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Show A PUBLIC SCHOOL VIEW. Inspector Clancy's Report on a' Visit to Parochial Schools. "For more than six years I have been been familiar with the public schoo'a. As a school inspector I have paid particular-attention to methods and . results. re-sults. But until recently I had never set foot in a Catholic parochial school," says James Clancy, a public school inspector of New York City. He was highly -pleaded with what' he saw on his first visit. "Promptly at U o'clock the classes are at their lessons, no time being lost iii an assembly room, as the prajeis are said in the class rooms. After the noon recess the children chil-dren have three or four minutes of prayer in their class rooms. The curriculum cur-riculum calls for only one-half hour 'instructicn in 'Christian doctrine.' "Do these parohial schools turn out better educated children than those from the public schools? Last summer while 30 per cent of the graduates of the parochial schools who presented themselves for the examination for entrance en-trance into the normal college were admitted ad-mitted (and many with 'honor') only 25 per cent of the graduates of the public pub-lic schoo.'s were successful. This summer sum-mer the Cathoiio percentage, was ' higher. I "In all the parochial schools I vis-I vis-I ited I was invited to examine the class- es in any subject contained in the cir-liiculum. cir-liiculum. Very few were below the standard, while the large majority were superior to the public schools. "In the essentials penmanship, language, lan-guage, grammar, reading, arithmetic, history and geography the parochial schools seem to me to excel. They ex-, eel in drawing. The reason for the superiority of the parochial schools in these respects is simple. At the end of a school term (one-half year), no child is promoted to a higher grade unless the child has a mastery of the subjec ts tausht in the grade in which he or she has been studying for that term. . , "As a rule, the parochial school pupils pu-pils are better spellers and . have, a clearer idea of the meaning of words .ban the average public school child. "The parochial i-chool children are (airly well acquainted with the geography geogra-phy of the world, so necessary in these days when the newspapers give such ample space to the current history of nations. They are well grounded ' in history of their own country, with a good idea of the history of foreign countries, while their writing and arithmetic. deserve the highest praise. 1 "The drawing taught in the paro- chial schools is merely mechanical, j and is co-ordinated with geometry. j "The parish school graduates can ; sing music from siarht (special teachers are engaged for this work) and' niw j enough of its technicality for all... 6r-dinary 6r-dinary purposes. ',: ' V . "Fiom the first srade to' 1 h'c hislf-est hislf-est the girls have lessons ii sewirr-'"- ' - V ') ; : ' but there is no effort to turn out finished finish-ed dressmakers. "All pupils in the grammar v grades are exhorted to take the regents' examination, ex-amination, and the large number of those who pass is worth more than ! passing notice. "There are high school classes in which stenography, algebra, foreign languages and the higher branches ae taught those pupils whose parents can afford to keep their children longer at school." |
