Education

WHILE it is universally agreed that girls ought to have a fair chance for education, there is a wide difference of opinion here in America about the means and methods which constitute a fair chance. Nobody now presumes to deny that “ women ought to learn the alphabet,” but the question is, How? Some are praying and working for identical coeducation of the sexes, as the only hope for woman’s future. This they regard as essential to a satisfactory solution of the “ woman question.” Their coming woman is to be taught on the same college benches with the coming man. The identical coeducation which they advocate means “ that boys and girls shall be taught the same things, at the same time, in the same place, by the same faculty, with the same methods, and under the same regimen.” This plan, which prevails very generally in American schools, both for elementary and for secondary instruction, they now urge for colleges and universities. It must be admitted that the plan has earnest, persistent, and influential advocates. But it has also, on the other hand, determined and able opponents, who denounce identical coeducation as injurious alike to girls and boys. Dr. Clarke’s Sex in Education has dealt it a serious blow. He denies that coeducation is a question of ethics or metaphysics, or of civil rights, but contends that it is a question of physiology and experience. His book is an argument based on physiological science, to prove that coeducation does not give girls a fair chance. The argument is equally against that separate education for girls which requires the same curriculum and regimen that experience has proved to be appropriate for boys, which is, in the main, the character of American separate education for girls, the female schools having copied the methods which have grown out of the requirements of the male organization. Dr. Clarke’s conclusion is that “ identical education of the two sexes is a crime before God and humanity, that physiology protests against, and that experience weeps over.” It would appear, from the discussion which his book has excited, to be a more easy task to find fault with his spirit and language, than to refute his argument. No physiologist has called in question his science. The results of experience adduced in proof of the soundness of his conclusion may not carry immediate conviction to every mind, much less to every biased mind, but they are certainly enough to raise the gravest doubts as to the wisdom of subjecting girls to the regimen of the masculine college. But whatever may be thought of the soundness of Dr. Clarke’s argument, it is an indisputable fact that his conclusions are in accordance with the experience and practice of all civilized countries except our own.

In considering the problem of higher female education, certainly nothing could be more pertinent or more rational than to consult the best foreign authorities on the subject. It would be rating ourselves too high to assume that we are above the need of taking lessons of foreign experience and foreign science touching this matter. What pedagogical science we have has been mostly borrowed from Germany, and one who is ignorant of German pedagogy is not entitled to speak with authority on important educational problems, for there is no other country in which this science has been so long and so seriously cultivated. Of the German states, Prussia doubtless stands foremost educationally, and Prussia is just now dealing with this very problem of higher female education with characteristic thoroughness and system. We can see it there treated as a national concern, and we can also there see a serious attempt to make it both commensurate with the numbers needing it, and of the appropriate quality. The method of proceeding in this attempt is very noteworthy. There were already existing in Prussia many very excellent institutions, both public and private, for the higher education of girls. But Dr. Falk, the liberal minister of public instruction, having thoroughly reformed the system of elementary schools, at once enteral upon the work of improving the higher schools for girls. His purpose was to frame the best possible general statute, or regulative, for the national organization of this department of education. To aid him in the performance of this task, he convened in his official apartments at Berlin a conference composed of twenty of the most competent experts in the realm. Five of the members were ladies who enjoyed the highest distinction for their practical knowledge of the subject; four were government counselors experienced in matters pertaining to administration, and eminent as educationists ; and the rest were directors of normal schools or higher female seminaries, and teachers who had acquired the highest reputation for their pedagogical science. Some time previous to the meeting of this body, each member was furnished with a series of carefully prepared questions, covering the whole subject, under four general heads, namely, (1) the establishment, objects, and aims of middle and high schools for girls; (2) institutions for advanced education for girls; (3) the training of female teachers; (4) and the examination of female teachers. The conference held its session about a year ago. The transactions, including the answers to the questions agreed upon and the substance of the discussion, have been printed in an official pamphlet which is before us. Where there was a difference of opinion in regard to answers, the names and opinions of the members in the minority were recorded. The regulative or statute is to be framed substantially in accordance with the opinions of the conference thus expressed, and when sanctioned by the minister it will have the authority of law. This method of proceeding may not harmonize with our democratic principles, but it must be admitted to be well calculated to accomplish the object in view.

The conclusions of the conference taken together constitute the basis of a system comprising the four divisions above named, and providing not only for the organization and arrangements of schools, and the courses of study, but also for the qualification and compensation of teachers. This catechismal summary of educational principles begins very properly with the question, “ What is the object to be accomplished by girls’ schools which are above the grade of the common schools ? ” The answer in substance is, To give to female youth, in a method corresponding to their peculiarity, a general education similar to that aimed at in the higher schools for boys and young men, and thereby to enable them to share in, and to promote, the intellectual life of the nation, — the necessity of a preparation for a particular calling or trade to be provided for by means of special arrangements or organizations. Thus, at the outset, it was assumed that the difference between the sexes requires a difference in methods ; and that a general culture is to take the precedence of that education required to fit girls for some special mode of gaining their livelihood.

The conference unanimously agreed that there should be two grades of girls’ schools above the common school : the lower to be called the middle, and the other, the higher schools for girls. For the middle schools the subjects of instruction are religion, the German language, arithmetic, elementary geometry, natural history, the elements of physics and chemistry, geography, history, the French or English language, drawing, singing, gymnastics, and female handiwork. The pupils are admitted at six years of age, and remain until fourteen or fifteen years of age. These schools are intended to meet the wants of the “ so-called middle classes of society.” The higher schools aim at that general education which is suitable to the higher spheres of life. It is deemed desirable that the curriculum should comprise nearly the same branches of study as that of the middle schools, but they are to be pursued to a greater extent, and to be taught more thoroughly and in a more scientific manner, and especially with reference to their relations to each other. Two foreign languages, the French and English, and their literary masterpieces, are required. The pupils are to enter at six years of age and remain until sixteen, passing through one class each year. The two upper classes are to attend school thirty hours each week, and the others from twenty-two to twentyfour, exclusive of the gymnastic exercises It is recommended that the number of pupils should not exceed forty in each of the lower classes, and that in the highest classes, it should be considerably less. Home tasks must be strictly limited, so as not to interfere with appropriate household duties.

Our space will not permit a description of the programme of studies. A sample or two will suffice to show how judiciously they are limited. In the French language : grammar, etymology, and syntax; ability to write letters and short compositions on things within the sphere of the pupil’s observation with substantial correctness, and to speak of such matters in simple sentences with correct pronunciation; ability to read a French book ; acquaintance with the masterpieces of the literature in the classical periods. In physics: a general acquaintance with electrical, magnetic, and mechanical phenomena, and also with those of light, heat, and sound ; a particular understanding of those physical laws applicable to common life and the principal industries.

It was agreed that experience forbids imposing upon the female teachers in these schools more than eighteen or twenty hours of teaching per week, and that the female strength was not adequate to a severer task for a long period. From twenty to twentyfour lesson hours may be required of the male teachers. It was also voted to petition the government to grant retiring pensions to female teachers earlier than to those of the male sex.

The provisions for the support and supervision of these schools are similar to those for the gymnasia and real schools for boys. Normal schools are to be established for the preparation of female teachers for this grade of instruction, and a normal school may be established in connection with a fully organized girls’ high school, but it must have a strictly separate organization. Such an arrangement already exists in the admirable higher school in Hanover, which has been attended by a number of American teachers.

But provision for the higher education of women is not to end with these two grades of schools. For those who have completed the middle school course, arrangements are to be made for advanced courses in technical branches, with such studies as the German language, the modern languages, industrial drawing, bookkeeping, commercial arithmetic, and various kinds of female handiwork, including millinery. These courses are to be given in the middle school buildings, but are to be strictly separated from the regular course of those schools. And so for such graduates of the higher schools as desire to continue their studies, advanced courses will be given in the higher school buildings. Such courses are given with marked success in the great Victoria school in Berlin. These advanced courses are to be left to the management of voluntary associations, under certain prescribed regulations, the accommodations for them being furnished at the public expense.

In the discussion, the value and necessity of handiwork, as an educational instrumentality, was strongly urged. The importance of gymnastics in relation to hygiene was strenuously insisted upon, and it was understood that a normal school would be opened for the training of female teachers of this branch.

Only a few points in this scheme can be touched upon, here, but it is evident from what has already been presented that there is a wide difference between its requirements and those of the higher German schools for boys, especially the gymnasia and real schools. And yet this is the deliberate judgment of a very high pedagogical authority. We may not accept this judgment as a finality, but it would certainly be unwise to ignore altogether the authority of the competent experts from whom it comes. It must not be forgotten that in Prussia education has long been cultivated as a science, while with us it is so little studied that we can scarcely be said to have any learned educationists among us. The opinion of Dr. Wiese, of Berlin, on an educational question is what the opinion of Huxley would be on a question of physiological science.

— The first volume of the American Educational Annual (J. W. Schermerhorn & Co., New York), seeks apparently to dissipate the somewhat trivial associations of the ordinary reader with the word annual, by an imposing supplementary title setting forth that it is a Cyclopedia or Reference Book for all Matters pertaining to Education, comprising a History of the Past and Present School Systems and School Legislation in all the States and Territories; a History of Land Grants and the Peabody Fund; Geographical and Scientific Discoveries during 1873-4; the National Bureau of Education; Civil Rights Bill; Educational Gatherings during 1874; Educational Systems in other Countries; Voluminous American School Statistics for Several Years past; Names of American Colleges, Universities, Theological, Normal, Local, and Scientific Schools; Names of Educational Journals; Sketches of Prominent Educators deceased during 1873-4; and Lists of School Books published during the year.

This is a comprehensive scheme; and some imperfection of method is doubtless pardonable in a first attempt to realize it. The book contains a good many interesting statistics and some valuable information, arranged in a rather disorderly fashion and unfurnished with an index. The biographies of the State superintendents, prefixed to their several reports, are enlivened by facetious allusions and the mention of such details as that Mr. James Wickersham, the Superintendent of Public Instruction in Pennsylvania, “never used liquor or tobacco in any form, and never had a sick day in his life.” A spirit of economy is shown by filling the blank spaces on the page, which frequently occur below the statistical tables, with anecdotes which often have a curious irrelevancy to the subject of the work.

In that section of the Annual which treats of National Land Grants on Behalf of Education, the author dwells at length, and with a liberal use of the expressive words “locate,” “donate,” and “inception,”on the grant of 1862, whereby Congress appropriated to the several States thirty thousand acres of the public lands for each senator and representative in Congress, the amount accruing from the sale of such lands to be invested as a perpetual fund for the maintenance of at least one college in each State, where the principal object should be “ to teach such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts, in such a manner as the Legislatures of the States may respectively prescribe, in order to promote the liberal and practical education of the industrial classes in the several pursuits and professions of life.” This grant forms the basis of the so-called agricultural colleges, thirty-nine of which have already been established in thirty-six different States; and the editor of the Annual strongly commends the policy which has so far prevailed in these schools, of giving instruction “in the whole range of mathematical, physical, and natural sciences, with special reference to their applications in the great branches of human industry,” rather than “ training a body of apprentices in manual practice.” The more common opinion among the thoughtful and experienced observers of these institutions is that up to this time they have signally failed of their proper end, and for the very reason given above. By aspiring to teach the whole range of the sciences, instead of giving, like the best industrial schools of the Old World, specific and thorough instruction in the different branches of industry, they have already degenerated into a species of high school, or cheap college of a low grade, where the national weakness in favor of an extensive smattering of many subjects is fostered, and less practical information given than an intelligent apprentice would acquire, in a workshop or on a farm. Indeed, as an eminent agriculturist lately remarked, Harvard College, with its present courses of lectures and its neighborhood to the market-gardens of Arlington and the scientific husbandry of Middlesex County, is, so far, a better agricultural school than any so called.

The sketches of foreign school-systems, particularly of those of Switzerland and Prussia, from which we have really so much to learn, are very meagre ; but the résumé of scientific discovery during the past year and the preface to the Annual are worthy of attention as unusual pieces of style, and can hardly fail to quicken in the mind of every thoughtful reader the desire for an early reform in our educational methods.

On the whole, however, the student who looks to the first volume of the American Educational Annual for an earnest of future American works fit to take rank with the profound and patient European treatises on the whole subject of what the Germans agreeably call “ Pedagogics,” will be apt to feel his hopes distinctly deferred.

— Two handy little volumes by Étienne Lambert and Alfred Sardou, entitled An Idiomatic Key to the French Language, and All the French Verbs at a Glance, seem fitted to afford about as much help as any books can to the English-speaking person, in acquiring a facile use of the difficult French tongue. The list of idioms is particularly full and well arranged, the idioms being grouped alphabetically, with the principal word idiomatically used standing at the head of a column and followed by a great variety of sentences in which it is embodied, with English translations opposite. These translations are usually excellent, with but a few slips even in the use of tenses, — that crucial test of familiarity with a foreign language, — and an occasional lapse into literalism, as “ I have known that ever so long ago,” and “ He went up the steps four by four.” Of the comprehensive tables of French verbs and pronouns in the smaller volume, it may be said, as of all such generalizations, that they are rather curious and interesting to the advanced student than helpful to the beginner, for whom, as a rule, the less of theory the better. Exception should perhaps be made in favor of the table of irregular verbs, where the arrangement is at once ingenious and unusually clear. The list of the obscure equivalents of may, can, would, should, might, and ought is also admirably made.