Virginia PTA History

Historical Presentation - Continued...

Virginia’s Governor at the time was A.J. Montague who was well aware of Virginia’s great educational needs. With his encouragement, the Cooperative Education Association of Virginia was organized in 1904 by an outstanding group of citizens of the Commonwealth to meet a definite and great need for better schools, health, civic and social conditions. Under the leadership of the first elected president, Dr. S.C. Mitchell, a professor at the University of Richmond, the Cooperative Education Association developed an eight-point program, which was:

1. A nine-month school for every child.
2. A high school within reasonable distance of every child.
3. Well-trained teachers for all public schools.
4. Efficient supervision of schools.
5. The introduction of agricultural and industrial training into the schools.
6. The promotion of libraries and correlation of public libraries and public schools.
7. Schools for the defective and dependent classes.
8. The organization of a Community League in every county.

Armed with this program, the historic “May Campaign” began in 1905 when the Governor and 100 of the “ablest speakers of the state delivered 800 addresses in 94 counties”. The direct result of the campaign was the organization of local school associations—Community Leagues, Civic Leagues, School Leagues—called by various names but organized by the citizens to improve the educational, health, civic, social, home, highway and farming conditions.

Soon this organization of citizens who were working on every phase of school and community improvement became aware of a national movement, the National PTA, to encourage parental and community involvement. Said Dr. E.L. Fox, then 8th president of the Cooperative Education Association, “this movement, national in origin, was in large measure the result of a growing interest in child psychology, a growing awareness of parents to the elusive effects of change upon the home, the family, and the problems of child care. The result is a demand for an organization for the promotion of parent education, child study groups, parent-teacher relations, and a quickened sense of the responsibility of the present adult generation to the rising generations.”

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