A Gigantic School.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 7714, 17 January 1905, Page 3

A Gigantic School.

TO ACCOMMODATE EIGHT THOUSAND CHILDREN. After years of deliberation the school authorities have decided to adopt plans for a "sky-scraper" school in New York, which will accommodate 7500 to 8000 pupils. The structure (says the New York correspondent of the London Chronicle) will be ten stories high, by far the largest elementary school in existence, and will be erected at once on the East Side, on a site 175 ft by 80ft. Each floor will have fifteen class rooms, each accoimnodating fifty children. The structure will be fireproof, only the furniture of the rooms being inflammable, and even if a fire should break out all that would be necessary, it is claimed, would be to close the particular room and let the flames die out. There are to be four elevator shafts, besides stairways and "escalators," and tho authorities are confident that the 8000 children can be handled with no more confusion than prevails in one of the large office buildings , down town, in several of which the daily movement exceeds 8000. The children on the lower floors will go out by the stairs, while those above will use the elevators. There will be four exits or entrances on three streets, and one byway. The annual report of the Commissioner of Education shows that more than one-fifth of the entire population of the United States was enrolled in the common schools of the country in 1904 ; to be accurrate, 20.04 per cent. The total enrolment in public and private schools on 10th June, 1904, was 18,187,918, of which more - than 16,000,000 were enrolled in the public schools. The average daily attendance was 11,054,502, which is the highest ever reported, being 69. 2 per cent of the total enrolment, against -59.3 per cent in 1870. This would seem to indicate that interest in primary education is decidedly on the increase. In 1870 males formed nearly 39 percent, of the entire number of teachers, in 1880 they were nearly 43 per cent., but im 1890 they had dropped to 31, and in 1903 to 26 per cent. The average monthly wages of teachers was just under £5 for males, and a shade over £4 for females last year, a slight increase over the previous year.