1 86 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



At present there seems to be a good deal of unrest among college 

 professors. It is a little difficult to see why; for, after all, the presi- 

 dent and the professors alike are hired men engaged for a consideration 

 to discharge fairly definite duties. It is difficult to see why a college 

 professor should make so much more fuss about losing his position than 

 is commonly made by an officer in a bank or an insurance company or a 

 corporation or in the public service. The college professor is not neces- 

 sarily an expert in education or in college administration as carried on 

 in these later days. He is apt to be a specialist, knowing something, 

 indeed, of many subjects and a great deal about some restricted range 

 of intellectual activity. Often he is absolutely without qualification for 

 formulating a course of study suitable for the average boy, for advising 

 the average student as to the studies that are best for him, or for the 

 construction of any educational policy whatever. 



The fact that A is one of the highest living authorities on clam 

 shells needs to be supplemented by other facts before this man can 

 expect much importance to be given to his views on the training of 

 youth or concerning the apportionment of funds among a dozen or 

 fifteen different departments. In most faculties, however, there are men 

 not disqualified by personal disposition or training for work other than 

 that in their own specialty. It is the policy of our faculty to utilize the 

 qualifications of these men by distributing them as chairmen of active 

 committees to which are referred questions of discipline, choice of 

 electives, and similar important matters. 



Probably we might do well to think twice about the importance to 

 *the professor or to the college of much of that which is called research 

 'work. A man can not teach well if he stops learning. Undoubtedly it 

 is much pleasanter to work in the library or in the laboratory, and much 

 pleasanter to work in one's own study, than it is to try to convey infor- 

 mation to a body of rather careless young men who would prefer not 

 to be instructed. But, after all, in the small college at least, the instruc- 

 tion of youth is the principal object of the professor's connection with 

 the institution. There are not many professors whose research work is 

 of any value whatever except to themselves. Those who are competent 

 to enlarge the boundaries of human knowledge constitute a different 

 class and are few in number. Such should have every opportunity and 

 every facility. Generally these men are such wretchedly poor teachers 

 that they have no place in the college faculty. Their service to mankind 

 must be rendered elsewhere and under different conditions. Of course 

 the college professor must have opportunity and time for continuous 

 self-improvement, but he mustn't be allowed to forget that his job is 

 that of a teacher. 



It is questionable also whether the faculty should have too much 

 to say about its own membership. In our college, the president, when 



