BUILDINGS AND GROUNDS.

Seventeen of the buildings range in size from 5 to 15 rooms. Fourteen of the buildings are in the open country; five are in towns. Three of the town schools have playgrounds of one square each; the remaining schools have from 3 to 6 acres used for playground purposes. Each of the buildings is modern in every particular, having the proper amount of light correctly located, furnace or steam heat with forced ventilation, sanitary drinking fountains, flush systems of toilets, and hot and cold water for domestic science tables. About half of them have shower baths, play rooms, and teachers' rest rooms. All have kitchens, manual training shops, and rooms for agriculture and sewing. Seventeen of them have audito

riums seating from 250 to 600. A new building now being erected and two recent additions have assembly rooms and combined auditoriums and gymnasiums.

COMMUNITY ACTIVITIES.

No school is at its best unless it functions as a community center, and neither is a community at its best unless its interests center in and around its school. The school buildings are used for all kinds of legitimate community meetings such as farmers' institutes, community clubs, parent-teachers association, farmers' clubs, Sunday school conventions, community socials, lecture courses, school plays, and concerts. Most of the commencements are held in the school buildings. These have brought people together who otherwise would have been almost unknown to each other, and whose influence upon the community would have been lost.

The consolidated schools offer a medium of organization that can not be found otherwise. The work of the county agricultural agent is largely amplified through the organizations made possible by the schools. The meetings of the Farmers' Federation and other organizations are held in them, and they encourage a large number of boys' and girls' pig, corn, and canning clubs.

Perhaps no one thing offered by the consolidated school does more for the elevation of community life than the music. Through the influence of the school the class of music used in the homes has been raised. Victrolas have been purchased, and children have

Display of manual training work for a community center meeting.

been induced to take lessons in instrumental music that they may join the orchestra. Each school has one or more pianos, and nearly all have victrolas and orchestras.

HIGH SCHOOLS.

The 16 consolidated schools which have four-year commissioned high-school courses make it possible for every boy and girl in the county to attend high school within easy driving distance of their homes and thus be at home in the evenings. Prior to consolidation. comparatively few eighth-grade graduates entered high school. A thorough investigation of each of the townships shows that for five years previous to consolidation the per cent of eighth-grade graduates to enter high school was as low as 21 per cent in one township and as high as fifty per cent in another, the average for the

An adequate, inexpensive domestic science equipment.

county being less than 40 per cent. Since consolidation the entire county has averaged more than 93 per cent. In 1915, 230 out of 240 eighth grade graduates entered high school; in 1916 there were 232 out of 242; in 1917 there were 243 out of 253; making a total of 705 out of 735, or slightly more than 95 per cent. Of these 705, 593, or more than 84 per cent, were still in high school. The attendance in the consolidated high schools of the county in 1920-21 was 921, and the graduating class had 168 members. In 1923 there were 1,044 students in the consolidated high schools, and the graduating class was composed of 98 boys and 86 girls.

COUNTY SENTIMENT TOWARD CONSOLIDATION.

If the interest on the part of the people in consolidation is not shown by this attendance, it is shown by the fact that 91 of the 127 abandoned schools have been abandoned by petition and could be reopened by petition, but none have been reopened. Abandoned school buildings can be sold only upon petition of the voters of the district after two years have elapsed. Nearly every school building is sold as soon as possible. This proves conclusively that the people have no inclination to go back to the one-room school. In answer to a questionnaire sent to the patrons asking their judgment relative to the value of the consolidated school, 404 said the increased school advantages were worth the increased cost, 96 said they were not,

15 did not know, and a number did not answer.

In reply to the

question whether they would change back to the old way, 458 said "No," 59 said "Yes," 6 did not know, and a number did not answer.

TRANSPORTATION.

The problem of transportation has been successfully worked out. Children have been transported to the schools in this county for 21 years, and in all that time only two of them were ever injured, and those only slightly. For years the board of education has required heated, ventilated wagons having glass sides. Well-qualified men. are employed to drive these hacks. They are paid from $60 to $65 a month. They must give bond to execute the contract, which contains a schedule of arrival and departure from each given point on the hack route, going and returning. They are required to stop at