REPORT OF A VISIT TO AMERICAN EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS.
Report of a Visit to American Educational Institutions. By E. S. A. Robson, M.Sc. (Sherratt and Hughes. ls. net.)—Mr. Robson, whose own work lies in the province of technical instruction, is naturally more full and precise in dealing with this part of his subject. At the same time, be supplies us with a highly instructive general account of education in the United States. The organisation of primary and secondary education in that country is far more orderly and complete than in this. It is true that the " Common School Statistics " are not very favour- able. The proportion of pupils enrolled is very little over a fifth, and of this number the average attendance is 68.5, working out at less than a seventh of the population actually at school. Doubtless the averages are much reduced by the illiteracy of parts of the South. (It would be interesting to have the State statistics separately given.) The salaries, too, are low, £117 is. 3d. for male, and £97 18s. 4d. for female teachers. (The figures include, it will be remembered, primary and secondary education ; private schools are a negligible quantity as far as numbers are concerned.) The school year, also, is short, averaging one hundred and forty-four days, less than thirty weeks of five days. Ours is considerably longer. In our primary schools the minimum of school days is two hundred, or forty weeks of five days. When we get out of general figures into the detailed experience which Mr. Robson records, the result is eminently satisfactory. He did not go further south than Balti- more, and he found everywhere much to admire. Technical education is especially well cared for. In commercial education the processes followed are very practical. The account of the Pittsburg system is peculiarly interesting. Each pupil starts with $5,000 (in paper). There is a bank, an insurance office, and firms dealing in produce. Pupils are taught how to conduct a business, to trade, and even, unless we are mistaken, to speculate. "One pupil was fifty bushels short at the end of the day, and had to stand the loss." An unsuccessful merchant has to start again from a lower position, as a clerk in a shipping or insurance office. In fact, we find described exactly the institution set forth in the pages of Stevenson's " Wrecker." In the province of University education the weak point is that any Place can call itself a University and give degrees. Still, there is a respectable number of genuine institutions of the first rank. And they are munificently supported. Mr. John D. Rockefeller between 1892 and 1902 gave to the University of Chicago more than .21,500,000. But while the material equip- ment of these Universities is excellent, the treatment of the teachers is not adequate. A head-master gets £700 in New York, but only £300 in Washington. The salaries of the chief assistants range from £470 to £150 ; of the juniors from £100 to £80. And living, it will be remembered, is more costly than here. Athletics, we are told, are being overdone. At Harvard the engineering laboratories are inadequately equipped, while £35,000 has been spent on a stadium, built after the model of the Coliseum.
Previous page
