THE ELECTIVE ELEMENT IN THE COLLEGE CURRICULUM.

The degree of Bachelor of Arts stands for the highest form of education given by the colleges in regular courses of study. It represents three or four years of special preparatory training followed by four years of collegiate work. For centuries the colleges have steadily adhered to the classical languages, mathematics, history, philosophy, and the natural sciences as the basis of this honor. Other courses are offered for other degrees approaching more or less closely to the classical, but never equaling it in public estimation, and always implying special rather than liberal culture.

But with the vast increase of knowledge in these later times, the innumerable lines of special work pursued, and the endless forms of applied science, there has appeared a strong and persistent expression of desire that the entire theory of collegiate training should be modified and the curricula materially changed. What answer have our colleges and universities made so far? and what further should and will they make in the near future? The college is a feature and factor of civilization reciprocally acting and being acted upon by surrounding conditions. It first came into being as a substitute for monastic schools because the conditions of society demanded liberal education for laymen as well as for the clergy. Merton College-the oldest of Oxford-was established in 1264, "in order to produce a constant succession of scholars devoted to the pursuits of literature," bound to employ themselves in the study of arts or philosophy, theology, or the canon law; the majority to continue in the arts and philosophy until passed on to the study of theology by the decision of the Wardens and Fellows, and as the result of meritorious proficiency in the first named subjects." This college, the product of the demand of the times, gave England many of her most eminent men during the first hundred years of its history. From that day to this the colleges have met, with more or less promptness, the needs of their times. In answer to the demand for a wider range of studies the elective element has appeared in varying degrees in nearly all our college courses. Harvard leads the movement by making almost every thing elective within prescribed limits. She

offers her students scarcely any thing for which she is not ready to accept something else. She degrades the classics from their traditional pre-eminence, and will accept almost any respectable studies in their stead. And yet she does not move off confidently along this new path, nor fail to utter a friendly caution to those upon whom she bestows such large liberty. She says, in her latest Annual: "Students are strongly urged to make their choice with the utmost care, under the best advice, and in such manner that their studies from first to last may form a rationally connected whole." "It is believed that any plan of study deliberately made and adhered to will be more profitable than studies chosen by him from year to year, without plan, under the influence of temporary preference."

She thus urges the student to select some judicious friend who will aid him to make the choices she declines to suggest. She requires her Freshmen to select studies from four of the following courses: Greek, Latin, German, French, History, Mathematics, Physics, Chemistry, and Natural History. To the other three classes she offers electives enough to bewilder them by their multiplicity.

That the utter abandonment by Harvard of the old foundations for her most scholarly degree does not meet with general favor among educators is evinced by the fact that the presidents of nearly, if not quite, all the New England colleges united in a formal protest against these radical changes when they were introduced.

Another form of elective work appears in institutions which offer a great number of courses of study. Cornell University prints as her motto the words of her founder, Ezra Cornell: "I would found an institution where any person can find instruction in any study;" and offers twenty-three courses of instruction, whose wide range extends from classic Greek to veterinary science, and from comparative philology to military science and tactics. She schedules three general courses leading respectively to the degree of A.B., B.P., and B.S., and adds eleven technical courses, beginning with agriculture and ending with the history of political science, nearly every one of which is honored with some degree. Thus this rich and large young university almost resolves herself into a school of technology. Still another form of elective work is presented by one of

our western colleges, in which about three fourths of the course is required, and the remainder is given to a special department during the whole four years. While a few institutions are boldly moving toward curricula made up largely of electives, the great majority of strong and reputable colleges and universities are holding to the long-approved basis of collegiate training, but admitting elective work amounting to a little less than half the course. This is usually introduced sparingly into the sophomore year, and steadily increases until it forms most of the senior work. Generally the elective studies proposed are carefully chosen, so as to harmonize with those required, and are practically options along that line. The University of New York classifies by subjects and hours the work in her two courses of study. For the course in arts she requires that 835 hours be given to languages and literature, 683 to mathematics and natural sciences, and 402 to philosophy and history. For the course in science she requires that about 450 hours be devoted to languages and literature, 1,000 to mathematics and natural sciences, and 462 to philosophy and history. Yale College permits considerably less than two years of elective work, but widens the possible choices to ninety two subjects selected from seven different departments of knowledge. The prevailing usage among the best colleges may be stated as follows: For the highest degree conferred about three fifths of the course is devoted to Greek, Latin, modern languages, mathematics, philosophy, and natural sciences, and the remainder to electives within prescribed limits. There is surprisingly little material difference in the courses of first-class institutions leading to the degree of A.B.

The schools of technology offer instruction in so many departments that somewhere almost every art or science may be pursued as a specialty without required work in other branches. Is it probable that the elective system will supersede the present one? I think not, for the following reasons:

The most important function of the college is to give that complete, symmetrical education which most perfectly develops the entire man. "In the college is determined the character of most of the persons who are to fill the professions, teach the schools, write the books, and do most of the business of legislation for the whole body of the people."

With such duties to society and the state, the colleges must maintain a form of education that shall develop the beauty and strength of all the faculties, as the Greek developed the physical ideal in the Apollo Belvidere and the Venus de Medici. They must not so much attempt the training of a man for some special profession, or to intensify and strengthen some special aptitude, as to fit him for the various responsibilities and vicissitudes of manly life. The elective system fails to give this education. It constantly keeps in mind either some utilitarian end or the gratification of some pronounced bent of mind. It forgets the ideal of mental, spiritual manhood.

Long ago Lord Verulam uttered his warning against this utilitarian danger. He says: "Among the many great foundations of colleges in Europe, I find it strange that they are all dedicated to professions, and none left free to arts and sciences at large. For if men judge that learning should be referred to action, they judge well; but they fall into the error described in the ancient fable in which the other parts of the body did suppose the stomach had been idle because it neither performed the office of motion as the limbs do, nor of sense as the head doth; but yet, notwithstanding, it is the stomach that distributeth to all the rest. So that if any man thinks philosophy and universality to be idle studies, he doth not consider that all professions are from thence served and supplied. If you will have a tree bear more fruit than it used to do, it is not any thing you can do to the boughs, but it is stirring of the earth and putting new mold about the roots that work it."

This high and symmetrical education is not to be secured by any miscellaneous and hap-hazard succession of studies which a youth of twenty shall select because they are easy, or in the line of his tastes, or will presumably be helpful to him in his anticipated profession.

Wherever the system of electives has been largely intro duced there are notable cautions against possible evils arising from it. The Cornell University Register says: "In the course of their elective work... students are urgently advised to proceed upon a carefully formed and clearly defined plan, and to aim at the attainment of special proficiency in certain lines of work. The members of the faculty will be glad to give advice and assistance in the forming of such plans."

It does not appear that the average student at the time he is in college is well qualified to determine what branches he should pursue. If this be true the elective system cannot supersede required courses of study. Electives as now generally introduced are so nearly on the lines of required studies, and are so few in number, that they scarcely do more than afford an option between subjects any of which might readily pass into the curriculum if every thing was required.

Our colleges are not rich enough to maintain the number of instructors which would be necessary to a general introduction of electives. Yale offers to her juniors and seniors ninety-two electives from seven different departments. The number of classes which would be necessary if these choices were all made can possibly be imagined, but when Cornell attempts to realize the idea of her founder, the number of classes and teachers cannot be imagined.

It will probably be found more practicable for our colleges and universities to determine the leading features of their curricula, and require that the work thus indicated be done, adding as far as may be a useful and attractive list of electives. Relief from the pressure of the multitude of studies which will be called for, and might be profitably pursued, will be found in different ways. The organization of several general courses leading to appropriate degrees will add to the variety of work and yet prevent the undue multiplication of classes; the increased requirements for admission will leave room for a wider range of subjects; a greater number of post-graduate courses will furnish admirable facilities for special work in the lines of taste or advantage, and the technical schools will provide for those who especially seek commercial and professional advantage in connection with their intellectual development.

The old classical college work doubtless will continue, and will grow broader and better, but will not cease to be chiefly required work. Other degrees will be given, but the world. cannot spare the Master of Arts, and will not abandon the courses of study by which he is developed.

C. N. Sims.