The school law of 1853 made ample provision for the education of every class and grade of youth within the State. We have seen in the preceding pages that those who participated in the organization of the Northwest Territory, and subsequently the State, recognized religion, morality and knowledge as necessary to good government and the happiness of mankind. We have also seen the gradual development of education from its earliest inception in the State up to its present permanent foundation through the law of 1853. Under the present law, the State is divided into school districts as follows: City districts of the first class, city districts of the second class, village districts, special districts and township districts. To administer the affairs of the districts, and to look after and promote the educational interests there in, the law has provided for the establishment of boards of education in each district. These boards may acquire real or personal property for the use of their districts, and are required to establish schools for free education of the youth of school age, and may establish schools of a higher grade than the primary schools. They are to determine the studies to be pursued and the text-books to be used in the schools under their control; to appoint Superintendents of schools, teachers and other employes, and fix their salaries. They are authorized to make such rules and regulations as they may deem expedient and necessary for the government of the board, their appointees and pupils.
The State Commissioner of Common Schools is elected by the people, and his official term is three years. He is required to superintend and encourage teachers' institutes, confer with boards of education, or other school officers, counsel teachers, visit schools and deliver lectures calculated to promote popular education. He is to have a supervision over the school funds, and has power by law to require proper returns to be made by the officers who have duties to perform pertaining to schools or school funds. It is his duty to give instructions for the organization and government of schools, and to distribute the school laws and other documents for the use of school officers. He is required by law to appoint a Board of State Examiners, consisting of three persons, who hold their office for two years. This board is authorized to issue life certificates to such teachers as may be found, upon examination, to have attained "eminent professional experience and ability." These certificates are valid in any school district in the State, and supersede the necessity of all other examinations by the county or local boards of examiners. Each applicant for a State certificate is required to pay a fee of $3.
There is in each county in the State a board of examiners appointed by the Probate Judge, their official term being three years. The law provides that "it shall be the duty of the examiners to fix upon the time of holding the meetings for the examination of teachers, in such places in their respective counties as will, in their opinion, best accommodate the greatest number of candidates for examination, notice of all such meetings being published in some newspaper of general circulation in their respective counties, and at such meetings any two of said board shall be competent to examine applicants and grant certificates; and as a condition of examination, each applicant for a certificate shall pay the board of examiners a fee of 50 cents." The fees thus received are set apart as a fund for the support of teachers' institutes.
In city districts of the first and second class and village districts, having a population of not less than 2,500, the examiners are appointed by the boards of education. The fees charged are the same as those of the county boards, and are appropriated for the same purpose.
There are in the different townships, subdistricts, in which the people elect, annually, a local director, whose term of office continues for three years. From this it will be seen that each subdistrict has a board consisting of three directors. These directors choose one of their number as clerk, who presides at the meetings of local directors, and keeps a record thereof. He also keeps a record of the proceedings of the annual school meetings of the subdistrict. The board of education of each township district consists of the Township Clerk and the local directors, who have been appointed clerk of the subdistricts. The law provides that "in every district in the State, there shall be taken, between the first Monday in September and the first Monday in October, in each year, an enumeration of all unmarried youth, noting race and sex, between six and twenty-one years of age, resident within the district, and not temporarily there, designating also the number between sixteen and twenty-one years of age, the number residing in the Western Reserve, the Virginia Military District, the United States Military District, and in any original surveyed township or fractional townships to which belongs Section 16, or other land in lieu thereof, or any other lands for the use of schools or any interest in the proceeds of such land: Provided, that, in addition to the classified return of all the youth residing in the district, that the aggregate number of youth in the district resident of any adjoining county, shall be separately given, if any such there be, and the name of the county in which they reside." The clerk of each board of education is required to transmit to the County Auditor an abstract of the returns of enumeration made to him, on or before the second Monday of October.
The County Auditor is required to transmit to the State Commissioner, on or before the 5th day of November, a duly certified abstract of the enumeration returns made to him by clerks of school districts. The law provides that "the Auditor of State shall, annually, apportion the common school funds among the different counties upon the enumeration and returns made to him by the State Commissioner of Common Schools, and certify the amount so apportioned to the County Auditor of each county, stating from what sources the same is derived, which said sum the several County Treasurers shall retain in their respective treasuries from the State funds; and the County Auditors shall, annually, and immediately after their annual settlement with the County Treasurers, apportion the school funds for their respective counties, according to the enumeration and returns in their respective offices."
The law provides that the school year shall begin on the 1st day of September of each year, and close on the 31st of August of the succeeding year. A school week shall consist of five days, and a school month of four school weeks. The law also provides, in relation to common schools, that they shall be "free to all youth between six and twenty-one years of age who are children, wards or apprentices of actual residents of the school district, and no pupil shall be suspended therefrom except for such time as may be necessary to convene the board of education of the district, or local director of the subdistrict, nor be expelled unless by a vote of two-thirds of said board of local directors, after the parent or guardian of the offending pupil shall have been notified of the proposed expulsion, and permitted to be heard against the same; and no scholar shall be suspended or expelled from the privilege of schools beyond tbe current term: Provided, that each board of education shall have power to admit other persons, not under six years of age, upon such terms, or upon the payment of such tuition as they prescribe; and boards of education of city, village or special districts shall also have power to admit, without charge or tuition, persons within the school age who are members of the family of any freeholder whose residence is not within such district, if any part of such freeholder's homestead is within such district; and provided further, that the several boards of education shall make such assignments of the youth of their respective districts to the schools established by them, as will, in their opinion, best promote the interests of education in their districts; and provided further, that nothing contained in this section shall supersede or modify the provisions of Section 31 of an act entitled an act for the re-organization, supervision and maintenance of common schools, passed March 14. 1853, as amended March 18, 1864."
Provision is made by law for the establishment and maintenance of teachers' institutes, which are established for the professional improvement of teachers. At each Session, competent instructors and lecturers are employed to assist the State Commissioner, who is required by law to superintend and encourage such institutes. They are either county, city or joint institutes of two or more counties, and the examination fees paid by teachers to boards of examiners are devoted to the payment of the expenses incurred by these institutions.
It is said that a State consists of men, and history shows that no art or science, wealth or power, will compensate for the want of moral or intellectual stability in the minds of a nation. Hence, it is admitted that the strength and perpetuity of this Republic must consist in the morality and intelligence of the people. Every youth in Ohio, under twenty-one years of age, may have the benefit of a public education, and since the system of graded and high schools has been adopted, may obtain a common knowledge from the alphabet to the classics. The enumerated branches of study in the public schools of Ohio are thirty-four, including mathematics and astronomy, French, German and the classics. Thus the State, which was in the heart of the wilderness one hundred years ago, and has not been a State but eighty years, now presents to the world, not merely an unrivaled development of material prosperity, but an unsurpassed system of popular education.