Philadelphia is an old and slow-moving city, in which everything follows precedent, and outward respectability is the whole of life. It resembles London, in that its leisure-class gentlemen have cricket-clubs; also in that old families have vast holdings of real estate throughout the city, which they hand down from generation to generation. The rich as a matter of course send their children to private schools, where they do not have to associate with the vulgar unwashed; so the big business men do not care what becomes of the public schools, and only want their tax assessments held down. For many years the social service organizations agitated for a school survey by the city, and finally matters got so bad that the survey was made by the state. The four volumes of the report, dated 1921, lie before me. If you are suspicious of my opinions about schools, you may prefer to hear from the state superintendent of public instruction. Dr. Thomas E. Finegan is not a muck-raker, but a high-up educational politician, with more letters after his name than he has in it—A.M., Pd.D., Litt.D., L.H.D., LL.D.; and he says: It cannot be too emphatically stated that the general condition of Philadelphia’s school plant is deplorable. Nearly forty thousand elementary pupils are on part-time attendance because of lack of sufficient classrooms, and the high school pupils are handicapped by the heavy overcrowding of their classes. There is a real hazard to the children of Philadelphia in the fact that seventy-four per cent of the school buildings are not fireproof, and are not equipped with modern fire protection apparatus. The system of fire drills and the devotion and competence of the teaching force afford the chief protection to most of the children in times of danger from fire. The citizens of Philadelphia would be shocked to learn of the unsanitary and unwholesome toilet facilities that are provided for the children in a majority of the public schoolhouses. It is no exaggeration to say that many of the conditions not only threaten the health of the children, but are a menace to their morals as well. Over eighty per cent of these buildings provide less than the standard play area now recognized as necessary to the healthy and happy school life of children. Moreover, Superintendent Finegan goes on to say: