Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 40.djvu/22

1 the class-room with them and teach as well as lecture. And the effect upon the men is good too. The human element in them grows, and this without loss of scholarship. But so large an undertaking as this can not obviously take second place in the consideration of its agents. As time goes on, the staff of lecturers will probably include an increasing number of men who give their entire time to extension work.

It might be well if a man could alternate between resident and itinerant duty. Perhaps this would save him from that intellectual stagnation which is one of the chief dangers of the professorial chair. At present it seems to me that our universities are too much the asylum of men who nurse rather than use their scholarship, or who give their best energy to original research and throw only an occasional crumb to those who are pleasantly called their students. In all but the largest institutions one man has generally to teach several branches of his subject. If he did both university and extension work, he might devote himself to one particular branch and get better results in both fields. Prof. Johnson used to say that he wished there might be a professor for each chemical element, and he would like to be Professor of Iridium. But this is a matter which may safely be left to experience.

Besides the men, money is needed. So far, the work of the society has been paid for by the annual membership dues of five dollars, while each local center has met the expense of its own courses. The lecturer's fee is always fifteen dollars a lecture. This is paid to the central office by the local center, the lecturer having no direct business relations with the people to whom he goes. The incidental expenses of the course, varying with the locality, are met by the local management. Extension work may thus be undertaken by any university which will devote a little of the time of its secretary to the purpose, and by any local center which can raise the fee for a course of six lectures, ninety dollars, and provide for incidentals. It will thus be seen that very little money is required to make the experiment of an extension course. In some instances the local centers have had a considerable balance at the end of the season. But this has been due to the fact that only popular subjects have been chosen. It has been the experience in England, and it will undoubtedly be the experience here, that the more systematic and satisfactory work will not pay for itself. Some outside revenue must be looked to.

In England, several plans have been tried and proposed. In some cases a fixed subscription, as with the American Society, supplies the needed funds. In others, associations are formed and shares offered for sale, while still others depend upon private munificence. But all these resources are transient, and place the