Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 82.djvu/403

Rh away finally; commercial intercourse is complete and the small farmer handles more money than did his wealthy predecessor of a century ago. College is sought no longer only by those destined for the "three learned professions"; young men of all aims, and a multitude with no aims, are enrolled in the classes; it has become the thing to own a diploma. The faculty no longer consists of five or six men, each supposed to be familiar with everything in the curriculum but, in all reputable colleges, it is composed of teachers who have spent years in special preparation for the chairs which they occupy—a college professorship is no longer regarded as a haven of rest for men who have failed in some other walk of life; the curriculum has been broadened in all directions and the cost per student has been increased by several hundred per cent.

In spite of the changed conditions, colleges, and to a great extent professional schools, are still regarded as closely allied to charitable institutions. The presidents of starveling academies with a college annex go about the country pleading the cause of their poor self-denying professors; colleges are exempt from all ordinary taxation; they maintain costly fields for semi-professional athletic contests to which admission fees are charged; they are permitted to reserve large parks around their buildings, even though the reservation be to secure an unearned increment. This conception that colleges are charitable institutions does comparatively little injury to the community, but it does far-reaching injury to the staff of instructors in that the salaries are adjusted on the altruistic basis. It is felt that the work is so lofty in aim and so important to the human race that no consideration of pecuniary reward should be permitted to corrupt the worker. Not long ago a western association of college teachers resolved that, in their opinion, the minimum salary for a professor should be at least $1,400. The president of one of the colleges asserted that such a minimum would be absurd; that, if the rule were enforced, a very great proportion of the colleges west from the Mississippi would be driven out of existence. If that should be the result, devout lovers of true education ought to establish at once a chain of prayer meetings to bring about the enforcement of that minimum.

But it is very difficult to believe that young men or young women have an inherent right to receive higher education at another's expense. If one can earn such education, it is his right; if another choose to earn it for him, no one may criticize either giver or receiver. All recognize the parent's duty to give to his child every advantage within his means, even at the cost of great self-denial, for he brought that child into the world without its consent. But the responsibility of others ceases at an early stage in education, far below the requirements for college entrance; it extends no farther than the community's protection demands. A wise community will go beyond the limit of its absolute responsibility