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fication (certificat d'aptitude pédagogique), and if his name is not borne upon the list of persons admissible to the function of teacher drawn up by the Departmental Council.

The time passed in a normal school counts in the term of required probation for male students above 18 years of age and for female students above 17 years. Exemption from the probation may be accorded by the minister with the advice of the Departmental Council.

It should be observed that heretofore the possession of the elementary certificate (brevet élémentaire) entitled a person to be nominated as teacher. Henceforth this suffices only for probationers, the certificate of pedagogic qualification having been made obligatory for full recognition as a teacher.

The hope expressed in many quarters that the nomination of teachers might be intrusted to the superior officers of education has been disappointed, the new law leaving the appointment in the hands of the prefects. Some advance has, however, been made in the restriction placed upon the authority of the prefects in respect to this matter.

Probationers receive their appointment directly from the academic inspectors. Directors, directresses, and professors of superior primary schools are appointed by the Minister of Public Instruction. They must be furnished with the certificate of qualification for a normal-school professorship. Moreover, although the appointment of primary-school teachers still rests with the prefect, this officer makes the appointment upon the proposition of the academic inspector and subject to the authority of the Minister of Public Instruction.

The law further provides that the chance removal of a teacher from one commune to another for the necessities of the service shall be ordered by the prefect only upon the proposition of the academic inspector. This provision protects the teacher from removal for purely political or personal reasons.

As regards the penalties and discipline to which the teacher is subject, the new law introduces few changes excepting that the teachers' rights are more carefully guarded privilege of appeal to a superior authority being accorded him in every case.

EDUCATIONAL PROGRESS IN THE ARGENTINE REPUBLIC.

The effect of the new school law of July 8, 1884,1 with slight modifications at date of June 28, 1885, is already quite marked.

The placing of the permanent school inspection in the hands of normal professors and the readjustment of the duties of district committees are both working towards progress in school matters. The effect is already being felt in a sort of rivalry between the teachers of the different districts, the aim being to keep the schools up to a certain standard.

Of the 4,736 teachers in the Republic not more than one-half hold either certificate or diploma, and many of them are very poorly prepared for the service.

The best teachers are found in the cities, while the need of a better class of instructors in the provincial schools is greatly felt. By bringing in teachers from other countries (especially from the United States) to aid in the work of the normal schools, by erecting fine edifices, and by supplying school apparatus, the nation is making every effort to prepare a better class of educators, and thus increase the educational advantages. Even the school inspectors are instructed by the National Council of Education to see that no good teacher is without a school. A strenuous effort is being made to prevent the better class of teachers from flocking to the capital, as many are desirous of doing, even at lower salaries, since they are particularly needed in the country schools.

While the lack in school attendance is deplored, yet a marked improvement is noticeable since 1869. Of the school population at that date, only 19.81 to the hundred received instruction. In 1885 the number was 33.43 to the hundred, and with the efforts now being made it is affirmed that the next decade will find 70 per cent. of the children in attendance at the public and private schools.

(Informe sobre el estado de la educacion comun, &c., durante el año 1835, pp. xxvii. lvii, xvii, xviii, lxxviii, xii, &c.)

A digest of this law was given in the Report of the Commissioner of Education for 1883-'84.

APPENDIX XI.

PAPERS ON EDUCATIONAL SUBJECTS.

I. THE PROMOTION OF HIGHER POLITICAL EDUCATION. II.-UNIVERSITY EXTENSION IN ENGLAND.

III.-SCHOOLS IN ALASKA.

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THE PROMOTION OF HIGHER POLITICAL EDUCATION.1

BY HERBERT B. ADAMS,

32 Ph. D. Heidelberg, Associate Professor of History in the Johns Hopkins University. The time for a national university in Washington is either past or not yet come. Such an institution is not desirable in the present state of national politics and civic administration, nor is it needed by the country with its present supply of universities, already pervaded not only by a State spirit but by a growing national, if not a truly cosmopolitan idea. What is needed, however, in all our States and in the nation's capital is the promotion of the higher political education in practical ways.

The representative or merit system in academic training should be made to connect not only, on the one hand, with the people, but, on the other, with practical politics and the civil service. Universities which recognize meritorious sons of the people or the principle of student election from legislative districts should themselves be recognized by representatives of the people as at least one influential factor in shaping civil-service examinations, and also as a proper source of supply whenever special scientific service is required. Such service has been frequently sought from the Johns Hopkins University by the city of Baltimore, by the State of Maryland, and by the United States Government; but the principle should be fostered throughout the whole country in connection with the State universities, and it should be extended to the improvement of the civil service, methods of taxation, schools, boards of education, State examinations, &c.

Universities should encourage their own graduates to enter the civil-service examinations of the higher grades in their respective States. Practical experience in a Government office for two or three years would afford the best kind of post-graduate course, especially if the State capitol and the State university should happen to be in the same city, so that further academic study might go hand in hand with practical work in an official bureau. Such an experience, as a subordinate under strict discipline, would prove a far better training for good and useful citizenship than does autocratic teaching in a country high school. The writer knows of several Baltimore students who have entered the Patent Office at Washington, one a Hopkins Ph. D., who received from the civil service board the highest mark on competitive examina tion. He is now pursuing law studies, in connection with his Government work, with a view to becoming a patent lawyer. If one can understand how such practical training will prove helpful professionally to this young man it will be readily seen that similar experience in other branches of the public service may not be without a wholesome influence upon sensible students.

There are to-day scores of young men employed in Government offices in Washington, many of them college graduates, who are also pursuing law studies in evening classes in some one of the three flourishing law schools in that city, viz, (1) Columbian University (Baptist); (2) Georgetown College (Roman Catholic); and (3) the so-called National University. Soon there will be a richly endowed Roman Catholio university in the nation's capital, and doubtless that institution will also take an important share in the legal or special training of some of the nation's public servants. Men of sound sense in Government employ will seek such opportunities mora and more, on the one hand as a means of preparing for higher professional work, and, on the other, in the hope of improving their chances for promotion or influence in the public service.

The Government is compelled to patronize institutions of learning from self-interest, for the reputation of its departments and its scientific bureaus, some of which are constantly turning to colleges and universities for special work. The War and Navy

During the current year this Office published a circular of information by Prof. Herbert B. Adams, of the Johns Hopkins University, upon William and Mary College, the writing of which led him to investigate the origin and growth of the higher education in the South and its significance to the country. Among the ideas which this study suggested to him was the possibility of reviving, on a larger scale, in the city of Washington and throughout the whole country that higher political edu. cation which was once so well represented at Williamsburgh in a political environment. The accom panying remarks of Professor Adams on this subject are taken from the circular referred to.

The writer is informed by President James C. Welling, of the Columbian University, that of the 190 students in the law school of that institution about 40 per cent. are in Government service: of the 100 medical students, 45 per cent.; of the 80 scientific students, 50 per cent. From Georgetown Col· lege and the "National University" the writer has not succeeded in obtaining returns, but in the opinion of good judges of the Washington situation, from 40 to 50 per cent. of the student class in these three professional schools are Government employés. There is a decided demand for special education on the part of our existing civil service. The tendency should be encouraged in every legitimate way. 743

Departments have detailed no less than ten men for further scientific training, or for the conduct of necessary Government investigations at the Johns Hopkins University. Various members of the university staff have been employed upon special commissions in the interest of the Geological and Coast Surveys, Bureau of Education, &c. This comity between science and the Government ought not only to continue, but to be promoted, especially with reference to political science.

IDEA OF A CIVIL ACADEMY IN WASHINGTON.

While the National Government will continue to seek special service wherever it can best be found, and while its public servants will continue to seek special training wherever they prefer, it is not inexpedient to suggest that the Government might easily secure for the civil service what West Point and Annapolis have so long provided for the Army and Navy, viz, well-trained men for administrative positions requiring expert service. There is in these times as great need of special knowledge in civil science as in military or naval science. A civil academy for the training of representative American youth would be as great a boon to the American people as the Military and Naval Academies have already proved.

The West Point and Annapolis idea of educating representative young men from political districts is already abroad in nearly every State in the American Union. A combination of this idea with the merit system in appointment is frequently made by Congressmen in the institution of a competitive examination to discover whom they shall appoint as cadets. The joint system has long been established in the State of New York, the centre of political gravity in these United States. The system should be taken up by the present administration, which sprang from New York and which represents the New York idea in administrative reform. The West Point plan of taking student appointees from Congressional districts, and the Cornell University plan of student appointment for merit, should be transplanted together to the city of Washington. From each of the three hundred and twenty-five Congressional districts there should be appointed by the respective Congressmen, upon competitive examination held by the State or leading university, or by some other impartial examining board, one student of the grade of bachelor of arts, to enjoy Government tuition in Washington for two years at a civil academy, as hereafter described, with an allowance of $600 a year for necessary expenses, as is now done for cadets at West Point and Annapolis. As at these two Government academies, so in the civil academy, if properly constituted, undoubtedly a large proportion of the appointees would be "found deficient;" many would resign for professional reasons or from dissatisfaction with the civil service, but a choice remnant would surely be saved to the state; the fittest would survive. Even if all returned to their own homes after two years' public training the cause of good citizenship would be greatly promoted.

These student appointees, or Government" fellows," should not be required to herd in barracks or dormitories, but allowed to live like frugal citizens in Washington. They should not be under martial law or even scholastic discipline of the juvenile sort. They should be treated as responsible men under contract, as Government employés, with special or assigned duties, under the general direction of an educational commission, appointed by the President for the specific purpose of managing the civil academy or Government college, which would require no very elaborate or costly equipment. A few lecture-rooms and a working library would suffice. The students should be instructed in physical, historical, and economic geography; in political, constitutional, and diplomatic history; in the modern languages; and in all branches of political science, including political economy, statistics, forestry, administration, international law, comparative methods of legislation, and comparative politics. Instruction should be given in class sections (as at West Point) and in public lectures by Government experts and university specialists, who might be engaged from time to time from different institutions for such services. The best talent of this country and of any other, whether university men or professional politicians, could be commanded for such occasional work.

In addition, the students should be a stributed through the various Government departments, at first in very subordinate and not too exacting positions, where they should be held accountable daily for a moderate amount of routine work or for certain practical tasks. Upon the daily record of such work and upon the results of occasional examinations, set by authority of the educational commission in specified fields, should depend the tenure of office as Government students and the promotion to more advanced privileges of practical work, such as special investigations in the interest of branches of the administration. As a reward of merit, certain picked men might be detailed for special graduate work in different American universities or even in European universities, at the Ecole Libre in Paris or, possibly, in the Statistical Bureau at Berlin, both of which institutions are practical training schools in the art

For the fellowship and scholarship system in American colleges, see annual report of Corne 1 University, 1883, pp. 63-65. For a complete survey of the subject of fellowships in England, Scotland, Ireland, Canada, and the United States, see proceedings of the Royal Society of Canada, Appendix for 1885, "Report on Fellowships."

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