Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 64.djvu/211

Rh That our present method or lack of method is successful, no one asserts. The practical shortening of the college course to three years and the proposition to shorten it still further are in themselves confessions of failure. They are more than that; they are acknowledgment that, in the competition between colleges, the race for degrees has been made so easy that all the mental training given in the four years' course can be given readily in three if not in two. And this acknowledgment appears to be not wholly unreasonable. As matters now stand, there is ample time even in the three years for men to complete the course for A.B. or B.S. creditably, while in addition they take elaborate courses in glee clubs, baseball, football, amateur journalism and other branches of learning, which require not only much time at home, but also frequent absences and excursions during term time. The correctness of the conclusion is made more evident by the fact that men following these collateral pursuits are required to maintain a fair standing in their classes. A fine degree of skill in determining the minimum degree of required work is attained by many of them; and their example is not altogether without influence upon their fellows, for it is well known that among students the 'dig' is a somewhat disreputable character. There is no room for surprise when one discovers that business men often look upon the college course as four years of training in the science of shirk and regret that social requirements compel them to send their boys to college.

The evil can not be corrected by shortening the college period. In truth, this proposition to shorten the period evidences another erroneous conception of the purpose of the college itself—a conception which seems to be gaining wide currency. The college is not an institution whose chief function is that of conferring degrees. This certainly seems to be the conception of many outside of the colleges as well as of not a few within, for there appears to be no end of ingenious methods whereby those who can not attend college may find a way of passing examinations, of receiving degrees and of becoming enrolled among the alumni, meanwhile adding to the glory of their college by swelling its numbers.

A thoughtful consideration of the conditions in American colleges reveals the fact that, during the last forty years, a great change has come about in the relations of instructors and students. In many respects this has been greatly to the advantage of both, but in others very much to their disadvantage. College matters have been adapted largely to accord with wishes of the students; the young men determine almost wholly the details of their courses; they regulate in no small degree the general conduct of matters so that a positive assertion of faculty authority causes surprise and is apt to arouse resentment; athletic associations complain bitterly because stringent rules are