Jllt 31, 1903.] 



SCIENCE. 



135 



cessions, coming from so conservative an 

 institution as is Yale, are of the deepest 

 significance. They mean that the move- 

 ment toward special education can not be 

 ignored by any institution. The demand 

 for special education is imperative. Like 

 the trusts, it has come to stay. 



It is reported that this change in the 

 Yale requirements was opposed by the lan- 

 guage teachers of the faculty, who de- 

 plored the debasement of the time-honored 

 degree of Bachelor of Arts. In many of 

 our larger universities, as well as smaller 

 ones, three baccalaureate degrees are given 

 in the school of liberal arts— Bachelor of 

 Arts, Bachelor of Philosophy and Bache- 

 lor of Science. If one will examine the 

 lists of graduates of such institutions he 

 will be struck with the proportionally 

 greater frequency with which the Bachelor 

 of Science degree is given in recent years. 

 Usually the graduates receiving this de- 

 gree outnumber those receiving both of the 

 other degrees. In fact one can only be 

 surprised at the rapid diminution in the 

 number of those striving for the old simon- 

 pure badge of a libei-al culture. Indeed, 

 those who seek the indeterminate, betwixt 

 and between, hybrid degree of Bachelor of 

 Philosophy are never very numerous. I 

 dare venture the assertion that any college 

 which persists in the old cultural course 

 of thirty years ago to the exclusion of 

 others, will soon be teaching empty benches 

 for the most part. A few institutions like 

 the University of ilichigan, the University 

 of Minnesota and Leland Stanford have 

 abandoned the Bachelor of Philosophy and 

 Bachelor of Science degrees, giving to all 

 alike in the non-professional courses the 

 one degree of Bachelor of Arts. 



To those who believe with me that an 

 earlier specialization or an earlier motive 

 in education is to be desired, such contin- 

 ued rending of the bonds of liberal culture 

 offers much of encouragement, though only 



the outcome of methods long ago intro- 

 duced by Harvard University, the system 

 of electives or optionals. 



No one can doubt now but that this sys- 

 tem has been of benefit. It permitted for. 

 the first time the student who was not con- 

 tent with an elementary training, to widen 

 to some extent his preparation for special 

 pursuits in life. So grudgingly bestowed 

 at first upon the senior, it has now become 

 the privilege of the freshman. But I can 

 not believe that the optional system has 

 been altogether a blessing. It has done 

 much to encourage the ambitious, but it 

 has also done much to stultify the lazy. 

 We all know how many students there are 

 who seek a degree rather than an educa- 

 tion. And many of us also know that the 

 average non-professional college student 

 can not be favorably compared with the 

 professional student of like age for zeal 

 and ambition. There is too often a tend- 

 ency for a college teacher to be lax in 

 discipline, that he may not diminish the 

 attendance upon his classes. The stu- 

 dent's choice is far too often decided by 

 trivial circumstances— the advice of a 

 classmate, the reputation of a teacher, the 

 ease of certain studies, or often indeed by 

 the toss of a penny. It is only the mi- 

 nority who deliberately plan their work, 

 because it is only the minority who know 

 what they desire to do in life, and it is 

 seldom that the student gets advice from 

 those whose duty it should be to advise 

 him. But the optional system is resolving 

 itself as rapidly as circumstances permit 

 into .special courses, either recommended or 

 required, and the student who now goes 

 through the senior year without some no- 

 tion of what he is striving after is becom- 

 ing less and less frequent. 



It wa.s but a short time ago that Presi- 

 dent Butler of Columbia University 

 shocked the world of higher education by 

 suggesting that the college course should 



