading manufacturers of the State in securing the school attendance of the children in their employ is gratefully acknowledged. The chief trouble is not with the large manufacturers, but with the far greater number who employ a few children in shops, or stores, or a single one on the farm or in the family. There are also, in some towns, a few families so degraded by intemperance and its attendant vices that their children are little, if at all, above barbarism. The fact needs to be re-stated that our law in regard to non-attendance applies not to manufacturers only, but to merchants, mechanics, farmers, and all employers of children, and should be executed with equal strictness towards individuals and companies. I respectfully solicit local coöperation in carrying out the provisions of this law-which has so manifestly met the approbation of the people of this State without reference to party or sect. No opposition to this law has ever been expressed, so far as my knowledge extends, either in the legislature, in the press, or in any public meeting. But this rigid law should not relax our efforts at persuasion-in making our schools so attractive and their substantial advantages so inviting that none can afford to lose them so that attendance shall be regarded as a privilege rather than a legal necessity. Much as has been done, there is need of better results. We may not rest, so long as there remain any neglected children. I therefore again request all persons who know of any instance of the employment of children under fourteen years of age who have not attended school the time required by law, or of any children growing up in indolence and degradation amid intemperance and vice, to notify me of such fact, giving the names and location of the employers of the children and parents. The friends of education throughout the State are invited to communicate all facts as to nonattendance. The letters sent me in response to a similar request B last year received prompt attention. I should re to the remotest part of the State amply compensa but a single child were brought to school. coöperation of teachers and school officers, a g this direction can be accomplished. Since our last Report, Mr. Giles Potter has work as circumstances required, spending thirty service, for which he has received one hundred and His expenses while in the discharge of his du hundred and twenty-two dollars and eighty-nine total amount paid to him, is two hundred and dollars and eighty-nine cents. During the next posed to follow up the work of visiting both sch tories more fully and systematically. The Board is fortunate in finding so competent and faithful ready to respond to their call as the exigency ma this very useful work. The Centennial Exposition was a school for the lessons are manifold. The grandest product of Education-the proudest exhibit at Philadelphiaitors themselves. This product is as directly trace schools as are the fabrics there shown to the mills them. That so many millions of people* could attend t tion, and that 268,653 by actual count of the une stiles should gather there in a single day, not only w lence, but maintaining order, quiet and decorum, an proofs of self-command, sobriety and education, re honor upon our nation than did all the works of art inventive talent there displayed. That this E though receiving less aid from the general govern any other-mainly a voluntary work of the peopleof private munificence, should prove of all others, o visitors themselves being judges, the largest in ex best in quality, the fullest in attendance, and the *The total number of admissions was 9,789,392. |