OCR Text |
Show REPORT OB THE COMNISSIONER OF INDIAN AFPAIRS. 37 to two stories in height. As the sleeping apartments are principally situated on the second floor, suitable fire escapes are provided, and as an additional safeguard against fire a standpipe with hose connections on each floor is introduced. Sanitary plumbing fixtures and principles are employed in the installation of all such adjuncts, equa' to the best modern and most advanced systems in vogue. Hygienic principles are given careful consideration in the study of plans. Dormitory rooms are devised to insure between 400 and 500 cubic feet of air space for each child, which, together with a thorough system of ventilation permitting between two and three changes of air per hour, assures a healthful atmosphere for occupants. As in the case of dormitory buildings, schoolhouses are devised in the light of the most advanced science in their oonstruction. Recita-tion rooms are proportioned to seat not exceeding 50 pupils. The arrangement for light is such as to admit an abundance to every part of the room and prevent the inconvenience and danger of any excess glare or reflection or cToss light. The ventilating system adopted insures at least three changes of air per hour. The system of heating the various buildings is through the medium of steam or hot water, and either from a central station or by boilers placed in the individual buildings, the heat being distributed by "direct" radiators placed about the rooms and passages. The surplus air required for ventilating purposes is introduced by the "direct-indirect" system, being admitted through apertures in walls and con-veyed through galvanized-iron ducts to radiators, where, being warmed. it is distributed to the rooms. The inherent danger in the use of kerosene for illuminating pur-poses induced this Department several years ago to substitute the more modern and safer systems of lighting by electricity and gasoline gas, each of which systems has proved satisfactory and greatly advantage-ous to the health of the pupils and for the best interests of the service. Attention is also paid to the ornamentation of the school grounds. Shade trees are required to be placed on the lawns and in the yards; playgrounds are provided, the design being to present a pleasing out-look to the eye and furnish an object lesson to the Indian pupil and his parents of the immense importance of adopting civilized means of living. The Indian is largely taught objectively, and when he sees the difference between the home of the white man and the tepee on the river bottom it raises in his heart a spirit of emulation, if not in the , older at least in the younger who has received a taste of the benefit , of these modern appliances. The only criticism offered in opposition to the plan of mak'ing com-fortable, modernized school plants arises from those people who oon-ceive that the Indian is being educated ir a way which lies beyond the |