taken in its local high school and two years in some good neighboring high school or high schools.

3. It may then organize a two years' course for its high school at home, giving special attention to these two points: (1) to making the subjects and time allotments for these two years as nearly as possible the same as they are in the corresponding two years of the high schools to be subsequently attended; and (2) to making the instruction in these subjects so satisfactory that pupils of average capacity and application may pass without loss of time from the local school to the outside school or schools.

4. If the town can accomplish as much as this, it may pay for high school tuition outside the last two years, and decline to do so for the first two years.

5. One teacher, with a daily session of five hours, more or less, divided into eight or nine periods of about half an hour each, some longer than this average and others shorter, would have from 1,600 to 1,800 periods a year at his disposal. Within these limits, he would have time to carry a full programme for two years, with a little margin for some options. The principal burden of the foregoing plan lies in the large number of subjects the teacher is called upon to handle. If, in addition to this, he should be called upon to teach a grammar school or the high school subjects of a third year or Greek, then he would be clearly overloaded. An additional teacher would be needed.

6. In connection with such a short high school course, the town should provide the necessary books, apparatus and material, so that pupils can do some work by laboratory methods. There being but one teacher, the laboratory table or tables should be in some available part of the main room, or in some room opening directly out of it and closely connected with it, so that pupils working there might be under his general supervision when he is otherwise engaged.

If a town attempting the foregoing plan should be unable to move its children through a four years' course without loss of time to them, if, for instance, its high school pupils of two years' standing should be compelled to begin at or near the bottom in a neighboring high school, this would indicate that its so-called high school is not a genuine one, and that it ought

to pay tuition elsewhere for what it does not offer at home, that is, for a full four years' course.

The law requiring towns to pay tuition for those of their pupils who go to the high schools of other cities and towns should be amended. It now applies to towns only that do not maintain high schools, but the spirit of the law is thwarted by towns that maintain nominal high schools. These, too, should be required to pay tuition in a good full-grade high school for the last one, two or three years, according to the grade for which their respective schools can fit their pupils.

Respectfully submitted,

J. W. MACDONALD.

STONEHAM, Dec. 31, 1895.

TABLE

SHOWING THE CONDITION, EQUIPMENT, ORGANIZATION AND WORK

OF THE

MASSACHUSETTS HIGH SCHOOLS,

AS REPORTED IN

JUNE, 1895.

ABBREVIATIONS. C., reported under composition; E., elective; excl., excellent; G., reported under grammar; L., reported under literature; lim., limited; n. s., not suitable or not satisfactory; R., reported under rhetoric; sat., satisfactory; suit., suitable. Blanks show that no reports were received. Names of towns italicized indicate that the school is only in part a high school. For further explanations of the table see pages 298-304. Since June a few high schools have either moved into new buildings or had their present quarters improved.