Word: pupil
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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Last week, after one of his white male teachers had been hit by a Negro pupil, School Superintendent James A. Hazlett finally brought the mess into the open. The story, as Hazlett and his teachers told it, was one of basic hooliganism aggravated by racial friction. Strong-armed bullies of both races extort nickels and dimes from young whites and Negroes alike. But when an argument starts, the races close ranks. "A fight might not be caused by racial issues in the beginning," said Hazlett, "but before it is over, you have a white-Negro problem...
Though their state ranks only No. 41 in the amount it spends on each pupil, West Virginians have long balked at putting any more money into their schools. Last week, in his "state of the state" message to the legislature. Governor Cecil Underwood finally made a proposal he never dared make before-a bill to give education an additional $15 million a year in state funds. Reason for his sudden boldness: the shock felt throughout the state by the revelations of a 476-page document called the Feaster Report...
...Bored. As if the figures were not bad enough, the Feaster Report has some bitter words to say about pupil and teacher attitudes. "Regardless of the types of schools the pupils have come up through, however much interest in learning a very significant proportion (36%) of them had in grades six and eight is completely, or almost completely, gone by the twelfth grade . . . When more than three out of every four seniors in four large high schools call schooling exasperating and tedious, the situation is too serious to be laughed...
...state of mind of the teachers is even worse. While the pupils at least took part of the blame for their apathy, "only one teacher even insinuated that the faculty might not always be blameless. The most alarming symptom was [the teachers'] fatalistic attitude toward pupil deficiencies and derelictions. The charge most frequently lodged against pupils for not studying, for instance, was 'they don't know how to study.' The tone of the accusation and of the teachers' elaboration on it was one of resignation to fate, of washing their hands of responsibility . . . Until teachers...
...parents spelling out a new policy by which "intellectual loafers and bench warmers" are being dropped. At a time of rising costs and the growing teacher shortage, the plan has its appeal. Says Calgary's Superintendent Warren: "In 1955 Calgary spent $344.29 on each high school pupil. The public cannot afford to provide such service to pupils who take an indifferent attitude toward their responsibilities...