06.14.08
Such appear to me to be the broad outlines of
Such appear to me to be the broad outlines of the relations which the
university, regarded as a place of education, ought to bear to the
school, but a number of points of detail require some consideration,
however briefly and imperfectly I can deal with them. In the first
place, there is the important question of the limitations which should
be fixed to the entrance into the university; or, what qualifications
Kent Heights School East Providence Rhode Island should be required of those who propose to take advantage of the higher
training offered by the university. On the one hand, it is obviously
desirable that the time and opportunities of the university should not
be wasted in conferring such elementary instruction as can be obtained
elsewhere; while, on the other hand, it is no less desirable that the
higher instruction of the university should be made accessible to every
one who can take advantage of it, although he may not have been able to
go through any very extended course of education. My own feeling is
distinctly against any absolute and defined preliminary examination,
the passing of which shall be an essential condition of admission to
the university. I would admit to the university any one who could be
reasonably expected to profit by the instruction offered to him; and I
should be inclined, on the whole, to test the fitness of the student,
not by examination before he enters the university, but at the end of
his first term of study. If, on examination in the branches of
knowledge to which he has devoted himself, he show himself deficient in
industry or in capacity, it will be best for the university and best
for himself, to prevent him from pursuing a vocation for which he is
obviously unfit. And I hardly know of any other method than this by
which his fitness or unfitness can be safely ascertained, though no
doubt a good deal may be done, not by formal cut and dried examination,
but by judicious questioning, at the outset of his career.
Another very important and difficult practical question is, whether a
definite course of study shall be laid down for those who enter the
university; whether a curriculum shall be prescribed; or whether the
student shall be allowed to range at will among the subjects which are
open to him. And this question is inseparably connected with another,
namely, the conferring of degrees. It is obviously impossible that any
student should pass through the whole of the series of courses of
instruction offered by a university. If a degree is to be conferred as
a mark of proficiency in knowledge, it must be given on the ground that
the candidate is proficient in a certain fraction of those studies; and
then will arise the necessity of insuring an equivalency of degrees, so
that the course by which a degree is obtained shall mark approximately
an equal amount of labour and of acquirements, in all cases. But this
equivalency can hardly be secured in any other way than by prescribing
a series of definite lines of study. This is a matter which will
require grave consideration. The important points to bear in mind, I
think, are that there should not be too many subjects in the
curriculum, and that the aim should be the attainment of thorough and
sound knowledge of each.
One half of the Johns Hopkins bequest is devoted to the establishment
of a hospital, and it was the desire of the testator that the
university and the hospital should co-operate in the promotion of
medical education. The trustees will unquestionably take the best
advice that is to be had as to the construction and administration of
the hospital. In respect to the former point, they will doubtless
remember that a hospital may be so arranged as to kill more than it
cures; and, in regard to the latter, that a hospital may spread the
spirit of pauperism among the well-to-do, as well as relieve the
sufferings of the destitute. It is not for me to speak on these
topics–rather let me confine myself to the one matter on which my
experience as a student of medicine, and an examiner of long standing,
who has taken a great interest in the subject of medical education, may
entitle me to a hearing. I mean the nature of medical education itself,
and the co-operation of the university in its promotion.