8o Proceedings of the Ohio State Academy of Science. 



to have an esprit de corps which makes the students feel that 

 the department is not the teachers but theirs to use for their own 

 best advantage. Some of the strongest students may even be 

 set to assisting in certain courses which they have completed. 

 One undergraduate can assist especially will in one course, an- 

 other in a second. The head of the department can thus have 

 two or three courses going at once and spend his afternoon 

 passing from laboratory to laboratory, giving suggestions to as- 

 sistants and to workers. These assistants would not be able to 

 plan the work independently, but this method may be made as 

 satisfactory as depending on a single graduate instructor. The 

 assistants are hardly worthy of a place in the printed list of 

 helpers, but they are valuable in the hands of an experienced 

 teacher, who is at the same time a good organizer and super- 

 visor. Some person teach the science better with a first course 

 than others do after years of study. No head of a department of 

 Botany should recommend even the best student for teacher at 

 the end of a year's course, though some of them will succeed if a 

 high school position is thrust upon them. Still, in some instances, 

 I am willing to let these same persons assist in my laboratory 

 under my own eye, provided they are at the same time broaden- 

 ing their botanical view by pursuing advanced courses and are 

 doing the assisting to further perfect themselves as instructors. 

 For assisting under supervision, tact and initiative are as im- 

 portant as the number of courses one has had, and some of these 

 undergraduates may do even better than the graduate who has 

 had little or no experience with instructing. It is a source of in- 

 spiration to see the enthusiasm and good sense with which some 

 of these students assist. They should never be given full charge 

 of the work at first, but may be tried and allowed such share 

 in the instruction and management as their abilities justify. For 

 a time they may be of no use as time and energy savers, but 

 they can sometimes be held for one or two years of under- 

 graudated assisting and for several years as graduate students and 

 instructors, finally becoming valuable aids, able to take full charge 

 of a laboratory. 



