The Ohio Democrat. (Logan, O. [Ohio]) 1886-1906, 1890-07-19
COLLEGE TRAINING.
II Is No Longer Inimical to Success In
Busineas Life.

business Life.
A good deal of discussion has ,boen
excited by Mr.. Andrew Carnegie's decla-
ration that, so far as his observation,
goes, college-bred young men are not
ant to succeed in business. Assuming
that the purpose of business is to make
money, he says that college graduate
does not fulfill it so quickly or so surely
as one who goes into business immcdi-
ately upon leaving school. There was
time, no doubt, when no one would
have disputed the assertion. The origi-
nal aim of universities was to fit young
men for the church, and up to the be-
ginning of this century, such colleges
as Harvard, Yale and Princeton so far
conformed to the medieval conception
of their functions, that majority OF
their graduates were intended for the
ministry and entered upon its duties.
Even those who chose the professions
of medicine or law were largely impelled
by other than pecuniary motives, and
did not contemplate rivalry with busi-
ness men as regards the accumulation
OF property.
In the days when college curricu-
lum was mainly confined to Greek,
Latin and the higher mathematics, it
was generally acknowledged that lad
looking forward to business life would
do better to enter store or counting
room at an early age than to spend at
college the scven important years be-
tween fourteen and twenty-one. Not
only would the graduate find it difficult
to make up for the long start acquired
by his non-collegiate competitors, but
he would be handicapped by habits,
tastes, predictions and points of view,
but i'll adapted to success in business.
1t was, perhaps, the belief once current
in the disqualification of highly edu'
Gated young men for business pursuits
that led the elder James Gordon Bon
nett to say to Mr.. George w. Childs (as
the latter tells us in his "Recollec
tions"):
"Chids how unfortunate II is for boy tc
have rich parents. II you and had been borr
that way, perhaps we wouldn't have amounted
to much"
In this country, however, and to {
considerable extent in England, the
: purposes and methods of college educa
ton have undergone process of read
adjustment during the present genera
ton. The results of the changes in thu
aim and the curriculum of universitie
are not yet 50 ma nifest as they will b
later, but we may already predict will
confidence that the Carnegies of the fu
ture will have comparatively LITTLE
! ground for pronouncing college train
r ing unsuited to business success. II
mako clergymen has ceased to be thu
primary purpose of our chief institu
t tions of learning. They are rather de
signed to qualify young men for effect
i've exertion in whatever vocation the
U may choose to enter.
= Their present function is twofold
= first to effect general stimulation an
discipline of the mental faculties: and
secondly, to supply instru ction throug
!, elective courses in subjects special
adapted to secure advancemen t in tn
I particular vocation to which youn
IL man looks forward. The time whic
: formerly lad must bave expende
o upon Greek, he can now devote to civ
}, engineering or to electricity and chen
@ istry. whose relations to industry ar
y manifold, direct and obvious. Moreovel
" the spirit of undergraduate life, g
VI might be expected, now that studies ar
D. adjusted to postgraduate intentions
: has become less academical and nor
n practical Instead of being, what it use
o to be, microcosm sequestered fror
o prosaic bread earning existence an
L. having sea rcely any points of conta
g with it, the college has become vest
!. bule of the outdoor world. Universitie
~ ~ in fine. have recognized the necessity
n such radical reco Instruction of their pr
q grammes and processes as shall max
n education not merely an intellectu
gymnastic but specific and substa1
tial promoter of advancement in an
c,roar V Tedrpr.