The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-05-22
AMERICANS AT OXFORD.

1 A present graduate instruction (the
 Americans will teach us to avoid the local barbarism post graduate") is not
 so much unorganized as non-existent | in Oxford. In this respect we are far
 beyond Aemrica, even allowing for the
 fact that high honors in Oxford imply
 attainments far above what is needed
 for any American baccalaureate. But | in America it has been recognized that the special study of any modern sub I ject cannot be compressed into four
 years, and requires something more 1 systematic from the teacher than a
 good general education plus whatever
 knowledge he may have picked up in
 teaching; hence three years graduate
 study for the doctorate of philosophy is commonly expected. In Oxford, on the other hand, we have lost almost the
 whole personnel for the purpose of graduate study which we ever pos-
 sessed. The decline in college revenues has fvery properly) entailed the aboli- tion of prize felowships But as a consequence the unemployed graduate
 popula tion of the university has almost disappeared There are neither prize
 fellows, nor Inducements to remain in
 residence in the hope of fellowship.
 And poverty has prevented also the es-
 tablishment of nearly all the senior
 scholarships and research fellowships
 contemplated by that extraordinary
 monument of optimistic folly, the Uni
 versity Statutes of 1881. Further
 more, the growing demand for detailed knowledge renders :t more and more
 impossible even for the best men to stduy any subject as undergraduate
 beyond the point required flor the schools" Hence the professors have been confronted with the painful alter
 native of either featuring for the schools or to empty benches. The for mer practice merely duplicates the work done by the tutors, the latter is discouraging. No wonder they are dis satisfied and insist on inserting inthe examination statutes" lengthy lists of
 special subjects" which are mostly quite unsuited to form part of a gene- ral education, and remain dead letter because the tutors know that in nine cases out of ten they could be taken up only at loss.
 Now, it seems very possible that the coming invasion of American gradu- ates may radically alter all this, and give the professors grand opportuili- ty they ought to welcome. It will SUD- ply them with an audience, and practi- cally force them to lecture on advance subjects, to form seminars" and in short to adopt the methods which are found to be efficient for such purposes in America and Germany. And in so 1 doing they will no longer be competing ! with the college tutors. For the latter | will neither be able nor desirous to | deal with students each of whom is en- gagged in a special study, And thus we shall achieve much needed education al reform-namely, the differentiation between the instruction given by the | and by the colleges.
 And, incidentally, it seems probable that the example and practice of so many American researchers" will ben eft our education also by checking the examination craze, by increasing the esteem in which the power to do inde- pendent work is held, and by dimin- lshing the exclusive admiration for the, qualities which come out in examination-Fo Review.