University of Wisconsin Oshkosh - Quiver Yearbook (Oshkosh, WI)

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work from which they attempted to Ik- distinguished, viz: the Institute. The muttering of thorough scholarship had been heard from the east, and the fruits of the early Institute had been stimulus rather than greatly increased strength or skill. So the first normal schools said, We must first seek sound scholarship, then all skill shall lie added to those who remain to the close.” But only a handful ever remained till that happy consummation, and the vast majority were somewhat hurriedly passed through a multifarious academic course, time for each much less than in the good-high schools, then went forth as teachers, possessing hut the merest inkling of the principles of teaching. The president best known told the writer that not a student of his school was fit to deal with any professional work before the senior year. But this attitude, sound in principle though it was. failed so seriously to permeate the State with any pedagogic influence, that widespread dissatisfaction began to voice itself. The Board of Regents heard it said that the Normal schools were simply first class high schools. and determined to change the currents, though Scylla and Charybdis threatened. Letters were sent out for views as to possible middle ground which would be practicable for the pioneer condition in which the profession as a whole found itself, before opening the new school at Oshkosh. The building was erected, but they were slow to begin a possible failure. It was finally opened under the leadership of a man who could claim little more than courage and conviction that, while the practical life and experience of the youth of a land furnished sufficient grounds for a full line of empirical professional training, there must be a sound training of the mind in scholarly data and logical attitudes before the principles of teaching could bo successfully planted with any rational expectation of of good fruit. He assured every candidate that he should have professional training every day of his school life, side by side with the growth in scholarship; that whenever necessity compelled him to engage in teaching for a season, he would find himself better able to cope with the practical difficulties than the teaching of any academy for the same expenditure would do for him. What he might go forth with after one or two years' training was temporary in character, for immediate use. while the well of philosophy had not been sounded; and yet intelligent ground had been laid on which a first crop might lx- most profitably raised. That the keynote of expediency had been struck was attested by the rapid growth of the school. Since it has been the canon of the school that neither advertising nor solicitation should lx used in the securing of students, we may safely assume that the theory upon which the school was based has been consistently carried out. and that valuable professional work can be carried on in connection with skillful academic growth; although intelligently discriminated. The school opened with 43 students in the professional department, and enrolled during the year 1871 2. 173; 1876 7. 369; 1881 2. 388; 1886 7. SOS; 1891 2. 585; 1896 7. 662. excluding preparatory classes. The model department has always been limited by capacity of the rooms, and has been one of the most important factors in the professional training of teachers. It has been claimed that the fact of adaptation to the felt needs in the State had much to do with the early lead 12

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r «§c6oof tefor . I N a work devoted to n v ”iT the lifeof an institution. the sober facts which may have (frown cold if not dead, the effort to fan the ashes of the past into a living flame by rehearsing achievements which the present (feneration counts as mere common-places, is unenviable, if not unprofitable. Hut the editors seek to come into closer contact with the alumni to whom those events were well known, and “a (treat part of which they were. For this reason we may be pardoned for sketching some salient features attending the inception and development of the Oshkosh Normal during the era of pioneer ideals and narrow beginnings. The early settlers of Wisconsin brought, among other belongings, a firm faith in the necessity of a well supported system of public schools. Hut the seeds of professional training for teachers had only l een sown in Massachusetts and New York when these men bade good-bye to the old homes. The fruit of such sowings, mingled with tares, came some years later. Hut the news of the professional awakening in the old states was borne to ready ears before the primitive cabins gave place to dwellings in which competence delights to comfort itself, and people were not easy with the primitive ways of the schools so long as there was promise of something better. Karlv in the fifties the legislature voted moneys for support of normal training lor teachers of the public schools, which were distributed among various educational institutions that consented to give rudimentary instruction to “teachers classes. In this an eastern precedent was followed, and does not appear to have been lacking in wisdom. In IHnfi the first normal school was established at Platteville. followed by one at Whitewater in 68, and one at Oshkosh in '71. The jsipular Institute hud stamped its image for good and ill over the face of the State and throughout most of the northern states. The first normal schools of the east had essayed to prove their distinctive place in a scheme of education by taking somewhat crude material, judged by academic standards, and imparting a brief didactic course in methods, which though founded upon correct principles, could not be so planted in the minds of the learners, both from brevity in time and lack of extended logical training in those taught. They went forth to honestly and earnestly talk of devices as principles and. worse still, sure that the gospel of the profession was included in the dicta of methods, which might not be lightly questioned. To rip. scholars, whether skilled or unskilled as teachers, this attitude was. very justly, trash and a stumbling which is still bearing fruit of prejudice against even the most philosophic efforts to develop a thorough training for the work of teaching. When the system of normal schools was first inaugurated in Wisconsin, there was altogether another phase of 11

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which the school has maintained. It is possible that one very practical and important aim in organization of the faculty, founded upon the equities due to students and communities alike, may have had much to do in securing it. First the faculty was selected for proved abilities in teaching power; scholarship was prized, but counted as naught unless combined with large pedagogic power to impress and stimulate. Second, the very ablest teachers were placed in charge of the commonest branches, that the students who could remain but a limited time might have been brought in touch with superior minds and receive some revelation that their value had never been discerned. Has the Oshkosh Normal stood for anything more than devotion to critical scholarship and a pedagogy of principles persistently applied, instead of methodic devices? In working out from pioneer adjustments mingled with much of ideality ill-defined, it is certain that to no one school of the system is all the honor of discovery and progress through these eventful years due. Neither in the growth of any school toward surer aims can any one person claim undivided honor. But we are writing the history of one school today, and must record the phases in which it has wrought out its contributions to the general welfare, gained with difficulty and much opposition at the time, though now the common heritage, which the youth have never considered as anything less than a part of the eternal order of things. Eager with the hope that the rift between the Normal schools and the confidence of the great body of common school teachers might be closed, this administration strove for some link with which to connect the n rmal school with every gathering of teachers organically. In the fall of '72 our opportunity came, in a temjwrary call for one of the faculty. Prof. Graham, an institute worker of the greatest ability, to till the vacancy occasioned by resignation of the incumbent of the only conductorship of the state, which had been kept entirely separate from any alfiliation with the normal schools for some inscrutable reason. W'e-put forth the claim that it was • the missing link. The Board rejoined that any such arrangement would disrupt school organization. The president of the school affirmed that he would become responsible for that end. and the boon was granted. Within two years the other two schools took on the same plan and an era of cordial intercourse and appreciation began, which has continued to this day. save when a school has blundered by placing a misfit man in this most important position, ami such have been few indeed. Oshkosh has been favored with an almost unbroken line of most able men charged with our mission to the uttermost parts of the state. No other school has held from year to year representatives from so many counties of the State, and it is due to work done for the people in the field as well as within the school. In these enumerations of advance ste|»s taken, only such are stated as subsequently were adopted for all the schools. In ‘73 Oshkosh, through its president, petitioned for a few dollars, $500, we think, with which to equip a chemical laboratory, but it was rejected, with ignominy heaped, moreover, in statement that no money ought to be squandered upon whims, and that such a thing was out of place in a normal school: that the university had one and that would probably meet the wants of the State for a long time. In '74 the first enlargement to meet growth took 13