The Klerfice St/.s/eiN. — U'adsirorfh. -I'll 
The courses in operation up to the time of commencenient. 
August 16th of this year, are two exceedingly rigid ones. Thr 
required work demanded of the student from seven to ten 
hoiirs a day, five days a week for forty-tive weeks a year, and 
for three or four years (according to which course was taken) 
in the class room, laboratory, field, mine or mill, while his 
daily preparatory work had to be attended to in outside time. 
When it is considered that all students, both special and reg- 
ular, have been transferred, not only without trouble but with 
general satisfaction from one sj^stem to the other, the success 
seems almost phenomenal. 
In the elective system of the Michigan Mining School the 
unit of work is taken as three hours a week in the class room 
or nine hours a week in the laboratory for thirty-four weeks, 
and this amount of work is called a course or a full course, 
while any subject scheduled in the prospectus for less time 
is taken for its proportionate part of a full course. The stu- 
dent, to obtain the degree of Bachelor of Science, must complete 
eighteen full courses, and to obtain that of Mining Engineer, 
twenty-two full courses, which in both cases include the sul)- 
jects of elementar}' geology and mining. 
Owing to the fact that the regular \vork in the Michigan 
Mining School extends through forty-five weeks of the year, a 
good student can obtain his degree in three or four years, de- 
pending upon the question of whether he remains during the 
entire forty-five weeks each year or for only the first thirty- 
four weeks, or, also, whether he wishes his course to he largely 
of practical or theoretical work. 
At the present time this institution has announced sixty- 
five diiferent subjects or studies from which the pupil can 
make up his eighteen or twenty-two full courses, onl_y one of 
these full courses being of required work. In a required sys- 
tem of study the pupil can be carried over all the subjects that 
experience considers necessary for the successful prosecution 
of his future profession, but this is always done at the expense 
of thoroughness, and it pays no, or but little attention to the 
individuality f)f every student or to the rapidly increasing 
specialization of work in every subject. It gains breadth, but 
it is at the expense of dei)th. 
In an elective system the individuality '>f the student, the 
specialization of work in nuxlern tinu's and the limitations of 
