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the point where three States-Wisconsin, Missouri, and Virginia 1——— have gone on record as definitely recognizing junior colleges in the educational system of the State. The Municipal University of Akron, Ohio, was added to the list of city universities, and the new "Association of Urban Universities," established in the fall of 1914, lends emphasis to this municipal-university development.

Degrees conferred by colleges and universities included 26,533 baccalaureate, 5,248 graduate, and 749 honorary. The degree of doctor of philosophy was conferred as the result of examination by 46 institutions on 446 men and 73 women.

PROFESSIONAL SCHOOLS.

As a result of the vigorous campaigns for better standards waged during the past few years, the number of "professional schools" reported by the Bureau of Education is decreasing materially. The number of institutions listed as professional schools in 1914 was 542, as compared with 556 in 1913. There was a falling off of 3 schools of theology, 2 law schools, 8 schools of medicine, and 3 schools of pharmacy. There was an increase of 2 in the number of dental schools. The number of students in professional schools increased from 65,585 to 66,873. Practically all of this increase was in the schools of dentistry, where there were 9,315 students, as compared with 8,015 in 1913, an evidence of the increasing interest in dental hygiene as part of the public program for good health. Graduates in law in 1914 numbered 4,496; in medicine, 4,048; in pharmacy, 2,290; in dentistry, 2,270; and in theology, 1,886. Engineering is not yet classed as a profession in the statistics of the Bureau of Education.

Receipts by professional schools in 1914 totaled $19,608,761, of which $11,450,393 was for medicine, $4,246,501 for theology, $1,831,163 for law, and $1,114,634 for schools of dentistry.

Nowhere has the insistence upon standards been so vigorous and the results so convincing as in medical education. There are now 34 medical schools requiring two or more years of college work for admission, and 50 requiring one year; in 38 of these the new regulation went into effect for the first time in 1914. There are now only 17 medical colleges that admit students on high-school education or less.

The growth in professional standards in legal education is almost equally noteworthy. Of the 122 law schools in the United States, 6 now require college graduation for entrance; at least 8 require two years of college work; and a large number require one year. There has been a corresponding lengthening of the law course. Of the 122

1 Still more recently Idaho.

law schools listed this year by the Bureau of Education, 1 still reports a one-year course; 17 report courses of two years; all others require at least three years. The law schools had 1,471 instructors and 20,958 students in 1914, an increase of 80 students over the previous year.

TEACHER TRAINING.

No figures are available to show the exact number of graduates of professional training courses for teachers who entered the profession in 1914, but some approximation is possible. Graduates of normal schools, most of whom are destined for teaching in the elementary schools, numbered 20,658 for the year; it is estimated that 15,000 went into the rural schools from teacher-training courses in high schools; and about 5,000 were graduated from college after taking courses in education, most of these teaching in high schools. Add to these a few hundred in graduate courses, destined chiefly for college teaching, and it seems safe to say that between forty and fifty thousand new teachers began work in the fall of 1914 with at least a measure of professional preparation.

It is practically impossible to make any reliable deductions from this as to the present proportion of trained teachers in the schools, since estimates of the average length of the teacher's career vary greatly; but it is clear that the supply of professionally prepared teachers is not yet sufficient for the number of teaching positions that must be filled every year. The need is felt most keenly in the rural schools; it is also felt in the high schools, where the requirement of special pedagogical training is now being added to that of college graduation, and States are offering subsidies, especially for teachers in vocational subjects. It is noteworthy that between 1910 and 1914. the number of institutions engaged in training teachers increased from 1,397 to 1,620, and the students in these schools from 115,277 to 122,446, the latter figure not including students in colleges and universities. The whole teacher-training situation is rendered still more encouraging by the continued remarkable development of summer-school work; of the more than two hundred thousand persons in attendance at all kinds of summer schools in 1914, it is estimated that fully one-third were teachers intent upon bettering their professional preparation.

NORMAL SCHOOLS.

There were 281 normal schools reporting to the Bureau of Education in 1914, as compared with 283 the preceding year. Of these, 235 were public normal schools, including 67 training schools in 59 cities. Students in normal schools in 1914 numbered 95,286, as compared with 94,455 the year before; and 84,095 in 1911. Five new public

normal schools appear on the list, and eight private normal schools were dropped because of failure to report or because they are known to have ceased to exist. Since 1910 the number of public normal schools has increased from 223 to 235 and the number of private schools has decreased from 65 to 46; while the number of students in public normal schools has grown from 75,642 to 89,537, and the number in private normal schools has diminished from 8,453 to 5,749. The 20,658 graduates of public and private normal schools in 1914 represented a net decrease of 114 from 1913.

Public appropriations for normal schools totaled $12,523,968 for the year, as compared with $10,432,252 last year and $2,212,952 a quarter of a century ago. With the complete recognition of teacher training as a public function has come a certain dissatisfaction with the manner in which normal schools have exercised that function, and the whole problem of teacher training is undergoing investigation in several States.

TEACHER TRAINING IN HIGH SCHOOLS.

The urgent need for rural teachers has caused a rapid development in high-school teacher-training courses. In 1914 public high schools to the number of 1,051 were reported as engaged in the work of preparing teachers, and 21,076 students in these schools were taking the training course. This is an increase since 1911 of 440 schools and 6,396 students. Maryland and Ohio established teacher training in public high schools by legislative act in 1914. Two hundred and eighty-eight miscellaneous institutions classed by the bureau as "private high schools," but including a number of "normal and indistrial institutes" also reported that they were training teachers in 1914; they registered 6,084 students in pedagogical courses.

COLLEGE DEPARTMENTS OF EDUCATION.

Schools of education or departments of pedagogy are reported by 352 out of the 567 colleges and universities listed by the Bureau of Education in 1914. It is difficult to ascertain the number of students taking professional work. Many college students proposing to teach take a course in methods for their particular subject; such persons are professionally trained to a very definite degree, but they would probably not be reported in any enumeration of students in education. The attempt made to get this information, which was collected by the bureau prior to 1911, will be resumed in 1915. Of special significance in the development of education as a university subject is the change of Teachers College, Columbia University, into a graduate school, which went into effect in 1914.

VOCATIONAL EDUCATION.

Vocational training as a national problem attracted special attention by the report of the commision on Federal aid for vocational education, rendered in June, 1914. While the comprehensive bill drawn up by the commission was not acted upon by Congress, favorable action is considered likely soon. Congress had already voted the Federal aid asked for in the Smith-Lever bill for agricultural extension education.

THE SMITH-HUGHES BILL.

The Smith-Hughes bill, which formed the report of the commission, but, as noted, did not pass, would have provided Federal aid to public supported and controlled schools of less than college grade for training teachers for agricultural education, trade and industrial education, and home economics, and for paying part of the salaries of supervisors and directors of agricultural subjects and teachers of trade and industrial education. A Federal board of industrial education was proposed, to consist of five members-the Secretary of Agriculture, the Secretary of Labor, the Secretary of Commerce, the Secretary of the Interior, and the Postmaster General, with the Commissioner of Education as executive officer. The appropriation for trade and industrial schools was to be $500,000 the first year, increasing to $3,000,000 annually; similarly for agricultural schools. For teacher training $500,000 was to be appropriated the first year, increasing to $1,000,000 in 1918-19, and remaining at that amount. For every dollar of Federal aid the State or local communities would be required to expend an equal amount, besides meeting all maintenance costs. The States were to create or designate State boards to handle the funds in the several States.

THE STATES AND INDUSTRIAL EDUCATION.

In the various States the progress of the year has been chiefly that of holding gains already made and working out in practice the legislation previously provided. The six States having definite systems for organizing and supervising vocational schools and for lending State aid to local communities-Massachusetts, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, and Indiana-have all been busy setting up the machinery of administration and extending the operation of the system in additional schools and classes. In each of the States mentioned the vocational schools have been placed under the direction of a special deputy or expert assistant, attached to the staff of the State superintendent or commissioner of education. Connecticut is developing a system of industrial schools, and California has begun. the organization of a division of vocational education in charge of a

commissioner of vocational education. New Mexico and Maine also have vocational or industrial divisions in their State departments of education. Several other States have for some time been getting ready to organize State systems of vocational education, but have not been able to decide as to the precise form of organization best suited to their needs.

The most serious problem encountered by communities that have sought to enlarge their facilities for vocational training during the year has been that of procuring teachers who are proficient in the trade to be taught and at the same time with professional training or experience.

Noteworthy in the cities is the tendency toward careful community study for the purpose of securing a definite knowledge of conditions. upon which to base an industrial education program.

AGRICULTURAL EDUCATION.

Courses in agriculture were reported by 1,677 high schools in 1914, an increase of 263 over 1913. Students taking these courses numbered 34,367, or 4,552 more than the year before. Some of this highschool work is definitely vocational; most of it, however, comprises brief textbook courses extending from a quarter to a full year. Special efforts have recently been put forth, by means of home projects and otherwise, to give a definite vocational bent to agriculture as taught in high schools. In addition to the 48 State colleges of agriculture there are now 7 other colleges and universities giving agricultural courses of college grade. In both college and high-school work there has been increased emphasis on the practical side of farming as opposed to "book agriculture." The extension work stimulated by the passage of the Smith-Lever bill in May, 1914, is now making rapid headway.

COMMERCIAL EDUCATION.

Students in public and private high schools and independent commercial schools numbered 346,770 in 1914, an increase of 16,231 over the year before. Business and commercial courses were given in 2,191 public high schools, and in 723 private secondary schools. The 704 business schools for which statistics are available reported 168,063 students. There are more than 1,300 such schools on the lists of the Bureau of Education, however; the remaining schools do not respond to requests for statistical information. Recent developments in this field have emphasized on the one hand the demand for a more systematic and practical secondary-school training for commercial pursuits, and on the other hand the importance of a higher professional education for business in institutions of college and university grade.

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