244 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



college graduate is untrained. The position of science in present-day- 

 life needs no advocate. 



It would seem that the difference between colleges and technical 

 schools would then disappear. In part, this is true and is desirable. 

 A difference of degree would still exist, as is evident from the follow- 

 ing suggested changes in their respective curricula. 



For the technical school there is suggested a standard five-year 

 course embodying all the features of the present four-year standard, 

 except some of the instruction in purely commercial operations. The 

 resulting year and a fraction gained for further study would be ex- 

 pended in part upon pure science and mathematics, but largely upon 

 history, economics and literature. The objections to such a curriculum 

 are mostly in the nature of practical difficulties in its inception. The 

 competition for students between technical schools is sufficient to for- 

 bid any except the largest and financially most secure from announc- 

 ing to prospective students five years to accomplish a degree for which 

 the purely technical requirements represent but four years' work. A 

 large number of our technical-school students are so short-sighted that 

 they resent and tend to avoid anything in the curriculum which does 

 not seem to bear directly upon the degree and the job to which it ad- 

 mits them. Any instructor in English in a technical school can sup- 

 port this statement. The difficulties are then, on the one hand, short- 

 sighted students, and on the other, short-sighted employers. 



A technical school, however, should be distinctly above the grade of 

 a business college or a school of stenography in its relations to the 

 ultimate public welfare. It should exert a formative influence upon 

 the future of its professions and not merely mirror existing commercial 

 conditions. It should by precept and requirement lead the short-sighted 

 members of its student body to a desire for a broader preparation, and, 

 relying upon that increasing number of far-sighted employers to care 

 for its graduates, it should confidently anticipate the market for its 

 product. 



For colleges, on the other hand, the following detailed suggestions 

 may be made. First, that a general introductory course of a year's 

 duration be required of the student in each of the subjects of physics, 

 chemistry and biology. In biology the emphasis should be upon living 

 forms and not on classification and nomenclature. Second, the student 

 shall then elect one of these subjects for continuation. The character of 

 these three subsequent courses departs radically from present college 

 conventions. Each course should be of a year's duration and should 

 treat briefly of the present-day commercial and technical applications of 

 the principles studied in the introductory course. The aim should be to 

 impart those scientific facts and methods of probable later value to the 

 student either in business relations with scientists and engineers, in 



