ganization and future development that the trustees offered him, and he accepted, the presidency. Although the report has not been published, the bureau is able, through the courtesy of the officials of Drexel Institute, to indicate briefly some of its more striking recommendations. All are based upon a study of the educational and geographical field of the institute. This study answers the questions: What area does and can Drexel Institute serve? What classe of students does it and should it serve? What other institutions are offering or may offer similar lines of training? What courses now offered by Drexel Institute are clearly unprofitable for it to maintain, in view of the limited area of its constituency and the similar opportunities furnished by adjacent institutions? What courses should it emphasize and seek to perfect? Among other recommendations made on the basis of this study was one that the institute, giving work of college grade, should obtain the right to grant degrees. In support of the recommendation the report calls attention to the change that has come about in the status of the technical school graduate in the last two decades. Twenty years ago the field of engineering operations was occupied chiefly by small concerns. It was undermanned, and employers were glad to get technically trained persons with or without a degree. Now the typical employer is the large corporation. Both corporation and governmental bodies have generally adopted what amounts to a civil-service test, often open only to degree holders, and there are more degree holders, both actually and relatively, than in the early nineties. Graduates of Drexel Institute, having no degrees, find themselves now at a disadvantage with graduates of other technical schools in applying for positions. Similar conditions have recently led the Armour Institute, of Chicago, and the Carnegie Institute, of Pittsburgh, to grant degrees. After having gained the right to grant degrees (it has since been secured), the report goes on to say that the Drexel Institute should so concentrate its resources and perfect its organization as to conform eventually to the following definition: Drexel Institute is composed of a school of engineering for men, a school of domestic science and arts for women, and a secretarial school for women, meeting the needs of the high-school graduate of Philadelphia and of the commuting area around Philadelphia by means of high-grade technical instruction in the lines mentioned above, and providing special technical courses of less than college grade for those irregularly trained men of mature years who can not obtain instruction of this type in the high schools. Believing that the curtailment or abolition of some departments of the institution to meet this prescription should be done gradually, the report offers valuable recommendations in tabular view concerning the external and internal policies and administration. In the case of each school or department these recommendations were based upon a study of the expenditure of the school for five years. compared with the enrollment for five years. In the case of the library school this study involved the positions open for five years in the general field of library practice, the receipts from tuition and the cost of salaries and disbursements, the total numbers in the school for five years, and the numbers from the metropolitan district of Philadelphia for five years. This last figure was of special importance, as the institute in all its publications gives notice that a boy or girl from greater Philadelphia will be given a preference over a boy or girl from outside greater Philadelphia. The accompanying charts present graphically the facts which the study of the library school disclosed. They serve also as an admirable illustration of this method of reporting significant college statistics. Finally, the report takes up the questions of costs and shows how the deficit of the past years may be avoided by a concentration of departments, scientific budget making, and more equal distribution of student-hours among instructors in the manner suggested by the Miami study cited above. The officers of the institute are now putting into practice as rapidly as possible the recommendations embodied in this constructive report. ACTION OF EDUCATIONAL ASSOCIATIONS. The wide adoption of the "unit" as a measure of secondary work and college preparation has helped to make possible the establishment of definite and intelligible standards for graduation from the high school and for admission to college. The "unit" is, however, a quantitative measure, with only incidental reference to quality. This appears to be its chief defect. Certain difficulties in its application have become evident already. There is, on the one hand, a tendency to overemphasize the time aspect of the unit, to regard it as so many minutes of school work. The commonly accepted definition which states that the "unit represents a year's study in any subject * ** constituting approximately a quarter of a full year's work," and the further explanations that this assumes "that a period is from 40 to 60 minutes in length and that the study is pursued for four or five periods a week," are intended to guard against a strictly mathematical interpretation of the unit. Nevertheless, the temptation to measure all school work in terms of minutes still gains many victims. Indeed, some of the critics of the unit itself as a standard of measurement complain chiefly of its vicious flexibility and lack of temporal precision. 73226°-ED 1914-VOL 1--12 THE NATIONAL CONFERENCE COMMITTEE ON STANDARDS. The other difficulty lies in the scheme of unit values adopted by the College Entrance Examination Board and the National Conference Committee on Standards of Colleges and Secondary Schools. As these values have received a longer trial, it has become increasingly apparent that certain modifications, especially in the weight of the units in algebra and history, are probably in order. To ascertain the extent to which the schools hold this conviction, the National Conference Committee sent out to the principals and headmasters of 500 schools a list of questions concerning the number of recitation periods per week devoted to algebra and history and the place of these subjects in the school curriculum. On the strength of the replies received the two following topics were placed for special consideration upon the program of the meeting of the National Conference Committee held in New York February 28: 1. Shall the present unit values of 1 for elementary algebra and 1 for history be changed? 2. Shall the committee recommend a different valuation for units in the earlier and later parts of the school course, or shall it issue an explanatory statement that will make clear the difference between work in the different years and that will guard against a too literal interpretation of the unit? As a result of the information received from the schools that had been circularized, the conference committee voted to send the following circular letter to the members of its constituent bodies: In spite of the marked progress toward uniformity in college entrance credits, this committee is informed of certain recurring difficulties in administration. It appears, for example, from our general inquiry concerning the subject, that elementary algebra is usually given more time than is represented by the unit and a half of credit given to this subject and that certain branches of history are usually given less time than is represented by the unit of credit that they receive. There is, on the other hand, a tendency toward a strictly mechanical interpretation of the units, even to the point of counting minutes, which emphasizes the letter rather than the spirit of a system of merely approximate measures. The committee realizes the importance of recommending as few changes in the regulations as possible, but it believes that it will be of service if the organizations that it represents will consider and report to the committee their official judgment or the attitude of their members toward the following suggestions: (a) That the unit credits assigned to the subjects of elementary algebra and history be modified so as to represent more nearly the amount of time given to these subjects. (b) That in certain subjects as, for example, history-the amount of credit to be assigned should not be uniform in all cases, but should vary with the time and attention given. (c) That some distinction be made between the amount of credit that is given to subjects taken in the early years of the high school and those taken in the later years. (d) That there be adopted some uniform plan of limiting the number of subjects in which credit may be gained in order that continuity of work may be secured in at least two subjects. THE AMERICAN MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. The Council on Medical Education of the American Medical Association rendered its report to the House of Delegates of the American Medical Association June 22-25, 1914. Two years ago the council was instructed by the house of delegates to omit from class A (of its classification of medical colleges) after January 1, 1914, any medical college which did not require for admission at least one year of collegiate work in addition to the standard four-year high-school education, the additional year to include college courses in physics, chemistry, biology, and the modern languages. The council has since voted to work toward the legal enforcement by State licensing boards of college courses in physics, chemistry, and biology. For the present it believes that a modern language should not be made a legal requirement. Medical colleges should, nevertheless, be urged to adopt it. Eighty-two medical colleges have met this standard and are already requiring for admission one or more years of collegiate work or have announced their intentions of doing so, beginning October 1, 1914. Of these, 37 have adopted the standard of two or more years of college work.1 ENTRANCE REQUIREMENTS. Changes in entrance requirements have been alluded to. Those announced by the United States Military Academy, the regents of the University of the State of New York, and Yale University affect such large numbers of young men and women as to be especially worthy of mention. ADMISSION TO THE UNITED STATES MILITARY ACADEMY ON CERTIFICATE. In January, 1914, the War Department issued general orders providing that a candidate for admission to the United States Military Academy might thereafter be excused from taking the mental entrance examination if he complied with certain stated conditions. Before the end of March a large number had qualified under the terms of the general orders and were admitted to the academy without mental examination. But it appeared that the terms of exemption were in some respects too liberal. The War Department therefore rescinded the order of January 23, and on May 22, 1914, issued General Orders, No. 38, which provide for the exemption from mental examination for admission to the United States Military Academy upon one of the following conditions: 1. That he present a properly attested certificate that he is a regularly enrolled student in good standing without condition in any university, college, or technological school accredited by the United States Military Academy, provided that the entrance require 1 See ch. 8, p. 192, of this report for further details of medical-school progress. |
