CHAPTER XL.

STATISTICS OF SECONDARY SCHOOLS.

In the institutions of various classes reporting to this office for the scholastic year ending June, 1897, there were 16,255,093 pupils enrolled. Of this number 584,904, or more than 3 per cent, were secondary students, i. e., students who had passed beyond the eight grades of the common school course and were pursuing studies usually taught in the four years high-school courses. This was a gain of 25,901 in the number of secondary students over the preceding year, or more than 44 per cent. The secondary students were distributed among eight classes of institutions, as follows:

The secondary students in public high schools, and in private high schools, academies, and seminaries numbered 517,066, or more than 88 per cent of the total number of secondary students enumerated in the above table. It is a well-known fact that there are in the elementary schools of nearly all the States many students pursuing secondary studies because high schools are not accessible. Could these scattering students be enumerated, it is not improbable that the aggregate of secondary students in the United States would reach a figure considerably above 600,000. It should be stated here that the 77,746 students enrolled in commercial schools and business colleges are not included in this table, although many of the branches taught in these institutions are equivalent to high-school studies; but it is obvious that students who spend only three or four months in a commercial school should not be given the standing of students who enroll for the year in the secondary school.

This chapter is devoted almost exclusively to the statistics of the 7,209 public and private high schools reporting to this office for the scholastic year 1896-97. The following table shows the growth of this class of schools for a period covering the past eight years: