The Quantum Theory

Modern scholarship is a marvellous thing, particularly when it is statistical.

For instance, Dr. McLedge Moffetty, of Columbia University, has announced the results of "the most comprehensive survey ever made of the teaching profession." He has statistically studied the average prospective teacher. Let those who dare to doubt the miracles of modern questionnairing ponder his discoveries.

After endless hours of cards and questions and careful computations, Dr. Moffet learned that: The favorite authors of American teachers are the best sellers. Temple Bailey, Gene Stratton Porter and Charles Dickens. Like several million others, they prefer the films to the drama, and musical comedy to opera. They like sacred music, also jazz and love songs. The average teacher is the daughter of a small business man, a skilled workman or a farmer; her average sister is a stenographer, a nurse or a clerk. Her average sources of average pleasure are picnics, amateur plays and basketball games. She goes to church; she washes dishes; she likes literary societies and the Y. W. C. A. Her average home has an automobile, a bathtub and a sewing machine and fewer than 200 books.

In other words, the average teacher in the average school in the average town is, on the whole, and as a rule, average. Correct, professor! You can go to the head of the class. You have demonstrated beyond conceivable doubt not only the accuracy but the sublime averageness of your statistics. --New York Tribune.