Attendance in general is good. The percentage of enrollment represented in the attendance on a typical Sunday varies from 66.7 per cent. for the town to 70.8 per cent. for the city schools. Yet only twenty-five schools make definite efforts to increase their attendance. The various methods used are contests such as a competitive Boys’ and Girls’ day, a fall Rally Day, cards, rewards and prizes, a Banner Class, a Look-out Committee and the Cross and Crown System.
During the year preceding the survey, 168 pupils joined the churches from the Sunday schools, and there were seven probationers at the time the survey was made. Decision Day was held in four country, one village, five town and four city schools. The results were meager. Only thirty-five declared for church membership. Nine town and city schools have classes to prepare for church membership, eight schools have sent twenty scholars into some kind of Christian work during the last ten years. A country Sunday school in Hughes County has shown what can be done in this respect. It has sent five young people into Christian service during the last ten years, and five more in the whole history of the school. It is significant that one consecrated pastor has served this Sunday school and church during this entire time.
Cradle Rolls are another excellent method of enlistment. Yet these are kept in only twenty-six schools. The total enrollment is 473. One of the greatest needs of this country is more local and better trained leadership, not only for Sunday schools but for the community at large. The only definite training for leadership is eight Teacher Training classes, held in two city, four town, one village and one country school.
Mission study is carried on in seventeen schools more or less frequently, several additional schools annually presenting the cause of missions. One city school has a four-day institute for the study of Sunday school methods and missions. Twenty-nine schools make regular missionary offerings, and seven take them once a year. Twelve schools have libraries with an average of seventy-three volumes each. Eighty-three schools give out Sunday school papers. There are 507 classes, an average of about twelve per class.
Proper preparation is one of the greatest needs of the Sunday schools in these counties. Much of the instruction is haphazard and indifferent. Men teach 123 classes and 26.6 per cent. of the total enrollment. Ordinarily, the man teacher, if there is one, takes the adult class at the expense of the growing boy who needs him more than the adults. Graded lessons are used exclusively in ten schools and twenty others use them in some classes. Seventeen schools have organized classes. Sixty-six schools are open throughout the year. The pastor is superintendent in six schools, teacher in fifteen, substitute teacher in one, “helps” in nineteen, is a student in two, and in one reports his job as “superintendent; teacher and janitor.”
Social events for the Sunday schools mean picnics, class parties, and sometimes a real ice cream sociable. About one-third of the schools have a reasonable amount of social activity, while sixteen report a great deal. Fifty-seven schools have picnics, and great events they are, too, with more cakes and pies and goodies of all sorts than the community is likely to see again for another year. One or more classes have socials, parties and “hikes” in seventeen schools (four village, nine town and four city). The “Anti-Kants” is an interesting class of young women. Every time one of the class becomes engaged, there is a party and a shower, called a graduation. Twenty graduations have taken place in the history of the class. About half of the schools have programs for special days, especially for Children’s Day, Christmas and Easter. One Union school has an Easter picnic and egg-hunt. Nineteen schools have mixed socials, such as parties, indoor picnics, ice cream suppers and entertainments. One town school has a weekly social. The only special Sunday school organizations are a Choir Association and Sunday school athletic teams in three town churches which play competitive games. Twenty report no social life of any sort in connection with their schools. They do not even have a picnic to liven things up.
HAPPY LITTLE PICNICKERS
The Baptist Mission at Kleenburg, Wyoming, does good work for the kiddies.