New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1881-09-29
NOTES ON EDUCATION.

The University of Georgia has received from the
Legislature the 1000 necessary to make its tuition
Smith College, at Northampton. has 100 new
students Increased facilities for the study OF
physics have been furnished.
Miss Harris. daughter of the late secretary Oh
Harvard College Is to have charge of the secretary
office during the coming year.
Harvard begins her new term to-day. The fresh
man class is a large one; POI applicants were adj
nitted IN June and about fifty more are expected
during the week.
Williams College is prosperous. 1t has now the
largest freshman class that has ever entered IN the
history of the college, and needs nothing but a
larger endowment.
The French Government has appointed q commits
sion to study the influence of school arrangements
on the alarming progress of myopia, and 20 devise
means of counteractlng the evil.
Swarthmore College is to be rebuilt Immediately,
and meanwhile the sessions of the College to be
resumed in the Chestnut Grove House, at Media.
The assurances the burned building aggregate
$4,000.
A Canadian educational authority thinks that
the dangers of examining" might be obviated if
the teachers would give sufficient time to explain
ing the next days lesson and instructng pupils how
TO proceed
The freshman class at the University of Pennsyl-
vania has 1O1 members-it had about 80 last year.
The Wharton School of Finance and Economy opens
its first term with class of eight members There
314 students Ill the departments OF art science
and finance.
At this years Oxford Local Examinations 474
passed of the 767 senior candidates-249 out $40
boys, and OBS out of 38S girls. One girl has been
placed IN the first division and twelve are in the
second. OF the junior candidates 716 boys and 249
girls passed, five girls being placed in the first divi-
sion.
novel art college for women has been established
Wimbledon, England, by Miss Bennett, a lady
well-known for the gratutous instruction she has
been in the habit of giving in art needlework. The
course of study is thorough and comprehensive and
the fees moderate The students will have the
opportunity OF getting remuneratlve employment IL
needed.
1t is gratifying to see that the school authorities
in many American cities are becoming interested in
the question of the effect of our educational system
on the health of the school children. 1t is worth
while to make the inquiry in regard 10 this matter
a National one Through the Board of Health and
the Medical Society of each city, facts might be
gathered and tabulated which could not fail to be
Oh value to the schools.
That the public schools in the prosperous West are
driving with dangerous speed, is the opinion of
The IoHrSatof Education. 1t advises the schools at
once to begin the necessary work of Stacking up in
velocity, wedding out courses of study, relieving the
intensity of examination and ceasing to act the
assumption that the average child endure the
strain of the average hard-headed, adult pioneer.
" The West is now excited says this critic with
the fond deuSion that il will outstrip the world in
public-school training, because it is bending the
prodgiOus energy that has made it great in indus
Try, in aud in craftsmanship TO the production
of such generation of Youthful prOdigies as no
country has yet seen, But the project, will break
down. from the simple reason that child is a child
and cannot be shot into maturity by a course of
study and monthly examination
The Student, interesting educational journal
conducted by the Society of Friends complains that
there seems to DO disposition substitute for gem
eral study and mental training normal course 1t
adds that ayoung man woman with very meagre
education takes course in the theory and prac-
tice of teaching" and is held to be weprepared to
teach up to the point to which he or she has
studied. while the drilled graduate in the Ian
guages and sciences, with a great reserve of brain
power, is ruled out incompetent. If this is ever
true. it can only be because the graduate has been
subjected to poor teaching during his student life
which, no doubt, is often, though not always, the
case. Normal schools, as medical schools, should
draw their students from the ranks of the educated
and not from those of the uneducated Their
instruction should be technical and special and not
general"
The least satisfactory part of the educational sys
tenn of the Province of Ontario is that devoted TO
secondary instruction. Only small portion of the
whole population enter the high schools and the col
Iegiate Institutes and those who not in position
to send their children to these institutions object to
bearing any share of the cost At a convention of the
high school teachers recently held it was proposed
that the collegiate Institutes should be broadened
by including girls as we'll as boys and by recocnz-
ing other studies as well as Latin and Greek 1t
was proposed, also, that minimum fee of about
S5 year should be established in all the high
schools, provided some arrangement be made TO
meet the case of those towns whose public schools
contain no fifth and sixth classes. The Govern
mental gIant-except the fixed sum of 800 to each
school-is now divided on the basis of the average
attendance OF ordinary and intermediate pupils
About two-thirds of all the high schools III the
Province give tuition free to all corners.
Superintendent Gilmour has published circular
containing the amendments lately made by the Leg
islature to the law permitting women to vote on
school matters The act amended reads thus:
Section II. Every person of full age residing in any
neighborhood school district and entitled to hold
lands in his State who hires real property
In such ncighborhoOd school district liable TO tax
alton for school purposes and every resident of such
neighborhood district who is a citizen of the
United States, above the age of twentY-one years
and who has permanently residing with him or her
enid or children of school age, some one or more
OF whom shall have attended the district school for
period OF at least eight weeks within one wear pre-
cedlng and every such resident and citizen as afor-
SAID, who owns any personal property assessed on
inc last preceding assessment roll of the town. eX-
cecdng 500 in value, exclusive of such as is EXEMPT
from execution, and no other shall be entitled to
vote at any school meeting held i'll such neighbour
hood OF district"