positions, can do more for the future of our country than any other group. We could make our normal schools into great educational West Points, where the best talent that the country produces could be instructed and trained and inspired to do the most important work that can be done in a great democracy.

NECESSITY AND DIFFICULTIES OF SUPERVISION IN A CITY SCHOOL SYSTEM

HERBERT S. WEET, SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS, ROCHESTER, N.Y. We are inclined to believe that the heart of this problem is to be found not in the present plan of supervision but in the difficulties of so administering it as to have it accomplish the ends for which it is designed. He who would deny that there is a vast deal of discontent among the teachers of this country over this matter of supervision is simply blind to the facts. As far as I am aware no city is free from it, and no city has a monopoly on it. Perhaps the best approach to a discussion of the chief causes of this discontent is to be found in a consideration of the two extremes involved in it.

At the one extreme stands the incompetent teacher or principal who objects to any standards of work except those which are self-imposed. The time will never come when supervision will be accepted by these members of a public-school system; but after all has been said that might be said concerning these we are face to face with the fact that they constitute a decidedly minority group in the city school system. The greater number of our teachers are fair-minded, intelligent, and devoted to the welfare of the children with whom they work. They are public-spirited, and during the days that have past no body of people in any community gave greater evidence of ability to do public service intelligently and devotedly than did the public-school teachers of the cities of this country. We may well ask ourselves, therefore, how it happens that this small group, which seldom stands up to be counted, can spread its spirit of discontent thru the great body of worthy teachers to the point where the interests of the schools are jeopardized and the sound principle of supervision challenged. I believe that the answer is to be found in the other extreme for which you and I as superintendents must in common fairness be held responsible. It is the extreme of autocratic supervision.

The fact that a teacher chafes under supervision does not necessarily indicate that she is incompetent. There is a type of supervision against which any self-respecting teacher ought to protest. It is first, last, and all the time supervision from the center to the circumference. Its great task is to get the wisdom of the center, which only too often comes thru introspection, out to those at the circumference in such a way as to keep them busy and contented. No one has ever yet succeeded in doing this in the long run.

Between these two extremes stands the true principle of representative supervision. It goes without saying that the first requisite in securing representative supervision is the selection of one who by talent, training, experience, and personality is really able to lead. In general, where such a person is selected his work will be representative of all the common interests involved rather than of his own particular theories unmodified by the results of practical observation and experience in the classroom. And yet even a person who inherently has all the qualities needed may fail to be representative largely because of the attitude of the superintendent himself or of other supervisors of the force concerning the place which the principal has in the public-school system. As a general principle supervision in a city school system will be representative in precisely the proportion that the principal of the school is regarded as a vital educative force in the school over which he presides.

The full significance of this distinction with reference to the place of the principal in the life of the school, as far as its bearing upon this problem of supervision is concerned, came to me some two or three years ago while in conference with a superintendent of schools. We were discussing this same problem of supervision and attempting to establish the spheres in which teacher, principal, and supervisor might each claim his sovereign rights. When the discussion turned to the place of the principal, this superintendent related the following experience:

During the first year that I was superintendent of schools a superintendent of several years of experience and a man who had met with good success in his chosen field, said to me that the most difficult problem which I would have to face as time went on would be that of knowing how to get accomplisht in the schools the things that I desired to have accomplisht, in spite of the fact that each school had a principal thru whom the superintendent was obliged to work. This remark made a profound impression upon my mind. I had been a principal myself and had been conscious at times of a certain domination which had so restricted my own opportunities for professional growth that I had chafed under the burden. Then and there I decided that come what might I would test out the proposition that my great function as superintendent of schools was to stimulate so far as possible the principal to exercise initiative and educational leadership and then to bend my energies toward securing for these workers in the schools conditions favorable to a realization of the ends for which they were working.

And he concluded with this significant statement: "I have been amazed at the power and resources that these principals have shown almost without exception." We may depend upon it that in that community the extremes of autocracy and of pure democracy are being avoided and that the sound principle of representative supervision is being carried out.

In conclusion then I believe that we must accept the necessity of supervision as nothing short of axiomatic. Without it no city school system can even approximate that cooperative working relation among its parts so essential if the whole is to be an organic unit. Without it neither the community, the child, nor the great body of worthy teachers. can be protected against the incompetent who not only works an injustice

to the children but reflects discredit upon the profession of which he is a member. And lastly, without it, it is difficult to find any practicable way of gathering, organizing, and distributing the contributions which are being made to education from the teacher in the classroom to the specialist in the university and making them available as helps to the great body of those principals and teachers who need and are entitled to receive these contributions. At the same time we must have our supervision more representative than it has been, if it is to stand the test. Some of us thru actual experience as teachers in the classroom and as principals in the school have learned some of the things to avoid if these larger needs of supervision are to be met. We had the task, but we may not have had the vision, and the task without the vision becomes drudgery. Likewise there are those who are so far removed from the classroom and the field of administration as to have the vision without the task, and the vision without the task becomes visionary. Between these two extremes lies the real supervisor, the real leader. There is no such thing as oversupervision when such a one is found. Task and vision are so linkt in his work that the spirit of service becomes his great characteristic. Give us a sufficient number of this type, and America thru her public schools will continue to bring out in the future even more than she has in the past the great fundamental values of democracy.

DEFECTS OF SUPERVISION AND CONSTRUCTIVE
SUGGESTIONS THEREON

SALLIE HILL, PRESIDENT OF LEAGUE OF TEACHERS' ASSOCIATIONS,
DENVER, COLO.

As we all know, the largest number of children complete their school life with the elementary grades. The public owes these children, who represent the great mass of our future citizens, the best elementary education which can be devised, in order that the results may be worthy of our labor and desire. To secure these best results it is necessary that the elementary teachers should work under conditions which are conducive to cheerfulness, hopefulness, and initiation. Such conditions do not now obtain, and for this our present system of supervision is largely responsible.

From the long list of criticisms of supervision of special subjects I have chosen only those mentioned in the majority of the reports. There are good supervisors and they are not dead. There are supervisors who realize that their work should be constructive and not destructive, but I am not askt to talk of them.

There is no democracy in our school systems today. Democracy cannot exist with the present system, which gives so much power to those who supervise. We have been trained to think; you encourage us to do extension work and attend summer schools. We have been your pupils,

sometimes your fellow-students, we have learned your methods, have imbibed your theories on democracy in the schools, have learned to direct children in planning and executing projects, and when we take up our work what do we find? We find a condition in which we are to use no initiative, in which we are not able to put into practice anything we have learned. Instead of training children to carry out projects, we are ourselves only the mediums thru which others work.

Too many supervisors are lacking in training, personality, and teaching experience. When shall we learn that a department certificate does not fit a man or woman without experience to be a supervisor? Or that a six to ten weeks' summer course does not fit an experienst teacher to be one? One class needs schoolroom experience, and the other class needs more training in criticism and supervision. The lack of these qualities is the - cause of constant irritation to the experienst teachers. It is humiliating and tends to neither cheerfulness nor hopefulness to have to submit one's work to the criticisms of those whose lack of training and experience has not fitted them for their positions. These limitations are so frequent as to disqualify a large number of those now doing supervisory work. More training and teaching experience are needed to see back of the form and into the spirit of a recitation. There should be less study of the teacher's plan and closer study of the effect of the teaching upon the class.

Frequently psychological laws are utterly disregarded in a supervisor's methods of criticism. Teachers are taught that the worst possible method in dealing with children is to leave them discouraged, yet there are many times when a teacher is left without courage or self-confidence. For a teacher to be left in such a state is a crime against teacher and pupil. Unwise, unfeeling criticism from supervisors has contributed more to the hysterical, broken-down condition of the teaching body than any other one cause.

Supervisors too often discuss unfavorably the work of the pupils before the class, which is a reflection upon the teacher. There are supervisors who mark the pupils' work, keeping up a running fire of criticism to the teacher all the while. The pupils during this time are given work to keep them quiet. Imagine the result and after-effects of such criticisms upon teacher and class. These are the ones who have no time to listen to a recitation or to give a lesson. The supervisor's mental and physical condition plays too large a part in the rating and reports made to superintendents. Favoritism is another disagreeable factor met with oftener than you perhaps realize.

Too much is demanded by the system of the teacher. Each teacher is expected to be a specialist in all subjects supervised, and her rating depends upon the degree in which her class work measures up to the standard set by the supervisors, each of whom has to prepare only one subject, generally in an office during the time the teacher is teaching. Think what a superwoman a teacher must be to compete with specialists in from one to

five subjects and finish all work in these and the other branches in the specified time. Is it any wonder that school work is condemned on the ground that boys and girls know so little about any one subject?

Last and most vicious of all is the rating power of supervisors. Here let me say that I do not want to give the impression that we are sensitive. No person who has remained a teacher for ten years can be sensitive. She is either dead or has gone into some other business. But teachers are afraid. They must hold their positions, or think they must, and they follow the course that seems the most helpful; that is, they give all the time they can, and then some more, in preparation of supervised studies; for upon the principal's report, plus the superintendent's, plus the school board's, plus the parents' opinion, plus the pupils' approval, plus the supervisors' rating, do their salaries rest; but the feeling, whether right or wrong, is firmly establisht that the supervisors' rating makes or mars the teachers' future. Many schools give no credits for these special studies. The pupils receive marks, but these marks in no way affect their promotion. The pupils soon learn this. Yet, note this well, the teacher's tenure depends partly at least upon the rating given her on class work done in the supervised branches. Is this fair? Pupils know the marks count them nothing, yet the teacher wins or loses by their work.

In fact, our system is tottering because of too many of everything. Too many supervisors with big salaries and undue rating power. Too many pupils in one room. I could talk about that for hours, if I could only get someone to listen. Too many studies for one child. Do you ever permit yourselves to recall the recitations one teacher in the elementary grades is expected to hear-I cannot say teach-in one day? For fear you can't recall them, let me remind you of the subjects, both the supervised and the unsupervised, in which she must be proficient and show enthusiastic interest: arithmetic, geography, history, civics, oral and written language and what technical grammar she dares to introduce, spelling, phonics, reading, memory work, literature, nature-study, use of dictionary, courtesy, how and where to find current topics, gymnastics, drawing, music, and sewing, with an occasional competitive composition thrown in for good measure. Yesterday someone said that we should be trained in health supervision. Could you do it? Neither can we.

Do away with supervisors in the elementary schools, as they have been dropt entirely from the senior high school and largely from the junior high school with most beneficial results. If this plan is good in the upper grades it will be even better in the elementary, for there is where the variety of studies prevails. Let the heretofore supervised studies be given to teachers who have proved themselves especially adapted and therefore especially successful in that work. Let one teacher have two of these subjects in one building, or one subject in two or more buildings, just as manual training and cooking are now taught. Do not require the regular teacher to be