Some uses of Statistics IX the Supervision of Schools
The Psychological Clinic Vol. II. No. 8. January 15, 1909. :Author: Roland P. Falknek, Ph.D., Commissioner of Education for Porto Rico, 1904-07.
Our school reports bristle with figures which are rarely the subject of comment and are oftentimes passed over in silence. Such figures seem to have as little obvious relation to the school system as the vermiform appendix to the digestive system, and an operation for the removal of the statistical appendix would be entirely safe.
In the eyes of many school superintendents statistics are a necessary evil, and like ‘other necessary evils they fail to awaken any enthusiasm. If asked why so much good white paper in their reports is filled with columns of figures, they are prone to reply that it lias always been done. Routine and indifference too often guide the preparation of the school statistics and their splendid possibilities as instruments of description and of investigation are ignored.
The state officers of public instruction are interested in the descriptive power of statistics, since it is their duty to portray annually the educational progress of the state. The city superintendent. has a like interest in the investigational efficiency of statistics if they can throw light upon his school problems and guide him in his school administration. The teacher too often is not interested at all. Dealing only with the smaller units, he only asks that his burden be made as light as possible. In organizing a system of statistical records all these points of view merit consideration. It generally falls to the lot of the superintendent’s office, charged with the general supervision of schools, to compile the statistics. Very often these functions are regarded as unrelated interests and little effort is taken to make them mutually helpful.
In Porto Rico I found a branch of the work distinctly laDeneu Division of Supervision and Statistics. Though united under one officer, statistics and supervision were utterly distinct. Was it not possible to co-ordinate them and make them one in fact as well as in name ? To this task our energies were devoted with distinct success. Never losing sight of the main purpose of supervision, statistics became not an appendage but an instrument. Through their use better schools were obtained, for they were employed to stimulate the superintendents, and better methods reacted upon the teachers as well.
School enrolment and school attendance appeared somewhat fitful in Porto Rico. This was no unusual condition, as the wide divergence between total enrolment and average membership which is encountered everywhere amply testifies. It may well be that in Porto Rico, with inadequate school supervision and loose attendance laws, the situation was more acute than in our American cities, but it is a fact of school administration, which merits more than the scanty study it has heretofore received.
To gain light upon the disparity between total enrolment and actual enrolment, and to discover any seasonal fluctuation, a system was inaugurated in September, 1905, by which each teacher reported at the end of each week the daily enrolment, attendance, additions to and deductions from the enrolment together with the weekly total and weekly average of enrolment and attendance. One of the results of the system was precise figures of the enrolment and attendance of all the schools of the Island for each week of the school year.
In the graded or town schools it was found that the number of children enrolled increased somewhat during the first five weeks of the year and diminished after that date. Beginning September 29th with 21,526 pupils, as many as 23,509 were enrolled October 27th. But by December 8th the number was reduced to 22,976. It never rose again for more than a week at a time as high as 23,000, and after the first of May was much nearer 22,000. In Columbus, Ohio, where a similar table is published, the number on the roll started September 7, 1906, with 17,723, and reached its maximum 19,268 the last week in October. After that it fluctuated but moved generally downward, and late in May and in June, 1907, it was but little over 18,000. Detail by weeks is not usual in the reports of American cities, but quite a number of them publish the enrolment by months. Wherever this is done we find a like falling off of pupils as the year advances. While it may not be possible to keep an instrument always keyed up to the highest pitch, it may perhaps be questioned whether the decrease in the number of pupils could not in some degree be lessened.
It is not to the statistical data, however suggestive, to which I would primarily direct attention, but rather to the effect of this scheme of reports on the school system and the teachers. Each report sent in was examined by the district superintendent and again by the department. If the enrolment or attendance fell below normal figures the teacher was called upon for an explanation. In the various cities statements of the different classes were made. All of this spurred the teachers on to greater effort. 2Tot that enrolment or even attendance lie wholly within the power of the teacher to control. But so far as they could exert an influence they did so. Before this report system was introduced the teachers had had their attention called to the matter. As to positive results it may be noted that in 1904-05 we had fewer schools than in the previous year, but we had over 3,000 more children in them. This result was obtained by the greatest effort of the district superintendents spurred on by the admonitions of the department. In 1905-06 equally good results were obtained without special urging of the department through the automatic action of the report method and the scrutiny of results which naturally followed it. The schools of Porto Iiico showed and still show, as do those of the United States, a very small number of eighth grade pupils as compared with the first grade. When it was seen that the third grade was only one-third as numerous as the first the inference was apparent that children left school very early. But it was found by comparison with the United States that the phenomenon, though exaggerated, was only the counterpart of what was frequent in our city school system. The forces at work here must also be at work in Porto Rico. “What are they ?
To solve this question a minute analysis of the school population was determined upon. Figures previously collected had referred to the total enrolment and did not represent average conditions. The calculation of ages, grades, and ages within the grades for the average enrolment would have been too complicated to be undertaken, and the census method was adopted. In March, 1906, for the first time a complete enumeration was made of all the children then on the roll, and sex, ages, grades and number of years in school were determined for all. .
Statistics which give the number of children at each age in the schools as a whole are not infrequent. Sometimes too a great deal of effort is spent in determining the average in each grade?a figure which is not specially significant. Our analysis was pushed a little further, and the number of children in each grade in each year of age was determined. When we found in each grade and especially in the earlier grades a wide diversity of ages, so that 10-, 11- and 12- year-old children were numerous in the first grade, it did not seem possible to ascribe this to late entrance in school alone. Comparison with some figures from the United States showed that in the United States as well as in Porto Rico the percentage of over-age pupils was larger in the second and third grades. This fact suggested non-promotion as a cause of the preponderance of the early grades. This was confirmed by the investigation of the number of years in school. This showed that of the pupils of the first grade only 45.2 per cent were in their first year of school, and that among those of the second grade only 33.9 per cent were in their second year. Again pupils with five years’ schooling to their credit were found in all the grades from the first to the eighth, though more than half of them were below the fifth grade.
From the standpoint of an ideal school system where each pupil advances in grade according to the school plan, these conditions were plainly abnormal. “Exaggerated though they may be by peculiar conditions prevailing in Porto Rico, these figures have their counterpart in the United States. Thus in Camden, iST. J., in the year 1905-06 there were 3,717 pupils enrolled in the first grade and only 269 in the eighth. In the first grade 26.8 per cent were above normal age, i. e. eight years. But by the time the fifth grade is reached as many as 63.7 per cent are above normal age. Camden is here mentioned as an illustration, not because its conditions are unique, but because Superintendent Bryan has discussed them with admirable frankness and clearness.1 In giving some parallel results of a study in Cincinnati, Superintendent Dyer in his report for 1907 says: “I cannot find that any other city has recently made so thorough an investigation, but there is no reason to believe that conditions elsewhere are materially better.”
Conditions discovered in Porto Rico by the analysis of ages were confirmed by other figures showing the length of time in school. In our American cities no such figures have been collected, though confirmatory evidence has been published in Boston, Cam’The Psychological Clinic, Vol. I, pp. 41-52. bridge, and Somerville in figures showing how long it takes the children who complete the elementary course of instruction to pass through the grades. Of course such statements neglect the large number of children who never finish the elementary schools and whose failure to do so may be ascribed in large measure to their slow progress through the elementary grades.
The inference of this investigation as to Porto Rico was further borne out by the statistics of promotions. It was found in June, 1906, that of the pupils then in the graded schools only 54 per cent were promoted to the next higher grade.
JSTow what was the value of this inquiry? It revealed defects in our school system which had heretofore been vaguely felt perhaps but not clearly understood. It pointed out the way for the removal of these defects. The comparison of different towns and different schools showed their variation from the Island average. District superintendents and principals were fired with a determination to make a better record in the future. Teachers were taught that the effectiveness of their work would be judged, in part at least, by the number of pupils prepared for the next higher grade. The result was an increased activity and earnestness in school work throughout the Island. Conditions of promotion were carefully studied and tests were made rather more stringent than before. But despite this fact the promotions in June, 1907, improved considerably. The percentage promoted rose to 64? still too low, but a notable improvement over the previous years. In a recent study in this journal Dr Oliver P. Cornman,2 one of Philadelphia’s district superintendents, suggested among the courses of such retardations of pupils as we have noticed: 1. Late entrance into school. 2. Language difficulties for pupils of foreign parentage. 3. Physical and mental defects. 4. Overcrowded classes. 5. Systems of classification and promotion. 6. Efficiency in administration and teaching force. Is it not worth while to consider whether any or all these causes are at work in different localities and to take steps to minimize their importance ? Can it be doubted that the intensive study of school statistics in regard to retardation, in which The Psychological Clinic has had so honorable a part, will bear fruit in administrative measures The Psychological Clinic, Vol. I, pp. 245-257. of the highest importance ? It has already turned the attention of school authorities to the needs of the retarded child, and given a new direction to the interests of superintendents and principals in the inspection of schools.
May not a like clearing up of problems for the superintendent and a stimulus to the teacher result along other lines ? I recently had before me a school report from which I learned that the average registration per teacher was 42.8, the average roll per teacher 33.1, and the average attendance 30.3. Here was a school system which certainly was not utilizing its teachers to the full extent, and yet had a considerable number of children in half-day sessions. There is in the report no explanation of this anomaly, and the school authorities seem to be unconscious of its existence. Doubtless it would be alleged in this case, that the difficulties lay in the location of the several schools, but if such were the case would it not be reasonable to examine whether the practice of transporting pupils to schools which has given such good results in rural regions, might not be successfully applied in cities to meet the situation described ?
These half-day schools offer in themselves an excellent illustration. Educators decry them, they are a makeshift and must be bad. But are they ? Would it not be possible to test them by actual experience ? They are generally in the first grade. It cannot be overlooked that the opinion of many is distinctly adverse to the long hours of full-time classes for children of the first grade. Why should we not ascertain from the records what are the facts as to the advancement of half-day pupils in comparison with other pupils who attend the entire day? If you are not satisfied with such a test why not follow these pupils after they reach the second grade and again compare their advance with that of other pupils ? In three rooms in Camden, 1ST. J., the half-day pupils in 1905-06 made better percentage of promotions than the all-day pupils of the preceding year under the same teachers. In one case a contrary result was observed. Under these circumstances, and these are the only records of the kind which have come to my attention, can we be sure that half-day classes for beginners in the first grade are a positive evil ?
Has there ever been any study of the value of the kindergarten in a public school system based on actual facts ? In Porto Rico we gave up our kindergartens because we believed we had a better use for our money. In the many complaints which we hear of overcrowded schools and of population outstripping both the accommodations and the resources of the school authorities it has struck me that the same situation may exist here. That it is not unknown may be seen in the following words of the Superintendent of Schools of Somerville, Mass. :3 “In the Baxter School seventyfive children are on half time. These children, whose ages run from five to twelve, and many of whom are ignorant of English, are deprived of one-half of their legitimate school session in order that thirty children of four years of age may enjoy the supposed advantages of kindergarten training. Without questioning the value of kindergartens where school accommodations are plentiful and financial requirements easily met, it will not be denied that it is short-sighted economy and a perversion of educational rights to pay a thousand dollars a year for the benefit of thirty four-year-olds, while for seventy per cent of that sum seventy-five six-year-olds could be given twice the school time that they now enjoy.” While Superintendent South worth is discussing a special situation and disclaims any intention of considering the question at large, his words certainly suggest a question as to the value of kindergartens generally. May it not be asked “What service does the kindergarten render the common school ?” “Do children who have had kindergarten training advance better in the grades than children of the same age who have not had such training ?” This is not a question of opinion. It is a question of fact. But do we anywhere possess the data upon which to base an answer to the question? Obviously it should not be a matter of great difficulty to arrange the school records so as to find out the facts in the case. Moreover, I believe that it would be worth the doing. The results, whatever they might be, would clarify our opinions as to the role of the kindergarten in the public school system.
It has not been the purpose of this brief paper to exhaust, but rather to suggest some of the possibilities of a well-ordered statistical system in the control and administration of schools, to touch lightly upon some of the many problems of our school work wherein statistics may be useful. Its purpose will have been accomplished if it has made clear that proper records increase our knowledge of conditions and thus stimulate us to more intelligent effort, and that practical administrative activity is guided, directed, and stimulated by the results of statistical investigation and analysis. “Report, 1907, p. 13.
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