STATE SUPERVISORS FOR ELEMENTARY TEACHERS We have had a service from the State department of education for helping teachers. Each one covers a region of the State. They served essentially 10 years ago as elementary supervisors. They largely work with the teachers who are having the worst time getting along. In 1953, the first legislation was passed. At that time I recommended that we needed strengthening in the department staff. We needed somebody to give direct attention to some other things you have spoken of, Senator, namely, the curriculums, what was going on in the schools. That is not a thing you can do with a little finger of your left hand. It takes a good deal of concentration and continuous attention. That request was before our legislature in one form or another, backed up by the State board of education, for four successive sessions before we finally got it. I would say that is one improvement as far as our State goes, that dates back for more than 2 or 3 months. I mean we finally did get it granted by the 1957 legislature. We have started this curriculum consultation service in helping the teacher. In other words, intensifying the service from the State department of education to the local schools. I look forward confidently to a much clearer sense of direction on the part of teachers, superintendents, and others as to what are the important things for our teachers to be driving at, because of the stepping up of the service. That did take some money, but if somebody had just thrown the money at us without our seeing what we needed done, and having a plan and some goals, the money might not have accomplished that. I know that the efforts in local districts and in States to improve instruction along the lines indicated by this bill, that that awareness and that purpose is there, and with more money we can do more about it. INTRODUCTION OF VISITORS The CHAIRMAN. Will you excuse me one minute, Doctor? Senator Cooper is going to have to leave us because he has to go to a very important meeting of the Public Works Committee. He has a very distinguished educator from the State of Kentucky. Would you present her, please, Senator? Senator COOPER. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would like to note the presence of Mrs. Willie Ray of Shelbyville, Ky., who is a superintendent of schools and a very devoted educator in our State. The CHAIRMAN. We are very happy to have you here, Mrs. Ray. Senator ALLOTT. Mr. Chairman, while we are on that, I would also like to introduce a very outstanding educator in the State of Colorado who is here, Mr. Dwight Baird, president of the Trinidad Junior College. The CHAIRMAN. Dector, we are very happy to have you here, sir. SUMMARY OF STATE ACTIVITIES Mr. FULLER. May I say just a word about State effort and readiness in regard to any funds which would be voted under any 1 of the 3 major bills here? We have made a survey of every State. We have returns now from, I believe, around 36 or 38 States. We are in the process of compiling those returns. They know what they are about. They know what they want to do. They lack the resources to do it with. That is the generalization from our State-by-State study. I will be glad to file the summary of those activities by the States with you if you would like to have them as soon as they have been completed. (The information was supplied later for the committee files.) The people out in the local school districts and in the State are just as alive as anybody in the city of Washington, perhaps more so, as to what needs to be done in their schools. The thing that holds them up more often than any other one thing is money. Senator ALLOTT. I will have to disagree with that, Doctor. It is not money that is holding them up. It is getting over the inertia of progressive education and the type of people who are not getting down to fundamental education. Mr. FULLER. I have been with Mr. Bester a lot. I spent 2 or 3 days with Mr. Conant and two or three hundred people discussing this problem. There was a conference in the Office of Education on the same problem and Kenneth Overholzer, superintendent at Denver, was there. Those things are being given all the attention that they can possibly be given. With more resources, more results would be forthcoming. INCOME TAX DEDUCTIONS FOR TEACHERS Senator ALLOTT. That would be true, but the primary problem is not that. I would like to ask this: Would you people be in favor of the proposal I have made, that schoolteachers, like lawyers and doctors and other professional people, should be entitled to an income-tax deduction for the money spent over their living expenses; in other words, for the excess expenses that are incurred by them in the additional training that they take, usually in the summer but sometimes during the winter too, by way of extension courses to improve their abilities as educators? Mr. FULLER. The council is on record in favor of that unanimously. A great inequity has been done to teachers in not permitting those deductions previously. The Internal Revenue Service has just lost a case on it, incidentally, in New York. Senator ALLOTT. That is good news. The CHAIRMAN. You may proceed, sir. Mr. FULLER. It is a pleasure to appear before you and your committee again, Senator Hill. I shall move immediately to consideration of a few selected administrative details. STATE SCHOLARSHIP COMMISSIONS We refer here, Mr. Chairman, to the administration's bill, section 123 (b) and to the Hill-Elliott bill, section 207 (a), both of which deal with establishment of State scholarship commissions. In section 123 (b) of the administration's bill there is uncertainty about how the State scholarship commission shall come into being, with statutory language that Any State desiring to participate *** may do so by establishing a State commission on Federal scholarships or designating an existing agency of the State to serve as the State commission on Federal scholarships * * *. This vagueness raises many questions. How does each State provide for its State scholarship commission? Does it wait for its legislature to meet? Does the law imply that the governor shall appoint the State scholarship commission? Would it be possible for the State educational agency to administer the law completely, so far as the Federal Government is concerned? It is entirely possible that in some States there would be so much doubt about these points that confusion and delay would result. ROLE OF STATE EDUCATIONAL AGENCY On the other hand, section 207 (a) of the Hill-Elliott bill enables a State to qualify by establishing through its State educational agency, a State commission on scholarships and student loans broadly representative of scientific, educational— at both the secondary and higher educational level-and public interests in the State * * This is a definite provision and has marked advantages in practice. It makes the scholarship awards sequential to the guidance, counseling, and testing provisions, and coordinates the results of this program with the scholarship awards. Such coordination is highly desirable. Such a program could be placed in effect quickly and smoothly in every State. We favor the Hill-Elliott bill's section 207 (a). GUIDANCE AND COUNSELING RELATED TO SCHOLARSHIPS Mr. Chairman, we desire to emphasize the importance of this provision to the States. Each of the two principal bills provides for statewide guidance and counseling for high-school students, and the administration's bill spells out statewide testing programs as well. Both have scholarship programs that would logically be the capstone of guidance, counseling, and testing. If a State, for whatever reason, should set up a State scholarship commission which in operation would divorce itself from the process and results of the guidance, counseling, and testing programs, both the effects of the guidance, counseling, and testing programs and the incentives for such programs would be largely lost. The administration's bill is likely, because of the vagueness of the provision for establishment of the State scholarship commission, to separate in some States the guidance, counseling and testing provided for in title I, part A, from the scholarship program authorized in title I, part B. The Hill-Elliott bill provides that the State scholarship commission shall have representatives of scientific, educational, and public interests of the State, with representation from both secondary and high education. It is clear in its provision for the State scholarship commission, insures that the commission shall be broadly representative of the educational and citizen interests in the State, and tends to encourage coordination of the guidance, counseling, and testing with the scholarship awards program. MATCHING: ANOTHER ADMINISTRATIVE PROBLEM Under titles I and II, the administration's bill authorizes $25 million annually for State educational agencies to assist in the early discovery of student aptitudes through guidance, counseling, and testing, and to strengthen State action in teacher training, supervision, curriculum modernization, and related activities in support of science and mathematics instruction. Title III authorizes Federal funds for improving State statistics in education. All 3 titles require 50-50 matching for all Federal funds used for State administration. The Hill-Elliott bill authorizes Federal funds for State administrative expenses in titles II (scholarships), VI (summer school and extension courses for teachers), VIII (guidance and counseling), IX (science, mathematics, and modern foreign language consultants) and XII (vocational education in occupations essential to national defense). None of these funds for State administration requires matching. The difference is very important to the State educational agencies, especially during the first year. We strongly favor the HillElliott provisions for practical reasons. MEETINGS OF STATE LEGISLATURES Mr. Chairman, only 17 State legislatures meet in regular sessions during 1958. Before any of the Federal legislation you are now considering is likely to become law, and before plans can be made for its administration in the States, these 17 legislatures will have adjourned, most of them until January 1959. State educational agencies can seldom match the Federal funds for State administration without legislative action, and the amounts involved would scarcely justify expensive special sessions of State legislatures. Matching provisions will probably delay the program a full year in many States, under the terms of the administration's bill. We must therefore prefer the Hill-Elliott legislation over the administration's proposals in regard to matching, at least insofar as the funds for State administration to be allocated annually to State educational agencies are concerned. If matching requirements for the administrative expenses of State educational agencies under titles I, II and V of the administration's bill are necessary from the viewpoint of your committee, we respectfully suggest that any such matching feature be postponed 1 year. Otherwise the programs themselves would be postponed about that long. ADEQUACY OF FUNDS AUTHORIZED We believe the Hill-Elliott bill is more adequate for the needs of the times than that proposed by the administration, insofar as the amount of Federal funds to be authorized are concerned. STATE AND LOCAL AUTONOMY We believe that from the point of view allowing each State to meet its own needs within the general purposes of the legislation, the administration's proposal in section 223 (a) of title II is better than any comparable provision of the Hill-Elliott bill. Here the major portion of the funds authorized are to be distributed to local school districts on the basis of State plans which have wide leeway in meeting State and local needs. The funds may be used by local educational agencies to employ additional science or mathematics teachers, or to increase the rate of compensation for such teachers already in service, or to provide special equipment necessary for teaching science or mathematics and for minor remodeling of laboratories, or for any activities or expenditures not involving teachers salaries, provision of equipment, or capital outlay which the State educational agency finds will otherwise expand or improve science or mathematics in struction. FLEXIBILITY DESIRABLE We believe this is the sort of flexibility which will make the funds most useful in each State according to its own needs. In some States laboratory equipment may not be needed as badly as additional teach ers of science and mathematics. Elsewhere, the competition of industry for science and mathematics teachers from high schools may have depleted the supply of such teachers so badly that additional salaries, at least on a temporary basis, will be desirable. In other States, lab oratory facilities and equipment may be the first priority. Many States will combine 2 or 3 of the alternatives in their State plans. Best of all, the administration's bill permits a State to develop additional means on its own initiative to carry out the purposes of the legislation. We hope your committee's final bill, Mr. Chairman, will carry these alternatives as they are provided in the bill which the administration has presented here. FEDERAL ACTION JUSTIFIED Mr. Chairman, the national security in regard to the rest of the world, the economic conditions of our society at the present time, and the responsibilities for adequate education that we have toward our rapidly increasing population of children and youth all justify Federal action in education. We congratulate the administration for introducing its legislation. We congratulate you and Representative Elliott for introducing even more liberal legislation which will go further to meet the needs of national security, the educational requirements of our children and youth, and the economic conditions prevailing in the United States. Then, we hasten to add, the bill introduced by Representative Metcalf and to be introduced by Senator Murray, is thoroughly in line with the policies of the Council of Chief State School Officers. (See, S. 3311, p. 1586.) THEORY OF MURRAY-METCALF BILL The theory of Representative Metcalf's bill is fundamentally different from the bill of the administration, and considerably different |