Statement by Commissioner of Education Earl James McGrath to the New York Times

Statement* Next year-1952-53-there will be 1,700,000 more children enrolled in our schools than are enrolled this year. This is a tremendous number to absorb. As matters stand now, most of our classrooms are painfully overcrowded. In many communities children are attending classes in school basements, apartment house basements, empty stores, garages, churches, and even trailers, and large numbers of children are going to school on a half-time basis. Even of the regular schools, approximately one out of five is either unsafe or obsolete. Nor is this, by any means, the whole story. According to present calculation, the peak of school enrollments will not be reached until 1957-58, if then. By that time, it is estimated, the enrollment in our public elementary and secondary schools will be more than 32 million, an increase of 6 million over our present 1950-51 enrollment. The tidal wave of children bearing down on our schools bids fair to overwhelm us. We simply are not building enough new schoolhouses or training enough new teachers to meet the situation. We can't go on from year to year on the present makeshift basis without seriously undermining our whole public school system. And unless the American people are prepared to take positive action to remedy these deficiencies, millions of children will continue to get a makeshift education. *By Earl James McGrath, U. S. Commissioner of Education, Federal Security Agency, Washington, D. C., on "School Enrollment," to New York Times, January 1952.