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

Page 13 text:

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

Page 12 text:

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

Page 14 text:

place. In '75 the first “supervisor of practice was sandwiched between other duties in conjunction with the president, the first regular officer of the kind in the system, and we dared not label him. In '7 we sent a second petition for a chemical laboratory, stating that as both the president and science teacher had some mechanical skill, we thought $150 would suffice for hoards, bottles, and a small outfit of re-agents. It was granted rather because of our importunity rather than from profound conviction of need, and the first primitive laboratory of a system which boasts of nearly a score to-day was set up for the other schools to reap the benefits of later, free from galling refusals. In 77 the second enlargement by erection of the great west wing was built, and filled to overflowing at once. Provision was somewhat surreptitiously made for the art room by the arrangements of skylights, but no promise of any special teacher for such fanciful work as drawing was conceded. Fortunately we had gained an able teacher of music in Prof. Graham at the very organization of the school, but every hour taken from hi' other work for music was deemed burning incense to folly by wiseacres throughout the state: but two thousand students will l car witness that he kept the fires burning, both for them and for posterity. So drawing languished for a decade, because there were no adequate ideals and no teachers who saw its educational values. The first distinctive teacher of this stamp was finally secured by Oshkosh in the early '$o . subject, however, that Miss Magee must do something else, and not waste all the time of one teacher on a line not recognized by statute as necessary to the common schools. Gymnastics of the Dio Lewis pattern hud been attempted in the three schools almost from their foundation, and managed by chance leaders either drawn from the faculty rank' as a by-pro luct of s .me enterprising professor, or from among the students, led by a vigorous youth who liked the fnn and eclat of the display. But of any systematic training there was not a vestige. Something was urged about the matter being made more formal and disciplinary as early as 7H when Oshkosh lost a man of good musical ability, in whose hands the slender work had rested for three years. Hut there was neither money nor conviction to support anything out of the common, and we all drifted. But about $2 an appeal was made to the public spirit of the students, which ha' been an unfailing resource in time of special need, beyond most schools. It was decided to employ a well-trained teacher, and a teacher of the German Turners was regularly engaged for thorough work of the entire department, men and women. For five years his entire salary was paid by the students and faculty. Other schools became uneasy and helped the cause by battering the ideals of the Board for help, but the Oshkosh school alone carried on the work to full demonstration of value. In S7 the Board tried the futile experiment of employing one man to itinerate from school to school, then five in number, four months of darkness and one of light. The Oshkosh students knew what regular training meant, declined the program with thank', presented their one-fifth share to the others, and kept on paying their teacher and reaping the benefits. In 88 the next addition was made to the building after three year of iterated demonstration of needs, and in that the first gymnasium of the system wa built, a commodious and convenient room. 14