Omaha daily bee., 1916-06-13
Educational Preparedness
Now York Evening Pest

This is the week Of commencements, ana
there are many reminders what an army OF grad
yates the United States musters. 1t IS week,
too Of exhortations to those leaving our colleges
and universities Yet the conditions. especially
for graduates who are to take up industrial and
commercial work, are so indifferent from those OF
former years that the speakers can hardly faii
to mark the fact. The young man Of special
training has today unusual opportunities. The
colleges have right to feel proud OF the way in
which they have anticipated the country's new
recognition Of the need for the expert. For all
the hard words said about them, the universities
tive field, including agriculture; they have done
as much as private enterprise for the application
of science to industrial and technical processes;
and they are largely responsible for the new role
of the engineer and that specialization which
makes possible expert production.
Especially in engineering, agriculture and BUSH
ness are the universities putting forth vigorous
effort We are accustomed to think Of engineer
ing as an old field, for it is three.quarters OF
century since the first polytechnic institute com
cen engineering schools in the country, with lO7
graduates yearly; in 1880, but forty-one with 226
graduates, and in 1890, but hfty-two, with 900
graduates. In 1910 there were liz such schools,
reporting 400 graduates, and the number is es-
timated s,nce to have risen to nearly 7,OOO. Yet
this is but half the story for the last few years
have witnessed rise in the dignity and thorough
ness OF engineering education. Twenty years ago
the field was scarcely Of college rank. II is now
of university and even graduate rank. Harvard
led the way about 1910 in establishing graduate
ment Of Johns Hopkins, two years younger, illus
trates another tendency in the prescription OF
uniform three years course, to be followed by
one or two years Of specialization in the differ
ent technical branches later. The state univer-
sites largely follow this latter plan, and some
require at least one year Of general college work.
In one sense, the word graduate" as applied to
engineering schools is misleading. in that Har-
wards course is much the as that Of Stevens.
avowedly undergraduate. But such schools often
The earliest graduate engineering experiment sta
ton was established at Illinois fifteen years ago;
it has naturally had followers.
A field in. which even more work is being
mapped out is that of business education. The
Wharton school was opened in the early sos and
few others in the later 90s but their prestige
and enrolment were comparatively small Re-
Gently there have been established schools con-
Quoted on varying plans, but in all the same ten
The Harvard School Of Business Administration
has two years program Of graduate work. The
Amos Tuck school at Dartmouth admits students
at the end Of the college junior year and carries
them through two years course. The school
Of business which Columbia is to open next au-
tumn will admit students at the end Of their sec
ond year. When the New York Chamber Of
Z Commerce offered to assist Columbia few years
ago in establishing such school, the university
declined on the ground that the demand was
small, the commercial high schools perhaps
adequate and the proper Curriculum nowhere yet
worked out. Its present action is significant as
being long studied and indicates general ten
dency to compromise between the Wharton
undergraduate and Harvard graduate idea. But
Coumbia's will be only one Of number of uni
versity schools designed to add to general
training two or three years Of special technical
courses. There must be already hundreds OF
graduates from such schools.
A natural accompaniment Of this growth is the
closer practical union of certain college and uni
versity departments with the industrial world
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for
example, has just established School of chemi-
cal engineering practice" by which stations with
well-equpped laboratory and professor are
to be maintained at each Of half dozen of Bos-
toms largest chemical plants. Never has the de-
mand been 80 insistent for chemical engineers"
declares the institute. number of schools, espe-
cially in the west, have had the state engineering
associations appoint advisory committees on un-
The attitude of business towards the CONNER
cial schools is evident in the arrangements made
by it in this city to afford practical work to the
Columbia students and in the efforts elsewhere to
have schools established The liveliest attention
has been paid by insurance circles for example,
to Michigan's recent development of an EXPERT
Curriculum in that subject. In sum--without mini
MIXING the value Of their general worl-the aid
which the colleges are ready to render in the
technical fields made more important by the war
deserves special note