Greensboro, Oct. 29—“North Carolina can never be honestly ranked as really educationally advanced so long as it permits the gross educational inequalities which now prevail in the state and so long as our political leaders are able with bedtime stories to lull the people into satisfaction with what has been done in recent years,” Dr. Edgar W. Knight of the University of North Carolina and president of the state teachers’ association declared at the opening session of the northwestern district meeting of that organization here this afternoon. He also replied to some of his critics.
“The important matter concerns not what we have done in the years that are gone,” he said. “The question now should be: ‘What are we going to do in the years that are ahead for the thousands of underprivileged children home the state continues to cheat of their rightful educational opportunity?’ The children hear no answer from those who have the power to provide. Only bedtime stories do they hear. These have become our most imaginative literature and bedtime story telling has developed into the only fine art that is widely encouraged in the state. Champion bedtime stories and bedtime story tellers entitle us to another first place.”
Among the champion bedtime story tellers Dr. Knight listed “some of our most influential citizens whose exaggerated if not immodest claims for our educational progress are likely to be interpreted by the public as actual defenses of our glaring educational deficiencies, which those how know the conditions cannot question. Some of these champion bedtime story tellers are giving the impression also that their skill in scooting the people into satisfaction with what we have done exceeds their courage in facing squarely the real educational issues in North Carolina at this time.
From the front page of the Goldsboro News, Saturday, Oct. 30, 1926
newspapers.digitalnc.org/lccn/sn93064755/1926-10-30/ed-1/seq-1/
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