VOCATIONS GUIDE OUTLINED IN NEW COUNCIL REPORT

In a previous report, this committee has already considered the need at Harvard for vocational guidance, and suggested that such guidance could best be given by a full-time, salaried director. This further report is a more specific amplification.

The need for vocational guidance has already been discussed. It is apparent in the rapidly expanding Senior placement work of the present part-time employment office in University Hall under Mr. Walker W. Daly. Statistics already quoted indicate the vagueness of the great majority of Seniors in touch with that office as to what they can do and want to do after college. Guidance will be further necessitated by the forthcoming enlargement of the alumni appointment office, now under Miss Ruth B. Monk, which has offered to handle the placing of Seniors as well as alumni. Since the alumni have offered this placement service, it is felt that the college should help Seniors to choose a vocation, in order to facilitate their placement by the alumni.

Problem Involved

Besides this immediate necessity, Harvard seems to have much the same problem as the other eastern universities, most of which like Yale and Dartmouth, have flourishing personnel departments. It may be argued that Harvard, because, of its location, or some tradition of individualism, has less need of vocational guidance. This point of view, however, seems a confusion of the question, in that more opportunities for placement are not sufficient to guide undecided Seniors in choosing a place. The problem, in other words, is bigger than local differences and is apparently becoming more pressing in proportion as the opportunities open to college men increase. Harvard has already recognized this need for guidance in the appointment in 1923 of a Faculty Committee, under Professor C. N. Greenough, with Mr. Delmar Leighton as secretary,--the work was discontinued in 1927. The fact that Harvard Seniors are not now vociferous in demanding guidance seems to this committee to indicate only their unconsciousness of the lack of a service to which they have not become accustomed.

Kind of Guidance Needed

The next problem is, what sort should this guidance be? In the first place, in the opinion of this committee, vocational guidance should aim to be human rather than scientific. It is a problem in helping young men find themselves, to be answered by sympathetic human contact rather than by statistical analysis. There can be no single method and no sure-five system. The committee is strongly opposed to any idea of routine measurement of capacity or pigeon-holing of personality by any chart system whatsoever. Intelligence tests should be taken as indicating perhaps the possession of capacity but never the lack of it. Records of grades and activities should only supplement opinions formed by personal contact.

In the second place, vocational guidance should never decide for the student but should merely stimulate him to decide for himself. It should suggest possibilities, give information, point out difficulties, stimulate personal investigation and decision, but never dictate. This seems obvious; but it is important that the man giving advice should do it as an understanding friend rather than as a technical expert performing an autopsy.

By the same token, all such guidance should be voluntary and not compulsory on the student. Compulsory interviews would always be conducted under an 'obvious psychological handicap. Moreover, relatively few students are interested in vocational advice until the senior year. The experience of the Dartmouth office and Mr. Daly's office indicates this. Hence the compulsory guidance of underclassmen would be in the nature of an imposition, as well as superfluous. Vocational guidance, in short, should make its own way on its own merits.

Coordination Necessary

The next question is how should this guidance be given? The committee feels that informal talks to groups of students by eminent professional men; personal interviews with company representatives or alumni or business men; and books and pamphlets are all valuable sources of information. But they should all be directed and coordinated by one man, perhaps with assistants, whose office should be a clearing-house and permanent center. It seems essential that this man be impartial, with no axe to grind as in the case of a company representative. He should be well informed, at least having access through other persons to information on any technical subject. He should be permanent and always accessible, to keep him in contact with both students and men capable of giving advice. It does not seem absolutely essential, however, either that he conduct research or that he be a retired business man or that he have had experience in a great number of fields, although all these things are desirable. The adviser's ability to talk to students understandingly is his prime requisite.

Only One Man Needed

Since one man is needed, the committee is opposed to a system of guidance by a faculty committee, functioning through a secretary. Such a system would first of all impose an enormous burden on the members of the committee, since guidance, to be more than mere information-giving, must involve incessant and often apparently useless interviews. Faculty members giving such guidance would be obliged to drop nearly all their academic work. If the members of the committee were not active, the work would presumably be done by the secretary. Insofar as the secretary were permanent, accessible, and capable he would fill the qualifications mentioned above. But a qualified and full time salaried adviser