passed by the legislative assembly of 1903, but much interest is being manifested in the subject, and without doubt a few districts will take advantage of its privileges in the near future. I have delivered several addresses in which I have pointed out the benefits to be derived from consolidation. While the people have been very much interested, it seems very hard for them to give up the idea that there must be a schoolhouse at every cross-road and as near the individual homes of the children as possible. But centralization is in the air, and it is bound to come. A few districts have suspended their schools, and transferred their children to adjoining districts. So far as I have heard, with but one exception, the people have approved the suspension of the school and would not go back to the smaller school. The following extract from the Oregonian of October 25, 1904, will give you a better knowledge of the practical operations of the law and the benefits to be derived from it than I could possibly do. The article recites the facts as they are and were received from reliable sources; hence I can vouch for the correctness of the article: Salem, Sept. 24.- (Special.)-The first experiments with the consolidation of schools in Oregon have proven to be a great success, and in all probability the plan will be adopted quite extensively in the thickly settled portions of the State. Better schools, better teachers, a larger percentage of attendance and longer terms are among the most apparent advantages of the system of consolidation, while other benefits secured are those arising from the contact of country children with town life and the stimulus given the pupils of the smaller school by reason of their being placed in larger classes, where interest is more easily maintained. Consolidation has been so satisfactory in its results that it will not be abandoned where it has been tried. Thus far consolidation of schools, and not of school districts, has been the plan followed. Two methods of uniting public schools are authorized by law, one in which two adjoining districts consolidate and become one in all matters of taxation and management; the other merely providing for the suspension of the smaller school, whose funds are paid to the larger district, in return for which the pupils of the first district are given free instruction. the latter instance, the smaller district retains its organization and elects directors from year to year, but sends its children to the school of the adjoining district. It is this plan which has been tried and approved. In At Independence, Polk County, a country school was suspended last year, and the pupils sent to the city school. According to the school census, there were in the city district 420 school children of school age, between 4 and 20 years, and in the country district 24 children. The city district had been employing eight teachers, and had a school term of eight months. The rural school had employed one teacher, and the length of the school year was from five to seven months. A favorable vote of the two districts having been secured, the school in the rural district was suspended, and the funds, amounting to about $300, turned over to the Independence district. The increased number of pupils in the city district, by reason of the consolidation, did not make it necessary to employ another teacher. The pupils of the rural school were of various ages, and had been receiving instruction in classes composed of two or three pupils each. When sent to the larger school these pupils were assigned to their proper grades, and though each class received a small addition to its numbers, it was not necessary to increase the number of classes. The addition to the several classes was not enough to overburden the teachers nor to lessen the attention given the children to the city school. The additional funds enabled the city district to add one month to the school year, so that the city pupils received nine months' instruction instead of eight, and the country pupils nine instead of from five to seven. ATTENDANCE WAS INCREASED. So far as attendance was concerned, the improvement was very noticeable in the rural district. Before the consolidation about 50 per cent of the children of school age attended the small, ungraded school conducted in the country. After being admitted to the city school, 80 per cent of the children attended. Prior to the suspension of the country school, the children traveled from one-half to two and one-half miles to school, the average distance being about one and one-half miles. After sus pension the children traveled in attending the city school from three-quarters of a mile to five miles, the average distance being about two and three-quarters miles. In going to the city school some of the children walked, while others went with bicycles, on horseback or in carriages. Where convenient two families of children went to school in one conveyance. It was not necessary to employ any drivers or incur any expense for conveyance except the time of horses, which were usually animals not needed for farm work. Speaking of the results of consolidation, Professor F. J. Newbill, principal of the Independence school, says that though they had farther to travel, the country children attended school more regularly and punctually in the city than they did in the rural school, and that there was no illness occasioned by exposure to winter |