Page:Discipline and the Derelict (1921).pdf/45

 he shows at once a marked increase in intellectual power. I have not, however, found that the scholastic standing of a student is in any dependable way an index of whether or not he will show promptness in the repayment of a loan. As often as not the dullard is as conscientious in meeting his financial obligations as is the high brow.

One significant fact has shown itself in the collecting of loans due the University. We have three principal loan funds. From one of these the loan is made to the individual student upon his own personal note without endorsement by a second person. Notes drawn upon each of the other two funds require security. No insistence has been made that these last notes be bankable, but only that a second person who has been recommended as honest and reliable sign them. Even when these notes are not paid when due there is seldom an attempt made to collect from the security. In but one instance, so far as I now remember, during the twenty years that the funds have been available has an endorser of a note been required to pay. It is a fact, nevertheless, that the notes that bear an endorsement are met with much greater promptness and regularity than are the other notes. It is not an exaggeration, I believe, to say that the unendorsed notes run twice as long, before they are finally met, as do those which bear an endorsement. The man who gives only his personal note feels safer, knows usually that a collection could with difficulty be forced, and so feels justified in taking his time.

A few years ago a wealthy friend of education offered to present to the University five-hundred dollars a year to be given to such needy students as the