396 



NA TURE 



[August 15, 1907 



man to teach mathematics if he cither despises or is 

 if^norant of the ways in which mathematics enter into 

 engineering. The fact is that for the great majority of 

 engineering students, the mental training they most need 

 is that which will enable them to think in physics, in 

 mechanics, in geometric space, not in abstract symbols. 

 The abstract symbols, and the processes of dealing with 

 their relations and combinations, are truly necessary to 

 them : but they are wanted not for themselves, but to 

 iorm convenient modes of expressing the physical facts 

 and laws, and the interdependence of those physical facts 

 and laws. When the student loses grip of the physical 

 meaning of his equations, and regards them only as 

 .ibstractions or groupings of symbols, woe betide him. 

 His mathematics amount to a mere symbol-juggling. That 

 is how paper engineers are made. The high and dry 

 mathematical master who thinks it beneath him to show 

 a student how to plot the equations y = .'\sin.\-, or 

 r = () sin 9, or who never culls an example or sets a problem 

 from thermodynamics or electricity, must be left severely 

 on one side as a fossil. Better a living Whitworth scholar 

 than a dry-as-dust Cambridge wrangler. He at least 

 knows that elasticity is soinething more real than the 



group of symbols E = p-=--^, which any mathematician 



may "know," even though he be blissfully ignorant 

 whether the force required to elongate a square-inch bar 

 of steel by one one-millionth of its length is ten ounces or 

 ten tons. 



One evidence of the wholesome change of opinion that 

 is springing up concerning the training of engineers is the 

 abandonment of the system of taking premium pupils into 

 works with no other test or qualification than that of the 

 money-bag. .Already many leading firms of engineers 

 have been finding that the practice of taking sons of 

 wealthy parents for a premium does not answer well, and 

 is neither to their own advantage nor in many cases to 

 that of the "pupil," whom it is nobody's particular busi- 

 ness in the shops to train. Premium pupilage is abso- 

 lutely unknown in the engineering firms of "the United 

 States or on the Continent of Europe. The firms who 

 have abandoned it are finding themselves better served by 

 taking the ablest young men from the technical school's 

 and paying them small wages from the first, while thev 

 gain e.xperience and prove themselves capable of good 

 service. Messrs. Yarrow and Co. have led the wav with 

 a plan of their own, having three grades of apprentice- 

 ship, admission to which depends upon the educational 

 abilities of the youths themselves. Messrs. Siemens have 

 adopted a plan of requiring a high preliminary training. 

 The Daimler Motor Company has likewise renounced all 

 premiums, preferring to select young men of the highest 

 intelligence and merit. Messrs." Clayton and Shuttleworth 

 have quite recently reconstructed their system of pupil- 

 apprenticeship on similar lines. The British Westing- 

 hous? Company and the British Thomson-Houston Com- 

 pany have each followed an excellent scheme for the 

 admission of capable young men. Even the conservatism 

 of the railway engineers shows signs of giving way ; for 

 already the Great Eastern Railway has modernised its 

 regulations for the admission of apprentices. What the 

 engineering staffs of the railway companies have lost by 

 taking in pupils because of their fathers' purses rather 

 than for the sake of their own brains it is impossible to 

 gauge. But the community loses too, and has a right to 

 expect reform. 



To this question, aflfccting the whole future outlook of 

 engineering generally, a most important contribution was 

 made in iqofi by the publication by the Institution of Civil 

 Engineers of the report of a committee (appointed in 

 Xovember, 1003) to consider and report to the Council 

 upon_ the subject of the best methods of education and 

 training for all classes of engineers. This Committee. 

 a niost influential and representative body consisting of 

 leading men appointed bv the several professional societies, 

 the Institutions of Civil, Mechanical, and Electrical 

 Engineers, the Institution of Xaval .Architects, the Iron 

 and Steel Institute, the Institution of Gas Engineers, the 

 Institution r,f Mining Engineers, and two northern socie- 

 ties, was ablv and sympathetically presided over bv Sir 

 William II, White. Its inquiries' lasted over two years 

 NO. 1972, VOL. 76] 



and included the following sections : (i) Preparatory 

 Training in Secondary Schools ; (2) Training in Offices, 

 Workshops, Factories, or on Works ; (3) Training in 

 Universities and Higher Technical Institutions; (4) Post- 

 graduate Work. The findings of this Committee must be 

 received as the most authoritative judgment of the most 

 competent judges. So far as they relate to preparatory 

 education they suggest a modernised secondary school 

 curriculum in which there is no one specialised scientific 

 study, but with emphasis on what may be called sensible 

 mathematics. They also formulated one recommendation 

 so vital that it must be quoted in full : — 



" A leaving examination for secondary schools, similar 

 in character to those already existing in Scotland and 

 Wales, is desirable throughout the United Kingdom. It 

 is desirable to have a standard such that it could be 

 accepted by the Institution [of Civil Engineers] as equiva- 

 lent to the Studentship Examination, and by the Universi- 

 ties and Colleges as equivalent to a Matriculation 

 Examination." 



One may well wonder why such a reasonable recom- 

 mendation has not long ago been carried out by the Board 

 of Education. Perhaps it has been too busy over the 

 religious squabble to attend to the pressing needs of the 

 nation. 



The second set of recommendations relates to engineer- 

 ing training. It begins with the announcement that 

 " long experience has led to general agreement among 

 engineers as to the general lines on which practical train- 

 ing should proceed"; but goes into no recommendations 

 on this head beyond favouring four years in workshops, 

 on works, in mines, or in offices, expressing the pious 

 desire that part of this practical training should be obtained 

 in drawing-offices, and suggesting that during workshop- 

 training the boys should keep regular hours, be subject 

 to discipline, and be paid wages. It then lays down a 

 dozen recommendations as to the " academic " training 

 suitable for the a%-erage boy. He should leave school 

 about seventeen ; he should have a preliminary year, or 

 introductory workshop course of a year, either between 

 leaving school and entering college, or after the first year 

 of college training. If the workshop course follows 

 straight on leaving school there must be maintenance of 

 studies either by private tuition or in evening classes, so 

 that systematic study be not suspended. For the average 

 student, if well prepared before entering College, the 

 course should last three academic years (three sessions') ; 

 in soVne cases this might be extended to four or shortened 

 to two. \ sound and extensive knowledge of mathe- 

 matics is necessary in all branches of engineering, and 

 those departments of mathematics which have no bearing 

 upon engineering should not claim unnecessary time or 

 attention. The Committee strongly recommends efficient 

 instruction in engineering drawing. The college course 

 should include instruction (necessarily given in the labor- 

 atoryl in testing materials and structures, and in the prin- 

 ciples underlying metallurgical processes. In the granting 

 of degrees, diplomas, and certificates, importance should 

 be attached to laboratory and experimental work per- 

 formed by individual students, and such awards should 

 not depend on the results of terminal or final examinations 

 alone. 



.All this is most excellent. It will be seen that it is 

 entirely incompatible with the premium-pupil system, which 

 may therefore be regarded as having been weighed and 

 found wanting. For two things clearly stand out ; that 

 the young engineer must be college-trained, and that when 

 he goes to works he should be regularly paid. It would 

 have been well if the Committee could have been more 

 explicit as to the proper course of workshop training ; for 

 instance as to the systematic drafting of the young engineer 

 through the shops — forge, foundry, pattern-shoo, fitting- 

 shop, &c. , and as to the proper recognition of the duty 

 of the shop-foreman to allocate work to the novice in 

 suitable routine. These are doubtless among the matters 

 in which " long experience has led engineers to general 

 agreement." But this being so, it would have been well 

 to state them authoritatively, k notable feature of this 

 report is its healthy appreciation of the advantages of 

 training, and an equally healthy distrust of the practice 

 of cramming for examinations. So soon as any subject 



