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Show oo A MOUNTAINEER SUMMER SCHOOL IN VIRGINIA Washington. Oct 10. After L'l 1 teachers hau each refused In turn to toach ibe regular school at Irish Creek hollow, in tue mountain of Virginia, two county school teachers ; nd a 12-year-old assistant invaded the district with a camping outfit and organized a summer school and an i ti.uing school that were both better attended than any schoo- in past I ; ears had ever been. The experi- I ill' nt was so successful that other I ' ted communities in Virginia are in !)' handled in the same way In - - Btead of allowing these isolated dls-irlctB dls-irlctB to get along as best they ma, ttat( and county officers In Irginia r going to send to the mountains every summer the very nest teach -i ts they can secure in order to pro-idi- the educational facilities that are needed lush t'reek Hollow Ig in a moun-tali moun-tali valley in Rockbridge county t Is sparsely settled and remote of ac-cefo ac-cefo The Inhabitants are mountaineer; mountain-eer; of original stock who have In-i In-i i married ae much as the law permits. per-mits. They live in log cabins that ire not even good log chains There was a school building but ror several wars there had been no scnool. No scnool teacher would accept the position po-sition In 1911, after all attempts to get a regular teacDer had failed, the coun-i; coun-i; superintendent persuaded two experienced ex-perienced teachers to g-o to Irish n ek Hollow after their own schools had closed, and to open a summer set col They carried with them tents to live in. provisions, and cooking cook-ing utensils School was opened in the old school building, and the at tendance eiceeded all expectations There were SO children enrolled in nurnlng classes, and 30 to 40 adults I in afternoon and evening classes. The mountaineers were so appreciative apprecia-tive of what was done for them that summer lhat they built an additional schoolroom and two comfortable living liv-ing rooms for the teachers Public spirit had developed to such an extent the following year that when one of the state Inspectors and the secretary of the Virginia Co-op-crntlvi Educational a-soriatlon v IhU -ed the place in the summer of 1912 ' they were able to organize a school j ad civic leagdc and an athletic asso- c ation. Practically all the resident j of the community enrolled In the c.vlc league. An interesting reaturo of the work is that it reaches the j adults as well aB the children A Saturday afternoon clas il reading and writing for grown-ups numbered E among Its members old men nad 1 women with grandchildren in the morning school. lu speaking of the experiment Mr I A. C. Monahan, rural-school special- I 1st In the U. S. Bureau of Education. ' snys. "In Inaugurating this work I Vi-ginia has undoubtedly taken a val- mble step toward benefiting one of I the most deserving and moat neglect, j ed classes of our country. Some ot j our best American stock Is in the J mountains, and It should not be al- lowed to degenerate for lack of educational edu-cational opportunities. The state department de-partment of Virginia, is now making a survey of the mountain sections of Virginia and proposes to conduct many summer schools in the future like this one which has been neld for , tr.ree years In Irish Creek Hollow |