COLLEGE CONDITIONS 409 



of thoroughness from the preparatory schools; entrance examinations 

 should be to determine how well the boy has been trained, not to ascer- 

 tain how fully he has been crammed. It may be well enough for col- 

 leges to waste their students' time in athletic contests for advertising 

 purposes, but such " commercialism " in preparatory schools should 

 be treated with indignation. 



College methods should be changed. But first of all, there should 

 be a definite legal determination as to the meaning of the term " col- 

 lege." The several states should respect themselves and should repeal 

 the charters of many schools which have power to grant degrees. 

 Drastic treatment has been applied to medical schools within the last 

 two years and similar treatment should be applied to academies which 

 masquerade as colleges and count as students all pupils, even those in 

 the primary department. It has been said that the existence of such 

 colleges is justified in many places, for the question is either poor col- 

 leges or none. Xot at all. There is no reason why these academies 

 should be called colleges and be empowered to grant degrees which the 

 recipients think equal to those obtained from colleges properly equipped 

 with men and materials; they should be recognized only as academies 

 and as such they should be self-supporting. There is so reason why an 

 academy in a prosperous community and with 400 pupils should not be 

 self-supporting. If comfortable farmers are unwilling to pay the cost, 

 that is no reason why overtaxed city dwellers should meet the deficit; 

 the canny agriculturist has ovei reached the great cities sufficiently 

 through methods of real-estate assessment. 



The cost of some so-called " colleges " is appalling. The writer 

 recently received a circular appealing for assistance to save a college 

 whose prosperity threatens its existence. The " institution," in a 

 prosperous agricultuial region, has almost 500 pupils, including the 

 summer school, whose utility in swelling the catalogue list has been 

 discovered. Of the grand total only one seventh can be classed as taking 

 college courses and the academy contains scarcely so many. During 

 the year 1911-12 the expenditures were almost $49,000 arid the deficit 

 was about $23,000, or an average expenditure of $100 per pupil — while 

 the receipts from tuition fees of all sorts amounted to only about 

 $7,500. Of the money expended, $17,000 was paid to teachers, but 

 the other expenditures show some surprising features, for one finds 

 $4,800 for "other salaries"; $1,000, "other expenses"; $5,600, 

 "printing and advertising"; $1,360 for "travel," making a total of 

 nearly $13,000 for administration and publicity in a prosperous com- 

 munity, which cared so little for the advantages that only $7,500 were 

 paid as fees for almost 500 pupils. During an existence of twenty-nine 

 years this "college" has succeeded in accumulating an alumni roll 



vol. lxxxii.— 28. 



