THE EDUCATIONAL DILEMMA

To the babel that has been raised in altercation upon the problem of secondary schol education a lawyer's voice is added. Victor Morawetz, writing in the Atlantic Monthly, has stated that the primary purposes of a preparatory school are the development of the body, the establishment of a firm character, the training of the mind. It is essential, in his opinion, that every school graduate should write and speak clear, forceful English. Mr. Morawetz goes on to attack the present methods of teaching history and literature as mere systems of amassing factual knowledge. The blame for this he conventionally lays upon the threshold of the College Board Examinations.

Like all dissertations upon secondary education, the article contains many arguments that are valid. But the author is writing too frequently from the bias of his profession. He hopes to inculcate a thorough knowledge of English Grammar in a boy which in itself is a laudable ideal, at the expense of foreign languages. In defense of this tenet the lawyer cites the elementary language courses at all universities which are more repetitions of a secondary preparation. The time spent on these subjects would be better applied to the Mother tongue in view of the collegiate regurgitation. What Mr. Morawetz is suggesting is tantamount to a stagnation of American education. Students would come to college ignorance of all speech save their own. The colleges would be forced to spend several years in equipping their students with a knowledge that has become indispensable to them.

The remedy lies not, as Mr. Morawetz implies, in relegating lingual preparation to the institutions of higher learning, but in a more efficient, more satisfactory teaching method in the secondary schools. Colleges are dependent upon preparatory institutions. Collegiate education has advanced as far as is possible, and it must now await the further development of its younger sister. What the college desires now in a more mature, intelligent, self reliant freshman, not a boy efficiently drilled in a few things, lacking all mental initiative.