What Should The College Do?
I

In times of crisis such as now exist in the world, men and women are
brought to examine more closely the ideals by which they live, to slough
off the complacent accevtance of things as they are, to seek within them-
selves and their past actions the causes of a catastrophe which they hope
to avoid in the future. To no group is such self-examination more impor =
tant than to the college teachers of America, who strongly influence at a
most impressionable time of life the youth who are to be the mature citi-
zenry of the most powerful single nation on earth. Such a responsibility,
indirect though it may seem, is not to be lightly dismissed, and its in-
creasing importance may be easily shown from the rising enrollment figures
in American colleges during the past generation. It is easy for us as
teachers to forget the dignity of our high calling, to judge its value by
the somewhat meager financial and social recognition often accorded it,
but a moment's consideration should assure us that those who guide the
minds and help to form the characters of a nation's youth have much to do
with determining that nation's destinye

Tt is particularly appropriate that the faculties of liberal arts
colleges should concern themselves with the aims and accomplishments of
education, since within our system of instruction the college is the most
advanced unit that concerns itself with general education, or education
taken as a whole. Beyond it are various professional schools and special-
ized departmental programs involving intensive study within a limited
range, but the college affords the last chance to give students a well-
rounded training, to impart a comprehensive view of life and the ability
to meet its problems. It is highly important that college teachers should
never lose sight of this general and inclusive function, as their own
interest in special fields of knowledge may sometimes tempt them to do.

In just this connection, however, the college today faces one of its
gravest problems, Formerly, the traditional subjects of the liberal arts
curriculum were almost the only materials actually taught to students
through classroom instruction. Even such subjects as medicine and law
were sometimes studied under private practitioners rather than in academic
institutions; the apprentice system was the regular way of preparing for a
specific trade or profession. How widely this system has been replaced
by organized instruction may be seen from the bare reference to such pro=
fessional schools as Engineering, Education, and Business, to the wide
variety of practical courses offered in Agriculture and Home Economics,
to the instruction in such manual skills as barbering, typing, and mech-
anical repair work, The systematizing of knowledge and techniques in
these and similar fields has made it possible to master them more quickly
by class instruction, And therein lies the college's problem.