question, in using unfamiliar technical language, or in failing to observe the right proportion between the length of the questions asked and the time allowed for their answer, will be offset in any particular case by his previous record; on the other hand the examinations ought to be a terror to the poorly prepared candidate, because he should know that there is practically no chance for good luck to offset his record of poor work.

If I may be allowed, in conclusion, to outline in some detail a system that, in my opinion, would preserve the immense educational value of examinations, and that by relegating them to their proper place would yet deprive them of their present artificial value and their injurious influence on school work and school standards, I would suggest a system that should have as its fundamental principle that, in no case, either in the promotion from one class to another in the same institution, or in the promotion from one institution to another, should the result of a single set of examinations be the sole factor considered; that, as a principle of almost equal importance, teachers in sending pupils for examination should have the privilege, or better the duty, of sending with their list of candidates a grading that should truthfully represent their standing in the school work in the subjects presented, accompanied by such brief comments on the individuals as would be of value to an examiner. For the sake of simplicity these facts and comments in the cases of candidates for Harvard could be sent in by each school on one sheet similar to that now sent to us by the college with the results of the examinations; this sheet could take the place of the present complicated certificates for each individual; one for preliminary examination, another for honorable dismissal, another for postponing candidates, and still another containing opinions and advice as to individual character. These sheets should be consulted before credits, conditions, or doubtful passmarks are assigned; and, if found to be in general harmony with the results of the examinations, should have the balance of power in deciding particular questions of doubt.

I believe that if the colleges would share the responsibility with the schools to the extent indicated, the response from the

schools and from their pupils would be instantaneous, that a standard of scholarship that is now confined to the most conscientious would become general, and that examinations, tho deprived of a part of their influence, the illegitimate part, I think, would have an influence upon school work such as they have not yet had in producing thoro scholarship and the ready command of one's faculties.

THE BROWNE AND NICHOLS SCHOOL,
CAMBRIDGE, MASS.

EDGAR H. NICHOLS

IV

THE CROWDED CURRICULUM 1

GEORGE H. BROWNE, Cambridge, Mass.

It has occurred to the councilors that they might put a snapper to this morning's whip in the form of resolutions to be presented to the College. The Faculty, resting in its wellearned repose, undoubtedly has left the new requirements with us as settled for some time. Without further discussion of the merits of those requirements and their new definitions, it seems to the councilors that there is a perfectly easy, simple way in which relief from the crowded curriculum can be immediately obtained; and that, without any effort on the part of the Faculty, the schools can be left free to do their legitimate work, in their own way, as Mr. Nichols has just outlined.

The testimony given this morning, it seems to me, makes it perfectly safe to say that, whether the curriculum is crowded all along the line or not, it is the universal experience that the preliminary year is congested. Of course in my brief treatment of this whole question I may be unduly influenced by the experience of my own school, which has an eight-years' course. In the public schools it may be that in the preliminary year the pupils are older; but in my opinion this congestion very often comes at a critical period in a boy's life. I have seen preliminary boys grow six inches in one year: they are getting to be the older boys in the school, they are getting on athletic teams, they are beginning to go into society-there are legitimate and illegitimate distractions without number that make this year somehow the hardest year of their whole school and college life.

In

Now there is an immediate relief that can be secured. the natural development of a long, continuous course, it happens that many boys on several subjects are ripe for their 1 Discussion following the preceding papers

examinations at least a year before they are now admitted to examination by the college. They frequently can pass a better examination, too, both in the matter of marks and in the effect on their own education, than they can the next year, with all its distractions. The best time to pick fruit is when it is ripe. Bananas and pears, to be sure, may mellow, if picked green; but if a boy takes an examination too soon he doesn't mellow; and if too late, he just as surely grows stale as an overripe pear; and there is inevitable educational waste in trying to keep subjects fresh that have done their work. Now why shouldn't the college grant to schools, whenever they request it, permission to send their boys up when they are ripe? The council offers this as the first resolution:

Resolved: That a candidate for admission to college be allowed to divide his preliminary examination into two parts, to be taken in successive years.

It is quite possible that little relief at present can come from this permission to schools that have only a four-years' course; but in behalf of the longer courses, allow me to call the attention of the association to the fact that there are in the four capital subjects-language (ancient and modern), history, mathematics, and science-a total of eighteen points in the new requirements now available for examination the year before the present examination. For the sake of continuity it may be advisable to prescribe that both French and German, both algebra and plane geometry, should not be offered the same year. That would reduce the possibility to fourteen. At least two of the scientific subjects are available in a fiveyears' course, making an easy probability, with elementary Latin, of seven or eleven points in the first preliminary examination.

The determining principle of choice, however, should be not what subjects an ambitious teacher may think he can possibly get out of the way by crowding his boys in on, but what subjects in the due course of a boy's natural development he is better prepared for examination in than later. At present five hours or eight points must be secured, or the preliminary examination does not stand. If there ever was any valid reason

for that restriction, it might be left now; but I doubt if there ever was much reason for it. It is chiefly a tradition now; and if the examination is confined to three consecutive years, the need of it would seem to disappear. Therefore the council offers this as a second resolution:

Resolved: That successful examination in any subject in which a candidate is duly recommended as prepared, shall count for admission.

The dean remarked to me day before yesterday that complaint about Harvard examinations is almost exclusively confined to the schools about Boston. He doesn't hear so much about it in New York and the West; there the examinations are welcomed as raising and maintaining a high standard of scholarship thruout the schools. That is undoubtedly true. The schools here, I think, have no quarrel with the requirements as a standard of attainment; but there are and long have been several schools in Massachusetts, in New England, that have not been wholly dependent upon Harvard College for their standard; and they are peculiarly liable, from geographical situation or from the large number of their pupils who go to Harvard College, to be subject to the evil influences of the examinations. The requirements are well enough; what does the mischief is the way the examinations on them are conducted. Fifty per cent. is perhaps as high a grade as the college can set for a universal pass-mark; but it is low for a school standard; and the college, by making its examinations the sole test of the quality of the preparation, makes it well-nigh impossible for the schools to exact a higher standard, especially of the unambitious, in the later years of the course, who calculate, on the basis of the successful experience of their indolent predecessors, that they can safely run their luck and get in on a cram, regardless of their school record.

Now we are reminded that the new certificates that schools send up as to the boy's record and character are taken into consideration more than we think. The committee on admission. examinations meets, and these certificates, classified, pigeonholed, and in possession of a member, are consulted whenever doubtful cases come up-doubtful whether a boy shall receive