with letters of introduction to the proper seniors-I was received with the same measure of cordial courtesy and half concealed surprise that we would receive a similar visit from the Grand Llama or a South American general.

Several things combined to put an end to this isolation. The Civil War itself and the growth of national consciousness that followed it; the development of public interest in athletics and the intercollegiate rivalry that went therewith; the establishment of endowed universities like Cornell or Johns Hopkins, avowedly national in their scope, which took their professors from many colleges and competed with one another to attract the postgraduate students-these and other causes combined to inaugurate an era of competition. We got both the good and the evil that always attends such an era; strenuous effort and improved performance on the one hand, duplication and misplaced attempts to attract students on the other. The whole mental attitude of that day was symbolized by a remark which a lady made to me in the early eighties, after she had seen a collection of glass flowers that somebody had given to Harvard: What is Yale doing to get a similar collection?" When I answered that we had some objects for which to spend our money that seemed more important than glass flowers, she said, "But if Harvard has a collection of glass flowers, it certainly seems as though Yale ought to try to get a better one!"

Much of this competition still continues. But our colleges are beginning to recognize the folly of duplication and the need of division of labor. Institutions have been established with a view of coordinating our activity and making such division of labor possible. This movement for coordination has received a powerful impetus from the World War. This war not only brought our colleges together for two years in the pursuit of a common aim, but it made their advanced work so costly that they had to seek means of cooperation and division of labor in selfdefense; to stop duplicating, because there is no money with which to duplicate. We have

not yet progressed very far with the solution of these difficulties. Our fathers would probably say that we were under conviction of sin but had not yet found the way of salvation. The men who are to take the lead in the college work of to-day must be the ones who can best point out that way of salvation.

We are working on a great national problem-one where cooperation must be a habit and competition only an incident. Our leader in dealing with the present situation must be the man who knows the large elements which should guide our choice of activities rather than the local ones which indicate best how we can carry them out. The local knowledge he can get from others; the national situation he must understand for himself. And besides recognizing the character of the work that lies before the next president, the Yale Corporation has also recognized something else that is necessary for its successful solution-the intellectual kinship among all colleges and all college men who work together for a common purpose. This catholicity of spirit is the one sound basis for success in any cooperative enterprise, be it league of colleges or league of nations. The brotherhood of the legionthe spirit which animated the group of Roman soldiers until it became stronger than mere ties of physical kinship-was the thing by which the Roman army conquered the world. As a fellow-member of this brotherhood we receive Dr. Angell into our graduate body.

It is a common belief that a university is distinguished from a school by the fact that it teaches more kinds of things. But the real difference lies not in the variety of subjects taught; it lies in the breadth of vision with which they are taught and the breadth of recognition achieved by the teachers. The outlook of the school is local; the outlook of the university is world wide. The teaching of the school may be sectarian; the teaching of the university is catholic. The school may draw its adherents from certain classes or groups; the university appeals to the whole world. Under Dr. Angell's leadership Yale will enjoy this vision and this outlook, will teach in this spirit, and will sound this appeal.

son

EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH AND

STATISTICS

THE MONROE SILENT READING TEST

Ar the beginning of the school year 19201921 the teachers of the city schools of Madiwere requested by the superintendent (C. S. Meek) to divide their classes into A and B sections, on the basis of the abilities of the individual pupils as soon as this could be determined. This was done within a month from the opening of school in most cases where conditions permitted, the A section being made up of the stronger pupils and the B section of the weaker pupils. The judgment of the teacher was the sole first determinant; this judgment being based on the general character of the initial work of the pupils. It is evident that a great variety of standards might obtain in a city school system and curiosity is keen as to whether the division as made is substantiated by the results of various applied tests.

The Monroe Silent Reading Tests were applied to the pupils of the Grades IV. to VIII. as a first step in increasing interest in Silent Reading. The comparison of results for the A and B sections throughout the school system was significant, the A section proving in general to be far superior to the B section of the same class. The following table gives the summary average of the median standings of the various classes in each grade for rate and comprehension, and shows the uniform superiority of the A sections in all measures.

If the A and B sections of any class were of equal ability in the tests the medians would be the same and only 50 per cent. of the A group would fall above the median of the B group. Where the percentage is equal or less than 50 it is a sign that the classification as determined by the teacher is not substantiated by the giving of the Reading Test. In some cases, as in the case of the Eighth Grade of School No. 1 the division was made on the basis of the pupils' ability to do original independent work, hence ability to pass a test of this type would not be an index, and it is not surprising that the sections prove to be of equal ability.

Some teachers were undoubtedly more largely influenced by a child's reading ability, while others fixed their classification in competition within other subjects as arithmetic and this may be one of the reasons for the wide differentiations in results and the failure of some groups to show a strong positive correlation. Nevertheless the fact that there is such a high correlation in the majority of cases is significant of the importance which ability in Silent Reading must hold in general classifications of pupils into superior and inferior groups. PAUL V. WEST

UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN

Volume XIII

THE FAILURE OF THE COLLEGE THE colleges of the country are making urgent appeals for funds. It is therefore pertinent at this time, to ask the questionWhy is the college, in spite of great effort, doing so little to raise the intellectual temperature of the undergraduate body?

Most people concede that the methods of college education, as they exist to-day, need considerable adaptation, but few are willing to face the facts that adaptation is not so much required as new objectives, new procedures and above all a new spirit. It is not a question of clearing away a little brushwood, it is rather a matter of felling some old and stately oaks.

In attacking the general problem, this article will confine itself to two mistakes of college administration. These are:

1. The failure of the college to recognize the existence of, and adapt its methods to, the heterogeneous student body;

2. The failure of college leaders to create in the student body, and to a large extent among themselves, a meet and proper respect for learning.

Dealing with the first point, the students of our colleges may be divided for convenience of discussion into three classes:

(1) Those of high intellectual endowment who will pursue an academic life;

(2) Those of equally high intellectual endowment who are training for important administrative or professional work;

(3) Those who enter college primarily with a view to its social side, and who lack the native ability, the intellectual training, or the ambition necessary for the pursuit of

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any work of a high scholastic order. With this class may be included a small group of faithful students who, through lack of native endowment, in spite of severe exertion, are unable to keep the pace set by the first two classes.

While some believe that the college should restrict itself to students of the first two classes, it is not the opinion of the writer that the aims of a college should be so limited. Academic bias would be revealed in the failure to recognize the important service which the college is capable of rendering to undergraduates of the third type. The college is not failing because it houses the three types. Where it is making its egregious blunder is in attempting to educate these three classes together.

Along

The outstanding contribution of American psychology to education has been the revelation of the mental differences which exist among normal individuals. these lines there has been a steady stream of work for the last twenty years which has culminated in the measurement of individual differences in a large cross section of the population in the draft. Whenever an attempt has been made to take stock of any group of individuals these differences, extreme in order and irrevocably fixed by nature, are found to exist. Psychology has not discovered these differences, it has merely presented, on such a large scale, quantitative evidence of the extent of these differences, that he that runs may read. Apparently college administrators are running too strenuously! Whatever may be the reason, it is true to say that the college