FIFTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE BOARD OF EDUCATION, TOGETHER WITH THE FIFTH ANNUAL REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE BOARD.

In the floods of periodical literature, which have issued from the press since the publication of this Report, we have scarcely been able to catch a glimpse of a notice of it, or the doings of the Board or Secretary, or of the progress of Education in the Commonwealth. How are we to account for the silence of Literature at the progress or even the movements of Education?

While the Board should have long since found able coadjutors in the conductors of periodical literature, we acknowledge our own fault in the matter, and numerous supporters in its patrons, it has been left to convince the public of its utility, and to carry on its plans single-handed and alone; and the only discussions, which have excited any considerable degree of agitation, have related to the question of existence. The question, whether the Board shall be abolished or suffered to live, not supported, is yet entertaining men's minds; while we might rather have expected them to be engaged in discussing measures of policy and progress with an eager zeal.

How can a body of men act with any degree of vigor, while the humiliating questions of the propriety of continuing its existence as a body is gravely controverted? Why is it, that the voice of Literature has not long since drowned these preliminary clamors? Is it because the subject is exhausted, unpopular, or barren, because education has nothing to do with the progress of society, or because the Board and the Secretary have by their own individual exertions, efficient as indeed they are, forestalled the suggestions of all Experience, the inferences of all Analysis, and the conclusions of all Philosophy? Is it because the office of the common-school system is too insignificant to merit notice, because its chaotic materials have not yet assumed a character, - because it wants individuality, or because it has already arrived at the perfection of a full maturity? Should the Literature of this State fail to discover in its Board of Education the movements and bearing of a young Hercules, while its operations have attracted the admiration of distant nations, and the first words of encourageVOL. XXXIII. - 3D S. VOL. XV. NO. I.

13

ment, which greet its ear, fall in no insignificant accents from the lips of a people separated from us by the broad Atlantic? Not thus does Literature in sister States. Virginia is bestirring herself in the work of common-school education, and her Literary Messenger, if not foremost in the enterprise, espouses its prosecution with a most commendable zeal.

The apathy here is not because people are indifferent. The community is shaking off its slumbers in this matter. To its ear the sleepy hum, by which the indistinctly uttered claims of common-school education once lulled it to a deeper repose, is becoming the imperative summons which quickens it to a vitality of multiplied vigor. The infinite individual and social difference between men educated and uneducated, by the striking contrasts presented in condition, fixes observation. To the common-school system the ignorant, lamenting over their inestimable misfortune in having been insensible to its value in early life, do homage. On it the philanthropist rests his anxious gaze, in the ardent expectation, that, though it now be a little cloud just visible in the horizon, and no bigger than a man's hand, it will soon pervade the whole hemisphere of mind, and, fraught with fertility, penetrate into all the secret sources of mental vegetation, causing abundant harvests to grow upon and beautify barren desolations. To it the wise look joyfully, as the instrument which shall eradicate imposition, empiricism, prejudice, and superstition, and prostrate the barriers of factitious distinction.

That its movements are onward is visible, notwithstanding its many discouraging obstructions. Five years ago the plan of a Board of Education, suggested by the example of sister States, was adopted into practice. Such was the doubt as to its utility, that it was with difficulty that a vote could be obtained from the Legislature to continue its existence. The fostering hand of private munificence gave at once strength to its character, and health and nerve to its feeble frame. Still its claims to support have been granted reluctantly, if not grudgingly. Partisanship and sectarianism have made it the target, on which to expend the ammunition of desperate assaults. These now, beginning to perceive the real grandeur of the objects which the system embraces, are hiding their forms in shame at the dastardly spirit that would lay sacrilegious hands on institutions, whose foundations are laid in a disinterested humanity. Each successive year gives new occasion for the

State to be more and more proud of its offspring, and to reward the labors of its devoted agents by a more ample pecuniary remuneration, or by an increased confidence in their recommendations.

The Report of the Board of Education presents first the Normal Schools and their condition, and recommends them to the continued fostering care of the State. Their influence has been felt, though they have as yet scarcely struggled through the obstacles, ever awaiting novel enterprises and infant institutions. It next alludes to the report of its Secretary, and then to the subject of a school library. Appended to it are the reports of the Visiting Committees, appointed by the Board to conduct the affairs of the several Normal Schools, namely, that at Lexington under the care of C. Pierce, that at Barre under the care of Professor Newman, since deceased, and that at Bridgewater, under the care of Mr. Tillinghast. Then comes the report of the Committee, appointed by the board to consider the state of the Normal Schools, and the expediency of their continuance, which is strenuously urged. Then follows the account current of the Treasurer of the Board. Lastly and chiefly is the highly interesting and elaborate report of the Secretary of the Board. It occupies some 110 pages.

After presenting a general view of the state of the schools in the Commonwealth, which looks favorable, the Secretary takes up several topics connected with common schools naturally coming under his notice.

It has

He proposes a substitute for county conventions. been his duty to meet every year, in each county in the State, the friends of education, to discuss with them its interests. These county conventions he regards unequal, as affording but a small portion of the inhabitants the easily accessible means of attending them. He therefore reccommends "more frequent meetings in smaller sections of territory, that sounder views and a livelier interest may be carried to the doors of those who will not go abroad to obtain them."

He then goes on to give a summary of some of the important facts and views, contained in the school returns and reports.

School Districts are first alluded to. The prevalence of the plan of uniting School Districts and classifying the schools is regarded as auspicious. It enables the united districts to give to every grade of scholarship the instruments best suited to it;

and by employing less expensive teachers for rudimental students, enables the united district, with about the same expense, to provide the more advanced pupils with exalted means of acquiring an education of a higher excellence.

Thus, too, the attention is directed to the Schoolhouse; and from the extraordinary improvements made in this species of architecture, in the comforts and accommodations afforded to the scholar and teacher, in the increased facilities supplied for acquiring knowledge, and thus carrying out the true purposes of the House, even had nothing else been accomplished by the system, its agency is commended to every philanthropist.

The impulse which has electrified every department of common-school education, since the organization of this Board, has in this one been especially brilliant. When we see throughout the entire State decent, comfortable, many frequently elegant and tasteful Schoolhouses, taking the places of the desolate, comfortless hovels, which were once distinguished by the same cognomen, we are filled with the astonishment one may be supposed to experience on beholding, under the transformations of magic, the humble shed suddenly assuming the graceful proportions of an elegant temple. When we observe these results, we cannot but conclude that a master spirit is at work with an energy as potent as it is ubiquitous. On this subject of Schoolhouses the Secretary says, "during the last year the city of Salem, and the village of Cabotville in Springfield have given the best specimens of schoolhouse architecture. Salem has erected several new schoolhouses, remodeled others, and put the residue in a condition of good repair. In Cabotville the wise step was first taken of uniting two contiguous districts. The united district is erecting and has almost completed a beautiful house, far superior to any other in all the middle or western part of the State. Its cost is estimated at ten thousand dollars. The plan of the house for the High School at Lowell is very well devised. . . . These, and several others erected during the last year, are ornaments to the respective places of their location, an honor to their inhabitants, and a pledge of the elevated character of their posterity."

The increasing interest of the public in the common school is manifest from the increase of the appropriations of Money to this object, and the jealousy with which any prostitutions of its funds from their legitimate purposes is guarded. It may not

be fully understood, but it is nevertheless true, that no district can lay its hand on the money raised for the support of schools, and appropriate it to the purchase of furniture for the house, to repairs, to seats, to payment of extra services of committee men, or any object except the payment of board and wages of teachers, and fuel for the schools.

Under the head of Amount and Regularity of Attendance, in which a striking increase is exhibited, much credit is granted to the School Register. Either we do not fully comprehend the statements made under this head, or the Register does not perfectly perform its functions. In speaking of those by whom the benefits of attendance on schools are received, it appears that the average absences for summer are eighty-three thousand three hundred and twenty-three, and for winter, sixty-five thousand one hundred and sixteen. The Enormity of this amount is illustrated with examples, showing how large a district, were all these absences confined to it, would be covered. From the view of the case that is taken a fallacy might be interpreted. On reading the statement as it stands in the Report the general reader might be led to suppose, that a large portion of the population between the ages of four and sixteen, our commonschool system does not reach; that we have a population of at least sixty thousand coming into active life entirely illiterate, having neglected the advantages of even a rudimental literary education.

If the Register were so kept as to show all the names of all the scholars in each district, and if from them it should appear that in the State there are sixty thousand children growing up, whose names are on the Register, but whose faces never are seen in the school room, the identical names year after year appearing blank, there would be just cause of alarm. Occasional absences are confessedly bad both for school and scholar; but the mere circumstance of a child's absence from school

proves but very little pro or con, in taking the measure of intelligence in the Commonwealth. It does not prove that it is not under the eye of its mother, that it has not been to school for the most part of the year, nor that it is not in some position for acquiring knowledge quite as favorable to that end as the school-room.

The increase of the Length of Schools furnishes another cause of gratulation. This, as well as the last point, should be estimated at its true value. It is by no means an unequivocal