October 3, 1901] 



NA TURE 



571 



(5) Agriculture, with six departments ; l6) Applied Chemistry, 

 with four departments ; (7) Physics, with two departments ; (S) 

 Fine Arts, with three departments ; (9) Business, with four 

 departments; (10) Navigation and Marine Transportation, with 

 two departments ; (11) Mathematics, with two departments ; (12) 

 Politics and Ecomomics, with four departments ; 113) Languages 

 and Literature, with four departments :(i4) Philosophical Science 

 and Ethics ; (15) Biology ; (16) The Preparatory College 

 (standard curriculum). 



In his presidental address to the section of social and 

 economical science. Prof. C. M. Woodward referred to the 

 report of the advisory committee on the Carnegie Technical 

 School in the following terms: — "For a variety of excellent 

 reasons the committee reaches the conclusion that some new 

 kind of preparation for the work of life must be introduced into 

 the school training of both boys and girls. It then proceeds to 

 outline a technical college, a technical high school and an 

 artisan day and evening school, which are to meet this demand. 

 "The artisan day and evening school is somewhat of the 

 order of German and English low-grade technical schools. I 

 earnestly hope that the suggestion of this school may be adopted 

 that the experiment may be fairly tried in America. The plan 

 for a technical college is in complete harmony with the best 

 engineering schools. 



" The scheme for a technical high school, however, seems to 

 me faulty. This school would be of high-school grade, takmg 

 pupils from the grammar schools and covering presumably four 

 years. The normal ages of entrance and graduation would 

 accordingly be fourteen and eighteen. Three things in the 

 committee's outline of this technical high school deserve atten- 

 tion : (i) The elective principle is to be recognised, the student 

 selecting the required number of courses under the direction of 

 the director of the school. Here the pupil at a tender age 

 (only fourteen or fifteen) is asked to surrender his birthright to 

 the privilege of choice when he is eighteen. 



" (2) The course in mathematics^which begins with elemen- 

 tary algebra — is to include the elements of calculus ! Of course, 

 it must include solid geometry, higher algebra, trigonometry 

 and analytical geometry ! One rarely meets with such an 

 astounding proposition from engineers who are supposed 10 have 

 studied mathematics and to know what they are talking about. 

 They might as well propose that the pupils shall take thermo- 

 dynamics in a short course of lectures. To be sure, .similar 

 ambitious schemes have been proposed elsewhere for boys just 

 out of the grammar school, but they came from people who 

 could have known very little mathematics, and nothing of the 

 uses of the calculus. This criticism may seem trivial, but in 

 more than one place the scheme attempts too much. 



" (3) The technical studies suggested take the form of trade 

 work or special employments, with well equipped shops and 

 experimental laboratories under the direction of expert artisans. 

 " What Mr. Carnegie will do with this last suggestion remains 

 to be seen, but any attempt to embody it in a real technical 

 high school of secondary grade will be full of interest to the 

 educational world. If any man was well prepared to give the 

 scheme a fair trial, that man is Andrew Carnegie ; but it will 

 cost a vast amount of money and its experience will teach us 

 how not to do many things. 



"I have high respect for the members of the advisory com- 

 mittee, but I think a less ambitious scheme would be more 

 successful. You cannot teach the higher mathematics in a high 

 school, and I have no great faith in the value of attempts to 

 teach employments, commercial or industrial, within the limits 

 of any secondary school. Such attempts are certain to mislead 

 and ultimately hinder those they aim to help. Any trade or 

 special employment must be dwarfed and narrowed before it 

 can be brought down to the grasp of an untrained boy, and its 

 very narrowness unfits it for the best educational uses. 



"The school is the place where one should learn the funda- 

 mental unchanging laws and manifestations of force and materials. 

 Special occupations, like special constructions, should be analysed 

 in their elements, and pupils should become expert in such 

 analyses, in so faras they involve universal elements that pupils can 

 comprehend. But there are many things essential to a business 

 employment, which cannot even be apprehended in school." 



From the foregoing it will be seen that much difference of 

 opinion exists as to the nature and extent of the subjects which 

 should be included in the curriculum of a large technical school. 

 Three different and distinct forms of school, which maybe com- 

 bined as parts of one complete technical university, have been 



NO. 1666, VOL. 64] 



proposed. If the whole scheme is accepted by Mr. Carnegie, 

 there will be, in the first place, a first-class technical college. 

 " This college,'' says the committee, " should be made attractive 

 to the greatest scholars in the fields of physical and chemical 

 science. To obtain and hold such men they must be given 

 ample opportunities for research. This college must be sup- 

 plied, therefore, not only with great experimental shops and 

 laboratories for students' use, but in all departments there should 

 be splendidly equipped laboratories of investigation and re- 

 search, under the direction of the head of such department, and 

 with a full corps of assistants for the carrying on of all lines of 

 investigation which are now partly or wholly unprovided for in 

 America." There will also be a Technical High School to 

 carry on work above that of the public grammar school, and 

 day and evening classes for the benefit of those who are unable 

 to take advantage of the more complete courses in this school. 

 Mr. Carnegie has now to decide whether he will found a school 

 for artisans, a technical high school or a technical college, or, if 

 his ambition mounts so high, a true technical university including 

 them all. 



UNIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 

 INTELLIGENCE. 



The building fund of 150,000/., which it is proposed to raise 

 for the Glasgow and West of Scotland Technical College, has 

 reached about 100,000/., and Mr. Carnegie has promised to 

 subscribe one-half the deficiency upon the condition that the 

 other half is promptly obtained. 



The position of science and technical instruction in schools 

 inspected by officers of the Secondary Branch of the Board of 

 Education can be seen in vol. ii. of the Report just issued by 

 the Board, containing extracts from the inspectors' reports for 

 the year 1900. Improvement is manifest in the larger technical 

 schools in the teaching of advanced science. General improve- 

 ment is also reported in the mode of teaching experimental 

 science. "Moreover," remarks Mr. A. E. Tutton, F.R.S., 

 " the influence of the advocates of the heuristic method of 

 teaching has proved to be so far effective that the general atten- 

 tion of teachers has been directed to the educative value or 

 calling forth the highest thinking and experimenting powers of 

 their pupils." Dr. H. H. Hofiert also reports that " there is 

 amongst the teachers a widely spread spirit of enthusiastic 

 eagerness to ascertain the best methods of instruction and to 

 apply them in their own schools." The movement for reform 

 is being felt in the teaching of mathematics, and Mr. J. Brill 

 contributes a short special report upon the subject to the volume 

 just issued. The work being done in the Schools of Science is 

 favourably reported upon by all the inspectors. In these 

 schools five or six hours a week are given to experimental 

 science, two or three to drawing and geometry, about 

 five to mathematics, and eight or ten to literary subjects. 

 Beyond this minimum requirement the extra time at the disposal 

 of the school is given to languages, to science, to commercial 

 subjects, or to manual occupations according to the particular 

 type of the school. In fact, these schools possess a curriculum 

 which is adapted to modern requirements, and in most of them 

 excellent work is being done, not only in science and art, but 

 also in literary subiects. 



A FULL report of the opening of the Harper-Adams Agricul- 

 tural College at Edgmond, Newport, by Mr. Hanbury, the 

 President of the Board of .-Vgriculture, appears in the Newport 

 and Market Drayton Advertiser of September 2S. The 

 College owes its establishment to the late Mr. Thomas Harper- 

 Adams, who left a large sum of money and an estate in order to 

 found it. It is provided with lecture rooms and laboratories 

 in which work can be carried on in physics, chemistry, biology, 

 and other sciences connected with agriculture. The farm 

 attached to the College is about 180 acres in extent and is 

 intended for experimental purposes ; and all the work will be 

 arranged with the object of instructing students in the practical 

 management of a farm on modern business lines. The Salop 

 County Council make a grant of 1000/. a year towards the 

 College funds, and together with the Stafford County Council 

 offer a certain number of scholarships tenable at the College. 

 The Principal is Mr. P. Hedworth Foulkes. In opening the 

 College, Mr. Hanbury referred to the small sum available for 

 agricultural education. At present the Board of Agriculture had 

 to spend, in grants, the small sum of Sooo/. for the whole of the 

 United Kingdom. In France, for the same purpose, 153,000/. 



