Board of Education

Muskogee was host city to the state teachers' convention, February 22-24, 1911. J. B. Taylor, Oklahoma City, presided as president. Hamlin Garland was one of the chief lecturers. Resolutions requested that a State Board of Education be set up ; that a constitutional levy be enacted providing sufficient state funds to maintain at least a five months school term; and that an Educational Com- mission be appointed. An amendment was made in the constitution giving the Executive Committee authority to set the date for the annual convention. The Executive Committee then reverted to the Christmas holidays as the date for the next annual session. Thus two meetings occurred in 1911. (Howell, op. cit., pp. 38-41 ; School Herald, XIX, No. 3 (Mar& 1911) pp. 6,7).

W. E. Gill served as president of the Oklahoma Education Association in 1912. Gill suggested enactment of a state tax levy to be distributed among all the public schools after local levies were made; urged &ate aid for rural school supervision, thus " giving more permanence, pay and power to the better county superintendents''; and recommended a law giving school officers full authority to force children into the public schools, with a provision to pay truant officers. He also favored the election of city and county superintendents by school boards for a term of four years, with a gradual raising of the standard of eligibility of both administrators and teachers. (&&; Progress, A Magazine of Current Even& and Education, 11, No. 5 (January, 1913, 132135. Henceforth referred to ur Progress).