^h >^. 1-5^ IMAGE EVALUATION TEST TARGET (MT-3) // // £?x .*\€p t^^ :/. f/j 1.0 I.I 1.25 :f IIIM M [2.2 20 1.8 M. i 1.6 y] <^ /^ d? e-2 7F c-: e-i ^.^ //a i O^^/ Photographic Sciences Corporation m iV ^\ ^ % V^ CD (meaning "CON- TINUED"), or the symbol V (meaning "END"), whichever applies. Un des symboles suivants apparaitra sur la dernidre image de cheque microfiche, selon le cas: le symbole — ► signifie "A SUIVRE", le symbole V signifie ""FIN". Maps, plates, charts, etc., may be filmed at different reduction ratios. Those too large to be entirely included in one exposure are filmed beginning in the upper left hand corner, left to right and top to bottom, as many frames as required. The following diagrams illustrate the method: Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent dtre filmds d des taux de reduction diffdrents. Lorsque le document est trop grand pour d;re reproduit en un seul clichd, il est filmd d partir de Tangle supdrieur gauche, de gauche d droite, et de haut en bas, en prenant le nombre d'images ndcessaire. Les diagrammes suivants illustrent la mdthode. 1 2 3 32X 1 2 3 4 5 6 ADDRESS AT TUK #^^nnig ofj Ihe ^etr lligli ^chool, MAir :Slsi, 1878. ADDRESS AT THE OPKXINO OK THK On, MA r 2M, 1878, BY THK KEV. eJOHN JENKINS, D.D. CHAIRMAN OF THK PROTKSTAVT BOARD OF SCHOOL COMMISSIONRR3. Ladies and Gentlemen, In the name of the Protestant Board of School Commissioners, I thank you for 3'our presence here (o-day, and extend to every one of you a cordial welcome to our new High School buildings. That you have consented to appear at this public ceremonial, we accept as an evidence of your interest in that educational work which, on behalf of their Protestant fellow-citizens, the Board has been prosecuting during thirty years. I say " thirty years," because this is the period of the Board's existence. But it must be remembered that very little was attempted in the line of adequate educational provision for the city, until the year 1868 ; indeed, in a not unimportant sense, our sj'stem is but five years old ; for it was as lately as 1873, that a nearly commensurate pecuniary provision for schools was made by the Legislature. I shall have little difficulty in convincing you, that only by the most strenuous endeavours, have the Commissioners succeeded in mak- ing, during this brief space, an almost adequate provision for the educational needs of their Protestant fellow-citizens. We have gathered into our schools twelve per cent, of the whole Protestant population of the city. Even in Boston, whoso school system has for many years commanded the admiration of the world, at least of the civilized world, only thirteen and half per cent, of its popu- lation are in schools. So, you see, Montreal is already following close on the heels of this far-famed New-England city. It is scarcely needful to explain that this rapid extension of school facilities has involved a very large outlay in the erection of school houses. Now, I am not vain enough to sujjpose that the policy of the Board commands the universal approval of the Protestants of Montreal, On so wide a question, a question, moreover, so diffi- cult of solution as that of State or iiublic education, the Board could not have expected unanimous agreement as to its policy. There are so many points of view from which the subject is regarded; that one ought not, perhaps, to wonder at the variety of opinions and objections which have been propounded respecting this policy. Some, very naturally, look at the question from the tax-paying point of view ; others, from the broader, patriotic point of view; others, again, from a professional or educational point of view. While slow to disregard the views which have reached them now and again from influential citizens and from the press, these views have been so divergent, so irreconcilable indeed, that the Commissioners have all along felt that nothing was left to them but to carry out their oAvn convictions of what would satisfy the mass of their fellow-citizens, and would be, on the whole, best in the educational interests of the citv. ^Ye advance no claim to infallibility; so far from this, we readily allow that we have made mistakes. Yet, I have good reason for thinking that the results already secured are such as largely to commend the policy of the Board to the Protestants of Montreal. I venture, morever, to predict that the fruit Avhich shall be hereafter gathered, will com- mand for this policy a yet warmer and wider, if not indeed a universal, civic approval. This, too, I will assume, that whatever differences of opinion may exist as to their policy, there are few of our taxpayers who would not be ready to accord to the Com- missioners the credit of having worked earnestly and honestly in the public interest. That we have worked self-denyingly, too, L take this opportunity of stating, just for the purpose of dispelling an illusion that still lingers in the minds of people, and haunts them almost to distraction, viz., that the Commissioners are paid for their work ! A member of the Board was gravely asked by a friend the other day, what salary he got foi* being on the School Board ! Let it be known in Montreal, once and forever, that no CommisHioner receives a dollar of pay for his work. I was speak- ii;g of existing differences of opinion respecting the policy of the Board ; i might have added that these differences have occawionally found expression in sharp criticism, not to use a stronger phrase. We have tried, not without success, to hear these things with equanimity. This 1 chiim on the Board's behalf, tliat so far- from concealing our policy from the public, we have all along announced it in the frankest and fullest way. The Department of Public Instruction, the City Council, and the citizens generally, have known beforehand, or might have known, all that the Board pro- posed to do and have since done, in the prosecution t)f its work. The extension of the common school system to the point of suffi- ciency, its connection with the High School and University, and latterly with the higher education for girls — this whole scheme was submitted to the City Council and to leading Protestant citizens in a document which the Commissioners issued ii» 1872, entitled "A pleafor the augmentation of the School Tax in theCity of Montreal." This plea was made the ground of that approach to the Legislature which led to the levy of the present rate. The City Council was a party to that augmentation against which some of its members are now crying out. Influential citizens of Mon- treal approached the Legislature by petition, craving augmenta- tion in the interests of the city, on the ground set forth in the Commissioners' Plea. Now, what extension of their work did the Commissioners propose in their " Plea ?" Amongst other iieedg propounded in it are these : A new School House in Shei-brooke Street Kast; another at Point St. Charles; and a High School for girls. The Lcgislatui-e having granted the increase thus contem- plated and sought for, the Commissioners felt themselves pledged to both the Provincial Legislature and to the City Council, no less than to their Protestant fellow-citizens generally, to act upon this 2)roposed extension of their policy : and act upon it they did ; believing, that having made, in advance, so frank an announce- ment, and havijig been, at the time, so largely encouraged, by both official and public opinion, to persist in their policy, they would thereafter be sustained by the sutlrages of every iTitelligent Pro- testant in the community. 1 ask those of our friends who clamour for a diminution of the school tax to consider what this narrower policy would involve. Certainly it would lead to the closing of one 6 half of our Common Schools, aud the withdrawal, Ihoroforo, oftho means of oducation from two thousand children of tax-paying' citizens, now under trainiiiii^, nioi'o or Icsh efficient, in these schools. As certainly would valuable properties which the city is pledi»cd to pay for, which indeed the city cannot escape ])ayint>; for, he loft useless — yea, rathei', a source of i-esultless expense. More than this, it would have the effect of disgracin; the average cost in the High School for Girls was 07c. If thcHo schools were closed, the cost to the city of educutiny the Ili^h School boys and ^nrls in the Common Scho(>ls would 1)0 «ijreatoi' by $4,270 than the outlay incurred under the present system. In the United States, the ili^U Schools are free, and a source of <;reat ex])ense to the cities in which they are established. In the High Schools of Boston each i)ii})il costs the city 830 a year. The city of New York maintains a free college, in which each jnipil costs the municipal government 816(5 a year. New York has also its Normal School, in which the cost of tuition alone is 858 i)er pupil. The same city provides for its population an educational luxury in the form of a Nautical School, the outlay for each pupil being $218 a year. In Montreal, on the contrary, the charge on the school tax for High School main- tenance is, as we have seen, so insigniticant as to be simpl}' nominal. I take this op])ortunity of reminding you of the ground which the Commissioners took on this question in their last Report, a ground to which they still adhere, viz., that every Pro- testant child in the city has a claim, equitable and even legal, to an expenditure on his education of an equal share of the whole amount provided by taxation for the maintenance of public schools. Schools ought to be ]>rovido<] in which the foes (and fees mu.st be charged in every school, according to a wise provision of the Legislature,) should bo so modei-ate at. *hat none bo excluded through ])overly. On thi other hand, those tax-])ayers who desire for their children an education higlier, and more costly therefore, than that which is given in the common schools, should have access to it in schools of a diiierent chai-acter ; but that for such an education, higher fees should be charged. To set aside the High School department of the Montreal school system would be to deprive those citizens who pay the highest school tax of oven those small pecuniary advantages which they enjoy under the present regime of the Board. Again, to abrogate the High School department of the Montreal school system, would bo to deprive parents in humble circumstances of the privilege of giving those of their children who may happen to be of marked natural ability, that higher education to which their talents seem at least to entitle them. Under our present scheme we have pro- moteti from the common schools to the High Schools fifty-two pupils, most of whom havodiHtiiiguiHhed IhomHclvoH in tlicir higlioi- HtudioH. HoyH in the common Hchools who ^ivo evidence of dili- gence and jibility are not only admiltod free into the iriii;h School, but by rt gonerouH arningcment on the part of the governors of McCfill ('ollcge, have also secured to them a free education in the University. The other day one of our lioyal-Arthur bt)y8 took his Bachelor's degree at MeCTill, carrying oil' the liogan gold medal. At the same Convo(!ation one oi'our British and Canadian School boys, still an under-graduate, won nearly all the prizes and honours of his year. At the present moment we have in the High Schools 20 free pupils, 1 1 boj^s and 1) girls, who have been transferred from our common scdiools on the ground of infontreal hrall f2^ time, the highest good. '^"»n eai, m all future NUMBER OF PUPILS IN THE HIGH SCHOOLS OF MONTREAL, I877-'8. High School, or lloyal Cnimmav Sdu.ol . . . '■^'''"■"^'' ^''- ^""''■"^• Preparatory Department ^^^ 203 Total mimbcr of LovB Hjgh School for Girl8 '^*^ •>26 Total number of Pupils "- b(0