SCHOOL SUPPORT ACT OF 1959 FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 27, 1959 HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, SUBCOMMITTEE ON GENERAL EDUCATION OF THE Washington, D.C. The subcommittee met at 10:10 a.m., pursuant to recess, in room 429, House Office Building, Hon. Frank Thompson, Jr., presiding. Present: Representatives Thompson, Frelinghuysen, and Brademas. Staff members present: Fred C. Hussey, clerk, full committee; Melvin W. Sneed, minority clerk; Russell C. Derrickson, investigator, full committee, and Robert E. McCord, clerk, subcommittee. Mr. THOMPSON. The committee will come to order. The counsel of the committee has something for the record. Mr. McCORD. Mr. Chairman, we have a letter from the Plainedge public schools of Bethpage, Long Island and the writer requests that it be made a part of the record. Mr. THOMPSON. Without objection, so ordered. (The information referred to follows:) Hon. CLEVELAND M. BAILEY, PLAINEDGE PUBLIC SCHOOLS, Bethpage, Long Island, N.Y., October 27, 1958. House Office Building, Washington, D.C. MY DEAR CONGRESSMAN: This is a thank you letter; a sincere expression of appreciation for your efforts on behalf of the public schools, the children attending them and the teachers working in them. In writing this letter I hope that you will accept it as representing the feelings of the 350 teachers in our school system. In our necessarily short talks I did not have the opportunity of explaining to you that we are a "have" school district. We have all new school buildings and very beautiful ones. We have one of the highest salary schedules in Nassau County, Long Island, which is to say one of the highest in the country. We have a broad program of education including art, music, physical education and science. We have libraries and trained librarians in every school. We have psychologists, nurses, speech therapists, reading specialists and nine guidance counselors. We have really fabulous laboratories and shops as well as athletic fields, bands and orchestras. We have auditoriums and a guidance clinic staffed with a psychiatrist and social workers. We have many tools with which to work, even closed circuit TV. We have special classes for the mentally deficient and the gifted. Any child can learn to play an instrument, have a speech defect remedied or receive a specially needed lunch. No child walks more than a half mile to school. Our schools are open 190 days a year and in the summer for remedial and advanced work. The high school is open 4 nights a week for either study or recreation; dancing in the cafeteria, games in the tremendous gymnasium. The library is open from 7 to 9 p.m. and staffed with librarians. The science labs are open with teachers there to guide students in experimentation and research. Over 400 students attend advanced evening classes in science, English, math, foreign languages, history and politics. Fifty-six students alone attend 2 nights a week for "typing for the college bound." This school system is run by 350 teachers, all certified, over 70 percent with masters degrees or better, seven with doctorates. All beginning teachers take a 1 year workshop course in teaching provided by the school district during their first year of teaching. The teachers are becoming proud of themselves and very few leave us. Many teach part time in universities as do I and several of the principals. A significant number have come to us from university teaching positions in order to increase their earnings. Over half of the total staff is engaged in graduate study including myself and all of the principals. Why then are we concerned; why tell you all this? It is because we know that all is not well with the schools of this country. We know that all is not well with the teacher training schools of this country. This, Plainedge, is a very young community and its people are young. Most of the fathers are veterans. Many of them still have high ideals. We work desperately hard with them to get their support. They in turn are taxing themselves unmercifully to give us that support. However, Plainedge is but an insignificant little dot on the map and this kind of support for education is not happening all over as the local control enthusiasts would have us believe. Perhaps our feelings could best be summed up by saying that we hope to see the Federal Government exert controls designed to raise the level in education as to amount and quality. Specifically, Federal support to those States and communities which (1) Provide a school year longer than a certain minimum; (2) Employ certified teachers trained to a certain minimum. These two basics would, we believe, serve as a starting point for bringing Federal control out into the open where it could be argued as a good, not an evil. Further (here I must use the personal pronoun in the singular and say, “I believe") that steps toward the nationalization of pension plans and certification requirements would be long range boons to the teachers of this country. Most pension plans are State administered and a teacher cannot move from one to another without personal loss. Specifically, a teacher with 20 years of experience, at the very apex of his effectiveness as a teacher, cannot move either from New York to New Jersey or New Jersey to New York without surrending 10 years of his accumulated pension rights. Usually he cannot afford to do this. Nationally, this is not good because teachers are human and they become very provincial. With reference to certification, last June I had occasion to employ two secondary teachers, man and wife. They had been educated in South Dakota and had taught there successfully for 3 years in the fields of English and math. They had then gone to Washington University in St. Louis to take their masters degree. That university recommended them to me and I flew to St. Louis to interview them. I found two extremely personable teachers, of high intellectual ability, with references and recommendations above question. Both had completed their work and were being awarded masters degrees (a requirement in our high school). I employed them but both are now working under provisional certificates in New York because certain courses did not match New York State requirements. To remain in Plainedge they are each taking additional courses at Columbia. That in itself is not necessarily bad. Nor am I complaining of New York State's and South Dakota's requirements. I am suggesting that we recognize this as one country and get together. In this effort the Federal Government could be effective. Most of Admiral Rickover's criticisms do not apply to Plainedge and it is a temptation to become as the Pharisees by saying, "Thank you, God, that we are not as others are". It is a temptation we are resisting because the criticism falls alike on us nevertheless. We feel that we can go forward from this point only by raising the level of education as a whole. For your efforts toward this goal we extend our thanks. With all my very best wishes to you and yours. STEPHEN H. LOCKWOOD, Mr. McCORD. And we have a statement with a covering letter from the Association of American Physicians & Surgeons, Inc., asking that the letter and statement be made a part of the record. Mr. THOMPSON. Without objection, so ordered. (The information referred to follows:) ASSOCIATION OF AMERICAN PHYSICIANS AND SURGEONS, INC., Hon. CLEVELAND M. BAILEY, DEAR CONGRESSMAN BAILEY: We submit, for the record, the Association of American Physicians and Surgeons' statement of opposition to Federal aid to education. We earnestly solicit your committee's careful consideration of our views and ask your committee and the Congress to reject Federal aid to education in any form and for any purpose. Sincerely, STATEMENT OF MAL RUMPH, M.D., President. THE ASSOCIATION OF AMERICAN PHYSICIANS AND SURGEONS, We oppose the Federal aid to education bills (S. 2, H.R. 22 and H.R. 965) and all similar legislation proposing Federal intervention in the conduct of schools because: 1. Federal aid in any form and for any purpose will lead to Federal control. "It is hardly lack of due process for the Government to regulate that which it subsidizes"-(317 U.S. 131, last sentence of first paragraph decision by Justice Jackson in case of Wickard v. Filburn, 1942). 2. If the 10th amendment to the Constitution is to be upheld, as Congressmen pledge to do when they take their oath of office, Federal aid to the schools for construction, for teachers' salaries, and for any other purpose, is unconstitutional. 3. There is no demonstrated need for Federal aid to education. According to information supplied by the Investment Bankers Association, more than 82 percent of the dollar value of bond issues proposed were approved by U.S. voters in the November 4 elections. This is indisputable evidence that local areas are willing to provide for public education needs. According to the Chamber of Commerce of the United States, total classrooms increased from 700,000 to 1,200,000 in the past 11 years; more than 25 percent of all classrooms now in use were built in the past 5 years, and more than 40 percent were built in the past 10 years; the average salary of teachers increased from $3,010 to $4,650 in the past 7 years, a period during which the number of teachers employed increased by 37 percent. Thus, the Nation's teaching force went up by one-third, in a period when the average salary went up more than 50 percent. These are facts. They show conclusively that localities and States are assuming their responsibility for education, and doing it more efficiently and economically than the Federal Government would or could do, because they are close to local problems. Cities and States are not handicapped by the inevitable waste of funds always prevalent when the Federal Government compulsorily takes tax money away from citizens and only returns a portion of the forced collections to the localities and States. 4. It is morally wrong for Congress to appropriate taxpayers' money for any purpose (except for defense of the Nation) when there is no real money to appropriate. The Federal Government has a national debt hovering around $300 billion. The Government has no real or honest money to spend unless it proposes to saddle the children of this generation and future generations with the enormous responsibility of paying for the financial follies of irresponsible Government of this generation. And these are some of the very children that the proponents of Federal aid to education fallaciously believe they will be helping. 5. There is no accepted standard of what constitutes educational needs. As Roger A. Freeman, a distinguished educational authority, points out in his study of "School Needs in the Decade Ahead" local school authorities have vastly different estimates on so-called adequate school needs. For instance, one high school principal concludes that with a little classroom readjustment he can get by for another year. Another principal would like to add four more music rooms, a solarium and teachers' lounge and, therefore, reports a shortage of six classrooms. 6. Education has been and should be the responsibility of localities and States under the close supervision of parents-not the Federal Government. As pointed out above, every dollar of Federal aid carries with it a large degree of Federal control. In 1916 Congress passed the Smith-Hughes Act providing financial aid for local vocational educational systems. Its proponents at the time of passage said that the measure would not bring about Federal controls. Exactly the reverse has happened. Federal regulations have been expanded over the years and are now printed in a 108-page book "Administration of Vocational Education" (published by the Government Printing Office). Only one sentence on page 4 is necessary to prove that the Federal Government controls vocational education. It reads: "Each State is required to submit a plan which must meet with the approval of the Federal Office of Education." 7. Finally, we believe that the proposal for Federal aid to schools is one of the greatest threats to our free society in the history of the Nation. Our constitutional form of government is endangered by the continuing advance of Federal powers and the usurpation of State and local responsibilities. We believe that if Federal aid to education is enacted into law, it eventually will achieve the breakdown of constitutional government, remove educational responsibilities from parents-where it belongs-make collectivized captives of our children, and bring about an educational system of mediocrity. We ask your committee and the Congress to reject Federal aid to education in any form and for any purpose. Mr. THOMPSON. We will hear our friend, Mr. Edward D. Hollander, national director of Americans for Democratic Action. Mr. HOLLANDER. Good morning, sir. Mr. THOMPSON. Mr. Hollander, would you identify yourself to the stenographer, and you may proceed as you wish. STATEMENT OF EDWARD D. HOLLANDER, NATIONAL DIRECTOR, AMERICANS FOR DEMOCRATIC ACTION Mr. HOLLANDER. Mr. Chairman, may I present Mr. William Taylor, who is the legislative representative for ADA, and ask that he be permitted to join me here? Mr. THOMPSON. Yes, Mr. Taylor, you are welcome to. Mr. HOLLANDER. Mr. Chairman, I am Edward D. Hollander, national director of Americans for Democratic Action. I am very grateful to you for the opportunity to appear here today on behalf of ADA. With your permission, I would like to place the statement as presented in the record and summarize and discuss it briefly with you. Mr. THOMPSON. That is perfectly acceptable, Mr. Hollander. (The information referred to follows:) STATEMENT OF EDWARD D. HOLLANDER, NATIONAL DIRECTOR, AMERICANS Mr. Chairman and members of the subcommittee, my name is Edward D. Hollander. I appear here today on behalf of Americans for Democratic Action, of which I am national director. ADA is among the growing list of those who over the years have urged that the Federal Government assume its share of the responsibility in fulfilling the unmet needs of American education. There has been some change in the character of these needs, but the greatest change in the past 10 years has been in their dimensions. The tremendous increase in our requirements for teachers and classroom facilities was easily predictable 10 years ago, and we can estimate today, with a minimum of guesswork, the dimensions that this problem will assume in the next 10 years if no Federal action is taken now. Moreover, the need has grown so great that more and more people every day are recognizing its existence, and there is a growing consensus that something must be done, and done quickly. Some groups tend to view the need in limited terms; for example, those who urge that great emphasis be put upon the teaching of science and mathematics to meet the imposing problems of technology that confront us. But there are other problems as urgent and obvious as those of science and technology. We must find some way to stem the deterioration in urban life, the spread of slums and inadequate housing, the debilitating effects of prejudice, the strangling problems of transportation, the persistence of poverty, and of disease, the spread of delinquency. We must find methods to increase the rate of growth of our national economy, to distribute our wealth in more efficient ways, to maximize our natural and human resources, to control unemployment, to provide the means for underdeveloped nations to assure their peoples a minimum standard of living, to strengthen our alliances, and work toward a just peace. And, finally, we must do all that we can to develop the potentialities of each individual in order to assure the continued vitality of our democratic society. All these goals will require the training of doctors, economists, social scientists, teachers, architects, and city planners-and just plain good citizens and well-informed voters-as well as scientists, mathematicians, and engineers. There are some who feel that even the boldest and most imaginative planning and action may not provide satisfactory solutions for these problems. But one thing is certain: in the absence of planning and vigorous action, these problems will overwhelm us. OUR EDUCATIONAL NEEDS The administration estimates our present classroom shortage at 140,500, about equally divided between overcrowding and obsolete facilities. Frankly, we believe that this is a great understatement of the actual need. Three years ago a comprehensive survey, conducted by the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare and financed by a $3 million grant from Congress estimated the classroom shortage at 312,000 as of 1952. This survey was widely regarded by experts as accurate and if we take the Department's own figures as correct, the accumulated shortage as of today would still be 300,000. But in some mysterious manner, the shortage had shrunk to 200,000 when the White House Conference on Education was held, and now it is down to 140,500. We have not been favored with any reasoned explanation for this wholesale reduction in numbers, but the Department's own statistics demonstrate that it has not been accomplished by building schools. Nor is it possible that facilities once correctly classified as firetraps, health hazards, obsolete and unusable have suddenly become safe for the education of our children. While there are a number of approaches toward eliminating the classroom shortage, we are sure that it cannot be eliminated by erasing it on paper. In any case, even if we were to take the Office of Education figures at face value, at present construction estimates of $40,000 per schoolroom, it will require more than $52 billion first to erase the shortage. TEACHER SHORTAGE The statistics on teachers' salaries are too well known to require repetition here, and just to state the teacher shortage in numbers does not reflect the large percentage now teaching who have not been adequately trained for their jobs. It is necessary only to cite the national average of $4,800 per year for teachers' wages to know that it will require real initiative by the Federal Government simply to make a beginning toward reducing the teacher shortage, insuring that teachers have the proper qualifications and bringing salaries up to a reasonable level. FUTURE NEEDS It is even more instructive to view present shortages in the light of known future needs. Until now the impact of rising population trends has been felt primarily in the elementary schools. But in the next few years the great population growth of the 1940's will be reflected in high school enrollments. In 1946, our public high school enrollment was 5.6 million; last year it was 6.8 millionbut by 1965 it will be 10.8 million, or almost double what it was 12 years ago. So what was once a partial problem will soon involve every level of our school systems. |