Clay v. Indep. Sch. Dist. of Cedar Falls

• Citation: 174 N.W. 47,187 Iowa 89
• Decision Date: 26 September 1919
• Docket Number: No. 32542.,32542.
• Parties: CLAY ET AL. v. INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DIST. OF CEDAR FALLS ET AL.
• Court: United States State Supreme Court of Iowa

187 Iowa 89

174 N.W. 47

CLAY ET AL.

v.INDEPENDENT SCHOOL DIST. OF CEDAR FALLS ET AL.

No. 32542.

Supreme Court of Iowa.

Sept. 26, 1919.

Appeal from District Court, Black Hawk County; H. B. Boies, Judge.

Action in equity for an injunction and for a writ of mandamus to be directed to the board of directors of the defendant school district. There was a decree as prayed, and defendants appeal. The material facts are sufficiently stated in the opinion. Reversed.

Ladd, C. J., and Stevens and Gaynor, JJ., dissenting.W. H. Merner, of Cedar Falls, and Mears & Lovejoy, of Waterloo, for appellants.

George D. Harris and Pickett, Swisher & Farwell, all of Waterloo, for appellees.

WEAVER, J.

There is in this case but little dispute upon the essential facts, and the general situation may be stated as follows:

The independent school district of Cedar Falls maintains five or more separate schools, housed in separate buildings, owned and used by the district for that purpose. In the same territory or adjacent thereto is located the Iowa State Teachers' College, formerly better known as the Iowa State Normal School. In one of its buildings the college maintains a normal training school, and by an arrangement between the college and the district, authorized by statute for that purpose, all pupils of school age residing in a certain section of the district are required to attend the school conducted in said normal training building where they are instructed by teachers employed by the college. The remainder of the school population of the district attends the public schools in the buildings first above mentioned. As is well known, the chief purpose for which the State Teachers' College was founded and is maintained is the education and training of its students for service as teachers in the public schools and other institutions of learning in which they may find employment. Neither party to this litigation questions the propriety or regularity of the matters thus far related, but they afford material aid in making clear what follows.

The board of directors of the district and the college authorities entered into an agreement whereby certain of the more advanced students of the college--usually members of its graduating class--came into certain of the public schools and undertook to teach or instruct a certain designated grade or class of pupils during a part of the day; such teaching being done and instruction given under the supervision, advice, and criticism of the public school teacher in regular charge of the room. This teacher, while so engaged in supervising and directing the student teachers in said service, was known and is spoken of in the record as a “critic teacher.” Prior to the beginning of this action the student teachers were not required to have certificates from the state superintendent of public instruction; they served without salary or wages from the district and without written contract with the district, but by reason of such service they received certain credits in their examination for graduation from the college. It also appears that in the employment of teachers to have charge of the public schools, where the foregoing plan of work was followed, the board of directors agreed to take into consideration the recommendations of applicants by the college and by the city superintendent of schools; but there is no evidence that the board surrendered or delegated its right or authority to act in such matters upon its own uncontrolled judgment, as should seem to it best for the benefit of the schools. It is further conceded that the teachers having special charge of these rooms were employed and paid by the district for less than full-time wages, and were paid by the college for so much of their time as was given to their work as critic teachers.

At the outset of this action the plaintiffs, who are residents and taxpayers of the district, challenged the regularity and legality of said arrangement, and by their original petition prayed that a writ of mandamus issue, commanding the defendants to discontinue employment of, or permission to, any person to teach in any of the schools of the district, except persons legally qualified or authorized to serve in that capacity, and further asked a writ of injunction to forbid the payment or expenditure of moneys or funds of the district to any teacher employed as a critic teacher, or who is in fact devoting his or her services in whole or in part to teaching or supervising students of the college. After the petition had been filed, and doubtless for the purpose of removing, if possible, any objection to the student teachers because they did not hold certificates, application was made to the state superintendent to issue to them provisional certificates as authorized by Code Supp. 1913, § 2734p2. The application was granted; the certificates were issued by the state superintendent and forwarded in the usual course to the county superintendent, to be by him recorded and delivered to the persons therein named. This fact coming to the knowledge of the plaintiffs, they amended their petition, stating the fact of the issuance of the certificates, alleging that they had been issued improvidently and without proper showing therefor, and that there was no occasion or necessity for the employment of additional teachers in the schools of the district. Upon these allegations an injunction was asked and granted against the county superintendent, who was made a defendant in the case, forbidding the delivery of the certificates to the persons for whom they were intended. Neither the state superintendent, who issued the certificates, nor the student teachers, in whose favor they had been issued, were made parties to the proceeding, and the record does not reveal upon what showing or evidence the state superintendent acted in granting the certificates, except an indorsement upon each certificateshowing the credits accepted in lieu of an examination upon educational qualifications of the applicant.

In answer, the defendants denied the employment of any teacher or teachers in violation of law, or the expenditure of the funds of the district for the service of uncertified teachers, and denied having permitted the use of the school buildings or property for any use inconsistent with the purposes for which such buildings and property have been provided.

There is much said in the petition concerning the details of the management of these schools, the method and manner of the instruction given the class or grade served by the student teachers, and the alleged ill effects of the arrangement complained of; but, there being little, if any, evidence in support of these allegations, and no insistence upon them in argument, we do not take time to recite them here.

The evidence in the case is, for the most part, given by teachers connected with the schools and college, who were minutely examined and cross-examined concerning the so-called co-operative plan existing between the schools and the college; but the ultimate effect of the facts developed is fairly reflected in what we have already stated. It is made to appear that the use of student teachers in some form had been continued through several school years, and while the plan of the arrangement had on one or two occasions been reduced to writing in the form of a proposal by the college and submitted to the board, no formal contract appears to have been executed. It was first inaugurated in the kindergarten at the request of the board of directors of the school district, in the belief that this department would thereby receive superior advantages, and was later, from time to time, extended to include some one grade in other schools; the plan of conducting it being arranged and developed by consultation between the president of the board, the city superintendent of schools, and some representative of the college. Such plan at all times included a condition by which the salaries of teachers dividing their time between the service of the district and the service of the college should be apportioned and paid by the district and college in like ratio. It should, perhaps, also be said that the college employed a superior or head critic teacher, who exercised supervision over the work of student teaching generally, and as such she visited the schools, observing the work done, and offering advice and suggestion, as she might think was needed, and for this service she was paid by the college alone.

Upon hearing the evidence the trial court entered a decree that the plan, by which student teachers are allowed to teach or assist in teaching in the public schools under the supervision of critic teachers employed by and paid in whole or in part by the college, is illegal; that the students theretofore employed in that capacity were not provided with certificates, nor under contract with the district, as provided by law; and that this objection was not removed by the issuance of the provisional certificates, nor by the further fact shown that the board of directors had entered into written contract with the persons to whom such provisional certificates had been issued. The court further found that the plan by which the student teachers were permitted to teach or assist in teaching in the public schools, and thereby earn credits for their graduation from the college, and the supervision of such teaching by college teachers, or by public school teachers paid in part by the college, is, in effect, the establishment and carrying on of a school of pedagogy for the benefit of the college, and is therefore an unlawful misuse of the public school buildings and property. Upon these findings the court ordered that a writ of mandamus and an injunction issue, substantially as prayed in plaintiffs' petition, and that the temporary injunction restraining the county superintendent from delivering the provisional certificates to the student teachers be made...