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The Universities and Colonial Scientific 

 Services.^ 



THE unfortunate shortage of trained men at the 

 end of the war, at a time when many of the 

 Colonies were especially anxious for expert help in 

 reorganisation and further development, led to various 

 suggestions for the increase in the supply. Lord 

 Milner, as Colonial Secretary, accordingly appointed 

 ;i Committee in 1920 to investigate how the univer- 

 sities could best help in training men for the scientific 

 services abroad and in securing the research necessary 

 tr the protection of the inhabitants of the Colonies 

 ,ainst disease and for the development of their 

 \ cterinary, agricultural, and mineral resources. The 

 ("ommittee consisted of Lord Chalmers as chairman, 

 .Sir Henry Birchenough, Sir John Rose Bradford, Sir 

 Walter M. Fletcher, Prof. E. B. Poulton, Sir David 

 Prain, Sir H. J. Read, Sir Stewart Stockman, and Sir 

 Aubrey Strahan. The Committee has now issued its 

 Report. It concludes that the universities can help 

 mainly in two ways — in the fuller training of students 

 $ and in the building up of a corps of advanced workers 

 J who would be available for the solution of especially 

 I complex problems. 



I The Committee's conclusion that the universities 



i must impart to the students who desire to enter the 



: Colonial services more than "book knowledge" will 



be universally approved, but the suggestion that some 



. universities still give scientific courses without labora- 



V tory and practical instruction will be read with surprise. 



The Committee further insists that the men required 



must have " a training in the methods of research, and 



this involves post-graduate study." It concludes, 



' Report of a Committee on Research in the Colonies. (Cmd. 1472.) 

 12 pp. 8vo. (His Majesty's Stationery Office, 1921.) zd. 



NO. 2734, VOL. 109] 



therefore, that the universities can assist most usefully 

 and directly by encouraging post-graduate study, and 

 for this purpose urges that an increase of research fellow- 

 ships and studentships would be of primary importance. 



The Report implies that appointments in the 

 scientific departments of the Colonies should be re- 

 stricted to men who have been through post-graduate 

 courses, but this limitation would be attended by serious 

 drawbacks, especially in tropical colonies. The men 

 would begin their service later and would retire when 

 older or with a smaller pension, and the men who have 

 taken the extra years of post-graduate work would be 

 lower in seniority than those who had joined the service 

 at the end of the ordinary university course. The 

 better-trained men would thereby be debarred, as a rule, 

 from securing the head appointments, with probably 

 much consequent jealousy and friction. The attempt 

 to correct this evil by dividing the staff of a small 

 department into two grades and restricting the upper 

 grade to men who have had post-graduate training 

 would lead to even greater difficulties. 



The Committee's conclusion implies that the courses 

 for university degrees do not include training in the 

 methods of research,although that training is the essential 

 of university education. Research training should be 

 improved, not by lengthening the time at the university, 

 but by earlier specialisation in the case of students re- 

 quiring a professional scientific qualification. The 

 universities provide for two sets of students, whose re- 

 quirements are different. They have to teach the 

 pedagogic methods and general principles, by knowledge 

 of which teachers may widen the mental outlook of 

 their pupils and inculcate habits of scientific thought. 

 They must also teach students who intend to adopt 

 science as a profession, other than in secondary educa- 

 tion and medicine, how to use the methods by which the 

 various sciences have achieved their present position 

 and may be further advanced. Now that a four years' 

 course for the honours B.Sc. is becoming the rule, the 

 university science courses should provide training in 

 the methods of research for at least two of the four 

 years for students who require it ; and men so trained 

 should be able to give useful service in the ordinary 

 research work required in most colonial departments. 

 The desired increase in the output of men trained for 

 research would be even better secured by encouraging 

 the universities to provide further teaching in research 

 methods in the course for the B.Sc. without adopting 

 the principle that such training " involves post- 

 graduate study." 



The second problem which the Report considers 

 is the provision of experts to solve the specially intricate 

 problems that would be met with from time to time. 

 The university staffs might be expected to help in such 



