i 7 2 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



The qualifications demanded of a college president are different in 

 different places. In some institutions the head is purely an executive 

 officer, with no teaching to do ; in others he must fill a professor's 

 chair also. On the one hand, a man of general scholarship, breadth of 

 view, and executive ability is called for ; on the other, special familiar- 

 ity with some particular branch of learning must be added to the re- 

 quirements. To find all these qualifications united in one individual 

 is by no means easy. A man of one ability is easily found at any 

 time ; but men of many abilities, at once both versatile and thorough, 

 are scarce. In any case, the college president, to be a successful man- 

 ager, must have tact ; he must have executive capacity and force ; he 

 must be business-like in his methods, he must command the confidence 

 and respect of trustees, teachers, students, alumni, and of the commu- 

 nity in which he lives; he must be a good judge of men; and he must 

 have the training which only experience can give. Failing in any one 

 of these qualifications he is liable to fail altogether, for the strength of 

 the whole chain is but that of its weakest link. He must have public 

 confidence, in order to attract public support ; he must be in harmony 

 w T ith the faculty, or things will go at loose ends ; if the students dis- 

 trust him, discipline can not be maintained. When vacancies occur in 

 the teaching force, he will have great influence in filling them ; hence 

 he must be familiar with scholarship in its various phases, and able to 

 decide upon the relative merits of different candidates. Finally, he 

 must be thoroughly acquainted with college routine, clear in his views 

 concerning courses of study and methods of instruction, up in all mat- 

 ters relating to marks, examinations, discipline, and the like. He 

 should have high ideals, and at the same time be neither a doctrinaire 

 nor a dreamer. 



The fact that most of the older American colleges were founded 

 with religious ends in view has had much to do in determining the 

 appointment of college presidents. Plainly, if the chief function of 

 the schools is to train clergymen, they should be controlled by clergy- 

 men ; and so they have been controlled almost universally. If a Baptist 

 college needs a president, some Baptist clergyman is chosen ; a Pres- 

 byterian college puts a Presbyterian minister at its head, and so on. 

 That this state of affairs has naturally come about no one can deny, 

 but whether it is any longer a legitimate condition is questionable. 

 The functions of the college are broader than they were a century ago; 

 it no longer aims chiefly to feed the ministry, but seeks rather to send 

 cultivated men and women into all walks of life. Hence, although a 

 minister may be an efficient college president, he should not be ap- 

 pointed because he is a minister, but for other reasons distinctly. Just 

 here an example may have value. A few years ago a popular clergy- 

 man was elected president of a well-known college. Within a year 

 his popularity was gone, and students, professors, and trustees were 

 alike dissatisfied. The reason was simple. The new head was a 



