CHAPTER VI.

EDUCATION IN PORTO RICO.

The following figures relating to the schools of Porto Rico are taken from an official communication to the United States Commissioner of Education from the assistant commissioner of education of Porto Rico:

Pupils belonging on March 1 in all schools of Porto Rico.

• Instruction suspended during improvement of university farm; school not under department. A minimum estimate.

The following notes are taken from an historical review of education in Porto Rico, entitled "The progress of a decade, 1899-1908," contained in the report of the commissioner of education of the island, Dr. E. G. Dexter, to the governor, dated September 21, 1908:

At the time of the American occupation there were upon the island 380 public schools for boys, 148 for girls, and 1 for adults. In addition to these there were 26 private schools, making a total of 555. In the public schools were enrolled 25,664 children, with an average attendance of 18,243.

The course of study in the elementary public schools consisted of Christian doctrine and elements of sacred history, reading, writing, elements of Spanish grammar, elements of arithmetic, with legal weights and measures and money, the merest elements of geography, and an elementary outline of agriculture, industry, and commerce.

In the superior schools the following subjects were added: Elements of geometry, lineal drawing and surveying, elements of history and geography, especially those of Spain, an elementary outline in physics and natural history adapted in their application to the needs of common life.

On the 30th of October, 1898, there was held in the theater of San Juan, P. R., a mass meeting of citizens, at which the following resolutions were adopted:

"As regards public education, the best means of advancing our people would be kindergartens and normal schools, as established in the United States. Our elementary and superior schools should be transformed and graded according to modern pedagogic methods. Secondary instruction should be a continuation of the primary and a preparation for the superior and collegiate. Universal education should be introduced on the best models of the United States. There should be established schools for adults, Sunday schools, schools of arts and trades, libraries, museums, academies of fine arts, and literary clubs.

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Education must be obligatory and gratuitous, and it must be compulsory on every municipality to sustain its own schools, the number being fixed by law with reference to the population. If the municipality be unable to sustain all the schools, the State should establish the necessary ones.

"Grades of instruction should be three-the fundamental, or that given by the public schools; the secondary, which should give positive notions on scientific, civil, and technical subjects; the professional, which comprehends the knowledge of jurisprudence, medicine, engineering, and technology, the universities to diffuse general knowledge of science for purposes of high culture. "For the formation of a competent body of teachers it is necessary to establish normal schools for teachers of both sexes, normal schools for professors, normal schools for university teachers, and military and naval schools."

The fact that these resolutions were adopted precisely twelve days after the original military government in Porto Rico seems to indicate not only that there had been a deep-seated interest in educational matters on the part of the Porto Ricans, but also that they did not delay in making a public expression of that interest.

General Brooke, the first military governor, seems not to have found, with his many duties, time to give his attention to the school problem. He was, however, succeeded as military commander on December 6, 1898, by Gen. Guy V. Henry. General Henry not only showed an interest in educational matters in the island, but in a somewhat definite way seems to have had an opinion as to what it was necessary to do. In any event, one paragraph of his address delivered upon assuming command was as follows:

"The system of school education should be looked into, and it is my desire to ascertain how many teachers they (the municipalities) can pay to teach the American or English language, commencing with the younger children. It is believed that those who can speak English only can accomplish the purpose by object lessons. It is thought that American women, for teaching, can be obtained for $50 a month in gold, and they are well worth it. The young children are anxious to learn, and now is the time for them to do so. If alcaldes will report to me how many teachers they can employ, they will be brought from the United States and sent to these towns."

With what preliminary steps on the part of the military government I am not able to say, but on December 31, 1898, three weeks after the inauguration of General Henry, Gen. John Eaton was appointed by the Secretary of the Interior of the United States as an expert to visit Porto Rico and reorganize the school system. He arrived in January, 1899. It would have been difficult to find a man whose experience better fitted him for the difficult task than General Eaton. He had been superintendent of public instruction for Tennessee; United States Commissioner of Education; a college president; the representative of the United States Government at various international expositions besides having occupied many other posts of great educational importance. In addition, he was an author of no mean repute and had risen to the rank of general in active service in the civil war.

Immediately upon his arrival General Eaton devoted himself to a study of the schools of the island as they had existed under Spanish control, and in the course of two or three months had formulated quite an elaborate school law, which appeared as general orders from the military governor.

In the organization of the government General Eaton was made chief of the bureau of education, which was a subordinate division in the department of the interior, to the directorship of which Hon. Federico Degetau y González had been appointed.

Under General Eaton's charge were not only the educational institutions of the island, but also the charitable institutions, including the asylum for the insane.

As his assistant, practically from the start, General Eaton had the efficient services of Dr. Victor S. Clark. Doctor Clark is a graduate of the University of Minnesota; had taken postgraduate studies at the University of Chicago, Göttingen and Berne, Switzerland, receiving his doctorate of philosophy at Columbia in the year 1900. He was a man eminently fitted for the work which he had to perform, and much of the success of the early educational movement upon the island seems to be due to him.

Upon May 1, 1899, the code of school laws prepared by General Eaton, presumably with the aid of Doctor Clark, was issued as a general order by General Henry.

The code provided, first, for a local school organization of 5 members in any barrio or township of the island, and defined fully the duties of such officers. General plans were also given for taxation and bonding of the school districts thus constituted. This part of the code seems to have failed largely, since organization was merely permissive and not mandatory. Orders were, however, issued six months later which obviated this defect.

The second part of the code dealt with the details of public instruction and did not go into effect until July 1, 1899, or after the completion of the school year in progress at the date of their issue. As outlined by Doctor Clark in his first educational report," the specific orders were as follows:

Order No. 1 abolished the fee system and made the public schools entirely free to pupils of all classes and degrees.

Order No. 2 limited the school year to nine months of twenty days each. Order No. 3 established a system of graded schools in the towns where schools had heretofore been ungraded; limited the number of pupils which any single teacher might receive to 50; and required that there should be a principal in every school employing more than 4 teachers.

• Senate Document No. 363, Fifty-sixth Congress, first session.

This order further required that wherever practicable the different grades of a school should be located in the same building, and determined the minimum floor area of 14 square meters for each pupil.

Order No. 4 outlined the course of study. Church doctrine and religion were dropped; the required subjects were to be Spanish, English, arithmetic, and geography, with the elements of United States history and civil government, while the minor subjects of music, drawing, manual training, hygiene, and morals were provided for wherever teachers were competent to give instruction in these branches.

Order No. 5 established the legal qualifications for teachers.

Order No. 6 fixed the salaries of public school teachers at $75 per month for principals, $40 and $50 per month for graded teachers, and $30 per month for rural teachers.

Order No. 7 made provision for free text-books.

Order No. 8 defined the relation of municipalities to public schools, and required the local school board to provide buildings, supplies, such as paper, ink, and chalk, school furniture, and residences for teachers.

Order No. 9 gave municipalities full authority to elect properly qualified teachers for their local schools.

Orders Nos. 10, 11, and 12 provided for the establishment of high schools, normal schools, and such professional schools as might be necessary in the island.

On July 8, 1899, a general order was issued by the military governor, establishing the first board of education under the American Government.

Less than a month later, August 12, 1899, the bureau of education was formally discontinued, the insular board taking its place.

The board so constituted functioned as the highest educational authority on the island up to the beginning of civil government, May 1, 1900. On that date the Foraker Act went into effect, and since one of its provisions was the appointment by the President of a commissioner of education, the insular board ceased to exist.

Dr. M. G. Brumbaugh was the first presidential appointee to the position of commissioner. He did not arrive upon the island until August 4, 1900. During the intervening three months Dr. George G. Groff, the president of the insular board of education, acted as commissioner. Doctor Brumbaugh was one of the best-known educators in the United States, and did work upon the island which is very fresh in the memory of Porto Ricans as a class, by whom he was much beloved. A graduate of Juniata College, Huntington, Pa., he did post-graduate work at Harvard and at the University of Pennsylvania, being the recipient of the master's degree and of the doctorate of philosophy and of the doctorate of laws. At the time of his appointment to Porto Rico he was professor of pedagogy in the University of Pennsylvania. He has published a considerable number of public school text-books, and many articles of pedagogical nature in magazines.

The school law promulgated by General Henry was in operation. At the first session of the Porto Rican legislature, however, he succeeded in passing what has been since that time the fundamental school law of the island. Although it has been amended in many particulars, some of them important, at each session of the legislature since, still much of the original law is in force.

In January, 1901, in answer to application made to the President of the United States, the sum of $200,000 was transmitted by the Federal Government to the treasurer of Porto Rico to be used for school extension in Porto Rico. Plans were immediately formulated for the proper use of this fund and 18