DIAGRAM 9.-Showing the whole number of teachers in the United States, also the num

ber of each sex, for each year since 1870-71.

NUMBER AND SEX OF TEACHERS.

The whole number of teachers employed during the school year 1891-92, as shown by Table 10, was 374,460.

Of these 121,638, or 32.5 per cent, were males; 252,822, or 67.5 per cent, were females.

About one-third of all the teachers in the United States are therefore males.

In two States, Massachusetts and New Hampshire, less than onetenth of the teachers are males (Column 8). In each of the other North Atlantic States except Pennsylvania more than five-sixths of the teach

ers are women.

Arkansas has the highest proportion of male teachers, viz, 70·7 per

cent.

In Diagram 9 the total number of teachers, and the number of each sex, are plotted for each year since 1870-'71.

It will be noted that there has been no perceptible increase in the number of male teachers since about the year 1880. The total number of teachers has continued to increase uninterruptedly, but the gain comes entirely from accessions to the ranks of the female teachers.

The year 1880 marks an epoch where the lines of the male and the female teachers, which had been ascending at a uniform grade, begin to diverge widely.

The following table shows the per cent of male teachers in each geographical division each year since 1870-'71. In Diagram 10 the same is graphically reproduced.

TABLE 11.-Showing what per cent of the whole number of teachers are males.

DIAGRAM 10.-Showing the ratio of male teachers to whole number of teachers each year

The trend of the lines in the diagram shows that in every section of the country the proportion of male teachers, which for ten years had been either constant or actually increasing, commenced to diminish rapidly about 1880. To what cause should be ascribed so decided and widespread a change at that particular period is not immediately apparent. It may be that a long course of discussion on the avenues open for the support of women and the active steps taken in the direction of their higher education had gradually familiarized the public mind with their needs, capabilities, and aptitudes, and paved the way for more advanced ideas; so that when once inaugurated in favorable centers here and there, the movement toward the more extended employment of women spread rapidly far and wide, the time being ripe for it and only a sufficient impetus being necessary.

CHANGES IN THE TEACHING FORCE DURING THE SCHOOL YEAR.

Eight States, in addition to reporting the whole number of different teachers employed, report the number of teachers' places or positions; or, what is equivalent, the number of teachers necessary to supply the schools (Table 10, Column 9).

If there is no change in the teaching force of a system during the school year, if each teacher occupies, to the end of the year, the place he held at the beginning, then the two numbers just referred to will be identical. But in the eight States which report the number of positions, there were in all 88,464 positions in 1891-92, and 110,014 different teachers; in other words, there were 124.4 teachers to every 100 positions, so that an average of 24.4 positions out of every 100 show a change of teachers during the year in the eight States. This average should, probably, be larger, as there are, doubtless, cases where a teacher is transferred from one school to another and not counted as a different teacher, though a change has been effected.

The number of teachers to 100 positions varies from 106-6 in Kansas to 141.7 in Michigan (Column 10).

It is probable that the number of teachers, as reported in several, perhaps many, of the States outside of the eight referred to, is made up in whole or in part (especially in the reports of cities), of the number of teachers necessary, instead of the whole number of different teachers, and in so far the statistics of teachers are not uniform. The headings of the tables or columns in school reports are often not sufficiently explicit to determine which one of the two quantities it is designed to give, the number of places or the whole number of different teachers.

The significant quantity of the two is the number of teachers necessary or required by the schools. This, from a statistical point of view, is what should be understood by the number of teachers." The whole number of different teachers, including in the count all who taught for any period of time, however brief, affords some collateral information, that is of value principally when considering the changes in the teaching force during the school year.

A table giving the number of teachers in each State required by the schools as conducted, with sex and race classifications, would admit of various useful applica