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tion of the aesthetical sense, the latter are made for practical use. * * *." Johnson's New Universal Cyclopedia, 1877. Edited by F. A. P. Barnard, President of Columbia, and Arnold Guyot, Professor of Geology and Physical Geography, College of New Jersey.

Examples of Mechanic Arts include manufactures, mining, the processes of working metals, woods, the ceramic materials, and the other materials of construction, and the design, construction and operation of roads, pavements, railways, bridges, water supply and sewer systems, power and lighting and heating plants, telephone and telegraph systems, buildings, harbors, canals and other public works, besides numerous trades.

The Mechanic Arts are to be contrasted with the Liberal Arts and the Fine Arts.

The Fine Arts include poetry, music, painting and sculpture. The Liberal Arts include the general sciences, history, philosophy, etc.; in the Middle Ages they included grammar, logic, rhetoric, arithmetic, geometry, music and astronomy.

Architecture is partly a Fine Art, in so far as it involves artistic design, ornamentation and decoration; and partly a Mechanic Art, in so far as it involves structural design, the strength of materials and the art of building. "In certain fields-as for instance in architecture the fine and mechanical arts are mixed so closely together that the dominion has been disputed. Here, too, however, the abovegiven distinction will suffice. A building, whether a court house, bank, or church, is a work of mere mechanical art if it is made only to answer its practical purposes, but if it is also made to represent in its forms the ideas of worship, government, or enterprise which underlie these purposes, it is also a work of art." Johnson's New Encyclopedia, 1877.

Engineering is the science and art of utilizing the materials and forces of nature for the service of man.

Respectfully submitted,

A. MARSTON,

W. H. S. DEMAREST,

E. E. SPARKS,

P. P. CLAXTON,

G. W. BISSELL,

C. H. BENJAMIN,

E. ORTON, JR.,
H. W. TYLER,
R. A. PEARSON,

Committee.

PRESIDENT MARSTON.-The report of the committee is now before us. What action shall be taken?

PROFESSOR NORRIS.-The thought occurs to me whether the second phase mentioned—I did not get the full wording of it-trade school and some other phase as the extension phase of the work, was sufficiently broad to include extension work as it is given. Trade school and short course work is mentioned as the extension phase, whereas, as a matter of fact, extension may cover more, and should cover more, than merely trade school and short course work. It may also, and does, include engineering education as well as trade school and short course work.

PRESIDENT MARSTON.-That matter was considered. The words "collateral" and "short course" make the definition general enough to include various activities which are not absolutely defined at the present time.

What shall be done with this report.

DEAN TURNEAURE.-I move the adoption of the report.

The motion was seconded and carried.

(Professor Tyler in the chair, by request of the President.)

CHAIRMAN TYLER.-I will call, first, for a discussion of the two topics presented yesterday morning: "Engineering Extension Work," and "Courses and Methods of Instruction in Engineering Extension Work."

PROFESSOR NORRIS.-In listening to the discussion on these two topics yesterday morning, it seemed to me that perhaps the correspondence phase of extension work was somewhat neglected, and that I might add a few words on that topic. Most of the institutions represented in the discussion yesterday are not doing a great amount of correspondence education.

I would like to present, however, some of the particularly valuable features of correspondence work as an extension method.

It so happens that the class of students we are dealing with in extension work are men whose educational interests are necessarily almost their last interests. Their family affairs and their daily employments must come first, and as a result, the educational work which they are carrying must naturally come at odd times. On occasions they will have no time, for considerable intervals, and then again they may have considerable time.

We have found in class work that where the men are all equally well situated and have about the same time at their disposal, class work does very well. But for the majority of students more flexibility is needed. The correspondence feature enables them to adapt their progress to the time which they have available, and a man is not required to go faster than he can conveniently do. If he is unable, by reason of other circumstances, to spend the proper amount of time on a lesson when it would be due in the class, he does not miss that work and become discouraged by being hurried on without sufficient foundation, but he can go as fast or as slow as he finds necessary.

We have found that the combination of class work and correspondence works exceedingly well, where we have regular class instruction going through a course, but leave the matter of making the recitation reports to the convenience of the student. The instructor and the class carry on discussions of the text matter as they go along in the class; but the student who falls a little behind may delay his recitation reports. Quite frequently we find in carrying such classes that perhaps one-fourth of the students will be able to make the recitation reports on time and finish with the class, and that the other part fall behind so that when the class ends probably the majority of them have not made more than one-half of the recitation reports; but they continue to come in, so that in the course of a few weeks, or two or three months after the class is ended, the greater number of the students will have done the required work of the course. In that way we are assured that the students have obtained the benefit of the course, having seen their recitation reports and having been able to know just what they have acquired and to set them straight on anything that they may have got a little confused.

The matter of payments for courses by the employers was mentioned in two or three cases yesterday. We have worked out in the last year or two some plans along that line that are working very successfully, and if the matter is presented to a company in a proper light, they are usually quite glad to do this. If you can make the firm realize that the extension organization offers them what many

of them are attempting to organize themselves, an educational system of their own, but gives them something already established, with well worked out courses, with experienced instructors, and if you can assure them that the instruction will be especially adapted to the needs of their own men, they can see an immediate saving for them and immediate results, if they tie up with the extension work; just as much as, or more so, than if they had their own educational system. In that way you will find them very ready to pay for the

courses.

However, it does not seem to us desirable to really have outright payment for the courses. In that way you will get a large number of men who will come in because they are getting something for nothing, that have not the proper ambition and enthusiasm for the work, and you will get a large number of deadheads.

The best plans seems to be to have the men themselves pay for the courses, and have the company agree to refund them all or a part of the expenses of the course on its completion in a way satisfactory to the extension department.

One scheme which has been working out very well is one in which the firms pay for all or a part of the course, depending on the quality of the student's work. Two or three large corporations in Milwaukee have been doing this, and recently we have started it with a large concern in Madison. If the grade of the student exceeds, say, ninety per cent, they refund the full cost of the course, and the refund is graded down according to the student's standings so that at the point of failure they receive none of the cost of the course. In that way a student who neglects his work and does not take the full benefit of it, does not become entitled to receive payment for his course. He has some interest at stake, which is more apt to hold him to a good performance.

The question of co-operation in text books was mentioned Wednesday morning, and I think there is no doubt that it would be of great value to all of us to try to co-operate in that direction. We found, when we started the work at Wisconsin, that it was absolutely necessary to develop our own texts. The published texts that are ordinarily used for residence courses leave too much to be supplied by the instructor. The extension text must be full, must be written by one who has had experience directly in the practical side of the subject, so that he can deal especially with the applications to the daily work of the men. We have been fortunate in being able to devote considerable time to the preparation of texts, and we have made arrangements with a well known and responsible book company to publish our texts as fast as we feel satisfied that they are in shape to put in permanent form. However, we do not print anything until it has been tried out at least a year or two, and in most cases four or five years, and has gone through considerable modification and rearrangement. We have only so far been able to publish ten engineering texts, I think, and we have a large number of others under way. We have, however, a great many calls for courses that we do not feel justified, from the size of the demand, in taking up and preparing ourselves. For example, we have a very small mining interest in Wisconsin, which would not warrant us in taking up mining work. On the other hand, there are other states in which there are much larger mining interests, that might better develop the mining texts, which we could acquire and use.

The same is true of railroading. In architecture we have been able to do practically nothing, although we have a great demand. We do not have courses in architecture in the university, and we really do

not feel qualified to take up work in architecture. Yet, if we could get good courses already prepared for this sort of work, we could engage an instructor to conduct such courses, and in that way, by working together, we could reach a far greater percentage of the classes of people who want instruction in these special lines.

CHAIRMAN TYLER.-I think it would be interesting if Professor Norris would tell us, in regard to that combination of class work and correspondence work, how often the class meets, and what proportion of it is correspondence work.

PROFESSOR NORRIS.-The class meetings are usually once a week, and at each of these meetings the man who has charge of this instruction work will spend about two hours discussing what we call the assignment. The assignment is a unit of correspondence work which experience has shown us to be the best unit to have. It corresponds to from six to eight hours study on the part of the student. It is not desirable to have as short a unit for report from the student to the instructor, as we have in residence work, where the students are being met regularly at more frequent intervals.

On the other hand, we can not have too large a unit for report on the part of the student; otherwise he will be compelled to go over too much material, and it is hard to keep him straight. We must have sufficient, but not too frequent reports from the student. In order to give it a different name than "lesson," because the term "lesson" is more often considered as referring to an assignment of work in residence, we have given it the name of "assignment."

In this class work, meeting once a week, we go over the material of one of these assignments with the students and a discussion is usually given to it, some attention paid to clearing up past difficulties, perhaps, and a reviewing of the preceding assignments.

The idea is that the average student should have about that amount of time available for his work during the week, so that most of them should be able to do the required work of one assignment during the week, and then be ready to go on to the next. Those who are less fortunate will not be able to do the required work that fast. That gives us our reason for having one class meeting to each assignment, meeting once a week.

DEAN RICHTER.-I want to say a few words on the question of extension work, especially correspondence work.

Professor Norris called attention to the fact that very little was said yesterday in connection with correspondence work. I think there is a particular reason for it. We of the west find that since our population is very scattered, and, as Dean Scrugham pointed out yesterday, since we have to create the demand for extension work, we are not very successful with correspondence work.

I think some experiences which we have had in Montana will bear out what Dean Scrugham said yesterday as to the necessity for creating the demand for any kind of extension or correspondence work in sparsely settled states.

Shortly after we decided that we would carry engineering instruction to the people of the state, we corresponded with one of the past presidents of the National Association of Stationary Engineers, thinking that we might obtain some help from him in getting the work started. The answer he gave us was that it was absolutely impossible to do anything in Montana, due to the labor situation; and for some time we found that that view was practically correct. However, very soon we got in touch with some of the officials of the Northern Pacific Railway, and through them finally had a meet

ing of the shop men in one of the towns and organized a society among the men.

The men themselves were supposed to carry on the work in their own organization, and, as a matter of fact, that is the only way in which we could accomplish anything with them.

I remember the first announcement that was made in the newspaper of a lecture was to the effect that it was a trial lecture and persons who attended the first lecture need not necessarily come to the second, or join the class. That will give you some idea as to the situation, and the attitude that the people had in connection with this work.

The first meeting was very successful, however, and we were able to organize classes.

The second class was organized by request of employees in the city of Helena. We were very much gratified to find that practically every man in the shop became a member of the class, from general foreman down to the apprentices.

At Livingston we had an experience similar to the first. We found that it would probably be difficult to obtain a hearing from the men. As a consequence, the first lecture was delivered from a bench in the shop, after closing hours, and there again we organized the men, and finally had a very successful class indeed.

I do not believe it would have been possible to have obtained a response in connection with correspondence work as such. We attempted it in a small way, but we only have had one or two students up to the present time, they were in surveying-and of course it has been exceedingly_unsatisfactory.

I think Dean Ferris, speaking yesterday, mentioned the fact that they did not have very much money and could do nothing more than to send out a few pamphlets. I want to say that we did not even have that. It was a struggle to secure funds with which to pay our traveling expenses. You can also see that under the conditions under which it was necessary for us to work, it was impossible in the beginning to charge a fee for the work which we attempted to do.

We have since then had several lecture and drawing courses, and the work is developing at the present time into lecture courses to clubs which have been organized along the line of the railroad.

I was very much gratified the other day to receive a letter from the Northern Pacific Railroad, from the men of the shops, requesting that the work be continued. They have now at Livingston a very successful railroad club, which is considered by the Northern Pacific as one of the marvels of the Northern Pacific Railroad.

We have also been able to organize some short course classes at the college, particularly with the people who are engaged in surveying in the state. We have a short course of about one week which is given to surveyors, principally county surveyors, and they come to us to take the work at the institution.

CHAIRMAN TYLER.-IS there further discussion, gentlemen? If there is no further discussion of engineering extension, we will pass to the next item on the program: "The Status of Military Drill." I understand that the executive committee has no formal report to present, but that Dean Orton will make a statement.

DEAN ORTON.-The present status of this matter is as follows: The address was made last year, as you remember, before a joint meeting of this association and the parent association, and the executive committee of that association requested that they should take hold of the matter themselves and obtain a copy of the paper promptly, and they adopted a resolution to the effect that the recommenda

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