St Louis Park High School - Echowan Yearbook (St Louis Park, MN)

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1930 O W A N THE SCHOOL AS A SHOCK . ‘k, '»KBE.' ZF the motoring is rough, it is the road, not the car. If young people ot a community do not measure up on conduct or otherwise to as many different standards as there arc people, it could not lie any negative influence in the community, it is the schools. If the youth of the community, bubbling over with life and energy, display more pep than we can recall possessing when we were young, it is the fault of the disciplinary methods of the school. If there is a wave of crime or petty thievery in a community, it is the fault of education. If the scholarship of the young people of a community is low, it cannot lx- a dozen distracting influences that make concentration on school work difficult, it is the fault of the school instruction. If homework is assigned to keep less energetic students up to grade, the schools arc driving the young people too hard and impairing health. If school costs are high, school officials arc extravagant. If costs are low, with a resulting lower standard of education, the ofTcials lack vision. It a superintendent exercises authority within his sphere, he is autocratic. If he docs not, he is held inefficient and lacking the courage of his convictions. It is a strange paradox that people know more about how a school system should lx conducted than any other single project. Being public institutions supported by public moneys, they hold public interest and attention. It is right that they should. A school system bears much the same relation to a community as the only child ot a family does to its near relatives. Many a child has been deprived of its initiative and its opportunity for development because it has been subjected to too much guidance by many interested relatives. The school system is the one child of the community and it should be accorded every opportunity tor growth. The school is concerned with the scholastic accomplishments of the young people. It is concerned with their conduct in and out of school. It is concerned with their physical well-being. It is concerned with their moral standards. It alone cannot lx- expected to overcome all negative influences. It cannot make void hereditary influences. It cannot furnish ability where ability does not exist. It cannot detect all personal characteristics where mass education is necessary. It cannot eliminate evil tendencies strongly embedded through heredity, environment, or unwholesome influences. It can be a party to remedying these situations. It cannot lx- held responsible for hazards but it can reduce their effects to a minimum. It can lx and is a shock absorber for the ills of a community. In order to keep up efficiency in morals, character education, physical well being, health and scholarship, the physical equipment must be adequate. Our elementary schools have sufficient room to do excellent work. The vacant rooms are fast disappearing. Next year there will lx one vacant at Brookside and Fern Mill and none at Lincoln, Lenox, Eliot and Oak Mill. The crowded condition at the High School building is becoming unbearable. It takes at least a year after a building is started before it can lx occupied. The prosjx ct for next year is that with 35 graduating and 115 entering the eighth grade we will have a net gain in the High School building of 80. This means two more teachers at least for the High School building. It means also a condition as crowded as before the seventh grade was taken to Lincoln last Christmas. In order for our school system to maintain its past high position for efficiency a new building must be voted to give us the necessary room for present and future growth. 17] Robert E. Scott, Superintendent.

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ROBERT E. SCOTT SL.

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• a FOREWORD STORY shows us that a study of the past triages clearer the way of the future. Feeling this to be true and knowing that a knowledge of what others have done acts as a spur to mental effort and originality by pointing the way to future opportunity, we are leaving this record of our triumphs and failures. In thumbing through its pages may memories of pleasant events and friendly faces make it as dear to your heart as are the memories it recalls.