THE State Educational Association

sea-shore,

No. 2.

TH

was called to order by President Flickinger at 10 o'clock on the morning of July 2, 1902, with the largest attendance ever witnessed at an opening session. Indeed, the interest manifested by the teachers of the two cities and the State of Allegheny, as measured by the attendance at the sessions, was as marked as the royal generosity of their provision for the entertainment of the membership. The music also deserves especial mention; it was all good, some of it very fine; the work of the children was a surprise; the Templar Quintette harmonized beautifully-altogether this branch deserved the high appreciation we heard frequently expressed. The decoration of the meeting-place was not forgotten; certain tall vases on the platform, filled with blooming roses, made a picture to be remembered.

Devotional services were conducted by Rev. H. H. Marlin, of the Fourth United Presbyterian church of Pittsburg.

ADDRESS OF WELCOME.

Hon. A. J. Robertson, representing the Recorder of the city, made the opening

address of welcome much as follows:

Teachers as a rule are very punctual, and regard this a valuable element of discipline -with children. [Laughter. The session was called for 9:30.] I am reminded of an urchin who was taken on an outing to the

of satisfaction and said it was the first time he had ever seen enough of anything: those who have been here this morning can say with him that they have seen enough of something. It seems rather a peculiar thing to make an address of welcome to people who come to Pittsburg--the city itself is a welcome, with its history and its present development. We know it is a great city, and we believe it is the greatest in the world; in many respects this is undoubtedly true. Our tonnage is greater than that of Boston, New York and Philadelphia combined-greater than London and Liverpool combined. We are also a great community on the line of intelligence. Our conservatory at the Park is one of the finest in the have in the near future a library that will world owned by a municipality. We will

be the finest in the world. We have also in contemplation the greatest technical school ever conceived of, and perhaps no other man could have conceived of it but Andrew Carnegie.

But the greatness of our people in the future depends on the work of your hands, who make the coming men and women. You have a great responsibility as representatives of a system that stands for the development and advancement of the brains of the nation-for brains rule the world. the dug-out been superseded by the ocean Through the development of the brain has steamer, the stage coach by steam and electricity. The school system you represent has changed the character of nations; wars are less numerous since you have demonstrated that the pen is mightier than the sword. The school is a mill grinding as

near as may be a uniform grist, regardless | of the quality of grain. Our system is truly American, maintaining the foundation principles of government and directing the forward march of progress by educating alike the children of the people. All our development, as individuals and as a nation, is due to our school system, and he who would injure or destroy it is an enemy to progress. Standing for no party, no church, no creed, no faction, greater than armies or fleets, it leads the way to prosperity and honor. Need I urge you to guard it well, and fill nobly your place in this great institution?

I have come before you as the representative of the Recorder, who was unable to be present, and in his behalf extend to you the freedom of our city. I have not the keys with me [laughter], but I proclaim you at liberty to do what you please so long as you do not break the law. Even if a few gentlemen should be so unfortunate as to fall by the wayside, I am City Solicitor, and will see that they are taken care of. [Laughter and applause.]

Supt. SAMUEL ANDREWS, of Pittsburg, made the second address of welcome, as follows:

It becomes my pleasant duty to welcome you to Pittsburg. That this duty assigned to me by the Executive Committee is not a mere perfunctory performance because an address of welcome has become a custom, I can only give you my hearty assurance, and let our acts of hospitality during the next few days speak for themselves. I also hasten to assure you that in this brief welcome I shall not turn loose upon your devoted heads the flood-gates of Uncle Sam's census reports to prove Pittsburg's industrial leadership of the world, although the chapters in those darling literary works under the head of Pittsburg tell a wonderful story of steel, iron, coal, natural gas, petroleum, glass, aluminum, carborundum and electricity, and of a tonnage on our rivers and railroads almost beyond belief. I shall not, I say, inflict these startling, staggering statistics upon you at this time -you know where to find them when you want them-but you shall go, if you choose, and see for yourselves how the armor plate for our battle-ships is made, and where the most powerful electric motors in the world are constructed; you shall see coal fleets by the acre, and the workings of free-slackwater navigation; you shall see our free libraries, art galleries, museums, conservatories, parks and zoological gardens, and you shall see some of our mills in operation by night from the top of Mt. Washington, although I warn you that James Parton wrote in the Atlantic Monthly over thirty (30) years ago, that this scene resembles Hades with the lid off.

I welcome you not only in the name of Pittsburg proper, but of that Greater Pitts

burg which will soon be a municipal verity, as it already is a practical fact, and which includes nearly all of Allegheny countythe county that Abraham Lincoln styled "the State of Allegheny on account of the patriotic promptness and liberality with which it sent troops to the front during the Civil War. This Greater Pittsburg includes three cities, forty-five (45) boroughs and twenty-six (26) townships, with a population approximating 750,000, and is not absorbed entirely in industrial expansion, but finds time and inclination to provide public school property valued last year at over nine (9) millions, to employ three thousand (3000) teachers, and to give the blessings of the public school to 150,000 pupils. When you first met in this city, a prophecy of such a showing to-day would have been dangerously risky to the prophet's reputation for sanity and laughed away as utterly Utopian.

The

It seems eminently fitting that this, the semi centennial of your organization, should be observed by your meeting in Pittsburg. The State Teachers' Association was organized at Harrisburg in 1852, but that preliminary meeting was called by Pittsburg educators, in which call Philadelphia and Lancaster subsequently concurred. first regular meeting was held at the Grant School in this city, not far from where you are now assembled, in August, 1853, and about 132 members were enrolled. At your meeting last year 2015 was the enrollment, and at this meeting a still better record will be made. If this does not show progress, then figures do not always tell the truth, and this Association had better go into liquidation.

The Executive Committee in charge of that first meeting in Pittsburg in 1853 seemed to have queer ideas about the time of assembling, as the Association met on Friday and continued over Sunday. This I learned from the School Journal, the organ of this Association, and which contains the only complete record of its proceedings to be found anywhere.

The Association then met semi-annually. The next year, 1854, James Thompson, a Pittsburg teacher, was president.

In 1861, at Lewisburg, Andrew Burtt, that sturdy advocate of intellectual light and liberty, who was so long the Nestor of Pittsburg educators, served as president. Then came Geo. P. Hays, at the accidental meeting in this city in 1873, Geo. J. Luckey at Shippensburg in 1874, J. P. Andrews at Pottsville in 1882, John Morrow at Harrisburg in 1885, and Samuel Hamilton at Media in 1894, a roster which shows Allegheny county's continuous interest in this Association, and which vouches for the genuineness of the welcome at this time.

I know of no other organization, social, scientific, ecclesiastical, political or otherwise, that has done so much for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania as this Teachers

Association. For fifty years its influence has been felt through wholesome legislation and through the circulation of intelligence that cultivated a public sentiment in favor of the public school system, which distinctly said hands off" to all who would mar its symmetry. Through all this eventful half century it has kept its eye upon the Legislature at Harrisburg, and by judiciously influencing that body when it was enjoying a lucid interval it secured the passage of wise measures which have redounded to the improvement of the schools and consequently to the general welfare. Among its achievements in this direction are increased minimum school terms, State Normal Schools, the county superintendency, teachers' institutes, a separate State School Department, increased State appropriations, free text-books, compulsory attendance and others, to say nothing about what it has done along lines that could not be accomplished by Act of Assembly, such as elevating the standard of qualification among teachers, stimulating the worthy endeavor of pupils, and giving to local school officers a higher idea of the magnitude of their calling.

In emphasizing the importance of this Association's work I cannot do better than repeat in substance what has so often been said on occasions similar to this, that in so far as it represents character there is no organization which has so surely, so potently, so actually, so generally pervaded the life of the State, its social, intellectual and civic economies. as the one whose members meet

here to-day. Holding these views, and feeling that respect for this body which these views imply, I can assure you in the name of the teachers of Allegheny county, and those of the cities embraced within its limits, a sincere welcome to the Iron City.

Your Executive Committee has provided a rarely entertaining feast of reason; the local committee will do the rest in playing the part of hosts and in carrying out the amenities thus incumbent upon them. The freedom of the city is yours; we are ready to receive you. Enjoy yourselves, make yourselves at home, and we trust that when the labors of this convention are completed, and you return to your homes, you will take with you pleasant memories of your visit to Pittsburg.

RESPONSES.

The first to respond to the welcome was Dr. D. J. Waller, Jr., of Indiana State Normal School, who spoke as follows:

Thrice before has this body met in Pittsburg. Twenty-nine years ago, in 1873, Dr. George P. Hays, President of Washington and Jefferson, was Vice-President of this body, and in the absence of the President, Edward Gideon, Esq., of Philadelphia, presided over all the sessions. Liberty Hall was the place of meeting. We are told by a

chronicler of the day that the attendance from all parts of the State was checked by the wet weather and by a report that cholera was prevalent in the city. Eighteen years earlier, in August, 1855-forty-seven years ago-this body held the semi-annual session here and the establishment of Normal Schools was the chief topic. The Association had its origin in a meeting held in Harrisburg in December, 1852, presided over by the Hon. Thomas H. Burrowes. In Pittsburg, in the following August-1853-the first meeting was held under the constitution. The President was J. H. Brown, of Philadelphia. The place was the third ward school building. J. P. Wickersham, of Lancaster, and J. M. Barnett, of Indiana, were upon the executive committee. Thomas H. Burrowes, editor of the Pennsylvania School Journal, read a paper upon Normal Schools that roused the Association to an extended discussion and received its full endorsement. The establishing of teachers' institutes was discussed. A committee was appointed also to report upon the subjects of County Superintendents and a State Superintendent. Thus the four great agencies, the State Superintendency, the County Superintendency, the County Institute and the Normal School, received their first impetus in that first meeting held in this city. The great school law of 1854 was enacted the next year. At that time the average of teachers' salaries in Allegheny county was, for men, $28.00; for women, $16.00. To day for men it is $73.55, and for women $45.41.

This body has now a constituency in every township in the Commonwealth, unvexed by political or religious differences, aggregating 1,161,524 gathered in twenty-nine thousand schools under one hundred and forty-one superintendents. Eleven and a third millions of dollars are spent for teachers. Nearly twenty-three millions of dollars were spent last year for public instruction. We represent those who thirty years hence will control all that you now direct. We are here trustees of their interests to discuss the best method of preparing for their entrance upon their inheritance. This is a preparation for the coronation of the coming kings. The interests here represented attract the attention of the world. No one of the states of the Union has more thoroughly invaded the world with her products than Pennsylvania. Her oil, rails, engines, electrical supplies and agricultural implements rule the markets. Her ships plow the main under many flags and her bridges span the streams and gorges of the world, and no part of the state contributes more to her exports than Pittsburg. This intelligent energy of our people has startled the world, and they are coming here to study the methods pursued in the education of our people. It is remarkable that our own people were not aware of the relative excellence of our educational system until very recently. German schools, lower and higher, were lauded upon

our institute platforms. The systems of other states were held up for imitation.

Within the past decade the foreign superintendents in our great industrial establishments have, to a great extent, been supplanted by men trained in the technical institutions of Pennsylvania. We are here to discuss the principles and methods that have been instrumental in securing this high eminence and to endeavor to apply them more fully. We know our deficiencies; we are stirred by the manifest possibilities. If the results achieved, as measured by the world's standards, have been wonderful, what may we expect when teachers throughout the State are what it is possible to make them? when superintendence is as close and as highly skilled as it should be? when libraries and high schools are found in every township, and when school terms are proportioned in length to the importance

of education?

We are here to co-operate with you in making a greater Pittsburg, a more aggressive competition in the markets of the world by the whole Commonwealth, a more effective army and navy, a nobler race of men and women. Our first meeting in your city was a memorable one. Could we look back upon this one as fraught with as much good to education in our State, we would be content.

Further response to the addresses of welcome was made by Supt. L. E. McGinnes, of Steelton, as follows:

It is my privilege as well as my pleasure to be one of those selected to respond to our cordial welcome. It was remarked last year at Philadelphia that some who read the newspapers might have felt they needed to go there armed with a shot-gun; no such contemplation could find place this year, since we knew we were coming to a city so remarkably free from political disturbances! [Laughter.] We have come together both to benefit and to be benefited. The day is gone by when the State Educational Association or any body of teachers needs to apologize for itself. We are assembled from every corner of the State, representing the whole Commonwealth, to uplift the whole people-Philadelphia and Pittsburg, and all between. We hope to help both you and ourselves, and so to make a legitimate combination of selfishness and altruism. No one could remain in a condition of lethargy here; as some one has said, "you couldn't go through even in sleeping-car without getting awake."

We shall receive inspiration to industry and efficiency from your splendid educational leadership. The State of Allegheny is the home of Hamilton and Morrow and Andrews, as well as thousands of other faithful teachers, many of whom are here with us this morning. It is the home of the man whose work is to-day touching the world as perhaps no other-Andrew Car

negie. We will learn here how far better it is to spend money upon the formative period of life than to wait until it is a question of punishing criminals. As Franklin once when asked for a contribution to a church bell said he preferred sense to sound, and presented books instead, so on the grand scale to-day we have enlightened liberality placing libraries all around us. Instead of

spending money hunting down and punishing criminals, let us give the young good books. We do not know when another Horace Mann may wander into our library, and take up a book that will mould his life into a blessing to the world.

We owe it to our friends to add that we have been gratified with the arrangements made for our comfort and pleasure, and thank you for your cordial welcome.

Miss Frank Huntly sang "The Holy City."

The meetings of Departments and Conferences set down in the programme for this afternoon were on motion postponed until to-morrow, that all might take part in the excursion down the Ohio.

SUPERVISION FROM THE TEACHER'S

POINT OF VIEW.

Principal W. M. Pierce, of Ridgway, read a paper on this subject, as follows:

I like the word standpoint as given in the subject of this discussion. It indicates that the teacher has a right to a standing-placenot to a view-point or a peek hole, from which she must dodge back or where she must hide herself when the superintendent or school director happens to glance in her direction, but a ground which is hers of right, on which she may stand upright and fearlessly view her surroundings. The influence of the teacher on our children, through the force of her example, if no other reason were to be found, demands that she have some independence, some known rights that she shall dare to maintain; that she shall be a womanly woman, not a timid servant. So we view this question from the teacher's standpoint.

Looking out, then, through the teacher's eyes at her surroundings, we seek first to establish the premises of the argument or the basis of the discussion which we shall make. To this end some conditions must be assumed. Let us make these conditions as simple, and therefore as inclusive, as possible. In technical language, let us narrow the content and thus widen the extent of our terms.

We assume then in regard to the teacher, on the one hand, that she is honestly trying to do her best, and on the part of the superintendent, on the other, that he is honestly trying to do his best. Here are two persons working together, each honest in his purpose, each working in a different sphere to accomplish the same end, that is, to do the