714 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXVIII. No. 725 



France was appointed to a professorship; 

 this year Leeds University, England, and 

 Edinburgh University, Scotland, have fur- 

 nished two professors. 



One of the most important pieces of edu- 

 cational legislation, as President Schurman 

 points out, was the establishment by the 

 College of Arts and Sciences of an admin- 

 istrative board with direct supervision over 

 the work of freshmen and sophomores in 

 that college, and President Schurman states 

 the underlying motive for this action in the 

 following words: 



Among the best of our colleges and universities 

 the great break in the course of a collegiate or 

 liberal education comes at the end of the second 

 year, both as regards the curriculum and the 

 methods of instruction. This differentiation of the 

 work, methods of instruction and educational aims 

 of the first two years of the course in the college 

 of arts and sciences in contrast with those of the 

 later years of that course calls for a correspond- 

 ing differentiation in the staff of instruction, 

 which could not fail to insure greater thorough- 

 ness of instruction, greater simplicity and effect- 

 iveness of administration and closer personal and 

 social intercourse between teachers and students. 



It has been recognized at Cornell Uni- 

 versity that a scheme of education which 

 permits students to elect their own studies, 

 whatever its advantages, is at any rate at- 

 tended with great risks, especially for the 

 younger and inexperienced undergradu- 

 ates; and for some time past a considerable 

 portion of the work of freshmen and 

 sophomores has been prescribed. But the 

 care and supervision of these underclass- 

 men has hitherto remained in the hands of 

 the entire faculty of arts and sciences, a 

 very large body, many of whom give no 

 instruction whatever to freshmen and 

 sophomores in arts. Now, however, these 

 underclassmen will be under the direct 

 charge of a distinct administrative board, 

 composed of 17 members (of whom 14 are 

 of professorial rank) selected from the 

 teachers of freshmen and sophomore courses 



and this board is given full power to super- 

 vise their work and to provide means for 

 making it effective. 



In effect this board will be a separate 

 faculty, which will have special charge of 

 freshmen and sophomores, thus giving these 

 underclassmen all the advantages of the 

 small college faculty. 



One of the most important problems 

 which press for settlement upon the admin- 

 istrative board for freshmen and sopho- 

 mores is the proper method of instructing 

 underclassmen, and President Schurman 

 brings forward the question iu the follow- 

 ing terms: The colleges and universities 

 have in the past given less attention to 

 improving the methods of teaching than 

 the schools ; and universities certainly have 

 made the mistake of applying to freshmen 

 the methods suitable to the graduate school 

 or to the popular rostrum. But the fresh- 

 man should not be treated either as an 

 investigator or as a passive listener. Reci- 

 tation, question and answer, and constant 

 drill are the methods of instruction proper 

 to the freshman class room. The object is 

 assimilation by the ignorant pupil of 

 knowledge with mental reaction upon it. 



If the modern undergraduate is unre- 

 sponsive in the class room, that is a natural 

 result of the exclusive use of the lecture 

 system. As one of the professors puts it 

 in his report: "Intellectual overfeeding 

 without intellectual exercise is bound to 

 bring about mental torpor. ' ' 



President Schurman also discusses fully 

 the functions of graduate study. In the 

 graduate department as in the university 

 as a whole there is constant danger that 

 the national tendency to worship mere mag- 

 nitude may distort the vision of the faculty 

 and especially of the trustees and friends 

 of the university. It is important, there- 

 fore, to keep clearly in view the essential 

 objects of a graduate school. These are 



