The Lancaster news. [volume] (Lancaster, S.C.) 1905-current, 1916-02-08
VICE OF SCHOLARSHIP

proceeds with something original
and worth while. 1t suggests
that maybe the reason for the
widespread waste of college op-
portunity is to be found in the
fact that the men charged with
the students instruction are
scholars instead of teachers.
"Americans have been curious
ly content" says the writer, TO
trust education to scholars. AS
2 novelist recently wrote, IN
structors are chosen from those
who know how to learn instead
of those who know how to teach.
The degree of doctor of philo-
sophy, of master of arts, or
bachelor of laws or literature, IS
considered as proof positive that
its possessor is an admirable
teacher. To have discovered
some new gas or to have written
some erudite book is often SUI
fcient to obtain an impressive
faculty appointment:
CONSERVATION with these cru
dite and valuable gentlemen VIII
convince anyone that their inter-
est is not in teaching. They are
still interested in gaining the ap-
nroval of their students. Ihey
are, most of them, frankly bored
with students. And the students
are, quite as frankly, bored with
them" , &c
There can be little question OF
the truth of this accusation, par
ticularly in the big colleges. Ihe
men charged with the chief work
of training young minds are not
training them. They do not de-
velop the minds under them.
They talk down to students from
q great distance, and if their lee
lures fail to find lodgment-
why. the students are lazy, un-
appreciative lot. to be sure!
THE student" says the Tri-
bune, "rarely finds more than one
or two men in his four years who
make him feel that using the
mind is a pleasant occupation" "
This vice of scholarship is
found all through our education
al system. The form is different,
but the evil is the same. 1t is the
false notion that what education
is for is to make scholars instead
of to develop minds-to cram
minds with facts. instead of to
wake them up so they will gather
facts for themselves.
The greatest evil, perhaps, is
fone in high schools. To illustr-
ate, take the teaching Of En-.
glish The student is initiated into
the study of literary master
pieces. He takes up, say, some
of Shakeespeare's plays, poems
by Tennyson, Milton, Shelley.
Longfellow and Whittier. and
some Of the best work of Haw-
thorne, George Elliot and Scott,
etc. And what happens?
Nine out Of ten men nand wo
men will tell you that never, af-
ter leaving school, can they toll
crate the thought of reading the
"stuff" they have studied. And
in most cases, perhaps, they have
acquired an ineradicable preju-
dice against the authors them
selves. Anything, indeed, label
ed classic" has become distaste-
full to them.
Why? Because they were fore
ed to read those masterpieces
over and over again, to digest
and analyze and criticize them.
to define and parse and comment
and listen to interminable har-
rangues, until they loathed the
printed words.
The teachers were doing their
duty as they see it-they are
doing it today, by thousands. I'm.
der the prevailing system, their
duty is to try to make literary
scholars of those children. And
all the time, what they ought to
be aiming at is not scholarship,
but appreciation.
Onnce bring a pupil of any age
to see the real beauty of a poem.
and watch how eagerly he will
take to reading poetry himself.
Once get him to feel and love the
personality of an author, and
watch him plow through that au-
thor's works. Once make him