ALBERT C. RITCHIE, GOVERNOR. 845

ance officer shall be invalid without the written approval of
the State Superintendent of Schools. And provided, further,
that no attendance officer, appointed under the provisions of
this section or continued in office under the provisions of this
section, shall be paid an annual salary of less than .twelve hun-
dred dollars ($1,200), and the State of Maryland shall pay,
as hereinafter provided, out of the General State School Fund
to the treasurer of the county board of education the entire
annual salary of one attendance officer not to exceed twelve hun-

dred dollars ($1,200), provided that the county board of edu-
cation shall provide suitable individual means of transporta-
tion for the attendance officer. County boards of education
may pay an additional amount to the attendance officer, but
the State shall not share in this additional payment. County
boards of education are free to employ as many additional at-
tendance officers as in their judgment are necessary, subject to
the approval of the State Superintendent of Schools, but the
State shall not share in the payment of their salaries. Pro-
vided that the State Board of Education in its discretion may
execuse any county from employing an attendance officer and
may designate the county superintendent of schools, the super-
vising teacher or the helping teacher to perform the duties of
the attendance officer, and when so designated the amount al-
lowed each county for such work shall be used for general
school purposes.

(3 There shall be employed in each county at least one sta-
tistical and stenographic clerk.

(4) And such other clerical, statistical, and stenographic

assistants and such other professional assistants, assistant su-
perintendents, supervising teachers, helping teachers, attend-
ance officers, medical inspectors and school nurses as the county
board of education shall authorize; provided that no professional
assistant shall be appointed who does not hold the appropriate
certificate issued by the State Superintendent of Schools, and
the appointment of no professional assistant shall be valid
without the written approval of the State Superintendent of
Schools.

The board of county commissioners of each county shall levy
sufficient funds to meet the scale of salaries provided for in
this section and shall not deny any part of the amount re-
quested for any one school year by the county board of educa-
tion to be raised by local taxation for the payment of the sala-
ries of the professional and clerical assistants of the county