several clauses of the Sixth Section of that Act, relative to the duties of each Annual School Meeting :

"VI. And be it enacted, That at every Annual School Section Meeting in any Township, as authorized and required to be held by the Second Section of this Act, it shall be the duty of the freeholders or householders of such Section, present at such Meeting or a majority of them,

Firstly. To elect a Chairman and Secretary, who shall perform the duties required of the Chairman and Secretary, by the Fifth Section of this Act.

Secondly. To receive and decide upon the report of the trustees, as authorized and provided for by the Eighteenth clause of the Twelth Section of this Act.

Thirdly. To elect one or more persons as Trustee or trustees, to fill up the vacancy, or vacancies, in the Trustee corporation, according to law; Provided always, that no Teacher in such section shall hold the office of School Trustee.

Fourthly. To decide upon the manner in which the salary of the Teacher, or Teachers, and all the expenses connected with the operation of the School, or Schools, shall be provided for.

3. It will be observed that the majority of the freeholders, or householders, present at an Annual Meeting have a right to elect whom they please to be Chairman, or Secretary, without any restriction, or exception; and however few electors there may be present at any such Meeting, (if no more than three,) they have authority to do all that could be done by one hundred electors. The lawfulness of the proceedings of any such Meeting is not in the least degree affected by the smallness of the number of school electors present, any more than the lawfulness of the election of a Member of Parliament would be affected by the smallness of the number of his constituents who had voted at his elections, provided he had the majority of those who did vote. All electors have a right to attend and vote, if they please; if they do not do so, they have no reason to complain, and are justly bound by the acts of those who did attend and vote.

The Chairman of such Meeting shall decide all questions of order, subject to an appeal to the Meeting, and shall give the casting vote in case of an equality of votes, and shall have no vote except as Chairman, and shall take the votes in such manner as shall be desired by the majority of the electors present, and shall at the request of any two electors, grant a poll for recording the names of the electors by the Secretary." A correct copy of the proceedings of every Annual School Section Meeting, signed by the Chairman and Secretary, shall be forthwith transmitted by the Secretary to the Local Superintendent of Schools."

5. In the event of a vote being objected to, the Seventh Section of the Act provides :That any person offering to vote at an Annual, or other, School Section Meeting, shall be challenged as unqualified by any legal voter in such Section, the Chairman presiding at such Meeting shall require the person so offering to make the following declaration: 'I do declare and affirm that I am a freeholder, (or householder,) in this School Section, and that I am legally qualified to vote at this Meeting.' And every person making such a declaration shall be permitted to vote on all questions proposed at such Meeting; but, if any person thus challenged shall refuse to make such a declaration, his vote shall be rejected.

The Act then renders any person liable to fine and imprisonment, who shall be convicted of having wilfully made a false declaration as to his right to vote at such Meeting.

6. With these references and explanations I think there can be no doubt on the part of any one, as to the organization and mode of proceeding at an Annual School Meeting. It remains, then, for the electors to discharge the three important duties which the Act imposes. The first relates to the Financial Report of the Trustees; the second to the election of one or more Trustees; the third to the manner of providing for the support of their School during the year.

year.

(1)_The_Meeting is to receive and decide upon the Report of the Trustees for the past The Eighteenth clause of the Twelth Section of the Act of 1850 requires the Trustees: To cause to be prepared and read at the Annual Meeting of their Section, their annual School Report for the year then terminating, which Report shall include, among other things prescribed by law, a full and detailed account of the receipts and expenditures of all school moneys received and expended in behalf of such Section, for any purpose whatover, during such year; and if such amount shall not be satisfactory to a majority of the freeholders, or householders, present at such Meeting, then a majority of said freeholders and householders shall appoint one person, and the Trustees shall appoint another; and the Arbitrators thus appointed shall examine said amount, and their decision respecting it shall be final; or, if the two arbitrators thus appointed shall not be able to agree, they select a third, and the decision of the majority of the arbitrators so chosen shall be final.

This provision of the Act affords Trustees an opportunity of publicly refuting any imputations which may have been cast upon them from any quarter as to their expenditure of school moneys; it also secures to the tax-payers in each School Section a public annual account of

school moneys of their Section. They have, therefore, the satisfaction of knowing that whatever may be the amount of school moneys which they have raised, such moneys will be expended in their own Section, by men of their own election, and accounted for to them at the end of the year. I am not aware of a provision for so prompt and satisfactory a mode of accounting for school moneys to school constituencies existing in any other Country.

(2) The second important duty of an Annual School Meeting is "To elect one or more persons as Trustee, or Trustees, to fill up the vacancy, or vacancies, in the trustee corporation, according to law." It will be observed from this clause of the Act, that the electors at a School Meeting can elect whom they please, (except a Teacher in their Section,) as Trustee, or Trustees, whether rich, or poor, resident, or non-resident. The Fifth Section of the Act, having specified the order of the retirement of Trustees from office, there can be no misunderstanding, or doubt, on this subject in ordinary cases. But questions have arisen as to the order of the retirement of Trustees elected at the same time, not in a new School Section, but in Sections already established, in cases where one Trustee has been chosen to fill a vacancy, occasioned by the retirement of a Trustee after his three years' service, and another has been chosen to fill a vacancy by death, removal, or resignation. The doubt will be removed, when it is recollected that a person elected in the place of a Trustee who had died, removed from the neighbourhood, or resigned, as authorized by the Eighth Section of the Act, remains in office, not three years, but so long as the person in whose place he has been elected would have remained in office had he lived, or not removed, or resigned. Thus is the harmonious working of the principle of the triennial succession of Trustees secured. I will not repeat here what has been said heretofore, as to the importance of electing the most devoted friend of youth and the most judicious promoter of education in each Section, as School Trustee for the next three years, commencing the fourteenth of January, 1852. There can be no doubt that the duties of School Trustee are much more important than those of a Township Councillor, and not second to those of a Member of the Legislature. I trust that every School elector to think of this, and in behalf of his children, the children of his neighbours, and his Country in all time to come to vote for the best men as School Trustees.

SCHOOLS MUST EITHER BE FREE, OR BE SUPPORTED BY FEES, OR SUBSCRIPTIONS.

(3) The last important duty of each Annual School Meeting is to decide upon the manner in which the salary of the Teacher, or Teachers, and all the expenses connected with the operations of the School, or Schools, shall be provided for. It will be observed by this clause, that the amount of the Teacher's salary and of other expenses of the School is not to be determined at the School Meeting; the amount of all such expenses, (as required by the Fourth and Fifth clauses of the Twelfth Section of the Act of 1850,) is to be decided by the Trustees,-who are the elected Representatives of the Section Indeed, the question of the precise amount of expense can seldom be decided upon by a public meeting in regard to any undertaking whatever. It is not so decided in any of the public works of Government, of Municipal Councils, Road Companies, etcetera. And the expenses attending the operations of a School are so contingent, that it would be as impracticable, as it would be injurious, to attempt the discussion and disposal of them at public meetings. Therefore, what is done by a majority of eighty-four men for the United States, and a majority of Five men for each Township, is wisely left to a majority of three men for each School Section, in respect to the amount of expense of the School,-three men elected for that purpose, and who have no other interest than that of the majority of those who elected them. But the manner of providing for these expenses is left to be decided by a vcte at the Annual, or a Special School Meeting. There is, however, one mode of providing for the expenses of a School, which is not recognized by the School Act, though some School Meetings have erroneously adopted it in the early part of the year; we refer to that of a Rate-bill, or tax, according to the number of children of school age. Those who have fallen into the error of adopting this method of supporting their School, have found it necessary to retrace their steps. There is no provision, or principle, of the law that will authorize a tax upon a man according to the number of his children. The act recognizes three modes of supporting Common Schools, -Voluntary Subscription, Rate-bill, (that is on parents sending their children to the School), and general rate, or tax "according to the valuation of property, as expressed on the assessor, or collector's roll." Which of these three modes of supporting the School shall be in each Section adopted, must be determined by the electors themselves of such Section. In the neighbouring States, a majority of the Legislature determine how each School throughout the State shall be supported; but in Upper Canada it is left with the electors of each School Section to decide how their own School shall be supported. If they decide to support it by Voluntary Subscription, the Second clause of the Twelfth Section of the Act authorizes the State to collect such Subscription, in the same manner as if it were a Rate-bill, or School Rate. If the majority at a School Meeting should determine to support their School by Rate-bill on parents, they should then determine how much should be paid per month, or per quarter, for each child attending the School; so that all parents sending

their children to the School may know, at the commencement of the year, how much they must pay. But the most simple, equitable and patriotic mode of supporting each School is by School Rate on property, and then opening the School to all the children of school age in the Section, -as free as the sunlight of heaven. The inhabitants of upwards of two hundred and fifty School Sections in Upper Canada adopted this mode of supporting their Schools in 1850; and some of the early and gratifying results are attested in the extracts from local reports, given in the Annual Report of the Chief Superintendent of Education for the year 1850. In the same Report will also be found the Address of the Chief Superintendent to the people of Upper Canada, "On the System of Free Schools."* In every case, where a Free School is adopted, two things should be especially remembered, there should be room in the School House for all the children in the Section who will attend the School, and there should be a Teacher competent to teach them all.

CHAPTER V.

CIRCULARS FROM THE CHIEF SUPERINTENDENT TO VARIOUS SCHOOL OFFICERS.

I. CIRCULARS TO THE CLERKS OF THE MUNICIPAL COUNCILS OF THE SEVERAL CITIES, TOWNS AND INCORPORATED VILLAGES IN UPPER CANADA, THE FIRST APPORTIONMENT OF THE

LEGISLATIVE SCHOOL GRANT, UNDER THE NEW SCHOOL ACT OF 1850.

I have the honour to intimate to you, for the information of the Council of which you are Clerk, and of your Board of Common School Trustees, that the sum opposite the name of your Municipality in the accompanying list, has been apportioned to it for the current year out of the Legislative School Grant.

2. By the 42nd Section of the School Act of 1850, the amount of School Money apportioned to each City, Town, and Incorporated Village is payable to the Chamberlain, or Treasurer, of such Municipality by the Honourable the Receiver General, Toronto.

3. This being the first apportionment of the Legislative School Grant under the new School Grants I would direct the attention of the Council to the provisions of the Eighteenth and Twenty-seventh Sections of the new School Act of 1850. By these Sections Municipal Councils are required to raise by assessment on the rateable property of the Municipality a sum at least equal, “clear of all charges for collection," to the amount of the Legislative School Grant. These two sums together form the "School Fund,” which can only be paid out as Salaries of legally qualified Teachers," and can be applied to no other purpose.

4. I would remind you of the provision of the School Law which requires the Council to furnish the Chief Superintendent from time to time with a copy of the proceedings of the Council on School matters, and the name of the Municipal Treasurer.

TORONTO, 1st May, 1851.

J. GEORGE HODGINS, Deputy Superintendent.

II. CIRCULAR TO LOCAL SUPERINTENDENTS OF COMMON SCHOOLS ON THE MODE OF DISTRIBUTING THE SCHOOL FUND AMONG THE SEVERAL SCHOOL SECTIONS FOR THE YEAR 1851.

1. I address this Circular to you, on the subject of distributing the School Fund" for the present year among the several School Sections placed under your charge. The First clause of the Thirty-first Section of the New School Act of 1850, requires each Local Superintendent, "as soon as he shall have received from the County Clerk a notification of the amount of money apportioned to the Township, or Townships, within the limits of his charge, to apportion the same, (unless otherwise instructed by the Chief Superintendent of Education,) among the several School Sections entitled to receive it, according to the average attendance of pupils attending each Common School, (the mean attendance of pupils for both Winter and Summer being taken,) as compared with the whole average number of pupils attending the Common Schools of such Township."

2. It is clear from the clause of the Act thus quoted, that, if no instruction be given by the Chief Superintendent of Education on the apportionment of the school money by Local School * For this Address, see pages 573-81 of the preceding Volume of this Documentary History.

Wherever it was possible, these Circulars have been curtailed and abridged, where the references in them was to purely local and temporary matters. The Circulars themselves incidentally reveal what was the actual state and wants of the Schools and School affairs in Upper Canada fifty years ago.

Superintendents, the average attendance of pupils must be the basis of such apportionment. The power given to the Chief Superintendent as to the basis of apportioning the money to the several School Sections under your charge, was designed merely to prevent the introduction of the new principle of apportionment without proper notice and against the wishes of any County. I have no desire, or interest, on the subject, except that which will be most acceptable to the people at large, and most conducive to the education of their children. The principle of aiding those who help themselves, and in proportion as they do so, appears the most equitable, and best calculated to call forth local effort to keep the Schools open both Summer and Winter, and to secure the largest and most regular attendance of pupils. But, at the same time, all parties concerned ought to have a year's notice that the amount of school money to be apportioned to them the following year would depend upon their exertions, and not upon the accidental circumstance of the number of children of school age resident in their Section. In order. however, to render the administration of the law on this point harmonious with the wishes of the people, the several County Councils have been consuited; and I have received replies from most of them. The purport of the greater part of the replies is in favour of apportioning the school money to each Section the current year according to the ratio of school population, and not of school attendance; in some of the replies no wish is expressed on the subject; and in one, or two, instances, County Councils have expressed a wish to have the moneys apportioned upon the basis of last year's attendance, as contemplated by the of the law.

3. Two of the County Councils have expressed a wish that the distribution of the School Fund for 1851 be according to the average attendance of pupils, as contemplated in the first clause of the Thirty-first Section of the School Act of 1850.

4. The remaining Counties have not expressed any opinion on the subject to the Education Office.

5. With the wishes thus expressed it is my desire to comply. I have, therefore, to request, that in all cases where your County Council has either expressed no opinion on the subject, or has expressed a desire that the former method of apportioning the school money the current year should be continued, you will apportion the same according to the ratio of children between the ages of five and sixteen years resident in each School Section, as compared with the whole number of children of school age in the Township. But, if your County Council has expressed a wish that practical effect, should be given to the new provision of the law on this subject, you will then apportion the school money to the several Sections under your charge according to the average attendance of pupils during the past year,-"the mean attendance for both Winter and Summer being taken."

6. Two questions have been proposed to me by several Local School Superintendents, as to the basis of apportioning the school money to the several School Sections. The first is, whether a School Section in which the School is kept open only six months is entitled to an apportionment equal in amount to another Section with the same number of pupils in which the School is kept open nine, or twelve. months? I answer, that the law having prohibited the payment of school moneys in aid of any Section in which a School shall not have been kept open six months during the preceding year by legally qualified Teacher, the period of six months has been regarded as the minimum of a school year. Yet, as the law does not require the Local Superintendent to pay to the orders of the Trustees of a School Section, in which a School may have been kept open six months all that may have been apportioned to such Section for the year, there is room to consider the question as to whether two Sections equal in school population should receive an equal amount of aid from the School Fund, though in the one case the School should be kept open only during six months of the year, and in the other Section twelve months. Thus, for each Section, in which a School has been kept open six months during the year by a qualified Teacher, has received the full amount of the apportionment for such year. That course, I think, should not be departed from during the current year. But the question involved may, I think, form a proper topic of remark and consultation at the County School Conventions, which I hope to be able to attend during the ensuing Autumn throughout Upper Canada.

7. The second question which has been proposed by several Local Superintendent, relates to the mode of apportionment, where the average attendance of pupils, and not school population, is made the basis of apportionment to the several School Sections of a Township. To ascertain the average attendance of pupils at a School for a given period, involves no difficulty; but I am asked, how the inean attendance of Winter and Summer is to be obtained? I answer, that in the directions which have accompanied the blank forms of Trustees' Reports during the last two, or three, years, it is stated that "the term Summer in the Report is intended to include the half year commencing in April and ending in September, and the term Winter, the half year commencing in October and ending in March;" or in other words, the Summer part of the school year commences in the Spring and the Winter part in the Autumn Should the "average Winter attendance" of pupils in a School Section be fifty, and should there be no School in such Section during the Summer, the mean attendance of pupils in Winter and Summer" in such Section would be twenty-five; but should there be a School in such Section

during the Summer, and the average attendance be forty, the then mean attendance of fifty in the Winter and forty in the Summer, would be forty-five.

These remarks on the modes of apportioning the school moneys, will, I hope, be sufficient to guide you in performing this part of your duty the current year. In the contemplated School Conventions next Autumn, we will confer on this, as well as on other, important subjects connected with the working of our School System.

TORONTO, 28th June, 1851.

EGERTON RYERSON.

III. CIRCULAR TO LOCAL SUPERINTENDENTS IN UPPER CANADA, IN TRANSMITTING BLANK FORMS OF REPORTS, AND DIRECTING THEIR ATTENTION TO SEVERAL MATTERS.

1. I transmit to you herewith the blank Reports for the Trustees of the Schools under your charge, and for yourself, for the current year, 1851. . . It is important that the Trustees should have these blank Reports in good time to enable them to fill them correctly and fully before the ensuing Annual School Meetings, (to be held as directed in the new Act of 1850, on the second Wednesday in January next,) at which the Trustees are required to read these Reports to their constituents, and then to transmit them forthwith to you. In each blank Report, there are plain and minute directions to Trustees as to the manner of filling up the various columns which it contains. . . . I have forwarded you these blank Reports direct by mail, instead of by stage through the County Clerk, in order that you may have ample time to secure the prompt delivery of them to each of the parties concerned.

2. I also forward to the Clerk of your County one copy of my Annual School Report for 1850 for yourself, and one copy for each of the School Trustee Corporations within your jurisdiction. This Report occupies nearly Four hundred (400,) royal octavo pages; and, besides a large amount of statistical information, it contains a copy of the School Act of 1850, the Forms, Regulations, and a great variety of Documents, which will render it a comprehensive School Manual for Trustees and all other parties concerned in the administration of the School System. To aid you still further in the preparation of School Lectures, and in deciding doubtful questions, I transmit to the County Clerk for your use a copy of the three bound Volumes of the Journal of Education for Upper Canada. Besides a great variety of educational articles, and educational intelligence generally, nearly every question of dispute arising under the operation of the School law, has been discussed in the Journal of Education, and may be referred to by means of the Index prefixed to each Volume; and the disputed questions not referred to in the first three Volumes of the Journal, are discussed in the fourth Volume, (not yet completed), and in the Appendix to my Annual Report. It will be observed that all copies of School Reports, Acts, and so forth, thus provided for Local School Superintendents and Trustees are not the property of individuals, but of School Officers and Corporations, and appertain to the Officers and Corporations by whomsoever filled, either now, or hereafter. It is important that every School Trustee, and I may say every school elec or should understand the new school Law, which has been so carefully prepared, and the principles and character of the School System itself; and I have done what I could to promote this object by issuing the Journal of Education for Upper Canada, and by the local circulation of Annual School Reports. It is one of the gratifying indications of progress, that the liberality of the Legislature has enabled me, during the last and the present year, to furnish each Municipal Council, School Superintendent, and School Corporation in Upper Canada, with a copy of the Provincial Annual School Report,--a Report which I have endeavored to render as complete and as instructive and interesting as possible.

3. To the filling, and adding up, of the columns of your own blank School Report for the current year, and to its early transmission to this Department, I must solicit your special attention and care. To the printed directions accompanying the blank Report, I need only add a few words on filling up the columns relative to the average school attendance of pupils. The strictest accuracy and uniformity in determining this is the more important as the present School Act provides, (not indeed, as some have supposed for the apportionment of the Legislative School Grant to Counties and Townships, but) for the distribution of the School Fund to the several School Sections in a Township, according to the average attendance of pupils at the School of each Section,-the mean attendance of Winter and Summer being taken, as already explained. I need not enlarge on this principle of the law which proposes to aid each School Section, not according to the number of children of school age resident in it, nor according to what the amount of its taxable property, nor according to what the inhabitants in each School Section may contribute, but according to the number of children actually sent to the Schools, and the time and punctuality of their attendance,-conditions favourable to the poorer Sections. Such being the principle of the School Law in respect to the local distribution of the School Fund, care should be taken that no errors, or attempted abuses, escape detection in the Returns of the average attendance of pupils. This you can easily prevent. The School Law requires each Local Superintendent, at his Quarterly Visit to each School, to ascertain among other