Report of the Commissioner of Education for the Year 1881

In this report, the Education Commissioner discusses the office's work, with a list of its publications. The Commissioner of Education also presents summary data and discussion on the census related to education and on illiteracy among minors as taken from the census; school age, population, enrollment, and attendance; teacher workforce, salaries, qualifications, and appointments; school finance; the district system; condition of education in the states, territories, and cities; Southern education; and education of the colored race. The Commissioner of Education also covers issues related to cities: school accommodation and attendance, illiteracy, primary schools, higher grade schools, evening and special schools, and city school finances, moral, and physical training. Normal schools are discussed, including appropriations, comparative admission requirements for normal schools and professional schools, normal school courses of study in the U.S. and abroad, teachers' institutes, and normal training in colleges. Other topics include kindergarten and public schools; secondary and preparatory education; institutions for the superior instruction of women; universities and colleges; college hygiene; elective systems; college attendance variations; political science schools; mechanical engineering, physics, and chemistry instruction; manual training schools; industrial schools for miners and mechanics; the Royal Agricultural High School of Berlin; professional-school summary statistics; medical school entrance examinations; nursing education; and degrees conferred. Library-related topics include summary statistics; library management; libraries and schools; and catalogues and indexes. Information is given on defective classes; institutions for the deaf and dumb; deaf-mute day schools; deaf-mute literary and industrial instruction; National Deaf-Mute College; schools for the blind and their history; printing for and instruction of the blind; schools for the feeble-minded and classification and instruction of the feeble-minded; idiocy causes; reform schools; Michigan's reformatory system; the family system in reform schools; the New Jersey State Reform School; girls' reformation; orphan homes and asylums; education benefactions; education publications; patentees in education furniture; and foreign education. The Commissioner of Education offers concluding remarks and recommendations. Detailed tables cover institutions across sectors, benefactions, publications, and education patentees.