Can Baltimore county afford to pay $5,000 to $6,000 to a superintendent of schools? There is no doubt that it can. A comparison of school salaries will show this clearly enough. Incidentally it is said that the county recently offered a salary of $5,000 to try to retain the services of a road supervisor. In giving population figures I shall use the census of 1910, giving round numbers that are close to exact. For reasons already indicated, it would be absurd to use county salaries as a measure; the Maryland county is virtually a municipality for school purposes, and we must make our comparisons with cities of somewhat corresponding population. Our point of departure is a population for Baltimore county of 125,000 and a salary for the superintendent of schools of $3,500.

If we pick out the three or four cities nearest in population to this county we shall find: Birmingham, Ala., $5,000; New Haven, Conn., $4,500; Omaha, Neb., $5,400; Dayton, Ohio, $5,000; Scranton, Pa., $5,000. These run, it will be noticed, from $1,000 to $1,900 higher than the Baltimore county salary. Only one city of such a group - Paterson, N. J. has a salary no higher — than that of the county. Turning now to salaries that do correspond and excluding the exceptionally high and low, one finds the following examples:

These cities average less than half the population of Baltimore county and present problems much less difficult. Nor are they extreme examples. As many cases could be quoted of higher salaries for work of the same magnitude. For example:

Furthermore, there are many small cities, much smaller than those mentioned above, and only a mere fraction of the size of Baltimore county, that pay as large or larger salaries. Note these:

Observe that the total population of these six towns is substantially less than that of Baltimore county and that they pay in all $26,200 to their school superintendents. The distinctly urban population alone of Baltimore county far exceeds the combined population of Montclair and Miles City, which together pay $9,200.

Such comparisons could readily be extended, but the facts already given certainly show that Baltimore county can afford to pay a superintendent of schools at least $5,000 and that some other Maryland counties are far from using their resources liberally for the support of education. The point might be made that if ability as well as necessity be considered the taxable basis as well as the population must be taken into account. This is true, but if the most liberal allowances are made the proposition will remain no less clearly established. At the same time it must be remembered that the county problem - the kind that we are now talking about-really demands a better equipment than does the ordinary urban problem.

In this article I have done little more than point out the special character of the Maryland county organization, with the splendid opportunities it gives, and the readiness with which the counties might spend a great deal more money for the employment of professional skill adequate to the development of those possibilities. There are many other important factors in the problem if time and space permitted their treatment here. Suitable academic and professional qualifications for the office of county superintendent should be established by law. A minimum salary might be established by statute; a New Jersey act of 1912 establishes a salary of $3,000, notwithstanding the fact that all important cities and towns have superintendents of their own. The power of district school trustees to appoint principal teachers is a relic of the decentralized plan that has no place under the county organization and is only a hindrance and nuisance to an efficient superintendent. There is the question whether some of the smaller and weaker and more purely rural counties of the State might be joined in larger administrative units in order to obtain the advantages that are open to the larger counties like those referred to in the foregoing paragraphs. The law which now explicitly

requires the Governor of the State to recognize party politics in making appointments to school boards should be changed, and the appointing power charged with the responsibility of ignoring partisan and political affiliations. The present miserably inadequate provisions for the professional education of teachers should be increased and vastly improved. And inseparably connected with all this is the problem of stronger State organization. Maryland may well study the strong centralized organization, with a State School Commissioner at $10,000, provided for the neighboring State of New Jersey under the Governorship of Woodrow Wilson.

V. THE COUNTY UNIT IN EDUCATIONAL ORGANIZATION IN GEORGIA

[Evans, L. B., Supt. of Richmond County, Georgia, in an address before the Dept. of Superintendence of the N. E. A., 1896.]

This address, made nearly twenty years ago, describes a system of county educational organization greatly superior to that to which our Northern states have as yet attained. If we succeed in developing as efficient an educational organization within the next decade or decade and a half we shall be indeed fortunate.

The educational thought of our time has been chiefly directed toward the improvement of city school systems. So we hear of the great schools of Boston, Chicago, New York, Cincinnati and Philadelphia, and a score of other places. The emphasis of our thought has been placed long and devotedly on city schools, at the expense of the rural schools. ***

It is quite time that we change the emphasis of our study, turn aside from the contemplation of the excellences of the city schools, and consider the necessities of the rural schools. The wisest policy is to frame some educational scheme that will keep people in the country, that will stop the exodus from the farms, that will make the rural people content, and that will make them enlightened and prosperous.

I believe very firmly that the county, or township, is the proper unit of educational organization. If one system of schools can be made to extend over a whole county, including city and villages, the organization will be upon the basis of territory. By this means the entire country can after a while be brought under uniform organization. So long as the organization is by cities,

we merely organize by locality, which can never be uniform or entire. It will always remain a one-sided development. A proper policy is to induce the people hereafter to organize by area, rather than by spots. The effect of this will be to give to the rural child the same school advantages as to the city child, and there is every reason in equity and good sense why these advantages should be the same.

I come from an illustration of this kind of organization, and it may not be amiss to tell something of the schools of Richmond County, Georgia, in which county is situated the thriving city of Augusta. Here, for the past twenty-five years, has been in operation what is known as the county system.

One board of education, composed of representatives elected by the people for a term of three years, one-third of the membership expiring every year, has charge of the entire school interests of the City of Augusta and of the County of Richmond. This board of education has the unique power of levying a school tax directly upon the people of the county, without revision by any other authority, and without any limit as to rate or amount. The school tax is levied and collected as a uniform rate upon all property of the county, whether it is in the city or out of it. This forms the general school fund of the county, supplemented by the state appropriation.

When it comes to the distribution of the fund no regard is paid to the amount raised by any ward of the city or any district of the county, but the fund is distributed according to the necessities of each ward and district, determined by the number of children to be educated. The school fund of the whole county is raised by a tax on all property of the county, and is distributed upon the basis of the school population of each community. Thus it happens that a community rich in naught else but children will get a flourishing school paid for by their wealthy but less fortunate neighbors.

As a matter of fact, a large part of the money paid by the city is annually spent in the rural districts, for the city has nine-tenths of the taxable property, but only three-fourths of the school population. So it happens that the rural schools may pay one-tenth of the school tax and receive the benefit of one-fourth of it. Augusta has spent in the past twenty years the sum of two hundred thousand dollars, in building schoolhouses and paying teachers for the children who live in the country districts around her. Augusta has shown her faith in the proposition that every city needs to be environed by an intelligent, industrious, and contented population. When it comes to teachers, the same qualifications are demanded

for rural schools as for the city schools. Upon the regular examination terms, and upon the issuing of licenses to teach, an applicant does not know whether he will teach in the city or out of it, and to many it is a matter of indifference. And I know whereof I speak when I say that there are young women graduates of normal colleges doing high-grade work in country schools ten miles beyond the limits of the city, and doing it happily and cheerfully. We firmly believe in the further proposition that a country school is entitled to as good a teacher as a city school, and that those who live in the fields are as deserving of education as those who dwell beside the asphalt. Carlyle must have had a country child in his mind when he said, "this I consider a great tragedy, that one soul should remain in ignorance that had capacity for higher things."

The teachers are treated as nearly alike as can be. City and country teachers are paid about the same salaries. They get it at the end of every month, and on the same day. The certainty and the regularity of a fixed compensation create a sense of security, safety, and comfort in a teacher, and accordingly increases his efficiency. No teacher can do his best work when he works at starvation rates, is paid once in three months, and often in scrip that he must discount. There is much philosophy also economy in the maxim that advises us to pay a public servant well and watch him closely. So we draw no distinction of locality. First-class work is worth as much twenty miles from town as it is in the heart of the city.

The schools of the county are run nine calendar months. They all begin at the same time and close at the same time. During the last year every child of the county, regardless of where he lived, was offered nine months of actual tuition.

So far as schoolhouses are concerned, these are located in rural districts, so as to be on an average of four miles apart. No child is out of walking distance of a school, open nine months in the year and taught by a good teacher. These houses are owned by the county board of education, and cost from three hundred to twentyfive hundred dollars each, according to size and equipment.

One superintendent has charge of all teachers in the county. The same degree of efficiency that should attend the supervision of city schools is likewise extended to the country schools. One expert for all is the theory, and, as far as human effort can avail, it is carried out in practice. The same course of study is prescribed for all pupils, and the same course of professional reading is required of all teachers. The teachers of the city schools meet for instruction once a week, the teachers of the country schools