Manitowoc County WI Archives History - Schools .....Rural School Supervision ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/wi/wifiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Joy Fisher sdgenweb@yahoo.com October 26, 2007, 10:59 pm RURAL SCHOOL SUPERVISION Manitowoc county schools, as we have noted in the previous articles, were first "supervised" by a committee of five inspectors of the common schools of the town. That was during territorial days when the number of schools in our county was limited to schools in Manitowoc and at Manitowoc Rapids. Ample provision was thus made, at least on paper, for supervision of the district schools as no less than five different persons were required to supervise the instruction and discipline and to give advice on the courses of study, textbooks, and general school administration. These men, however, knowing little or nothing about the technicalities of teaching, could not conduct an ideal type of supervision, even when they did carry it out as required, which was rarely. When the territory became a state in 1848 the four or five schools of Manitowoc County were placed under the supervision of a town superintendent. The weakness of this type of school supervision was discussed in the article on "Town Superintendents". In 1862 the supervision of county schools was placed in the hands of the county superintendent. The first county superintendents were usually men without the qualifications of a teacher. Consequently, they spent much or little of their time in performing the clerical and statistical work connected with a centralized office. They had little time to pay more than brief "inspection" visits to the many Manitowoc County schools which had been organized. The more than one hundred schools of the county, separated by impassable roads during the winter, made close supervision of instruction an impossibility. It is small wonder then that people interested in rural education favored legislation which would make possible a better means of supervising rural schools than had existed prior to 1900. In 1901 the legislature passed a measure authorizing the county superintendent, with the consent of the county board of supervisors, to appoint a deputy, provided he had under his jurisdiction not less than one hundred schools. But the consent of the county board of supervisors was difficult to secure, with the result that deputies were appointed in only one or two counties and Manitowoc was not one of them. The legislators, however, in 1915 created a committee on common schools in each county, consisting of three members, to be appointed by the county board of supervisors. This board had among its powers the right to appoint an assistant county-superintendent. In Manitowoc County the board consisted of A. A. Lyken, Henry Goedjen, and Dr. E. C. Cary. These gentlemen appointed Lillian Chloupek to be the assistant to C. W. Meisnest, then county superintendent. She pioneered in setting up objectives for the county teachers and in formulating the duties of a rural school supervisor since the new law was very vague in listing the qualifications and responsibilities for that position. Those were the horse and buggy days in which she hired liverymen to transport her from school to school. She would leave the city on Sunday night and return on Friday after a continuous school week of visiting and living in the country. Improved rural school teaching resulted through this in-training service. Two years later a second assistant to the superintendent was appointed. The person chosen for this position was Elizabeth Marquardt. In 1923 a new law specifically authorized the county superintendent to appoint the supervising teacher or teachers. Manitowoc County was fortunate in having two supervising teachers each year up to 1933 who devoted their entire time to their work: But then in 1933, in accordance with a ruling of the Attorney General, Manitowoc could retain only one supervisor. After two years, in 1935, Manitowoc County again had the right to appoint two supervising teachers and continued to have two until 1945. Thereafter only one supervising teacher was employed. The passage of years has brought about higher and higher standards for appointment to this responsible position. The person appointed must have personality, show much initiative, have the confidence of the teachers, and other qualities. By 1934 supervising teachers had to have taught at least three years, one of which was in the elementary schools, and to have held a state, license to teach based upon three or four years of professional training in an accredited teacher training institution. Such training had to contain a minimum of twenty credit hours in elementary education. By 1945 County Superintendents were advised by the state department to employ supervising teachers whose qualifications exceeded the minimum statutory rquirements and to make replacements with teachers who held educational degrees. The salary and expenses of supervising teachers are paid by the state out of the income tax moneys. Manitowoc County in the past has supplemented the salary paid by the state with an additional fund of one of two Hundred dollars. Manitowoc County has always had as its supervisors people whose qualifications exceeded the demands of the statutes. The following well-qualified and efficient supervisors helped further the county's high educational standards: Lillian Chloupek 1915-1920 Elizabeth Marquardt 1918-1925 Anna M. Pritchard 1920-1927; 1935-1941 Amanda Heyroth 1925-1929 Joseph J. Rappel 1928-1942 Frieda Hammann 1930-1933 Robert Guse 1942-1945 Gretna T. Brown 1941-1946 Clara Lallensack 1946- Additional Comments: Extracted from: 1848 - 1948 CENTENNIAL HISTORY of the Manitowoc County School Districts and Public School System EDITED BY JOS. J. RAPPEL, COUNTY SUPERINTENDENT OF SCHOOLS 1948 File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/wi/manitowoc/history/schools/ruralsch57gms.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/wifiles/ File size: 6.4 Kb