THE AGE OF COLLEGE GRADUATION. 159 



CHANGES IN THE AGE OF COLLEGE GRADUATION. 



By W. SCOTT THOMAS, 



TEACHERS COLLEGE, COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY. 



nnHE belief seems to have become general that the American boy 

 -■- of to-da}' takes his first collegiate degree — A.B. or its equivalent 

 — a good deal older than his father took his, and a great deal older 

 than his grandfather. The present study was undertaken with a view 

 to determining from actual records the measure and rate, if real, of 

 this increase. The plates and tables that are presented herewith tell, 

 in the main, their own story; my task will be little more than the 

 making of a running commentary upon these. 



The calculations are based upon nearly twenty thousand cases, and 

 include the graduates of eleven colleges, representing all parts of the 

 country except the extreme west. If undue weight seems to be given 

 to the New England colleges, my excuse is twofold : first, the proportion 

 of colleges that date back fifty years or more is much larger in New 

 England than elsewhere; secondly, I have used all the published ma- 

 terial I have been able to find, in the shape of alumni catalogues which 

 give the date of birth of graduates. These have, moreover, been 

 largely supplemented by private information very kindly furnished 

 by the officers of colleges whose general catalogues do not come down 

 to the year 1900. 



The results are given in decade periods for the double reason that 

 shorter periods are imwieldy, becoming too numerous, and because the 

 longer period is more reliable. Two- or three-year periods often show 

 what seems a very decided trend in a given direction; but this is in 

 all cases decidedly modified if not entirely obliterated by the addition 

 of the remaining years of the ten. The results thus win stability and 

 evenness. 



Before beginning the discussion of the tables and plates, one further 

 word of explanation may be given. It will be noted that in Table I. 

 and elsewhere the median age is used rather than the average age. The 

 reasons for using the median age — the point above which and below 

 which, respectively, one half of the students in each decade graduate — 

 are evident. In the first place, the labor of finding the exact arith- 

 metical average of the age of graduation of 20,000 students would be 

 enormous ; and when found it would not give us what we wish, viz., the 

 age at which the students, or a definite percentage of them, actually 



