376 REPORT—1904. 
schools, to be known as “accredited schools,” from which schools pupils 
who presented certificates of having satisfactorily passed the full four 
years’ high school course would be received without examination into the 
University. One of the University professors of education has for his 
main function the visitation of schools with a view of testing their fitness 
to be placed on the accredited list. He is from time to time assisted by 
his professorial colleagues, who inspect the schools from the point of view 
of their special subjects. Schools that are found satisfactory in all respects 
are placed on the accredited list ; others have their deficiencies pointed 
out to them, and are told that when these are remedied they, too, will be 
put on the list. 
‘When a school has been placed on the list it is still subject to inspec- 
tion. It receives a report from the University upon each student that it 
sends thereto at the end of his first session or first semester, as the case 
may be. The University reserves to itself the right to refuse a student 
who is found to be insufficiently prepared to go on with his studies, and 
also the right to withdraw from the accredited list the name of any school 
that is proved by the pupils that it sends up to have an unsatisfactory 
standard. The result of this is that in the States where it has been 
adopted the whole educational system has been unified and strengthened. 
The University is lookéd up to as a counsellor and friend of the schools ; 
the University teachers iearn much by continued intercourse with their 
scholastic colleagues and vice versd. 
‘In this way the barriers that exist in many countries between the 
various grades and teachers are rapidly being removed, and, what is even 
more important, the teaching of all classes of teachers is thereby made 
more direct, more stimulating and attractive, to the students. Here and 
there I met teachers who disliked the accrediting system and preferred 
the old examination system, but the vast majority were strongly in favour 
of the former. They pointed out that no system that had been, or as far 
as they could see, could ever be devised, would ensure that all the students 
entering a given class in a given year at the University would all approxi- 
mately start with the same amount of training and learning. 
‘ At the same time the accrediting system, as against the older system, 
leaves the teacher and the taught free, and thereby stimulates better 
training. So strong is the feeling in favour of this system in the Middle 
West that even entrance scholarships to the colleges and Universities 
are awarded by it. The entrance scholarships are allotted among the 
accredited schools, each school taking its turn, and receiving as nearly as 
possible the number of scholarships proportioned to its own number of 
students, and to the number who proceed from the school to the Univer- 
sity. 
af The evidence given by Professor Harper in favour of the system was 
very striking. He said that when he left Yale to go to Chicago he was 
opposed to the accrediting system, but that experience in the Middle 
West had led him to change his opinion, and that now he is a firm 
believer in it. In order further to extend the system, and to prevent 
needless repetition of work, the State Universities of the Middle West 
propose to draw up a list of the schools that can be accredited by all of 
them. The standard for this joint list is to be somewhat higher than the 
standard adopted by the Universities singly for their several lists. As I 
have already said, the system is gaining favour in the East, and with the 
exception of Harvard, Yale, Princeton, and Columbia Universities it has, 
