THE CARNEGIE FOUNDATION
FOR THE ADVANCEMENT OF TEACHING
A STUDY OF
ENGINEERING EDUCATI
BY
CHARLES RIBORG MANN
BULLETIN NUMBER ELEVEN
1918
A STUDY OF ENGINEERING
EDUCATION
PREPARED FOR THE JOINT COMMITTEE ON ENGINEERING
EDUCATION OF THE NATIONAL ENGINEERING SOCIETIES
BY
CHARLES RIBORG MANN
BULLETIN NUMBER ELEVEN
NEW YORK CITY
576 FIFTH AVENUE
D. B. UPDIKE • THE MERRYMOUNT PRESS • BOSTON
CONTENTS
PAGE
PREFACE V
By the PRESIDENT OF THE CARNEGIE FOUNDATION
INTRODUCTION ix
By the JOINT COMMITTEE ON ENGINEERING EDUCATION of the National Engi-
neering Societies
PART I PRESENT CONDITIONS
CHAPTER
I. The Development of Engineering Schools in the United States 3
II. Aims and Curricula of the Early Schools 9
III. The Struggle for Resources and Recognition 15
IV. Development of the Curriculum into its Present Form 21
V. Methods of Administration in Engineering Schools 27
VI. Student Elimination and Progress 32
VII. Types of Instruction in Engineering Schools 37
PART II THE PROBLEMS OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
VIII. Admission 47
IX. The Time Schedule 54
X. Content of Courses 60
XI. Testing and Grading 67
XII. Shopwork 75
PART III SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS
XIII. The Curriculum 87
XIV. Specialization 95
XV. Teachers 101
XVI. The Professional Engineer 106
iv CONTENTS
APPENDIX
Objective Tests 117
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY 127
INDEX
PREFACE
THE present bulletin has been prepared under conditions somewhat different from
other publications and bulletins of the Carnegie Foundation. This study of Engineer-
ing Education arose out of the action of a joint committee on engineering education,
representing the principal engineering societies. More than three years ago the Com-
mittee had gathered a considerable amount of material bearing on the subject, and
had come to the opinion that the work could be best carried out by the employment
of some one trained in applied science, who should devote his entire attention to the
study, working under the general direction of the Committee and in touch with it.
The Carnegie Foundation agreed to appoint such a man and to bear the expense of the
study. Professor Charles R. Mann, of the University of Chicago, undertook the work
under these conditions, and the report which follows is the outcome of his studies under
the general supervision of the Committee. The discussion of Professor Mannas report
by the Committee forms the introductory chapter.
It will be understood that the report did not contemplate a study or examination
of the engineering schools of the United States, altho a limited number of typical
schools were visited and studied by Professor Mann. The point of view from which
the study was undertaken was the following: Fifty years ago, when the engineering
schools of the United States were inaugurated, they began their work upon a definite
teaching plan and one that had at least pedagogic consistency. The course was four
years. The first two were spent mainly in the fundamental sciences — chemistry, phy-
sics, mathematics, and mechanics ; the last two years mainly in the applications of
these sciences to theoretical and practical problems.
In the half century that has passed this course of study has been overlaid with a
great number of special studies intended to enable the student to deal with the con-
stantly growing applications of science to the industries. While the original teaching
plan remains as the basis of the four-year engineering curriculum, the courses given
in most schools have been greatly modified in the effort to teach special subjects. Asa
result, the load upon the student has become continually heavier and bears unequally
in different places and in different parts of the course. In addition there is a wide-
spread feeling that under this pressure the great body of students fail to gain, on
the one hand, a satisfactory grounding in the fundamental sciences ; and on the other
hand, do not fulfil the expectations of engineers and manufacturers in dealing with
the practical problems with which they are confronted on leaving the engineering
schools.
It is out of this situation that the Committee of the Engineering Societies began
its study, whose purpose is not so much to record the details of engineering teaching
in the various schools as to examine the fundamental question of the right methods
of teaching and of the preparation of young men for the engineering professions : in
other words, to question anew the pedagogic solution of fifty years ago, to examine
vi PREFACE
the curriculum of to-day and the methods of teaching now employed, and to suggest
in the light of fifty years of experience the pedagogic basis of the course of study
intended to prepare young men for the work demanded of the engineer of to-day.
In the effort to do this, the point of view of the teacher, of the engineer, and of the
manufacturer and employer has been kept in view.
While the report and the introduction of the Committee deal with many matters
of detail in the formation and development of a suitable curriculum, and suggest vari-
ous methods for simplifying the present courses of study, three questions of impor-
tance are raised which are closely related to the primary purpose for which the engi-
neering school exists.
Professor Mann argues that the present arrangement, under which the fundamental
sciences are taught in advance of their applications, is the wrong method of teaching,
and that the engineering education will never be satisfactory until theory and prac-
tice are taught simultaneously.
For example, mathematics is the most important tool of the engineer. It is taught
for two years in the engineering school in separate courses — higher algebra, coordi-
nate geometry, the calculus, and mechanics. The splitting up of mathematics into sepa-
rate courses is itself a source of weakness from the standpoint of the student's needs.
He needs not studies nor recitations in these artificial divisions of mathematics, but
a single course in mathematics illuminated and made alive at every step by applica-
tions in the solutions of actual problems. Algebra, coordinate geometry, and the cal-
culus are not separate and unrelated studies, but merely parts of the one subject of
mathematics.
As a consequence of this method of teaching Professor Mann urges that the engi-
neering courses, as taught in the preliminary years, do not form sound criteriafor judg-
ing as to the ability of the student to do successful engineering work, and that many
students are sent away from the technical school without having had any fair test
as to their capacity for engineering practice or study.
In the third place he gives the results of certain objective tests designed to throw
light upon the fitness of the applicant to undertake engineering studies and practice.
It is quite clear that the trial of these tests made hitherto is not sufficient to demon-
strate their trustworthiness, but the question raised is an exceedingly interesting one.
There are few devices connected with teaching more unsatisfactory than our present
day examinations, whether used as tests for admission or as criteria of performance on
the part of the student.
In general these suggestions of Professor Mann, if carried out, would affect present
day teaching of engineering in much the same way that Langdell's case method revo-
lutionized the teaching of law.
Langdell built the teaching of law exclusively and directly upon the study of cases.
His notion was that the principles upon which the law rests are few in number, and
that these could be best apprehended and mastered by the student in the direct
PREFACE vii
examination of typical cases. The number of such cases necessary to illustrate these
principles he held to be very small in comparison with the overwhelming mass of law
reports to which the student had formerly been directed as the basis of the study
of the law in conjunction with textbooks. LangdelPs method involved the working
out by the student of the principles of the law from actual cases tried and decided
in the courts. Law he conceived of as an Applied Science.
Langdell's method is not infrequently referred to as the laboratory method of
teaching law, conveying the impression that the case method of teaching law con-
sists in transferring to the teaching of law the methods employed in the teaching of
applied science. This statement has been the cause of no little confusion. The teach-
ing of law by the case method presents only a remote analogy with the methods
hitherto employed in teaching applied science. Applied science is not taught ordi-
narily in the engineering school by the case method. On the contrary, the methods
actually employed in teaching the so-called laboratory subjects do not differ appre-
ciably from the methods of teaching literature or Latin. At present the student un-
dertakes to learn a vast body of theory under the name of physics, mechanics, or chem-
istry, illustrated in some measure in the laboratory, and then seeks later to select
from this mass of knowledge the principles to be applied, for example in electrical
engineering. The case method would proceed in directly the opposite manner. Taking
up, for example, the dynamo as a "case," — that is, as an illustration of physical laws
in their actual concrete working, — it would proceed to analyze the machine for the
purpose of discovering the fundamental physical or mechanical principles involved
in its operation. It would lead the student from practical applications by analysis
to a comprehension of theory, instead of from theory to applications as under present
methods of teaching.
It is an interesting fact that while much is said about the teaching of science in
the modern school, the methods of teaching science are actually but little changed
from those employed in teaching the subjects that filled the curriculum before the
teaching of science began in the school. The practical suggestion of this report is
that the case method of teaching is truly scientific and that the present methods of
teaching applied science are unscientific. Furthermore, as an essential feature of the
new method of teaching science, Professor Mann would combine theory with practice
much more intimately than occurs in the law schools of the present day, by requiring
the student to learn to operate the " case " under study. The student must not merely
observe and analyze the operation of the dynamo: he must also actually run it and
repair it when out of order. The method of teaching he advocates for engineering
students, while based on the same conceptions as Langdell's pedagogic innovation,
is designed to meet some of the objections commonly raised to-day against even case
method law schools.
Whatever may be thought of this contention, the subject is one of great signifi-
cance, and worthy of the attention of teachers and engineers. Engineering schools,
viii PREFACE
like all institutions of learning, are slow to undertake educational experiments. It is
sometimes easier to start a new school than to try an educational experiment in an
old one. But obviously an actual experiment thoroughly carried out would be the only
satisfactory demonstration of the soundness of the case method of teaching science.
The report is published by the Carnegie Foundation as a work of cooperation with
the great engineering societies, and with the hope that the formulation of these
important enquiries and their discussion may lead to a serious effort on the part
of those having to do with engineering education to reexamine the curricula of the
schools, and to approach the problem of their improvement not only from the stand-
point of the teacher, but also from that of the practising engineer and of the employer.
HENRY S. PRITCHETT,
President of the Carnegie Foundation.
INTRODUCTION
THE Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education, at its Cleveland meeting
in 1907, invited the American Society of Civil Engineers, the American Society of
Mechanical Engineers, the American Institute of Electrical Engineers, and the Amer-
ican Chemical Society, to join the Society for the Promotion of Engineering Educa-
tion in appointing delegates to a "'Joint Committee on Engineering Education' to
examine into all branches of engineering education, including engineering research,
graduate professional courses, undergraduate engineering instruction, and the proper
relations of engineering schools to secondary industrial schools, or foremen's schools,
and to formulate a report or reports upon the appropriate scope of engineering edu-
cation and the degree of cooperation and unity that may be advantageously arranged
between the various engineering schools."
At the Detroit meeting in 1908, a resolution was passed authorizing this Com-
mittee to invite the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching and the
General Education Board to appoint delegates.
Notwithstanding the appropriation by the American Society of Civil Engineers
of a sum to assist in the investigation, it was found to be utterly impracticable to
carry on the work without larger funds, and the Carnegie Foundation was thereupon
urged to undertake the work on a comprehensive scale. After proper examination, the
Foundation generously acceded to this request, and finally selected Professor Charles
R. Mann to make a careful investigation and report
In presenting Professor Mann's report, the Committee desire to state that they
have been closely associated with Professor Mann during his investigations, and have
frequently conferred with him in the progress of the work and in the different plans
adopted for securing information. Many of the conclusions reached have been dis-
cussed at public meetings of educational experts and have had the advantage of ma-
ture judgment and long experience. The views of the whole engineering profession,
widely scattered throughout the country and representing every phase of professional
activity and practice, were ascertained. The results of some of these special enquiries
were published and considered by the engineering societies ; they were both inter-
esting and surprising, and are set forth in Chapter XVI of the report.
Notwithstanding this varied experience, it was not until the Committee had the
advantage of examining advance copies of Professor Mann's report that they realized
the coordination existing between all of the different portions of the investigation,
and their bearing upon the value of the whole study.
We believe that this report possesses particular significance on account of the simple
and clear treatment of the complicated problems involved. The history of the origin
and development of the schools is concisely told, and the connection between the cur-
riculum and the changing demands of industrial activities and growth is clearly nar-
rated. If the study went no farther — and this is but the threshold of the report — we
x INTRODUCTION
believe the value of this result alone would go far toward repaying the expense of
the enquiry, liberal as that has been.
Other significant characteristics of the report are found in the discussions of the
general failure to recognize such factors as " values and cost," the importance of
teaching technical subjects so as to develop character, the necessity for laboratory
and industrial training throughout the Courses, and the use of good English.
Valuable suggestions are offered for avoiding or reducing present difficulties found
in many other directions, and all of the problems have been treated in a broad and
comprehensive spirit. No hard and fast rules are laid down for the government of
engineering education. Such a course would inevitably increase the difficulties of future
advances. Changes must be made from time to time to meet conditions as they arise,
and any attempts to solve the problems of engineering education must be of so flex-
ible a nature as to admit of improvements.
We now turn to a few of the principal points emphasized in the report. Professor
Mann has called attention to the waste occurring in educational efforts arising from
lack of coordination shown in the histories and aims of the technical schools as set
forth in the first chapter of this study.
Another point is the perplexing one of the regulation of admissions. At present
sixty per cent of those who enter the schools fail to graduate. The importance of
limiting admissions more strictly to those students who possess some aptitude for
engineering is demonstrated, and a substitution of objective tests in place of those
of a subjective character is recommended.
Another point emphasized, and one of deep importance, is that of the reorganiza-
tion of curricula which are commonly acknowledged to be much congested, and which
it is stated will continue, "as long as departments are allowed to act as sole arbiters
of the content of the courses." Plans are offered for developing particular types of
curricula suited to the environment of each school.
Emphasis is also given to the necessity for a broader training in the fundamentals
of science as an equipment for all engineers and forming a sort of " common core "
to every curriculum. With this broad training in the first and second years the stu-
dent is expected to develop some natural leaning toward a specialty, and then will
follow vocational guidance in the later stages of his education.
Among the questions that will perhaps occur to many interested in the status and
progress of engineering education, in connection with this report, are — How far will
the recommendations in the report be applicable to present conditions? and what
will be the possible influence of this study upon education and practice ? These ques-
tions are of course difficult to answer with precision. We can only form an estimate,
based upon experience and knowledge of the present chaotic condition of the schools,
arising from world-wide events over which they are called to exercise a powerful in-
fluence. There probably never was a time when the minds of teachers were so intently
alive. and receptive to rapid changes, as at the present moment. This report, made
INTRODUCTION xi
under the auspices of the Carnegie Foundation and with the direct assistance of
this Committee, will be read and studied all over the country, as soon as it becomes
available. Engineering educators are already partially familiar with the trend of the
report. They, better than others, know from long experience something of the dif-
ficulties in establishing standards by which to measure the successes or failures of
their efforts to provide proper training for engineers. It may take time to convince
all that a measure, or scale, has been created by the practising engineers of the
country by which an estimate may be formed of the amount of success in engineer-
ing teaching, irrespective of the special courses involved. That scale is the improve-
ment of character, resourcefulness, judgment, efficiency, understanding of men, and
last of all, technique, as shown by students. These facts have already been published
and widely circulated, and since they became known there are probably few intelli-
gent educators who have not asked themselves the question — Am I so teaching as
to produce these results in my pupils and in the order of value specified by the en-
gineering profession? It may perhaps be considered not unreasonable for this Com-
mittee to believe that if portions of this study have already proved of value and
interest to the schools, there is some secure foundation for thinking that the whole
report will awaken wide interest because of the applicability of its results, and that
its influence on engineering education will be beneficial.
In addition to its possible effects on professional educators, we entertain the hope
that it will also have a wider significance as an important contribution to the gen-
eral cause of education. The publication of the study in the present emergency, when
the Government is so deeply concerned with so many vital questions connected with
educational processes, may assist also in the solution of some of the many problems
arising in connection with vocational training in the different branches of military
science.
American Society of Civil Engineers
DESMOND FITZGERALD, Chairman, ONWARD BATES, DANIEL W. MEAD
American Society of Mechanical Engineers
F. H. CLARK, FRED J. MILLER
American Institute of Electrical Engineers
C. F. SCOTT, SAMUEL SHELDON, Secretary
American Chemical Society
CLIFFORD RICHARDSON, HENRY P. TALBOT
American Institute of Chemical Engineers
J. R. WlTHROW
American Institute of Mining Engineers
HENRY M. HOWE, JOHN HAYS HAMMOND
Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education
D. C. JACKSON, G. C. ANTHONY, C. R. RICHARDS
Joint Committee on Engineering Education of the National Engineering Societies.
PART I
PRESENT CONDITIONS
CHAPTER I
THE DEVELOPMENT OF ENGINEERING SCHOOLS IN THE
UNITED STATES
DURING the Colonial period industrial production in America was almost wholly con-
fined to agriculture. All forms of manufacture were systematically discouraged by
acts of Parliament. Iron mining was encouraged, provided the product was shipped
to England as pig iron ; but all tools, implements, guns, gunpowder, and machinery
used in the colonies had to be purchased in the mother country. This effort to limit
American production to agriculture and raw materials was one of the chief causes of
the War of Independence.
When the supply of goods from British factories had been cut off by the non-im-
portation agreement between the colonies (1774), clothing, gunpowder, tools, and
equipment soon became scarce. An immediate need arose for skilled workers in all the
mechanic arts. Congress sought to meet this need by urging the establishment in every
colony of a Society for the Improvement of Agriculture, Arts, Manufactures, and
Commerce, and by offering premiums for the best achievement in every essential line
of industry. Enough was accomplished by these means to carry the war, with the help
of France, to a successful termination.
After the war England sought to crush the incipient American industries by sell-
ing her goods here at lower prices than were charged at home. The Confederation was
threatened by an industrial domination that seemed no less oppressive than political
domination. This crisis was met, first, by the formation of numerous societies for the
promotion of the useful arts, to encourage a spirit of enquiry, industry, and exper-
iment among the members; second, by offering premiums from state treasuries for
such improvements in the useful arts as might seem beneficial to the country; and
third, by inviting trained artisans from abroad to settle here and give America the
benefit of their training. It was on this basis that Samuel Slater, a skilled English
worker from the Arkwright factory, established at Paw tucket in 1790 the first suc-
cessful textile mill driven by water power.
The real beginnings of American engineering were made at this time under the
spur of a patriotic spirit of industrial independence. In 1793 Eli Whitney invented
the cotton gin, which determined the industrial future of the South. Oliver Evans
made the first machinery for flour mills in 1787, and in 1801 constructed the first
high-pressure steam engine. Philadelphia equipped its water works with a double
steam pump that had a capacity of 3,000,000 gallons a day, built by Nicholas I. Roose-
veldt in 1801. Six years later Robert Fulton made his famous trip up the Hudson in
the Clermont. The Santee canal in South Carolina was begun in 1786. Work was started
on the Middlesex canal in Massachusetts and on the canal joining the Schuylkill and
the Susquehanna rivers in Pennsylvania in 1793. The mechanical inventions were made
4 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
by Americans who had no formal engineering training; the canals were built by foreign-
trained civil engineers.
The effect of the War of 1812 was similar to that of the War of Independence. For
three years American production was stimulated by being thrown on its own resources.
This was followed by a period of stimulation due to foreign competition. By 1812
the exhaustion of the soil because of unscientific methods of agriculture was already
driving the population to seek new land in the West. There arose a loud cry both
for instruction in better methods of farming in order that the farms might not be
deserted, and for better means of transportation to the West. To meet the latter, the
Erie Canal (1817-25) was built. This was the first great achievement of American en-
gineering, because the work was done by three self-trained Americans, James Geddes,
Benjamin Wright, and Charles Brodhead.
The demand for scientific information to increase production in agriculture and
domestic manufactures is voiced in an enormous number of memorials, petitions,
and committee reports to the various state legislatures. Of these the Report of the
Committee on Agriculture presented by Jesse Buel to the New York State legis-
lature on March 29, 1823, is perhaps the most complete and expressive. This report
urges the establishment of a tax-supported school of agriculture along the lines that
had proved so successful at the Fellenberg School at Hofwyl, Switzerland. Full de-
tails of the plan, the methods, and the results to be expected are given. It was stated,
finally, that if the state would undertake the support of the school, the Hon. Stephen
van Rensselaer would donate the necessary land. The proposal was rejected by the
legislature.
The following year Mr. van Rensselaer established at Troy the pioneer school of its
kind in the United States, the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. At the beginning a
new type of instruction was used, but it proved too expensive. In 1829 the curriculum
was revised, a course in civil engineering added, and for a quarter of a century this
school divided with the West Point Military Academy the honor of supplying men
with scientific training to meet the country's need for engineers. Many of the early
graduates of both schools won renown in designing and building the pioneer high-
ways, bridges, canals, and railroads that led to the conquest of the West.
For engineering education the striking features of this period from 1770 to 1830
are the gradual and persistent growth of the demand for scientific information for the
purpose of increasing production, and the scanty attention given to devising ways and
means of satisfying it. After twenty-three years of keen discussion, the Rensselaer
Polytechnic Institute, which soon specialized in civil engineering, and the West Point
Military Academy, which was intended for a totally different purpose, were the only
two scientific schools in the country.
In the fifty years from 1820 to 1870 the industrial conditions in the United States
were completely reorganized. During this period the percentage of the working popu-
lation in agriculture dropped from 83 to 47.6; while in manufacturing, trade, and
DEVELOPMENT OF ENGINEERING SCHOOLS 5
transportation it increased from 17 to 31.4. In addition a new class called personal
service, claiming 18 per cent of the workers, was added and the professional group
expanded from a negligible per cent in 1820 to 3 per cent in 1870. Thus the advent
of the steam engine, the railroad, and the reaper reduced the number of farmers by
354 out of every 1000 workers, increased the number in manufacturing, trade, and
transportation by 144, and created the new trade of personal service, giving occupa-
tion to 180 per thousand. The professional group also expanded to include 30 per thou-
sand. The number of patents increased in this same period from about two hundred
to over thirteen thousand per year.
A high degree of engineering ability was required to accomplish this industrial revo-
lution. Among the civil engineers who took part were a number who had the advan-
tage of scientific training either at Rensselaer or at West Point. But in the long list of
mechanical engineers who built the locomotives, the steam engines, the machine tools,
and the farm machinery, it is difficult to find a single one who had any special school
training for the work. As science developed and machinery became more and more
complex, the need of special training for the mechanical engineer became more press-
ing. Hence the period from 1820 to 1870 may be said to have indicated the value of
special training for the civil engineer, and to have defined the need for trained me-
chanical engineers for industrial production.
Scattered here and there in the vast mass of pamphlets, petitions, memorials, and
reports, addressed to various legislative bodies during these years, urging the estab-
lishment of state schools for training in mechanic arts, there appears another concep-
tion that added inspiration to the industrial demand for schools of science. It is to the
effect that thorough training in science must not only increase production, it must
also raise agriculture and mechanic arts to the rank of the learned professions like the-
ology, medicine, and law. In the Buel report just mentioned it is urged that because
agriculture is the basis of all industry, it should be elevated to the rank of a liberal
and fashionable study. The well-known phrase in the Morrill Act — "to promote
the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in their several pursuits
and professions in life" — implies the same conception. Some of the earliest engineer-
ing schools were called Industrial Universities.
It thus appears that the clearly defined practical demand for training in science as
an aid to industrial production was blended with a vaguely defined ideal of liberal
training thru science. These were the forces that gave scope to engineering in America
and compelled the development of the schools.
At first this development was very slow. In spite of the widespread recognition of
the need, the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute remained for twenty-three years the
only school of its kind. At length in 1847, thru private benefactions, the Lawrence
Scientific School was established at Harvard and the Sheffield Scientific School at
Yale. The University of Michigan also voted that same year to offer a course in civil
engineering. These were the only additional engineering schools opened before the
6 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
Civil War, and they had a hard struggle for existence because their aims seemed dan-
gerous to academic traditions.
During the Civil War Congress passed the Morrill Act (1862) granting federal
aid to the several states for founding colleges of agriculture and mechanic arts. State
legislatures that had for years been deaf to all appeals now quickly accepted the fed-
eral grants and voted to create the new type of school. Established colleges caught
the spirit and added departments of engineering. The four schools of 1860 increased
to seventeen by 1870, to forty-one by 1871, to seventy by 1872, and to eighty-five by
1880. Now there are one hundred and twenty -six engineering schools of college grade,
of which forty-six are land grant colleges operating under the Morrill Act, forty-four
are professional schools in universities, twenty are attached to colleges, and sixteen
are independent. The number of students has increased from fourteen hundred in 1870
to thirty-three thousand in 1917, and the annual number of graduates in engineering
from one hundred in 1870 to forty-three hundred. Then there were less than three
graduates per million population, now there are about forty-three per million.
The rate of growth of the schools has not been constant. In the decade 1870-80
the number of graduates per million population increased from three to four. The
figures for the successive decades are:
Decade Graduates per Increase per
ending million million per
year
1860 1
1870 3 0.3
1880 4 0.1
1890 10 0.6
1900 17 0.7
1910 36 1.9
1916 43 1.1 (6 years)
It is to be noted that growth was rapidly accelerated from 1870 to 1910, especially
during the last decade. Since 1910Jthe growth has been less phenomenal.
This increase in the number of graduates indicates another important change in
school conditions. In 1870 the ratio of graduates to the total number of students was
one hundred to fourteen hundred, or one to fourteen. In 1915 this ratio was forty- three
hundred to thirty- three thousand, or one to seven and seven-tenths. This indicates
that a much larger proportion of the students now take the full course ; that is, there
are relatively fewer stragglers. Back in the '70's the mortality was in many cases as
high as 90 per cent, that is, only ten out of every hundred freshmen continued thru
the whole course. Now the highest mortality among the schools visited J is 75 per cent,
and the average for the twenty schools is 60 per cent. Hence the schools have not
only increased in size, but their work has been better systematized and standardized.
From figures published by Mr. A.M.Wellington in the Engineering News for 1893
1 See page 82.
DEVELOPMENT OF ENGINEERING SCHOOLS 7
and from data presented in the Reports of the United States Commissioner of Edu-
cation it appears that the total number of engineers graduated in the succeeding
decades was approximately
Prior to 1870 866
1871-1880 2,259
1881-1890 3,837
1891-1900 10,430
1901-1910 21,000
1911-1915 17,000
The total number of engineering degrees granted in the United States up to 1915
has therefore been about 55,000. In 1911 the eleven technical high schools of Ger-
many were graduating engineers at the rate of 1800 per year, and the total number
of graduates up to that date was 14,215.
In addition to the hundred and twenty-six engineering colleges just discussed there
are forty-three degree-giving institutions that pay some attention to engineering
work. Of these, eighteen are arts colleges that claim to give " two years of engineer-
ing;" sixteen advertise engineering courses, but have neither the faculty nor the equip-
ment to give them well; four are military schools which occasionally graduate a civil
engineer; and five are privately owned institutions which endeavor to teach engineer-
ing to all who apply, without regard to previous academic training, and grant a con-
siderable number of degrees on this basis. There are also many excellent schools, like
the Wentworth Institute, the Lowell Institute, and the Franklin Union in Boston; the
Baltimore Polytechnic Institute, Pratt Institute, the Bliss Electrical School in Wash-
ington, the Casino Night School in Pittsburgh, the Dunwoodie Institute in Minne-
apolis, the Cogswell Polytechnic in San Francisco, and the numerous technical classes
of the Young Men's Christian Association in various places, that teach engineering
but make no pretense of granting college degrees. These schools are meeting a real
need in a genuinely effective way without departing from their vocational purpose
or confusing the educational situation by granting degrees.
The first schools offered only one course — civil engineering. The Massachusetts
Institute of Technology opened in 1865 with six curricula leading to degrees in civil,
mechanical, and mining engineering, practical chemistry, architecture, and general
science. Now the specialized courses at the Institute have increased to fifteen and nu-
merous other specialties are offered at other schools. The additions include all phases
of engineering, such as chemical, sanitary, metallurgical, marine, cement, electro-
chemical, textile, automobile, aeronautical, ceramic, highway, agricultural, and en-
gineering administration. The work of the schools has thus increased in scope and
become more complex.
Unfortunately it is not possible to give any even reasonably trustworthy figures
as to the resources and the equipment of all the engineering schools, because so many
of them are inextricably bound up with colleges and universities. The United States
8 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
Bureau of Education still treats engineering under the general heading "Universities,
Colleges, and Technological Schools." In a university with several schools it is a very
perplexing problem to determine how much of the total equipment and expense
should be charged against any one division such as engineering. In order to secure
some estimate of the cost and resources of engineering education, as distinguished
from college education, the following summary of the conditions at the sixteen inde-
pendent schools that devote all their resources to engineering alone is presented. The
figures are from the Report of the United States Commissioner of Education for 1916.
In the sixteen independent schools there were, during the year 1914-15, 762 in-
structors and 6807 students; or on the average one instructor to nine students. The
total expenditure for the year was $2,348,000, or an average of $345 per student.
The plants were valued at $14,047,000, the equipment at $3,022,000, and they had
endowments amounting to $12,985,000.
These sixteen schools are widely distributed over the country, the number of in-
structors varies from 5 to 290, the number of students from 26 to 1816, the value of
the plant from $98,000 to $6,300,000, the endowment from nothing (at state schools)
to $3,236,000, the value of equipment from $51,000 to $478,000, and the cost per
student year from $204 to $1333. Seven are state institutions and nine are on pri-
vate foundations. It is therefore not unreasonable to assume that the conditions that
maintain for the 6807 students of these schools are typical of conditions for the 33,000
students in all schools. On this assumption, the total annual expenditure for the en-
gineering instruction of 33,000 students at $345 per year is $11,385,000. On the same
assumption the total value of the plants used for this purpose is about $68,000,000,
the equipment is worth about $15,000,000, and the endowment is about $63,000,000.
Altho these figures are merely estimated, they are as trustworthy as any that are
available under present conditions.
Since the engineering schools entered upon their remarkable development fifty years
ago the conditions of industrial production have changed, new fields of engineering
have been developed, the professional ideals of the engineer have grown more defi-
nite, laboratory work has won recognition as an essential element of all instruction
in science, and educational theory and practice have been brought within the range
of scientific test. Under these conditions numerous fundamental questions concerning
engineering education have of necessity emerged. Do we need fewer or more schools ?
Is the curriculum too long or too short? Should the engineering school be made a
graduate professional school ? What are the present demands of science, of industry,
and of education? How well are the schools meeting these demands? What changes,
if any, seem desirable?
The answers to questions like these are at present both vague and unconvincing.
This study endeavors to define a number of the more important problems of engi-
neering education, and to suggest policies and methods that promise to be fruitful in
working toward more satisfactory solutions.
CHAPTER II
THE AIMS AND CURRICULA OF THE EARLY SCHOOLS
ENGINEERING schools are so obviously a result of the needs of industrial production
that the conceptions on which they are founded are necessarily much the same for all.
Hence three schools — the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (1824), the University
of Illinois (1867), and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1865) — are here
selected as typical expressions of the general movement, because the documents
relative to the founding of these institutions state their ultimate aims with striking
clearness.1
From the evidence presented in the History of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
it appears that in planning his school Mr. van Rensselaer was strongly influenced by
two foreign institutions : namely, the Royal Institution of Great Britain, which was
established by Count Rumford in 1799 as an offshoot of the Society for Increasing
the Comforts of the Poor, and was intended to facilitate the general introduction
of useful mechanical inventions; and the Fellenberg School at Hofwyl, Switzerland,
which sought to educate the children of the poor thru manual work in accordance with
methods devised by Pestalozzi. As stated in the official notice of the establishment
of the school, its aim was to furnish instruction "in the application of science to
the common purposes of life," in order to train men to teach "the sons and daugh-
ters of farmers and mechanics . . . and who will be highly useful to the community
in the diffusion of a very useful kind of knowledge, with its application to the busi-
ness of living."2 Prior to 1829 no mention of professional engineers is made beyond
the remark in the Buel report (page 5), that because agriculture is the basis of
all industry, the state should elevate it " to the rank of a liberal and fashionable
study."
The educational conceptions of the land grant colleges developed gradually during
the quarter century from 1825 to 1850. They are expressed in numerous memorials
to the Federal Congress, petitions to state legislatures, and resolutions of societies for
the promotion of agriculture and the mechanic arts. An analysis of the more impor-
tant of these documents and of the debates in Congress on the several Morrill acts
has just been published by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teach-
ing in Dr. I. L. KandePs Bulletin on Federal Aid for Vocational Education. These
conceptions reached their fullest expression in the meetings of the Illinois Industrial
League in 1851-53. A very complete statement of the aims of the new schools is made
in a memorial sent by the league to the state legislature in 1852.3
1 Cf. P. C. Ricketts : History of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, New York, Wiley, 1895; W. B. Rogers : Objects
and Plan of an Institute of Technology, Boston, 1861 ; E. J. James : The Origin of the Land Grant Act of 1862, Uni-
versity of Illinois Bulletin, vol. viii, No. 10, November, 1910.
2 Ricketts, loc. cit., pages 6-10.
8 E. J. James, loc. cit., pages 90-95.
10 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
In this document the memorialists state that as members of the industrial classes
personally engaged in agricultural and mechanical pursuits they have forced on their
attention constantly the fact that from one-third to one-half of the products of the
state are annually sacrificed because of the worker's ignorance of scientific laws and
methods of work. This appalling loss might be prevented if there were established a
suitable industrial university to teach what is already known and to carry on inves-
tigations of new problems. To secure these ends, it is necessary to establish industrial
universities which shall give the industrial classes a thorough scientific and practical
training equivalent in all respects to the literary training already given so success-
fully and abundantly as preparation for the so-called learned professions.
The educational aims and methods required for this purpose were stated forcefully
by Professor J. B. Turner in two addresses which are reprinted in President James's
pamphlet. In these Professor Turner makes clear that the conventional forms of in-
struction in literary colleges are not suitable for industrial training. Book learning
alone does not suffice, but must be supplemented by a study of things. The former
produces "laborious thinkers," while industry needs "thinking laborers." Nor are
schools that teach the application of science to the art of killing men fitted to teach
scientific methods of feeding, clothing, and housing men. A special type of instruction
is needed, — one that analyzes practical problems and sets the student "to earnest and
constant thought about the things he daily does, sees, and handles, and all their con-
nected relations and interests." Men secure true discipline best by "continued habits
of reading, thought, and reflection in connection with their several professional pur-
suits in after life." In this way schools can "teach men to derive their mental and
moral strength from their own pursuits." There are "more recondite and profound
principles of pure mathematics immediately connected with the sailing of a ship, or
the moulding and driving of a plow, or an axe, or a jack-plane than with all three of
the so-called learned professions together," and these should be made objects of study
in order to "extend the boundaries of our present knowledge in all possible practical
directions."
It is to be noted that the aim of the founders of the "Illinois Industrial Univer-
sity" was increased production and professional recognition. The conception of the
need and the methods of training farmers and artisans for increased production in such
a way as to elevate their callings to the rank of professions is, however, much more
definitely expressed than in the case of Rensselaer. The need for expanding the bounds
of knowledge by scientific investigation has also been perceived.
At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology the aims and methods were defined
by its first president, William B. Rogers. The seeds of the conception of a polytechnic
school were planted in him during his first experience in teaching apprentices at the
Mechanics Institute in Baltimore in 1827. The growth of the plan was fostered by
his share in the preparation, in 1837, of a petition for the Franklin Institute to the
Pennsylvania State Legislature praying for the establishment of a state school of
AIMS AND CURRICULA OF THE EARLY SCHOOLS 11
applied science, and by his formulation for his brother in 1846 of a "Plan for a Poly-
technic School in Boston." 1
The final statement of his conceptions was printed in his Objects and Plan of an
Institute of Technology, Boston, 1861. In this pamphlet, which was issued to attract
support for the enterprise, the argument is this : " Material prosperity and intellectual
advancement are felt to be inseparably associated" (page 1). But material prosperity
requires intelligence in industrial production, and this in turn demands "that sys-
tematic training" in the applied sciences, which can alone give to the industrial classes a
sure mastery over the materials and processes with which they are concerned. Such a
training, forming what might be called the intellectual element in production, has, we
believe, become indispensable to fit us for successful competition with other nations
in the race of industrial activity, in which we are so deeply interested" (page 20). Such
a training should not only impart knowledge and develop habits of exact thought;
it should also "help to extend more widely the elevating influences of a generous
scientific culture." There should also be included "a department of investigation
and publication, intended to promote research in connection with industrial science "
(page 6).
It appears from the foregoing pages that from the beginning the engineering
schools have had a clear conception of their functions. They themselves understood
that their ultimate aim was increased industrial production, and that their special
contribution to this end was systematic instruction in applied science. In addition
they believed that if this instruction were given with the proper spirit, engineering
would become a learned profession and scientific research a recognized necessity.
The means employed at Rensselaer in 1824 to secure these ends were novel and
unique. The first curriculum required one year for its completion, and was divided
into three terms. School opened the last week in July with an "experimental term,"
during which the students gathered botanical, mineralogical, and zoological speci-
mens, visited shops and factories near the school, and discussed with the class the sig-
nificance of what they had collected and observed. In addition each student gave a
number of lectures on chemistry and natural philosophy, fully illustrated by experi-
ments performed with his own hands.
During the second term, from the end of November to the first of March, the stu-
dents reviewed in class the sciences taught in the fall, and in addition studied rhetoric,
logic, geography, and mathematics. The spring term lasted from the first week in
March to the end of June. For six weeks the work consisted of lectures by the stu-
dents on experimental philosophy, chemical powers, substances non-metallic, metal-
loids, metals, soils, and mineral waters. For the remaining nine weeks the students
were exercised in the application of the sciences to practical projects and in the study
of engineering works in the neighborhood of the school.
1 William Burton Rogers: Life and Letters, vol. i, pages 420-427.
12 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
In the catalogue published in 1828 the term "civil engineering" occurs for the first
time, as one of the topics on which the senior professor would lecture. The catalogue for
1831-32 states that the second sub-term would be devoted to "Trigonometry, Navi-
gation, and the Elements of Civil Engineering." In 1835 the legislature was petitioned
to amend the charter of the school so as to permit the addition of a " department
of mathematical arts, for the purpose of giving instruction in engineering and tech-
nology." Graduates of this department were to receive the degree of Civil Engineer.
This degree was awarded for the first time in the United States to four members of
the class of 1835.
It will be noted that during the first ten years the Rensselaer Institute evolved from
a school of natural science designed to train teachers able to spread among farmers
and artisans scientific information that would assist them in production, into a school
of engineering and technology. The changes in curriculum that accompanied this evo-
lution are striking. The full program for 1835 is printed in President Rickett's His-
tory. A comparison of this curriculum with the first one shows that the "experimental
term" at the beginning has disappeared. The school year begins in November with
class work in " practical Mathematics, Arithmetical and Geometrical,1'' combined with
"extemporaneous speaking on the subjects of Logic, Rhetoric, Geology, Geography,
and History," and "Lectures on National and Municipal Law "by the senior professor.
The second term of twenty-four weeks devotes eight weeks to practice in the use of
instruments; eight weeks to study of the theory of mechanical powers, bridges, arches,
canals, etc. ; four weeks to calculations of the quantity of water per second supplied
by streams with reference to their use for various practical purposes; and four weeks
to inspection of "mills, factories, and other machinery or works which come within
the province of mathematical arts."
This evolution of the curriculum was carried one step farther in 1849, when the
director, Professor B. Franklin Greene, went abroad and made a careful study of French
technical schools. On his return the course at Rensselaer was lengthened to three years
and a new curriculum adopted. This curriculum is a combination of the curricula
of L'Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures, which plans to train civil engineers,
directors of works, superintendents of factories, and the like; and L'Ecole Poly tech-
nique, which prepares for certain government technical institutions. The first half of
the curriculum was intended to lay the general scientific basis of all engineering, and
the second half to develop proficiency in some special line. This curriculum is given
here in full along with the first three years of the first curricula of the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (1865) and the University of Illinois (1867).
AIMS AND CURRICULA OF THE EARLY SCHOOLS
13
RENSSELAER
Algebra, geometry,
trigonometry
General physics
Geometrical drawing
English
Foreign language
Surveying
Botany
Analytics, calculus
General physics
Chemistry
Descriptive geometry,
machine drawing
Topographical and hydro-
graphical surveying
English
Foreign language
Mineralogy
Zoology
Geology
Mechanics
Practical astronomy
Geodesy — trigonometrical,
railroad and mine surveying
Descriptive geometry — per-
spective, topographical
drawing, stereotomy
Industrial physics
English
Practical geology
Physical geography
Machines
Constructions — theory of
structures, bridges,
hydraulic works, railways
Mining
Metallurgy
Philosophy of mind
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE
First Year
Algebra, solid geometry,
trigonometry
Elementary mechanics
Drawing — mechanical and
freehand
English
Foreign language
Chemistry — inorganic
Second Year
Analytics, calculus
Physics
Chemistry
Descriptive geometry, machine
and freehand drawing
Surveying — plane
English
Foreign language
Astronomy, navigation
Third Year
Calculus, analytic and
applied mechanics
Spherical astronomy
Surveying — roads,
railroads and canals
Descriptive geometry —
masonry and carpentry
Physics
English
Drawings, plans, etc.
Foreign languages
Computation of earth
work and masonry
Hydrographical surveying
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
Algebra, geometry,
trigonometry
Descriptive geometry
and drawing
English or
Foreign language
History
Botany
Analytics, calculus
Descriptive geometry,
drawing
Surveying
Foreign language
Calculus, analytic
mechanics
Descriptive astronomy
Railroad surveying
Shades, shadows, perspective
Physics
Chemistry
The curricula at the Massachusetts Institute and the University of Illinois did not
evolve thru a period of years. They were simply adopted in the form given. How
much influence the Rensselaer curriculum had in shaping the others it is impossible
to say. Internal evidence suggests that this influence was large.
14 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
A comparison of these three curricula indicates that the general plan is very much
the same in all. The third year at Rensselaer contains some of the technical courses
that appear in the fourth year of the other two schools. But they all agree in placing
mathematics, drawing, descriptive geometry, physics, and chemistry before the work
in applied science. In other words, they all sought to meet the demand for increased
production by first teaching the necessary theoretical science and then showing how
to apply it. This was the plan in the French schools, and it was transplanted without
change to America. It remained and still is the prevailing conception underlying the
curricula of our engineering colleges.
But tho these three curricula agree in general plan, the methods of handling the
work in the three schools were quite different. The system of instruction by the stu-
dents, which has already been described, had by 1865 given place at Rensselaer to the
system now used there of interrogations and blackboard demonstrations. Field trips
and the observation of industrial processes in action in neighboring shops had been
discontinued. These changes were made necessary by the increased attendance at the
school.
At the University of Illinois the instruction in theory was given by lectures and
recitations from textbooks combined with the use of plates and models. This was in
a way coordinated with shopwork, in that machinery planned in the drafting room
was actually constructed in the shops. Much of the early equipment, including an
eight horse power steam engine, was constructed by the students in this way. Oppor-
tunities for manual labor for pay were offered the students, and many of them earned
enough to meet their expenses by making furniture and apparatus in extra hours of
shopwork. A chemical laboratory was part of the earliest equipment.
At the Massachusetts Institute there was no shopwork until 1877. The lecture-
recitation method of instruction was used in all class work, but this was supplemented
by laboratory work in physics and mechanical engineering. The first laboratory for
undergraduate instruction in physics was opened here by Professor E. C. Pickering
in 1869. The organization and many of the experiments he devised are still used in
physics laboratories. The teaching was necessarily very like that in other colleges
because all the professors had been trained in existing schools devoted mainly to lit-
erary studies.
CHAPTER III
THE STRUGGLE FOR RESOURCES AND RECOGNITION
THE Rensselaer Institute began work in 1824 in a rented house with several hun-
dred dollars worth of equipment, all of which was supplied by the Hon. Stephen van
Rensselaer. There were 25 students the first year, each of whom paid $36 tuition, and
these fees were paid to the two professors as their remuneration. During the first
eight years the founder paid about half the cost of maintenance — a total of $22,000.
By that time the value of the equipment had increased to $4000. For twenty years
work was conducted in rented quarters. Finally, in 1844, a house and lot were given
the school by the city of Troy on condition that a fund equal to the value of the
property be raised for maintenance. For this purpose Mr. William P. van Rensselaer
gave $6500, and $1150 was raised by subscription to build a chemical laboratory.
That year there were 75 students, the tuition was $40 a year, and the total value of
the plant was appraised at $15,850.
In 1850 the course was lengthened to three years and the tuition raised to $60 a
year. Tuition was increased to $100 in 1857, to $150 in 1864, and to $200 in 1866,
at which figure it still remains. In 1851 the state gave the institution $3000 and ten
years later $3750, for general purposes. After the fire that destroyed the buildings
in 1862, the state gave $10,000 to help rebuild, and this was increased by a further
grant of $15,000 in 1868. From 1846 to 1854 the school was classed as an academy
by the state Board of Regents and as such received $744 in all as its share of the lit-
erature moneys distributed to the academies of the state. These figures represent the
entire support granted by the state, a total of $32,494.
From these facts it appears that prior to the beginning of the Civil War this insti-
tution owed its existence almost wholly to private benefactions and to the devoted
services of its staff, whose enthusiasm and self-sacrifice made the continuance of the
work possible with meagre equipment and slender resources. The experience of other^
schools of this period was similar. At Yale the scientific school was started in 1847,
when Professors Silliman and Norton opened a laboratory for practical instruction
in the application of science to the arts of agriculture. Professor Norton was permit-
ted to hold the chair of agricultural chemistry on condition that he should draw no
salary; this entire enterprise was housed mainly in the chapel attic until 1860, when
Joseph E. Sheffield supplied the funds needed to place it on a permanent footing. The \~
Lawrence Scientific School at Harvard was more fortunate in that its early financial
support was assured by the gift of Mr. Abbott Lawrence in 1847. The engineering
department at the University of Michigan was the one state-supported school of
engineering before 1860, but no engineering degrees were granted there until 1861.
Science and engineering in America owe a great deal to the Rensselaer Polytechnic
Institute. Founded at a time when the great masses of the people knew little about
16 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
science and cared less, it quietly and persistently trained teachers and engineers who
diffused scientific information and built many of the railways, roads, and bridges
that were essential to the success of the industrial evolution. By 1860 it had grad-
uated 318 men, while from the West Point Military Academy, for many years the
only other school for scientific training, but 200 of the graduates entered engineer-
ing before 1860. The Lawrence School at Harvard graduated 49 men before the Civil
War, in the face of an unconcealed disdain on the part of the regular faculty.
It is a very striking fact that before the Civil War so little progress was made in the
establishment of schools of science. Altho there were many far-seeing men who urged
the need of them in memorials, addresses, and petitions to legislatures, there was little
action before 1860. But a great change occurred during the strife and turmoil of
battle. Congress passed the Morrill Act in 1862, thereby creating in each state a fund
for the establishment of a college " for the liberal and practical education of the indus-
trial classes in their several pursuits and professions in life." In 1861 the Massachu-
setts State Legislature granted a charter and a tract of land to the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, and in four years over $100,000 had been raised by subscrip-
tion for a building, and the school had opened for work. The School of Mines at
Columbia (1864), theThayer School at Dartmouth (1867), Cornell University (1867),
the Worcester Polytechnic Institute (1868), were established at this time. In addition
the states of Illinois, California, Iowa, New York, New Jersey, Maine, Michigan, New
Hampshire, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, Vermont, and Wisconsin accepted the terms of
the Federal land grant of 1862 before 1870.
But altho after the Civil War money began to flow toward the support of techni-
cal education, the financial struggles of the schools were by no means ended. At the
Massachusetts Institute in 1868, in spite of stringent economy, the total income of
the school was $34,230 and the total expense $42,650. The deficit had to be made up
by subscription among the friends of the project. At this time the tuition was $100
for the first year, $125 for the second, and $150 each for the third and fourth. But
the total cost per student per year was $250. At Harvard it was then $180, at Yale
$126, at Columbia $115, at Brown $178, at Amherst $80, and at the University of
Pennsylvania $42. At the new Illinois Industrial University, with a total income in
1869 of $35,000 and 156 students, it was $224, and there were no tuition fees. In other
words, the schools soon found that instruction in science was not only new, but more
expensive than regular college teaching, because of the relatively high cost of labora-
tory work and the small number of students.
In the thirty years from 1870 to 1900 the schools slowly grew stronger and more
secure. The plant at Illinois increased in value from $186,000 in 1870 to $1,300,000
in 1900, or at the average rate of $37,000 a year. At the same time the annual income
increased from $35,000 to $483,000, or at the average rate of about $15,000 a year.
The student increase during this period was from 156 to 1756, the average rate being
53 per year.
STRUGGLE FOR RESOURCES AND RECOGNITION
17
The complete figures for the typical schools, compiled from the early records and
the Reports of the United States Bureau of Education for 1900 and 1916, are given
in the following table:
VALUE OF PLANT
1870
1900
1916
Increase
Increase per year
Ratio y
1870-1900
1900-16
I
1870-1900
II
1900-16
ILLINOIS
$186,000
$1,300,000
$5,152,000
$1,114,000
$3,852,000
$37,000
$240,000
7
MASS. INST.
400,000
911,000
6,778,000
511,000
5,867,000
17,000
367,000
22
RENSSELAER
50,000
240,000
1,521,000
190,000
1,281,000
6,300
80,000
12
ANNUAL INCOME
ILLINOIS
$35,000
$483,000
$2,209,000
$448,000
$1,726,000
$15,000
$108,000
7
MASS. INST.
45,000
348,000
817,000
303,000
469,000
10,100
29,300
3
RENSSELAER
19,000
49,632
225,000
30,000
175,000
1,000
11,000
11
NUMBER OF STUDENTS
ILLINOIS
156
1,756
5,523
1,600
3,767
53
235
4
MASS. INST.
167
1,178
1,816
1,011
638
34
40
1.2
RENSSELAER
125
250
545
125
295
4
18
4.5
From these figures it appears that the resources and attendance increased steadily
but moderately during the period from 1870 to 1900. Since 1900 the development has
not only been rapid ; but the buildings, equipment, and expenditures have increased
much more rapidly than the number of students. Because of this the total expendi-
ture per student per year has practically doubled since 1900, and every institution
in the country is finding it yearly more difficult to live within its income.
The above figures, while as trustworthy as any that can be obtained, are not accurate
to within 5 per cent or so. They, however, indicate the general drift clearly enough. In
the decade from 1871 to 1880 private benefactions to education averaged $6,000,000
a year. In the past decade they have averaged $26,000,000 a year. In like manner total
expenditures for education in the United States have increased from about $75,000,000
a year in 1870 to $240,000,000 in 1900 and to nearly a billion in 1916. The yearly
increase up to 1900 was about $5,500,000; since then it has been $48,000,000, or
nine times as great.
This growth of the engineering schools in size and resources has been closely par-
18
STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
alleled by the development of the engineering profession and of the manufacturing
activities of the country. As has been pointed out (page 5), the elevation of the
mechanic arts to the rank of a learned profession has always been one of the con-
scious aims of instruction in applied science. This aim was very vague indeed when the
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute was founded, for at that time there was no engi-
neering profession to define professional standards as a guide to the schools.
The first effort toward a more specific definition of the profession was made in 1839
by Benjamin Latrobe, John F. Houston, Benjamin White, and others, when they tried
to establish a national society of civil engineers. This effort was not successful. The
present American Society of Civil Engineers was established in 1852 and held its first
national convention in 1869. The mining engineers attained this same degree of pro-
fessional consciousness in 1872, when the American Institute of Mining Engineers
was founded. The American Society of Mechanical Engineers was established in 1883,
and the American Institute of Electrical Engineers in 1884.
The Census Reports are no more satisfactory concerning engineering than are the
Reports of the United States Bureau of Education (page 17). The Report for 1850 lists
512 civil engineers. In 1860 the corresponding entry is 27,437 civil and mechanical
engineers, with a footnote stating that this includes stationary engine and locomotive
engineers. In 1870 the heading is "electricians, engineers (civil, etc.), and surveyors
7,374." Under this heading the number in 1880 is given as 8261 ; in 1890 it is 43,239,
and in 1900 it has increased to 93,956. The several branches of the profession are
recognized for the first time in the 1910 report, which enumerates 14,514 engineers
(mechanical), 6930 mining engineers, 52,033 ci vil engineers and surveyors, and 135,519
electricians and electrical engineers — a total of 208,996. Probably not more than
80,000 of these engineers enumerated by the census could qualify for membership in
any of the professional societies mentioned, which now have about 30,000 members.
Recently a number of new engineering societies have been organized, representing
cement, automobiles, electric light, electric traction, etc. The total membership in all
the societies having headquarters in the Engineering Societies Building in New York
is about 53,000.
The rate of growth of the engineering societies is shown in the following table:
Founded
Membership
Increase
Increase per year
Ratio "
I
II
1900
1916
Origin-lQOO
1900-16
Origin-l9QQ
1900-16
Civil Engineers
Mining Engineers
1852
1872
2227
2661
7909
5234
1984
(since 1870)
2661
5682
2573
66
95
355
161
5
1.7
Mechanical Engineers
1883
1951
6931
1951
4980
114
311
2.8
Electrical Engineers
1884
1273
8212
1273
6939
80
434
5
STRUGGLE FOR RESOURCES AND RECOGNITION 19
These figures indicate that the professional societies, like the schools, have grown
much more rapidly since 1900. This probably does not result so much from mere increase
in the total number of engineers in the country, as from an awakening and expan-
sion of professional consciousness. The establishment of the Engineering Foundation
in 1915, the cooperation of the engineering societies with the National Academy of
Science in the National Research Council, the bill to charter an American Academy
of Engineers introduced into Congress in 1917, and the recent discussion of the status
of the engineer also indicate that the engineers have only just reached that state of
professional consciousness where they are able to define their status among the learned
professions. This definition is now in process of formulation; and until it is announced,
it is unreasonable to expect the statisticians at the Census Bureau or the Bureau of
Education to distinguish clearly between the professional civil engineer and the sur-
veyor or between the electrician and the electrical engineer.
The part played by the colleges in this development of professional spirit may be
estimated from the fact that the various schools had graduated 866 engineers up to
1870, or less than one-ninth of the 7374 practising engineers in the country at the
time. As indicated on page 7, the total number of engineering degrees granted in
the United States has been approximately 55,000. Since a number of these graduates
have died and perhaps a fifth of them have gone into other lines of work, it is safe to
say that there are not more than 40,000 graduates of American engineering colleges
in engineering practice to-day. If the number of professional engineers is approxi-
mately 80,000, it follows that now possibly about one out of every two is a college
graduate. Since this ratio was only one in eight or nine in 1870, the magnitude of
the contribution of the schools to the development of the profession is obvious.
The growth of the second powerful influence on the development of the engineer-
ing schools — the manufacturing industries — is indicated by the following facts: The
total value of manufactured products in the United States in 1870 was 3400 million
dollars. In 1900 the value was 13,000 million dollars, and in 1916 it was 32,200 mil-
lion dollars. The increase in value of manufactured products for the period 1870-
1900 was therefore 9600 million dollars, or at the average rate of 320 million a year.
In the sixteen years from 1900 to 1916 this increase was 18,200 million dollars, or
at the average rate of 1138 million a year. Hence, like the schools and the profes-
sional societies, the manufacturing industries have developed much more rapidly in
the twentieth century than in the nineteenth.
The attitude of these industries toward the college-trained man is indicated by
the fact that of the 4622 technically trained men now employed by 98 representative
manufacturing establishments 1992, or 43 per cent, have engineering degrees. The
highest ratio is in the field of metal refining, where 87 per cent of the technical men
are college graduates. The lowest ratio is in the automobile trade, where only 49 out
of 186, or 24 per cent, are college-trained men. In shipbuilding the ratio is 48 per
cent, 359 out of 735, and in machinery and machine tools it is 41 per cent, 836 out
20 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
of 2043. In response to the question "Do you employ men graduated from engineer-
ing colleges in preference to men trained mainly thru practical experience?" 60 out
of 120 firms answered "yes;'1 40, or one-third of the number, answered "no;" and
20, or one-sixth of the whole number, expressed no preference.
It is difficult to interpret the interplay that has been going on among industry,
science, and engineering. At the close of the Civil War science had but scant recog-
nition either in educational institutions or among the masses of the people. Now it
has assumed a commanding position because of the transformations it has wrought
in the daily life of every one thru its varied and fruitful inventions. In this develop-
ment there has been no regular procedure, no well-defined organization. It has been
a matter of independent action and individual effort. Sometimes it was the college
professor of science, pure or applied, sometimes it was the inventor or the professional
engineer, and sometimes it was the manufacturing industry that took the initiative,
conceived the new idea, or made the new discovery, and sought the assistance of
the others in realizing it in practice. Now evidences are multiplying to show that
the time has come for a clearer definition of the relations among research, instruc-
tion, engineering practice, and industrial production. How to coordinate these ele-
ments most effectively is a large and pressing problem. Further consideration of the
meaning of this problem to the engineering schools is given in Chapter XII.
CHAPTER IV
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE ENGINEERING CURRICULUM
INTO ITS PRESENT FORM
IN the fifty years that have elapsed since the curricula described in the second chapter
were established a number of striking changes have taken place. The general nature
of these changes is indicated in the following tables, which give the data for two of
the schools selected as typical. The Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has been omitted
because its early programs do not give the number of hours per week assigned to the
various subjects.
ENTRANCE REQUIREMENTS
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
1914
1870
Arithmetic
Geography
Algebra to quadratics
Plane geometry
English grammar
Arithmetic
Geography
Algebra to quadratics
Plane geometry
English grammar
United States history
Algebra A 160 hours
Algebra B 160 hours
Plane geometry 160 hours
Solid geometry 160 hours
English composition
English literature
Physics
French 240 hours
German 240 hours
Electives
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS
Algebra A 1 unit1
Algebra B \ unit
Plane geometry 1 unit
Solid and spherical geometry \ unit
English composition 1 unit
English literature 2 units
Physics 1 unit
Electives 8 units
In 1867 admission was by examination. Graduation from high school was not men-
tioned, the sole requirement being ability to meet the tests and an age limit of 16 years.
Admission is still by examination at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, while
at the University of Illinois it is now mainly by certificate from accredited high schools.
It will be noted that arithmetic and geography are no longer required, probably be-
cause it is assumed that they have been satisfactorily completed in the grammar school.
1 The unit is generally defined as one-quarter of a year's work in a secondary school.
22 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
The number of examinations (or subjects required) has increased from 5 or 6 to 8 or
10. The amount of algebra, geometry, and English required has been increased by from
50 to 300 per cent. The content and methods of instruction in the various high school
units have also been carefully defined and standardized by the College Entrance Exam-
ination Board, the National Educational Association, and several other associations
in which colleges and secondary schools are represented.
These changes are the direct result of the development of the public high schools.
Altho the average age of entrance to college has remained constant at about 19 years,
the present freshman has had more instruction and more highly systematized instruc-
tion in more subjects than was possible before the recent striking development of sec-
ondary education.
At present all but 4 of the 126 engineering colleges require at least 14 units for
admission without condition. These four are tax-supported institutions in states where
the public school systems have not developed to the point where the requirement of
four years of preparatory work would be justified. They are raising their requirements
as fast as local conditions permit. Forty of the schools still advertise that they accept
students with two or three units of conditions. All admit either by certificate from
accredited high schools or by examination excepting the Massachusetts Institute and
the Sheffield Scientific School, which admit by examination only. West of the Alle-
ghenies entrance examinations are rare.
The number of units specifically prescribed for admission varies from 5 at the North
Carolina College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts, to 13 at Yale and George Wash-
ington University, or even to 14 at Notre Dame University. Half specify 10 or less,
and half specify more than 10. All agree in demanding English and mathematics, the
amounts varying from 2 to 4 units. In English nine-tenths of the schools regard 3
units as standard, while in mathematics six-tenths have settled upon 3 as standard,
half of the remainder requiring more and half less. History is specifically required by
71 per cent of the schools and one science (physics or chemistry) by 73 per cent. One-
third, mostly land grant colleges and state universities, require no foreign languages
for admission.
The nature of the changes in the distribution of time in the curriculum itself is
indicated by the following typical cases. The unit is the semester-hour.
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
Mechanical Engineering
Per cent of Total Time
1867 1914 1867 1914
Foreign languages 31 7
English 14 8
History p 3 4
General studies 0 _12
~48 ~S1 31 18
DEVELOPMENT OF THE ENGINEERING CURRICULUM 23
Per cent of Total Time
1867 1914 1867 1914
Mathematics 16 17
Chemistry 8 17
Physics 12 14
Geology 2 0
Mechanics 4 13
~42 ~61 27 36
Drawing and descriptive geometry 49 17
Mechanical engineering 10 0
Machinery and motors 4 0
16 specialized courses in M. E. 0 63
~63 ~80 42 46
The most notable changes in the mechanical engineering curriculum of the Massa-
chusetts Institute of Technology, as noted above, are :
The reduction of the foreign language requirement from 31 to 7 credit hours. This
is partly a result of better language work in preparatory schools.
The apparent reduction of the English requirement from 14 to 8 credit hours. In
interpreting this fact it must be noted that in 1867 the study of political economy,
the United States Constitution, and some history of civilization were included under
the head of English. Subjects like these are now provided for in the 12 credit hours
of general studies. On the whole, however, the time given to these "humanities "has
been reduced from 31 per cent to 18 per cent of the total.
In the science group, chemistry has increased from 8 to 17 credit hours, and me-
chanics now gets 13 instead of 4. This latter increase is noteworthy because the fun-
damental principles of mechanics have not changed materially in the past fifty years.
Some of the additional time is devoted to laboratory work in applied mechanics,
strength of materials, etc. Mathematics and physics retain practically the same time
allowance. The time given to science has in general increased from 27 per cent to 36
per cent.
The technical subjects have been given more time (from 63 to 80 credit hours),
altho their percentage has increased but little (42 to 46). They have, however, been
specialized to a high degree. The only technical subjects mentioned in the program for
1867 were drawing (47 hours), mechanical engineering (10), machinery and motors (4),
and stereotomy (2). To-day the mechanical engineer must take drawing (17 hours),
heat engineering (7), mechanism (6), boiler design (3), engineering laboratory (3),
electrical engineering (7), machine design (8), dynamics of machinery (2), hydraulics
(5), factory construction (3), power plant design(4), foundations (1), refrigeration (1),
heating and ventilating (1), and shopwork (10).
This increasing specialization has not been confined to the subject-matter of each
curriculum. In 1886 the civil engineering curriculum was divided into three sub-spe-
cialties, civil engineering, railroad engineering, and topographical engineering. The
24 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
following year mechanical engineering was divided into marine engineering, loco-
motive engineering, and mill engineering. As a result, the six different curricula of
1867 have now expanded into more than twenty. Fifty years ago the work of the first
two years was the same in all six curricula; now specialization begins in the middle
of the first year. Then a student carried only four or five courses at one time; now
he carries from eight to thirteen.
The following table gives the distribution of time among the three main divisions
of the materials of instruction for two curricula in the two typical schools together
with the average for all 126 schools. The figures are per cents.
Languages Mathematics Drawing
1867 Humanities Sciences Engineering
ILLINOIS C. E. 25 33 42
ILLINOIS M. E. 24 40 36
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY C. E. 29 29 42
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY M. E. 31 27 42
Average 27 32 41
1914
ILLINOIS C. E. 12 30 58
ILLINOIS M. E. 14 33 53
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY C. E. 17 35 48
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY M. E. 18 36 46
Average 15 34 51
Average (all schools) 19 29 52
There is no agreement as to what percentage of time should be devoted to each
of these main groups of subjects. The percentage devoted to professional work varies
from 25 at Northwestern, or 30 at Johns Hopkins University, to 70 at Cornell, or
even to 85 at the Michigan College of Mines. Similarly there is no accepted propor-
tion for individual subjects like calculus, which varies from 52 hours at Rensselaer
to 216 hours at the University of Florida. The requirement in languages in college
varies from zero at Leland Stanford, the University of Virginia, and Cornell, to 408
hours (18 per cent) at the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale, or to 594 hours (18 per
cent) at the Virginia Polytechnic Institute. The total number of hours of assigned
work required for graduation varies from 2000 to 3800, and the number of required
credit hours per week varies from 16 to 28.
At several of the schools visited efforts are being made to adjust the requirements
of the several courses in such a way that a student will be able to accomplish the
work in 50 hours a week, including class work, laboratory work, and outside prepa-
ration. As a matter of fact few students succeed in keeping up to grade without
spending much more than this on their work. If a student is able to keep within the
limit, he has, when he is carrying thirteen courses, on the average 3 hours, 50 min-
DEVELOPMENT OF THE ENGINEERING CURRICULUM 25
utes, and 46.15 seconds per week for each. Rensselaer is the only school among those
visited that limits the students to three subjects at any one time. There each subject
is pursued intensively for a stated period that varies from one to fourteen weeks.
Thus the freshman begins work with chemistry, drawing, and French. At the end of
eight weeks his three subjects are algebra, drawing, and French. In the second term
he begins with trigonometry, French, and steam engineering, which is changed at the
end of five weeks to gas analysis, French, and physics. By this means, altho he carries
but three studies at one time, he actually completes from ten to eighteen different
subjects each year.
There is almost unanimous agreement among schools, parents, and practising engi-
neers that at present the engineering curriculum, whatever its organization, is con-
gested beyond endurance. It is obviously absurd to require from the student more
hours of intense mental labor than would be permitted him by law at the simplest
manual labor. Yet on all sides the pressure of topics and subjects that have become
important because of the extraordinary growth of science and industry is constantly
increasing. In 1870 a student might choose his specialty at the end of his second
year; now he must decide in many cases in the middle of his first year. Formerly the
choice lay among civil, mechanical, and mining engineering; now the selection must
be made from aeronautical, agricultural, architectural, automobile, bridge, cement,
ceramic, chemical, civil, construction, electrical, heating, highway, hydraulic, indus-
trial, lighting, marine, mechanical, metallurgical, mill, mining, railway, sanitary, steam,
textile, telephone, topographical engineering, and engineering administration. No one
school offers curricula in all of these specialties. But all are offered somewhere, and
enough are given at every school to render the selection during the freshman year
of his life's specialty a peculiarly difficult matter for the student.
From the wide variations in the amount of time required for completing the course
and the great diversity of ways in which the schools have met the demands of increas-
ing specialization in industry it is clear that they have reached no general agreement
as to how to deal with the problem. Each has sought to adjust itself as best it could to
the immediate demands in its locality, and has added specialized courses as the need
for them appeared. But tho there are many variations in the details of curricula at
the several schools, all have remained true to the original conception of the early
curriculum; namely, that instruction in the general principles of science and in the
humanities should precede instruction in the various technical specialties. In nearly
all curricula the work of the freshman year consists of chemistry, mathematics, Eng-
lish, foreign languages, and drawing. The work of the sophomore year, while not so
well standardized, very generally contains calculus, physics, some language study, and
drawing, with here and there a few of the engineering courses. The junior and senior
years are filled to overflowing with specialized technical courses.
The present curricula are thus the natural result of two well-defined influences;
namely, the original curriculum that was imported from France in 1849 by Professor
26 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
B. F. Greene of Rensselaer, and the phenomenal expansion of science and industry.
Meanwhile, two other influences have been gradually developing — the engineering
profession and the science of education. The bearing of these on present practices is
discussed in the later chapters.
Since the plan on which this study was carried out did not contemplate a complete
survey of engineering schools or a grading of them into classes as good, bad, or indif-
ferent, only twenty typical schools were visited. The examples in the following chap-
ters are therefore drawn in the main from these schools, selected not because of their
geographical location, but because they seemed representative of all types of engi-
neering college. The author wishes here to express his appreciation of the cordial man-
ner in which all college presidents and teachers cooperated in securing all the infor-
mation sought and in frankly discussing mooted points. The twenty schools visited
were the following:
The United States Military Academy, West Point, N. Y.
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, N. Y.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Mass.
Stevens Institute, Hoboken, N. J.
Carnegie Institute of Technology, Pittsburgh, Pa.
Columbia University, New York, N. Y.
Tufts College, Tufts College, Mass.
Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Worcester, Mass.
Virginia Polytechnic Institute, Blacksburg, Va.
Purdue University, Lafayette, Ind.
Pennsylvania State College, State College, Pa.
Cornell University, Ithaca, N. Y.
Sheffield Scientific School, Yale University, New Haven, Conn.
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, Pa.
University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Va.
University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, Pa.
University of Illinois, Urbana, 111.
University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wis.
Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio.
University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio.
CHAPTER V
METHODS OF ADMINISTRATION IN ENGINEERING SCHOOLS
THE final control of American Engineering Schools, as of the colleges and univer-
sities, is vested in a board of trustees or regents. In the case of state institutions the
members of the governing board are usually appointed by the state governors, while
in independent institutions they are self-elected for long terms. Generally the regents
or trustees are citizens who have won distinction in either professional or industrial
life. In a few cases a limited number of members of the faculty are also members
of the board ; but as a rule all communication between the faculty and the board is
thru the president.
The regents or trustees are charged with the financial management of the schools.
They elect the president on their own initiative and appoint or promote members of
the faculty on his recommendation. All appropriations, to be legal, must have their
sanction, and educational policies framed by the president or the faculty are nomi-
nally subject to their veto. This organization places large responsibilities on the presi-
dent and makes it possible for him to be the dominant influence in the development
of a school.
In the early schools the problem of framing and administering the requirements
for admission and graduation was relatively simple. At Rensselaer the first faculty
had but two members, both chosen because of their sympathy with the educational
aims of the institution. Similarly at the Massachusetts Institute, President Rogers
surrounded himself with a faculty of nine men who were enthusiastically devoted to
him and to the new venture. Prior to 1870 no school had as many as 200 students,
curricula were few, and the faculties were so small that a close and intimate coopera-
tion among the members and with the president was everywhere the rule. But with
a teaching staff of 260 and 2000 students, the present numbers at the Massachusetts
Institute, this direct personal contact among the members of the faculty and between
instructor and student is no longer possible. It was easy for Professor Pickering to
exert a strong personal influence over every one of the 25 students in his pioneer
physics laboratory; but it is impossible for any one to do the same when there are 450
students who need apparatus, attention, and guidance. The increase in number of stu-
dents from 1500 in 1870 to 33,000 now, in value of plants from about one million
dollars to sixty-eight millions, in annual expenditures from about $250,000 to over
eleven millions, and in number of professional specialties from four to perhaps forty,
has compelled the devotion of a large amount of attention to the organization and
administration of the daily routine on which the effectiveness of the school so largely
depends.
The regulations and the administrative systems that have been developed at the
various schools under the pressure of increasing size and complexity differ widely from
28 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
one another. All bear evidence of having been shaped to meet local needs under the
guidance of individuals of strong convictions. But while it is not possible to classify
these systems in well-defined categories, they may be arranged in a series that extends
from what may be called the marked military type, on the one hand, thru the autono-
mous-department type, to the well-defined cooperative type on the other.
The leading characteristics of the military type are exhibited best in the admin-
istration of the United States Military Academy at West Point. Since this school is
supported from the federal purse, its financial control is vested in Congress, which
makes its appropriations for this purpose on the recommendation of the War Depart-
ment and the Board of Visitors, composed of five senators and seven members of the
House of Representatives. The administration of the school is entrusted to the super-
intendent and the academic board, consisting of the superintendent, the commandant
of cadets, and the eleven heads of the departments of instruction. The curriculum
framed by this board, the methods of instruction, and the textbooks selected for use
are subject to approval by the War Department. The time schedule and the order
of instruction in the several courses are determined by the academic board, which also
conducts examinations, passes on the merits and proficiency of the cadets, grants di-
plomas, and makes recommendations for commissions in the army. When considering
questions concerning relative standing and promotion, the senior assistant in each
department sits with the academic board.
The officers of instruction are detailed to this duty by the War Department. Their
number varies from 110 to 120 for 580 cadets. Only the thirteen members of the aca-
demic board have any voice in selecting subject-matter and determining methods of
instruction. The classes are divided into small sections, usually of twelve each. The
ground to be covered each day and even the questions to be asked during each lesson
are as a rule determined by the head of the department, who is also required to visit
each section frequently in order to ascertain the proficiency and qualifications of the
cadets and the manner in which the instructors perform their duty. The assistants
seldom serve more than four years, but new appointees are usually required to attend
classes and study the methods of instruction for a few months before being placed in
charge of sections.
The daily routine of each cadet is rigidly prescribed. He is responsible for some
duty every hour, is sure to be called to recite at every class meeting, and is given a
numerical grade for every recitation. These grades are reported by every instructor
every week, and the roll of the class is arranged each month in the order of the rat-
ings. The division of the class into sections is made according to the relative stand-
ings ; the twelve cadets with highest standings being assigned to the first section, the
next highest twelve to the second section, and so on. The instruction is to a certain
extent adjusted to the ability of the several sections, the more difficult investigations
and subjects being given only to the higher sections. Assignments after graduation
and relative rank when commissioned follow the order of merit at graduation. The
METHODS OF ADMINISTRATION IN ENGINEERING SCHOOLS 29
maximum number of grade points attainable by a cadet in the four years is 2525 ;
and since these are assigned by a large number of different instructors, the number
secured is a pretty accurate measure of the cadet's ability to meet the requirements
of the academy. Because of this fact, the grading system is a very real incentive to
good work and to the maintenance of the ideals of soldierly honor and obedience to
orders which are such effective features of this school.
While military drill and military instruction are required of male students at all
the land grant colleges, military methods of administration are little used in engi-
neering schools. Here and there maybe found a single department that is administered
in a military manner. At the University of Pennsylvania several departments divide
their classes into small sections, outline the work for each "section hand," as the in-
structors have been called, and rotate the instructors among the sections each week.
Johns Hopkins University has recently introduced a curriculum called military en-
gineering very similar to that given at West Point, but the methods of administering
it do not differ from those used for the rest of the school. The West Point honor and
grading systems and West Point discipline, either for instructors or for students, were
not found at any of the other schools.
In the great majority of engineering schools the control of the curricula, the regu-
lations for admission and graduation, the time schedule, and the discipline are vested
in the faculty, which is composed of all officers of instruction above a specified rank,
differently defined at the various schools. All general educational policies, require-
ments, and rules for students are determined by a majority vote of the faculty and
administered by executive officers, deans, and boards or standing committees, usually
appointed by the president, tho at several institutions they are elected by the faculty.
The number of these committees varies from six to twenty -six. Every voting member
of a faculty is subject to service on committees, many of which have to meet weekly
and devote much time to their work.
Faculty control generally ends with the adoption of the curriculum and the time
schedule. Having determined by majority vote the requirement in hours for each sub-
ject, the choice of subject-matter, texts, and methods of instruction in each subject
is left entirely to the department concerned. For example, if three hours a week is
assigned by the faculty to English, the department of English may use that time in
any way it likes. Each department is treated as an expert in its own line, and this de-
partmental autonomy is carefully preserved by common consent. Departments vary
in size from three or four members to thirty or forty, and a serious effort is always
made to assign each man to work for which he is particularly fitted by temperament,
ability, and training. Hence the various phases of the work within a department are
usually well coordinated, but the policies and methods of instruction in the different
departments of the same school often differ widely from one another. While faculty
control is more democratic than military control in that every member of a faculty
has a vote on questions of general requirements and policies, it does not produce
30 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
the unity of aim and effort exhibited at West Point because its jurisdiction ends at
departmental boundaries. For this reason, this form of administration is called the
autonomous-department type.
When an engineering school is part of a large university, — like Cornell, Ohio State,
or Illinois, — which also con tains a school of liberal arts, a law school, a medical school,
and an agricultural school, it is customary to vest the control of each school in an in-
dependent faculty of its own. The departments of English, foreign languages, mathe-
matics, physics, and chemistry are usually organized under the faculty of liberal arts,
frequently without representation on the engineering faculty. In such cases engineer-
ing students are under the jurisdiction of the faculty of liberal arts for most of their
work during their first two years, and the engineering faculty has limited control of
the instruction of its students in these fundamental subjects. Under these conditions
the four-year course in engineering has no coordinating centre.
The cooperative type of administration has reached its fullest development at
the engineering school of the University of Cincinnati, tho both the Sheffield Scien-
tific School at Yale and Stevens Institute are experimenting along analogous lines. At
Cincinnati the engineering school has its own departments of English, mathematics,
and foreign languages; and the departments of physics and chemistry, tho organ-
ized under the faculty of liberal arts, are represented in the engineering faculty by
the instructors who teach the engineers. The faculty thus constituted meets every Sat-
urday morning for a systematic study of its educational problems. A syllabus stat-
ing the objects, the methods, the subject-matter, and the mechanism of the school as
a whole was prepared by the dean and discussed at length by the faculty. After many
changes and amendments, the syllabus was finally adopted as an adequate expression
of the basic conceptions toward which the school as a whole is working. Each depart-
ment in turn then presented a similar syllabus setting forth in detail the objects,
methods, subject-matter, and mechanism by which it proposed to contribute to the
general result. These departmental syllabi were discussed freely by the whole faculty,
and approved only when a general agreement had been reached. In this way there has
been developed a very effective coordination of effort among the several departments.1
The coordination of effort does not end with the agreement on syllabi. By unani-
mous vote of the faculty no student is finally passed in any subject until he gradu-
ates. Each student is graded at the end of each course ; but if, after receiving a pass-
ing grade in any subject, he shows in a later course that he is weak in that subject,
he is sent back to the department in question for more work. For example, the pro-
fessor of machine design may "flunk" a man in calculus if he cannot use the calculus
properly in the work in machine design. Again, all reports prepared for the technical
departments must pass the department of English before reaching the department
for which they are intended. This cooperation among the departments in the school
1 A full description of the system, including several of the syllabi, has been published by the United States Bureau
of Education in Bulletin 31, 1916, on The Cooperative System of Education, by Professor C. W. Park.
METHODS OF ADMINISTRATION IN ENGINEERING SCHOOLS 31
is as important an element in the Cincinnati experiment as is the cooperation of the
school with the industries. The University of Pittsburgh and the Massachusetts In-
stitute of Technology are cooperating on a part time basis with industries, but their
faculties are organized on the autonomous-department plan.
The cooperative type preserves one of the main advantages of the military type
in that its jurisdiction extends within departmental boundaries. Since it uses this ju-
risdiction not for autocratic control but as a means of converting a government by
majority vote into a community of effort for the students good, it also possesses
another of the effective factors of the military type, namely, homogeneity of action.
When skilfully organized, as at Cincinnati, the engineering faculty is a coordinating
centre for the entire engineering curriculum. Nor does it appear to have lost any of
the nominal advantages of the autonomous-department type in the way of personal
freedom of its members and inspiration for creative work.
CHAPTER VI
STUDENT ELIMINATION AND PROGRESS
ENGINEERING schools as a rule keep accurate account of the number of students in
attendance each year in each class. These figures, however, do not show how large the
actual elimination is, because a number in every graduating class have pursued irreg-
ular courses — have entered with advanced standing or been retarded a year or more.
Hence the difference between the number of graduates in any given year and the num-
ber of freshmen four years back does not indicate the true mortality. In order to de-
termine this it was necessary at each of the schools visited to pick from the records
of the graduating class all students who had entered four years before and proceeded
thru without break. The ratio of this number of what may be called regular gradu-
ates to the total number of freshmen four years previously is one expression of the
manner in which a school is meeting the needs of its locality.
Only one of the schools visited already knew how large its elimination is when
counted in this way. Among this selected list of schools the lowest mortality was
found at Pennsylvania State College, where just half of the freshmen went thru
regularly and graduated in four years. The highest losses were found at the Univer-
sities of Illinois and Wisconsin, where only about one-quarter of those admitted as
freshmen graduate regularly on schedule time. The figures vary from year to year at
every school, so that no fixed figure can be given for any institution; but from the
counts made for two years at twenty schools it is clear that less than 40 per cent of
all freshmen at engineering schools complete the course in the allotted time. While
this record is sufficiently striking, it is better than it was in the early days. Then in
some cases the elimination was as high as 91 per cent and the average was nearer 75
than 60. This change for the better is in large measure the result of the increased
efficiency of the secondary schools.
While it is interesting to compare the elimination of 66 per cent at the Massa-
chusetts Institute, which admits only by examination, with the elimination of 75 per
cent at Wisconsin or Illinois, which admit almost wholly by certificate, it is not safe
to draw any conclusions as to the relative merits of the two methods of admission.
Elimination depends on too many other variable factors, such as physical health,
family conditions, financial resources, college spirit, the appeal of the college work, and
the friendly personal interest of the faculty. For example, the date of Dean Burton's
appointment as counselor to freshmen at the Massachusetts Institute is recorded by
a sharp drop in the freshman mortality figures. Because of the complexity of the prob-
lem it is perhaps not surprising that the schools have no records as to the reasons for
withdrawal.
Nearly half of the elimination takes place in the freshman year and about one-quar-
ter more in the second year. During these years almost all of the time is spent on Eng-
STUDENT ELIMINATION AND PROGRESS 33
lish, mathematics, foreign languages, chemistry, and physics, and little opportunity is
afforded for contact with real engineering projects. Hence many engineering students
are eliminated before they have a chance to show their ability at their chosen profes-
sion. At one of the schools several cases were found where engineering students had
been eliminated during the freshman year for failure to meet the demands of the
department of German. At another English literature was a fertile source of dis-
couragement for freshmen. A large amount of pertinent information concerning the
success of school administration and instruction may be secured from a study of the
reasons why students leave engineering schools, especially since many who do leave
before graduation persist in engineering and make a success of it.
The variations of the average grades of a group of students thru their four years
of work supply an interesting basis on which to judge of student progress and the
adaptation of the work to student needs. The following table presents for each of
the four years the weighted average grades 1 of a group that entered regularly, pro-
gressed normally, and graduated on time at the several schools named:
Institution Cases Fr. So. Jr. Sr.
UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS 64 86.9 84.1 83.7 83.2
UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA 17 86.0 84.0 82.0 85.0
PURDUE UNIVERSITY 51 84.7 83.2 80.7 81.6
REKSSELAER 22 83.7 81.7 82.5 83.7
UNIVERSITY OF WISCONSIN 47 84.5 83.3 83.2 86.3
PENNSYLVANIA STATE 54 80.6 80.4 78.4 79.6
VIRGINIA POLYTECHNIC 48 79.6 77.0 77.3 87.3
STEVENS 51 78.1 73.4 75.5 74.0
CINCINNATI 19 77.4 76.5 74.9 76.7
COLUMBIA 56 77.2 76.2 75.8 74.9
UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA 55 74.5 72.0 70.0 71.5
OHIO STATE UNIVERSITY 46 72.0 71.0 70.6 71.2
YALE (SHEFFIELD) 79 67.0 65.2 68.2
MASSACHUSETTS INSTITUTE 67 66.8 64.7 65.6 64.0
CORNELL (SIBLEY) 40 75.2 72.9 73.2 73.9
CORNELL (C.E.) 30 76.3 76.0 72.1 75.2
TUFTS 39 72.0 68.0 70.0 73.0
Average 785 76.9 74.9 74.8 76.9
Average age of graduation 22 years, 11 months.
In every case the standing of this random group of the regular graduates is higher
in the freshman than it is in the sophomore year. In the general average for the 785
cases studied the drop of 2 points persists thru the junior year and is recovered in the
last year. The phenomenon is general, altho some schools exhibit it more markedly
than do others.
While several interpretations of the meaning of this sag in the average grade curve
are possible, its cause may be located statistically by noting in what subjects the
1 The weighted average is found by multiplying each grade by the number of credit hours it represents, adding the
products, and dividing by the total number of credit hours for the year.
34 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
students had the greatest number of low grades in those years. For this purpose thirty
or more records of regular graduates were taken at random and the number who re-
ceived low grades in each subject was counted for each school. The meaning of the
term " low grade " was determined at each institution from a study of the local grad-
ing system. At schools that grade numerically with 60 as the pass mark, like Virginia
Polytechnic Institute, Stevens Institute, and Cornell University, all marks below 70
were counted as low. Thus, for example, at Stevens Institute out of 51 cases studied,
31 had at least one grade below 70 in physics and the average mark in that subject for
these thirty-one students was 63.2. In calculus 26 had received grades below 70, the
average being 63.1, and so on. When 70 was the pass mark, as at the Universities of
Illinois and Wisconsin and Pennsylvania State College, marks below 80 were counted.
At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where 50 is the pass mark, L, which
stands for a rating between 50 and 60, was considered a low grade. At Sheffield Sci-
entific School and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, which grade on a scale of 4 with
2 as the pass mark, marks below 2.4 were counted. The grading systems of the Uni-
versity of Pennsylvania, Ohio State University, and Purdue University could not be
used for this purpose because they recognize only three grades, A, B, and C, above
pass mark and the lowest grade covers too wide a range. At Ohio State University
a new grading system with five steps between pass and 100 has recently been intro-
duced.
The table on page 35 gives the results of this count for twelve schools. Every stu-
dent whose record was counted was a regular student who had entered without con-
ditions, had passed thru normally in the regulation time, and had received his degree.
The low marks of the 60 per cent who were "weeded out" are not included; if they
had been, the percentages would be much higher. The figures in the table are there-
fore a fair statement of the results achieved by a school under the most favorable
conditions.
Taken in connection with the facts of elimination, these figures show that out of
every 1000 freshmen not more than 400 graduate in the specified time, and that half
of these just "get by"" in physics, calculus, and mechanics. The percentage of low grades
is about the same in English and modern languages when these subjects are required.
This means that out of every 1000 who are admitted only about 200 — 20 per cent
— adapt themselves creditably to the requirements of the schools in these so-called
" fundamentals."
The two tables make it clear that the drop in the average grades occurs when physics
and calculus with an average low grade record of 49.5 per cent replace chemistry and
freshman mathematics with an average low grade record of not over 25 per cent. It
is not possible to give this last percentage exactly because the freshman mathematics
courses are not comparable; but the low grade counts in advanced algebra, trigonom-
etry, and analytics are all below 20 per cent. Altho the third year program and courses
differ so much from one another that the figures from various schools cannot be com-
STUDENT ELIMINATION AND
NUMBER AND PERCENTAGES OF Low GRADES IN
PROGRESS
PARTICULAR SUBJECTS
35
Insti-
tution
Number
of Cases
Physics
English
Modern
Languages
Calculus
Mechanics
Chemistry
Descriptive
Geometry
1
67
43-64%
37-55%
38-57%
22-32%
21-31%
20-29%
13-19%
2
79
40-51
47-60
51-64
48-61
47-60
31-40
26-33
3
51
31-60
11-21
4-8
26-51
26-51
11-21
21-41
4
48
21-47
37-77
34-69
13-29
20-42
7-14
5-10
5
43
30-69
not required
not required
32-74
28-65
14-32
16-37
6
54
38-70
not required
not required
33-61
35-65
15-28
21-40
7
19
10-52
10-52
6-31
9-47
13-68
11-58
4-21
8
46
13-28
13-28
16-35
18-40
25-54
7-15
6-13
9
64
24-37
31-48
not required
27-42
27-42
14-22
4-6
10
22
15-68
16-72
7-33
15-70
5-23
15-70
10-45
11
44
13-30
7-16
not required
22-50
24-55
12-27
5-11
12
84
39-47
40-48
48-57
33-39
49-58
44-51
34-40
Totals
621
317
249
198
298
330
201
165
534
416
51.0%
46.6%
47.5%
48.0%
53.1%
32.3%
26.5%
pared, it is fairly evident that the mechanics, which is common to all and which has
a low grade record of 53.4 per cent, is largely responsible for the continuation of the
low average grade thru the junior year.
While many professors regard a high percentage of low grades as proof of efficient
teaching, experience has proved that an excessive number of low grades in some par-
ticular subject in the records of regular graduates is a sign of some trouble that can
usually be removed by a little attention. For example, 80 per cent of the regular grad-
uates of 1914 in Cincinnati had low grades in History 50. This course had been intro-
duced the previous year to give a broader outlook. It consisted of a rapid study of
geologic evolution, of biologic evolution, and of the evolution of civilization given by
the respective heads of the departments of geology, biology, and history in the Fac-
ulty of Arts, Literature, and Science. The first year it proved a great success, and the
engineering students in the class of 1913 gathered much information and inspiration
from it. But the class of 1914 had much trouble with it until it was discovered that
it had been turned over to a young instructor who was drilling the class on Guizot's
History of Civilization by the textbook-recitation method. The course was promptly
dropped and the students absolved from the requirement by the engineering faculty.
Since employers regard college grades as precarious guides in selecting men for jobs,
36 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
an effort was made to find out whether the fact that about half the graduates of en-
gineering schools have received low grades in physics, calculus, and mechanics means
that half the graduates are on that account low grade engineers or not. The direct
method of doing this would involve tracing the later careers of those who received the
low grades to see if they were relatively less successful than those who ranked high
in these fundamental subjects. This method is impracticable because there is as yet
no valid definition of what constitutes success in engineering. There are, however, a
number of large industrial firms that employ several hundred college graduates each
year and keep records of their accomplishments. A comparison of the records of the
same men in college and in industry would indicate how close the correlation between
them is.
Thru the courtesy of Mr. A. L. Rohrer of the General Electric Company of Sche-
nectady, copies of his records of the 168 graduates in their employ from the class of
1913 of all the schools visited were secured. On these records each man was rated by
each of the foremen under whom he worked as A, B, or C in each of the five qualities,
Technical ability, Accuracy, Industry, Ability to push things, and Personality. Thru
the courtesy of the schools copies of the full college records of these same men were
secured. An extended study of these two sets of records by Professor E. L. Thorndike
of Columbia showed that the correlation between the two was very slight; that is,
that ability to secure high grades in college was no indication of ability to meet the
requirements of the General Electric Company. On the other hand, the college grades
signify something, since the grades for the senior year con-elate closely with the aver-
age grade for the entire course, showing that ability to secure high grades in college
is a stable and permanent characteristic of an individual. A similar study was made
thru the courtesy of Mr. C. R. Dooley of the Westinghouse Electric and Manufactur-
ing Company of Pittsburgh of a group of 40 college graduates in the employ of that
company. The results were practically the same.
While these studies have not yet settled the problem, they serve to define it more
clearly. The facts are that half of the college graduates are rated low in the funda-
mental subjects by their college instructors, and that college grades show little cor-
relation with the ratings of two large industrial companies that "take on" several
hundred college graduates each year.
CHAPTER VII
TYPES OF INSTRUCTION IN ENGINEERING SCHOOLS
THE method of instruction employed at Rensselaer during the first five years (1824-
29) was new in America, tho it resembled the methods inaugurated in 1806 by Pesta-
lozzi in the Fellenberg School at Hofwyl, Switzerland (page 9). It was designed by
the first senior professor, Amos Eaton, who was a graduate of Williams College and
had done graduate work with Silliman at Yale. At no other school was the student
given the place of the teacher and compelled to rely on his own resources in preparing
subjects for presentation to his classmates. The observation of industrial processes as
the basis for class discussion and laboratory problems which led by inductive processes
to general principles after the manner of real scientific investigation were at this time
unique in elementary instruction. No other school treated beginners by the same
methods that were used so successfully in advanced study. But altho the method as
practised proved successful, it had to be abandoned in 1829 because it was too ex-
pensive for the slender resources of the school. As the number of students increased,
still more didactic methods were introduced; until in 1850, when the French curricu-
lum was adopted (page 12), the student lectures had become blackboard demonstra-
tions prepared from texts followed by " interrogations" and recitations conducted by
the professors.
At the opening of the Massachusetts Institute in 1865 instruction was given mainly
by lectures, in which the professor presented to the class a logically well-organized ex-
planation of the general principles and theories of the subject in hand. Lectures were
illustrated by experiments and accompanied by blackboard demonstrations. The stu-
dents took notes, recited on them at regular quiz hours, and worked problems that
illustrated the principles and theories presented. Frequent and thorough examina-
tions were given for the double purpose of testing knowledge and inciting to dili-
gence. As soon as the facilities were available, laboratory work was introduced, in
which the student reproduced standard reactions, measured known constants, verified
theories, visualized principles, and acquired skill in manipulating delicate instruments.
The use of the illustrated lecture in instruction in science was not new, but the or-
ganization of laboratories for undergraduate students in physics was a striking inno-
vation, suggested by President Rogers and carried out by Professor E. C. Pickering
in 1869. The course consisted of a series of simple experiments illustrating funda-
mental principles or scientific methods of study and involving the use of important
instruments. The administration of the work was made practicable by having com-
plete apparatus for each instrument ready for use together with carefully prepared
written directions for its correct manipulation. When a class entered the laboratory
each member received a number directing him to the apparatus and written directions
for making the required measurements and recording the results. In this way Professor
38 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
Pickering was able to care for a class of twenty -five students at one time, because, as
he himself tells us, the written directions prevented the students from making seri-
ous mistakes.
The marvelous expansion of this method of laboratory work into all branches of
science in all grades of schools and the profound impress made by this expansion on
the American school system are matters of common knowledge. Here it is important
to note that this type of laboratory work was devised as an adjunct to the illustrated
lecture, for the purpose of giving training in pure science, to foster industrial produc-
tion, and develop the scientific or professional engineering spirit.
Besides the innovation of the laboratory, new methods of teaching English were
introduced at the Massachusetts Institute by Professor W. P. Atkinson, who sought
to cultivate a taste for good literature and a love of reading on subjects of interest to
the student as a man and a citizen. After a rapid review of composition and rhetoric
the classes read and discussed Duruy's Histoire des temps modernes and Guizot's His-
tory of Civilization in Europe. In the fourth year contemporary problems of politics,
economics, and sociology were discussed and written reports on subjects of their own
selection were read by the students in class. Two hours a week throughout the four
years were devoted to this work.
Since 1864, but especially since 1900, the increase in the number of students and
the migration of students among the schools have tended to standardize methods of
teaching in both high school and college. In the secondary school the process has been
accelerated by the pressure of college entrance requirements and the accompanying
definitions of the units framed by the colleges, while in the colleges the process has
been retarded by the universal respect for departmental autonomy and academic free-
dom with the consequent "laissez faire" attitude toward the problem. Under these con-
ditions some college subjects have become more standardized than others, but it is sel-
dom possible to point to any one method in any one subject as generally accepted. At
present there is a marked tendency in certain subjects to break away from the tradi-
tional forms. Some of the efforts in this direction are noted in subsequent chapters.
While there are many differences in the details of curricula and methods of teach-
ing, the first two years of work are more nearly uniform than the last two in content
and general treatment. The freshmen in almost all schools take mathematics, chem-
istry, English, drawing, and shop work; while sophomores usually study mathematics,
physics, English, drawing, and shopwork. The methods of instruction in some of these
fundamental subjects, like mathematics and physics, are very much the same every-
where; while in chemistry, English, drawing, and shopwork there are wider variations
and several distinct types. Still the salient features and the underlying philosophy
of the instruction in each subject are enough alike at most institutions to make pos-
sible a description of the typical treatment accorded to engineering students during
their first two years in college. Certain striking exceptions in which totally different
conceptions and methods prevail are discussed in the later chapters.
TYPES OF INSTRUCTION IN ENGINEERING SCHOOLS 39
The aims and methods of teaching mathematics to engineering students have been
fully described in the report of Sub-committee IX of the International Commission
on the Teaching of Mathematics.1 From this report it appears that mathematics teach-
ers are generally agreed that mathematics should be taught as a science by profes-
sional mathematicians and not as a tool by engineers. While all regard professional
efficiency in the use of mathematics as the test of success, they hold that this efficiency
is best secured by teaching mathematics by itself, so that the student's mind is not
distracted from the mathematical form by the engineering applications. The limited
amount of time allotted to mathematics is barely sufficient to enable the mathematics
teacher to cover the required ground thoroughly. If the teacher of engineering would
familiarize himself with the mathematical subjects, the methods, and even the nota-
tion his students have learned, he could then teach them how to use their mathe-
matics with a success and completeness not possible to his mathematical colleague.
Inasmuch as the professors of mathematics are generally agreed on this point of
view, the mathematical instruction to freshmen and sophomores is almost universally
based on the use of a standard text, in which the successive propositions are deduced
by logical processes from definitions, axioms, and postulates. A definite portion of
the text is assigned as a lesson, and in the daily recitations the students are required
either to reproduce demonstrations given in the text or to solve mathematical prob-
lems that illustrate the theorems under discussion. The customary division of math-
ematics into trigonometry, analytics, and calculus is preserved at all but two of the
schools visited. In short, mathematics in engineering colleges, as in the high schools,
is still taught by the standard methods that are so well known as to need no further
description. According to the report just mentioned (page 30), "There is nothing to
indicate that many changes have taken place during the past 10 years, or that many
are contemplated."
In chemistry the basis of the instruction is the demonstration lectures, at which
the entire class assembles two or three times a week. For the quiz and laboratory
work the class is divided into sections, usually in charge of assistants. A standard
text is generally followed by the lecturer and used by the students as a source of in-
formation for the quizzes. A separate manual containing directions for the laboratory
experiments is customary.
In most of the schools visited the presentation of the subject-matter in chemistry
begins with general statements about atoms, molecules, chemical equations, Avoga-
dro's law, molecular weight, chemical affinity, diffusion, valence, and formulas. Then
follows descriptions of the non-metals, oxygen, nitrogen, carbon, etc., — their occur-
rence, preparation, and properties, — leading to the metals in due order. The facts dis-
cussed in the lectures are learned for the quizzes and verified in the laboratory. The
purpose of this type of instruction is to familiarize the student with the elementary
1 United States Bureau of Education, Bulletin No. 9, 1911.
40 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
facts and reactions of chemistry as a means of identifying substances and therefore
as a preparation for qualitative and quantitative analysis.
Recently another type of course in chemistry has been introduced in a number of
schools. In this the data are presented not as elements prerequisite to a mastery of
chemical analysis, but as vehicles for the elucidation of modern chemical theories. In
courses of this type the study of oxygen includes such topics as the diffusion and lique-
faction of gases, critical temperature, endothermal and exothermal reactions, the gas
laws, and the kinetic-molecular theory of matter. Similarly the facts about hydrogen
are used to elucidate reversible reactions, chemical equilibrium, equivalent and atomic
weights, and chemical equations. The study of water furnishes a natural thread on which
to string the law of combining volumes, Avogadro's theory, molecular weight, solu-
tions, and the kinetic theory of solution. The properties of chlorine serve as a basis
for the presentation of electrical conductivity of solutions, osmotic pressure, ionic the-
ory, degrees of ionization, electric charges on the ions, valence of the ions, and the elec-
tron theory. About ten weeks is required to cover these topics, and then the remainder
of the year is spent in studying the more important reactions from the standpoint
of the ionic theory. Incidental references are made to the industrial uses of chemistry.
Altho these two types of courses in chemistry differ in content, both use the lec-
ture-quiz-laboratory method of imparting information. In one case the information
is being stored for later use in chemical analysis; in the other it is being organized
for the elucidation of ionic theories. In neither case is the student given such a pro-
ject as: "Make baking powder and determine whether it is better and cheaper than
any you can buy." His problem is always in the form : " Determine the chemical com-
position of this powder."
Physics is generally taught in the second year as a one-year course, tho five of the
schools visited devote some time to it in the first year. As in chemistry so here, the
typical course consists of three parts, demonstration lectures, quizzes, and laboratory
work. In the lectures, of which there are two or three a week, the professor presents
the essential facts and principles in a logically well-arranged order, beginning with
definitions and statements of laws, followed by their mathematical or experimental
demonstration, and ending with a few brief remarks concerning practical applications.
Usually the entire sophomore class attends the lectures in a body; so that, in the
larger schools, there are as many as three or four hundred students at each lecture. For
quizzes the class is divided into sections of from twenty to twenty-five each; and these
are turned over to assistants who listen to recitations on assignments in the text, ques-
tion the students on the content of the previous lecture, and assign illustrative prob-
lems to be solved at home. With large classes of from twelve to twenty sections the
quiz and laboratory work requires a large corps of assistants, many of whom are grad-
uate students or fellows who receive a modest stipend (from $200 to $500 a year) for
this service.
In the laboratory work the methods and aims defined by Professor Pickering in
TYPES OF INSTRUCTION IN ENGINEERING SCHOOLS 41
1869 are still dominant everywhere. About one-third of his original experiments are
still in use, and the new ones that have been introduced have as their objects the
verification of some known law, the visualization of some known fact, or the deter-
mination of some known constant. When the same experiments are used year after
year, as is the case at most schools, the students soon discover that the number of
failures and low grades in physics can be materially reduced if the results of the
physics experiments are carefully preserved from year to year and judiciously used
as occasion may require. Projects of the form " Which of these 3 electric motors is
the best for the price?" — a question that cannot be answered without making the
experiment — are almost never used. The prevailing type is "Measure the efficiency
of this electric motor." In other words, physics instruction, like that in chemistry,
aims to stock the student's mind with information as a preparation for solving real
problems should they ever arise.
The proficiency and the progress of students in mathematics, chemistry, and physics
is measured by periodic examinations, which as a rule call for the statement of defini-
tions, the mathematical demonstration of principles or theorems, and the solution of
illustrative problems. For small classes the professor himself is usually alone respon-
sible for the questions, and is also sole judge of the rating of the replies. For large
classes the examination is sometimes set by the professor in responsible charge and
sometimes by the entire group of instructors in conference. In either case the papers
are as a rule distributed among the instructors for rating so that the grade assigned
is often determined by the judgment of a single observer. The final grades assigned
for the year are a combination of the examination grades, the quiz grades, and
the laboratory grades. In making the combination the weights given to these sev-
eral elements vary enormously, some treating the examination as the sole factor and
others relying mainly on the quiz and laboratory grades. The students are gener-
ally well posted on the system used in each department, and their grades are fairly
accurate statements of their successes in meeting the requirements of the various
professors.
With regard to instruction in English, the engineering schools may be divided into
two approximately equal groups, the one composed of those schools that maintain
the current standard college course; and the other composed of those that are trying
to discover a type of work better suited to engineers. In the standard type of course,
the student studies a textbook of composition and rhetoric, learns the rules of correct
punctuation and paragraphing, together with the four forms of discourse, and then
writes themes on assigned subjects selected by the instructor to give practice in either
description, narration, exposition, or argumentation. In some schools the strict ad-
herence to this plan is mitigated by allowing a choice from among several assigned
subjects. The accompanying study of literature consists of a brief survey of the lives
of the great writers and the analysis of selected passages from their writings. This
well-known type of course was developed during the latter half of the past century
42 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
for the purpose of making English an acceptable substitute for the classics in high
schools and colleges.
Doubtless because the professional engineers have been so frank in their demand
for better training in English, about half of the engineering schools are experiment-
ing with their methods of teaching this subject. These experiments are so varied in
plan and execution that it is not possible to classify them. One of the more radical
of these is described in Chapter X.
But if it is impossible to describe the types of instruction in English because of
their number and diversity, it is still more difficult to select any one type of drawing,
descriptive geometry, or shopwork as characteristic of even a majority of the schools.
In drawing the aims of the instruction range all the way from imparting enough tech-
nical skill to enable a graduate to earn his living as a draughtsman, to developing
the power of visualizing solid objects from flat drawings. At some schools the subject
is introduced with geometrical drawing for practice in the use of instruments, at others
the first plates are merely copied, while at still others freehand sketching in perspec-
tive takes the lead. In some cases descriptive geometry is closely con-elated with draw-
ing from the beginning; in others it is treated independently and even by a separate
department.
The variations in types of shopwork are no less numerous. At some few schools
no shopwork whatever is required; at others students merely visit shops and listen to
lectures on the subject, but do no actual work with tools; at still others the emphasis
is placed on acquiring a certain amount of manual dexterity in typical operations
with tools, but nothing is actually constructed; at others production of salable articles
is placed foremost; the shop is used in some cases as a means of acquiring practice in
scientific management and business administration ; while under the cooperative plan
the school conducts no shopwork, but the students gain practical experience with
tools, production, and management by working half time for pay in industrial plants.
It is a striking fact that the three subjects in which there are such wide variations
in teaching practice are the three that are constantly exposed to objective test. Eng-
lish, drawing, and shop are three subjects in which a student's ability is expressed
objectively if at all; and these are the subjects in which experiments in methods of
teaching are most numerous.
These six subjects — mathematics, chemistry,, physics, English, drawing, and shop
— occupy the major part of the time for the first two years in all engineering cur-
ricula. The majority of schools also require one or more foreign languages, taught
almost invariably by the standardized method of grammatical study and analysis. The
civil engineering curriculum usually includes in the first or second year the theory
of surveying, followed by a summer camp for practical work. Apart from this work in
surveying, there is as a rule very little that makes the freshmen or the sophomores
vividly aware of the fact that they are studying engineering. This has been recognized
as a defect by some schools, which have sought to remedy it by "orientation" lee-
TYPES OF INSTRUCTION IN ENGINEERING SCHOOLS 43
tures and talks by professional men describing the nature of real engineering work
in the field. Still there are cases on record where freshmen in engineering have been
"weeded out" entirely because of deficiencies in English and German.
The instruction during the last two years is almost wholly devoted to professional
work. The prevailing methods of teaching are very similar to those used in the earlier
years in chemistry and physics, the difference being that the topics and problems are
technical rather than purely scientific. Since specialization has now divided the juniors
and seniors into groups, the classes are generally small and they receive the atten-
tion of the older and more experienced professors. Theory and theoretical design are
strongly emphasized throughout and some attention — frequently very little — is
given to the practical problems of labor, organization, values, and costs.
Twenty-five years ago every senior was required to prepare a graduation thesis as
an exercise in the application of all he had learned and a training in engineering meth-
ods of attacking real problems. At present only half of the schools require theses of
all graduates; in one-tenth the thesis is elective, in one-tenth the better students only
are allowed the privilege of preparing one, and in the remaining three- tenths no thesis
is required. Formerly the thesis was frequently the only opportunity given the stu-
dent to exercise his originality and express his initiative in constructive work. At pres-
ent engineering projects are being used more and more as problems and exercises in
the regular class work of the last two years. In a few cases real engineering problems
are freely used with freshmen and sophomores. These tendencies to encourage a spirit
of investigation among the younger students and to give even freshmen opportunities
for creative work are becoming more marked each year. Several significant changes
of this kind are discussed in the later chapters.
PART II
THE PROBLEMS OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
CHAPTER VIII
ADMISSION
THE Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education has always had a standing
committee on Entrance Requirements. This committee has made periodic reports,
which are published in the Proceedings of the Society. Yet the variations in the re-
quirements for admission to engineering colleges are still very striking (cf. page 22),
tho the content and methods of instruction in many of the accepted units have been
partially standardized by the effective work of the College Entrance Examination
Board and of numerous committees on the definition of the high school units.
From the point of view of their success in limiting admission to engineering schools
to those who have some aptitude or ability for engineering, it is evident that when
60 out of every 100 admitted fail to continue thru the course, present systems of
admission are not satisfactory. Even when due allowance is made for those who leave
for financial reasons and for the praiseworthy desire of faculties to give every boy who
has any claim to consideration a chance to prove his mettle, a fairly large number of
students who ought not to try to become engineers are permitted to undertake a
course of study for which they have little natural ability. Nor is this condition justi-
fied by the plea that an engineering training is good discipline for a journalist or a
banker; because the spirit of the work is spoiled for true engineers by the presence
of the temperamentally unfit, while these do not get the maximum benefit from work
they cannot really do well.
Fifty years ago every college gave its own entrance examinations. But as the sec-
ondary schools grew stronger, the custom of accepting their certificates as satisfactory
credentials for admission gradually expanded ; with the result that for a number of
years two ostensibly rival systems have existed side by side, and many a wordy debate
over their relative merits has been held. In engineering schools the statistics of elimi-
nation (page 32) indicate that the success of present admission systems does not depend
seriously on whether the colleges give their own entrance examinations or whether they
accept certificates from the secondary schools.
Reasons for the similarity of results by the two methods of admission are not hard
to find. For every high school teacher who has in his class one boy preparing to take
a college entrance examination is fairly sure to drill the entire class on old college en-
trance examination questions, large collections of which have been reprinted by pub-
lishers of textbooks and individuals interested in maintaining the examination sys-
tem. Under these conditions if both college and school are sincere in their work, —
which unfortunately is not always the case, — it clearly makes little difference in the
boy's real attainments at the end of the course whether he takes his examination
at school or at college. In the one case he is admitted by examination, in the other
by certificate; in either case on the average at least 60 out of 100 admitted fail to
48 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
finish the course. Evidently the source of the difficulty does not lie in the machin-
ery of admission, but in the controlling factor that is common to both, namely, the
nature of the test itself. For engineering the question, therefore, is not which of the
two methods of admission is the more efficient, but whether current college entrance
tests really measure engineering ability or not. Ability to secure high grades in school
is a stable characteristic of an individual; but is ability to pass current school and
college examinations a valid criterion of engineering ability ? And if not, what type
of test can be safely used? This is the real problem of admission as it is the real prob-
lem of the entire college course, for tests control teaching.
Trustworthy hints as to the ways and means of discovering better types of tests
for admission to engineering colleges are expressed in the recent developments of en-
trance systems. For when every college gave its own entrance examinations in its own
way the secondary schools were confronted with a perfectly impossible task. In each
subject there were as many different examinations as there were colleges; and since
each examination measured rather the degree to which the candidate conformed to
the examiner's conception of the subject than the student's real ability, great con-
fusion prevailed. It was to abolish this confusion that the College Entrance Exam-
ination Board was organized in 1900. By having the examination questions framed
by committees instead of by individuals, by giving the same examination for a large
number of colleges, and by having all the rating done by one group of readers, con-
ditions were vastly improved, and have continued to improve as the board has gained
in experience and skill.
In the central and western states, where admission has for a number of years been
by certificate, the development has been nominally somewhat different. There the deci-
sion as to whether the work of a high school was of such quality as to warrant the
acceptance of its certificate for entrance to college was made first by professors sent
out by the colleges; then by state high school inspectors, who visited each school
periodically and reported their findings to the state universities. On the basis of their
reports a list of "accredited schools" was constructed for each state, and these lists
were combined by such organizations as the North Central Association of Colleges
and Secondary Schools to include the schools over a wide territory. Recently there
has been a tendency to check the findings of the high school inspectors by the ratings
received in college by the students from the various schools.
While the respective developments of admission systems east and west appear to
be quite different, they are in reality very much the same. In the examination system
committees instead of individuals both set the questions and grade the papers. In
the certificate system the work of a high school is now judged more by the ratings of
its students by a college faculty than by the personal judgment of one high school
inspector. Hence in both cases the growth has been away from reliance on the personal
judgment of individuals toward acceptance of the combined judgment of a group.
Under the certificate system this combined judgment is based on daily observation
ADMISSION 49
of the student's labors for a number of months, while under the examination system
the judgment in each subject is based on the reading of one paper.
From the foregoing facts it appears that the real difficulty with college admission
systems has been instinctively recognized everywhere. The determination of a candi-
date's fitness to enter college depends ultimately on tests of some kind ; and the tend-
ency in selecting and applying tests has clearly been to eliminate the fallacies and
vagaries of individual personal judgment, in order that grading may become more a
measure of ability and less an expression of how far the student conforms to the estab-
lished convictions of individuals. But tho very encouraging progress has been made
of late, all recognize that still greater improvement is possible, and that the forward
movement is in the direction of reducing the personal equation to a minimum by
making examinations and tests as objective as possible.
The expenditure of an enormous amount of time and energy has been necessary
to liberate college entrance tests from personal bias and to achieve even the degree
of objectivity that has been attained. The precipitation of the instinctive feeling
for the direction of progress into a well-defined statement of conscious aim has pro-
ceeded slowly. Now that the aim is clear and generally recognized, more rapid advance
is possible, provided the schools are ready to undertake the arduous and plodding
work involved ; for both the invention and the interpretation of satisfactory tests
require long and careful statistical studies by competent men who have been spe-
cially trained for the task. The work is worth while because admission to college is
an important division of the central problem of education — vocational guidance. If
any reasonably trustworthy method of discovering what work each individual is best
fitted for can be found, the other problems of education will in large measure solve
themselves.
Since engineering is perhaps the most objective of all professions, it offers excel-
lent opportunities for the scientific study of objective tests. A study of engineering
education therefore provides an appropriate opportunity to initiate experiments and
to attempt to sort out the more promising methods of investigation from those that
prove to be less fruitful. To this end Professor Edward L. Thorndike of Columbia
University undertook a special series of experiments with freshmen in engineering
at Columbia, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the University of Cincinnati,
and Wentworth Institute. The experiences with the Columbia group are here de-
scribed as typical of the principles and methods applied. Further details with samples
of the tests used are given in the Appendix (pages 117-125).
Thru the courtesy of Dean F. P. Keppel, an invitation was extended by Professor
Thorndike to forty freshmen in engineering to spend two successive Saturdays (four-
teen hours) in taking the tests. Each of the thirty-four students who completed the
series was given a small fee and a full statement of his record. Fifteen tests in all were
used, each designed to record the student's relative ability in some one particular
activity which was complete in itself, altho it involved a rather complicated series of
50 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
reactions. Thus each student was asked to read paragraphs and write answers to ques-
tions on their meaning, to identify words as proof of his range of vocabulary, to supply
missing words in sentences, to solve arithmetical and algebraic problems, to perform
algebraic computations, to draw graphs from given data, to give geometrical proofs
of stated theorems, to solve problems in physics described in words, to arrange physi-
cal apparatus to secure stated results, to match each of a series of pictures with one
of a series of verbal statements, to supply missing lines in drawings of machinery, and
to construct simple mechanical devices from their unassembled parts.
Each test was constructed as a series of graded steps of increasing difficulty, the
first being so easy that every one was sure to accomplish it, and the last one so
difficult that only the ablest could master it. The grading of the steps is secured by
first submitting a large number of problems of a given type to about a dozen suc-
cessful teachers of the subject and asking them to divide them into groups numbered
1, 2, 3, 4, etc., in what they consider to be the order of difficulty. Problems common
to group 1 are used as the first step, those common to group 2 as the second step,
and so on, in making up a preliminary test, which is then tried on a number of classes
in different schools. The relative difficulty is then in inverse order to the number who
accomplish each step. Much further experimenting and computation are necessary if
it is desired to make sure that each successive step is more difficult than its predeces-
sor by the same amount. Most of the tests used in these experiments with engineering
students were graded in steps of equal difficulty.
The advantage of tests of graded difficulty lies in the fact that a student's grade
is determined by the number of steps he accomplishes in the assigned time. Since the
questions used are as a rule of a type that cannot be answered from memory, but
must be answered by a short statement, judgment concerning the correctness of the
answers is seldom ambiguous, so that personal bias in assigning grades is almost
wholly eliminated. Independent scorers in these tests repeatedly made ratings that
were practically identical (correlations .95 to .98. Cf. page 119).
The ultimate criterion of the validity of these tests is the future careers of those
tested. Since extensive data of this kind are not yet obtainable, the results of the tests
were compared with a composite rating compiled by combining the students' high
school marks in English, mathematics, and physics, their ratings in the Regents'
examinations in these three subjects, their freshman records in English, mathematics,
and chemistry, the combined judgments of the students concerning one another's
intellectual ability, the judgment of the teachers who were acquainted with the men,
and the age of entrance to college. This composite is the best obtainable summary of
the current school judgment concerning the relative intellectual abilities of the stu-
dents tested. By it the thirty-four who took the tests were ranged in a series in the
order of their relative standings as determined by current school methods.
The students were then arranged in 15 similar series, the order of merit in each
being determined by the ratings in one of the 15 tests; and each of these 15 series
ADMISSION 51
was compared with the series defined by the schools' ratings by the method of Pearson
correlation coefficients (Appendix, page 119). Every test showed a positive correlation
with this composite school series, the correlation coefficients varying from .% to .8.
This indicates that all the tests are symptomatic of the qualities which enable
a student to enter college young, make a good record in high school and in the Re-
gents' examinations, do well during the freshman year, and be regarded as of high
general ability by his classmates and teachers. When all fifteen tests are combined into
a single measure, the test series and the composite school series are almost identical
(correlation coefficient .84).
The records of the thirty-four men tested at Columbia have been followed for three
years. Five of the seven who stood highest in the tests received general honors, while
five of the seven lowest in the tests failed in more than half of their work and left
school. The top seven all made more than 125 credits in three years, the middle seven
averaged 92 credits each in three years, and of the lowest seven the two who did not
leave averaged 56 points each in three years.
The tests, however, differ in their validity as symptoms of intellectual ability and
should therefore have different weights in making up a summary. The computation
of the relative weights was carried out by Dr. Truman L. Kelley by the method of
partial correlation coefficients. His investigation shows that a suitable combination of
the ratings from only seven of the tests gives a closer correlation with the composite
school series than does the composite of all fifteen (coefficient .87 as against .84). These
seven tests are the five in mathematics and the two in supplying the missing words
from sentences. These seven tests require five hours of the student's time, and their
results arrange the students in an order of intellectual ability practically identical
with that of the composite school series. At present the composite school judgment
is universally accepted as determining fitness to enter college. College entrance exam-
inations consume from fifteen to twenty-five hours of the student's time. These seven
tests gave in this experiment at Columbia as good a rating in five hours, and the scor-
ing is independent of personal bias. Similar results were obtained at the other schools.
To this rather striking fact must be added another no less important ; namely, that
the other eight tests contributed practically nothing to this result. These eight were
paragraph reading, range of vocabulary, giving opposites of words, laboratory prob-
lems in physics, matching diagrams with sentences, completing imperfect diagrams,
physics problems stated in words, and the construction of mechanical devices from their
unassembled parts. The fact that these eight tests are unnecessary in determining an
order of ability that closely resembles the order defined by current school practices
does not mean that they are on that account useless. On the contrary, they are partic-
ularly valuable because they evidently measure abilities of which the current school
methods take no account. Further experimentation is required to determine just what
these other abilities are. They probably include language abilities that depend on
interest in reading, clear grasp of the meaning of single words and phrases, power to
52 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
keep in mind past context in reading a connected passage, skill in working with dia-
grams and apparatus, and mechanical sense. All of these are of prime importance in
engineering. The development of all the men tested is being followed for the purpose
of throwing more light on the questions here raised.
The same fifteen tests were given by Professor Thorndike thru the courtesy of Dean
A. E. Burton to forty freshmen at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, thru
the courtesy of Dean Herman Schneider and with the cordial cooperation of Professor
B. B. Breese to forty-one engineering freshmen at the University of Cincinnati, and
thru the courtesy of Director A. L. Williston to sixty students at the Went worth
Institute in Boston. The students in these groups came from so many different schools
that it was not possible to make a composite rating of their abilities on the basis of
their school records. The college records of these men have been followed for two years,
with the result that in Cincinnati the tests prophesied academic achievement in these
two years as accurately as the college rating for one year prophesied the rating for
the succeeding year (correlation coefficients .64 and .62). At the Massachusetts Insti-
tute the tests prophesied the college ratings for the two years four-fifths as well as
the ratings for one year prophesied those for the succeeding year (correlation coeffi-
cients .49 and .64). The implication is that such tests as these tell as much about
a student before he enters college as the college now knows of him at the end of his
freshman year.
The same tests were given to groups of students at four different institutions.
A comparison shows large differences among the average abilities of the four groups.
This indicates that certain schools, whether because of their locations, their repu-
tations, their student activities, or the excellence of their training, attract boys of
greater innate ability. When further developed and perfected, tests of this type may
make it possible to construct a scale of freshman abilities, by which each school can
measure the quality of each freshman class. It is conceivable that a similar scale to
measure the abilities of the seniors may some day be constructed. Then the difference
in the positions of the freshmen and the seniors on these scales would be a much more
valid criterion of the success of the school work than any now available.
Neither present admission systems nor objective tests take account of several im-
portant factors that in many cases have an important bearing on a student's efficiency
in school work. For example, Professor Thorndike found that during their high school
course two-thirds of the freshmen examined had spent more than 8 hours a week on
work other than school work. The median number of hours per week of such work
reported was 12 during school time and 40 during the summer vacation. Out of 72
freshmen at Columbia and the Massachusetts Institute, 21 reported no outside work,
37 reported from 1 to 9 hours of outside work, 11 from 10 to 19 hours, and 3 more
than 20 hours. At Cincinnati all the engineering students spend half their time in
outside work. One student, who was rated low in the composite school series but who
made an excellent record in the tests, was found to be doing over 40 hours a week of
ADMISSION 53
outside work. It is clear that a record of the amount and the kinds of outside work
done by students would be of value in determining fitness to enter college.
A record of boyish interests and activities might also help to reveal to college ex-
aminers the presence or absence of real engineering bent or temperament. The fresh-
men tested by Professor Thorndike were asked to indicate by numbers their present
preference for bargaining, managing people, studying books, clerical work, mechani-
cal work, farm work, work with animals. In the replies from 90 freshmen mechanical
work was rated first or second 82 times out of a possible 200, which is three times as
often as chance would give, and over three times as often as was the case for a group
of school superintendents at the same age. Out of 103 engineering freshmen who re-
ported on the matter of boyish activities, 91 had constructed on their own initiative
mechanical or scientific devices such as cannons, telegraph lines, telephones, electric
motors, arc lights, gasolene motors, lathes, steam engines, water wheels, boats, etc.
None of the engineering schools at present record this type of information or make
any systematic effort to use it or to interpret its meaning; nor do parents and ele-
mentary school teachers realize the importance of giving young boys and girls oppor-
tunities of expressing their innate mechanical sense in creative work.
Let no one imagine that the tests presented in the Appendix are a final solution of
the college entrance problem. They are but the beginning of an effort to proceed one
step farther in the direction indicated by the development of college entrance systems
during the past twenty years. A large amount of experimentation and cross checking
among different schools must be done to determine the validity of this type of test
and to interpret the results of its use. Enough has been done to show that the princi-
ples of testing here presented are worthy of further investigation and that methods
of procedure have been indicated that point to a safe road of real progress. As these
principles are applied and these methods are developed by many observers in many
schools, it may be possible to liberate college entrance from its present fetters and
place it on a more rational and scientific basis.
The effect of such a development on the quality of preparation for college is sure
to be most beneficial. College professors are at present the only teachers in the school
system who are permitted to teach without one hour of special training for teaching.
With mastery of their respective subjects and the highest idealism and sincerity, they
devise specifications for the content of high school courses, and then enforce those
specifications directly or indirectly by entrance examinations that do not really
measure ability or create the best conditions for its development. When the colleges
are able to define their admission requirements in terms of abilities as measured by
objective tests, instead of in terms of subject-matter covered, it may be possible to lift
the great incubus of ignorance that now oppresses the secondary schools, to supply
the colleges with freshmen much better trained and sorted on the basis of ability,
and to reduce the mortality of 60 per cent to a more reasonable figure.
CHAPTER IX
THE TIME SCHEDULE
WHEN faculties were small and the number of subjects that seemed essential were rel-
atively few, the problem of the time schedule was a fairly simple one. All the neces-
sary courses could be arranged in a compact and consistent program that required
the student to carry not more than 18 credit hours of work at one time and to study
not more than four or five different subjects each term. But as science expanded and
became more intricate, specialization was unavoidable. By 1890 the civil engineer-
ing student had to choose either general civil engineering, or railroad engineering,
or topographical engineering. Similarly the prospective mechanical engineer had to
decide by the end of his second year whether he would follow the general curriculum
in mechanical engineering, or one that specialized in marine, in locomotive, or in mill
engineering. Since 1890 this process of subdivision and specialization has advanced
rapidly, pushing the student's choice of a specialty back into the first year, increas-
ing the required number of credit hours in some cases to as many as 27, and at times
loading his weekly schedule with from eight to thirteen different subjects.
If there is any one point on which practising engineers and teachers of engineer-
ing are in substantial agreement, it is that at present this specialization and subdivi-
sion of curricula has gone too far. The congestion that inevitably results is univer-
sally recognized to be a fruitful source of confusion to the student and a real cause
of superficial work. Attention is distracted from mastery of the subject and encour-
aged to seek ways and means of securing passing grades with minimum effort ; so that
a rigid and exacting department is likely to get more than its share of time and labor.
There is too little time for persistent thinking, too little opportunity to realize the
joy of achievement, and too much inducement to join in the scramble for credits.
There are two obvious methods of relieving congestion, namely, more time or fewer
subjects. A few years ago Harvard University and the University of Missouri expanded
their engineering curricula to six years, partly to relieve congestion and partly to raise
engineering to the rank of a graduate professional study like law and medicine. Both
of these efforts have been abandoned, but Columbia has undertaken to continue the
experiment. The University of Wisconsin for a number of years offered a five-year
curriculum along with the regular four-year one, but this was given up because it
proved to be a haven for "lame ducks" who could not accomplish the regular work in
four years. Cornell still maintains a five-year curriculum and is much pleased with
its operation. The five-year curriculum at Yale consists of two years of specialized
graduate work added to the regular three-year curriculum that leads to the Ph.B.
degree in engineering.
In the matter of fewer subjects a number of the best schools are succeeding in keep-
ing the required number of credit hours below 18 per term, as at Cornell, Ohio State,
THE TIME SCHEDULE 55
Illinois, and Wisconsin. Under these conditions the tendency to congestion is relieved
to a certain extent by having a fairly large number of specialized curricula and allow-
ing some small choice of electives among the technical subjects in the last two years.
Both of these devices really result in a reduction of the amount of subject-matter
by a limitation of its range, and thus bring the schools face to face with the charge of
training narrow specialists instead of broad gauge professional men.
Thus far neither more time nor fewer subjects have as a matter of fact cured con-
gestion. For the amount to be learned in every field is so vast and is increasing so
rapidly that whenever a professor gets more time for instruction, he usually tries to
cover more ground; and this tendency is supported by many of the younger alumni,
who keep suggesting the addition of this, that, or the other bit of information that
was not given them in college, but would have been useful to them on their first jobs
if it had been included in the curriculum. This pressure to keep up to date, combined
with the natural reluctance of every teacher to abandon material he has once worked
up for presentation to the class, is fairly certain to produce congestion even after it
has been temporarily relieved. The real causes of congestion, however, with its well-
known symptoms of mental confusion, superficiality, and scurry for credit, lie deeper.
Their roots penetrate to the methods by which curricula are constructed and the edu-
cational conceptions on which they are based.
Engineering curricula were originally organized on a very different basis from those
in other professional schools. The earliest instruction in law and medicine was given
by the apprenticeship system. As these professions grew, it was found convenient to
gather the apprentices together in groups for class instruction by some particularly
well-qualified practitioner. These classes were then organized into schools controlled
and managed by practitioners, who, until recently, also gave the greater part of the
instruction on a part time basis. The first law and medical schools at universities were
practitioners' schools appended to, but never fully assimilated by, the institutions
to which they were attached. Full time college professors of medicine and law are of
relatively recent date, and even now much of the instruction in these subjects is still
given in university schools by practitioners on a part time basis. The curricula of these
schools, therefore, developed out of apprentice courses and were framed by men in
daily contact with professional work.
In engineering, on the other hand, altho the apprenticeship method of training was
originally employed and is still in extensive use, — about half of the professional engi-
neers in America to-day being shop-trained men (page 19), — this system of training
never developed into engineering schools to any extent. The first engineering schools
were founded by colleges, their professors were college-trained men, and their curric-
ula were devised by college faculties; professors also gave practically all the instruc-
tion with very little assistance from practitioners. For this reason the first technical
schools had a serious struggle to prove that engineers could be trained in schools.
Even now technological schools are classed in the Reports of the United States Bureau
56 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
of Education with universities and colleges ; while schools of law, medicine, theology,
dentistry, pharmacy, and veterinary medicine are classed together as professional
schools.
This dominance of the college of liberal arts in engineering schools has undoubt-
edly been a powerful factor in the development of the engineering profession. The
emphasis still placed in the curriculum on pure science, pure mathematics, and the
humanities, in spite of numerous vigorous attacks on them, is evidence of the extent
to which the ideals of the American college still dominate the technological schools.
But tho this protection of the conception of culture within the engineering schools
has tended to liberalize them and to prevent their becoming too materialistic, it has
not been an unmixed blessing; for that conception has been slow to adapt itself to
the changed conditions produced by engineering, and has tended to preserve several
fundamental practices that are now regarded as the probable causes of congestion and
of other serious difficulties in current curricula.
Prominent among these outgrown practices is the method of constructing and
changing curricula. When the students' hardships have become so obvious that they
can no longer be ignored, a committee is appointed to study the problem and sug-
gest changes. This committee usually requests each department to submit a statement
of its requirements and desires; and, while this is being prepared, compiles a table
showing how much time is allotted by other schools to each of the subjects included
in the curriculum. The departmental statements are also compiled so as to show how
much time is needed to fulfil all their requests. Generally the number of topics each
department considers essential is so large that the hours required to cover them all
would be double or triple the number available. The various claims are then discussed
in committee, reduced within reasonable limits by a process of cut and fit, and the
result reported back to the faculty. In the faculty debate that follows, each depart-
ment presses its claims for more hours, and numerous changes are suggested, debated,
and ordered made or not made by a majority vote. When the matter is settled each
department takes the time awarded to it and uses those hours in any way it likes. In
short, distribution of time among the departments is usually regarded as the chief
function of the faculty. Respect for departmental autonomy forbids any investigation
or scrutiny of the aims, the methods, or the results of the work of any one depart-
ment by the faculty or by any of its committees.
Under present conditions the members of the various departments in engineering
schools are selected in the main because of their abilities as specialists in their re-
spective fields. Since every competent specialist is always an enthusiast over his spe-
cialty, there is no limit to the number of hours he would like to fill or the amount
of information he would like to impart to the students, especially when the work is
conducted by the lecture method. Therefore congestion of the curriculum is inevita-
ble so long as each department remains sole arbiter of the content of its courses,
and there is no coordination among departments with respect to the amount and the
THE TIME SCHEDULE 57
nature of the subject-matter in courses, and no scrutiny of the results of each depart-
ment's work by some agency outside the department. The problem of congestion is
evidently not merely a question of the time schedule, but leads at once to such specific
departmental questions as : What is the minimum mathematical equipment essential
to every engineer, no matter what his special line may be ? What fundamental prin-
ciples of mechanics must be mastered by every engineer ? In developing a mastery of
these principles of mechanics, what coordination of work among the departments of
mathematics, physics, mechanics, and engineering is most effective? Until such inter-
departmental investigations and experiments are the rule everywhere, instead of the
exception, congestion is likely to persist and grow more and more disastrous.
Investigations and experiments of this type are already under way at several
schools. Thus at the Naval Academy an effort is being made in the postgraduate de-
partment to coordinate mathematics with engineering by scanning the subject-mat-
ter of both to eliminate non-essentials, so as to make the treatment of each topic
as brief as is consistent with clear understanding; there is also an earnest effort to
arrange the material in both departments so that the presentation of the practical by
the engineer and of the theoretical by the mathematician come at about the same
time and complement each other.1 Similarly at Cincinnati, many of the problems
used in the mathematics classes are actual industrial problems brought in by the
students from their practical work in commercial shops ; and the work in English is
so organized that theme writing gives outlook to the technical courses and technical
reports are also exercises in English composition.
Important as are experiments of this sort in indicating present tendencies, their
benefits are limited to the schools where they are made, because their results are not
tested by methods easily recognized as valid, and the conclusions derived from them
are not expressed in terms intelligible and convincing to all. To be widely effective,
experiments must be checked by tests that are as free as possible from the personal
equation and the errors of subjective judgment on the part of the experimenter. There-
fore, ultimately, the problem of congestion leads, like the problem of admission, to
the need for more impersonal and generally intelligible methods of testing and meas-
uring the growth of abilities. The invention and perfection by experiment of objec-
tive tests of ability seems to offer the most promising road to progress toward a type
of instruction that places less emphasis on information and more on ability to use
information intelligently — toward greater cooperation among departments and less
of the specialized exclusiveness of departmental autonomy, and hence toward the
relief and the ultimate cure of congestion. This question is discussed further in the
following chapters.
The seriousness of the problem of congestion has been widely recognized. There is,
however, another closely related and equally important problem the significance of
which has not been so fully apprehended; namely, the order of sequence of the various
1 R. E. Root: Engineering Education, vol. vii, pages 190-196, December, 1916.
58 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
courses. In this matter the 1849 curriculum at Rensselaer (page 12) imported a French
style that has been followed implicitly ever since. The conception underlying this and
all later curricula is that engineering is applied science ; and therefore, to teach engi-
neering, it is necessary first to teach science and then to apply it. In conformity with
this conception the first two years of college work are almost universally devoted
wholly to learning the fundamental principles of chemistry, physics, and mathematics.
Only when the student has passed a satisfactory examination on these fundamental
principles and their various non-technical applications is he permitted to work on
engineering projects.
Some of the peculiar effects that result from this universal habit of teaching first
the theory, then the practice, are now beginning to attract attention. Instructors who
are close to freshmen and sophomores tell how bewildered and discouraged the under
classmen often are because, having come to college to study, as they supposed, the
dynamic agencies for doing the world's work, they find themselves merely continuing
their elementary and high school drudgery with books and abstract symbols. Doubt-
less some of the freshman elimination is due to this discouragement, and it has been
suggested that the drop in student grades in the sophomore year (page 33) may be
attributed mainly to this cause. The question has also been raised whether failure to
make good in these preliminary studies as taught, or to succeed in the tests as given,
is really conclusive evidence of lack of engineering ability.
Several of the schools visited have found that the introduction of "orientation11
courses and talks by practising engineers on the real experiences of the engineer's life
are effective means of increasing the interest and strengthening the morale of the
freshmen. A moving picture of an engineering enterprise in action is not without re-
sults. These realistic portrayals of the technique of practice lend reality to the book
work and arouse the professional ambitions of the hearers. The actual participation
in technical work under the cooperative plan at Cincinnati, Akron, and Lafayette, the
summer vacation work in industrial plants, and the summer surveying camps all tend
in the same direction.
Recently the conception that beginners might learn more quickly and thoroughly
if real experiences were coordinated with their study of theory has been carried one
step further by introducing real work into the class work itself. Perhaps the most
striking of the several recent experiments of this kind is that conducted by Professor
C. C. More of the University of Washington. Mechanics is generally placed in the third
year so that the students may be well prepared for it in physics and calculus. The
conventional course begins with the statement of definitions and the deduction of gen-
eral principles, followed by the solution of typical problems. Professor More begins by
asking the student to report on the safety of the sheet piling in a certain cofferdam
whose dimensions and location are pictured and described. Theory and principles are
worked out and proved as they are needed to solve the problem. Calculus and physics
are freely used. This complete reversal of the conventional order proved so success-
THE TIME SCHEDULE 59
ful that last year the same course was tried, including the calculus, on one section of
engineering freshmen, who mastered it with little more trouble than the juniors. As
a result, the entire engineering faculty now sanctions this order of topics from appli-
cation to theory as a great improvement over the older conventional one.1 Other simi-
lar experiments are discussed in subsequent chapters.
Altho the engineering faculty at the University of Washington approve of Pro-
fessor More's new order for teaching mechanics, other instructors in mechanics who
cannot personally observe the results will be slow to follow or inaugurate similar
experiments because there are no generally intelligible objective tests and scales of
ability in terms of which the results may be expressed. For this reason experiments
with the curriculum, either to relieve congestion or to secure more enthusiastic and
intensive work thru variations in the nature and the order of the topics, have at best
a limited effect. So this problem too settles down ultimately to one of inventing and
defining tests and scales to measure variations in ability. Further uses for such scales
are explained in Chapter XI.
1 Cf. W. E. Duckering: Engineering Education, vol. iii, pp. 518-635, May, 1917.
CHAPTER X
CONTENT OF COURSES
ONE of the most striking and universally recognized features of the technological
schools is their lack of agreement on the content of courses that bear the same or simi-
lar titles. Some of the more marked differences in elementary chemistry, English, draw-
ing, and shopwork have been mentioned in Chapter VII (page 38). Obviously the 52
hours of calculus at Rensselaer cannot have the same content as the 216 hours of cal-
culus at the University of Florida (page 24). Some of the courses in mechanics place
great emphasis on the absolute system of units while others use only the engineers'
units. In the treatment of descriptive geometry the number of essential problems
varies from 27 to 86 and the number of fundamental conceptions from 6 to 12. The
teachers of each subject not only do not agree on what equipment in their subject is
essential for an engineer, but they have not yet taken the first step toward such an
agreement, namely, the definition of the criteria that must govern the selection and
the organization of the content of their several courses.
The prevailing wide diversity in the content of courses is clearly a necessary result
of the general confusion as to ends, aims, methods, and rating of instruction. But
while the many strong points in the present system are duly appreciated, it is grad-
ually becoming evident that in training men for so definite a vocation as engineer-
ing, in which the various elements — science, mathematics, language, economics, and
hand work — are so intimately interrelated, some agreement as to aims and some
cooperation among departments in determining the content of courses is absolutely
essential. That this need is recognized at all the schools is evidenced by the numerous
common complaints among departments. The departments of engineering insist that
the preliminary work in mathematics and physics is unsatisfactory because students
who have passed these courses cannot use either mathematics or physics intelligently
in the later technical work. Conversely the teachers of mathematics and physics claim
that the students are poorly prepared in these subjects in high school and that the
engineering departments make unreasonable demands. All the other departments
decry the work in English and foreign languages as inefficient and wasteful of the
students' time.
To remedy these well-recognized difficulties, conference committees are frequently
organized and friendly meetings are held, in which each side explains its point of
view. The resulting changes, however, are few. At one school a professor of mathe-
matics voluntarily attended numerous classes in engineering subjects to get some
notion of the mathematical needs of these courses. The course he devised on the basis
of the information thus secured was so successful that he was called to a more respon-
sible position in another institution ; yet his colleagues did not carry on his experi-
ment. At another school a professor of chemistry conducts a volunteer class in Ger-
CONTENT OF COURSES 61
man in order that the students in chemistry may have a chance to get the practical
mastery of German that every chemist needs. One professor of civil engineering and
one of electrical engineering were found giving regular instruction to volunteers in
English composition, both written and oral.
In spite of the fact that deviations from established practice in teaching are not
encouraged, so that there is an almost universal disinclination to make changes, a few
important experiments are being made for the purpose of discovering more appropri-
ate content for courses. Prominent among these are two in mathematics, one at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology and one at the University of Wisconsin. In
both the aim has been to construct a single two-year course in mathematics in place
of the customary but somewhat unrelated courses in algebra, trigonometry, analyt-
ical geometry, and calculus. Both courses have been published in textbook form;
the former in Woods and Bailey's Course in Mathematics 1 and the latter in Slichter's
Elementary Mathematical Analysis 2 and March and Wolff's Calcuhis.2 While the par-
ticular categories under which the various topics are arranged are very different in
these two courses, the underlying conceptions are similar, in that both attempt to
reorganize the content of the mathematics courses for the purpose of securing a more
logically coherent presentation. Each is a consistent working out of a mathemati-
cian's conception of the mathematical equipment needed by every engineer. This em-
phasis on logical sequence has undoubtedly a fascination to certain types of mind —
teachers of mathematics, for example. Its effectiveness with the great majority of stu-
dents may well be questioned, especially when the logic is expressed in curves and
symbols carefully detached from technical applications. Both of the courses just con-
sidered claim to pay particular attention to applications, but these are mostly of the
non-technical variety. In the Woods and Bailey text, out of 2288 problems for drill
in the application of mathematical principles, only 103 even mention material things;
while in Slichter's book, only 146 out of 1102 problems discuss concrete realities.
The experiments just described are typical of one method of attacking the problem
of finding more significant content for engineering courses. The emphasis in reor-
ganization is placed on more logical and coherent sequence of topics and a better
adaptation to modern scientific theories, with little attention to the introduction of
engineering content into the mathematical forms treated. To some extent the con-
tend of courses in physics and chemistry is being reorganized into more logical and
coherent presentations of current kinetic and ionic theories of matter. The methods
of instruction followed in experiments of this type are usually much the same as
those of the old standard courses.
A second type of reorganization of content is being worked out by Professor H. M.
Goettsch at the University of Cincinnati. After sixteen weeks of preliminary train-
ing very similar to that ordinarily given in courses in elementary chemistry, the fresh-
men work in the laboratory from 8 a.m. to 4.30 p.m. for ten weeks solving problems
1 Two volumes. Ginn & Co., 1907. 2 McGraw-Hill, 1914.
62 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
of industrial chemistry. Projects such as" Make baking powder and determine whether
it is better and cheaper than any you can buy" are assigned without any instructions
or references, and the student is required to work out his own salvation in the library
and the laboratory. In the period of ten weeks he completes a number of these pro-
jects covering a wide range of topics, but little effort is made to present the topics
in logical or any other sort of orderly sequence. Much emphasis is placed on synthetic
work and on the cost of a given product by different processes; while chemical analysis
and the ionic theories of matter, which usually occupy the centre of the stage in chem-
istry courses, here take a subordinate place. The course in mechanics devised by Pro-
fessor C. C. More at the University of Washington (page 58) is another example
of this type of reorganization of content in which the logical sequence of topics is
subordinated to project work, and theory is evolved from rather than illustrated by
problems and experiments. Professor R. M. Bird conducts his course in elementary
chemistry at the University of Virginia on this plan with great success.
The content of courses of this type is clearly determined by considerations both of
logical completeness and of pedagogical vigor. For a series of interesting projects that
does not eventually compel the student to work out a fairly complete conception of
the large theories and the important principles of chemistry is obviously inadequate,
no matter how enthusiastic the students are in their work. On the other hand, altho
the suggestion that an effective course can be constructed as a series of apparently
disconnected projects comes as a shock to those who have grown up with logically
rigorous courses, the value of the enthusiasm engendered by well-chosen projects must
not be overlooked. Our most valuable information and training come from working
out projects that are really worth while; and if this method works in life, why not in
school? Especially since in educational institutions it is always possible to organize
significant projects into a connected series that leaves a well-developed conception
of the whole subject in the student's mind. This has been accomplished in the courses
just mentioned, where the summing up is done after sufficient facts to warrant sum-
maries have been secured. Their success should encourage others to further experi-
ments. The inclusion of considerations of values and costs in the content of these
courses is also an element of enrichment that deserves careful attention.
Those who find a series of projects an unsatisfactory course of instruction, but who
nevertheless wish to make the content real and of great value to the students may
find many worthy suggestions in Professor R. H. FernakTs course in power plants at
the University of Pennsylvania. While the topics in this course follow one another in
a logical sequence, they are chosen largely from engineering practice, and include much
of the practical information every engineer must have when he goes to work. Many
of the problems are actual cases that really occur in engineering, so that they appeal
both to professional instincts and to the sense of values and costs — in fact, many of
them are openly problems that deal with costs of operation and maintenance in work-
ing plants. Yet the course is not a mere mass of useful information ; rather useful
CONTENT OF COURSES 63
information is the vehicle for conveying to the student a firm grasp of fundamental
principles and engineering methods of attacking and analyzing problems not only
from the point of view of scientific theory but also with due consideration of the limita-
tions imposed by practice and by costs. Professor Fernald's course has been published
in textbook form,1 and a number of other schools have adopted it and are following
it with satisfaction.
The emphasis given in this course to the economic aspects of power plant problems
is an encouraging sign of the dawning recognition of the profound importance of this
side of engineering in technological schools. Most of the technical colleges now include
short courses in economic theory, banking, contracts and specifications, etc. ; a few
give some small amount of practice in figuring costs and making bills of materials
from drawings assigned by the instructors. Here and there the attention of the stu-
dents is directed to the practical difficulties of construction and the controlling power
of costs. There has always been and still is a strong aversion on the part of colleges
to placing emphasis on the material and financial aspects of the engineer's work. Yet
it is a burning question whether the commercial bearings of each subject cannot be
introduced into every course in such a way as to increase enormously its use and its
vitality without in the least impairing its inherent scientific value. The enrichment
of the content of courses by judicious appeal to practice and costs is a problem that
offers rich opportunities for further experiment.
But if experiments of this sort are undertaken in large numbers in every school,
there is obviously serious danger of actually becoming too materialistic, thereby sacri-
ficing powers of abstract thought and humanistic ideals on which real progress ulti-
mately depends. Efficiency in the mastery of materials without humane intelligence
to guide and control it is now recognized in all civilized countries as a curse. Hence
great care must be exercised in making these experiments, and every effort must be
made to enforce the truth that mechanical efficiency, while essential to success, is ser-
vant and not master. The opportunity offered to the humanistic studies by this situ-
ation has already been perceived at a number of schools, and many efforts are being
made to alter the content of the courses in English, in history, and in economics to
meet the obvious need. Perhaps the most striking experiment with this aim is that
now being made by Professor Frank Aydelotte in cooperation with the members
of the department of English of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. At this
school English is a required subject for all students throughout the first two years.
The first half of the freshman year is devoted to general composition, with the object
of eliminating the more common errors of construction and of leading the student to
see that excellence in writing comes not so much from the negative virtue of avoid-
ing errors as from the positive virtue of having something to say.
The work of the second term of the freshman year begins with a class discussion
of such questions as : What is the difference between a trade and a profession ? What
1 R. H. Fernald and G. A. Orrok : Engineering of Power Plants, McGraw-Hill, 1916.
64 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
is the meaning of the professional spirit? What should be the position of the engi-
neer in society in this new era of the manufacture of power — that of hired expert or
that of leader and adviser? Is the function of the engineer to direct only the material
forces of nature, or also human forces ? Such questions readily arouse the interest of
engineering students and bring on thoughtful discussion, in which different points
of view are expressed by the students and debated with spirit. Essays by engineers
are then assigned for reading, and after further discussion each student is asked to
write out a statement of his own position on the mooted questions. These themes are
criticized in personal conferences in which faults are corrected by asking the writer
first what he intended to say; and, second, whether the sentence or phrase in ques-
tion really says it, rather than by reference to formal rules of grammar and rhetoric.
Those who have had experience with this work claim that once the habit of self-crit-
icism from the point of view of the idea is established, the student makes astonishing
progress in the ability to express himself clearly and independently; he gathers hints
from all sources ; and in ways too complex for pedagogical analysis he is more likely
to acquire such power over language as he is naturally fitted to possess, than he is by
current formal methods. For the achievement of this complex end, the conventional
instruction in technique is too crude and clumsy to be of more than incidental use.
Having discussed the question : What is engineering ? the class proceeds in the
same manner to wrestle with such problems as : What is the aim of engineering edu-
cation ? What is the relation between power of memory and power of thought ? Is
there any connection between a liberal point of view and capacity for leadership?
What qualities do practical engineers value most highly in technical graduates? What
is the relation between pure science and applied ? What is the relation of science to
literature ? The authors read in connection with the discussion gradually change from
engineers to scientists like Huxley and Tyndall, and then to literary men like Ar-
nold, Newman, Carlyle, and Ruskin. The student seems to read this material with
no less keen interest than was shown for the writings of engineers ; so that thru his
own written and oral discussion of masterly essays each comes to work out for him-
self some rational connection between engineering, with which he began, and litera-
ture, with which he ends. No orthodox point of view is prescribed; his own reason is
the final authority. The aim is to raise questions which it may take half a lifetime to
answer, but the thoughtful consideration of which will give a saner outlook on life
and on his profession.
A similar experiment along analogous lines is being made by Professor Karl Young
and his colleagues in the department of English at the University of Wisconsin.
Reports indicate that this type of course is a great success there also. The materials
used in both these courses have been reprinted in book form for the convenience of
the classes.1
^ydelotte: English and Engineering. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1917; The Oxford Stamp, Essay X. New York:
Oxford Press, 1917 ; Foerster, Manchester & Young: Essays for College Men. New York: Holt, 1913.
CONTENT OF COURSES 65
The four typical experiments just described indicate that the reorganization of the
content of courses is being attempted with a wide variety of aims, such as more logical
coherence, better pedagogical organization, greater emphasis on the economic phases
of the work, or a broader and more humanistic outlook. Many other aims are con-
ceivable, and many combinations of these four are possible, so that there is unlimited
opportunity for the further experiments that are needed as a basis for the reconstruc-
tion of the curriculum. The current method of framing curricula by first distributing
the student's time among the various subjects by faculty action and then allowing
each department to fill in its quota as it sees fit leads to the impossible conditions
discussed in the preceding chapter. The way out lies in the direction of reversing the
process; that is, first determining by cooperative faculty investigation what equip-
ment in each subject is essential to every engineer, and then requiring each depart-
ment to discover by experiment how much time is necessary to give adequate control
of that essential equipment to the promising students.
In order to carry out this suggestion, entrance requirements must first be placed
on some such basis as that described in Chapter VIII, so that the technical school can
be reasonably sure that the majority of the students admitted show promise of suc-
cess in engineering. Then for each of the fundamental subjects common to all engineer-
ing curricula an answer must be found by cooperation among all departments to the
question :
What is the minimum equipment essential to every engineer, no matter what spe-
cialty he may eventually choose ? The answers to this question must be stated in terms
of ability to accomplish rather than in the customary terms of topics to recite; for
example, the familiar "algebra through quadratics" must read "ability to make alge-
braic computations as difficult as required in solving for x in
x + a x-a x2 _ „
x-a x + a aP-x2 ~
After such statements of the minimum essentials have been secured, the respective
departments will be able to construct their courses intelligently and to devise objec-
tive means of testing their progress.
There are at present two serious obstacles to carrying out the plan here proposed.
One is the reverence for departmental autonomy, which makes all departments reti-
cent about making suggestions to one another and inclines each department to regard
any suggestion from another as unwarranted tampering with vested rights rather than
as an intelligent effort to benefit the students. The other is the lack of generally intel-
ligible and transferable scales and methods of testing. These two obstacles deprive
such experiments as are being made of the greater part of their potential usefulness, —
the former by limiting the scope of the experiment by the bias inevitable to every
specialist, and the latter by making it impossible for the experimenter to state his
conclusions in terms that are convincing to others. The chances for real progress in
vitalizing the content of courses are increased in proportion as departments cooperate
66 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
in defining the minimum essentials and as scales of ability and methods of testing
are liberated from the errors of individual judgment. It is here that the teacher has
his greatest opportunity for creative work; for when the content of a course is well
chosen and the subject-matter is effectively organized to meet both the scientific and
the human requirements, the game is worth the candle for the student and he plays it
with energy and zest.
CHAPTER XI
TESTING AND GRADING
ABOUT half of the schools visited grade students on a numerical scale of 0 to 100,
with pass marks varying from 50 to 70. Two grade on a scale from 0 to 4, one having
3 and the other 2 for the passing mark. The remaining schools ostensibly grade on
literal scales (with per cent values attached) ; but of these, three have three grades
above pass, designated respectively by A, B, C, or M, P, C, or C, P, L; and two have
four grades above pass, indicated in the one case by A, B, C, D, and in the other by
D, G, P, N. As a result, whenever a student transfers his credit from one school to
another, it is very difficult to evaluate his record and determine his status in the
institution to which he comes. Tho all student grades are apparently reducible to
numerical values, a grade of 88 is hard to interpret even when you know the school
and the instructor that gave it, because each school and each instructor has a per-
sonal equation in grading.
After one year's experience with a group of students, a teacher of mathematics, for
example, undoubtedly possesses more information concerning the mathematical in-
terests and abilities of these students than can possibly be ascertained by a few hours
of examination or testing. But his knowledge is largely in the form of personal ex-
perience and intuitions based thereon, which cannot be expressed in the usual record
blanks and so is seldom transferred to other departments. The knowledge now pos-
sessed by the teachers in a school of engineering, tho abundant, is not accessible
thru records; but is segregated in departments and individuals, and confused by per-
sonal equations. Even tho ability to secure high grades in school and college seems
to be a stable characteristic of an individual (page 36), employers have long since
learned that college records are precarious guides in selecting men for jobs.
About ten years ago Professor Max Meyer of the University of Missouri started
a campaign to eliminate the personal idiosyncrasies of individual instructors from
academic ratings by requiring every professor to distribute his grades over his classes
approximately according to the probability curve. It was pointed out that when all
the students at a university are arranged in the order of their average grades, about
fifty per cent are found grouped about the middle grade, with about 25 per cent
higher and 25 per cent lower. Hence the University of Missouri defines its grading
system thus: "In classes sufficiently large to exclude accidental variations, approxi-
mately 50 per cent shall receive the grade M (medium) ; to the great majority of the
25 per cent above M the grade S (superior) shall be given; and to the few most ex-
cellent students the grade E shall be assigned; the majority of the 25 per cent below
M shall receive the grade I (inferior), and the minority shall be given the grade F
(failure)." l In order to render the grading significant to the students, 30 per cent
1 Hyde : Proceedings of the Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education, vol. xxi, p. 175, 1913.
68 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
excess credit is granted for all work done with a grade of E, 15 per cent excess for
work of grade S, and a 20 per cent reduction of credit is made for work of grade I.
The results of this experiment at Missouri and of similar investigations at other
schools indicate that considerable progress is being made toward reducing the number
of professors who either mark most of their students A or else fail a large percentage
of them. The mere presentation without comment to each member of the faculty of
his own grade distribution curve superposed on the average curve for the whole
institution has been found to reduce abnormalities in grading without discussion or
faculty action. Clearly this work is developing in the same direction as are the entrance
requirements (page 49) ; namely, toward a reduction of the errors in grading that
result from personal equations. There is need and opportunity for further effort to
stabilize the distribution of grades along the lines of this experiment.
The study of the distribution of grades is now expanding in the direction of search-
ing for the reasons for strikingly anomalous curves. In the schools visited a number of
cases were found in which from 50 to 75 per cent of the students who graduated had
received grades just slightly higher than the pass mark (page 34). Experience shows
that when so large a fraction of a class receive such low grades there is some serious
difficulty, which can usually be removed by investigation (page 35). As a result of nu-
merous such studies it appears that the grading systems in current use possess several
inherent characteristics which have been accepted so long as a matter of course that
their normal effect on the distribution of grades seems to have been largely overlooked.
Prominent among such characteristics are the convention of granting the same amount
of academic credit for all grades of work above the pass mark, and the habit of leav-
ing the definition of the basis of testing and grading in each subject wholly in con-
trol of the instructors who do the teaching.
The harmful influence of both of these characteristics of current marking systems
is very generally recognized. Every college teacher knows well that many of the
ablest students regard it as an evidence of poor management on their part if they get
grades very much above the pass mark. College authorities have sought to break up
this student tradition by offering academic honors of one sort or another, like Phi
Beta Kappa, Tau Beta Pi, Sigma Xi, or honorable mention on the commencement
program. A further and more effective step has been taken by the University of Mis-
souri in granting excess credit for high grades, as just described. Other schools are
trying the experiment of adding to the regular grading a system of honor points, so
framed as to prevent the student from graduating on mere pass grades. But even
these devices do not render the grades intelligible to employers and to other colleges,
nor do they always inspire the student to maximum effort. The West Point grading
system (page 28), on the other hand, does act as a real incentive to good work and as
a genuine support for the maintenance of the honor system.
The reasons why grades under present conditions do not act as real incentives to
good work are very similar to the reasons why payment of wages to workers on the
TESTING AND GRADING 69
basis of time spent at work fails to result in maximum output and even tends to scale
down the efficiency of the skilful to that of the slothful. So long as the credit in both
cases is determined mainly by the time consumed, the only accomplishment demanded
being a certain minimum below which the job cannot be held, so long there is no real
incentive to speed up and show mettle. Hence workmen "soldier "and even deliberately
unite to deceive their employer as to how much work an able and ambitious worker
can do in a day ; and students have been known to practise analogous tricks on pro-
fessors. All of which has a decided tendency to concentrate grades in a small area on
the safe side of the pass mark. The device of granting bonus credit for high grades,
while it improves the situation, is not likely to effect a real cure until grades are a
truer measure of achievement than is at present the case. For the students know as
well as anybody that college grades are very ineffective measures of the type of abil-
ity that wins recognition in the world's work — they know of too many notable ex-
amples that fortify their own personal observations and convictions in the matter.
The real cure for "soldiering" in college work has already been found and put into
practice in one department, namely athletics. There the students submit gladly to rig-
orous discipline and exert themselves to the utmost in the games because the work
appeals to them as thoroughly worth while and the score is a valid and objective mea-
sure of achievement. In their studies, on the other hand, the game does not always
seem worth the candle, and their scores often depend as much on their ability to con-
form to the personal points of view of their instructors as on their real achievement
in mastering materials. For under present conditions each department — frequently
each individual instructor — sets all examinations and tests and determines the rela-
tive merits of the students by means of individual, subjective standards. College boys
understand this perfectly, for it is not unusual to find bright ones among them who
win high grades by studying the instructor rather than the subject. Obviously here,
as in the case of admission, the need is for more objective methods of measuring
student progress and more assurance that the tests used are tests of the abilities the
engineer needs to have developed, rather than of something else the exact nature of
which is at best vague, uncertain, and undefined.
The analysis of a large number of the examination papers and quiz questions in
current use reveals the chief reasons for the vagueness and uncertainty of the results
secured by conventional methods of testing. A large proportion of the questions can
be answered by reciting or writing memorized words, phrases, or equations. How can
the instructor decide whether correct answers to these questions mean merely a reten-
tive memory, or whether they indicate clear understanding of the relations involved,
or an ability to use them in practice? Again, many of the questions call for verbal
descriptions of apparatus or processes. The answers to questions of this sort are fre-
quently so ambiguous that it is impossible for the teacher to tell whether the stu-
dents do not understand the subject, or whether they are unable to express themselves.
Hence different instructors make estimates that may vary from 30 to 80 on the same
70 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
paper ; and there are no means of deciding as to which estimate is best. Finally, little
effort is made to arrange the questions in their order of difficulty, by placing the easi-
est first and the most difficult last. Occasionally some questions are given greater
weight than others, but the assignment of weights is apt to be an act of arbitrary
judgment on the part of the instructor.
Since tests control teaching, it is obvious that one of the most effective methods
of attacking the teaching problem is thru the study of tests. For the purpose of mak-
ing a beginning of such a study aimed at removing some of the ambiguities of cur-
rent examination practice, Professor E. L. Thorndike of Columbia University devised
for seniors in electrical engineering a series of objective tests, analogous to those used
in his experiments with freshmen (page 49). In planning the tests, and selecting the
types of activity that seemed most likely to reveal abilities essential to engineering,
Professor Thorndike was assisted by a volunteer committee consisting of Messrs. E. B.
Katte, Chief Electrical Engineer of the Grand Central Terminal, New York ; L. D.
Norsworthy, Professor of Civil Engineering at Columbia University; F. P. Keppel,
Dean of Columbia College; J. W. Roe, Professor of Mechanical Engineering at Shef-
field Scientific School at Yale; the secretary of the Carnegie Foundation; and the
author of the present study. Descriptions of the tests used in this experiment are given
in the Appendix (pages 117, 118).
While some of these tests appear at first sight very similar to ordinary examina-
tions, they are, as a matter of fact, constructed on very different principles. In the first
place each test is intended to measure a specific ability, such as arithmetical compu-
tation, geometric construction, paragraph reading, understanding of words, mechani-
cal dexterity, or comprehension of diagrams. Each of these is a single activity, altho
requiring a complicated coordination of psychological processes. Then the tasks are so
selected that their accomplishment can be indicated with little or no use of words,
so that ability to perform the task is not confused with powers of verbal expression ;
and the errors of personal judgment in deciding whether an answer is right or wrong
are reduced to a minimum. Because of this independence of the personal equation,
results obtained by these tests at different schools, or at the same school at different
times, are comparable with one another. Moreover, tests of this kind are capable of
indefinite extension by alternative tests that give commensurable results. In this way
the danger of cramming for any one set test may be avoided ; since after the success-
ful type has been found, it is a relatively simple matter to construct ten or twenty
alternate tests on the same pattern. Again, the successive tasks on each test are
arranged in the order of difficulty, beginning with one that can be correctly met by
almost all students of the degree of training in question, and progressing gradually
to one that can be done by only a very few of the most gifted. Such a test is a scale
up which the student climbs to the extent of his ability in the particular type of
activity under scrutiny ; so that, when the test is well constructed, his relative rank
is determined without ambiguity by the difficulty of the task he can successfully
TESTING AND GRADING 71
master, rather than by an estimate of how much credit must be given for a partially
completed task.
Thru the courtesy of Mr. C. R. Dooley of the Westinghouse Electric and Manu-
facturing Company at Pittsburgh, these tests were tried out on a group of forty engi-
neering graduates employed by that company as graduate apprentices. These appren-
tices are given very varied tasks, are observed by superior officers with a view to per-
manent employment, and are given ratings on a series of essential characteristics by
every foreman under whose direction they work. The essential characteristics used in
these ratings are: physique, personality, knowledge, common sense, reliability, open-
mindedness, tact, initiative, attitude, originality, industry, enthusiasm, thoroughness,
system, analysis, decision, English, and ability. In addition to these ratings by fore-
men, the two officers of the educational department of the company who are in closest
touch with the work of the apprentices rank them after they have been there about
nine months, for general ability and for order of choice for employment by the com-
pany. The apprentices themselves were also asked to rate one another, as far as
acquaintance permitted, for promise of success in engineering.
The ratings thus obtained from the records by foremen, the estimates by the edu-
cational experts, the opinions of the apprentices themselves, and the tests were com-
pared in many different ways. Unfortunately the college records of the apprentices
could not be used, because so many different colleges with incommensurable grading
systems were represented in the group. As a result of the analysis it appeared that
the foremen's ratings would give as good a record if they used the six qualities —
ability, analysis, originality, thoroughness, enthusiasm, and common sense — instead
of the eighteen just mentioned. The order determined by the ratings by half the
foremen agreed fairly well with the order determined by the ratings of the other half
(correlation coefficient .48); and the order of merit in the judgment of one expert
agreed fairly well with the order according to the judgment of the other (correlation
coefficient .53) ; but the foremen's order and the expert's order did not agree so well
(correlation coefficient .24). The correlation of the order given by the tests with the
foremen's order was also .24 and with the expert's order .37.
The orders of merit given by the four different ratings were finally combined into
a single order, which most probably represented the best order as determined by all
available information. The individual orders were found to correlate about equally
well with this composite (correlations are: foremen's records .73, tests .71, appren-
tices .70, experts .60). Hence in this case the tests, which require eight hours' time,
appear to give as reliable an order of merit as do the judgments of either the experts,
the foremen, or the apprentices themselves after six months of experience with the
men in a specially well-organized industrial company. This does not mean that these
tests are infallible, for even a perfect measure of achievement under one set of con-
ditions would probably be in error, just as the judgment of experts would be in
error, as a prophecy of later years of work under different conditions. The subsequent
72 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
careers of those tested must be followed for a number of years and many other simi-
lar experiments must be made before the validity of any set of tests can be definitely
established. It does mean, however, that, in a given case, a systematic test of eight
hours may detect engineering ability and prophesy engineering success as effectively
as expert personal inspection of actual work over a period of several months. It is
this possibility that makes experimentation with this type of test so well worth while.
The tests herewith presented are in no sense final. They are first approximations,
requiring much study and trial for their perfection. Those who have studied these
experiments closely are convinced, however, that the method of attack here used is
sound, and that progress in the direction here indicated is both safe and sure.
Many experiments with objective tests of the type here described have been made
in recent years in elementary and secondary schools. Similar tests are being tried on
a very extensive scale on the members of the new national army by Major Yerkes, the
well-known psychologist, who has accepted a commission in the army for this purpose.
Industries, too, are beginning to look to these tests to guide them in the selection and
placing of workmen, in the hope of reducing the labor turnover that is costing the
country several hundred million dollars a year. Altho the movement is still in its
infancy, enough has been done to forecast what may be accomplished by further scien-
tific work in this field. In engineering, for example, it is conceivable that before long
admission to college and achievement in college may be liberated from the bondage
of personal equations as grading becomes less a matter of individual bias and more a
valid record of actual accomplishment. Then college grades may be transferable among
colleges; then academic marks may become significant to employers; then the results
of educational experiments may be stated in convincing terms; and then students may
come to respect their records and strive to beat them without artificial stimuli in the
way of academic honors and credit bonuses.
The greater the number of schools that undertake experiments with tests, the more
rapid the progress toward the attainment of these ends. It is not a question of merely
superposing a few tests of the type described on the present examination and grad-
ing system. Such superposition may well be a first step; but ultimately it is a ques-
tion of working the whole testing and marking system to a more objective basis, and
this is a long and laborious task. For the final rating must include and express the
enormous amount of information which teachers now gather about students by inspec-
tion of their work and by the regular examinations, quizzes, and reports, in terms that
are intelligible for scientific and practical use. Then a rating becomes a safe instru-
ment for vocational guidance, which is, after all, the fundamental problem of the
schools.
When grading is conceived as an instrument of vocational guidance, rather than as
an expression of the degree to which an individual has succeeded in conforming to an
established order of things, more information is needed than can be secured from pres-
ent tests and examinations. It is a striking fact that while most schools grade merely
TESTING AND GRADING 73
on academic work, most industries rate men on personal traits like character, initia-
tive, tact, accuracy, responsibility, and common sense. This fact has led a number of
schools to supplement their regular grades with estimates of personal qualities such
as these. At Purdue, the University of Kentucky, Pennsylvania State College, and
other engineering schools, elaborate records of personal impressions of students are
kept on file and used with effect in guiding students into suitable positions. Usually
the record card has the names of a number of the desired qualities printed on it, and
the instructor is asked to place a grade mark opposite each. Sometimes each instructor
does this in private, sometimes the grades are assigned after discussion in depart-
mental meetings. In either case considerable difficulty is experienced in selecting the
qualities to be graded and in deciding on the proper grade to be given to each individ-
ual for each of the qualities selected. Among the many schemes that have been devised
for this purpose two seem to be particularly suggestive to schools of engineering.
The first of these schemes was devised by Professor W. D. Scott of the Carnegie
Institute of Technology for the use of large business organizations in selecting em-
ployees and executives, and is now being used by the War Department at Washington
for grading army officers. The qualities selected for grading in this case are: 1. Physique,
including bearing, neatness, voice, energy, and endurance ; 2. Intelligence, including ease
of learning, capacity to apply knowledge, ability to overcome difficulties; 3. Leader-
ship, including self-reliance, initiative, decisiveness, tact; and ability to command obe-
dience, loyalty, and the cooperation of men; 4. Character, including loyalty, reliability,
sense of duty, carefulness, perseverance, and the spirit of service ; and 5. General value
to the service as a drill master, a leader in action, an administrator, and one who can
arrive quickly at a sensible decision in a crisis. Each officer who grades candidates on
these qualities is required to construct a personal scale of reference for each quality
by writing down a list of five officers of his acquaintance, the first of whom seems to
possess the specific quality in a preeminent degree, and the last of whom has as little
of it as any one he knows. The third man is then selected as a mean between the two
extremes, and the second and fourth as means between the middle and the top men
or the middle and the bottom men respectively. The various grades are given numeri-
cal ratings from 15 for the highest to 3 for the lowest. The advantages of such scales
are apparent, since it is obviously easier to place a candidate on the scale by com-
parison with other men, than it is to make a numerical estimate of such composite
and abstract conceptions as intelligence or leadership. The method has proved so suc-
cessful in operation that an Army Personnel Committee with Professor Scott in charge
has been established as an addition to the Adjutant General's office in Washington
to supervise this and other activities involved in sorting, grading, and testing men
for all kinds of army work.
The second suggestive method of rating personal qualities as a help to vocational
guidance has been used in the University of Cincinnati for a number of years. The
characteristics selected for rating in this case are of a very different sort, and are ar-
74 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
ranged in pairs of related opposites as follows : (a) physical strength — physical weak-
ness; (b) mental — manual; (c) settled — roving; (d) indoor — outdoor; (e) directive —
dependent ; (f) original (creative) — imitative ; (g) small scope — large scope ; (h) adapt-
able— self-centred ; (i) deliberate — impulsive; (j) music sense; (k) color sense; (I) man-
ual accuracy — manual inaccuracy; (m) mental accuracy (logic) — mental inaccuracy;
(ri) concentration — diffusion; (6) rapid mental coordination — slow mental coordi-
nation; (p) dynamic — static. These pairs of related opposites are printed on blanks,
and each instructor is asked to express his judgment of each student by checking one
or the other of each pair. The independent votes of the instructors are summarized in
the central office. The method of using this type of rating is obvious. No one would
think of advising a man of settled, indoor, dependent, self-centred, and static tem-
perament to undertake a job as superintendent of construction on a large viaduct or
bridge.
Under present conditions, when current testing and grading systems are more
largely estimates of the amount of static information possessed than of dynamic abil-
ities, it is evident that ratings of personal characteristics and dispositions are essen-
tial for vocational guidance. Whether this will be so or not when grades have been
made to express abilities, whether correlations will be found between various tem-
peraments and various types of ability or not remains an open question for further
study. In the meantime there is no investigation that is likely to give larger returns
in fruitful progress than the scientific investigation of testing and grading systems;
for tests control teaching, and objective records of achievement are one of the most
potent means of releasing creative energy in both students and faculty.
CHAPTER XII
SHOPWORK
IN American technical schools shopwork still occupies a rather anomalous position.
Few teachers of the mechanic arts have been granted the title "Professor," and the
work itself is seldom recognized as being intrinsically of " university grade." Yet no
one denies that it is an essential element in the equipment of every engineer ; and
therefore it has been tolerated by engineering faculties and allowed to develop as best
it could. As a result there is no agreement as to the purposes and methods of shop-
work. Nearly every school has a shop philosophy and a well-organized shop method
of its own.
The first engineering school, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, was not financially
able in the beginning (1824) to support shops of its own. Therefore the founder
directed " that with the consent of the proprietors, a number of well-cultivated farms
and workshops in the vicinity of the school be entered on the records of the school
as places of scholastic exercises for the students, where the application of the sciences
may be most conveniently taught." The students were required in the first three
weeks of the first term (page 11) to "examine the operations of artists and manu-
facturers at the school workshops under the direction of a professor or assistant, who
shall explain the scientific principles upon which such operations depend, four hours
on each of six days in every week." This plan is identical in principle with that now
in use at the Sheffield Scientific School at Yale. There the students spend their whole
time for three weeks before the opening of the second year in a well-organized course
of this sort called " mechanical technology." The boys do no actual manual work in
shops. The purpose of the course as stated in the catalogue is : "to acquaint the stu-
dent with the terms and processes in use in manufacturing and power plants, and to
give him some personal contact with engineering work before taking up his studies
in the classroom and the drafting room."
It will be noted that this type of course gives the student opportunity for first-
hand observation, study, and discussion of the mechanical technique of production
under real commercial conditions, but does not give him either manual skill and the
"feel" of the machine that come only from actual use of tools, or acquaintance with
the habits and the outlook of workmen. Hence the benefits derived from this work
are perhaps more like those derived from inspection trips, the value of which is un-
questioned.
A totally different solution of the shop problem is presented at the Worcester Poly-
technic Institute. At the founding of this school (1868) the Hon. Ichabod Washburn
gave funds with which to establish a small manufacturing plant on the campus. In
order to furnish a real shop atmosphere, twenty or more skilled journeymen are regu-
larly employed and articles of commercial value are manufactured and sold in the
76 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
open market. The students work side by side with these journeymen, but are relieved
by them of much of the drudgery that comes from the too frequent repetition of the
same operation. The instruction is given by means of a series of graded exercises upon
machine parts required for the business of the shop.
In his inaugural address as first president of Rose Polytechnic Institute in 1883
President C. O. Thompson, who originally organized the shops at Worcester, tells us
that this work was guided by the conviction that the more the students understand
the nature and the difficulties of actual practice, and the more they use theoretical
principles under conditions as like as possible to those of real practice, the greater are
their chances of becoming competent and successful engineers. Mere contact with prac-
tical work, however, is not enough. For the best results the student's work must be
subjected to the inexorable tests of business, so that he feels responsibility in the use
of valuable materials, and the stimulus that comes from knowing that he is making
something that some one else wants but cannot make for himself. Without the con-
struction of articles whose workmanship is subjected to the objective test of salability
in the open market, shopwork is liable to exalt the purely abstract aspect of mechan-
ical knowledge.
The shops at Worcester are still run as a manufacturing plant on a commercial
basis. But in addition to the regular instruction in shop practice and the construc-
tion of articles for sale, much attention is now given there to modern methods of "sci-
entific management." The students analyze the cost of production into its elements,
and determine the relative values of different methods of construction to meet the
limitations of manufacture and the market price. The organization and operation of
the manufacturing work of the shop furnish materials for the study of accounting,
time cards, depreciation, inventories, overhead costs, purchasing, and selling.
The Worcester plan, it will be noted, seeks to coordinate the shop instruction with
real conditions of industrial production in such a way that the students secure, in the
least possible time, manual skill with tools, understanding of the principles of machine
construction, and first-hand knowledge of manufacturing and commercial methods.
The manufacturing shop is a working model for the study of the technique of business
and of practice. The productive nature of the work and the objective test of its sala-
bility are two of its important characteristics that tend to make the experience signi-
ficant to the students.
Among the schools visited, two others, the University of Illinois and Pennsylvania
State College, regard the production of salable articles as an essential element of
school shopwork. At the University of Illinois the shop has been recently organized as
a manufacturing plant for the production of a two-cylinder gasoline engine. No effort
is made to market the machine, yet no difficulty has been experienced in disposing of
the entire output to the students and their friends. Manual skill is not made a spe-
cial aim, and there is no series of graded exercises to teach the fundamental operations.
The 300 or more operations required for the construction of the machine are all stand-
SHOPWORK 77
ardized, and instruction sheets, like those regularly used in scientifically managed
shops, are carefully followed by the students in all their work. All finished parts are
tested and faulty ones rejected.
No paid journeymen are employed, but each section of the class is organized as a
working unit, consisting of workmen, foremen, tool-room attendants, production man-
ager, storekeeper, inspectors, etc. Each student is moved periodically from one type
of work to another in such a way that when his three semesters of shopwork are com-
pleted he has performed all the essential functions of operating the plant.
Each student is graded according to his efficiency in production. Since every shop
operation is standardized and has an experimentally set time limit, efficiency is de-
fined in terms of the actual time taken and the standard time. Grades are posted each
week and, like all objectively determined grades, they stimulate great rivalry for maxi-
mum efficiency. The importance of careful planning and complete utilization of time
is forcefully impressed, for the several sections are regarded as rival teams, and no
student dares waste time in shop lest his team fall behind.
In this Illinois plan construction is still an integral part of instruction ; but the
omission of the journeyman mechanics shifts the emphasis from actual commercial
production, subject to the objective test of salability in the open market, to instruc-
tion about methods of commercial production. The shop becomes a "shop laboratory,""
and the manipulations there partake of the nature of experiments designed to verify
the principles of production that are operative in the industrial world, rather than
to solve problems that arise in connection with their productive activities. As in most
current laboratory work, the chief problem for the student is likely to be that of fol-
lowing directions intelligently, rather than that of finding the answers to questions
that cannot be answered without making laboratory tests.1
The shopwork at the great majority of American technical schools is based upon
a notion that is very different from those that have just been presented. This notion
has existed for many years, but it was given great prominence by President Runkle of
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1876. President Runkle was so much
impressed by an exhibit of Russian shopwork at the Centennial Exposition in Phila-
delphia that he immediately addressed a special report on this subject to the Cor-
poration of the Institute under date of July 19, 1876. He explains that in the Rus-
sian system all construction has been analyzed into a number of typical operations
which may be arranged in groups, each of which involves the use of a distinct type
of tool. The novice makes most rapid progress if he is first trained in the so-called
"fundamental shop operations1' without any idea of making any useful article. In-
struction in the use of tools is thus entirely separated from construction or produc-
tion ; so that only after the student has satisfactorily achieved skill in filing, turning,
boring, forging, and the like, is he permitted to construct anything. Since the tools
1 Cf. B.W. Benedict: Shop Instruction at the University of Illinois. Bulletin, Society for the Promotion of Engineer-
ing Education, vol. vi, pp. 234-257, December, 1915.
78 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
required for instruction in the fundamental operations are relatively simple, it is pos-
sible at reasonable expense to equip an "instruction shop" that will accommodate as
many students as one teacher can instruct at the same time, thereby securing the
greatest economy of both time and money. Besides, the more expensive construction
shops are not essential at a school, since the young engineer, after graduating in such
a course, will find no difficulty in completing his practical education in great manu-
facturing works.
President Runkle was very enthusiastic about this type of shop organization, call-
ing it "a fundamental and complete solution of this most important problem of prac-
tical mechanism for engineers." As a result, instruction shops were established at the
Massachusetts Institute and are still being operated with great success as instruction
shops pure and simple. The work is now so thoroughly well organized that about 300
hours of training suffices to give a young mechanic skill in the fundamental opera-
tions of his trade. The director of these shops, Mr. R. H. Smith, has published his
instruction sheets in two excellent handbooks of shop practice.
The inference that President Runkle drew from his study of the Russian exhibit at
the Centennial Exposition, namely, that the instruction shops might be totally sepa-
rated from the construction shops without loss of educational value for engineers, was
very generally accepted as sound; so that the majority of college shops were and still
are organized on that basis. Undoubtedly the fact that the instruction shops were less
expensive to equip and maintain than the construction shops made this division even
more attractive at a time when funds were scarce and the financial problem loomed
large before the schools. Certain it is that in the great majority of schools there is no
direct connection between shopwork and industrial production.
This type of shopwork met a real need when it was first introduced, forty years
ago. At that time skill in machine tool work was often a real asset to a young engi-
neer in securing his first job. Manufacturing shops were not so numerous nor so well
organized as they are to-day. Under the present changed conditions, the question
is now being seriously debated whether the shop courses in the engineering colleges
ought to be altogether abolished. This question has been answered in the negative at
the University of Illinois by the recent conversion of the shops into shop laboratories
designed to teach the principles of industrial production, as just described. On the
other hand, the University of Cincinnati has answered it in the affirmative by the
establishment of its well-known cooperative plan.
The Cincinnati plan was first formulated by Dean Herman Schneider in 1899, while
he was an instructor in civil engineering at Lehigh University. In 1902 Dean Schneider
presented a full statement of his scheme to the directors of several large industrial
firms which were considering the establishment at Pittsburgh of a new technical school
to give an engineering training that would be better suited to industrial needs than
that then given in the engineering colleges. This plan was abandoned when Mr. Carne-
gie founded the Carnegie Institute of Technology in the City of Pittsburgh. Finally,
SHOPWORK 79
in 1906, Dean Schneider found an opportunity to make his experiment at the Uni-
versity of Cincinnati.
The mechanism of the scheme is very simple. The students are divided into two
groups, one of which is assigned to work in industrial plants while the other goes to
school. At the end of each bi-weekly period the two groups change places, so that the
shops and the school are always full-manned. In the shops the students work as regu-
lar workmen for pay, but the nature of their work and the length of time each stays
on any particular job are subject to approval by the university. The emphasis of the
school work is on theory and principles, but these are well interrelated with the shop-
work by "coordinators," who visit each student during each shop period and then meet
the several groups during the university periods in special "coordination" classes for
this purpose.
The curriculum is completed in five years of 11 months each, so that each student
receives 27 months of university instruction. Since the regular four-year curriculum
in other schools requires about 36 months of actual instruction, it would seem at first
glance that the Cincinnati curriculum could not give as full a training in fundamentals
as is given elsewhere. This inference, however, is wholly unwarranted, because in the
27 months of industrial work the student gets a vast amount of practical knowledge
which is given in other schools in information courses, and because the close coordina-
tion with practice makes the theory more intelligible and significant to the students.
The graduates of Cincinnati have unquestionably as extensive a training in theory as
have those of other first class schools. In addition, the Cincinnati graduates are able
to command engineering positions at graduation without one — or two — year "ap-
prentice" courses, such as are required of men from other schools by a number of the
large corporations.
About one hundred of the industrial firms of Cincinnati and the vicinity are now
cooperating with the university in this work. These firms represent every important
phase of engineering, so that the university is able to arrange the work schedules in
such a way that each student progresses regularly thru every phase of his specialty,
from the crude and rough work to the more difficult and responsible positions. For
example, a civil engineer usually begins with pick and shovel as a member of a gang
repairing track. If he elects railroad work, he will progress to switch and signal work,
to bridge work, to general engineering work in the engineering department, and to
evaluation work. He will learn how to run regular trains and work trains, how to place
and operate the equipment for repairs or new construction, and how to calculate cuts
and fills — all as part of the regular work on a "real railroad." The employers, on the
other hand, also benefit by the arrangement; they have found the labor of the "co-op"
students both reliable and profitable.
Financially the cooperative plan is very economical both for the university and
for the students. The university has access without expense to shops and shop equip-
ment that are worth millions of dollars and are never allowed to deteriorate or be-
80 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
come antiquated. Since only half the students are in school at any one time, the same
school equipment is adequate for twice as many students as elsewhere. The result
is that the total cost to the university per student per year at Cincinnati is about
$130. At no other school of equal grade is this cost less than $250, and at the large
endowed schools it runs as high as $600 or even more. The money earned by the
student during his shop periods, while not sufficient to pay all his expenses, is of great
assistance, and makes possible an engineering education to many a worthy boy who
could not otherwise afford it.
In addition to the obvious financial advantage, the cooperative plan has many edu-
cational advantages. Not only is instruction combined with construction so that its
social use is obvious to the students, but the construction has three marked points
of superiority over that done in college shops. In the first place it is real commercial
production that must succeed or fail on its merits. A shop atmosphere does not have
to be artificially created. In the second place the variety of construction work is much
greater than is possible in any college shop. The students' experiences are not limited
to those of making a gasolene engine or a drill press, but may include any of the activ-
ities of one hundred different manufacturing plants. In the third place the student
is thrown into close personal touch with workmen. He thus comes to know their point
of view in a sympathetic way and secures a conception of the human problems of
industry and of the appraisement of human values and costs that is invaluable to
him and cannot be acquired so well in any other way.
Another striking educational advantage is secured by this method of conducting
the shop instruction. Because it is obviously impossible for an industrial plant to
permit its workmen to spend time giving instructions to green college boys, many
have thought that the student must waste an enormous amount of time doing routine
manual labor. This loss is prevented by the "work observation sheets" that are given
the student when he begins a new job. These sheets contain from fifty to two hun-
dred questions concerning the details of the job, and direct him to sources of informa-
tion where he can find the answers. He is required to be able to answer and discuss
these questions during the "coordination periods." In this way the manual labor is
made the source of problems that are solved in the class-room and the laboratories.
Shopwork thus becomes a series of exercises in defining and solving problems. Under
these conditions it is much more likely to be intellectually fruitful than when it con-
sists in carefully following the specifications of standardized direction sheets.
But if the Cincinnati plan has proved stimulating to the students, it has been revo-
lutionary for the faculty. Cooperation and business methods outside have compelled
cooperation and business methods at home, with the results already discussed in Chap-
ter V (page 30). Departmental autonomy has practically disappeared, the spirit of
investigation has been liberated in the field of education, and it is probable that more
experiments in teaching are being made and objectively checked there than anywhere
else.
SHOPWORK 81
Dean Schneider's experiment is clearly much more than a novel and inexpensive
method of handling the shopwork. It is an effort to create a type of school that meets
the demands of an industrial age. It frankly recognizes that the present need is for
masters of materials who can humanize industry. It tries to emphasize rather than to
discourage the appraisement of values and costs, and endeavors to express idealism in
the mechanics of life rather than build ideals that are unrelated to human experience.
Because the educational conceptions on which the Cincinnati plan is founded are
so different from the currently accepted conceptions of school practice, it has taken
some time for other schools to recognize the significance of the venture. The scheme
was scoffed at as unworthy of a real university and more likely to produce skilled
"boiler makers'" than professional engineers. The graduates are still too young to
prove whether this criticism is to any extent valid or not. Meanwhile the cooperating
firms in Cincinnati eagerly absorb all the product of the school, while other schools
are introducing similar organizations. For several years the University of Pittsburgh
has been cooperating on the same principle with a number of firms, the new muni-
cipal university at Akron is organized as a cooperative school, and the Massachusetts
Institute has just completed arrangements whereby juniors and seniors in chemical
and electrical engineering spend a number of months under school guidance in in-
dustrial plants before graduation. A detailed account of the Cincinnati Cooperation
System, written by Professor C. W. Park, has been published in Bulletin 37 for 1916
by the United States Bureau of Education.
With such rich opportunities for education lying plentifully about in every indus-
trial plant, it is a striking anomaly that the schools make so little use of them. The
situation is all the more impressive because the cooperative use of industrial plants
results in a large reduction of the cost of schooling and gives the student the chance
to support himself partially in college. The neglect of the possibilities of shopwork is
responsible in large measure for the professional criticism that the graduates cannot
apply theory to practice, for the establishment by large corporations of apprentice
schools in which engineering graduates may complete their training on the practical
side, for the preference shown by many firms for shop-trained rather than college-
trained men, and for the insignificant percentage of production managers who are
college graduates.
On the other hand, the neglect of shopwork is not the result of carelessness or of
chance. It is due to a consistent effort to meet the professional demand that empha-
sis in school be placed on the fundamentals of engineering science. But while practis-
ing engineers are unanimous in this demand, they recognize that something is wrong
with the present system. The fundamentals that are presented in college do not seem
to be mastered in such a way that they function readily in practice. Yet common sense
instinctively feels that there is no essential contradiction in the practitioner's position,
but that it is possible for colleges to teach the principles of science and develop a sci-
entific attitude of mind in such a way that both are readily transferable to practice.
82 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
The University of Cincinnati endeavors to do this by using the practical problems
of the shop as the basis of the theoretical work in the school. But the established en-
gineering schools hesitate to approve this solution. In spite of the fact that their real
aim is to develop men for intelligent production, they fear too close an intimacy with
industry. They shrink from offering short courses and extension work in mechanic
arts, like those which have done so much to advance agricultural production, because
this type of instruction does not seem to be "of university grade.1' This fear is justified
so long as shop practice is limited to training in the so-called "fundamental shop
operations'" wholly divorced in "instruction shops" from production and contact with
workmen. But when the students are systematically guided, as they are in Cincinnati,
by work observation sheets and coordination classes, the shopwork not only develops
mechanical skill and imparts practical information concerning shop practices, but
it also serves as a source of problems and projects for theoretical analysis and solu-
tion in the university classes in physics, in chemistry, in mathematics, in mechanics,
in economics, in sociology, and even in ethics. The problems thus defined are not the
stock type of book problems that were made up to illustrate theories already demon-
strated in class; they are the real engineering problems of production that constitute
the warp and woof of the engineer's life. On this basis shopwork is perhaps the most
effective type of professional training, since it is a direct application of the adage —
Learn to do by doing.
Recently Dean Schneider has been able to express this fundamental educational
conception of the cooperative system in a manner that is easily comprehensible to
university men. Several of the industrial firms cooperating with the university are
supporting industrial research laboratories for the purpose of increasing production.
These laboratories are treated by the university exactly like every other section of
an industrial plant; so that upper classmen, who have shown ability in investigation
by the way in which they have discovered and defined problems in industry during
their earlier years of shop experience, are assigned here as assistants on research prob-
lems for their regular bi-weekly industrial tasks.
During the past decade a number of large industrial companies have established
in their plants research laboratories manned by eminent scientists of pronounced
research ability. These laboratories are supported by the industries, and are excel-
lent investments, because the increase in the efficiency of production resulting from
their labors saves each year more than the cost of their maintenance. Now that in-
creased production has become a national necessity, a large amount of attention is
being given to the question of the relation between the universities and the indus-
tries in the matter of research. Up to the present the Mellon Institute at the Uni-
versity of Pittsburgh is the only instance of cooperation between a university and
the industries in the maintenance and operation of a strictly research institution.
The success of this experiment, originally devised and inaugurated by the late Robert
Kennedy Duncan at the University of Kansas, has been so gratifying to the univer-
SHOPWORK 83
sity in bringing its professors in contact with industrial life, and to the industries
in reduced costs of production, that other similar institutes will undoubtedly soon
be established under the pressure of the present great national need. Industrial shops
are literally bursting with problems that call for scientific investigation of the high-
est order; factories are filled with masses of observation and of empirical data whose
coordination and theoretical analysis would be of the utmost value to production if
scientists competent to accomplish the task could be found. Millions of dollars are
annually wasted in the United States by the duplication and repetition of investiga-
tions and experiments in several different plants because there is no pooling of prob-
lems or of scientific interests and no central bureau of information, record, and research
to which all could look for scientific enlightenment. The missing link is a technique
for coordinating learning and labor so that each may serve the other to the fullest
in increasing the intelligence and the economy of production as the basis of mutual
strength. The experiments with cooperative shopwork at Cincinnati and with indus-
trial research at the Mellon Institute at Pittsburgh are rapidly developing such a
technique. The engineering colleges are beginning to grasp the real educational sig-
nificance of cooperative shopwork, and industrial research laboratories at universi-
ties will surely be forthcoming as soon as the conception of their national scientific
and industrial importance is clearly defined. Some combination of the two will un-
doubtedly supply the ultimate solution of the problem of shopwork in engineering
education.
PART III
SUGGESTED SOLUTIONS
CHAPTER XIII
THE CURRICULUM
IN the preceding five chapters the larger problems of engineering education are dis-
cussed and a number of suggestions are offered concerning methods of investigation
that promise progress toward effective solutions. It remains to indicate how the vari-
ous conceptions presented may be integrated in a consistent and workable curriculum.
The question of admission requirements is treated with sufficient detail in Chap-
ter VIII. If a group of schools will take up the careful study of their entrance systems
and make experiments with objective tests and records of the students'* youthful
interests and achievements, it is certain that the percentage of elimination can be
reduced to at least a fourth of its present size, with an enormous saving of time,
energy, and money for both student and school. The effect on secondary education
would also be most salutary, in that objective entrance tests that measure ability
require a shifting of the emphasis in high school from learning facts to developing
ability, and tend to liberate teachers from the bondage of detailed syllabi and cram-
ming methods. In order to accomplish these ends it is necessary to expand the re-
corder's office into a bureau of investigation, and to equip it with a competent per-
sonnel for this work; for at present most college record offices are overburdened with
routine work and so cannot undertake this experiment without both expert guidance
and additional clerical help. It is more than probable that the expense thus added
will prove a real economy, because intelligent selection of students at entrance is
bound to reduce the waste that comes from trying to teach engineering to boys who
have no real engineering interest or ability.
The reorganization of the college curricula to accord with the suggestions in the
preceding chapters requires several radical changes from current practice. In the first
place the number of required credit hours per week should be less than eighteen —
preferably sixteen. This recommendation is not intended to decrease the number of
hours of work done per week by the students, but to make it possible for them to do
all of their work more thoroughly. It is, of course, obvious that such a reduction of
required credit hours cannot be satisfactorily made without extensive changes in the
content of the courses, for it would be disastrous to leave the distribution of time
among the departments as it is and merely try to organize them on a sixteen-hour-
a-week basis instead of on a twenty or twenty-four hour basis.
In the second place, the few experiments that have been made on the subject indi-
cate that college students do their best work when the number of different subjects
studied at a given time is not greater than five. In constructing a curriculum it is
desirable, therefore, to limit the number of simultaneous courses to four or five at the
outside. At Rensselaer they are limited to three, but the advantages of this are to a
certain extent offset by frequent changes in the three (page 25).
88 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
A third essential requirement of all engineering curricula is adequate provision
in the first two years for "orientation," contact with real engineering projects, and
practical experiences that make the boy feel that he has actually left high school and
entered upon a professional career. Orientation lectures to freshmen meet this require-
ment to a certain extent; practical work in surveying parallel with trigonometry
during the first term of freshman year is perhaps more effective for this purpose; a
course in mechanics, such as is now given to freshmen at the University of Washing-
ton (page 58), is excellent; but the cooperative system at Cincinnati (page 78) is the
most complete and thoroughgoing solution of this problem yet presented.
Practical engineering work is essential for the freshman not only because it appeals
to his professional ambition, arouses his enthusiasm, and gives him training in prac-
tice, but also because it helps him to master the theoretical work more fully and more
quickly. Every one knows that at present the engineering professors are seriously handi-
capped in their work with juniors and seniors because the students are notoriously
unable to make professional use of the principles of physics, of mathematics, and of
mechanics with assurance and accuracy. One of the most common complaints of em-
ployers is that even college graduates have serious difficulty in applying theory to prac-
tice. As has been pointed out (page 80), this weakness may be overcome by suitable
coordination of theory and practice during the learning process. Hence to the three
other requirements of effective curricula must be added this need for interrelation
between the concrete and the abstract throughout the entire college course.
Besides the four requirements that have been mentioned there are a number of
pertinent suggestions that demand attention in framing curricula. Thus there is a
widespread agreement among professional engineers that the college curriculum
should aim to give a broad and sound training in engineering science, rather than
a highly specialized training in some one narrow line; that considerable attention
should be paid to humanistic studies like English, economics, sociology, and history,
not merely because of their practical value to the engineer, but also because of their
broad human values; and that the young graduate should have some conception of
business management and of the most intelligent methods of organizing and control-
ling men.
It is well-nigh impossible to construct curricula that will meet all of these require-
ments and suggestions without giving careful consideration to many of the recent
investigations of experimental psychology and to the rapidly increasing literature
of the new science of education. Every professor who takes a responsible share of
this work will find much to help him in the books listed in the Selected Bibliogra-
phy on page 127, for until college faculties appreciate the necessity for experiments in
teaching and grasp the significance of the results already obtained, progress is likely to
be slow. Therefore the first step for any school desiring to reorganize its curricula is
the appointment of a small standing committee composed of men who are interested
in the problem of better teaching and able and willing to give considerable time to
THE CURRICULUM 89
the work. This committee will need ample facilities in the way of clerical help, and
effective service on it will soon be recognized by everybody as one of the surest and
most expeditious ways of winning academic advancement. Unless a school is prepared
to place this study of education on a basis of unquestioned respectability, it is just
as well to continue the present methods of constructing curricula by debates on the
time schedule and of measuring educational progress in terms of hours plus a passing
grade.
When a suitable committee on instruction has been appointed and given adequate
support, its first big problem is that of the relations of the school with the industries.
Here the solutions are bound to be varied because, tho there is general agreement
that some actual experience in practical work is an essential part of the training of
every engineer, the environments of the schools are so different that no single type
of arrangement is likely to prove most effective for all. Even in industrial centres
like Cincinnati, Pittsburgh, and Boston, quite different schedules for handling coop-
erative shop work are in use; and still others may be found that are more effective for
institutions in rural communities, like Cornell, the University of Illinois, or the Uni-
versity of Colorado. The important point is that in some way adequate provision be
made for personal participation in industrial work, for supervision of that work by
the school, and for stimulating the student to be ever on the watch for practical ques-
tions and problems which may be brought back to the school for discussion, theo-
retical analysis, and solution. Professor Thorndike found from his study of engineer-
ing college freshmen that 95 per cent of them do engage in productive labor; so the
problem is to make the time so spent fruitful by some form of supervision that may
prevent their wasting their energies as ushers in theatres or bell boys in hotels for
the sake of supporting themselves in college.
Having selected the type of cooperative industrial work that seems best suited to
the peculiarities of the environment of each particular school, the committee on
instruction may proceed to formulate a curriculum for the school work itself. In this
it is conceivable that the schools will reach conclusions that are more similar to one
another than is probable with the cooperative industrial work ; for if it is agreed that
the chief function of school work is to give the greatest possible mastery of the essen-
tial principles of engineering science, then there is a common foundation on which
all curricula must be built. The first step, therefore, in framing a course of study is
to define this common basis of all engineering as clearly as possible ; that is, to make
a list of all the facts, principles, and processes that are essential elements in the equip-
ment of every engineer. Theoretically this is the plan on which present curricula are
founded, for they all have a common core made up of three distinct parts, namely,
science (mathematics, chemistry, physics, and mechanics), mechanic arts (drawing and
shop), and humanities (English and foreign languages). All of this common core is
usually explicitly required of every student, no matter what specialty he may choose.
In addition to this explicitly recognized core of common material it is customary
90 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
at present to require civil engineers, for example, to take brief courses in mechanical
and electrical engineering, since it is necessary that a road or a railroad builder know
something of steam machinery, turbines, electric machinery, and gas engines. Con-
versely, the modern electrical engineer must know something about steam engineer-
ing, girders, trusses, factory construction, and even tunneling; and the sanitary engi-
neer finds it necessary to understand at least the elements of hydraulics and the mech-
anism of pumps and pumping machinery. This instruction in one specialized branch
of engineering for students who are specializing in another is now generally supplied
by technical courses in the third or fourth years, sometimes by combination courses
required of all students, and sometimes by special short courses in one branch for
students in the others. Evidently there is a large amount of material which is now
presented in technical courses after specialization has begun, but which is really
essential to every engineer, and therefore might well be explicitly recognized in the
core of common material.
Without regard to the question as to whether the subject-matter of this common
core is well or poorly chosen and irrespective of the success with which the work is
given, there is a fundamental difficulty in the current organization of the common
core of all engineering; namely, the fact that it recognizes no inherent or intrinsic
relationships among the three categories under which the classification is made. The
sciences are usually treated as sciences pure and simple without regard to their func-
tion in engineering (page 39); in the mechanic arts the instruction shops are as a rule
purposely separated from the construction shops (page 78) ; and the humanities gen-
erally strive consciously and vigorously to get away from engineering in order that
the student may get at least a glimpse into the mysteries of language and of literature
and a touch of culture. As a result of this lack of inherent connection, many schools
have already dropped the requirement of foreign languages, because some faculties
recognize that French and German when taught as they are for purposes of drill in
grammar have no vital connection with engineering. Similarly some schools are seri-
ously considering giving up the shopwork, since it is not at all clear why skill in the
handling of tools is essential to every engineer. There has even been some talk of ceas-
ing to require calculus of every student, because there is very little obvious connec-
tion between some forms of calculus and engineering. Thus before a more effective
common core for all engineering curricula can be constructed, it is necessary to adopt
a classification of the subject-matter that obviously expresses the intrinsic relation-
ships of the several component parts to the needs of every engineer.
The categories for a new classification of this kind may be deduced from the fun-
damental aim of engineering. As has been frequently pointed out (pages 3-8), the real
purpose for which engineering schools were established is to increase industrial pro-
duction, because the ultimate aim of engineering is more intelligent production. But
every production project requires the coordination and adjustment of three factors,
namely, scientific theory, mechanical practice, and cost. A theoretically perfect ma-
THE CURRICULUM 91
chine that cannot be built is no more useless than one that costs so much that no
one is willing to buy it. Success in engineering comes to him who most often judges
soundly concerning the best adjustment of these three complex factors. Therefore
engineering education is likely to be more effective in proportion as it fosters the
development of skill in determining the most expedient adjustments among theory
and practice and cost.
It is customary in designing curricula to keep these three essential phases of engi-
neering distinct from one another and to teach them as independent units, leaving
their synthesis into well-organized mental processes to the student's own efforts. This
practice is so widespread that its validity is naively accepted as a matter of course,
and few seem to suspect that it may be connected in any way with the year or two
of floundering thru which most graduates pass after leaving college and before
finding themselves. Universal experience, on the other hand, seems to indicate that
the most effective method of learning is by doing; so that if engineering depends
ultimately on power to interrelate theory and practice and costs, a training that re-
quires the student frequently to interrelate these three fundamental factors is likely
to yield a better product than is secured from a training that largely ignores their
interdependence. A curriculum that recognizes the intrinsic relationships involved is
not difficult to construct after the fundamental common elements of all engineering
have been selected; but until these elements have been chosen, it is impossible to give
more than a general outline or skeleton, on which any school may easily construct
a program by filling in with subject-matter appropriate to its environment and its
educational aim.
A curriculum that satisfies all of the requirement mentioned above would include
at least four types of work. In the first place there must be actual participation in
real industrial work, either during summer vacations or better thru some form of con-
tinuous cooperation with industries. This industrial experience must be supervised
by the school and used as a source of problems and projects for scientific analysis and
study in laboratory and class-room. It should begin at the beginning of the freshman
year and continue at least until the work common to all branches of engineering is
completed. In the later years it may well take the form of cooperative work with an
industrial research laboratory (page 82). It is not necessary or desirable that all stu-
dents do the same type of thing, provided class meetings are held for the discussion
and exchange of experiences.
In the second place there should be engineering laboratory work, including draw-
ing and descriptive geometry; and this, too, should continue throughout the com-
mon portion of the course. Here the student would make the measurements and carry
out the operations needed to enable him to solve the problems and projects that origi-
nate either in his industrial or in his class work. These problems and projects should
be as far as possible framed in such a way that the desired solution cannot be secured
without making the experiment; they should not consist of mere verification of known
92 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
results or of repetition of standardized manipulations. Elementary surveying is a
fruitful source of problems of the right kind; the energy transformations and effi-
ciencies of different sorts of machines, prime movers, and motors require endless in-
vestigation, much of which is simple enough for freshmen yet rich in engineering
content. Questions concerning the kind of material to select under given conditions
of stress, wear, and cost are also excellent. Attention has already been called to simi-
lar problems now in use in mechanics (page 58) and in chemistry (page 61). All of
this material should require the constant use of the fundamental principles that every
engineer must know, and frequent problems involving the computation of relative
costs under various conditions should be discussed and solved.
The third type of work essential to the new curriculum is mathematics and sci-
ence, which should be developed systematically in logical order so as to furnish the
backbone of the course. The determination of the sequence of topics for the labora-
tory projects and for the classes in mathematics and science offers an opportunity for
investigations of the highest order, because it is obviously desirable that theory and
experiment be closely interrelated, and this requires agreement as to what are the
fundamental conceptions of mathematics, mechanics, and physics. The Society for the
Promotion of Engineering Education has made an admirable beginning of such in-
vestigations thru its committees on teaching mathematics and on teaching mechanics;
but the reports of these committees have not yet been generally accepted, and the
laboratory side of the problem has not yet received serious attention.
The humanistic studies make up the fourth type of work essential to the training
of every engineer. The professional criticisms of the schools indicate that this field
offers the greatest opportunity for effective changes in current practice, because lack
of good English, of business sense, and of understanding of men are most frequently
mentioned by practising engineers as points of weakness in the graduates of the
schools. The criticisms point out two types of weakness, namely, lack of technical
facility in expression, in business, and in handling men ; and lack of appreciation of
and interest in literature, economics, and social philosophy. Clearly the humanistic
departments are not alone responsible for these weaknesses, for no amount of drill in
the technique of language will make a student write and speak clearly if he does not
think clearly; and training in clear thinking is as much the function of the teachers
of science, mathematics, and engineering as it is the function of the teachers of Eng-
lish. And if the professors in the technical subjects rigidly exclude from their instruc-
tion all discussion of human values and costs, is it reasonable to expect the students
to appreciate economics and social science? As every one is aware, languages, eco-
nomics, and social sciences are generally treated as "extras" in curricula, and are as
generally regarded as superfluous "chores" by the students.
The difficulty in present school practice evidently lies in the exclusion from the
technical work of all consideration of the questions of human values and costs ; and,
conversely, the isolation of the humanistic studies from all technical interest. The
THE CURRICULUM 93
theory has been that engineering at best is tied to materials; but that it can be made
less materialistic by ignoring the question of dollars and cents in the technical work,
and by teaching science, mathematics, economics, and literature for their own sakes
entirely isolated from inherent technical relationships. This conception, however, is
gradually giving way, for the experiments described in the last four chapters indicate
that technical work is more impelling, and is, therefore, more fully mastered, when it
includes the consideration of values and costs; while humanistic work becomes sig-
nificant, and therefore educative, when it starts from and builds upon the professional
interest. And after all, the ultimate control of all engineering projects, as of all activi-
ties, is vested in some man's decision that the game is really worth while; and this
control is likely to be more salutary, the more completely the man who decides com-
prehends the full import of the values and costs involved.
A good example of one method of treating the study of English so as to develop
skill in expression, appreciation of literature, and a philosophy of values and costs
may be found in Professor Aydelotte's experiment with freshmen and juniors at the
Massachusetts Institute (page 63). If work of this kind were continued thru several
years, it might readily be made to include some study of all the political, economic,
and social problems which every engineer is compelled to meet. The experiment of
organizing a series of projects and problems in these subjects for class discussion, out-
side reading, and report, into a consecutive course that would give young engineers
some conception of the present social situation and of the engineer's relation to it,
is well worth trying. It may be that such a course, by developing in students an
intelligent understanding of the meaning of engineering in modern life, would be a
powerful factor in defining the status of the engineer and in liberating his creative
energies for still larger service.
The best time schedule for a curriculum built along the lines suggested cannot be
determined in advance. It is therefore necessary at first to make an arbitrary distri-
bution of the 15 credit hours available and then make adjustments as experience may
dictate. Two schools, Brown University and the University of Washington, are try-
ing a new curriculum of this kind this year. At Brown the time of the freshman year
is divided in this way : mathematics 4, drawing and descriptive geometry 3, engineer-
ing mechanics 3, English 3, and chemistry 3. If military science is required, it might
be well to reduce the time for mathematics from 4 to 3 in order to make place for it.
It is also impossible to decide without experiment how many years will be required
to give this training in the essential common elements of all engineering. After the
essential topics have been selected, as much time as is required to teach them thor-
oughly should be taken for this purpose. Two years may be enough, but if this is found
to be inadequate, more should be assigned to this fundamental portion of the work.
The important thing is that the essential elements be first selected and then that time
enough to master them be given, instead of the current practice of assigning the time
and then "covering" as much as is possible within the set limits. No time schedule
94 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
of the proposed curriculum is offered here, lest schools be tempted merely to fit present
courses into the suggested schedule without first making the thorough analysis of
the problem here demanded. Such a simple rearrangement of the old bricks in a new
pattern will not be likely to accomplish the required results.
No provision is made for foreign languages in the curriculum just suggested. They
have been omitted because three-quarters of the 1500 practising engineers who re-
plied in writing to a question on this subject agreed that they had never found for-
eign languages essential to their professional careers, and half of them thought that
they should not be required. In addition, there is a growing conviction among the
schools that for students of engineering the time now spent in college on foreign lan-
guages may be much more profitably spent in other ways. If it appears that the for-
eign expansion of the national outlook necessitates facility in one or more foreign
languages, every effort should be made to ensure the acquisition of that facility be-
fore entering college. At West Point the cadets acquire all the control an engineer
needs over French in 200 hours of intensive training; and the technically minded
student is far more likely to become broad-minded and cultured thru studies of lit-
erature and social conditions in the manner just described than he is thru the type
of linguistic drill that is now universally given under the name of foreign languages
in high schools and colleges.
The organization of curricula here proposed is very different from that in general
use. Therefore it would not be wise to attempt to produce a curriculum of this kind by
merely substituting, say, engineering laboratory for foreign languages and the new
type of English for the old, without in any way changing the content or the methods
of instruction of the other courses. The new plan is based on the proposition that it
is possible to analyze engineering practice and to make a list of all principles, facts,
and theories that are essential to the equipment of every engineer, and then to or-
ganize this subject-matter into a curriculum in which the several types of work are
interrelated in such a way that their inherent relations are obvious to the learner.
Such a curriculum satisfies the professional demand for broad and fundamental train-
ing for all engineers and renders superfluous the requirement of two or three years
of pre-engineering work in a college of liberal arts. It does not prepare specialists,
and hence specialization is the topic of the next chapter.
CHAPTER XIV
SPECIALIZATION
THE preceding chapter suggests methods that may be profitably employed in
framing a well-coordinated curriculum designed to give all students of technology
a broad and solid foundation in engineering science and practice, thru personal con-
tact with industrial work, experience in solving practical problems in the engineer-
ing laboratories, systematic instruction in mathematics and science, and thought-
ful consideration of the significance of human values and costs. The criterion by
which to determine what subject-matter may be included and what excluded is that
of common necessity; so that all those principles, processes, facts, and theories which
are approved by a board of expert judges as essential to the equipment of every
engineer are included, and all others are excluded. The course of study thus organ-
ized will be called the common core of the curriculum. How may provision best be
made for specialization when a student has satisfactorily mastered this common
core?
Evidently the first step toward successful specialization is intelligent sorting of
the students, so that each is led as definitely as possible into that type of work for
which he is best fitted temperamentally. This requires that while the students are
working thru the common core of studies every effort be made to discover the par-
ticular abilities and specific bent of each, not only by means of ordinary examinations
and academic grades, but also thru objective tests of graded difficulty (page 50), per-
sonality estimates by members of the faculty (page 73), consideration of boyhood in-
terests (page 53), and observations of each student's reactions to the different portions
of the common core. In other words, the work of the common core offers an excellent
chance for vocational guidance; so that the student would not choose but rather be
claimed by the special field for which he is best fitted. Probably nothing would con-
tribute more to the success of the later specialized work than a systematic utilization
of this opportunity. A number of schools are ostensibly doing this now, but none has
yet achieved the degree of success that is easily attainable by intelligent experiment
with the various methods now in use in many places.
By the methods provided for sorting the students during the first two or three
years of their courses it should be possible when they finish the common core of the
engineering curriculum to divide them into five or six groups, each of which contains
all who have special qualifications for one of the major lines of professional work.
For each such group a curriculum must be framed on the same plan as that used for
the common core. Thus for the civil engineering group a competent committee would
first select all the elements essential to all civil engineers but not already included
in the common core, and these essential civil engineering elements would be organ-
ized into a consistent curriculum composed of the same four types of work required
96 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
for the common core. A similar selection of subject-matter has to be made for the
mechanical engineering group, for the electrical engineering group, and for each of
the other major groups which the school desires to develop.
As with the common core, so here, the amount of time needed to master the mate-
rials selected as essential in each group has to be determined by experiment. It may
well happen that more time is required for electrical engineers than for civil or min-
ing engineers, but this is no real objection; the conception that four years of study
makes any kind of an engineer is a habit rather than a rational conclusion. If the
subject-matter chosen can all be shown to be really essential, and if the instruction
is intensive, then the school may well insist on time enough to do its work thoroughly.
This does not mean necessarily that more than four years will be required for thorough-
going training, for the present congestion of curricula is in large measure due both
to the presence of subject-matter which cannot be justified on the ground that it is
essential, and to the teacher's habit of underestimating the student's actual ability and
capacity for significant work.
The number of these semi-specialized groups at any one school may well depend
on the location and the capacity of the school. The great majority of institutions will
probably have one for each of the commonly accepted branches, as civil, mechanical,
electrical, and chemical engineering. The mining group has already been somewhat
separated from the others by the establishment in mining districts of state schools
of mines, so that a number of strong schools elsewhere no longer offer courses in min-
ing engineering. While it is clear that every technical college should offer the com-
mon core, it is an open question how many of the semi-specialized groups each should
attempt to supply. It is conceivable that some schools might do much more thorough
work if they followed the example of Stevens Institute and specialized on one or two
groups. It may even happen that a number of the smaller schools will find it to their
advantage to give only the common core and send their students for specialization
to the stronger schools. It may also be best for many of the students to leave school
when they have completed this general work, especially if leaving should be dignified
by the award of a suitable certificate or diploma.
On the other hand, there is an urgent need that a number of the schools add to
these semi-specialized groups one in production engineering or engineering admin-
istration, as it is called at Pennsylvania State College and the Massachusetts Insti-
tute of Technology. The seriousness of this need has been emphasized by war con-
ditions, which have demonstrated how essential it is to apply engineering methods
to accounting, to the management of men, and to the organization of business, if
maximum production is to be attained. Until recently most schools have specialized
in design, with the result that at present fully ninety-five per cent of the production
managers in manufacturing plants are not college but shop- trained men. The oppor-
tunity for the college-trained engineer is now very much larger in the field of pro-
duction and administration than it is in the field of design, so that the most striking
SPECIALIZATION 97
development of the engineering schools in the next twenty years will probably be
made in the direction of the former.
Throughout the period of semi-specialization it is desirable to continue all of the
four types of instruction comprised in the common core, but the technical work of
the several groups may be very different, each along the line of the group specialty.
In the humanistic work, however, the subject-matter presented may well be the same
for all, because the engineering attitude which these studies foster is the same for
all. By this means it is possible to develop among the engineering students a unity
of purpose and outlook which will be a great asset in developing a professional con-
sciousness among engineers, because it tends to establish engineering standards by
which to interpret and attack the industrial and social problems of the day.
The systems of grading and personality analysis used during the early portion of
the course should also be retained, in order that the semi-specialized work may fur-
nish the basis for more accurate guidance of each student into the particular line of
work for which he is best fitted.
When the student has completed the semi-specialized work he should be well
grounded in the fundamental principles of engineering science and in the theory and
practice peculiar to some one of the major branches of the profession. If during this
training he has shown particular ability in some specific line of work, opportunity
should be given him to pursue his specialty in elective courses of highly technical con-
tent. These courses, however, should not consist, as many of the senior electives do
now, of detailed study of the technique of such subjects as heating and ventilating,
telephone wiring, roads and pavements, sewage disposal, and the like. If the student
has been trained as he should be in methods of attacking problems and gathering
information, he will probably make better progress in this kind of work in the in-
dustries than he will in school. Since these courses are for specialists who have elected
them after a long process of vocational selection, they should deal with the more
abstract and general phases of each subject. For the industrial phase of it, current
problems in industrial research with practice as assistant on some of them are appro-
priate; for laboratory practice, expert testing and trouble hunting might serve well;
on the scientific side, thermodynamics, the ionic theory, differential equations, func-
tions of a complex variable, wave motion, spherical harmonics, electromagnetic theory,
and all types of design, might be given for those whose bent and abilities warrant.
The plan of curriculum here proposed may seem to many very similar to the one
on which curricula are at present constructed. In a general way this is true, since both
the present plan and the one proposed agree in requiring all engineers to take the same
training at the beginning and in gradually separating them into specialized groups
later. The two schemes, however, differ radically in a number of important ways.
In the first place, current curricula are made by first setting the time limits for each
of the several subjects involved and then allowing each department to use its time
allotment as it may see fit (page 56). The new plan suggests that the faculty first
98 STUDY OF EiNGINEERING EDUCATION
select the subject-matter that is essential to the equipment of every engineer and then
ask the several departments to determine experimentally how much time is needed
for their respective parts. The former is a centrifugal system, which magnifies depart-
mental differences, causes confusion as to the aims of the instruction, and wastes an
immense amount of time; the latter is centripetal, in that it operates to bring about
mutual understanding and hence definiteness of aim and economy of time.
Again, the proposed plan calls for the student's participation in real industrial work
and the utilization of his experiences there as a source of problems for theoretical
analysis and solution in the class-rooms. This is suggested as a substitute for most of
the current shop practice, such elements as should be retained in school being included
in the engineering laboratory work.
In the third place, the suggestion is made that engineering laboratory work be re-
quired throughout the first two or three years. At present such work is given almost
entirely in the last two years, because teachers generally believe that the students are
incapable of working intelligently at practical engineering projects until they have
been well drilled in theoretical principles and mathematical processes, in spite of the
astonishing manner in which boys of high school age learn without assistance to man-
age wireless telegraphy or gas engines. The proposed arrangement makes it possible
for the faculty to assign tasks that tax the boy's capacity and challenge his ingenu-
ity and his natural instinct for mechanism. Such tasks are almost sure to be effective
means of releasing creative energy and of directing it so that it brings the greatest
educational returns. Besides, under these conditions a student finds himself constantly
in need of the principles and methods developed in the classes in mathematics and the
sciences. In this way these subjects may be made significant to boys with an engineer-
ing bent; and, as is well known, the probability of learning thoroughly increases with
the significance of the lesson. The fact that a boy elects engineering indicates that
his mind is probably of the type that thinks most clearly in terms of specific objects,
and that grasps general principles most firmly when it has built these up by the syn-
thesis of a number of specific concrete cases. In combination with the cooperative
industrial work this engineering laboratory work furnishes also a rational foundation
for the proposed industrial research of the later years (page 82).
In the fourth place, the suggested organization requires a close coordination be-
tween the scientific courses of the common core and the practical work. At present
mathematics and the fundamental sciences are usually taught for their own sake, with
independent laboratories and little attention to technical applications. Under the
arrangement proposed the essential portions of the laboratory work in elementary
physics, for example, would be absorbed and taught in the engineering laboratory.
The elementary class work in physics would then be limited to the study of those
fundamental conceptions and principles of physics that are embodied in all engineer-
ing work; while the more elaborate and recondite portions of the subject would be
reserved for elective courses in the later years, where they would be better appreciated
SPECIALIZATION 99
by students qualified to grasp their significance. The same suggestion applies to chem-
istry and especially to mathematics, in which much that is ordinarily imposed on
unwilling sophomores would be eagerly grasped by selected seniors.
A fifth departure from current school practice is made in the recommendation to
emphasize the problems of values and costs. This topic has obtained scant recognition
in higher education for fear of contaminating university ideals with those of the mar-
ketplace. Such a fear is justified when the discussion is limited to monetary values and
costs. But when the subject is treated in some such manner as Professor J. A. Hobson
treats it in his Work and Wealth, A Human Valuation? it may be made the most
potent means of expressing the highest type of university spirit. Hence in urging ex-
tended consideration of this subject it is taken for granted that the discussions will
not be limited to questions of dollars and cents. The control of engineering lies in the
hands of those who judge most accurately what enterprises men value sufficiently to be
willing to assume the cost. Because engineering education has confined itself largely
to technological training, engineers are seldom placed on state highway commissions
and other public boards that must decide how public funds shall be expended on engi-
neering enterprises. Too frequently the engineer is employed to do the technical work
of construction only after a board composed of doctors, lawyers, clergymen, bankers,
merchants, or politicians has made an appraisement of values and costs and decided
which project shall go forward and which not. The conception is rapidly developing
that the public interest might be better served if the engineer had more voice in mak-
ing such decisions, and to win greater influence in this direction he must be trained
to appraise correctly what men consider to be most worth while.
Because the appraisement of values and costs is the controlling factor in engineer-
ing, the final important change from current school practice that is suggested deals
with the humanistic studies. The usual method of treating these subjects in short in-
dependent courses in the technique of composition, literature, history, economics, and
so on, seems less likely than the method proposed (page 92) to develop the desired
insight into these profound problems of value and cost. The experiments at Wiscon-
sin and the Massachusetts Institute have progressed far enough to show how success-
ful this type of work is with freshmen in developing powers of both forceful expres-
sion and appreciation of good literature. Therefore it seems reasonable to expect that
the extension of this work into a consecutive course extending thru the entire curri-
culum and consisting of live discussions and extensive study of the best that has been
thought and said concerning the immediate and the ultimate values in life, offers the
most promising solution of the problem of culture for engineers.
The organization of curricula suggested in the foregoing chapters does not solve
the problem of engineering education. It does, however, create conditions that are
more favorable than those now prevailing for progress toward the desired solutions of
a number of the major questions. Thus objective tests for admission will undoubtedly
1 Macmillan, 1916.
100 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
enable the schools to reduce elimination by permitting only those who have some
demonstrable degree of engineering ability to enter, but much time and many experi-
ments will be required before this end is accomplished. Similarly the engineering work
in the common core, when measured by a suitable system of testing and grading, makes
the experiences of the first two or three years both valuable to technical men of all
grades and a further means of sorting the students according to their varying degrees
of engineering talent and ability. On completion of the common core an opportunity
is given for those whose capacities and temperaments lead them to prefer the prac-
tical phases of production to leave school with credit and go to work immediately.
Finally, specialization, which has been the source of so much trouble to curriculum
makers, is subordinated in the proposed plan to vocational guidance. Because the
common core contains real engineering work, it can be made a measure of engineering
ability that is much more searching and valid than is possible with the current ab-
stract, linguistic type of work. And because the common core contains the essential
elements of all branches of engineering, it gives the student a chance to choose his
specialty on the basis of experience, and furnishes the faculty with a broader range
of activities on which to base its judgment of special aptitudes for particular jobs.
Hence it diverts the attention of the faculty from the construction of specialized
grooves down which the student may be shoved by routine administrative mechan-
isms, to the study of the personalities, the temperaments, and the capacities of young
men who are eager to do the work for which they are best fitted. The required change
in attitude on the part of the instructor may be materially encouraged by changing
the conditions under which faculties serve along the lines suggested in the following
chapter.
CHAPTER XV
TEACHERS
IN the summer of 1824 Amos Eaton was employed by Stephen van Rensselaer to
deliver a series of lectures on natural science, with experimental illustrations, at a
number of towns in New York State. The undertaking was so successful as an edu-
cational venture that a school was founded to train teachers to instruct farmers and
mechanics in the applications of science to industrial production. Thus the first Amer-
ican Engineering School owed its existence to the fact that a man of rare power as
a teacher had been found to conduct it. Following the inspiration embodied in it by
Amos Eaton, the Rensselaer School was for forty years a Mecca for teachers of applied
science. The published works of Professor Eaton prove that he was also a scientific
investigator of rare merit.
Thirty years later (1853) William Barton Rogers, also a geologist and pioneer
investigator of the geology of Virginia, moved to Boston to find opportunity to teach
industrial workers how to utilize science in their work. For twenty-five years Profes-
sor Rogers had taught natural science at the University of Virginia with such spirit
that the aisles and window-seats of his lecture room were often crowded by young men
eager to listen to the eloquent words of the teacher they so much admired. It was in
this spirit that he founded the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and the nine
men whom he called to be fellow members of the first faculty were all enough inter-
ested in the educational problem to give a large share of their time to its study.
The interest in the teaching problem has never disappeared wholly from engineer-
ing schools, as it has from some of the universities. The first, and for many years the
only association for the study of education in colleges was the Society for the Pro-
motion of Engineering Education, which developed from the engineering congress
at the Columbian Exposition in 1893. For twenty-five years this organization has
carried on extended and valuable studies in its field, and there can be little doubt
that the recent rapid progress in engineering education has been in large measure
due to its activities. At present about one-third of all the teachers in American tech-
nological schools are enrolled among its members, yet in spite of this, a series of ques-
tions on educational aims, methods, and practices, which was personally presented to
the faculties at the first seven of the schools visited, proved highly unpopular; and
from eighty-five answers that were turned in it appeared that 38 per cent of the pro-
fessors spend no time at all in study to increase their understanding of educational
methods, 60 per cent spend from one to ten per cent of their time in this manner, and
but 2 per cent spend more than this. Obviously it is essential to pay much more at-
tention to the study of education if serious progress is desired.
Fifty years ago little was required of the college professor beyond his teaching.
The opportunities for participation in industry were relatively few, and scholarship
102 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
was universally regarded as a valid excuse for the impracticality of academic life. But
as industrial production has become more and more scientific, the bonds between the
engineering school and the industries have become closer, until now it is generally
recognized that intimate cooperation between the business man and the teacher is of
the greatest benefit to both, for thereby businesses grow more creative and colleges
more business-like.
The infusion of business methods into colleges is of fundamental importance for
good teaching. The tradition that scholars and investigators have no interest in the
material rewards of their labors is true only with regard to rewards over and above
what may be considered as a living wage. It is therefore just as essential for good
teaching as it is for good work of any other sort that the worker be relieved of worry
over the means of material support for himself and his family. During the past twenty
years schools have made very striking progress in the way of stabilizing teachers'
tenures and salaries both by larger endowments and appropriations of public funds
and by better business management. Nevertheless much still remains to be done ; for,
tho teachers1 pay has been slowly increasing, the median salary for a full professor
at state-supported institutions is now only $2500, and his appointment at some
schools has to be renewed formally every year. Even at universities where professorial
appointments are ostensibly made for life, teachers of distinction and even entire
faculties are at times summarily dismissed by the board of trustees.
Two other phases of the problem of laying firm foundations for the profession
of teaching have already been the subjects of extended investigation and report by
the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. Bulletin Number Five,
on Academic and Industrial Efficiency, indicates how modern business methods may
be advantageously applied in university organization to liberate teachers from such
drudgery as care of buildings and grounds, purchasing supplies, publicity, keeping
records, financial management, and supervision of the material welfare of students.
At some of the larger schools professors are now free from duties of this sort, but
many a university man still spends much time and energy running a typewriter, post-
ing accounts, keeping records, or making out requisitions. Bulletin Number Nine
(1916), on A Comprehensive Plan of Insurance and Annuities for College Teachers,
describes the principles and methods that have been proved by ten years of experi-
ence and exhaustive study to be essential to a sound and effective system of insurance
and annuities for college teachers. An organization for putting this plan into action
has been formed and financed, thereby supplying one of the most essential ingredients
of the business basis on which a new liberalized education may safely be built.
The creation of stable financial conditions, the assurance of permanency of tenure,
of a living wage, of relief from routine clerical work, and of safe insurance against
old age, however, are not the only requirements for encouraging good teaching. In-
stitutions that have already achieved these fundamental prerequisites are still ham-
pered by educational conceptions and practices that discourage rather than encourage
TEACHERS 103
progress in teaching. Prominent among the usages that tend strongly to preserve the
status quo is the common practice of employing large numbers of recent graduates or
even of undergraduates as assistants in elementary instruction where the classes are
large. These assistants have usually received all their training in engineering schools
that pay not the slightest attention to the professional education of the teacher.
When such a novice begins his apprenticeship as teacher, his instruction depends
entirely on the attitude of the head of his department. He may be turned loose with-
out directions of any kind, or he may be given such minute directions that he is apt
to become a cog in a machine. In any case he instinctively imitates the methods and
practices of his own teachers, and is kept so busy with routine work that he has
neither the time nor the inclination to study or make experiments in teaching. That
so many eventually turn out to be good teachers is a tribute to Yankee adaptability
rather than to educational foresight, but the energy losses due to inevitable blunders
during the teacher's period of incubation are a serious drain on the intellectual out-
put of the schools. In some of the best institutions the number of assistants is greater
than the number of full time professors.
In selecting young graduates for assistants in teaching it is customary to pick out
those who have won high grades in the subjects they are called upon to teach, be-
cause mastery of subject-matter is obviously a first essential for teaching. Several
schools, however, have recently recognized that this apparently worthy practice may
be a serious handicap both to progress and to good teaching. Under present systems
of grading, high marks are quite as likely to indicate adaptability to the professor's
point of view, as they are to stand for either mastery of the subject or independence
of mind. Hence the inbreeding process, even when based on high grades, in reality
tends strongly to maintain a stolid conservatism which deplores innovations and
inhibits experimentation.
As a remedy for this condition, at one or two schools appointments to the teach-
ing staff are made only after the candidate has had one or more years of successful
experience in some phase of engineering practice. In a few of the more progressive
departments no man is ever appointed to a full professorship until he has won the
recognition of the technical experts in his own line of work. In this respect condi-
tions may be still further improved by freer use of graded objective tests and of per-
sonality ratings (page 73). Schools of engineering might also do well to consider
seriously cooperation with departments of education in the professional training of
teachers of applied science and in the scientific study of their teaching problems.
While the recruiting of the teaching staff from recent graduates tends to maintain
conditions as they are, and therefore to inhibit experiments in teaching, the current
indifference of colleges to problems of education is more directly traceable to the lack
of effective incentives for this work. After the teacher has been liberated from worry
over material support, his most impelling incentive is his desire for self-expression in
creative work. Universities recognize this fact, and have for forty years been struggling
104 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
to develop conditions that would free creative imagination and expand the bounds of
knowledge. In this they have been marvelously successful in the field of natural sci-
ence— so much so, that research and the publication of the results of research have
become the measure of success and the criterion of promotion in most institutions of
higher education in the United States. So completely has this conception of research
won recognition that academic promotion is now determined almost wholly by suc-
cess in it. This fact has produced the impression, prevalent in many quarters, that
research and teaching are in some way antithetical. Hence the question has often
been raised whether research should not be discouraged at educational institutions
in order that teaching might receive a larger share of attention.
It is unquestionably true that research, as at present treated, does interfere seriously
with teaching. Hundreds of college instructors whose interests lie in the human prob-
lems of education, rather than in the material problems of natural science, are now
being diverted from a study of the teaching problem and induced to undertake re-
search because academic promotion so obviously depends on the latter. Many a young
man with promise of making an excellent teacher is sidetracked by the requirements
for the Ph.D. degree and becomes instead, a mediocre researcher. Yet tho much that is
done under the name of research is but pseudo-research, the university is clearly light
in its position that the spirit of investigation is an essential factor of university life.
The difficulty does not lie in research itself, but in the limitations that still cling
to the common interpretation of it. Because research has been developed in the field
of natural science and has wrought such marvels there, its activities have unconsciously
been thought of as restricted to the problems of the material world. Because the tech-
nique of research and the units and methods of measurement have been so perfected
in the domain of natural science that great accuracy and definiteness of conclusion are
now possible, the early struggles for objectively defined standards and scales have been
forgotten. Hence it seems to many grotesque to talk about research in education and
the impersonal measurement of the vaguely defined and elusive qualities of human
beings. The fact that such measurements have as yet been rather crude and incon-
clusive is no reason against trying to improve them, especially now when the great-
est need of education is a technique and a terminology that will make the results of
experiments in teaching intelligible to every one. The inability of teachers to carry
conviction as to the merits of teaching and the meaning of experiments in education
is one of the chief reasons why teaching fails to receive the recognition accorded to
research. But as soon as it is possible to measure the results of teaching by impersonal
means, successful teaching will be as easy to recognize as profitable research. Objective
records of achievement have been found in industry to be one of the best incentives to
creative work. Hence the line of progress in education does not lie in the direction of
making arbitrary distinctions between research and teaching, but rather in the direc-
tion of removing the limitations placed upon the spirit of enquiry so as to encourage
its expansion to education and human relations generally.
TEACHERS 105
If university trustees, presidents, and faculties will unite in insisting on a scientific
study of their educational work, they will create the conditions needed to release
teaching power in the engineering schools. The professors who have teaching interest
and ability will welcome the opportunity to win recognition in work that arouses
their enthusiasm and stirs their imagination to creative effort just as the professors
who are interested in natural science have responded to the opportunity to promote
research. This should not result in a diminution of output in research, but in a de-
cided increase, because it tends to give each man the work he is best fitted to do, and
therefore leads ultimately to maximum efficiency.
The practical carrying out of this suggestion in any school is relatively simple, pro-
vided the faculty is ready and able to undertake it in a spirit of disinterestedness and
helpful cooperation, that is, in a real scientific spirit. Many practical hints concern-
ing essential details of operation have been given in preceding chapters. Any faculty
that will get together and take time to think out their problem can create an organ-
ism that will be a live influence in education ; and the doing of it will in two years
bring more joy to all concerned than forty years of weary effort to maintain things
as they are.
The good effects of an interest in the scientific study of education in institutions
of higher learning are not limited to the institutions themselves. For a number of
years objective methods of measuring the results of training have been gaining favor
in the lower schools. Until very recently the colleges and universities have looked
askance at the progress, and refused to do their share by giving professional training
to those whom they send out to teach. The colleges have thus been a positive hin-
drance to this development, and even now, when more than half of their graduates
teach, for a time at least, no professional work in education is as a rule required out-
side of the so-called teacher's colleges. Meanwhile the industries have been compelled
by the slowness of the academic development to establish schools of their own, and
have organized the National Association of Corporation Schools with an active mem-
bership of more than one hundred and twenty-five large corporations, which are as
much interested in the scientific study of vocational guidance and methods of training
as they are in industrial research. The scientific study of industrial education thus
ranks with industrial research as a bond of union between the engineering schools
and the industries. On the fuller development of both teaching and research depends
the realization of the ultimate aim of engineering education, namely, more intelligent
production.
CHAPTER XVI
THE PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER
AT the first meeting of the Joint Committee of the National Engineering Societies
with representatives of the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching
it was agreed that an analysis of the requirements of the engineering profession was
one of the first essential steps in this study of technological education. Accordingly
a number of representative engineers were questioned in personal interviews concern-
ing the factors that are most powerful in determining success in engineering work and
most effective in building up the engineering profession. These interviews, together
with a study of the methods of rating college graduates in several large manufactur-
ing companies, indicated that personal qualities such as common sense, integrity,
resourcefulness, initiative, tact, thoroughness, accuracy, efficiency, and understanding
of men are universally recognized as being no less necessary to a professional engi-
neer than are technical knowledge and skill.
The statement that individuality counts for as much as learning for the engineer,
just as it does for the lawyer or the physician, seems like a veritable platitude. Yet
because the engineering schools have always made it their chief aim to impart the
technical information needed in industrial production, and because both scientific
knowledge and industrial practice have grown so rapidly, the attention of technical
schools has been focused chiefly on keeping up to date in science and practice. The
university emphasis on research in natural science has also tended to magnify the
importance of technique and to minimize the importance of personality; until cur-
ricula have become so congested with specialized courses that students generally re-
gard literature and sociology as unnecessary chores, to be endured rather than enjoyed.
Therefore it seemed necessary to consider the question whether this emphasis on tech-
nique is producing a new and higher type of engineer, or whether the engineering
profession still stakes its faith on the fundamental thesis that personal character is,
after all, the real foundation for achievement.
The results of this enquiry have already been published.1 Briefly, they showed that
fifteen hundred engineers, who replied in writing to the question : What are the most
important factors in determining probable success or failure in engineering? men-
tioned personal qualities more than seven times as frequently as they did knowledge
of engineering science and the technique of practice. A second circular letter stating
this result was then sent to the thirty thousand members of the four large engineer-
ing societies, and each was asked to number six groups of qualities headed respec-
tively Character, Judgment, Efficiency, Understanding of men, Knowledge, and Tech-
nique, in the order of importance which he gave them in judging the reasons for
engineering success and in sizing up young men for employment or for promotion.
1 Engineering Education, vol. vii, No. 8, pp. 125-144, December, 1916; Educational Review, vol. 53, January, 1917;
Columbia University Quarterly, vol. xix, pp. 66-78, December, 1916.
THE PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER 107
More than seven thousand engineers replied to this request, and their votes placed
the Character group at the head of the list by a majority of 94.5 per cent, while
Technique was voted to the bottom by an equally decisive majority. A very similar
definition of the essential requirements of the engineer was formulated by Mr. A. M.
Wellington and published by him in the Engineering News for May 11, 1893, as
the conclusion of his well-known series of articles on the engineering schools of that
time.
This definition of the essential characteristics of the professional engineer is impor-
tant, because it proves that in spite of the enormous development of scientific infor-
mation and technical skill, the engineers of America have not been beguiled into
thinking that efficient control of the forces of nature is the sole requirement for achieve-
ment in applied science. Therefore the schools that intend to train engineers cannot
afford to neglect wholly the personalities of the students. While it is obvious that
personal traits like integrity, initiative, and common sense cannot be taught didacti-
cally like the rule of three, it is no less obvious that the growth of these essential
characteristics in students may be either fostered and encouraged or inhibited and
discouraged by the manner in which the school is organized and the subject-matter
presented. The problems of finding the best organization, of constructing the best
curriculum, and of discovering the best methods of teaching cannot be solved by logic
alone or by research in natural science. As has been abundantly shown in the pre-
ceding chapters, their solution requires extended experiments in education under con-
ditions that command respect. f
The enquiry just described was completed in 1916 — a year that will always be
memorable in the history of engineering because it marks the beginning of a deeper
public recognition of the importance of the engineer's function in national life. In
that year the Federal Government, for the first time in its history, formally recog-
nized the engineering profession in the organization of the Naval Consulting Board,
the Council of National Defense, and the National Research Council. The first of these
invited the National Engineering Societies to nominate the members of the state com-
mittees on Industrial Preparedness which compiled an inventory of the industrial
resources of the country. Representatives of these societies are also members of the
National Research Council which has so effectively mobilized the scientific resources
of the country for national service. The establishment of the Engineering Founda-
tion, the United Engineering Societies, and the Engineering Council, and the recent
appointment of one man as secretary of them all, indicates the progress that is being
made toward the conception that there is really but one profession of engineering, in
spite of its apparent division into the several well-known branches.
War conditions have not only hastened public recognition of the engineer as an
expert in applied science and fostered solidarity of the profession, they have also opened
to him new fields of activity. Back in 1914 most people believed that the war could
not last long because enough money could not be found to finance it. But three years
108 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
of experience have made it clear to every one that altho money is plentiful, it is use-
less if there is nothing to buy; so that winning the war depends on increasing pro-
duction by an amount which has been estimated as the output of at least ten million
additional industrial workers. This extra production may be secured either by train-
ing more workers or by increasing the output per worker by engineering methods.
Hence there has arisen a pressing demand for men who can deal with labor and with
business administration in the engineering spirit. This demand is further emphasized
by the fact discovered by the Federal Trade Commission, that only ten per cent of
the manufacturers in the United States know their actual costs of production. The
determination of these costs requires a scientific study of production which only an
engineer can make. This work involves the analysis and apportionment of overhead
expenses, and thus leads at once to such fundamental questions of economic justice
as : Should the capital invested in idle machinery be paid wages tho idle workingmen
are not?
These new opportunities for the engineer have been gradually developing for a
number of years, but the profession as a whole has been slow to discern them. The
war has focused attention on them and precipitated a general recognition of them.
It is also evident that the mastery of these new activities depends in greater measure
than does mastery of the traditional types of engineering on the personality of the
man. The success of a designer of bridges or of machinery is not necessarily impeded
by lack of insight into human nature or of failure to comprehend the things that
mankind considers most worth while. But to the man who would deal successfully
with human labor and with business, personality is usually a greater asset than tech-
nical knowledge and skill. Therefore as engineering expands into the new fields now
opening before it, the conception that character, judgment, efficiency, and under-
standing of men are no less necessary than technical knowledge and skill will become
more and more impelling, and it will become more and more essential that schools
of engineering pay greater attention to the effect of their work on the personal de-
velopment of the students. Altho many specific suggestions as to how this may be
done have been made in the preceding chapters, a connected summary of the educa-
tional conceptions on which the suggestions are based may serve to make clearer why
the current organization is inadequate and how the proposed plan more fully meets
the present requirements and also supplies a sound basis for future growth.
The ultimate aim of engineering education has always been and still is more in-
telligent industrial production. Technical schools were founded when industrial evo-
lution had progressed so far as to create a pressing demand for men who knew how
to utilize the new and rapidly expanding knowledge of natural science to increase
and improve production. Science was then little taught in high schools and colleges,
so that both the public and the manufacturers were ignorant of it. Under these con-
ditions the obvious need was for scientific enlightenment; and this the engineering
schools were organized to supply. President Rogers's statements that the immediate
THE PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER 109
aim was to supply the intellectual element in production, and that this meant know-
ledge of the fundamental principles of science, were accurately true when he made
them (1861).
The schools have loyally pursued this aim, and have thereby contributed enor-
mously to the achievement of two striking results ; namely, the extension of science
instruction into the school system generally, and the development of public recog-
nition of engineering as a profession, coordinate with theology, medicine, and law.
At the present day an encouraging fraction of the people are reasonably intelligent
in science, the worker in applied science has become socially respectable, and there
has been developed a large conception of the engineering profession. Meanwhile the
methods of dealing with the material problems of industry in a scientific way have
been in a measure established, while the more intricate problems of organizing and
managing men are rapidly pressing forward and demanding engineering treatment.
The net result is that the curricula and methods of instruction that were devised to
supply the intellectual element in production by imparting knowledge of natural sci-
ence must be reorganized to meet the new industrial demand for engineering admin-
istrators and the larger professional demand for men of strong personality. The gen-
eral plan of the proposed reorganization is based upon an analysis of engineering prac-
tice into its three essential factors; namely, knowledge of engineering science, skill
in technique of application, and judgment in the appraisement of values and costs.
In every engineering project the overlapping claims of these three essential factors
must be harmonized with respect to the two fundamental elements of production,
namely, materials and men. Surely every engineer should have some conception of
the present conditions and problems in at least the general aspects of all these essen-
tial factors and elements. If this be granted, it is easy for any school to discover
where its curriculum is overloaded and where it is deficient.
This analysis also indicates^ how the present organization of school work can be
modified so as to furnish a more vital training for professional engineers. Thus, with
regard to materials, the schools do give careful instruction in the laws of physical
science and in the properties and uses of materials. Students are taught the relative
strengths of substances in the materials laboratory, kinematics teaches the principles
of gearing, the shapes of gear- teeth are worked out in the drawing room, the chemical
properties are taught in chemistry, mechanics deals with the forces required to over-
come inertia, machine work is relegated to the shop, and so on. But seldom is all this
information coordinated in a single practical problem, such as determining whether
mild steel, nickel steel, or phosphor bronze is the best thing to use in making a par-
ticular gear wheel; nor is the student ever asked to judge what combination is likely
to produce the most valuable result for the price. Yet this balancing of value and
cost is the controlling factor in all intelligent production.
Again, little consideration is given in courses in machine design to the comfort
and safety of the operator. Yet a pynch press, for example, that requires a workman
110 STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
to use both hands to operate it is far more intelligent than one that takes a large
annual toll of fingers because the driver has one free hand. Similarly the importance
of good heating, lighting, ventilation, and sanitation in increasing the output of
workers and in keeping them strong and healthy should always be taken into account.
These human factors enter in large measure into the determination of the values
secured for a given cost.
It thus appears that an adequate treatment of the first element in production in-
volves not only a scientific presentation of the laws of nature and the properties of
materials, but also an estimation of the values and costs from both the material and the
human points of view. The chasm between the school and practical life is due largely
to a failure to appreciate this fact. The introduction of the study of values and costs
in all their phases is the most direct method by which the schools can bridge this
chasm. Such study is also one of the most potent means of liberating creative energy
and of developing the spirit of investigation.
With regard to the second element of production — men — most schools at present
are doing practically nothing to arouse the students to an intelligent appreciation
of the problems of personal and human relations in production. Yet these problems
are every day becoming more acute, as indicated by such movements as Americani-
zation, human engineering, industrial engineering, and scientific management, with
their various efforts to improve the condition of the workman and to increase his out-
put in production. Many of the burning questions of the time lie in this field. The
loss to industry from turnover — the hiring and firing of workmen — is variously
estimated at from $150,000,000 to $400,000,000 a year. This expense adds from 7
to 20 per cent to the cost of production, and yet it injures rather than benefits the
product. What are the means to prevent turnover — better housing? better social con-
ditions ? higher wages ? profit sharing ? opportunity for self-expression ? juster economic
treatment? or more kindliness ? Does the time-study method of speeding up work pay ?
Does it really relax or wear out the worker? Does it produce the best type of citizen-
ship among the industrial classes ? These and many other similar unanswered ques-
tions are now waiting for an engineering analysis, and the country looks to the engi-
neering schools to train men who shall be able to answer them.
The training of men for the solution of these human problems cannot be carried
out in the schoolroom alone. The students must have some vital, first-hand, personal
contact with labor and workmen's conditions, either by a cooperative system, as at the
Universities of Cincinnati and of Pittsburgh, or thru the industrial service movement,
or in some other real and living way. Hence meeting this demand requires some form
of closer cooperation between the engineering school and the industries, better under-
standing of their mutual relations, and willingness on both sides to approach the
problem with the true research spirit. Such cooperation is needed not only to give
the students a vital conception of the workman's point of view, but also to furnish
that intimate personal knowledge of the details of production which cannot be secured
THE PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER 111
in college laboratories and shops. The lack of this sense of the physical properties of
materials is one of the chief reasons why less than five per cent of the production
managers in this country are college-trained men.
It is, however, in the matter of estimating values and costs that this problem
assumes its most far-reaching consequences. The following are some of the typical
problems now pressing for solution in this field. What is the effect of good housing
on the development of the men, the efficiency of production, and the size of the profits?
What is the most effective incentive to maximum output — the bonus system ? oppor-
tunity for cooperation in management? opportunity for creative work? or shorter
hours? Does the assurance of justice and a square deal always tend to increase output
and also to foster the growth of a social spirit and of patriotism ? Does a plant pay
better when profits and output are increased by efficiency methods which give work-
men no chance for self-expression? or when the development of the workmen is made
an aim as well?
Every manager will estimate the values and costs of these various methods of treat-
ing workmen in accordance with his own philosophy of life. There is as yet no con-
clusive evidence to prove these cases one way or the other. The successful manager
to-day is the one who estimates most accurately the human values involved. There-
fore, one of the most important contributions that the school can make toward the
education of the engineer is to guide him in developing an attitude toward life and
a philosophy of living that will enable him to judge rightly as to the things human-
ity considers most worth while. This is the meaning of the professional demand for
larger opportunities for cultural and literary studies. It cannot be met by merely
requiring more work of the ordinary academic type in history, in economics, and in
languages; but rather by introducing the consideration of values and costs into the
regular engineering instruction in some such way as that described in Chapters XIII
and XIV.
Some attention has already been paid by the engineering schools to the problem
of organizing men into effective working groups. At the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology, Pennsylvania State College, and several other schools special courses in
engineering administration are now given regularly. These courses deal mainly with
the various types of organization, the technique of different kinds of management,
accountancy, banking methods, and economic theory. All of this is, of course, essen-
tial to every engineering administrator. Industry sorely needs men thus trained ; for
the determination of costs is relatively easy so far as materials and labor are concerned ;
but the overhead, because it includes the cost of maintaining the organization, is a
matter of great difficulty. Analysis by engineers shows that the largest wastes in pro-
duction are in the overhead expenses, and result from faults in organization, such as
idle machinery, inefficient maintenance, poor routing, lack of foresight in purchas-
ing, delays from lack of instruction from the office, and so on. The study of overhead
expenses has led to many searching questions of economics and industrial justice,
STUDY OF ENGINEERING EDUCATION
with which the student will have to deal after graduation, but to which the schools
have not yet given serious attention.
But it is gradually becoming evident that the ultimate success of any organization
depends on its spirit; and this, in turn, is determined by the manner in which those
in control coordinate and interrelate the intelligences and imaginations of men. Great
organizers and leaders in industry are those who not only master the laws of nature,
but who also shape and control their organization thru their power of estimating ac-
curately the value which each worker esteems most highly. The engineers instinctively
recognize this fact and the educational implications of it when they declare that char-
acter, judgment, efficiency, and understanding of men are even more essential to the
practising engineer than is knowledge of the science and technique of engineering.
The educational interpretation of this professional demand is not nearly so mys-
terious as many have tried to make it. For the schools have already discovered that
students learn best when they are inspired by the conviction that the work is really
worth while. One of the most effective ways of making work seem worth while is by
constantly relating it to the consideration of the whole range of values involved and
all the costs. Every decision in daily life is an answer to the question whether the value
is worth the cost. The omission of this mainspring of all investigation and enquiry
from school work is perhaps the chief reason for the breach that separates the schools
from life. Hence the first message of the profession to the schools is — Motivate your
work by making it worth while; liberate the spirit of investigation by making the
game worth the candle; for character, judgment, efficiency, and understanding of men
develop best in men who work with enthusiasm and intelligence at things that they
believe to be worth while.
But there is a second message in the professional demand. For the spirit of investi-
gation accomplishes valuable results only when the investigator is resourceful, accu-
rate, and efficient in mastering facts, and when he has judgment, common sense, and
a wide perspective. These qualities depend on the ability to put things in their proper
places at the proper times, which ability depends in turn on the perception of intrinsic
relationships. The most successful organizer and executive is the one who perceives
relationships so clearly that he can build an organization which acts to liberate the
creative energy of each in ways that prove most helpful. Hence training in ability to
perceive relationships — interrelation — is one essential for the development of re-
sourcefulness, judgment, common sense, perspective, efficiency, and the rest. This is also
one essential to the acquisition of knowledge. Therefore in so far as the school work
develops the student's ability to perceive relationships, in so far do knowledge and the
desired personal traits increase together.
It thus appears that so far as the school work itself goes, the professional demand
for upbuilding of character along with increase of knowledge suggests at least two
promising lines of educational experiment, namely, motivation and interrelation. The
lower schools have long ago recognized the possibilities of these fields of investigation.
THE PROFESSIONAL ENGINEER 113
In fact, the educational progress of the past century has centred around these two con-
ceptions. Many fruitful experiments and a large literature have gathered about the
subject of motivation and the related topics of interest, formal discipline, and trans-
ferable training. In like manner much has been accomplished toward interrelation
thru efforts that have been made to correlate various subjects, as indicated by the
terms commercial-geography, business-arithmetic, household-science, domestic-econ-
omy, agricultural-chemistry, soil-physics, and the like.
The organization of curricula proposed in Chapters XIII and XIV is suggested as
one practical method of harmonizing the conflicting demands of technical skill and
liberal education. It coordinates the results of numerous individual experiments in
a consistent program. It recognizes all the essential elements and factors of engi-
neering as well as the educational requirements of motivation and interrelation. It
is not a Utopian dream, but a summation of the best that has been thought, said, and
done in education during the past two centuries. Finally, it embodies the modern
conception of the professional engineer, not as a conglomerate of classical scholar-
ship and mechanical skill, but as the creator of machines and the interpreter of their
human significance, well qualified to increase the material rewards of human labor
and to organize industry for the more intelligent development of men.
APPENDIX
OBJECTIVE TESTS
THE investigations here described were made by Professor Edward L. Thorn dike of
Columbia University, as an integral part of the study of engineering education. Their
bearings on the problems of admission, elimination, and grading have been discussed
here and there throughout the report, but especially in Chapters VIII and XI. The
types of test used were the following :
MATHEMATICAL ACHIEVEMENT
Mj. Arithmetical Problems. The student is allowed thirty minutes to solve five prob-
lems requiring arithmetical computation only. The problems are arranged in the
order of difficulty and the student is instructed to finish each before passing to the
next. The grade is determined by the number of correct answers. The first problem
of the series is :
1. A boy was tested with a series of sixteen problems in algebra. He did
nothing at all with six of them ; he did one correctly except for a mistake in
changing signs; he did two with many mistakes in each; he did the others per-
fectly. He finished the work in one hundred minutes. What was his total credit,
supposing that he is given a credit of 8 for each example right, a credit of 3 for
each example right except for changing signs, and a penalty of 1 for each minute
spent over an hour and a half?
M2. Algebraic Problems. This test is similar to MI in that it consists of five problems
of graded difficulty, but these require the use of algebraic equations for their solution.
The first problem of the series is :
1. Let L stand for the safe load that can be hoisted by a hemp rope. Let C stand
for the circumference of a rope. If L = 100 C2 pounds, how many pounds are a
safe load for a hemp rope 2J inches in circumference ?
M3. Algebraic Computation. A series of seven algebraic equations of increasing
difficulty, requiring substitution of numerical values and solution for x. The rating
is determined by the number of correct answers secured in thirty minutes.
M^. Graph Test. This is a series of five problems of graded difficulty requiring the
plotting of a series of points to represent various relations between dollars earned (d)
and hours of work (h). The first (d = % h) is worked out by way of illustration. The
others are:
d = -, d = 4 + h, d = T, and d = - + 5
5 A 8
The score is determined by the number of equations correctly plotted in thirty
minutes.
M5. Geometrical Proof. The blank for this test contains a list of fourteen geomet-
rical facts and axioms which are given as proved, and the student is asked to prove
five theorems with the use of the data given. As in the other tests the theorems are
arranged in the order of increasing difficulty, and the rating is determined by the
number correctly demonstrated in half an hour.
118 APPENDIX
ACHIEVEMENT IN ENGLISH
E±. Paragraph Reading. The blank for this test contains three paragraphs, the
first very simple, the second more intricate, and the last very complex. Under each is
a series of five or six questions as to the meaning of the paragraph. The student may
read each paragraph as often as he wishes in order to find answers to the questions.
A quick-witted man gets the point from a single reading, while a slower mind has to
reread. The score is determined by the number of correct answers written in thirty-
six minutes.
E2. Range of Vocabulary. The student is given a sheet on which is printed a series
of words, beginning with those in common use and leading up to relatively rare terms.
He is asked to write under each word a suitable symbol to indicate whether the word
means a flower, an animal, a boy's name, a game, a book, something to do with time,
something good to be, or something bad to be. As in the other tests the score is de-
termined by the number of correct answers in a given time.
E3. Completion of Sentences. This is the well-known Ebbinghaus test, consisting of
a series of sentences of increasing intricacy, from which key words have been omitted.
The student must supply the missing words in such a way as to make sense. The
score depends on the number of blanks correctly filled.
E4. Verbal Relations. Twelve minutes is allowed in this test to write the opposite
of each of a long list of words, as up — down, friend — enemy, and so on. The obvious
cases at the beginning are followed by more and more difficult cases, like " hiss,"
"some," "sacred," "if," and "whether."
ACHIEVEMENT IN PHYSICS
Pi- Practical Laboratory Problems. Each student is given a complete set of the
apparatus required to solve eight simple practical problems in physics, such as
"connect the electric bell to the dry cell so that it will give a single stroke but will
not clatter when the circuit is closed." " With the two ounce weight provided, find the
weight of the meter stick." The solution of each is recorded on a suitable blank, from
which the score is counted.
P2. Described Problems. This is a series of five ordinary physics problems described
in words. They are arranged in the order of difficulty and the student is given twenty-
five minutes in which to answer them.
P3. Matching Diagrams. On one half of the blank is printed a series of diagrams
and pictures of physical apparatus, each marked with a number. On the other half
is a series of statements of physical facts or names of physical phenomena, each of
which corresponds to one of the pictures. The student writes at the head of each state-
ment the number of the corresponding picture.
P4. Completing Statements. This is the same type as E3 except that the sentences
in which the missing words are to be supplied are statements from physics texts.
P5. Completing Diagrams. There are eight diagrams representing physical appa-
ratus, but each is faulty because of the omission of several lines. The student must
complete the diagrams by drawing in the missing lines.
APPENDIX 119
C. The Stenguist Construction Test. Each student receives a box divided into six
compartments, in each of which is an assembled mechanical device and the pieces re-
quired to construct it. The first contains a simple piece of harness ; the second, a snap
switch; the third, a door lock; the fourth, an electric bell; the fifth, a clock work;
and the sixth, an electric pull socket. The student is given fifty minutes in which to
construct the finished models from the loose parts. His score depends on the number
he accomplishes successfully in the given time.
THE RESULTS OF THE TESTS
In the experiment with thirty-four Columbia College students each student's scores
in these tests were combined, and then the students were arranged in their order of
merit as determined by this combined score. To test the validity of this order, which
was called X, all available information concerning each student was gathered, and
the thirty-four were arranged in their order of merit in the following different series:
H. According to high school records in English, mathematics, and physics.
R. According to Regents1 examination records in English, mathematics, and
physics.
C. According to college records for scholarship in English, mathematics, and
chemistry during the freshman year.
B. According to the combined judgment of the students.
T. According to the combined judgment of the dean and teachers.
A. According to age at entrance to college.
The series X was then compared with each of the other series and the Pearson cor-
relation coefficient1 was computed for each comparison, with the following results:
Correlation of (X) with (H) High School Scholarship .62
Correlation of (X) with (R) Regents' examinations .74
Correlation of (X) with (C) Freshman year record .74
Correlation of (X) with (B) Opinion of classmates .74
Correlation of (X) with (T) Opinion of teachers .75
With the age at entrance to college, which is a perfectly objective, altho partial,
measure of the student's past ability to get thru the elementary school rapidly or to
begin his schooling young, or both, X correlates positively to an extent of .30. This
correlation could not be expected to be very close, even if the tests gave a perfect
measure of general scholarly power, and is in fact higher for the tests than it is for
H, R, C, B, or T, their respective correlations with A being .12, .21, .11, .12, and .19.
If we give each student, as a rating for general scholarly power, or ability with
ideas, or intellect in the sense of intellect applied to school tasks, a composite of H,
R, C, B, T, A, and X, allowing approximately equal weight to H, R, C, B, and X
and half weight to T and A,2 the rough total score in the tests correlates with this
composite (called Ig) to an extent of .84.
1 If the two series are identical, the coefficient is +1. If one series is the inverse of the other, the coefficient is -I.
A coefficient of zero indicates that there is no resemblance whatever between the two series. A coefficient of + .5
indicates a close resemblance, and one of + .9 expresses one of the closest resemblances found in nature — that
between the shape of the right and the left hands of the same individual. For detailed directions as to the method
of computing these coefficients, cf. Thorndike : Mental and Social Measurements, chapter xi. New York, Teach-
ers College, 1913.
2 T is given only half weight because it is already largelycredited under C ; A is given half weight because the age
at entrance to college is influenced by other causes than ability.
120 APPENDIX
Every one of the tests shows a positive correlation with this Ig, our best obtain-
able measure of general intellect. The Pearson coefficients are :
Mx. Arithmetical problems .625
M2. Algebraic problems .796
M3. Algebraic computation .625
M4. Graph test .614
M5. Geometrical proof .531
Ex. Paragraph reading .447
E2. Range of vocabulary .652
E3. Completing sentences .547
E4. Giving opposites .438
Px. Laboratory problems .253
P2. Described problems .531
P3. Matching diagrams .309
P4. Completing sentences .654
P5. Completing diagrams .416
C. Construction test .180
Every one of these tests, excepting the construction test, is thus symptomatic of the
quality which makes a student enter college young, possess a good record in high school
and in the impartial Regents' examinations, do well during freshman year, and be re-
garded as of high general ability by his classmates and teachers. When all but the last
are combined into a single measure they are symptomatic of it in a very high degre^ ,
A correlation of .84 is probably closer than that which would be found between the
student's average grade in freshman year and his average grade in sophomore year.
The rough total score in the tests which we have called X does not utilize them
to the full. In it each test is given a weight in rough proportion to the time devoted
to it. The tests, however, differ in their value as symptoms of Ig and should, there-
fore, have different weights. The probably best weights to attach to each test as a
symptom or prophecy of Ig can be determined by the method of partial correlation
coefficients, developed by Edgeworth, Pearson, Yule, and Kelley. The calculations,
which are necessarily too elaborate to be reported here, were made by Dr. Truman L.
Kelley. The numerical values of the coefficients for the various tests were found to be :
Mj.. Arithmetical problems +.3376
M2. Algebraic problems + .0669
M3. Algebraic computation + .2941
M4. Graph test +.2755
M5. Geometrical proof +.1523
E±. Paragraph reading —.3412
E2. Range of vocabulary —.1429
E3. Completing sentences +.2881
E4. Giving opposites +.0149
PI- Laboratory problems — .0552
P2. Described problems —.0731
P3. Matching diagrams +.0912
P4. Completing sentences +.6639
P5. Completing diagrams —.1910
C. Construction test -.0377
APPENDIX 121
The partial correlation coefficients show substantially that a practically perfect
prophecy of Ig can be obtained by using the score of the five tests in mathematics,
the completion test in English, and the test in completing statements about physics.
Combining these seven scores so as to give them relative weights of about 4, 1, 3, 3,
1|, 3, and 7 respectively, we obtain a composite measure (call it ME3P4), which cor-
relates with Ig to the extent of .87 (Pearson coefficient, .86; coefficient by the method
of squared differences in ranks, .87; coefficient by percentage of unlike-signed pairs,
.92).
We can then secure a practically perfect prophecy of Ig by these seven tests alone.
They tell us very closely what rating a student would have if we combined his high
school marks, Regents' examination marks, marks during freshman year, grades as-
signed him by his teachers and by his classmates, age at entrance (taken inversely),
and score in our fourteen tests (C being excluded). The other three tests in English
and the other four tests in physics do almost nothing1 toward prophesying this Ig,
except in so far as they involve abilities already measured by the completion tests and
mathematical tests.
This does not mean that these tests in English and physics are of no independent
value as symptoms of any important abilities in these students. On the contrary, in
so far as we may trust the regression equation, they are proved thereby to be of very
great value, because they measure abilities which the entire record of school work,
examinations, and judgment by teachers and fellow students fails to measure.
Just what these other abilities are cannot be stated. Further experimentation and
the calculation of other sets of regression equations will be required for that. They
certainly include, however, in P±, P3, and P5, some aspects of certain abilities with
things rather than abstract elements thereof. These abilities seem likely to be of spe-
cial importance for future success in the study and practice of engineering. They
probably include, in El5 E2, and E4, certain abilities with language which depend on
interest in reading, memory of the meaning of single words and phrases, and efficiency
in keeping in mind the past context in reading a connected passage.
Negatively, they are abilities which the records of high school and freshman year
do not test, and which are other than the abilities for managing symbols and rela-
tions tested by the mathematical and completion tests.
Consider now the test in "Construction"" or assembling parts to make mechanisms.
It shows a positive correlation of .18 with Ig, but this correlation is shown by the
investigation of the partial correlation coefficients to be due wholly to elements of
ability already fully taken account of by Ml9 M2, M3, M4, M5, E3, and P4. The con-
struction test C gives us primarily a measure of abilities not tested by the record of
school, entrance examinations, freshman year, and opinions of fellow students and
teachers. They are, presumably, concrete knowledge of mechanisms and skill inputting
them together. Here again we have information that the ordinary school records and
examinations and the like do not give, and that is probably somewhat prophetic of
success in the study and practice of engineering.
On the whole, our tests fall into four groups, each contributing facts of sure, or
almost sure, importance. First we have Mj, M2, M3, M4, Mg, E3, and P4. When an
individual's scores in these are properly weighted and combined, we have a measure
(called ME3P4) which gives us substantially the same rating as if we combined (as
1 P3, the test in matching diagrams with the facts or laws which they illustrate, does deserve a small weight (one-
seventh as much as the test in completing sentences about physics). The others deserve none.
122 APPENDIX
in Ig) his high school marks for four years in mathematics, English, and physics, his
entrance examinations, his marks for freshman year, his rating for general intellect
in the minds of his teachers, his rating for general intellect in the minds of his class-
mates, his age at entrance to college, and his score in our fourteen tests of ability in
mathematics, English, and physics. ME3P4 thus gives us, within a few days after a
boy enters an engineering school, a sufficiently accurate measure of what is commonly
regarded as general intellectual ability or promise as a student.
In the second place, we have Pl5 P3, and P5, the tests with the laboratory prob-
lems, matching diagrams, and completing diagrams.1 Call this combination P135.
These measure a mixture of abilities measured by ME3P42 and other abilities not
measured by ME3P4 or by Ig. These other abilities seem likely to be prophetic of
future success in engineering rather than law, teaching, or business.
In the third place, we have the test in mechanical skill, which has very little in com-
mon with the E1? E2, E4 group, and not much more in common with the M12345E3P4
group, but does have much in common with the Pi35 group, and also much that is
peculiar to itself. For the construction test C the correlations are: With the compos-
ite of EX, E2, and E4, .166 by the method of squared differences in ranks, .055 by the
Spearman foot-rule; with the ME3P4 composite, .25 (.247 and .250 by the two meth-
ods); with the P135 composite, .5 (.61 and .62 by the two methods).
In the fourth place, we have the tests in reading English words and paragraphs and
in giving opposites (El9 E2, and E4). This combination, which may be called E124, has
a good deal in common with ME3P4 (r equals .7), but practically nothing in com-
mon with P135 or with the tests in mechanical knowledge and skill (r equals .2 for the
former and .1 for C of the latter). They have much that is peculiar to themselves.
That each of the first three groups tells us something important about candidates
for an engineering education, probably no competent person will doubt. The future
careers of students tested as the thirty-four students were tested will give the mate-
rial for measurements of correlations which will decide their merits beyond dispute.
The fourth group of tests (E1? E2, and E4) give rather specialized information con-
cerning a candidate's mastery of the vernacular, which is useful chiefly as a means of
interpreting the results of other tests. If they were left out, we should have nearly
as adequate measures of the abilities of direct importance as indications of probable
success in the study and practice of engineering as we have from the entire series. We
would not, however, be able to tell so well as we could by their aid, whether failure
with verbally stated problems was due to lack of scientific and technical ability or to
the lack of linguistic ability.
These same tests were given to forty-one freshmen at the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology. No adequate measures of Ig (General Intellect) are available, but the
value of the tests appears from the following facts : Using the team of seven tests (all
five tests in mathematics, and the tests in completing English sentences and complet-
ing statements about physics), a boy's score in the tests resembles his average score
in the studies of freshman year more closely than does his score in the elaborate
series of entrance examinations given by the Institute. The average correlation be-
tween the score in these tests and the academic record in either half of the subjects of
the freshman year is -f- .45 ; the correlation between the median entrance examina-
1 P2, the test with the described problems, may belong with this group or in a special class by itself. It probably
involves in part the abilities involved by the ME3P4 group, those involved by the Pl35 group, and certain special
abilities to understand language.
2 The correlation of Pi36 with ME3P4 is .5 (.50 by the method of squared differences in ranks and .56 by the Spearman
foot-rule method); the correlation with Ig is also about .5 (.48 and .46 by the two methods just mentioned).
APPENDIX 123
tion mark and the academic record in either half of the subjects of the freshman year
is +.37. The correlation between the two halves of the academic record is only -f .76.
The tests were given also to forty-one freshmen in the Engineering School of the
University of Cincinnati. In this case also there were no such adequate measures of
Ig available as was the case with the thirty-four Columbia students. The tests, how-
ever, tell how well a boy will do in one half of his freshman studies just as well as his
marks in the other half do. That is, using the first three subjects (average of 12 marks),
the last four subjects (average of 16 marks), and the record in the selected weighted
team of tests (Ml9 M2, M3, M^, M5, and the tests in completing English sentences
and completing statements about physics), we find :
The resemblance between the score in the tests and the score in the first 3
subjects is +.49
The resemblance between the score in the tests and the score in the last 4
subjects is +.57
The resemblance between the score in the first 3 subjects and the score in
the last 4 subjects is +.49
This team of seven tests also tells how well a boy will be rated in his shopwork for
pay nearly as well as does either half of his marks in freshman studies. Neither one,
however, corresponds at all closely to this shop rating. The average resemblance of
half of the freshman marks to the opinion of the coordinator as to the boy's shop-
work for pay during the year is +.22. The resemblance of the selected team of tests
is +.14.
Considering the facts from both Cincinnati and the Massachusetts Institute, it
appears that the team of seven tests foretells how well a student will do in either
half of his freshman year studies about four-fifths as well as does his record in the
other half of these studies themselves.
It also appears from a study of the academic records made by the Columbia group
in their sophomore year, that these seven tests foretell how well a student will do in
the sophomore year at least three-fourths as well as does his entire academic record
for the freshman year.
Teachers of engineering will naturally inquire why any technological school should
not give these tests to its entering students instead of accepting a high school certi-
ficate or a regular college entrance examination. The chief reasons for giving these
tests in addition to those of the secondary schools are the following :
1. These tests give relatively much more weight to the ability to deal with "real"
situations and problems than ordinary examinations do. In the mathematical work,
for example, problems which life could never offer, because to frame the problem one
must first know the answer, are rigidly excluded. So also are fantastic and artificial
problems invented for disciplinary purposes alone.
2. Ordinary examinations confuse the ability to think and do with the ability to
understand verbal descriptions and tell in words what one does think or do. The stu-
dent who has a good command of language thus gets undue credit. Ability to handle
verbally described problems in physics means, for example, ability to understand the
words, the necessary knowledge of physical facts and laws, and ability to express one's
response in words. A student might be able to repair an electric bell if he saw it, but
not be able to tell what the trouble was from a verbal description ; or, if he could do
the latter, not be able to tell in words how he would repair it. Ability to handle verbal
symbols is important, and these tests measure it, but they are designed to measure
124 APPENDIX
also and separately the ability to think with things and diagrams. Three of the five
tests in physics demand responses to actual objects or pictures of objects.
3. It has been shown that tests Ml5 M2, M3, M4, M5, E3, and P4 together give us
a practically sufficient measure of the abilities involved in and tested by ordinary
school achievements. Pl9 P3, and P5 give us something very different. The test for
mechanical skill gives us something still different. El9 E2, and E4 give us something
still different. If the ordinary examinations were so given as to be as commensurate,
objective, scientific, and convenient as these tests, they could be used in place of
Ml5 M2, M3, M4, M5, E3, and P4; but we should still need to supplement them by
Pl5 P3, and P5, and by the tests in mechanical skill.
4. A high school mark is simply a statement of relative position in that school.
The same mark has many values in different high schools; all of these are unknown
quantities until they are defined in terms of the actual tasks given during the school
course. If John Doe in School A was marked 85 and Richard Roe in School B was
marked 75, we do not know how much either knew or could do, or which was the
better.
An entrance examination mark has the same defects, altho to a much smaller ex-
tent. The examinations in different years may vary in difficulty, and the grades that
different examiners would attach to the same set of answers may vary widely. The
authorities responsible for these examinations could eliminate the former possibility
by proper investigations, and could reduce the latter to a harmless minimum by other
investigations. It is not known that they have ever made investigations of either sort,
altho the New York Regents' examinations seem to be rather free from both defects.
5. It is unlikely that the average school or entrance examination would show the
low constant errors and high correlations between different judges' scores which these
tests have. The measurements made by Elliott and others, indeed, lead one to expect
a marked inferiority in this respect. Until those responsible for these examinations
measure their constant errors and coefficients of reliability , we may fairly assume that
they will be inferior to tests devised with especial attention to objectivity.
6. The ordinary examination is a collection of tasks selected largely irrespective
of other criteria than that it be a "fair" test, and that it distinguish those below from
those above a certain standard for passing. These tests are constructed of steps of
increasing difficulty, thereby making possible a fairly definite determination of the
degree of difficulty where a student's efforts change from success to failure.
7. In the tests recommended here the plan of constructing the tests, and the details
of scoring them, are settled so that the work of arranging for them each year is greatly
reduced.
8. The value of all other measurements of an entering class, such as their records
in high school or records in the regular college entrance examination, is increased
when these tests also are given. They would be worth giving if only as a means of
equating to a uniform scale the grades of schools, different years, and the like. The
trouble with our present information about students at entrance is not so much that
it is intrinsically misleading, as that it requires common denominators to interpret it.
The record made in the school of engineering itself is one such denominator. These
tests furnish another. Each has its advantages. The two together will enable the of-
ficers of schools of engineering to interpret the records sent in by secondary schools
and examining boards, and to suggest improvements in the examining machinery by
which these records are secured.
APPENDIX 125
To prevent unfair preparation for the tests, and to permit repeated measurements
of the same individuals, it is necessary to have many alternative series of each sort of
test. These should be so devised that the same person would get approximately the
same score for ability in English, ability in mathematics, or ability in physics, no mat-
ter by what series of the tests he was tested. If all the alternative forms of each sepa-
rate test could be equal in difficulty, that would be still better. The plan of these tests
permits the selection of such alternates.
The provision of satisfactory alternative series of tests involves much experimen-
tation and statistical work, there being hardly any other satisfactory criterion of
"equally difficult" than "such that equal percentages of the same group of students
succeed therewith.'1 The group must also be representative, and therefore large.
If the tests described here are found to be as useful in practice as they seem likely
to be, state examining boards and institutions interested in knowing what the abili-
ties of their entering students really are should cooperate to provide fifteen or twenty
alternative series. That number could, by interchange of elements and by easily ar-
ranged devices to detect and penalize heavily any student who had been " crammed "
for the specific tests, be made to last indefinitely.
Whatever the merit of these particular tests may be, it is certain that the criteria
by which any test should be judged are worth attention. An institution which uses
any set of examinations to judge the fitness of entering students should find the
coefficients of correlation (1) between each of such tests and another of similar plan,
(2) between the score given to each of such tests by one judge and that given by an-
other judge independently, (3) between each of such tests and the Ig or Mg or Eg
or whatever ability is supposed to be measured, and (4) between the total score of
the team of tests used to decide entrance and the Ig or F (some other measure of
demonstrated degree of fitness for the work of the institution). It should not toler-
ate a system showing a correlation below .9 for the team of tests with Ig or F in the
case of pupils from approximately equally good schools. It should use the regression
equation or equivalent "cut and fit" methods to find the team of tests which gives
a correlation of .9 or more with a minimum cost of time and a maximum amount of
intelligibility of units, convenience, and easy extension by alternates and good effect
upon the teaching and learning of the lower schools.
Such an evaluation of a set of examinations requires knowledge of the theory and
technique of educational measurements and much labor, but there is no other sound
way. The merit of a system of entrance examinations is not a matter for divination
or faith.
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
THE following list of books has been made short in order to encourage teachers to
read and study at least some of them. Each throws additional light from an inde-
pendent point of view on the problems discussed in this study.
AYDELOTTE, F.
English and Engineering. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1917.
BEARD, C. A.
The Economic Foundations of Jeffersonian Democracy. New York: Macmillan, 1915.
CLARK, V. S.
History of Manufactures in the United States. Washington: Carnegie Institution, 1916.
DEWEY, JOHN
How We Think. Boston: D. C. Heath, 1910.
Democracy and Education. New York: Macmillan, 191 6.
FERGUSON, C.
The Great News. New York: Kennerley, 1915.
GANTT, H. L.
Industrial Leadership. New Haven: Yale University Press, 191 6.
HOBSON, J. A.
Work and Wealth, a Human Valuation. New York: Macmillan, 1916.
Democracy after the War. New York: Macmillan, 1918.
JAMES, E. J.
The Origin of the Land Grant Act of 1 862. University of Illinois Bulletin, vol. viii,
No. 10, 1910.
KANDEL, I. L.
Federal Aid for Vocational Education. The Carnegie Foundation, Bulletin No. 10, 1917.
KEPPEL, F. P.
The Undergraduate and his College. Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1918.
MANN, C. R.
The Teaching of Physics for Purposes of General Education. New York: Macmillan,
1912.
PRITCHETT, H. S.
What is Religion? Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1906.
RICE, J. M.
Scientific Management in Education. New York: Hinds, Noble & Eldridge, 1913.
ROE, J. W.
English and American Tool Builders. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1916.
130 SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY
SCHNEIDER, H.
Education for Industrial Workers. The World Book Company, 1916.
TAYLOR, F. W.
The Principles of Scientific Management. New York: Harpers, 1913.
THORNDIKE, E. L.
Education. New York: Macmillan, 1914.
Theory of Mental and Social Measurements. New York: Teachers College, 1913.
WELLINGTON, R. G.
The Political and Sectional Influence of the Public Lands. Boston, 1914.
INDEX
INDEX
ABILITY, engineering, test of, 48.
Academic and Industrial Efficiency, 102.
Accredited schools, 48.
Accuracy in engineering, 106.
Achievement, tests of, 117ff.
Activities, extra-school, importance of, 53.
Administration of engineering schools, 27 ff.
Cooperative type, 30 f.
Faculty control, 29.
Military type, 28 f.
Admission requirements in engineering schools,
21f.,47.
Agricultural instruction, demand for, 4.
Agriculture in the United States, 4, 5.
Aims of early engineering schools, 9 ff.
Akron, University of, cooperative plan at, 58, 81.
Algebraic problems, tests in, 117.
American Academy of Engineers, 19.
American Institute of Electrical Engineers, 18.
American Institute of Mining Engineers, 18.
American Society of Civil Engineers, 18.
American Society of Mechanical Engineers, 18.
Amherst College, tuition at, 16.
Apprenticeship and professional training, 55.
Arithmetical problems, tests in, 117.
Army officers, grading of, 73.
Army Personnel Committee, 73.
Army, tests in the, 72.
Assistants in universities, 103.
Atkinson, Professor W. P., 38.
Aydelotte, Professor Frank, 63, 64, 93.
IJALTIMORE Polytechnic Institute, 7.
Banking in engineering schools, 63.
Bibliography, 127.
Bird, Professor R. M., 62.
Bliss Electrical School, 7.
Board of Visitors of United States Military
Academy, 28.
Boards of regents, 27.
Boards of trustees, 27.
Breese, Professor B. B., 52.
British manufactures and American produc-
tion, 3.
Brodhead, Charles, 4.
Brown University, new curriculum at, 93.
Tuition at, 16.
Buel, Jesse, 4, 5, 9.
Burton, Dean A. E., 32, 52.
C/ALCULUS, place of, 90.
California and federal land grant, 16.
Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of
Teaching, 102, 106.
Carnegie Institute of Technology, 78.
Carnegie, Andrew, 78. [77 f.
Casino Night School, Centennial Exposition,
Census Reports and engineering, 18.
Certificate system and examination system com-
pared, 48 f.
Admission by, 47, 48.
Character and achievement, 146 f.
As quality in grading, 73.
Chemistry for engineering students, 39 f.
Cincinnati, University of
Administration in, 30 f.
Cooperative plan at, 58, 78 ff., 88.
Coordination at, 57.
Grading at, 33, 35, 73 f.
Graduates of, 79.
Reorganization of content at, 61 f.
Shopwork in, 78.
Testing of students in, 52, 123.
Civil engineer, degree of, 12.
Training of, 5.
Civil engineering, first mention of, 12.
Specialization in, 23 f., 54.
Civil engineers, statistics of, 18.
Clermont, the, 3.
Coefficients of correlation, 119f.
Cogswell Polytechnic Institute, San Francis-
co, 7.
College Entrance Examination Board, 47, 48.
Colleges and professional development of en-
gineering, 19.
Colleges, arts, engineering work in, 7.
Columbian Exposition, 101.
Columbia University
Engineering curricula in, 54.
Grading in, 33.
Testing of students in, 49 f., 119 ff.
Tuition in, 16.
Columbia University, School of Mines, 16.
Committee on Agriculture, report of, to New
York State Legislature, 4.
Committees on Instruction, 88 f.
Common sense in engineering, 106.
Completion tests, 118f.
Comprehensive Plan of Insurance and Annuities
for College Teachers, 102.
Congress and Administration of United States
Military Academy, 28.
Congress and industrial development, 3.
Contracts and specifications in engineering
schools, 63.
Cooperative plan, 58, 78 ff., 89, 110.
Advantages of, 80.
Cost of, 80.
Meaning of, 81.
134
INDEX
Cooperative System of Education, The, 30.
Cooperative type of administration, 30.
Coordination in engineering schools, 57, 98.
Coordinators, 79.
Cornell University
Engineering courses in, 24, 54 f.
Student grades in, 33.
Correlations, coefficients of, 119f.
Correlations in Thorndike tests, 119f.
Cost of cooperative plan, 80.
Costs, practice in figuring, 63.
And values, 99.
Cotton gin invented, 3.
Council of National Defense, 107.
Courses, engineering, length of, 54 if., 93 f.
Content of, 60 ff.
Credit hours in engineering courses, 54 f.
Culture in engineering schools, 56.
Curricula of engineering schools, 7f., 9ff., 21 ff.,
38ff.,60ff.
Commercial subjects in, 63.
Congestion of, 25, 57.
Construction of, 56, 65.
Control of, 29, 55, 60 f.
Coordination in, 57.
Distribution of time in, 22 f., 24 ff., 54 ff.
Essentials of, 89.
Experiments in, 61 ff.
Length of, 54 ff.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 13,
22.
Methods of teaching, 37 ff.
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 13, 57.
Reorganization of, 87 ff.
Methods of, 88 f.
Required credit hours and, 87.
Specialization of, 23, 25, 54, 55.
University of Illinois, 13, 24, 55.
.DARTMOUTH College, Thayer School, 16.
Dentistry, schools of, 56.
Dooley, C. R., 36, 71.
Drawing for engineering students, 42.
Duckering, W. E.,59.
Duncan, Robert Kennedy, 82 f.
Dunwoodie Institute, Minneapolis, 7.
Duruy, Histoire des temps modemes, 38.
EATON, Amos, 37, 101.
Ecole Centrale des Manufactures, 12.
Economic theory in engineering schools, 63.
Edgeworth, partial correlation coefficients of,
120.
Education, science of, 88.
Efficiency in engineering, 106.
Electrical engineers, statistics of, 18.
Elimination of students, 22 ff., 100.
Causes of, 33.
Determination of, 32.
Engineer, the professional, 106 ff.
Equipment of, 65.
Opportunity for, 107, 108.
Engineering ability, test of, 47.
Administration, courses in, 111.
Aim of, 90.
And apprenticeship, 55.
Census reports on, 18.
Colleges and, 19.
Common basis of, 89.
Curricula in, 7, 9 ff., 21 ff., 38 ff., 60 ff.
Education, aim of, 9ff., 108 ff.
Demand for, 4, 5.
Problems of 8, 47 ff.
Essentials of, 106.
Profession of, 18 f.
Qualities required in, 106.
Engineering Council, 107.
Engineering Foundation, 19, 107.
Engineering, professional ideals of, 8.
Engineering schools, administration of, 27 ff.
Aims of, 9 ff.
Chemistry in, 39 f.
Classification of, by U. S.' Bureau of Educa-
tion, 56.
Commercial subjects in, 63.
Content of courses in, 60 ff.
Coordination in, 57.
Culture in, 56.
Curricula of, 7, 9 ff.
Descriptive geometry in, 42.
Development of, 3ff., 55 f.
Drawing in, 42.
English in, 38, 41.
Entrance requirements of, 12.
Equipment of, 7f., 15 ff.
Examinations in, 41.
Experiments in, 61.
Faculty control in, 56.
Financial management of, 27.
Foreign languages in, 42.
Grading and testing in, 67 ff.
Graduates of, 6, 7.
Graduation thesis, 43.
History in, 38.
In large universities, 30.
Liberal arts in, 56.
Mathematics in, 39.
Methods in, 14.
Methods of instruction in, 37 ff.
Number of, 6.
Number visited, 26.
Orientation courses in, 58.
Problems of, 8.
Resources of, 7f., 15 ff.
INDEX
135
Shopwork in, 42, 76.
Students in, 6, 15 ff.
Teachers in, 56 f., 101 ff.
Tests of students in, 117 if.
Theory and practice in, 58.
Tuition in, 16.
Types of, 28 ff.
Engineering societies, 18.
Engineering, specialization in, 23, 25.
Engineering work in arts colleges, 7.
English, in entrance requirements, 22.
Methods of teaching, 38, 41 f.
Reorganization of, 63, 93, 99.
Tests of achievement in, 118 ff.
English literature and elimination of students,
33.
Entrance requirements in engineering schools.
See Admission requirements.
Equipment of engineering schools, 7f., 15 ff.
Erie Canal, 4.
Evans, Oliver, inventor, 3.
Examination system and certificate system com-
pared, 48 f.
And tests, 17ff.
In engineering schools, 41 f.
Extra-school activities, importance of, 53.
.T ACULTY control in engineering schools, 29, 56.
Federal Aid for Vocational Education, 9.
Federal land grant, acceptance of, 16.
Federal Trade Commission, 108.
Fellenberg School, Hofwyl, Switzerland, 4, 9,
37.
Fernald, Professor R. H., 62 f.
Fernald, R. H., and Orrok, G. A., Engineering
of Power Plants, 63.
Financial management of engineering schools,
27.
Florida, University of, engineering courses in,
24, 60.
Flour mills, machinery for, made, 3.
Foreign languages for engineering students, 42,
90, 94.
Foremen, qualities of, 36.
Franklin Union, Boston, 7.
French in engineering schools, 90, 94.
French technical schools, 12, 14.
Freshman year in engineering, 25, 38.
Grades in, 35.
Practical engineering in, 88, 91.
Fulton, Robert, 3.
GEDDES, James, 4.
General Electric Company, 36.
General studies in engineering curricula, 22 f.
Geometrical drawing for engineering students,
42.
Geometrical proof, test in, 117.
Geometry, descriptive, for engineering students,
42.
George Washington University, entrance re-
quirements, 22.
German and elimination of students, 33, 90.
Germany, graduating engineers in, 7.
Goettsch, Professor H. M., 61 f.
Grades, low, meaning of, 34.
And employment, 36.
And specialization, 97.
Distribution of, 68.
Number and percentage of, 35.
Qualities selected for, 73 f.
Student, 33 ff., 67 ff., 117 ff.
Vocational guidance and, 72. [19.
Graduates of engineering schools, 6, 7, 16, 17,
Employment of, 20.
Graduation, average age of, 33.
Graph test, 117.
Greene, Professor B. Franklin, 12, 26.
Guizot, History of Civilization, 35, 38.
HARVARD University
Engineering curricula at, 54.
Tuition in, 17.
High school inspectors, 48.
History in entrance requirements, 22.
History of engineering schools, 3 ff.
History of the Rensselaer Polytechnic Insti-
tute, 9.
Hobson, Professor J. A., Work and Wealth, a
Human Valuation, 99.
Houston, John F., 18.
Human factors in engineering, 109 f.
Humanities in engineering schools, 89, 90, 92 f. ,
99.
ILLINOIS and federal land grant, 16.
Illinois Industrial League, 9.
Illinois Industrial University, 10.
Tuition at, 16.
Illinois, University of, 9.
Curricula of, 13, 24, 55.
Elimination in, 32.
Entrance requirements, 21 f.
Graduates of, 16, 17.
Resources of, 16, 17.
Shopwork in, 76f.,78.
Student grades in, 33, 34.
System of instruction in, 14.
Inbreeding in college faculties, 103.
Individuality in professions, 106.
Industrial companies and research, 82 f.
Industrial universities, 5.
Industry in the United States, development of,
3, 4f.,18, 19.
Engineering schools and, 8, 9 ff., 14, 78 ff., 89,
90,91,98, 108 f.
136
INDEX
Foreign artisans and, 3.
Patriotism and, 3.
Scientific information and, 4, 10, 20.
State treasuries and, 3.
War of 1812 and, 3.
War of Independence and, 3.
Initiative in engineering, 106.
Instruction, methods of, in engineering schools,
37 ff.
Integrity in engineering, 106.
Intelligence as quality in grading, 73.
International Commission on the Teaching of
Mathematics, 39.
Interrelation, 112.
Iowa and federal land grant, 16.
JAMES, E. J., Origin of the Land Grant Act of
1862, 9, 10.
Johns Hopkins University, engineering school
in, administration of, 29.
Engineering courses in, 24.
Judgment in engineering, 106 f.
Junior year in engineering, 25.
Grades in, 35.
KANDEL, Dr. I. L., on Federal Aid for Voca-
tional Education, 9.
Kansas, University of, and industrial research,
82 f.
Katte, E. B., 70.
Kelley, Dr. Truman L., 51, 120.
Kentucky, University of, grading of students
at, 73.
Keppel, Dean F. P., 49, 70.
Knowledge in engineering, 106 f.
LABORATORY problems, tests in, 118f.
Laboratory work in engineering education, 8,
91, 98.
Lafayette College, cooperative plan at, 58.
Land Grant Colleges, movement for, 9.
Latrobe, Benjamin, 18.
Law and apprenticeship, 55.
Lawrence, Abbott, 14.
Lawrence Scientific School, Harvard Univer-
sity, 5.
Graduates of, 15.
Leadership, as quality in grading, 73.
Liberal arts in engineering schools, 56.
Liberal training and science, 5.
Lowell Institute, 7.
federal land grant, 16.
Manufactures and engineering. See Industry in
the United States.
March and Wolff, Calculus, 61.
Market conditions in shopwork, 77.
Marks, 67 ff., 117ff.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Administration in, 111.
Administration of, 27.
Aims of, 10, 11.
Cooperation plan in, 31, 81.
Curricula of, 7, 13, 22, 24.
Elimination in, 32.
English in, 63, 93, 99.
Entrance requirements, 21 f.
Grant from state to, 16.
Methods of instruction in, 37 f.
Resources of, 16, 17, 27.
Shopwork in, 77 f.
Specialization in, 96.
Student grades in, 33, 34.
Students of, 17, 27.
System of instruction in, 14.
Testing of students at, 52, 119 f.
Massachusetts state legislature, 16.
Matching diagrams, tests in, 118. [39.
Mathematics for engineering students, aims of,
In entrance requirements, 50.
Methods of teaching, 39.
Reorganization of, 61.
Tests of achievement in, 117 ff.
Mechanic arts in engineering schools, 89, 90, 91 f.
Demand for training in, 5.
Mechanical engineering, specialization, 24.
Courses in, 22 f.
Mechanical engineers, statistics of, 18.
Training of, 5.
Mellon Institute, 82.
Medicine and apprenticeship, 55.
Schools of, 56.
Meyer, Professor Max, 67.
Michigan and federal land grant, 16.
Michigan College of Mines, engineering courses
in, 24.
Michigan, University of, 5.
Engineering school at, 14.
Middlesex Canal, 3.
Military drill in land grant colleges, 29.
Military type of administration, 28.
Mining engineers, statistics of, 18.
Minnesota, University of, engineering curricula
at, 54.
Missouri, University of, grading at, 67.
More, Professor C. C., 58 f., 62.
Morrill Act, 5, 6, 15.
Motivation, 112.
.NATIONAL Academy of Science, 19.
National Association of Corporation Schools,
105.
National Engineering Societies, 106, 107.
National Research Council, 19, 107.
Naval Consulting Board, 107.
New Hampshire and federal land grant, 16.
INDEX
137
New Jersey and federal land grant, 16.
New York and federal land grant, 16.
Norsworthy, Professor L. D., 70.
North Carolina College of Agriculture and Me-
chanic Arts, entrance requirements, 22.
North Central Association of Colleges and Sec-
ondary Schools, 48.
Northwestern University, engineering courses
in, 24.
Norton, Professor W. A., 14. [22.
Notre Dame University, entrance requirements,
OBJECTS and Plan of an Institute of Technol-
ogy, 9, 11.
Officers, army, grading of, 73.
Ohio State University
Engineering curricula in, 54 f.
Student grades in, 33.
Orientation courses, 58, 88.
Origin of the Land Grant Act 0/1862, 9.
XARAGRAPH reading, tests in, 118.
Park, Professor C. W., The Cooperative System
of Education, 30, 81.
Patriotism and industrial development, 3.
Pawtucket, textile mill at, 3.
Pearson coefficients, 120.
Pennsylvania and federal land grant, 16.
Pennsylvania State College
Elimination in, 32.
Engineering courses in, 111.
Shopwork in, 76.
Specialization in, 96.
Student grades in, 34, 73.
Pennsylvania, University of
Administration of, 29.
Student grades in, 33.
Tuition in, 16.
Personal service in the United States, 5.
Pestalozzi, 9.
Pharmacy, schools of, 56.
Phi Beta Kappa, 68.
Philadelphia water works, equipment of, 3.
Physics for engineering students, 40 f.
Tests of achievement in, 118 f.
Physique as quality in grading, 73.
Pickering, Professor E. C., 27, 37, 40.
Pittsburgh, University of, cooperative plan in,
31, 81.
Practical engineering for freshmen, 88.
Practice and theory in engineering schools, 58,
88, 91, 98 f.
Pratt Institute, 7.
Problems described, tests in, 118.
Production and Science. See Industry in the
United States.
Production, elements of, 91, 109 f.
Professional engineer, definition of, 106 ff., 113.
Professional schools of law and medicine, 55, 56.
Professional service in the United States, 5.
Professional work in engineering schools, 24, 43.
Profession of engineering and education, 112.
Progress of students, 32 ff., 41 f.
Projects, use of, 62, 91 f.
Psychology, experimental, 88.
Purdue University, student grades in, 33, 73.
QUALITIES of foremen, 36.
Qualities required in engineering, 106.
.RECORDERS' offices, reorganization of, 87.
Regents, boards of, 27.
Regents' examinations, 119ff.
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, 4, 5, 9, 101.
Administration of, 27.
Aims and methods of, 11 ff.
Curricula of, 11 ff., 24, 25, 58, 60.
Equipment of, 14.
Graduates of, 15, 17.
Methods of instruction in, 37.
Resources of, 14.
Shopwork in, 75.
Student grades in, 33.
Students of, 17.
System of instruction in, 14.
Rensselaer, Stephen van, 4, 9, 101.
Reorganization of engineering curricula, 88.
Research in engineering schools, 43, 103 f., 112.
Research laboratories in industrial plants, 82.
Resourcefulness in engineering, 106.
Resources of engineering schools, 7 f., 9 ff., 15 ff.
Ricketts, P. C., History of the Rensselaer Poly-
technic Institute, 9.
Roe, Professor J. W., 70.
Rogers, President W. B., 9, 10, 11, 37, 101.
Rohrer, A. L.,36.
Rooseveldt, Nicholas L, Philadelphia Water
Works, 3.
Root, R. E., 59.
Rose Polytechnic Institute, shopwork in, 76.
Royal Institution, Great Britain, 9.
Rumford, Count, 9.
Runkle, President, 77 f.
Russian shopwork, 77 f.
SANTEE Canal, 3.
Scales of measurement, 59, 117ff.
Schneider, Dean Herman, 52, 78, 81, 82.
Schuylkill-Susquehanna Canal, 3.
Science and production. See Industry in the
United States.
And Liberal training, 5.
Science subjects in engineering curricula, 23, 89,
90, 92.
Scientific information, demand for, in indus-
tries, 4.
Scientific study of education, 105.
138
INDEX
Scott, Professor W. D., 73.
Senior year in engineering, 25.
Grades in, 35.
Sentences, completion of, tests in, 118.
Sheffield, Joseph E., 14.
Sheffield Scientific School. See Yale University.
Shopwork, 42, 75ff.,90.
And theory, 82.
Sigma Xi, 68.
Silliman, Benjamin, 14, 37.
Six-year courses, 54 f.
Slater, Samuel, and industrial development in
America, 3.
Slichter, Elementary Mathematical Analysis, 61.
Smith, R. H., 78.
Society for Increasing the Comforts of the
Poor, 9.
Society for the Improvement of Agriculture,
Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce, 3.
Society for the Promotion of Engineering Edu-
cation, Committee on Entrance Requirements
of, 47, 92, 101.
" Soldiering," 69.
Sophomore year in engineering, 25, 38.
Grades in, 35.
Specialization in engineering, 23, 25, 54, 55, 95 ff.
State institutions, administration of, 27.
State treasuries and industrial development, 3.
Steam engine, high pressure, invented, 3.
Stenquist construction test, 119.
Stevens Institute
Cooperative administration in, 30.
Specialization in, 96.
Students, elimination of, 6, 32 ff.
Grades of, 33, 73.
In engineering schools, 6, 17.
Progress of, 32 ff.
Tests of, 117ff.
TACT in engineering, 106.
Tau Beta Pi, 68.
Teachers in engineering schools, 56, 101 ff.
And research, 103 f.
Practical experience of, 102, 103.
Qualifications of, 101 f.
Salaries and tenure, 102.
Technical subjects in engineering curricula, 23.
Technique in engineering, 106 f.
Technological schools, classification of, 55 f.
Tennessee and federal land grant, 16.
Tests, and examinations, 70.
And secondary education, 4 f.
And teaching, 70.
Effect of outside work on, 52 f.
In English, 118 ff.
In mathematical achievement, 117ff.
In physics, 118 ff.
In the army, 72.
Nature of, 49 ff.
Results of, 119ff.
Validity of, 50.
Value and purpose of, 49, 57, 59, 67 ff., 117 ff.
Thayer School, Dartmouth College, 16.
Theology, Schools of, 56.
Theory and practice in engineering schools, 58,
88, 91,98 f.
Thesis, graduation, 43.
Thompson, President C. O., 76.
Thorndike, Professor E. L., 36, 49, 52, 53, 70,
89, 117 ff.
Thoroughness in engineering, 106.
Time schedule in engineering schools, 22 ff.,
54 ff., 60, 93.
Trade in the United States. See Industry in the
United States.
Transportation in the United States, 5.
Trustees, boards of, 27.
Tufts College, student grades in, 33.
Tuition, about 1870, 16.
Turner, Professor J. B., on industrial training,
10.
UNDERSTANDING of men in engineering, 106.
United Engineering Societies, 107.
United States Bureau of Education and Engi-
neering Schools, 8, 55 f.
United States, educational expenditures in, 17.
United States, industrial conditions in. See In-
dustry in the United States.
United States Military Academy
Administration of, 28 f.
French at, 94.
Grading at, 68.
United States Naval Academy, 57.
Universities, Colleges, and Technological
Schools, classification of, by United States
Bureau of Education, 8.
VALUES and costs, 99, 110, 111, 112.
Verbal relations, tests in, 118.
Vermont and federal land grant, 16.
Veterinary medicine, schools of, 56.
Virginia Polytechnic Institute
Engineering courses in, 24.
Student grades in, 33.
Virginia, University of
Reorganization of content at, 62.
Student grades in, 33.
Vocabulary range, tests in, 118.
Vocational guidance and grading, 72 f.
"WAR Department and administration of United
States, grading of officers by, 73.
Military Academy, 28.
War of Independence and industrial develop-
ment, 3.
Washburn, Hon. Ichabod, 75.
INDEX
139
Washington, University of
Coordination at, 58 f.
Mechanics' courses in, 88.
New curricula in, 93.
Wellington, A. M., on essentials in engineer-
ing, 107.
Wentworth Institute, 7, 52.
Westinghouse Electricand Manufacturing Com-
pany, 36, 71.
West Point. See United States Military Acad-
emy.
White, Benjamin, 18.
Whitney, Eli, inventor, 3.
Williston, Director A. L., 52.
Wisconsin and federal land grant, 16.
Wisconsin, University of
Elimination in, 32.
Engineering curricula in, 54 f.
English in, 64, 99.
Student grades in, 33, 34.
Woods and Bailey, Course in Mathematics, 61.
Worcester Polytechnic Institute, shopwork in,
75, 76.
Wright, Benjamin, 4.
YALE University
Cooperative administration in, 30.
Engineering curricula in, 54 f.
Entrance requirements to, 22.
Shopwork in, 75.
Student grades in, 33.
Yerkes, Major, 72.
Young Men's Christian Association, engineer-
ing work of, 7.
Young, Professor Karl, 63.
Yule, partial correlation coefficients of, 120.
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