To the Editor of the "Nonrn-Cinva Dany News"
Sin—Teaching Is the most im= portant and at the same time the worst treated profession in China, Tt is the most Important because the hope of having a stronger China rests solely on the sound education which her young citizens are going to receive: and the carrying out of the sound education in turn depends chiefly the eMlcleney of the teaching profes: sion.
IU'ls the worst treated, because the average salary received' by a school teacher is poor indeed when compared with that received by a man of any other profession, The follow-Ing are two fables, one showing the average salaries received by. the Teachers "of different grades of Schools, the other those by the staff of the Maritime Customs Service 'A glance at the above two tables will Be sumeient to show the unfair treatment accorded to the teaching profession, The amount of Technical training required by" teachers and professors is in no way Jess than that Fequired by the staff of the Customs Service, and yet the average salaries Fecelved by the former are three time less than that received by the latter. Besides this unfairness treatment there is also the matier of annual ratully {9 be considered. Men of nearly all professions receive more or less some sort of Bonus or double pay at the and of each year, Dut the' teachers receive none.
T was one day attracted by a Want Ad." in a Chinese news paper, It reads as follows: "Wanted lady teacher who must be at lerist a, graduate of Senior High School, She is required to give lessons of Chinese, English and Arithmetic. to two girls daily from 9 am, to 12 a.m, and from 2 pan. to 8 pam, salary. $15.00 each month." "Now imagine a Senior High School girl graduate working 6 hours daily and yet getting only, $15.00 monthly. What kind of service could be expected from such 8 poorly paid teacher! The public In China seem to think that teachers are saints "or superhuman beings who an render excellent services without the means of living happily and comfortably. 'The former give, the Tatler hardly enough to get for them selves and" their' families a fairly 00d amount of food, clothes, shelter ind_reereatlon and yot expect them to make fine citizens out of the younger generation. How very foolish! We must realize that treat ment and service are closely related, Poor treatment produces poor service. and. vice versa, What. Kind of a Service can we expect from a halt starved man oF from a man who has f sick child or an uncared for wife? vith only a monthly income of $30.00 it is dimieult, if not impossible, for a man of breeding to make. both ends meet in a Metropolis like Shanghai, and yet there are primary school teachers who get less than $30.00, Imagine their "plight. in trying balance their family budgets, said that half of tie communists, in China are recruited from the teaching class, Who would not be a com= untinist, if he were so ill-used and 30 Mi-provided for? What kind of sound education could such teachers carry out, but communistic education Nay, the very thought that teachers are usually badly paid tends to degenerate the younger gon= eration. Once a lazy pupil was asked by his' teacher why the should have given" so little attention to, his Books, "The answer was something like this:—Why should he care to ay great attention to his books, when is teacher, who had all through his life pald sich great attention to books, was s0 "Poorly pak, while his uhele, who could not even write a decent welter, earned 20 times more than his teacher. That is only one example of how the very thought that a teacher is usually poorly paid, {ends to degenerate the younger gen eration. "I{-a pupil shows such cone tempt for his teacher, there is no hope for him to be benefitted by his teacher's tuition.
'There are hundreds of other things which f-can well about the male treatment received by the teaching profession, but as some of them are well known to the public, Tteave them to the Teaders' imagination. conclusion T would like to aske the public never to blame the teaching profession for neglecting their duties, but to hold themselves responsible for the mal-treatment they have accorded to the teaching profession, Shanghai, Jan, 21:
Tue population December last, of Nanking in numbered 602,583 male and 404385 female Persons, or 7442 male and 5,213 female persons more than in November Tost says the "China,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.