Michigan Schoolmasters' Club

PROCEEDINGS OF THE FORTY-FOURTH MEETING HELD AT ANN ARBOR, MARCH 31, APRIL 1, 2, 3, 1909

EDITED BY THE SECRETARY

GENERAL MEETINGS

The forty-fourth meeting of the Michigan Schoolmasters' Club began on Wednesday, March 31, with meetings of the Classical and Historical, Modern Language, and Physiography Conferences. The paper, "The Making of Michigan," read by Clarence M. Burton of Detroit at the Classical and Historical Conference, reviewed some points in the history of Michigan not generally known. It is published in full in the proceedings.

The paper, "Peter White as Man and as Citizen," read by Hon. Levi L.. Barbour, of Detroit, is to be published by the Board of Regents and will be sent to the members of the club.

The Conference of Physiography held its first meeting this year and proved so interesting and profitable that action was taken to make the Conference a permanent part of the club.

The general meetings of the club were held on Thursday and Friday mornings in University Hall. Thursday morning was given over to the teachers of English. Papers were read by Professor J. F. Hosic, of the Chicago Normal School, Professor F. A. Manny, of the Western Normal School, and Professor Laura J. Wylie, of Vassar College, New York. Friday morning the topic for discussion was: The Meaning of Heredity. Professor George D. Strayer, of Columbia University, spoke upon one phase of the subject, i. e., “In how far and in what way is it true that the child is born free?" Professor C. B. Davenport, of the Carnegie Institution of Washington, spoke upon another phase-"In how far and in what way is it true that the child is bound by heredity?" And Professor R. M. Wenley, of the University of Michigan, spoke upon the phase, "What

special hopes do the facts of heredity offer for education?" All of these papers will be found to be interesting reading for the members of the club. On Thursday night Professor W. B. Scott, of Princeton, gave an address upon the subject of Evolution.

On Friday night an address was given by Professor L. W. Sprague, of Ethical Culture School, New York, upon the subject, "Myths and Legends." In this address Professor Sprague showed the great value of the story in a child's life. That character can be better formed by asking the child to recall certain stories than can be formed by less human methods so often used. The club is sorry that it could not get the manuscript of this most admirable address for publication.

The different Conferences held their meetings on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday and Saturday and were largely attended.

On Thursday another Conference-Drawing-had its birth and makes the tenth one to become a permanent part of the club. The program of this and other Conferences can be found in the last part of the Journal.

The plan adopted by the executive committee of admitting teachers to the meetings of the club by badge or ticket proved to be an excellent thing. Not only did the teachers enjoy the meetings better for having paid their full share of the expenses, but they also increased the membership roll twofold. This will enable the club to obtain good speakers and more of them for its meetings.

On Saturday morning the fourth symposium on the Value of Classical Studies was given and reprints of it will be sent to all members of the club. Reprints Nos. 1, 2 and 3 will be sent to any address upon receipt of a twocent stamp for each reprint.

Some of the pleasant features of the meeting were the annual supper of the alumnæ of the University of Michigan given in Barbour gymnasium, the young ladies' classes in gymnastic drills and basketball game, the organ recital given by Mr. H. W. Church of the School of Music, and the reception given by Professor and Mrs. Kelsey. All in all, the meeting was by far the largest and best in the history of the club.

THE BACKGROUND OF THE CERTIFICATE SYSTEM.

PROFESSOR FRANK A. MANNY, WESTERN NORMAL, KALAMAZOO, MICH.

The college entrance problem is a part of the social movement of the day. To an increasing number of people this larger movement is seen at its best in democracy or a common sense balance between the tendencies which may be characterized negatively as exclusiveness and indiscriminate leveling, and positively as distinction and uniformity. In our smaller problem the same general forces appear.

A few years ago President Eliot went to New York to deliver two educational addresses. In one he showed to the satisfaction of many that the best line of advance in college entrance determination will continue to be by examination resulting in the selection of the members of this important social group by methods which would reject those who could not or would not conform to a certain set of arbitrary tests. In the other address he showed the folly of such a system when applied by labor unions and resulting in the closed shop.

Whatever later adjustments may come, the certificate system has been thus far the most important tool used to re-form the situation. The fact that this method has proved itself serviceable to the extent it has is significant of the need there was for it. The merits and demerits of the case have been discussed extensively, but the essential gain has been that there has come with it increased freedom together with the recognition of a larger unit in which the secondary schools and the colleges have mutua! responsiblities. The state university has been the chief means of promoting this more effective organization and even the Harvard professor recognizes and states the advance. Professor Royce, at the Baltimore meeting of the American Association, indicated that a quarter of a century in service at Cambridge had only shown him more clearly that the social relationships of the state university furnish the type which is bound to influence with increasing success the older institutions. Some years ago Professor Palmer in an address at Cleveland on "The Glory of the Imperfect," gave us perhaps the most valuable statement that has yet been made of American education as a distinct organization of sufficient definiteness to be a tool in contributing to world improvement.

It is this "glory of the imperfect" that is the distinguishing feature of America's contribution-the fact that products are only valuable and significant as parts of processes and consequently are at their best only materials for further advance. The aristocratic element marked by the advance in organization is only one factor, while the other factor, serviceableness in further advance, is of equal importance. The segregation and isolation of products, whether in the form of resources, wealth, culture, art or piety, result in a lack of circulation and a consequent hindering of

progress. The testing of a situation tends to take account of what one has rather than what it will lead to. The cost of an inventory of this kind is so great that it can only be afforded once in a lifetime. Logically this great event should come at the end of the student's schooling, but the university has contented itself with the coarser screens of honors and pass men, cum laude and summa cum. If the finer shot has been sifted out in a senior wrangler, the larger numbers in the other class have realized their compensations. The German examination at the close of the nine year secondary course has best illustrated this devotion to products and the work has suffered for it. I have seen many instructors in mathematics in that country dictating demonstrations and solutions to students because with the pressure for accumulation to be tested later it was felt that the student must not be permitted the hazard of a single misstep. It is not strange that at one of the universities I was told that for courses involving any consideration of mathematics as a means to further growth the gymnasial student must in many cases begin over again when he entered the university, for the impeding habits of accumulation must be gotten rid of before he could see mathematics as a tool of science. Again it is not strange that in these schools the laboratories were almost as fresh after several years of nominal service as they were on the day of opening.

In the days of the assaults of the barbarians upon the treasures that Rome in church and state had gotten control of, it is not strange that an educational ideal should have become prominent which was dominated by the notion that education consisted in keeping intact and passing on the spiritual acquisitions which became more precious as they were seen to be endangered. Nor is it strange that the methods used in handling these came to be recognized as the only habits which had the transferability requisite to disciplining the youth. It was logical that every addition to the curriculum forced upon the school by society came in time to be subjected to a considerable extent to these methods and these tests. This was true of the Greek and Roman life brought in by the humanists for it became our disciplinary grind to acquire the most tangible and measurable of the products of that life-the languages. Mathematics suffered the same "seachange," so that the average student in America never gets into the swing of the larger mathematics because more formal aspects are more measurable. Modern languages and the mother tongue have gone through the mill and the natural sciences show that they can lend themselves to the same exactions. Even manual training in set exercises and domestic science in recipes as governors rather than as working hypotheses have often followed the course.

But today we are in better condition than ever before for next steps. The program of Professor Scott for English reform, that of Professor Mann for advance in Physics, the Perry movement in Mathematics all seem to show that the isolation and consequent wasting of resource products is passing. This segregation at its worst was modified when Matthew

Arnold called for the teaching of products as the results of processes even though he could not see the educational possibilities of participation in the processes themselves. One does not wonder at this when he goes into the laboratory and finds students so swamped in details and in doing that they have no time or energy for meaning and functions. To be lost in the process is as bad as to take the product second hand. Neither is necessary, we are coming to see, and both represent forms of that early specialization fatal to the continuance of growth which are equally reprehensible in the form of child labor, trade instruction at too early an age, or specializing in skill in jumping college fences.

One chief reason for the larger social inclusions indicated by the certificate system, the recognition of the products-culture-the classicas stages rather than as ultimates has been the development of modern science with all that goes with it. Three stages can be seen in this movement. Early man like the other animals when he met a difficulty must hazard too often all that he had upon the issue. This was the stage of brute experience and the result was often death. The chance successes led to better organization and consequently more effective psychical functions and the method of theory came to stand out. Education went over to this and repudiated its former connection with practical experience. Theories, deductions, products were so significant that they were counted all significant. In recent years the laboratory has marked a third stage in which man can try on a problem physically without running the risk of losing his all. There is sufficient control so that he need no longer be a partisan in the theoretical-practical controversy but can employ both tools in safety, working upon conditions especially prepared to meet the issue involved, recognizing the value, the superiority, of his result without losing sight of its indebtedness to the whole and the necessity of using it in the next step in the process that never ceases to proceed.

Just as the school wisely went over to the method of theory and deduction as soon as that stage could stand for itself, so today we see the transition of that institution to the laboratory point of view and as an important outcome of the second stage was an extraordinary advance in freedom of thought, so we may reasonably expect that the present forward step will greatly facilitate freedom of action.

What are some of the immediate lines of development which come to us as definite opportunities and responsibilities on account of the progress marked by scientific organization? One of the first results from any removal of restraint is the chance to breathe more freely. It cannot be denied that some schools when put upon a certificate basis enjoy this opportunity to the full and unless there is outside prodding the chance for breathing space results in sound sleep. The tendency is also seen to take it for granted that because the examination system is so badly misused the reducing of examinations to a minimum is the best means of advance. Probably one of the greatest needs of our schools from the kindergarten up is