State publication of school textbooks in the United States has, from the first, been. largely a political issue. There has never been, and is not now, in any American state, any educational demand that the schoolbooks used in the schools be printed by the state. In no case has the proposal come from school administrators or from organized bodies of teachers. To the contrary, the chief opposition to the proposal, whenever and wherever advanced, has come from those responsible for the proper education of the children of the state.

Doubtless you have all heard many times the statement that the World War not only materially changed the character of our national life, but gave new directions to our relations with other nations as well.

In May, 1915, a survey of the public-school system of Salt Lake City, Utah, was conducted by a corps of five workers, of which I was director. One of the problems presented at Salt Lake City was that of estimating the efficiency of the instruction given. This was made especially important by reason of the fact that there had been much criticism in the city, on the part of the business men, of the instruction in the so-called fundamental subjects in the schools.

From small beginnings we have gradually evolved, during the past fifty to seventy-five years, a series of American school systems of which we may feel justly proud. Though each state and territory has a different school system, the systems in different states often differing greatly in important features, there is nevertheless such a similarity of aim and purpose between the different state school systems that we not uncommonly group them all together and speak of them collectively as our American public-school system.

The various systems in use for certificating teachers in the different states and territories, though differing much in minor details, are nevertheless reducible to a very few type systems. In Massachusetts and Connecticut we find the town system of local certification. In all the other states and territories, a few distinctive local systems in part excepted, the various systems are reducible to one of three type plans. In the first plan the power of certification is vested almost entirely in the county authorities. In the second plan the power is vested almost entirely in the state authorities, the county superintendent merely performing certain clerical duties in connection with the giving of the examinations and the transmitting of the papers. In the third plan the two systems exist side by side, and two forms of certification, the two often overlapping, are provided for by the state.

In almost all of the states having local town or county examination systems for the granting of teachers' certificates, or a state examining system controlling all certification, as in Alabama, the school Iaw enumerates the general requirements and prerequisites to being admitted to the examinations, and specifically enumerates the subjects upon which the applicants for each grade of certificates must pass. Frequently the minimum and average passing percentages are enumerated as well for each grade of certificate issued.

The length of time for which the different grades of certificates are valid varies in the different states. One year for third-grade, two years for second-grade, and three years for first-grade are quite common periods. In Michigan, Kentucky, and Texas the first-grade certificate is valid for four years, the second for either three or two years, and the lowest for one year. In Illinois, Iowa, and North Carolina but two grades 8 are granted, and these are good for but one and two years respectively.

In addition to the local or county systems of certification, almost all the states have instituted some form of state certification as well. In a few states the state examination system has completely supplanted the local systems, and all teachers in the state are required to pass the state examinations and to hold certificates issued by the state. In a few others all questions are prepared and all examination papers are graded by the state, but the certificates to teach are issued by the county superintendents, and are limited in validity to the county where the examination was taken and the certificate issued.

So far in the consideration of the question of certification we have dealt with teachers' certificates, as such, and without distinction except as to grades. This has been done for the reason that in almost all of our states a certificate of any of the regular grades is valid for teaching anywhere in the school system. In this chapter we wish to consider certain special forms of certificates, granted by a few states, to teach in certain types of schools or for instruction in certain special forms of school work, viz., high-school certificates, kindergarten certificates, and special certificates.

A tabulation of conditions in the various states shows that in fifteen of our states the certification of teachers is almost wholly in the hands of the county superintendent alone; in fifteen other states the certification of teachers is controlled by a county board of education or examiners, of which the county superintendent is a member in all but one state; and in the remaining states the certificating authority is the state, the town, or some combination of the state and the locality.

In the study of present conditions, perhaps the two most significant weaknesses revealed in our systems of certification were the low standards and the great lack of uniformity. To raise and to standardize our certification requirements ought to be the keynotes of future progress.