The Sidney herald., 1956-06-28

~
Helena - In asking for Gan
being granted) retirement be
cause the state board of educa
ton declined to raise his salar,
DR.. Rush Jordan, president Q
Western Montana College of Edu
cation, said:
Il am tired of the fiction of
unified system of education il
Montana. This board must real
ixe that there is no unity anC
that "there never will be unit
the system has a strong executive
head"
/ do not believe DR.. Jordan
intended TO infer that unified ad-
ministration of the six University
of Montana units, accidentally
and fiscally, has not been under
taken. 1t was undertaken 40
years ago. 1t was the chancellor
ship system, provided for by a
law which was on the books until
it was repealed in 1855.
The trouble began when Mon
tana's state system of higher edu-
cation was not set up as a single
or unified institution in the first
place. This scattering of schools
had its inception in political log
rolling, or perhaps it might be
said, in deals and trades In which
rival communities agreed among
themselves how the melon was
to be cut even before the seed
sprouted. There is evidence of
this as far back as the state con-
stitutional convention in 1890.
Statehood had hardly begun
when the cutting of the melon
started. Missoula got what was
called the university. To Bozeman
went the college of agriculture and
mechanical arts. A school of mines
was located in Butte. Assigned
to Dillon was the state normal
school. Years later but about the
same time what is now Eastern
Montana College of Education
was established at Billings and
Northern Monana college at
Havre. These are the six units
comprising what is now sometimes
termed the Greater University of
Montana +,
Quite naturally, each unit was
and is ambitious to expand. And
In each case local interest - eau
Ii Main street - has an economic
or business stake. Regardless of
all else. legislators from univer-
sity unit counties r expected to
bring back bigger and bigger APP
preparations. Collectively the leg
from the university unit
communities are potent.
Moreover, until fairly recently
{ was the practice, virtually
deviation, for each uni
unit town to have a men,
Der on the state board of educa-
ion This was helpful to the ex-
,ent that this member was very
familiar with the conditions at
md the needs of his unit, but in
comparison with his own, his con-
>ern for the other units was Ii
to be slight. Presently there
are no board members from the
communities, but some
are alumni of or other of the
IA dII0 lFC1x(C AIA11liC0 W
be influenced by loyalty.
Each unit has its own advisory
board, a sort of liaison between
the community and the school and
can hardly be condemned
being active when matters af-
its institution are before
he legislature.
nor, I'll -<1 81 %L4 ~~-
rary, the prevailing tendency has
,een to keep the university units
eparate entities, although theo-
etically tied together. 1t was for
he purpose of reversing this ten
lency that the legislature created
he chancellor system.
Figuratively, the chancellor, an i
ducator of high repute, was to +,
a hard-fisted boss - a kind :
f referee Or umpire - to the :
nd that even though the schools :
yere in different localities, they {
yould be a single and coordinated !
of higher education. :
The first chancellor was DR.. 4,
dward c. Elliott, who came in {
ZIG. DR.. Elliott, now president !
meritus of Purdue university, !
as able and ~assertive - a bit of .
n a%utocrat, it seemed to me. / 8
link that, more than anything :
Sc, it was contentious in the po- e
tical-legislative realm that made z
easy to accept the presidency 2
Purdue and leave the Mon d
ma job to someone else. +
Then in 1923 came DR.. Melvin p
4. Brannon. He served l0h d
ears. DR.. Brannon, who died in n
$50, was softer-spoken than DR..
Lliott and apparently got along
asonably well with the unit v
'esidents, but the legislature was n
S undoing. Session after ses- II
On unsuccessful attempts were v
AIDE to repeal the chancellor q
ip law. Finally this objective =
as attained in a roundabout way :
provision for the chancellor's y
larry was stricken from the ap- -
opriation bill. DIR. Brannon quit. a
There followed an interval, a
1888 to 1941, when there n
no chancellor, the nonaca-l v