EDUCATION. The first grant of land for public education in the territory of Ohio was made in 1785, when the Continental Congress reserved for that purpose the sixteenth section of every town ship. These grants were supplemented later by similar grants in the Virginia and United States military reservations and the Connecticut Re serve. In 1S25 a school tax law was passed, and in 1827 provision was made for the sale of the school lands. A general school law was passed in 1873 providing for the classification of school districts, and making the use of the English language obligatory in teaching all branches, instead of German, which had hitherto been used in many schools.
During the second half of the nineteenth cen tury Ohio was in many respects the leading State in the West with regard to education, and some of the most important educational reforms in the United States were first introduced here. School attendance is compulsory between the age of eight and that of fourteen. Consid erable progress has been made of late in Ohio in the centralization of rural schools, with the result that there has been an increase in the number of high and graded schools, as well as in the regularity of attendance. The cost of maintaining the schools under the new system, including transportation, is in some cases less than under the old system. The census of 1900 gives the illiterate population of Ohio as 4 per cent. of the total population of ten years and over, being 2.4 per cent. for native white, 11.1 per cent. for foreign white, and 17.9 per cent. for colored. The total school age population (six to twenty-one) in 190] was 1,219,919, of whom 829,857 were enrolled in the public schools. The average attendance in the same year was 610,622, or nearly 74 per cent. of the total enrollment. The length of the school term averages 163 days. The male teachers constituted 39.2 per cent. of all instructors in 1901. The average salaries of teachers in that year were $40 for males and $35 for females.
The school revenue is derived from State and local taxes, fines and penalties, and various other sources. The State contributions consist of the general State tax of one mill and the interest (6 per cent.) on the money obtained from the sale of the school lands and held by the State as an irreducible State debt, amounting in 1901 to $3.97S.705. In 901 the total school revenue was $14,237,752, of which 811.351,987 was ob tained from local taxes, $1,783,258 from State taxes, and $242.257 from the income of the per , manent fund. The average expenditure per pupil of average attendance in the same year was $23.33. Public kindergartens are found in all the larger cities. For the preparation of teach ers there are a number of State and private normal schools. Some of the colleges and the also give courses in pedagogy. Ohio has more public high schools than any other State, though New York has a greater high school at tendance. In 1901 there were in Ohio 899 public high schools, with a total attendance of 41,909. In the same year the 3S3 high schools of New York had an attendance of 63,549. The Case School of Applied Science (q.v.) ranks among the leading technological schools in the United States.
The best known of the academic institutions are the State University, at Columbus; Oberlin College (nonsect.), at Oberlin; Western Reserve University (nonsect.), at Cleveland; and the University of Cincinnati (city), at Cincinnati. Among the other higher institutions are Miami University (State), at Oxford; Ohio University (State), at Athens; Ohio Wesleyan University (Methodist Episcopal), at Delaware; University of Wooster (Presbyterian), at Wooster; Hiram College (Christian), at Hiram: Marietta College (nonsect.) , at Marietta : Kenyon College (Prot estant Episcopal), at Gambier; Saint Xavier (Roman Catholic) and the Hebrew Union Col lege, at Cincinnati. Most of these institutions are coeducational.