Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 67.djvu/387

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the question of the college course is not solved is proved by the changes continually being made in the programs of studies. The seven leading universities in the east are Harvard, Yale, Columbia, Cornell, Princeton, Pennsylvania and Johns Hopkins. Harvard has consistently maintained the free elective system and Johns Hopkins the group system, but the other five institutions have recently revised their requirements for the undergraduate course and the bachelor's degree. Cornell has formed one college of arts and sciences and gives the A.B. degree to all students for a free elective course extending through four years. The ancient languages are not required either before or after entrance, and Cornell is thus more consistent than Harvard, where the A.B. degree means that Latin was studied in the preparatory school and the B.S. that it was not. Cornell requires sixty hours of work and insists on four years of residence; Harvard requires fifty-four hours and rather favors three years of residence; Harvard requires the bachelor's degree for entrance to its professional schools; Cornell permits students to take the fourth year of the college course as the first year in the medical or law course. Pennsylvania now confers the A.B. degree only on students who take both Latin and Greek for one year in college and the B.S. degree on the others. It requires sixty hours' attendance, which may be accomplished in three or four years. Of these hours twenty-two are required, eighteen are group studies and twenty are free electives. One half year of college work may be in the department of medicine. Like Pennsylvania, Yale has altered its program of studies in the direction of the group system. Students of the college must offer Latin at entrance, but need not continue its study. Sixty hours are required for the degree, and they must include two 'majors' and three 'minors.' One year of work may count for both the professional and college degrees, and the college course may be completed in three years. The Sheffield Scientific School offers both liberal and engineering courses. Curiously enough, Latin is required for entrance, the course is three years, and the degree of bachelor of philosophy is awarded.

Princeton has this year adopted an entirely new program of studies. A third degree, Litt.B., has been added. The arrangement is logical, in so far as candidates for the A.B. degree must take Latin and Greek for two years, candidates for the B.S. degree must specialize in science and candidates for the Litt.B. degree in languages, philosophy, history or art. Latin is required for entrance to all courses. The studies of the freshman year are completely, and those of the sophomore year are partly, prescribed, and the rest of the four years' course is arranged on a group system. The tutorial system of the English colleges is to be introduced. Princeton aims to return to the old-fashioned college, and may be congratulated on the fairly consistent methods that it has adopted. The experiment in one of our larger institutions will be followed with interest.

Columbia has also adopted a new program of studies. A B.S. degree has been established for students who enter without Latin, but no plans have been made for a course in the sciences. The B.S. students take one course in science in place of a course in Latin, but as nearly all A.B. students elect a course in science and very few of them elect any course in Latin or Greek, the only distinction between the A.B. candidates and the B.S. candidates is that the former have probably forgotten the small Latin they once learned, whereas the latter have probably never learned any Latin. An extreme form of the table d'hôte system is adopted in the first two years, all freshmen being required to take seven unrelated studies; while in the last two years an