November 18, 1910] 



SCIENCE 



101 



est grades as the random selection — 196 as 

 opposed to 56. This is the most significant 

 fact in Table III. In the second place, as 

 President Lowell's more extensive data 

 based on a difi'erent definition of success 

 clearly show, it appears to make little dif- 

 ference what subjects a student elects. 

 There is no evidence that social sciences 

 are a better preparation than anything 

 else for law or that natural sciences are bet- 

 ter for medicine. Furthermore, the number 

 of elections in each subject by each group 

 of the class of 1894 shows no marked cor- 

 relation, not otherwise accounted for, be- 

 tween subjects elected and success in later 

 life. William T. Foster 



BowDoiN College, 

 September 23, 1910 



INBREEDiyG IX THE INSTRUCTIONAL 



CORPS OF AMERICAN COLLEGES 



AND UNIVERSITIES 



By inbreeding is here meant the election of 

 alumni or alumnss to the instructional stafiF 

 of their alma mater. This practise seems 

 peculiarly American in that it obtains in our 

 schools to a far greater extent than in the 

 schools of Europe. In the German Oym- 

 nasium, e. g., it is comparatively rare, and 

 when it does occur the instructor is elected to 

 his alma mater only after a long course of 

 study or teaching elsewhere. 



In American schools this case is the ex- 

 ception rather than the rule, especially in the 

 less reputable schools where the rule is to 

 elect the inbred instructor soon after gradua- 

 tion, or even before. The reasons for a high 

 per cent, of inbreeding in our schools, as a 

 study of inbred faculties suggests them, are.: 



(1) Inbreeding as a set policy, since it is be- 

 lieved that the alumni are truer to their alma 

 mater than outsiders. This is rather unusual. 



(2) Financial considerations in that recent 

 graduates can be had cheaper than more 

 seasoned and better trained men elsewhere. 



(3) Lack of outlook on the available candi- 

 dates on the part of persons electing. (4) 

 Sectarian considerations in church schools 



and race considerations in race schools which 

 tend to narrow the field of selection, and even 

 to restrict it to some degree to the alumni of 

 such schools themselves. (5) Belief in 

 " home product." Thus for a good many 

 schools there can be shown to be a certain 

 territory from which each draws the additions 

 to its faculty. (6) Fond teachers who bring 

 about the election of their students to their 

 own faculty. (7) Family or friendly rela- 

 tions of the inbred instructor to the persons 

 electing. 



On the results of inbreeding and therefore 

 on the advisability of it as a plan, it is diffi- 

 cult to give tangible evidence. To be sure, 

 inbreeding in plants and animals has been 

 generally considered disastrous, hence the 

 stigma popularly attached to the term. 



In the breeding of animals and plants, in- 

 breeding is never advantageous unless you 

 have almost perfect animals to start with and 

 unless vigorous selection is practised. Then, 

 with great care and good judgment the best 

 individuals are generally produced by it. 



But because inbreeding with average stock 

 in plants and animals is mostly disastrous 

 does not prove that inbreeding in college 

 faculties must be so. The analogy is a very 

 loose one. In the one case a definite biolog- 

 ical process, governed by fixed laws : in the 

 other, merely a social-intellectual corporation, 

 influencing its fledglings in a less exact and 

 measurable way, who in turn would influence 

 their students in the same way, and so on. 



What really happens in inbreeding in fac- 

 ulties is this : A more or less constant body of 

 professors has a certain range of ideas and a 

 certain range of ability : Intellectually, mor- 

 ally and socially. These ideas and capacities 

 they transmit to a greater or less extent to 

 their students. These students are elected to 

 the corporation without taking on any con- 

 siderable number of new ideas or capacities 

 from elsewhere. Thus if we grant that the 

 older men are not steadily deteriorating and 

 that the professors impart themselves fully 

 to their pupils, the range of intellectual, moral 

 and social potencies would remain about con- 

 stant. 



