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COMMONWEALTH OF KENTUCKY,
DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION,
Frankfort, April 25, 1947.

Senator GEORGE D. AIKEN,

Chairman, Senate Subcommittee on Education,

Washington, D. C.

DEAR SENATOR AIKEN: Since I cannot appear before your subcommittee in behalf of S. 472, I want to make this statement for the committee and urge that a bill embodying the principles in S. 472 be reported to the Senate. I have been director of teacher education in Kentucky since 1933. I have worked with national committees and regional committees in the promotion of higher standards for teachers. We in Kentucky and in the southern area have done everything we can to maintain a staff of trained teachers for our schools, but always we have faced the fact that we are not able to pay our trained teachers an adequate salary.

Kentucky is one of the many States in the Union which is making a definite effort to maintain its teaching staff. There are approximately 18,164 teachers employed in Kentucky. When the war started, the demands of the war years began taking our teachers from the classrooms. Their places were taken by emergency teachers. We had hoped that then the war was over these teachers would return to the classrooms. They have not returned.

We are now faced with the appalling fact that we have issued more emergency certificates in 1946-47 than anytime during the war years. We simply are not able to offer the salaries sufficiently large to attract back to the classroom those good teachers whom the war took away from us.

We have made great efforts to stem the tide, as the following facts will show. Since January 1, 1944, the State allotment to local districts for school purposes has gone from $10,000,000 to $19,500,000. This, as you can see, is approximately 95 percent increase over a 3-year period in the State's allotment to the local school fund. In addition to this, the legislature has raised the maximum permissive tax rate from 7.5 mills to 15 mills. One-half of our districts have raised their local tax rates since this permissive tax rate was increased. In the face of these major efforts, more than 50 percent of our teachers receive less than $1,400. When the war was started our Government selected the sons of the men from every State in the Union-the poor States and the rich States. No question was asked as to whether these boys and girls came from wealthy States or poor States. These men, gathered from every nook and corner of our land, risked their lives to fight for the ideals of democracy. The very core of democracy lies in the right of every child under the flag to an education. These men have returned and are rearing their own families. They have children who will have to go to school. They want the best schools for them. These men should have for their own children some of the democracy which they offered to the world. I can think of no better way for a grateful people to express their appreciation for the sacrifices, of men than to guarantee for their children an opportunity to an education. S. 472 is not the complete answer but it is a step on the right road.

In listening to you and watching you preside over the Subcommittee on Education and Labor, I am convinced that you are making a major effort to stop the delay in answering this call which has been heard for many years throughout the country-a call for educational opportunity among the several States. Cordially yours,

RICHARD E. JAGGERS,

Director, Teacher Education and Certification.

QUOTA CLUB INTERNATIONAL, INC.,

Washington 6, D. C., April 30, 1947.

Senator ROBERT A. TAFT,

Chairman, Committee on Labor and Public Welfare,

Senate Office Building, Washington, D. C.

DEAR SENATOR TAFT: Quota Club International, Inc., wishes to go on record during the hearings on Federal aid to education as in favor of S. 472 with the exception of section 6B, which we believe should be deleted.

We are of the opinion that whereas States may have the right to use State funds in any manner they see fit, Federal funds should be used only on public nonsectarian educational projects which are offered without restriction to all children and young people.

Quota International has voted at successive conventions in favor of Federal aid to education, and our members in clubs throughout the United States support the policy of Federal aid to equalize educational opportunities in all parts of the Nation.

Sincerely yours,

GLADYS W. JONES, General Secretary.

MISSOURI STATE TEACHERS ASSOCIATION,
Columbia, Mo., March 17, 1947.

Hon. GEORGE D. AIKEN,

Chairman, Senate Subcommittee on Education,

Washington, D. C.

DEAR SENATOR AIKEN: The Missouri State Teachers Association, at its meeting in Kansas City on November 6, 1946, unanimously adopted the following resolution on Federal aid to education:

"The Missouri State Teachers Association records its belief in the necessity for a program of Federal aid sufficient in amount to guarantee an adequate program of public education, and emphasizes its belief that Federal participation should be channeled through the regularly constituted educational agencies in the several States."

We are truly in the throes of an educational crisis in Missouri. Two thousand three hundred sixty-eight emergency certificates have been issued; 309 departments and classrooms in high-school districts have been closed; 5,200 teachers are new to their positions this year; the preparation of teachers is rapidly declining, only 3 out of 10 rural teachers teaching this year were even teaching in 1941; the average annual salary of rural teachers is $1,063, and the average annual salary of all teachers in the State is $1,793. The situation is growing increasingly worse and it is obvious that it will be most acute for the coming school year.

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DEAR SENATOR AIKEN: The New Jersey Education Association has been on record for Federal aid to education for more than 15 years. The platform of the association, adopted in November 1946, contains the following statement:

"Education should be financed by a carefully coordinated and balanced program of local, State, and national communities.

"1. Federal funds should be provided, on an equitable basis, and under State and local control, for the support of education.

"2. In emergencies, Federal or State funds should be available, to prevent interruption of educational progress."

This association, representing 27,000 teachers in the New Jersey public schools, therefore wishes to be recorded, at your hearings on S. 472, as in favor of Federal aid to education, and specifically in favor of S. 472, of which New Jersey's Senator, H. Alexander Smith, is a sponsor. Through the National Education Association, New Jersey educators have played a substantial part in the development of this bill.

We fully recognize that the Federal-aid plan incorporated in this bill will not bring Federal funds to our State at the present time. We accept the principle that limited funds should be used in those States where the need is greatest. We have supported that same principle in the distribution of our own State's money for education.

Naturally we hope that, as the principle of Federal aid becomes established and accepted, the Federal Government will recognize its obligations toward all children, wherever they may live. We believe that the Federal Government

can well use some of its taxing power to help support in all States a program of education that will develop better citizens in all.

New Jersey will, however, benefit from Federal aid as provided under S. 472. Ours is a highly urbanized, highly industrial State which draws its citizens not only from New Jersey, but from the whole country, and especially from the very States which S. 472 most aids. Between 1920 and 1940 New Jersey virtually doubled its Negro population, largely through migration from the rural South. The better the education these men and women receive in their native States, the better New Jersey citizens they become.

The 1940 census shows that nearly one-third of New Jersey's American-born citizens were born in other States. This is far higher than in any other State in our section of the country. As population shifts, New Jersey consistently draws more people from other States than it loses to them. Thus the educational standards of New Jersey's people depend not only on our efforts, but on the standards of its sister States. S. 472 would help raise these.

Our association heartily endorses the following principles on which S. 472 is based:

(1) absence of Federal control;

(2) use of Federal funds under the individual State's constitutional provisions governing education;

(3) provision for a minimum foundation program for American public education. We hope your committee will report S. 472 favorably, and we ask that this statement be entered in the record of your hearings.

Very sincerely yours,

BERTHA LAWRENCE, President, New Jersey Education Association.

THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS,
LEGISLATIVE REFERENCE SERVICE,

Washington 25, D. C.

FEDERAL AID TO ELEMENTARY AND SECONDARY EDUCATION
(Background and Analysis of the Current Question)

CONTENTS

1. The national problem of school finance.

2. The cost of the Nation's schools.

3. Federal policies in education.

4. The current questions relating to Federal aid.

(C. A. Quattlebaum, General Research Section, April 23, 1947)

1. THE NATIONAL PROBLEM OF SCHOOL FINANCE

The problems of adequate financial support for the Nation's schools are perennial.1 A study of the history of education in this country indicates that probably never before have these problems been so important or their solution so urgent

as now.

The general problem of school finance is national in character and in scope. There is common agreement that the educational attainment of the population is important to the welfare and progress of the country as a whole. That a fairly high minimum level of education for all citizens is of fundamental importance in a modern democracy is no longer a subject for debate. The broad question at issue is to what extent the Federal Government is responsible for maintaining this minimum educational level, and to what extent the Federal Government is responsible for providing equal educational opportunity for the future citizens of the Nation.

From its inception the Federal Government has assumed a share of the responsibility for the financing of public education. In most of the States the public schools are still receiving considerable income from land grants initiated by the Congress of the Confederation in 17852 and increased through many years to a

Paul R. Mort and Walter C. Reusser. Public School Finance. New York, McGraw Hill Book Co. 1941. P. 3.

L. E. Blauch. Federal Relations to Education, Encyclopedia of Educational Rescarch. New York, the MacMillan Co., 1941. P. 495.

total area 10 times as large as Maryland. The development of other forms of Federal support for public education will be dealt with later in this report.

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The extreme variations in the size, population, and wealth of the States and local units contribute to the wide difference in the financial resources available for the schools. Variations in individual public school units range from the small district with a one-teacher school and a few pupils to the largest city system with an enrollment of approximately a million pupils more than the combined pupil enrollments of the 11 States having the smallest populations. The significance of this fact is apparent when we consider that in some States the local units still bear more than 90 percent of the burden of school support. The States do not generally contribute to the support of church or private schools.

Other important factors affecting school finance as a national problem are the mobility of the population, the proportionate number of children to be educated in different areas-that is, the number of children in relation to the total population in those areas, and the number attending private schools.

Compilations of arguments, pro and con, concerning these and other aspects of the national problem have appeared in various publications within recent years.

2. THE COST OF THE NATION'S SCHOOLS

With respect to the number of persons affected public education is the biggest business in the United States. Sometimes a great corporation, such as an automobile manufacturing company, announces that it has served a million customers. usually over a period of year. During the single school year 1944-45, the latest year for which such data are available, the public schools of the United States served over 23,000,000 customers-the total number of pupils enrolled in that year. These customers were served by a professionally trained staff of over 800,000 men and women 10—the public school teachers of America-composing about 11⁄2 percent of the working force of the whole country."

During the school year 1944-45 the United States spent about 2.6 billion dollars for the operation of its public elementary and secondary schools, including the payment of salaries of the instructional staff.12 The cost of the schools

was somewhat less than the 2.7 billion dollars which the people of this country spent for tobacco in the calendar year 1944. In the same year this Nation spent 7.1 billion dollars for alcoholic beverages.13

The total expenditure for the public schools during the school year, 1944-45 was approximately 1.6 percent of the estimated national income of $161,983,000,000 in calendar 1945.14 The cost per pupil during the school year was $129.82, or 73.8 cents per day for the school term of 175.8 days.15

The total cost of public elementary and secondary education in 1944-45 was $19.99 per person in the total population, estimated at 131,976,000 16 on July 1, 1945.

During the school year 1944-45, the total amount spent in the United States for all types and levels of education, public and private, was about $3,500,000,000,17 or a little over 2 percent of the national income for 1945. England spent approximately 3 percent of her national income on public education alone during the fiscal year 1945-46.18

3 F. H. Swift. Federal and State Policies in Public School Finance. P. 59.

New York, Ginn & Co., 1931.

Statistics of City School Systems, 1943-44.

Washington, U. S. Government

Washingten, U. S. Government

4U. S. Office of Education. Printing Office, 1946. P. 16. U.S. Office of Education. Statistics of State School Systems, 1943-44. Priniting Office, 1946. Pp. 35-36. (Computation by the author of the present report.) • Ibid. p. 9.

Library of Congress. Legislative Reference Service. Federal Aid to the States for Education, by C. A. Quattlebaum. Public Affairs Bulletin No. 31, October 21, 1943, resisued May 6, 1944. Pp. 12-47. (And other sources.)

P. A. Wannamaker. The Challenge of Leadership. Address of the president of the National Education Association before the American Association of School Administration, Atlantic City, N. J., March 2, 1947. Processed. P. 2.

U. S. Office of Education. Statistics of State School System, 1944-45. Statistical Circular, February 1947. P. 2.

10 Ibid.

1 U. S. Department of Commerce. Survey of Current Business, June 1945. P. 89. (Percent computed.) 12 U. S. Office of Education. Statistics of State School Systems, 1944-45. Statistical Circular, February 1947. p. 2.

13 Federal Aid to Education, Congressional Quarterly, Mar. 22, 1947. p. 99.

14 U. S. Department of Commerce. Statistical Abstract of the United States, 1946. p. 270.

15 Data obtained from the Research and Statistical Service, U. S. Office of Education. Cost per pupil computed from average daily attendance and current expenses and interest for full-time day schools. 16 U. S. Bureau of the Census. Special Reports. Series P46, No. 3.

17 U. S. Office of Education estimate.

1 British Information Service, Washington, D. C. Percentage computed from data in publications of His Majesty's Government.

During the calendar year 1945 the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics spent about 28,600,000,000 current rubles on education,19 over 8 percent of the national income of approximately 355,000,000,000 current rubles.20 While the comparability of data on expenditures for education in the Soviet Union and in the United States is questionable, it appears that in proportion to the national income the Russian people may be supporting education several times as generously as the people of the United States. According to George S. Counts, professor at Columbia University and author of a number of published studies of Soviet education, the Russians are spending a larger proportion of their income for education than any other people in history.21

The American Association of School Administrators has declared that in the United States the appropriations for schools should be tripled and the number of teachers should be doubled to meet the present demands for elementary and secondary education.22 It is expected that these demands will greatly increase within the next decade. In the 5 years following entry of this country into World War II about 13,000,000 babies were born in the United States, although population experts had predicted only 9,000,000, consequently elementary-school enrollments will increase rapidly until 1950. By 1953 the high schools will feel the surge and will expand rapidly until 1960.23 School enrollments after that are unpredictable.

3. FEDERAL POLICIES IN EDUCATION

Although in most foreign countries public education is financed and administered by the national government alone, in the United States public education is still widely regarded primarily as a function of the State and local governments. Nevertheless the Federal Government has not only contributed to the support of the public schools throughout their history in the United States, but the Federal Government has also continually carried on educational activities of its own.24 Within recent decades these activities have become very extensive.

The National Advisory Committee on Education appointed by President Hoover reported in 1931 that practically all administrative units of the Federal Government were "concerned directly or indirectly with education." the committee pointed out that Federal educational activities included "liberal and vocational education, for both sexes and all ages, in school and out, reaching from the earliest primary education to the most advanced graduate and professional training." 25

The committee recommended establishment of a Department of Education with a Secretary in the President's Cabinet.26 The Advisory Committee on Education appointed by President Franklin D. Roosevelt reported in 1938 that almost every Federal agency carries on some educational functions or engages in activities bearing a relatively direct relationship to some phase of education. The committee recommended the establishment of an executive department of health, education and welfare, which would "facilitate the problem of coordinating educational activities." 27 In the same report the committee made the following observation which is significant to a consideration of the subject of Federal aid to elementary and secondary schools:

"Past Federal participation in education has been required by the fact that locally supported programs of education have never been adequate to accomplish all vital national purposes. Their relative inadequacy is increasing, not because the local programs do not improve, but because they do not improve rapidly enough to meet increasing needs.

"The ability of the States and local communities to provide education has always been unequal. That inequality has been magnified, however, by the recent great changes that have taken place in social and economic conditions. At the same time, education has become increasingly important.

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19 Izvestia, Feb. 3, 1946, p. 4.

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20 U. S. Department of Commerce. Survey of Current Business, February 1946, p. 8.

21 George S. Counts. Remaking the Russian Mind, Asia and the Americas, October, 1945. p. 479. 22 American Association of School Administrators. Schools for a New World. 25th yearbook. Wash. ington, D. C., 1947, p. 8.

23 Ibid., p. 71.

24 For a fuller discussion of this subject see High Lights in the Development of Federal Policies and Activities in Education, by Charles A. Quattlebaum, the Library of Congress, Legislative Reference Service, Public Affairs Bulletin No. 30, April 1944, reissued 1946, 57 pp.

25 National Advisory Committee on Education. Federal Relations to Education (report of the committee), Washington, D. C., 1931, pt. I, pp. 5-6.

2 Ibid., p. 95.

U. S. Advisory Committee on Education. Report of the committee, Washington, D. C., 1938, p. 121,

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