The training of teachers in the United States of America

by Amy Blanche Bramwell; H. Millicent Hughes

PART II.
By Millicent Hughes.

IN America, as in Europe, it is becoming increasingly recognised, that the fact of having received a good education, even if that education have included a University course, is no guarantee of fitness for the teaching profession. That some special professional preparation is also necessary before a teacher can be safely entrusted with teaching responsibility can hardly be said to be any longer a matter of debate among those who have devoted time and thought to educational questions. There may be much difference of opinion as to the best way of giving that preparation, but that it should be given is becoming more and more a foregone conclusion. There seems at last some chance that a well-earned rest may be allowed to the well-worn comparison made between the doctor’s and teacher’s professions, with its obvious moral—that just as no right-thinking parent would allow an unqualified practitioner to prescribe for his child’s body, so it should be impossible for that far less understood and delicate something, which we call the mind, to be entrusted to the care of one whose only qualification for the post is the possession of a certain amount of useful information. There are many battles yet to be fought, many experiments yet to be tried, many failures yet to be faced, ere all shall be agreed on the best kind of professional training that can be given to teachers; yet I have returned from America encouraged in the belief that the decisive battle in favour of training has been fought and won on both sides of the Atlantic, and that the old world and the new may with advantage to both join hands in the endeavour to discover the best ways and means of such training.

And it would seem especially fitting that England and America should thus join hands, for, after all, few things about the Americans impressed me more than the fact that they are really English, and that the inhabitants of Great Britain and the United States really form part of one great English-speaking nation, with the heritage of a noble language and literature, and a common life of thought and feeling. In matters educational, the truth of this oneness impressed me vividly. Allowing for such differences as must exist between an old and a new country, it is nevertheless true that most of the problems in education which they are trying to solve are those which perplex us also, and of these the problem of the Training of Teachers holds a place in the front rank. But it is a curious and interesting fact, that the solution should be attempted in both countries, and yet that so little attention should be paid in each to what is being done in the other. The ignorance that prevails among American teachers as to what is being attempted in England is, I fear, only equalled by our own ignorance of American educational life. This ignorance is largely the result of the difficulty that both American and English teachers experience, in obtaining definite information on educational matters in connection with either country. This fact made it very difficult for me even to map out my tour, so as to include as far as possible what was typical of American Training in the short time at my disposal, and had it not been for the unvarying kindness and courtesy shown me by American teachers, in directing my notice to what was best worth seeing, my task would have presented almost insuperable difficulties. As it is, I have, of course, been unable to cover the whole ground, and indeed have been able to personally examine into the opportunities for training in a very few States. These, however, I believe to be representative States, from a study of the means of training in which it is possible to arrive at a very fair conclusion of its condition in the States as a whole. They include the following: Pennsylvania, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New York, Michigan and Illinois. I was, however, fortunate in being able to supplement the information thus obtained by a careful study of the many excellent State exhibits in the Educational Department of the Liberal Arts Building, at the World’s Fair, and to further correct and intensify the impressions I had received by many conversations with educationists from all parts of the United States, whom it was my good fortune to meet at the Educational Congresses, held at Chicago in July.

In considering any American educational question, there are one or two points which must never be lost sight of, and perhaps it will be well to indicate them here. In the first place, it must be remembered that there is not one American educational system, but many. Each State has complete control of its own educational matters, has its own School Law, sets aside common lands, or levies taxes for the support of its own schools, and is responsible to no higher authority. The only part taken by the Central Government of the United States in connection with education has been in the establishment of a Bureau of Education, the chief functions of which have been (1) the collecting of statistics and general information respecting education in all the various States, which are embodied in an annual report made by the Commissioner of Education, (2) the publishing of monographs and circulars of information on topics of educational interest, such as Co-education, Teaching of History, etc., and (3) the maintaining of a valuable Pedagogical Reference Library at Washington.

Secondly, a distinction must be made between the Western States, of which Michigan might be taken as representative, and the Eastern, of which Massachusetts might be considered typical. In the former we find a most complete system of State education, leading from the Primary School right up to the great co-educational University of Michigan. The State Schools there have few private rivals, and the University none. In the State of Massachusetts, on the contrary, although Primary, Grammar and High Schools are maintained at the public expense, yet the children of a large proportion of the inhabitants attend private schools and academies, which undertake to prepare them for Harvard or the Women’s Colleges, such as Wellesley. In fact, few of those who enter upon a University career do so straight from the common school, as is the case in the Western States. It follows from this that there are two classes of teachers to be considered in the Eastern States—(1) those who teach in the common schools (Primary, Grammar and High), and (2) those who teach in private schools and in the academies. Those of the second class are largely recruited from the ranks of College graduates, who rely upon their University course as preparation for the profession of teaching, and amongst whom the idea of a special training for their work has only here and there been awakened. It is mainly in connection with State education that the idea of the training of teachers has been developed, although the fact that several of the older Universities, including Harvard, are providing courses of lectures on the Science and Art of Teaching may be taken as a hopeful sign of the gradual growth of the idea among all classes of teachers.

It will be perhaps well to enumerate the various means available for the Training of Teachers in the United States, and then to describe more particularly the special features of the training to be obtained in each kind of institution.

Training may be obtained at:

			Public or State.
i.	Normal Schools		City.
			Private.
ii.	City Training		Schools.
			Classes.
iii.	Pedagogical Departments in Universities.
iv.	Teachers’ Institutes.
v.	Summer Schools.

NORMAL SCHOOLS.

There are three kinds of Normal Schools to be considered—State, City and Private. It was my privilege to visit a good number belonging to the first two classes, but I was not fortunate enough to be able to inspect any of the Private Normal Schools. These latter are, of course, chiefly to be found in those States which have few or no State or City Normal Schools.