Oakwood Industrial School for Colored Students
By A. G. Daniells
it. Although this school, like all others, has its hard problems, it has been doing a good work. It was our privilege to meet at the Nashville Conference a number of colored students from this school. They are earnest, intelligent, promising young people, from whom we are to secure our best workers to carry this blessed message to their race. To those who are conducting this school, and also to those who have given of their means for its establishment and support, we would speak words of courage. The school has already done good work, and we believe that it is destined to do much for the salvation of the colored people. During the Conference at Nashville, important recommendations were passed to make that school more nearly self-supporting than it has been hitherto. The recommendations read as follows:— “We recommend that the financial basis of the Oakwood Industrial School be so changed as to make it more nearly a self-supporting institution; and to accomplish this, we further recommend,— “(1) That as far as possible tuition be secured in whole or in part from students. “(2) That appeals be made to friends of the colored race throughout the world for contributions to a fund for the payment of tuition of worthy and promising students who have not the means for securing tuition for themselves. “We also recommend that the managers of the school make request from its friends for the following:— “(1) Five hundred dollars for a cottage for the principal. “(2) Two hundred and fifty dollars for the enlargement of the orchard and equipments for the culture and preservation of fruit. “(3) One thousand dollars for the material with which to build a girls’ dormitory. “That an effort be made to arrange some plan by which a few white families, of good judgment and influence, may be encouraged to settle in Huntsville or near the school, that their influence and counsel may help to build up that institution.” The land, buildings, live stock, the crops just gathered, and farming implements are valued at $18,281.68; but the school is owing on the original purchase price, $6,000. This makes the actual present worth about $12,281. It will be necessary not only to lift the indebtedness of the school, but to provide more buildings and better facilities for making the school all that it should be as an industrial institution. Whatever help any of our brethren can render this school will be thankfully received. Besides these two leading schools, quite a number of church schools are being operated among both white and colored, in various parts of the South. Some of these are under the supervision of the Southern Missionary Society, and others are under the care of the Educational Department. The report of the Field Secretary of this department contains the following interesting statements:— “We now have in the entire Conference about thirty-five schools, of all grades, employing about fifty teachers, giving instruction to nearly six hundred students. There is required for teachers’ wages about one thousand dollars a month. “Omitting the training-schools and others conducted under officially appointed boards, as they will be reported in detail by their respective officers, we will note some statistics of home, church, and mission schools, which, though necessarily incomplete, may be of interest just at this point:— |
|
|---|
| Number of schools reported |
27 |
| Mission schools |
9 |
| Church schools |
18 |
| For colored children |
8 |
| For white children |
19 |
| Total enrollment |
68 |
| Children from non-Sabbath-keeping parents |
50 |
| Seventh-day Adventist teachers reported |
41 |
| Colored |
15 |
| White |
15 |
| Number in public schools |
8 |
| Range of ages of students, in years |
5-21 |
“All these figures would be increased more or less had complete reports been possible. But the organization of some Conferences is of so recent date that the secretaries have been unable to obtain exact information.” There is no more important work being carried on by our people in the South than this educational work. We are glad that so many of our brethren and sisters have felt the importance of this work, and have offered both their lives and their means for its promotion. No part of the United States stands in greater need of this feature of our work than does the South. As the Union Conference continues its systematic, organized efforts, we believe that the educational work will be more fully developed, and become a stronger factor in the salvation of the people. The aim is to give every child and youth that can be placed in the schools a true Christian education. This means the conversion and regeneration of those who enter the schools.