correlate curricula, in order to corral in students, and little interest is taken in the grammar grades, and none in the kindergarten. I have spoken frankly, and have dealt only with general principles over a vast field, far too large to be adequately discussed here. I have carefully avoided all details, altho I have fully worked them out on paper at great length, for each topic to the close of the high-school period or the age of nineteen, when physical growth is essentially complèted. This material will soon appear in a volume. The chief petition in my daily prayer now is for a millionaire. With the means at hand, I have no shadow of doubt or fear but that in five years from the date of any adequate gift we shall be able to invite all interested to a system of education, covering this ground, which will be a practical realization of much present prophecy, and which will commend itself even to the most conservative defenders of things as they are and have been, because the best things established will be in it. But it will be essentially pedocentric rather than scholiocentric; it may be a little like the Reformation, which insisted that the sabbath, the Bible, and the church were made for man and not he for them; it will fit both the practices and the results of modern science and psychological study; it will make religion and morals more effective; and, perhaps above all, it will give individuality in the school its full rights as befits a republican form of government, and will contribute something to bring the race to the higher maturity of the superman that is to be, effectiveness in developing which is the highest and final test of art, science, religion, home, state, literature, and every human institution. DISCUSSION AARON GOVE, Superintendent of schools, District No. 1, Denver, Colo. The paper to which we have just listened gives me much gratification and some surprise. It presents conclusions reached by the eminent author after years of profound thought and careful experiment. While the entire professional world is acquainted with President Hall, and has known in a general way of the philosophical and experimental work at Clark University, so far as I know this is the first presentation showing results. It does not follow that the conclusions reached by President Hall are absolute or final, neither is it necessary that agreement in the conclusions follows. The value of the paper to me is what seems to have been discovered and accomplished by almost a generation's work in investigation of the proper methods of approach to the pupil's mind. Omitting the first, or kindergarten, period, and the last, or the high-school, period, it is the treatment of the grammar school that delights me most, and serves to confirm me in my own observation and experience, because, like some other men, I rejoice when I meet accord with others. Superintendents, who often are quite as much men of action as of thought, are confronted with problems in school administration which scarcely appear to the philosopher and theorist. I understand the paper, altho I have not read it and have heard it read but once, to declare that the grammar-school period of the boy's life is the time for drill, memory-training, severe application to tasks with an accounting for their accomplishIn other words, that what has been denominated by some of the critics "soft ment. pedagogy" and "mellow education" should be reduced to its minimum during the grammar-school period. If this be the tenor of the paper-and we shall all be able to read it later it serves to restore to many doubters confidence in our pedagogical philosophers, whose teachings, often presented under circumstances of wrong interpretation, misapplication, and superficial acquaintance, have suffered in the hands of their friends. That a hive of bees in the yard or on the playground of the schoolhouse is theoretically beautiful and helpful, and has been even recommended as an essential adjunct, is an illustration of how our friends in that field have taught us that, while theory must always precede practice, practice should not always follow theory. Some of us have complained of the time wasted in school in experimenting along lines indicated by pedagogic experts; we have had a notion that the experimenting should be limited to the smallest practicable field until tolerably right conclusions are reached, at which time the whole can enter into the practice of new and hitherto unintroduced methods. I take this occasion, altho perhaps not strictly in line of anything said in the paper, to declare my belief in the misfortune of identical coeducation in the high schools; also my belief, based upon my immediate environment, that the grammar-school boy of today is not as well fitted for the high school as he was ten years ago; that the letting up of assignment and demanded accomplishment of tasks, the introduction of entertainment and the misinterpretation of the "doctrine of interest," have tended to make the young fellows weak in mental power, and consequently weak in grasping problems and overcoming obstacles. That the high-school girls should be differently treated from the highschool boys is my belief; because, as Dr. Hall has just informed us, of the extraordinary and positive separation in the mental, social, and physical natures, as he has demonstrated by most careful and patient experiment and investigation. If our high schools are to be continued as coeducational institutions, the boy should take four years for his work, while the girl takes six; the boy should be held in school all day; the girl should be dismissed from the schoolhouse at noon. Not less work should be given her, rather more, but of a different kind. On account of extra calls outside of school duties, including the home, society, and music, and perhaps art; on account of changes in physical constitution, and on account of the importance of outdoor life, she can well afford to take six years to acquire that mental discipline for which four is ample for her brother. I regard this paper as one of the most instructive presented to this Council within my recollection. I reiterate my pleasure in finding myself so close to Dr. Hall. The pleasure is heightened by the previous feeling that I had been called here to the not pleasant task of disapproving what I might hear. The paper will receive, when printed, wide attention, and careful and thoughtful essays will be written and printed thruout the land upon the many phases presented and the unusual inspiration which it contains. MISS LUCIA STICKNEY, Cleveland, O.-Dr. Hall has told us of the need, and of the time for supplying the need, of the spiritual in the form of legend and myth. We recognize the fact that literature is the medium for the moral and spiritual in education, and we are making our boys and girls, even those who are taking a business course in our schools, familiar with the religious ideas of the ancient nations and of the peoples of the Middle Ages. We exhume them in mythology. We present the ideal in character and strength from the Greek and Roman and Norse heathenism. We dwell on the romantic in chivalry, and we seem to study to avoid the stories of our own Bible, which should be dear and sacred to every child of every faith in our schools. We seem to be afraid of what they have no prejudice against and, what is wrong perhaps, no impression of. We blush to confess the ignorance of our children of our cutivated homes as to Bible literature. We lose the best opportunities of giving them a moral lesson, apparently because we are afraid of meeting the question, which has nothing in it, at our time of liberal thought and purpose, to be afraid of. When all are demanding the recognition of higher and deeper things in our school work, we are going out of our way to avoid the best medium at hand for bringing these things into it. HIGH-SCHOOL STATISTICAL INFORMATION JAMES M. GREENWOOD, SUPERINTENDENT OF CITY SCHOOLS, Owing to some omissions in the minutes of the Council, I found myself in a dilemma after I had received and read the proceedings of the Charleston meeting. On motion of Dr. Hinsdale, it was moved and carried that the investigation I had commenced on high schools. should be continued, and that two other members of the Council should be associated with me as a committee to make a report at this meeting. Hon. Frank A. Hill, of Massachusetts, and Hon. E. W. Coy, of Ohio, were nominated, but the minutes contained nothing of this, and as neither gentleman was present at the session when the announcement was made, I was forced reluctantly to drop the matter so far as committee work was concerned, but I continued the investigation on my own responsibility. The special report which I now submit is suggestive, and it is designed to call attention to three or four phases of thought in this department of public education. I need not dwell upon the imperfect methods, in vogue in various cities of this country, of tabulating high-school statistics, and the difficulty one experiences in collecting definite information, especially as to the persistence and character of attendance in classical, English, and manual-training high schools; the lines of work in which the greatest number of failures occur; the actual cost of maintaining such schools, based on the total enrollment; the average daily attendance, including all expenses of whatsoever nature. Many reports fail to show the total expenditures in such a way as to be of any value in the compilation of statistics. For information concerning the attendance, reasons for dropping out of school, failure in class standing, I have drawn entirely from the schools of Kansas City, and for expenditures from several cities in different sections of the country. Kansas City is different in some respects from any other large city of the country, in enrolling a larger per cent. of its entire population in high school, in having a larger per cent. of graduates to the entire population, and also in having a larger per cent. of pupils enrolled in the high schools in proportion to the total enrollment of pupils in all the schools, unless it be Springfield, Mass. These facts are not accidental. They are the results of definite causes that have operated for years, which I need not specify in this connection. Last year I showed that the younger pupils who completed the ward-school work were not the ones who failed and left the high school during the first year. The reason is obvious: bright children keep up in their studies whether in high- or ward-school work. This point I think is well established. TOTAL ENROLLMENT IN KANSAS CITY HIGH SCHOOLS The total enrollment in the high schools was 3,602, distributed as follows: first year, 1,396-boys 567 and girls 829; second year, 900 -boys 305 and girls 595; third year, 722-boys 263 and girls 459; fourth year, 585-boys 189 and girls 394. In the first year 338 pupils left school-150 boys and 188 girls; the percentage of boys was 26.4 and of the girls 22.6; second year, 18161 boys and 120 girls, or 19.4 per cent. of the boys and 20 per cent. of the girls; in the third year 138 dropped out — 64 boys and 74 girls, or 24.3 per cent. of the boys and 16.2 per cent. of the girls; in the fourth year, 107-32 boys and 75 girls, or 17 per cent. of the boys and 19 per cent. of the girls. Expressing the enrollment by years in per cents., 39 per cent. are first-year pupils, 25.3 per cent. are second-year pupils, 20.2 per cent. are third-year pupils, 15.5 per cent. are fourth-year pupils, while only 18.4 per cent. of the entire enrollment withdrew from school during the year. By way of comparison on the same basis I will take the first-year pupils in the Central High School, in the Manual Training High School, in the Westport High School, and in the Lincoln High School, and note the persistence of attendance. In the Central 544 were enrolled as first-year pupils 195 boys and 349 girls. Now, 55 of these boys and 78 of the girls left school during the year, or 28.2 per cent. of the boys and 24.4 per cent. of the girls. In the Manual Training High School the first-year pupils numbered 673-313 boys and 360 girls. Eighty-two of the boys left school and 72 of the girls -total, 154; expressed in percentage, 26 per cent. of the boys and 20 per cent. of the girls. But in the Westport High School the total enrollment in the first-year class was 64- 21 boys and 43 girls. Two boys left this class and 10 girls, or 9.5 per cent. of the boys and 23 per cent. of the girls. In the Lincoln High School, a school for negro children, the firstyear class consisted of 38 boys and 112 girls. Eleven boys left school and 28 girls, or nearly 29 per cent. of the boys and 25 per cent. of the girls. If these first-year statistics prove anything, persistence of attendance is better in a small high school than in either a large classical high school or a large manual-training high school. A better reason, I think, is that the Westport boys started into school as a business and a considerable number of others as an experiment. Furthermore, the persistence of attendance of the first-year pupils within certain limits is variable in this same school from year to year and is dependent upon local influences. The variation will probably range from 3 to 10 per cent. ENROLLMENTS AND WITHDRAWALS BY SCHOOLS CENTRAL HIGH SCHOOL The total number of pupils enrolled in this high school during the year was 1,686-boys 552 and girls 1,134. There were 544 enrolled in the first year, 437 in the second, 371 in the third, and 334 in the fourth, and from which 254 pupils graduated, or about 68 per cent. of the fourthyear pupils. Of the pupils enrolled, 1,336 were promoted from the Kansas City ward schools, 245 from other schools, and 5 had been admitted by examination from the outside. Out of 1,336 Kansas City pupils enrolled in the four classes, 256 dropped out of school during the year, and out of 350 admitted from other schools, 91 were dropped; or 19 out of every 100 of the Kansas City pupils left school, while 26 out of every 100 of the outsiders dropped out. This may be expressed as follows: 27.7 per cent. of the Kansas City boys and 15 per cent. of the Kansas City girls belonging to the first year left school, while 32 per cent. of the boys and 44 per cent. of the girls who were admitted from outside schools dropped out. Grouping both classes of pupils together, the percentage of the boys that left school was 28, and of the girls 22.3, and the total percentage of both sexes belonging to the first year, 24.4. The total number of pupils enrolled in the second year's work was 437 134 boys and 303 girls. Of this number, 108 boys and 244 girls had been promoted from the Kansas City ward schools, and 26 boys and 59 girls from other schools. From the Kansas City boys 18.6 per cent. left school, and from the girls 15.1 per cent. Among the outside pupils 15.66 per cent. of the boys dropped out of school and 34 per cent. of the girls. Putting both classes together, 18 per cent. of the boys and 18.6 per cent. of the girls withdrew, and the per cent. of withdrawals of both sexes is 18.5. The third year shows an enrollment of 371 pupils, there being 280 from Kansas City schools and 91 outsiders. There were 52 pupils that dropped out of the Kansas City contingent and 19 out of the others. Designating by sexes, 23.6 per cent. of the Kansas City boys and 15.8 per cent. of the girls quit school, while of the outsiders 20.6 per cent. of the boys and 21.37 per cent. of the girls quit school; or, putting the two classes together, 22.9 per cent. of the third-year boys and 17 per cent. of the girls left school, and 19.1 per cent of the class. Total number of the fourth-year pupils was 334-92 boys and 242 |