THE REVIEWING COMMITTEE OF THE COMMISSION ON THE REORGANIZATION OF SECONDARY EDUCATION.

(The Reviewing Committee consists of 26 members, of whom 16 are chairmen of com mittees and 10 are members at large.)

Chairman of the Commission and of the Reviewing Committee:

Clarence D. Kingsley, State high school inspector, Boston, Mass.

Members at large:

Hon. P. P. Claxton, United States Commissioner of Education, Washington, D. C.

Thomas H. Briggs, associate professor of education, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York City.

Alexander Inglis, assistant professor of education, in charge of secondary education, Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.

Henry Neumann, Ethical Culture School, New York City.

William Orr, senior educational secretary, International Y. M. C. A. Committee, 104 East Twenty-eighth Street, New York City.

William B. Owen, principal, Chicago Normal College, Chicago, Ill.

Edward O. Sisson, commissioner of education, Boise, Idaho.

Joseph S. Stewart, professor of secondary education, University of Georgia, Athens, Ga.

Milo H. Stuart, principal Technical High School, Indianapolis, Ind.

H. L. Terry, State high-school inspector, Madison, Wis.

Chairmen of committees:

Organization and Administration of Secondary Education-Charles Hughes Johnston, professor of secondary education, University of Illinois, Urbana, Ill.

Agriculture-A. V. Storm, professor of agricultural education, University of Minnesota, St. Paul, Minn.

Ancient Languages-Walter Eugene Foster, Stuyvesant High School, New York City.

Art Education-Henry Turner Bailey, Newton Mass.

Articulation of High School and College--Clarence D. Kingsley, State highschool inspector, Boston, Mass.

Business Education-Cheesman A. Herrick, president Girard College, Philadelphia, Pa.

English-James Fleming Hosic, Chicago Normal College, Chicago, Ill. (Address for 1916-17, 404 West One hundred and fifteenth Street, New York City.)

Household Arts-Amy Louise Daniels, University of Wisconsin, Madison. Wis.

Industrial Arts-Wilson H. Henderson, assistant superintendent of schools in charge of vocational education, St. Paul, Minn.

Mathematics-William Heard Kilpatrick, associate professor of education, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York City. Modern Languages-Edward Manley, Englewood High School, Chicago, Ill Music Will Earhart, director of music, Pittsburgh, Pa. Physical Education-James H. McCurdy, director of normal courses of physical education, International Y. M. C. A. College, Springfield, Mass.

Chairmen of committees-Continued.

Sciences-Otis D. Caldwell, director, Lincoln School, and professor of education, Teachers College, Columbia University, New York City.

Social Studies-Thomas Jesse Jones, United States Bureau of Education, Washington, D. C.

Vocational Guidance-Frank M. Leavitt, professor of industrial education, University of Chicago, Chicago, Ill.

REORGANIZATION OF ENGLISH IN SECONDARY

SCHOOLS.

I. THE HISTORY OF THE STUDY OF ENGLISH IN AMERICAN SECONDARY SCHOOLS.

The high school has ceased to be mainly a preparatory school. This fact explains why there is a movement for the reorganization of the English course and indicates what the general character of the reorganization is likely to be. Agitation for reform in English is not unique. It is identical in spirit with the effort to develop a better type of course in history, mathematics, science, and foreign languages and has much in common with current demands for increased emphasis upon art, music, physical education, manual training, agriculture, and domestic science. After more than half a century of struggle, the public high school has definitely established itself as a continuation of common-school education, as a finishing school (in the good sense of that term) rather than a fitting school, and now, recognizing its freedom and its responsibility, it has set to work in earnest to adjust itself to its main task.

The early secondary schools in America were traditional. In the Latin-grammar school of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. only a few formal studies were carried on because little besides Latin and Greek was demanded by the college of that day. Broader courses were instituted in the academies at first, but these, too, became chiefly preparatory schools, and hence in them the emphasis was placed on ancient language and mathematics. Even Franklin's academy, in which he had planned to have instruction in English and other studies necessary, as he thought, to fit for real life, when finally organized followed traditional lines and offered little but the classics. It was not until dissatisfaction in Harvard College with the quality of expression used by the students led that institution to require preparation in composition 2 that any sort of English study received much attention in the academies except English grammar. This was taught, moreover, like much else in the secondary schools of the time, mainly as formal intellectual discipline, not as useful knowledge or as a means of attaining a specific kind of skill.

1 Lull, H. G. Inherited Tendencies of Secondary Instruction in the United States. * Hill, A. S. Briggs, L. B. R., and Hulburt, B. S. Twenty Years of School and College English.

The early admission requirements in English at Harvard are of special interest because they established a type of preparation and examination which has persisted in some localities even to the present. The catalogue for 1865-66 announced that "Candidates will also be examined in reading aloud." In 1869-70 the requirement was for the first time called "English," and two books, Julius Cæsar and Comus, were named as alternatives for the examination. Three years later the catalogue announced that "Correct spelling, punctuation, and expression, as well as legible handwriting, are expected of all applicants for admission; and failure in any of these particulars will be taken into account in the examination." In 1873-74 the requirement was as follows:

English Composition. Each candidate will be required to write a short English composition, correct in spelling, punctuation, grammar, and expression, the subject to be taken from such words of standard authors as shall be announced from time to time. The subject for 1874 will be taken from one of the following works: Shakespeare's Tempest, Julius Cæsar, and Merchant of Venice; Goldsmith's Vicar of Wakefield; Scott's Ivanhoe, and Lay of the Last Minstrel.1

The example of Harvard was followed by other colleges and led, after a time, to the creation of The Commission of New England Colleges on Admission Examinations, which undertook the task of formulating from year to year the requirements in English. The custom of prescribing certain masterpieces of English literature as the basis of tests in writing was followed and became firmly established. The test in oral reading seems to have been dropped. The Harvard requirement related primarily to expression. A new element, namely, knowledge of literary masterpieces for their own sake, was introduced by Yale University in 1894, was favorably considered by the New England Commission in 1895, and quickly became general.

The college admission requirements in English did not become uniform, however, even throughout New England, and in 1893 a movement to bring about such uniformity was started by Wilson Farrand, principal of the Newark Academy in Newark, N. J. He read a paper on "English in the preparatory school" before the Association of Colleges and Preparatory Schools of the Middle States and Maryland, at Columbia College, in December of that year, in which he deplored the lack of uniformity in the collegeentrance requirements in English. In consequence, a committee was appointed to prepare a report upon the subject. The committee indorsed, in the main, the recommendations of the Committee of Ten, whose findings had been made public a short time before, added a few of its own, and proposed a joint conference with other associa

1 Twenty Years of School and College English, Appendix.

tions having to do with the problem of college entrance in English. These recommendations were as follows:

1. That any examination set should be based upon the reading of certain masterpieces of English literature, not fewer in number than those at present recommended by the Commission of Colleges in New England on Admission Examinations.

2. That certain of these books should be of a kind to be read by the candidate as literature; and that others—a limited number should be carefully studied under the immediate direction of the teacher.

3. That each of the whole number of books should be representative, so far as possible, of a period, a tendency, or a type of literature; and that the whole number of works selected for any year should represent with as few gaps as possible, the course of English literature from the Elizabethan period to the present time.

4. That the candidate's proficiency in composition should be judged from his answers to the questions set, which should be so framed as to require answers of some length and to test his power of applying the principles of composition.

5. That formal grammar and exercises in the correction of incorrect English should in no case be more than a subordinate part of the examination.1 This resulted in the formation of the National Conference on Uniform Entrance Requirements in English, which met at intervals of three or four years thereafter and selected lists of books for reading and study in the preparatory school, to which were appended certain aims of English study and directions concerning the examinations to be set. The lists grew longer from time to time, in response to the demands of secondary teachers for greater freedom of choice, and at the meeting of May, 1912, even the short list of books for intensive 'study was so extended as to allow some option. In February, 1916, an alternative "comprehensive" plan was instituted, by which all candidates taking college entrance examinations should have the option of choosing questions not requiring a knowledge of certain prescribed books.

It should be steadily borne in mind that this national conference never attempted to deal with secondary education as such. It grew out of the demand of the preparatory schools for a convenient uniformity, and had always before it the problem of insuring to the colleges a certain quantity and quality of preparation on the part of entering students. Indeed, the conference sedulously avoided the appearance of dictating the high-school course in English and did not suggest any definite organization of the subject matter which it approved. It is but just to say that the books listed were invariably worth while from the point of view of the student of English literature, though in many cases quite too mature for boys and girls in their 'teens, and that the reports of the conference, copied into most

1 Cook, A. S. A Summary of the Proceedings of the Meetings of the Conference on Uniform Entrance Requirements in English, 1894-1899.