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Specialized teaching, i. e., cases in which the teacher has but one subject; from class of 1912 and data from Intercollegiate Bureau. Teachers whose work has correlation with their college majors:

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Teachers whose work has no correlation with their college majors:

Noncorrelates teaching one subject:

English

History

Domestic science__

Drawing

Geology

Mathematics_

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1

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109

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The results appended show a discouraging degree of variety. The most frequent combinations with mathematics are science, English, and Latin. With Latin, the most frequent combinations are German, history, and mathematics; French most often combines with German; but German combines with Latin in one more case than with French; history, besides the English combination, is taught most often with Latin. Botany and zoology are seldom separated; they appear as biology, sometimes as one combination, sometimes in unpredictable combinations with other subjects. The combinations required of the 1912 teachers tallied with those of the Intercollegiate Bureau almost exactly in order of frequency of occurrence.

A census then was taken of the teachers who were able to specialize to the extent of teaching one subject, with the interesting results that while 109 correlates taught one subject, only 18 noncorrelates were able thus to specialize. Of the subjects, English was most frequently taught by itself.

A not impossible ideal for the preparation of teachers might be a condition by which the student could combine the subject in which she is most interested with work in the department of education on the way to teach that subject. At the same time, it should be possible for her to have access to knowledge of the teaching combinations which may be required with her particular subject, and to make

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allowance for them in her choice of courses. If the secondary school would supply greater uniformity of demand, and the college would recognize the amount which already exists, the career of the young teacher would be less difficult. If the college would recognize the amount of uniformity which already exists in the demand upon secondary teachers, it might, in the first place, turn out teachers who could with greater ease and success fit into their new work. The college might, in the second place, succeed in increasing the amount of uniformity of subject combination in the secondary schools by supplying better prepared teachers and by exercising care in placing them. Small high schools must require large groups of subjects of their teachers, but if the teachers are specially equipped with a combination of subjects recognized by large schools, they will stand a better chance of advancement in their profession.

The relation of the department of education to the rest of the college and to the teaching profession has been a matter of interest from the first installation. The department has met with much opposition and has until the last decade grown slowly. Of the five colleges, Vassar is the only one which still denies the need of a department of education. At present in the other four colleges the anomalous situation exists of recognized vocational preparation in one direction, while it is frowned upon in others. The work, however, is frequently made general in order to accomplish a cultural end.

Having decided upon the combination of subjects which she desires to teach, the student should be able to take in the department of education a seminar dealing especially with problems concerned with this group of subjects. In connection, also, with the department, she should be directed to secondary schools where she could see her subjects ably taught. These two methods of practical laboratory work would help obviate the difficulty of the beginner in modifying and adjusting her college work to secondary needs. The objection to so-called normal methods is invalid, since the full content of the college courses is given to the student in each department from which she elects work regardless of whether she teaches it or not. The time given to the vocational side of her subject would be limited to her senior year and would probably occupy less time and give more permanent results than many of the present senior activities. Since the college actually turns out a large proportion of its students as teachers, since a placement bureau for teachers is part of its equipment, since a possessor of the college diploma is

1 The reaction of the schoolmen who employ college-trained teachers was expressed by the exasperated protest of the Superintendents' Association in Boston in 1915. The superintendents seemed, on the whole, to have reached the limit of their endurance with what they termed "the raw A. B." The solution which they offered is of interest; that is, practical service in teaching during the college course to be counted as points toward the degree.

recognized as a suitable candidate for a teaching position, the support of a department of education and a knowledge of its policy by the college seems highly desirable. At present the colleges recognize bitterly the inadequate, meager preparation of the students who enter from secondary schools. They fail, however, to make the logical connection between themselves and that lack of preparation; they have trained the teachers for those schools. Some part of the remedy, at least, rests in their assumption of their responsibility for that training.

The third group of noncorrelates, the secretaries, is considered not only because of its size in the 1912 classes, but because from the Intercollegiate Bureau data secretarial work appears to be the vocation into which ex-teachers largely go. Over 45 per cent of former teachers who were correlates and 57 per cent of former teachers who were noncorrelates became secretaries.

Like social work, secretarial work appears upon an analysis of its requirements to be closely allied with the regular college courses. The course of secretarial studies given by the extension teaching of Columbia University for college graduates lists the following subjects: Stenography, typewriting, Spanish, contemporary literature, history, secretarial bookkeeping, typography, and an adequate training in French and German. The demands of English are ease and clearness of diction; "for to write accurately what one thinks must always be one of the prime requisites of a secretary."

It is obvious that such a course might be shortened by the student who had decided upon the vocation of secretaryship, if she had in mind the requirements. Election of the languages, literature, and history would cover the academic preparation. The fulfilment of the English demand is greatly to be desired of all students. Of the technical training, typewriting has become not only a convenience but a necessity in so many fields that any student would do well to acquire it. Typewritten college work would be a boon both to the student and to the instructor. One method of obtaining it has been secured at the Connecticut College for Women by providing a room equipped with typewriters which the students are free to use at any time. Stenography studied during vacations could offer no better opportunity for expert practice than that provided in the lecture room of the college.

Secretarial bookkeeping and typography then are the only classes which require special technical preparation. The student who wished to enter upon her vocation upon graduation could probably in the nine months of vacation of her college course acquire such extra work.

If after making the suggested preparation in any one of these three fields of teaching, social work, or secretarial work, the gradu

ate changes her desire for that occupation, nothing is lost. On the contrary, she is the gainer in first-hand knowledge of social and economic conditions which make for good citizenship; in a scholarly grasp of a group of subjects and a confidence in herself in her ability to handle facts; or in ability to make language her tool. In the meantime she has had the stimulus toward real work in college which is supplied in the professional school by what Dr. Eliot calls the life-career motive.

To suggest a way in which such a motive can be supplied early enough in the college course of the student to permit thoughtful choice of vocation and intelligent correlation of studies is the subject of the next chapter.

V. THE SOCIALIZATION OF THE WOMAN'S COLLEGE.

The study of the curriculum through its development and in its present state, and of its relation to the individual to whom it has served as a means of education for four years, has brought out with emphasis certain considerations which concern both of these factors. To sum them up briefly into two groups, the first consideration includes the possibilities of the individual, the second the potentialities of the curriculum in its relation to the individual.

The college woman has disproved two fallacies, that her place is exclusively in the home, and that her place is exclusively in the schoolroom. Increasingly she has demanded work, and increasingly that work has become more varied in its character. The existing conditions are, then, larger groups of college-trained women entering occupations each year, and a greater number of occupations opening to receive them. Furthermore, these new vocations do not open automatically with the increased number of applicants, but only as pioneers prove successful in them.

If college women are to continue their efforts and their successesand there seems no predictable barrier except an entire social setback-the college must take upon itself a new responsibility, that of providing society with something which more nearly approximates its maximum working efficiency. To quote from Woods: "Society is suffering less from the race suicide of the capable, than from the nonutilization of the capacities of the well-endowed.” 1

If women congregate in numbers in one or even a few professions, the chances are against the utilization of the highest capacity of the individual. She is probably not in the field because it is the one peculiarly fitted to her aptitudes. The reasons for the selection of her career, if it is a majority career, may be based on the contagion of imitation, on the ambitions of her parents, on financial pressure, on the ease of entrance, or on lack of knowledge of other opportunities. None of these motives is essential to success. Given a knowledge of other opportunities, however, with a conviction of aptitude for a particular one of them, and no one of the other reasons will probably be powerful enough to determine choice.

1 Woods, Erville B. American Journal of Sociology, November, 1913.

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