882 



SCIENCE. 



[N. S. Vol. XXIII. No. 597. 



spirit of professionalism in teaching is en- 

 gaged in what is nothing less than a life-and- 

 death struggle. When a university president 

 or a school principal can indulge unrebuked 

 in the insufferable arrogance of such an 

 expression as ' my faculty ' or ' one of my 

 teachers,' when school trustees are capable of 

 calling superintendents and principals and 

 teachers ' employees,' it is time to consider 

 the matter somewhat seriously, and to inquire 

 into the probable consequences of so gross a 

 misconception of the nature of educational 

 service. 



There is one general consequence which 

 subsumes all the others. It is that young 

 men of character and self-respect will refuse 

 to engage in the work of teaching (except as 

 a makeshift) as long as the authorities in 

 charge of education remain blind to the pro- 

 fessional character of the occupation, and deal 

 with those engaged in it as objects of sus- 

 picion, or, at best, as irresponsible and un- 

 practical theorists whose actions must be kept 

 constantly under control and restricted by all 

 manner of limitations and petty regulations. 

 Membership in a profession implies a certain 

 franchise, an emancipation from dictation, 

 and a degree of liberty in the exercise of 

 judgment, which most members of the teach- 

 ing profession find are denied them by 

 the prevalent forms of educational organiza- 

 tion. And the denial is made the more ex- 

 asperating by the consciousness that these 

 rights (which are elementary and should be 

 inalienable) are withheld by persons whose 

 tenure of authority is more apt to be based 

 upon the executive energy or the ability of 

 the schemer or the success of the man of 

 practical affairs than upon expert acquaint- 

 ance with the conditions of educational work. 

 The ' business ' president or administrative 

 board is bad enough, and the ' political ' presi- 

 dent or board is worse ; yet upon the anything 

 but tender mercies of the one or the other 

 most men who devote their lives to the noble 

 work of teaching must in large measure de- 

 pend. 



The inevitable consequence of this condi- 

 tion is, as we have said, that a process of 

 natural selection is constantly tending to 



drive the most capable men into professions 

 which may be pursued upon professional 

 terms, and to make the teaching profession 

 more and more the resort of the poor in spirit, 

 to whom the words of the Beatitude must have 

 a distinctly ironical ring. To become a 

 teacher in this country is, except in the case 

 of a few favored institutions or systems, to 

 subordinate one's individuality to a mechan- 

 ism, and to expose one's self-respect to indig- 

 nities of a peculiarly wanton sort. It is no 

 wonder that the young man of parts is not 

 over-anxious to enter a profession so forbid- 

 ding to every professional instinct, and that 

 he turns aside from the educational field, 

 however strong his natural inclination to enter 

 it, when he gets sight of the artificial obstacles 

 to its proper cultivation. 



It is often urged that the money rewards of 

 the teaching profession are insufficient to at- 

 tract to it the better class of men. This is 

 undoubtedly true up to a certain point, but 

 to insist upon it overmuch is to take a more 

 cynical view of human nature than we are 

 willing to take. Inadequate compensation is 

 a grievous fault of our educational provision, 

 but it is not so grievous as the faults that 

 undermine professional self-respect, and sap 

 educational vitality at its very root. Tet 

 these graver faults are easily remediable, and 

 would be promptly remedied if we could once 

 rid ourselves of the obsession of the commer- 

 cial or military type of administrative organi- 

 zation. If the educational laborer is worthy 

 of his hire, he is even more worthy of the 

 trust and confidence that necessarily apper- 

 tain to his delicate and specialized duties, 

 and to refuse him these is to degrade his 

 effort into the mere journeyman's task. The 

 whole question of the relative importance of 

 compensation and consideration was thus 

 stated by one of the speakers at the Illinois 

 Trustees' Conference of last October : " Young 

 men of power and ambition scorn what should 

 be reckoned the noblest of professions, not 

 because that profession condemns them to 

 poverty, but because it dooms them to a sort 

 of servitude. * * * The problem is not one 

 of wages; for no university can become rich 



