Editing Carter County, Missouri (section)

===Early schools===
Prior to the creation of Carter County the only schools in the area were private subscription schools. These schools were generally held in a home or an abandoned log cabin. Teachers were paid by charging a monthly tuition, generally a dollar a month, which they were responsible for collecting. The average salary for these teachers was about ten dollars month. The curriculum was very basic as generally the teachers themselves had little in the way of education.

When Carter County was organized the 16th section of each township was set aside for schools, and when sold the interest on the money raised would go toward the maintenance of public schools, also known as Common Schools as they were regarded as being for the “common” people who could not afford to patronize one of the private schools.

At the second meeting of the Carter County court (July 4, 1859) N. H. Tucker was appointed commissioner of the common schools. Tucker issued four teachers certificates that year. William Kirkendall received a certificate to teach a school at Brushy Creek near to where Ellsinore would one day be located. Maercus L. Giles received a certificate to teach a public school which was probably located somewhere on upper Big Brushy Creek. James Ferguson received a certificate to teach a public school that was probably on Cane Creek south of the present location of Ellsinore. And Daniel W. Hoskins received a certificate to teach a public school that was located on Carter Creek east of Van Buren. That year there were a total of 433 students attending school Carter County, with 208 of those students attending the public schools.<ref name="Carter County pages 26-34">Dr. Gene Oakley "A History of Carter County, Sesquicentennial Edition" 2007 pages 26-34</ref>

As early as 1861 a school was organized in Van Buren but was soon discontinued because of the Civil War. Indeed, the Civil War disrupted schools all across Carter County.

In 1874, a report sent to the State Superintendent of Public Schools stated that of the 581 children of school age in the county, only 99 were attending school. (Another source places the school age population of Carter County in 1874 at only 487).<ref name="Howard Louis Conrad 1901, pg 507 - 508">Howard Louis Conrad [https://www.google.com/search?tbm=bks&hl=en&q=Encyclopedia+of+the+history+of+Missouri%3A+a+compendium+of+history+...%2C+Volume+1&btnG= "Encyclopedia of the history of Missouri: a Compendium of History and Biography for Ready Reference, Vol 1, 1901, pg 507 - 508"]</ref> The 1874 report to the State Superintendent went on to say that there were only three school houses in the entire county and 25 teachers. The salaries of a male teacher averaged $16 a month while that of a female teacher averaged $10 a month.<ref>Robert Sidney Douglas [https://www.google.com/search?tbm=bks&hl=en&q=HISTORY+OF+SOUTH+EAST+MISSOURI "History of Southeast Missouri, Vol 1, pg. 409. (1912)"]</ref>

During the same year (1874), the Carter County Superintendent in his report said, "Among other difficulties may be mentioned an indifference to the subject of popular education on the part of many citizens, and a reluctance to be taxed for school purposes. Our schoolhouses are of a very inferior class, supplied with the rudest benches for seats, and destitute of blackboards or apparatus of any kind. Many of the houses in which schools are taught are unoccupied cabins, which have been erected and used for temporary dwellings, until the owner could furnish more comfortable apartments for his family."<ref name="Howard Louis Conrad 1901, pg 507 - 508"/>

In 1884 there were 17 schools with 20 teachers with an average salary of $28.80 a month. There were 855 school age children in the county, but the daily attendance was only 384, less than half of the school age population. The total value of school property was $1,360.00 and the total expenses for the schools that year were $2.566.67.

In 1892 there were 24 public schools in the county. That year there were 1,542 school age children in the county of which 1,386 were enrolled in school. The total expenses for the schools that year were $4,374.55. Three of these 24 schools had globes, two had charts, and six had wall maps.

In 1903 there were 29 public schools and 33 teachers. Of the 2,001 school age children in the county 1,552 were enrolled in a school, and the schools had an average daily attendance of 900. The total expenditures for the schools that year were $13,319.71.

In 1913 there were 36 public schools in Carter County employing 40 teachers at an average salary of $40.00 a month. The number of school age children in the county was 1,754 of which 1,561 were enrolled in a school. The average daily attendance was 737. Although there were more schools and teachers than in 1903, there were fewer students. This was due in large part to the departure of the big sawmills as the timber boom in Carter County came to an end. From about 1900 to 1910 there had been a high school at Grandin, but by 1913 there were no high schools in Carter County. Yet by 1914 there were four high schools in the county.

In 1923 there were 29 public schools in the county employing 59 teachers at an average salary of $79.00 a month. That year there were 1,960 students enrolled in school with an average daily attendance of 1,215. The total expenses for schools that year were $15,729.93.

1923 also saw a total of 6 high schools in the county, the largest number of high schools to ever exist in Carter County at one time. The high school at Midco was the first to close, consolidating with the Fremont School. In 1957 the Fremont school was destroyed by a tornado, and although rebuilt the school eventually consolidated with Van Buren. The high school at Hunter was consolidated with the school at Grandin, which in turn was consolidated with the Ellsinore School in the early 1960s, bringing the total of high schools in the county to two, which is the present total.

Today there are two public school districts in Carter County, Van Buren R-1 School district, and the East Carter County R-11 School district at Ellsinore.<ref name="ReferenceA"/><ref name="Carter County pages 26-34"/>