of an
agricultural people.

A wholly efficient system of supervision of rural teaching, then, would
be possible only in a system of consolidated schools, each under the
immediate direction of a principal, himself thoroughly educated and
especially qualified to carry on the work of a school adapted to rural
needs. Over these schools would be the supervision of the county
superintendent, who will stand in the same relation to the principals as
that of the city superintendent to his ward or high school principals.
The county superintendent will serve to unify and correlate the work of
the different consolidated schools, and to relate all to the life and
work of the farm.

If it is said that systems of superintendence for rural schools could be
devised more effective than the county superintendency, this may be
granted as a matter of theory; but as a practical working program, there
is no doubt that the office of county superintendent is a permanent part
of our rural school system, unless the system itself is very radically
changed. All the States, except the New England group, Ohio, and Nevada,
now have the office of county superintendent. It is likely, therefore,
that the plan of district superintendence permissive under the laws of
certain States will hardly secure wide acceptance. The county as the
unit of school administration is growing in favor, and will probably
ultimately come to characterize the rural school system. The most
natural step lying next ahead would, therefore, seem to be to make the
conditions surrounding the office of county superintendent as favorable
as possible, and then give the superintendent a sufficient number of
deputies to make the supervision effective. These deputies should be
selected, of course, with reference to their fitness for supervising
particular lines of teaching, such as primary, home economics,
agriculture, etc. A beginning has already been made in the latter line
by the employment in some counties, with the aid of the Federal
Government, of an agricultural expert who not only instructs the farmers
in their fields, but also correlates his work with the rural schools.
This principle is capable of almost indefinite extension in our school
system.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 5: See Coffman, _The Social Composition of the Teaching
Force_.]

[Footnote 6: _The Social Composition of the Teaching Population._]

OUTLINE

I. THE RURAL SCHOOL AND ITS PROBLEM

=The Genera