362 



SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXIX. No. 740 



hastened the completer demolition of the 

 college. But educationally the two phe- 

 nomena are not the same. "We can neither 

 appreciate nor escape our present plight, 

 until we hold them in thought at arm's 

 length from each other — in thought, for 

 summary geographical sundering of the 

 one from the other is not at this moment 

 advocated, I believe, by anybody. 



I say the old college has gone to pieces. 

 But it has not simply gone to pieces, leav- 

 ing a dust heap to mark its site. It has 

 perished as perishes a frontier town, in 

 the very process of conversion into a mod- 

 ern city. The significant aspects that meet 

 the eye are not so much the evidences of 

 dissolution as the preparations for a new, 

 more commodious and more substantial 

 structure. The college has increased its 

 resources, it has undertaken to serve a far 

 wider range of social activities by frankly 

 conceding the culture-value and dignity of 

 science and of the useful arts. This exten- 

 sion of scope saved it from extinction, at 

 the same time that it procured for the col- 

 lege a far more vital function than it had 

 previously discharged. The historian of 

 our educational history will, I believe, 

 speak of this successful transformation as 

 the great educational achievement of the 

 generation following the Civil War — an 

 achievement destined to be permanently 

 associated with the name and leadership of 

 President Eliot. 



On the other hand, from the standpoint 

 of the incoming generation, it is fair to re- 

 gard the college situation as still unde- 

 termined. I have used the word "prepa- 

 rations" advisedly. The college has in 

 hand the elements out of which effective 

 schools may some day actually be made. 

 But they have not been made as yet. Except 

 in the realm of technical education, the 

 college is still almost wholly unorganized. 

 The question inevitably arises whether 

 educational organization at the college 



level must be limited to the technical field ; 

 further, whether it is only the technical 

 instinct that discloses itself during adoles- 

 cence; finally, whether other types once 

 made out may not be equally amenable to 

 organized educational treatment. In k 

 previous discussion^ I excluded the tech- 

 nical school, not because it ought to be 

 severed from the college, but because criti- 

 cism aimed at collegiate chaos does not lie 

 as against the technical departments. I 

 hope now to show that, so far from having 

 no bearing on the academic situation, the 

 technical school, whatever its present de- 

 fects, is really highly suggestive. The col- 

 lege recognizes the technical motive, stim- 

 ulates and rewards its expression by 

 providing for it adequate and continuous 

 discipline. It has no fear of wrecking a 

 youth who expects to be an engineer by 

 encouraging him to know his mind at 

 eighteen; in other cases, however, it keeps 

 hands off for fear of doing violence to 

 what is deepest in social and individual 

 activity. Hence, the college outside the 

 technical field now almost entirely avoids 

 definite formulation on the educational 

 side. Once a minimum of content and a 

 maximum of organization, it is now a max- 

 imum of content and a minimum of or- 

 ganization. 



It is as though a great clearing had been 

 made to which stone and timber, lime and 

 sand have been hauled in large quantities. 

 But neither architect nor builder appears. 

 Meanwhile the neighborhood children play 

 at building with the material. They pile 

 up rambling inconsequential structures 

 that quickly collapse into as many shape- 

 less separate heaps. The brick and stone 

 are college courees; the separate heaps 

 represent individual curricula; the chil- 

 dren building without eventual purpose 

 are college students ; and the utter absence 



^ " The American College," p. 48, etc. 



