officers located at the state capital would have had in caring for lands scattered throughout a vast territory, largely a wilderness; a general tendency to oppose state control; the lack of a strong centralized state government. At the present time these conditions have either passed away or have become negligible factors.33

The present system by which the ownership and management of the sixteenth section funds of Illinois are divided among 1656 townships, is wasteful and ineffective. The total income of the combined township funds in the year 1914 was $1,038,270.26, and it cost approximately $225,000, slightly less than one fifth of the income, to administer the township funds in 1914. In thirty-six counties the expense of administering the township fund was greater than the total income of the fund. To this may be added the fact that during the last seventeen years, from 1905 to 1921, inclusive, the losses suffered by the township funds amounted to no less than $768,255.31. (See above, Chapter III, Table XV.)

34

Illinois should no longer refuse to follow the example of almost every state admitted into the Union since Minnesota (1858) and particularly the example of Florida and Tennessee, each of which originally regarded the sixteenth section funds as belonging to the townships, but later merged them into a single fund owned and controlled by the state. Just as Illinois merged her permanent county funds into her township funds, let her now merge her township funds into one state endowment.

Proportion state funds to school needs.-Preceding paragraphs have shown the need of vastly larger funds for the support of public schools in Illinois. They have also indicated that Illinois can easily provide these funds by adopting a modernized system of taxation, including such features as a state income tax, a state severance tax and the assessment of real property by state rather than by local officials on a 100 per cent valuation basis (the basis provided by law but violated in practice). Emphasis has also been laid upon the fact that the state and only the state will ever be able to equalize school revenue, school burdens, or educational opportunities.

State appropriations versus taxation.-There has been much discussion as to which is the better method of providing school moneys for state aid, to make appropriations out of the general revenue of the state or to provide for a state tax the proceeds of which shall be devoted to schools. We have seen that Illinois, after experimenting with the state school tax abandoned it in favor of state appropriations. California did likewise. The same objection holds against a state appropriation of fixed amount as that which

23 Cf. F. H. Swift. op. cit., pp. 107-19.

& Illinois School Survey, p. 180.

holds against a state school tax of fixed rate: neither policy furnishes any guarantee that the amount of money produced will be sufficient to provide adequate school facilities.

A sound and effective system of school finance must provide some means by which to determine in advance how much money will be needed to guarantee, first, that every child of school age shall be in school, and second, that the quality of instruction and the character of school facilities provided for every pupil shall be worthy and adequate. Instead of pursuing any such policy as this, Illinois provides a state appropriation of a fixed amount together with certain other sources of school revenue. Then she says in effect to the school districts: "This year you will have so many dollars to maintain your schools." She does not ask whether it will be possible to maintain satisfactory schools with the amount provided. Even the reform act of 1923, designed to equalize educational opportunities definitely provides for prorating state aid.

Contrast with such a policy that of Massachusetts which provides no fixed amount to be furnished by the state, but names the projects which the state will subsidize, the amount of the subvention to be furnished for each project, and then draws the subventions from a state fund many times sufficient to meet all claims. Contrast the Illinois policy also with the policies of Arizona, Utah, California, and Washington, which guarantee from state funds a fixed and relatively generous amount for each school child.35

Illinois should create an interim commission on school finance, whose function should be to determine as nearly as possible the amount of money needed during the next biennium for all public school projects to be financed by the state. Such a commission should report this amount to the legislature at its next session, together with the amount which will be available from all continuing sources. The legislature should thereupon forthwith take. steps to provide the revenue required to meet all obligations of the state to the public schools.

25 For details of the methods pursued by these states, see F. H. Swift A Biennial Survey of Public School Finance in the United States, 1920-22, pp. 16-17. Also, F. H. Swift, State Policies in Public School Finance, p. 37.

CHAPTER VII

RECOMMENDATIONS

Preceding chapters have described existing educational conditions in Illinois. They have not only pointed out the defects but have, in many cases, suggested remedies. They have also explained at a considerable length the reason for these recommendations. It seems desirable to bring together here at the close of this study the recommendations which have been scattered throughout various sections of the present account. To the recommendations specifically presented in the earlier portions of this study may well be added certain others, which, although not stated, are, by implication or as a consequence of principles laid down, contained therein.

SECTION I. Abolish the present antiquated, unfair methods of apportioning state school moneys and adopt modernized, scientific methods which will recognize variations among the local school units as to number and qualifications of teachers and other school officers employed, length of school year, assessed valuation per full time teacher employed, local tax rate, aggregate days of attendance.

SEC. 2. Establish 8 months (160 days) as the minimum school year.

SEC. 3. Abolish school districts.

SEC. 4.

Establish the county as the local school unit.

SEC. 5. In case school districts are retained, require a minimum county school tax of not less than ten mills, the proceeds to be distributed as an equalization fund among the school districts within the county, in accordance with the principles set forth in section I.

SEC. 6. Extend to the counties the taxing and bonding powers now enjoyed by school districts.

SEC. 7. In addition to all other state funds provide a state equalization fund to be apportioned among those counties which levy a county school tax of more than 10 mills, but are unable to produce thereby for every child of school age resident in the county a quota equal to the state average county quota per child derived from proceeds of such county taxes.

SEC. 8. Empower and require the State Department of Education to fix and to modify from time to time, as conditions seem to warrant, the requirements and standards which counties must meet in order to receive quotas of state moneys.

SEC. 9. Require county and all other school boards to prepare annually a budget of estimated school costs for the next succeeding year, such budget to be submitted to the proper authorities and used as a basis for levying taxes.

SEC. 10. Make it unlawful for the state or for any school corporation to undertake any new type of educational project until previous provision has been made for a new and adequate fund for financing the same.

SEC. II. Require the counties to formulate and provide for the carrying out of a four-year county building program to provide new buildings and other new school property.

SEC. 12. Remove all limits on local taxation.

SEC. 13. Require the adoption of a serial bond policy by all political corporations empowered to issue bonds.

SEC. 14. Abolish the office of county superintendent as an elective office and place the appointment of the county superintendent and the fixing of his salary in the hands of the County Board of Education subject only to limits as to professional qualifications and minimum salary fixed by the State Board of Education.

SEC. 15. Establish an amount not less than that paid to city superintendents in first class city systems as the minimum salary of county superintendents.

SEC. 16. Provide for every thirty rural teachers a supervisor or teacher helper of qualifications sufficient to entitle said supervisor to a salary not less than that paid to expert supervisors employed in first class city school systems, appointment to be made by the county superintendent upon the basis of qualifications fixed by the State Board of Education.

SEC. 17. Provide a state graduated personal income tax upon the proceeds of which public schools and other educational institutions shall have first claim.

SEC. 18. Provide a state severance tax, the proceeds of which shall be devoted to

a state permanent common school fund. (Compare sections 26 and 27.)

SEC. 19. Reserve to counties and to districts the sole right of levying taxes upon real and personal property and derive all state taxes from other forms of taxation, e.g.— taxes on incomes, corporations, natural resources and occupations, luxuries, etc.

SEC. 20.

Provide that all real and personal property shall be assessed by state officers, not local, and that assessment shall be upon 100 per cent valuation basis in accordance with the existing law.

SEC. 21.

Create a state interim legislative educational budget commission which shall prepare and recommend to each succeeding legislature an educational budget. SEC. 22. Provide for the raising by state taxation of funds sufficient to pay all state subsidies provided by law for all educational projects, positions, and institutions. SEC. 23. Provide that state tax rates for educational projects shall be determined biennially on the basis of the amount of money required, in addition to that available from all continuing sources, to provide adequate funds for all educational projects to be subsidized by the state.

SEC. 24. Empower and require the State Board of Education to establish and modify from time to time, as conditions warrant, a scale of educational and professional requirements for all positions to be subsidized entirely or in part by the state and a corresponding salary scale in which salaries paid shall vary according to the professional preparation, experience, and class of certificate of the incumbent.

SEC. 25. Provide that no moneys belonging to a public school endowment fund shall be invested in bonds or in any other securities chargeable to, or dependent upon, the credit of the political corporation to which such fund belongs.

SEC. 26. Merge the existing separate 16th section township funds into one permanent state endowment for public schools.

SEC. 27. Provide for an adequate and reliable school census.

SEC. 28. Require the State Department of Education to prepare a uniform system of recording receipts and expenditures, and an accompanying handbook of detailed instructions such as have been compiled by the state departments of New York and Pennsylvania.

SEC. 29. Summarizing the most important tendency of forward-looking legislation which underlies many of the recommendations contained in the preceding sections, a tendency which must be recognized and accepted before school burdens and educa tional opportunities can be equalized in any thoroughgoing manner: Place upon the

state (which is the only unit capable of equalizing school revenues, school burdens, and educational opportunities) the major portion of the burden of school support by requiring the state to furnish funds sufficient to pay the minimum wage to which every incumbent of an educational position is entitled by reason of his qualifications, professional and otherwise. This recommendation covers salaries of superintendents, principals, teachers, truant officers, county superintendents, assistants, rural supervisors, and all members of the staff of the State Board of Education. Place upon the state also the responsibility of furnishing the funds sufficient to pay the costs of textbooks and apparatus immediately related to instruction.