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"" ") "'" "'"' LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS AT URBANA-CHAMPAIGN 378 M666p ... %I~rrra~p~i~B~ssar~RB~er~ s~ I ~' -----~ ~~-1 -s~ r I I I --L- ~-- r ' ' I PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Studies in Administration, Student Personnel, Curriculum, and Instruction Edited by EARL HUDELSON, Ph.D. MINNEAPOLIS THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA PRESS 1928 COPYRIGHT, 1928 BY THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA ALL RIGHTS RESERVED PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. PREFATORY NOTE Evidences multiply that higher education is to be studied as well as practiced and standardized. Current attempts at analysis and evaluation -range over the whole field from the junior college to the professional school, and attacks upon the problem exemplify many methods of approach. At the University of Minnesota, interest in the matter has been widespread, affecting almost every college and department. Through a period of years studies and investigations have gone forward, seeking to throw light upon the practical problems confronting the University. For three years a Faculty Conference has been maintained where educational mat- ters are discussed and researches reported. These conferences have been enriched by the activities of the University Committee on Educational Research with its investigations. The first Institute on the Problems of College Education, held at the University of Minnesota July 5 to 17, 1927, was a natural outgrowth of these activities and represented a genuine desire on the part of the University to make its resources available beyond the limits of its own faculty, and at the same time to receive from others whatever would be useful in this important field. The program was constructed from the available research projects Q developed at Minnesota, supplemented by contributions provided T by invited speakers. The attendance at the Institute was surpris- ingly large and enthusiastic. It comprised college presidents, deans, registrars, and other faculty personnel. So enthusiastically was the program received that a wide- "" spread request for publication of the stenographic report of the proceedings developed. As a matter of fact, approximately five K hundred copies were asked for before the matter of publication was definitely decided upon. To meet what, therefore, appears a genuine need this volume is now issued. 66286 vi PREFATORY NOTE The editorial work on the stenographers' copy was undertaken by Professor Earl Hudelson, of the College of Education, and through him and the editorial service of the University Press, the volume has been prepared for publication. To all who participated in the programs of the Institute and to Professor Hudelson as well, the University is deeply grateful. G. S. FORD, Dean of the Graduate School J. B. JOHNSTON, Dean of the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts F. J. KELLY, Dean of Administration M. E. HAGGERTY, Dean of the College of Education, Chairman UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA MINNEAPOLIS JANUARY, 1928 INTRODUCTION When the avenues of approach were opened between the an- cient cultures of the East and the uneasy minds of western Europe, early in the Middle Ages, the college and university of modern times began to appear. The new access to the rich and voluminous subject-matter of the learning of the past fired the imaginations of men. Great teachers arose and an increasing number of students sought their guidance. Gradually, the discipleship of eager scholars who followed an individual master increased to such a degree that new complica- tions came into the simple relationships that had existed hitherto. It became indispensable that teachers and students should be- come anchored to a common site, that unified courses of study should be arranged, that a social code of intercommunication be- tween one man and another should be evolved, that regulations should be drawn protecting common rights, and that provision should be made by which food and shelter should be' provided upon a common and a permanent basis rather than that these should remain contingent upon capricious fortune. These were problems of administration for which provision had to be made without delay. Centuries later, when Charles Darwin in 1859 put out his abstract on The Origin of Species, he said, "When the views en- tertained in this volume, or analogous views are generally admitted we can dimly foresee that there will be a considerable revolution in natural history." That revolution has taken place and attendant upon it there have been revolutions throughout all the realms of learning until the subject-matter of knowledge has been uncalculably increased, with commensurate increase at every point in problems of admin- istration in our colleges and universities. If it be asked why constantly there need be so much said about what the university is for and what it ought to do, reply must be made that it is because of the fact that conditions within the university and without the university are never the same in one INTRODUCTION time and another. Robert Louis Stevenson, in Lay Morals, makes analogy between life and the shadow of a great oak. "The shadow," he says, "lies abroad upon the ground at noon, perfect, clear, and stable, like the earth, but let a man set himself to mark out the boundary with cords and pegs and were he never so nimble and never so exact, what with the multiplicity of the leaves and the progression of the shadow, as it flees before the traveling sun, long ere he has made the circuit, the whole figure will have changed." So it is with education. The accurately drawn figure of a given moment may be descriptive of little existent in the next. The rela- tion of shade to light alters continuously from year to year. It is consequently incumbent upon the university, from time to time, as frequently as possible, to examine the figure it has drawn of what education is and often to make revision of its concepts of what its own artistry must portray. Always for the university there is the increasing task-some- thing to be added to that for which it has been responsible before. It cannot lessen its emphasis upon the need for depth of knowl- edge. There must be in constantly increasing numbers scholars who will consecrate themselves to acquiring the technique of dis- covery and who will forego all else to make meticulous examination of the validities of old truths and to undertake self-sacrificing search for new ones. Yet, in our time as never before, the college and the university must, in justice to the needs of society, emphasize the areas of knowledge, as well as its profundities. Particularly must they insist upon the importance of human experience in modifying doctrinaire hypothesis. Further, they must relate thinking to the realities of life. The possibilities of thought for thought's sake alone are soon exhausted. This proposition is early to be consigned to the limbo of useless, if not degenerate, things. Today, the world is handicapped even more by lack of men with sense of proportion and sense of the relationship of one phenomenon of life to another than it is by lack of men of erudition in specialized branches of knowledge. Ignorance of the relationships of knowl- edge may be found as evident and as dangerous among men learned in specialized fields as it can be found among those who are igno- ramuses in all fields. The only available agents within our system viii INTRODUCTION of formalized education for giving thought to this condition and for making effort to correct it are the institutions of higher learning. Mankind is constantly misled and often has suffered grievously from its instinctive inclination to believe without proof that authori- ties in restricted fields of knowledge are wise in all. The great mind, which functions with superb efficiency in the field of economic production, but generalizes fallaciously in regard to the uselessness and ineptitude of historical study, is no more astray from reality than may be the scholarly social-scientist who contemns machine production, in disregard of its ultimate possibilities for adding to the comfort and to the happiness of society at large. All of this is part of the problem of administration. How should organization of the work of the university be accomplished so that maximum advantages shall be secured, so that minimum harm shall be done by the machinery inevitable and indispensable for working with groups? Students are flocking to our institutions of higher learning in unprecedented numbers. New relationships are being established as with industry or government. New factors of influence are enter- ing, as for instance through the alumni. New devices, facilities, and equipment are deemed necessary. We must do our thinking, even, in what Mr. Balfour once called "a new mental framework." All of these factors, and many more, enter into the problems of academic administration. Meanwhile the rapidity with which conditions change leaves little time for thinking about the problems these changes precipitate. Herein may be found the cause for the fact that university and college administration is not far better than it is. Bagehot quotes Pascal as saying that most of the evils of life arise from "man's being unable to sit still in a room." It is a fine service to all educational institutions that has been done by the University of Minnesota in organizing and carrying through this institute for the discussion of college administrative problems. It is a further service to make this material available by publication. In behalf of the guild of college and university administrative officers I wish to express our gratitude. ERNEST MARTIN HOPKINS President of Dartmouth College ix TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE PREFATORY NOTE ........................................................................ V INTRODUCTION .............................................................................................. ii ERNEST M. HOPKINS, President of Dartmouth College. ADMINISTRATION I University Problems of Vital Concern.................... 3 LOTus D. COFFMAN, President of the University of Minne- sota. II Educational Research in the University of Minnesota 15 M. E. HAGGERTY, Dean of the College of-Education and- Professor of Educational Psychology, University of Minne- sota. III Studying the Internal Problems of the University...... 23 A. J. KLEIN, Chief, Division of Higher Education, United States Bureau of Education. IV Educational Experiments and Publicity........................ 37 E. C. ELLIOTT, President of Purdue University. V Educational Policy and Budget Making........................ 49 FRED ENGELHARDT, Professor, of Educational Administra- tion, University of: Minnesota. VI An Analysis of the Financial Needs of a College of Liberal Arts for One Thousand Students..... ...... 57 DONALD J. COWLING, President of Carleton College. VII The Support of the State University.,....................... 85 R. R. PRICE, Professor and Director, University Extension Division, University of Minnesota. VIII Selection and Improvement of the College Faculty...... 94 Guy STANTON FORD, Dean of the Graduate School and Professor and Chairman of the Department of History, University of Minnesota. IX Administrative Procedures for Improving College Teaching ......................................... ........ 102 A. J. KLEIN, Chief, Division of Higher Education, United States Bureau of Education. TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE X The Present Status of the Junior College ....................118 L. V. Koos, Professor of Secondary Education, University of Minnesota. XI The Trend of Reorganization in Higher Education as Affecting the Junior College ....................................128 L. V. Koos, Professor of Secondary Education, University of Minnesota. XII The Four-Year Junior College...................................... 153 JAMES M. WOOD, President of Stephens College. XIII The Graduate School-Its Functions and Criteria......164 D. A. ROBERTSON, Assistant Director, American Council on Education. XIV The Function of a Graduate School....... .............177 GuY STANTON FORD, Dean of the Graduate School and Professor and Chairman of the Department of History, University of Minnesota. XV International University Relations.................................. 182 D. A. ROBERTSON, Assistant Director, American Council on Education. STUDENT PERSONNEL XVI Student Mortality, Student Survival, and Student Accounting ........................................ ....... 199 RODNEY M. WEST, Registrar, University of Minnesota. XVII Student Ability and Its Measurement .....................210 M. E. HAGGERTY, Dean of the College of Education and Professor of Educational Psychology, University of Minne- sota. XVIII The Prediction of Student Scholarship........................232 J. B. JOHNSTox, Dean of the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts, and Professor of Comparative Neurology, University of Minnesota. XIX The Selection of College Students.................................239 J. B. JOHNSTON, Dean of the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts, and Professor of Comparative Neurology, University of Minnesota. xii X11 TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE XX The Orientation of the College Student........................247 ERNEST H. WILKINS, President of Oberlin College. XXI Student Orientation at Minnesota ..................................261 J. B. JOHNSTON, Dean of the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts, and Professor of Comparative Neurology, University of Minnesota. XXII A Program for Student Counselling................................265 D. G. PATERSON, Professor of Psychology, University of Minnesota. XXIII College Marks ..................................................287 W. S. MILLER, Professor of Educational Psychology, Uni- versity of Minnesota. XXIV Mental Hygiene for College- Students.................. ........302 SMILEY BLANTON, Professor of Mental Hygiene, Vassar College. XXV Mental Hygiene and Speech Education....................308 FRANK M. RARIG, Professor and Chairman of the Depart- ment of Speech, University of Minnesota. XXVI The Control of Student Health..................................... 327 H. S. DIEHL, Director of the Department of Pre- ventive Medicine and Public Health and Director of the University Student Health Service, University of Minne- sota. XXVII The Control of Student Life ..........................................341 ANNE D. BLITZ, Dean of Women, University of Minnesota. XXVIII The Significance of Extra-Curricular Activities............351 F. STUART CHAPIN, Professor, and Chairman of the Depart- ment of Sociology and Director of the Training Course for Social Work, University of Minnesota. CURRICULUM AND INSTRUCTION XXIX Reorganizing the College Curriculum............................361 ERNEST H. WILKINS, President of Oberlin College. XXX A College Curriculum for Women..................................369 JAMES M. WoOD, President of Stephens College. XXXI The Future of the Liberal Arts College ........................383 DONALD J. COWLING, President of Carleton College. xiii TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE XXXII Class Size at the University Level..........................403 EARL HUDELSON, Professor of Education, University of Minnesota. XXXIII Experiments on Class Size in the Department of Physics, University of Minnesota.....................421 1HENRY A. ERIKSON, Professor and Chairman of the De- partment of Physics, University of Minnesota. XXXIV A Suggested Program of Investigation Having in Mind the Improvement of Instruction in Science at the University of Minnesota........ ......................426 EDWARD M. FREEMAN, Dean of the College of Agriculture, Forestry, and Home Economics, and Chief and Professor of the Division of Plant Pathology and Botany, University of Minnesota. XXXV The Results of an Experiment on Methods of Teach- ing Gross Human Anatomy .....................................444 CLARENCE M. JACKSON, Professor and Director of the De- partment of Anatomy, University of Minnesota. xiv LIST OF TABLES TABLE PAGE I Receipts of Universities, Colleges, and Professional Schools, 1923-24 ...................................... ............. 87 II Expenditures of State Universities and State Colleges, 1924-25 ........................................ ................ 89 III Numbers of Junior Colleges of Each and All Types and Numbers of Students Enrolled, 1927................120 IV Distributions of Junior Colleges by Numbers of Students Enrolled during 1926-27, and Average, Medians, and Quartiles of Enrollment........................................122 V Distribution by Sections of the Country of the Three Types of Junior Colleges, 1927 ....................................125 VI Requirements for Admission to College in Subjects Other Than the Classics from 1822 to 1900............. 133 VII Years in Which Certain College Subjects Were Given in Amherst, Williams, and Yale at Intervals from 1825 to 1920 .................................................................. 134 VIII An Interesting Possibility.................................................. 160 IX Paternal Occupations of the Students of the University of Illinois .................. .................... ......... 217 X Paternal Occupations of the Students of Pennsylvania State College .............................................................219 XI Showing Combined Occupational Groups Represented in High School, Giving the Number of Cases, the Median, the Middle 50 Per Cent, the Semi-inter- quartile Range, and the Total Range of IQ..............220 XII Occupational Status of Parents Related to Intelligence of Seniors ........................................ ......... 220 XIII Distributions of Scores in the Army Alpha Tests of Freshmen in Four Colleges and Universities..............225 XIV Distribution of Scores on Moore's Completion Test ........226 LIST OF TABLES TABLE PAGE XV Distributions of Thorndike Intelligence Examination Total Scores for 505 Candidates for Admission to Columbia College in September, 1919 ......................227 XVI Means and Sigmas (Aprox.) of Thorndike Intelligence Scores of Candidates for Admission to, and of Stu- dents in, Nine Institutions of Higher Learning in the United States and One Preparatory School in Canada ........................................................... .... 229 XVII American Council on Education Psychological Tests for College Freshmen. Average Scores of Certain Col- leges in Each of Eight Tests and in Total................230 XVIII Showing Factors Evaluated by University High School Instructors and Value Given Each on Basis of 100 Per Cent Total.................................. .........................288 XIX Average of Percentage Distributions of Marks of All Colleges Receiving Entering Freshmen and of All Colleges Requiring Some Junior College Prepara- tion .......................................................................... ... 294 XX Percentage Distribution of Marks by Quarters of 91 Students Who Entered the College of Science, Lit- erature, and the Arts as Freshmen in the Fall of 1921, and Who Remained in Attendance in the Same College for Nine to Eleven Quarters ..............294 XXI Percentage Distribution of 2,901 College Freshman Marks, Academic Subjects, First Quarter, 1921-22, University of Minnesota......... ...............................295 XXII Percentage Distribution of Marks in Largest and Small- est Classes in Five Freshman Courses at the Uni- versity of Minnesota, Fall Quarters, 1920-25, Inclusive ................................................... ..................418 XXIII Scope and Representative Character of University of Minnesota Experiments on Class Size......................419 XXIV Comparison of Anatomy Grades ........................................447 XXV Correlations in Anatomy Experiment..............................449 xvi LIST OF FIGURES FIGURE PAGE 1 Bird's-Eye View of Completed Plant, Carleton College...... 74 2 Group Plan, Carleton College......................... 77 3 Median Enrollments and Range of Enrollments of the Middle 50 Per Cent of Each Type and of All Types of Junior Colleges......................................... 123 4 Geographic Distribution of Junior Colleges..........................124 5 Numbers of Junior Colleges in. Operation in Each Suc- cessive Year from 1900 to 1927, Inclusive...................126 6 Percentages of Freshmen Entering Five Institutions at Various Periods Who Were 151/2 Years of Age or Younger and 161/2 Years of Age or Younger..................... 130 7 Percentage of Approximately Two Hundred College Grad- uates Who Were Influenced in the Selection of Their Major Subjects by Occupation, Interest, and In- structors ..............................................................................139 8 Percentages That Enrollments at Various Intervals Are of the Enrollment in 1888-89 in Each of Several Types of Higher Institutions.....................................................143 9 Percentage That the Students Enrolled in the First Two Years Are of the Students Enrolled in the First Four Years of Each of the Several Types of Higher Insti- tutions .........................................144 10 Percentage of Retention in Eight Eastern Colleges, Thir- teen Mid-western Colleges, and Three Mid-western Uni- versities .......................................................................... 147 11 Percentage Distribution of Students to Certain Divisions in Six Eastern Universities.............. ............................149 ADMINISTRATION I. UNIVERSITY PROBLEMS OF VITAL CONCERN L. D. COFFMAN President of the University of Minnesota Since the directors of this conference have taken the liberty of summoning me to speak on twenty-four hours' notice, they cannot complain if I observe no rules of the game in treating the subject they have assigned me. As president of a university I feel that we are in the stage in higher education at the present time that the public schools were in twenty years ago, and that more progress actually has been made in solving the problems of organization and administration of the public schools than has been made in solving the problems of college administration during this same period. One of the healthful signs I find is the fact that colleges and universities are willing to learn from the investigations and researches that have been made in public schools of student progress, student achieve- ment, and the budgeting of moneys. The public schools concerned themselves at the outset with two things: first, with the retardation and elimination of pupils, grade by grade, and, second, with matters relating to cost. It was not until they had spent a number of years on these questions that attention was paid to student achievement. It was a long step forward when Thorndike and his associates began to formulate measures for the progress of students. I remember very well a meeting of the Department of Superintendence in Philadelphia at which the advocates of educational measurement desired to secure a friendly, favorable vote in support of their work. There was a long and vigorous debate on the subject. Many maintained that mental traits cannot be described statistically, and that progress in school subjects cannot be measured. The motion approving this type of scientific work prevailed by only one vote. But in the course of time we began to get so many scientific studies of this nature that the mass effect of them brought about changes in school procedure bordering on the revolutionary. 4 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION We are now dealing with the problems in higher education in a manner similar to the way such problems were dealt with in the public schools a decade or two ago. We evaluate our work in terms of successful experience. Studies of a more or less scientific nature are emerging here and there. There is a growing desire for facts rather than opinions. Studies relating to student progress are being made, and budgets are being studied. These are hopeful and encouraging signs. We don't know very much yet, but we realize the need of further study. One of the questions we hear on every hand is, Don't we have too many people going to college? There are many who sincerely believe too many people are going to college. A prominent lawyer said to me a while ago, "We have practically destroyed civilization by giving education to the people of this country. We should have selected a group of highly intelligent people and allowed the others to remain ignorant." It is important that this sentiment receive earnest and serious consideration, for it strikes at the very roots of American democracy. A recent issue of School and Society presents an analysis of the different professions and shows that with one exception they are understaffed, and that exception is the profession of law. Personally, I am not appalled at the number of persons, going to college. I regard it as a hopeful sign, as the surest safeguard of American institutions. I heard a man from Denmark say that 80 per cent of all of the farmers of Denmark are college men. He did not mean that they are all college graduates, but he did mean that 80 per cent of the farmers have had more or less college training in agriculture. I don't believe it is a mere coincidence that Denmark has become one of the leading agricultural countries of the world. We are sending experts to study bacon production in Denmark. Bacon produced here sells for one or two cents less on the English market than the bacon produced in Denmark. The Danes know how to get more lean in a side of bacon than we do; we wish to know how they do it. Denmark is one of the leading butter and poultry coun- tries. Its productivity bears a direct relation to the character and amount of education the colleges have provided. UNIVERSITY PROBLEMS OF VITAL CONCERN 5 The value of college training to agriculture may be illustrated in another way. In the neighborhood in Indiana where I grew up, the farmers farmed as their fathers and their grandfathers had farmed. I recall that a broken-down professor came into the neigh- borhood and rented a farm. After plowing and studying the soil, he began to put in some kind of fertilizer. The farmers of the neighborhood talked about how foolish this was; they said it cost money and that a little dust like that could not produce more grain. This college professor sprayed his fruit trees and got bulletins from the United States Department of Agriculture and from Purdue University. He applied intelligence, knowledge, and science to his problem. Within three years his neighbors were trying to farm as he was farming. He was producing more per acre than they; he became their leader. Some years later the farmers of that county organized a club composed of the leading farmers of the county, and the first one selected for membership was this broken- down professor. Just over the hill there was another farmer whose wife was a college graduate. The farmer was intelligent but uneducated. His wife was a leader in everything that made for community improve- ment and yet she attended to the work that a farmer's wife may reasonably be expected to do. Because of her position and leader- ship, when the club was organized her family was taken in as one of the leading families. Illustrations similar to these might be taken from every profession. What I fear is that we will not have enough college people. I don't think we shall ever have too many people who understand their government; I don't think we shall ever have too many people applying trained minds to industry and commerce; nor do I think we shall ever have too many people interested in science and the fine arts. We are in far greater danger of being ruled by the demagogue than of being ruled by a trained and intelligent citi- zenry. We need to train men for intelligent "followership" as well as for leadership. There is, perhaps, no reason to elaborate this question as to whether or not too many people are going to college. It is some- what disturbing to find some professors more interested in reducing 6 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION the number going to college than they are in improving their in- struction. Never before has there been any serious discord among those in higher education with reference to the number of students that should be admitted. It has only been a few years since they went out in the highways and byways to persuade students to come to college. The most lurid advertisements were used, and the most preposterous claims of the value of a college education were made. Now all this is changed. A few presidents and individual members of many faculties have sounded a new slogan; it is that too many students are going to college. No evidence is put forth that a col- lege education is any more inimical to public welfare now than it ever was. It is claimed that many of those entering college are mentally incapable of doing satisfactory college work, and that it is better to educate a few gifted persons than to attempt to provide a college education for great masses of mediocre young men and young women. It is without doubt true that we have more men- tally incapable students in college now than ever before, but there does not seem to be any conclusive evidence-at least, thus far I have been unable to find it-that the percentage of mentally incapa- ble students in college today is any greater than it ever was. Whether or not the time has come when those who do not pos- sess superior gifts may be privileged to go to college is a question of great social significance. That they have always gone is gen- erally admitted. There are thousands of college graduates in this country who know that they were not endowed with unusual talent. They had ability and they succeeded because they were willing to work. There is not a college president in America who could not name members of his faculty who possess no unusual ability. A distinguished member of a distinguished private eastern university is reported to have said recently in conversation with one of his colleagues, "With the rules for entrance as high as they are, it is a good thing that we are on the faculty rather than applying for entrance, for we could not get in." "We might have gotten in," the other replied, "but I could never have remained in." It is conceivable, of course, that the academic world is under- valuing and overlooking the possibilities of the so-called mediocre UNIVERSITY PROBLEMS OF VITAL CONCERN 7 person. The average citizen, whether he be right or wrong, still thinks this is the case. He believes that intellectual progress and moral development are within the compass of higher education and are possible for his own children. Which of these points of view will prevail still seems to be a matter of opinion. It is my candid opinion that in case existing institutions do not cheerfully and will- ingly make provision for an increasing number of college students, other colleges and institutions of higher learning will arise to meet the need. It seems doubtful to me whether or not those who desire to limit the present college facilities to the number of students they maintain those facilities can accommodate will receive the perma- nent approval of the public. The opinion still prevails, indeed, it inheres in the American conception of the constitution of demo- cratic society, that every child is entitled to a fair opportunity from the kindergarten to the university. The debate as to the functions of universities, and particularly of state universities, in providing educational facilities for the average man, may grow more serious, but the popular conception of the functions of the state university, that it is a part of the public school system and therefore has a definite public obligation to perform, will not be easily put aside. For years now the staffs of state institutions have encouraged the youth of the state to believe that attendance at the university was their great opportunity, and the youth have accepted these statements at their face value. They have come in response to an urgent appeal, and I dare say that the public will insist upon the obligation implied in this appeal being fulfilled. With reference to the question of the competency of the college students of today, President Thompson of Ohio State University in his Founders' Day address at Cornell in 1923, said: "Is it true that too many of our youth are attempting higher education? Is it true that a considerable percentage of these young people are incom- petent? The universities appear to think so, but let me assure you that the parents do not agree with us on that issue. They respond by directing attention to the fact that many teachers in our univer- sities are less experienced than the high school teachers. They insist that inferior teaching may account for results as definitely as stupid students. They tell us that not all the responsibility is 8 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION upon the student and cannot be charged to heredity, They ask that we test our processes of education as carefully as we read our examination papers. We are told that many teachers are little more than advanced students not yet parents. The fathers and mothers are inquiring why these undeveloped teachers are so infalli- ble in their judgments as to the fitness of students to win degrees or escape the follies of the freshman year. Public sentiment pro- poses to make clear the responsibility of the teacher. It is obvious that we cannot escape by way of the Binet test unless it is applied all around. . .. We cannot correct the evils due to excessive enrollment by protesting that our students are inferior. Some other method awaits our discovery." The opinion, nevertheless, persists that too many are going to college. Don't misunderstand me. One of the surprises to me is how a moron gets through the grades and high school, but I suppose it is due to the Christian spirit of the teachers. After a teacher has tolerated one for a while in her class, wishing to develop the spirit of tolerance and Christian charity in another teacher, she passes him on to her friend, and so on and on, and this practice accounts for the student's entrance later into college or the university. Surely those who cannot work and those who will not work should not be allowed to remain in college. I feel dreadfully sorry for the incompetent, but I don't feel particularly sorry for those who will not work; I have a somewhat different feeling toward them. We have been raising the threshold of college work for a great many years. The standards of entry and of work after one is once in are higher than ever before. Students used to stay five or six years on the football team. They can't do that now. They must now be in residence a year and be up in everything before they can play, and then they can play only for three years, whereas in the good old days students registered and played on the team irrespec- tive of the grades they received. Those days fortunately are gone. The scholastic standards are too high for such practice to be in- dulged in. This question of whether or not we have too many going to college has been largely responsible for the introduction of many UNIVERSITY PROBLEMS OF VITAL CONCERN 9 devices for the selection and elimination of students. We should have these devices for the incompetent, the incapable, and the loaf- ers. At the same time there is a psychological danger accompany- ing these devices which we, as college people, need to realize. You know perfectly well that when you put your emphasis on the elimi- nation of students, this emphasis destroys or minimizes the sym- pathetic relationship that should exist between the students and the staff. Whenever the members of a staff are thinking about the percentage of people they can eliminate, they are, in my opinion, likely to have a distorted point of view with reference to teaching. Whenever you have a staff that is more interested in the salvaging than in the elimination of students, more interested in teaching than in administration, you will have a wholesome situation in your institution. The one thing we need more than any other single thing is a more sympathetic attitude in teaching. Anyone can.gain notoriety in an institution as a hard-boiled teacher; it takes far more skill to be a sympathetic teacher. We forget, I suspect, that the buildings and equipment and all the organization of the insti- tution are there for just one purpose, namely, to increase the efficiency of what goes on in the classroom. I want to speak of one other topic that arises in this connection. Last year we had 14,410 students in the University of Minnesota and this year we shall have over 15,000. A great many people think some numerical limit should be set as a maximum for a higher institution of learning. Now I realize there is a wide difference of opinion with reference to this matter. Many people maintain that the students do not have the personal contacts in the big institutions that they have in the small colleges. If we had time I should like to have you take a piece of paper and write down the professors you had who had dynamic personalities and who had a good influ- ence on your careers. There would not be more than five or six of them. On the other hand, there would be a list as long as this table of those whom you have forgotten. Human nature has always been distributed in this way and human nature will, I presume, always continue to be distributed in this way. When this genera- tion of students has been out of college twenty years, it will be able to point out a few distinguished and forceful personalities now 10 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION on the teaching staff, and down at the other end of the curve of personalities, there will be a group that will have been totally for- gotten. It is also well to remember that there are no small colleges any more. When I went to college a small college had an enrollment of 100 or 200; now it has 300 or 400; a college with 300 now has 600; and a college with 500 now has 1,000. In other words, com- paratively speaking, all colleges are now large colleges. A recent study showed that the college growth has paralleled exactly the growth of the university. It is also well to remember that universities have been broken up into colleges. It is surprising to discover how intimate is the relationship between the instructor and the student in the profes- sional schools, how much they know about each other. There never was a time when a student got so much time and attention as now. When a student comes here he gets his physical examination and his mental examination, and then he is advised concerning his pro- gram of studies. There is a dean of men with his assistant and a dean of women with her assistant, a personnel department, and a vocational adviser, all cooperating for the welfare of the students, a matter that is attended to more efficiently than ever before. If a college fails to pay attention to the welfare of its students and if the instruction is incompetent, even though the college has only one hundred students, it should go out of business. If it fails in either of those respects, it is too big. If it has twenty thousand students and competent instructors who look after the welfare of students, it is not too large. In other words, we should spend less time thinking about how large our colleges and universities are, and more about the competency of the institution and the attention it gives to its students. Size is a matter of no consequence if these things are well taken care of. There is still another heresy to which I wish to allude in this discussion. It is my opinion that our educational program is so set up as to make it almost impossible for a student to get a liberal education. In public address and otherwise we exalt the values and the virtues of a liberal education, and then we inconsistently organize a program that makes it impossible for a student to get UNIVERSITY PROBLEMS OF VITAL CONCERN 11 such an education. Many of our courses are nothing but attenuated bits of knowledge. We get some young professor and make him a member of our staff. If he is competent and able he will, at the end of the year, have two courses instead of one, and at the end of the second year three courses instead of two, and then he will want a desk and a chair and a department. All this takes place because we base promotion on ability to differentiate courses and to carry on research. A college president, speaking at the University of Illinois recently, said he felt that the staff of a university should be quite as much interested in the development of their own teach- ing as in writing dull books. There is a certain element of truth in that. We departmentalize and split up our knowledge for purposes of administration" to such an extent as to make it very difficult for a student to get an over-view of anything. Practically the only way he can get an integrated knowledge of his college courses is by accident or by discussions with students outside of class. You may say that is not true; I hope it is not true at your institutions. The time was when the liberal arts program was an orientation program. We now have some orientation programs, sometimes open to a small, selected group of freshmen. A few years ago a group of teachers entered a summer school, seeking a general course in geology. Although the department gave such a course, the students were told they could not enter it. They were intelligent people, knew what they wanted, and were able to carry the work, but they were told that there was a year's work in organic chemistry required as a prerequisite. Careful inquiry was made as to why they wanted to take the course in geology. They said they would like to know something about the world in which they lived, its nature, its structure, its history, and the theories about its origin. But they were to be denied this, not be- cause they lacked ability, but because the department had more interest in keeping students out of its courses than it had in giving them a liberal education. The same thing is happening in the field of home-economics education. Almost no training is provided for home making, yet 90 per cent of the students will get married. Training is provided for teachers, for cafeteria managers, for dieti- 12 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION tians, interior decorators, but not for home-makers. One can hardly get an over-view of knowledge in any field. This is due to an over- emphasis upon specialization and an under-emphasis upon general education. I have two more things I wish to discuss. I think that, as I have already intimated through this discussion, the most important thing we can do is to select a faculty skilled in teaching. It is easy to say that; it is more difficult to do it. Success in teaching depends upon an interest in the welfare of the students. Aside from training there are several other things that con- tribute to one's attitude toward his profession. This is particularly true of teachers. Teachers must receive comfortable salaries and they must be supplied with the proper conditions for work. There are some other things that may prove to be very helpful. One of these other things is making provision for retirement and for old age. One of the reasons for making such provision is that teachers have not been as adequately compensated as they might be, and the other reason is that some of them have been spending all they have earned in improving themselves. I know a man who retired from a university not so far from here, who spent all he earned making collections of insects in the South Sea Islands to give to his university. Apparently he forgot he might grow old and that he should make provision for his old age. I know a woman, a member of a university faculty, who has devoted her life to the study of certain materials in a remote section of the world. She has become one of the world's authorities in her field. When she retires, she will retire with no money. Whatever collections she has made have been given to the university. I knew a young pro- fessor, who died a few weeks ago at thirty-eight years of age. He was married when he was thirty-one years old. Since the World War he has devoted all his time and money to securing a doctor's degree. He left his family, a wife and two infants, with practically no property. The University provided a fellowship for the wife for two years in order that she might qualify herself for teaching. We have a plan for partial protection of old age at the Univer- sity of Minnesota, which we hope to introduce sometime. We pro- pose to take out insurance policies of $5,000 on every member of UNIVERSITY PROBLEMS OF VITAL CONCERN 13 the staff and $2,500 on every employee, and we propose to induce the faculty to enter upon a savings scheme that will provide $5,000 for each member of the staff and $2,500 for each employee at the age of sixty-eight. These savings will be left with the University, and the University will invest them as it invests other trust funds. If the individual leaves the University, he will take with him his savings, plus their earnings. It is his money. If he dies before sixty-eight, his wife will have the insurance, plus his savings, plus the earnings, and she will be required to take out an annuity. If we had had this policy in operation a few years ago, this young wife, to whom I referred a few moments ago, would have had $5,000 insurance, plus her husband's savings, plus the earnings, with which to purchase an annuity. According to our plan, in case the individual dies, the wife gets the insurance plus the earnings. In case he lives until he is sixty- eight, he has $5,000 with which to buy an annuity, and he must buy an annuity. Our plan is, if he is physically disabled before sixty, he gets his insurance plus his earnings; if disabled after sixty, we agree to carry him. There are 140 institutions in this country that have some protection of this sort. Another thing that will help to keep a faculty contented is proper living conditions. You have to keep these people hopeful, optimistic, their faces to the future, and with faith in the institu- tions where they are employed. I think Stanford University has been assisting the faculty in providing homes. A great many people think a state institution ought not to be allowed to do such things. We have a forty-acre tract between here and the farm campus. I would develop and lay it out in lots. I would assist the faculty in building homes. All these things will contribute to the develop- ment of a wholesome attitude on the part of a staff, and that is the secret of success in university life. One of the things that determines the spirit of a college or university is the extent to which it is a community and seeks to develop community attitudes and relationships. We cannot do this alone by building classrooms, libraries, and laboratories. We must provide all those other things and all those influences that minister even more directly to good will. The things we teach in 14 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION the classrooms are intended to affect a man's intellect, but the things that make for character are more or less silent influences that are continually being brought to bear on the senses of the individual. We make our pleas for high intellectual training. I would provide high intellectual training for our students, and in addition I would provide some training in the finer things of life. Whenever we exalt the laboratory of the mind to the neglect of the training of the spirit, these institutions are going to fail to realize their largest possibilities. II. EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH IN THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA M. E. HAGGERTY Dean of the College of Education and Professor of Educational Psychology, University of Minnesota What I have to say is in the way of a preview of the investiga- tions of the problems of higher education that we have been con- ducting in the University of Minnesota. Several of the researches will be reported to you during this Institute by persons who have been engaged upon the problems. My purpose is to review briefly the history of the movement and to indicate the scope and signifi- cance of the investigations. Two agencies in the last eight years have attempted to study in a systematic way the problems that this University has to meet. One of these was the Survey Commission, appointed, I think in 1919, by President Burton, the immediate task of which was to forecast the probable growth of the University in reference to the building program which was at that time in view. President Coff- man,. then dean of the College of Education, was chairman of this commission, and under his direction Professor Koos, Mr. West, and some others made studies of probable growth in student enroll- ment during the next quarter of a century. Their report was printed and has been from time to time the basis for administrative action. The commission as such expired about the time of the pub- lication of the report. When Dr. Coffman became president of the University, he retained Professor Sears, now of Stanford, to con- tinue the studies that had been begun by this commission. Profes- sor Sears worked for approximately a year collecting information more or less of the type reviewed by Mr. Klein in regard to student load, to the faculty, to the teaching load, budget arrangement, and so on.x The results of Professor Sears's studies have been published as reports of the commission, and while the commission has ceased to exist, it is perpetuated in name by these reports. 1 See post, pp. 23-36. 16 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION In this series of reports, all of which are available in the uni- versity library, are the studies made by Mr. West on student enroll- ment. The first dealt with student mortality, followed by one on student survival. Then came the study of student load, and more recently a study of the graduates of the University. In all, nine reports have appeared from the Survey Commission, and, with the exception of the first two, which are out of print, can be obtained from the University of Minnesota Press.2 The other agency, which is still active, started from a somewhat different interest, namely, a problem in student guidance. Dr. Louis Wilson, director of the Mayo Foundation, and responsible for the guidance of a large number of graduate students in the field of medicine, wrote a letter to the President regarding the possible advice that might be given to young men and young women con- cerning their future occupations. The letter was brief, but it stated as an immediate prospect the possibility of calling a con- ference with principals of high schools, at which conference this problem might be discussed and a plan of procedure worked out. As a result of Dr. Wilson's letter the President appointed a committee which came to be called the Committee on Educational Guidance. It consisted of deans and faculty members, including Dr. Wilson, and met over a period of one and a half years. The committee called in persons who were not members to present papers and finally made a report. One of the recommendations of this report was that there should be established a more or less permanent committee to be called a Committee on Educational Research. That committee was appointed and has been in operation about four years. I happen to have been the chairman of it during this period, as I was also of the earlier committee. The personnel of the present committee is representative of practically all the colleges of the University. There are, for instance, the deans of the College of Agriculture, the College of Arts, the College of Engineering, the College of Education, the School of Medicine, the Law School, the School of Business Administration, and the Graduate School. The Dean of the College of Dentistry was a member until he resigned from the University 2 No. 10. Student Aptitudes and the Prediction of Student Scholarship, by Dean J. B. Johnston is now off the press. EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AT MINNESOTA 17 at the end of this year. There are also representatives of depart- ments within these colleges. The committee totals thirteen or four- teen men. It came together with rather a vague understanding as to what it might do, although the earlier committee had discussed some of its problems. It was decided that instead of trying to map out a logical program of educational research, the psychological thing to do was to attack the problems that presented themselves to the committee. One of these problems was the marking system, a problem in every institution. It seemed after some discussion in our general committee that it might be desirable to call in other persons in the institution who knew more about the question than we ourselves knew. We thus created a subcommittee on the marking system. Professor W. S. Miller was made chairman. There were repre- sentatives from the Law School, the School of Medicine, the College of Arts, and of the other schools and colleges. The sub- committee was able to enlist the aid of a graduate student, and through a period of three years they did a very considerable amount of work collecting information about the present marking system and its operation. The results, embodied in a doctoral thesis by Dr. John Bohan, constitutes the report of the subcommittee. This thesis will be printed and will, I think, in addition to clarifying certain conditions in this institution, contain some very important suggestions for their improvement. I am not going to speak further of this study because Dr. Miller will address you later on the subject of his subcommittee's investigation. Another problem that the committee accepted was given to it by a member of the faculty. He had written a letter to the dean of his college to the effect that students were engaged in too many extra-curricular activities for the good of the students and that something ought to be done to curb participation in matters that have nothing to do with college work. While this problem was not quite central, it had the psychological value of having some- one interested in it. A subcommittee was appointed and the writer of the letter, Professor W. A. Anderson, was made chair- man. The chairmanship later fell to Professor F. S. Chapin, who will report to you some of the results of the study, which has now 18 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION gone through a period of three years. The subcommittee has col- lected large quantities of information about student participation in various extra-curricular activities and of the kinds of activities in which different types of students take part. They have studied medical students, law students, arts students, and a group of alumni who responded to a questionnaire. I shall not go into the results because you will have the story from Professor Chapin; but I think it may be said that this subcommittee, with the aid of an assistant, has collected more useful material than is available anywhere in the literature. The report is nearly completed and will soon be ready for publication. If we are able to publish it in its entirety, it will make a monograph of several hundred pages. Another problem that came to us was the question of class size. This institution, like others, has been confronted with the growing size of its instructional units. In spite of the widespread belief that large classes are ineffective, we seem inevitably doomed to adapt ourselves to them. It therefore seemed worth while to study the problem. Again the investigative technique was worked out by a subcommittee, and the experiment has been carried on through a period of nearly four years. At least one doctor's thesis has come out of it. I shall not go into detail because Professor Hudel- son will give it to you later and Professor Erikson will contribute a detailed report of class-size experiments in the Department of Physics. A little more than a year ago a number of us were discussing the problems that the University confronts because of its increasing load in science teaching, the building of its new science buildings, and related matters. Certain figures compiled by Dean Johnston showed that a very large percentage of the budget of the Arts Col- lege is going into the instruction of the freshman and sophomore groups. One doesn't need to manipulate figures long to become aware of the fact that we have taken on in this institution an enor- mous budgetary problem in the teaching of elementary science. As a matter of fact, it appears almost as if the effort made in teaching students in elementary science will be so great as to prevent work in advanced fields and in research. The very growth of interest in science in an institution like this almost imperils the growth of EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AT MINNESOTA 19 science itself. When you are spending from 80 to 85 per cent of your budget for junior-college instruction, there is not much left for what a good many people think is the real work of a university. These facts, among others, made the science men in the Univer- sity willing to study this problem. The matter was proposed in our committee with considerable discussion. It was agreed that there should be organized a subcommittee to conduct the investiga- tion. After this meeting I took the opportunity to ask the deans of those colleges wherein science looms large to come together. At a second meeting each dean brought a representative of the science department of his college. There were thirty-five persons present, all of them teachers of science or administrators of the colleges. After considerable discussion Dean Freeman, who had been made chairman of the subcommittee, said he should like to know how many of the group would really be interested in going forward with this study of science teaching. Every member present voted for the subcommittee to go ahead. Ten years ago in this country you would not have found this favorable attitude toward the educational investigation of college teaching. We may sometimes get discouraged by the lack of inter- est in problems of education, but there are many things like this that indicate that we are really making progress. I may say that the response of this group was not a mere courtesy vote. When Dean Freeman's subcommittee made its progress report to the larger group a year later, sixty-five science men were present, and all were just as enthusiastic over the progress that had been made as any member of the subcommittee had been. I have been able with the President's approval to secure the services of a man who is devoting himself almost entirely to the work of the science subcommittee. Dean Freeman will later lay before you the scope of their program, and Professor C. M. Jackson will report an experimental project in the field of anatomy. One of the early projects growing directly out of the work of the earlier committee was the study of student guidance and the development of personnel records. One of the outcomes was a personnel record-card, which elicits a great deal of really signifi- cant information about students, and which is being widely used. 20 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Professor Paterson will report to you on the work of this committee. We have also attacked the problem of the mental hygiene of the college student. This problem will be discussed by Professor Blanton. It is in efforts like these that you have the program of the Com- mittee on Educational Research. I should like to turn now to the technique of the committee's work, because to my mind it repre- sents a very important method of going about the problem of im- proving college education. Our procedure is based upon the belief that in problems having to do with the college curriculum, problems having to do with col- lege instruction, and, pretty largely, problems having to do with student personnel, hope for improvement lies in the active interest of the teaching faculty. Nobody can improve instruction in science, for instance, except the instructors in science. A great deal was said this morning" about the deficiencies of people in the field of Education. Nothing was said with which I do not agree. The great difficulty about getting men in Education to help the college situation is that they know too little about the problems of college education to be of much aid. Take the problem of teaching-skill in college. I challenge you to describe in standard and objective terms the best kind of college teacher. We do not know enough about college teaching to do that. It seems easy to recognize a very bad recita- tion, or possibly a very good one, but most recitations are neither, and in the borderline cases we are helpless. All of us can cite teachers who secured a good response in college days but whose work left no lasting impression on us. We also know instructors who would rank low in formal instruction but whose teaching bore marvelous fruitage ten, fifteen, or twenty years later. I have often said that three of the best teachers I have known violated every known standard of recitation procedure and did it every day. Their power lay in a form of intellectual stimulation that transcends the technical rules of pedagogy. Until we know vastly more than we now know about the basic principles of effective instruction at the college level, the problem of improving instruction will remain a matter for investigation and not a matter of didactics. ' See post, pp. 102-117. EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AT MINNESOTA 21 Our method has assumed that improvement of instruction is a problem for the teaching faculty in every department. Theirs is the primary responsibility. All that the science of Education or that men in Education can do, is to assist interested teachers in devising means of studying their own work and, perchance, of improving it. Education can supply the technical methods of re- search to a teacher of French or a teacher of chemistry who wishes to investigate a teaching problem, and it can assist in the investiga- tion. This is about all that it can do. This sort of supplementary aid is what we have tried to offer in the study of class size and in the study of science teaching. There is another reason for seeing to it that in your program of research your subject-matter departments do the work. If you can get an instructor to carry through an experiment himself, so that he is familiar with all stages of the procedure and of checking its results, the problem of selling the results is already accomplished by the time the problem is worked out. The selling otherwise is often very difficult. You will be skeptical when you hear Dr. Hudelson's report on class size. The figures will be in contradic- tion to certain long-held beliefs. But take any of the men who have worked through this investigation; listen to Professor Erikson; go over to the Law School or to the Department of Psychology or Sociology or History or to other departments where the problem was pursued; and you have no task there in selling the results, because they belong to the man or woman who created them. The problems that have faced this committee and on which we have been working are really in another field than those that Mr. Klein discusses.4' Those can be taken care of largely by the admin- istration. I do not believe that these instructional problems can. The strategy is to get your teachers of English and your teachers of science to improve their own curriculum and their own instruc- tion. The great difficulty about a program of educational research of this kind is that members of the subcommittees and all others do this in addition to their regular work. The only help we re- ceived was from the man who assisted the subcommittee in science, and from the graduate students at work on thesis problems. We " See post, pp. 102-117. 22 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION have had some subsidy from the President, small appropriations for clerical service in tabulating results. I felt quite envious when President Elliott reported that he had $10,000 a year for his Bureau of Educational Reference. One other thing grew out of the work of this committee, and that is a series of faculty conferences. These meetings have been held on Monday nights through a period of two years. Very largely the program has been set up by representatives from colleges other than the College of Education, and those who have attended have come from every college in the University--something like three hundred or four hundred different persons at one time or another. During the first year the average attendance was forty. Reverting to Mr. Klein's discussion,5 I may say that the results of these con- ferences have not been all that they might have been. We have not come to the point where we differentiate between the two kinds of teaching, that for men in service and that for graduate students. We have had men in the Graduate School in Education, who have attended, and students who have taken Education as a major and have done their minor work in an academic department, but as yet we have had no wide interest on the part of academic majors. The majority of those who have attended have been the regular members of the faculty, many of them holding major pro- fessional positions. The conference topics have been such as are represented on the program of this Institute-problems of student personnel, problems of curricula and instruction, and problems of administration. In fact, this Institute itself is an indirect out- growth of the work of our Committee on Educational Research and represents its essential spirit and outlook. 5 Ibid. III. STUDYING THE INTERNAL PROBLEMS OF THE UNIVERSITY A. J. KLEIN Chief, Division of Higher Education, United States Bureau of Education In discussing the subject assigned me, it is my plan to approach the problem of this conference from the standpoint of a member of the United States Bureau of Education whose work consists largely in the collection of information about educational matters, not only from universities but from all types of colleges. The internal problems to which I wish to call attention are much the same in both the smaller and larger institutions, although their volume and complexity are naturally greater in the university than in the college. Anyone who has engaged in survey work will agree that the most amazing aspect of such experience is the discovery of how little information is actually collected, arranged, and interpreted by the institutions themselves as a matter of current policy. This has been the experience of members of our Bureau's survey staffs. A similar condition is found in our routine collection of educational statistics. We are frequently astonished at the inquiries received from university administrative officers in which are revealed large deficiencies in elementary knowledge of standard educational prac- tice and literature. Ability to furnish helpful information in such cases is the greatest source of satisfaction to the members of the Bureau staff, who feel sometimes that they are too far removed from the firing line of the practical problems of college adminis- tration and instruction. All who have attended or participated in meetings of the regional accrediting associations know that it some- times strains the knowledge of presidents and deans to furnish the comparatively simple information demanded of them by their own associations. Even more frequently the pleas of college officers reveal significant ignorance and a curious lack of attention to the rules of which they themselves are the creators. The seriousness of this situation is only impressed upon them when the educational 24 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION league sends to the sticks some of its members who do not play ball upon a factual basis. Because of the existence of these conditions, I shall take the liberty of discussing in a very informal way some of the items of information that should be collected, arranged, and interpreted pri- marily by the institutions themselves. This is quite a different matter from the so-called self-survey, and such a systematic col- lection and use of information by the institutions will not eliminate the outside survey. With the Division of Higher Education of the Bureau of Education definitely committed to two nation-wide sur- veys involving over 140 colleges and universities, perhaps it is quite natural that I am favorably prejudiced toward the value of the outside survey. But it does appear fairly obvious that the outside survey will always continue to be valuable in dealing with those questions in which local judgment is distorted by personal feeling and by institutional bias, for this type of survey may place proper perspective on the side issues and on the petty matters that are likely to command undue attention on the part of the persons immediately concerned. The outside survey also always has the advantages of a prophet outside his own country. Officers and administrators of an institu- tion may actually know more about the problems and be more com- petent to deal with them than the members of the survey committee. Nevertheless the fact of outsidedness lends weight that is difficult to obtain in the survey conducted by the institution itself. Obvi- ously the good outside survey will make use of such knowledge and abilities as it finds within the institution, but the results obtained and the recommendations made will appear as the work of the.sur- veyors and will be correspondingly more effective. There are, however, a number of items of information that can and should be collected and interpreted just as well by the institu- tions themselves as by outside persons. In considering the objee- tive standards set up by cooperative or other authoritative agencies, interpretation of large groups of facts implies the exercise of little independent judgment. In many instances the interpretation is as simple as the application of a yardstick to any object of linear measure. In other instances a considerable degree of impartial INTERNAL PROBLEMS OF THE UNIVERSITY 25 reasoning and judgment may be demanded. In both cases, how- ever, facts, facts, and more facts, systematically collected and ar- ranged, are indispensable. At the risk of drawing some criticism from the extreme advocate of formal standards, it seems fairly obvious that many of them, although generally accepted, are not conclusive or final. In some cases, perhaps, they have little real significance, and in others they are only respectable convefttions. Frequently they are intended as mere definitions of the permissible minimums, but on account of the fact that they are set up by more or less authoritative agencies, they are accepted as the goals of attainment. Furthermore, the tendency to base standards upon "averages" or "medians" results in placing a premium upon mediocrity and in discouraging attempts to attain goals other than central tendencies. Any one who exam- ines very many studies made in higher education will be impressed by the frequency with which the middle ground of past performance is accepted as a standard of future achievement. The charge against American higher education, that it is upon a dead level of mechanical procedure, is in part due, no doubt, to the misinterpre- tation and misuses of the standards that have been created. This precautionary digression is not intended to minimize the usefulness of standards for large numbers of our educational insti- tutions. While strong colleges may say with justice, "We pay no attention to the standards," the statement actually means that they have gone so far beyond the "means" or "minimums" that they are not concerned. Their interpretation of the meaning of the stand- ards, therefore, is the correct one. Standards should be looked upon as points of departure. Merely to comply with the minimum standards of the accrediting associations, as a justification for the use of the name "college," is to hover around the borderline of edu- cational respectability. The standards of the associations may be open to criticism but they are not open to rejection by those who have not attained them. They do measure to a large degree whether institutions have merely attained "saving grace" or whether their virtues are of such a high order as to contribute to the treasury of merit stored up in the educational world. Knowledge of where your institution stands with reference to accepted and respectable 26 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION standards is not a matter of credit or cause for self-complacency. It is a disgrace not to know. The length of this introductory statement warns me that it is time to get down to cases, if I am to mention some of the elementary matters concerning which surveys and correspondence have revealed a real lack of definite institutional knowledge. To begin with, I wish to mention the need for the routine col- lection of information concerning the faculty, the student body, the plant, and equipment. In one university recently surveyed by the Bureau the surprising situation was discovered that no personnel records of the faculty had been collected or kept in any form. Inquiry as to the training and experience of the instructing and research staffs elicited the reply that such information had not been gathered. To be sure, degrees were listed in the catalogue but no one in the institution knew where these degrees came from. In another institution it was found that one faculty member was listed in the catalogue as "John Doe, Ph.D., Fake and Pittsburgh Uni- versities." Obviously the name of the first university was not "Fake," but investigation showed that this particular member of the teaching staff had attended Pittsburgh University for two or three months, was then dropped for poor work, and later obtained his Ph.D. from an unknown university that had no claim to the title except that it was within the law. The standards set up by practically all of the accrediting asso- ciations require that professors have at least two years of study at a recognized graduate school in their respective fields of teaching. One who has examined into the practical application of this stand- ard cannot avoid reaching the conclusion that considerable disregard is paid to it even in some institutions where faculty personnel records are kept. A college professor having attained a Ph.D. in history is frequently assumed to be thoroughly competent to teach economics. Perhaps graduate work in economics or philosophy qualifies teachers of sociology; but it is suspected that no outside survey committee upon the discovery of a condition of this kind would pass it by without comment. How an institution not in possession of complete and detailed records of the training of its faculty can tell whether it complies with the standards of the ac- INTERNAL PROBLEMS OF THE UNIVERSITY 27 crediting association to which it belongs or how the accrediting association can feel justified in retaining such an institution upon its list of respectables is an interesting, although perhaps an imper- tinent, inquiry. I know of no standard faculty personnel record existing at the present time, but this is no reason why an institution should not work out a personnel record for its faculty and provide itself with items of information as critical as these. Another fault in prevailing methods of keeping records of the faculty lies in the common practice of filling out a blank form when a man is employed and thereafter assuming that a fair picture of his training and experience is presented for all time to come. This actually happens in spite of the fact that our institutions are per- mitting, if not insisting upon, various forms of research and pro- ductive activity by their faculties. Presumably this plan is adopted in order to contribute to effectiveness in the institution where the men are employed, and hence in the ones to which they will go when they leave. An annual revision of the faculty personnel record should be made. It would be extremely useful if such revi- sion took the form of an annual report, giving in itemized form the resident and extension teaching carried on by each instructor during the year, the research and productive and literary activity in which he engaged, his participation in the conferences of professional associations, his administrative and committee assignments, and the unorganized services performed by him that cannot be scheduled or definitely assigned but that have contributed to the benefit and prestige of the institution. A collection of such records, extending over a period of years, would give a valuable insight into the in- stitution's administration and would form a basis for judgment regarding many matters. Since the clerical work of maintaining such records might legitimately be thrown on the faculty, no ex- pense would be involved except that of printing or mimeographing the form used. Outside surveyors often discover that the only way the teaching loads of the faculty can be determined is through examination of scattered and unsystematized records. The obvious and logical step of presenting the load in easily inspected form is quite fre- 28 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION quently neglected by the institution itself. A paradoxical phase of this situation is that in most cases the institution is vitally and practically concerned in the teaching loads of the members of its faculty so that it may comply with the standard of the accrediting associations. The standard of the North Central Association, for instance, provides that institutions having teachers whose schedules exceed sixteen hours per week must report the facts annually to the secretary of the Commission on Institutions of Higher Educa- tion. Similarly, the accrediting associations assert generally that educational efficiency is endangered when classes have more than thirty students. But from the administrative standpoint in many institutions, the heavy schedules and large classes, condemned by Association standards, are of even less significance than light schedules and small classes. In addition to proper concern on the part of the administration that the average faculty member is not working him- self to death at too rapid a pace, administrative officers are justified in gathering this data in order to assure the members of the boards of trustees and friends of the institution that no faculty member is loafing on a comfortable job. Examination of these facts should further assist the adminis- tration to determine whether or not there is in the institution an unjustified and unwarranted multiplication of courses. It is readily comprehensible that the existence of small classes might even indi- cate some need for more careful control and more systematic deter- mination of what new courses should be added. It is not uncommon for a professor to split one course into two or to add, largely upon his own initiative, after a little administrative maneuvering, to the number of his courses. How many undergraduate courses in the senior division are due solely to gratification of professorial hobbies! If the facts were systematically collected and examined, action by the administration and by faculty council might be more intelligent. The measurement of faculty load in terms of student clock-hours is a comparatively simple matter, yet it is impossible for the Bureau of Education to ask institutions to furnish the information in this form for statistical purposes, because, judging from the attempts already made, many administrative officers do not know how to INTERNAL PROBLEMS OF THE UNIVERSITY 29 figure clock-hour loads. The commonly accepted standard of 300 clock-hours as a reasonable load (15 recitation hours, with an aver- age-size class of 20 each) means little in the lives of many deans and presidents. It is not necessary at this point to discuss the validity of these teaching-load standards in detail, but until an institution has attained them, it is hardly justified in departing widely from these accepted standards in the number of scheduled hours, in the size of classes, and in student clock-hour loads. No one, of course, is maintaining that uniform and rigid adherence to fifteen hours of recitation schedule is absolutely essential. An institution, never- theless, may well show some interest in the work that it is getting out of the professor who has less. No one believes that an absolute limit of thirty in the size of the classes is conclusive evidence of educational efficiency. The experiments carried on in the Univer- sity of Minnesota with larger classes show that the results have been good. To be sure, this may mean merely that the student has to do all the work anyway, whether the class be large or small, and that the learning process is no more hampered in the small class than in the large by the instruction carried on! Individual cases of student clock-hour loads in excess of 300 hours, are, of course, subject to individual judgment in each instance; but unless the factual basis is accurately and persistently obtained, judgments even in simple matters have little validity. Incredible as it may seem, the Bureau of Education has sur- veyed institutions that were unable to furriish clear statements with" reference to the salaries of their instructors. In institutions keep- ing good financial records) salaries can be determined without much trouble; but even in many of these institutions they have not been tabulated to show comparatively the salaries of the different ranks of the staff. Still more frequently -no relationship exists between the load of the instructor and the salary he is paid. The lo6ad, of course, in this case does not mean teaching load, but the load of service of all kinds to the institution. Over a period of years care- ful selection and arrangement of such: information might afford some valuable information in regard to the causes of faculty mor- tality. 30 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION The points mentioned concerning information that institutions may well have on hand continuously in regard to their faculties are merely high spots of difficulty that every survey encounters. The list might be extended, but, after all, the faculty is a fairly well- known quantity as compared with the student body. To the outside observer of the practices in vogue with reference to institutional student-records, the most striking is the paucity of records of graduates and ex-students. Where records of this sort are kept it is quite the usual thing to entrust the collection and arrangement and, what is more important, the scope of the infor- mation gathered, to an alumni secretary or association whose main interest is considerably removed from the educational use that might be made of such records. It may be entirely desirable to entrust collection and filing of records of ex-students and graduates to an alumni office, but the nature of the information obtained and its arrangement should be such as to serve educational purposes. Time forbids a detailed consideration of these uses, but the values to curriculum construction of occupational life-histories, to choose but one example, are self-evident. Another matter impressing an outside observer of institutional records is the vagueness of knowledge concerning the sources from which students are drawn. This applies especially to the prepara- tory sources. In spite of standardization and accrediting, every- body knows that the character of the product of high schools varies considerably. It would seem desirable so to arrange records that each high school might be measured in terms of the records of its students in college and that the results be furnished in one form or another to the high schools concerned. This is done by some insti- tutions, and the results have been remarkably beneficial. Closely connected with this question is the matter of territorial distribution of students. General facts are known and some studies have been made that are significant, but except for these more or less occasional efforts, the territorial fields of institutions have been the subject of little inquiry. A perusal of some of the reports upon territorial distribution shows that the guidance afforded by such inquiries would be of considerable value to institutions, if carried on systematically. INTERNAL PROBLEMS OF THE UNIVERSITY 31 A great deal of interest has been excited by studies of the mor- tality of freshmen. The importance of such knowledge is generally recognized so far as freshmen are concerned. A few cases of studies of mortality beyond the freshman year may also be found; yet when I attempted to find some of these studies, the only extensive one discovered was that prepared by the Bureau of Education in 1917-18. This study, made upon a national scale, was of consider- able interest, but it may be doubted whether appraisals and judg- ments at the present time should be derived from a study containing figures ten years old. Even though no standard is available, it is certain that studies regarding the loss of students, carried on year after year from the institutional standpoint, would have great sig- nificance in local administration. Although the Association of Collegiate Registrars has for a long period discussed the matter of counting students, the question arose in discussions at every one of the thirty or more institutions recently visited by representatives of the Bureau of Education. In spite of the astounding gains in college attendance during the last few years, institutions are still found that are so interested in numeri- cal showing that every student that can possibly be counted is lumped into one grand total. Comparative statistics on enrollment are, therefore, extremely difficult to obtain. This is not, perhaps, such a serious matter on a national scale, but it should be a serious matter from the standpoint of the institution's own records. What- ever the Association of Collegiate Registrars may set up as standard definitions-and it is desirable that such definitions should be set up-institutions are missing one of their most important sources of knowledge about themselves when they fail to refine their classifi- cations of students in directions that will guide institutional manage- ment and development. Mr. West of the University of Minnesota has, along with others, called emphatic attention to the inadequate picture of the load of the institution presented by ordinary student records. The infor- mation and the classifications which the University of Minnesota undertook to formulate five or more years ago are well worth ex- amination and adaptation to the specific needs of the individual institution. Tendencies shown by total enrollment are of less genu- 32 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION ine value than those that may be derived from classifications. Per- haps a recent, question of a dean, "What is a home-economics stu- dent?" may be applicable to other departments and may require an arbitrary definition. But the definition upon which records are made should be clearly known in each institution and should be followed consistently. If nationally accepted definitions should be developed, the records would serve more generally, but until this happens the institution should maintain its records of students in accordance with principles contained in the discussions of the Asso- ciation of Collegiate Registrars. The load of study and activities borne by students requires con- siderable investigation. As in the case of the faculty, mere class- room schedules do not adequately represent the real load carried. Nevertheless, current institutional studies of classroom load placed on students might protect the standards of an institution and aid in curriculum adjustment. In one institution recently surveyed, it was found that students in large numbers had, in certain depart- ments, scheduled loads which confined them to class and laboratory many more hours each day than union labor finds tolerable. The time remaining for preparation, for eating, sleeping, recreation, and participation in student activities, was insignificant and entirely inadequate. Such a condition could not have existed if the institu- tion had as a matter of regular inquiry tabulated the class load of its students. In this connection, although it is perhaps not strictly to the point, attention may be called to the possible values of a systematic examination by the institution of what a credit means in terms of student work. In one institution recently visited, where such a study had been conducted, the startling discovery was made that a large proportion of the students spent less than half an hour in preparation of their mathematics for each hour in class, and fre- quently the statement was made by students that their English.work required only fifteen or twenty minutes outside the class. The more or less accepted 'convention that one hour of class work implies two hours of outside preparation, simply failed to represent the real conditions. It was also a matter of interest to find at this institu- INTERNAL PROBLEMS OF THE UNIVERSITY 33 tion that the failure to represent the real condition was uniformly on the side of an overestimate. Of several hundred cards rather hastily examined, no student in any subject was discovered who spent two hours of preparation for one hour of class attendance. This is a matter of institutional concern, and appropriate inquiry can only be made by each institution itself, since the adjustments of the faculty's conception of the difficulty of its work and of the amount of effort which may be demanded of students will have to be handled with surgical rather than garden instruments. The development of interest in the specially gifted student and perhaps the desire of institutions to cut down their over-burden of attendance have led to increased interest in institutional grade studies. In almost every institution of which I have personal knowledge, the matter of the grading of students has received con- siderable attention. Much of this interest was inspired by the activities and discussion aroused by the advocates of the new-type tests. The champions of the new-type tests have made a real con- tribution to education through the interest that they have succeeded in arousing in grade problems. However, one of the commonest general uses of grades, that of normal curve of grade distribution, is still in a somewhat doubtful state of reliability. Probably the standards based upon studies already made are not very reliable as mathematical measures nor very just when a comparatively small number of individuals is considered. Nevertheless, grade curves furnished to different departments and to different members of the faculty tend to stir up intellectual activity on the part of the per- sons concerned and have, therefore, considerable worth. Studies of faculty and students involve human factors that pre- sent difficulties. Records and information about material plant and equipment are capable of more accurate measurement in many in- stances and are more tractable. Time is lacking for detailed dis- cussion of the institutional delinquencies with regard to plant and equipment as frequently shown by surveys conducted by the Bureau. I will merely outline with brief comment certain kinds of informa- tion that every institution ought to have available but now fre- quently lacks. 34 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION It would seem that knowledge about the library should be fairly complete, since it is usually in charge of a trained person and pre- sumably is the common laboratory of both faculty and students. Forms for recording library costs have been worked out rather carefully, and reasonable standards have been set up with refer- ence to library expenditures and personnel. It is frequently the case, however, that these standards are neither known nor the infor- mation obtainable upon which to base judgment whether they are being observed. How large the library staff should be continues to depend upon the insistence of the librarian and his facility in extracting aid from the administration. Quite often also he does not even know the standards that would serve as a good argument for receiving increased help. Expenditures for the library are cut off without reference to the standards that should be maintained in order to preserve educational efficiency. The accrediting associa- tions demand libraries of a certain size, containing live and well- distributed books. What is a live book? So far as I can discover, no institutional studies have been made showing the shelf-bound books as distinguished from those that circulate and are read. Rec- ords of circulation do not show the degree of circulation for specific items. There is a whole field of useful research through record- keeping here, which might be carried on without a great deal of extra expense. In every institution visited or surveyed by our bureau repre- sentatives the complaint is made that space is too limited and that more room is required. In only a few instances, however, have actual records of space use been available. In some cases exami- nation showed that the plant, upon the basis of reasonable standards of room use, was employed at less than 50 per cent efficiency. For purposes of economy as well as for the sake of securing new build- ings, it would be worth while for an institution to keep constant records of its space use. Another class of information that is usually difficult to secure is the value of laboratory equipment and the amount spent annually for supplies. To be sure, information is sometimes obtainable, but the professor's "I want so and so," or "I need this and that," is accepted quite frequently without reference to the equipment needed INTERNAL PROBLEMS OF THE UNIVERSITY 35 for the educational program of the institution. Accurate and reli- able records of expenditures for these purposes are not difficult to keep and should be constantly available for inspection. One who visits many institutions is impressed by the emphasis placed upon playground space and buildings. This is usually the result of enthusiasm, especially on the part of the alumni, and is not based on a careful study of playground needs of student bodies as determined by fairly satisfactory standards. In many institu- tions, too, questions of building inspection, of fire escapes, sanitary arrangements, drinking fountains, lighting, and all subjects of stand- ard practice, receive no attention except when difficulties arise. Two miscellaneous matters are worthy of mention. There is an increasing tendency to regard honorary degrees with suspicion or at least to handle them with considerable caution. Everyone who is familiar with discussions of this subject during the last ten years knows that certain types of degrees are looked upon as un- suitable for honorary purposes. In addition, the number of hon- orary degrees granted has tended to decrease steadily. Yet it is often necessary when inquiries are being conducted concerning a specific institution to dig into old records in order to find what and how many honorary degrees have been granted. If an institution wishes to comply with current tendencies, an easily inspected record showing the plain and unvarnished facts would seem to be highly desirable and annually useful. Another matter that might serve many useful purposes would be a continued year-to-year tabulation of the courses listed in the catalogue that are not actually given. This question seems to have received little attention, yet the reputation of an institution is based in part upon the truthfulness of its catalogue. It is still a current saying that all catalogues are liars, but the degree of veracity is becoming a matter of greater concern to reputable institutions. Further, many departments seem to feel that a large listing of courses in the catalogue, whether given or not, magnifies the im- portance of the department. Even college presidents have been found who encourage the padding of their catalogues in order to make an impressive showing. It is hoped that this more or less disjointed discussion of the 36 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION internal problems of American institutions of higher learning has not been permeated with a vein of pessimism. As a matter of fact, universities and colleges, both large and small, are now engaged in the conduct of studies and in the collation of facts regarding aca- demic procedure and administration that indicate many improve- ments. The results of these inquiries are being published and disseminated. Ten or fifteen years ago it would have been a most unusual occurrence for a small college to issue a publication con- taining the results of a faculty-committee study. If the number of such studies now being issued is a criterion, the time is not far distant when mechanical conformity to uniform rules and past prejudices will be eliminated, and administration of our institutions of higher learning will be based on scientific principles and facts. IV. EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS AND PUBLICITY EDWARD C. ELLIOTT President of Purdue University You should know that when I started to read and to measure the assignment, "Educational Experiments and Publicity," I suc- ceeded in reaching a half-way point. Even a more or less super- ficial consideration of the question of experimental work in higher education left me scanty moments for "publicity." This seems to accord with the rule of proportional values, for I am fully con- vinced, affairs in our higher institutions being what they are, that the experimental elements of the problems of economy, of effective- ness, and of progress are entitled to our first as well as our best attention. We must prepare ourselves to manufacture newer and more modern wares to make publicity worth the effort. Here, at the outset, a rough and brief formulation of my major position may enable you to follow more easily my sketchy and time- limited arguments, thus: The revolutionary changes taking place throughout higher edu- cation compel new valuations of motives, methods, material, and machinery. Such valuations call for an entirely new type of edu- cational experimentation and a wide range of carefully devised scientific researches. These researches necessitate cooperative verification by many similar -as well as many different institutions, if actual practices are to be reformed. The effective publication of true scientific data concerning the problems, the process, and the productiveness of higher education to the members of our own profession is a first .requisite of useful publicity. A sounder professional opinion within higher education is needed before we may hope for a sounder public opinion outside of. our institutions. Altogether too much of that now designated as.publicity by higher educational institutions is devoted to the superficial and the incidental. The new educational publicity must be grounded upon new educational facts. As I made my preparatory reflections upon what appears to be the proper central theme of this session, I soon realized that I must build for myself, if not for you, a background for the stage 38 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION upon which the higher educational drama is being enacted today. The scenes of experiment and of publicity take place on this same stage. Thus perhaps the professional motives and the scientific means may have a re-enforced reality. When the present-day situation in our colleges and universities and professional schools is reviewed, it is possible to distinguish at least four varieties of phenomena that contain and reflect forces of change and of reconstruction. It is not unlikely that some of these have already been called to your attention. For the com- pleteness of my own presentation, however, it seems appropriate to discuss each of these groups of phenomena briefly. In the first place, one is compelled to recognize the country- wide social acceptance of the general principle of the equality of educational opportunity as applied to that which we have come to call higher education. This has resulted in an unprecedented ex- pansion and increase of bulk of the whole of higher educational enterprises. The expansion of activities, the enlargement of vol- ume, and the pyramiding of costs have been described in a great variety of statistical and sentimental ways. The more significant of the recent changes may be summarized somewhat thus: During the past twenty-five years the chances of the normal American boy and girl to receive the opportunities and perchance the advantages (a sharp distinction should be recognized between the opportunities and the advantages) of liberal, professional, or technical training of the higher sorts have been multiplied approxi- mately ten times. In other words, if it were to be said that the higher educational chances of the American youth during the earlier years of the decade following 1900 were rated as one, then such chances, I estimate by a somewhat elaborate calculation, must now be measured by ten. Within this period the number of institutions of higher rank has increased from about five hundred to something over eight hundred. The number of students has multiplied not quite five times. Roughly, the student increase has been from about 160,000 in 1900 to approximately 750,000 in the academic year 1926-27. The number of collegiate students in our population has jumped from 2,000 per million to 6,000 per million, and the num- ber of those holding various kinds of higher degrees has been EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS AND PUBLICITY 39 doubled. It may be said that in the quarter of a century indicated, society has doubled the necessity of absorbing college graduates and protecting itself against them. When these hard facts are brought into a state of solution proper for logical and precise thinking, there is bound to be a clearer sense of responsibility throughout the profession of higher education, and also among those entertaining more or less conven- tional reservations relative to the democratic doctrine of higher education. Each of us no doubt has noticed the present-day tend- ency for the development of reactionary opinions concerning the apparent new importance that higher education has come to pos- sess in the minds of our people. Undoubtedly, among the leaders and the workers in the field of higher education there is a growing feeling of being unequal to the tasks that have so suddenly pre- sented themselves to our higher institutions. Personally, I am willing to testify to an increasing incapacity for overcoming the new problems that avalanche upon me. Perhaps this admission is an untimely truth arising from weakness. If I appear to be am- biguous, then I fear it is that sort of ambiguity that someone has described as "stating the truth when you don't mean to." Higher education, then, has suddenly become a problem of mass education. It is no longer the concern of the ambitiously self- selected, individualized, or aristocratic few. It touches the prac- tical interest and magnetizes the idealism of the greater part of our increasing population. In spite of all, the purposes of higher education in this day of ours are no longer well defined or easily recognized. In this respect we are in the midst of a confusing revolutionary whirl, unwilling to discard the old and unable to grasp the new. Nevertheless, those capable of seeing beneath the surface of things will readily see that higher education today is passing through an evolution similar to that of secondary education begin- ning fifty years ago and elementary education a hundred years ago. A new conception of the meaning of the equality of educational opportunity is being formulated. As I came to this hall this eve- ning I expressed to my generous host, the President of this Uni- versity, an iconoclastic dissatisfaction with my work. I said, some- 40 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION what unguardedly I fear, that if I were permitted to send home 40 per cent of the students of my institution, 90 per cent of my difficult educational problems would be solved. Practical common sense says that this cannot be done. Society has come to expect us to provide a place for every student who wants to enter. More or less unconsciously we have accepted for the betterment of our higher education the same liberal philosophy that has dominated and rendered dynamic the whole of public and independent educa- tion in America: that there should be a limitless equality of oppor- tunity for all who aspire to education. Equality of educational opportunity is not gained through identity of educational opportunity, but rather through variety of educational opportunity. The recognition of this accounts for many of the characteristic features and changes of our higher schools. How else can the great cosmopolitan institutions of our day be explained? How else may be justified the strivings and ambitions of even small institutions to meet this or that professional, voca- tional, or specialized cultural need? On what other basis could the present controversies concerning the function and the future of the college of liberal arts be carried on? The intrusion of this modification of the old principle of educational equality, which I here designate the principle of the variety of opportunity, accounts for an entirely new set of issues for colleges, universities, and professional schools. Here again it may be maintained that our present and emerging problems of higher education are closely identical to the original problems of elementary education and secondary education. One needs but to recall the history of our elementary and our high schools to become strongly hopeful in spite of the existing foggy atmosphere of pessimism. The second force affecting the status of and the attitude towards the progress of higher education may best be expressed by a sen- tence from a current magazine which recently came under my eye. You will, I feel sure, agree with me that this sentence makes record of a widespread habit of mind frequently noted in modern discus- sions on higher education. "We live in a differeit America than we did in 1914. Every product, every process, every policy that was in effect in any business prior to 1914 should be challenged." EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS AND PUBLICITY 41 This seems to be the generality of opinion among the thinking as well as among those who drift with the days. Somewhat vaguely we know that the world has been completely transformed by the construction and the destruction of the cataclysm of war. Still more vaguely we recognize that we are under an immediate neces- sity of remaking our institutions to meet the changed world-situa- tions. Therefore, there are grave doubts all along the line of education whether or not the things we are doing are the things that we should be doing. And there are some of us witnessing the world in the process of rapid and almost incomprehensible change and wondering if we can possibly change ourselves, our philosophies, and our institutions to follow what seems to be a new procession moving in a new direction. The third thought to which I would call your attention is that the profession of higher education is traditionally static. Higher education resists more than any other human institution, save per- haps the church, the forces that would produce fundamental changes. While we of America make great show of our modernity, in reality we are content to accept and to practice ancient operating habits. We retain the old machines of life and of education, apparently, because we have learned to like their jarring and their rattles. For specific proof of the static nature of the education that engages us, I suggest that you compare the existing requirements for admission to your institution with the requirements in force in 1900. The differences are microscopically small. Since the begin- ning of the century we have learned to use a few modern phrases, but in reality the old established nature of things still controls. The theory of discipline largely controls higher curricula. The spoken word is still worshipped and accounts for the persistence of the lecture method of higher instruction. In spite of the oft- repeated denials, we for the most part rely for our instruction upon the hortatory devices of the Middle Ages. There seems to be a permanent pride in the lecture form of instruction, a form of personal liberty, regarded perhaps as a reward for a poorly paid profession. The fourth factor that must be recognized is the general move- ment whereby every profession and technical vocation seeks to 42 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION establish itself on a higher educational basis. It now begins to look as if soon there will be no human work that is not "white collar" work. On my own campus they are digging a great ditch for the building of a concrete tunnel to contain the installation of an un- derground utilities service. While watching the building operations the other day, I was struck by the fact that every man on the job was wearing a white collar or what was intended to be a white col- lar. Practically all of the work was being done by machinery, and the directors as well as most of the operators of the machinery were men whose special training could easily be called technical. It may be that every kind of work will soon demand some form of higher professional training. These four forces that I have somewhat crudely described ex- plain in large measure the restlessness and the chaos that are to be observed today in all of our leading institutions. Higher edu- cation, under the pressure of the world situation today, appears to be like a bit of steel that for a long time has been subjected to stress and strain, and, like the steel, suddenly crystallizes and tends to fracture. This crude figure of speech may be extended by say- ing that if higher education is cracking under the pressure of mod- ern life, this is due to its own long-strained hardness. It is not surprising, then, that we suddenly find ourselves in a mood for critical self-examination and seek to learn the entirely new procedure by the method of trial and error. Everywhere there is endless tinkering with the motives and the mechanisms of our higher institutions-more tinkering than thinking, perhaps, with the frailties, the faults, and the futilities of higher education. Our national journals, today so potent in the making of public opinion, teem with indictments against those institutions to which we belong. We have become uneasy, partly because we have a professional conscience, and partly because we need our salaries. Sincerely, there is an increasing number in our profession who feel themselves under the necessity of endeavoring to find, if not a new ground plan, a new mode of operating these institutions for which we are held responsible. Dean Haggerty has already unconsciously marked out a path EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS AND PUBLICITY 43 for my own next argument. He has spoken of his own difficulties of knowing and of utilizing the large volume of scientific and quasi- scientific material dealing with higher education. Some days ago I read a most illuminating article. While it applies only indirectly to the subject at hand, I recommend it as a possible catalyzer for your constructive thinking. In the June number of Century Walter B. Pitkin, under the title, "The New Testament of Science," submits this pregnant question, "What are minds doing right now?" He answers himself thus: They are scheming, inventing, devising, and planning a thousand times faster than they can execute, and they are discovering facts ten thousand times faster than anybody can assimilate them. S. . "Technique in surgery," said a great surgeon last year, "advances more swiftly than surgeons can. No matter how nimble the surgeon's wit, no matter how fast he can read, and take in new ideas, there isn't a chance in a thousand that he can learn half of the new methods he comes upon in the journals and in the clinics." "I used to go regularly to meetings of the American Mathe- matical Society," an eminent mathematician told me, "but I rarely go now. I cannot understand what most of the men are talking about there. I do not even understand the words they use, nor their symbols. It is embarrassing." "It is physically impossible for the most competent psychol- ogist living to keep up with the literature in all branches of psychol- ogy today." This from a distinguished psychologist. "When you consider that an all-around psychologist ought to follow also the leading journals in neurology, general physiology, psychiatry, and even biology, you can see into what a helpless mess we are drifting. We are all becoming learned ignoramuses." When I had read these paragraphs I experienced a certain spir- itual relief. If the leaders in the learned professions of medicine, mathematics, and psychology were frankly admitting that their intellectual production today was far outstripping their ability to apply, then certainly we of education may not consider ourselves the only culprits of superfluous knowing. If the situation in science is as so strikingly described by the author just quoted, is there not justification for one to suggest, whimsically if not wisely, that all new investigations be stopped? Penalize anyone who is bold 44- PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION enough to suggest the introduction of new ideas into our institutions. Let us demand the opportunity to examine the unused new ideas. The prospect for any immediate actual reform in higher educa- tion is pitifully meager if one considers what has been produced during the past decade and what actually has been changed. For instance, a dozen years ago we began to examine with scientific methods and under professional microscopes the organization and operation of some of our higher institutions. Those of us who have followed the numerous institutional surveys have accumulated a considerable special library. One of the earliest and one of the best of these studies was conducted in a neighboring state a little more than ten years ago. Last year I served as a member of the second commission appointed to study the same institutions and the same situation. After completing our work the members of the commission agreed that every constructive thing that we might say had been said a decade before. We carefully considered all of the earlier diagnoses and recommendations. The facts had been known by all of those concerned, yet not a single substantial reform or improvement had been brought about. Some years ago I reached the firm conclusion that every insti- tution should set up as a part of its permanent organization an agency whose exclusive function was to seek and tell the truth about the work of the institution. During the past two years I have been dealing with such an agency, the assigned business of which was to study impersonally, critically, constructively, and sympathetically the various purposes and parts of the university. This agency represents an effort to make the administrative officers and the educational workers of the institution constantly aware of the character, the effectiveness, and the goals which belong to the institution. We call our agency the Division of Educational Ref- erence. The announced purpose of the division is "to make careful studies of those matters which in the judgment of the faculty require constructive attention for the better welfare of students and for the increased effectiveness of the efforts of the university. It will undertake to analyze all those educational administrative problems which under existing arrangements would be referred to special faculty committees." EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS AND PUBLICITY 45 Before the division was established my first task was to convince my colleagues that the university would benefit by critical, scientific analysis of its own operations. I asked that we put aside our professional biases and prejudices and frankly ask ourselves, "Are we doing well the job we think we are doing?" We have discovered some very humiliating things, and we are seriously going about the task of reform. Every institution that submits itself to this kind of impersonal, cold-blooded, constructive analysis will experience that humility that is the prized possession of the humanist who is at the same time a scientist. Only a part of the record of the Divi- sion of Educational Reference has thus far been published. Those of you who might be interested in this single effort to apply the principles of scientific method to the human and scientific com- plexities of a modern higher institution may perhaps find data and technique of interest in the bulletins thus far issued. These have been published in a series entitled, "Studies in Higher Education." The following numbers are now available: I. The Purpose and Function of the Division of Educa- tional Reference II. A Study of the Enrollment (Includes analysis of the enrollment of the several schools of the University from 1874 to 1927, with a prediction study for the next twenty-five years.) III. A Study of Student Mortality and Survival IV. A Study of the Methods of Defining Scholastic Failure in the University V. The Preparation in English of Purdue Freshmen VI. Report of the Student Committee of Seventeen VII. Study of Selected Sections at Double Pace VIII. Report on the Progress of a Study of Potentially and Actually Failing Students IX. Study of Sophomores on Probation for Scholastic Failure Two of these studies are worthy of brief special mention. For many years I have been disturbed, as no doubt you have, by the illiteracy of the students entering the universities. The data col- 46 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION lected during several years showed that approximately 10 per cent of our twelve to fourteen hundred incoming freshmen are pathetic examples of our apparent failure to teach the use of the mother tongue. If my own twelve-year-old boy in the elementary schools was not able to write and use better English than those belonging to this 10 per cent, I should begin to lose faith in education and in heredity. After several experiments we frankly organized secondary-school classes in English for those students so inade- quately equipped with the most needed of all the instruments for intellectual training and development. When you examine the study, you will be interested, I am sure, in the facsimile repro- ductions of typical freshman essays. Such students, without possessing the minimum ability to read and write, obviously are doomed to early, tragic, and expensive failure. This is a well-known and ancient problem. Nevertheless, like some apparently incurable human diseases, we must continue to study it. The most difficult part of the problem is to get its full meaning to the people immediately concerned-teachers, parents, and high-school students. Notwithstanding our efforts to make known our findings concerning these particular students, we feel we have completely failed in the accomplishment of anything worth while. At more or less risk of life and limb, I have written and spoken throughout my own state. The principal difficulty that I have encountered is the sensitiveness of the supervisors and teach- ers of the secondary schools. They are, as you well know, exceed- ingly sensitive regarding the quality of their work. Yet I am more than ever firmly convinced that defective preparation in English is the real reason for the high mortality of students attending our colleges and our universities. In the Division of Educational Reference we have been trying to study this phenomenon of student mortality. We are making some progress in finding rational explanations for our 60 per cent mortality as students pass from the beginning of the freshman year to Commencement Day four years later. Early in my experience I discovered that one of my most de- pressing efforts was that which Chesterton, the English journal- ist, has called "the education of the educated." You may remember EDUCATIONAL EXPERIMENTS AND PUBLICITY 47 in the early days of the World War he wrote this, "The most diffi- cult of all human enterprises is the education of the educated. They need education more than anyone else. They resist it more than anyone else." As a means of helping our own staff with the rapidly flowing stream of scientific education, I proposed to the Division of Edu- cational Reference that there be prepared each month a brief and convenient summary of the more significant things published during that month relating to higher education. As a result we have been issuing during the past year a mimeographed publication that we call "The University Review." This I think is the most useful bit of publicity that we have accomplished. The demand has become so great that I have been compelled to ask the trustees of the uni- versity for authority to print the monthly issues. In the beginning we prepared five hundred copies, distributing one hundred copies to other institutions. Recently in one month we had requests from other states aggregating one thousand, indicating conclusively that the members of our university staffs are willing and even eager to become familiar with what is going on in educational circles. This particular device is, I believe, helping to create a genuine educational consciousness among the members of our staff. With this educational consciousness we shall be able progressively to attack in a truly scientific way the intricate problems that now stand in the way of our satisfaction and progress. Until I have been able to find a way of effective communication with my own university staff, with the students on my own campus, and with the parents of those students, I am not willing to devote very much time to the great mass of the public. The one great research that I believe is entitled to our best attention is that of finding the conditions that provide the best opportunity for learning on the part of the individual student. Here I believe we must resort to cooperative processes. If a dozen comparable institutions would join together in a study of the causes of mortality among freshmen or in a study of that other outstanding problem, dishonesty in university work, we might be able to reach profitable ends. Other problems, such as the scientific study of examinations and the treatment of students of superior ability, are entitled to early attention. 48 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Never before was there a scientific field so open, so rich, and so promising of reward as this one at our doors. Before we tackle the problem of publicity we have yet to solve the problem of the production of valid, scientific answers to the eternal question of the right education of the youth on our own campuses. V. EDUCATIONAL POLICY AND BUDGET MAKING FRED ENGELHARDT Professor of Educational Administration University of Minnesota As educational services are extended and as they are made available to all levels of a democratic society, new controls and attitudes are created that establish new relationships between the educational institution and the groups served. When the higher institutions enrolled a small number of students and were supported by a small proportion of the people, the public at large was little concerned regarding the services rendered or the cost. 'This was true irrespective of the nature of support, whether the institution received its funds wholly or in part from public or private sources. As soon as-the daors opened to an extended and increasing variety of clientele, an entirely new condition was created. Public interest in education is directly proportionate to the number of homes reached, and controls are established in a direct ratio to the public funds expended. In private institutions deter- minants also arise in that the benefactor becomes concerned not only because of the increased demand for money but because of the possible outcomes when the institutional service is extended to all levels of society. The issues that arise in the administration and financing of higher education are not only those derived from the mounting cost associated with the increased enrollment and the new offerings, but are also outcomes of a need felt by the new groups receiving the services, as they scrutinize the offering and weigh the education they are to receive in terms of its utilitarian and economic useful- ness. The more educational opportunity is extended, the more the "pure cultural" aspects, as such, are disregarded by those who must consider the things they purchase in terms of relative cost, the time and energy consumed, and the price paid. Every new contact develops directly or indirectly new associated interests in the enter- prise. Desirable or not, new challenges are constantly created which must be met, and the queries into the why and wherefore of 50 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION each aspect of the organization and its administration cannot be ignored or left unanswered. In the changes that take place, cost, of all the factors that enter in to determine policies and practices, takes on a more and more important role. That stage in educational administration has now been reached when the nature of the offering in an institution is a more significant function of its economic worth than formerly. If this is the case, then great care must be exercised to insure that all factors involved are given fair consideration in all deliberations, a condition that can exist only when the business and educational aspects of any contemplated change in the enterprise are more closely coordinated than has been the practice in the past. Factual Basis for Administration.-It is impossible to manage any enterprise economically without considering the facts. Indi- vidual judgment and opinion have ruled in management too long. Many established traditions in our institutions are being challenged and must justify their existence. A factual justification is alone satisfactory to those who may be in doubt regarding an issue. Un- less an institution has adequate records concerning each activity engaged in and the various important aspects related thereto, little improvement in administration can be expected. Facts must be made available through records, and the intelligent analyses of these facts can alone supersede the old methods of doing things. Importance of Planning.-Planning in advance on the basis of factual evidence is as essential in education as in any other enter- prise. Coordinating the educational progam with the financial plan is the only effective basis upon which efficient administration can be established. In other words, to secure the educational results de- sired, those responsible for the administration of an institution must fully recognize the wide range and purpose of budgetary planning and control. The fact that budgetary preparation involves prog- nostication immediately brings to the front a large number of variables, whose control within certain limits is essential if projected plans are to be useful. Unique Characteristics of an Educational Enterprise. - Most educational enterprises are not operated for profit. This fact differentiates educational institutions as a whole from private busi- EDUCATIONAL POLICY AND BUDGET MAKING 51 ness of other kinds. Unlike transactions with private concerns, the individual receiving educational service may pay only in part for the benefits derived. Production in a private concern may be reduced in time of economic depression, while an educational insti- tution must carry its full load, irrespective of the phase of the eco- nomic cycle considered. From the financial standpoint the plant, in an educational in- stitution, has a different bearing on management than in a private enterprise. Property values are not kept intact except as they relate to the service value the property has to the enterprise. There is no original capital invested, little relationship between outstanding debt and plant value exists, as a rule no taxes are to be paid, and borrowing power is not related to capital expenditure. The plant is significant only in terms of its cost, its maintenance, and the effect the cost has on the current educational program. Dynamic Nature of Education and Planning.-Education is not a static affair but a living service. The organization of the enter- prise, the service rendered, the methods, and the techniques used, as well as the content, are constantly being challenged in the light of new discoveries and modifying social and economic conditions. Constantly to adapt the institution to desirable changes demands constant investigation, the study of trends, and a plant that has a flexibility sufficient to meet these changes with a minimum cost, and yet to provide efficient facilities for the new order within the insti- tution. Extension of Service and Administrative Control of Activities.- There are many changes in the attitudes of educational institu- tions regarding the welfare of the student body outside of the class- room. These changes originate new administrative practices, with accompanying costs. That is, institutions operate bookstores, cafe- terias, health services, infirmaries, clinics, presses, as well as a supervisory control of the management and finances of most student activities. The policy to be followed in placing the burden of cost is a matter for each institution to determine. The essential need of accurate accounting and budgetary control is apparent in the operation of these various services. Need of Standardization.-One finds a great variety of prac- 52 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION tices followed in regard to fees and charges made for use of laboratory, library, and classroom materials, equipment, and other instructional supplies. In one course a pupil may purchase the textbook while in another the study outlines include lists of books and periodicals provided in the library of the institution. In the sciences a variety of practices are followed in the use of laboratory facilities, but use of the library is not generally a charge against those students for whom the library serves as a laboratory. In general one finds a conglomerate variation in practice fol- lowed within departments of any institution in regard to fees charged and the methods of collection. The cost factor may not be the determining one. In fairness to those receiving the service, and to the departments within the institution, and for the sake of the efficient and economic operation of the enterprise, standardiza- tion and uniformity of practice must be basic to good administration. The practices generally followed lead to many distorted notions of costs and unfair claims regarding the cost of offering various courses and providing college activities. The economic aspects of the problem cannot be adequately considered without standard prac- tice and accurate allocation of costs, which are made possible through accounting. Standardization of the positions in the institution and of the materials used in providing educational services is as important as in the case of the services rendered. Any analysis shows the impor- tance of having clearly defined conceptions of the work to be done by individuals, the salaries to be paid, and the load to be carried. The classification of professional positions is most difficult, for the title designation of a position does not necessarily define the nature of the work of that position. Irrespective of these difficulties, stand- ardization, with full recognition of the limitations involved, is essential. Unless standards are set for the quality, quantity, and use of the materials to be used within an institution, much waste of time and effort will ensue. Those associated in the use should determine standards, in so far as that is practicable. The number of articles to be purchased should be reduced to a minimum, and whenever possible multiple use should be considered in the selection of materials. EDUCATIONAL POLICY AND BUDGET MAKING 53 Units of Measure.-For an effective fiscal control reliance must be placed on some means of measuring results and of relating costs to services, and achievement to anticipation and expectancy. Only when adequate measuring devices are discovered can plans pro- jected into the future have significance and value. In this regard, as in every other phase of budgetary control, adequate records of all kinds are essential to making satisfactory units of measurement applicable. Administration and the Budget.---The budget cannot be an effective administrative control unless the organization has fully appreciated the value that records, planning, and standards have in the management of the enterprise. The budget, being an esti- mate of future conditions, can only be as satisfactory as the facts available make it and as effective as the organization can operate and carry it out. The administration of the budget requires a con- stant check of forecasts with performance, and an analysis of the conditions that have entered in to make for success or failure. A successfully administered budget is one where the service plan in the educational program is constantly being checked with the financial plan. Each activity is then carefully scrutinized in terms of the effectiveness of the organization in operation, the services rendered, and the cost. The Budget.-The financial plan or budget can be considered as made up of three distinct units. These are related in various ways in different institutions. There are three programs for which financial planning is essential. First, the financing of the current educational program, including all activities and the immediate related factors carried on by the institution, must be planned. Sec- ond, financing maintenance, replacements, and the extension of the plant must be considered. The third distinct factor that is sig- nificant is the outstanding indebtedness. The financial program for the last two factors can be planned for several years in advance where adequate records are available and where the educational program has been determined. Budget Preparation.-The more the responsibility for the prep- aration of the budget can be centralized the better the plan will be. This statement is made on the assumption that records are available, 54 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION that standards for personnel and materials have been determined, and that working policies have been approved. Creating policies for a future fiscal period should be a matter for decision prior to and apart from the preparation of the tentative budget. The edu- cational program should be determined in advance. Naturally, in the final analysis, adjustments must take place in the light of avail- able funds. A University Budget.-It may be of interest to this group to note how extensive the budget of this University really is.' There are in this institution 183 different departments or organization units. The University is carrying on 150 distinct service enter- prises, and these involve certain trust funds that require special handling. There are 1,800 people on the payroll, not including a miscellaneous payroll of 1,000 individuals. During each year there are about 13,000 requisitions, and 15,000 purchase orders which are sent out from the Purchasing Department. Financial transac- tions involve 39,000 invoices, 60,000 salary checks, and the funds of the University are kept in 180 different accounts. The problems involved in budgetary control under such conditions are complicated. Unless materials, supplies, and positions are standardized, one can readily imagine the resulting confusion in this situation. Function of Budget.-The function of a budget is to provide administrative control of the enterprise and to relate performance with estimates and forecasts. The budget, based upon esti- mates, and prognosticated on the basis of available facts and admin- istrative foresight and skill, will require, without question, some modification as the year progresses. Although the educational pro- gram and its associated financial plan set goals to be attained, it should be recognized that both have been anticipated in advance and will require change in view of further knowledge and unfore- seen conditions. The executive who thinks that a large balance at the close of the year is indicative of good management mistakes the purpose of the budget. Conditions of this kind should have been anticipated and the money "saved" in the preparation of the document. This is equally true in cases where an overdraft results. Yet to go through the year and have expenditure and income exactly 1Data for 1925-26 from an unpublished statement of W. T. Middle- brook, comptroller of the University of Minnesota. EDUCATIONAL POLICY AND BUDGET MAKING 55 equal to estimate is mere chance, and where this occurs, the execu- tive should not take unto himself undue credit. The budget is not a perfect instrument, and the spirit and atti- tude of the professional staff toward the administration of it will go a long way in its success or failure. Its limitations and weak- nesses should be noted and corrected in subsequent years, and in each fiscal period the financial plan should show improvement over previous plans, both in its make-up and in its administration. The scientific research necessary objectively to improve the budget should have an ever increasing value as an instrument in the general administration of the institution. Great care should be exercised in the control of budgets of administrative units and departments. The intelligent and compe- tent administrative officer who, through skill and initiative, may find it possible either to improve his organization or to develop a more economical way to do a task should not be required in the interest of the general cause to lose the money saved. This frequently kills initiative. It is economical to set aside additional funds for the use of those departments that can produce results or for those that have demonstrated their ability to set up an investigation worthy of support and encouragement. Budgetary Limitations.-The limitations of the budget may be presented more directly and in briefer form as follows: The budget cannot be substituted for good administration. The budget will be as good as the executive makes it. The budget improves as administration improves. The budget should not be discarded because of failure to use it advantageously. Responsibility should not be placed on the budget, nor should the budget be followed blindly. Judgment should be used. Remember the budget is based on estimate. The budget should not be allowed to run the institution and to kill initiative. Remember the budget is to good administration what bookkeep- ing is to good accounting.2 SN. L. Engelhardt and Fred Engelhardt, Public School Business Administration (Teachers College, Columbia University, 1927), p. 675. 56 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Problem of Coordination.-With the increasing significance of costs in determining educational policies, changes in attitudes and traditions among professional staff members in educational insti- tutions must come about. There is much in the traditions, the per- sonnel selection, and current administrative practices that creates in staff members individualistic rather than cooperative attitudes. A re-definition of what constitutes individual prerogative and what belongs to the institution will naturally follow if all activities are considered in terms of the greater good and in terms of their service and economic value. There are extreme dangers in the centralization of authority, particularly in the business offices. These dangers are usually of the petty kind that can be avoided when the business office is organ- ized as a service department, fully aware that its function is to minimize and relieve, as far as possible, the institution as a whole of details. Education Must Be Justified on Basis of Results.-The day is past when support to educational institutions can be made purely on emotional appeals and the basis of loyalty. The public does not respond so readily to these requests for more money. The need must be justified in terms of the service demands and the product delivered. The evidence must be presented to show the justifica- tion for the institution as a whole and for each part. This can be done only by an administration that is able to relate performance and service to cost, a most difficult problem but one that must be solved if satisfactory progress is to be made. VI. AN ANALYSIS OF THE FINANCIAL NEEDS OF A COLLEGE OF LIBERAL ARTS FOR ONE THOUSAND STUDENTS' DONALD J. COWLING President of Carleton College A good education is bound to cost somebody considerable money. There is such a thing as a cheap education, but there is no such thing as a good education to be had cheap. Somebody must pay the full cost. The only question is, Who shall it be? Earlier gen- erations have answered this question by saying, "Let the teachers pay," and low salaries represent the method they arranged to bring this about. This policy, still in force in most colleges, threatens to run the whole profession of college teaching into the ground. As a matter of fact, strong teachers are no longer to be had for small salaries. There are, of course, rare exceptions, but in the long run, low salaries mean poor teachers. A second answer to the question, Who shall pay? is that the student should be asked to carry a larger! share of the cost of his education. This is proving a practical solution of some of the problems of the stronger eastern institutions, where a very con- siderable portion of the current income is received from students. However, attention should be called to the difference between the situation an eastern college faces in this respect and that confront- ing colleges in the West, which are doing their work under the shadow of great state universities. In most state universities the income from students is a very small part of the current income, and the theory of free tuition has created a situation in the West in which it is exceedingly difficult for non-state colleges to charge as high rates of tuition as are paid in eastern colleges. If western colleges should charge as high fees as are common among eastern institutions, it would mean a steady trend in the direction of exclud- ing students of moderate means and of making these colleges class schools for the well-to-do. 'Reprinted from the Association of American Colleges Bulletin, Volume XIII, No. 1 (February, 1927). 58 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION It is probably true that most of the stronger western colleges could go further than they have gone in requiring the student to carry a reasonable part of the cost of his education, but it is also true that this possibility does not furnish a complete solution of the problem. The third answer to our question as to who shall pay is that the public should bear a large part of the cost of higher education, either through taxes or gifts. The theory of public support for state institutions is well established and it is assured that these institutions will steadily grow in influence and power. The multi- plying of opportunities for higher education through state institu- tions is cause for increasing pride all over the country and is a movement that deserves the support of all good citizens. On the other hand, the very fact of the enormous success of state institu- tions adequately supported through public funds makes it all the more necessary for the separately organized colleges to secure ade- quate resources from private benevolence to enable them to meet the scholastic standards set by state institutions and to offer in addition many advantages not to be had in state schools. There are certain objective features of a good college that are not difficult to recognize, and that are sure marks as to whether or not a college is offering its students first-rate opportunities. For example, a good college should have on the average at least one teacher for every twelve students. The enrollment in classes should not exceed thirty. At least 40 per cent of the teaching staff should be full professors. The amount spent for salaries for teaching and educational administration should be at least two-thirds of the entire current budget. These and similar provisions create a situa- tion that requires an expenditure of more than $500 per year for each student for current educational expenses. In addition to this, it is necessary for a college to provide an adequate income for current additions to equipment, such as books for the library, laboratory apparatus, and new buildings. A third item of expense is the matter of scholarships and loans for students who are not able to pay the regular fees. Probably a sum equal to one-fifth of the total tuition receipts could be spent wisely to enable students of unusual promise but without financial resources to continue their college work. ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS The following study attempts to indicate the main items of expense in providing reasonably satisfactory opportunities for one thousand students. OUTLINE A. Statement of Assumptions on Which the Analysis of Needs Is Based B. Faculty Requirements for 1,000 Students C. Buildings and Equipment Needed for 1,000 Students D. Summary of Proposed Current Educational Budget for 1,000 Students E. Summary of Endowment, Plant, and Current Fund Needed for 1,000 Students F. Annual Cost per Student A. STATEMENT OF ASSUMPTIONS ON WHICH THE FOLLOWING ANALYSIS OF NEEDS IS BASED 2 I. A Completely Equipped College First assumption: That it is proposed to maintain a four-year college of liberal arts that shall represent (without extravagance) all the essential features of a college of the first rank. II. A Liberal Arts Curriculum Second assumption: That it is proposed to maintain a liberal arts college without affiliated graduate, professional, or technical schools. III. A Coeducational College, Limited to One Thousand Students Third assumption: That the student body will include about 550 men and about 450 women. The total enrollment will be limited to 1,000 students. More students would require additional funds. IV. A Four-Year College Fourth assumption: That a college of the type in question seeks chiefly to meet the needs of those who desire a full four-year course in liberal arts as a preparation for later professional study 2 This statement attempts to summarize only those features of a liberal arts college that directly involve expense. Many other features that may be vitally related to the aim and purpose of such a college are not here referred to because they do not, as such, directly affect the financial budget. 59 60 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION and life work. It is assumed that the needs of irregular students, or those desiring only a partial course, will be provided for by some other type of institution. Ordinarily, only those intending to complete their course at the college in question will be admitted as freshmen. It would prob- ably not be wise to administer this rule rigidly. It is to be expected that some students who start out with this intention will be unable to meet the requirements of the course or, for other reasons, will find it unwise to continue. However, with proper care exercised in the selection of freshmen, it would seem entirely reasonable to expect that such a college should graduate about two-thirds of those who enter, and would have an actual attendance approximately as follows: 320 freshmen, 250 sophomores, 215 juniors, and 215 seniors. It is assumed that the greatest loss will be between the fresh- man and sophomore years. Those who are not able to do satisfac- tory work will not be encouraged to continue beyond the freshman year. At present the most serious losses are between the sophomore and junior years, due primarily to the fact that many able students desire to go on with their professional training on the basis of the usual minimum requirement of two years of college work. Every effort will be made to encourage such gifted students to complete the four-year course. The loss between the junior and senior years is assumed to be negligible and will be made up by the limited number of students who will be permitted to enter as seniors from other institutions. The privilege of entering as seniors will be extended to only a few exceptionally well-qualified students. Perhaps the most discouraging circumstance confronting those interested in liberal education, particularly in the Middle West, is the fact that so small a percentage of those who begin such a course actually secure their A.B. degree. Comparatively few col- leges in the Middle West graduate as many as 50 per cent of those who enter. Colleges supported by private gifts must demonstrate their ability to secure at least some results that cannot be so surely gained in institutions supported by taxes. It is assumed that the chief opportunity for a college of the type in question to make its distinctive contribution lies in the field of what may be broadly ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS termed the student's personal philosophy of life. The junior and senior years are essential for significant results in this field. V. A Democratic College Fifth assumption: That the college in question will be a demo- cratic college, and that it will include in its student body young men and women of various social and financial levels. It is assumed that it will be necessary to provide funds for scholarships and stu- dent loans amounting to 20 per cent of the total tuition receipts. Some students will need more help than others. Perhaps as many as 40 per cent of the students should receive some assistance. How- ever, a sum amounting to the full tuition of 20 per cent of the stu- dent body would seem reasonably satisfactory, and it is assumed that one-half of this help will be in the form of loans. A tuition charge of $250 a year is proposed, yielding an income of $250,000 from 1,000 students. Of this amount, $25,000 will come from endowed scholarship funds and $25,000 from funds given to students as loans. For these purposes there have been included in the summary of needs $500,000 for endowed scholar- ship funds and $125,000 for student loan funds. (See page 78.) VI. Academic Standards Sixth assumption: That it is desirable to maintain the follow- ing standards: 1. Students will not be admitted who are not able to meet the regular requirements for entrance. 2. Students will not be permitted, except in special cases, to carry more than 16 hours of class work, it being deemed more profitable to a student to do work of superior quality than to take more subjects with mediocre success. 3. Teachers will be expected to teach an average of about 12 hours per week, ranging from 9 hours to a maximum of 15 or 16 hours. Laboratory work is counted on the same basis as regular classroom instruction. 4. Teachers in the ratio of one to about twelve students will be required to provide classes of limited size and to insure to each student the benefit of individual instruction and opportunity to come into close personal contact with the teacher. The number of students in each class recitation should ordi- 61 62 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION narily be limited to 30, with an average of from 15 to 20 (labora- tory sections not to exceed 15). In exceptional cases where larger numbers are admitted, the group should be broken up into smaller sections for special quizzes. Classes of less than 8 or 10, except in advanced work, ordinarily lack proper stimulus and therefore are not encouraged. 5. Four grades of faculty ranking will be recognized: pro- fessor, associate professor, assistant professor, and instructor. About 40 per cent of the total number of actual teachers are full professors, and the remainder distributed about evenly among the other three ranks. It is assumed that no one will be employed in the work of teaching whose rank or salary is below that of an instructor, fully recognized as a member of the faculty. The expense of "assistants" with special training to help in the work of a department is included in the salary budget. 6. Teachers will be asked to carry only a minimum amount of administrative work. The purpose of this provision is to enable each teacher to devote himself without handicap to the work of his department. This policy assumes that it is desirable for a college to make adequate provision for administration expenses separate from direct expense for teaching. In cases where administrative officers, such as deans or registrars, also offer instruction, a corresponding por- tion of their salaries should be charged to salaries for teaching, and when regular administrative duties are assigned to teachers, a corresponding portion of their salaries should be charged to admin- istration salaries. 7. Teachers will be encouraged to maintain genuine interest in productive scholarship in order that their teaching may be kept fresh and vigorous. The expense of a limited amount of such work, which can be carried on in connection with the regular work of a department, may properly be charged to "Departmental Expenses." In cases where important pieces of separate research work or related enterprises are carried on (for example, in the case of Carleton, the publishing of Popular Astronomy) the expense of such undertakings should not be included in the current educational budget but should be provided for separately. If teachers are ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS relieved of part of their regular teaching work in order to engage in such separate undertakings, only that fraction of their salary that represents their actual teaching service should be included in the current educational budget. 8. Physical education and athletics for men and for women will be organized as regular departments of instruction. All in- structors and coaches are regarded as regular members of the fac- ulty on full-time appointment with the same rank and salary as their training and experience would merit in other departments. No seasonal coaches will be employed. (See page 81 for statement regarding expenses of intercollegiate athletics.) VII. Sabbatic Furloughs, Pensions, etc. Seventh assumption: That the efficiency of the faculty will be increased by providing for its members the following privileges: 1. A system of sabbatical furloughs for full professors equiva- lent to one year in seven on half pay. A sabbatical furlough should not be regarded as a vacation but as an opportunity to prepare for more effective teaching in the years to follow. Such preparation might well include the under- taking of some important piece of research in a well-equipped uni- versity offering opportunities for work of this kind not available in a college. The expense should be provided for by setting aside each year, in a special fund for furloughs, one-twelfth of the total salaries of full professors on active service. This method of financing fur- loughs distributes the cost equitably each year; it places the finan- cial burden of the furlough where it belongs, namely, in the current expense of the years in which the service is rendered on the basis of which a furlough is granted; and it eliminates from the annual "cost per student" a variable factor that tends to make the annual cost per student fluctuate in an undesirable way, as happens when the half salary of absent professors is charged to the current ex- pense of the year they are on furlough. It is not to be understood that the arrangement of one year in seven on half pay will be strictly administered. It may frequently be desirable for a professor, after six years of service, to take a furlough of one semester on full pay, or he may prefer some other 63 64 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION arrangement that would come within the financial possibilities cre- ated by the above plan of financing furloughs. 2. A moderate allowance for attending annual professional meetings. In the following outline of needs an annual allowance of $50 is made for each teacher, except instructors. It is not to be assumed that each teacher will actually receive $50 each year, but merely that such an arrangement will provide a fund from which may be paid the expenses of teachers as their needs may appear. 3. Provision for pensions. A satisfactory pension and related benefits can be provided by setting aside each year 10 per cent of a teacher's salary. An in- ducement to the teacher to make this saving is arranged by adding 5 per cent to a teacher's regular salary (including teachers on fur- lough) on condition that he set aside an additional 5 per cent for the same purpose. When accepted by the teacher, this additional 5 per cent becomes an integral part of his remuneration for a given year and should, therefore, be added to the regular salary budget. The college should, in no case, attempt to retain any jurisdiction over the accumulations resulting from this annual 5 per cent pay- ment. It belongs to the teacher on the basis of service rendered. It is only another form of salary and should become the teacher's property without any restrictions whatsoever. The arrangement, of course, should provide that the sums thus set aside may hot be drawn upon for any other purpose during the lifetime of the teacher. In case an institution has failed to make provision for a retiring teacher and finds itself obliged to pay him a pension out of current funds, this expense should not be included in the current educa- tional budget. VIII. Repairs and Depreciation Eighth assumption: That it is desirable to provide comfort- able physical surroundings for students and teachers. The heating, lighting, plumbing, and ventilating of all buildings should be prop- erly arranged, and the buildings and grounds should be made at- tractive as well as useful. The physical plant should be maintained in first class condition and all needed repairs and replacements should be looked after promptly and charged to current expense. ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS A clear distinction should be made in this connection between charges for maintenance and charges for depreciation, representing estimated deterioration in physical properties not covered by cur- rent repairs. It is obvious that all expenditures for repairs and replacement of short-lived or easily broken equipment are part of the current expense for maintenance. It should be equally clear that the actual cost of operation includes whatever deterioration has taken place in the physical properties during the accounting period. This deterioration should be represented by an expense charge in the maintenance budget. This depreciation charge should be adjusted to correspond to the actual conditions, averaging perhaps 2 per cent on well-con- structed buildings, 5 per cent on permanent equipment, and perhaps as high as 20 or 25 per cent or even higher on equipment that can be used for only a few years. These charges should represent such wear and tear on buildings and equipment as cannot be restored at once by replacements or current repairs. The percentage of depreciation to be charged on any building or piece of equipment would depend upon the estimated life of the property in question and upon its salvage value at the end of its period of usefulness. The salvage value would probably be very small and might well be disregarded entirely. The factor of obsolescence may also be disregarded in the case of college buildings for the reason that, other things being equal, college sentiment for a building increases with age, thus maintaining its service value. Various methods of accounting for depreciation are used. The weight of good accounting authority seems to favor the "straight line method" rather than the "declining value method" or any other. The straight line method bases the annual charge for depreciation on the original cost of the property, thus providing a constant sum each year for depreciation and making possible direct comparisons of total costs between various years. These current charges for depreciation should be set aside in special reserve funds for the separate buildings and their equip- ment, and for whatever additional property units are recognized, such as furniture. The book value of any building or other prop- erty unit (cost less depreciation reserve), plus the actual amount in the corresponding reserve fund, should always be equal to the 65 66 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION original cost of the building. In this way a fund will gradually be built up for each property unit, which, at the end of the period of its usefulness, will equal the original cost of the property. Buildings and other property, as well as endowment funds, may thus become permanent memorials. The income from investments representing any depreciation reserve fund may be used for current expenses, thus giving the college in any given year the full benefit of the use of the total original gift. These special reserve funds, while they remain intact, thus function as endowment funds. A depreciation reserve fund may also be drawn upon for major repairs and replacements. When so used, the cost of the improve- ments should be taken from the reserve fund and added to the book value (cost less depreciation reserve) of the property in question. By the above method of charging minor repairs and replace- ments to current expense, and of setting aside from current income a suitable amount for depreciation to be held in special reserve funds, it should be possible to maintain an educational plant in excellent condition without any expense other than what is provided for by the regular current income for maintenance. Based on the above considerations, there is included in the fol- lowing expense budget a depreciation charge of 2 per cent on buildings and 5 per cent on equipment. B. FACULTY REQUIREMENTS FOR 1,000 STUDENTS The following table is based on a careful study of about twenty- five of the leading American colleges, and represents reasonable provision for the needs of 1,000 students in a liberal arts college: I. Division of Language and Literature Departments of 1. English (Literature, Rhetoric, and Public Speaking) Professors ................... ..... ....................... 3 Associate Professors ..................................... 3 Assistant Professors ....................................... 3 Instructors ...................................... 3 Total ...................... ......12 ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS 67 2. Latin Professors ................................................................. 1 Associate Professors ........................................... 0 Assistant Professors ........................................... 0 Instructors ........................................................ 1 T otal ............................................................. 2 3. Greek Professors ........................................ ............ 1 Associate Professors ......................................... 0 A ssistant Professors .............................................. 0 Instructors ........................ ..................... Total ....................................................... 1 4. German Professors ............................................................... 1 Associate Professors ........................................... 2 A ssistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors ........................ ....................... 1 Total ........................................................ 5 5. Romance Languages (French, Spanish, Italian) Professors ........................................................... 2 Associate Professors ......................................... 1 Assistant Professors ........................................... 2 Instructors .......................... ................... 2 Total ..................................... 7 Total for Division of Language and Literature ..............27 II. Division of Philosophy, Religion, and Education Departments of 6. Biblical Literature, History of Religion, and Religious Education Professors ............................................................. 2 Associate Professors .................. .......................... 0 Assistant Professors .............................................. 0 Instructors ........................ ....................... Total .......................................................... 2 68 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 7. Philosophy Professors .......................................... 1 Associate Professors ............................................ I A ssistant Professors .............................................. 0 Instructors .......................... ......................... T otal ............................... ......................... 2 8. Psychology and Education Professors ............................ ............................. 2 A ssociate Professors ............................................. 1 Assistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors .............................................................................. Total ............................................ 4 Total for Division of Philosophy, Religion, and Edu- cation ............................ ........ ................. 8 ITT. Division of Political and Social Science Departments of 9. Economics Professors ........................................ 2 Associate Professors ................... ................... 1 Assistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors ......................... .......................... T6tal ........................................................ 4 10. History and Government Professors ............................... ..... ............. 2 Associate Professors .................... .................... 1 Assistant Professors ............................... 1 Instructors ............................ ............................ 1 Total ..................................... 5 11. Sociology Professors .................................................... 1 Associate Professors .............................................. O0 Assistant Professors ............................................. . 0 Instructors .... ....................... ............................ 0 Total .................................................. ... 1 ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS 69 12. Home Economics Professors ............................................................ Associate Professors ......................................... 1 A ssistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors .......................................... Total ....................................................... 2 Total for Division of Political and Social Science..........12 IV. Division of Science Departments of 13. Mathematics Professors ........................................................................ 1 Associate Professors ....................... ................ 2 A ssistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors ......................... ......................... 1 T otal ........................... ... ......................... 5 14. Astronomy Professors .......................................................... 1 Associate Professors .............................................. 0 Assistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors ........................... .......................... Total ...................................... 2 15. Geology Professors .............................................................. 1 Associate Professors .............................................. 0 A ssistant Professors .............................................. 0 Instructors ......................... ......................... T otal .............................. .......................... 1 16. Geography Professors ............................................................. 1 Associate Professors .............................................. 0 Assistant Professors .......................... .......... O Instructors ................................................................ O0 T otal .......................... ......................... 1 70 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 17. Physics Professors .................... ............... .................... 1 Associate Professors ............................ 0 A ssistant Professors .......................................... . 1 Instructors ................................ 1 T otal ................................. ....................... 3 18. Chemistry Professors ....................................................... 2 Associate Professors ............................................... 0 A ssistant Professors .............................................. 0 Instructors ............................. 2 T otal .............................................. .............. 4 19. Biology (Zoology and Botany) Professors ............................................................ 2 Associate Professors ............................................. 0 A ssistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors ......................... .................... 2 T otal ............................................. ....................... 5 Total for Division of Science..................................21 V. Division of Fine Arts Departments of 20. Art Professors ......................................................... 1 Associate Professors ......................................... 1 A ssistant Professors .............................................. 0 Instructors ...................... ........................ 1 T otal ............................... ......................... 3 21. Music Professors .................... .................... 1 Associate Professors ........................................... 1 A ssistant Professors .............................................. 0 Instructors ........................ ......................... T otal .................................. ...................... 2 * It is assumed that two teachers will be able to offer the theoretical courses in music for which no special fee is charged. The salaries of such ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS 71 22. Dramatic Arts Professors ......................................................... 1 Associate Professors ........................................... Assistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors ........................ ...................... Total ...................................... 2 Total for Division of Fine Arts ....................................... 7 VI. Division of Hygiene, Physical Education, and Athletics Departments of 23. Hygiene and Public Health P rofessors ........................................................... 1 Associate Professors ............................................ 1 Assistant Professors ....................................... 0 Instructors ....................... ...................... T otal ............................................................. 2 24. Physical Education and Athletics for Men Professors ......................................................... ... 1 Associate Professors ............................................ 1 Assistant Professors ........................................... 1 Instructors ....................................... 1 Total ................................. .... ............ 4 25. Physical Education and Athletics for Women Professors ........................................................ 1 Associate Professors ............................................ A ssistant Professors ............................................ 1 Instructors ....................... .................... 1 Total ........................................................... 3 Total for Division of Hygiene, Physical Education, and Athletics ....................................... .......... 9 Total Number of Teachers........................84 additional teachers as may be needed to give individual instruction in music will be provided for by special fees, and are therefore not included here. These additional teachers will be on regular full-time appointment and will be given the same rank and salary as their training and experi- ence would merit in other departments. No commissions will be paid. 72 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION VII. Summary Rank Number Per Cent Professors ........................ ............................ 83 40 Associate Professors ........................................ 17 20 Assistant Professors ........................................ 17 20 Instructors ....................................... 17 20 Total Number of Teachers ...................... 84 100 C. BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT NEEDED FOR 1,000 STUDENTS It is much more difficult to outline the details of a college plant than of a college faculty. Much depends upon the taste of those in charge, upon local conditions, including the topography of the campus, and upon conditions such as climate in the section of the country in which the college is located. Owing to these variables and contingencies, it is practically impossible to outline a model college plant that will constitute the best solution of the building problems for more than a single institution. The following table is therefore based upon the situation at Carleton College, and represents the present plant, with such addi- tions as have been definitely planned for its expansion. The accompanying bird's-eye view shows the completed plant, and the ground plan shows the relation between the present plant and what is proposed. The table does not include dormitories, dining halls, heating plant, nor any other self-supporting buildings or equipment, such as college hospital, faculty houses, janitors' houses, college book- store, laundry. farm. These service buildings and equipment should be self-supporting, including proper charges for interest on the investment and for depreciation, and a reasonable reserve set aside each year for retiring the investment. When this plan is followed, no gifts are required for the construction or maintenance of these service properties. (See page 81, section 6 ff.) No estimate is included for a stadium or other equipment for intercollegiate athletics, it being assumed that gate receipts will be adequate to finance these interests. (See page 81, section 4.) Ample provision is made for the work of physical education. ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS PROPOSED EDUCATIONAL PLANT Grounds: Campus, including grading, paving, drainage system, etc . ...................................................................................$200,000 Men's Athletic Field................................. 30,000 W omen's Athletic Field..................................................... 20,000 $ 250,000 Educational Buildings: Main Building (Recitation rooms, offices for faculty, administration, etc.) ...................... ..........................$500,000 Library Building ................................................................ 250,000 Chapel ........................................ 200,000 Physics Building ..................................... 200,000 Chemistry Building (Chemistry, Geology, Geog- raphy, Home Economics) ..................................... 250,000 Biology Building (Including Greenhouse, etc.).............. 225,000 Astronomical Observatory .................................... 100,000 Music Building ............... ................. 150,000 Art and Museum Building............................................... 200,000 Men's Gymnasium ...................................... ... 225,000 Women's Gymnasium ........................... .......... 200,000 2,500,000 Educational Equipment: Library ........................................ ................$250,000 Laboratory apparatus .......................... ............ 150,000 Art and Music equipment and Museum.......................... 150,000 Gymnasium equipment ................................... 50,000 Chapel equipment (organ, etc.)..................................... 25,000 Furniture, fixtures, office equipment, etc...................... 125,000 750,000 Total Value of Educational Plant..................................... $3,500,000 73 0 Q 0 EA E-4 0 0 P4 0 0 o L ol '-4 w h- ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS D. SUMMARY OF PROPOSED CURRENT EDUCATIONAL BUDGET FOR 1,000 STUDENTS Current Educational Expense: Salaries:4 For Instruction Professors5 29 at $5,000 ......................... .........$145,000.00 Associate Professors 17 at $3,500..................................... 59,500.00 Assistant Professors 17 at $2,800 ........................................ 47,600.00 Instructors 17 at $2,000........................................ 34,000.00 Assistants ................................. .. 2,000.00 Miscellaneous (Visiting Professors, etc.) ........................................ 500.00 $288,600.00 Reserved for teachers on furlough (1/12 of total salaries of active full professors. See page 62, VII, 1) ..................................... 12,083.33 - $300,683.33 For Library .................................. ............. 18,000.00 For Administration ..................................... 30,000.00 Total for Salaries............................................. $348,683.33 5 per cent allowance for pensions .................. 17,434.17 $366,117.50 Supplies and Expenses: Departmental ......................................... $ 15,000.00 Library .................................................. 2,000.00 Administration ................................... ......... 13,000.00 30,000.00 4The average salaries here proposed will make possible a scale of salaries running from $4,200 to $6,000 (higher in exceptional cases) for full professors, $3,200 to $4,000 for associate professors, $2,500 to $3,000 for assistant professors, and $1,800 to $2,400 for instructors. 6 It is assumed that four professors will be on furlough each year. 6 The departmental expenses here listed do not include expenses cov- ered by special fees. (See footnote on page 76; also page 81, section 3.) 75 76 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Operation and Maintenance of Plant: Wages ........................................ $ 20,000.00 Heat, ligllt, power and water................................. 48,000.00 Insurance ............................ ........ .............. 8,000.00 Campus ul)keep ............................... ........ 2,000.00 Repairs ........................................ 20,000.00 Miscellaneous supplies .................................. .... 2,000.00 $100,000.00 Depreciation ......................... .... .............. .... 87,500.00 187,500.00 General Expenses: Religious services, commencement, etc...................................... 6,000.00 Total Educational Expense....................... $589,617.50 It is assumed that the income to meet this expense for educa- tional purposes will come from two sources: (a) tuition from students and (b) income from endowment funds. The college will not be obliged to ask for gifts for current expense. The proposed tuition charge of $250 would provide an income of $250,000, of which $200,000 would come from cash payments by students, $25,000 from deferred student payments, financed through student loan funds, and $25,000 from scholarship funds. (See page 61, V.) To produce the balance of $339,617.50 still needed to meet the total educational expense of $589,617.50, there will be required endowment funds of $6,792,350, invested at 5 per cent. The following table summarizes these items: Current Educational Income: 800 students each paying $250 tuition in cash..........$200,000.00 100 students each paying $250 tuition with money received as scholarships..................................... 25,000.00 100 students each paying $250 tuition with money received as loans........................... .... .... 25,000.00 - $250,000.00' Income from Endowment........................... 339,617.50 Total Educational Income.................................. $589,617.50 'This total does not include the income from special fees (music, chemistry, etc.), it being assumed that these fees will be applied to special expenses, not included in this budget, for individual instruction and for materials for individual use. CA I,-- 78 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION E. SUMMARY OF ENDOWMENT, PLANT, AND CURRENT FUNDS NEEDED FOR 1,000 STUDENTS On the basis of the standards indicated above, a college for 1,000 students, with a tuition charge of $250 a student. needs $6,792,350 for general endowment with income available for cur- rent expenses. In addition to this, an endowment of at least $1,000,000 is needed to provide an income of $50,000 a year for necessary annual additions to permanent equipment such as books and laboratory apparatus, not included in the current educational budget (see page 80, section 1); at least $500,000 more to provide an income of $25,000 for scholarships for superior students of limited means (see page 61, V); and an additional sum of $125,000 to be used as a revolving fund for loans to students who should be encouraged to undertake the responsibility of repaying the help received. (This would provide $25,000 a year for student loans averaging five years in length.) It is also proposed to provide a fund of $100,000 as current working capital. A college frequently needs to borrow money for short periods of time or to finance some undertaking temporarily in anticipation of expected income. This current fund of $100,000 is intended for such purposes, and when not so needed may be invested in productive securities, the income from which would be available for current expenses. This would provide a small annual income for extra expenses not included in the budget. It is assumed that endowment funds will never be drawn upon for current expenses nor for additions to plant or equipment, and that no endowment securities will ever be used as collateral for loans. The following table summarizes the amounts thus needed as capital investment to provide adequate college opportunities for 1,000 students: 1. Endowment Funds: Endowment for Current Expenses..............$6,792,350.00 Endowment for Annual Additions to Permanent Equipment .......................... 1,000,000.00 Endowment for Scholarships.................... 500,000.00 Revolving Fund for Student Loans............ 125,000.00 $ 8,417,350.00 ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS 2. Plant: Campus, Athletic Fields, Grading, Drain- age System, etc............................... 250,000.00 Educational Buildings .................................. 2,500,000.00 Equipment ............................ ............. 750,000.00 3,500,000.00 3. Current Fund ................................ ............. 100,000.00 $12,017,350.00 This total of $12,017,350 represents the investment created by gifts. It does not include any-self-supporting buildings or equip- ment, such as dormitories, that may be financed out of income (see page 81, section 6), nor does it provide current funds for special research work (see page 62, section 7), nor for a student employ- ment bureau (see page 80, section 2), nor for college publicity (see page 82, section 19). F. ANNUAL COST PER STUDENT The "Annual Cost per Student" is found by dividing the total spent for current educational purposes by the average number in attendance in any given college year. I. Average Attendance The average attendance is found by taking half of the sum of the totals representing the attendance for each semester, as pub- lished in the annual catalogue. Merely nominal registrations (those withdrawing during the first week or two of a given semester) should not be published in the catalogue, nor counted here. In case "terms" are used instead of "semesters," the average attend- ance is found by dividing the sum of the totals for the various terms by the number of terms. No provision is made for a summer term nor for special stu- dents. If a summer session is undertaken, additional funds must be secured. It is assumed that if special students are admitted, special fees will be charged to reimburse the college for any extra expense that may be involved in their instruction. 79 80 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION II. Current Educational Expense The total "Current Educational Expense," upon which the "Annual Cost per Student" is based, should include, as indicated in the above Summary of Educational Expenses, only those items that are directly related to the distinctly educational opportunities provided and that do not result in adding to the book value of the permanent equipment. The following items should therefore not be included: 1. Permanent Equipment. It is assumed that a college of the type in question will provide adequate buildings and all the library books, laboratory apparatus, and other supplies that may be necessary for the proper development and illustration of every course offered. However, all such expenditures for new equipment and build- ings, which result in an addition to the capital investment, appear in the capital account and should not be included in current ex- pense. A separate endowment of one million dollars is suggested on page 78 to provide an income of $50,000 a year for these regu- larly recurring needs for new additions to library, laboratory apparatus, and other permanent equipment not included in the current educational budget. 2. Scholarships. Scholarships awarded on the basis of a stu- dent's need should not be included. Here the institution simply takes the place of the parent in providing financial assistance for a student. (It is assumed that the full amount of tuition for every student will be accounted for and that there will be no "rebates" of tuition.) The expense of maintaining a Bureau of Self-Help to secure employment for students who desire to earn part of their college expenses is in reality another form of scholarship help and should be charged to funds secured for that purpose. The foregoing budget does not provide for this expense. It is assumed that interest on student loans will cover cost of administration and losses. Prizes and prize-scholarships, offered to students on the basis of their scholastic work, regardless of financial need, are educa- tional devices intended to improve the quality of the student's work and, for that reason, are included under "general expenses." ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS 3. Expenses Covered by Special Fees. It is assumed that special fees charged for laboratory courses will be sufficient to provide for the replacement of equipment and materials consumed by individual students. Any unused balances from these fees re- maining at the end of the year should be carried over to the follow- ing year and used for the purposes intended. These fees should not be used to purchase additional new equipment. Instruction in music and art is regarded as an essential part of a liberal arts curriculum. It is assumed that no charge in addi- tion to the regular tuition will be made for class instruction in theoretical courses in these subjects, but that the extra cost of offering individual instruction in these departments will be pro- vided for by special fees. These expenses, covered by special fees for materials and for individual instruction, should not be included in the total upon which the "Annual Cost per Student" is based. 4. Intercollegiate Athletics. It is assumed that all direct ex- pense for intercollegiate athletics will be paid from gate receipts. These expenses will include such costs as those of arranging games, equipping teams, traveling, publicity, and officials. It is also pro- posed to finance whatever stadium or grand stand may be necessary, out of gate receipts. The necessity for this can, of course, be avoided by securing gifts. The expense for maintenance of gymnasiums and athletic fields, and for salaries of all coaches and instructors in physical education is regarded as part of the regular budget for educational purposes. 5. Public Concerts, Lectures, etc., should be self-supporting. If a deficit is likely to occur, this should be made up beforehand by special gifts from those who are willing to act as guarantors. Departmental lectures, designed for groups of students, are re- garded as part of the work of instruction, and are included under "departmental expenses." 6. Dormitories and Dining Halls. Colleges, not being char- itable institutions, are under no obligation to provide room and board for less than cost. There seems to be no good reason why the public should be asked to make gifts for this purpose. Students who are unable to pay the full cost may be helped, as individuals, through scholarships and loan funds. 81 82 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION It is therefore proposed to manage all dormitories and dining halls on a self-supporting basis. This should result in a net income of 6 per cent on the investment and in setting aside each year a proportionate amount for retiring the investment within reasonable time. It is not expected that dormitories will be a source of "commercial profit," nor that there will be any surplus available for any other purpose. It is planned merely to make all dormi- tories and dining halls self-supporting, including financing the in- vestment. The financing of dormitories and other service properties may be done conveniently through a separate corporation, affiliated with the college. Such a corporation might well own and operate all service properties, which could be financed through loans secured by mortgages on these properties. 7. College Hospital and Health Service. This service should be organized on the same plan used for dormitories. A separate fee should be charged to make it self-supporting, including interest, depreciation, and retiring the investment. 8. Heating Plant. Inasmuch as the central heating plant serves such buildings as the dormitories, and the hospital, as well as those used for instruction, it is proposed to operate it on a separate budget, on the same plan used for dormitories, and to allocate the total cost of its operation to the various units served, on some equi- table basis, such as square feet of radiation. The same plan is followed with reference to light, power, and water. 9. Faculty Houses, etc. It is assumed that such auxiliary services as are rendered by faculty houses, college farm, bookstore, laundry, will be self-supporting. After paying interest, deprecia- tion, and a reasonable allowance for retiring the investments, it is not expected that these properties, as a group, will be a source of net income. 10. Publicity and Alumni Bureau. It seems obvious that the cost of financial campaigns and expenses in connection with keeping the public and the alumni interested (Alumni Secretary, Alumni Bulletin, etc.) should not be charged to the current educational budget. The item of direct advertising and other expenses in con- nection with annual efforts to interest students in attending college ANALYSIS OF FINANCIAL NEEDS seem more doubtful. In view of the fact that some colleges are obliged to spend a great deal more money in securing the enroll- ment they desire than others are obliged to do, and having in mind that this expenditure in no way enhances the educational offerings of any college, it seems desirable to exclude these expenses also from the regular educational current budget. No provision is made for any of these expenses in the foregoing budget. Additional income will have to be secured for any expendi- tures for these purposes. 11. Interest on Indebtedness. Interest payments, no matter for what purpose the money is borrowed, are not a part of the cur- rent expenditures for distinctly educational purposes and therefore should not be included in the current educational budget. III. Cost per Student In the foregoing budget it is assumed that the average enroll- ment for the two semesters will be the equivalent of 1,000 full-time students. The total of $589,617.50 represents only the current ex- penditures for the distinctly educational work of the college for a given year, and does not include any of the items referred to in the above paragraphs. Dividing this total of $589,617.50 by 1,000 shows a proposed expenditure of $589.62 per student. It is as- sumed that students will pay a tuition charge of $250, or about 43 per cent of the cost. Deducing the total per student payment ($250) from the total per student cost ($589.62) leaves a balance of $339.62 per student as the proposed net annual cost to the col- lege of each student for the current educational opportunities pro- vided. To this should be added 6 per cent interest on the funds ($3,500,000) invested in grounds and educational buildings and equipment, amounting to $210,000 or $210 per student. Adding this $210 per student, representing an interest charge for educational buildings and equipment, to the net current cost of $339.62 per student, makes a total net annual cost to the college of $549.62 for each student. In addition to the above, it is proposed (see page 61, V) to spend $25,000 a year in assisting a limited number of students with 83 84 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION special scholarships and to offer further assistance in the form of loans amounting to $25,000 a year. From the foregoing analysis, it will be evident that teachers, students, and the public must all cooperate if good college oppor- tunities are to be provided at moderate rates. Even under the most favorable circumstances, teachers' salaries cannot be made as gen- erous as those that men of equal ability can earn in most of the other professions. The public must be prepared to provide the entire physical plant, including buildings and equipment, without cost to the student, and it must provide through endowments or current gifts a large part (57 per cent proposed above) of the actual money spent for current educational purposes. With this help, it is not unreasonable to expect that the student, or his par- ents for him, should bear the rest of the cost. The student who receives no special help would thus be ex- pected to pay the tuition of $250, representing considerably less than one-third of the actual cost of his education, plus his board and room, the charge for which should be sufficient to cover the cost. These latter items, in most standard colleges, run from $350 to $500. In addition to this, a student would have to provide for his personal expenses, which, disregarding extremes, would prob- ably range from $300 to $500, thus making a total annual expense to the student of from $900 to $1,250. A college education should be thought of primarily as an invest- ment and not as an expense. If a student makes worthy use of the opportunities provided, the investment brings rich returns in character and capacity for service and adds to the nation's wealth its most important element-a citizen with powers developed and devoted to noble ends. VII. THE SUPPORT OF THE STATE UNIVERSITY R. R. PRICE Professor and Director of University Extension University of Minnesota In all of this discussion of public support of college education we must go back to the main subject of adapting means to ends. There is not so much distinction as you might think in discussing finances for a state or for a private college or university. After all, the main idea is getting support from the public. In the long run it is a question of getting from public sources the means to an end. As a background to the discussion of the support of state uni- versities, I want to review briefly the way this support started. If we eliminate for the moment one or two institutions in the eastern states, which had their birth early in our history, and which were not at that time typical state universities, the beginning of state support for universities was with the Ordinance of 1787. The subsequent Purchase Act, which supplemented the Ordinance, required that sections 16 and 29 of each township be set aside, respectively, for religion and the common school and that two entire townships be devoted to the support of a university. In each state founded subsequent to these acts, at least two townships of land were accordingly reserved for what was then called a seminary of learning. Thirty states were assisted in founding universities by this and subsequent enactments of the same type; and, in addi- tion, each state has a college of agriculture, or of agriculture and mechanic arts. Most of the seminary lands in the states of the Northwest Ter- ritory were sold at very low prices-ridiculously low. In the state of Ohio they sold for 53 cents an acre. One state received $11.87 per acre, which was a very high price. There were two different grants in Ohio, and two universities were founded. Later, in 1862, they had still a third, which we now know as the Ohio State University. The Federal Land Grant, then, stimulated the founding of universities, and the legislators went to work immediately founding 86 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION them; yet it was long, long years before the people actually took those institutions into their bosoms and claimed them as their own. It was a common belief that land grants would also furnish sufficient income to support the universities. In the act founding the Uni- versity of Kansas there is this clause, "Nothing herein contained shall be construed as involving the state in any expense in the organization of the University." The income from Minnesota's Permanent University Fund for 1926 was $134,000, so you see it is a long, long way from sufficient to support a university. There has been a good deal of criticism about the way these lands were handled. There was, to be sure, a lot of politics and public scandal connected with them. It should be remembered, however, that these lands had to be sold in competition with Federal land that could be pre-empted at $1.25 per acre; that the current generation wanted to benefit from education; that the states were more in need of settlers than land; that immediate prospects of higher educational facilities tended to attract a higher class of set- tlers; that, in short, the prime object was to get the institutions incorporated, established, and opened. In addition to the facts shown in Table I, I want to quote a few figures from the same source on the standing of universities as of June 30, 1924. All of the property of universities, colleges, and professional schools amounted to $1,871,000,000. This repre- sents an increase of 231 per cent since 1900. The total endowment of these institutions was $814,718,813, a gain since 1900 of 359 per cent. Another significant fact is that in the two-year period, 1922-24, the increase of endowment was equal to 65 per cent of the total amount of endowment accumulated from the time of foundation down to 1900. Annual receipts for 1923-24 were nine and one-half times greater than for 1900. During 1922-24 pro- ductive endowment increased 16.5 per cent; number of students, 20.6 per cent; total fees paid by students, 26 per cent. The total cost of all tax-supported education in the United States in 1923 was about 1.8 billion dollars. The nation's average income was about 65 billion dollars. For every $5,000 income, $138.50 was spent for the support of public education; 2.77 per cent of our income would pay all school costs. THE SUPPORT OF THE STATE UNIVERSITY 87 TABLE I RECEIPTS OF UNIVERSITIES, COLLEGES, AND PROFESSIONAL SCHOOLS, 1923-24* PER CENT CURRENT PURPOSES OF TOTAL Student Fees ...................................$ 81,171,612 31 Income from Endowment........... 40,431,608 15 Gifts-Current Expenses ................ 12,375,326 5 United States Grants...................... 13,641,424 5 State and Municipal Grants.......... 73,423,956 28 Other Sources ................................. 42,047,049 16 $263,090,975 100 RooM RENTS AND BOARD Room Rents................................... . 8,934,749 Board ..................................... 28,028,858 - 36,963,607 CAPITAL PURPOSES Increase of Plant State Grants ................................... 18,828,593 Private .................................... 22,632,735 Endowment ..................................... 46,726,677 - 88,188,005 Total ....................... ................. $388,242,587 * U. S. Bureau of Education Bulletin, 1925, No. 45. Our accumulated national wealth in 1922 was nearly 321 bil- lions. The cost of all public education for four years, 1920-24, was about 8.75 billions. During that same four-year period passen- ger automobiles cost over 17 billions. The annual expenditure now for passenger automobiles is 8 billions, and the gas costs one billion. For tobacco alone in 1924 we spent more than the cost of all public education in 1922. In Michigan in 1922 it cost 82 cents per capita to maintain the university. During the same year the people spent per capita for soft drinks $2.90; for candy $3.40; for jewelry $3.45; for admissions to movies and theaters $6.80; for cigars $14.28. Here are some of the figures for Minnesota: 1.75 millions for chewing-gum; 8 millions for sporting-goods; 9 millions for 88 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION jewelry; 14 millions for candy; 16.75 millions for soft drinks and ice cream; 19 millions for movies and theaters; 37.5 millions for tobacco; total, $112.500.000.1 I think too much cannot be made of such facts. When people tell us that the public cannot stand the rising cost of education I think,. as President Cowling said, it is merely piffle. No people that spends so much for nonessentials is on the verge of bank- ruptcy. In 1918 Chancellor Capen calculated that college work cost about $200 per year per student. For the University of Minnesota in 1920-21, Dr. J. B. Sears estimated that the average cost in Lib- eral Arts was $219.15; Engineering, $464.88; Medicine, $461.25; Law, $257.60; and Education, $614.70. Mr. George Zook in 1918 estimated a college education at $365 per year, and that was a fivefold increase since 1892. President Kinley calculated that in 1918 the University of Illinois spent on mere instruction $238.64 for each student. In 1920 the expenditure was estimated at about $500 for all purposes, such as teaching, research, administration, and physical plant operation. Of eight-four institutions dealt with by Thurber,2 we find that eight by state law must charge tuition and fees; thirty-five have laws permitting trustees to fix tuition and fees; in the case of six- teen the laws do not mention tuition or fees; therefore fifty-nine of the eighty-four may or must charge. It is interesting to note the devices used for dodging the issue so as to be able to say in their catalogues that "tuition to state residents is free." If one will look under Contingent Fees, Incidental Fees, Annual Tax, or various other such categories he will probably find the tuition fee concealed. I am speaking now only about Arts and Science; I am talking only about what we call college fees. I have the figures here for 1920 on the derivation of income of state universities and state colleges: student fees, 11.4 per cent; productive funds, 4.5 per cent; state support, 57.2 per cent; U. S. Government, 8.1 per cent; private benefactions, 4.5 per cent; all 1 Research Bulletin, N.E.A., Vol. III, No. 3 (May, 1925). 2 C. H. Thurber, Fiscal Support of State Universities and State Col- leges, U. S. Bureau of Education Bulletin, 1924, No. 28. THE SUPPORT OF THE STATE UNIVERSITY 89 other sources, 14.2 per cent." Figures for 1924 differ only by frac- tional per cents.4 In Minnesota between 1912 and 1920 the total of all taxes levied, state and local, increased over 100 per cent, whereas the total state appropriations to the University increased but 22 per cent. Out of each dollar of all taxes levied in Minnesota for all purposes in 1921, the University received 2.4 cents. TABLE II EXPENDITURES OF STATE UNIVERSITIES AND STATE COLLEGES, 1924-25* PER CENT Operations and Maintenance 1. Salaries and W ages.........................................$ 79,011,421 51 2. Materials, Supplies and Other Expenses.... 36,208,800 23 Capital Outlay 3. Equipment ........................................ 6,277,863 4 4. Lands, Buildings, and Land Improvements 21,733,841 14 Not Detailed Above............................. ......... 8,697,906 6 Trust Funds ................................................. 2,697,906 2 Total .......... ..............................................$154,584,675 100 * U. S. Bureau of Education, Higher Education Circular No. 32, Sept., 1926, p. 5. Michigan spends in the neighborhood of four and one-half millions a year on salaries, while Illinois, Wisconsin, and Minnesota each spends three and one-half millions a year on salaries and wages. Now I should like to get before you some figures on the increase made in recent years. I have called them combined fixed charges. The figures are for the period 1913-21. I am talking in terms of a stationary dollar. The purchasing value of a dollar today as compared with 1914 is, I believe, 66 cents; consequently a college today with the same enrollment as in 1914 would have to add 50 per cent to its revenue to be as well off as it was then, even if it 3 R. R. Price, Financial Support of State Universities (Harvard Uni- versity Press, 1924). 4 U. S. Bureau of Education Bulletin, 1925, No. 12, p. 16. 90 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION had not grown at all. Add the enormous influx of students, and you will see that the colleges have had a double tax. Between 1913 and 1921 in the state colleges of agriculture and mechanic arts, the median increase was $14.00, or 140 per cent; the average increase was $15.00, or 88 per cent. In separate state uni- versities the median increase was $12.00, or 60 per cent; the aver- age $8.00, or 38 per cent. In state universities that combine agricultural colleges, the median increase was $15.00, or 100 per cent; the average $28.00, or 122 per cent.5 During the period from 1890 to 1924 the population of this country increased 78 per cent; the enrollment of collegiate students, 445 per cent. This means that the college enrollment has grown nearly six times as fast as population has increased. It is obvious that state universities have grown faster than they have carried the people with them. In Minnesota the percentage of state support has been chopped from 75.2 in 1914 to 56.9 in 1917, 61.6 in 1921, and 65.9 in 1925. And at best state support covers only about two-thirds of the cost. There is a possibility, but not a probability, of increased sup- port from the Federal Government to state universities. The pre- cedent of land-grant colleges is already established. The National Government has a stake in the training of its youth. An annual appropriation of fifty million dollars for this purpose would not seriously burden Federal finances and would be a great help to state institutions. The danger here is in an attempt at Federal control. State universities should start to build over a term of years endowments amounting to not less than fifty million dollars, using these sources: gifts from individuals; proceeds from land grants; inheritance tax, in whole or in part; severance taxes; and proceeds from escheated estates and clear proceeds from fines for violation of all penal laws, state, county, town, village, and city. After allowance for current expenses, the balance could be divided be- tween the university and the common-school funds. State universities are not so much favored by private benefac- tions as endowed colleges are. They are not so old in traditions "Thurber, op. cit., p. 40. THE SUPPORT OF THE STATE UNIVERSITY 91 and in alumni loyalty nor are there such persistent campaigns to induce wealthy persons to contribute. Yet the University of Michi- gan has received fully one-third of what it possesses from private gifts. Men will contribute to state universities money for buildings but not for endowments. Yet $150,000 to $200,000 will endow a chair in perpetuity and command an absolutely first-rate man, whereas the same amount will build but an ordinary small univer- sity building, which will be useful only about fifty years and will be a constant source of expense for upkeep. We therefore urge that when buildings are given, they be accompanied by an endow- ment for upkeep and maintenance. Many of the universities, especially the endowed ones, are en- couraging classes to present their alma maters with a check for $100,000 or $150,000 on their twenty-fifth anniversary. This is explicitly not for endowment; it is to be expended for some current need. This is a practice that might well be encouraged by state universities as well as by private institutions. Student fees in 1924 constituted 21 per cent of the receipts for all purposes, capital and current. Excluding the receipts for capi- tal purposes and for board and room, student fees represented 31 per cent of the receipts for current expenses. For each dollar toward current expenses paid by students, $2.23 came from other sources. If the receipts for capital purposes were included, for every dollar that students pay, $4.00 more must come from other sources.6 The proportion of receipts from student fees is smaller in state universities than in other institutions of higher learning. In the University of Minnesota for 1925 it was about 16 per cent. The fee system has grown without any controlling principle except that students should not pay the full cost, on the theory that society benefits as well as the individual. When students were studying to become clergymen and teachers, it was felt that society should bear a large part of the expense; but with vocational and technical training becoming more and more prominent it is ques- tionable whether the old attitude is defensible. Several years ago Arnett advocated that student fees should 6 U. S. Bur. of Ed. Bulletin, 1925, No. 45, p. 3. 92 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION approximately equal the salary roll of the instructional staff.7 He found that in endowed colleges the receipts from students averaged 87.5 per cent of the instructional payroll. In women's colleges student fees more than covered the cost of instruction. In the University of Minnesota this would necessitate increasing student fees threefold. In 1927 Arnett concluded that fees should cover the entire cost of instruction, and this was supported by Mr. Rocke- feller, who believes that large endowments for education are going to cease. Thurber advocates full payment of cost by those able to pay and deferred payments after graduation by others. He cites as examples of this policy the universities of Washington and Virginia.8 The difficulty is that we have not yet arrived at an agreement on what should be the basis of these fees. The suggestion has been made that they should represent from one-third to one-half of the cost in colleges and from two-thirds to full cost in profes- sional schools. There ought to be some agreement on what it should cost students to attend a college or university. There is now no principle governing it at all. The mill tax began in Michigan as early as 1867 with .05 mills on the dollar on all taxable property for the support of the university. This gradually increased until in 1921, with a tax of .6 mills, the receipts amounted to three million dollars. No doubt the mill tax is an advantage in that it is flexible; but in Michigan they cut right at the roots of it by stipulating that the university should in no event receive during one biennium more than a certain amount of revenue from the tax. The University of Minnesota mill tax is merely nominal, 0.23 mills. It produced in 1925-26 only $432,547, which of course did not go far. The mill tax is not the panacea it was once thought to be because it is too uncertain and usually is far from adequate. It is not producing as it once did. As you know, the assessed valuation in almost every state is a fictitious figure, sometimes only 'Trevor Arnett, Teachers' Salaries in Certain Endowed Colleges and Universities in the United States, Gen. Ed. Board, Occasional Papers No. 7, 1921, p. 11. 8 Association of American Colleges Bulletin, Feb., 1927. THE SUPPORT OF THE STATE UNIVERSITY 93 one-third of the actual value. Perhaps there should be a fixed mill tax on the total state revenue in addition to a fixed increment over a base year. It is obvious, then, that we have not carried the people with us on the problem of financing state universities, and that as a result state support is not beginning to meet the emergency. I would suggest the following remedies: 1. Keep a complete budget system, with an adequate business staff. The use of a budget gives control of the finances, reveals unsymmetrical developments, and discloses inequities in the dis- tribution of income. 2. So far as practicable, discontinue the offering of courses that belong in secondary schools. Get universities on a true uni- versity level. 3. Restrict free electives. 4. Keep down the cost of buildings. Erect plain, simple structures, not monumental buildings. It should never be forgotten that a new building is a liability as well as an asset. For instance, the new library building at this university set up an additional drain upon the university budget of $20,000. 5. Establish a rational system of fixing fees, having some rela- tion to cost. 6. Inaugurate a systematic campaign for gifts that will be true benefactions. 7. Reform taxation policies to prevent the practice of con- verting wealth into intangible forms that escape taxation. 8. Press for increased Federal subsidies. 9. Ask legislatures for appropriations based upon average per capita expense each two years. VIII. SELECTION AND IMPROVEMENT OF THE COLLEGE FACULTY Guy STANTON FORD Dean of the Graduate School and Professor and Chairman, Department of History, University of Minnesota I am interested in this question of choosing men because I am perfectly clear that it is the one big job in a university. Making budgets is necessary and tinkering with curriculums is busy work; but getting together a real faculty is the only thing that makes a great institution. There is much scurrying around as a result of which we call this man from one institution and that from another; but of the kind of real, careful study of prospective men and sources of supply, of men who will adapt themselves to your insti- tution, I think there is mighty little going on at the present time, and it is the biggest and most challenging job that faces college or university men. To my mind, if you will take any great, outstanding university president and really go back to what he did, you will find that what he did was to build a faculty. We talk about President Eliot of Harvard, what he did with the elective system, and so on. That is the least that he did for Harvard. His real contribution was in picking and calling men, in building up a staff of men who, no matter what the curriculum was, would have made a great educa- tional institution. We talk about Gilman and the founding of Johns Hopkins University. That wouldn't have meant anything if he hadn't called seven outstanding men at the very start. We talk about what Harper did in getting money to make possible the University of Chicago, but it would be a great deal more appre- ciative to say that he chose discriminatingly certain outstanding men. When he had secured them, we may say that there was an institution at Chicago long before they had built any part of their physical plant. I could add a number of men who have been outstanding in their genius for picking a staff. If I were to add a fourth, nearer our own day, it would be Edmund James of the University of Illi- SELECTION OF THE COLLEGE FACULTY nois. What he did in getting a new faculty into that institution transformed it in a decade into a relatively great university. I remember his quoting to me what was really a great tribute. At a meeting of university presidents one of them said to him, "Well, James, we are much obliged to you. It used to be that we had to go scurrying around for men, but now we save ourselves a lot of trouble by looking Illinois over first." David Starr Jordan might be put in this class, but what he did was to transfer practically his entire staff from Indiana to Stanford. In employing men he trusted a great deal to his personal impressions. He would meet a man on the train, talk with him, like him, and go back and offer him a position. That method is not so good, perhaps, as the one sug- gested here of breakfasting with him. I ought to say that if I were considering a place, I should like to take breakfast or luncheon with the head of the institution myself. I think I could learn a lot about the institution and whether I should like to go there or not. I can recall a luncheon that I had with a president once, as a result of which he almost lost me. He didn't smoke and I did, and my disposition and digestion were almost ruined! It is a great task, this picking of men. What Eliot of Harvard did, it seems to me, was this: he didn't always wait for a head of a department to nominate a man. He got men there whether they were needed or not and kept them in cold storage, as it were, be- cause they were the coming men. He chose them for the sake of what they were 'going to be or because he realized that the men picked in the earlier days weren't going to be there forever. For the future of Harvard he put his faith in the men under thirty-five who were on the staff or who could be added. He was particular about the instructors and assistant professors. An institution or- ganized in that way doesn't wait for a man to grow old and die before busying itself with seeing that in the lower ranks good men are coming up. The kind of president who goes to sleep and rests his institution upon what the veterans have done does more damage than any other member of the institution, and that kind of damage has been done over and over again. I am interested in this for another reason. As dean of a gradu- ate school I face the products of the colleges and have an opportu- 95 96 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION nity to talk with them. I will say to you frankly that I think no more tragic an experience can come to these people than when you have to make it clear to them that the institution from which they come has not done its duty by them, and that they cannot come into your graduate work on the footing for which they thought their degree and title qualified them. They say to me almost with tears in their eyes, "It is a sad thing, when you have just four years to spend in college, and no one has told you in time that you were wasting it in a college where the faculty was second-rate and the teaching standards so low that its degree was at a discount." But this element is not the only one. I have some heartening experiences, too. I have a man come to me out of this department or out of that department of some small and struggling college, first one man and then another, and each makes a record outstand- ing at once. Another and another follows out of that same depart- ment; then I know that somewhere back in that little college-and I soon find out who it is-there is one man who knows his stuff and who gets his students fired with enthusiasm to go on. I can name a small institution, narrow and biased in its views, out of which have come to us five outstanding men in the field of biological science and more exceptional graduate students than I have seen entering the University of Minnesota from any other single insti- tution in the dozen years that I have been here. From another institution, better equipped, more liberal than the one just alluded to but still a small college, have come to us in one department alone during the past ten years somewhere around eight or ten graduate students, and every one of them has been a first-class student. I know the man there in the particular field of these students' inter- ests. The case is a demonstration of what President Elliott of Purdue said about not knowing what makes a good teacher. The man in that little college is by no means an outstanding scholar; he cannot even write acceptably; yet somehow or other he so inspires his students that they actually speak of him with tears of gratitude in their eyes. Even if he isn't a scholar, he gives his students something which fires them with enthusiasm to carry on. I have no patience with a college president who through a series of years neglects the opportunity to build a faculty that can turn SELECTION OF THE COLLEGE FACULTY out alumni who will establish their institution's credit in the eyes of the educational world. Last fall I sat on a committee of the Association of American Universities. This committee was con- cerned with the question of rating institutions to determine their facilities for training their graduates to begin graduate work. We had before us the papers of two institutions in the same state and within a relatively short distance of each other. They had both been inspected and the inspectors were present. Reports were made on faculty, equipment, and, incidentally in this case, on the upkeep of buildings and grounds. The majority of the committee seemed in favor of institution A. School B looked a little seedy; the grass wasn't cut, and the buildings weren't being kept up. The question was asked as to what sort of teaching was being done in school A. Did it inspire anyone to think that knowledge is worth while and that going to college isn't all fun? It turned out that school A had had no graduate who had gone on into a graduate school or into any of the better law schools or medical colleges. Institution B, on the other hand, had in its body of teachers the kind of men and women who make school seem worth while. They had a living, influential record of their teaching. Their alumni were their ambassadors. In such cases you don't have to have inspectors. You can get at the proof of good teaching without an elaborate system of classroom inspection. If not, God help the college and college teaching! It isn't secondary work; it is some- thing different. On what basis shall teachers be chosen? Some like them short and black, and others prefer them as gentlemen do-blonde. I have no prescription to lay down. In building a faculty you have first to know your own institution. No matter how big it or its faculty is, the president is the final word in the matter of appoint- ments. But he shouldn't be wholly loaded with such a great responsibility. He should know his institution, its general charac- teristics, and then lay down certain standards. But don't, when you make your list of qualifications necessary in a teacher, lay down the same rules that you do for your student body. Don't draw up a definition of a chap with wings. A man who has spent from eighteen to twenty years in preparation is offered $1,800 to 97 98 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION start with. If he lasts long enough he may get $2,000, provided he regulates his life and conduct according to the personal and de- nominational prejudices inherited and exemplified in the president. Let your faculty exercise some kind of freedom. It pays to gamble on getting worth-while men on your faculty. Even if you have to have a deficit, make your institution worth while; if it dies of a deficit it will have attempted and achieved enough to make its going regretted, and that is more than can be said of every institution that solicits students. The second thing is to know the sources of supply, where to go for men. I think that the average college president doesn't know enough about the institutions where men are trained or the particular department or departments within an institution that produce outstanding teachers. Careful discrimination even among the best graduate schools is necessary to ascertain which depart- ments train and inspire their students. It is up to the college president to find this out. There is a world of meaning in the allu- sion that has been made to a sheaf of recommendations that are half-truths. It is hard to know how to read letters of recommen- dation. It can be done wisely only when you know the writer. A few are given to understatement; more think that all of their geese are swans. You can secure letters that are a great deal more worth while if you will make personal contact with someone in an institution to whom you can trustfully turn to help you find the sort of man who will fill your need. Indiscriminate firing of letters around will not get you the man you want, and very rarely will a teachers' agency be of any real value to a college executive. They are not well enough organized with special reference to the college- teacher type. Now, when you look over a person's record, you are asking for certain qualifications. I hold that there is one attribute in a pro- spective appointee for which there is no substitute, and that is brains. There is no magic in a doctor's degree. It is no panacea. But there is one thing about a man with a doctor's degree: if he writes a thesis and it is published, that is one time when you have a chance to look inside a man's head. You can tell a good deal about his brain quality by the way he handles his subject. It may SELECTION OF THE COLLEGE FACULTY seem supererogative thus to specify brains; but I have had many inquiries in which denominational affiliation or not smoking seemed to be the first requisite. A great many executives demand personality, whatever that may mean-chiefly "front"; but what good is personality when the man is fifty years old? That alone will not get by. Students know whether a teacher has, or has not, the necessary brain quality. I would put up with a great deal in the way of inexperience and the like, so long as a man's shortcomings are not absolutely inimical to his career; but I know perfectly well that if he hasn't the brains, the zest and urge to keep intelligently alive, he is going to be a lia- bility on an institution long before he retires. Students are entitled to the best of intellectual leadership. When I look over a person's record I have come to pay more attention to his undergraduate training than I do, in a certain way, to the place where he got his doctor's degree. But I would make this one qualification: sometime during his career he should have had a connection with a great institution. If he hasn't a native vision, I should like to have him exposed to the vision of some great, forward-looking institution. The fellow who is perfectly content from one year to another with the apparatus of his department or who knows nothing about the improved microscope or the latest scientific periodicals is of no value. It is exceedingly difficult for a graduate student or a college teacher to recover the lost opportu- nity for the larger outlook that comes from' a good, sound, strong undergraduate training. Let me add this proviso, that if you find a strong, promising man who measures up in every way and yet is the product of a small and limited institution, you may be reason- ably sure that you have something out of the ordinary right there. If he has had the urge and determination to make him recover his lost ground and lay the foundations for what was wanting, he is likely never to cease to grow. He has the makings of a real scholar in him. There is another thing of which the small institution is in dan- ger, and that is inbreeding. Too many small colleges are just turning back their own graduates into their faculties after a short period of assistantship. Out of necessity you create an assistant- 99 100 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION ship. Then the incumbent gets married; age and an increasing family secure promotion, and soon you have a man in the highest position with only a bachelor's degree. His own standards being low, he adds teachers no better than he is in training or intellectual caliber. It is an endless round of an institution's trying to lift itself by its own bootstraps. If an institution is to have its own graduates on its faculty, they should be those who have gone forth into larger institutions and have come back with a wider vision and with a surviving respect for their alma mater and who also will do certain work more readily and self-sacrificingly than will gradu- ates from another institution. You should have a few such teaching alumni, but what the right proportion is I don't know. Not more than one-third might well be the maximum. I am inclined to think that most administrators of smaller institutions of higher learning do not fully realize what a respon- sibility they take. They talk about wanting this or that kind of a man; but what responsibilities do they assume when they call some- one who is promising, if they never give him a new book, never give him any new apparatus, and do not watch and reward his growth? There is no place where men control men's lives so greatly as in the academic profession. The head of the department is the man who makes or breaks careers. Certainly, I think that any of us who are in this game must realize these things; and when we talk about judging men we need to be sure not only of our own stand- ards, but that we have given a fair chance to the men and women who have chosen a life career. I have had another illuminating experience. There is a small fund given by one of the foundations to the American Council of Learned Societies. This fund is to be expended by a committee in grants to aid in scholarship or research or study. It is intended to help the men in the smaller colleges, and no single grant exceeds $300. It was surprising to me how many men are eager for such assistance. But here is the other side of it. When we make these grants we write a letter to the president of the institution telling him that one of his faculty has been considered so promising in the scholarly project that he has proposed, that he has been chosen out of a score of applicants. How many presidents do you SELECTION OF THE COLLEGE FACULTY 101 suppose are pleased about it? I wish I could say there are more than there actually are. How many administrators are really studying their faculties and know what to do when an emergency arises? Everyone re- sponsible for picking teachers should have a reserve file, and when- ever he hears a name put it down, keep the file up to date-in short, know where men are when they are needed. I have no sympathy with the president of an institution where the faculty is small, who is absolutely blank when he loses a man. Knowing where you can put your finger on another man is the greatest satisfaction in the world. That and the ability to make it possible for a real teacher to do real teaching are what make an administrator; and such administrators make institutions that are their lengthened and bene- ficent shadows. IX. ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES FOR IMPROVING COLLEGE TEACHING A. J. KLEIN Chief, Division of Higher Education, United States Bureau of Education I am not closely connected with the actual probitms of improve- ment of college teaching. Practically all I can do is to present a report of what the colleges are doing. Since I knew that I would not have the opportunity during the other portions of this Institute to hear the presentation and discussion of the various aspects of this topic, my problem in preparing for the discussion of this sub- ject was to select an approach different from that of previous con- ferences. The work in the Division of Higher Education in the United States Bureau of Education gives me data for such an approach. Considerable information collected in the course of the Bureau's work indicates that it may be profitable to consider the question of the improvement of college teaching from the standpoint of the administrative procedures that have been adopted to accomplish this purpose. That seems logical enough. Most of you are admin- istrators, or aspire to be, and your administration will be measured by its ability to improve the quality of instruction given to students. In the main, the information contained in this discussion will be based on data obtained from 74 institutions, 59 of which I have personally visited during the last 18 months. In every case I in- quired concerning their procedure in the improvement of the teach- ing of the resident college faculty. In 26 of the 59 institutions that I visited personally, inquiry was conducted as a part of more or less extended surveys of the institutions themselves. I am also indebted to an unpublished report of an inquiry conducted by the questionnaire method and kindly furnished me by Charles D. Bo- hannan, dean of agricultural education and vice-dean of the Col- lege of Agriculture in the New Mexico College of Agriculture. He secured information from 47 of the 52 white land-grant colleges of the United States about certain definite measures adopted to im- ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES prove teaching. During the last six months I visited 25 of the colleges covered by Dean Bohannan's material. I am indebted also to the reports of three survey groups which, under my direction, have surveyed 49 negro colleges and universities during the last four months. These 49 negro institutions are not included in the 74 institutions tabulated. Of these 74 institutions, there is an undue predominance of land-grant colleges (47) and of negro institutions (17), but 22 of the 47 land-grant colleges are also state universities. There are only 10 white private institutions included in the 74. For this group probably a larger number of white private institutions would have been highly desirable if I could have considered them. I think, however, that these figures may perhaps interest you. Of the 74 institutions considered, 56 have adopted, or put into opera- tion experimentally, some form of administrative procedure de- signed to improve the quality of teaching in the college. Excluded from such procedure is encouragement of research and graduate work on the part of the faculty. In other words, subject-matter preparation is not included unless incident to some other means of improving the quality of college teaching. On the other hand, no attempt is made to consider classroom devices. We are inter- ested in the administrative measures that have been adopted for the purpose of improving the quality of the teaching in the insti- tution. I shall attempt to classify these procedures, give you the figures, make brief comment, and, in one or two instances, I will go into a little more detail about plans that are rather unusual. Considerable criticism of the basis for college employment has been directed against the appointment of raw graduate students who have had no teaching experience. It is interesting, therefore, to discover that 7 of the 74 institutions have laid down as a condi- tion of employment definite prescriptions with reference to prior teaching experience. These prescriptions in most cases vary for different faculty ranks. Seven additional institutions do not lay down definite prescriptions but require "some" prior experience. In 13 of the 14 cases-that is, the 7 that prescribed definite amounts and 7 that prescribed "some," it is not stated whether the experi- ence demanded must be in college or in high school. It is probable 103 104 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION that in the case of two schools, one of engineering and one of min- ing, the experience referred to may be in part practical experience in those professions, not teaching experience. One of the 14 insti- tutions prescribes three years of college experience for professors, while for the other ranks high-school or public-school teaching may be used to satisfy the experience requirement. In other words, presumably three years of any kind of teaching experience for those below the rank of professors is acceptable. Of course, if high- school experience is permitted it presupposes also some degree of professional training, for such training is a prerequisite to practi- cally all public-school positions that would be occupied by men aspir- ing to employment in colleges of the grade these tabulations cover. The study of education and of methods of teaching is being advocated increasingly as a solution for poor college teaching. Of the 74 institutions for which information was obtained, it is perhaps significant that only 4 four-year colleges have laid down definite prescriptions of any kind with reference to hours of professional education as prerequisites for employment. It may interest you to know that Maine requires 12 hours of instructors. Tennessee re- quires that professors have 12 hours and the remaining portion of the staff 5 hours. The School of Education in Pennsylvania State College requires Ph.D.'s with a major in Education, and masters must be masters in Education. But since this rule is confined to the School of Education, it has little significance for the general college. In Rhode Island the equivalent of 15 semester hours is required by state law if advantage is to be taken of the state's pen- sion system. It is rather interesting to note that of the forty-seven land- grant colleges considered, only the four mentioned above have definite prescriptions for educational training as a condition of college employment. The interest in this fact arises from a reso- lution passed by the Land-Grant College Association some time ago, which recommended that members of the staffs of land-grant colleges employed in the future should have definite amounts of professional training in Education. Apparently the resolution was inspired by the administrative officers of the Association, but has not been practicable of enforcement. ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES To return to the case of Rhode Island, the requirement of pro- fessional education, it must be noted, is not absolute, but participa- tion in the state pension provision is contingent upon the college professor's having had fifteen hours of training or study in Education. The part of the law which sets up standards of quali- fication for the professional certificate provides for issue of such certificate by the State Commissioner of Education on the authority of the State Board of Education. The certification is for a five- year period, renewable for five years on evidence of successful teaching. No experience prior to the issue of the certificate is required, but graduate study of three years following graduation from an approved college and 216 hours of approved professional study are prescribed. Credit for all the professional subjects may be obtained by examination or by work in courses. In addition to the four cases mentioned in which definite pre- scriptions are laid down, the Michigan State College "looks for" such training, but when the president was asked whether lack of such training barred a man from employment, he replied, "No, not if he is a good man." Baylor University in Texas asks that new men have some training in professional education, but the amount is not prescribed. El Paso Junior College requires that the heads of departments qualify by professional education, but since this institution is attached to a high school, it has comparatively little significance as representing the practice of colleges. Of the institutions that do not require definite amounts of train- ing in Education the practice evolved by Clemson College in South Carolina is most interesting. A system has been adopted of pro- moting faculty members at the beginning of a year of leave for study. The institution, represented by the dean and the president, rather definitely prescribes what the man thus promoted must take during his absence. The institution says, "We are promoting you, but while you are away you should study certain things." Included in these are educational subjects related to his specific field or to general ones in case he has not previously had basic training in psychology and related subjects that aid in his teaching. I found this practice in no other institution. 105 106 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION The reasons for failure to prescribe professional training in Education as a prerequisite to employment are rather obvious. Con- siderable lack of confidence exists with reference to the effective- ness of educational training as a means of improving teaching. President- Elliott puts it this way, "Indeed, looking back over the last twenty years, I am not certain that such a requirement has any relationship whatever to high-grade instructional service." Whether we agree or do not agree, this opinion is rather general. Lack of confidence does not arise from the failure of the educationist to provide a large body of useful and helpful material. Nor is there much inclination to deny that established professors and deans of long experience are noticeably ignorant of this material. Doubt about the effectiveness of professional courses in Education is to a considerable degree a survival of the attitude inspired by emphasis upon mechanical methods during the earlier history of teacher- training. Perhaps also many normal school and teachers' college faculties are still guilty of an "holier than thou" aroma! The contention that courses have not been offered that are suit- able for graduate students who are preparing to teach in colleges and for professors who are already teaching in colleges has con- siderable force. To meet this situation the institutions concerned have developed two types of courses. One type is prepared espe- cially for members of the faculty already employed. Another is intended for graduate students who contemplate college teaching. Courses prepared especially for the faculty are sometimes given with credit toward an advanced degree, but are more usually with- out such credit. The feeling in many colleges seems to be rather strong that a faculty member should not earn graduate degrees in the institution that employs him. Eleven of the seventy-four institutions have tried one or the other of these types of courses, and three additional colleges plan to give courses especially for the benefit of their faculties. Two of the latter are intended to be voluntary and one will be compulsory, the latter being for new members of the faculty who have not had training in Education. Courses of this kind are given by the School of Education, although in some instances other schools of the insti- tution may participate in the work. ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES The immediate significance of courses designed to prepare graduate students for college teaching lies in the fact that they may be open to faculty members of the institution in which the courses are offered. Mr. Boyd H. Bode, of Ohio State University, described one of these courses, which Ohio State University is con- templating, substantially as follows: "The course is planned by the Graduate Council as a three-quarter course. It will deal, first, with the scientific method; second, historical and social background; and third, with such questions as logical versus psychological organ- ization, the meaning of a liberal education, and the like. The third quarter will be conducted by the College of Education and the course will be required of all graduate students who plan to teach in college." Courses are also offered by Chicago, Cornell (for mechanical engineers this summer), New York University, Columbia Univer- sity Teachers College, and perhaps others; but quite frequently the greater part of the emphasis is upon administration and organi- zation rather than upon classroom work or upon subjects that con- tribute to the improvement of classroom work. In this connection it should be noted that the Harvard Graduate School of Education prepares only college teachers of Education and has, therefore, little significance for the general college teacher. I tried to find out a little about the success of the courses pre- pared especially for the college faculty, and it seems that they are not very successful. When the compulsory element is introduced, they do not work at all. One president reported that the faculty regarded such work as a challenge to their liberty and used the class, therefore, as an opportunity to reject everything offered, or at least to wrangle over petty details. Where classes are voluntary, the faculty looks upon them as periods for discussion upon the basis of general knowledge. Quite generally members of the faculty will not do the studying that the School of Education plans the courses to require. In one instance, however, in which the course was planned by the class itself upon the basis of individual prob- lems proposed by its members, considerable enthusiasm was aroused, and the work went rather better than average. Voluntary attendance has been somewhat more successful than compulsory enrollment, 107 108 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION but not a great deal of enthusiasm exists anywhere except upon the part of the president and the education folk. Except for occasional individuals, interviews with the subjects of the experiment discov- ered few who regarded it as other than something to be tolerated and taken with a considerable degree of salt. I have interviewed 180 deans and presidents during the last six months and find that courses given primarily for graduate students, but open to volun- tary attendance on the part of faculty members, with credit given toward higher degrees, seem somewhat more promising than special faculty courses, in their effect upon the few who will attend. The fault lies, of couise, in the fact that only those whose initial interest is strong will enroll. This element constitutes but a small propor- tion of the faculty. Closely related to special courses upon methods of college teach- ing is the attendance of faculty members upon regular courses given by the School of Education. Eleven of the seventy-four institu- tions report that they have faculty members attending regular classes of the School of Education. One institution plans to require young instructors to take some of the work regularly given by the School of Education in those cases in which the instructor has not had professional training in Education. Of the eleven institutions whose faculty members go to regular courses and the eleven who have special courses for the faculty, two cases show attendance upon both regular and special classes. Another device adopted by some institutions is a series of lec- tures and forums conducted by outside men. This is done by nine- teen of the seventy-four institutions. The procedure varies from occasional lectures to continuous two-week forums. Attendance is apparently always voluntary, but the prestige of the outside man is usually such that everybody attends. The results of this pro- cedure are not very easily measured. The outside man is, of course, tempted to use material he has already developed and cannot be familiar with the local situation. The interest in him and what he has to say may be set temporarily at a rather high pitch, but the results are usually not very permanent unless, under the impetus of this outside force, the institution itself develops some systematic and more largely self-directed consideration by the faculty itself of the problems of teaching. ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES Whether inspired by work conducted by outside men brought in for the purpose or developed within the institution, a group of devices has arisen each of which has many of the advantages of regular courses. These methods are variously known as "discus- sion clubs," "faculty forums," or "faculty seminars." The advan- tage is that they are voluntary and carried on under the more or less inspired initiative of the faculty itself. They command a larger degree of self-directed activity and are not usually conducted under the restraint of administrative requirements. Fifteen of the group of seventy-four institutions have such clubs or forums. Not in every case, however, does the club include the entire staff. In several instances schools or departments have become interested in educational questions and organized their own clubs or directed existing clubs to educational study. The engineers are especially active in this matter of study clubs. This may be due in part to the survey made by the Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education. In such clubs set programs are usually planned ahead, and the study and research on the part of those who are to read papers and lead discussions may be considerable. When clubs are intended for the entire institution, the voluntary feature is maintained but may be inspired by pressure from the adminis- tration. In the case of one negro college the president stated that they had a voluntary club for discussion of educational problems, and he displayed considerable enthusiasm over the seriousness of the work and the fine results obtained. I was a little suspicious, and so I questioned him about the attendance and found that the entire faculty belonged to the club. I found that the president of the college was president of the club ex officio and that he appointed all committees. He sat with the program committee and passed upon its plans. I suggested to him that this did not look very voluntary to me, and that under this procedure he dominated the situation, but he insisted that it was a voluntary matter. But when I asked him whether or not promotions and increases in salaries that he recommended depended in part upon the attitude and par- ticipation of his faculty in the club, he said, "They know very w'ell that if they don't work in the club, they don't stand much chance of promotion or of increase in salary." 109 110 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION The weakness in the voluntary club is the temporary character of leadership in many cases. Unless the School of Education man is a very attractive person who lacks the extreme pedagogical odor, he frequently fails in establishing his leadership in the faculty group. If there is no strong man in another department who is interested in the problems of education, the clubs are likely to dwindle off into affairs of little significance. A further difficulty is that when they are entirely independent and voluntary, the admin- istration may seriously object (I was rather surprised at this) to the time taken for the study, or to the use of regular classes for experimental purposes. In such cases when the voluntary club decides that a procedure or method would be advisable, the admin- istration may not favor it, and the work of the club is left hanging in the air. Some of the weaknesses of the voluntary-club procedure have been avoided when formal discussion of professional education is tied up definitely with faculty or departmental meetings. Twenty- eight of the seventy-four institutions report that one or more meet- ings of the faculty each month are devoted to carrying out carefully planned programs upon the subject of improvement of instruction. The degree of compulsion implied by making such work the regular order of business of the official faculty meeting is minimized by the fact that the faculty thus escapes the wearisome and trivial quibbles to which they are accustomed in faculty assemblies. It is a- relief to talk about something different, and they can afford to disregard the elements of compulsion. This plan has the further advantage that when a decision is reached or a proposal made it has the weight of official action. Of course some of the papers are regarded merely as wearisome assignments, which cannot be es- caped, and which must be got off with the least trouble possible. Usually, however, in the faculty there will be enough antagonism or friendship to arouse a considerable degree of effort. Pertinent criticism by colleagues is a constant spur. It is something to watch out for. Faculty attention is frequently not merely courteous listening such as is accorded an outside speaker. The obstreperous individual who delights in his reputation as a scrapper is not free, when work of this kind is conducted as part of faculty procedure, ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES to discuss an issue as easily as is the case when an outside leader is brought in. Nor can the uninterested or antagonistic professor withdraw quite so completely as he may if he does not like the trend of the discussion in the voluntary club. In addition to the regular general faculty program, the device of appointing special committees for special studies has been adopted in eleven of the seventy-four institutions. This plan is possible only if the problems have been defined and the interest of departments and of individuals determined. The function of these special committees ranges all the way from mere planning of the annual program to planning and carrying out specific studies and experiments in teaching. Although a new venture, the committee on academic teaching in the University of Oregon is a splendid example of the development of faculty committees. A subcommittee has been formed to plan educational experiments in various depart- ments. The departments themselves conduct the experiments in ac- cordance with the plans developed by the subcommittee and report to the faculty. Another committee is studying the problem- and project-methods of instruction and carrying on some experiments in the effectiveness of these methods. A third subcommittee works on tests, measurements, and examinations, a fourth on the lecture method, and a fifth on departmental objectives in teaching. Other subcommittees contribute a general consideration by the institution, of the improvement of instruction in the University. This method of procedure has engaged the activity and a considerable degree of interest on the part of from one-half to two-thirds of the faculty. Success of the committee method is most probable if the adminis- tration exercises aggressive and personal leadership. I have addressed the question, "How do you know what kind of teaching you have?" to many administrative officers. The re- plies received were various and in some cases almost pathetic. Nineteen of the seventy-four institutions claim some form of class inspection, but further personal questioning leads one to suspect that this is not a very serious matter in many cases. Deans and presidents quite generally respect the sensitiveness of the college professor and avoid any appearance of open inquiry and criticism. As things now stand, the resentment of inspection and supervision 111 112 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION felt by college people is on the whole justified. Most deans, and most presidents, too, base their judgment of class teaching upon personal prejudices rather than upon scientific knowledge or edu- cational training. The faculty man feels that the usual adminis- trator is not competent to pass upon classroom work. Nor have the educational departments generally excited the whole-hearted respect of the other schools and colleges. This is due in part to the traditions previously mentioned, and in part to early experi- ences with men in teacher-training who were of a peculiar type that does not appeal to men of the world or to men of the academic cloister. In part also it is due to the preoccupation of many of our educationists with details which are regarded as more or less irrelevant rather than as fundamental principles or helpful, appli- cable suggestions. One dean presented another side to the problem of judging class work when asked whether he ever visited his classes. "No," he said, "I know who are some of the rotten teachers in this university, but I can't do anything about it. Why should I visit the classes to find more rotten teachers as long as it doesn't make any difference anyway?" The tendency of faculty members is to take the position that advancement lies in research in their subject-matter fields. Such an attitude is justified, of course, by the prevailing practice, which judges faculty members upon the basis of research or literary productiveness rather than upon the basis of what is done in the classroom. Promotions in rank and salary are only in a slight degree dependent upon teaching. The professor who acts as though this were not true is quite frequently regarded as a "queer duck" and "back number" by his colleagues. Technicalizing the obvious in good teaching may not win the respect of other subject- matter departments for professional education, as it has in many instances for other fields of research. In this connection it may be of interest, and perhaps even sig- nificant, that in some of the agricultural colleges a tendency exists that would separate the experiment-station research staff and the resident teaching staff. This proposal is supported by the argu- ment that when the same man is employed part-time in each, either the teaching or the research suffers. ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES To return to class supervision in college work, a few cases were found in which inspection of teaching is carried on rather system- atically and carefully. Conferences with the instructor are even based upon the results of such inquiry. In one case the dean stated that the president and he were very brutal about visiting and criti- cizing, but that it had been carried on without any special resent- ment on the part of the faculty. No doubt this was a case of strong power to hire and fire, but it was also possible because the dean and president in the institution happen to be very human and understanding persons. Two very interesting methods of actual inspection and study of class work have come to my attention, one in the A. and M. College of Texas and the other in Purdue University. Much of the work done at Purdue has been described in printed form. In the Texas institution the Department of Vocational Education was invited by the College of Agriculture to make a systematic survey of the class and teaching work of the college. The inquiry and study extended over a period of two months. A formal report was prepared by the Education Department and presented to the fac- ulty of the Agricultural College in a series of meetings and discus- sions. Apparently the results were good. Interest was aroused; some disagreement was stirred up, to be sure, but on the whole the tendency was to produce effective action and further self-directed study by the faculty. Negro colleges and universities seem to be more thorough-going in their supervision of class work than is the case in white institu- tions. This is, of course, natural since many of these institutions have either just passed or are in the process of passing from the grade of high schools to that of colleges. They have carried over into college work familiar methods of supervision and correction of faults discovered by supervision. Further, the administration in the negro college quite generally exercises a stronger control over the faculty than is the case in white institutions. In one negro institution I found that the president requires the deans to visit classes and to make a daily personal report on what they find. In case the dean fails to visit or to discover faults, the president arbi- trarily gives him a limited period to do both under direct threat 113 114 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION of discharge. In the case of faults discovered, the president insists upon the dean's making himself responsible for correction. Sup- plementary inspections are made by the president himself. In other negro institutions, also, the supervision is frequently very careful and usually conducted by persons with adequate educational training. Since a distinguishing characteristic of negro presidents seems to be autocracy, combined with a large degree of more or less humorous common sense, the results are on the whole good. One extremely diplomatic negro president told me that he car- ried on his inspection personally when he suspected an instructor of incompetence. He does this by bringing visitors from outside to visit the classroom in order to show, so he said, "what fine work the instructor is doing." As the president put it, "If I take a visitor to visit the class and the work is poor, I call the instructor in and tell him he has brought shame to the institution, and that the next time I come to one of his classes, I don't want to find such and such conditions." On the whole, however, among white institutions, the most gen- erally used means of knowing what kind of instruction is going on is student report. It is interesting to see how much dependence is placed upon this basis for judgment. Systematic inquiry among alumni is also regarded as helpful, although athletic and other prejudices on the part of alumni seem to be given more weight by presidents than are similar forms of student bias. In this connection, two institutions that I visited, both colored, employ inspectors who visit the graduates of the institution, in their schools when they are teachers, or at their places of employ- ment. The inspector talks with these former students and with the employers about the deficiencies of their past instruction. The results of such inspection are then brought back to the institutions and frankly presented to the faculty. Faults of methods of in- struction and of content of courses are sought. The administration thus takes cognizance systematically of the results produced by the faculty. If an individual is constantly reported as a source of institutional weakness, the man is discharged or given an opportu- nity to study further when the deficiencies are likely to be corrected by study. In another negro institution the president requires the ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES librarian to submit to him each month a list of the reading matter that members of the faculty have obtained from the library. Un- less professional magazines or other educational reading is shown on the list rather constantly, the president makes direct inquiry of the delinquent faculty member and asks him why he has not read so and so. In another negro institution each teacher is required to prepare a detailed syllabus of the work for each course. The dean is required to see that the teacher follows the syllabus and presents the material effectively. An ingenious method of inspecting classes has been worked out by one negro president. He appoints committees of two or three teachers to visit classes in other departments. They then make a written report to the president. He appoints committees of trade teachers to visit the academic teachers, committees of science men to visit the arts men, and so on. In faculty meetings the president then reads portions of the committees' reports. It is admitted that the discussions that result are general and warm. While the admin- istrative control in negro institutions is very much more complete, in most cases, than in white institutions, one must admire the negro presidents who refuse to pussy-foot in dealing with their faculties. One of the best approaches, apparently, to the problem of improving the quality of teaching is through enlisting the faculty in studies of the content of college courses or in assuming a slightly larger degree of control over content of courses given. Faculty members seem somewhat generally inclined to believe that the administration has a larger legitimate interest and degree of con- trol over what is given than over how it is given. No doubt recog- nition of real dangers of duplication of effort and of subject matter as between various courses works also to make faculty members somewhat less touchy about administrative interferences in these fields. Engineers are apparently very much alive to possibilities of improvement both in content and method. In two institutions I found very interesting processes being carried on by the colleges of engineering. In one of the colleges every member of the engi- neering faculty is required to state for each course given by him why engineering students should take that course. Then he is 115 116 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION required to put down the specific things he expects the student to know and to do after he has finished the course, and finally (this is the joker) he must state how he expects to teach the students the things he expects them to know and do. The Oregon Agricul- tural College at Corvallis operates a somewhat similar plan in the engineering division, although the refinements have been worked out in somewhat greater detail. The process described is preceded by presentation of material dealing with general and specific edu- cational theory. Some of the statements prepared by professors are most interesting. The reports are very carefully done and have led to a great deal of collateral study. Although the purpose of these analyses is to discover duplications and to justify specific activities or content, such an examination of material makes neces- sary a restatement of the objectives of the courses. The problem of how to accomplish the "know" and "do" portions of the program becomes definite, practical, and personal. After all, getting better teaching is largely a matter of getting mental activity on the part of the faculty. Morrison's statement that, given the material to think about, a method of thinking, and a motive for thinking, any normal individual will think, has force when applied to the instructor as well as when applied to the student. Another method of approach to the problem of stirring up the faculty minds to consider the processes of teaching is that found at the University of Southern California. In this case the dean of the School of Education sets up ten objectives for college edu- cation based on the National Education Association's cardinal prin- ciples of secondary education. After these ten objectives have been explained to the faculty, each instructor is required to put down in writing what each of his courses contributes to each of these objectives. Some of the returns were examined. They are interesting and might afford the basis for better catalogue descrip- tions of courses offered. They might even give some light on whether or not the typical student schedule covers the objective of the college. But, in my opinion, the ordinary college faculty would find them somewhat vague and irritating. The procedure smacks somewhat of the abstract and the impracticable, which the ADMINISTRATIVE PROCEDURES antagonistic professor is all too ready to charge against educa- tionists. One of the most hopeful things is the increasing employment in institutions of men whose major time is given to studying the inter- nal problems of the institution. One rather amusing case comes to mind, illustrating this situation. At a Michigan institution (not the University of Michigan) where an assistant is employed, he did not dare touch the faculty at all as far as the class work was concerned, but made a practice of reading over all the faculty re- ports and letters. Whenever he found a letter charging that the school was very poor in any respect, or a report showing that a student was having difficulty with specific work, the assistant wrote a note to the faculty member who made the report. The assistant's note called attention to the possibility that the School of Education might have some information about how to correct the situation complained of and suggested that the faculty member go over and see the head of the School of Education. As a result ten or twelve faculty men who would not previously touch the School of Educa- tion with a ten-foot pole are now seeking personal advice and assistance there. This procedure will ultimately become system- atized. Circuitous means seem to work best in the beginning. The direct method does not produce results so quickly. This is a very incomplete study of the devices used for improve- ment in college teaching. I do not intend it to be discouraging. It is not discouraging. These problems are very general. There is progress being made constantly. There is, of course, need for some reform. I don't know just how it will be brought about. You may be interested to know that Dean Haggerty of Minnesota and Dean Effinger of Michigan have asked that the Bureau of Education call a conference of the men most active in the study of this ques- tion to see if from such a conference, study on a national scale of the problems of improving college teaching can be launched. I hope very much that such a conference may be called and that it will result in something tangible and effective. 117 X. THE PRESENT STATUS OF THE JUNIOR COLLEGE LEONARD V. Koos Professor of Secondary Education University of Minnesota SOURCE OF MATERIALS OF THE PRESENT SURVEY One who reads at all widely on education frequently encounters conjectures as to the present status of the junior college. These estimates usually pertain to the numbers of units of this new organ- ization now in operation, their enrollment, and the like. Some of these estimates are wild indeed, and few, if any, are based on an actual recent count. In endeavoring to predict the future organi- zation of American education and the place of the junior college in it, it is desirable from time to time to take some sort of inventory of the movement. It is the purpose of this paper to report simply and briefly on its present extent. The materials reported have been drawn from what is in effect a re-count of junior colleges for 1927. An earlier canvass of the status of the movement was made by the writer for the year 1922, that is, five years ago. The present inquiry was made by methods as nearly identical with those used in the earlier study as possible. Essential elements in the procedure were (1) inquiries aiming to locate all junior colleges in operation and (2) inquiries to all junior colleges as to such matters as dates of establishment, enrollment by year and sex, auspices of control. Inquiries of the former sort went to all state departments of education, all state universities, and all junior colleges already on the lists kept by the writer. All three of these sources aided in discovering junior colleges recently established. Wherever necessary to secure a response, second and third inquiries of the latter sort were sent to institutions not answer- ing the first request. Even the third request did not elicit re- sponses from all institutions appealed to, although the number not making some kind of acknowledgment was very small. In cases of failure to respond, the institution was left off the final list of junior colleges except where the writer had evidence through other avenues that it was operating as a junior college. For this and PRESENT STATUS OF THE JUNIOR COLLEGE 119 other reasons it may be assumed that what is being reported is less than a full count of junior colleges, although, in view of the methods used, it cannot be far from the total number in operation. Until we have some official agency with coercive power to secure the data, we shall never be able to report a full count of such units. A few further explanatory comments are necessary for an ade- quate appreciation of the data reported below. The count includes a number of junior-college units, nineteen, in fact, announced to begin operation at the opening of or during the school year 1927-28. All others included reported students in one or both junior-college years during the school year 1926-27. No institution is included whose authorities indicated a preference not to be included in a list of junior colleges. Among those thus excluded from the count here reported are a number of institutions offering four years of college work but approved for only two years of college work by the local state university or other standardizing agency. From the list were excluded a few institutions now giving only two years of college work, whose authorities look forward to early extension to include the two remaining college years and, therefore, prefer not to have their institutions identified with junior colleges. On the other hand, not all institutions that are included in the count and that offer one or two years of college work have had this work approved by some standardizing agency. This pro- cedure may seem open to criticism, but is justified by the absence to date of agencies to standardize junior colleges in certain states and in wider-than-state areas and even more by the fact that extent of development of schools on other levels, for example, high schools and colleges, is often, and quite properly, measured without regard to standardization. NUMBERS AND TOTAL ENROLLMENTS OF JuNIOR COLLEGES BY TYPES With the exception of the lower divisions of colleges and uni- versities, which are not being considered here, the total number of junior colleges discovered after the manner of inquiry described is 325 (see Table III). This is well over a hundred more than were in operation during 1922, only five years ago. 120 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Public Junior Colleges.-Of the whole number almost a third- 105, to be exact-were public junior colleges, that is, parts of local public school systems. For the most part these units are main- tained in connection with public high schools. This represents an increase from a total of 46 units in 1922, and means that the num- ber of such units was much more than doubled during the half- decade intervening. State Junior Colleges.-The group designated as state institu- tions numbers 31, an increase of only 7 since 1922. This is an exceedingly diverse group, including as it does, among others, 7 maintained as parts of normal schools or teachers' colleges; 3 as county schools supported mainly from state resources in a state in which the county is not a dominant educational unit; 1 as a branch of the state university; at least 3 as branches of the state college of agriculture and mechanic arts; and a number of others more or less independent of other educational institutions, but under state control. It is significant to note that the number in normal schools and teachers' colleges dropped between 1922 and 1927 from 18 to 7. This decrease represents a marked defection from the movement by teacher-training institutions. It seems, however, not to be out of harmony with a somewhat general insta- bility and heterogeneity of the state type of junior college. TABLE III NUMBERS OF JUNIOR COLLEGES OF EACH AND ALL TYPES AND NUMBERS OF STUDENTS ENROLLED, 1927 TYPE OF NUMBERS OF NUMBERS OF UNIT SCHOOLS STUDENTS Public 105 16,382 State 31 3,763 Private 189 15,485 All 325 35,630 Private Junior Colleges.-Institutions of this type outnumber the total of both the foregoing, 189 having been located during the progress of the survey. This is an increase from 137 in 1922, an increase of almost 40 per cent. The term "private," of course, PRESENT STATUS OF THE JUNIOR COLLEGE 121 represents a wide variety of types of control, ranging from private- venture schools maintained for profit, at one extreme, to units under complete denominational control, at the other. Reports on enrollment during 1926-27 are at hand for 284 of the 325 junior colleges represented in the study. Such data are quite naturally not available for the 18 units beginning operation during the school year 1927-28. Of the remaining 23 for which data on enrollment were not reported, 5 are public units, 7 are state units, and 11 are private units. Three of the state units not report- ing could not do so because of the impossibility of distinguishing junior-college and teacher-training students. The full count of enrollment in junior-college years only, in the units reporting, was 35,630, the equivalent of the enrollment in four or five large universities, or in one hundred to one hundred and fifty small col- leges. The enrollment in each of the three types of junior colleges was, respectively, 16,382, 3,763, and 15,485 students. Compared with 1922 the total enrollment in 1926-27 represents an increase of 121 per cent. The increases for the three types were: public, 217 per cent; state, 15 per cent; private, 102 per cent. Judged by the increments both in numbers and in enrollment the public junior college is more dynamic than the private junior college, and the private junior college than the junior college on state foundations. SIZE OF JUNIOR COLLEGES AS MEASURED BY NUMBERS OF STUDENTS ENROLLED The present status of the junior college is shown not merely by the number of institutions in existence and the facts on gross enrollments, but also by the enrollments in individual units. Data of the latter type are presented in Table IV and Figure 3. The former contains evidence that institutions of each of the three types range widely in size, although the range is greatest for public units. The measures of central tendency near the foot of this table and in the figure show that public units tend to be largest. They are followed closely by state units. Private units lag notably behind the other types in this respect. Many units of all types are small, especially when compared with the tentative minimum standard of one hundred fifty to two 122 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION hundred students proposed elsewhere by the present writer.' There are, on the other hand, many junior colleges that meet such a standard. Moreover, comparison of the present measures of cen- tral tendency with those obtained five years ago,2 discloses sub- stantial progress in this regard during the intervening period, progress prophetic of even greater improvement. TABLE IV DISTRIBUTIONS OF JUNIOR COLLEGES BY NUMBERS OF STUDENTS ENROLLED DURING 1926-27, AND AVERAGE, MEDIANS, AND QUARTILEs OF ENROLLMENT TYPE OF JUNIOR COLLEGE ENROLLMENT Public State Private All Less than 25 5 .... 20 25 25- 49 50- 74 75- 99 100- 124 125- 149 150- 174 175- 199 200- 299 300- 399 400- 499 500- 999 1000-1999 2000-2999 No data Average � First Quartile Median Third Quartile Range 17 12 9 8 7 4 4 9 6 4 1 1 18* 188 49 103 194 5 to 2471 3 3 4 5 1 3 1 1 2 1 157 73 101 164 33 to 620 41 30 26 17 13 5 7 10 2 1 1 16 90 36 70 116 1 to 533 61 45 39 30 21 12 12 20 8 3 6 1 1 41 125 41 80 138 1 to 2471 * Thirteen new in 1927. t Three do not separate junior-college students from teacher-training students. $ Five new in 1927. � Computed from original distributions. 1 Jnior-College Movement (Ginn and Company, 1925), pp. 380-81. 2 Ibid., p. 13. PRESENT STATUS OF THE JUNIOR COLLEGE 123 FIGURE 3 MEDIAN ENROLLMENTS, AND RANGE OF ENROLLMENTS OF THE MIDDLE 50 PER CENT, OF EACH TYPE AND OF ALL TYPES OF JUNIOR COLLEGES Type of NumBe6 of .students Junior Collefe 0 40 80 120 160 200 Public 3rat- Privare - All (The length of line represents the range of the middle 50 per cent; the square locates the median.) THE DISTRIBUTION OF JUNIOR COLLEGES The geographic distribution of these 325 junior colleges is shown in Figure 4, an outline map of the United States in which the loca- tion of each institution is indicated by type. A major impression afforded by examination of this map is that junior colleges are rather generally distributed over the entire country. In fact, they are to be found in thirty-nine of the forty-eight states and in the District of Columbia. The nine states for which no examples of the new organization are reported are Vermont, New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Delaware, New Jersey, South Carolina, Montana, Wyoming, and Nevada-three New England states, two Middle Atlantic states, one state in the South, and three sparsely settled western states. A somewhat better basis of generalization on the distribution of junior colleges is afforded in Table V, which shows their distri- bution by sections of the country. The Middle West leads in the number of public units, reporting more than half the total organi- zations of this type. It is followed in order by the West (almost t4 0 411 Ce ce rA Q) .e 0 0 0 �e o 0 4) =: 00 �d 0 Cd 0 4-j cO .d 0 Cd 0, z PRESENT STATUS OF THE JUNIOR COLLEGE 125 all public units here being in California), the South, and the north- eastern section. No section leads at all notably as to the number of units on state foundations, an interesting fact being the total absence of this type from the northeastern section. The South leads in the number of private units, fully half of all organizations of this type being reported from this section. It is followed by the Mid-West and at a further distance by the western and north- eastern sections. When totals of all types are considered, the Mid- West and South lead with approximately equal numbers, and are followed by the western and northeastern sections. TABLE V DISTRIBUTION BY SECTIONS OF THE COUNTRY OF THE THREE TYPES OF JUNIOR COLLEGES, 1927 SECTION PUBLIC STATE PRIVATE TOTAL New England and Middle Atlantic 3 .... 16 19 Southern 18 12 90 120 Mid-western 54 8 66 128 Western 30 11 17 58 All 105 31 189 325 THE RECENT GROWTH OF THE JUNIOR COLLEGE It was possible to obtain the date of establishment of junior- college work for 303 of the total of 325 units represented in this study. These have been compiled cumulatively for each type and for all types with results as shown in Figure 5. In interpreting the data presented it should be kept in mind that they do not in- clude junior colleges in operation some time during the period but discontinued before the school year 1926-27. Units of the private type are shown to have come first on the educational scene, to have largely determined the growth of the movement as a whole over a period of almost fifteen years, and to have outnumbered the other types throughout the period represented. The first examples of the public type made their appearance shortly after the opening of the century, but this type did not manifest rapid development until about 1914 and 1915. Since that time the rate of its growth has been an accelerated one. Units of the state type were the last 126 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION FIGURE 5 NUMBERS OF JUNIOR COLLEGES IN OPERATION IN EACH SUCCESSIVE YEAR FROM 1900 TO 1927, INCLUSIVE 300 275 250 - -- All Junior Coll ge5s .--- Private Junior College .--* Public Junior Collegas 225 --- Stata Junior College 9 zoo s: 175 150 / e 1 i S1lZ5 A- z 100 1909 1912 1915 PRESENT STATUS OF THE JUNIOR COLLEGE 127 to appear and their increase has been slower than for other types. Because the figure does not include junior colleges discontinued before 1926, it cannot disclose the fact that earlier examples of the state type were in operation in 1910 and 1911. Looking finally at the curve of growth for all junior colleges we note that almost all of this growth has taken place during the last fifteen or twenty years. In point of fact, only 38 of the 303 units represented in the figure were in operation during 1912, only fifteen years ago. It would be difficult to overemphasize the im- portance of a development of this rapidity. One way of stressing it may be by comparison with the growth and present status of colleges and universities. There are listed annually in the Edu- cational Directory of the United States Bureau of Education a total of six hundred to seven hundred such higher institutions, not including state normal schools, teachers' colleges, and junior col- leges. This number includes, of course, many feeble four-year institutions. It represents a development extending over the period of approximately three centuries since the establishment of Harvard College in 1638. For this new organization, the junior college, virtually within a period of fifteen to twenty years to increase the count of its representatives to the number of half the total of four-year colleges and universities is nothing if not extraordinary. In view of this remarkable development and the present status as reviewed in the foregoing pages, it is high time that the new organ- ization be taken seriously into account by all those who would shape the destinies of secondary and higher education in America. XI. THE TREND OF REORGANIZATION IN HIGHER EDUCATION AS AFFECTING THE JUNIOR COLLEGE 1 LEONARD V. Koos Professor of Secondary Education University of Minnesota Claims for the Junior College Touching the Reorganization of Higher Education.-In any complete catalogue of claims made for the junior college are to be found several having more or less intimate bearing on the organization of secondary and higher edu- cation. Among these are: placing in the secondary school all work appropriate to it, fostering the natural evolution of the system of education, and making possible real university functioning. The implications of such claims are so far-reaching that no study of the junior-college movement making any pretensions to comprehen- siveness could escape criticism if it neglected to inquire into their validity. A partial canvass of the acceptability of these claims is the concern of this paper, the plan being to disclose evidences of the reorganization that seems destined to assign to the junior col- lege a logical place in the school system. These evidences are presented as pertaining to the problem of reorganization as a whole rather than to the validity of each particular claim as stated. Far-reaching reorganization of higher education has come upon our secondary and higher schools so gradually that there is little general consciousness of its profound character and extended rami- fications. Indeed, some of those who are presumably leaders in the field still seem to be totally unaware of it or, if they see it, unappreciative of its forces, are, King-Canute-like, endeavoring to 1 This paper presents in brief the findings of Part III of The Junior College (Research Publications of the University of Minnesota, Education Series No. 5, University of Minnesota Press), the report of a study car- ried forward under a subvention from the Commonwealth Fund. Figures 7-11 in the present article correspond respectively to Figures 55 (p. 283), 67 (p. 826), 71 (p. 835), 62 (p. 314), and 72 (p. 338) of The Junior College. [Ed.] TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION command its tides to recede. They appear by their attitude to assert that the American college is today what it has always been and that it is ordained to remain immutable in the future. The facts presented render such assumptions untenable and do much to strengthen the claims of the friends of the junior college as to its place in reorganized secondary and higher education. Ages of College Freshmen a Hundred Years Ago and Today.- The age of students attending college is an important consideration in evaluating the assmption that the Americal college has undergone little or no change since its establishment in the colonial period and remains today essentially what it has always been. Information is available which indicates that during the later decades of the last century students entered college at more advanced ages than during the first third of the century. Even as late as 1851 a writer in the North American Review2 speaks of boys entering college at fifteen or sixteen years of age and their need of parental discipline while in attendance. There are other scattered evidences of advance in the age of college freshmen, but up to the time the present investigation was undertaken, there was no study that could be considered at all comprehensive. Desirous of securing as nearly complete a description as possi- ble of this advance in the age of college freshmen by a standard method of computing ages, in order that the results of all compari- sons should be valid, the writer obtained access to the records of admission to Harvard College for a period near the opening of the last century and at periods two or three decades apart up to 1916. The median age for students entering this institution advanced in the half-century beginning about 1830 and ending in 1880 from 16 years and 3 months to 18 years and 7 months, an increase of two and one-third years. From 1880 to 1916 there was a decline but not sufficiently large to warrant anticipation of any significant change in this respect for some time to come. The typical Harvard freshman of a century ago was fully two years younger than the freshman of the more recent period, The situations as to the ages of the freshmen in other older 2George H. Whitney, "Wayland on College Education in America," North American Review, LXXII (January, 1851), 82. 129 130 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION colleges in the early part of the nineteenth century had one essen- tial element in common with the situation at Harvard. All of the distributions show large proportions of students entering at from 11 or 12 to 161/2 years of age, as shown in Figure 6. Thus, almost one-fifth of Amherst's freshmen during the years 1827-31 were 151 years of age or younger, and almost one-third were 161/ years of age or younger. Almost one-third of Bowdoin's fresh- men during the years 1810-17 were 151/2 years of age or younger, and between two-fifths and one-half were 161/2 years of age or younger. Even in Dartmouth, where the freshmen during the years 1800-1804 were, on the average, somewhat more mature than the freshmen in other colleges, one-sixth were 151/ years of age or younger, and more than one-fourth were 161/2 years of age or younger. Percent- Percenr- Institution 0 1e age younger younger, 18.4 31.4 30.5 45.7 16.3 26.8 36.1 66.8 0.T 6.8 0.3 4.4 Per cent. 25 50 0 25 FIGURE 6 75 100 50 75 100 PERCENTAGES OF PERIODS WHO WERE AGE OR YOUNGER FRESHMEN ENTERING FIVE INSTITUTIONS AT VARIOUS 15% YEARS OF AGE OR YOUNGER AND 16% YEARS OF The marked contrast of these situations with the situations today in our modern institutions of higher education can be illus- trated in the cases of Harvard and the University of Minnesota. In the case of Harvard the percentage of students entering at Amfirst 182 - 31 Bowdoin 1810-17 Dartfmoutfi 1800- 04 Harvard 1829 - 3Z Harvard 1916. ...... Minnesota 1921 .... I V o I 1 1 pri r . TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION 151/2 years of age or younger in 1916 was practically negligible, being only .7 per cent, while those 161/2 years of age or younger constituted only 6.8 per cent of the whole group. In the case of the University of Minnesota the corresponding percentages are very similar, being .3 per cent and 4.4 per cent, respectively. Almost negligible proportions of freshmen enter college today at the immature ages at which they were admitted a century ago. What These Facts Must Mean.-Thus we find that these early distributions of the ages of the entering freshmen have at least one characteristic in common-they show large proportions of students beginning what was regarded as college work a hundred years ago at a much earlier age than that at which the present college and university freshmen enroll. At least with respect to the age of the student body there is an outstanding difference between the college of the past and the college of the present. Biographers of our earlier poets are accustomed to point out, sometimes as though it were an indication of extraordinary pre- cocity, the early ages at which these poets entered college. Emer- son and Lowell, it is reported, entered Harvard as freshmen when they were fourteen and fifteen years of age, respectively. Bryant and Longfellow were admitted to college as sophomores when fifteen years old, the former at Williams and the latter at Bowdoin. These ages, while not exactly typical for their generation, were sufficiently common to detract measurably from the feeling of awe which they inspire in the minds of those unacquainted with the facts. The Widening Scope of the Requirements for Admission.-It would be surprising, indeed, if the advancing age of the college entrant were not accompanied by an increasing amount of educa- tional content required for admission. Such a tendency impresses one most when one attempts a summary of the changes that have taken place during the last hundred years in the requirements for admission to college. The nature of the changes must, as in the case of the study of the ages of college entrants, be shown by reference to eastern institutions that have maintained continuous existence throughout at least a century. They will be illustrated for Amherst and Yale, which, on account of the large extent of 181 132 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION similarity of the New England colleges in this respect, may be looked upon as typical. Throughout most of the nineteenth century the requirements in the classical languages for admission to college, although ex- periencing some change, were characterized by relative stability. Preparation in both Latin and Greek was prescribed in the twenties and thirties. In fact, the only prescriptions for college entrance outside of these fields were, as will be seen later, in such subjects as are now typically found only in the elementary school, namely, arithmetic, English grammar, and geography. Near the end of the first third of the century the content in which examinations for college entrance were set was Latin grammar, Sallust or four books of Caesar's commentaries, the orations of Cicero, Virgil, and Latin prosody. By the end of the century Sallust had given way entirely to Caesar, and Yale had made a prescription of Ovid's Metamorphoses. During this period the amount of classical mate- rial read had diminished to some extent, as in the number of Cicero's orations and the range of content selected from the Aeneid, the Bucolics, and the Georgics, but there seems to have been no marked change in this respect. In Greek, the prescription in grammar was, of course, per- sistent throughout the period, but the particular content read shifted considerably from the religious to the secular, as is shown in the change in the requirements from the Greek Testament to the Anabasis and the Iliad. A careful estimate of the prescriptions in these languages in terms of present-day requirements places their total at something like seven or eight units, not far from one-half of the number of units required at the present time for admission to college. The real changes in the requirements for admission during the period considered were outside of the field of the classics. As shown in Table VI, the only subject prescribed for examination by Yale in 1822, in addition to these classical materials, was arithmetic. By the middle of the next decade examinations in two more present-day elementary-school subjects-English gram- mar and geography-were added to the entrance requirements. They persisted as requirements until near the close of the century. TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION 133 The first subject now typically of high-school grade, in addition to the work in ancient languages, to make its appearance is what we refer to as elementary algebra, and this prescription was imposed during the forties. By the end of the next three decades the pre- scription in this subject had been extended to include essentially what we designate as higher algebra. Before this extension was made, plane geometry (Euclid) had been prescribed, so that by the end of the nineteenth century the equivalent of two and one- half units of supra-arithmetical mathematics was required where none had been prescribed at the opening of the period under con- sideration. Upon the heels of algebra and geometry came subject after subject, until at the end of the century, in addition to the prescriptions in the classics, there were prescriptions in algebra through quadratics, plane geometry, ancient history, French or German, and English literature. TABLE VI REQUIREMENTS FOR ADMISSION TO COLLEGE IN SUBJECTS OTHER THAN THE CLASSICS FROM 1822 To 1900* DATE OF ISSUE OF CATALOGUEt SUBJECT 1835 1841 1850 1858 1871 1879 1890 1822 1834 1842 1850 1860 1870 1880 1890 1900 Arithmetic Y A, Y A,Y A,Y A,Y A,Y A,Y A,Y English grammar A, Y A, Y A, Y A, Y A, Y A, Y Geography A, Y Y Y Y A, Y A, Y Algebra to quadratics A, Y A, Y A, Y A Algebra through quad- ratics Y A, Y Y Euclid or plane geometry Y A, Y A, Y A, Y Y Ancient (classical) geog- raphy A A Roman history Y Y Y Greek history Y Y Roman antiquities A Ancient history A French A French or German A, Y Y English literature A Y * A means Amherst; Y means Yale. ? The first date in each case refers to the catalogue of Amherst; the second date, to the catalogue of Yale. 134 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION These changes, when put in quantitative terms and when only the work now regarded as appropriately of secondary-school grade is considered, constitute an increase of from seven or eight to four- teen or fifteen units, now typically fifteen or sixteen. This means that the amount of work prescribed for admission to college was at least doubled during the period of a century; that is, at least two more years of liberal education are being required for admission to college now than formerly. This conclusion is in harmony with the advancing age of the college entrant already demonstrated but cannot do justice to the extension of typical general education preliminary to college training afforded in the rapid expansion of the elementary school during the same period. Downward Trend of the Materials of the College Curriculum.- Intimately related to the widening scope of the college-entrance requirements is the downward trend of most of the subjects that have found a place in the standard college curriculum during the last hundred years. This downward tendency becomes evident during even a cursory examination of the curriculum of any one of the older colleges as set forth in the catalogues issued during TABLE VII YEARS IN WHICH CERTAIN COLLEGE SUBJECTS WERE GIVEN IN AMHERST, WILLIAMS, AND YALE AT INTERVALS FROM 1825 To 1920* DATE OF ISSUE OF CATALOGUE SUBJECT 1825 1845 1865 1885 1905 1920 Homer 1, 3 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 Beginning French 3 2, 3, 3 2, 3, 3 2, 3 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 English grammar 1, 1 1 English literature 3, 4, 4 2, 3, 4 1, 2, 2 1, 1, 2 Arithmetic 1, 1, 1 Elementary algebra 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 1, 1 1 Trigonometry 2, 2, 2 2, 2,2 1,1,2 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 1, 1, 1 Analytic geometry 3 1, 2, 2 2, 2 1, 2, 2 1, 1, 1 Physics or natural philosophy 3, 3 3, 3, 3 2, 3, 3 3, 3 1, 2, 2 1, 1, 2 General chemistry 3, 4 3, 3,4 3, 3, 3 2, 2,4 1,1,2 1,1,2 Zoology or natural history 4 3, 4, 4 3, 3, 4 2, 3, 3 2, 2 2 Geology 4 4, 4 3, 4, 4 3, 4, 4 3, 3, 3 2, 3 Mental philosophy or psychology 4, 4 4,4,4 4, 4, 4 3, 4 2, 3, 3 2, 2, 3 Economics (political economy) 4 3, 4, 4 3, 4, 4 3, 4, 4 2, 3, 3 2, 2, 3 * The figure "1" means that the subject was listed for freshmen; the figure "2" means that the subject was listed for sophomores, etc. TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION any considerable period of years beginning with the early decades of the nineteenth century. A systematic inquiry concerning this depression of courses from upper to lower college levels was made for three of our oldest and best institutions-Amherst, Williams, and Yale- from which only illustrative extractions arei made for our present purpose (Table VII). The ancient languages and literatures are the only fields in which there was no consistent downward trend. The history of the placement of beginning courses in modern lan- guage shows marked downward movement. After having been in most cases sophomore and junior offerings in the thirties and forties, these dropped to typically freshman levels by the opening of the twentieth century. The first course in the history of English literature changed from a junior and senior offering of the sixties and seventies to a predominantly freshman course in recent years. Trigonometry, which was a standard sophomore course in 1825, is now curricular material for first-year students, while all other courses in mathematics have shifted downward, those preceding trigonometry continuing their downward movement into the sec- ondary school. The sciences, too, joined the downward trend; courses like physics (natural philosophy) and general chemistry, after having been junior and senior work in the twenties and thirties, became available to freshmen in the later period. Even philosophy, ethics, logic, and economics (political economy) joined the downward movement but did not drop as far as the sciences. Many courses dropped even farther in universities, especially those of the state type, for the reason that they are needed as prepro- fessional work, which is a matter of greater concern in these insti- tutions than in institutions like separate colleges, some of which cling tenaciously to the hope of providing only liberal training throughout the four-year period. It is obvious that the shift described could not and did not stop at the freshman year of the college. The depression of course materials into secondary-school offerings has already been fore- shadowed in discussing the widening scope of college entrance requirements. The subjects added to prescriptions for college entrance-English grammar, geography, arithmetic, algebra through 135 136 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION quadratics, plane geometry, ancient history, French and German, and English literature-were all inheritances from college curricu- lums. The first three subjects continued their downward course until they reached the elementary grades. Most of the other courses have found a place in the first two years of the four-year high school. Nor does this complete the narrative of the downward progress of courses formerly peculiar to the college. Many other courses, some less often honored by a place among those prescribed for college admission, either accompanied those named or followed them in due course, among them being rhetoric and composition; such courses in mathematics as solid geometry and trigonometry and occasionally college algebra and analytic geometry; many courses in science, such as physics, chemistry, and biology; economics; sociology (as "social problems"); and several of the courses in history, such as American, English, European. What a sound basis they have who refer to the high school as the "people's college," with so much of its total offering inherited from the standard college! The Textbooks of Yesterday and Today.-In order the better to compare the courses in the colleges of approximately a century ago with their counterparts in the colleges and the high schools of today a careful examination was made of the textbooks in use then and now. Some of the old texts were compared with present-day college texts; more often they were compared with present-day high- school texts; and not infrequently they were compared with both college and high-school texts of the present day. The comparisons essayed were in the history of English literature, rhetoric and composition, plane geometry, physics, chemistry, general history, American history, and economics, with briefer studies in a few other subjects. Only the general conclusion from the comparisons is here stated: each of the comparisons essayed tells essentially the same story, namely, that the subjects and the courses have experienced no apparent dilution during the process of depression to lower years in the school system. On the contrary, among the courses considered there are some, such as plane geometry and American history, which have been notably extended as to content TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION and even strengthened as to difficulty during the period of down- ward trend. All of them are much enriched as to nature of con- tent and improved as instruments of education. To those who may call attention to the fact that textbooks do not always limit the content of courses and that consequently conclusions as to courses drawn from a comparison of textbooks only cannot be valid, it may be said that the farther back into the preceding century one goes, the less use one finds of supplementary volumes. Even as late as the year 1849 the catalogue of Williams College published the following information: "The College Library is open to the senior and junior classes the first Friday of the term and every Wednesday; to the sophomore and freshman classes, every Saturday." Some of the extensive depression almost universal in the fields of instruction mentioned must unquestionably have been due to development within the given fields, such as the development resulting from the findings of research in science and history. With the enlargement of the content emanating from investiga- tions, differentiations and specializations were bound to make their appearance. Then came the desire to secure recognition of these differentiations as advanced courses in the college curriculum, as in the case of qualitative, quantitative, and organic chemistry. Before their introduction was feasible, it was necessary to lower the general or preliminary course far enough to make a place for these advanced courses. After making all allowances for this development, the fact remains that the advancing age of the student for any given college year and the increasing extent of his training before arriving at that point made the downward shift of the materials in undiluted and even in enhanced form practicable as well as desirable. The Changing Organization of the College Curriculum.-As it seemed possible that there might be some relation between the organization of the curriculums and the advancing age of the col- lege student, an effort was made to note any changes in this respect during the last hundred years. A canvass of the catalogues of several New England colleges at intervals a decade apart through the period 1825-1915 disclosed far-reaching modifications in the 137 188 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION method of administering the curriculum, of which the following summary for Amherst is illustrative: 1825, fully prescribed; 1835, fully prescribed; 1845, fully prescribed; 1855, slightly optional in the sophomore, junior, and senior years; 1865, slightly optional in the junior and senior years; 1875, slightly optional in the junior and senior years; 1885, much election in the last three years; 1895, largely elective in the last three years; 1905, largely elective in the last three years; 1915, largely elective with the major system. The curriculums for most of these New England colleges at the opening of the period began as "fully prescribed," proceeded in the course of a decade or more to become "slightly optional" in one or more years of the full course, became increasingly elective as the decades passed, and ended by being "largely elective with the major system." They moved step by step from the complete prescription of a restricted secondary school, through gradually increasing freedom comporting with the increasing age of the stu- dent, to an elective program that assumes sufficient maturity on the part of the student to assure wise selection of subjects and courses and that opens up the opportunity for specialization. Out of the curricular chaos that reigned during the operation of the largely elective plan emerged the major system, which requires the student to specialize. The major system is at the present time almost universal, as shown by a study of the catalogues issued for the year 1920-21 or the year 1921-22 by 114 colleges: 94, or 82.5 per cent, of these colleges require the completion of a major for graduation. This is equivalent to saying that at least this proportion of the colleges require specialization of the student. The Function of the Major.-Whatever may be the intent of college authorities in prescribing the major, it is important to know its actual function in practice. This has been ascertained for almost two hundred alumni of one of the best separate colleges in the Middle West by (1) inquiring of them the bases on which they selected their majors and (2) studying possible relations between these majors and subsequent occupational activity. Three recurring influences appeared in the selection of under- TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION graduate majors, as shown in Figure 7, namely, occupational prep- aration, interest in the subject, and esteem for an instructor. The overwhelmingly predominant motive in selection was the first named, which was reported by more than four-fifths of all of the graduates responding. Interest was operative in the case of almost two- thirds, while esteem for the instructor was a factor in the case of only 6.6 per cent of the graduates. The men who made actual occupational use of their major subjects subsequent to graduation were just one-half of the total number. There is no escape from the inference that for this group of college graduates the occupational function of the major was the paramount one. This function appears at the time of selecting the major as well as in the use made of it after the completion of the college course. Thus, the system that emerged from the cur- ricular chaos of a quarter of a century ago represents not merely Influence in Per Cent. 5election 0 10 0 30 40 50 60 7O 80 90 100 Occupation Interest Instructor F Men VWomen All Graduate5 FIGURE 7 PERCENTAGE OF APPROXIMATELY Two HUNDRED COLLEGE GRAD- UATES HWHO VWERE INFLUENCED IN THE SELECTION OF THEIR MAJOR SUBJECTS BY OCCUPATION, INTEREST, AND INSTRUCTORS 139 140 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION a recognition of the need for specialization but also, from the point of view of the student, a device affording an opportunity for occu- pational specialization or, at least, the beginning of such an oppor- tunity. This occupational function is also in line with the greater maturity of present-day college students as compared with the maturity of college students of a century ago. Readjustments within Present-Day Higher Institutions: (a) Accommodations within the Separate College.-The major system is not the only evidence that we have of inroads upon the four-year period of liberal education. One who compares any considerable number of recent catalogues of separate four-year colleges with catalogues issued during an earlier period will find accommodations in the present-day colleges, which are in the nature of a compro- mise on the length of the liberal or non-occupational curriculum. The character and frequency of these accommodations can be shown by summarizing the results of an examination of recent catalogues of 227 institutions of the "small college" type selected at random. The accommodations may be classified under six main headings: (1) affiliation with universities to give combination arts-professional curriculums, with the first three years in attendance at the college; (2) arrangements to give bachelor's degrees when the later portions of the four-year period are spent in professional or technical schools elsewhere; (3) preprofessional curriculums two or three years in length without announced affiliation; (4) four-year professional curriculums, such as business administration, engineering, and home economics; (5) professional names in the titles of departments; and (6) professional courses in departments bearing liberal-arts titles. These six types of modification were made by a total of 163 of the 227 colleges or almost three-fourths of all. The total frequency of the accommodations was 539, which is an average of almost two and one-half per institution when all of the colleges are included in the computation and approximately three and one- third when only the 163 institutions making them are included. While these accommodations to the pressure for abbreviated periods of unspecialized training have been distributed among six types, they may be roughly divided into two major groups: first, TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION those that show the student how he may complete his liberal training in two or three years and then transfer to a professional school and, second, those that provide for the introduction of professional studies in the institution granting the degree. There are, of course, colleges that still maintain stubborn resist- ance to what they look upon as the illegitimate encroachments of utilitarian motives, but they are seen to be even now a dwindling minority. The tendency thus revealed is in striking contrast to the college curriculum of two or three generations ago, which was liberal in intent throughout, being fully or almost fully prescribed and offering to the student not even the slightest opportunity for specialization. The changes here described, as in the case of the changes in the type of curriculum offered, are in harmony with what has been shown to be the greater maturity of the college student of the present day and the greater extent of his training as compared with the maturity and training of college students of earlier generations. (b) The Junior-College Line of Cleavage in the University.-It is appropriate at this point to refer briefly to the movement to introduce a line of cleavage between the two lowest years and the remaining years of the university. This does not refer to the presence in this institution of an increasing number of two-year preprofessional curriculums nor to the group requirements for under-classmen and the major system prescribed for upper-classmen in the liberal-arts units connected with the university, although there is something in common between these and the division being effected. Attention is directed only to the instances of the junior- college line of cleavage. At the present time there are eight large universities of the West and Middle West committed to and operating under the plan, namely, the universities of California, Chicago, Washington, and Minnesota, Stanford University, the University of Nebraska, the University of Oregon, and the University of Michigan, the reor- ganizations having been effected in the order given. The major impression obtained from an examination of the junior-college movement within the university is that it seems founded on a conviction that the functions of the lower years of 141 142 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION the university, especially in the college of liberal arts, are to be distinguished, at least in considerable part, from those of the upper years. The upper years are assumed to be the proper place for specialization, whereas the lower years are still to be devoted to general education. The different purposes of the two divisions of the university, coupled with the emphasis on the desirability of having the work in the lower division continuous with that of the high school-not to mention other administrative provisions like that pertaining to guidance-show that the higher institutions are proceeding as if the first two years are really a part of the full period of general or secondary education and that higher education proper begins in the upper unit. The Trend of Enrollment in the Higher Institutions.-Probably few have followed the presentation of the foregoing materials without wondering whether the tendencies shown have been re- flected to any extent in the growth of higher education. Of the recent rapid growth of the higher institutions as a whole, all are aware, but interest in this case is concerned with the more detailed aspects of the general situation. Some will be disposed to ask, What is the trend of growth in the several types of higher institu- tions represented: universities, separate colleges, and professional schools? Are they developing at the same rate, or has there been a tendency from the standpoint of numbers for one or another to dominate the field? Is there any difference among the several types as to the trend of enrollment in the lower and upper years? Is professionalization of curriculums in universities increasing or decreasing, and how does this affect the distribution of students in liberal-arts and professional curriculums? Is the proportional enrollment of lower- and upper-classmen in the liberal-arts units of these institutions increasing or decreasing? 1. The rates of growth in the several types of higher insti- tutions differ from one to another, as shown in Figure 8. The state universities show the most rapid rate, their enrollment in 1919-20 having increased almost 900 per cent over the enrollment in 1888-89. Private universities and other public institutions (state colleges of agriculture and mechanic arts, other separate publicly supported technical schools, and municipal universities) follow TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION 143 FIGURE 8 PERCENTAGES THAT ENROLLMENTS AT VARIOUS INTERVALS ARE OF THE ENROLLMENT IN 1888-89 IN EACH OF SEVERAL TYPES OF HIGHER INSTITUTIONS 144 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION FIGURE 9 PERCENTAGE THAT THE STUDENTS ENROLLED IN THE FIRST Two YEARS ARE OF THE STUDENTS ENROLLED IN THE FIRST FOUR YEARS OF EACH OF THE SEVERAL TYPES OF HIGHER INSTITUTIONS 75 7C 65 .) c o:3 cC 10 0 cC 0 0 C.' '4 i. 3tate lniversities, other Public oitutions and Private Universities II. Men's nd Coeducational Colleges III. Wome 's Colleges, Class A IV. Grou I and 3cfiools of Medicine Law Denti try, Pharmacy Ve erinary eicin \I IItII . 2~~~L)~ 1- 4 60 55 co co co co Q C 5C TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION rather closely, with increases of 747.1 per cent and 621.3 per cent, respectively. The remaining types appear in the following order, but at some distance from the first three groups named: women's colleges, Class A3 (404.7 per cent), men's and coeducational col- leges (216.9 per cent), and schools of medicine, law, dentistry, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine (112.0 per cent). 2. These differing rates of growth during the period of three decades or more that the data cover inevitably resulted in a shift in the proportional prominence of the types of institution included in the study. From something more than one-fourth of the total enrollment in the groups of institutions considered, the enrollment in state and private universities and other institutions of poly- technic type by 1915-16 mounted to well over one-half, while the enrollment in women's colleges of Class A and men's and coeduca- tional colleges combined dropped sharply during the first decade from more than two-fifths to less than one-third of the whole. When the enrollment for the schools of medicine, law, dentistry, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine is added to the enrollment of the former group of institutions, its position of dominance during the last twenty or more years becomes even more apparent. This fact of numerical dominance may have had something to do with the degree to which separate colleges have in recent years intro- duced the curricular modifications described. 3. A study of the enrollment in the first and second years and in the third and fourth years in a number of higher institutions of the several types discloses certain significant related tendencies (Figure 9). If an increase in the percentage that those enrolled in the third and fourth years are of the total-or the converse, a decrease in the proportion in the first and second years-be taken as an indication of increasing efficiency, the women's colleges of Class A have by far the best record. The group of institutions made up of state universities, other public institutions of poly- technic type, and private universities shows no conspicuous change. 3 Women's colleges, Class B, normal schools, schools of theology, and higher institutions for colored students were not included in the study because of the relative uncertainty of requirements for admission to many of them. 145 146 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION However, when combined with the schools of medicine, law, den- tistry, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine, this group shows marked progress toward smaller proportions in the lower years, except for the post-war years, which cannot be regarded as indicative. On the other hand, the men's and coeducational colleges lost ground consistently. This trend is not striking, but it is unmistakable and, in contrast with the situation in institutions with recognized oppor- tunities for occupational training, should give pause to the friends of the separate liberal-arts college. 4. A study of retention and elimination in separate colleges and of the destination of students transferring from these colleges affords findings of significance in this connection (Figure 10). In thirteen good colleges in the Middle West the percentage of stu- dents who remain for their third year is 49.0. In other words, the separate college serves as a junior college for a majority of the entering students. The facts presented lead to the expectation that this will become increasingly true. A second finding concerns that special group of students eliminated who transfer to other institutions before completing the four-year curriculum. It was possible to ascertain the destination of 219 students transferring, 86 from eight eastern colleges and 133 from thirteen mid-western colleges, of whom a total of 182, or 83.1 per cent, shifted to uni- versities or other institutions where professional training is avail- able. 5. A count was taken of all professional schools in eighteen large universities of the country for each half-decade for the period beginning with 1894-95 and ending with 1919-20. The average numbers of professional schools per university, not including col- leges of liberal arts and graduate schools, were 4.2, 4.9, 5.2, 5.9, 6.5, and 7.3, respectively. These figures show a steady growth. There is little need of mentioning the particular schools that were added except to state that the earlier additions were in fields long associated with professional training, such as medicine, law, and engineering, while in the later years the more frequent additions were in commerce and education. 6. The same group of universities-six eastern and twelve mid-western, western, and southern institutions-were studied as TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION to proportional enrollments as follows: the percentage of the total enrollment (a) in the college of liberal arts, (b) in the junior-college years of the college of liberal arts, and (c) in the senior-college years of the college of liberal arts; the percentage of the total liberal-arts enrollment (d) in the junior-college years and (e) in the senior-college years; (f) the division of junior-college and senior-college liberal-arts enrollments as to men and women, etc. From these computations may be drawn several conclusions highly FIGURE 10 PERCENTAGE OF RETENTION IN EIGHT EASTERN COLLEGES, THIR- TEEN MID-WESTERN COLLEGES, AND THREE MID-WESTERN UNIVER- SITIES yr. 147 148 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION pertinent to the problem of organization in higher education. For the eastern universities the most notable change shown is the steady decline in the percentage that those enrolled in the last two years of the liberal-arts enrollment are of the total liberal-arts enroll- ment (Figure 11). The downward trend is not rapid but so con- sistent as to be unmistakable, dropping by small steps from 45.9 per cent to 40.6 per cent. Correspondingly, the percentage that the junior-college liberal-arts students are of the entire student body shows a tendency to increase. The decline of the senior- college liberal-arts group for the mid-western, western, and south- ern universities is not as consistent, but it is nevertheless apparent. Other tendencies in harmony with these are to be noted, but the most important is the shrinkage in the percentage of men in the senior-college years of the liberal-arts unit, from 60.1 in 1894-95 to approximately two-thirds of this percentage in the later portions of the quarter-century, at the same time that the men were much more nearly holding their own in the junior-college years. The decrease in the percentage of students, especially men, in the senior-college years of the non-occupational curriculums would without doubt have been even greater if account could have been taken of those registered in the special occupational programs announced in the catalogues but administered by the liberal-arts unit. Professionalization of training for women is lagging behind that for men, as may be judged from the increasing proportion of women in the senior-college years of the liberal-arts unit. If recent movements affecting the social status and the occupational life of women may be taken as an indication of the developments of the future, the shift that has taken place for men will soon follow for women. The change from departments of education to schools of education is one step in this direction. The Current Conceptions of the Aims and Functions of Secondary and Higher Schools.-The trend of reorganization as shown has the support of the findings of an extended study of the aims of the secondary school, the liberal-arts college, and the university, to which only the briefest reference can be made here. The materials used in the analysis are the conceptions of purposes held by large TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION numbers of leaders in each of the three units represented. Among the chief findings of this study are the nearer approach to unanimity in the secondary-school and the university groups than in the col- lege group, the much greater similarity of college and secondary- school aims than of college and university aims, and, in consequence, the rather sudden break between college and university aims. One FIGURE 11 PERCENTAGE DISTRIBUTION OF STUDENTS TO CERTAIN DIvisIoNS IN Six EASTERN UNIVERSITIES 50 40 30 10 189418695 1699-1900 1904-1905 1909-1910 1914-1915 1919-19Z0 Group I. Percentage liberal-arts enrollment is of total enrollment Group II. Percentage junior-college enrollment in liberal arts is of total enrollment Group III. Percentage senior-college enrollment in liberal arts is of total enrollment Group. IV. Percentage senior-college enrollment in liberal arts is of total liberal-arts enrollment .'-.. .Group IV Group I Oroup II - -- . . Group III � + + I _ I _ I I -i - I I I - - i . _ .. * 149 oL 150 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION who gives careful consideration to the results of this study is almost certain to come to the conclusion that the advent of the junior college will hasten the clarification of the issues centering around the r6le of each of these units in the school system, a clarification that will result in a distinction of r6les not unlike that to be found in the European school systems, in which all general education is relegated to the secondary school and in which the university devotes itself exclusively to professional and other advanced spe- cialization. The Concurrence of the Tendencies.-Among the most outstand- ing characteristics of the tendencies toward reorganization that have been epitomized is their large degree of concurrence. Prac- tically without exception, they show the same general trend, indi- cating that, whatever the forces, these tendencies are all of a piece. The facts presented are to be regarded as links in a single chain of evidence foreshadowing inevitable and ultimate reorganization of secondary and higher education, a reorganization that involves the acknowledgment of the first two years of college as the typical termination of the period of general and secondary education for those who contemplate going on to higher levels and the beginning of higher education proper somewhere in the vicinity of the present junior year. The Meaning of the Tendencies for Higher Institutions of the Future.-Some of our higher institutions, among them both colleges and universities, on account of the effect of tradition and a selected persisting clientele, will doubtless be able to withstand for a long period the forces of reorganization as presented in this article. It is not unlikely, moreover, that there may be a place in the American school system for a small proportion of institutions of the type that assumes the longer period of non-occupational training before entering upon the work of the professional school. In the face of the apparently inevitable tendencies of reorganization shown, however, they must come to be regarded as atypical, the prevailing type conforming to the trend of reorganization as disclosed. The consummation of this type, bringing with it the upward extension of the secondary school by the inclusion of the junior-college years, will go far toward justifying those claims of the friends of the new unit who insist that it will place in the secondary school all work TRENDS IN REORGANIZATION appropriate to it, foster the evolution of the public school system, and make possible real university functioning. The future of the university and of other higher institutions of the polytechnic type in this impending reorganization is much more clearly discernible than is the future of the separate four-year college and the normal school or teachers' college. It is doubtless too early to essay prophecy concerning them that will approach realization in any significant degree, but at least some conjecture can be ventured. As admitted, a small proportion of the separate colleges, especially those with a ballast of endowment and a host of well-to-do and tradition-loving alumni, may be able to with- stand the inevitable trend and remain institutions affording unspe- cialized training throughout a four-year period. Most of them, however, must make further accommodations to the trend, serving their generation in the way in which it insists upon being served. In the case of the weaker units, this will be as junior colleges that will draw their students from secondary schools in communities too small to warrant the offering of junior-college work. The remain- ing institutions, for the most part in a better state of development than those just referred to, can serve in the dual capacity of (1) junior colleges and (2) senior colleges in which certain types of liberalized occupationalization and specialization are featured. Few such institutions will be able to afford the variety of opportu- nities for specialization offered by the universities, but they can devote their energies and resources to one or a few, such as educa- tion, commerce, home economics. In the remote future the junior- college division may atrophy, and these colleges will then devote themselves exclusively to the senior-college task. If the future form and function of the separate college are problematic, those of the normal school or teachers' college are even more so. Perhaps, until standards of teacher-preparation rise to appropriate levels, the normal school will recruit most of its students from communities too small to warrant the offering of junior-college work and from among those who desire this type of semi-professional training. As the standards are raised, it is conceivable that the teachers' college with a four- or five-year curric- ulum will come to articulate with the public junior college in such 151 152 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION a way as to encourage the prospective student to attend the junior college for two years beyond the present high-school level and to transfer to the teacher-training institution at the opening of his third college year. It seems reasonable to expect that the general establishment of junior colleges will, by making the first two years of college training more easily accessible, hasten the elevation of the standards of teacher-preparation to the strictly professional level. Although we may question the validity of this prophecy of the future of the two types of institution last considered, one thing is certain: the reorganization of the secondary school and the univer- sity along lines involving the incorporation of the junior-college plan will be reflected in them, for the reason that they must adapt themselves to what is to become the dominant organization of the educational system. XII. THE FOUR-YEAR JUNIOR COLLEGE JAMES M. WOOD President of Stephens College There is probably no part of the American educational system that is attracting more attention at the present time than are the secondary schools. The very confusion that now exists is but evi- dence of this fact. The field that a quarter of a century ago was occupied exclusively by the high school is now filled by organiza- tions known as the junior high school, the senior high school and the junior college; and it is no longer possible to define either of these units in terms of years or of curriculum content. A common basis in the discussion of the secondary-school problem seems to be the fact that all of these units are predicated upon a completion of a six-year elementary school course. In some school systems this elementary period is followed by a two-year junior high school, leading into a four-year senior high school, which in turn leads into a two-year junior college. In other places there is a three-year junior high school, followed by a three-year senior high school, in turn leading into a two-year junior college. Again, there is a two-year junior high school, a three-year senior high school and a two-year junior college. In all cases except in the last men- tioned it seems to be the unanimous agreement among school men that the secondary system should cover the eight years of ado- lescence, extending, roughly, from the age of twelve to the age of twenty. The administrative problem that confronts school men is there- fore the wise distribution of time during the eight-year period. Shall it be organized into one unit of eight years or shall it be divided into two or more units? If the latter course be pursued, the question is immediately raised as to the most efficient unit, both with respect to curriculum organization and to teaching efficiency. Wholly aside from curriculum consideration, school men seem to be fairly agreed upon two propositions; namely, that the eight- year period is too long and that the two-year period is too short for the building of the student morale essential to efficient work. 154 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION It is for this reason that the junior high school in so many places has absorbed the freshman year of the senior high school. For exactly the same reason men who have been working in the junior college are convinced after years of experimentation that the two-year unit is not a feasible one and that if the junior college is to live, it must extend its courses either downward into the field now occupied by the senior high school or upward into the field of the professional schools of the universities. For more than a quarter of a century educators, following the leadership of former presidents Harper of the University of Chi- cago, James of the University of Illinois, and Jesse of the Uni- versity of Missouri, have pointed out the fact that the freshman and sophomore courses of the present liberal arts college (now known as the junior college) are purely secondary in character and therefore belong in the secondary field. If this position, which is now quite generally accepted, be sound, it would be a mistake for the junior college to extend its curriculum upward into the field that is not legitimately its own. The only alternative then is for the junior college to absorb the upper courses of the senior high school. If this be done, however, and the senior year of the high school be taken into the junior-college curriculum and organized on a junior-college basis, another serious situation is created. The senior high school, having given up its freshman course to the junior high school below and its senior year to the junior college above, becomes within itself the same two-year unit that has proved undesirable in the case of both the junior high school and the junior college. It would seem, therefore, that the ultimate solution of the secondary-school problem must lie in the establishing of a four-year unit. In that case the junior high school should absorb not only the freshman year of the senior high school as it already has done, but the sophomore year as well. The junior college, on the other hand, should extend its course downward to include not only the senior but the junior year of the standard four-year high school course. This administrative reorganization will establish a six-year elementary school as at present, followed by a four-year junior high school, leading in turn into a four-year junior college that THE FOUR-YEAR JUNIOR COLLEGE leads directly into the professional schools of the university. It will be noted that the junior high school, extending roughly from the ages of twelve to sixteen, covers and permits the organization of subject matter and the adaptation of teaching methods to the needs and interests of early adolescence. The period covered by the junior-college unit, extending roughly from the ages of sixteen to twenty, permits the adaptation of curriculum content and teach- ing methods to the interests and needs of later adolescence. The four-year unit also permits the school system to adapt its curriculum to the abilities of the students. The honor student should be able to complete each of the two units in a period of three years, gradu- ating from the junior college at approximately the age of eighteen, while the inferior group could be given an extended period. It is confidently believed that possible reorganizations of the curriculum within the junior high school and the junior college will ultimately cause the word "junior" to be eliminated from both. It is impossible to enumerate all of the implications involved in this proposal. It is the ambition of practically all fathers,and mothers that their sons and daughters shall have the practical and cultural advantages of a college education. Under the existing educational machinery, this has been reserved almost exclusively for an intellectual or a social aristocracy. A man in comparing American educational methods with European made the criticism that American education had not yet produced the cultured peoples of Europe. Possibly the traditions of Europe have something to do with it. Possibly it is fortunate for us that they have not pro- duced those conditions as yet. Under the proposed reorganization, the liberal arts college itself would open its doors in every commu- nity now able to maintain a junior college. Through systems of consolidation, it would be brought to the doors of practically every community, and the university would become what it has heretofore been in name only, a real university. It was the confident belief in the feasibility of such a reorgani- zation that caused the Board of Curators of Stephens College to ask permission of the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools to experiment in the field of the proposed four- year junior college. 155 156 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Official Request Submitted to North Central Association WHEREAS, It is the judgment of the Board of Curators of Stephens College after fifteen years of experience that two years is not a practical unit for the junior college either from the stand- point of educational efficiency or from that of financial economy; and, WHEREAS, It seems to be the judgment of the best educational thought that the two years now included in the junior-college course is essentially secondary in character; and whereas, for that reason it would seem logical to make this extension of the junior college downward further into the secondary field; THEREFORE, be it resolved, That the President of Stephens Col- lege be instructed to ask permission of the North Central Associa- tion of Colleges and Secondary Schools to explore for a period of five or ten years the possibilities of such downward extension of the junior-college curriculum to include the period now covered by the junior and senior years of the present high school organization. Since this experiment involves the obliteration of the lines of demarcation now existing between the last year of the high school and the first year of the junior college, the integrity of the work done shall be safeguarded in such manner as may meet with the approval of the North Central Association. Upon the recommendation of the Commission on Higher Insti- tutions the Association granted the request. Its acceptance was expressed in the following words: Voted that Stephens College be permitted to carry on an edu- cational experiment for a period of five years involving the down- ward extension of the junior college into the fields of junior and senior high-school education and contemplating the obliteration of the lines of demarcation now existing between the last year of the usual four-year high school and the first year of the junior college; provided that in order to assure the maintenance of proper junior- college standards the President of Stephens College be required to report annually on the progress of the experiment to a committee of three persons appointed by the Chairman of the Commission. It will be noted that Stephens College was granted a period of five years within which to try the experiment. The committee appointed by the North Central Association to supervise the ex- periment is composed of Dr. Charles H. Judd of the University of Chicago, Dr. L. V. Koos of the University of Minnesota, and THE FOUR-YEAR JUNIOR COLLEGE Dr. George F. Zook, president of the University of Akron and for- mer commissioner of higher education under the Federal Govern- ment. This committee is to report annually to the North Central Association on the development of the experiment. Their findings will thus be made available for the information not only of other men working in the field of the junior college, but also for super- intendents and principals of high schools. The demand for such reorganization of curriculum material and educational objectives and methods is responsible for the rapid development of both the junior high school and the junior college. It 'is impossible to think of them separately because one is the vitalizing unit in the lower and the other in the upper secondary field. These institutions possess two distinct advantages over their respective senior institutions. They are free from the traditions that hamper the free development of the senior high school and the senior college. Unlike the latter institutions, they are the direct outgrowth of community needs and are not yet dominated by so-called intellectual standards. They represent a conscious and wholehearted attempt to adjust the curriculum to the needs of the individual student. Since this is true, it is evident that these institutions should not be permitted to develop along traditional lines, making no contribution whatever toward the solution of our educational problems. It is possible in these pages to discuss only one of the many changes in the curriculum of the junior college made possible by the above action of the North Central Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools. In the following discussion it will be remem- bered that the freshman year of the four-year junior college paral- lels the junior year of the senior high school only so far as the age and previous attainments of the student body are concerned. The organization of the curriculum itself is entirely upon the col- legiate level. I want before following the discussion simply to intimate what this particular possibility seems to be. We have had the feeling that the problem of the student who enters college is that there has been no place in the secondary system for her to get an idea of what it is all about. She has been given a varied program of 157 158 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION subjects, but it has been given piecemeal and there has been no correlation. She has never been taught the relation between chem- istry and physics, the relation between chemistry and foods, or between literature and music. She has been given no comprehen- sive view from which she might draw for her knowledge of the subjects. We deem it necessary to organize a series of four orientation courses, three dealing with the major fields of knowledge and one dealing with a specific problem. In our study of this situation it has seemed to us that if we used the term "humanities" for the first of these, the term "social and political sciences" for the sec- ond, and "physics, chemistry, natural sciences" or simply "sciences" for the third, we could cover the field for these students, so far as the range of human knowledge is concerned. We have included un- der humanities also such subjects as literature, drama, music, poetry, religion, and philosophy-such things as are an outward expression of the emotional life, the fundamentals of the life of a nation. In the second group, the social and political sciences, we have included all those recorded parts of human experience that have grown up because men and women have had to learn to live to- gether in the family, in the community, and in the nation-all those things that have a definite background in the field of interrelation between human beings-so that when a student later takes a course in chemistry, for example, she sees it not as an isolated thing, but in its relationship to the other sciences. The fourth orientation course is what you may call, if you will, vocational orientation. I don't like the term "vocational" because it is just as much an orientation in the professions as in the trades and industries. The term is used in connection with these courses because of the opportunities that they give to the student for remunerative employment. The object is to give the engineer, for example, before he goes into his professional school, a knowl- edge of, the contributions that he can make in that particular field, and the particular talents that he will have to use in that field. With every vocation and every profession passing in review before the minds of the students in their freshman year, and with the results of prognostic and other tests, he or she could tell pretty THE FOUR-YEAR JUNIOR COLLEGE well which one of the trades or professions to enter, making pos- sible an intelligent selection. This particular orientation course is confined entirely to the freshman year and disappears at that particular level. In addition there is a fifth subject provided for, and that is what we would term a service subject. There are certain subjects that have no particular value of themselves, but they are absolutely essential in some profession, some trade, some vocation, or for a mas- tery of these fields of learning. In this group we would place such subjects as English composition, a reading knowledge of a foreign language, shorthand, typewriting, bookkeeping, and accounting. From this group of electives the student would choose some par- ticular service subject that was essential in her line of work. It is proposed in the sophomore year to require election from each of these three fields-humanities, social and political sciences, sciences,-of every student who goes through. That means that the student elects one subject from the field of humanities. That subject may be English literature, music, or art. It may be any one of the subjects that fall within the subject of humanities. She is not limited within the field itself, but she must elect one course from each group, guaranteeing a continuance of that breadth of interest. I want to call your attention now to the provision that is made in the work of the sophomore year. A student elects a course in science, let us say chemistry. She isn't thrown immediately into the laboratory in chemistry to begin performing experiments, but the head of the chemistry department must organize what we call a survey unit where the relationship of chemistry to the other sciences is very definitely pointed out. In addition to that, the contributions of chemistry to human life and its welfare are pointed out, so that in so far as it is possible for this teacher to do this, chemistry is given human background and experiments become more significant because they point to a definite end. The head of each department is required to organize these survey units, which may be extended over a period of three months. Passing over to the junior year, electives are required from any two of these three fields of knowledge. The election in the 159 160 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION field of the major must take into.account the subject of prerequi- sites. That is, if a student has elected as a major the field of English literature, then she cannot elect a course in literature without giving heed to the sequence. She cannot elect a course in English one year, a course in music the next year, and a course in art the next and call it her sequence. In so far as her major is concerned, there is a definite sequence of courses. In her minor there is no sequence of courses. TABLE VIII AN INTERESTING POSSIBILITY SOCIAL AND HUMANITIES POLITICAL SCIENCES VOCATIONAL SERVICE SCIENCES SUBJECTS Freshman *f * *. *t Sophomore Junior t t Senior t * Orientation. t Required. Terminal, or elective. In the senior year the only requirement is in the major field, so that during the development of the four-year course the student is given a fairly comprehensive background, I think you will agree, for covering the field of human knowledge. This course may lead directly into her professional course in the university, as the choice of her electives has been safeguarded. I want to call your attention to two things that these courses demand. They are to be given by heads of the departments, so that an instructor who is offering a course in the freshman year follows the student through her four years in college. Heads of departments are to be found in the freshman year, not in the senior year. Secondly, all of these courses are organized on a senior- high-school level. It will be observed in Table VIII that four out of a possible five subjects offered in the freshman year are designated as orien- THE FOUR-YEAR JUNIOR COLLEGE tation courses. The purpose of this organization is to give the student at the beginning of his junior college course a compre- hensive view of the entire field of human knowledge and at the same time to give him a mastery of the particular set of tools that he may need to use in his own field of endeavor. The completion of the courses as outlined will bring the student not only to the door of the professional school but it will provide him with a cul- tural and informational background needed by the ordinary citizen in the solution of his life problems. A more detailed study of the proposed curriculum will probably make its ultimate objectives more intelligible. FRESHMAN YEAR I. Humanities This term is used to describe those fields of knowledge that represent the fullest expression of human emotions: literature, including drama; music, including poetry; art, including sculpture, painting, architecture, and forms of applied art; religion, including philosophy and ethics. It is not the purpose of this course to enter intensively into any one field of culture, but rather through an overview of them all to give a broad cultural background by means of which a stu- dent will be able, in later courses, to evaluate specific fields of knowledge. II. Social and Political Sciences This course is designed to give the student an overview of the interrelationships of human beings and the activities, both con- structive and destructive, which history has recorded as the results of such interrelationships. It serves definitely as a background for a later intensive study of the records of family, community, and racial life, together with the institutions that have developed as a direct result of the operation of certain social forces. III. Sciences This is a comprehensive view of the entire field of science in its relationship to human progress and human welfare. It is de- signed to render more intelligible the work that the student may later undertake in any specific field of science. 161 162 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION IV. Vocations The primary function of this course is to render the choice of a profession or of a vocation more intelligible. It is designed to acquaint the student not only with the nature of the professions, trades, industries, and vocations, but also with the possibilities for service in the various fields, the peculiar personal qualities needed for the successful handling of the problems, and the course of study necessary for its pursuit. This course is offered only in the freshman year. V. Service Subjects Whatever field a student may elect for his major or his minor subjects, the mastery of certain tools that will be vital in that particular field is necessary. Since these subjects are necessary tools in specific fields of learning, they are designated as service subjects. In this group would fall applied mathematics, a reading knowledge of a foreign language, English composition, shorthand, typewriting and accounting, the technique of applied music. SOPHOMORE YEAR It will be noted that the student is required during the sopho- more year to elect courses from each of the three major fields covered by the orientation courses of his freshman year. These elections are determined by the student's natural interests and ability and are designed to make possible the selection of both a major and a minor field of work at the close of the sophomore year. Each department is required to introduce the student to a given specific field of knowledge through a survey unit in that field. For instance, if a student elects chemistry as his subject in the field of science, he is given a survey course covering this entire field and introducing him not only to the fundamental forces oper- ating in the field of chemistry but likewise to the contributions chemistry has made to civilization. This course may cover a few days or a few weeks, but in any case its immediate objective is to render more intelligible the work of the student in the classroom and in the laboratory. A similar course with the same objectives introduces each basic subject in the curriculum. In the field of the service subjects the objective is a mastery THE FOUR-YEAR JUNIOR COLLEGE of the particular tool needed. A qualitative and a quantitative standard is maintained, but without the usual artificial time meas- urement. For instance, the objective in the mastery of a foreign language as a service subject is an easy reading knowledge of that language. The normal time limit for that mastery is two years. The objective in the course, however, is not two years but the mastery of a reading knowledge of French, whether it be done in three months or whether it require three years. JUNIOR YEAR At the beginning of his junior year the student will select both his major and his minor fields. The former will be based upon definite prerequisites, the latter will be free electives within the field of his chosen minor. SENIOR YEAR The only general requirement in the senior year is the con- tinuation of work in the student's major field that is designed not only to lead to an intelligent understanding of at least one field of human effort but also to prepare the student for more intelli- gent work in a specific school of a university. In addition to the above general requirements the organization of the curriculum upon a functional basis makes necessary specific requirements in relation to the Stephens College curriculum that are described in connection with another of the major research problems-The Education of Women. 163 XIII. THE GRADUATE SCHOOL-ITS FUNCTIONS AND CRITERIA DAVID A. ROBERTSON1 Assistant Director, American Council on Education The extraordinary prosperity of our country has created new educational problems at various levels-high school, college, medi- cal school, graduate school-for economic conditions have brought about a greatly increased enrollment in all our schools, especially the institutions of higher education. This crowding of the colleges has raised many questions. Are there too many persons in college? Is it true, as one college president has said, that 50 per cent of the students in college ought not to be there? If it is true, how are we to set up a process of selection for admission in order to retain the personal touch of professor and student? Owing to the wisdom and generosity of Mr. John D. Rockefeller, Jr., who has given to the American Council on Education the sum of $20,000 a year for three years for the purpose of conducting a cooperative study in personnel methods, these problems will be the subject of special study by all college administrative officers and teachers, led by an expert committee of which Dean H. E. Hawkes of Columbia is chairman. The question, Are too many people going to college? naturally involves not only the kind of people but the purpose of the college. You are familiar with Minnesota's important contribution to the discussion of this subject, Dean Kelly's volume, The American College. You are familiar with another important Minnesota docu- ment, The Junior College, by Professor Koos. These represent responses to searching questions: What is the function of educa- tion? How shall education be organized to attain these purposes? Who shall be educated and how? These are the queries forced on the colleges by the increase in the number of persons desiring to enter them. The medical schools have been severely tested by the increase in the number of those seeking admission. They have been obliged to limit their students to the number that their teaching facilities THE- GRADUATE SCHOOL and laboratories make appropriate. Forced to select candidates, they are naturally choosing those with the highest qualifications, personal and academic, and have found that the great competition has brought it about that the published minimum entrance require- ments are notably lower than the qualifications of those actually admitted. And, like the colleges, the medical schools are studying their own function and the function of the medical men in the United States during this and the next generation. The graduate schools of arts, literature, and science are con- fronted by problems made poignant by increased registration. Library facilities are inadequate in some departments because of the large number of students seeking to use the books. Must libraries provide for graduate students duplicate copies of essential books as they provide them now for students in large college courses? Must source material, even manuscripts, be duplicated by photostat? And what can the American university library, which has developed such elaborate devices to facilitate the use of books, do to provide a sufficient number of cubicles and reading- room or stackroom desks for graduate students? Laboratories are crowded. What can be done to furnish facilities in chemistry, physics, zoology, botany, pathology, anatomy, bacteriology? Du- plicate books and periodicals, photostats, cubicles, desks in the stacks or reading rooms, laboratory space and equipment, even additional platinum flasks and trays, can be bought if money is available. But though lecture classes can be enlarged, the seminar, typical of graduate instruction, can be conducted effectively for only a small group, and although additional funds may enable an institution to secure an adequate extra instructor in a freshman course in English composition or in history, no amount of money will enable a graduate school to extend indefinitely its seminars and staff--to buy extra Michelsons or Deweys. No wonder, then, that under existing conditions some graduate deans and professors in some departments, like Palmerston when visited by a large delegation, distinguish between those who are many and those who are much. Shall the graduate schools exclude the many? Obviously,,limitation of the total number of graduate students will not remove the difficulty; the shoe pinches in certain 165 166 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION departments and the pinch cannot be averaged for the whole boot. Can graduate students of a particular professor or in a particular laboratory be limited to the number that the professor can guide in graduate study and research and for whom there is adequate laboratory space and equipment? One dean of a graduate school has declared in his annual report that the situation is too difficult to solve. But it will be solved. The National Research Council, with all the great increase in the number of graduate students, is still interested in discovering gifted students who can be encour- aged to undertake research. Modern personnel methods have been encouraged by the National Research Council. And perhaps co- operation of schools, colleges, and graduate schools in the develop- ment of such methods for discovering and developing individual abilities will make it possible for the graduate schools to find those best qualified for admission. Universities, like hotels, may have so many patrons that they must turn some away or increase their accommodations. In France and England there are inns that architecturally represent gradual accretions, the result of taking in the house next door and the unused convent beyond that, structures with tortuous passages lead- ing to tombs, dark, airless, and without baths, and with halls clut- tered with innumerable steps up and down and round about on every floor--ill adapted for hygienic lodgings but endured by the American tourist, who delights in spending a single night in the beamed room once occupied by Cromwell or Charles II. In the United States when a hotel expands, it also buys the house next door and the one beyond. But, before tearing down all the old structures, the proprietor plans a new building to cover his entire ground; he makes sure of financing his venture; he carefully con- siders the architect's plans for the accommodation of guests; he assures himself of the reliability of his contractors; and makes certain of the date when his hotel can offer patrons living arrange- ments as nearly perfect as possible. The graduate school, like the medical school and the college, if it is to meet the new demands, must immediately determine its functions and have them dominate developments. The graduate school may be studied in the light of the later THE GRADUATE SCHOOL careers of its members, just as the purpose of the college has been considered in relation to the future activities of its graduates as members of society at work or at leisure. Former graduate students are conducting research in great industrial organizations, such as the Western Electric Company, the American Telephone and Tele- graph Company, the Grasselli Works, and many others; some find their opportunity in research institutes like the Rockefeller, Mellon, Wistar, and Sprague Institutes; and a very few are genuine ama- teurs in scientific discovery. The last class is not so large in this land as in some of the older countries; but advance in prosperity and culture will increase the number of those who can afford to pursue research for its own sake. No one is likely to suggest in Washington a bill like that which, according to press dispatches, was recently introduced in Angora to limit to fifty the number of scholars "operating" in Turkey. There will always be room for the man who does not need to depend on his research for an income; as yet, however, the market for research workers is not large enough to absorb all of the researchers prepared by our graduate schools. But the graduate schools also train teachers. Dean Haggerty, in his report to the North Central Association, showed that 80 per cent of the doctors of philosophy of one university were engaged in teaching. The graduate schools, aware of their teacher-training responsibilities, ,must have some policy; they must afford prospec- tive teachers an opportunity for learning their profession, develop- ing perhaps the present system of using graduate students as assistants in elementary courses, like internes in hospitals or pupil teachers at another level, and giving them real guidance in the art of teaching their subjects; or they must explicitly encourage the student to secure such training as the result of his own initia- tive, just as he gets control of language and other tools or even his own special subject. It is gratifying to observe a rapprochement between the two functions of the graduate schools. The Metcalf Committee, the Guggenheim Foundation, and other bodies are encouraging college teachers to participate in research; some lead- ers in research, awake to the situation presented in the annual meeting of the American Council on Education and in the sessions of regional associations of colleges, are desirous of increasing the teaching effectiveness of their doctors. 167 168 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Among graduate students, however, are some who do not be- come either researchers or college teachers. Some worthy students continue in the graduate school the general education begun in college. They are really carrying forward an adult education program of liberal culture. Many more are registered for courses that "may be counted for the master's degree" because such credit is necessary before the individual can secure the next higher rank or an increase in salary in some city school system. This large group of students, not primarily interested in research or college teaching, makes it impossible to consider the function of the gradu- ate school only in the light of the future careers of its students. Universities are right in emphasizing as the first function of the graduate school, research, creative scholarship, learning. But if this were its only function, each graduate school would be an All Souls' College or a Rockefeller Institute. For the sake of research itself and all that it stands for in the development of civilization, it is important that the best research men be not isolated but asso- ciated with the discovery, enlistment, and training of future re- searchers. Sometimes an institute can share the responsibility, as the Institute of Economics does, by selecting men for special pieces of research, paying them a salary, and on the completion of the study returning them to their graduate school to complete the requirements for a doctorate. In the main, however, the dis- covery and training of leaders in research and in the allied college teaching must be a function of the graduate school. Before the graduate schools can effectively select students to be trained, they must have a clear understanding of the duties of both research man and college teacher. Perhaps a description of the teacher in a university will suffice to illustrate the kind of per- son the graduate student may expect to become. The university professor must have mastery of his subject so that he can impart full, accurate, systematized knowledge of his field and refer exactly to recorded knowledge of his subject and direct study of original sources; he must be able to teach his subject so that a student will get not only departmental information but that full inspiration and discipline represented by the objective of the college or uni- versity as a whole; he must add to the sum of knowledge through THE GRADUATE SCHOOL the discovery of truth and the publication of his discoveries; he must perform promptly and effectively departmental, college, or university administrative duties such as chairman or secretary of a department, member of a faculty board or committee, or as dean, examiner, or other officer; and he must render public service effec- tively in his teaching and research, or in extension thereof' through articles, lectures, and addresses, or as a member of committees and commissions, or as a public officer, municipal, state, national, or international. If in some such fashion and with greater detail the graduate schools and the colleges can write the specifications for the work of the college teacher, it will be possible to define also the qualities desired in one to be admitted to preparation for such service. Up to the present the trial-and-error method used in a psychological laboratory for white mice in a maze has been used, rather than the methods resulting from experiment with human beings. It is not too much to hope that modern personnel methods may assist the graduate schools to find more rapidly and surely those who are likely to be most worthy of their long and expensive attention. If industry and collegiate institutions find in mounting costs of adjust- ing students to their work or study a compulsion to select the effective men and women as rapidly and surely as possible, the graduate schools must certainly feel such an impulse. Of course the students' interest in graduate work in a particular department or in a particular graduate school is an important item in the selective process itself. Why do graduate students migrate? Why do so many Americans want to go to Oxford when for a par- ticular purpose they might better go to Cambridge, London, Edin- burgh, Glasgow, Manchester, or Bristol? Why do they choose certain American graduate schools? Perhaps one might as well seek to analyze matrimonial selections. Propinquity seems to oper- ate in both fields and in either may be damnable. But perhaps it is more like choosing a hotel in Europe. Some want only the com- fort of prompt and cheerful services and lodging in a light, airy, quiet room with adjacent bath and plenty of towels, with a bed the springs and mattress and clean linen of which promise restful slumber. Some seek in addition a prestige that comes from enter- 169 170 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION taining friends in the hotel's luxurious drawing room or exquisite restaurant. And some, so I have heard, think chiefly of an impres- sive label on an emblazoned suitcase. How does one, how can one, choose a graduate school? In the region of the North Central Association, as President R. M. Hughes has pointed out in the North Central Association Quarterly (March, 1927), in the past five years out of 163 insti- tutions 67 have not conferred higher degrees; 99 (including 3 teachers colleges) have conferred such degrees; 87 accept candidates for higher degrees; during the last five years 74 conferred the de- gree of master of arts and 49 that of science; 23 conferred the doctorate of philosophy. It may be remarked that in the Associa- tion of American Universities there are 27 institutions, of which 13 are outside the North Central area. How many graduate schools are there in the United States to choose from? Which are the best ones? Should there be an approved list? What are the criteria of graduate schools? It has been argued that the American Council on Education or the Association of American Universities should issue a list of approved graduate schools. It is asserted that such a list would be a great convenience for college presidents and professors in guiding their gifted students into the best graduate schools and also choosing for themselves the best places for graduate study and research. But it has been urged also that such a list would be a convenience for superintendents who desire to find for their teachers qualifying for promotion some courses that would count for the master's degree, and thus would add to the crowding of the best institutions with students not engaged in advanced study or research. It should be noted also that a list already exists in the membership list of the Association of American Universities- a list, however, which does not include the University of Cincin- nati, the University of Colorado, or the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Even if the Association of American Universities were to increase the number of members and create a new group of associate members, there might remain a problem that the Asso- ciation of State Universities did not solve in 1909, when it sought to define a university as an institution qualified to offer three years of training for the degree of doctor of philosophy in at least five THE GRADUATE SCHOOL departments. Must we determine how many departments make a graduate school? At the California Institute of Technology a student can qualify under Millikan for the doctorate in physics; at Rice Institute the doctorate in physics can be secured under Wilson; at the Robert Brookings Graduate School of Economics training is offered in a single field. Shall we list approved graduate schools or opportunities for graduate study and research in specific departments ? For the training of a researcher or a college teacher the greatest requisite is a professor who is himself a leader in research and in graduate instruction. Fortunate indeed is the university that has at least one--a La Place, a Lavoisier, a Pasteur, a Garton Paris, a Champollion, a Binet, a Comte. Such men come rarely and not in ways to satisfy standardizing requirements. How can the pro- spective graduate student recognize him when he comes ? What is more generally necessary is a way to evaluate those who have not as yet attained the rank of genius in research. Of course the graduate student already knows the names of those who have con- tributed to the literature of his special subject, and his college professor has spoken of some who have influenced the development of his field. The teacher and the student both rely on certain data to assist them in measuring the quality of the professor in the graduate school. What was his college and his record while in college? In a British university a degree with honors is a very significant thing; in an American college a man may win the key of Phi Beta Kappa or a degree with departmental honors. What was his graduate school? His degrees and the source of them will tell but a part of the story. In his graduate school did he hold a fellowship? Did he take his doctorate summa cum laude? With whom did he do the work leading to his thesis? Has the thesis or any other contribution become notable in bibliography? Has he been honored by his colleagues as officer of any learned society or as editor of a scientific journal? What teaching positions has he held? What honors have been conferred upon him by other scientists? Has his reputation led to overburdening him with stu- dents? The regional associations inquire eagerly concerning the teaching load of each instructor in a college. It is even more 171 172 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION important to know whether or not a professor in a graduate school has classes that are too large or lectures that are too frequent. In School and Society (June 18, 1927, p. 735) Professor Buswell shows that in a single department of one university, in three years there were 242 candidates for higher degrees under the supervision of 20 members of the department. If these students had been distributed equally at the rate of 80 a year each adviser would have had 4 annually-a comfortable load. As a matter of fact one actually had 41, another had 39, one had 29, another 19, two had 17 each, 3 had 10, and 11 had 9 or less. Is the great man accessible to students? Does he treat the advanced student as a colleague or a laboratory diener? Does he cooperate with other professors and students in a search for truth or is he like the French professors in their laboratories as described by Darboux, barons in their medieval chateaux not bothering about one another and not joining for a common cause? Above all, what men and women has he trained to carry on the search for truth? Material resources are significant. In the humanities the library is of first importance. We know that the Library of Congress has over 3,000,000 books. Harvard has 2,497,200; Chicago has 1,000,000; Yale has 1,700,000. But the graduate student is less interested in a general collection, however large, than he is in a special collection possessing perhaps unique opportunities for re- search in his special field. The Catholic University of America has a general library of 268,504 volumes. It reports an English departmental library of 1,100 volumes. It has an Ibero-American library of 40,000 books. Moreover, there are other libraries, some two hundred of them in Washington, some of which, notably those of the Pan American Union and the State Department, enable the student of Latin America to find in that city a rich library. The exchange of books with the Library of Congress for the con- venience of research workers, the list of periodicals currently re- ceived, and the condition of the files of learned publications will help to determine the excellence of the opportunity to find materials in a special field. The scientist is more important than test tubes and beakers, nevertheless the worker in chemistry and biology and physics needs THE GRADUATE SCHOOL material equipment. The cost and date of a laboratory building or the expenditure for equipment will not suffice to determine the value of a graduate school. But these things help to measure a university's attitude toward its scientists. On financial stability depends in part a graduate school's ability to command the services of the best professors and the best resources in libraries and laboratories. Endowment, though em- phasized by the associations that rate colleges, is not in itself a sufficient criterion, nor is income from endowment. Although Columbia, including Teachers College, Barnard, and the School of Pharmacy, has an endowment of $98,204,633.43, and California, a state university, has an endowment of $10,506,506.06, California expends annually a sum considerably larger than Columbia spends (California, $12,233,712.76; Columbia, $10,290,004.63). Although Harvard has an endowment of $76,000,000 and Michigan an en- dowment of $3,238,154, Michigan annually expends $9,008,071, far more than its endowment and considerably more than the heavily endowed Cambridge institution spends (Michigan, $9,008,- 071; Harvard, $8,153,000). Minnesota with an endowment of $7,412,360.38 spends annually $8,270,225.40, or more than Har- vard does. These enormous annual expenditures must of course be judged in relation to the educational program. A criterion that the increasing enrollment in graduate schools makes especially important is one that the classifiers of colleges have had to dwell upon emphatically-admission requirements and their administration. A baccalaureate degree from any institution on the approved list of the Association of American Universities is a generally announced requirement for admission to graduate work. Then there is admission to candidacy for which foreign languages, decent command of oral and written English, and some general knowledge of the special field are necessary. It will not be long before a graduate school will be judged by the character of its admission requirements and its administration of them, so as to protect its laboratory and library facilities from overcrowding by the less serious, as well as to discover the most promising schol- ars. The Department of Education of the University of Chicago has already been obliged by heavy registrations to set up devices 173 174 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION for the elimination of the 20 per cent who classify low on tests and who prove to be incompetent to carry graduate work success- fully. Professor Judd is selecting students from the group admit- ted by the examiner by requiring the highest personal qualifications, the best preliminary education, intelligence tests, and full records of training and professional activities. He selects these students carefully during the first quarter of residence, offers them personal guidance and preferential registration, and refuses to admit to candidacy those who fail to indicate the highest qualifications. In other words, he is using at the graduate-school level those methods of finding the gifted student encouraged by the National Research Council, the American Council on Education, and others who are interested in the possibilities of modern personnel procedure. We are trying to find out what the college must know in order to select students. What must the graduate school know? What should be on the record of the student as he comes from school and col- lege? Are there ways in which aptitude for research or creative scholarship can be predicted? A lad who came down from tending sheep in the highlands was refused admission to the University of Edinburgh. Disappointed, he asked, "Do you no gie credit for original thocht?" The discovery of a measurement of potential original thought would indeed be a boon to the graduate dean. Meanwhile there are some more or less objective measurements he or the department may wish to use. Degree requirements and their administration are likewise sig- nificant. One might ask first, Is it necessary for a graduate school, or more particularly an institution offering graduate opportunities, to confer a degree? American graduate students who go abroad do so because they wish the best possible opportunity for graduate study and research in their fields. Some British educators have been disappointed because our students do not take the Ph.D. established by their hopeful British cousins for their benefit. Of all candidates for the Ph.D. in Spanish language and literature the University of California requires a year in Spain. In our own country graduate students find in industry or a government bureau or in a research institute an opportunity for study or research without the compensation of a degree. Notably the Institute of THE GRADUATE SCHOOL Economics has afforded such opportunity. I predict that other institutes will find the policy of the Institute of Economics a wise one for research apprentices, graduate schools, institutes, and the cause of truth. In those institutions that will confer degrees it is important to know the requirements. Is there an infection of semester hours and grade points from college contagion? How is mastery of subject tested? What are the responsibilities of the student for achievement? How is this tested by examination, preliminary re- ports, and thesis? What are the methods of instruction? How many are admitted to a seminar-two or ten or two hundred? When does a seminar cease to be such? What is a graduate course? Can one be more specific than the dean who described it as any course in the catalogue numbered from 200 to 300; or another dean who declared that it was any course listed on page 429 or following; or a college president who pronounced it to be any course to which graduate students are admitted; or a loyal one, now far from New Jersey, who wrote that it was any course listed as such by Princeton? My question-begging friends leave un- touched for you the problem, What is a graduate course? The number of graduate students enrolled may be very signifi- cant-perhaps in unexpected ways-for large numbers may actu- ally interfere with the best graduate work. In any case, as indi- cated in Professor Buswell's report, enrollment under a particular professor is more important than an average or a total. More im- portant than number is the quality of the graduate student commu- nity. Even more than in the case of college students, graduate students educate themselves and each other. How can one deter- mine this quality? The annual registers list the institutions from which graduate students have been received. Although it is true that a graduate school prefers to have a first-rate individual from a second-rate college rather than a second-rate man from a first- rate college, it remains a fact that the list of colleges may give some interesting light on the probable quality of the students. The geographical tables, too, tell a story. If students come from every state and twenty foreign countries, there may be an excellent reason. Which departments attract students from other state and countries? 175 176 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Most of all, the quality of the graduate students and the quality of instruction and other graduate opportunities can be measured by the success of alumni, just as in the case of colleges that prepare students for the graduate schools. Some years ago Professor Cat- tell studied a thousand men of science voted preeminent by their colleagues. I understand that in this unpublished study he noted where the starred men came from and when they came, and he studied the staff of the indicated institution. Indiana, for instance, prepared a long line of starred men in zoology; in a certain year the stars stopped; in the same year a line of stars began at Stan- ford. Obviously the answer was David Starr Jordan. This brings us back to that important criterion with which we started-the professor, a leader in research and teaching. I have been raising questions: What is the graduate school to do in the face of the greatly increased enrollment? If there is to be limitation and selection of students, how can the gifted stu- dents be selected? For promise in research and teaching? What, in short, are the functions of the graduate schools? How many institutions perform these functions? What are the best graduate schools? Should there be a list of approved graduate schools or a list of graduate opportunities? What are the criteria by which we can judge the opportunities for ourselves? My friend, Dean Ford, has enough knowledge and wisdom to answer all of them; but because he is not only a master of his subject, a distinguished researcher, administrator, and public serv- ant, but also a skilled teacher, he will not answer all of them but will expect you to do so. XIV. THE FUNCTION OF A GRADUATE SCHOOL GuY STANTON FORD Dean of the Graduate School and Professor and Chairman, Department of History, University of Minnesota I remember a good many years ago that during "a visitation" of a legislative committee at the University of Illinois one old gentleman in wandering around got in touch with one of the uni- versity men. "Now what is this here graduating school that you got here?" he asked, "I don't understand this graduating school." It is quite possible that many others are asking the same question now, and I wish that in the graduate school we quite met the specifications laid down by Mr. Robertson as the typical American method: careful planning, knowing where we are going, and hav- ing every detail from cellar to garret specified before we start. We have not done that in making graduate schools in the United States. I think those striking and rather distressing statistics that Mr. Robertson quoted concerning the granting of graduate degrees would seem to prove that we are a good deal like the country school board that resolved to build a new schoolhouse and resolved to use the old material to build the new structure and resolved to use the old schoolhouse until they got the new one built. Evidently that is what we are doing. A large number of institutions with dis- tinctly no qualifications, resources, personnel, or anything more than barely adequate facilities for doing undergraduate work are becoming concerned with rebuilding the old, using the old material for the new, and carrying out the new in the old way and calling the result a graduate school. Now I don't think there is any real use in starting out to define the function of a graduate school until for a moment I underscore some of the things that Mr. Robertson has put in the form of ques- tions, in order to make clear what graduate schools are at the present time. Put in its very best terms, a graduate school is a group of men, interested in research and the advancement of learn- 178 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION ing, who have reasonably adequate facilities to enable them effec- tively to give to others the proper training in these fields. But most of the men who do graduate teaching in American universities are still teachers of undergraduates. They are still members of college faculties, concerned with the problems of col- leges and college curriculums, and doing all kinds of teaching in one department. For the greater part of their lives they have had to do with regulations and requirements that in a certain sense find their main purpose and emphasis in responsibility for the prog- ress of the student who has to be directed, urged, and sometimes inspired to do what he is supposed to do. In the surplus of that time the college professor is a researcher himself and an inspiration for the free spirit. Put in terms of complete devotion to graduate work or to work with graduates of colleges, there are practically no universities of that type in the United States. Johns Hopkins was that when it started and has attempted to go back to that state. Whether it is an ideal situation or not, the teacher of graduate students in America is two-thirds teacher of undergraduates. Those are the facts in the case. It is not an ideal situation. However, I am not saying that the only kind of graduate school is necessarily one in which men are appointed solely to do and guide research. The situation involved in this double duty under present conditions is a great strain upon the leaders, but I make free to say that the best leaders of research are also by that very signature the men who can best inspire undergraduate students-that they are at least worth while. The most inspiring teaching is done by the man who at the same time is the most valuable in the graduate work. His research and maturity make him a man who knows things in proportion and relation and who can teach them more interestingly, more inspiringly, because he is not simply transferring what he himself has been taught, and so finds himself at the end of his resources when his notes run out. Now this situation is more than doubly a strain upon this rare kind of men because every undergraduate college is bulging with students who come not to seek the scholar but to seek a degree or to secure ampler training. The scholar's duties and obligations in the field of undergraduate teaching in American universities are THE FUNCTION OF A GRADUATE SCHOOL 179 not growing less; they are growing more. The graduate schools now feel, every one of them, the results of the increasing oppor- tunities and the increasing utilization of these opportunities on the college level; so that the graduate schools now, in view of their resources, are faced by the whole series of questions that Mr. Rob- ertson has raised. All this increase in education on a certain level has been accom- panied by a diversity in the forms of training that are given now. Just as soon as a college curriculum creates new and specialized courses, there comes a demand that in some way that subject shall be raised to the graduate scale or level. Journalism, for example, is no sooner put on a college level with a specialized course than a graduate school will be asked to consider giving graduate work in journalism, irrespective of whether or not it is a subject for research. When I look at transcripts of students' undergraduate courses, not only to see what they have taken but to get some idea of what they are prepared to do in the field they say is to be their major work, I can see all kinds of things likely to demand graduate- school status. I found the other day a young woman with credit for shirtwaist-making in college. Possibly it was a substitute for ancient history; at any rate, there was a credit for shirtwaist- making. Perhaps someone will come along and say it should be on a graduate level in order that we may train college teachers. As Mr. Robertson indicated, it is simply passing up what was once the high-school problem, and later the college problem, to the grad- uate school. The reason neither Mr. Robertson nor I can stand up here and make clear-cut definitions about what the graduate-school function is, is pretty largely because the graduate school is doing so many things. No one can tell at present what it is destined to continue to do. The question of training men who have degrees has come in law and in medicine and soon will come in all the branches of engineering. They are now far behind, but it is coming. The graduate school, then, is going to be a university; indeed, it is that now in that its offerings represent every kind of course. It is meet- ing current needs in that it is offering courses in practically every field. It is responding, just as each of the different institutions 180 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION on the lower levels has responded, to its clientele. Really, then, the problem of how far it is going to respond and the definition of its function, of its primary function-the one that makes it a university where, let us say, university work is done- are going to depend upon the answers that are given to some of these questions. It is going to come down to this: Will you define the function of the graduate school in terms of persons or of pur- poses; in terms, let me say again, of students or of subjects; in terms of what students are admitted from or of what they are admitted to; in terms of degrees or in terms of scholarly desires and achievement? Whether you take my first definition or my sec- ond, the two being quite different in emphasis, is going to determine your answer to the question of the prime function of a graduate school. If faced by numbers, if faced by inadequate training on the part of the students that come to you, you will organize and stress in your graduate school the giving of courses and the super- visory tutelage that will give you one kind of graduate school. You will have a school that consists of graduates of colleges; and you will carry over into it, quite logically and quite necessarily, I think, all that is suggested by personnel methods and all of the other things that have been introduced into the colleges. Stress upon the student and person is quite different from stress upon the sub- ject. In the latter case the professor says, "This thing I do; if you want to join with me in the doing of it and learn from me how it is done, if you are interested enough to think that possibly you might want to do it yourself and to make it a cooperative enter- prise, you doing your part as a free and independent spirit, well and good"-that is a different kind of ideal for the graduate teacher and graduate school and, in the long run, for graduate- school organization. In the end the answer to this question is not going to be a clear- cut one. It is going to be a carrying on of what the graduate school now is, of more general education, of a certain amount of specialized education, and of research. The graduate school has got to clarify its mind a little better and organize itself so that it can do each of these a little more effectively. I think the excuse for this morning's program is that from certain angles there is not any THE FUNCTION OF A GRADUATE SCHOOL 181 one more desperately interested in what graduate schools are doing and are going to do than are college executives. Somehow or other I should like to see the day come when both you and I are a little more emancipated from the belief that the holding of certain degrees is the true test either of being a graduate student or of being qualified to teach in the college. May I point out one thing in connection with Mr. Robertson's statistics about the number of institutions that are granting de- grees-most of those, of course, are masters' degrees given by the colleges. The question has been raised, and well may be raised, whether the master's degree is not becoming a degree for admin- istration by the undergraduate faculty. You would then have grad- uate schools that were interested only in candidates for the Ph.D., those who want to do, essentially, research and teaching on the higher level. You college executives are just beginning to turn to the study of college problems of your own particular type. The graduate school has a task here, too, in its own field, instead of complaining about the college just as the college complains about the high school, the high school about the grades, the grades about the kindergarten, and so on to the homes and parents in the end. We are now beginning to face some of the results of our own work. We are going to study our own problems. But when we do it, may I say that I still cherish the hope that into the graduate school will not be carried too much of the apparatus of the high school. Somehow I hope that we shall manage to preserve the opportunity for the teacher to teach without reporting marks or grades all the time and that we shall give him as associates students who do not have to be told just what pages to read in the textbooks but will set themselves to a task with free and independent spirit, utilizing to the fullest all the opportunities for better scholarship which, I may say, are growing richer and better every day in the United States. XV. INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS DAVID A. ROBERTSON Assistant Director, American Council on Education International university relations involve the exchange of per- sonnel-students and professors-and the exchange of ideas. About both of these topics I wish to speak as one reporting to his constituency-the membership of the American Council on Edu- cation. EXCHANGE OF STUDENTS AND PROFESSORS American students always have gone abroad, for one reason or another, since the beginning of the eighteenth century. From 1705 to 1866 in the School of Medicine of the University of Edin- burgh there is record almost every year of at least one and some- times as many as nine American students. In the eighteenth century Virginia sent fifty-seven, and Pennsylvania, ten, in addi- tion to four students designated as Philadelphians. Most of them are listed simply as Americans. And Americans they seem truly to have been, for they returned to their homes in Virginia, Mary- land, Pennsylvania, and the Carolinas, and engaged in the politics of the time, at least one of them appending his signature to the Declaration of Independence. In those colonial and revolutionary days students of the law like- wise sought instruction abroad. During the formative period from 1750 to 1775 there were 120 American-born members of the Inns of Court. Before the year 1815 we find record there of 236 American members. South Carolina sent the largest number, 74; Virginia, 49; Maryland, 29; Pennsylvania, 23; New York, 25; Massachusetts, 19. The lawyers, too, retained what even at this time we may call their Americanism: Nathaniel Bacon, the "Virginia rebel" of 1676, was a member of St. Catherine's College, Cambridge, and of Gray's Inn; five Middle Templars and one Inner Templar signed the Declaration of Independence; and four Middle Templars became attorney-generals of the United States. One at least went back to England-John Singleton Copley, son of the painter, entered Trinity College, Cambridge, in 1790. Four years later he received INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 183 a traveling scholarship to America-the first such scholarship I have discovered-and in the land of his birth he expected to settle down as a farmer. But crossed in love, so we are told, he returned to England and in 1795 entered Lincoln's Inn. He is the only American who ever became lord chancellor of England. All these American students seem to have made themselves welcome like one of them who died in Edinburgh. Last summer with the Professor of Philosophy of the University of Edinburgh I visited his grave, just next to Thomas De Quincey's. On the tombstone the lad was described as the "amiable American stranger." With the growth of American colleges and universities it has become less needful for our students to seek instruction abroad. The presence of foreign students in the United States is one con- firmation of this position. In 1922 there were 43,837 students in the world who were working outside their own countries. Of these 8,357 were in the United States; 6,447 were in France; 6,334 were in Germany; and 4,171 were in the United Kingdom. In 1923-24, according to figures issued by the Institute of International Edu- cation,. there were 6,988 students from 100 countries in 400 American colleges. Thirty-six of these American colleges had fifty or more foreign students. It is not generally known, by the way, that the British students in the United States exceed in number the American students in the universities of Great Britain and Ireland. In 1924-25 there were 338 students from the United Kingdom and 870 from the dominions, a total of 1,208 British students. Furthermore, the number of scholarships and fellowships for students of Great Britain and Ireland who desire to study in the United States in 1926 exceeded the number of scholarships and fellowships for American students who wished to study in the United Kingdom, including the Rhodes scholarships. And yet in 1925 in the universities of Great Britain there were 425 Americans, almost as many as from combined Canada, Aus- tralia, and New Zealand. In 1926 there were 449. In 1925 they were distributed thus: Oxford, 179; London, 114; Cambridge, 75; Edinburgh, 39; Glasgow, 7; Aberdeen, 5; Dublin. 5; Manchester, 1. In 1926 there were in Oxford, 166 American students; in London, 139; in Cambridge, 67; and in Edinburgh, 65. 184 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION In 1925, in France there were 3,789 foreign students, 1,558 men and 2,231 women-787 more than in 1923-24. Of these, 694 were in the University of Paris and 452 in the provincial univer- sities. In the University of Paris there were 283 American stu- dents during the regular session and 169 during the summer; at Grenoble during the regular session there were 56 and during the summer 117; during the regular session at Toulouse, 26; Bordeaux, 14; Strasbourg, 11; Clermont-Ferand, 11; Montpellier, 10. Why, if we have facilities in the United States, do our students go abroad? When Andrew Melville, after years at Poitiers, Paris, and Geneva became principal of Glasgow University, Scottish stu- dents no longer found it necessary to study in France and Ger- many. When medical science developed at the University of Edin- burgh, Scottish students no longer needed to visit Paris and Vienna. And soon foreign students were in Glasgow and Edinburgh. But Scottish students still went to France and Germany and Austria as today they go to Paris, Berlin, Heidelberg, Munich, and Vienna for special work. So with our Americans. Most of them are grad- uate students. Graduate students will always seek to work under leaders. Their migration we are used to; it is not uncommon for a man to take his bachelor's degree at Stanford, his master's degree at Chicago, and his doctor's degree at Harvard. Why should a graduate of Harvard go to Chicago? A physicist, he knows that Michelson is there. Why should a graduate of Chicago wish to go to Harvard? A student of English, he knows that Kittredge is there. Only credit is reflected on Chicago or Harvard by either migration. So without regard to national lines, the graduate stu- dent will eagerly seek to work with an Arrhenius, a Ramsay, or an Ostwald; a R5ntgen, a Curie, or an Einstein; a Finson, an Ehrlich, or a Hill. Moreover, material for research not available in the United States, material to be found in the Records Office of London or in the Bibliothbque National, induces our research men to work abroad. Note that I speak of work, not degrees. There was a time when Americans sought both training and degrees in medicine at Edin- burgh, in law at the Inns of Court, and more recently in the facul- ties of philosophy in German universities. The German degrees INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 185 our students no longer seek. In 1925 there were but 14 American students in German universities. Last year there were more, and as relations are resumed the number will increase. But never again will the best Americans be satisfied with German doctorates. Nor will they seek the recently established English degree of Ph.D. At the Congress of Universities of the Empire in Cambridge last sum- mer a few of our British cousins expressed their frank disappoint- ment because Americans had not flocked to the universities of the United Kingdom to acquire doctorates. "We had hoped that gifted and guileless Americans might come to us in great numbers. But the Americans, though gifted, were less guileless than we antici- pated. They have not come for our Ph.D's." To this the perspi- cacious Sir Gregory Foster and Professor A. P. Newton made the right American answer, "They have come to get the best we can give them in men and libraries and laboratories; and they have returned to take their own degrees." Americans no longer seek only the gray city of dreaming spires and romantic lost causes, though some 90 or 100 always will do so because of Rhodes. There is a realism in their choice of insti- tutions, gratifying already and likely to be more so when they know the resources of universities other than Oxford: Hill of Lon- don and his laboratory of physiology; Fowick and Tout of Man- chester and Pollard of London with the adjacent Institute of His- torical Research, the British Museum Library, and the Records Office; Rutherford and the Cavendish laboratories in Cambridge; Irvine and the chemistry laboratories in St. Andrews; the labora- tories of the new King's Buildings at Edinburgh; or Tyndall and the new �200,000 Physics Building at the youngest of English institutions. Our American students are seeking in Britain the best opportunities in their subjects where they can find them- even outside of the two ancient universities. And they are right in taking their degrees at home, for here are their future careers and they know how important is the interest of their American university and department and professor, not only in placing them after graduation but in encouraging and guiding them in the devel- opment of their careers. Is it desirable to encourage migration of undergraduate stu- 186 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION dents ? Or is it better for a lad from a farm to go to the institution within fifty or one hundred miles of his home and there deliberately confine his educational experience to four years at a chosen col- lege? The attitude of some small colleges is well known. The experience of urban universities, which are affected by the urge to the cities, is familiar. Large numbers of American undergrad- uates migrate from one college to another, as registrars are cer- tainly aware; and they migrate largely at the end of the second or fourth year of college in a search for facilities better fitted to their growing needs. Some of these undergraduates, who will never pursue graduate work, and who will never have the occasion to seek libraries or laboratories in European countries, will become leaders in business and politics. In the new international position of the United States it is important that leaders have some international expe- rience. So thinks the Committee on Foreign Travel and Study, the work of which was first announced in 1924 by Mr. Marcus Marks. The gentlemen of this committee believe that it is desirable for highly selected American students to go abroad for their third college year, return to their college for the fourth year, and grad- uate with their class. To make this possible it was necessary to interest the educational authorities of this and' other countries. In 1924 President Aydelotte visited England on behalf of the committee and secured assurance of cordial cooperation with any feasible plan for the exchange of students between the two coun- tries. Mr. Marks also conferred with educational leaders in France, Great Britain, and other countries and reported great interest in the suggestion of the Committee on Foreign Travel and Study. The problem of 1925, therefore, was to prove practicable some method of relating American students to the foreign educational system and some method of relating the student's foreign educa- tional achievement to the American requirements for the bachelor's degree. For undergraduates the problem of credits is important. The American Council on Education, on receipt of funds where- with to establish undergraduate scholarships for foreign study, issued to the press and to the American universities and colleges on the approved list of the American Council on Education, on INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 187 April 10, an announcement of "Undergraduate Scholarships for Foreign Study." In response, 155 applications were received from students in 67 American institutions in 32 states, who desired to enter 22 foreign institutions. The Assistant Director of the Amer- ican Council on Education carefully considered each of the 155 applications and put before the Committee on Foreign Travel and Study 21 nominations, chosen because of the strategic importance of the universities in which the students were registered and the strategic importance of the countries and institutions to which the students desired to go, as well as the merits of the individual applicants. The committee appointed the following scholars: Philip L. Boardman, Greeley, Colorado, Colorado State Teachers College, University of Montpellier; William Benno Brown, New York City, New York University, University of Munich; Clyde E. Dicky, Jr., New Haven, Conn., Yale University, University of Madrid; Robert S. Huse, Jr., Elizabeth, N.J., Princeton Uni- versity, University of Madrid; Fred H. Lumley, Columbus, Ohio, Ohio State University, University of Munich; Frank C. Monaghan, Uniontown, Pa., Cornell University, University of Manchester; James R. Pennock, Chatham, Pa., Swarthmore College, University of London; Milton Schilbach, Woodhaven, L.I., College of the City of New York, University of Paris; Edna M. Wilson, Oak Park, Ill., University of Chicago, Newnham College, Cambridge University. Because of the necessity for considering the matter as it per- tained to students in their own institutions applying for the scholar- ships announced by the American Council on Education, the authorities of sixty-seven American institutions were sufficiently interested to agree to the plan and to recommend applicants. In order to make effective the exchange of credentials, the Assistant Director of the American Council on Education at once communicated with the dean of each institution involved, explaining the special character of credentials likely to be intelligible to for- eign university authorities and notifying the student himself of the character of the experiment and the responsibility undertaken in connection with it. At the same time a letter was sent to the head of the institution that the American student desired to enter. 188 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Then the Assistant Director of the Council visited universities abroad, conferring not only with principals and rectors and vice- chancellors but with the university officers who would in the regular course be called upon to administer the cases of American under- graduates applying for admission. Everywhere there was a cordial desire to cooperate with the American Council on Education in finding a basis on which exchange might effectively be arranged. On the basis of the reports furnished to university registrars, the students were received by European institutions. Two things should be noted. It was desired that the American students should get the best that the foreign university offered in the way of train- ing that would be acceptable to the American university from which the students expected to take their degrees. Registration in the required curriculum of a given year of a French or German university might have involved repeating work already completed in an American institution, or undertaking studies that might be carried just as well in the students' home institutions, or pursuing subjects which, though required in the European degree course, were not necessary in the American curricula. For these reasons it was arranged that American students be registered in what American colleges call the group of special or unclassified students. This permitted the students to select just what they needed for the serious advanced work of the second half of the college course. On their return to the United States these students brought to their registrars statements of achievement of the kind provided when they went abroad. Six were completely successful in securing full credit for a year of work toward the degree in their American university. One returned to America at the end of the first half- year. One found in Madrid no opportunity to get work acceptable to Princeton but insisted that the year in Spain was eminently valuable to him even if it did not enable him to be graduated with his class. One, because he changed his major subject, found him- self involved in much the same sort of difficulty of adjustment to a new curriculum as he would have encountered in changing his program within an American college. During the past year one scholarship holder has been in St. John's College, Cambridge. Five have been in France as members INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 189 of the University of Delaware group. Indications are clear that when these young people return to their American colleges next autumn, they will have little difficulty in securing credit for a year of work toward their baccalaureate degrees. The University of Delaware, at the request of the American Council on Education, admitted students from other colleges to its group in France under supervision of Professor Kirkbride. The group this year has included students from the University of Dela- ware and from other institutions. Smith College has a group of juniors in France under supervision of a member of the regular staff. Vassar College has proved the feasibility of third-year stu- dents undertaking work in that country. Because the American Council on Education had proved that highly qualified American students were able to secure admission to universities abroad on the basis of intelligible records of achieve- ment, and because after a year of work in the foreign universities they were able on the basis of similar records of achievement to secure credit for a full year of work toward their American bac- calaureate degrees, the Council requested the Committee on Foreign Travel and Study to offer its scholarships to the Institute of Inter- national Education for administration in the future. To that Insti- tute all future applications for scholarships should be sent. The interchange of professors is even more significant. Think of the work of the American Scandinavian Foundation, the Kos- ciusko Foundation, the Albert Kahn Fellowships, the Common- wealth Fund Fellowships, the Carnegie Endowment for Peace ex- cursions, for economists in 1926, and journalists in 1927, the Gug- genheim Memorial Fellowships, and the many fellowships of the Rockefeller Foundation and the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memo- rial. But of this phase of the exchange of personnel I do not have time to speak. EXCHANGE OF IDEAS The existence of such an exchange of personnel, both students and professors, has created many administrative problems. In them the American Council on Education has been interested from its beginning. Officers and committees have given a generous amount of time both during and between annual meetings to studies 190 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION made necessary by these exchanges of students and professors. These are the subjects of some of the studies: Development of a Uniform Policy toward Foreign Degrees, Preparation of Lists of Degrees Recommended to Foreign Universities, French and Amer- ican Higher Degrees, Latin American Degrees, American Masters' Degrees, British Degrees, a System of Undergraduate Scholarships for Foreign Study. The valuable formulation of criteria by the Committee on Standards and the acceptance of these by important associations began in 1919 as a simplification of a situation con- fusing to foreign educational authorities, who were unable to assess accurately the various standards set up for colleges by the seventy- two standardizing organizations at work in that year. The forthcoming volume on American Universities and Colleges has been edited primarily for those of other countries who desire to know the facilities for higher education in the United States. It is with the educational problems involved in the exchange of per- sonnel, rather than with the individual students and professors involved, that the American Council on Education is concerned. The relations of the American University Union, the Institute of International Education, and the American Council on Educa- tion have been the subject of almost annual report. Always the Council has taken the stand that it should not be concerned with administration but should be free to study large matters of policy, especially within the United States. This was in accord with its constitution: The general object of the Council is to promote and carry out cooperative action in matters of common interest to the associations represented. It is understood that such matters will lie mainly in the field of university and college work, and in related educational fields. The Council was organized to meet national needs in time of war and will always seek to tender patriotic service. It will also encourage international cooperation in educational matters. In 1924 an understanding was arrived at by the American University Union, the Institute of International Education, the American Council on Education, the American Association of Uni- versity Women, the Carnegie Corporation, and the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial. The Institute became a constituent mem- INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 191 ber of the Council; the Union became a part of the Council, its former board of trustees becoming a committee of the Council, and its financial support a responsibility of the Council; the Association of University Women undertook to cooperate with the Institute and Council; the Carnegie Corporation undertook to pro- vide funds for the Institute, which had until then received grants from the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, and the Laura Spelman Rockefeller Memorial promised to match the in- come of the Council, dollar for dollar, up to the sum of $35,000 annually so that the international work of the Council, including the American University Union, might be cared for. It was at this time that the Council charged the assistant direc- tor to formulate effective foreign policies and to simplify admin- istrative machinery for their realization. When I went to Wash- ington to make that study, I wanted to find out how many associa- tions were operating in the field of international educational rela- tions. I published a list of 115 such organizations. When I was in Paris I found that the situation there was in need of organiza- tion. Thirty-five agencies in Paris operated without much regard for each other. In London the case was similar. I found people in Berlin, Rome, Prague, Vienna, Geneva, and Madrid ready to work with American representatives. It seemed a pity that there should be so much money going into overhead when it might be used for scholarships, fellowships, or exchange professors. The Council set an example by turning over to the Institute the admin- istration of the Franco-American Exchange and the undergraduate scholarships and the American University Union. The Council has indeed been seeking to "formulate effective foreign policy" and to simplify the administrative machinery for its realization. An effective foreign policy in education is largely conditioned by political considerations, although science and art do not stop at frontiers. The emergence of a great emphasis on nationalism has been a striking post-war phenomenon in Europe with its eight new states, in Africa, in Asia with its ambitious expression in China, and in Latin America. Paradoxically there appears also an interest in possible methods of international cooperation: a So- ciety of Nations, a Pan American Union, a Pan Pacific Congress. 192 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION This situation is likely to condition international educational re- lations for years to come. National responsibility for educational relations with other countries may be carried on through an organization active within national boundaries or through one that functions not only at home but in other countries. The British Universities Bureau in London and the Amerika Institut in Berlin are examples of the first-not yet fully developed. The Office National des Universitis et Acoles frangaises is an example of the latter. The French system includes not only a distinguished staff in Paris but a representative in Florence, Naples, Madrid, Barcelona, London, Prague, Bucharest, Sofia, Buenos Aires, and until recently, New York. This national organization is also considering projects in Portugal, Belgium, Luxemburg, Poland, the Baltic States, Canada, Australia, Jugo- slavia, Albania, Switzerland, Holland, the Scandinavian countries, Latin America, and the Far East. A somewhat similar program was in the minds of the Committee on American University Union when it issued its statement in the Educational Record of Janu- ary, 1926. The world being what it is today, which is the more desirable policy to encourage? Financial considerations already have caused France not only to refrain from developing new projects but to withdraw from fields already occupied for years-for example, the United States. Financial considerations have had to do largely with the lack of progress in the program of the Committee on American University Union. The temper of the political world today has led to charges of propaganda when the French estab- lished a New York office, when the Germans established an institute in Madrid, or when the United States has suggested an office in Latin American countries. But even if unlimited resources per- mitted the establishment of a chain of national offices in foreign countries and even if the sincerity of university representatives convinced skeptics that the only propaganda was of disinterested friendship and promotion of truth, would it be desirable to estab- lish in another country an office charged with looking after one's nationals in the universities or would it be better to afford the host nation an opportunity for hospitality to its foreign guests? INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 193 The American Committee, acting in cooperation with the League of Nations Committee on Intellectual Cooperation, after careful consideration of this matter has submitted to the latter for its consideration at the July plenary session of the committee in Geneva the following: Resolved, That the American National Committee suggest to the International Committee on Intellectual Cooperation that it should consider whether the bene- fits of study abroad would not be greatly increased if each nation affording facilities for foreign students and teachers within its borders would establish, by public or private enterprise, a central office whose functions would be: 1. To assist foreign students in finding and getting access to the educational facilities or research materials they seek, 2. To help its own nationals find the educational opportunities they seek abroad, and 3. To keep corresponding offices in other countries informed concerning all phases of national education of interest to foreigners. In university capitals resorted to by large numbers of students from a given country, the national office might be fortunate in having attached to it experts who had had long experience in, and full knowledge of, the educational institutions of the country from which students come. The Amerika Institut in Berlin is thus for- tunate in having a staff accurately and sympathetically acquainted with the universities and colleges of the United States. In the absence of such fully informed staff members, it might be possible for a national office to secure as attach6 an expert from the country or countries concerned, experts being frequently available among the professors temporarily resident in the country. In a country with centralized governmental control of higher education such a national office might be a part of the Ministry of Education. In Great Britain and the United States it might be a private organization of the universities and colleges, or it might be that both private and public support would create the national office. Obviously it ought to be in the port of New York, since it handles the personnel and acts as a national agency. Naturally, 194 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION we turn to the agency which is a member of the Council, the Institute. Obviously, if such a national responsibility in the United States be assumed by the Institute of International Education, the Amer- ican Council will be released from administrative details like the management of scholarships and fellowships and the American University Union and at the same time have increased opportunity for attending to its major interests of higher education in the United States. The Council has 6ompleted an important Finance Inquiry. The Minister of Education of the Irish Free State de- clared to me his great interest in this particular study and desired to receive the thirteen published volumes of the report. The Mod- ern Foreign Language Study has been conducted by a committee in the United States and another in Canada cooperating in the closest possible way. The Canadian committee has enlisted the cooperation of modern language teachers in Scotland and Eng- land in a study that will afford some very interesting comparisons of the results of beginning foreign-language study in early child- hood. Some thirty-two thousand French tests have been given in representative English and Scottish schools. The comparable results will afford some important issues in this as in the compari- son of Canadian and American foreign-language teaching. I quote Professor M. A. Buchanan of the University of Toronto, chairman of the Canadian Committee on Modern Languages: It is in the preparation of achievement tests that the American and Canadian committees have been able to cooperate most closely. To the Canadian committee has fallen the responsibility for deter- mining norms for a Canadian intelligence test-an adaptation of the American Army Alpha test. About 10,000 have been worked, and the results are now being tabulated. To our committee has likewise fallen the provision and working of English tests for use in the Province of Quebec, preparation of the Spanish vocabulary test, and all of the Italian tests. An experimental edition of a Spanish audition test has also been prepared and is receiving a preliminary trial. An experimental French audition test, prepared for the American committee, is being given a preliminary trial in the schools of Montreal, where stress is laid more particularly on teaching English pupils to speak French. The results obtained in our testing program can be summarized briefly as follows: Taking the French test as a whole, and exclud- INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY RELATIONS 195 ing the Province of Quebec, the American schools gain on Canadian schools in the first two years. In vocabulary there is slight gain also in the third and fourth years. In grammar the Canadian schools show slightly greater progress in the third and fourth years, and in comprehension or silent reading a gain of one test unit over the American schools in the fourth year. In none of the three tests, however, do they overcome, even by the end of the fifth year, the initial lead of the American schools. This is a significant disclosure that our investigating committee is studying carefully, in the hope that the factors producing the inferiority may be brought to light and remedies proposed. Cooperative experiments with comparable achievement tests, personality measurements, and personnel record-cards will aid American students in the United States and foreign students in their own universities and will facilitate migration in both direc- tions. Development of a basis of fact will enable us to get away from the vain opinions that now hamper international exchange of personnel. At present, while innumerable well-intentioned com- mittees and associations are eagerly urging such exchanges, col- leges and universities, without facts and moved by a sentimental enthusiasm-for Chinese students, for instance-and dependence on mere opinion expressed by some educational dignitary, lower their standards of admission and graduation for students from abroad. Greater respect for students from abroad is shown by institutions that exact from them the requirements expected of their own students. I have heard of professors passing a Filipino student who would have failed to qualify for a doctor's degree had he been a continental American. They said that he was not good enough for an American doctorate, but good enough for a Filipino. Last year two students came from Peking with the same curriculum. One was Chinese and the other English. They had had the same curriculum and teachers, but the Chinese was given the advantage of the English student by one full year. We want American students to satisfy the requirements of English, French, and German universities; we do not wish them to have courses diluted for their special benefit or doctorates good enough for Americans but not equal to those for which natives must qualify. Obviously, the development of comparable achieve- ment-tests in American universities may be important for institu- 196 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION tions in other countries, in both their domestic and their interna- tional relations. Even the development of a standard terminology in education will not only aid the development of uniform statistics in this country but will help students of American education wher- ever they may be. All our successes in these cooperative experi- ments may, indeed, serve the universities of other lands. And of course the educational achievements of other countries may be of use to the United States. Listening to the discussions in the United Congress of Universities of the British Empire, I was deeply impressed by the fact that those universities had prob- lems in common with us. So impressed was I, in fact, that I sug- gested that the next Congress, in 1932, be held at the University of Toronto, and that following it there be a conference of English- speaking universities, and that American institutions have the privi- lege of extending hospitality to the guests of their neighbor. Perhaps we can bring about a discussion of the problems that are common to all English-speaking universities. From our British cousins we can learn things directly useful to our colleges and universities. By that I do not mean to imply imitation of Oxford architecture or Oxford college organizations, for I firmly believe in the necessity of native solution of problems, with all possible light thereon out of the East or any other quarter. Why imitate the Oxford residential college in the United States? If we want such a social unit, we already have it at hand. Every fraternal chapter in the United States is a potential Oxford College, the same in origin, but a college without dons. Let the alumni and active members of the chapters employ tutors as the early Oxford colleges did and as two or three fraternity chapters in this country are now doing, and we shall have intellectual as well as social groups, like Oxford colleges in some respects, but essentially American. As they share our ideas and we share theirs, perhaps we may find it possible to cooperate in educational studies just as fully and freely as have the Canadians and Americans of the Modern Foreign Language Study, and perhaps, in each seeking the best for its own nationals and in joint search for that best, we shall all find that a high objective brings workers together into mutual understanding, respect, and even lasting friendship. STUDENT PERSONNEL XVI. STUDENT MORTALITY, STUDENT SURVIVAL, AND STUDENT ACCOUNTING RODNEY M. WEST Registrar, University of Minnesota The three topics comprising the title of this paper are more or less closely related. The paper itself consists largely of ex- cerpts from Survey Commission Reports 6, 7, and 8, previously published.' STUDENT "MORTALITY" The records of the Registrar's Office show three groups of stu- dents: (a) those now enrolled, (b) the alumni or the finished product of the institution, and (c) ex-students, who may be con- sidered, in a sense, a by-product of the University. This study on student "mortality" has to do primarily with the last group. It is significant in so far as it is able to show the extent to which the institution is responsible for the student loss. During the past decade the overabundance of students and the increasing difficulty of financing the rapidly expanding schools and colleges have largely overshadowed the importance of the increas- ing numbers who start a college education and drop by the way- side. During the college year 1922-23, the period covered by the Minnesota Survey Report, the data show a loss of 21 students during the first week of school. Although the total number of individuals enrolled during the year reached 9,791, the maximum number in residence at any one time was only 8,559, and by the close of the spring quarter this figure had decreased to 7,578, a loss of over 2,200 students. This, too, does not include those who failed to return to college at the opening of the fall quarter. 1R. M. West, Student "Mortality," Student Survival, The Measure- ment of Student Load. Survey Commission Reports, Nos. 6, 7, 8, 1924-26. (University of Minnesota Press.) 200 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION The gross total losses for the year are shown in the following table: GRoSS TOTAL LOSSES FOR 1922-23 CANCELLED DURING NOT RETURNED QUARTER TOTAL Fall quarter 2,029 402 2,431 Winter quarter 574 461 1,035 Spring quarter 539 276 815 Total 3,142 1,139 4,281 REASONS FOR LEAVING COLLEGE PER CENT OF PER CENT REASON FOR TOTAL CASES OF NET LEAVING COLLEGE NUMBER CLASSIFIED TOTAL Loss Illness 256 19.7 15.4 Illness or death in the family 48 3.7 2.9 Needed at home 20 1.5 1.2 Family moving away 32 2.5 2.0 Married 16 1.2 0.9 Financial 413 31.7 24.9 Going into business 109 8.4 6.6 Travel 15 1.2 0.9 Temporary, for experience 17 1.3 1.0 Transferred to other institutions 112 8.6 6.8 Change or lack of an objective 89 6.8 5.3 Program or curriculum difficulties 32 2.5 2.0 Dissatisfied with some phase of the University 42 3.2 2.5 Lack of interest or discouraged 94 7.5 5.7 Miscellaneous personal reasons 7 0.5 0.4 Total classified 1,302 100.0 78.5 This loss of 4,281 students, however, that would not normally be expected to includes certain groups return to college. For example: 1,078 graduated during the year from a non-continuation course or had so nearly completed the degree requirements as to make it possible to complete the remaining work by corre- spondence. 527 were registered as special or unclassed students. STUDENT MORTALITY AND SURVIVAL 463 were excluded by the University for scholastic or discipli- nary reasons. 103 cancelled in order to transfer to some other unit of the University. 5 were deceased, and in addition 446 of those who cancelled did return during the year. If these numbers are deducted from the gross total loss, there remains a group of 1,659 students, or 18.4 per cent of the total registration, who would normally be expected to continue with their college work but who failed to do so. Information obtained from the individual student, the Univer- sity Health Service, the deans of the colleges, and the deans of student affairs and of women made it possible to classify the rea- sons for leaving college in 1,302 (78.5 per cent) cases. The re- sults of this classification are shown in the second table on p. 200. A discussion and further analysis of each of these groups will be found in the Survey Report, from which the following summary is taken: Number of Students Involved.-In comparison with a total registration of undergraduate collegiate students of 9,025 for the college year 1922-23, there were 4,281 cases of cancellation and non-return to college, or 47.4 per cent. Of this number 2,622 may be left out of consideration on account of transfer to another unit of the University, death, subsequent return, completion of course of study, or exclusion by the University, leaving a net loss of 1,659 students or 18.4 per cent of the year's registration. Relative Numbers of Men and Women.-The relative numbers of men and women who discontinue their courses do not differ materially. A noticeably larger percentage of women leave on account of illness, illness or death in the family, marriage, and change or lack of objective; while in cases of financial difficulties, business opportunities, desire for practical temporary experience, and program and curriculum difficulties, the percentage of men is the higher. Probability of Return.-It appears, aside from those cases in which the parents leave the city or state, the women marry, trans- fers are made to other'institutions, or students leave on account of dissatisfaction, that a very considerable proportion will re-enroll. In the cases of illness and financial difficulty, which together rep- 201 202 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION resent nearly half the instances of discontinuance, over 83 per cent expect to return. These factors in student loss, therefore, while important as causes of interruption of the college course, do not appear to be of as serious concern to the University as the smaller groups of those leaving from dissatisfaction and discouragement. Scholarship.-With the exception of those cases of discontinu- ance on account of illness or death in the family, necessity of being at home, and removal of the family from the city or state, all of which may be grouped as exterior causes so far as the student is concerned, scholarship appears to be an important factor. To the causes enumerated above should probably be added those of leaving to be married and leaving on account of miscellaneous personal reasons. Both of these groups are too small for any significance to be placed on the honor-point ratio. In cases of ill health, financial difficulty, and change or lack of objective, the low scholarship is probably in general a reflection of the existence of these conditions. In many of the remaining cases, without a doubt, the poor scholastic progress was one of the deter- mining factors in the student's decision to discontinue. Residence.-In comparison with the residence of all students in the colleges under consideration a larger proportion of the cases of cancellation and non-return appear among students residing out- side of the Twin Cities. This condition is most noticeable in the group cancelling for financial reasons, as might be expected. The fact that a comparatively small percentage of those living in the Twin Cities left on account of dissatisfaction with the University is of interest in that it points to the possibility that this dissatis- faction may have been at least partially incidental to the fact that the student was living away from home. Classification.-Approximately two-thirds of the cases of dis- continuance occur in the cases of students of junior-college grade. Where finances are a factor, the situation may be explained by the fact that many students, having acquired sufficient funds to start their college course, were unable to continue a second year without first recuperating financially. The upper-class students are, of course, those that have already survived the period of the greatest elimination, and have acquired STUDENT MORTALITY AND SURVIVAL a greater interest in their course and a more definite objective. It is natural to find that a smaller proportion would leave college under the same conditions that might cause a student of the fresh- man or sophomore years to discontinue. The University's Responsibility.-The chief concern of the Uni- versity should rest with those students with no objective or an uncertain one, with those who are dissatisfied with some phase of the university course, and with those who leave through discourage- ment or because of lack of interest. It is true that these three groups aggregate only 225 students, or 13.5 per cent of the total loss, and but 2.5 per cent of the total registration. Aside from those who cancel for these reasons, however, there are unquestion- ably many more in exactly similar circumstances and with similar states of mind who continue with their college courses. Much may be accomplished through the efforts of the Univer- sity to establish a systematic scheme of vocational guidance. Steps should be taken to assist each student in formulating a definite objective as soon as possible after matriculation and thereby create an interest in his educational opportunity which he otherwise lacks. While discouragement due to poor scholastic progress is not necessarily a responsibility of the institution, reasonable care should be exercised to insure against the loss of students from this cause, in those cases where there is evidence of ability and pos- sible success if temporary causes inhibiting good scholarship can be obviated. It is possible that the extension of the psychological tests and a more intimate personal contact between students and advisers will make it possible to recognize such cases and permit of greater assistance and reduction of the number who leave college because of discouragement. Finally, every possible effort should be made to avoid appear- ances of unfairness or discrimination. Every student against whom an adverse decision is rendered is entitled to, and should have, a full explanation and justification of the institution's point of view. STUDENT "SURVIVAL" The report, Student "Mortality," discussed above, showed that 81.9 per cent of the first-year students, 35.6 per cent of second- 203 204 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION year students, 18.3 per cent of third-year students, and 9.5 per cent of fourth-year students, all of whom would normally be ex- pected to continue in college, left during the year of the survey. Of this group, however, 71.3 per cent have expressed themselves as intending to return and complete their courses of study. This study of student "survival" was undertaken to determine, if possible, (a) how many entering students remain in college throughout the normal four-year period, and (b) how many, whose courses are interrupted, eventually return and complete the work for their degrees. The freshman class for September, 1920, which was selected for this study, was made up of 1,672 students. The consideration of the problem was complicated by the fact that considerable num- bers transfer from one college to another on account of changing objectives. Similarly, many transfers occur between the comple- tion of preprofessional work in the Arts College and admission to the various professional schools. At the end of the normal four-year period it was found that of the 1,672 entering freshman, 12.8 per cent had graduated from the college in which they had originally matriculated, 11.1 per cent had either graduated or completed four full years in a combined preprofessional and professional curriculum, and 0.6 per cent had graduated after transfer to another college of the University. Approximately 24 per cent, therefore, either graduate or com- plete four full years of work in the normal time. Of the remaining 76 per cent, a part have remained in regular attendance but have failed to graduate on account of delinquencies or because they have carried only partial programs. A part have had their courses interrupted but have returned during the four-year period. Others who have cancelled their registrations will return at some later date. Some have permanently left the institution. The study necessitated following the history of each individual case. By the close of the fall quartei of the first year 7 per cent had left or transferred to another college. At the opening of the winter quarter some of these had returned either to the original college or to some other college of the University. At the opening of the second year only 50 per cent of the group remained in the STUDENT MORTALITY AND SURVIVAL original college of matriculation, and by the fall quarter of the third year only 16 per cent remained without some interruption to their course of study or transfer of registration. The graduating group of 1924 was made up as follows: Graduation in the normal four-year period 30.1 per cent Graduation in less than four years 5.5 per cent Partial residence at University of Minnesota 30.0 per cent Entered prior to September, 1920 34.4 per cent The last group, comprising the deferred graduations, consisted of 369 students. Of this group 253 or 66.2 per cent entered 5 years prior to graduation, 65 or 17.0 per cent entered 6 years prior to graduation, 23 or 6.0 per cent entered 7 years prior to graduation, 16 or 4.2 per cent entered 8 years prior to graduation, 5 or 1.3 per cent entered 9 years prior to graduation, 7 or 1.8 per cent entered 10 to 22 years prior to graduation. If the sizes of the entering classes with which these groups entered were the same as the entering class of 1920, it would be fair to assume that the above percentages of deferred graduations would hold for a reasonable period of time. As a matter of fact, however, the freshman group of 1919-20 was 1.26 of that of 1920; and the ratios of the preceding freshman groups were respectively: 1918-19, 0.56; 1917-18, 0.57; 1916-17, 0.56; 1915-16, 0.56. On the basis of the relative sizes of the freshman classes and the proportion of deferred graduations in the class of 1924, there- fore, it can be deduced that while at the end of four years only 24.4 per cent had actually graduated, this proportion would have increased to 38.5 per cent at the end of five years, 47.1 per cent at the end of six years, 49.7 per cent at the end of seven years, 51.7 per cent at the end of eight years, 52.4 per cent at the end of nine years. The following summary is taken from the Survey Commission Report No. 7: Number of Students Included in the Problem.-Of the total freshman class of 1920-21, there were excluded those matriculating prior to that year, those entering with advanced standing, those 205 206 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION matriculating at the opening of the winter and spring quarters, and all of those registering originally in two- and three-year curricula. This left a total of 1,626 students who matriculated in the Uni- versity for the first time in September, 1920. The study was based on the individual records of this group. Graduates at the End of the Four-Year Period.-Including all of the foregoing group who received degrees from any college of the University in June, 1924, together with those who completed four full years of the five-year courses in Arts and Law and in Arts and Dentistry, only 23.7 per cent of the entire group are represented. In addition, 19.9 per cent were in residence at the close of the year in June, 1924, without having graduated, and 56.4 per cent had left the institution. Scholarship.-The average scholarship of the graduating group as a whole is far in advance of the averages for those delayed in graduation and those not returned prior to June, 1924. On the other hand the data show conclusively that many of those whose courses have been interrupted and those who have dropped out are desirable students from the standpoint of scholarship. These con- stitute a large potential group for later re-enrollment and graduation. Summer Session and University Extension as Aids to Gradua- tion.-The proportion of graduates at the end of four years is mate- rially affected by the opportunities offered by the summer sessions and, to a less degree, by those available in University Extension classes. The influence of these agencies though at the present time not subject to accurate estimate, undoubtedly will be made apparent in future delayed graduations. The increasing patronage of the summer session by regular college students testifies to this fact. Graduation from Other Collegiate Institutions.-In addition to the students whom it graduates, the University contributes in a measure to the finished product from other institutions through those students who transf6r and ultimately graduate elsewhere. The fact that all of the work of these students is not done at the University of Minnesota is more than offset by the large numbers coming to Minnesota, particularly to the professional schools from other colleges. The inclusion of such students in this study, how- STUDENT MORTALITY AND SURVIVAL ever, seemed necessary in order to estimate fairly the proportion of students of the original class of 1924 who will eventually graduate. Deferred Graduation.-Approximately as many students from the class entering in September, 1920, will graduate after the nor- mal four-year period as received their degrees in June, 1924. This estimate is based on the proportion of deferred graduations in the 1924 graduating class and the relative sizes of the original groups with which these students entered. Conservatively estimated, about 50 per cent of the entering group in 1920 will probably have graduated during the next five years and, under existing conditions, this proportion can reasonably be applied to succeeding groups. Non-Graduates.-It is not fair, however, to measure the influ- ence and effectiveness of an institution like the University of Min- nesota by the number and proportion of its graduates alone. Many of the 50 per cent who never graduate will spend four years or more, and many others will have spent less time on the campus, in the libraries, and in the classrooms and laboratories of the Uni- versity. The experience of even these shorter associations cannot be considered as of negligible value either to the student or the state. Nor should it be looked upon as wasted effort on the part of the University. The non-graduating group constitutes a very considerable portion of the University's load with which the insti- tution's responsibilities for its graduating students must be shared. MEASUREMENT OF STUDENT LOAD As a result of the foregoing statistics the inadequacy of the present methods of measuring student enrollment was emphasized and the following survey was undertaken to determine if possible the real relationship between "enrollment" and "student load" at the University of Minnesota. Weekly reports and summaries of enrollment and actual attend- ance showed for 1924-25 a difference of 70 students by the close of the first week and a spread of nearly 2,500 students by the close of the year. Data for subsequent years show a fairly constant relationship to exist between total enrollment and actual attendance. Over a four-year period the spread between total enrollment and 207 208 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION actual attendance was found to average 4.5 per cent of the total enrollment at the fall quarter; 15 per cent at the end of the winter quarter; and 23 per cent at the end of the spring quarter. A measure of actual attendance, however, does not properly measure student load because, although some students carry more than normal programs, a very considerable number carry less than the normal graduation load. A count of the actual attendance in terms of the theoretical full-time student for 1924-25 showed as an average for the year approximately 900 less than the average actual attendance of individuals and over 2,000 less than the aver- age total enrollment. The greatest difference appears at the close of the year, when it reaches 3,300 students. The largest propor- tional variation is found in the fall quarter. The Survey Report referred to contains a full discussion of these variations and the method of counting full-time students. The Summary is quoted below: A. Student enrollment figures as prepared in accord with pres- ent practice, while they indicate the number of individuals who at some time during the year come into official contact with the institution, do not adequately measure student load. B. The chief differences between total enrollment and student load are the result of (a) cancellation of registration during the year and enrollment after the opening of the year, (b) registrations for partial programs, and (c) different loads for different types of students. C. At Minnesota, with a total enrollment of approximately 10,000 students, the variations in load due to late enrollment and cancellation during the year are sufficiently constant in character and proportionate numbers to warrant the use of total enrollment figures as an index, though not a measure of actual registration. This constancy in variation further justifies the prediction of the year's enrollment and losses on the basis of the registration for the first few weeks of any year. D. Neither the figures for total enrollment nor those for actual attendance can be fairly used even as an indication of load in inter- institutional comparisons unless the Minnesota curves and the re- lations existing between them find fairly parallel counterparts in corresponding enrollment curves of other institutions. How far the variations in these curves represent American college enrollment tendencies in general and how far they are influenced by local social conditions, the community in which the STUDENT MORTALITY AND SURVIVAL university is located, and the administrative policies of the institu- tion itself, can only be determined from comparable studies in other universities. The effect of the quarter system, the effect of a large urban community, the effect of coeducation, and the effect of other lesser factors, remain to be measured before total registration figures can with propriety be considered a real index of size or a real measure of comparative student loads. E. The best and most practicable basis for measuring student enrollment is with the use of the theoretical full-time student as a unit. If each collegiate institution would agree to report with its total registration figures, their equivalent in terms of the number of such full-time enrollments, the first step will have been taken toward the placing of quantitative comparisons on a sound basis. F. The measurement of departmental teaching-loads in terms of credit-hours, or preferably weighted credit-hours, is an essential basis for determining relative instructional costs. The direct re- lationship, therefore, which exists between such units as student credit-hours and the theoretical full-time student should make the extension of the latter to the measurement of university enrollment not only expedient but necessary both for intra- and interinstitu- tional comparisons. 209 XVII. STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT M. E. HAGGERTY Dean of the College of Education and Professor of Educational Psychology, University of Minnesota Mr. West opened this series of discussions of student personnel with a presentation of the facts of student mortality and survival and of some of the causes of elimination from college. It is my function to discuss with you the matter of student ability in rela- tion to student achievement and some of the recent steps forward in the measurement of factors that determine what students do in college. We shall travel over a wide range of problems, and in the nature of the case cannot give exhaustive treatment to any. More detailed discussions of particular matters will follow in suc- ceeding papers. My purpose will be accomplished if this intro- ductory overview provides a schematic outline for later discussions and gives some introduction to a series of important problems in the field of college student personnel. FUNDAMENTAL THEORY Something may be gained for the point of view with which we approach this Institute by a bit of fundamental theory at the begin- ning. The time has come in our consideration of college education to rid ourselves of many illusions and superstitions and to substitute scientifically verified facts for ancient prejudices. This process is already well under way and many influences are contributing to it. If this fortnight of conferences can be made to accelerate the movement and set some of us to work upon vital problems with the methods of science, it will have justified itself. What, then, is this fundamental theory? Simply this, that the problems of college education are amenable to investigation by the methods of science. Possibly you readily accept this proposal, but I cite you to the literature of the field, which accumulates in such utter disregard of this hypothesis that it is little short of ludicrous. Many of the cherished educational prejudices to which we are wedded are maintained in the total absence of factual knowledge STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 211 to support them and at times in direct opposition to scientific evi- dence of which we might avail ourselves. It may easily be main- tained that a thoroughgoing application of the theory laid down above will call in question a large portion of our beliefs about col- lege education and in some cases will show them to be false and unfounded. Abundant evidence of the truth of this statement will be forthcoming in later discussions. THE EDUCATIONAL EQUATION Let me state the theory here suggested in the form of an edu- cational equation. On the left of the equation we will arrange all the factors that contribute to a desirable outcome of a college course on the right will be the outcome itself. Our equation will read: A + B + C +D E +F G = V +W +X +Y - K, - K2 For illustrative purposes and without any attempt at exhaustive analysis or exact logic, the symbols A to G may be indicated in the following outline: Some Factors Contributing to the Outcomes of a College Education A. General 1. Age 2. Race 3. Nationality 4. Wealth B. Physical characteristics 1. Size: height and weight 2. Voice and speech 3. Health 4. Energy 5. Nutrition C. Mental characteristics 1. Sensory acuities 2. Reaction rate 3. Memory 4. Span of attention 5. Intelligence or intellect 6. Drive 7. Aggressiveness 8. Personality 9. Emotional history 5. Occupation of parents 6. Religion 7. 8. 6. 7. 8. 9. Skill Hygienic habits Sleep Sex 10. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14. 15. 16. 17. 18. Emotional stability Industry Interests Social attitudes Attitude toward study Religious attitudes 212 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION D. Previous training and experience 1. Home training 2. Schooling (a) Elementary (b) Secondary English Other languages Mathematics Science History, etc. E. Curriculum 1. Content 2. Difficulty F. Instruction 1. Instructor 2. Laboratory 3. Library 4. Textbooks G. Extra-curricular experiences 1. Fraternities 2. Clubs 3. Athletics 4. Music 5. Dramatics 6. Publications 7. Church and religious societies 3. Occupational experience 4. Social experience 5. Extra-curricular school activities 6. Travel 7. 8. 3. Quantity-load carried 4. 5. Classroom procedures 6. Size of class 7. 8. 8. Personal contacts (a) With students (b) With faculty (c) With others 9. Earning of money 10. Home conditions 11. Student politics 12. In like manner the right-hand symbols may have the following explication: Outcomes of Student Life V. Academic achievement 1. Information gained 2. Increased power to think 3. New skills 4. Academic marks W. Physical achievement 1. Health 2. Skill 3. Energy 5. Academic honors 6. New intellectual interests 7. 8. 4. Hygienic habits 5. 6. STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 213 X. Personality 1. Greater integration of 3. Better emotional balance abilities 4. ----- 2. Greater attractiveness 5. Y. Social adjustment 1. Easy social contacts 4. Friendships 2. Leadership 5. 3. Broader human sympathy 6. Z. Vocational fitness 1. Knowledge 4. Experience 2. Skill 5. 3. Interest 6. In our educational equation the K1, K2, etc., represent losses incident to college attendance, i.e., money spent, loss of earning time, breaking of home ties, disturbance of beliefs. When you phrase the complex matter of college education in this analytic and sequential fashion and ask yourself, Upon how many points in this equation do we have exact knowledge? In how many places can we substitute for the symbols used, a quan- titative statement of facts? you are astounded at the paucity of genuine factual material at hand. Beliefs and opinions we have in abundance and based upon these, an amazing industry, but of scientific information we have little. So long as this condition prevails we are at the mercy of our superstitions and our prejudices. In the absence of facts the most plausibly and powerfully presented argument gains the majority vote and prevails, however wrong and untrue it may be. With this situation we cannot be content. The scientific ideal in our study of college education is to replace every symbol in our educational equation with quantitatively evaluated facts so that we may speak with knowledge rather than opinion and may go about our task with assurance and certainty that our work will eventuate fruitfully. THE POINT OF ATTACK If we are going to attack the study of college education from a basis of fact, we may begin at any point in our educational equa- tion. Any topic put down here is one for investigation, because you can fairly say that for no single one of them do we have suffi- 214 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION cient information to enable us to draw hard and fast conclusions. Dean Freeman's discussion about improving instruction in science is full of questions.' Page after page seems almost taken up with the formulation of problems. This is a very different sort of edu- cational discussion than that to which we are generally accustomed. It is a curious situation that if you are actually going to study the improvement of science, nearly all the information you would like to have about the matter is yet to be got. If you insist upon making your discussion of a positive character, you have to go ahead in the absence of facts. The same thing is true in the field of mental qualities. If you undertake in connection with any single item under C in our outline to formulate your knowledge so that it is sure and dependable and so you can draw conclusions from it, then what you find is that there are some things you don't know about it, and you must back up and make an investigation. In college educa- tion we are at the beginning of a scientific approach, and most of the knowledge that we should like to have as settled scientific fact is yet to be found out. I have given in the educational equation a letter K to indicate whatever disadvantages a student may incur by going to college. Some are perfectly obvious. A student continues as a non-wage- earning individual for nearly four years, a fact of which parents are often painfully aware. Students do not earn all their expenses through college. We glorify far out of its proportion the contribu- tion that students make to their education. There are certain other disadvantages that a young college student experiences in the un- settling of his emotional life and possibly of his religious beliefs, and all these disadvantages must be subtracted to get the educa- tional equation. In that equation there is no place for superstition; there is no place for prejudice; there is no place for magic; there is only a place for solid fact, and nothing else. If at this stage of the discussion we were to adhere to strictly scientific fact, the talk would be very brief. Possibly, however, we may derive from these considerations a point of view that will do two things-enable us to evaluate educational literature and also set us to work upon our problems with the methods of science. 1Post, pp. 426-43. STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 215 This discussion should not be interpreted to imply that we have no facts at all; it is rather that the total universe with which we deal is vastly great in contrast to the small part of it already com- passed. In the reduction of a small area of the field to a basis of accurate fact, in the meager beginnings of scientific study, lie our encouragement and the promise of a better educational literature. Let us pass in brief review a few of the items in our educational equation and note some of the available facts concerning them. We shall be able to deal with but a few of the matters included in the outline. CHRONOLOGICAL AGE As one of the simplest items let us begin with the matter of chronological age. Under the eight-four or any similar organiza- tion of pre-college education, students should come to college at about eighteen years of age. Professor Koos2 in his study of the junior-college problem has shown that this age is being gradually pushed upward. The age of entrants at Harvard, for instance, has increased two chronological years in a half century, a fact of great significance for the understanding of the present college. Professor Pittenger3 studied the classes that entered the University of Min- nesota in the years 1910 and 1911 and graduated in 1914 and 1915. The average entering age was 19.4 years for the men, 19.1 years for the women. An interesting fact, however, is that the ages of women for the class entering in 1911 ranged from sixteen to twenty-six, showing a range of ten years in the age of beginning students. These were not unclassed students; they were freshmen. One woman who entered at that time was thirty-five. The implications of these age facts are not very clear because human development does not proceed in exact conformity with chronological age. Intelligence has its own rate of growth, the bones and muscles have theirs, and the problems of social adjust- 2 L. V. Koos, The Junior College, Part III (University of Minnesota Press, 1924). * B. F. Pittenger, Efficiency of College Students as Conditioned by Age and Size of High School (Sixteenth Yearbook, Nat. Soc. for the Study of Education, Part II, 1917). 216 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION ment are complicated by individual differences in emotional endow- ments and varying environmental factors. About many of the matters that might enable us to make the optimum educational adjustment for a particular age we are still in ignorance. Is it best, for instance, for a sixteen-year-old girl graduating from high school to enter the University of Minnesota at once? By scores of parents the decision of this problem is made in uncertainty. The student is often less assured. We are this year graduating from the College of Education a young woman of eighteen. She has made all her credits with satisfactory marks; she has had more than the allotted portion of student contacts and activities; she has been elected by her fellow students to high office; she has assumed responsibility for maintaining proper student standards to the point of suspending undesirable students from the University. Viewed outwardly she has had a successful college career. She herself, however, does not carry this assurance. This matter she discussed with me on the eve of her commencement. She frankly felt that she had entered college too early, and that she should have had another year or two in which to acquire a social maturity before being subjected to an environment that stimulated her social inter- ests and exploited the social gifts that she possessed in a high degree. Her state of mind constituted a severe criticism upon an educational regimen that brought her a college degree at eighteen years of age. Was her judgment correct? Frankly, I do not know. One thing, however, seems clear. We cannot answer this young woman's criticism by alleging that we are treating some scores and hundreds of other young women to a similar educational program. Taking these younger people into an institution that is possibly better adapted to persons one or two years older is serious business. It does not follow that because one is intellectually advanced or because he has had unusually favorable opportunities in early life to acquire knowledge, he is also physically advanced or socially mature. Many other educational questions center about this matter of age. Is our lengthening educational program making unneces- sary requirements in time, as is frequently charged? Is the stand- ard program the best adaptation we can make for the students whose college careers are delayed to twenty-five or more years? STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 217 PATERNAL OCCUPATION Let me turn to another matter. We have developed in this country a form of education and a form of society that make it possible for increasingly larger percentages of our total population to go to college. This is interesting in its effect on the occupations represented in our institutions. In the Scientific American for August, 1924, is a statement of the occupations of the parents of the students of the University of Illinois. Thirty per cent of the students of the University of Illinois were from farms. I think that percentage would not be quite so large at the University of Minnesota, although it is true here as in all our state universities and many colleges that is from rural districts. of Illinois are shown in a considerable portion of the student body The figures as given for the University Table IX. TABLE IX PATERNAL OCCUPATION Farmers Skilled and unskilled labor Business Professional Scientists Railroad men Retired Artists Musicians Mail carriers Postmasters Theater managers Blacksmiths Miners No. 3,000 1,399 3,175 885 325 210 302 14 34 19 2 21 55 PATERNAL OCCUPATION Painters Plumbers Watchmen Barbers Clergymen Doctors Policemen Hotel porters, etc. Chauffeurs Chefs Lake captains Junk dealers Waiter No. 37 35 11 31 146 265 11 2 3 4 4 4 1 You have represented in this group of students at the Univer- sity of Illinois almost every classification of occupation. They are not represented in proportion to the number of the group in the total population. The percentage of parents that send students to college is much greater in the professional group than in certain other groups, as, for instance, bakers and plumbers. The children of some of the latter, however, are there and this situation is not 218 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION likely to change. The industrial groups almost certainly will send larger and larger numbers of their children to college as well as to high school. This expansion of education has interesting consequences. There is clear evidence in connection with intelligence tests that the children of professional parents are distinctly superior, for instance, to the children of parents in unskilled labor. We have not only the army data that bear this out but we have the intelli- gence-test surveys of a large number of schools now; so there is not very much doubt that occupational status has a very definite relation to intellectual quality and therefore to capacity to master a college curriculum. Professional groups stand the highest and in the past have sent their children to college. Now, the children of other groups are coming to college, and there certainly will have to be a change in our institutions to meet the needs of this new group of college stu- dents. It is inevitable, under the circumstances, if you are going to provide a form of education that is open to all, that you will have to have a difference of standards and a differentiation of curricula that we have not yet learned to make. We have done almost noth- ing in college education intentionally to meet this situation. We need not have any illusions about this matter. We must meet the situation in terms of the capacities of our students. American society is not going to solve this'problem by exclusion. On the other hand, it is going, I think, to cooperate in a fair solution of the educational problems that these conditions present by support- ing a kind of education by which all these intellects can profit. The facts from Illinois are supported in Table X by those from Pennsylvania State College as given by Hoffman.4 This extended range of occupational groups represented in our student population has implications in two directions. It affects the content of desirable college curricula; it also affects the scholar- ship requirements we are able to make within a particular curricu- lum. I shall give you some of the evidence bearing on the second point. 4Wm. S. Hoffman, School and Society, Vol. XXII, No. 560 (Septem- ber 19, 1925). STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 219 TABLE X Of the 3,483 students considered, 363 stated that their fathers were deceased or retired without occupation. The remaining 3,120 were among the eight groups as follows: GROUP NUMBER PERCENTAGE Industrial 631 20.22 Artisan 568 18.21 Mercantile 519 16.63 Agricultural 493 15.80 Professional 345 11.06 Clerical 226 7.24 Official 93 2.98 Miscellaneous 245 7.85 The number of parents in each of the twelve leading occupations, without respect to the foregoing groups, is as follows: GROUP NUMBER GROUP NUMBER Farmers 423 Clerks 94 Storekeepers 320 Manufacturers 84 Supts. and mgrs. 286 Physicians 77 Railroad employees 146 Carpenters 76 Laborers 118 Contractors 69 Salesmen 109 Machinists 61 In a survey of high-school seniors in Indiana, Book5 classified the seniors by occupations of their parents and then determined the intelligence level of each of these groups. In the professional group approximately 31 per cent of the students had an A and B rating in the intelligence tests. In the laboring group there were 19 per cent with this rating. The farming group was still lower, the percentage for A and B ratings being 18, with 33 per cent rat- ing D, E, and F. We made a survey in the public schools of the state of New York covering ten thousand children in all. We had the occupa- tional group and intelligence tests for the larger portion of them. I will give you (Table XI) our findings in terms of the middle 50 per cent based on 1,433 high-school students. The middle 50 per 5W. F., Book, The Intelligence of High School Seniors (Macmillan Company, 1921). 220 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION cent of the professional group showed intelligence quotients ranging from 110 to 129; for the farmer group the range was from 97 to 119. TABLE XI SHOWING COMBINED OCCUPATIONAL GROUPS REPRESENTED IN HIGH SCHooL, GIVING THE NUMBER OF CASES, THE MEDIAN, THE MIDDLE 50 PER CENT, THE SEMI-INTERQUARTILE RANGE, AND THE TOTAL RANGE OF IQ PER CENT MIDDLE SEMI-INTER- GROUP CASES OF WHOLE ME- 50 PER QUARTILE TOTAL GROUP DIAN CENT RANGE RANGE 1. Professional 201 14.02 121 110-129 9.2 80-167 2. Business and clerical 374 26.10 112 102-126 12.2 60-168 3. Unskilled 54 3.77 111 101-120 9.5 69-139 4. Skilled 267 18.63 108 97-125 13.8 78-149 5. Semi-skilled 48 8.50 108 101-120 9.5 90-159 6. Farmer 489 34.12 106 97-119 11.0 72-155 We had similar data in the Virginia and North Carolina surveys. I will only add here a table from MacPhail8 based on an intelligence survey of high-school seniors in Massachusetts (Table XII). TABLE XII OCCUPATIONAL STATUS OF PARENTS RELATED TO INTELLIGENCE OF SENIORS (Data from 29 high schools; 2,532 cases) TOTAL PER CENT SCORING IN NUMBER OCCUPATION OF PARENTS CASES, Lowest Highest BOTH State State SEXES Quintile Quintile Professional 174 14 40 Clerical workers 99 15 30 Business executives and foremen 535 19 28 Salesmen and clerks 562 22 28 Skilled artisans 759 23 21 Farmers 93 31 20 Day laborers 310 27 16 2,532 SStephen S. Colvin and Andrew H. MacPhail, Intelligence of Seniors in the High Schools of Massachusetts (Dept. of the Interior, Bureau of Education, Bulletin No. 9, 1924). STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 221 It would not be wise to generalize too far from these data. Scores in intelligence tests are not the only evidence of ability to do col- lege work, nor are they an infallible index. On the other hand, to ignore these figures is to indulge ourselves in the luxury of inac- curate thinking about our problems. NATIONALITY Now, without expending much time, I wish to call your attention to two additional facts. We hear a great deal in these days about the racial elements in American civilization. Ours is probably the most mixed of all national populations, and this situation sets us interesting and important problems. In almost all our institutions now we have represented wide ranges of nationalities. When the question is asked what this means in terms of educable capacities, we are forced to fall back upon prejudices and opinions because we have really very little in the way of authentic information re- garding the discriminable mental qualities of the children of dif- ferent nativities. We have claims that a certain national group rates very high and that another national group rates very low in terms of general intelligence. So far as I am aware, there is noth- ing in our studies that makes certain that the individuals who are measured are representative of the nation to which they are cred- ited. Choose almost any national group and take the children of the poorer or the criminal classes and you will get a low rating, and in the same national group the children of the professional classes will give a high rating. Yet information of this sort is about all that we have about the relationship between national origin and intelligence. In our College of Education group we made a study of nationality and intelligence in something like fifteen or sixteen groupings, and when we examined the figures after the tabulations were made we were wholly unable to select any nationality in terms of its scores. There are, however, certain factors about nationalities and racial differences other than intelligence that affect our prob- lem, but time will not now permit us to elaborate this problem. RELIGION Another topic to which we can only refer in passing is the reli- gion of our students. About this matter we have one outstanding PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION fact; namely, that American students, by and large, pretend to church affiliations. We have little more in the way of established fact, and it must be admitted that for the most part we have either ignored this topic or approached it from preconceived theories and beliefs. STUDENT INTERESTS I am going to turn now to items under C in our list. First, let me call attention to Item 12, Student Interests. Ten years ago Thorndike' made a study of the interests of college students, and from such data as he was able to secure at that time, he concluded that students are interested in the things in which they have ability to succeed. It would follow from this that if you have a fair meas- ure of what a student is interested in, you have a fair measure of the kind of occupation in which he may succeed. This study has been considerably extended by others. Thorndike's conclusion has been seriously calred in question, and I believe that one would not now be justified in saying with him that student interest indicates student ability. However, it is perfectly clear that student interest is a matter of very great importance, and recent studies have tended to indicate that there is a definite cleavage between the natural interests of certain occupational groups. At Stanford University Professor Strong and others have de- veloped a vocational-interest blank. This is a folder of several pages. In Part One are listed more than a hundred kinds of occu- pations. In use, the individual is asked to indicate whether he likes, dislikes, or is indifferent to each of the vocations named. On the second page is a list of amusements designed to show in which ones the individual is interested. The third part has to do with school experience, the fourth with activities, and the fifth with peculiarities of people. Other sections deal with the preferences for activities, and, finally, he is asked to estimate his present abil- ities and characteristics by answering such questions as: Do you win friends easily? Do you get people to do things you wish done? Are you quite sure of yourself? Can you accept just criticism without getting sore? Do you worry about mistakes? On the basis of information secured from the filling out of these 7E. L. Thorndike, "Early Interests: Their Permanence and Relation to Abilities," School and Society, 5:178-79 (Feb. 10, 1917). 222 STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 223 blanks, Strong claims that they have been able to discover clear- cut cleavages between occupational groups. He says in this letter that they have been able to discriminate sixteen occupations. Law- yers' interests differ from those of engineers, and engineers' from those of doctors, and both of these from the interests of business executives. We shall not tarry now for further exposition of Strong's method or to evaluate his results. I offer this brief state- ment about interest as one illustration of a rapidly accelerating attack upon the non-intellectual aspects of human nature. The experimental investigation of the traits, other than intelligence, which go to make up human character is enlisting scores of students at this time. While it is too early to claim any very dependable contribution, the movement is full of promise. STUDENT CHARACTER An illustration of the pervasive interest in this problem is a bibliography consisting of ten pages selected from Dr. Goodwin B. Watson's "Character Tests of 1926." 8 The items selected are those that have a bearing upon the problems of college student personnel. The annotations indicate the content of each of the one hundred and twenty titles. The list as a whole is impressive of the vigor with which we are really setting to work to study the intrica- cies of student character. The temptation is strong to dwell upon this topic. However, since our purpose is an overview of the field rather than an exhaustive treatment of any part of it, we shall hasten to the matter of student intellect. STUDENT INTELLECT Twenty-five years ago when psychologists proposed to measure the human intellect it was regarded by most persons as chimerical. Probably 99 per cent and more of all the people in the world, including the scientists, had the feeling that it was an impracticable proposition. In the course of twenty-five years, however, we have devised measures and have accumulated an amount of information about the human intellect by means of different tests, which add greatly to our understanding of educational processes. It is safe to say that we have learned more in measurable terms about the 8 Vocational Guidance Magazine, Vol. 5, No. 7 (April, 1927). 224 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION human intellect in the last ten years than in all previous time. The result is little short of marvelous. As the latest contribution of the first order to this field, I would call attention to Thorndike's new book entitled the Measurement of Intelligence." The goal toward which we are traveling in this matter is a technique by which we can give a quantitative as well as a qualita- tive definition of the intellect that a person has, using intellect now in a rather broad common-sense way as meaning the capacity that enables an individual to deal with his environment, social and physi- cal, through the more elaborate associative processes of his mind. Thinking of intellect in this way, the results of intelligence meas- urement encourage the hope not only that we can give the qualitative and quantitative statement indicated, but that we can give it for the year 1950 in the year 1930. Our intelligence tests appear to have prognostic value. You can secure at ten years of age a quan- titative estimate of the amount of intelligence that an individual will have when he is twenty years of age. The use of intelligence examinations is now a widely spread college practice, particularly in connection with freshmen. Much of the work done with these newer indices of human intellect has been by way of the development and refinement of the tests them- selves; their exploitation has also served to acquaint college facul- ties and administrators with the possibilities of their usefulness. Probably the most significant information forthcoming from their use, beyond the fact that they do afford a partial basis for the prediction of scholastic achievement in college, is the clear demon- stration of the wide range of intellect represented in our college population. Two tables support this statement. The first, Table XIII, is from Professor Koos's The Junior College and gives the distribu- tion of scores in the Army Alpha for the freshmen of four repre- sentative American colleges, Minnesota, Ohio State, Oberlin, and Yale. The other, Table XIV, is based on the Moore Completion Tests and contains the data from twenty-five American colleges and four special groups examined at Minnesota by Professors Paterson and Miller. ' Bureau of Publications, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York City. STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 225 TABLE XIII DISTRIBUTIONS OF SCORES IN THE ARMY ALPHA TESTS OF FRESIIMEN IN FouR COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES* COLLEGE OR UNIVERSITY SCORES Minnesota Ohio State Oberlin Yale No. Per Cent No. Per Cent No. Per Cent No. Per Cent 200-212 195-199 190-194 185-189 180-184 175-179 170-174 165-169 160-164 155-159 150-154 145-149 140-144 135-139 180-134 125-129 120-124 115-119 110-114 105-109 100-104 95- 99 90- 94 85- 89 80- 84 75- 79 70- 74 65- 69 60- 64 55- 59 50- 54 45- 49 40- 44 Below 39 1 1 4 6 13 9 16 20 81 25 40 85 33 38 26 26 17 29 22 22 12 10 6 6 4 5 8 2 1 .... ....� 1 0.2 3 0.2 6 .... 14 0.9 28 1.3 50 2.8 56 1.9 83 3.5 88 4.3 135 6.7 139 5.4 157 8.6 195 7.6 150 7.1 179 8.2 186 5.6 161 5.6 179 3.7 132 6.3 129 4.8 113 4.8 95 2.6 78 2.2 62 1.38 49 1.3 89 0.9 20 1.1 20 0.6 22 ...0 99 ...o, 8 0.4 8 0.2 2 .... 4 Total 463 100.1 2,545 0.0 3 0.1 2 0.2 2 0.6 6 1.1 11 1.9 14 2.2 12 3.3 24 3.4 28 5.3 32 5.5 23 6.2 25 7.7 28 5.9 28 7.0 18 5.8 3 19 6.3 16 7.0 12 5.2 10 5.1 5 4.4 4 8.7 5 3.1 1 2.4 .... 1.9 1.5 1 0.8 0.8 1 0.9 .... 0.4 .... 0.3 0.1 0.1 0.2 99.9 330 0.9 0.6 7 0.6 6 1.8 11 3.3 22 4.2 31 3.6 45 7.3 39 8.5 385 9.7 483 7.0 33 7.6 28 8.5 28 8.5 14 5.5 17 5.8 15 4.9 8 8.6 5 3.0 7 1.5 3 1.2 1.5 1 0.3 2 0.3 .... 100..0 00 0.3 .... 100.0 400 1.8 1.5 2.8 5.5 7.8 11.3 9.8 8.8 10.8 8.3 7.0 7.0 3.5 4.3 3.8 2.0 1.3 1.8 0.8 0.3 0.5 000 tooo .... a... 100.0 Median 130.4 * Koos, Junior College, p. 102. 130.3 148.4 159.5 226 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION TABLE XIV DISTRIBUTIOw OF SCORES ON MOORE'S COMPLETION TEST 1 2 3 4 5 No. Per Cent No. Per Cent No. Per Cent No. Per Cent No. Per Cent 38-39 .... .... 1 .2 3 .4 0 .... 8 .8 36-37 5 .1 0 .... 1 .1 0 .... 10 1.0 34-35 18 .3 1 .2 2 .3 1 .3 10 2.1 32-33 41 .7 4 .7 2 .3 2 .7 23 2.4 30-31 77 1.3 5 .9 11 1.5 0 .0 37 8.8 28-29 123 2.1 7 1.3 22 3.1 5 1.9 64 6.6 26-27 207 3.6 17 3.1 13 1.8 8 2.8 69 7.1 24-25 273 4.7 17 3.1 27 3.8 17 5.9 115 11.8 22-23 391 6.7 25 4.6 30 4.2 15 5.2 101 10.4 20-21 486 8.3 43 7.8 53 7.4 26 9.0 115 11.8 18-19 575 9.9 53 9.7 79 11.0 34 11.7 98 10.1 16-17 648 11.1 71 13.0 88 12.3 34 11.7 105 10.8 14-15 710 12.2 60 10.9 84 11.7 39 13.4 77 7.9 12-13 700 12.0 86 15.7 82 11.4 33 11.4 57 5.8 10-11 585 10.2 71 13.0 68 9.5 28 9.7 36 3.9 8- 9 446 7.7 36 6.6 54 7.5 27 9.3 11 1.1 6- 7 291 5.0 31 5.7 54 7.5 9 3.1 19 1.9 4- 5 160 2.7 15 2.7 29 4.0 7 2.4 8 .8 2- 3 66 1.1 3 .5 14 1.9 2 .7 1 .1 0- 1 16 .3 2 .4 1 .1 3 1.0 1 .1 Total 5,828 100.0 548 100.1 717 99.8 290 100.2 975 100.1 Mean 16.30 15.63 15.65 16.08 21.02 S.D. 6.46 6.08 6.72 6.04 6.64 1. Distribution of freshman scores in Moore's Completion Tests. Data from 25 colleges. 2. Native-born, white, freshman women entering University of Minnesota, September, 1924, College of Science, Literature, and the Arts. 3. Native-born, white, freshman men entering University of Minnesota, September, 1923, College of Science, Literature, and the Arts. 4. Native-born, white, freshman men entering University of Minnesota, September, 1924, College of Engineering and Architecture, and School of Chemistry. 5. Juniors and seniors, College of Education, University of Minnesota, September, 1925. STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 227 The data for a more exhaustive measure of intelligence than either of the above tests are given in Table XV, taken from Ben D. Wood's Measurement in Higher Education, p. 33. TABLE XV DISTRIBUTIONS OF THORNDIKE INTELLIGENCE EXAMINATIO TOTAL SCORES FOR 505 CANDIDATES FOR ADMISSIOx TO COLUMBIA COLLEGE I SEPTEMBER, 1919* SCORE 0 N (0-N) 33 1 2 3 37 41 45 49 53 57 61 65 69 73 77 81 85 89 93 97 101 105 109 113 117 1 3 2 6 9 13 20 23 22 17 27 16 14 10 6 2 1 1 1 10 7 11 18 21 28 29 29 28 32 30 19 15 16 9 4 1o 1 1 10 7 14 20 27 37 42 49 51 54 47 46 31 30 19 10 3 2 N 193 312 505 M 86 79 81 Sigma 13.6 14.7 14.6 * The examination was made up of Forms D and E of Part I, and Form B of Parts II and III. The frequency column headed 0 relates to Old Plan candi- dates, all of whom were admitted before they took this examination; they took the intelligence test merely for purposes of record. The column headed N relates to New Plan candidates, not all of whom were admitted. The last column is- a com- bination of the other two. The score-index is the midpoint of each respective step. 228 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION The implications of all these tables-and they could be supple- mented by many additional citations-are clear. However selec- tive the processes of education below the college level may be, they still permit the entrance into college of a range of ability that will make an adequate curricular adjustment to all the varying abilities of college freshmen an exceedingly difficult matter. It is fairly clear that the problem of this adjustment is still unsolved. If time permitted we could show that not only does the college receive many students of meager intellect, but the intelligence ex- amination of high-school seniors reveals the fact that many excellent intellects cut short their education at the close of the high-school period. They simply do not go on to college at all. The intelligence tests further reveal in an objective way that some colleges are much more selective of intellect than are others. Two tables are presented in support of this statement. Table XVI is taken from Wood's book already mentioned and gives the results for the Thorndike tests. Only a sentimentalist could examine this table, knowing the implications of the test scores, and classify the institutions grouped in Item 10 as of equal status with those in 1 to 3. In support of this differential character of colleges I shall present one more table (p. 230). This is composed of data taken from the Educational Record,o0 being the report of the American Council on Education Psychological Tests for College Freshmen. This table gives the scores in each of eight tests and the total score for fifteen institutions selected from a much larger number for which data are available in the report. These data will appear more significant if I give you the quar- tile and median scores for 16,711 students in 55 colleges. For this entire group the lowest quartile was 77, the median 127, and the upper quartile 166. If you will now turn to Table XVII you will see that the score for Dartmouth is 147.9, which is but 18 points below the upper quartile and 19 points above the median of the entire group. On the other hand the Ripon median is 97, twenty points above the 10 L. L. Thurstone, "The Psychological Test Program" in Educational Test Record, Vol. 7 (1926), pp. 114-24. STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 229 lowest quartile and 30 points below the median of the same group. Both of these institutions are colleges, but does any one believe that the level of intellectual work can be even approximately the same in both of them? Other comparisons can easily be made from this table, and supporting data is forthcoming from other sources. TABLE XVI MEANS AND SIGMAS (APROX.) OF THORNDIKE INTELLIGENCE SCORES OF CANDI- DATES FOR ADMISSION TO, AND OF STUDENTS IN, NINE INSTITUTIONS OF HIGHER LEARNING IN THE UNITED STATES AND ONE PREPARATORY SCHOOL IN CANADA (From official reports of the institutions named.)* M SIGMA N 1. 2. 3. 4. Columbia College (men) Candidates for admission, 1919 Freshmen admitted, 1919 Students surviving two years Academic failures (1919-1922) Brown University, Freshmen, 1919 Women's College, Eastern State, Freshmen Pomona College, California Freshmen-Men Women 5. Stanford University, Entrants, 1921 Freshmen-Men 79 81 88 69 76 74 14.5 13.3 12.8 8.5 15.0 13.3 505 350 233 90 300 200 (?) 74 14.5 102 71 12.2 106 71 Women 72 Other undergraduates-Men 72 Women 72 6. Collegiate Institute, Winnipeg, Canada 1921 Graduates 68 7. University of California, Freshmen All men 68 Men passing first semester 70 Men failing first semester 61 Women passing first semester 65 Women failing first semesster 48 8. Women's College, Southern State, Freshmen 66 9. Trenton, N. J., State Normal School (Freshmen) Women 64 10. Eastern Agricultural and Small Colleges 52 16.7 13.6 17.7 13.6 294 61 151 34 13.0 88 15.0 15.0 15.0 11.5 11.0 13.2 157 131 26 104 12 100(?) 13.0 170 16.0 400(?) * Wood, Measurement in Higher Education, p. 44. CO 001N02 0CO CO 0102O H i 0201 C 0k: 0 = , 0 CO o01!14 W H H 0 W -e H 0 u r4 0 Co Al H Wz4 H 0 0 H k E-4 04 Z E- 01I 0C) 0 0 1 O cq 0 - P----- P-4O COS o0 m 10 0 C; 02I m 1o, C> k7 CO1 r- c156r. 10 C) 02 co co C6 C11 01 06 co COS 0m CO COS C1 00 02 CO C1 CO 06 02 CO CO. cc CO4 cc 02. CO 0 0 CO 1 02 02 t- 01 0 ,!J 6I 0 r0 P-4 bD C 0 C) Ce d C) 0 C) C) CeH b~e ~ ;-4 ' Q Cd P Ce4 0e ;.4 S C Z d Ce ) 9 m W Cex z C) (1) 0 ) C)-4 01 06 C6 CO 1- CO 01q co 00 CO 16 CO CO 00 C; 1 CO 0 C; 01 H STUDENT ABILITY AND ITS MEASUREMENT 231 Now, it is time to close this discussion. You are quite likely unsatisfied with it because we have not arrived at practical conclu- sions. We have sketched a theory, touched superficially many as- pects of our complex problem, and have failed to come to close grips with any portion of it. My apology is that this talk is intro- ductory. As we proceed you will be offered much more concrete and helpful material by others. Our purpose will have been served if we have given a point of view, provided a common orientation for later discussions, and made easier the accommodation of our minds to a common understanding. XVIII. THE PREDICTION OF STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP J. B. JOHNSTON Dean of the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts and Professor of Comparative Neurology University of Minnesota The two topics that I have been asked to discuss, "The Predic- tion of Student Scholarship" and "The Selection of College Stu- dents," are very closely related. First of all, let me say that success or failure in college is an individual matter. It is William Smith or John Brown who suc- ceeds or fails in his work, and it is a matter of most serious impor- tance in the individual case. In a state university the responsibility for considering indi- viduals as individuals is more directly felt than in endowed insti- tutions. If there is hope of selecting students in a state university, then we must present methods which will apply to individuals, which will do justice to individuals, and which will appeal to the public as just and reliable methods of procedure. We must recog- nize at once that success is a relative matter, that there are degrees of success, and that we want to know, success in what? What are the worth-while things to be gained in college? Many students would tell you that social experience and cultivation is one of the things worth while. Many think that preparation for business suc- cess is the chief thing for which they enter college, and they expect to gain this either through vocational training, professional training, or, in many cases, through their experience with student activities. I think that most of our faculties would be inclined to lay more stress on the development of the powers of the individual, so that he may realize to the fullest extent the possibilities of his life. In speaking of the development of the powers of people we have in mind general culture, scientific study and research, preparation for teaching, and technical or professional applications. These objectives that the college or university regard as worthy to be followed in its organization and by means of its facilities are recognized and given the institution's approval in the form of a PREDICTION OF STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP 233 degree. Many subsidiary experiences and activities go with that course, but the characteristic and normal activity of the institution and of the students in it is that which leads to one of the degrees offered. Since the degree of success may imply something about social usefulness and social values, that is measured by means of marks, and distinguished success is rewarded with prizes, scholar- ships, and various honors. This leads to the observation that the prediction about which we are speaking must deal with minimum, usual, and extraordinary degrees of success; that is, ability to meet minimum requirements, to secure such accomplishments as the larger number attain, or to distinguish one's self in scholarship. Let us take up first the pre- diction of minimum success. It may be observed immediately that every form of admission requirement implies the prediction of minimum success. Every time we give admission examinations or any form of admission requirements, we predict that those who are admitted will be able to do passing college work. The criteria employed until recent years have been based upon the assumption that evidence of suc- cess in previous studies was the only necessary and an entirely adequate proof of fitness to make use of the facilities offered by the college. To base the admission of students upon their success in previous courses was more appropriate in early days when the college course consisted largely of Latin, Greek, and religion. Since the introduction of the elective system in the latter part of the nineteenth century, the continuation of the same studies from the secondary school into college is much less general. The assumption above referred to was never tested in any scien- tific way. There is no means of finding out what rejected students could have done had they been admitted. All that the colleges have done is to determine what the students who have been admitted have accomplished. What the college faculties observe is the failure of many who have been admitted, the inadequacy of previous edu- cation, and the lack of correlation between secondary and higher training. These observations have led to attempts to devise sys- tematic and valid means of measuring aptitude for college work. For this purpose the state universities and colleges through the 234 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Middle West and West who receive pupils on the certificate plan are in a better position to be able to observe both the failures and the successes and to test the validity of any of their hypotheses as to who may be expected to succeed or fail than those institutions admitting by examination only. Admission of everyone who grad- uates from high school is required by law in some states; it is required in this state by public opinion. Some of the criteria that may be used to measure student apti- tude in advance are content of previous studies, evidence of success in previous work of a nature similar to that of the college, capacity for college work as ascertained by psychological tests, desirable traits of character, physical force, ambition, zeal for study, hon- esty, and social cultivation. We come now to reporting the studies that we have made at the University of Minnesota in an attempt to find a solid basis for selection of students. We began our work with the hypothesis that no single form of test would be likely to yield satisfactory results. Even the eastern institutions under which examinations arose were not fully satisfied with results of college-entrance ex- aminations. We believed that a more reliable basis of judgment would be found by combining several criteria. It was desirable to examine the candidate from as many different points of view as possible. We began by scrutinizing the content of previous study. Ten or twelve years ago it was still argued that students who had taken Latin or mathematics would be more likely to succeed in a univer- sity than those who had not. We studied the records of students who had had four years of Latin in high school to see what kind of work they did in college. In no case did we find anything of consequence; those who presented Latin did no better than those who did not. The results were the same with regard to other subjects. We next examined the degrees of success in high school. We had had some experience with a rule for admission requiring some- thing more than mere passing in high school. Under this ruling a certain proportion of students were rejected. In 1910-12 under President Vincent it was found that some of these rejected students PREDICTION OF STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP 235 had gone to other institutions and made good in their work. Presi- dent Vincent felt that an injustice was being done by this rule and induced the faculty to rescind it. We had been taking for granted that a little higher grade than was required for mere pass- ing would insure a better selection of students, and we had been taking the responsibility of rejecting those who fell below that grade. Most of our faculty felt that if the rule were unjust it should be discarded, but that some other way should be found for selecting students. Because we were receiving large numbers of students who were unable to do college work, the faculty felt that the attempt to select them should not be entirely abandoned. In all of our later studies we have never found reason to change our opinion that the degree of success in secondary work is the best single criterion of success in college. Another matter that was examined, which we thought might throw some light on the ability of the student to do college work, was the selection of studies made by the student in his high-school work. In high schools there are generally certain subjects offered to freshmen, certain others that run through four years, and still others given only in the junior and senior years. Upon examining the records of all students coming from high schools in 1916-17 we found that the average amount of advanced work taken was about two and one-half or three units and that those who took less than this average furnished about two-thirds of the failures in college work. This is a distinctly useful measure, and one which has never been followed up closely. It can be used only in a subsidiary or auxiliary way, such as throwing light on doubtful cases. The importance of these advanced studies is found in continued atten- tion to one study and in the indication that this sort of election gives of zeal and effort on the part of the student. There are certain other criteria that may be applied. We have made some use of the interests and activities of students during their secondary period. The kind of literature in which they were interested, the types of activities in which they engaged, whether or not they earned their own living-all of these have some value in showing what sort of boy or girl you have to do with. Home 236 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION conditions and the education and occupation of parents and elder brothers and sisters are also significant. Then it is possible that we shall some day have tests of character traits, built along the lines of psychological tests. The University of Michigan for twenty or thirty years has required that all students entering by the certificate plan be rec- ommended by their high-school principals. In later years the University of Wisconsin has had the same requirement. A while ago I wrote to twelve institutions having this requirement, inquiring about the validity of the principals' recommendations. No study had been made; they simply had faith in the value of the recom- mendations. Professor Paterson made a little study of it at the University of Minnesota two years ago and is still continuing it. The results are not altogether encouraging. Brown University made a study and reported adversely on the use of principals' esti- mates as valid means for determining aptitude for college. We here have used a combination of the degree of success in high school and psychological tests as the primary basis for pre- diction. Success in high school must be expressed in terms of the relative rank of the student in his class; for the relative standing is a significant fact, whereas the meaning of marks varies widely from teacher to teacher and from school to school. The psychological tests used have been much the same type since 1921, when they came into the hands of Professor Paterson. They have been revised from year to year. When some part of the test was found to have little or no significance, we rejected that and put in something else. We now have a test that correlates well with college work. We are not testing general intelligence; we are testing the probability of a student's performing as we want him to perform in college. We have given the tests in the Twin City high schools in May and have secured all of our data at that time. The rank of each student in the test is computed and it and his high-school rank converted into percentile ranks, so that students coming from classes of different sizes may be compared on the same basis. The two percentile ranks are then simply averaged to secure a combined rating, which serves as our basis of prediction. Although the best PREDICTION OF STUDENT SCHOLARSHIP 237 prediction thus far has been obtained by giving equal weight to high-school record and test score, there are indications that the former is more important. Of 1,088 students who entered in 1923, 1924, and 1925 and whose combined ratings were studied, it was predicted that 208 (who were listed individually by name in advance) would be unable to show satisfactory scholarship in college. Of these 208, only 3 exceeded our expectations. The four-year records of students who entered in 1921 show that none of those whose combined rat- ings fell below the "threshold of ability" had graduated or made satisfactory progress in four years.' It seems to me that we would be justified in advising in advance students who have such low ratings that they should consider very carefully whether or not they can get value received from coming to college. The probabilities are that they would make more prog- ress by going into some other employment. Now just a word about our attempt to predict high scholarship. We encourage students to come to us personally and ask for their own ratings. We do not reveal any student's rating to anyone but himself or his parents. Our experience causes me to feel that it is only right and just to tell these students what their ratings are. If they are high we should encourage them and give them to understand that we shall expect more of them than we shall of those who rate low. For the last three years I have tried to predict students who will make an average of B in their work. Although this is much more difficult than predicting failure, it is possible to list most of those who should be able to do unusually good work. Separate charts are necessary for women and for men because women are given better marks than men in both high school * More detailed reports of these studies, with tables, may be found in: J. B. Johnston, "Predicting Success or Failure in College at the Time of Entrance," School and Society, Vol. XX, June 28 and July 5, 1924. , "Predicting Success in College at the Time of Entrance," School and Society, Vol. XXIII, January 16, 1926. , Student Aptitudes and the Prediction of Student Schol- arship, Report of the Survey Commission, No. 10 (University of Minne- sota Press, 1927). 238 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION and college. A study of the aptitude and ability of students with high ratings gives us a basis for the work of faculty advisers in finding out whether a student is loafing or doing his work. Colleges and universities are not getting their proper share of the brightest students. There are various reasons for this situa- tion. One of the most important responsibilities of colleges and universities is to do everything possible to encourage promising students to go to college. Educational support should be expended upon them rather than upon the 30 or 40 per cent of the freshmen who enter but who are not capable of doing college work reason- ably well. The question is always present whether or not low quality of college work is due to the incompetency of students or to the instruction they receive. There certainly are faults in teaching, but even if the instruction were perfected as far as possible there would still be many students who would fail, and these methods of predicting would apply equally under those conditions. XIX. THE SELECTION OF COLLEGE STUDENTS J. B. JOHNSTON Dean of the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts and Professor of Comparative Neurology University of Minnesota There is so close a connection between the two topics of Pre- diction of Success in College and the Selection of College Students that I think it would be well for me to summarize briefly what I hope was suggested by my report in the preceding paper. Our studies in this field of prediction have shown that of all the criteria employed, the degree of success in previous studies is the most important single measure of aptitude for college work. Dependence on this alone, however, for purposes of admission or selective advising would result in errors too numerous to be neg- lected. The most carefully prepared psychological tests are per- haps the second best measure of aptitude. The use of these alone would result in slightly more errors in prediction than the use of the high-school record alone. The high-school record and the psychological tests measure somewhat different attributes or capac- ities and the combination of the two furnishes a measure much superior to either taken alone. The errors of prediction regarding ability to meet minimum college requirements are not above 1.5 per cent of those judged to be not fitted. Such an error is much smaller than that made by any other form of entrance test that has been subject to scientific examination or control. The error is probably much lower than that made in all sorts of social, eco- nomic,. industrial, or political judgments resulting in the choice of industrial managers or public servants or in the determination of the work to be undertaken by individuals in practical life. In this sense I believe that the error in these predictions is negligible. The prediction, however, can be made more reliable by the use of several auxiliary sources of information, including the advanced studies taken in the secondary school, the interests, activities, and experiences of the student, the occupation and education of parents and of older brothers and sisters, and the judgment of teachers 240 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION and principals. The procedure described enables us to identify individually more than one-half of those who are lacking in the native endowment, both intellectual and moral, necessary for suc- cess in college. Those for whom failure can be predicted make up 20 per cent of the freshmen in the College of Liberal Arts in the University of Minnesota. This procedure enables us also to identify another group, equally large, that should be warned and advised regarding their choice of college studies because the chances are four to one against any member of this second group's completing any college or pro- fessional course. We are able also to recognize individually those who probably have the intellectual ability to attain distinction in college studies. Many of these require guidance, stimulation, or help, and the fail- ure of the college to secure the best results with this group is a failure at the most important and strategic point in the whole field of higher education. We now come to the problem of the "Selection of College Stu- dents." Why are we troubled with this question? What is the need of selection among college students? College faculties have long sought some improvement because of the large number of failures among those who attempt college work. College teachers are impressed by the waste of resources and the social and human wreckage following from the lack of co- ordination between secondary and college instruction. Now that accurate measurements of aptitude for studentship are becoming possible, teachers are more than ever sure that something ought to be done about this situation. The public is interested in the social and economic considera- tions involved. Three times as many people out of every thousand of the population are coming to college now as came twenty years ago. In state universities and many colleges each member of the faculty is teaching more students than he did before the war and is receiving less pay for his work. In my own college the unit of teaching for which the people of the state and the students paid one dollar in salaries in 1914-15 is now being furnished them for about forty-five cents. In the state universities the increase THE SELECTION OF COLLEGE STUDENTS 241 of student enrollment has not only outrun the rate of growth of ,population; it is also outstripping the growth of wealth from which taxes are raised and is in sharp competition with the desires of the people for the comforts and luxuries of life. I shall not enter the lists at this time to do battle against the automobile and chew- ing gum, but I want to say that the choice that the people make among the various goods offered to them will determine in the long run the kind of educational service that your institution and mine will give. In particular, right now our service is being seriously curtailed by the fact that the rates of salaries offered are not suf- ficient to attract into college teaching a large enough number of capable men and women to care for the numbers of students and maintain intellectual standards. There are three main purposes of selection. The first is to find the students who can profit by what the college has to offer. The example of the young man who fails in college and makes a fine success in business should be accepted as a matter of course. This is to be expected in occasional cases. The work of the college is of a peculiar character, determined by the requirements of the professions or activities for which the college trains. It demands peculiar kinds of abilities and interests on the part of its students as a condition of success. There are other kinds of things well worth while and leading to higher satisfactions for many types of people. Out of simple justice to the individuals presenting themselves, the institution owes to them a full explanation of the circumstances. The second purpose is to meet our responsibilities to society for the proper use of the resources put at the disposal of our sev- eral institutions. This is equally true of state and endowed col- leges. The presence of incapable or ill-fitted students brings about the waste of resources applied to them, and the withdrawal of facilities or opportunities from those who are capable. The third purpose is to prepare, in behalf of society, men and women with native ability and adequate training for the more complex, intricate, difficult, and responsible functions in the mod- ern industrial and political organization. These are three ways of stating the same thing: namely, that 242 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION the college wishes to select those young people who can do the job for which society has created the college to give training, and to allow other institutions, apprenticeships, or employments to have those young people who can do their jobs. The matter is very simple. Difficulties have arisen because the public has been given erroneous notions regarding the value and function of college edu- cation. The means employed for the selection of college students have included entrance examinations, special information or recommen- dations from local alumni of the college or ministers or business men in the student's home community, the certificate of graduation from high school, the rank of the student in his high-school class, the results of psychological tests, and some combination of two or more of these means. The results attained have varied greatly from time to time and from one institution to another. Whenever a certain part of the applicants are rejected, there is no available check on the validity of the selection. For example, the statement that only 8 per cent of the students in a given college have failed of graduation means only that instruction and standards in that college are adjusted to the type of students selected by its process. It gives no infor- mation about what would have been the performance of those who were rejected, nor is the performance of those admitted checked against any common or universal standard of college work. What is the relation of high-school to college work? Is mere passing in high school adequate evidence of ability to profit by college work? I cannot do better than to read to you here from a paper prepared for another purpose: 2 THE SECONDARY SCHOOL AND THE COLLEGE It is because our educational system is still very imperfectly coordinated that there exists a difficult problem of admission re- quirements. We must consider what kind of transition takes place from the high school to the college. There are essential and very great differences both in objectives and in the character of the work done. 2 From the chapter on "Student Selection," in Organization and Admin- istration of Higher Education, edited by Dean Raymond A. Kent. THE SELECTION OF COLLEGE STUDENTS 243 The high school gives training for the common duties of citizen- ship and for vocations or employments of ordinary kinds; the col- lege gives training for scientific research, for literary and artistic appreciatioin and production, for the practice of the learned pro- fessions, and for leadership in public affairs, whether local or national. The high school deals with the more general and simpler facts of history and social organization and with the elementary mathematical and linguistic tools used in acquiring and communi- cating knowledge and in the prosecution of mechanical work; the college treats its subject-matter with ever increasing thoroughness until in its advanced instruction it approaches the limits of human knowledge, and with the more and more highly technical and re- fined tools of knowledge which are necessary for research into the unknown. The high school conveys the subject-matter of its studies chiefly as information to be accepted; the college presents its materials as the objects of critical examination, as facts to be explained, as phenomena the causes of which are to be discovered, as actions or policies the reasons and significance of which are to be determined. The high school requires minds ready to grasp a certain rela- tively simple body of knowledge and ready to use the simpler tools of learning. The college requires minds capable of growth and development beyond the high-school level, minds which will be able to deal with successively more and more intricate, profound, and difficult subject-matter, to carry investigation and analysis ever deeper and with increasing clearness of insight, and appre- ciation of the causes and forces involved. It is the higher order of intellectual ability, the plasticity of mind, the freshness of interest, the power of going on which chiefly characterize the suc- cessful college student. It is the possession of these qualities, too, which chiefly characterizes the most valuable citizen, the leader in educational, industrial, and public affairs, the great doctor, lawyer, engineer, scientific investigator, inventor, and statesman. Under the elective system in both schools and colleges some overlapping of subject-matter occurs, but this in no way invali- dates the essential distinctions above drawn. The college sets a more rapid pace in these subjects and expects its students to carry other more difficult subjects because it assumes that it should and does receive from the high schools students who are capable of the progressive performance above described. It is for the train- ing of this type of students that colleges exist. Schools organized to train students who belong on the intellectual level of the high school are not colleges. If such schools should be organized under the same administration as colleges their student personnel will 244 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION of necessity make their departments essentially different from the colleges. Some universities maintain subcollegiate schools of agri- culture and might maintain similar schools for other trades. The question of public policy regarding the establishment of such other schools cannot be discussed here; but it has a bearing on the prac- tical questions regarding student selection. The point of view that sees a very material difference between the first two years and the last two years of the college course is not inconsistent with the distinctions between high school and col- lege noted above. At the college age it is none too often to expect a serious and careful taking of stock at each two years. At the close of the adolescent period it is highly appropriate that those who go beyond the high school should enter upon a more rapid and intensive stage of intellectual training. In this phase those who are to enter vocations of moderate difficulty should be trained directly for such vocations; while those who aspire to the highest and most difficult functions in society should enter upon a suitable course, namely, college training. High schools, therefore, have a serious problem arising from their dual role. They must give the occupational training best suited to those who are not going to college and at the same time do whatever is necessary in preparing others for college work. The duty of the high school toward those who will go on to college is to prepare them to begin work on the college level. No scientific study has yet been made to determine what specific preparations are essential for college students. When this is done it may be found that the dual burden on the high schools will be somewhat lightened. THE BENEFITS OF SELECTION The necessity for some degree of selection at entrance to college because of economic and other limitations which appeal both to the institution and to the general public has never been ques- tioned; nor has the benefit of selection to the institution in its intellectual interests ever been doubted. It has generally been recognized also that the exclusion from college of those who are in reality least capable proves beneficial to the students who are admitted. The advantage which has scarcely been recognized is that which the selection of students bestows on those who are rejected. Parents expect the public schools to make educated people of their children. A boy whose innate mental and physical powers fit him for a mechanical trade is educated when he is properly prepared for a trade that he likes and is provided with a certain fund of general information, together with a liking for reading or THE SELECTION OF COLLEGE STUDENTS 245 conversation which will keep him informed on the affairs of the day. Such a boy is not educated by being sent to a school or col- lege where the kind of work done is beyond the capacity of his mental equipment. The parent has a right to expect public edu- cation for his son, but someone must exercise judgment as to what kind of education is fitting. The present method of allowing the boy to make a wrong choice of school and then flunking him out is not beneficial. This kind of selection comes too late to help him prepare for a suitable vocation. Students who have had low standings in the secondary school come into college under great handicaps. They often have a diffi- cult and harrowing experience. Failing, they return home discour- aged and disheartened and are less able than before to make a success of a suitable vocation, if they can find it. The duty of high school and college is to give these young people advice in time to save them such unfortunate experience, to direct them into the kind of school suited to them or into apprenticeship in some line where they may succeed. The boy who is refused admission after wise examination of his ability and interests is no less benefited by a system of student selection than is the one who is admitted. A system of selection of college students involves much more than entrance examinations. The mere rejection of students by institutions because they have no room for them or because they desire particular classes or types, is the least significant step. It contributes only a little to society's general problem of finding his proper place for each young citizen. At least four significant elements should enter into any plan for selection. They are: 1. The development of vocational and educational guidance in the high schools to the highest possible efficiency. 2. The dissemination of information from universities, colleges, and high schools until the general public is acquainted with the basis of selection in individual differences and with the advantage to the individual of frankly facing the facts in order to find his place. Individual differences are the sole ground for social organi- zation and the only means by which the individual may discover his place in society. 3. The acceptance and use of the technical means of predic- tion and selection or guidance which are already in hand and the extension of these measures by further research. 246 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 4. The development within the college, especially in the first two years, of an educational guidance program that will continue the process of selection. The purposes of this selection are: (a) to find the particular place in higher education and service based on it for which the individual student is best fitted, and (b) to assist those who prove not fitted for higher education to find some other vocation or occupation suitable to them. The means of selection within the college may include: (a) printed bulletins or other sources of vocational information; (b) faculty advisers for freshmen and sophomores; (c) scholarships, prizes, honors, and other means of calling attention to the worth of true scholarly effort; (d) courses of study designed to orient and guide the freshmen; (e) sectioning classes on the basis of ability; (f) academic privileges to students of high attainments; (g) ability tests with follow-up for stimulation; and (h) special scholarship requirements for promotion from the junior college to the senior college. XX. THE ORIENTATION OF THE COLLEGE STUDENT E. H. WILKINS President of Oberlin College Orientation is one of the magic words these days, one of the words that everybody is using. It is a great word. It combines something of the mysticism of the East with something of the flavor of Western tion-ism, of putting things into systems. I suppose there is only one other term that rivals it in up-to-dateness, and that is "personnel work." In fact, I think I might define the most exciting problem in the field of ultra-modern educational discussion as this: Does orientation include personnel work, or does person- nel work include orientation? Two of the most notable recent publications in the field of higher education are The Orientation of College Freshmen, by H. J. Doermann, published by the Williams and Wilkins Company, and President L. B. Hopkins' "Personnel Procedure in Educa- tion," a report published in the Educational Record for October, 1926. Dr. Doermann treats orientation as including personnel work, and President Hopkins treats personnel work as including orientation. It is very interesting to see how widely these two studies overlap in content. I think perhaps the simplest way for me to orient you in the field of orientation is to run briefly through the contents of Dr. Doermann's book. It is divided into three parts, entitled: "A Statement of the Problem," "A Statement of the Current Practices with Respect to Problems of Orientation in Representative Amer- ican Colleges," and "A Guidance Program." Both of the two latter parts carry much interesting and valuable material. The second part, the statement of current practices, is again divided into three parts. The first discusses the process of induc- tion into college; the second, advising students during the first year; and the third, orientation courses. In the second of these three subdivisions are included these topics: the system of faculty advisers, limiting the number of advisers, the preceptorial and tutorial schemes, students as advisers, organized guidance and per- 248 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION sonnel work, special kinds of guidance (vocational guidance), lec- tures on vocations, appointment bureaus and guidance, guidance in mental health, student government and guidance, and faculty rules and their relation to guidance. The third main part of the book, which the author calls "A Guidance Program," is in itself divided into four parts: "Person- nel Service," "Pre-registration Guidance," "Guidance during Regis- tration Period," and "Guidance during the Freshman Year." The first of these four parts, on personnel service, contains an elaborate outline of personnel service as he understands it. In his chapter about guidance during the registration period he treats exclusively, and very well, of Freshman Week. That gives you an idea of what he includes under the term "orientation." So far as I can see he has everything in except the Boy Scouts. Now let us turn for a moment to the first half of the series of topics in President Hopkins' report. Under the heading, "Selec- tion and Matriculation," he discusses the selective process, freshman week, psychological tests, and placement tests. The division on personnel service includes the following subjects: faculty advisers, other organized student interviews, health service, mental hygiene service, vocational information, employment and placement, and discipline. All of these topics are treated by Dr. Doermann under the head of orientation. Each of these two books has much to say about vocational guidance; in fact, the term "vocational guidance" is almost as dominant, almost as ultra-modern as the terms "orientation" and "personnel work." Indeed, I fear that vocational guides might resent a little being rated as secondary to personnel workers or orientationalists. I have here an excellent book called The Vocational Guidance of College Students. It is by Dr. L. A. Maverick, and was published by the Harvard University Press in 1926. He ranks orien- tation and personnel procedure as subdivisions of vocational guid- ance. His table of contents is a bit confusing, so I will not read that; but here is a list of the sections of his bibliography: admis- sions; bibliographies; education (administration and aims); employ- ORIENTATION OF THE COLLEGE STUDENT 249 ment management (vocational psychology); guidance--general; guidance reports; individual training (provision for superior stu- dents); mental hygiene; orientation class; orientation devices (con- ferences, freshman week, freshman year); orientation publications; personnel officers (deans, counsellors, advisers-their functions and preparation); personnel research (intelligence); placement and employment supervision; record forms; studies of guidance and of personnel work; vocational education, part-time cooperative edu- cation; and vocational information. Almost exactly the same ground is covered, you see, as in the two books first mentioned. So, if you want, you can get three points of view on the same material. Dr. Maverick's seventy-five page, critical bibliography is the best one I know of on the more recent publications. So, then, the field of orientation, at least the field of what might be called orientation, is enormously large. Every one of the elements that I have mentioned is an important thing in itself, but I cannot feel that they all belong properly in the field of orienta- tion. So I am going next to indicate to what the term orientation may be applied in a more rigorous sense. It may properly be used to include three things: orientation with respect to the field of knowledge, orientation with respect to the immediate problems of college life, orientation with respect to post-college work. Of these three, the first is abstract and general; the other two are practical. The third type, orientation in respect to post-college work, means, in effect, vocational guidance. This matter I shall treat only by referring you to Dr. Maverick's book, with just two re- marks. First, I believe most heartily in the need of vocational guidance as part of the duty of the college towards its students. One of the great failures of the college has been in letting so many of its students go away from the campus after four years there without any specific qualifications to do any specific thing. The people who are preparing for law or medicine are getting along pretty well; but the people who are going through college without the intention of going into any professional school are apt to flounder after graduation. I have heard it stated that the exam- ination of the life histories of a group of graduates of one of the best colleges in the country shows that it has taken on the average 250 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION about ten years for them to find themselves. That is a serious indictment. Such a situation could largely be avoided by vocational guidance. My other remark is this: vocational guidance is in its infancy, and we don't know very well what personal characteristics lead normally to what vocations, but we ought to do all we can on the basis of what we do know. That leaves me, then, two types of orientation to speak of: orientation with respect to the field of knowledge, and orientation with respect to the immediate problems of college life. I shall speak first of this latter topic, treating briefly three phases of it: 1. Freshman week. 2. Special orientation course on the problems of college life. 3. The advisory system. Freshman week is a recent development in college education. It really started at the University of Maine in 1923, although some of its elements are older than that. A number of other places adopted the idea in 1924, and after that it spread like an infection. If you should put a red dot on the map for each institution that adopted it, you would see a crimson stream sweeping westward. There is a chapter on it in Dr. Doermann's book, and President Hopkins devotes about three pages to it. I had an article about it in the School Review for December, 1924. Habits of work in college are formed in the freshman year; habits of work in the freshman year are formed in the autumn quarter; habits of work in the autumn quarter are formed at the beginning of the quarter. There is no more critical time in the boy's or girl's life than the first week in college. Everything is so completely new that the college ought to do everything it can to help the student in transferring, from the familiar high school to the "unhomey" college; and ought at the same time to do what it can to establish right habits from the start. The ordinary program of freshman week includes a number of lectures on appropriate topics. The following suggested list is found in Dr. Doermann's book: the purpose of freshman week, the freshman curriculum, the aims and purpose of the college, college duties and responsibilities, and the college man's religion. A number of tests are given, the results of which can be ORIENTATION OF THE COLLEGE STUDENT 251 utilized in various ways in putting a student where he belongs and in helping him with his registration. There is a program of recreation and entertainment, which will help to solve the very real problem of homesickness. The first registration is a very important matter. In some places students register by mail, but my feeling, based on experi- ence at Chicago, is that that first conference between the student and the adviser is apt to be the most important event of freshman week. It has a more official character than anything else that is done in freshman week. The registering dean or adviser is the first real officer with whom the freshman deals. If that contact is such that the student is convinced thereby that the university is going to give him the best individual attention, his attitude toward the college is going to be very different from that which he would form if he were simply passed along from clerk to clerk. I should like to give you just a bit of local experience, which I think is transferable. There is at Chicago an admirable system of selective admission that calls for the filling out by the student, in connection with his application for admission, of a very formi- dable and extensive blank. On that blank he tells all about his high-school experience and gives any other information about himself that is significant-four or five pages in all. At Chicago that material does not die in the files of the examiner's office; it is handed on, before registration, to the body of advisers who are going to register the freshmen. The advisers study these papers. Therefore, when any given freshman comes to an adviser to reg- ister, the adviser knows that boy and is able to treat him as an individual right fromn the start. And I know from what students have said that this first word of individual greeting has meant a great deal to them. On a day in September, 1923, the first time we tried out this plan at Chicago, the deans who were going to register were sitting around a table in my office. Each had a pile of fifty selective- admission blanks in front of him. I had no such pile, as my work was merely supervisory. Just to keep in touch with their plans and problems, I pulled out one blank, at random, from the nearest pile, and read it. It was very creditable. The boy had been a 252 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION good student; he had a wider field of reading than most students. Under the heading of "What have you done that has given you most satisfaction?" he said that he was on the debating team and in the senior year was president of his class. It was all very interesting, but not astonishing--until I came to the last sentence. These papers were supposed to be written in the applicant's own handwriting. His last sentence was, "I have been unable to write this in my own handwriting as requested, because I am totally blind." That put a very different light on the whole situation, and made it a very fine record. When the freshmen came to register, a day or two later, just one student out of eight hundred came to me for special advice-and it was that boy! I was able to greet him with individual knowledge and friendliness. That in- cident seems to me a notable and significant symbol of what may be done in individual orientation. Freshman week, I think, has come to stay. Now let us consider a freshman course on the problems of col- lege life. Such a course, as a full-time regular course, does not exist, as far as I am aware. As a partial and frequent substitute there are the lectures in freshman week on how to use the library, how to read, how to take notes, etc. But you can't expect a man to reform his methods on the basis of four lectures. Another way of attempting to meet that same set of problems is by a special series of required talks scattered throughout the autumn quarter. But I have never known a case in which a special series of re- quired lectures on such subjects was really successful. The solution, I am now inclined to think, is the one proposed by Dr. Doermann-to put in the freshman year a regular course on the immediate problems of the college student. The topics that Dr. Doermann suggests as the subject matter for such a course are these: how to study, budgeting the student's time, mental health, student activities, student government, examinations, choosing a course of study, choosing a career, the relationship of a liberal education to a professional career, the daily press and the student's non-required reading, and intellectual interests outside the classroom. He might have put in a number of other appropriate topics. It ORIENTATION OF THE COLLEGE STUDENT 253 seems clear to me that a most significant whole course within this field could be worked out, something much more substantial than what is being given as a section of some of our present orientation courses. Dr. Doermann makes the point also that this course might be utilized in connection with training in logic. Why not take these things for our typical problems? They are immediate life problems. Advisers.-We have had faculty advisory systems since any of us can remember, but they have very largely broken down. The matter is discussed by both Dr. Doermann and President Hopkins. I will read you a paragraph from Dr. Doermann: The principal cause of the breakdown of the system is now clearly seen to have been the inability of the average faculty member to perform the duties of a counsellor, particularly when the assignment was superimposed upon a full teaching load. Skill in advising students is not a by-product of scholarship and teaching. It is, however, a skill which is necessary in the college. Institu- tions alive to this situation, which still continue the teacher-adviser system, are selecting those members of the staff who have interest and ability in counselling students, and they are relieving them of a portion of the regular teaching load. President Hopkins devotes a couple of paragraphs to listing the requisites for success in advisory work. By the time you are through with that list of requisites you will think that no one short of the highest order of the angels could do advisory work. What, then, shall we do? Shall we wait until we get ideal advisers? Shall we find the one or two men in the country who might do such work perfectly, and let our teachers be exempt from it? In theory, it ought not to be separated from the actual teaching work. The same people should do it. This means, then, simply making the best of what we have. I don't mean accepting what we now have and calling it good enough; but taking what we now have and mak- ing it as good as we can, taking teachers who could conceivably be good advisers, getting them to study advising, training them, and, as Dr. Doermann says, relieving them of an appropriate por- tion of the teaching load. The use of students as advisers has failed everywhere. Presi- 254 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION dent Hopkins thinks it need not have failed, and that something might be made of it, but experience on this point is certainly nega- tive as a whole. The gist of the advisory system is simply this: Every student should know that there is some one person in the college community who knows him, and to whom he is free to go whenever he wants to talk about things in general or things in particular, especially when he wants advice. Not exclusively then; the college student doesn't often go out looking for advice. What he wants is the nearest thing he can get to a friend who knows the game. It isn't to be expected that this adviser will be omniscient; nor should he ever pretend to be. It is to be expected that he will be wise and friendly, that he will give such help as he can himself, and that he will tell the student how he can get whatever other help he needs. I think it is Dr. Doermann who recommends very strongly that the advisers be always people who teach freshmen, and I am inclined to subscribe to this recommendation. It carries the con- notation that people who teach freshmen ought to be just as good as any other teachers in the college. They can then establish the advisory relation in the classroom by talks after class or through calls or walks suggested then. This might be better, in some cases, than sending a formal blank saying, "Your adviser is so-and-so; go to see him at such-and-such an hour." The problem is not easy, but the relationship is certainly a most essential one. I come now finally to what I mentioned as the first type of orientation; that is, orientation with respect to the field of knowl- edge. There is a sense in which the whole problem of general education is a problem of orientation. But no system of general education can ever cover the whole field. There should, then, be some means of integration, of acquainting students with fields in which they cannot take courses, some means of synthesizing the material that they get in various departments. The device by which this is now generally accomplished is the orientation course. I have a little to say about orientation courses as they are, and a little to say about what I think they are eventually going to be. I call your attention to the bibliography on the orientation course ORIENTATION OF THE COLLEGE STUDENT 255 in Dr. Doermann's book, and to the very good bibliography in Dr. Maverick's book. Orientation is also treated in a recent interesting pamphlet by Miss Amy Kelly of the Bryn Mawr School in Baltimore. It is privately published, but I think one can get a copy by writing for it. It is entitled A Curriculum to Build a Mental World. There are two forthcoming studies on this subject, one by C. M. Fitts of Pomona and another announced, but not published, by the School of Citizenship of Syracuse. Orientation Courses as They Are.-I might attempt a synthesis, but I think the sensible and useful thing is for me to talk about the Chicago courses, taking them as a sample. I should like to preface that, however, by a word of appreciation and high esteem for the Minnesota course.' It is an excellent course in itself. Furthermore, it has been studied as an experiment from the start, with a careful recording of results. I come, now, to the Chicago series of orientation courses. Some of you will perhaps remember that I spoke of the field of knowledge as having, roughly, three main divisions: physical science, social science, and the arts. The Chicago orientation program is based on this analysis, that is, they have one course for each of the three groups. They have given them as follows: the first in the first two quarters of the freshman year; the next in the first two quar- ters of the sophomore year; the third in the third quarter of the sophomore year. The series has thus continued through a period extending to the end of the sophomore year. The first of these orientation courses is "The Nature of the World and of Man." They begin with the origin of the earth, take up the study of physics and chemistry, follow the story through the development of the plant kingdom and of the animal kingdom, up to and including the development of man, ending with psychol- ogy. The organization of this course is as follows: There is one man in charge of the course who stays with it all the time. There are at the present time five sections, each with a section leader who stays with it all through the course. For each topic there is brought into the course that member of the college community who 'Man in Nature and Society. A Syllabus for an Orientation Course (University of Minnesota Press, 1927). 256 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION is best qualified to talk on that theme. For example, for the astronomy lecture the head of the department of astronomy is brought in. This plan has a double advantage: the lectures are given by experts in the various fields, and students come into con- tact with the leading men of the faculty. On Monday the special lecturer lectures to the five assembled sections; on Tuesday that same lecturer faces the entire group again, this time for a question- and-discussion hour.. The director of the course and the section leaders are there to steer the discussion if necessary, but they don't have to do so very often. On Wednesday the lecturer lectures again. On Thursday the five sections meet in separate rooms with their section leaders and spend the hour in discussing the two lec- tures and the reading assigned for that week. The section leader has the chance to pull things together and to answer more questions. On Friday they again meet in separate sections. That hour is generally devoted to testing, but the section leader is free to use the time as he thinks best. The system has worked very well, and there is no thought of changing it. We didn't dare to attempt to give this course to all freshmen at the beginning. We gave it to the ablest students because we believed in its value and because we believed in the principle of giving the best to the best. It is an invitation course, and it is decided before the student ever sees the campus whether he is to be admitted or not. If a freshman's name is on the approved list, he is told, when he comes to register, that he is invited. The course is now so well known that students are eager to come into it. I have known of only one student who declined to enter. Pressure is on the University to enlarge the course to take in the whole freshman class, for there are many who feel that these values ought to be given to the whole class. The substance of this first course is now in print under the title, The Nature of the World and of Man. The second course, "Man and Society," is the corresponding orientation course in the social sciences. It resumes the story of life at the point where the first course leaves it and takes it up to the problems of the present day. In theory the organization is just the same as that of the first course. The first course has been an almost unqualified success; the second course has been a failure, ORIENTATION OF THE COLLEGE STUDENT 257 and it is being withdrawn for the time being. The students report a definite drop in interest from the excitement of the first course to the more textbookish material of the second. That drop in interest hurts. Furthermore, there is some repetition in the course as it has been given. Many students have had a considerable amount of work in the social sciences when they get to this course. I confess this failure because I think it reflects a more than local problem, since in other institutions also the course of this type has proved less successful than the course of the first type. I have even heard it suggested that this may indicate that social scientists are less socially minded than other people. Part of the difficulty is that many social scientists are keen-rightly-about orientation within their individual departments. Finally, there is the course in the meaning and value of the arts. The other two courses are fairly common nowadays; but, so far as I know, Chicago is the only institution that has developed a course in orientation in the arts. This course treats of architec- ture, sculpture, painting, music, and literature. The purpose of the course is to attempt to create in the student the habit of direct enjoyment in each of these fields. That is, it is hoped that the result of the course will be such that the student who takes it will ever afterward feel that there is a delight available to him in each of the arts if he will only go out and get it. Chicago's experience has been that some of the best students come to their sophomore year quite blind in one or more of the fields of art. It is a revela- tion to them to realize that there are in art great resources for the enjoyment of life, which they have never touched. Each of the five portions of the course is in charge of a faculty man who carries it through. In each case, unless the faculty man is himself a creative artist, some creative artist is brought in to supplement him. But I should think that fully half of the value of the course lies not in the lectures but in what may be called "collateral activity." This means, at Chicago, the spending of eight hours a week in activity related to the course. About half of the time is spent in reading; but time may be also spent at the Art Institute, in studying buildings on the campus or elsewhere, in Mr. Lorado Taft's studio, or in going to concerts or appropriate 258 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION lectures. Each week the student is given a mimeographed list of suggestions. At the end of the week he is asked to write a report on what he has done in the way of collateral activity during the week. An attempt is made to socialize the work as much as possible. This particular type of course lends itself well to informal faculty contacts. This spring we went around in groups and studied campus buildings, we met at my home and sang folk songs, we went over one of the downtown skyscrapers together, and we went to the Art Institute together on an evening when it was opened exclusively for us. The socializing element has had a large part in the success of the course. I come now to my conclusion, which is a suggestion of what orientation courses may be in a system of general education such as that which I outlined this morning. The initial function of the orientation courses has been to assert the need for a synthetic view of the whole collegiate field and to provide an opportunity for such a view pending the organization of a plan of general education that would meet the need with some degree of adequacy. They have served hitherto to furnish a general suggestion of what is going on in the physical and social sciences to students in whose experi- ence whole ranges of human interest might otherwise have been left blank. They have been carrying the primary burden in the endeavor to acquaint the student systematically with his universe and with his fellow man. But just in so far as the present dis- organized election of courses is superseded by an organized plan of general education the burden upon the general survey courses will be diminished. With such a plan in operation, however, the general survey courses will still retain the double purpose of giving the student some touch with the fields in which he has not taken and is not expecting to take courses, and of establishing a synthetic perspective control of the whole territory of intellectual life. They will thus be, in a double sense, courses of integration. The normal place for courses having this double purpose is at the end of the period devoted primarily to general education- that is, in the sophomore year. There should be three such courses, running in sequence throughout the year. The first should deal ORIENTATION OF THE COLLEGE STUDENT 259 with the physical and the physical-social sciences; the second with the- social sciences, plus history, philosophy, and religion and the third with the arts. The method of these courses should be determined in accordance with the answer given by the organizer to these two questions: "How shall I best give the students some initiation into the several fields that they have not touched hitherto ?" and "How shall I lead them to bring together into an ordered whole the stocks of infor- mation and of interest that they have gained or are gaining in other courses, in this course, or elsewhere ?" The twofold purpose of the course creates a special problem in organization. During each portion of the course the student personnel will comprise both students who have already covered the subject in question and students to whom that subject is new. The composition of the two groups will shift as the course reaches each new field. Clearly the same treatment will not be adapted for both groups. The situation will best be met by dividing the course, for each of the different portions, into two sections, one for each of the two groups, the sectioning changing as the course enters each new field. In the section consisting of those who have already studied the subject in question, the paramount purpose will be that of emphasizing the synthetic significance of the subject, particularly its relationship with adjacent subjects. Differential programs of collateral work may readily be planned. Books that themselves interweave results or theories in different fields may be of particular value in this connection. Students in the experi- enced section may be used to some extent as helpers in the initia- tion of students who are in the inexperienced section. A third purpose, which is in reality a special phase of the first, is the renovation at the sophomore level of the student's acquaint- ance with subjects that he has studied in high school but not in college. Each of the three courses should be something more than a series of descriptions of related subjects; each should be given coherence and vitality by some specific inner character. For the course on physical sciences this inner character is quite obviously afforded by the concept of evolution. For the course in social 260 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION sciences the same concept may be continued, or, since the problem here is that of conduct, the course may well proceed by the discus- sion of present current problems, involving individual or group conduct, in the several fields considered. For the course in the arts, while the evolutionary background may well be recognized, the specific purpose should be to give each student a chance to realize something of the enrichment of life that lies for him in acquaintance with the works of art, the music, and the literature available to him; and to render each student more sensitive to the values, in life itself, which form the data of artistic re-creation. XXI. STUDENT ORIENTATION AT MINNESOTA J. B. JOHNSTON Dean of the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts and Professor of Comparative Neurology University of Minnesota The course in student orientation originated at the University of Minnesota in 1922-23. After some desultory discussion of the need of something to orient the freshmen we began to discuss the character of the course more seriously. The question was first taken up in the curriculum committee, but we knew that it would have to run the gauntlet in the faculty. We were familiar with the course in Contemporary Civilization at Columbia and similar courses elsewhere. The character of the course at Dartmouth, strictly in evolution, was determined almost wholly by the men who give it; at the University of Missouri there was a course introductory to social science; at Brown University there was an introduction to the college course. The purpose of the last-mentioned course was to lay before the student the various types of courses and the fields of study that he might find in Brown University, and to get him oriented with reference to those opportunities. The course in Con- temporary Civilization at Columbia contains large blocks of material in particular subjects, such as history, economics, and psychology. It seemed to us to be an extremely heavy course for freshmen, in content and in the detail with which various subjects were treated. It contained enough of each subject to warrant Columbia College in replacing certain courses given in previous years. That didn't seem to be the type of thing we wanted to do. What we did set up was neither an introduction to any particular field of study nor an introduction to the college course, but something designed to arouse a spirit of inquiry, foster independent thinking, and encourage the exercise of individual judgment. The content of the course was determined by this rather abstract objective. Our purpose may appear to have been to give the students a survey of human knowledge; instead, the survey was selected as the best vehicle for arousing a spirit of inquiry, the 262 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION material best fitted to encourage the students to think for them- selves, to learn to use the library, to go after the material, and so on. So the course, as finally arranged, begins with the study of astronomy, followed by studies of the development of the earth looked at as the abode of man or to become the abode of man; biological evolution, including the origin of man; social origins and primitive social states; and a very elementary treatment of psychol- ogy. That, I believe, constitutes the first term's work, followed the second quarter without a break by studies of geography in its social-science aspect, economics, political science, and ending with education and art.' It is a very large program, but we were break- ing ground; starting out with no models before us except those which we had rejected not as being of themselves unsatisfactory in their own environment, but as unsuited to our particular pur- poses. The program was discussed vigorously in faculty meetings and required considerable engineering on the part of the curriculum committee. With, I think, four dissenting votes, the faculty finally approved it, as a course that should be adopted in an experimental way, and that should be given, if it seemed worth while, for four or five years, at the end of which time we should decide whether or not it should be given to all the freshmen. At the beginning we could not accommodate more than two hundred freshmen, but the number has since been increased to over three hundred. It is a five-hour course running through the first and second quarters. There was another problem that presented itself to us, namely, how this orientation course should be given. The first suggestion was that we should have our best lecturers in the various fields lecture on the different topics. There was unanimous agreement, however, that such a procedure would render the course extremely difficult to make alive and to realize the objectives that we had set up. We definitely rejected, then, a course of lectures by ex- perts and adopted what is very much more difficult, the plan of asking men who might be interested in the objectives to undertake the teaching of the whole course. It was decided that the teaching should be done by the recitation or discussion method. Only two SMan in Nature and Society. A Syllabus for an Orientation Course (University of Minnesota Press, 1927). STUDENT ORIENTATION AT MINNESOTA 263 lectures are given during the entire course, one on the constitution of matter, the other on art. The method, then, by which the course is given is by reference reading and discussion. A syllabus is provided giving a rather voluminous list of readings. The students have found the work heavier than that of the average freshman course. They are ex- pected to do the readings before coming to class, and the class hour is devoted to discussion under an instructor who goes through the whole course. We have instructors, however, who have given one half of the course and then have turned it over to another. You may wonder how we can treat such diverse fields when we haven't many men on the faculty who have had wide training even in their undergraduate years. We have one or two men with encyclopedic minds, but most of them had to get ready for the course. They were all interested in its objectives, and there were on the staff one or two specialists in nearly every field who acted as coaches for the others. After we had the main features of the course threshed out, this staff met day after day, week after week, each man bringing in reading matter-books from which he would suggest appropriate extracts, magazine articles from scientific monthlies, classical references such as Thomas Huxley's lectures- and presenting these to the other members of the staff. They would all discuss the character of the readings, their fitness for the freshman mind and the purposes of the course, determine upon the most appropriate references, and work these up for a syllabus. That was in the fall of 1923. The course began in January, 1924, with the syllabus for one term ready. That for the second term was prepared in a similar manner while the first term was in progress. We have not found occasion thus far to change the course radically. The readings have been scrutinized in the light of ex- perience; some have been discarded and others substituted; more material has been introduced from magazines and other sources not readily accessible to the students; and a few more instructors have been added from time to time. Having received no adverse comments from the faculty, the course may, I think, be regarded as successful. At least two or three of the men who originally voted against it have expressed their satisfaction, and no one has 264 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION raised the question as to whether or not the issue should be voted on again. Nevertheless, there are certain very serious problems in con- nection with the administration of the course. One of these is how to make it available to the whole freshman class. We have not been disposed to supply enough duplicate copies of reference material in the library for everybody to read. The only way we can see to enable all freshmen to take advantage of the course is to get these readings bound in a single volume. This project has been under way for a year or two. The references have been studied and revised with a view to getting them printed eventually in a book of readings that the students can buy. Then, of course, we can open the course to as many students as we have teachers for. There is also the question of whether or not the course should under present restricted conditions be given to a select body of students or to a random sampling. The staff, believing in the value of the course when given to ordinary classes of students in mixed sections, has not been inclined to limit the registration to any special group. The course is a free elective, and any fresh- man may enroll as long as there is room for him. We are particularly interested in the reports made by the stu- dents themselves regarding the course. One means of learning their reactions was a questionnaire given to the students at the time of their last examination with the request that they write frankly and honestly their answers to the questions and with the assurance that their responses would not be read until after their marks for the course were turned in. The first question was, "If you had a brother or sister coming to college next year would you advise him or her to take this course?" The first year 97 per cent answered affirmatively; the second year, 95 per cent; and the third, D4 or 95 per cent. They also revealed in their answers the convic- tion that the course is useful to them in deciding upon the subjects that they would like to study later. They were asked to indicate such matters as which parts of the course required the hardest work, and which were the most interesting fields. A part of our feeling of satisfaction comes from the results of these question- naires, our methods of examination, and other procedures employed in the course. XXII. A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING DONALD G. PATERSON Professor of Psychology, University of Minnesota HISTORY OF STUDENT COUNSELLING IN THE ARTS COLLEGE The attempt to develop an effective advisory and counselling service in the Junior College of Science, Literature, and the Arts is an outgrowth of the recommendations of the University Com- mittee on Educational Guidance urging that improved means for personal advice to students be provided.' In June, 1923, three special advisers were appointed in the Junior College.2 They began their work in September, 1923, giv- ing approximately one-third of their time. These advisers de- voted the year to intensive study of selected groups of students, primarily with the aim of training themselves. This involved not only discovery of the range and extent of problems presented by various students but also the development of a technique for aiding students to overcome difficulties. Probation students, students of superior tested ability and superior high-school achievement who were failing to live up to their expectations in the University, and students who were superior in every respect constituted the groups interviewed and followed up. Work with these groups indicated the advisability of increasing the work during 1924-25. As the work progressed the aims of advising became more clearly outlined and the genuine difficulties to be overcome, more obvious. Perhaps a statement of these aims at this time will best serve as an introduction. GENERAL AIMS OF COUNSELLING The aims of counselling were, first, to bring about a more harmonious adjustment of individual students to the opportunities available within and without the University, and second, to estab- 'Report of the Committee on Educational Guidance (University of Minnesota Bulletin, Vol. XXVI, No. 31, August 4, 1923). 2The following faculty members were designated as special advisers during 1923-24: D. G. Paterson, O. C. Burkhard, and Miss E. Thorp. 266 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION lish, as far as possible, a friendly and constructive personal rela- tionship between individual members of the faculty and students desiring such contact. This aim may be regarded as an attempt to re-establish the student-faculty relationship said to have existed in the small college and supposedly lost as a direct result of in- crease in enrollment. There is an obvious difference of aim between this group and the registration advisers who assist students in complying with curriculum rules and regulations. Furthermore, these faculty ad- visers should not be thought of as offering a mere "Pollyanna at- titude" which seeks to solve student problems by spreading good cheer, optimism, and expressions of faith in the inherent goodness of human nature. Unintelligent advising is apt to be of this sort. Neither should the work be confused with that of sentimentalists who have no real knowledge of the complexities of human nature or of the mechanisms of human adjustment but proceed to bring about better adjustments on the naive theory that the liberal use of praise and blame, of simple rewards and punishments, is all that is necessary to make each student do his best. On the contrary, the work of special advisers may best be characterized by the following statement of their duties and quali- fications prepared on March 21, 1924, by Dean J. B. Johnston, chairman of the Program Committee of the group of university faculty advisers: The function of advisers is twofold: to help the student and to collect and report information which may be used by other agencies to improve the administration of the University. In helping the student the adviser is called upon to deal with curriculum matters, methods of study, living conditions, associations and habits, inter- ests, extra-curricular activities, health, and any and all matters which affect the student's work and the degree of his success as a student and as a future citizen or professional man or woman. The aim and function of the adviser is to help the student to make the most of his university opportunities and to realize in the highest degree his own possibilities. The point of view and the attitude of the adviser are determined by the question, What is best for this individual student? The adviser must approach his work with the spirit, interests, and method of a university officer as distinguished from an advocate of a college or department. For the prosecution of their own work advisers will collect in- A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 267 formation about the student, sometimes voluminous and of varied character. The advisers will maintain always an independence from any disciplinary function. They should not be members of a students' work committee or other disciplinary body. They will furnish such officials with information and diagnosis when desired but they will not take part in or responsibility for any disciplinary action. Advisers are essentially friends and counsellors of students; their function is to help young men and women so long as they are students. PROGRAM FOR 1924-25 In planning to extend the work for 1924-25 in order to reach a larger number of students, the following program was drawn up, and a committee of special faculty advisers was appointed to carry it out: Suggestions Regarding Work of Special Advisers for the Col- lege of Science, Literature, and the Arts, 1924-25 1. That the three special advisers be reinforced by the addi- tion of six or nine additional faculty members who will serve as special advisers and members of special advisers' committees in addition to their other duties. 2. That this Committee of Special Advisers adopt a uniform mode of procedure in studying individual students. That this committee hold regular staff conferences at frequent intervals for purpose of conference, exchange of experiences, and development of unity in aims and methods. 3. That the immediate program of each adviser in his con- tacts with assigned students be limited to the following five points: (a) To act as registration advisers for each assigned student throughout residence in the Junior College. (b) To study time distribution as it actually exists in the case of each assigned student. (c) To study each assigned student's vocational and professional aim or objective. (d) To study the extent and nature of each student's participa- tion in extra-curricular activities. (e) To investigate methods of study, time of study, place of study, and conditions of study. 4. That each adviser keep a personnel record folder filled out as far as possible and kept up to date for each assigned student. 5. That a written record in the form of informal notes be kept concerning the facts elicited and suggestions made at each and 268 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION every interview, this written record to be entered on the interview sheets printed for this purpose and filed in the student's record folder. 6. That a summary be prepared for each student interviewed as soon as the adviser has collected sufficient information to admit of a judicious summing up of the student's capacities, aims, and adjustments, this summary to be organized under the following headings: (a) identifying information, (b) reason for assignment to special adviser, (c) facts apparently favorable to good scholar- ship, (d) facts possibly unfavorable to good scholarship, (e) ap- parent needs and suggestions made, and (f) scholarship record by quarters. 7. That the advisers be urged to read such books and period- icals as are suggested by members of the group and by speakers who will discuss advisory problems before the university group of advisers. Throughout the year this group held frequent meetings with practically perfect attendance.3 The following formal discussions were led by invited speakers. Dr. F. S. Chapin, chairman of the Department of Sociology, on "History of Social Case Work"; Miss Mildred Rosenstiel, manager of the Minneapolis Woman's Occupa- tional Bureau and vocational adviser for women at the University of Minnesota, on "Vocational Advising"; Dr. R. M. Elliott, chair- man of the Department of Psychology, on "Psychological Mechan- isms Involved in Student Adjustments"; and Dr. Angus W. Morrison, neuropsychiatrist, on "Mental Hygiene Problems." In addition to these formal meetings the group held four additional meetings for the purpose of outlining the program, arranging for specific interviewing tasks, and discussing selected cases. Mem- bers of the group were supplied with copies of The Principles of Vocational Guidance formulated by the National Vocational Guid- ance Association, and Dr. F. J. Kelly's The American Arts College. The first task undertaken was the interviewing of 54 new fall- quarter freshmen placed on probation after the mid-quarter exam- " The following faculty members constituted the committee during the year 1924-25: Messrs. D. G. Paterson, Chairman; O. C. Burkhard, E. H. Sirich, R. V. Cram, J. T. Hillhouse, W. O. Beal, R. Huntley, J. F. Markey, L. H. Reyerson, G. A. Thiel, W. H. Loveland, and Misses E. Thorp, E. Nissen, and H. George. A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 269 inations. Additional groups interviewed during the year were: 33 students of high expectation and poor college performance; 39 Twin City students and 52 non-Twin City students of high ex- pectation and high performance in college. In addition, an unde- termined number of students voluntarily seeking special advice were interviewed one or more times. PROGRESS DURING 1925-27 The committee was increased for the year 1925-26 and the name was changed to Committee of Faculty Counsellors.4 The change in name was made to avoid confusion between the work of these counsellors and the work of the regular staff of registration advisers. The large increase in the committee was made to ac- quaint a larger group of the faculty with the work of the more active members of the committee (for instance, those teaching the Orientation Course were added with the expectation that they might serve as counsellors for students enrolled in that course). Certain members were also added to the committee because of their interest and special knowledge of some phase of the problem, so that they could contribute to the group discussions without actually participating in the interviewing of students. The interviewing work during these past two years has been directed toward conservation of scholastic talent among freshmen. Major emphasis has been placed on the more promising students, although freshmen failing in 50 per cent of their work have been interviewed, providing they had secured ratings of sixty percentile in the college-ability tests at time of entrance to the University. So much for an historical account of the actual machinery, the general aims of counselling, and the duties of the faculty counsellors. 4The following served as members of the committee during 1925-26 and 1926-27: Messrs. W. Anderson, W. O. Beal, C. Bird, O. C. Burkhard, F. Butters, F. S. Chapin, G. P. Conger, R. V. Cram, R. M. Elliott, D. Fer- guson, J. M. Gaus, R. Hartshorne, J. T. Hillhouse, R. Huntley, A. C. Krey, M. Lambie, W. H. Loveland, J. F. Markey, D. Minnich, D. G. Pat- erson, F. M. Rarig, L. H. Reyerson, E. H. Sirich, W. H. Stead, G. A. Thiel, W. D. Wallis, E. G. Williamson, Mrs. F. K. del Plaine, and Misses A. G. Grandy, E. Nissen, M. Rosenstiel, and E. Thorp. 270 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION THEORETICAL BASIS FOR ADVISORY WORK There is an important theoretical basis for such advisory work, outlined as follows: 1. Appreciation of the extent and nature of individual differ- ences in aptitudes, abilities, interests, and desires among college students. 2. Appreciation of the range of motives among college stu- dents, direct and indirect means of expressing these motives, the numerous possibilities of mental conflict arising from the multi- plicity of motives, and possible methods of solving such conflicts in harmony with the student's best interests. Maladjustments among college students are brought about by a blocking or a thwarting of desires. Such a thwarting of desires is termed a "mental conflict." Unless the mental conflict is resolved in such a way as to permit suitable expression of the conflicting impulses, the maladjustment is apt to become intensified and we have the development of reveries or daydreaming, wish-fulfillment mechan- isms, compensations, and defense mechanisms. B. Hart's Psy- chology of Insanity gives the best account of these phenomena, which differ only by degrees from the abnormal to the normal. The most intense typical desires of the college student center around yearnings for love and sympathetic understanding, eagerness to participate successfully in socialized activities and the desire for adequate social recognition, to be well thought of by instructors, upperclassmen, etc. Strong emotional reactions toward grades, athletics, dramatics, debating, publications, parties, Greek-letter societies, dates, parents, instructors are evidences of desires that when thwarted give rise to a bewildering variety of behavior symptoms. 3. Knowledge of the more obvious symptoms of mental-hygiene problems, so that those requiring the special services of a physician, a psychologist, or a psychiatrist may be referred to the proper agencies. 4. Knowledge of and ability to utilize social case work technique in interviewing students. 5. Familiarity with the significance of the results of devices for measuring intelligence and other personality traits. A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 271 6. Knowledge of the educational significance of extra-curricular activities. 7. Knowledge of sources of occupational and vocational in- formation. From the foregoing it is apparent that such advisory work requires: 1. Trained interviewers. 2. A detailed knowledge of the assets, liabilities, and opportuni- ties belonging to each advisee. 3. A continuous prosecution of research to develop better methods of personality analysis and opportunity analysis. One might conclude that this program cannot be executed by faculty members because it is difficult, if not impossible, to develop qualified faculty members. In other words, it might be claimed that such a program requires a staff of specialists including medical examiners, psychiatrists, psychologists, and social workers. To be sure, such expert consultation and research service is needed. However, the problems of student adjustment cannot be adequately handled unless the classroom instructors are kept fully informed of the significance of the problem, so that they will be glad to co- operate in carrying out the recommendations of specialists. Hence it seems wise to continue the work through such a faculty com- mittee with the aid of available specialists. METHODS USED IN STUDYING EACH STUDENT AS A UNIQUE PERSONALITY It may be of interest to list here our present methods of ob- taining detailed knowledge of the assets, liabilities, and oppor- tunities of each student. 1. Interviews with the student, his instructors, his friends, his parents, and others who may know him well. 2. Student Personnel Record Folder, filed in the office of the dean of the college in which the student is registered in accord- ance with the resolution passed by the University Committee on Educational Research. This folder makes provision for recording information on previous school history, including summarized school marks, previous occupational background of the family, re- 272 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION sults of physical examinations and health ratings, information on his complete college record both scholastic and extra-curricular, results of intelligence tests, personality tests, educational tests, and other special tests and statements concerning the student's aims, interests, and plans from time to time. Because of frequent re- quests for copies of this folder from persons interested in student personnel work, the two inside pages and the back side of the folder are reproduced here. The front side of the folder is blank. The record card is arranged in the form of a folder so that it serves two purposes, namely, a repository of information and a folder into which can be placed notes of interviews, correspondence, etc. It is filed as any similar 81/2Xl folder is filed but the stock is extra heavy to withstand wear and tear. 3. Knowledge of curricular and extra-curricular opportunities in the University and of educational and training opportunities out- side the University. 4. Research projects designed to provide better tools for per- sonality analysis and more adequate knowledge of opportunities. In 1926-27 a systematic study was begun to determine the value of such student-adjustment work." In the meantime a number of additional research projects are under way, such as Dr. Edna Heidbreder's research designed to develop methods of measuring obscure personality traits such as introversion, inferiority com- plexes, neurotic symptoms, etc.; Miss Marion Myer's attempt to isolate and measure scholastic zeal; Mr. P. E. Schellenberg's ef- forts to develop an objective mental-hygiene group-test; and Mr. Theos Langlie's studies of the value of placement tests and the value of teachers' ratings of personality traits. (Because of the widespread interest in student-rating scales the one developed for use in this study is shown on page 276.) Dean Johnston's studies of the predictive value of college ability tests and high-school scholar- ship standing have been invaluable aids in counselling, furnishing the most important data now available concerning the scholastic potentialities of each student. " The study is being made by Mr. E. G. Williamson, graduate student in psychology. A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 273 FIGURE 12 PAGE Two OF STUDENT PERSONNEL RECORD FOLDER Unsvasryv or MTNNESOTA STUDENT RECORD CARn PERSONAL HISTORY INFORMATION SECTION In what college Dat Name I re you registering? Local Xddress StreetanNuTelephone No. Age in Years Date of Birlbth DayYarPlace of Birth MoantS Da Ysas Citizen of U. S.0 Yes -- ), No I-- ) If foreign born, howloeg have you lived in U.S.? PHOTOGRAPH Sex-1 t-- ) F t- . Race Religious Preference? I Name of Parent Home Address or Guardian Stree Ci' Stat Father's Birthplace? Education? --------- Occupation? Mother's Birthplace? Education? Occupation? Older First Name Education Occupation Brothers First Name Education Occupatio and Sisters First Name Education Occupation Name of Preparatory Date of or High School Location Graduation Place an L after the two subjects taken by you in high school that Describe your activities In high school in athletics, dramatics, debat you liked best. Place a D after the two subjects you disliked most ing, music school paper or magazine, etc. or liked least English Literature - Physics--- English Composition--- Chemistry- Algebra - Botany- Geometry- Biology- General Mathematics- Physiology- Latin- Zoology- Greek- Commercial Subjects- French- Industrial ArtsA - German-- Mechanical Drawing- Spanish- Music-- Norse or Swedish- Painting os Drawing- History- Offices held m school or student organizations SoGenerial Sciences-'- Kind of Offie GeneralScienceOrganization Held Special training Kind Amount Kind o Oce such as music, art, Kind of Office stenography, etc Kind - Amount Organization Held Indicate strong interests or hobbies while in high schoe Agricultural, Business, o Industrial Experience Salary Kind of Work Jusi what did you do Years Hos. Earned Pe Name o any school or college ateoded. Degree in addition to clementary or high school Kinn of School Course Taken Years Receied Books recently Magazines read read regularly What occupation or profession do you From which college do you plan to tahe op as your life work? expect to graduate? Are you totally dependent on your own earnings)? Yes (- ). No (- ) It so, state hours pe week and nature of work Are you partially dependent on your own earnings? Yes (- ), No (- ) If so, state hours per week and nature of work Are you married? No (- ), Yes (- ) How many persons are dependent on you for support? State the college subjects you expect to he most interested in Sie of Ranh in m n Percentile Principal's Senior Clae Senior Clas - -- Rank Estimate-- I-. 274 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION FIGURE 13 PAGE THREE OF STUDENT PERSONNEL RECORD FOLDER UIVSIOEIT OF MINNEIESASTUENTSI R CES Ae COLLEGE RECORD SECTION Activity FirtIIYar Second Year Thrd Year Fourth Year Intercollegiate Athletcs IntOramuralAthletics Publications Dramatics, DebteMusic Other Campus Actties FraternitieM Sororities Clubs, Societes Work for Compensation Wok for Comperisatio Wok for ComentEOiho Vocatiooal Chcoes RecordofSumeE mplCoPIytet Kindof Work Mo. Earned Per SummerEof Summer of ESmmeof Summ~e of Conditionof Study First Year SeconedYear Third Veat FouthbYear LivOEing tomIeIor wth relatives? RetOingEaroo? NamCeIooommat? Num~bIEeroonininIsame house? Addreoo SCSI SECI IIttIO7 8A fA Subsequent History A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 275 FIGURE 14 PAGE FOUR OF STUDENT PERSONNEL RECORD FOLDER RECORD OF TESTS AND SCHOLARSHIP First Quarter Gr. Cr P. Second Quarter Gr. Cr.HP Third Quarter Gr Cr H.P. Date Date Date ] - >4 Dae Date Date Date Uate Date Teus, Date Scor P.R. S.D. Tess Dae Score P.. S.D. Tets Dae Sor P.R. S.D Moore's Completion Miller Test Opposites Test Vocabulary "A" Vocabulary "B" Total First Year Second Year Third Year Fourth Year Disciplinary Actions Dscplinary Actions Disciplinary Actions Prizes, Honors, iwaadls Prizes, Honors, Awards Rernarks Physical Condition at Entranre: Heghkts - Welght. Health Rating: A-B-C-I)- Strength Rating: t-2-3-4- NAME 276 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION FIGURE 15 GRAPHIC RATING SCALE FOR STUDENTS Name of Name of Rater . ......................................................................... ..................... Student .................. . ........... . . .... Rating Instructions: Rate this student on the basis of his actual performances, if you know him well. enough to give a judg- nent in all the qualities. Before attempting to make out your report, it is necessary to have clearly in mind the exact qualities to be reported on. Read the following definitions very carefully. In each quality or trait consider this student's standing carefully. Place a check (V) somewhere on the line running from "very high" to "very low" to indicate this student's standing in each quality. It is not necessary to put the check directly above any of the descriptive phrases or adjectives, QUALITIES I. Consider ability to grasp and assimilate new ideas, facts, prin- ciples and methods. (Ability to learn.) IL. Consider resourcefulness and initiative in proposing new prob- lems, applying principles and makingsuggestions. (Initiative.) III. Consider power of concentra- tion and sustained attention as shown by perseverance and ap- plication to studies. (Indus- try.) IV Consider interest in books. in getting new ideas and in in- dependent study. (Scholastic Zeal.) V. Consider observance of instruc- tions and rules, punctuality and faithfulness in fulfilling obliga- tions inside and outside the classroom. (Dependability.) VI. Consider ability and actual ac- tivities (athletics, debating etc.) regardless of scholastic stand- ing.. (Outside School Inter- ests.) VIL Consider ability and actual suc- cess in civic and business activi- ties. (Civic and Business In- terests.) VIII. What sort of scholastic record will this student make in Col- lege? (Capacity for College Work.) REPORT Very Lea rns Ordinary Slow to Learn Dull Superior with Ease Ve Resourcuelu Ocasonally Rotin Need s Constant Original Suggests Worer Supervision rVer nt Industrioun Ssmodic Need Fre cent Las Persistente gin t Craves Unusual Studious Usually t Lakinl Scholarly Work Zeal Indifferent Ree Sis e Ue s 11 Faith ut FU a Irresponsible oiResponsihilitui Deendable bu Outtaendin Versatile Limited Auenpts Tins Lcing end Vcratl. Success ButFails Ver Enterprising Enterprising F sirlf Attempts things Luig nd Successul Sucssful But Pil Will be an Will Earn Pssale or Barely Will Prbabl Honor Student Superior Grades Average Grades Satsfatory Fad Total............. . Final - Rating............ r.. K L M I RI ........................... . . . .................... I ....................... . ....... I ........ . .......... I ....... . .. . .... . ........ ~ .... ............ . ........... ~ l . . . ....... I............. ....... I I ..... ..............., ..I...... .. ....... .......... .. ............. . lnn ~ .l+ .......I............................... . I................... . .............. ... ........I. ...... .. . ... A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 277 THE SPECIFIC AIMs OF INTERVIEWS In interviewing students the attention of counsellors is directed toward: 1. Studying time distribution as it actually exists in the case of each assigned student. The counsellor frequently enlists the cooperation of the student to the point where he will systemati- cally record his activities on a Time Distribution Sheet,6 returning at a later date for a discussion of time budgeting. In some cases it would mean advising a student to spend less time in studying, but to study more intensively. Similar attention can be given to each activity reported. 2. Investigating methods of study, time of study, place of study, and conditions of study. Many students complain that they cannot concentrate or that they cannot stay awake to study in the evening. Frequently it is necessary to call their attention to such manuals as Whipple's How to Study Effectively, or to Kornhauser's How to Study, emphasizing the principles that seem to apply in the particular case. Some students need special advice on relaxa- tion and rest before the evening meal in order to complete an evening of intensive study. Difficulty in concentrating in many in- stances is a symptom of mental conflicts and of reveries resulting from failures to achieve certain ends in real life. Hence, improve- ment in study cannot be expected unless the underlying conflict is removed. In these cases, the mental-hygiene specialist is consulted. 3. Studying the extent and nature of each student's participa- tion in extra-curricular activities, aiding and urging the student to engage in those activities most in line with his own interests, abilities, and needs. For example, we frequently find that a stu- dent has devoted three or more years to the study of some musical instrument, yet he drops this activity upon entering college. Such a student might be urged to join one of the musical organizations or to take an extra course in the Department of Music to maintain his interest and ability in music. SThis form is identical with that used in student-personnel work at Northwestern University and is reproduced in L. B. Hopkins' "Personnel Work at Northwestern University," Journal of Personnel Research, Vol. I, Nos. 6 and 7, 1922, pp. 277-88. 278 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 4. Studying each assigned student's vocational and professional aim or objective to determine its origin, its harmony with family background, and student's real abilities. In this work we are very fortunate in having the aid of Miss Mildred Rosenstiel, manager of the Minneapolis Woman's Occupational Bureau, whose expert- ness and skill has resulted in numerous readjustments. 5. Giving each assigned student an opportunity to discuss per- sonal problems frankly and confidentially with an older and more mature member of the faculty. To bring about greater uniformity in the interviews without unduly mechanizing or too rigidly standardizing it, two forms for summarizing the interviewer's impressions and suggestions have been developed. These forms have been very useful in systematiz- ing the approach to student problems, serving as a sort of check list or guide so that important factors would not be overlooked in discussing a student's problems with him. These two forms are reproduced on pages 280 to 282 as Forms A and B. SELECTED CASES The following cases have been selected to indicate the com- plexity of the problem and to indicate some of the results that have been achieved. No attempt has been made to classify systemati- cally the various types of student adjustment problems. The aim here is merely to give a bird's-eye view of some of the student problems encountered. Two cases of inferior ability and inferior college work, yet possessed by an irrational and intense desire to do college work. 1. Mr. A. entered the general course in September, 1924. His college-ability-test rating showed average ability, but his high- school scholarship was very low. He graduated from a Minne- apolis high school at the bottom of his class scholastically, i.e., 7 percentile, his principal predicting failure for him in college. He made a very poor record during his first year, claiming that he did not study enough. He came to a faculty counsellor to learn how to make good grades. The real motive for staying in college was a desire to keep up with his classmates. Interviews with his mother and with the boy resulted in their decision to find some other form A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 279 of training better suited to his abilities. The Psychology Depart- ment gave him a series of tests, discovering that he was highly gifted along mechanical lines. He was advised to enter a trade school. Follow-up report indicates the boy is successful and en- joying this course. 2. Mr. B. entered the pre-medical course in September, 1924, at the age of 20. Is entirely self-supporting and is an earnest, conscientious student. Very poor rating on college-ability tests (in lowest one per cent of entire freshman class). Failing in 66 per cent of his work at mid-quarter. He could not understand his failure in view of the fact that he had done nothing except study for the six-week period. He was grateful for information that his lack of reading habits throughout his life, with a resulting meager vocabulary, made it almost impossible for him to master his college subjects. He said, "Well, I believe that is true and I ought not continue, because I'm paying my own way and I can get more out of my money by trying something else." His interest in medicine was a "derived interest" and not in line with his abilities. His uncle had greatly influenced him for some three years to take up medicine. Mr. B. plans to go into business by starting at the bottom in some industry. The above two cases indicate something of the variety of non- scholastic and non-intellectual motives driving students of inferior scholastic abilities to continued and repeated attempts to suc- ceed in the University. Such students do not need discipline. They do not understand dismissal, which is merely followed by return to the University at the first opportunity. They need guidance that will lead them to see that the University is not an opportunity for success for them and that will cause them to seek opportunities for success elsewhere. Three cases of superior tested ability and poor college achieve- ment. 1. Mr. C., age 22, entered the pre-legal course in September, 1923, with 77 credits advanced standing. He was referred to a special adviser on April 8, 1924, being on probation for failure in studies. This student had a very high test rating (94 percentile), had won a gold medal for scholarship in high school, and claims 280 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION FORM A COLLEGE OF SCIENCE, LITERATURE, AND THE ARTS SUMMARY OF STUDENT INTERVIEW NOTE TO INTERVIEWER: Check the appropriate numbers or phrases for each item, and make notes in the margin, giving specific details and facts. Items I, II, and the first two parts of Item III will be obtained from personnel records by a clerk. Name Age- Course Class- Year of High School Graduation- Home Address P.O.- I. TESTS Raw %ile 0- 11- 31- 71- 91- Score Score 10% 30% 70% 90% 100% --College Ability F D C B A %lo- - H.S. Scholarship F D C B A - Principal's Estimate F D C B A - English Aptitude F D C B A --Emotional Questionnaire F D C B A F D C B A F D C B A II. a. SCHOLARSHIP LAST QUARTER F E D C B A F E D C B A F E D C B A F E D C B A F E D C B A b. TOTAL SCHOLARSHIP to date Credits- H.P.- H.P. Ratio- III. HEALTH Health Rating (by Health Service) D C B A Strength Rating 4 3 2 1 Sleep 5-6 7 8 9-10 hours Does student feel his hours of sleep are adequate Eating (Check those that describe his situation) Irregular hours Regular hours Restaurants Varied diet Boarding house ---- - Home cooking IV. STUDY CONDITIONS (see directions) Number of Hours of Study per Week Very Poor Poor Fair Good Excellent Give the number here 0-7 8-14 15-25 26-35 36- Definite Daily Plan of Study Hours No Yes Methods of Study (see directions) Poor Fair Good V. REASONS FOR SELECTION OF HIS COURSE None Advised Experience A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 281 VI. ACTIVITIES (Hours per week in athletics, fraternity, social life, etc.) 41-up 31-40 21-30 11-20 1-10 VII. OUTSIDE WORK (Hours spent per week in self-support, home duties, etc.) 35-up 20-34 15-19 5-14 0-4 VIII. EMOTIONAL AND NERVOUS BALANCE Excessive Fair Strain Balance Good IX. PERSONAL DIFFICULTIES Curricular: Personal Relations with Instructors Poor Fair Good Selection of Subjects Dissatisfied Indifferent Satisfied Number of Credit Hours Carried Present Quarter Excessive Heavy Reasonable Load Extra-Curricular: Family Relations Strained Indifferent Satisfactory Economic Factors Totally Self- Supporting Partly Not at All Social Life Lonely and Has Made a Adequate Number "Out of It" Few Friends of Friends Note here any other personal difficulties and indicate their extent X. REMARKS Put an (F) before all the following factors which the Faculty Counsellor assigns for the causation of the student's difficul- ties. Also an (S) before all the following factors which the student assigns for his own difficulties. Fac. Stu. Possible Causes Fac. Stu. Possible Causes - - Poor Preparation for Course - - Misplacement - - Physical Health - - Unsuitable interests for his - - Extra-curricular Activities vocational objective - - Self-support - - Lack of special aptitude Social activities for this course Athletics - - Lack of general intelligence - - Other undergraduate - - Peculiarities of Temperament, activities and Emotional Difficulties - - Study Methods - - Other Reasons. Please be S- Loafing specific - - Inefficient methods Slowness Signed Faculty Counsellor Date- 282 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION FORM B COLLEGE OF SCIENCE, LITERATURE, AND THE ARTS SUMMARY OF STUDENT INTERVIEW SPECIFIC SUGGESTIONS GIVEN TO THE STUDENT BY THE COUNSELLOR Please check the appropriate ones and add others not mentioned herein. I. HEALTH HABITS -Less time on outside activities - More sleep, rest periods during the day, etc. - Better eating habits - Referred to Health Service because of physical condition Specify cause II. STUDY HABITS - Improve study conditions by - Increase number of study hours - Adopt daily schedule for study - Improve methods of study by- -Explained rewards for good scholarship such as Phi Beta Kappa, Sigma Xi, quality credit rule, etc. Specify III. VOCATIONAL Aided student to discover life work motive by: - Referring to for vocational information or by - Advising vocational experience such as part time work while in school, summer work, etc. Specify - Referred to psychologist for additional examination such as aptitude tests, diagnosis of special disabilities, analysis of study methods, etc. Specify - Outlined a better course of study in line with this student's vocational or educational objective. Specify IV. FINANCIAL ---Less outside work, rely on student loan funds - Referred to employment office - Referred to Dean Nicholson for student loan V. EMOTIONAL - Referred to psychiatrist because of lacking emotional balance Reason for this action VI. - Suggestions relative to improved family conditions Specify VII. - Suggestions relative to improved social contacts Specify VIII. -----Additional suggestions to the student Specify Signed Faculty Counsellor Date A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 283 to have made good grades at a first-class small college. He was in poor health and had lost confidence in his own mental capacity. This seems to date from his failure in debate tryouts as a college freshman. Apparently a marked change in personality took place, with a change in his whole mode of living. His success in the college-ability tests encouraged him greatly and reassured him as to his mental capacity for law. The Student Health Service gave him intensive physical examinations, the results of which convinced him that his health was really good. A light program of studies stressing political science and history was arranged. He made 10 hours of C grades that quarter and followed this up by earning 30 credits and 40 honor points during the next two quar- ters, making him eligible to enter the Law School. 2. Mr. D. entered the pre-medical course in September, 1921. When interviewed on October 16, 1923, he was still in the pre- medical course although he had failed in physics three times and in chemistry twice. In spite of these failures in the basic sciences, he had done good work in rhetoric and French. The college-ability tests revealed marked ability, 88 percentile in the vocabulary test and 97 percentile in the Miller tests. Analysis revealed an illogi- cal motive for studying medicine, and in view of the success of several older brothers and sisters in education and social service work, he was persuaded to shift his attention to the social service field. He agreed with this plan and immediately improved in his scholarship, graduating from the University with a B average in his major subject. 3. Mr. E. entered the arts course in September, 1921, and was interviewed on March 14, 1924. He had been an excellent student in high school but had lost interest in his college work and was failing to make a C average. He did not have any objective and seemed to lack interest in anything. A strong appeal was made to his pride, and he was urged to enter the Law School, where he would find stiff professional competition. He was advised that a trial in political science and history courses during the spring quarter would demonstrate whether he had the qualifications nec- essary to succeed in the Law School. He proceeded to make 15 credits and 40 honor points during the spring quarter and followed 284 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION this up by making a B plus average in the Law School the follow- ing year. The above cases emphasize the importance of effective interests and motives in the successful adjustment of students. Insight and understanding of students' peculiar temperamental make-up are necessary before the appropriate appeal can be determined upon and applied. In such cases mere praise or blame are ineffective, whereas an attitude of patient analysis enlists the students' co- operation and leads to the discovery of the effective motives to get them organized so that they can achieve in accordance with their superior abilities. Two cases of superior ability and superior college achievement who needed guidance. 1. Miss F. entered college in September, 1924. Her first inter- view with a special adviser was held five months later. This student showed very superior ability on entrance. Her college-ability- test rating was 80 percentile and her high-school scholarship rating, 86 percentile. Three older brothers and a sister are college gradu- ates. Her health was good, and she enjoyed excellent study con- ditions. She made a B average during her first collegiate quarter. She participated in no extra-curricular activities in high school or in the University. She was timid and shy although she had a very pleasing appearance and manner. She was not interested in teaching and did not want to prepare for teaching but did not know what she wanted to do after graduation. She had no decided likes or dislikes, her interests being limited and her attitude toward most things in life being one of indifference. She was unsocialized and had made no attempt to adjust to the University on the social side. Her adviser attempted to persuade her to participate in some intellectual extra-curricular activity in order to catch some- thing of the spirit of college life. Her scholastic work through the year was excellent, averaging higher than a B in all work. 2. Mr. G. entered the pre-legal course in September, 1924. He had very superior ability and made a B average during his first year. He participated in no extra-curricular activities in high school or in college. He had been brought up in apartments, mov- ing frequently, and hence had never enjoyed the socializing influ- A PROGRAM FOR STUDENT COUNSELLING 285 ence of neighborhood groups of playmates. He had not adjusted himself to the social side of university life, but merely attended classes. He seemed grateful for suggestions that he make strenu- ous efforts to identify himself with the intellectual, cultural, and social life of the University. In view of his interest in law he was encouraged to develop a genuine interest in literature and in public speaking, both of which he disliked. The above cases indicate that even superior students doing superior college work need assistance and advice, especially guid- ance toward socializing influences. Many of these students also need guidance with reference to proper planning of courses looking toward graduate work, broadening their courses during their junior-college years, and taking on extra-curricular respon- sibilities. STUDENT ATTITUDES TOWARD COUNSELLING SERVICE In the spring quarter of 1927 we prepared a questionnaire to ascertain the attitude of students who had been assigned to coun- sellors during the past three or four years. Over 300 replies were received, and there is reason to believe that these are fairly repre- sentative of all who have been interviewed by faculty counsellors. Mr. E. G. Williamson's tabulations reveal that 94.8 per cent of those replying believe that the University should continue and should extend this effort to provide faculty counsellors for students. Individual replies stress the need of such service for freshmen and especially for out-of-town freshmen. Many state that the fresh- man feels inferior, insignificant, and lost in the crowd, and that a faculty counsellor renders a genuine service in bolstering up self- confidence and in aiding the freshman to find himself. A consider- able number of replies emphasize the importance of such a service because it is one of the student's few points of contact with mem- bers of the faculty outside of classes. Space forbids enumeration of all the varied reasons prompting approval of the counselling idea and urging extension of counselling facilities. A large majority of the students (73.7 per cent to be exact) feel that they were benefited by their faculty counsellors. State- ments concerning the nature of the help received were made by these students. These statements are reassuring in that these stu- 286 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION dents are able to point out specific ways in which such counselling service is effective. The following quotations are indicative: "It gave me a higher self-estimate and helped me to rid myself of an inferiority complex." "My counsellor gave me a better under- standing of how to study. He also helped me become more adapt- able to university life. He seemed to understand me as no one else ever has." "I was very much upset. The suggestion was made that I rest more, and that my abilities were, contrary to my fears, very good." "His unbiased criticisms of my choice of pro- fession stimulated me to reason out my fitness for the work." "Just talking things over with someone unprejudiced either for or against certain lines of work or attitudes helped me." "It was meeting people like this man that made me want to go on with college." "Steered me away from a profession for which I have since come to believe I had no special aptitude." "He diagnosed an emotional difficulty, the effects of which were troubling me but the nature of which was absolutely unknown to me." "Helped me to decide what course to take, showing me the possibilities in each, and then let me decide for myself." "Helped me get started in extra-cur- ricular activities." "Gave me valuable advice in regard to study and recreation." This questionnaire study merely confirms in a statistical man- ner the surprise and gratitude personally expressed by many stu- dents at the opportunity such interviews have afforded them. Time and again, at the conclusion of an interview, students have ex- pressed amazement at the fact that anyone in such a large univer- sity should devote time to them or be interested in them as individuals. This type of appreciation leads members of the com- mittee to believe that their work is sufficiently worth while to justify strenuous efforts to improve and extend the service to as many students as possible. XXIII. COLLEGE MARKS W. S. MILLER Professor of Educational Psychology University of Minnesota The practice of assigning marks to college students is so uni- versal that it seems unnecessary to attempt to justify it. College faculties seem to be convinced that the use made of marks justifies the large amount of time and energy expended. There are, how- ever, those who believe that two marks, "passed" and "failed," would be quite satisfactory. Marks serve as a basis for assigning credit, special honors and awards, credit for quality, for determining eligibility, for engaging in extra-curricular activities, and for recommendation for positions. The fact that marks are taken so seriously by many students, and that teachers, parents, and others attach so much importance to marks makes it imperative that instructors assigning them exercise great care in giving them a meaning that can be understood by those who make use of them. To the question, "Of what are marks a measure?" one will get a variety of answers by instructors. Some will say they are a measure of achievement alone. Others will say that the marks are a measure of achievement plus attitude, industry, improvement, and many other factors. These instructors will admit that the mark of a given student is lower than his mark based on achievement alone because he has not exerted sufficient effort; and that the mark of another student, because he has worked faithfully, is higher than the mark based on achievement alone. Some instructors will assign high marks for relatively low achievement because the stu- dent has been prompt, courteous, cooperative, and industrious. Table XVIII shows clearly the lack of agreement among teach- ers of the University of Minnesota High School on "What Marks Measure." The teachers were asked in making these ratings "to assign on a basis of 100 per cent the weight given to each item aside from its direct effect on accomplishment." 0 0 0 0 0 0 14N Ho 0 4 0 0 U) ac, NI c- ac- co NI9 4 ul1 in) co 00CC 4C C C 4 siNHaj Uad NI "logs af NHO "*H~LVN 'HSIUDN[ aTO SUHIHOVal H aaIvA IIOUaAV Ni AViaovA RalvA ROUHAV IISI'IDN H C 4 00'IN~ H NIi~x CO aq t t4 C4 t- &c 71 o00 OD N (Z C t-C inIC 00 C> aqH C]i C] 111N 0 inI o inCC) h H 1h 10 OH d rm C-) ~ 4-l) H rilH4-4 rA 4-1 - 0 0H W 0~ C.) 0 CdH HO X Cco H Ee 41 as NI - cCC hC CfI 14 i 0 .4 A1cl M. k~ 'HIVJAl rH H.LVNH HSII0NH[ c0 )C)NaIOs HN H 0 UC d. Cl Cl 1CI i NI CCNI 4) ,0 0 bln 41) ,0 0. 0 C P-4 Crl) E-4C 0ce COLLEGE MARKS No one would believe that the items listed in this table are always weighted by each teacher in the manner indicated; for example, it is unbelievable that teacher No. 13 gives a weight of just 2 per cent to item 7. It is quite probable that if, after an interval of ten days, these same teachers had been asked to evaluate these same items, the results would have been quite different. The important point to be gained from this table is that all teachers except No. 17 admit that their marks are not based wholly on achievement. Furthermore, no two of the instructors weight the various items in the same way. A similar study made by Mr. Philip Hauge' at the University of Washington shows the same lack of agreement among public- school teachers as to what marks measure. Many college instruc- tors will admit that their marks are not marks of achievement alone. The first step in improving a marking system is to limit the mark to achievement only. If this were done, then an A rating in any given subject would mean superior achievement in that sub- ject, which may or may not be accompanied by promptness, excel- lent attitude toward teacher, regularity of attendance, and superior conduct. The problem of rating a student's achievement in any subject is difficult enough without complicating it by introducing the ratings on all desirable human traits simultaneously. A com- posite mark of achievement and character traits may very well have some meaning to the instructor assigning it, but to the person unacquainted with the instructor and student it is practically mean- ingless in relation to the actual achievement of the student. There can be no question of the importance of these character traits, but they should be rated independent of achievement, except as their presence or absence affect actual achievement. Assuming that the instructors in a college have agreed to make their marks a measure of achievement alone, the problem of mark- ing would still be complicated by the method of measuring achieve- ment, and of expressing the different levels of achievement. This raises the question of standards of achievement and symbols for rating. SAugust Dvorak, "Uniformity in the Assignment of Marks," Washing- ton Educational Journal, March, April, and May, 1925. 289 290 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Among those who have given serious attention to the problem of marking, it is quite generally agreed that expressing levels of achievement in terms of per cent of accomplishment of task set is unsatisfactory, especially when there is no uniformity in difficulty of tasks set by different instructors or by the same instructors at different times. The practice of establishing a passing mark of 60, 70, or any other point on a 100 per cent scale must necessarily be unfair to the student since on tasks with varying difficulty no point on the scale has the same meaning on all the tasks. One task may be so easy that all students will do more than 70 per cent of it, while another may be so difficult that none of the same group will do 70 per cent of it. This is illustrated by the fluctua- tion of the percentage of failures in a state examination in some subject in successive years. It is hardly believable that the varia- tion in the ability of 10,000 pupils in a given state to do the opera- tions in first-year algebra would fluctuate as it does from year to year if measured by a uniform standard. It must be obvious that the marked fluctuation in percentage of failures is very largely a fluctuation of the difficulty of the examinations given. PROPOSED FREQUENCIES OF OCCURRENCE OF THE MARKS A, B, C, D, F F D C B A Cattell' 10 20 40 20 10 Meyer' 3 22 50 22 3 Dearborn4 2 23 50 23 2 Finkelstein5 12 19 45 21 3 Rugg' 7 24 38 24 7 2 . M. Cattell, "Examinations, Grades, and Credits," Popular Science Monthly, 66:367-78. ' Max Meyer, "Experiences with the Grading System of the University of Missouri," Science, N.S., 33:661. 4W. F. Dearborn, School and University Grades, University of Wis- consin Bulletin No. 368, High School Series No. 9, 1910. SIsidore Finkelstein, The Marking System in Theory and Practice, Educational Psychology Monograph No. 10 (Baltimorei Warwick and York, 1913). 6 H. O. Rugg, Statistical Methods Applied to Education (Houghton Mifflin Company, 1917). COLLEGE MARKS The percentage system is rapidly going out of use and is being replaced by the letter system in which there are five steps or letters. The five-step system is very satisfactory, for it provides a mark for the average group with two marks above and below. This makes possible the designation of very superior and very inferior groups and also the groups above and below average. Defining each of the five marks in terms of the old percentage scale retains the main fault of the percentage system. It seems more desirable to define the marks in terms of the frequency of their occurrence in a large, unselected group. Frequencies of occurrence of the five marks that have been pro- posed will be found in the table on the preceding page. Investigations of distribution of marks in different subjects and by different teachers in the same department show that there is little agreement among teachers as to the meaning of the marks. All of these investigations reveal variations that render the marks practically meaningless. When 77 per cent of the 667 marks given by one instructor are A's and none of the marks of another instructor in the same department are A's, it is difficult to form any definite conception as to the meaning of a mark of A in that department. In the same institution the instructors in 19 depart- ments in actual practice assigned A's as follows: PER CENT OF INSTRUCTORS PER CENT OF A's 7 Less than 10 30 10 to 19 24 20 to 29 17 30 to 39 7 40 to 49 12 50 to 59 3 60 to 86 In the face of these facts what can be the meaning of A achievement? Seven teachers from various academic departments in a western high school over a series of. years gave marks distributed as fol- lows: ' 7Dvorak, op. cit. 291 292 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION TEACHER DISTRIBUTION OF MARKS IN PER CENTS OF TOTAL MARKS GIVEN No. F C B A 1 2 17 36 45 2 % 17 46 37 3 13 33 23 31 4 / 14 60 25 5 4 40 40 16 6 8 42 42 8 7 13 31 31 2 In almost any high school or college in which no special atten- tion has been given to marks and their distribution, investigation will reveal wide variation among its teachers in the percentages of the various marks assigned. This fault can be remedied by the faculty's agreeing on the meaning of the marks in terms of the percentage of a large group of students that might normally be expected to receive them. Any one of the proposed distributions (p. 290), or an average of all of them would be an improvement over what is usually found. Rugg'ss proposal based on a fivefold distribution with the range equal to - 2.5 S.D. should work out very well in practice. According to Rugg's proposal, quality of work that did not vary from the mean by more than +- .5 S.D. would be labeled C or average; quality of work that was more than 1.5 S.D. above or below the mean would be labeled A and F respectively; and quality of work falling between the extremes and the C group would be labeled B and D. In such a scheme, by cutting off the curve at _ 2.5 S.D. each letter is equal to 1 S.D. of the distribution. When marks have been defined in terms of frequency, it be- comes the duty of the teacher to assign her marks accordingly. In terms of Rugg's proposal, A represents the quality of work done by approximately the best 7 per cent of a relatively large group, B, the next 24 per cent; C, 38 per cent; D, 24 per cent; and F, 7 per cent. It is, indeed, a very difficult task to define failing work in any subject. It is common knowledge that individual instructors vary ' Rugg, op. cit. COLLEGE MARKS widely in their conception of what constitutes failing work. So long as we use our present relative system of marks, the amount of elimination, it seems to the writer, should be agreed upon by the general faculty rather than determined by each instructor's conception of what constitutes failure in his classes. Without common standards of achievement, why should the lowest 30 per cent of one class fail when only 2 per cent of another class of equal ability under another instructor fail? Objective measure- ment of two such sections often reveals the fact that on the basis of actual achievement there is no basis for the percentage of fail- ures being fifteen times as great in one section as in the other. In addition to the five letters mentioned above, it is very con- venient to have two other marks, I and E. The I is used in those cases in which the pupil, because of unavoidable reasons, has been unable to complete his work. The I means "incomplete" and will stand on the records until his work is completed. E is a condi- tional mark that will be changed when the pupil has complied with certain conditions, such as passing an extra examination or doing passing work in the term that follows. It is to be expected that in the case of small, selected groups the distribution of marks will not necessarily conform to this pro- posed distribution. In the case of departure from the proposed distribution the teacher should be able to justify it by furnishing evidence that the group is selected. Evidence of selection may be obtained from two sources, (1) the average of the marks given to the same pupils by teachers of closely allied subjects, (2) the intelligence level of the group as indicated by the median intelli- gence-test ratings of the group. The distribution of marks of selected groups must necessarily vary from the proposed distri- bution. Marks of upper classes will distribute differently from those of freshman classes, and marks in elective courses differ in their distribution from marks in required courses. The important question in variation from the proposed distribution is, "Can the variation be justified?" Table XIX shows distributions of marks in the fall quarter of 1921 and 1924 in a junior-college group and a senior-college group at the University of Minnesota. On the basis of ability as measured 293 294 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION by intelligence tests those in the senior-college group are more capa- ble, and it might be expected that they would make a larger percent- age of the higher marks and a smaller percentage of the lower marks. This may be due in large part to the elimination of the students making the lower marks. Doubtless some of the increase in the percentage of high marks in the senior-college group is due to the fact that the students in the senior college are taking courses in fields that they have chosen as their majors. TABLE XIX AVERAGE OF PERCENTAGE DISTRIBUTIONS OF MARKS OF ALL COLLEGES RECEIVING ENTERING FRESHMEN AND OF ALL COLLEGES REQUIRING SOME JUNIOR COLLEGE PREPARATION* TOTAL DF DNt I F E D C B A PER CENTS Junior '21f 1.0 3.3 3.5 3.9 5.6 20.7 30.7 22.3 8.9 99.9 College Group '24f 1.1 3.0 8.6 6.0 4.7 18.5 82.0 22.5 8.8 100.2 Upper Class '21f 0.3 3.4 5.2 1.9 2.8 13.9 384.0 29.0 9.4 99.9 Group of Colleges '24f 0.2 2.1 7.6 1.8 2.2 11.6 85.5 28.9 10.1 100.0 * After Bohan. t Dropped with no grade. TABLE XX PERCENTAGE DISTIBUTION OF MARKS BY QUARTERS OF 91 STUDENTS WHO ENTERED THE COLLEGE OF SCIENCE, LITERATURE, AND THE ARTS AS FRESHMEN IN THE FALL OF 1921, AND WHO REMAINED IN ATTENDANCE IN THE SAME COLLEGE FOR NINE TO ELEVEN QUARTERS* FIRST THIRD FOURTH SIXTH SEVENTH NINTH PER CENT AVERAGE MARK QUAR- QUAR- QUAR- QUAR- QUAR- QUAR- OF TOTAL OF TER TER TER TER TER TER MARKS PER CENTS A 11.0 B 18.2 C 33.6 D 25.7 E 2.4 F 8.9 I .4 Total of Per Cents100.2 12.8 22.6 34.3 22.3 1.8 5.5 .7 10.9 23.9 37.6 19.3 .6 7.5 .3 13.5 24.3 38.0 15.5 2.3 5.8 .6 14.2 30.6 34.0 13.0 .9 7.1 .3 14.8 26.1 38.8 10.7 .3 7.9 1.4 100.0 100.1 100.0 100.1 100.0 12.8 12.8 24.4 24.3 36.1 35.7 17.6 17.8 1.4 1.4 7.1 7.1 .6 .6 100.0 99.7 No. of Marks 292 274 348 342 324 291 Total 1871 * After Bohan. COLLEGE MARKS Table XX shows that students who remain through to the senior college have from the first quarter made a larger percentage of the high marks and that in general the percentage of A's and B's combined increases in successive quarters as follows: 1 3 4 6 7 9 29.2 35.4 34.8 37.8 44.8 40.9 The average of the percentages of A's and B's for the first, third, fourth, and sixth quarters of the Junior College is 34.3 per cent; while for the seventh and ninth quarters of the Senior Col- lege the average is 4.28 per cent. Table XXI furnishes evidence that classes differing in ability as measured by a so-called intelligence test might be expected to show a different distribution of marks. TABLE XXI PERCENTAGE DISTRIBUTION OF 2,901 COLLEGE FRESHMAN MARKS, ACADEMIC SUBJECTS, FIRST QUARTER, 1921-22, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA* STANDING IN A TWENTY- COLLEGE MARKS (12 Weeks) MINUTE INTELLI- GENCE TEST (MILLER A) F Dr I E D C B A Highest One-Fourth 5.9 1.1 2.0 2.8 16.0 36.1 24.4 11.6 Second One-Fourth 11.1 2.2 0.4 5.7 22.5 38.5 15.8 3.7 Third One-Fourth 16.5 3.4 1.3 6.6 24.0 35.5 10.8 2.0 Lowest One-Fourth 21.4 7.3 1.9 8.5 26.2 29.0 5.0 0.7 Total 14.0 3.0 1.0 6.5 22.0 35.0 14.0 4.5 * W. S. Miller, Manual for Miller Mental Ability Test. (Yonkers, New York: World Book Company. 1921.) It is quite apparent that such a marking system without the use of standardized tests is a relative system. The function of examinations, recitations, and quizzes is to put the students in order from the best to the poorest. When this has been done the quality of each student's work is labeled as agreed upon. It is obvious that this system will not make possible the com- parison of the work of students in different colleges, or even in different classes within the same college. To make such compari- sons there must be some common standard or measuring scale of achievement. This may be illustrated as follows: 295 296 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION STANDARD TEST :A : B : C :D :F CLASS X CLASS Y CLASS Z A B C SD F :A : B :C " F Judged by a common, standardized measuring scale it is possi- ble for work rated A in Class Y to be equal to work of standard B quality. Work of B quality in Class Y would, according to standards in Class Z, be rated F. It should be understood, then, that basing marks on achievement alone and agreeing upon symbols and their meaning in terms of the frequency of their occurrence would be an improvement over prevailing practice; but still we should be in error if we interpreted any mark as having the same meaning under all conditions. If marks are assigned according to a distri- bution agreed upon, for example A, 7 per cent, B, 24 per cent, C, 38 per cent, D, 24 per cent, and F, 7 per cent, then A does mean that the quality of work so rated is in the best 7 per cent of the group in which the mark was given. There is, however, no assurance that the best 7 per cent in group X has the same meaning as the best 7 per cent in group Y, when judged by a common standard. COLLEGE MARKS Knowledge of such conditions should hasten the day when wider use will be made of objective standards of achievement in college subjects. If a college faculty is unable to agree on a uni- form distribution, a large amount of variation may be eliminated by furnishing the staff with tables of frequency of marks by indi- vidual instructors, in order that the prevailing practice may be common knowledge. In the light of the discussion up to this point, something should be said in regard to the practice in some schools of assigning extra credit for work of a high quality. Where credit for quality is given, one common practice is to give honor points for the different marks and then assign extra credit on the basis of honor points earned. To illustrate, honor points may be awarded as follows: A = 3, B = 2, C = 1, D = .5, F = 0. Sample: CREDITS MARK HONOR POINTS English 3 C 3 Mathematics 3 D 1.5 History 2 B 4 Sociology 5 A 15 Latin 2 F 0 23.5 A student with such a record would have an excess of 8.5 honor points over a C average. If 1 extra credit were given for each 5 credits in excess of C, he would have 1.7 23.5-15 extra credits. \ 5 / A student receiving all A's in the same program would have a total of 45 honor points, 30 in excess of a C average, hence 6 (45-15 extra credits. Stated in another way: 1 credit of A quality = 1.4 credits 1 credit of B quality = 1.2 credits 1 credit of C quality = 1.0 credit I credit of D quality = 0.5 credit 1 credit of F quality = 0.0 credit 297 298 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Such a system is designed to encourage students to do work of high quality by giving more credit. It will make it possible for the abler student to finish the course sooner and will retain the dull student for a longer period. A strong argument might be made for a larger quantity of work of a higher quality from the abler students. Without discussing the merits of the principle of credit for quality, the writer would like to call attention to injustices that are certain to occur in giving credit for quality in a school system where the standardization of marks has received little or no atten- tion. Where teachers vary widely in the percentage of A's assigned to their pupils, the credit value of the generous teacher's course is greater than that of the less generous teacher, in spite of the fact that in most cases more and harder work is often done in courses in which the percentage of A's is smallest. Those who care to do so can demonstrate that there is a decided tendency for the percentage of A's and B's to be higher in courses attracting students of lower intelligence as measured by intelligence tests. In courses in which this is true, the school is giving more credit for a poorer quality of work. In justice to students in schools where credit for quality is given, it is all the more imperative that steps be taken to establish uniformity in distribution of marks. SUMMARY 1. Marks should be given for achievement only. 2. Instructors should be given an opportunity to rate students on character traits, independent of achievement. 3. Five levels of achievement should be indicated by the letters A, B, C, D, and F. 4. These marks may be defined in terms of the normal prob- ability curve: A, 7 per cent; B, 24 per cent; C, 38 per cent; D, 24 per cent; and F, 7 per cent; or in terms of some other type of distribution agreed upon by the faculty. 5. Explanation of the meaning of the five marks should not be in terms of equivalents on the 100 per cent scale, A = 95 to 100, B, 85 to 94, etc. 6. The ideal marking system is one in which students will be COLLEGE MARKS rated on objective, standardized tests of achievement. Until we have reached this ideal, it is very important to recognize that marks indicate only relative achievement in the small group in which they are earned. BIBLIOGRAPHY I. MARKS IN COLLEGES AND UNIVERSITIES CHAPMAN, J. C. and HILLS, M.E., "A Statistical Study of the Distribution of College Grades," Pedagogical Seminary, 23:204-11. CLEMENT, JOlu- ADDISON, Standardization of the Schools of Kansas. DEARBORN, W. F., The Relative Standing of Pupils in High School and in the University, Bulletin of the University of Wisconsin No. 312, High School Series No. 6, 1909. , School and University Grades, Bulletin of the University of Wis- consin No. 368, High School Series No. 9, 1910. ERNST, J. L., Psychological Tests versus First Semester Grades as a Means of Academic Prediction," School and Society, 18:419-20 (October 6, 1923). FERRY, DEAN, Grading College Students, Williams College Bulletin, Series 8, No. 5, 1911. FINIKELSTEIN, ISIDORE, The Marking System in Theory and Practice. FOSTER, W. T., Administration of the College Curriculum. , "Scientific versus Personal Distribution of College Credits," Popular Science Monthly, 78:388-408 (April, 1911). HoPIKINS, L. T., The Marking System of the College Entrance Examination Board, Harvard Monographs in Education, Series 1, No. 2. JUDD, CHARLEs H., "On Comparison of Grading Systems in High Schools and Colleges," School Review, 18:460-70 (1910). LINcoLN, E. A., "Relative Standing of Pupils in High School, in Early College, and in College Entrance Examinations," School and Society, 5:417-20 (April 7, 1917). LONG, PERCY W., "Grades That Explain Themselves," English Journal, 2:488-93 (October, 1913). MEYER, MAX, "Experiences with the Grading System of the University of Missouri," Science, N.S., 33:661 if. (1911). , "The Grading of Students," Science, 28:243-50 (1908). SCATES, DOUGLAS E., "A Study of High School and First Year University Grades," School Review, 32:182 (March, 1924). SLossoN, E. E., "Grading Professors," Independent, 70:836-39 (April 20, 1911). SMITH, A. G., "A Rational College Marking System," Journal of Educa- tional Psychology, 2:383-93 (1911). STARCH, DANIEL, "Marks as Measures of School Work," Chap. XXII in Educational Psychology. 299 300 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Tables of Grades: Main University, University of Texas Bulletin No. 2037, July 1, 1920. Tables of Grades, Sessions of 1910-11 and 1911-12 in the College of Arts, Department of Education, Department of Engineering, Department of Law, Bulletin of the University of Texas, Official Series No. 78, November 1, 1912. II. THEORETICAL DISCUSSIONS OF THE DISTRIBUTION AND RELIABILITY OF MARKS BANKER, HOWARD J., "The Significance of Teachers' Marks," Journal of Educational Research, XVI, 3 (October, 1927). BLACKHURST, J. H., "Normal Curves as Related to High School and Col- lege Grading," School and Society, 13:447-60 (April 9, 1921). BoRINo, E. T., "The Marking System in Theory," Pedagogical Seminary, 21:269-77 (1914). BRowN, W., "Educational Psychology in the Secondary School," Journal of Philosophy, Psychology, and Scientific Methods, 7:14-18. CAJORIE, F., "A New Marking System," Science, N.S., 39:874. , "A New Marking System and a Means of Measuring Mathe- matical Ability," School Science and Mathematics, 14:283-93 (April, 1914). CATTELL, J. M., "Examinations, Grades, and Credits," Popular Science Monthly, 66:367-78. CoLvIN, STEPHEN SHELDON, "Marks and the Marking System as an In- centive to Study," Education, 32:560 (May, 1912). EDGEWORTH, F. Y., "The Generalized Law of Error," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society, 1906, pp. 497-530. FOSTER, W. T., "Scientific Distribution of Grades at Reed College," Science, N.S., 35:887. HALL, WINFIELD SCOTT, "A Guide to Equitable Grading of Students," School Science and Mathematics, 6:501-10 (June, 1906). HERSCHEL, A. P., "Scientific Ranking System," Bulletin of the Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education, 1913. MEYER, MAX, "The Limit of Uniformity in the Grading of College Students," Science, N.S., 40:330. OTIS, ARTHUR S., "The Method for Finding the Correspondence between Scores for Two Tests," Journal of Educational Psychology, 13:529-46 (December, 1912). RUEDIGER, W. C., HENNING, G. N., and WILBUR, W. A., "Standardization of Courses and Grades," Science, N.S., 40:642. RUGG, HAROLD ORDWAY, "Use of the Normal Frequency Curve in Educa- tion," Chap. VIII in Statistical Methods Applied to Education: A Text Book for Students of Education in the Quantitative Study of School Problems. COLLEGE MARKS 301 "Teachers' Marks and Marking Systems," Educational Admin- istration and Supervision, 1:117-42 (February, 1915). SARGENT, E. B., "Education of Examiners," Nature, 70:63. SIES, RAYMOND W., Scientific Grading of College Students, University of Pittsburg Bulletin, Vol. 8, No. 3, 1912. STARCH, DANIEL, "Can the Variability of Marks be Reduced?" School and Society, 2:242-43 (1915). , "Marks as Measures of School Work," Chap. XXII in Educa- tional Psychology. -- -, "Reliability and Distribution of Grades," Psychological Bul- letin, 1913, 10-74. ,"Reliability and Distribution of Grades," Science, N.S., 38:630-36 (October 13, 1913). STARCH, DANIEL and ELLIOTT, E. C., "The Reliability of Grading Work in History," School Review, 21:676-81 (1913). , "Reliability of Grading Work in Mathematics," School Review, 21:254-59 (1913). , "Reliability of the Grading of High School English," School Review, 20:442-57 (1912). STEELE, A. G., "Training Teachers to Grade," Pedagogical Seminary, 18: 523 (1911). WEISS, A. P., "School Grades--To What Type of Distribution Shall They Conform," Science, N.S., 36:403 (1911). WooD, BEN D., Measurement in Higher Education. XXIV. MENTAL HYGIENE FOR COLLEGE STUDENTS SMILEY BLANTON Professor of Mental Hygiene, Vassar College, Formerly Director of the Children's Clinic, Minneapolis Socrates was killed because he asked people to define their terms. Anyone who goes about asking people to define their terms is likely to meet a disastrous end at the hands of the populace. Nevertheless people should be required to define their terms because there must be agreement about meaning before there can be under- standing. This is particularly true of the term mental hygiene, for it is a term which, though coming to be widely used, is little under- stood. Most people outside of colleges feel that it refers to some method of caring for the feeble-minded and perhaps the insane. Mental hygiene did, as a matter of fact, grow out of the care of people who had had mental breakdowns, and it still carries the connotation of mental disease because the average person thinks that anyone who has had a mental breakdown is some queer sort of being who is not easily understandable. Mental hygiene grew out of work with people who had some- thing seriously wrong with them. First came junior clinics and child-guidance clinics; then the conviction gradually evolved that mental hygiene should be concerned with normal persons as well as with people who had had nervous breakdown. It was felt that many of these latter could have avoided a breakdown if help had been given them in time. Gradually, then, the attitude has grown that we should give help to normal persons to forestall breakdowns, just as we vaccinate healthy people to prevent smallpox. This is the conception I have of the function of mental hygiene in colleges. I stress this because many people do not agree with me. In fact, as I talk with people, I find many of them believing that a course in mental hygiene would bring disgrace upon a col- lege. An officer in a college in the Middle West remarked to me, "Every once in a while I get a nut whom I would be glad to turn over to you." Now, I feel that such an attitude is likely to hinder college students. The president of another college said, "We don't MENTAL HYGIENE FOR COLLEGE STUDENTS 303 want mental hygiene in this college because we don't want students to think they are crazy." I had a conversation with a dean during which I asked him if he would not allow us to have a class for some young people with difficulties arising from emotional conflicts and give them credit for the course. "No," he replied, "I can't do that. We don't give students credit for having their tonsils out or for overcoming flat feet." I answered, "It seems to me if you were to help your students to become less timid and better able to use their minds you would be educating them as truly as you are when you teach them Latin, physics, or mathematics." "It's too much for me," he declared with finality, "I cannot allow it." I should define mental hygiene, then, as a specific type of edu- cation aiming not only to prevent failures and breakdowns but to help the average student to become more efficient. The great tragedy of life, as I see it from the mental-hygiene standpoint, is the fact that the average individual is realizing only about half of his poten- tial efficiency. He has emotional attitudes, emotional inhibitions, that prevent him from making the most of his abilities and fre- quently result in failure and sometimes in tragedy. I was talking with a college man about the psychiatric work that was being done at Dartmouth. "I don't think very much of it," he remarked. "All you are doing is nursing young boys, just kidding them along." About five years ago I asked the president of a promi- nent mid-western university what they were doing for their mal- adjusted boys. "We don't want any lame ducks," he answered, "Our college is not a hospital institution. People either live up to what we do or get out !" That may sound like a logical attitude; but, without an analysis of the facts behind it, it is untenable. Many boys pass through college who are not getting along very well. A boy was graduated from a western college in August instead of in June because he didn't get a thesis in on time. Now, his teachers had probably scolded him from time to time by telling him that he was a little careless about his work. That did, in fact, appear to be the extent of his trouble, but upon thorough analysis he was found to be seriously in need of help. He was chronically procrastinating and he had a very marked hesitation in speech. I found that his father was a hypersensitive, high-strung man, who 304 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION worried so much about his son that the boy developed a strong feel- ing of negativeness. For instance, the father said, "Why did you put on those duck trousers today? It's too cold." "I don't think so," the boy replied. "You had better put on some others," the father continued. "You might catch cold." The boy might have contracted a cold; he did develop a marked negativeness. He had an emotional conflict. He had acquired such a reaction against authority that when his professor demanded that the boy get the thesis in on time, he couldn't get it in on time. He was an example of a person needing mental hygiene. Now, in the average college the dean would probably have called that boy in and have said, "My boy, you are not doing satisfactory work; what is the trouble?" The boy would have replied, "I don't know what the trouble is; I work as hard as I can." Then the dean would have continued, "We have looked into your records and find that you are not running around. Looks as though you ought to get your work in on time. Your mother and father are making some sacrifice for you." Now, when you try to help somebody and he doesn't respond, you get angry. So the dean says sharply, "Now, see here, my boy; you have got to do good work. A word to the wise is sufficient." And the upshot of it all is, the boy goes out muttering "The fat-headed fool!"-and does worse work than ever. Our boy received different treatment. He graduated and is now out working and is getting along all right. It is unfortunate, however, that he could not have got more out of his college educa- tion by having had wise counsel as a freshman. That college students do need mental hygiene is shown by the various surveys that have been made. Our survey was made with a class of about one hundred unselected juniors and seniors in the University of Wisconsin. I found 85 suffering from severe timidity, stage fright, and self-consciousness; 74 from feelings of insecurity and inadequacy; 72 from conflicts with one or both parents; 55 from problems relating to love affairs; 14 from inability to choose their careers; and 14 from religious problems. One graduate took the course without credit. He had been specializing in biology but had developed a stutter. His doctor told him that since he could not go MENTAL HYGIENE FOR COLLEGE STUDENTS 305 on with biology he should get into something else; so he took up English literature. He made A's in it but he could not get a posi- tion because he had both an accent and a halt in his speech. I had another young man in that class, who was studying to be a physician. He was interested in business, not in science; but because his father was fond of liquor the boy frequently, to his utter humiliation, had to rescue his dad from the gutter, whereupon the lad resolved that he would become a great physician, return to his home town, and restore his family's good name. He went into business. How should mental-hygiene work be organized in colleges? My feeling is that it should not be housed with the medical school lest students associate it with ill-health. If we are right in con- sidering mental hygiene an integral part of the educational system, our job is training and educating the emotional side of young peo- ple. We must have them with at least some serenity of spirit, that they may go ahead and do their work properly. I have known several instances where mental-hygiene service failed because the offices were placed in the medical school or hospital, and students wouldn't go to it because they felt that if they did, their friends would think there was something wrong with their heads. If stu- dents get the wrong idea, you may as well quit. An ideal organization would be just such a one as the Minne- apolis Children's Clinic. It is just as much a part of education as are arithmetic and reading. Besides the psychiatrist we have a corps of psychiatric social workers who get the trend of the cases. They have to gather a great many diverse facts about the student. The subject himself does not give them enough to work on. He may tell them the truth as he sees it; but if they expect to give him proper guidance they must check this evidence against the tes- timony of other people. In dealing with a case the first thing to do is to go to the home and analyze the family situation. With most college students you might write home and ascertain certain useful facts. Then you should get the student's record in elementary school, high school, and college. Find how he is spending his time--how much in work and how much in play. Then give him physical, psychological, and 306 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION mental examinations. With all of these facts before you, you are in a position to lay out a program that will be of some value to him. Many students will be sent to you who do not need help. The very students who need guidance are apt to be the most hesitant about coming. There should be a required mental-hygiene course in the freshman year. You will be told that the first year is already overloaded; but if you can convince the administration of the neces- sity for such a course they can always find time for it. Such a course is objected to by many people who say that it is dangerous. Is it dangerous to have people think about themselves ? It all depends, to be sure, upon the kind of course you offer. If you give one in which you describe all the difficulties which people have, it probably will be dangerous; but it is entirely possible to build a course that will benefit every student. There is always the possibility, of course, that a few students may become morbid; but some people become morbid about the fourth dimension. If the course is well arranged and given in the right attitude I feel that only good will result from it. Only by means of such a course are you likely to discover the students who need help. I would have them write a history of themselves in which they present their atti- tudes and viewpoints. Some of them, to be sure, will "give you a buggy-ride," but my feeling is that any young person who puts down statements that are not true is very much in need of mental hygiene. Now, if you had such a course for freshmen you would find that from 10 to 15 per cent of them should continue it right through col- lege in order to make the most of themselves. It is important to uncover these cases. If they do their college work all right, the untrained counsellor is at the end of his resources. He cannot say, "I don't like the looks of you; therefore I'll just send you down to the Mental Hygiene Bureau." A student may get his diploma on schedule and yet have serious inhibiting attitudes that will militate against his success in life. Faculty members, unless they have had some training in mental hygiene, are not likely to detect these symp- toms. Most instructors, in fact, need mental hygiene worse than their students do. Because of their own conflicts, many of them feel that what is really needed is a severer attitude toward- these MENTAL HYGIENE FOR COLLEGE STUDENTS 307 young men and women, then all will come out well. Many people look upon the children's clinic as an excuse factory. If you arrange a course that fails or if you try to work with the wrong personnel, mental hygiene will be killed in your college for twenty years. Mental hygiene, on the other hand, that is concerned with the bases of behavior and the conditions that determine emo- tional attitudes is of inestimable educational value. Life is becom- ing so complicated, there are so many calls upon human energy and intelligence, that we cannot afford to have our young people go out bearing the incubus of social maladjustment when it could have been removed by a sane diagnosis of their individual problems. XXV. MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION FRANK M. RARIG Professor and Chairman of the Department of Speech University of Minnesota Dr. Blanton has explained the nature and importance of mental hygiene among college students. He has made it clear, however, that educators are not unanimously agreed as to its value, and in view of what he has said as to the indifference of some adminis- trators, you may be interested to hear what President Hopkins of Dartmouth thinks of the place of mental hygiene in his college. In a letter to Dr. Diehl, director of the Health Service at this institution, and chairman of our Committee on Mental Hygiene, President Hopkins said: "We are on our fourth year of slowly developing the work in mental hygiene as a preventive work for men within the college. We believe it to be one of the best things we are doing. "We have found that many a man who has entered college with good credentials and then failed to make good within the college, was failing because of conditions entirely apart from his ability or from his capacity for intellectual accomplishment. "Moreover, we have found that through misinformation, mis- understanding, or maladjustment, many a man was under a mental and nervous strain which was impairing his ability to carry his college work, and was consequently creating a situation likely to be tragical for himself, which, however, was easily and quickly correctable." President Hopkins is strongly of the opinion that a student's emotional attitude toward his college environment may make or mar his college course. That this is true, anyone acquainted with students can testify. We are now beginning to realize that pre- occupation with the training of intellect as the sole factor in edu- cation must give way to the broader conception of developing effective personalities. If we define personality as the sum of one's habits of response to his social environment, we shall lay down the basis for an understanding of speech as that activity by which, MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 309 through the use of auditory and visual symbols, we adapt to our social environment and exercise control over it. Speech, broadly conceived and understood, includes all social behavior that is moti- vated by a desire to communicate. Many of the so-called lower animals carry on their social or group life with the aid of such rudiments of speech as suggestive action, tones, and rhythmic sounds. In addition to these primary elements, man has invented articulate language, as a tool of thought and of social adaptation and control. It is by his mastery of human speech in meeting social situations that he develops personality. If the student's adjustment to his college environment is of pri- mary importance, and if speech is the activity by which he makes this adjustment, then it must follow that any improvement in speech habits will add to the student's chances of success in college, by helping to eliminate faulty adjustments to the environment and by building up more desirable personality traits. In order to bring about improvements in speech habits, we need to have a clear under- standing of the possibility of changing habits for better or for worse, and of the methods to be employed in bringing about desired changes. We have known for a long time that good habits may deteriorate and be replaced by thoroughly bad ones. Is it not equally possible, then, that good habits may be made to take the place of bad ones ? The methods of psychology have given us not only new insight into the nature of personality, but also data showing the possibility and practicality of modifying and even reconstructing it. One of the basic conceptions of dynamic psychology is that man is what he does, because what he does determines his habits. What he does at first is simply the response of his inherited reaction-tendencies to his environment. As he continues to respond, he builds habits, which have an increasing tendency to determine his actions in his environment. In other words, personality is not a biological but a social product. It is built up in a social environment, and is a result of the action and reaction on each other of inherited tend- encies, past experience, and present environment. Although the inertia of habit is very powerful, still it is possible to change habits and, by changing them, in many cases to modify and even recon- 310 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION struct personalities. Habits that have been acquired by a process of unconscious learning can often, by a process of conscious analy- sis and relearning, be eliminated, modified, or replaced by other habits. It is obvious that habits of skill are not inherited, but ac- quired by actors, pianists, and golf players. Just as it is possible to "learn" typing, sewing, dancing, and skating, so it is possible to build up habits of skill in making social adjustments. The prob- lems may be more complicated, but they are not, except in cases of extreme abnormality, unsolvable. What methods, then, are used in substituting habits of skill in making social adjustments for non-adaptive emotional habits? Three steps in the process may be defined. The first is that of creating in the minds of the students an understanding of the gen- eral problem of speech behavior. The second step is an under- standing of each individual student by the student himself and by the instructor. The third step is the working out of each individual problem through the application by the student, under the guidance and criticism of the teacher, of the principles of speech education. What does a student need to know in order that he may under- stand the general nature of the speech problem? What information must he have in order that he may take an objective, critical attitude toward himself? What general facts as to the nature of speech habits will enable him to recognize and welcome the possibility of understanding himself ? In the first place, it is pointed out to students that they have acquired their speech habits unconsciously. Speech is a part of their social inheritance. Their families, their playmates, their teachers, and their neighbors have laid down for them the patterns of their speech habits. They have had practically nothing to say about it. Although every human being reacts selectively to his environment, still his personality is bound to be a resultant of the interplay of his inherited tendencies and his environment. In learning to adapt to his social environment, he acquires speech through a process of unconscious imitation. It is obvious that he acquires in this way the elements of language, such as speech sounds, tone quality, and intonation. He also "inherits" his characteristic social behavior, for the most part, from one or both of his parents; MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 311 his bodily carriage, facial expression, and gestures are likely to show more than traces of parental influence. Other facts, not so obvious, should be recognized as important. Voices are usually family affairs. When a baby begins to talk, the ear-vocal circular responses are usually conditioned by the mother, although in some cases, particularly in those of boys, the influence of the father is evident. Several years ago my office door opened, and a feminine voice said, "Good morning." "Good morning, Miss G- ," I said. "How did you know my name? You never saw me before." "No," I answered, "but I had your brother in my class several years ago, and he had the same kind of voice interference that you have." Another important fact, often not recognized, is that the domi- nant emotional traits are built up in the family. Children of the same parents, in their reactions to the home environment, show a wide variety of positive and negative responses, which range all the way from subservient conformity with the family code to rebellious rejection of it. Whatever the atmosphere of the home, whether it be peaceful or turbulent, the child acquires there either the habits that he will later use in his attempts to satisfy his wants, or the habits that will make it impossible for him to satisfy them. An emotion, objectively considered, is a type of behavior, and in this sense many families that we know have emotional habits in common. Some families are cheerful; others are morose. Some are phleg- matic; others are animated. The members of some are blindly loyal to each other; the members of others are candidly critical. Some cooperate; others fight. Most college students suffer from feelings of uncertainty as to their native abilities. They feel repressed, inhibited, and inferior; and they welcome the information that these feelings may have causes entirely separate and distinct from their inherent capacities, and that they may be able, by understanding the causes, to overcome the undesirable effects. By far the most important period of habit formation is adolescence; and it is highly important that college students understand what has happened and is still happening to them during this period of the reconstruction of their personalities, 312 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION for it is during this time that habits of inferiority are likely to result from conflicts between the basic drives of sex and the desire for security, on the one hand, and various repressions, on the other hand. Every adolescent who lives in a state of human culture must undergo a civilizing process. He must be inducted into an ordered and regulated society, in which his basic desires must be subordinated to the good of society. In order to satisfy his desires of sex, his desires for the acquisition of property and for a secure social position, he must master an intricate code of behavior laid down for him by social custom, commercial practice, family tradi- tion, school curricula, and the law. He must not lie, cheat, steal, forge checks, or throw stones through the neighbors' windows. In its negative aspect, the process is that of acquiring inhibitions. In its positive aspect, it is the acquisition of habits of skill. Among other forms of coercion, fear is often used as an aid in discipline by teachers and parents who govern not wisely but too well. If the means employed in training the youth of each genera- tion were intelligently adapted to the ends desired, many of the personalities that result would not be so crippled and inadequate as they are. Our general failure to provide for the education of parents compels them to rely for guidance in rearing their children on instinct and emotion, and on the habits they themselves built up in their own early environment. This does result in a kind of continuity and coherence in social institutions, but it does not give parents an attitude of enlightenment toward the desires and needs of the adolescent. Bad habits are as inevitably handed down from one generation to another as are good ones. The sudden upthrust of adolescent desires catches the great majority of parents unpre- pared to guide and train those desires. Some parents inherit wisdom and others acquire it, but the great majority repeat the mis- takes of their own parents and grandparents. Many hinder the development of their children in various ways. Some make of affection an emotional self-indulgence, which weakens the child by making him dependent. Fathers and mothers often make their children emotionally unstable by their failure to understand and cooperate with each other. Some fail to recognize and respect the emergence of the traits of individuality during adolescence and MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 313 make the mistake of trying to exercise over the youth the same domination they exercised over the infant and the child. Parents often overlook the necessity of providing outlets for the super- abundant energy of growing boys and girls. Girls are often re- pressed by the reiterated warning, "Don't be a tomboy !" All healthy children desire and need opportunities to exhibit their growing mental and physical powers for the approval of their elders and playmates; and if they meet only with scorn and carping criticism, the result is bound to be unwholesome habits either of fear and repression, or of antagonism and hostility. A parental attitude of suspicion has similar results. Innuendo and unsympa- thetic ridicule, if persistently indulged in by either teachers or parents, can have no other effects than either repression or antag- onism. When the desires of children to express themselves are systematically repressed, they usually develop habits of deep-seated inferiority. If these desires, on the other hand, meet with intelli- gent sympathy and wise guidance, children learn to socialize their impulses by making their exhibitions of self acceptable to those about them. Many students who come to us in classes in Speech are suffering from habits of repression and inferiority which are traceable, not to lack of native ability as indicated by their accomplishment in other courses, but to such factors as I have explained. Mrs. K- may be taken as an example. She was born in Massachusetts and had taught school for years in Montana, where she had married a rancher. She was the mother of grown children. She said she had no difficulty in handling a schoolroom of children, but always felt inferior before an audience of adults. Adults, she felt, could not possibly be interested in anything she might have to say. When- ever she attempted to talk to an audience of men and women, her mouth became dry, she lost control of her breath, and her whole body trembled. Her upper lip and cheeks showed vertical lines of worry and repression. She was particularly inhibited in regard to her own experiences, about which she could hardly be induced to talk. She insisted that she had never had any experiences worth talking about. In spite of the fact that since her husband's death she had been making her own living and helping a son and a daugh- 314 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION ter through college, still she was very sure that for her to use her own life as a source of materials for speeches would be a manifesta- tion of egotistical self-exhibition. When Mrs. K- 's substantial accomplishments were pointed out, and when the possible causes of her feelings of inadequacy were made clear to her, she began to reason about her problem, and had no difficulty in explaining it. Her father, a stern Calvinist, had early impressed on her her own unworthiness and sinfulness, and had required her to be silent in the presence of her elders. Both he and her teachers had taught her that all knowledge worth acquir- ing is to be found in books, and she won their approval by mastering this knowledge. She had never taken part in a play with other men and women, and had never learned to sing or to use a musical instrument as a means of winning the approval of adults. She had early learned, however, to care for children and to win their confi- dence and affection. She read poems to children and told them stories, but had never ventured to do either before grown-up per- sons. Through such a process of analysis, Mrs. K- began to understand herself and, although she was fifty years old, she found positive delight in learning how to express herself. A similar case was that of Mary. She was thirty-five years old, and she also had taught school for years, and likewise felt perfectly at home with children but inferior in the presence of adults. She insisted, at first, that she could not speak to an audi- ence of college students, and when, after much persuasion and care- ful preparation, she attempted to do so she made an almost complete failure. Her behavior showed the symptoms that indicate uncon- trolled emotional response. Her mouth opened and closed spas- modically, she gasped for breath, made random movements with her hands over the front of her dress, and twice made involuntary escape movements as if to leave the platform. She said afterward that her mouth felt as if it were coated with dry ashes. When it became apparent that she could not continue, and as she stood there looking pleadingly at me as if to ask for permission to escape, I asked her whether she really wanted to give up and take her seat. She replied in a positive manner that she did not. Then while she maintained her position, we all joined in a discus- MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 315 sion of her problem. The main purpose and effect of this discussion was to establish in her mind a clear recognition and definition of her attitude of determination to conquer her fear and her feelings of inadequacy. She was brought to the point of saying that she was there of her own volition and not because of the compulsion of anyone in authority over her. In other words, she herself defined and put into language the basic fact of her desire to learn to meet such situations and thus committed herself to cooperate with the group and with the instructor for the purpose of working out the solution of her personality problem. I then explained that there must be causes for her difficulties, that she was in no way to blame for her troubles, and that she had accomplished very positive and definite results in her first appearance before the class. It was further explained that she and the instructor would attempt in con- ference to discover the causes of her non-adaptive emotional habits. She was in such despair in regard to herself, and the facts of her life were so insignificant in her own estimation that it took three conferences to elicit them from her and formulate a reasonable theory to explain her emotions. A few of the most significant facts were as follows: her mother had died when she was ten years old, and her father's sister had come to take charge of the family. The aunt, who was past middle life and had had no experience with children, thought her first and chief duty to be that of repressing them. Mary had always been delighted when visitors came, because she found in them a welcome relief from the monotony of life on the farm. She looked forward eagerly to their coming and enjoyed talking with them. But the aunt soon put a quietus on this self- assertion by pointing out to her how foolish were many of the things she said, how freckled was her face, how hay-colored her hair, and how awkward were her long legs. Her aunt's favorite formula became, "You know, Mary, that when you open your mouth before company, you make a fool of yourself." In church Mary liked to join in the congregational singing; but this, too, her aunt discouraged by a sharp thrust of the elbow and a whispered com- mand, "Mary, don't! Your noise spoils the song for everybody else." Mary could not be called beautiful when I knew her, and her physical equipment had caused her to be ridiculed by her playmates. 816 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION This had probably been a contributing but incidental factor in the formation of her habits of social maladjustment. I found her to be positive in her fundamental attitudes, and on acquaintance, she proved to have habits of reflection and a sense of humor, elements of effective personality that she had never learned to use in her relations with adults. She said that many persons had found fault with her for her failings, but that no one had suggested the possi- bility of her understanding them and overcoming them through objective study and practice. She became keenly interested in her- self and made steady progress in substituting habits of skill for her old emotional behavior. I have briefly sketched the method used to create in the students an understanding of their speech problems, as well as an attitude of willingness to face them. Any imputation of blame for whatever difficulties they may have is carefully avoided. It is impressed on them that they are not responsible for faulty speech habits acquired in the past, but that from now on they assume full responsibility for bad habits as they are pointed out and proper correctives indi- cated. It is explained that the only cure for the "big, buzzing confusion" of self-consciousness that has plagued them is complete understanding of their personalities, in terms of their social effec- tiveness or ineffectiveness, and that this understanding must be supplemented by constant experimentation and practice in breaking out of bad habits and forming good ones. They eagerly embrace the opportunity to study themselves and, with few exceptions, respond with interest and candor to the request for their speech histories, in which they are encouraged to tell what the instructor should know in order to give them the greatest possible assistance. They are instructed to include sig- nificant information about such details as relations with father, mother, brothers, sisters, and close friends, emotional conditions in the family, dreams, disappointments, relations with teachers, love affairs, foreign language in the family, conflicts between foreign- language and English-language habits, social fears, repressions and inhibitions, feelings of inferiority, difficult social situations, and such voice defects as harshness, indistinctness, stuttering, and vocal fatigue. MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 317 This preliminary case history is perhaps more important as a means of ascertaining the student's attitude toward his problem and his understanding of it than it is for the facts it contains. It is likely to be inaccurate and almost always, in serious cases, lacks important information. It does explain the student's intention and understanding in relation to the course, however, and usually aids the instructor in his analysis of speech behavior. In making this analysis, the instructor looks at the behavior of the student as a pattern of end-results, the causes of which are to be found in the process of habit-building that lies behind them. This process has been almost entirely an unconscious one, and most persons remain unaware of their most characteristic behavior until an objective observer calls it to their attention. Most persons also do not understand that behavior is even more a cause than an effect of emotion and that by changing their responses to social situations they can change their emotional experiences in those situations. As I have before suggested, an emotion, to an objective observer, is a mode of behavior; and if the student is to get rid of harmful emotions, he must not only understand himself as he is, but he must also recognize and accept the necessity of substituting adaptive behavior for habits that in themselves perpetuate unwhole- some emotions. Emotional self-consciousness must be replaced by intellectual self-consciousness, or knowledge of self. This knowl- edge of self can be acquired through an analysis, on the one hand, of the habits that result in the desirable and helpful emotions of poise and self-confidence, and on the other hand, of those that re- sult in the harmful emotions of fear, inferiority, and repression. In order to make clear this relation between habits and emotions we find it necessary to explain the various types of non-adaptive be- havior used by students in class recitations, in conferences, and in speeches. Let us look at a few of the most common types of behavior that indicate social maladjustments. Perhaps I should make one or two explanations, however, before offering these examples. In the first place, it should be understood that the perfectly normal person is a rarity among college students, who as late-adolescents are busily engaged in making many complicated adjustments. We have stu- 318 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION dents, of course, who are as nearly normal as human beings can very well be at their age; and such students present no particular problems so far as mental hygiene is concerned. It should be under- stood, in the second place, that many students register for a begin- ning course in Speech as an act of compensation. They more or less vaguely recognize that something is wrong with them, and they hope that a course in Speech may help them "to get over it." Then, too, it should be understood that other students are deterred by fear from submitting themselves to a process of critical analysis and conscious relearning of personal habits. In this class are always some extreme cases of speech defects, which should be discovered and treated by a general Speech Clinic organized and conducted in close cooperation with the Student Health Service and the Depart- ment of Speech. What, then, are some of the types of behavior that indicate so- cial maladjustments? ' The most common is hypertonicity of some or all of the muscles. Uncontrolled tensions of the "voluntary muscles" are a sure indication of a non-adaptive, emotional response. The result may be a greater or less degree of uncoordinated activity that is entirely out of relation to the social situation. Random and shifting eye-movements, nervous walking about, gasping for breath, jerky movements of the hands or of the head, spasmodic gestures, a set rigidity or convulsive working of the facial muscles-these all indicate uncontrolled emotional habits of adjustment, which may be so unimportant as to be negligible, or may be so serious as to border on hysteria. As outlets for excess emotion, speakers often indulge in such activities as twiddling their thumbs, playing with their watch chains, picking at their clothes, handling their notes, or swaying the body forward and backward. One preacher who had formed the habit of twisting one of the buttons on the back of his Prince Albert had so weakened the thread that the button fell off while he was reading the scripture lesson. Members of his choir observed the fall, and held their breath in suspense while catastrophe threatened-until his fingers found the other button! Uncontrolled tension and relaxation of the "voluntary muscles" often manifests itself in a trembling of the knees, which is distress- ing to the victim, but is usually unnoticed by the audience. Spas- MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 319 modic contraction and relaxation of the breathing muscles may result in gasping for breath or in crying, and a similar general activity may show itself in the trembling of the whole body. In some cases the voice mechanism is temporarily put out of commis- sion, and the student stands rigid, with mouth either shut tightly, or soundlessly opening and closing, or remaining open. Occasionally we find a young person who desires nothing so much as to meet situations, and who yet has formed habits that seem to indicate a desire to run away. These persons, who are often women, when they confront a new or difficult situation, make movements of escape or avoidance. If they are presenting an exer- cise in class, they may look longingly toward the door, or may look supplicatingly toward the instructor, or may start to leave the platform, or may actually run to their seats. Some persons, in conference with one with whom they are on the best of terms, stir restlessly about, start to rise and sit down again, and seem to feel a nervous anxiety to be somewhere else. A less pronounced type of negativism is to be seen in the person who may make no explicit movements of escape but whose charac- teristic activities, nevertheless, suggest avoidance or withdrawal. Such persons simply take no positive interest in the proceedings. They are completely dominated by the situation, and appear to have no desire either to adjust to it or to control it. Some appear to be suffering from chronic relaxation. Others are tense and rigid. When the social effect of their behavior is pointed out to them, they frequently have dificulty in understanding what is meant, and insist that they have always made their adjustments satisfactorily. The fact usually is that they have avoided much trouble by following a policy of neutrality, and they often do not readily see how color- less and ineffective they are. Some victims of negativism, instead of seeking to escape or withdraw from difficult situations, substitute for a normal adjust- ment various degrees of antagonism or even of pugnacity. Many high school debaters bring to college their habit of fighting their opponents instead of trying to persuade the audience. Others com- pensate for their feelings of inadequacy by recourse to an expan- sive boisterousness of behavior manifested in loudness of voice and 320 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION exaggerated movements of self-assertion. It frequently happens, particularly in the case of men, that the pugnacious type of com- pensation has been substituted for normal adjustment during ado- lescence as a result of the unwise attitude of parents and teachers. I have in mind a student who first attracted my attention in class by his self-assertive determination to disagree with everything and everybody. His face wore an habitual scowl; his lower jaw pro- truded further than nature originally had intended that it should. He gave every evidence of intelligence, however, and when I pointed out to him this characteristic behavior, together with the fact that he had no reason to take such an attitude toward me, be- cause I had only the friendliest of intentions in relation to him, he at once rewarded me with his confidence. He said that he felt hostile toward most of his teachers, and explained it by the fact that during his first year in high school, one of his teachers had ridiculed his attempt to answer a question. "Everything went red," he ex- plained with a gesture of his hand across his face; "and from that time on my main object was to humiliate that teacher. At last, in my senior year, I succeeded in making her cry, and I have never gotten such a kick out of anything in my life." The student who is known as conceited, "cocky," afflicted with "swelled head," who is "stuck on himself," is invariably over-com- pensating for a feeling of inferiority. These students almost as invariably respond to candid analysis of the true nature of their difficulty and can be brought to substitute normal social cooperation for their habits of over-compensation. Then we have also, as other fixed patterns of compensation, the over-conciliatory, the over-courteous, the fawning, and the ever- smiling types of behavior. One girl always smiles and rolls her eyes. A young lawyer invariably grins, whether he is pleading for a death sentence or telling a joke. A young negro girl has prepared to thrill an audience with the grisly horrors of one of Poe's best- or worst-stories, but instead falls victim of her life-time habit of conciliating the "white folks" in her audience, and wears on her face a half-apologetic, half-pleading smile throughout her per- formance. One of the main functions of speech-education in a college or MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 321 in a university is to follow up the analysis of emotional and mental problems of students by the substitution of habits of skill for these and other types of non-adaptive, emotional behavior. The process of relearning speech proceeds from the simple to the complex, and in this sense it is a recapitulation of the earlier unconscious process by which the individual built up whatever adaptive habits he may possess. A commonplace truth, about which we seldom think, is the fact that we are able to meet effectively those situations in life for which we are equipped with habits of skill. The resourceful, inventive person, as he meets more and more difficult and complicated situa- tions, is able to combine old habits in new patterns as necessity arises. College students are in the late-adolescent period, and it is for them a critical stage of the organization of their personalities. They are under considerable emotional strain because they are en- gaged in active competition with each other and with the faculty for social and academic standing. Their survival in the academic environment depends on their successfully making both kinds of adjustments. Many of them find these adjustments difficult for a variety of reasons; and this is particularly true in a large insti- tution admitting students from all economic, social, and cultural levels and racial groups. The children and grandchildren of Euro- pean peasants are competing with the children and grandchildren of families in the social inheritance of which has been handed down a long cultural tradition. We have observed that practically all negroes and a large proportion of German and Russian Jews show definite by-products of this competitive struggle in the form of inadequate social behavior. It is a noticeable fact that as a general rule students who are socially active, with a given ability and indus- try, accomplish more than do those who are socially inactive. The process of replacing non-adaptive emotional behavior with habits of skill begins with an understanding of the problem as a whole. This understanding is created by an explanation of the elements involved. The first point is the distinction between emo- tional and intellectual behavior. A general emotion, as defined by Watson, is a profound disturbance of the whole organism, involving particularly the emotional mechanism, that is, the heart. stomach, 322 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION lungs, glands, and the smooth muscles of the intestines. When the activities of these organs are dominant, the voluntary muscles are out of control. I have already.described the symptoms of such lack of control. Such a response to a situation makes adaptation and control impossible because the victim cannot see the situation as it is. His abnormal and uncoordinated muscle-tensions make im- possible the motor responses involved in perception. He substitutes subjective reality for the recognition of objective reality. He pro- jects his emotions into the situation. It follows that action based on discrimination and judgment becomes impossible, although it often happens, of course, that long-established habits carry one successfully through such an experience. It is obviously impossible, however, for one so affected to make any unaccustomed or compli- cated adjustment. In the second place, skill is explained as the complete coordina- tion of mind and body by which we accomplish results with a mini- mum of effort. Specific acts of skill are specialized coordinations of a limited number of voluntary muscles, which for the time domi- nate the rest of the body. An emotional response to a situation means that such a specialized coordination is impossible, for the reason that through the action of the sympathetic nervous-system all the voluntary muscles are tied up together in an undiscriminat- ing and uncontrolled tension. Persons attempting to do things for which they have not the requisite habits of skill exhibit the symp- toms of general emotional response. I recall the writing of a letter by a half-breed Indian whose face, legs, and back muscles became strenuously involved in the task. His bare feet labored also, and when the letter was finished they had dug their way to the ankles in the soft sand. Students writing examination papers furnish in- teresting studies in varying degrees of emotional and skilled activity. In effective behavior, the voluntary muscles are in control, be- cause they have been trained by the discipline of experience in right habits, so that they dominate the emotional mechanism. The emotions supplement and support the adaptive and manipulative activities but are never allowed to gain the ascendancy. The instant the balance of control is destroyed so that the emotions dominate, the behavior becomes non-adaptive. MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 323 The problem that we now confront, then, is that of disciplining the voluntary muscles as well as the mental processes in the habits of skill necessary to meet every conceivable social situation. This involves, first, the training of the body, and second, the training of the mind. The first step in the training of the body is that of bringing under control all involuntary responses, and this is accom- plished initially through relaxation. The voluntary muscles are arranged in opposed pairs, and in adaptive behavior these opposed muscles work in smooth coordination with each other. It follows that if we can train the muscles in habits of coordination, we shall succeed in building up dominant habits of effective control over the emotional mechanism. Students must, then, be trained through varied exercises in relaxation so that they can consciously relax involuntary muscle tensions. Habits of emotional behavior tend constantly to reassert them- selves. Victims of such habits when they confront difficult social situations find that their old habits reassert themselves. As a mem- ber of a group, the individual is passive, and usually highly sug- gestible. He is eager to receive impressions and to conform to the emotional tone of his fellows. When called on to speak or recite, he is suddenly under the necessity of a greatly increased activity. The emotional mechanism is likely to "get the jump" on the volun- tary muscles. The heart beat may rapidly accelerate, the rate of respiration increase, the face flush or grow pale, and there may be a general trembling of the whole body. The remedy for such an emotional response is action, or the use of the voluntary muscles. In this connection, it is interesting to note what a prominent medical authority has asserted to be a fact-that during the war every case of shell-shock that came under his observation had occurred in the trenches when the victim was inactive, and consequently under great emotional strain. No man suffered a war neurosis while engaged in fighting. Exercises in action, then, provide relief for emotional tension. Carefully planned exercises not only enable students to break out of their emotional habits by bringing the voluntary muscles into coordination, but they also induct the student into the experience of exercising control over an audience. When he once becomes 324 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION conscious of his power to control an audience, his training has begun. The exercises used for this twofold purpose require the employment of the muscles in activities of communication. An effective exercise is that of drawing a diagram on the blackboard and using it to illus- trate the points of a speech. The manipulation of apparatus serves also as an adequate outlet. It has been found effective to assign students the task of leading the class in the discussion of reading assignments, in vocal exercises, or in exercises in relaxation. If a student can portray the characteristic activities of several persons other than himself, he has no difficulty in breaking out of his own fixed patterns. Exercises in pantomime serve the same purpose, as do also descriptions of exciting experiences or of impressive and vivid landscapes. The use of animated dialogue is also valuable. Another exercise is that of explaining through voice and action several experiences suggested by various words. This exercise is based on the fact that names of things are substitute stimuli, and when a person gives to an audience his complete response to such words as "sand," "wind," "water," or "mud," he ordinarily has little difficulty in recalling and enacting before the class some of his most vivid experiences in connection with these elements of his physical environment. Several years ago a negro trackman, who was unable to make a grammatical sentence in his speeches, hit upon the idea of explaining the use of relaxation in connection with athletics. He explained and illustrated, among other things, for example, why it is necessary for the receiver of a forward pass in a football game to keep his hands relaxed, because, if the hands are tense when the ball strikes them, they fail to respond to the impact, and the result is bound to be a fumble. He was highly successful in stimulating response in his audience, and from this time forth had much less trouble with grammar. In his case, as in many others I have ob- served, emotion was the basic cause of language difficulties. Voice exercises are another means of emotional control because they help to substitute accurate and discriminating coordinations for general body tension. Having in mind the fact that speech is an over-laid function, we seek constantly to free the voice coordina- tions from deep-seated habits of general emotional response, and from habits of swallowing, chewing, and coughing, which tend to MENTAL HYGIENE AND SPEECH EDUCATION 325 assert themselves. The essential voice coordinations are first, the reciprocal tension and relaxation of the diaphragm and waist mus- cles; second, the complete relaxation of the muscles of the legs, back, arms, and neck; and, third, the flexible and free activity of the jaw, tongue, soft palate, and lips as they coordinate with the breathing muscles in shaping speech-sounds and in adjusting to changes in pitch, force, and quality. Besides working for control of the body and voice, we endeavor constantly to train students to think. As they have lived in an ego-centric, emotional world, so also they have acquired most of their knowledge and have done their thinking in an ego-centric, intellectual world. They need to learn social objectivity. A speech is an attempt by one person to produce a change in the intellectual and emotional attitude of an audience toward the subject discussed. The speaker is not a private person but the symbol of a social pur- pose. He must discover to the audience the true nature, as he sees it, of their interest in the subject. To accomplish this he must know his subject and he must have skill in the use of the mechanisms of reasoning. He must be able to use knowledge in order to attain a definite social objective. He must objectively recognize, inde- pendently of the emotions of the ego-centric world of his childhood, the values that are realities to his audience as a group and as rep- resentatives of a larger public; and he must be able to show rela- tions between these values and his knowledge of history, economics, psychology, education, literature, chemistry, or any other subject. It is the failure of many an academid lecturer to show such rela- tions between his special knowledge and the interests of his students that makes his discourses fall into a vacuum of inattention. A col- lege professor once spoke to a group of laboring men on "Higher Education." It was a rambling discourse, and the audience was uneasy. The speaker showed no relations between the desires of his audience for higher pay, shorter hours, better conditions, a share in management, a greater political power, security in their jobs, the education of their children, or the values of the good life. Students in Speech learn habits of socialized thinking by learn- ing to reason about facts in the attempt to solve problems. They learn that by positing definite problems they can stimulate the audi- 326 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION ence to desire their solution. They thus learn that by confronting others with the necessity of thinking, they can stimulate both their audiences and themselves to think. Or they may employ devices that excite curiosity or speculation in their hearers. By using their own experiences they initiate the habit of reflecting upon the facts of their own lives. By such reflection, they subject their experiences to analysis, and learn to draw from their experiences inferences that have social meaning and value. This process is essentially that of perceiving the universal in the particular, and as it progresses, the student identifies himself emotionally and intellectually with social causes and social purposes. The speech class is itself a social group, which the instructor organizes for the purpose of cooperating in training each member in the technique of completely socialized behavior. The friendly compulsion of the group, guided by definite, objective criteria during each stage of the course, is exerted on each of its members, as he seeks to gain approval and avoid dis- approval. Through such a process of objective analysis the teacher of speech seeks to help the students in his classes to understand them- selves, to get rid of bad habits and to build up good habits in their stead. The object in each case is the emotional and intellectual integration of the personality in its social environment. A Depart- ment of Speech in a college or university should be organized and conducted as an integral part of the institution to the end that stu- dents may not only have complete knowledge of self, but that they may also be able and eager to use their knowledge gleaned from books and laboratories in meeting and solving the problems of the communities in which they live. XXVI. THE CONTROL OF STUDENT HEALTH ' H. S. DIEHL Director of the Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health, and Director of the Student Health Service University of Minnesota Almost from their beginnings, American colleges and universities have attempted to make provision for the physical welfare of their students in the establishment of dormitories, gymnasia, physical education requirements, and recreation fields, meager though these originally were. However, the provision of medical service for students, either for treatment or prevention of illness, was not con- sidered a responsibility of the institutions until between fifteen and twenty years ago. In many instances the first employment of physicians to care for the health of the students was the direct result of some epidemic on the campus. The work of these first "college physicians" was concerned with the maintenance of an office, usually in the gymnasium, to which students could come for medical advice. In some institutions, the service is still in this primitive stage of development, but many colleges now are carrying on constructive health programs far in advance of these early conceptions. Physical examinations of entering students were soon added to the program of the health service. These were intended to discover any physical defects or abnormalities that might handicap students in their college work. Any defects discovered were explained to the student and he was advised to have them corrected by a private physician. A few institutions made provision to correct certain defects for those students who could not arrange to have them cor- rected elsewhere. Through these stages the Student Health Service has evolved until the present conception is that its main objectives should be the improvement of physical and mental health of students, the prevention of disease, and the education of the student body in regard to the essentials of healthful living. The care of the sick 1Presented in part before the American Student Health Association, December 30, 1926, New York City. Adapted with permission from an article in the Journal of Preventive Medicine, Vol. I, No. 5 (May, 1927). 328 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION and correction of physical defects are integral parts of the program. ORGANIZATION AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA The type of organization that is most satisfactory for any par- ticular student health service must necessarily depend upon several factors, such as the size of the student body, the amount of the health service budget, the relationship to a medical school, the size of the city in which the institution is located, and the number and training of physicians who are available for part-time service. At the University of Minnesota, we have a student body of slightly over 10,000 and a budget that is made up of the funds that accrue from a health fee of $6.00 per year2 per student, plus some spe- cial charges for services highly individual in character, such as dentistry, x-ray, drugs, operating room, physiotherapy, out-patient calls, and board and laundry in the infirmary. The Medical School and the University Hospital are on the campus, from both of which institutions effective cooperation is obtained. The University is located in a large urban center, so that almost half of the students live at home. It has been possible to procure on a part-time basis the services of well-trained, thoroughly competent specialists in the various fields of medicine. Certain details of the organization here developed will not be applicable to other institutions, but the gen- eral principles will apply in most colleges and universities. At Minnesota the Health Service has a status similar to that of a school or college; that is, the Health Service is responsible directly to the president of the University, and the director of the Health Service is a member of the administrative committee of the Univer- sity Senate, which meets weekly with the president to discuss mat- ters of general university policy. This plan has certain advantages in that the Health Service occupies an important position in the university administration; it gives the director a contact with the deans and other administrative officers of the institution, thereby making for cooperation with the various faculties; it makes possible a freedom of action in matters that have to do with the health of the students; and it develops in members of the staff an "all-univer- sity" interest and point of view which might be lacking if the Health 2 This health fee will be $9 per year, beginning July 1, 1927. THE CONTROL OF STUDENT HEALTH Service were part of the organization of some individual college or department. The various activities of our Student Health Service are: Physical Examinations.-The physical examinations which the Health Service conducts are of several types: entrance physical examinations, periodic health examinations, and special physical examinations. The entrance examinations are performed at the time of registration. In order to complete these in a short space of time, it is necessary to employ assistants to supplement the usual staff and temporarily to reorganize the entire department for the exclusive purpose of physical examinations. In receiving such an examination, the student passes from one examiner to another, each of whom makes one observation or group of observations. Upon the completion of the examination the findings are summarized for the student, their significance is explained, and recommendation for their correction is made. The disadvantages of giving examinations in this way are that they are rather impersonal and are made at a time when the students are considerably confused by the entire process of entering college. The advantages of the plan over the one of extending the examinations throughout the year are that the findings are available at a time when they can be used for assigning students to special classes in physical education, for limiting their programs of activity, both physical and scholastic, and for the cor- rection of defects that might handicap them in their school work. Defects and abnormalities that are discovered by the entrance examinations are followed up during the school year. Periodic health examinations given annually, if possible, will discover some important pathological conditions and should prevent some actual breakdowns in health from tuberculosis and other dis- eases. Unquestionably, however, the greatest value of these exami- nations is their educational value. They tend to develop in the student the habit of an annual physical examination; they teach him what a thorough examination should be; the examiners point out to the students their bad health habits, explaining the ill effects which eventually will follow such habits; the periodic check-up serves as an incentive for students to correct defects and improve health habits; and the personal conference is a means of getting in 329. 330 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION touch with students who have emotional problems and need advice along the lines of mental hygiene. At Minnesota, before the student sees the examiner he has filled out his history blank and has had certain preliminary tests and laboratory work performed. Then the student is given an hour's appointment with the examiner. On the average, about forty-five minutes of this hour is devoted to checking over the history blank, to examining the student, and to giving advice; the remaining fifteen minutes being utilized for fur- ther consultations with the students previously examined. This may seem a considerable amount of time for an examination; but unless these examinations are absolutely thorough and the advice carefully given, they lose their effectiveness and probably might better be dispensed with entirely. Special physical examinations for students who wish to partici- pate in athletics or other extra-curricular activities will prevent some students from attempting more than they are physically able to carry, and will safeguard the institution against an accusation of negligence in the discharge of the moral responsibility attendant upon the sponsoring of these extra-curricular activities. When periodic health examinations are given, special examinations for certification are unnecessary. Out-Patient Service.-The out-patient service consists of the out-patient clinic or dispensary, and the calls made at the students' rooms. This out-patient service can well be considered the front line of attack in the battle against disease. When students come here upon the first appearance of symptoms, the possibilities of pre- venting the development of serious illnesses as well as the spread of communicable diseases are greatly increased. Most of the con- ditions seen in these out-patient clinics for students are of minor importance, but among the students with minor ailments come some with more serious conditions. In order that these shall not be missed, a high standard of medical service must always be main- tained, the number of physicians must be adequate, and specialists should be available for consultations. In these out-patient clinics, the Health Service has a unique opportunity for informal health education at a time that is psycho- logically opportune, because, when people are well, they are inclined THE CONTROL OF STUDENT HEALTH to listen passively to discussions regarding health, but when they are ill, they become most actively interested, not only in recovery but also in the preservation of their health. These opportunities for effective health education should not be neglected. Vaccinations.-Vaccinations, immunizations, and immunity tests are an important part of the student health work, not only because the student should be given the greatest possible protection against communicable diseases, but also because the best method of educat- ing an individual in regard to vaccinations and their harmlessness is to vaccinate him. In a few years these college students will be among the leading citizens of their communities, and if they them- selves have been vaccinated against smallpox and diphtheria, they will not hesitate to support the general immunization of the children of the community. At the University of Minnesota for the past four years a Schick test has been included as a part of the entrance physical examination. When this test is applied, the student is given a card explaining the significance of the test and the impor- tance of the immunization of susceptibles. As a result, most stu- dents, when they come to have their tests "read," know whether they are susceptible or immune. Private institutions and state universities in which compulsory vaccination is legal should require, as an entrance procedure, that all students be protected against smallpox. In the state of Minne- sota there is a law prohibiting compulsory vaccination, so the Uni- versity cannot require students to be vaccinated. Until a few years ago the practice had been to call the attention of the student at the time of his entrance physical examination to the fact that he needed to be vaccinated and to urge him to come to the Health Service immediately after school opened for this vaccination. The result was that very few were vaccinated. For several years, however, a much more effective method has been followed. At the time of en- trance examination, if a student needs vaccination, he is told about it, and unless he refuses to permit it, is vaccinated immediately, with the result that there are now in the University very few stu- dents unprotected against smallpox. The difference in effectiveness is due to the fact that previously the student had to show initiative to be vaccinated; now he must show initiative not to be vaccinated. 331 332 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Control of Contagious Diseases.-Contagious diseases always have occasioned the loss of enormous amounts of time not only in secondary schools but also in colleges and universities. An effective health service can prevent a large part of this. In the first place, the temporary isolation from the out-patient department of all stu- dents who have symptoms suggesting the prodromes of some con- tagious disease will prevent the exposure of many other students to the cases that later develop. Furthermore, a modified quarantine for students who have been exposed to communicable diseases has been found entirely satisfactory. The procedure which has been followed at the University of Minnesota is, instead of isolating the students or even excluding them from classes for the incubation period of the particular disease to which they have been exposed, to permit them to attend classes provided that they report to the Health Service for inspection each morning. During the four years that this procedure has been followed, there has not been a single case of a contagious disease which could be traced to exposure to another student who was attending classes under this provision; on the other hand, the practice has prevented the loss of an enor- mous amount of time by students who ordinarily would have been excluded from classes. Mental Hygiene.-The fact has often been pointed out that many college students have emotional problems, more or less serious, and that during their college courses some develop actual maladjust- ments or warps, which will be handicaps to them not only in college but also in later life. Furthermore, psychiatrists properly qualified for mental hygiene work are demonstrating that it is possible to assist some of these students to acquire healthier habits and to pre- vent their developing serious maladjustments and neuroses. What proportion of students need such expert advice in mental hygiene has not been determined, but every college of any size has a con- siderable number of students who need help of this sort and through its health service every institution should make provision to meet this problem. Nutrition Workc.-Statistics from the various parts of the coun- try show that from 20 to 30 per cent of students are more than 10 per cent below the average weight for their height and age, and the THE CONTROL OF STUDENT HEALTH studies of Emerson at Dartmouth, and others indicate that a large proportion of this group is also below par physically and mentally. A nutrition service for such students involves a thorough physical examination followed by the correction of the defects which might contribute to the condition. Then there must be an analysis of the student's diet and his habits of eating, sleeping, recreation, worry, and work. On the basis of this comprehensive study the student should be given the advice that will fit his particular case and should be followed up from time to time to see that progress is being made. Infirmary and Hospital.-In order to carry on an effective pro- gram of prevention, a health service should have a student infirmary or hospital in proximity to its out-patient clinic; for whenever stu- dents are too ill to attend classes or whenever they show any symp- toms suggestive of a communicable disease, they should be sent home or to the infirmary. The easier it is for students to reach the infirmary, the more likely they are to go there instead of to their rooms in fraternity houses or dormitories. Early infirmary care will decrease the development of many serious complications in the patients themselves and will prevent the spread of infections to associates. Sanitation.-The health service should cooperate with other departments of the institution in providing hygienic conditions in dormitories, dining halls, gymnasia, swimming pools, and the campus in general. The examination of food handlers in cafeterias and dining halls maintained by the institution is a proper function of a student health service. Dental Service.-A department in which dental examinations are performed and advice given is essential in an adequate health pro- gram. Some institutions include in this department a dental hygien- ist who gives dental prophylaxis to students. A few have a complete dental service in which students may receive not only examinations and advice but also operative dentistry. The reason that it has been necessary to provide such complete service is that a large proportion of students, particularly if away from home, will fail to follow advice in regard to dental work unless the health service also pro- vides facilities through which they can have their work done. A complete dental service for students, which the University of 333 334 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Minnesota established four years ago on a self-supporting basis, is proving most successful. The work is done by competent dentists who are in practice in the city and who devote part of their time to the health service work. Fees are calculated on a cost basis; while these are not low, they are considerably less than they would be for the same quality of work done in private practice. The advantages which this department offers to students are: a high class dental service on a cost basis; a saving of time because of work done rapidly and without the necessity of trips down town; appointments made to suit the students' schedules; and a service of easy accessibility. The use which students have been making of this department has been most encouraging. During the year 1925-26 about 1,800 students made 8,772 visits to the department for examinations or treatment other than the entrance dental ex- amination. Refractions.-The entrance physical examinations at every in- stitution discover numerous students with defective vision un- corrected by glasses. In order to prevent these defects from handicapping the students in their college work their eyes should be examined and, if necessary, glasses prescribed. Merely to tell the students that they may need glasses is not sufficient, because some of them, for financial or other reasons, will fail to have their eyes examined and others will fall into incompetent or unscrupulous hands. On this account most institutions have felt that they should provide refractions and arrange for the supplying of glasses to those students who do not have a private oculist or physician whom they can consult. Laboratory and X-Ray.-Adequate laboratory and x-ray services are essential in connection with the out-patient service, the health examinations, and the infirmary. Pharmacy and Physiotherapy.-A pharmacy in conjunction with the health service is not only a great convenience but also a means of saving considerable money for students. Physiotherapy depart- ments, particularly with diathermy and ultra-violet ray, are dem- onstrating their value in the health services which have installed them. THE CONTROL OF STUDENT HEALTH RELATIONSHIPS OF A STUDENT HEALTH SERVICE The effectiveness of a student health service will depend very largely upon the cooperation which it receives from the students and faculty. The students need to have confidence in, and appre- ciation of, the service, and the faculty members need an intelligent interest in the work. Hence, it is important that the director build up sound and effective relationships for the department. Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health of the Medical School.-With this department the Health Service has an exceptionally close affiliation because of the similarity of the work and the considerable overlapping of the staffs of the two depart- ments; in fact, the director of the Health Service is also director of the Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health. This dual connection seems a profitable one because the Department of Preventive Medicine and Public Health is teaching and conducting research along lines of personal and public health, and the Student Health Service is a practical field for carrying out these teachings. I am certain that the connection with either department enhances the value of our staff members to the other department. Departments of Physical Education and Athletics.-The aim of these departments, like the Health Service, is to improve and preserve the health of the students, so between them and the Health Service there always should be the best cooperation. Students are referred from the Departments of Physical Education to the Health Service for medical care or for advice as to what exercises or ath- letics they should engage in; the students who need corrective exer- cises, orthopedic gymnastics, or recreational sports are referred by the Health Service to the Departments of Physical Education. The Dean of Men, the Dean of Women, the deans of colleges and the special advisers very frequently refer students to the Health Service for consultation in regard to some mental hygiene problem or some physical condition. This cooperation is most important, particularly in relation to the mental hygiene service. The Department of Buildings and Grounds in cooperation with the Student Health Service supervises the sanitation of swimming pools, university buildings, and the campus in general. 335 336 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION The Housing Bureau frequently consults the Health Service in regard to the sanitary conditions in rooming houses or the health of students who are living in close contact in these houses. The university dining halls and cafeterias are inspected by the Health Service, and all employees who handle food are examined with reference to their being carriers of communicable disease. Extra-curricular Activities.-Participation in extra-curricular activities is a form of treatment recommended by the mental hygiene staff for students who have certain types of mental hygiene prob- lem.3. Students who wish to participate in extra-curricular activities must have health certificates from the Health Service. Employment agencies, such as the Woman's Occupational Bu- reau and the University Employment Agency, consult the Health Service in regard to the types of positions that certain students should have in consideration of their physical or mental conditions. The University Hospital renders most valuable cooperation to the Student Health Service by supplying consultations whenever requested and by accepting students who are in need of major sur- gery or who require prolonged medical care. The Diagnostic Laboratories of the State Board of Health, which are located on the campus, render most valuable assistance in the diagnosis and control of communicable disease. The Minneapolis City Board of Health has charge of the quar- antine of all rooming houses and fraternity houses which are located off the campus. They make exception to their regular quarantine regulations in the case of university students who have been exposed to communicable diseases and permit them to attend classes pro- vided they are kept under the supervision of the Health Service. The Department of Bacteriology of the Medical School makes autogenous vaccines for the Health Service and supplies certain toxins for tests and for immunizations. The University School of Nursing includes the nurses in four hospitals. During their course all of these nurses receive training in the contagious sections of the Minneapolis General Hospital. Previous to this training the Health Service gives to every nurse the necessary immunity tests and the immunization inoculations against smallpox, typhoid fever, diphtheria, and scarlet fever. THE CONTROL OF STUDENT HEALTH Outside of the University the staff of the Health Service has relationships and contacts with many agencies, such as public health associations, parent-teacher associations, and nursing groups. CLINICAL STAFF The first qualifications of members of the clinical staff should be that they are competent to discharge the responsibilities of their positions. In other words, the director should select only physicians to whose care he would be willing to entrust his own children if they were away at school. In the second place, members of the Health Service staff should have an interest in the prevention of disease and in the improvement of health. In the right type of physician, this point of view frequently can be developed by means of meetings and conferences after his appointment to the staff. The size of the staff necessary will depend largely upon the extent of the service which is being rendered. At the University of Minnesota for a student body of about 10,000 the following out- patient service has been found necessary: Hours per Week General medicine ....................................... 102 Eye, ear, nose and throat................................................. 18 Refractions ........................................ ................... 18 Minor surgery and surgical consultations....................... ........... 12 Dermatology and venereal disease................................. ........ 6 Orthopedic surgery .............................................. 6 Diseases of metabolism........................................ 6 Neurology ........................................... 3 G ynecology ................................................ ..................... ................... 3 Prescribing of corrective exercises and gymnastics .............. .. 3 The periodic health examinations with the necessary subsequent consultations require approximately one hour each. On this basis one can compute the time necessary to examine any student body. In a university of 10,000, approximately 3,500 will receive the en- trance examinations; this will leave 6,500 to be given periodic health examinations, or 6,500 hours will be required. If the exami- nations are extended over 32 weeks, approximately 200 must be examined per week, or the equivalent of the full time of five physi- cians will be necessary. 337 338 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION The entrance examinations can be most economically performed by adding to the regular staff temporary assistants, professional and clerical. For nutrition work in a student body of 5,000 to 10,000, a physician on full-time basis should be in charge and he should have the assistance of a dietitian or social worker. The mental hygiene service will require the full time of at least one psychiatrist and one or more psychiatric social workers. As to whether the clinical staff should be on full-time basis or part-time basis will depend primarily on local conditions. An ade- quate and thoroughly competent staff on full-time basis would be ideal, but it frequently happens that it is possible to procure more competent service, particularly in the specialties, on a part-time basis than could possibly be obtained on full time. Some members of every staff, however, should be on full time in order to plan, direct, and supervise the work and to meet the emergencies with which a health service is confronted every year. COST OF AN ADEQUATE HEALTH SERVICE The budgets upon which health services operate are derived from various sources. Some are appropriated from the general funds of the university; some are derived from a separate health fee which is paid with the tuition; some are provided by a combina- tion of these two methods; and some add to one or both of these schemes other funds which accrue from special charges made by the department. The services which are provided without cost to the student vary widely: some institutions give only physical examina- tions and emergency service; some add general out-patient service but no hospitalization; others add out-patient service and limited hospitalization; and some provide unlimited hospitalization with or without a complete examination and out-patient service. This last plan, however, seems a scheme of sickness insurance rather than a program of preventive medicine. If an institution had unlimited funds with which to finance a health program, it would be very sat- isfying to be able to give the students unlimited service, both in the out-patient department and in the hospital. However, it is doubtful, even under these conditions, whether or not it is wise to develop in the minds of students the idea that illnesses and physical defects which affect only the individual are community responsibilities. THE CONTROL OF STUDENT HEALTH A plan that has been found satisfactory at the University of Minnesota is to provide for students' physical examinations, out- patient service, medical and nursing service in the infirmary, and free board and laundry in the infirmary for two days. For other services highly individual in character, such as x-rays, drugs, board and laundry in the infirmary, or dentistry, students are charged on a cost basis. A provision that the Dean of Student Affairs may recommend the cancellation of any bill prevents these charges from working a hardship on students who cannot afford to pay. This plan enables the department to expend funds in constructive health activities for the entire student body which otherwise would have to be expended for board, laundry, or drugs, for a relatively small proportion of the group. Furthermore, all students who have family physicians or who desire the service of private physicians are re- ferred to them for medical care by the Health Service. The larger colleges and universities are finding that it costs from $10 to $15 per year per student to carry out a satisfactory health program, not including the formal classroom instruction in hygiene and preventive medicine. The relative cost of similar pro- grams in smaller institutions probably would be somewhat higher. College executives who feel that their institutions cannot afford such a budget for student health work should realize that a thor- ough health examination alone would cost the student at least as much as the entire health service program that has been outlined in this paper. SUMMARY 1. The health services of most colleges began with the provision of physical examinations and a certain amount of medical advice for students who were ill. 2. The adequate health service of today has as its objectives the improvement of the physical and mental health of students, the prevention of disease, and health education. 3. The various phases of a complete student health program are: physical examinations, entrance, periodic, and special; out- patient medical service; vaccinations; control of contagious dis- eases; mental hygiene; nutrition service; infirmary and hospital service; sanitation; dental service; refractions; laboratory and x-ray service; pharmacy and physiotherapy. 339 840 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 4. The cooperation of the student body and faculty is necessary for the carrying out of an effective health program. 5. The clinical staff of the student health service must be com- petent to render first-class medical service and must have the pre- ventive point of view. The amount of time which is required for the various phases of work is discussed in this paper. 6. The cost of an adequate student health program in a large university is from $10 to $15 per year per student. The funds to make up the budget may be obtained from several sources: general university funds, health fees, and charges to individual students. XXVII. THE CONTROL OF STUDENT LIFE ANNE D. BLITZ Dean of Women, University of Minnesota The control of student life is a much larger subject than I am prepared to discuss. Student life is very much self-controlled, but I will give you something of a picture of the student life that goes on on a large campus like this. Students have always engaged in many extra-curricular activities. You get a very good picture of student life in early times from some works of fiction-Pendennis, for example. In medieval times these activities were fully as engrossing as the curriculum that the college in itself provided. The gradual taking-over of control and the gradual recognition and sanction of activities is a comparatively recent college phenomenon. It does not go back so very far, some- thing like twenty-five to thirty years in most colleges. When I was in college, which is not such ancient history but still very ancient to my students, such activities as the publication of the year-book were solely student activities. We had no one who took any notice whatsoever of what we did, we had no supervision, advice, or comment until the book was out; and then what com- ment was given us was usually adverse. , It was a student activity, pure and simple. Nowadays there are types of control over nearly all of such activities in our colleges. Last year there were listed in the office of the Dean of Student Affairs something like 275 legitimate organizations of the campus. These ranged all the way from sororities and fraternities, which are purely social, to the most serious study groups, which are aca- demic but which are nevertheless extra-curricular activities-like the biology club, for instance, or the language groups, and so on. It would be difficult to classify them. They are all registered with their membership, their purpose, their constitution, and what other facts seem to be necessary, in that office and my office. One of the outside activities that occupies a very large propor- tion of the attention of our students at the University of Minne- sota, and I think at other colleges, is one that is seldom listed as 342 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION an extra-curricular activity. That is self-support-work done for a living during the college year. We have not had a very accurate way of checking on that here. Our students list on their registra- tion cards whether they are wholly or partially self-supporting, but do not state whether that is while they attend college, during sum- mer vacations, or whether they stayed out a year and worked to earn money to put them through the next year. But our figures show that 60 per cent of our men and 40 per cent of our women are wholly or partly self-supporting. Forty per cent of our men and 19 per cent of our women are wholly self-supporting, having no resources outside of their own earnings to put them through college. That is a tremendous number of the student body to be engaged in this way. For the girls, I would say that I think about 75 per cent of those who report themselves as wholly or partly self-supporting are doing it while carrying a full program. I don't know about the men, but I know the number of girls actively engaged in doing work while they go along is very large. The girls who are doing that work are, naturally, not able to participate in many other extra-curricular activities. A girl who is giving four hours a day to work for room and board, carrying a full program of 15 hours (which is 45 hours given to school work, two hours preparation being necessary for every hour of recitation), and using some time for such necessary processes as sleeping and eating, has not very much time left to devote to extra-curricular activities. So we find that students who are self-supporting are naturally less active in the other extra-curricular activities. I am often asked if that is because there is a stigma attached to self-support. I would say that at Minnesota the students are remarkably free from such feelings. Many of our self-supporting girls, for instance, are members of sororities, and I have never seen that it made any dif- ference in the way the students act toward them, feel toward them, or think toward them, excepting that it does limit their participation. I am also asked what the effect is on scholarship. We have never made any very conclusive study of this, and about the only thing I can say is that for the last three years the highest scholar- ship group-average attained has been that of one of the cooperative THE CONTROL OF STUDENT LIFE houses for women in which the only requirement for entrance is that one shall be wholly or partly self-supporting. That cottage has had an average way over that of any sorority or any other single group living together on the campus, which record would indicate that self-support need not lower scholarship. Of course, another factor is that the girl who cares enough for a college education to work her way usually has a motive strong enough so that she does good work in her college studies. Of course, we have some exceptions to that, but we feel that if anyone is working so hard for the privilege of being here that she is earning her own way, we should not take the privilege away from her until she has shown con- clusively that she cannot do the college work. The self-supporting girl is more apt to do very conscientious work in her classes than the dependent girl. One of the other big activities that takes a great deal of our students' time is the student cooperative government. We have two associations on the campus. One is the All-University Council made up of representatives elected from each of the colleges, a kind of student governing board for activities. It does certain regulatory things. We have also the Women's Student Government Associa- tion to which every woman is automatically admitted upon payment of her entrance fees in the University. Its objects are to raise the standards of the life of the women students and to unify them. Its activities include scholarships, social life, housing conditions, lowering expenses by running a second-hand bookstore, and helping girls who are failing by conducting a tutoring bureau. The W. S. G. A. took up the matter of the point system that the All-University Council has drawn up, as it applied to women. They said, "We are dissatisfied with the way you have rated these various offices. It seems to us you have rated them on the basis of the honor attached to the office. We think they should be rated on the basis of the work and responsibility required. Take the first-class offices, such as W. S. G. A. president. A woman who holds that office would not have time to do anything else; president of the Y. W. C. A. is another; president of All-University Council another. But you have put the president of the senior class down here and you have put the captain of the football team as a first- 343 344 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION class office. He doesn't do anything except when the football season is on. How can you call it a first-class office ?" The women said, "We are not judging our offices on that basis." They said, too, "This ruling is a dead letter unless we appoint an officer to check up." So the women's activities board have ap- pointed one of their board members to check up every quarter their women students holding offices, to see that their scholarship average is up to C, and that no one person is holding too many offices. An office-holder whose scholarship is not up to the require- ment automatically drops out, and they hold a new election. Stu- dents have come to the same point of view. They say, "If a student cannot carry the work necessary to permit her to graduate from the University, then we have no right to use her time by letting her divert her activities into this other channel." So they see that they maintain the C average, which is our graduation average here in Minnesota. There are nineteen members on that women's board and something like that same number on the All-University Council Board. Each college has a student council that manages the stu- dent affairs for that college. So you can see student cooperative government does usurp students' time. A large amount of students' time is spent working on student publications. There are on the two campuses at least four publica- tions: the big annual year-book, The Gopher, the Minnesota Daily (which is run like a regular newpsaper), the Skli-U-Mah, a monthly humorous magazine, and the Gopher Countryman, published on the agricultural campus. These publications are regulated by a board, handling something like $60,000 to $100,000 a year--a splendid financial training-and they handle it straight, too. The Gopher is unique in that it is supported entirely by subscriptions and con- tains absolutely no advertising. In dramatics we have another large group engaged in extra- curricular activities. Some three years ago we consolidated six separate dramatic clubs into a single all-university dramatic club called the "Minnesota Masquers." Since then there has been a feeling that better results would be accomplished if one or two of the groups maintained their separate organization, but the work they do is still under one department and managed by the same THE CONTROL OF STUDENT LIFE personnel. Dramatics is also remarkably good training for the students because more and more as they go out into smaller towns they are asked to do that very thing, and their experience during college is a very great help in that way. Music is another of our big extra-curricular activities. We have a splendid music department, the music work reaches practically all fields, and the student who has any inclination along that line can find an opportunity to work there. Athletics for both men and women is a large extra-curricular activity. The emphasis is coming to be more similar all the time, though there was a time when for women it was entirely different. With men it was extra-mural competitive athletics; with women, intramural. I think every student should have an opportunity to take part in some form of physical exercise. Every year we have an increasing group of men in intramural sports. It is one of our most valuable ways for developing individual students. Then there are, of course, any number of service enterprises on the campus that take up the Students' time, such as the cafeterias and the various places where we serve food to our students. It is largely students who man that service and many earn their way through college by this work. We have many activities exclusively for women. One that touches quite widely the whole group of women is the vocational bureau. We have a vocational adviser who works with the student vocational chairman in two or three different lines. Appointments are made for consultation with her. They can be made in several different ways: the student can ask for an appointment; if the student comes to me I can make the appointment; or a faculty member can make the appointment. Then that student comes and has a conference with our very capable vocational adviser, who is trained in that field, and the student gets continued help if she needs it. In addition to that we run a series of round-tables, con- ferences to which we have speakers come and tell the students of advantages and work in their own fields, followed by a general discussion. Last year we had six of those round-tables. We cov- ered such subjects as "Interior Decorating as a Profession for Women"; "Journalism as a Vocation for Women"; "Psycho-thera- 345 346 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION peutics as a Vocation"; and "Advertising in Department Stores as a Vocation for Women." I think the most interesting round-table we had was on "Marriage as a Vocation for Women"; echoes from that did not die down for about four weeks. If in our work we find a student who is not of college caliber we are very apt to send her to the vocational adviser. Instead of saying, "You don't belong in college," we may say, "We do not believe you belong in college, but we suggest that you go to our vocational adviser and talk with her of the different opportunities for women and see if you cannot find a line where you will succeed." She has been able to help a really remarkable number in that way. Then, of course, there is the big extra-curricular activity that practically all the outside world thinks is the most important-the social life of the student. As I said before, there are 275 organiza- tions on the campus. There are a great many varieties of groups- religious, social, cultural groups, and even locality groups such as a North Dakota Club, or a Kansas Club. Now of course, a large percentage of these are purely social. We have on our campus 23 sororities, about 40 social fraternities, and something like 20 or 22 professional fraternities, so you can see that the social group is an extremely large one. Then we have another very large array of extra-curricular activi- ties being conducted on this campus. Those are the religious ac- tivities. We have a well-organized Y. M. C. A. and Y. W. C. A., a Liberal Discussion Club, a Christian Science Society, the Newman Club, which is a Catholic organization, inter-racial and inter-class clubs, and various others that have for their purpose the discussion of religious problems and the furthering of spiritual life. There are clubs for every single denomination, Presbyterian, Baptist, Methodist, Congregational, Lutheran, and so on. So you can see that any student interested in that side of life has a big opportunity to nourish that interest. The purpose of most of these church clubs is to train leaders in that kind of work. There is a great deal of interest on this campus in the inter- racial problem. Our students are very well aware of the fact that racial differences are creating large social problems, and they are very earnestly going to work to try to free themselves from THE CONTROL OF STUDENT LIFE prejudices that exist in the outside world, not only as to color but as to such differences as those between the white race and the Chinese, the Japanese, and others. One of the things the girls are doing is to have an inter-racial commission of the Y. W. C. A. Equal numbers of white and colored girls meet at lunch for dis- cussion of joint problems of the two groups and their better relationships. I think on the whole that the attitude of the women, at least, toward the extra-curricular activities, is that they are service enter- prises, and that it is a privilege to cooperate with them, and also a training. They brought that out very clearly in the discussion of the point system, in their checking on the holding of the C average, and so on. They devote the money that they earn by their own enterprises to the giving of scholarships to needy stu- dents. This year they are giving sixteen scholarships to women students on a competitive scholarship basis. I think one thing should be said to any group that is talking or thinking about the social extra-curricular activities; namely, that the pace is not set today by the students and by student standards, but by standards of the outside world brought over into student life. What the students read of social activities is what they base their own activities on. It is truer today than ever before because of the publicity given that kind of thing. The responsibility for the standards is no longer within the student group, and many times it is a case of exploitation of the student group for the profit of adult enterprises. If you listen to your students I think you will see this is really true. This standard is spread by the freedom of publication of the details of things and by the commercial and adult world that hopes to profit by the impulsiveness and imitative instinct of the youth. DIscussIoN Q. When speaking of student publications, I suppose you refer to both men and women? A. Yes. Q. Are they paid? A. Yes, the manager and editor-in-chief are each paid a certain sum. For the Daily and The Gopher, the annual year-book, it takes a great deal of work. 347 848 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Q. What is the subscription price for The Gopher? A. It is $4.50 if paid in advance and $5.00 if paid at the time of publication. Q. What about social functions held off the campus? A. Our organizations fill out a form and bring it to my office three days before the party, telling what it is, where it is going to be, and the names of the chaperons,. The chaperons must be approved by my office, must be someone I know. Many times the chaperones are the mothers of the students. "It does not take long for information to get back, and if there is any rumor of irregularity, it is in- vestigated. I must say any school would be proud of the general standard the students: here set for their own social lives. Q. Is there a welfare department in Minneapolis that has any control of the functions, or any municipal organization that takes note as to the character of the dance? A. I don't think so. Of course the police department has access to all functions, and if there is any irregularity reported, it is promptly taken care of. We have had no experience to lead us to know if there is any other supervision. Q. In some communities there is a Welfare Division, which supervises all social functions. A. It is not true in Minneapolis, but we have several unofficial organizations here such as the League for Law Enforcement. They do frequently make reports of con- ditions, when the conditions concern university students. Q. What supervision does the Dean of Women have over sorority houses? A. A very direct supervision. We inspect the sorority houses. There is a regulation that any student under twenty-five years of age must have her place of residence approved by the Dean of Women. The sorority houses are exactly on the same basis as any approved rooming house. Moreover, we say to the group that their chaperon must be approved by the Dean of Women before appointment. In addition, we have two organizations in connection with my office. One is an organization of the landladies of these rooming houses, which meets once a month with me and the Director of Housing, and we go over any problem of adjust- ment between them and the University. Any matter I want to call to their attention I can take up at that time. This keeps us in very close touch. The chaperons form another organization and also THE CONTROL OF STUDENT LIFE meet once a month. There any questions they wish to discuss are brought up and discussed. In addition, if anything is going wrong at the house, the girls are free to come to me for help or advice or counsel. Sometimes it is a case of a chaperon's not doing her job. Girls may report that she does not seem to be able to control the girls in the house, in which case we try to help them to find someone more satisfactory. I know very definitely all the chap- erons in the houses, and I know the girls in the groups pretty well, too. Q. Do you have any supervision over the actual hours of the girls? A. That, of course, is part of the Student Government Regulation. They have rules as to how late they may be out. It is the chaperon's duty to see that every individual girl lives up to those rules. If not, the girl who fails is apt to be put on probation and will be in for discipline by the group. Q. I take for granted there is quite a number of students resi- dent in Minneapolis? A. About 60 per cent are living in their own homes in the Twin Cities. Q. Is anyone responsible for the conduct at sorority parties? A. Yes, chaperons assume the responsibility for that. If given in the name of the sorority, the sorority would be held responsible for the conduct of its members and guests and the chaperon would be the one from whom I should seek the information regarding the conduct. Q. They must be out of your jurisdiction part of the time- say, going to and from parties. A. There is no means whereby the University can assure itself that the conduct of every single one of these 12,000 students is all that its highest ideals would like to have it be at all times. That is impossible. It does not try to do it. But it does try to build up enough character so they will be self-directing in themselves; and the fact that we have had as little difficulty from those sources as we have had, would indicate that students are, for the most part, building up those resistances. Of course, the student living in her own home is under parental direction. We do not presume to say to a mother that she is not capable of the direction of her own daughter. It is the student away from home that we try most to help. However, if we find 349 350 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION a girl living at home, who is having an excessive social life, we very frequently have a conference with the parents and try to introduce light into a place that has been dark. The parents fre- quently seek us out because they are disturbed over what is hap- pening and are anxious for cooperation. Q. In smaller colleges where there are no fraternities or sororities, would you recommend that they organize? A. If they haven't them, I don't see why they want them. Q. Is any faculty member a member of the Student Governing Board for women? A. The Dean of Women is, ex officio; she is there as a stabilizing source of information, to tell what has been tried in the past-in an advisory capacity. That is one of my richest contacts. I might say that the Dean of Women has always been made to feel extremely welcome at all activities. They have always tried to make the Dean of Women feel that they wanted her there, missed her when she was not there, and looked to her for certain kinds of help. Q. Do you think dormitories better for students than approved campus houses? A. We think the ideal would be a college-owned- and-managed house. You have an inevitable conflict of interest in the privately managed house. When your landlady is asked to enforce a regulation, antagonism arises on the part of the girl, and she may say, "I will move." In the dormitories that is not true. The girl who goes in knows she is going to live under regulation. Q. Do you have any doubt that the moral standard is as high as it was ten or fifteen years ago? A. I prefer not to answer that question. It does not come under a discussion of extra-curricular activities. I would say, however, that I think the moral standard of the student is affected, just as the social standard is, by the standard of the community outside. I don't want to get into that discussion, however. It takes too long. May I say one more thing, and that is that we are not presenting this picture of extra-curricular activities as an ideal. We are just showing you how it has de- veloped, and what the picture is at Minnesota. XXVIII. THE SIGNIFICANCE OF EXTRA- CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES F. S. CHAPIN Professor and Chairman of the Department of Sociology, and Director of the Training Course for Social Work University of Minnesota As you know, we have at the University of Minnesota a Com- mittee on Educational Research and a subcommittee on the study of extra-curricular activities. In 1924 this subcommittee was set up with the idea that we ought to discover, if possible, what the social and educational values of extra-curricular activities are. That, of course, is assuming that such values can be determined. We had no illusions on that point. After all, what is the educa- tional value of mathematics? What is the educational value of history? Who knows? Nobody knows! Nobody has ever meas- ured it! There have been all kinds of discussions and faculty meetings that you have all had experience with at which the educa- tional value of some of these subjects in our curriculum was argued; and yet, nobody knows. It is a matter of opinion. The question as to whether or not educational values will remain a matter of opinion or can be brought within the range of quan- titative study is not one that I shall discuss today; but at the present time, at least, the matter of the educational value of extra- curricular activities is a matter of opinion. At the same time we do know that hundreds and thousands of our students are engaging in these activities and that they must have some value; so the first thing to do is to find out what we can. This Committee on Extra-curricular Activities was fortunate in having as a research worker Mr. O. M. Mehus, a graduate student working for a doctor's degree, who put a great deal of time and energy into the work. In the first place a bibliography was com- piled,. which runs up through the spring of 1925. There is in this list a total of about fifty-five titles. Just let me indicate the signifi- cance of this bibliography. We found only twenty articles of a statistical nature, twenty-three articles that gave vent to opinions, and twelve articles that were purely inspirational. That is, a very few, only twenty out of the fifty-five, deal with facts; the others 352 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION deal with opinions, and usually opinions about opinions, not opin- ions about facts. So that what we decided to do was to collect facts and base our opinions on those facts. Consequently in 1924-25 we conducted a fairly elaborate study of student extra- curricular activities here at the University. In the first place, we collected information from students as to activities in which they were actually engaged-as a matter of fact, not as a matter of opinion. In the second place, we collected information on the number of existing campus organizations and what they were doing-another matter of fact and not of opinion. In the third place, we collected information from the alumni as to what they had done in student activities when in college, what they were now doing in activities that corresponded to these (all matters of fact), and in addition their opinions as to the value of these activities. You will find in President Coffman's annual report for 1925-26, on pages 21 to 23, a summary of the first year's work of this committee. The main facts-the mere conclusions-of the study are there presented in non-statistical form. We were not sure at first just what the best method would be of getting the facts. We thought it would be a good thing to get a students' time budget, so we had a number of students keep a log-book of how they put in their time, accounting for every minute of their time each day for a week. At the same time we got from a group of students information on the number of organ- izations they were members of and what they did in these organiza- tions. From this information we were able to devise a schedule, which, although by no means perfect, was one that inquired specifically about the facts of student participation in extra-cur- ricular activities. I may say that these questionnaires were handled in different ways by the different colleges of the University. Some were filled in at class sessions under the direction of the instructor; others by students at the time of registration in the spring of 1925. We got a total of 4,637 student replies, which is a 65 per cent re- turn. We checked the returns to ascertain whether they were "a selected return" or how nearly they constituted a random sampling. Dividing them up, we took alphabetical lists by classes and by colleges and checked the returns and found they were quite evenly EXTRA-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES distributed up and down these lists. We therefore concluded that they were a fair sample. A questionnaire was also prepared and sent to 306 campus or- ganizations. We received 151 replies. That constituted the second mass of factual data. The third consisted of replies to question- naires sent to alumni. To do this we selected from the classes that graduated from 1910 to 1915, roughly 10 to 15 years prior to the time of the study, lists of the 500 most outstanding student leaders, that is, men and women who had been in official positions in campus organizations. Then we took a random sample of 500 of the re- mainder of the graduates of those years and sent out to the 1,000 members of these two groups questionnaires asking for information about the activities in which these men and women had been en- gaged when they were students ten years before. We also ques- tioned them with reference to activities in which they were engaged at the present time and their opinions about the values of the extra- curricular activities they took part in when in college, as they looked back upon them after being out ten or fifteen years. Now, as to the results of studying these facts, the replies and the opinions, let us first take the group of 4,637 students who replied. There are a good many ways in which such material can be analyzed. One of the things we wanted to do was to find out how many different activities a student was engaged in concur- rently. This would be a matter of fact that could be quantitatively expressed. So this information was arranged by sex, class, and college, and we have tables covering these data. First, as to the number of activities in which these students were engaged, we found that upper-classmen, juniors and seniors, were engaged, on the average, in more activities than under-classmen. We found that women were engaged in more activities than men. Considering next the types of activities, and running through the different forms of activities, we divided them into groups. (There is not time, of course, to give you all the details in this connection.) There were 22 general categories. Taking this mass of nearly 5,000 returns and analyzing it on the basis of the kinds of activities, we found that about 40 per cent of the students were in fraternities and sororities. One-third of the students reported membership in re- 853 354 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION ligious societies. There was an increase in the percentage engaged in religious activities from the junior to the senior college, which is a fact contrary to some people's opinion. Women were more active than men in literary activities and student government. Men were more active than women in dramatics and music. About 35 per cent of the students reported that they were earning money. This percentage of wage earners rises to as high as over fifty in the senior college. A larger percentage of men than women earn money. We had returns given by these students as to the amount of time per quarter that they estimated they devoted to earning money, but these returns we do not regard as reliable or complete. The estimate that a student gives in retrospect of the time he put on certain activities is likely to be vague. When it comes to whether or not they engage in religious activity, that is a matter of fact of which they can be certain. In general, however, the returns show that men spend more time than women in athletics, fraternities, and in earning money, and women spend more time than men in religious activities and housework. On the whole, more time is spent in earning money than in other activities outside of classes. There are about 20 tables analyzing these returns. I am just touching on the high points. We made a number of special studies. You often find when you are dealing with thousands that the average gives a fictitious value; so it was necessary to make specific studies of specific groups. We made a study of 379 prominent students, who returned ques- tionnaires by special request. These prominent students were the men and women mentioned by the organizations as their prominent members and were regarded as very outstanding in leadership and otherwise. Then we had another group of 114 honor students, who received a special study. Our analysis showed that the honor stu- dents took part in more activities than the prominent students. The median number of campus activities for the student body was found to be one. That is, the average person engaged in one campus ac- tivity. The median number for the prominent student was three, for the honor student, four. We made a study, as I said, of campus organizations in 1924-25. EXTRA-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES There were 278 campus organizations found to be actually living. These 278 were survivors from a total of 527 that had been in existence at one time or another since 1887. When the different types of organizations were studied and ranked in the order of their mortality, they fell into three groups. Sororities, fraternities, and honorary societies showed the smallest death rate, due possibly to the fact that they get support from national organizations. Now as to the alumni. We had 241 returns from the group of alumni leaders and 169 returns from the random sample. We found in analyzing these data that there was a relationship between the kind of activities a man or woman participated in during college days and the kind of activities engaged in since graduation. We are not sure whether this is due to the individuals' having learned something by their undergraduate experience that they put to effect as alumni in after life, or whether it was due simply to the fact that people with natural abilities do those things inevitably when out in society. .Either interpretation could be admitted. In their own opinions the alumni tended to emphasize the values of primary and face-to-face contacts derived from extra-curricular activities rather than information obtained or habits of study gained by them through the pursuit of these activities. Several other special studies were made that are of more inter- est, I think, than these I have alluded to. We wanted to make a more thorough analysis of special groups because, as I have said, when you are dealing with thousands of cases, averages may give you fictitious values. So we made a special study of 321 students. This is not a group of leaders particularly, but merely the largest group for whom we had complete and comparable data. Even with these thousands of cases there were so many incomplete schedules that we had to throw out hundreds and hundreds until the comparable group was finally boiled down to 321. We wanted to determine the relationship between the extra-curricular activities of these students and their academic achievement. That is, were the poor students the ones most active, or vice versa? We divided them into three equal groups: 107 not engaged in activities on the campus, 107 engaged in two or three activities, and 107 engaged in five or more activities. It was found that in the two upper 355 356 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION groups women spent less time than men on campus activities. Pro- ceeding from the inactive to the median-active and most-active groups, there is a steady and consistent gain in honor points for each group. This indicates that, on the average, the better students are more active. This was particularly true for women, and the gain was more pronounced in women than in men. The special study that I have just summarized was confined chiefly to the upper classes, so we thought it desirable to make a study of freshmen. A special study was made of 200 freshmen, half of whom were women and half men. For these students we had such information as the number of hours they spent in activities, and the number of activities they engaged in. They were divided into two groups of 100 each, the first group those not engaged in any activities, the second those engaged in two or three activities. As in the former case, women spent less time than men in campus activities, as well as in all activities. The honor-point ratios were appreciably higher among the students engaged in two or three activities. The women were consistently higher than the men in this respect. This corroborates the other special study. A third special study was made of art students, education stu- dents, and engineering students on the basis of two divisions, those graduating from Twin City high schools and those from high schools out of the Twin Cities. The analysis shows that there are no significant differences between the two groups with respect to num- ber of activities. These Twin City and non-Twin City high-school groups were also studied with reference to their membership in fraternities and sororities. Twin City students showed a larger membership in academic fraternities and sororities in the junior- college years than the non-Twin City students, but this was equalized in the senior college. Another study was made of 904 officers of student organizations, and is interesting because it has some sociological significance. These leaders were arranged in three groups: first, the officers en- gaged in one or two activities concurrently; second, those engaged in from three to nine activities concurrently; third, those engaged in from ten to seventeen activities concurrently. In every case it was found that the students engaged in the largest number of dif- EXTRA-CURRICULAR ACTIVITIES ferent activities were also on the greatest number of committees, and at the same time held the most offices. These results cor- roborate the results of study of students at Smith College, and seem to show clearly that those engaging in many activities are also more intensely active in each activity. So the old adage "If you want a job well done, get a busy man to do it," seems to have some basis in this particular study. However, there has been the contrary theory, that if you get into a lot of activities you spread your energies and do not get anywhere in any of your different activities. A special study was made of the academic achievements, as measured in terms of honor-point ratio, university percentile rank, and high-school percentile rank, for members of organizations- fraternities, sororities, literary societies-to see if students with greater intelligence went into athletics and those with less intelli- gence went into intellectual activities, or vice versa. We found the following facts to be true: Students with the highest honor- point ratio, who did the best academic work in college, both men and women, were engaged in student activities of an intellectual sort, such as literary societies, religious activities, student govern- ment, and student publications; and those engaged in the fine arts, music, and dramatics, had the lowest honor-point ratio. That, of course, does not necessarily mean that they are dumb-bells; it may mean that the practice of those arts demands so much time that it does not leave sufficient time for other studies. We learned that those engaged in social activities occupied an intermediate position in the honor-point ratio. We also found that the students with the highest university percentile rank and high-school percentile rank were also engaged in student activities of an intellectual sort. The fine-arts students were second in percentile rank. At the present time we are continuing the analysis of alumni activities, and hope to prepare a report to be submitted for pub- lication next fall. 357 CURRICULUM AND INSTRUCTION XXIX. REORGANIZING THE COLLEGE CURRICULUM1 ERNEST H. WILKINS President of Oberlin College The central purpose of the college is the training of the minds of its students. This training is twofold: it involves, first, the acquisition of knowledge by the student, and, second, training in the processes of the acquisition and the use of knowledge. The modern man needs two types of knowledge. If he is to be a sympathetic, broad-minded, and generally intelligent member of society he should have some measure of significant and ordered knowledge of each of the main fields of human interest. And if the modern man is to render efficient individual service in the main- tenance and development of human society, he must have a large measure of significant and ordered knowledge within some special field. College education should, therefore, be in part general, in part special-in part extensive, in part intensive. Current Ameri- can practice divides the college curriculum of the individual student about equally between general and special education, general edu- cation being emphasized in the first two years and special education in the last two years. General education implies the attainment of some measure of significant and ordered knowledge of each of the main fields of human interest. Let us now consider in some detail the implications of this statement. A survey of the subjects taught in a typical college will show the existence of three main groups of subjects, and of certain other subjects not included in the main groups. The three main groups are: the social sciences; the languages, literatures, and arts; and the physical sciences. The order given is the traditional one; it has, however, no logical propriety. Let us place the physical sciences first, leave out the languages for the time being, and let "The chapter from which this abstract is taken appears in full in President Wilkins' recent book, The Changing College, and will appear also in a forthcoming cooperative volume on The Organization and Administra- tion of Higher Education, edited by Dean R. A. Kent. 362 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION the term "the arts" include literature as well as the other arts. We shall then have this sequence: the physical sciences, the social sciences, the arts. This new sequence is at once luminous with evolutionary significance. For the physical sciences deal with that which is infra- human and with the human in so far as it partakes of the infra- human; the social sciences deal with man in the relations forced upon him by the conditions of human society; the arts are the free creation of man's surplus super-physical energy. The physical sciences describe the ever-changing stage upon which the human drama is being played, indicate the basic condi- tions of man's existence, and give to him a swiftly increasing ability to control the dangers and to utilize the opportunities of the infra- human environment. The social sciences face the central problem-the problem of human behavior. They describe human behavior in many different fields, studying motives, methods, and results; and they seek ulti- mately to inform man as to the effects of various kinds of action, in order that he may adapt himself to his companions and with them work out a way of living that shall yield to each as great a measure of fullness of life as the fundamental conditions of existence will permit. The arts are of a different order. They are, in the long evolu- tionary perspective, something new-a social increment. They are themselves means for the enlargement of life-products and reser- voirs of surplus energy, perennially ready, with due mediation, to pour their treasure into new lives. Such, in broadest outline, are the three main groups of subjects. General education obviously calls for a very considerable amount of study within each of these three groups. [Here followed a more detailed analysis of the three groups, subject by subject.] There remain certain subjects which, unlike the foregoing, are not primarily-for the college student-fields for the acquisition of knowledge, but are rather means of training in the processes of the acquisition and the use of knowledge. They may be classed, roughly, as general mental tools. They are mathematics, logic, REORGANIZING THE COLLEGE CURRICULUM 363 English, and the several foreign languages. Mathematics underlies and makes possible all true science, physical or social; and logic, less formal than of yore, is still its companion. The languages, to the college student, are primarily significant as media of under- standing and utterance within the fields both of science and of liter- ature. English is of course of primary importance. Only half of the college curriculum, or thereabouts, is to be devoted to general education. Obviously the student cannot within two years' space gain an adequate measure of even general acquaint- ance with the vast field of knowledge outlined above. Furthermore, many of the subjects mentioned are such that a good general ac- quaintance with them may be won by students of pre-college age. Obviously, therefore, the process of general education should begin long before the student comes to college. It is indeed only by the careful interweaving of the high-school curriculum and part of the college curriculum that a satisfactory program of general education can be achieved. The present inquiry, however, is concerned with the college curriculum. The immediate problem is therefore this: assuming that each freshman comes to college with the process of general education begun but incomplete, what curricular provision shall be made for the completion of the process? The natural collegiate method of gaining knowledge in a given field is to take a course or courses in that field. And for the pur- pose of meeting the need in this way, every department should offer a single course, or a short sequence of courses, intended to give some measure of significant and ordered knowledge to the student who takes work in the department solely as a phase of his general education, and has no intention of specializing in the field in question. But no student can take or should take anything like the whole set of such courses and course-sequences. Clearly, then, a choice must be made. On what principles? Four, I believe: the principle of adaptation to individual need; the principle of major significance; the principle of group representation; and the prin- ciple of integration. The word "curriculum" has no proper modern significance ex- cept as designating a course of study created anew for each indi- 364 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION vidual student. No two students bring to college the same background, the same experience, the same achievement in knowl- edge; and no two students face the same future of work and of leisure. We have no right to do less than to study with the utmost care each individual record and each individual prospect, and to plan the individual curriculum in accordance with the results of that study. Are there, among the subjects listed, any of such outstanding significance that they should certainly appear in the typical indi- vidual curriculum? My answer is, distinctly, "Yes." And the subjects I should designate-with full recognition of the fact that there is room for difference of opinion in this matter-are psy- chology, hygiene, logic, and English. Psychology is, to my mind, the key-subject in the modern intel- lectual advance. Every one of the social sciences, together with philosophy and religion, is realizing more and more closely that it cannot reach valid and significant conclusions with regard to con- duct without such understanding of the normal processes of the complete human being as psychology seeks to give. Ultimately no conduct-sanction will endure that is not established on psycho- logical foundations. There is, therefore, pressing need for the right building of these foundations. For these reasons I advocate giving to every college student some measure of acquaintance with the psychological field, so that if he shows the least sign of special ability therein he may be encouraged, for the sake of society, to develop that ability. And I make this recommendation with full recognition of the fact--all the more urgently because of the fact- that psychology, is still in the stage of groping infancy. [Hygiene, logic, and English were similarly discussed.] The principle next to be invoked is that of group representation. Inspection of the field of general education as outlined above shows at once the existence of certain natural groups of specific subjects. Thus, within the division of physical sciences appear these groups: (a) the basic physical sciences; (b) the sciences concerned with the observation of the inorganic universe; and (c) the biological sci- ences. Moreover, each of the subjects that stand outside these natural groups is sufficiently relevant to some other subject or sub- REORGANIZING THE COLLEGE CURRICULUM 365 jects to be regarded as forming a group therewith. Thus the whole field-omitting the four subjects of major significance-may be regarded as divisible into the following groups: (1) mathematics, physics, chemistry; (2) astronomy, geology, geography; (3) the biological sciences; (4) sociology, history; (5) economics, political science; (6) philosophy, religion; (7) the literatures; (8) architec- ture, sculpture, painting, music; and (9) the foreign languages. I do not maintain that this grouping is inevitable; it is intended to serve as a possible typical plan. General education obviously calls for a considerable amount of study within each of the larger divisions of the field of general education. The specific principle of group representation, a logical development of that obvious general principle, indicates that one course or short course-sequence should be taken (unless the field has already been adequately represented in the student's ,high-school work) in each group of a series such as that just suggested. Application of the foregoing principles will still leave some subjects untouched, and will accentuate the need for some synthesis of the several types of knowledge with which the student has be- come and is becoming acquainted. How shall he gain some sig- nificant idea of the fields within which he cannot take a course? How shall he assemble his blocks of disparate information into a significant and ordered whole? Just here, to my mind, lies the permanent function of the general survey or "orientation" courses, which have come recently into such wide vogue.2 A second means of integration, necessary if general survey courses are for any reason not given, and in some cases desir- able per se, is self-initiation into a given field through inde- pendent reading of the best initiatory books. I shall turn in a moment to the question of general reading. My present suggestion is that a good student may well be encouraged to enter alone some field quite new to him-alone, that is, in companionship with the thought of able writers. Current collegiate experience still tends all too much to give the impression that the only way to gain knowl- edge of a subject is to take a course in it. We are seeking not only to see that our students get knowledge, but also to train them in 2 For President Wilkins' discussion of such courses, see ante, Ch. XX. 366 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION the acquisition of knowledge. The formation of the habit of the acquisition of knowledge through the independent use of books is a major factor in this training-and if this habit is not formed in college it is not likely ever to be formed. We have made great progress, within the limits of the individual course, in the use of books rather than of lectures for the gaining of certain bodies of information. But the practice of discovery through independent reading should be still further emphasized and given still further scope. I therefore strongly recommend that at least one field be covered by the student through private reading; that such reading be regarded by the college as equivalent to course- taking; and that for practical purposes it be duly tested and credited. Still more important is the development, as a phase of general education, of the habit of general reading. The college experience should be such as to merge gradually into the later experience of life. The process of education in the college should be so devised that it may continue naturally and readily throughout life. The idea that education stops with commencement is a tragic absurdity. Now the normal means of education in later life-aside, of course, from the more or less haphazard education of personal experience- is the reading of books, particularly current books, and current periodicals. Therefore the habit of the discriminating reading of current books and periodicals should be formed in college. In this instance also, if the habit is not formed in college it is not likely ever to be formed. Notable interpretations of life, notable suggestions for the bet- terment of the conditions of life, and notable reviews of significant books are constantly appearing in the weekly and monthly press. Through books themselves come most clearly the significant records of past lives and the voices of our own prophets. Books and peri- odicals alike bring store for literary satisfaction. And some are good and some are negligible and some are bad. It is true, again, that current books and periodicals are being used more than ever before in connection with particular courses; but it is also true that the greater part of what we call current literature is not likely to be made known to the students through the courses they take. How then shall it be made known to them? REORGANIZING THE COLLEGE CURRICULUM 367 Acquaintance with current literature can hardly be a thing super- added to a curriculum already completely full. There is a limit to the use of eyesight and to the use of the reading faculty. There must be no infringement upon the time needed for recreation and for sleep. The answer is then obviously to reduce the amount of ordinary course work sufficiently to make possible the practice of a considerable amount of general reading. If the course mechanism be necessary, the reading can be done under the aegis of a special course name and number; but it would be better that it should be done in some other way. The library and the librarian should presumably have a major responsibility in this matter--and the college bookstore should be an ally and not an enemy. Guidance is necessary; but the guidance should be suggestive rather than imperative. The first two years of the college course, while devoted primarily to general education, should include also some measure of special education-that is, some fairly intensive study of a given field. Such study is indeed a necessary complement to general education as a means of training students in the processes of the acquisition and the use of knowledge. For if the mind is to function effectively in solving the varied and unexpected problems that will confront it throughout life, it must have the experience of striking deeply into one particular range of thought. Without this experience the lesser study of several different fields might tend toward super- ficiality. Such specialization should not only give some sense of mastery in the chosen field, but should convince the student that only specialization can give mastery in any field, and should estab- lish in him a habit of specialistic achievement transferable to work in other fields. The specialization of the first two years, however, is preliminary, not final. It does not seek the absolute mastery of a given field as an end in itself; it is concerned with the attainment of the experi- ence of intensive work, and with the establishment of a transferable habit of specialization. Consequently, it may or it may not lie in the field that is to be chosen for the final specialization. In the case of a student who on entrance does not know what his field of final specialization is to be, the field of preliminary spe- cialization should be chosen, under guidance, with reference to his 368 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION natural tastes and abilities. If the preliminary specialization should confirm the student in such tastes and abilities, he may very nat- urally continue in the same field; but if some other interest should develop to a greater power during his first two years, that other interest rather than the first should become the field of his final specialization. If the student on entrance does know what he is to do after graduation, it does not follow that his preliminary specialization should lie in the line of his vocational intent. The chances are, indeed, that it should lie elsewhere. For the principle of adaptation to the individual need of the student might well mean, in this con- nection, the development of interests, old or new, outside of the field in which he is to specialize. The development of these non- special interests is a precious thing, likely to add to that breadth of outlook that the program of general education should in any case provide, a free-ranging, individual eagerness, which should forever prevent undue narrowness and should forever increase a man's value in companionship. [Here followed a brief discussion of the special education to be had mainly in the last two years of the college course.] XXX. A COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR WOMEN JAMES M. WooD President of Stephens College I entered the field of the education of women some fifteen years ago as a skeptic, believing that there was no such thing as a differ- entiation necessary in a curriculum for women. I had not been in that field of work very long, however, before I was convinced that certain types of problems, certain types of reaction, are peculiar to women. After several years of deliberation, I definitely deter- mined to find out whether or not such a differentiation in the cur- riculum should be made, and if so, just what the nature of that differentiation should be. Some seven years ago the trustees of Stephens College author- ized the selection of a curriculum expert. Dr. W. W. Charters was the man who was selected for the investigation. He was chosen for several reasons; one was the fact that in his work in the Carnegie Institute of Technology he had developed a technique that we felt was quite superior, and another was that his contacts had brought him into touch with this particular phase of education in a way that probably had not reached other educational leaders. Dr. Charters was given the task of making a job analysis of the business of being a woman. That job analysis was undertaken in this way. He enlisted the services and assistance of a thousand women, who were graduates of ninety-five different colleges and universities, and who were living in thirty-seven different states. The college woman was selected because of the conviction on his part that the problems of women are common to women. They are not peculiar to the college woman or to the woman who does not have a college training. Our purpose in building the curriculum was to fit women definitely for the job of being able to meet the problems that they will necessarily encounter as women. The method selected was that of having autobiographies kept by these women under the instruction and direction of Dr. Charters. In these autobiographies the women were asked to list every prob- lem that they encountered in their lives. They were asked to indi- 370 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION cate the type of problem that they hesitated to put on paper. These autobiographies were not signed. They were kept for every month in the year from January to December. The geographic, institu- tional, and seasonal distribution was fairly comprehensive. With these autobiographies brought together the next task was that of listing the activities of women, bringing them together into a defi- nite group. It was found before the tabulations were complete that we had something like 7,349 different activities. The listing was continued until no new activities could be found. After this was done, the next problem was that of classification. Of course it was manifestly impossible to build the curriculum around 7,349 different problems. Could a type of classification be found that would reduce that number by bringing together the problems that were similar in their nature? After several months of work it was found that a tentative classification was possible, and these more than 7,000 activities were listed in twenty-eight dis- tinct groups. Some of the women who kept the autobiographies were mothers in homes, some were business and professional women. The significant fact discovered during the progress of the classifica- tion was that there are certain activities common to all women, whether they are in the home or in professional life. There are other problems that are peculiar to housewives and still others peculiar to professional life. In the ultimate analysis the required courses in the curriculum of the college for women will cover those problems that are peculiar to women. In that requirement you have the basic courses of the new curriculum. In so far as seven years of study has revealed it to us, there will be seven of these courses. The other twenty-one groups are for the courses that will follow in the elective field. Our concern for the next few years will be with the group of required courses. When Dr. Charters was put to work upon this problem we assigned it to him as a ten-year task. We have given him fifteen additional years in which to bring the curriculum to anything like completion. The indications are at the present time that he is going to need more than the three years that are still available for the work on our required courses and he will need the additional A COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR WOMEN fifteen years to complete the curriculum; but suffice it to say that the past years have convinced us that there are in the field of edu- cation problems that are peculiar to women. Our psychologists are convinced, for instance, that the basic element in the curriculum for women will not be the intellectual but rather the social. It is particularly evident in all of our analyses that in her reactions to situations that confront her the motive force in the life of a woman is dominantly a spiritual one. One of the greatest bits of advertising that was done during the World War was that poster used in one of the Red Cross cam- paigns where the central figure was a mother, and the title used in that poster was "The Common Mother of Us All." That expresses more than anything that I can say the dominant note in the life of womanhood. It is the element of service. It is getting out of self and getting into the life of others-father, mother, sister, brother, children. It is said that Sir Isaac Newton worked seventeen years to discover why the steam in a teapot lifted the lid. Sir Isaac New- ton's wife probably would have worked fifteen minutes on a prob- lem of that type but she would doubtless have worked seventeen years to make a man out of a good-for-nothing boy. One cannot get away from the fact that nature has endowed men and women with a different set of reactions to the same situation and it seems inevitable that ultimately we shall take cognizance of this in our educational system. I have here two volumes that represent the first three years of our study. There are listed here the more than 7,000 activities of women. There are brought together the classification of these activ- ities. The problem will be made more intelligible if I give you a few paragraphs from the survey that was made at the end of this classification period. "During the last quarter of a century there has been an increas- ing tendency on the part of educators to discuss the question of differentiation between courses for men and for women. This dis- cussion has largely been theoretical and academic, but it was felt by President Wood and others that with the presence of an improv- ing technique for analyzing curricula from a functional point of view, it would be possible to take the discussion out of the field of 371 372 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION theory, to analyze with some definiteness the activities and prob- lems of women, and from this to determine at first hand the content of a curriculum which will help them to perform these activities in the most satisfactory manner. "In the study of this problem, it immediately became apparent that a distinction should be made between conduct and information as the objective of the curriculum. If the giving of information were made the teacher's aim, then all that would be necessary would be to collect and teach as information the best methods of carrying on women's activities. If, on the other hand, it were decided that conduct should be made the aim of teaching, it would be necessary not only to give the information, but to devise methods by which this information could be carried over into conduct, and with ade- quate definiteness modify the conduct of women in the carrying on of these activities and the solving of their problems. The second alternative was chosen. "To accomplish this end the following steps are necessary: First, the activities and problems of college women after graduation must be collected and classified. A study of the problems and activ- ities of women in college must necessarily be made, but only as auxiliary to the preparation of women for their equipment for adult life. Psychologically, the woman student must be taught to solve her problems while in college, but while this is being done, the instruction should so handle student situations that the student is being prepared for participation in adult activities. "It is necessary in the second step to evaluate the activities so discovered and in such a manner that if all cannot be taught, the most important are covered. Specifically, this has led in our inves- tigation to a distinction between required and elective subjects. We have attempted to determine what should be the required sub- jects for women when we define the required subjects as those that deal with activities that women carry on irrespective of their adult occupation in the home or as women in professions or women of leisure. With elective subjects, which women carry on because of their interests in specific fields of scholarship, we have not yet been concerned. "When the activities and problems have been evaluated and dis- A COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR WOMEN tributed in classes, it then becomes necessary to analyze each of these classes to determine with definiteness the problems and activ- ities within each class. From the broad study which we have made, it has been impossible to make such an analysis except in a few cases; but the methods of those that have been devised are sufficient to carry the analysis through to completion in each field. "It is of course apparent that in establishing the curriculum it is necessary not only to determine the activities and problems of women but the traits of personality as well. The successful conduct of a life is determined as much by the ideals of accuracy, open- mindedness, friendliness, and ambition as it is by what the person actually does. Because of this fundamental fact it is essential that the traits of personality shall be treated in the construction of a curriculum. "The activities, problems, and traits of women having been determined, the next step that logically follows is the collection of the best methods of performing these activities under the domi- nation of the appropriate traits and ideals. For instance, when the field of civic activities has been analyzed and the specific prob- lems within the field have been determined, it is then necessary to collect and present to the students the best methods of handling the problems. In this way the problems become the topics and the methods of handling the problems become the content of the course. "The study of the content of the curriculum would not be com- plete if merely methods of handling the situation were collected. It is necessary to derive the fundamental information that explains why the solutions are satisfactory and how they operate. Inevitably this leads us back to a consideration of the service subjects such as mathematics, economics, sociology, and psychology. It is not sufficient in college merely to give students methods; it is equally necessary to teach them principles upon which the methods are based. Clearly in determining an adequate curriculum it is neces- sary to include the fundamental-service subjects, and it is possible to determine with considerable definiteness just what should be their content. "Up to this point the raw material for the curriculum has been provided for. It is necessary in the next step to organize the mate- 373 374 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION rial in the proper teaching form. From the point of view of courses of study for women from the first grade to graduation from college, it is necessary to gradate the material in order to determine when during the sixteen years of school life required subjects should be taught. The whole educational program must be considered as a unit, and when teaching is efficient it is found that many of the fundamentals in women's education can be adequately and finally covered before the student has reached the college level. "From the point of view of methods of teaching, consideration has to be given to the best forms in which the material can be pre- sented, including not only presentation in print but instruction in the classroom. "In teaching, finally, it is necessary to devise methods by which information can be carried over into conduct. Clearly in such a simple subject as letter-writing, this is easily done because the students can use their letters as a basis for instruction within rea- sonable and adequate limits. Somewhat more difficult is the giving of conduct instruction in civic problems, for while the students do not actually participate extensively in the civic problems of adult life while in school, the machinery of the school can be so organized that a maximum of participation is obtained through student organi- zations and government so that considerable practice can be had in the actual solving of the problems. A greater difficulty is dis- covered in handling such problems as the training of children in a home-makers' course, but if the conduct objective is set up and earnestly followed through by the school the proponents of this objective must be set. If all that can be done is done, this will be found to be in all these fields much more than is at present accom- plished. To secure complete "training on the job" is impossible in school, but an effort to approximate to this standard will produce startling innovations. "It will thus be seen that the first step in such a study is to determine, classify, and analyze the activities of women. Along with this the traits and ideals must go hand in hand; and when these have been discovered the content of the course of study can be built around them with due regard to the best teaching organiza- tion and to the objective as far as possible and so set the stage that something more than mere information can be given. A COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR WOMEN ACTIVITIES OF GRADUATES OF WOMEN'S COLLEGES "It may be said at the outset that the term activities used in the extremely broad sense includes naturally the physical activities of women, but it is much wider than this because it embraces mental, moral, social, religious, and aesthetic activities. The modern con- ception of the individual from the activity point of view makes us familiar with the idea that life is activity. Problems are closely associated with activities since a very difficult activity constitutes a problem. Needs are likewise founded upon activities because they may be defined as blocked activities with an emotional context, and they are closely related to problems since in the satisfying of needs, problems arise. We, therefore, use activities in the broad sense and use problems and needs as approximate synonyms with activities, since those activities that present no problems naturally do not become topics for school study. "With this conception of activities in mind, the first study made was to determine the activities of graduates of women's colleges. The study was limited to college women because the work was being done for a woman's college. It is our opinion, however, that the classification that we have made for college women will hold for all women. The problems that women face are determined by their vocations rather than by their training. Evidence of this can be presented from a study of the secretarial duties. In this study we classified secretaries under six groups according to the school train- ing that they had secured and we found that the graduates of sec- retarial schools had to meet problems and duties of service which were not markedly different from the problems of the graduates of the eighth grade and the business college. The occupation rather than the training of the secretaries determined their duties. The value of superior training lies not so much in its influence upon the selection of problems that they face as upon the quality of solution which they are able to bring to the problem; so that in the life of women it is highly probable that the activities and problems are set by their occupation rather than by their school preparation." You will be interested to note the ultimate classification that grew out of this study of the activities of women. "The task of classifying the activities of a human being seemed at the start to be extremely difficult. A woman has so many prob- 375 376 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION lems, some of which can be definitely organized but many of which are elusive and occur in flashes, that it seemed not all of them could be put on paper, else they would be spending all of their time writ- ing. It would seem, further, that the diaries would present only a skeleton outline of what they did and thought about; but since the assignment had been made, there was nothing to do but to make an attempt at the classification. "For some time we experimented with different methods of analysis without finding a successful one; but finally it was decided to draw off each specific activity as it was mentioned in the diaries and to set up classes that were immediately apparent, such as food, clothing, and physical hygiene. Then, when new activities were discovered that would not classify under the headings already set up, new classes were formed. By this process we were able finally td classify all the items drawn from the diaries. Of these there were 4,608 different items in the home-makers' diaries and 2,885 items in the extra-vocational life of the unmarried professional women. The result was that we were able to classify all of the items for home-makers under the following 25 classes: 1. Food 14. Civic Relations 2. Clothing 15. Social Relations 3. Physical Hygiene 16. Music 4. Mental Hygiene 17. Art 5. Communication 18. Literature 6. Transportation 19. Nature 7. Reading 20. Gratification of Random Interest 8. Recreation 21. Increase of Circle of Interest 9. Study 22. Associative Thinking 10. Schooling 23. Introspection 11. Reproduction 24. Increase of Income 12. Religion 25. Participation in Vocations 13. Philanthropy "Running across these classifications were five others. Two of these were management and training; three others had to do with equipment, as follows: building and ground unit, room unit, and cleaning-equipment unit. "For purposes of study we selected the diaries of home-makers who did not follow an outside vocation, and unmarried professional A COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR WOMEN women. We analyzed but did not use the diaries of the unmarried women who did not follow a vocation and the married women who followed vocations. We did not use them because we found no activities that could not be included in the lists obtained from the two other sources. The reason for analyzing the home-makers and the professional women separately was this: If we could find the activities common to both classes we should then know what would be the fundamental required elements in a curriculum for women, whether they were entering a vocation or becoming home-makers. This comparison will safeguard the findings of the study from the criticism that the education of women should not be built entirely around the home. This criticism will be still less forceful if we bear in mind that the study has nothing to do with elective subjects of the curriculum that students may study merely from personal interest. "We shall now proceed to a detailed study of the classes of activities. By way of introduction it may be said that the study has aimed only to secure the major classes and has not exhaustively analyzed each of these. Rather the activities drawn off from the diaries have been classified under what seemed to be the easiest subheadings to use; but they are in no sense presented as a final analysis, for while the 7,493 items classified constitute the largest group that has been collected up to this time, they are by no means complete, and undoubtedly an expert working in each field would make an analysis different from those which are presented in this report: "It is to be expected as a matter of course that activities may be classified under more than one heading. For instance, listening to music may be classified under recreation or music. Each diffi- culty was handled with two considerations in mind. In the first place, the activity was placed under the heading that seemed to the classifier to be the essential element in the activity. This, to be sure, is highly subjective, but it is cared for by the second consid- eration to this effect: When an expert in any one of the fields uses this material for analysis of that field, it is expected that he will list not only the activities which appear within the field of study in this report, but will draw from all the other fields those activities 877 378 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION which have been classified for other reasons within other fields. This second consideration makes it unnecessary for the classifier to perform the huge task of listing each activity in all the classes to which it could reasonably belong, and at the same time gives the expert who analyzes the field all the data that can be secured from the diaries. "In making major classes, the basis for classification to be car- ried consistently through the body of material is felt to be of first importance. Ordinarily in the classification of women's activities made by home-makers, experts have used two bases. For instance, we have the impersonal activity 'foods' on the one hand and the care of children on the other. "If we use people as the basis of classification we would classify the activities according to whether they were performed for hus- band, son, daughter, or neighbors, and a classification could be made upon that basis; but in this analysis it was felt advisable to avoid a classification on the basis of persons, particularly because in some cases the person for whom the thing was done was not indi- cated and because a classification on the basis of impersonal activ- ities would give greater detail. However, it was felt that the two bases should not be confused. "While the personal element was discarded as the basis for classification, it was strikingly apparent in the study of diaries that the home-makers' activities are highly personal. In a study of a small section of the diaries it was found that in 30 per cent of the activities listed, a person was explicitly indicated, as for instance 'preparing breakfast for my husband'; and in 45 per cent a person could easily be implied. "Summary: 1. This is not a frequency study. No matter how many times an activity appears, it is recorded only once. 2. A frequency study based upon 300 diaries does not possess any validity and would not, even though valid, be of great sig- nificance. 3. Each activity was placed in one class only, even though it might be placed in several classes. 4. Certain common activities, such as training, financing, and A COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR WOMEN management, run through many of the classes. Theoretically, they might appear in each class, but they have been included only where specific items are found in the diaries in connection with them. 5. Separate headings were made for management and for train- ing because of the fact that a good many problems of management were so general in extent and so indifferent in statement that it was not possible to include them within the individual classes. The same holds true of the equipment organization. 6. The subclasses are in no sense final. The basis of classifica- tion of a few of the classes, such as foods and clothing, will prob- ably not be changed by an expert in those fields, but in other cases the subclassification selected was the one into which the items seemed most naturally to fall. 7. The activities of women are classified under two main head- ings: activities of home-makers, and extra-vocational activities of unmarried professional women. This division was made with the purpose of discovering the activities that were common to women irrespective of whether they were professional women or home- makers. 8. The vocational activities of professional women were not in- cluded because this is not a study that concerns itself with vocations except in so far as home-making may be called a vocation. The object of the study is to discover what are the minimum essentials in a woman's education, irrespective of vocation." Since this summary was made our studies have continued. In the past four years we have brought together a grouping that seems to indicate those activities that are common to all women, and that are to constitute at least the initial group of required subjects in the college of liberal arts for the education of women. Not only have we classified what seemed to be the group of required subjects but we have had specialists working during the past few years in the organization of material for textbooks for these courses. The seven required blocks of courses, as we term them, are these: those problems that deal with physical health; those problems that deal with mental health; communication; aesthetic appreciation; social, economic, and political problems; morals and religion; and efficient consumption. 379 380 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION Let me dwell for just a minute on this classification to indicate very briefly the nature of the experimentation that is going on in these fields. The analysis of the work of our students made by the physical education department indicates that the time given to physical train- ing has been very largely misspent; that the greatest task in dealing with the period of later adolescence is not so much one of exercise as it is the one of relaxation. It is not so much getting the student into the gymnasium or onto the athletic field as it is getting the student interested in relaxation exercises. It may be nothing more than an afternoon siesta. This as an experiment grew out of the expression of a desire on the part of a number of students that they might have a period for relaxation before their afternoon classes. During the month of February, 1927, the students were permitted to go to their rooms for an hour immediately following the noonday luncheon. They might go to bed, lie down, read, or do anything that had nothing to do with the work of the day and that did not interfere with the relaxation of others. At the end of the month the reports from the student body and the faculty were practically unanimous in favor of continuance throughout the year. Beginning with September, 1927, the problem of working out a systematic type of relaxation is to become a major problem for the physical training department. The second problem deals with the mental health and that is the problem of the psychoanalyist, the psychologist, and the physician. The third problem is that of communication. This may be illustrated by the experiment in freshman English composition. In order to find out exactly the expressional activities that were impor- tant in life, the English department sought the advice of several thousand college women and men. They asked these people what they did in an expressional way after they got through college. This is the grouping that came out of that particular research, begun by the English composition department some years ago: FOREWORD "The purpose of the following chapters is to aid the student to improve his ability in performing the practical composition activ- A COLLEGE CURRICULUM FOR WOMEN ities which he has occasion to perform in the course of his ordinary experience. A study of expressional needs, based upon an analysis of activity lists, points to the following activities as those which are probably most frequently performed by people in general: (1) letter-writing, (2) conversation, (3) group discussion, (4) making a speech, (5) giving reports of experience, (6) giving directions or explanations, and (7) story-telling. It would seem, therefore, that these activities should be included as important units of study in the course in English composition." The first six of these items were made chapter headings in the volume, with appendixes on the subjects of diaries, the Class Club program, and speech improve- ment. Compare this, if you will, with the orthodox freshman composi- tion course and you will find the reasons for our discontent. The question would naturally arise as to whether or not the student completing this particular course would be able to compete on the same basis with the student who took the orthodox freshman Eng- lish composition. Such records as we possess seem to indicate more than satisfactory results. Fourth: aesthetic appreciation, and may I call to your attention a piece of work that has been done in our English department and that will soon be available for the general public, Introduction to English Literature by Louise Dudley. The table of contents of this particular textbook in English literature reads thus: I. LITERATURE AS AN ART Chapter: 1. Introduction: The Standards of Literature 2. The Three Stages of Art 3. The Kinds of Knowledge 4. The Kinds of Images 5. The Reality of Images 6. The Imagination 7. The Nature of Intuition 8. The Emotions 9. Intuition and Art 10. The Externalization of Art 11. The Classifications of Art 12. Time Arts and Space Arts 881 382 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 13. The Imitation of Art 14. The Duplication of Art in the Mind of the Critic 15. Necessity for Understanding the Terminology of Literature 16. The Study of Art II. THE LANGUAGE OF LITERATURE 1. Mechanics of Verse and Style 2. The Forms of Prose 3. The Forms of Poetry 4. Drama 5. Mixed Forms III. THE DEVELOPMENT OF ENGLISH LITERATURE 1. The Old English Period 2. The Middle English Period 3. The Sixteenth Century 4. The Seventeenth Century 5. The Eighteenth Century 6. The Nineteenth Century 7. The Twentieth Century APPENDIX-HOW TO STUDY ENGLISH LITERATURE You will observe that aesthetic appreciation is a very funda- mental concept-a concept of literature, of art, of music, of drama, of poetry, all based on a background that deals with human emotions. The fifth required course deals with social, economic, and po- litical problems. That study has reached the point where we feel that the textbook will be ready during the next twelve months. The sixth deals with morals and religion. The most funda- mental thing in the life of women is the dominance of the spiritual forces. I should like to tell you of the experiment that we have been conducting in this field during the past few years but it would take much more than an hour to do it. The seventh and last is the problem of efficient consumption. The name chosen would probably seem to indicate a kind of super- ficial classification until you remember that the women of America spend 90 per cent of all the salaries and wages. Yet in the face of this fact there is scarcely an institution that is particularly con- cerned in training of women in the art of buying. XXXI. THE FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE DONALD J. COWLING President of Carleton College During the last twenty-five years the four-year college of liberal arts has been called upon in a very definite way to defend itself. There has been very little disposition to call in question the good work these colleges have done in the past. They represent the oldest type of institution of higher education in this country, and until about fifty years ago it was the only type. The college of liberal arts is a distinctly American institution. Its record con- stitutes one of the brightest pages of our country's history, and its contribution to our national life in statesmanship, in scholarly achievements, and in moral and spiritual uplift has been excelled by the fruits of no other type of institution to this day. But with the marvelous development of the public high schools on the one hand and the equally marvelous development of technical and professional schools on the other, there has come to the minds of many friends of education a question as to the further need of the four-year college of liberal arts. There are those who say that the day of the separately organized college has passed; that it has served a good purpose and done its work, and should now be re- placed by other types of institutions better adapted to the condi- tions and spirit of our time. It is certain that the college will be shown no favors. It will have to stand the test of real useful- ness, which is today the criterion of value, and because of value, of existence also. There are many and powerful forces at work in America today classifying our educational institutions-a process which will result in the elimination of those that are not able to stand the required test. It will be increasingly difficult for those schools that are not able to come up to the full standard to maintain even the standards that they have had in the past. In educational matters today it is becoming literally true that "to every one that hath shall be given and from him that hath not shall be taken away even that which he hath." The great flood of these mighty forces 384 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION is rapidly rising around our institutions of learning, and unless the signs of the times are misleading, some of them are about to be lifted from their foundations and swept away into oblivion. In other words, when the need for certain schools or certain types of schools no longer exists, or when these schools no longer ade- quately meet the needs that do exist, then they are bound to be short-lived because of the keen competition of these strenuous days. If the college of liberal arts is to continue to appeal successfully for adequate financial support, without which it will surely die, it must be able to show reason for its existence and adequate grounds for its claim upon life in the future. The college is being called upon as never before to give an account of itself, and its place in the future will depend upon whether or not it can do so con- vincingly. It can do so, if at all, only by showing that it is ac- complishing a work that no other type of institution is doing, and that it is doing that work better than any other type of institution can do it. If the college can show this to be true, then its place in the future will be secure, as its record in the past has been honorable. Let us consider briefly a few of the suggestions that have been proposed by those who do not regard the four-year college of liberal arts as an essential feature of our educational system. Let us consider first the proposal that the high-school course be ex- panded to include the first two years of college, and that at the end of this six-year period the student enter at once upon his technical or professional training in the university. This sugges- tion, of course, means the complete elimination of the college as a distinct institution, and what is of even greater importance, the elimination also of the ideals for which the college stands. This suggestion that the high school take over the first two years of college work has been repeatedly made during the past twenty- five years, but until recently no extensive movement has resulted front the agitation. I should be sorry to see the high schools, as such, attempt to take up this work. From the point of view of preparing students for college, our high schools today are not meet- ing the demands made upon them. The great majority have neither the equipment nor the teachers, and none of them have either the FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 385 spirit or the method to furnish what a well-equipped college can offer in its first two years. In large centers of population where money is available for the separate organization of junior colleges in connection with public school systems, there is every reason to encourage the mul- tiplication of local opportunities for higher work. I also believe that many institutions that carry the name "college" without pos- sessing resources sufficient to offer substantial college work should become junior colleges and limit their efforts to the first two years. But the establishment of a separately organized junior college, whether as part of the public school system or as a separate insti- tution supported by gifts, is a very different thing from merely expanding the high school course with the hope of covering the first two years of college work. The Biennial Survey of Higher Education, published last year by the Bureau of Education at Washington, contains the following summary of the purposes of junior colleges: "It is the purpose of such institutions to render educational service along three lines. First, presentation of a liberal arts course of two years which will lead to entrance to the junior year in col- lege or university; second, conduct of two years of professional or pre-professional courses; and, third, offering two-year completion courses for those who do not desire to secure a degree or to lead professional lives." I find myself in hearty sympathy with the third of these ob- jectives. I can also see a large field for its work in connection with the second objective. I feel convinced that it is a mistake for it to attempt the first. The exceptional student, for whom the college of liberal arts is designed, should be encouraged to select a strong institution at the very beginning, and should be given the benefit of the full four years of regular college opportunities. I feel particularly convinced that the college needs of the so-called poor boy should not be met by purely local opportunities. On the average the children from the less privileged homes who desire a college train- ing are a much more highly selected group than those who come from the more privileged homes. From the standpoint of the wel- 386 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION fare of society as a whole, such students should be given the very best the college has to offer. These unusual minds should be brought into early contact with the most capable and inspiring teachers. They are the ones who will profit most by such oppor- tunities. The problem of the poor boy should not be solved by sending him to a poor college. The needs of these students could be met more adequately if the smaller communities would estab- lish scholarships for the purpose of encouraging unusually prom- ising young men and women to go to well-established colleges elsewhere rather than burden their citizens with heavy taxes to maintain an unsatisfactory substitute for a real college. The junior-college movement has been encouraged by the at- tempt on the part of many educational leaders in recent years to split the four-year college of liberal arts into two sections by driv- ing a wedge between the sophomore and junior years. President Harper of the University of Chicago was probably the most in- fluential advocate of this system. The working out of this plan inevitably changes the essential character of a college of liberal arts. In a true college of this type the natural break comes at the end of the freshman rather than at the end of the sophomore year. This fact is coming to be recognized by many institutions, for ex- ample, Yale University, in the special arrangements they are mak- ing for the handling of freshmen. High school graduates are coming to college for the most part without satisfactory preparation for college work. This situation may as well be recognized frankly by making the work of the freshman year a continuation of the work of the high school. In view of the unequal opportunities provided by high schools in different localities, entrance require- ments should not be too strict nor should they be too rigidly en- forced. Final judgment upon a student should be deferred until the end of his freshman year. At this time he should be required to pass a comprehensive examination, both oral and written. This examination, supplemented by his year's record as a freshman, together with such help as may be had from intelligence tests and other appraisals of his capacity and qualities of character, should furnish a more satisfactory basis for determining his fitness for college work than any method now in vogue. FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 387 In so far as a junior college attempts to do college work, it should be limited to this first year, and standard colleges might well refuse to give credit beyond the first year for work done in any institution that is not able to offer full opportunities for the bachelor's degree. If this policy were adopted, the work of the three upper years could be arranged as a unit and methods could be employed that would be hopeless if used under present conditions. This proposal leads us to a second suggestion that has been made for modifying the four-year college of liberal arts, namely to compress its work into three years. Clark College, Worcester, Massachusetts, is an example of this type of institution. It regu- larly grants an A.B. degree in three years. The experiment here has been tried under the most favorable conditions and under the leadership of admirably qualified men; but no great enthusiasm has resulted from the experiment and there seems to be no tendency whatever on the part of colleges generally to yield a particle in the matter of the four-year requirement. If some sure method could be devised for selecting students of superior ability, and if these came with adequate preparation for college work, including satisfactory language training and a genuine desire for what the colleges have to offer, three years would doubtless be sufficient for accomplishing all that the degree of A.B. now represents, without lowering present standards. Under present conditions, however, the freshman year is necessary to identify those of college caliber and to complete their preparation for work of college grade. A third proposed method of dealing with the problem is to combine three years of liberal arts with one year of professional training and grant an A.B. for this four-year combination. The temptations to this plan are more alluring in colleges associated with universities than in those separately organized, although there have been many instances of agreements of this sort between col- leges and universities. For example, twenty-odd years ago the institution which I serve had arrangements with the medical schools of Harvard, Northwestern, and Minnesota by which our men would leave us at the end of our junior year and after completing the first year of the medical course at the University would be given our bachelor's degree. Harvard at that time had the nominal re- 388 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION quirement of an A.B. for entrance into its medical school. When President Eliot learned of the arrangement he disapproved, with the result that it was discontinued. President Eliot said in effect that the arrangement was a subterfuge, and that men who had had only three years of college work were not college graduates and were not entitled either to the degree or to entrance into pro- fessional courses based upon the degree. Following this incident, we, of our own accord, discontinued the arrangements with North- western and with the University of Minnesota. The plan stood as an open invitation to our men to leave us at the end of three years, and the results of the brief experiment were altogether un- satisfactory. Carleton's degree now stands squarely for four years of liberal arts work. The question presents itself at this point as to whether or not a college with such ideals and such purposes should admit part- time students. There are doubtless some students who enter col- lege who do not have the capacity to profit by what the college has to offer. It would be folly to encourage them to attempt to complete their course. It is impossible to identify them with certainty at the beginning, and the work of the first year in college seems the only adequate way of sifting out those who can profit by the instruction of the later years. No college should exact from any student a promise to stay the full four years. Many ought not to stay. Some should never have come. But what of the capable student who plans to come for only part of a course? Some feel that he should be admitted even if he has definite plans to leave the institution at the end of the first year or two. They argue that the plans of a freshman are seldom final, and that if he be given the opportunities of a college for a year or two, it is more than likely that he will respond to what he finds and com- plete the course. Doubtless this is true in many instances. There are many students who come to college with definite plans to leave at the end of the freshman or sophomore year but who, nevertheless, come to be gripped with the ideals of the institution and complete their course. One of the arguments against admitting these part- time students is the fact of their influence upon other students, neu- tralizing in part the influence of the college, with the result that FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 389 when such a student leaves at the end of a year or two, he is quite likely to persuade two or three others to go with him. A college cannot accomplish its full purpose with the average student in less than four years, and any college that has a majority of its students for only part of the time cannot do for the four-year men what an institution with a majority of full-time students can do. If I were asked to assist a prospective student in selecting a college, I should strongly advise him to inquire how large a percentage of its students a given college graduates and, other things being equal, I should advise him to go to the college that graduates the largest percentage of those who enter. Such an institution is able to maintain scholarly standards of a far higher level than ungraded colleges that are willing to do the miscellaneous work required by irregular students. A college with a large majority of four-year students is also able to maintain a richer and more inspiring atmosphere than other types of schools; the incidental phases of its life are more significant. What I mean finds illustration in the difference in the English that one learns in a six-months course at a business college and the use of his mother tongue that he acquires by years of residence at Oxford. Merely to live at Oxford is to learn to speak English well. G. Stanley Hall has well emphasized the importance of the indirect educational influ- ences of a college. He says, "The best education is not that which comes with effort from direct attention and application, but there is an unconscious education, which is much more important, and which is carried on in the penumbral regions of the mind. This environmental education needs more time." This statement from Dr. Hall not only buttresses the argument for the four-year course, but it also sounds a note of warning to the college that it should jealously guard that intangible something that we call its atmosphere, in order that the influences that affect the marginal regions of the students' minds may be influences sat- urated with scholarly ideals and earnestness of spirit. Furthermore, I think it may justly be maintained that it is in the last two years, and not in the first two, that a college accom- plishes its purpose with a student, and creates within him its dis- tinctive ideal. It is not in connection with freshman mathematics, 390 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION or the beginning languages, or elementary sciences, that a college finds its real opportunity. The work of these first years is largely a preparation for what the college has to offer in the years that follow. It is only when the student begins to delve into philosophy and economics and the social sciences, and when he begins to under- stand the natural sciences in their implications, and has developed a real taste for literature and something of prospective in history- it is only then that his personal philosophy of life begins intelli- gently to take on final form. If the colleges of liberal arts, both in the university and outside, cannot develop citizens of broader outlook and deeper sympathies than other types of institutions can do, then they fail of their chief function, and there is little hope of their permanent existence. But I believe there is a difference, and I am convinced that the difference is shown chiefly in those who have taken the full course and have become the children of their Alma Mater, and not by those who have joined the college household temporarily. Any college in taking a student does so with the hope that ulti- mately the student will come to represent the ideals for which the college stands, and every genuine college in the country desires to graduate the great majority of her students and have them perma- nently for her children. The sentiments and loyalties that cluster around an alumni relationship to a college that has really inspired and given one a start are among the most significant and satisfying influences that can ever possess a man. They constitute the chief asset of a college and are a lasting blessing to the graduate himself. But four years' time is not the only condition of a satisfactory college course. The content of the course is of equal importance. During the past twenty-five years there has been continuous discus- sion as to what our high schools and colleges should teach. There has been a feeling that too much of our teaching is poorly adapted to the needs of the students and does not fit them for their life work. The subjects are not practical, it is held, and the feeling in many quarters is strong that they should be replaced by others more nearly related to the demands of everyday life. There can be no objection to the various forms of industrial and vocational education, which have been so splendidly developed in FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 391 recent years. Underlying any permanent social structure are the great economic necessities for physical well-being, which must be provided if there is to be any society at all. The result of this unal- terable necessity is the further necessity that the vast majority of any population must be employed in production industries and the trades. The changes that the last few decades have brought about in our high school and college courses have been inevitable, in view of the spirit and emphasis of our times, and perhaps for the most part wise. I feel in sympathy with the present-day efforts of the high school to concern itself more with the great majority who go out to their life work without further training, than with the com- paratively few who go on to college. I believe the day is past when our high schools can be regarded merely as fitting schools for col- lege. They have become great training schools for the people, and institutions where the children of all classes may receive such in- struction as shall make them intelligent citizens and lay a broad foundation for their work in industry and the trades. For this reason I believe in the introduction into our high schools of manual training and of agriculture, of the commercial courses and domestic science. It is well that the training of the hand and of the eye be united with the training of the mind, and it is well, too, that boys and girls be taught to recognize the dignity of labor and the value of honest toil. But in our effort to make our training practical, let us not forget to make it worth while. Life is more than meat, and the body than raiment. While I believe that students should be taught to make their living, and that any education is a failure that leaves them dependent on others for support, I also believe that at least a few, drawn from all ranks and conditions of society-no distinctions of wealth or social standing here-should be given a higher education, whose value cannot be measured in dollars and cents, and which those who have it would never barter for silver nor gold. One sometimes wonders whether there is not a great deal of educational machinery today with but little educational motive back of it. The motive in too many cases is economic and industrial, and not educational and cultural. The aim is to increase industrial 392 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION efficiency and not to develop human worth. It is not enough that students be put in possession of facts, nor that they be trained in some profession that will bring them a living. An education means more than that. It fails of its, most important purpose if it does not inspire the student with a belief in the ideal values of life and a loyalty to them; if it does not enable him to understand the social order of which he is a part and develop in him a feeling of respon- sibility for its welfare; if it does not bring him to consider his rela- tions to the universe and to feel himself in sympathy with the heart of the world. It is the very genius of education to ripen and bring to full fruition the native powers of men and women, and to increase their love and loyalty to the truth. Whatever fails in this, whatever leaves them with their powers still latent, their lives circumscribed and cramped; whatever limits their horizon or narrows their sym- pathies or neglects their character is not education in the full mean- ing of the term. The time is coming in this country when what we shall need most is not men of greater industrial or economic efficiency, but men and women of greater insight into human values; not so much people capable of producing more wealth, as people capable of directing their fellows in the wise and worthy expenditure of the wealth already gained. Hence I cannot regard as progress that disposition which would gage the value of all studies in terms of their money- getting power, nor which holds that the chief business of higher education is to increase the economic value and money-earning capacity of its students. There has been a tendency in recent years to deny the educa- tional importance of certain parts of the historic curriculum and to declare that there is no inherent difference in the educational value of various studies, providing they are equally well taught. But these declarations, even when voiced by distinguished educators, do not carry with them the proof of their contention. The only ade- quate test of the permanent value of any subject is the test of its bearing on the lives of those who are influenced by it, and no single generation is able fully to apply this test or to pronounce a final verdict on the problem. With all due allowance for the undoubted advantages that have FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 393 been introduced by recent changes in our courses, I cannot help admiring the curriculum of the older colleges. From the standpoint of the work they undertook to do in training a few men to be leaders in letters, in statesmanship, and in the professions, the older colleges were a splendid success. Their course centered in the ancient lan- guages, Latin, Greek, and to a certain extent, Hebrew. These three languages put the student in touch with the best that the ancient past had to offer, and helped him to understand and to appreciate the three nations of antiquity which have had most to do with mould- ing and shaping the thoughts and institutions of modern times. Next to the languages, philosophy occupied the place of honor. Students endeavored to grasp the underlying principles of the world and of human life. To gain a true philosophy of life and an under- standing of its deeper meaning-such was their effort, and it brought its reward. After the languages and philosophy, rhetoric and public speak- ing were their chief concern. Debates and arguments were frequent and gave the student a good training in marshaling his thoughts and expressing them in a natural and forceful way. Some attention was also given to elementary mathematics and a little time to science, chiefly botany and astronomy. Looked at from the standpoint of the instruction offered in our modern colleges, the old course seems narrow and restricted. It did not make any attempt to cover the whole field of human knowl- edge. That was not its purpose. It did not have a university ideal. The course was not rich in content nor was it calculated to make the student familiar with the learning of the world; but it did put him in possession of himself and it did train him to think and to judge, and to rely on his own judgment. It consisted of a few sub- jects chosen from the whole realm of knowledge, selected not for their own sake but for their value in the training of men. These few subjects were well organized and well applied and the boy got the benefit of what there was. What they did they did well, and it was performance rather than opportunity that constituted the distinguishing mark of the early colleges, as contrasted with the emphasis upon opportunity and so little upon performance, so char- acteristic of the colleges and universities of our day. The old course 394 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION was simple, compact, effective. What it lacked in breadth it more than made up in intensity, and as an instrument of intellectual and moral training, it has never yet been excelled. I do not advocate a return to the rigid course of the older col- leges, but I do believe that the ideals they cherished are fundamental ideals and that the qualities they developed are permanent pos- sessions of educated people everywhere. The basis of such a course is the languages, and it would seem that every student should have considerable knowledge of at least two, one ancient and one modern. The method of acquiring this knowledge gives the student invaluable mental discipline, and there is no surer way of developing insight and appreciation of any civilization than by learning its language. The second great group of liberal arts subjects comprises the philosophical and social disciplines. These attempt to give the student some understanding of the relations that exist among per- sons: the social sciences, the persons comprising human society; and the philosophical sciences, the personality of the universe with all that that pregnant phrase implies. This should include some general knowledge of the conclusions of the outstanding thinkers of our race on these great themes and some training also of the student for fresh thought on his own part. The third group represents the facts of nature and attempts to give the student practical instruction as to how he should behave in the presence of these facts, so that nature may help and not hinder him in his progress. These three aspects of a liberal arts curriculum are about equally important, and the disposition to allow the student to spe- cialize in one to the neglect of either or both of the others, such as the open elective system permits, has proven unwise and even its extreme advocates have given it up, while the disposition to substitute professional or technical subjects in place of these lib- eralizing disciplines has defeated the purpose of liberal arts and has turned out specialists rather than broadly educated men. The most serious criticism that is being lodged against the col- lege today does not relate to its ideals but to its accomplishments. It is said that students as a matter of fact do not really do the work prescribed nor realize the benefits of the ideals professed. I have FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 395 a good deal of patience with criticism of this sort because I believe that much of it is justified. It does not call in question the purpose or aim of a college, but only whether or not the college is actually successful in making its aim effective. I have a very strong suspi- cion that there is too little rather than too much work in most of our American colleges, and "a good time" is altogether too prone to take the place of scholarly interests and intellectual achievements. The essential framework of a college course is a genuine mastery of the subjects offered, and old-fashioned grinding is still the method of accomplishment. The aim of a college is just as definite as that of any profes- sional school. That aim is to develop the student with respect to all his capacities into a mature, symmetrical, well-balanced person, in full possession of all his powers, physical, social, mental, and spiritual, with an intelligent understanding of the past and a sym- pathetic insight into the needs and problems of the present. I would use the word "culture" to define what I mean if that term were not so much misused that many people with red blood in their veins have come to feel a repugnance for it. I am not advocating that pseudo-culture which is too refined to concern itself with the things of real life and too haughty and too supercilious to keep in touch and in sympathy with common men. A college train- ing should broaden a man's sympathies and deepen his purpose to serve the common good. It should create in a student a disposition to face facts squarely, whatever they may be, and the ability prop- erly to appreciate and evaluate them when found. It should enable him to recognize and to test his own prejudices; it should keep him open-minded and tolerant in his attitude toward others, and at the same time enable him to anchor himself to the truth because he is able to detect its outlines and trace its leadings. He will be able to live worthily in the present because he understands the past. He will be in possession of convictions based on the experiences of the race, and not be unsettled and blown about by every utopian wind stirred up by those who would cure the world's ills in a day. At a time like this, when there is so much uncertainty in public life, when social standards are changing, and religious convictions are unsettled, at such a time what we need most of all is men and 396 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION women of leadership, wise, sane, well-balanced people in every department of life--men and women who shall be able to steady and to reassure, and to lead on unfailingly to higher things. I do not maintain that the training of these leaders is the exclu- sive work of the college, but I do believe that it is its most impor- tant work, and that our colleges will fail in doing for society today what their prototypes did for our fathers of old, if they fail in this supremely important function of training a few people who shall be to their fellows trustworthy guides and interpreters of the finer and higher meaning of life. But for this purpose, a mere course of study is not enough. The influence and power of a college depend not only, nor chiefly, upon the kind of courses offered. It is not so much what is taught as by whom that counts in training a boy for the service of his time. Someone has said that the most important part of a university is its library and the most important part of a college is its faculty. Whether or not we fully agree with this contrast, it certainly points out an important difference in emphasis between the two types of institutions. Here again one discovers the source of much of the power of the early colleges. The character of the early teachers has chal- lenged the admiration of succeeding generations. They were not for the most part men of eminent scholarship, although they were well trained and familiar with the school learning of their time. They were men in whom the spirit of self-sacrifice was strong. It was not in financial returns that they looked for their reward. Most of them had but the scantiest living for their labors. But in strength of character, in loyalty to convictions, in faith in ideals, and in devotion to the work of developing these in the mind and character of the growing boy-in all these respects the early teacher continues and always will continue to challenge the respect and the admira- tion of all to whom character and ideals are a concern. The gifts which the early colleges had for their students were imparted through the human touch of such men as these. Each of his pupils was to the teacher a great leader in embryo, whose use- fulness in the future would depend upon his fidelity in the days of preparation, and for whose faithfulness during these days the FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 397 teacher held himself personally responsible. And it was more than a mere academic responsibility that he carried. His teaching was a service performed as unto God. To train men for the service of God and leadership among their fellowmen, that they might serve as seers and saviors of society-this was the work to which the early teachers gave themselves with full heart. It was this direct personal touch, day after day for four years, with men of solid character, strong convictions, and great hearts that was the secret of the effectiveness of the early colleges. It is the lack of this per- sonal touch that is the secret of the ineffectiveness of so much of our college and university teaching today. One of our chief mistakes today is that we take too much for granted on the part of the students. Growth in intellect and char- acter is not sudden but gradual; a boy does not become a man in a day. There is an intermediate period during which he needs to be treated by methods which are neither those of the high school on the one hand nor of the university proper on the other. It is with this transition period that the college is especially fitted to deal. The fundamental thing about this type of college is the person- ality of the teacher. This implies that teachers and students shall be given opportunity actually to know each other. Education, after all, is an individual affair, and real teaching cannot be done at arm's length. Only the exceptional student is alive to his own best interests and is steadily and strongly inspired from within. The majority need the stimulus of external pressure and the encourage- ment and inspiration that come from the teacher's personal touch. It is not enough that a boy be given the opportunity to learn. The average boy has not the vision to see his opportunity nor strength to follow it alone. He needs the direction and discipline of a strong guide and the encouragement and uplift of a sympathetic friend. The strength of a college lies in the character of the men who are its teachers, and the value of a college training to a student depends upon how much of a teacher's life gets into his own. This implies that a teacher shall have a real opportunity to influence his students and that the influence when exerted shall be of the right sort. I trust that I have made clear my reasons for at least three 398 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION convictions: first, that the full period of four years is necessary for a college to accomplish its purpose in the life of a student; second, that a college should confine its curriculum strictly to the field of liberal arts; and, third, that its effectiveness is dependent almost entirely upon securing strong men of the right spirit for its faculty. Before closing I wish to discuss briefly a fourth topic, which seems to me important as we contemplate the future of the college of liberal arts, namely, its size. How large should a model college be? In the parlance of recent years this type of institution has come to be known very generally as "the small college." There are some who glory in the adjective and who feel that a college with comparatively few students has a distinct advantage over larger institutions, no matter what their type. I want to suggest a few considerations which seem to me important in their bearing on the question of the size of a college. In the first place, a college should be large enough to warrant at least two teachers in every department of instruction. When a teacher is left alone in a department, he is almost sure to miss the professional stimulus needed to keep him at his best, and he cer- tainly misses the professional companionship that helps so greatly in keeping the ideals of his department fresh and vigorous in his interests. I have a suspicion, perhaps without a full basis of fact, that there is a lot of poor teaching done in many colleges without anybody's knowing very much about it. I believe it to be altogether possible for a teacher, living his professional life in isolation, actu- ally to become a fossil without anybody's knowing that the life has gone out of him until a long time after the transmutation has taken place. A teacher needs the competition, the stimulus, and the inspiration that only professional companionship can bring. Furthermore, a college should be large enough to offer a student a variety of courses sufficiently representative of the important interests of life to enable him to discover his own tastes and ade- quately to test his own capabilities. It is now pretty generally agreed, as I have already pointed out, that unrestricted freedom in electing courses is of questionable value to the average student; but it is equally clear that any limitation that may be imposed should FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 399 not be made necessary by the limitations of the institution itself. To make a virtue of any such necessity is to enthrone insincerity and to becloud our thinking with considerations of practical com- pulsion. Whether a particular institution can afford to offer a wide variety of courses is one question, but it is an entirely different question as to what is really desirable and what is needed to accom- plish the very best results. Another consideration that should have weight in forming an opinion as to how large a college should be is the matter of build- ings, library and laboratory equipment, and other material supplies. A college needs a certain quantity of material equipment if it is to do first-class work. It must possess first of all an adequate library. Probably not less than 100,000 volumes could be regarded as fairly representing the various fields with which a college of liberal arts concerns itself. A college must also have laboratories; the various fields of scientific interest cannot be disclosed to the student except in connection with experiments and demonstrations, which require a lot of expensive apparatus. The physical develop- ment and welfare of young people also place upon a college the responsibility for providing gymnasium facilities that are adequate for all kinds of systematic and intelligent exercise in order that the causes of physical defects may be disclosed and the student enabled to develop and command his own physical resources. No institution that is conspicuously lacking in any of these facilities can rightfully claim to be offering its students opportuni- ties for a first-class college education. On the other hand, if an institution has these advantages in fair proportions it will probably be able, as far as material equipment is concerned, to admit five hundred students as well as two or three hundred. A college would scarcely be justified in having such an equipment for a much smaller service than would be represented by a student body of five hundred. Another factor that must not be lost sight of in our thoughts about the size of a college is the question of the complexity of its life. The meaning of every man's life is to be found in the relation- ships it sustains, and the importance of any life may be measured in terms of the number and significance of these relationships. The process of establishing these relationships is well under way when 400 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION a boy comes to college, and the college situation should be complex enough to be fairly representative of the world for whose life the boy is to be trained. The Duke of Wellington is said to have testi- fied that the Battle of Waterloo was really won on the football field at Rugby. It is the pressure of an institution as a whole that really molds its students, and the type of men it turns out is the resultant of many and complex forces. I would not for a moment subordinate the curriculum to so-called college activities; but I do believe that these activities have a very proper place among the forces that produce men, and that the task of college administration is properly to direct and utilize these "outside activities," rather than, by abol- ishing them, to discard what is of tremendous potential value. If all this were otherwise, then a monastery or a private tutor would provide the ideal conditions for education; but slow-got experience has rendered a different verdict. But if a representative program of student activities is to be maintained, then a student body of some size is altogether essential. Strange as it may seem, the life of an individual student is apt to be more complex in a small institution than in a large one; and he is frequently burdened with a load of activities, which are not for his own good but which he, with a few others, must carry if the normal lines of student enterprise are to be represented in his col- lege. A student body of one hundred and fifty boys is not large enough, without undue pressure upon individuals, to support foot- ball, basketball, baseball, track work, literary societies, intercol- legiate oratory and debate, glee club, orchestra and chorus work, the college choir, and the Y. M. C. A. These activities are all help- ful and right in proper proportions; but when they are loaded on a student as a burden for him to carry, not primarily for his own good but to add glory to the name of his college, then we go from where the college is a help to the student to where the student's welfare is sacrified for the college. The only satisfactory solution is to have a student body large enough to support such a variety of activities as will meet the needs and tastes of all types of students without becoming a burden upon any one of them. A final point to consider regarding the size of a college is the FUTURE OF THE LIBERAL ARTS COLLEGE 401 question of internal organization. Here we discover that a co- educational institution is in a somewhat different situation from a college that admits only one sex. A coeducational college is obliged to provide a double scheme of administration heading up in a dean of men and a dean of women, and many phases of its work center around this twofold organization. It would seem, therefore, that a coeducational institution may very properly be twice the size of a college which admits only men or women, and still maintain, for each division of its work, about the same general conditions as exist in a man's college or a woman's college of half the number. Having in mind, then, the above considerations, I think it fair to say that an institution with less than five hundred students may be regarded as incomplete. It is still in the process of growing as an institution, and is not able to offer to its students the full-rounded opportunities available in an institution that is fully established. Whether a college should admit more than five hundred students is a question that every institution must answer for itself, and will depend upon the actual demands that its constituency makes upon it. The thing to be guarded against here is not to expand faster than is warranted by new funds. It is commonly agreed that certain general relationships should hold within a college, such as one teacher for every ten students, recitation exercises to be limited to thirty, laboratory sections to fifteen, that no teacher be expected to teach more than a limited number of hours per week. If a col- lege of limited resources is able to provide these advantages for five hundred students, it would be a serious blunder to admit addi- tional students in such numbers as would lower these standards and weaken its educational effectiveness. A college is justified in limit- ing its enrollment to such numbers as will enable it to preserve its highest educational efficiency and to provide for its students an individual training that comes only through personal touch. But if a college can secure the funds to preserve all this, and is called upon by its constituency to expand its work, I can see no reasonable objection to eight hundred or a thousand students, or even more. After an institution has become a full-fledged college, such as is represented by a student body of about five hundred, it 402 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION need not thereafter seek additional students for its own sake, and the question of numbers becomes entirely a matter of quantity of service for its constituency. But let it always be insisted that the institution remain a col- lege in spirit and that its chief interest center in the student and not in knowledge as such. There is a fundamental difference be- tween interest in knowledge for its own sake and the use of knowl- edge as an instrument of intellectual and moral discipline. Upon this fundamental distinction is founded the difference between a college and a university. The preserving of a college atmosphere is not primarily a question of numbers, but concerns the spirit of the men who teach. To sum up the question of size in a final word, we may say this: In order to present to its students a situation sufficiently complex to be fairly representative of the important interests of life, without loading them with individual programs too complex for their good, a college needs about five hundred students. With less than this an institution is not likely to possess the pressure or prestige or the equipment to produce the best results, and too large a share of its strength is likely to be expended in efforts to build itself up. Whether or not a college should admit more than five hundred students is a local question and depends upon the demands of its constituency. It should, however, resist the tempta- tion to expand faster than is warranted by new funds enabling it to maintain its standards, and it should never forget that the great objective of all its work is not knowledge as such, but men. The four-year liberal arts college is America's unique contribu- tion to the educational organization of the world. Its ideals were never more needed than now; and in the improvement of under- graduate work, both in colleges connected with universities and in those separately organized, lies our greatest hope for educational advancement. XXXII. CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL EARL HUDELSON Professor of Education, University of Minnesota SIGNIFICANCE OF THE PROBLEM The question of class size is significant for several reasons. The most obvious is cost. The greatest single determinant of educa- tional expense, from the kindergarten through the university, is the cost of instruction. The major factors involved in instructional costs are salary schedule and teaching load. Teaching load in- cludes hours of teaching and numbers of students. As these factors are ordinarily administered today, class size is the greatest single variable determinant of educational cost. Increasing the size of classes, then, offers an obvious and tempting means to immediate educational economy. But educational economy does not necessarily imply lower edu- cational expense; it may mean a wiser allocation of funds. If larger classes prove feasible in all subjects and under all instruc- tors, then, obviously, total costs should decrease; but larger classes in certain subjects may only release funds for departments in which large sections are impracticable, or the funds may be used to attract better instructors or for more adequate facilities. The promise of lower total expenditure is not necessarily implicit in any investigation of class size. A less obvious but probably no less significant aspect of the problem is the relation of class size to educational opportunity. The school is indeed fortunate that can boast of more than a few great teachers. A very small proportion of the students, there- fore, have an opportunity of coming under the influence of great leaders. This unintentional discrimination is hardly consistent with our ideal of equal opportunity; but it appears to be inevitable as long as small classes prevail. If it could be proved that all, or even some, of these master teachers can learn to handle large classes as effectively, or even nearly as effectively, as they handle small ones, a higher percentage of students could come into their rightful edu- cational heritage. Even if only certain courses, or particular parts 404 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION of courses, were found to be adaptable to bigger classes, the effects of the enlarged influence of great teachers might be incalculable. Moreover, larger classes would effect economies that would enable institutions to hold their great teachers and attract others. Emerson visioned these possibilities when he said: My college should have Allston, Greenough, Bryant, Irving, Webster, Alcott, summoned for its domestic professors. And if I must send abroad (and, if we send for dancers and singers and actors, why not at the same prices for scholars?), Carlyle, Hallam, Campbell, should come and read lectures on History, Poetry, Let- ters. I would bid my men come for the love of God and man, promising them an open field and a boundless opportunity, and they should make their own terms. Then I would open my lecture- rooms to the wide nation; and they should pay, each man, a fee that should give my professor a remuneration fit and noble.' Then I should see the lecture-room, the college, filled with life and hope. Students would come from afar; for who would not ride a hundred miles to hear some of these men giving his selectest thoughts to those who received them with joy? I should see living learning; the Muse once more in the eye and cheek of the youth. Closely related to this problem is that of instructional emphasis. At the University of Minnesota, for example, approximately 85 per cent of the teaching in the Arts College is being done in the junior-college courses. This means that less than one-fifth of the resources of this college are available for instruction at a truly university level. The facilities of the physical plant and the energies of the faculty are being usurped by students before they reach the senior college. As long as the unprecedented number of freshmen who surge over our university campuses each fall continue to be assigned to classes of thirty or less, there seems to be no relief from this disturbing situation. A fourth respect in which class size is of vital importance re- lates to the improvement of instruction. Probably the most signifi- cant trend in higher education today is its growing disposition to attack its own educational problems scientifically. Colleges and uni- versities, following the lead of elementary and secondary schools, * A few years ago the faculty of a private college in America, seeing no other prospect of obtaining salaries sufficient to meet the increased cost of living, voluntarily inaugurated a policy of larger classes. CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL are becoming laboratories wherein attempts are being made to de- termine experimentally the best administrative and instructional techniques. The University of Minnesota is playing a prominent part in this movement. Under the guidance of the Committee on Educational Research many instructors are investigating their own classroom problems. Now, this kind of teaching takes time. Just as the modern medical specialist devotes more time to research than to practice or consultation, so should the modern instructor have time to de- termine inductively his best ways of teaching. Many an instructor, burning with a vision of better service, is too busy to do more than behold the vision. Many who are cognizant of their opportunities for professional self-improvement are too heavily scheduled to seize the opportunities. Larger classes offer a possible means of relief. It may well be that the direst losses that could possible accrue from larger classes would be more than compensated for by af- fording conscientious, competent, open-minded instructors a part of each day for introspection and modest research. There is a growing sentiment that senior colleges and univer- sities should put away childish things and begin to cultivate in their students initiative and a sense of responsibility. The spoon- fed diet is coming to be considered too soft for the proper condi- tioning of upper-classmen and graduate students. Compulsion is giving way to the practice of offering the student facilities and expert guidance and then insisting that he do a little thinking for himself. President Aydelotte of Swarthmore, a pioneer in this movement, sums it up by saying: I think the most important feature of the whole honor system, as it is being worked out in this country, is the fact that it puts more responsibility on the student. We think too much about ef- fective methods of teaching and not enough about effective methods of learning. No matter how good our teaching may be, each student must take the responsibility for his own education, and the sooner he finds that out the better for him.2 Apropos of the r6le of the instructor, an article in the Robbins College Bulletin contends that "if the student has been faithful and 2 Quoted in What the Colleges Are Doing, No. 25, May, 1927. (Boston: Ginn and Company. 405 406 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION learned his lesson, then manifestly he has learned without the aid of the teacher. If he has been unfaithful and has not learned his lesson, then it is too late to learn in the recitation period. In either case the professor plays a minimum part in the student's mental progress."3 A review of their publications reveals that over a hundred colleges and universities in the United States are com- mitted to the principle of growing up and of demanding that their students grow up with them. A prevalent reason for opposing large classes is that instructors cannot "get over" the class. Getting over usually means quizzing. Small classes, then, are better adapted to the paradoxical practice of having the teacher who, supposedly, knows quiz the students who, theoretically, are there to learn from him! Yet the majority of these same instructors favor putting students more upon their own re- sponsibilities. Many students, too, particularly those with initiative and independence, chafe under conformity, compulsion, and strict accounting. They claim that large classes afford them more of the freedom and individual responsibility which their instructors profess to believe in but fail to demand in small classes. This is the issue that prompted Professors Erikson and Buchta of this University to inject into their series of class-size experiments in physics4 varying amounts of student-initiative and teacher-coercion. In the report of his initial experiment Professor Erikson said: The question of coercion, personal and otherwise, in educational matters is, of course, one of great importance. In the earlier school years there can be no question as to its necessity. When it comes to college or university, there can still be no question as to the necessity for the degree of coercion that is exerted through exam- inations. There is, however, a question in this case as to the advisability of daily personal coercion. May it not be that the com- munity is better served by providing higher educational facilities only for those individuals to whom coercion is not necessary because of an inborn desire or hunger? Is it not quite likely that the slogan should be "Self-Education" and that the function of a university is to provide facilities that will be an incentive to self-education and ' What the Colleges Are Doing. 4 See complete report, Class Size at the University Level, to be pub- lished by the University of Minnesota Press. CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL that will, furthermore, make self-education more possible? Is it not probable that even now self-education is actually a more im- portant factor than is commonly supposed; that the influence and aid of the instructor, though indispensable, are supplementary rather than predominating, and in many cases at least may be fully as effective en masse? The issue of class size, then, is no mere local, ephemeral, super- ficial whim affecting only the externals of educational organization. Small classes, if they are to be maintained, must justify themselves in terms of the ultimate purposes of education. If they cannot do so they will have to yield to classes that can. Any changes that may come should be prepared for in advance, however, for at any given time the optimum class size is that which produces maximum results with current facilities and under the best techniques of instruction and classroom management that teachers generally know how to use. CLAss-SIZE LIMITATIONS, REAL AND ASSUMPTIVE It would be asinine to contend that there are no real limitations to class size. In situations, for instance, where lecturing is proved to be the best method, the hour is wasted for the student who can- not hear the lecture. If it is necessary to teach by means of visual aids, such devices must be within the range of vision of the class. To say that class size is limited to the number of students that the largest available meeting place will accommodate is simply plati- tudinous. An enforced policy of big classes might preclude that degree of specialization commonly considered the prerogative of upper-classmen and graduates in a modern university. The object of electives would be largely defeated in all but the most populous universities if such offerings were made contingent upon large class enrollments. These limitations are real, practical, serious, and inherent. On the other hand, there is a much greater array of empirical objections to large classes. Some of the reasoning behind these antipathies is manifestly specious, while the soundness of other arguments depends upon conditions. One purpose of the present investigation is to try to determine which conclusions about class size are valid and when and why they are valid. 407 408 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION PREVAILING ATTITUDES AND REASONS THEREFOR Large classes are generally unpopular among university in- structors. Even the most charitable contend that while such classes may be educationally expedient, they are probably never education- ally advantageous. The aversions of a few instructors are so strong as to tax even their emotional equanimity. However unreasonable they may be, these instructors are sincere and their attitude is ac- countable. They themselves were educated in small classes; they either inherited or early acquired the all-but-universal faith in small classes; in so far as they were trained at all they were trained to teach small classes; most of their teaching experience has been with small classes; and their students have fanned their fervor for small classes. Many instructors were trained and have taught in schools where small classes are a feature if not a fetish. If they have since made no effort to adapt their teaching procedures to large-class situations, these instructors may very well be having their best success with small classes. Moreover, in all too many cases large classes are instantly associated with increased teaching loads. To an instructor who, whether in imagination or in reality, is stagger- ing under his present pupil load, the wishing upon him of more students is a weak incentive to experimentation. He is tempted to remind his administrative superiors that one should never stop a man to preach heaven to him when he is running to catch a train, lest he miss both. It is not surprising, therefore, that university instructors, with their training and experience, find it easy to rationalize; nor is it strange that practically no sustained attention has been paid to class size at the university level. But the question is too momentous to be left to personal pre- dilection, and cannot truly be called settled until every reasonable effort has been made to adapt teaching procedures to classes of various sizes, to compare the results under controlled conditions, and to express those results in understandable terms. Moreover, educational efficiency is a relative, not an absolute, matter. The faculty of the University of Minnesota, recognizing its simultaneous obligations to the student and to the state, has submerged its preferences and devoted itself for three years to an attempt to solve the complex problem of class size. CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL HISTORY OF THE INVESTIGATION Several years ago President Coffman appointed a university Com- mittee on Educational Research, consisting of administrative officers and other faculty members specifically interested in the study of university education, to investigate whatever it might conceive to be outstanding educational problems in the University of Minnesota. At least three members of the faculty had already carried on inde- pendently in their courses modest experiments on class size and had found some rather disconcerting indications. These isolated studies and Edmonson's report of his experiment at the University of Michigan had come to the attention and aroused the concern of the Committee on Educational Research. Deciding to encourage further investigations along this line, it appointed, in 1924, a subcommittee on class size. The subcommittee's conception of its functions is indicated in its first report of progress, submitted in December, 1924: The subcommittee on class size believes that its proper duties are to make available a review of the reports of previous investiga- tions; to draw up suggestive experimental techniques for attacking the problems of class size and to make these techniques avail- able to all instructors who may be interested; and to stand ready to advise and assist in the technical aspects of any experiment that may be undertaken. It is felt particularly that the subcommittee may be of service where intelligence tests need to be selected and administered; in pairing students for controlled experiments; where instructors desire to supplement their regular examinations with objective tests; and in the statistical analysis and interpretation of experimental results. The subcommittee did not then contemplate nor has it at any time attempted either coercion or suasion. Every experimental con- tribution to the investigation has been volunteered. The faculty of one department, for instance, having been granted an appropriation for a new building and wishing to know the most efficient size or sizes of classrooms to provide, requested the subcommittee to devise an experimental technique for determining the optimum class size or sizes in that department. The specter of rapidly mounting en- rollments has inspired many of the experiments. Suffice to say, the motives have been practical throughout. 409 410 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION THE PROBLEM ANALYZED Upon careful analysis the problem of class size resolved itself into these major considerations: 1. What is the optimum class size (or sizes) under present meth- ods of instruction and classroom management? 2. If small classes are better, are they enough better to justify the inevitable increase in costs ?5 3. If small classes show little or no advantage over large classes under present methods of instruction and management, can tech- niques be so refined or otherwise modified as to produce results favorable to larger classes ? 4. If students achieve as well, or even nearly as well, in large classes as in small ones, can the continued maintenance of small groups be justified? May there be other important outcomes which can accrue only from small classes? If so, can these be isolated, controlled, and measured? 5. If somewhat larger classes prove to be practicable, how much larger can they be made without loss of efficiency? 6. Do students under present prevailing standards of class size really receive more individualized instruction than can be devised for larger classes? 7. May it be that there are two supplementary but distinct prob- lems-mass instruction on the one hand, on the other, individual or case treatment for students who deviate significantly from the mass in their characteristics and needs ? 8. Under present standards and policies of financial support, how can universities most nearly realize their aims and perform their functions-by reducing the size of classes, or by evolving means of handling larger classes as effectively as possible? 9. Will relative results in large and small classes be the same for all students in all subjects under all teachers and with all methods of instruction? If not, what are the critical factors in class size ? 5 Stevenson found, for example, that it cost Chicago $15.00 per pupil to teach high-school English in large classes to the point represented by a term mark of 77 per cent, whereas it cost $28.00 per pupil to break classes up into small enough groups to raise the average term mark to 78 per cent. See also the cost studies by Erikson and Buchta. CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL 10. If certain instructors are found to be capable of handling large classes effectively, what is there about them or their teaching that enables them to do it ? 11. If certain teaching procedures are found to be peculiarly adapted to large classes, can a sufficient number of instructors be trained to use those procedures? 12. Do the practices necessary to the success of large classes impose unreasonable demands upon teachers or students, or can administrative cooperation obviate or compensate for all unreason- able conditions ? 13. However successful large classes may prove to be in experi- mental situations, are they generally feasible with present facilities and under other existing conditions ? THE PROGRAM OF INVESTIGATION To answer as many as possible of the above questions the sub- committee projected the following program of investigation: 1. To ascertain, by means of a questionnaire, the attitudes of the faculty toward class size and their reasons therefor; the teach- ing methods which they have found to be most successful with large classes; and classroom procedures which, in their opinion, are least suited to large classes. 2. To secure from a representative sampling of students their attitudes toward class size and their reasons therefor; the personal characteristics of instructors who, in the students' opinion, are peculiarly successful large-class teachers; and descriptions of suc- cessful small-class and large-class teaching techniques. 3. To visit the classes and analyze the procedures of reputedly successful large-class instructors. 4. To study trends in class size throughout the University over a period of years. 5. To study the effects of class size upon student achievement as expressed in student marks. 6. To analyze the results of large and small classes conducted under uncontrolled or semicontrolled conditions. 7. To encourage and assist in the prosecution and to analyze the results of as many controlled class-size experiments in as many 411 412 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION colleges or departments and under as many instructors and methods of teaching as possible. 8. To assemble all available evidence on the relation of class size to educational costs. THE REPORT Obviously it is impossible in these few pages to present either a detailed analysis of the results of the investigation or the impli- cations of those results. Moreover, an attempt to cull from a five- hundred-page report on such a ramified problem as class size is not without its dangers. Nevertheless, the urgency of the question justifies the attempt to indicate the scope and nature of the investi- gation and to report briefly a few of its most outstanding and un- equivocal results. The scope is indicated by Table XXIII and by the Table of Contents of the forthcoming complete report; the investigative technique is suggested by the analysis of the problem and the program of investigation; and a few of the most significant findings are given under the various approaches to the question. TABLE OF CONTENTS OF COMPLETE REPORT CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION. Significance of the problem. Class-size limitations, real and assump- tive. Prevailing attitudes toward class size and reasons therefor. History of the investigation. The problem analyzed. The program of investigation. Sources of data. Methods of investigation. CHAPTER II. CRITICAL REVIEW OF PREVIOUS INVESTIGATIONS ON CLASS SIZE. Review. Summary. Recapitulation. Conclusions. CHAPTER III. TRENDS IN ADJUSTMENT TO INCREASED ENROLLMENT. Steps taken to meet the situation. The situation at Minnesota. CHAPTER IV. THE CLASS-SIZE SITUATION AT MINNESOTA. Average size of classes by colleges. Average size of classes by courses. Opportunities for experimentation. Trend in selected courses in the Col- lege of Education. Relation of class size to marks. Variations in class size. Effect of variation in size upon classes sectioned on the basis of abil- ity. Effect of holding the instructor constant. Effect of class size upon mark indexes. Summary. CHAPTER V. STUDENT TESTIMONY. First inquiry. Second inquiry. Third inquiry. Opinions as to limits in class size. Effect of class size upon student marks. Effect upon stu- CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL dents-types favored. Large-class instruction. Qualities of best large-class instructors. Best large-class teaching techniques. Student-teacher con- tacts and student participation. Disadvantages of large classes. Advan- tages of large classes. Administrative and instructional aids. Additional testimony. Professor Buchta's impressions. The first letter. The second letter. Summary of student testimony. CHAPTER VI. FACULTY TESTIMONY. Character of teaching population represented in tabulations. Class-size preferences. Limits in class size. Large-class experience. Experience and preference. Measurement of results. Assistance. Physical conditions. Managerial procedures. Acquaintance with students. Amount of talking done by instructor. Student participation. Other modifications. Teaching procedures. Disadvantages of large classes. Advantages of large classes. Aims. Miscellaneous testimony. Summary of faculty testimony. CHAPTER VII. EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE. Inception of the study. Method of attack. A technique of experi- mentation. Definition of criteria. Limits of "large" and "small" classes. Types of procedure followed. An example of experiments. Other experi- ments in General Psychology. Detailed experiments illustrated. Remaining experiments in General Psychology. Experiments in the Law School. Experiments in Physics. Experiments in the College of Education. Other experiments in the University of Minnesota. Other considerations. Achieve- ment by intelligence levels. Achievement by mark-point levels. Relative achievement of superior and inferior students. Summary. Conclusions. CHAPTER VIII. CLASS SIZE AND TECHNIQUES OF INSTRUCTION. Experiments in Education 15. Experiments in Physics. Summary. Conclusions. CHAPTER IX. OBSERVED EVIDENCE. CHAPTER X. CLASS SIZE AND INSTRUCTIONAL COST. CHAPTER XI. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS. BIBLIOGRAPHY APPENDIX A. A suggested technique for experimentation on the relation of class size to educational efficiency at the university level. B. Class-size questionnaire sent to students. C. Class-size questionnaire sent to faculty members. D. Tables of paired groups and distribution tables." 6 Because of the expense Appendix D will not be included in the printed report, Class Size at the University Level. 418 414 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION STUDENT TESTIMONY Since the problem of class size is thought to be intimately related to the welfare of students, it was deemed worth while to secure their reactions to debatable aspects of the question. While mere opinion, however well grounded on experience and disinterested judgment, is by no means equal in validity to sound experimental evidence, nevertheless consensus of opinion helps to clarify the issue by bringing critical points into relief, thereby enabling experi- menters to meet the issue squarely. Accordingly three measures were taken to ascertain student opinion on the comparative desir- ability of large and small classes.7 In the first inquiry, instigated by the instructors, from 65 to 100 per cent of the students in four large College of Education classes expressed either a qualified or an outright preference for small classes. The most frequent reason offered by those who unquali- fiedly favored large classes was the increased opportunity for con- tact, student with student. The modal objection to large classes was that they cause embarrassment, due to the necessity of having to shout to make one's self heard. The most frequent qualified re- sponse was that large classes are better for lecture courses, small classes for all other occasions. To the second inquiry, made by a senior student, 122 freshmen, juniors, and seniors responded. Two preferred large classes, four were indifferent, and 116 favored small classes. The arguments in support of large classes were that (1) they evoke more varied responses; (2) the marks are not based on prejudice; and (3) in- structors prepare better for large classes. The students who as- sumed a neutral attitude felt that the instructor, and not class size, is the determining factor. The prevailing reactions in favor of small classes were (1) closer personal contact, student with instructor; (2) less chance to bluff; (3) more personal attention; (4) stimulate interest and independent thinking; and (5) more conducive to infor- mal discussion. In the third inquiry the Committee on Class Size submitted a questionnaire to 600 students. Tabulations were based on the re- 7 In all cases "large" and "small" classes are those which deviate mark- edly from the prevailing class-size practice in that department. CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL sponses from students who had had considerable experience with both large and small classes (six or more of each). These included 16 graduates, 34 seniors, 50 juniors, 35 sophomores, and 65 fresh- men and represented 37 major fields of study. Forty-seven per cent of these students preferred small classes, 35 per cent favored medium-sized classes, 12 per cent preferred large classes, and 6 per cent were indifferent. According to the modal student reac- tion, the following are optimum class sizes: JUNIOR SENIOR COLLEGE COLLEGE GRADUATE Lecture classes 105 75 50 Recitation classes 25 20 15 Laboratory classes 30 20 15 For a full analysis of the results of the student questionnaire, see the complete report. FACULTY TESTIMONY The subcommittee's chief aim in canvassing the attitudes of the faculty toward class size was to bring into relief the critical aspects of the problem to serve as guides in devising investigative techniques focusing upon the critical issues. Accordingly a seven-page ques- tionnaire was submitted to every member of the faculty. Tabula- tions were based on the first 150 reasonably complete returns from teachers who had had experience with both large and small classes. Eleven collegiate divisions and 56 departments were represented in the tabulations. Professional ranks ranged from teaching assist- ants to full professors. Fourteen per cent preferred large classes, 54 per cent preferred medium-sized classes, 15 per cent preferred small classes, and 17 per cent were indifferent. According to the modal faculty reaction, the following are optimum class sizes: JUNIOR SENIOR COLLEGE COLLEGE GRADUATE Lecture classes 75 40 20 Recitation classes 25 20 15 Laboratory classes 20 15 10 415 416 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION For analyzed responses to their reasons for their preferences, teaching techniques best suited to large and to small classes, etc., see the complete report. In general, faculty and students agree in their opinions about class size, but both are refuted by the results of other parts of the investigation. TENDENCIES IN CLASS SIZE However unpopular and inefficient large classes may be, they are becoming more and more prevalent. A few departments are steadfastly maintaining their class-size standards but, on the whole, the average size of teaching units in the University of Minnesota is rapidly increasing. CLASS SIZE AND STUDENT ACHIEVEMENT If, as both students and faculty believe, large classes handicap student achievement, the marks assigned during the past six years do not show it. (See Table XXII.) EXPERIMENTAL EVIDENCE The tentative conclusions drawn from Table XXII were sup- ported by 59 experiments involving 108 classes under 21 instructors in 11 departments in 4 colleges of the University of Minnesota. The experiments involved 6,059 students-4,205 in large classes and 1,854 in small classes. Direct man-to-man comparisons were made upon 1,288 pairs of students carefully matched as to intelligence and past scholarship and taught under carefully controlled condi- tions. Student achievement as measured by objective final exami- nations was the usual criterion of educational efficiency. In the few cases where the essay type of final examination was employed, the comparative results were the same as those of the objective examinations. Table XXIII shows the scope and representative character of the experiments. In 46 of the experiments, or 78 per cent, a more or less decided advantage accrued to the paired students in the large sections. Only in the remaining 13 experiments, or 22 per cent, was there any advantage in favor of the students in the smaller sections, and in only 2 of these 13 cases were the advantages statistically significant. CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL On the other hand, 19 of the 46 experimental units which favored the large sections showed statistically significant advantages. At every intelligence level and at every scholarship level the paired students in the large sections excelled their mates in the small. The excellent scholars profited somewhat more from large classes than did their less conspicuous classmates, thereby confirming Steven- son's conclusion that whatever advantages accrue from small classes are due to the presence of dull students. CLASS SIZE AND METHODS OF INSTRUCTION In the experiments in physics varying amounts of opportunity for student initiative were afforded. These variations did not affect the relative superiority of achievement in the large sections. In the experiments in the Techniques of High School Instruc- tion five different methods of teaching were tried one at a time. For example, the lecture method was employed exclusively upon both the large and small classes during one quarter, the question and answer method another quarter, the discussion method another quar- ter, etc. In each case one method was used exclusively except that during one quarter all the five methods were combined for purposes of comparison. The same comprehensive, objective final examina- tion was administered to all classes. In every case the average score of the paired students in the large class excelled that of the students in the small section. The lecture method produced slightly the highest average achievement score. CLASS SIZE AND INSTRUCTIONAL COST The relative instructional cost of large and small classes was computed for the experiments in physics. Instruction covered teach- ing, proctoring, and reading of papers. It should be borne in mind that the small sections contained 12 students, the large 150, and that in every experiment the paired students in the larger class excelled their mates in the smaller. The small classes cost from six to nine times as much per student as the large sections. If all of the 336 students who took physics during the fall quarter of 1926 had been organized in sections of 20, as was formerly the rule, the per stu- dent cost of instruction would have been 3.07 times as much as it was for the large experimental class (150 students) that quarter. 417 0 rin 0 U CI E-4 0 0 H E4 1- cm 10 r4 -0 eq co 0 ci C6 co co C6 0 0 0 CO 16 co C1 16 10 Co 0) 0 '4 Co o666~6 CoeqCoeqCOeq 10 -4 - eq ~ 0) Co . CO 0 ~ eq - Co Co CO 10 Co Oeq.~~Co CoCoeqeq 94- - 4.442 141 rd4 41~ - pq r1. 0 W w pa 9 ul 184 E-4 eq co co eq co e 10 cc 10 IQ cc co o 10 16 CO Co CO t6 C6 0 C6 co 0 eq C6 t- o t6 co co eq Co1 10 t6 co 0; 0I 0 C; C6 to CO 0 co b: H 0 C.) ce -0 00 0 0 4. 4-) 4)2 x - CoN r4 o~e H H 122 H 4i 2200 Co ~12 ~ H 22 zd z 0 12 22 H Co H H 22 0 C.) CLASS SIZE AT THE UNIVERSITY LEVEL 419 TABLE XXIII SCOPE AND REPRESENTATIVE CHARACTER OF UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA EXPERIMENTS ON CLASS SIZE No. OF No. OF IN- SMALL- LARG- COLLEGE COURSE EXPERI- STRUCTORS EST EST MENTS INVOLVED CLASS CLASS Arts General Psychology 27 7 21 71 Physics (lectures) 8 2 12 150 American History 2 1 86 107 Introduction to Sociology 1 1 20 87 Law Contracts 1 1 80 78 Criminal Law 1 1 24 79 Business Mechanism of Exchange 2 1 28 67 Education Techniques of High School Instruction 5 1 18 113 Educational Psychology 4 1 46 133 Mental Testing 2 1 40 73 Educational Sociology 1 1 56 169 History of Education 2 1 75 128 The High School 5 3 35 146 CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS In the light of all available evidence, class size seems to be a relatively minor factor in educational efficiency, measured in terms of student achievement. What the major factors are we do not know; to be determined they must be isolated, controlled, and tested one at a time. Neither do we know whether there are important educational outcomes other than achievement accruing, or at least accruable, only from small classes or whether experiments by other instructors using the same or different teaching methods in the same or other departments or courses would produce comparable results. All that can be said is that in the courses investigated the effect of class size upon student achievement is, in the opinion of the com- mittee, too slight to warrant the cost of small classes. It hardly seems reasonable to assume that the same techniques of instruction and classroom management are equally well suited to all sizes of classes; yet few efforts have been made studiously to adapt teaching procedures to class size. Conclusions, therefore, are in the main based on a comparison of traditional small-class methods versus slightly modified small-class methods. It may be that efficiency of instruction in small classes is now far below the 420 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION maximum and that attention to technique could push the level of effectiveness above the maximum for large classes. What may be needed is a complete breaking away from tradition, and the devising of instructional procedures suited to the demands of modern higher education. The general coercive policies that prevail in colleges and universities may actually be doing injustice in the name of edu- cation. To the degree that education is less a matter of telling students what and how to do and more a matter of encouraging and guiding them in educating themselves, large classes may prove to be ideal educational situations. Changes in large-class-size policy, however desirable, are certain to be of such import and to involve so many other educational fac- tors that they should be neither precipitously adopted, irrationally resisted, nor complacently ignored. They should, rather, be pre- pared for; for the necessary adaptations in budgeting, organization, buildings, curriculum, and instructional procedures can hardly be effected in a single generation of teachers. Every teacher is morally obligated to contribute his part to educational efficiency. If he can teach, or learn to teach, larger classes with little or no loss of effectiveness to his students, neither prejudice, preference, nor tradition should deter him from contrib- uting that much to educational economy; but if after a thorough, thoughtful, sincere trial he finds that he cannot, no amount of pres- sure should induce him to continue the attempt. He should, instead, contribute his part in other ways; for educational efficiency consists in each one's doing to his utmost what he can do best. XXXIII. EXPERIMENTS ON CLASS SIZE IN THE DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS, UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA HENRY A. ERIKSON Professor and Chairman of the Department of Physics University of Minnesota I feel that I ought to preface my report by an explanation of the situation in physics and a description of the basis upon which our experimental results have been computed. In making compari- sons this is vital. Up to about 1917 the work in the Department of Physics in the University of Minnesota was conducted on the so-called recita- tion basis. There was one experimental lecture a week and the student membership was divided into sections of 20 for recitations three times a week. As time went on budget limitations brought about a gradual increase in the size of the sections until, instead of 20 as we had planned, the number rose to 30, 35, 40, and even 50. We then came to the conclusion that we might just as well go to the larger-group method; consequently we organized the work of the department into divisions of mechanics, heat, electricity, and optics. We placed at the head of each division a man qualified to be a leader along that line. We arranged for larger groups to be given instruction by means of three demonstration lectures a week. The groups ranged from 75 to 150. In order to secure a check upon student progress we had every student write once a week for one hour. The papers were read with every possible care. To assist in the reading we employed seniors who had been "A" stu- dents in this work. We had the papers read horizontally under a plan of rotation whereby a part of each was read by all of the readers. As far as we could tell, the educational results and the degree of attainment were as high on this large-group basis as they had been under the old plan. This, however, was merely our im- pression. We had no definite, quantitative information upon which to base a conclusion. We wanted such information; consequently in September, 1926, largely under the inspiration of the subcom- 422 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION mittee on class size, of which Professor Hudelson is chairman, we undertook to devise a definite, clear-cut measuring method in order to determine, if possible, just how we were getting on in attainment. For the fall-quarter course we selected two groups of twelve students of as comparable and heterogeneous ability as possible. These groups were paired man-to-man on the bases of mark points earned during the preceding year and scores on an objective place- ment-test given the first day of the fall quarter. This test involved 175 items on information obtainable from general reading or from observation in their daily lives. Since mathematics enters into the work in physics, we tested these experimental students on simple algebraic expressions. One hour was found to be ample time for this objective examination. On the bases of these criteria, then, we organized the two groups of 12. One was taught as a section by itself; the other was incor- porated in a large group totaling 150. The large section met during the second hour; the small during the following hour in the same room. Both groups were given the same text assignments and prob- lems and both were subjected to the same ten weekly quizzes and to the same two-hour comprehensive final examination. The com- posite score on the ten quizzes and the final examination constitutes the basis for comparison. I met the large group from 9:30 to 10:30 on Mondays, Wednes- days, and Fridays; the small group the hour immediately following in the same lecture room. This being an established course, expe- rience or practice probably was of slight import; but whatever influence it may have had may reasonably be expected to have favored the small class. I did not choose to use any coercive method but tried to be as inspirational in the small group as in the large. I tried in the small class to give as much opportunity for discussion as time would per- mit, and on the whole endeavored to make use of the devices that should be and are possible in a smaller group. I kept myself in ignorance as to the progress of the students in both sections because I did not wish to be prejudiced. The results at the end of the fall quarter surprised me very much. I began to question my ability as a teacher because I had CLASS SIZE IN PHYSICS fully expected that the results would be the reverse of what they were. The score for the small group was 69.4 per cent; that for the twelve paired students in the large section was 75.7 per cent. I do not think that undue significance should be attached to a difference of 6.3 per cent. I have found that one can safely allow for a chance variation of 3 points. One can, for example, take two groups of 12 of comparable ability, place them in the same class of 150, and at the end of the quarter find an average difference as great as 3 per cent. We should keep that in mind. I do not know just how much weight one should give to the difference that I have cited.' The question of cost, of course, was pertinent in this investiga- tion, and I was interested in determining the relative cost of the two groups. I think that my method of comparison, while somewhat faulty, is legitimate. The summary of costs, including salary of instructor, salary of readers, and cost of proctoring the quizzes, is as follows: Cost per student in the small class of twelve, $36.29. Cost per student in the large class of 150, $4.34. Dividing the former by the latter, we find that the cost of in- struction was 8.36 times as much for the small group as for the large. During the winter quarter we carried on the same procedure. We selected two groups of eight students on the same bases as for the fall quarter. Dr. J. W. Buchta met the section of eight in the physics lecture-room on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays at the sixth hour (2:30-3:30 p.M.). The other group of eight, placed in a larger section of 145, Dr. Buchta met in the same room the following hour on the same days. Again all factors except class size were kept as constant as possible. The small group received an average score of 66.2 per cent; the paired students in the large section, 67.5 per cent. Again the advantage, though slight, was in favor of the group of eight in the large class. The per-student cost in the small sections was $24.49; that in the large class, $2.83. This is a ratio of 8.66 to 1. i Statistically, this is a fairly significant difference. Cf. W. A. McCall, How to Experiment in Education, pp. 154-58.-EmToR. 423 424 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION During the spring quarter we obtained two groups of eleven students of comparable ability by the same procedure. I had charge of both groups this time. The small section met during the second hour in the forenoon in the physics lecture-room on Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. The other group of eleven met in a section totaling 115 students during the following hour in the same room and on the same days. Again all factors except class size were controlled and both sections wrote on the same questions in the same room on the same days. The average score of the small group of eleven was 78.7 per cent; that for the eleven paired stu- dents in the large class of 115 was 75.0 per cent, making a differ- ence of 3.7 per cent in favor of the smaller group. Instructional cost per student in the small section was $39.45; for the large class, $5.19. It thus cost 7.6 times as much to teach the students in the smaller class. The summary for the entire year is as follows: Average score for the small groups, 71.4 per cent. Average score for the paired students in the large groups, 72.7 per cent. Per-student cost in the small groups, $33.41. Per-student cost in the large groups, $4.12. It therefore cost over eight times as much to handle the students in the small groups as it cost to teach those in the large, with a degree of attainment in the subject, as measured by our tests, that is slightly less for the small classes. In conclusion I wish to say that our plan is to carry on next year in a similar manner. Our impression, however, is that we are justified in continuing our revised plan of organization and proce- dure. We cannot feel that we would be warranted in going back to the recitation method. To do so we should have to increase our staff to the point where the resulting increase in our total depart- mental budget would be such that we do not feel it could be justified in terms of comparative student attainment in physics. It would be folly, of course, to contend that individual attention is futile, and I do not think that any technique that is adopted should preclude that. We have attempted to bring it about by having the head of each division spend a whole evening in the laboratory for CLASS SIZE IN PHYSICS conference. We invite the students to come with their difficulties. It is not compulsory at all, but anyone is at liberty to come, and they do come, and we have a very pleasant evening. We also have conference hours during the day. An instructor can keep open house more completely when not loaded down with the heavier schedule. There is an impression that comes to one as he studies the edu- cational problem from this standpoint that self-education is going on to a greater extent than we suppose. I am coming to feel that we should make "Self-Education" more fully the slogan in these educational matters because that is the only worth-while kind. The question is, to what extent can we as instructors be instrumental and to what extent can we make these facilities instrumental in the furthering of self-education? It seems to me that we should study the problem and make use of every device we can to bring about this self-education. As far as the small- and large-class situation is concerned, I may say that we have such confidence in our organization and procedures that we have planned our new building on the basis of larger groups. We feel justified in doing this. I, of course, have been speaking entirely for physics. That is where I have confidence. I do not presume to speak for other subjects. I do feel, however, that it is up to all departments to study this question and to devise tests that will throw light upon the efficiency of their methods and organization. 425 XXXIV. SUGGESTED PROGRAM OF INVESTIGATION HAVING IN MIND THE IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE AT THE UNIVERSITY OF MINNESOTA E. M. FREEMAN Dean of the College of Agriculture, Forestry, and Home Economics, and Professor and Chief, Division of Plant Pathology and Botany, University of Minnesota I shall try to give you a picture of what the committee and various members associated with it have in mind as a program of investigation in the field of science teaching, after which Pro- fessor Jackson will give a concrete illustration of one type of experimental investigation. We hope to show you that there is, as we view it, a very comprehensive program possible and that our method of enlisting men of science can, if we work together, im- prove teaching. Need for Unification and Coordination of Work.-Unification and coordination of the projects for the improvement of instruction in science in the University are desirable. It seems reasonable to believe that if all the agencies now at work toward this improve- ment can combine on a common program mapped out by a con- ferring committee representing all the departments of science, the possibilities of success will be great. With more or less detached projects under way, not dependent on one another, and having no relation each to the other, the strength of united effort is lacking. If, on the contrary, each project is a definite portion of a com- prehensive plan, it is more likely to receive stimulation and aid from the other coordinate portions and, in turn, lend similar stimu- lation and aid to them. Plan of Organization.-That there is demand for systematic attempts to improve instruction in science is evident from an ex- amination of Part A appended to this article. For two years past Monday-evening meetings of the faculty and graduate students of the University have been held to discuss problems of college edu- cation. These meetings have dealt with problems of instruction, IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 427 student personnel, organization, and administration. Among the lectures given, the various science departments have been well rep- resented. Part A of the appended matter is a list of problems that were suggested from a reading of the lectures given by the members of the professorial staff representing the science departments. The problems constitute a formidable list, but not impossible of solution or they would not have been mentioned by those so interested in them. The program which follows is, therefore, given for the purpose of systematizing, unifying, and coordinating the several features which seem to offer the greatest hope of worth-while accomplish- ment. It has seemed wise to group them under the categories, (A) the curriculum in science, (B) methods of instruction in science, (C) measurement of achievement in science, (D) aims and ob- jectives of instruction in science, and (E) costs of the features of instruction in science. Some of the more detailed problems under each heading are given, but it is expected that as the investigations proceed, other questions will intrude themselves as component parts of the program, subsidiary to those suggested. Cautions to Be Kept in Mind in Considering the Following Pro- gram.-It may be well before outlining the program further to call attention to the features presented as being suggestive rather than fixed or mandatory. It is believed that the time to solve problems is when distinct need for their solution is felt. The con- cretely presented problem always has peculiarities that distinguish it from all other problems of a similar nature. No set program of this kind will suffice as more than suggestive of a general trend in procedures and modes of attack. Furthermore, the committee does not have in mind an immediate and impulsive attack on all the problems mentioned. It will take time to get individual ones under way and a much longer time to secure conclusive results from many of them. It is thought that the program as presented will elicit more unification of thought on the part of science instructors and also that these instructors may be led to call for aid on any problem which seems to them of vital concern. It may thus eventually turn out that when any considerable part of the work in carrying on the general content 428 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION is completed, the program itself will have taken on new features, new phases. It should be kept in mind, then, that actual working conditions should be expected to vary the plans to suit the specific occasions which present themselves. A. THE CURRICULUM IN SCIENCE A good beginning for such a program is the curriculum as it is constituted at present. Certain forces have contributed in bringing about the courses we now have. If these courses are to develop as time goes on, a better development will be induced by having always presented a clear, concise picture of conditions as they are. The following subheadings, with the questions given, will serve to indicate briefly the nature of the investigations. I. The Curriculum in Science at the University of Minnesota What courses in science are now offered in Minnesota? In what colleges are they offered? How many students are enrolled in these courses? What are the specifications of these courses? What relations have the courses offered in the College of Science, Literature, and the Arts to courses in other colleges? What courses are prerequisite for other courses? Do syllabi of the various courses follow well-developed sequences? This problem would need tabulation from analytic examinations of the various syllabi to determine relationships, sequences, and overlapping. It would necessitate careful study and considerable consultation with the several instructors, especially the department heads. A schematic design showing the whole situation with its varied intercorrelations and ramifications would result. II. A Study of Prerequisite Courses Are the prerequisite courses meeting the essential requirements; i.e., are they functioning as real prerequisite courses? Are the students who enroll for certain courses adequately prepared to enter upon the work of these courses? Are advanced courses prop- erly fashioned to utilize previous training received by the student? A testing program would be necessary to find the answers to these questions. A properly developed testing program would give evidence of poor or good preparation by prerequisite courses. IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 429 It would show the outcomes of the elementary courses, the demands of the advanced courses, and the good or poor intercorrelations. Reasons for modifications of either elementary or advanced courses might be made evident. III. Studies to Improve the Correlations among Existing Courses Instructors desire to have their courses function to the highest degree. The two preceding projects would lay the foundations for desirable improvements. These questions naturally follow. Can prerequisite courses be devised which will more fully meet the re- quirements of the more advanced courses? Can elementary courses in physics be better devised to meet the needs of engineering stu- dents, for example? Can elementary courses in biology be devised so as better to meet the needs of students of dentistry or anatomy, for example? Can advanced courses be modified to utilize more completely the previous experiences and training of the students enrolled? What relationships are there between courses and final occupations ? These questions are of very great interest to those teaching the more advanced as well as the elementary courses. The demands of the advanced courses should be ascertained by well-conducted analyses of the occupations for which they prepare, and specific plans should be made for distributing the abilities needed along a schedule of courses to develop these abilities. Social and ethical demands of these occupations should not be forgotten. Neither should the variations of the demands of these occupations nor the need for abilities to bring about adjustments to these variations be neglected. The part taken by the prerequisite courses could be determined by the difficulty of the various portions and by the natural sequence, if there be one, of the activities necessary to develop the abilities. The best means of developing these abilities would be determined by the results of the experimental procedures given under methods which involve try-outs and evaluations. This investigation would open up other questions concerning the desirability of courses not yet devised, to meet needs not sufficiently cared for at present. Are there needs for new courses which can be met? Are modifications of old, well-established courses desirable? This phase of the subject occupies the front rank in importance, 430 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION as well as in difficulty. It rests upon the work of all the other investigations spoken of here. Important initial steps will have been taken if the preceding three projects are well executed. They will make clearer ways and means of automatically providing for a continuous and progressive reorganization of the total curriculum. B. METHODS OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE This field furnishes opportunities for much educational experi- mentation. Given definite aims and objectives, how may they be most easily and economically attained? I. Experimental Investigations An immediate attack on this subject is possible. Many methods have been used by instructors in science. How much is known of experimentation to discover the best method? Some summaries have already been made of educational experiments in methods, but any technique used so far to determine efficiency of instruction leaves plenty of room for more accurate evaluations. The following methods have been used and may be evaluated and improved upon. Experimental attacks on these methods are recommended. (1) The laboratory as a means of instruction. Individual labo- ratory work, group work in large and small groups, the rotational scheme of work, the simultaneous method. Each should be tried out singly and in possible combinations to secure the best method for the achievement of results. These should be tried with different types of work. Each of the following methods except the last should be tried both exclusively and in combination: (2) the lec- ture, (3) the project, (4) the developmental, (5) the individual, (6) the topical, (7) the problem, (8) the research, (9) the field, (10) the textbook, (11) the question and answer, and (12) the contract and job-sheet. Whether or not these methods are applicable to science should be known. Is any one method best or should methods be varied to meet given situations? There are numerous opinions on these questions, but very little has been done to answer them objectively. II. Canvass of Present Methods Another type of investigation on methods would be in the nature of a canvass of the methods now used in various courses in science. IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 431 The names of methods given above do not suggest to every mind the same set of procedures. It is possible to clarify the conceptions in regard to these names by finding out how these courses are at present conducted. How much time is given to this phase or that? How does Millikan conduct his work in physics? How does Thorn- dike work in educational psychology? What are Karl Pearson's methods? Who are the recognized good teachers? How do they secure results from their pupils? What kind of results do they se- cure? Why are they thought to be good teachers? This type of investigation requires first-hand acquaintance, analytic study, and tabulation. Actual inspection is desirable; not general and superficial, but intensive and analytic, with complete tabulated observations. The technique of making methodical and accurate observations must be undertaken. C. MEASUREMENT OF ACHIEVEMENT IN SCIENCE At present the field of measurement of achievement in science is particularly attractive. Not very long ago measurements in the field of electricity were attracting certain individuals. These work- ers succeeded in bringing about very accurate measurements of electrical quantities by the development of units of measurement long before the real nature of electricity was known. Probably the statement that science has developed in just about the proportion that units of measurement have been developed and accurate meas- urement established would not be challenged. The greatest hope of improvement in the teaching process and in all educational processes may be in the development of better ways of measuring educational products. The following indicate possible projects in this connection: (An investigatory study of desirable outcomes of instruction in science is presupposed. This is a part of the study on aims and objectives given below but may be mentioned to show the necessity of basing measurements on desired and expected outcomes.) I. Attempts to Devise Methods of Measuring the Outcomes of Instruction in Science The following are some suggested outcomes: (1) Informational achievement. 432 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION This may be of different types; e.g., perceptual, conceptual, relational, factual, abstract, generalized. It may depend on kinds of material which may be indicated by these words given. It may also vary with different concrete materials. (2) Ability to apply information in the solution of various kinds of problems connected with it. (3) Ability to carry over methods of solution into neighboring fields. (4) Ability to analyze written material; to get meaning from the printed page. (5) Ability to distinguish significant from insignificant data. (This may be a part of (2) above). (6) Ability to observe accurately. (7) Ability to form clear percepts. (8) Ability to distinguish between fact and speculation. (9) Ability to think abstractly. (10) Ability to suspend judgment, recognizing the need for more data. (11) Ability to keep the mind open to new impressions and revise opinions on the strength of the new impressions. (12) Improvement of the correlation of ideas or sensing of re- lationships. (13) Training of the imagination. (14) Development of the scientific attitude. (This is probably inclusive of most of the preceding.) (15) The development of self-reliance. (16) The development of perseverance in the face of obstacles. (With the last two might be listed other worthy traits of character.) These are suggestive of possible measurable quantities. If instruction in science should bring out these abilities, it seems wise to work toward means of better defining them, recognizing them, and measuring them. Parts B, C, and E, appended hereto, contain further data along this line. They were suggestions jotted down by the executive secretary during the reading of certain literature bearing on the subject of instruction in science. They are noticeably quite general on the whole and need analytic revision and separation. IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 433 Some of the more obvious questions on problems of measuring educational products are given below. They are perhaps more nearly questions "in the gross," which come more often in the first stages of concern or anxiety over the very inadequate measure- ments now being made to determine achievement: How well are students prepared when they enter upon the work of certain courses? Have any reliable and valid means of accurately estimating this been determined? If the fairly exact status of each student on a scale of educational proficiency were known when he entered upon a given course, would it be helpful for the instructor to know that status? Do the tests given at mid- quarter or at the end of the course entirely satisfy the instructors as measures of the achievement of the individuals constituting their classes? If the tests were repeated a few days later, would the in- structors rank the students as they had ranked them first? Would every instructor in a given department score the tests identically? How much does liking for the personality of the student enter into the final mark? Do evidences of fine character traits enter into the mark given the student? How much credit is given for labora- tory work? How much of the mark is mere estimation; how much based upon tangible results? Is it possible to measure laboratory resourcefulness? Is laboratory skill ever measured? Are there im- portant phases of achievement that are never estimated? Does it seem reasonable to believe that quantities in the field of learning may be made tangible enough to make their measurement possible? II. Collection and Classification of Existing Tests The last several questions suggest the value of collecting and keeping on hand samples of the tests already devised and of new tests as they are formulated. Some summaries are already avail- able of the tests developed to date, but they only indicate the need for more work in this field. More complete data on these tests is desirable, however. They should be subjected to further experi- mentation for data on reliability and validity, and all available records of their use kept on file. D. AIMS AND OBJECTIVES OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE A comprehensive survey, tabulation, and summary of aims and objectives of college instruction in science are desirable. That the 434 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION organization and conduct of courses in science, as of courses in all subjects, should be determined by the aims and objectives of these courses is axiomatic. There are several reasons why such a survey is pertinent at this time: (a) The phenomenal increases in enrollment in recent years have changed the aspect of instruction. (b) Fail- ure of students to fulfill the requirements of the courses now offered suggests that the present courses are not adapted to all students. (c) The increasing literature expressing dissatisfaction with present conditions gives a hint of needed revamping. (d) The great changes in industrial and social life in the last two decades make investigation desirable. The following major divisions are suggested as points of specific attack: I. Analytic Survey of the Literature (Analytic tabulation of aims and objectives in the elementary branches of each of the fundamental sciences-physics, chemistry, biology, geology, and psychology-as stated in the literature on the subject.) The literature should be searched for statements on this subject, the various statements should be tabulated, combined into categories, and put into summary form showing the amount of common opinion on the statements made. II. Analytic Survey of Present Authorities (A systematic canvass of the authorities now competent to speak on the subject, using the questionnaire method to get the data.) Tabulation, combination, and summary should be done as in I above. The questionnaire should present the subject so as to secure definite answers to such questions as these: Are these courses primarily designed to serve as general introductory courses for the more advanced courses? Are they general informational courses for the student who does not wish more detailed and technical knowledge of the science? Are they exploratory courses to ac- quaint students who are uncertain of their future life work with the types of work in that field? Can a multiplicity of aims function efficiently in a single type of course? III. Study of Student Personnel (A detailed study of the student personnel enrolled in the many courses in science.) By means of student conferences and well- IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 435 chosen questions to the students, their expectations of a course may be determined. What future occupations are they preparing for? What relation has the present course to this expected vocation? What made them decide to enroll in the course ? Is the course giv- ing them what they expected to get? What desirable changes would they wish made to suit their particular situations? The purpose of this investigation is to secure a basis for deter- mining what should be the aims and objectives of the several courses from the standpoint of the real life needs of the student himself. IV. Study of Alumni Occupations (A thorough survey of the occupations finally engaged in by those who were former students in the specific courses in science.) There is great need for more thorough investigations as to the final disposition of the products of such an institution as a state univer- sity. What becomes of them? What proportions go into the pro- fessional lines of endeavor? What professions? What proportion go into business? What businesses? Actually what relation does this course or that course have to their final fields of activity? What do these graduates have to say concerning the direct values or the indirect values of the courses in science in which they are enrolled? Such an investigation would be difficult but very worthy of trial. If courses in our educational system are to be determined by the needs of those taking them, who should be better judges of this than all of those who have gone into practical life from these same courses? Does this one feel that the hours spent in shop work or laboratory have been very fruitful to him in his everyday life? Are there many activities that he might have engaged in which he feels would have been of incalculable value to him? Would his con- structive suggestions not be valuable in planning for more adequate opportunities for those who are coming to the University in the future? The technique to be used in this investigation would need de- velopment. A roster of the graduates and the selection of a repre- sentative sampling would be relatively easy. Then a method of getting reliable data from these graduates would have to be evolved. Consultation either in person or by correspondence would seem to 436 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION offer the best means of securing results. Each individual should be made to see the constructive value of his opinions. Motivation should be carried to the point of stimulation of a desire on his part to make constructive suggestions. This investigation is seen to be closely related to that in III above, the purpose of both being to secure further data on which to determine courses to meet the needs of those who take them. E. COSTS OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE Hand-in-hand with these other investigations should go an in- vestigation of the costs of the varied features of instruction in science. This is tied up with a study of the curriculum itself. The latter is partly for the purpose of ascertaining what are the features of instruction in science. The former will have as its object a study of the relative costs of these varied features. A consideration of costs coupled with measurements to discover the efficiencies of the several features of instruction may show more desirable and economical means of adapting instruction. The costs of laboratory instruction in teaching personnel and equipment should be known, also the costs of the demonstration material. If, as one writer says, investigations in the state of Washington show that five and one-half cents of lecture equals twenty-two cents of recitation equals a dollar and twenty-nine cents of laboratory in- struction, the matter should be verified, the truth known, and the necessity for the larger expenditures on certain features demon- strated. APPENDIX A PROBLEMS RAISED IN COLLEGE EDUCATION WITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO SCIENCE How to care for the great variety of individuals entering the University. Relation of University to high school as to curricula. Furnishing of incentives to students. Orienting new students. Aims of college teaching. IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 437 Teaching versus research. . Who need our present college courses? Who should go to college? How many teachers are needed? Place of textbook in the course. Reference material in relation to the course. Relation of the library to the course. Intension or mastery versus extension or superficiality. Field work in the course--museums, observatories, etc. Specialization versus broad outlook. Problem of health in the University. Problem of formation of proper study habits. Educational guidance in college. Vocational guidance in college. Lecture versus quiz method in first-year science. Motivation in science. Best method of teaching science. Place of lecture in science teaching. Place of visual aids in teaching science. Influence of voice of lecturer on instruction. Use of the notebook in science. Vocabulary to be imparted in given science courses. What is the purpose of the science course? Function of the laboratory in science. Best size of class for laboratory work. How should directions for laboratory work be given? How much initiative should be allowed the student in labo- ratory ? How much time should be given to laboratory? How should problems of science teaching be attacked? How should courses in science be differentiated for the different purposes for which students are taking them? The place of diagrams in science instruction. How to measure success in science. Does the mental ability of college students affect success in conventional laboratory work? Should there be ability grouping in college work in science? 438 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION What is the place of project work in college science? Is it feasible to work out an individual method adapted to each individual in science? Could present laboratory instruction be replaced to a large extent by some other work? Do students differ in ability to handle "big" concepts? What are the outstanding characteristics of scientific thinking? Should the cost of education to the state count as a vital factor in solving educational problems? How can failure in science courses be eliminated or decreased? Should students be selected for science courses as now con- ceived or should science courses be fashioned for the students who come to take them? How should the gifted student be treated in science? What provisions should be made for the mediocre and poor students ? Are research individuals "born" or trained? Or can research workers be developed from otherwise non-research ma- terial? Does science work inculcate certain traits such as truthfulness, initiative, etc.? What characteristics are most desirable or absolutely impera- tive in a research worker? Can individuals be trained to solve problems? How can creative capacity be discovered? What has the National Research Council done in chemistry? Place of lecture and class discussion in science. Bearing of maturity of students on method. What is the relation between character of material and method of presentation? The effect of the number of recitations per week upon achieve- ment, other things being equal. The effect of various time divisions of lecture, quiz, discussion, and laboratory on achievement. Place of supervised study in college science. Effect upon achievement of tests and examinations as teaching devices. IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 439 Development of devices to measure the various factors of achievement in science. Effect upon achievement in science of an individual topical plan of assignment and class procedure. How to develop constructive originality in science. Effect of club work upon achievement. Effect of informal discussion groups upon achievement and motivation. Effect upon achievement of informal library reading periods substituted for lectures. Effect of various types of library reference assignments upon achievement. Effect of method upon emotional stimulation-inspiration. Effect of general mental ability upon achievement. Can laboratory courses be developed where large enrollments can be accommodated without loss of efficiency? Can the laboratory quota of time be limited without loss of efficiency ? Can the costs of laboratory equipment be cut down without lowering efficiency? Effect of the physical position of a student in a class upon his achievement. Effect of freedom of election of courses upon fundamental achievement-e.g., in medicine. Effect of previous courses in science upon succeeding courses. Standardization versus non-standardization in science courses. The project method in science. Aims and objectives of science in general. Aims and objectives of each course in science. Proper sequence of science courses. The relation of the seven cardinal principles to science in- struction. Correlation of science courses with identical courses in various colleges of a university. The place of the descriptive course in science. The place of information in human development. The science courses and vocational needs. 440 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION APPENDIX B AIMS OF LABORATORY WORK 1. Teach the use of apparatus and equipment in a certain field. 2. Teach methods of attacking problems. 3. Teach standards for distinguishing significant from insignifi- cant data and drawing rational conclusions. 4. Teach methods of gathering facts. 5. Teach modes of keeping scientific records. 6. Teach open-mindedness, or unbiased observation. 7. Teach scientific modes of thought. 8. Teach the student to do, rather than know. 9. Teach methods of research. 10. Develop the power to weigh evidence-suspend judgment. 11. Develop analytic power. 12. Gain experience in actual measurements. 13. Gain facility in the manipulation of tools. 14. Gain precision. 15. Develop honesty. 16. Develop habits of self-reliance, originality, and good judgment. 17. Distinguish between accuracy and vagueness. 18. Improve the correlation of ideas or sensing of relationships. 19. Train the mind in logical reasoning. 20. Train the imagination. 21. Instill the scientific attitude. 22. Train in the interpretation of nature and her laws. 23. Learn to relate hypothesis, theory, and law. 24. Learn the meaning of a principle (abstraction). 25. Develop ingenuity. 26. Stimulate interest. 27. Give clearer percepts. 28. Teach accuracy of observation. 29. Stimulate the imagination in formulating tentative hypotheses. 30. Give opportunity for self-expression. 31. Give opportunity for first-hand observation. 32. Produce a deeper impression. 33. Develop appreciation of the experimental side of science. 34. Develop skill in the technique of measurement. IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 441 35. Give personal familiarity with the facts. 36. Develop the spirit of investigation. APPENDIX C LIST OF SUCCESSFUL CONSEQUENCES OF A CLASS PERIOD 1. Information-factual. 2. Development of methods of thinking. 3. Development of interest in the subject or certain projects. 4. Feeling-tones, orientations, inspirational factors. 5. Skill in verbal habits-e.g., answering definite questions. 6. Disciplinary values. 7. Cultural values. 8. Development of qualities associated with culture. 9. Development of the individual pupil as a personality. 10. Discovery of particular abilities and effective interests. 11. Development of appreciation of the principles of nature. 12. Development of the technique of the subject itself. 13. Development of attitudes or viewpoints. 14. Mastery of tools of learning. 15. Preparation for earning a living. 16. Preparation for professional studies. 17. Stimulate scientific curiosity. 18. Stimulate accurate observation. 19. Stimulate sound deduction. APPENDIX D POSSIBLE VARIABLE FACTORS, THE EFFECTS OF WHICH SHOULD BE STUDIED 1. Amount of laboratory work on achievement. 2. Amount of recitation work on achievement. 3. Amount of lecture work on achievement. 4. Amount of demonstration work on achievement. 5. Supervised study on achievement. 6. Size of class on achievement. 7. Mentality on achievement. 442 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 8. Reading ability on achievement. 9. Previous scholarship on achievement. 10. Previous training on achievement. 11. Sex on achievement. 12. Instructor on achievement-(a) experience, (b) training. 13. Total time spent in class meetings on achievement. 14. Required readings on achievement (amount). 15. Number of tests on achievement. 16. Types of secondary-school work on achievement, (e.g., small high school, large high school, city or country, etc.). 17. Type of lecture on achievement-(a) forcefulness, (b) dra- matic appeal, or (c) other qualitative effects. 18. Tempo of lecture on results. Concreteness and use of illustra- tion. 19. Effect of discussion on results. 20. Effect of projects on results. 21. Time of tests on retention, (e.g., "terminal" quizzes). 22. Effect of review on retention. 23. Effect of note-taking on learning or retention. 24. Effect of amount of reading on learning (little and much). 25. Effect of homogeneity of group. 26. Effect of after-correction of tests on further tests. 27. Effect of length of class or lecture period. 28. Effect of definiteness of aim on results (specific). 29. Effect of distractions on individuals and class (sensitivity). 30. Effect of maturity on results. 31. Effect of library work on results. Types of library work. 32. Effect of group assignment. 33. Effect of individual instruction. 34. Effect of field trips on instruction. APPENDIX E TESTS SHOULD MEASURE 1. Mental habits acquired. 2. Aims of courses accomplished. 3. Growth in power. IMPROVEMENT OF INSTRUCTION IN SCIENCE 443 4. Ability to attack new problems. 5. Ability to plan a line of work. 6. Ability to think mathematically, or scientifically, etc., to avoid typical fallacies of thought. 7. Appreciations. 8. Skill. 9. Attitudes. 10. Ability to state and enumerate problems suggested by a situa- tion. 11. Ability to solve problems suggested by a situation. 12. Ability to discover a large body of facts involved in a situation. 13. Ability to arrange a large body of facts in logical order. XXXV. THE RESULTS OF AN EXPERIMENT ON METHODS OF TEACHING GROSS HUMAN ANATOMY C. M. JACKSON Professor and Director, Department of Anatomy University of Minnesota One of the insistent questions in science teaching is this: How much laboratory work is it necessary for the student to do in order to achieve the desired results? As you know, students may par- ticipate to a variable extent in laboratory work. Each student may do all of the work by himself or two or more may work in groups. Next would come certain types of laboratory work so arranged that students, either singly or in groups, merely assist the instructor. Next comes the method of instruction in which the teacher alone performs the experiments, usually in the form of lecture demon- strations. Finally, there remains the lecture or recitation method, with neither laboratory work nor demonstrations. Science teachers generally believe that laboratory training is of unique importance. Here alone the student comes into actual contact with physical phenomena, thereby enabling him to train his powers of observa- tion and reasoning and to achieve results otherwise impossible. The importance of individual laboratory work is greatly em- phasized in the medical sciences. In my own department, Anatomy, there is a very firm belief that it is necessary for every student to dissect the human body independently. The Association of the American Medical Colleges requires that each student shall dissect one lateral half of the body. In some states this is even a legal requirement, prerequisite for license to practice medicine. During the war, however, certain difficulties arose in teaching anatomy. The time available was limited, and there happened to be a temporary shortage in the number of bodies available for dis- section. Through necessity, therefore, we put four students on a body instead of two. Under the plan the students worked in pairs, one reading the directions while the other dissected, and alternating frequently. Thus each student would follow through and see every- TEACHING OF GROSS HUMAN ANATOMY thing, but would not actually dissect everything for himself. That method seemed to work fairly well, as far as we could judge from the results of the final examinations. After the war we returned to the previous plan of placing but two students on a body during the school year. Each summer, however, we repeated the course in dissection, and in the summer course we continued the plan of putting four students on a body. So far as the test scores or final grades were concerned, the results appeared to be about the same. The summer students apparently did as well working four on a body as the winter students did work- ing two on a body. The teachers, however, were still not convinced that this was really true. We therefore decided to make a more careful experi- ment to see whether or not any difference could be demonstrated in the results under these two methods of teaching. With the help of Mr. A. W. Hurd of the College of Education, the entire freshman medical class of ninety-four students was divided into two divisions of as nearly equal ability as possible, measured by (1) previous college marks and (2) intelligence tests. We first went over their premedical records. Two years of col- lege work are required for admission, including physics, chemistry, and biology. The average mark for each student was calculated separately for the required premedical college courses and for the total premedical college work. The grades were evaluated in terms of honor points, each mark of A giving 3 honor points, B giving 2, and C giving 1 for each unit of credit. In addition, two intelligence tests were given to the entire class. One was the Miller Mental Test for graduate students, the other the Sigma X Reading Test. The students were then paired on the basis of all of these records. For each student another student was picked with a record as nearly equal as possible. By going through the whole class in this way, we found that only 27 pairs were obtainable. The 40 students who could not be satisfactorily paired were distributed between the two divisions in such a way that the average ability was the same in both groups, whether judged on the basis of previous college marks or intelligence-test scores. The' students were placed in four laboratory rooms with an 445 446 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION instructor in charge of each room. Of the twenty-four students in each room, twelve, belonging to one of the two original divi- sions, were put to work four on a body; the other twelve, belonging to the second division but of equal ability, were put two on a body. Then the work proceeded as usual. The entire class had one hour of lecture each week. Each section also had one hour for recitation in osteology, one half-hour each week for a written review test, and twelve and one-half hours devoted to the laboratory work of dissection. Unusual care was taken to measure the achievements of the students from time to time. They were graded in four different ways: (1) weekly objective tests; (2) weekly estimate of labora- tory work; (3) final practical test at end of term; and (4) final objective written examination. The results. of all of the tests are given in Table XXIV, the grades being given separately for the fall and winter quarters. In the first column are shown the mean or average grades for each divi- sion on the nine weekly reviews given each term. Each of these tests contained fifty items. The second column similarly gives the averages for the grades on the quality of laboratory work as esti- mated weekly by the corresponding laboratory instructor. The third column gives the grades for the final practical test at the end of each quarter. In this test the student was required to identify various structures usually indicated by tags. In all, one hundred items were included in each of these final practical tests. The fourth column indicates the results of the final written examination, which was given at the end of each quarter. This was also objective and was much like the weekly review tests except that it covered the entire range of the quarter's work. There were 250 items in each of the final tests. The grades in all cases were recorded numerically on the scale of 100, the passing grade being 75. While there are slight differences between the results of the various tests, the average grades, both preliminary and final, are practically identical in the two divisions. The differences in the means for the two-to-a-body and the four-to-a-body divisions are always less than three times the probable error of the difference, being therefore statistically insignificant. This was true for the 4-J0 1140 z 0 U r4 E- 0 0 r ;A +1 ci +1 16 0 10 10 00 1 00 00 +1 00 00 ci +1 cq CoD ci Ti I- 10 Gi +I 10 6l 00 0- r-1 0- Ti 00 +1 cq C6 00 00 C; 00 00 cci +1 10 Co 06 1 ci cc 00 +1 ci 00 t-01- 0010D d+d4 ci R 0 0 0 ,0 0 ci U U) U A 0 0 nO 0 04 ac H 0 0 0 Ti co co r- 0 0 0 0 0- 0 0 0 0 Q frn H 0 +1 Tli 0 i+ 0, A 448 PROBLEMS OF COLLEGE EDUCATION 27 pairs separately as well as for the entire class (the figures for the latter only being given in Table XXIV). In the winter quarter the divisions were reversed, those who had been in the two-to-a-body section now being transferred to the four-to-a-body division, and vice versa. The number in the four-to-a-body division was somewhat reduced in the winter; but the results were the same, as shown in Table XXIV. No significant difference in grades was found between the two divisions. In connection with the final practical examination it occurred to me that it might be interesting to test also what the students had achieved in anatomy through the sense of touch. The successful physician depends much upon a delicate sense of touch; conse- quently in anatomy we emphasize the importance of tactual im- pression in studying the various structures, especially the skeleton. In order to test the tactual ability of the students we made boxes with front curtains. The student was required to put his hand in the box and identify what he found there by the sense of touch alone. This is quite different from the usual practical test, which is purely visual in character. As shown in Table XXV, the results of the two forms of the practical tests do not correlate very closely. The fact that the grades on the tactual and those on the visual tests were so different indicates that they test different kinds of achievement. This raises the question of how much emphasis should be placed upon each. Perhaps our examinations do not, after all, really measure adequately the actual results of instruction. There is, moreover, the question of permanence of knowledge gained. Many teachers and students still believe that, irrespective of grades on examinations, the student who does the entire dissection by himself has a more thorough mastery of the subject and will retain his knowledge longer. This could be proved only by subse- quent tests. About 80 per cent of the students, after having tried both plans, stated on a questionnaire that they personally believed that the plan with two to a body is better, even though the examina- tion grades show no difference. Final conclusions are perhaps not justified without further study and experience with the two plans under carefully controlled conditions. TEACHING OF GROSS HUMAN ANATOMY TABLE XXV CORRELATIONS IN ANATOMY EXPERIMENT SCORES CORRELATED FALL WINTER Anatomy with Sigma X Reading Test .13-1 .07 .27� .06 Anatomy with Miller Mental Test for Graduate Students .24� .07 .24�L .07 Anatomy with Honor-Point Ratio in required pre- medical sciences .18� .07 .321 .06 Anatomy with Honor-Point Ratio in all premedical subjects .25�- .07 .30�L .06 Anatomy with Zoology Grades, premedical .32� .06 .46� .06 Anatomy with Zoology and Miller Mental Test (multiple) .36- .06 .48� .06 Anatomy (Fall) with Anatomy (Winter), final grades .92�L .01 Anatomy practical with Anatomy visual and tactual .32� .06 Anatomy weekly quiz 1 with repetition ten weeks later .35� .06 Anatomy weekly quiz 3 with repetition eight weeks later .51� .05 Anatomy weekly quiz 10 with repetition one week later .66� .04 Time does not permit a full presentation of the data in con- nection with this experiment, but some further points of special interest are shown in Table XXV. It will be noted that the cor- relations between the final anatomy grades and the mental tests are somewhat lower than those between anatomy and the premedical subjects. The highest correlation was with zoology, although even this was comparatively low. Some repetitions of the weekly tests (at the final) indicated that the correlation is higher when the elapsed time is shorter. 449 This book is a preservation facsimile produced for the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. It is made in compliance with copyright law and produced on acid-free archival 60# book weight paper which meets the requirements of ANSI/NISO Z39.48-1992 (permanence of paper). Preservation facsimile printing and binding by Northern Micrographics Brookhaven Bindery La Crosse, Wisconsin 2012