BUILDINGS AND EQUIPMENT. THE AFFILIATED COLLEGES. The various Departments of the University located in San Francisco and the affiliated Colleges there-most inadequately housed hitherto, and without visible bond of fellowship or connection,-are soon to enter upon a larger and a more united life. The State Legislature of 1895 appropriated $250,000 for the erection of suitable buildings, and the generosity of Hon. Adolf Sutro provided the sitethirteen acres of ground in the western part of the city, on a wooded slope a short distance south of Golden Gate Park, commanding a noble prospect east, west, and north. The buildings are four in number: one for the Law College, one for the Medical College, one to be shared by the Colleges of Dentistry and Pharmacy, and one for the Veterinary College. The three first-named stand side by side, each four stories high, substantially built, with solid concrete foundation, with walls of Folsom granite for the basement, and of Roman brick and terra cotta for the superstructure, and with roofing of El Dorado slate. Each is abundantly piped for drainage, water, and gas, and wired for electricity; and each has an independent system of heating and ventilation. The central building, and the largest of the group, is the College of Medicine. It has lecture rooms to accommodate seven or eight hundred students, ten rooms for clinics, and a semi-circular auditorium for public exercises, with stage and dressing rooms, capable of seating twelve hundred persons. In addition to these it has abundant provision for offices, laboratories, and demonstration rooms, and it is surmounted by a handsome clock-tower. To the west stands the Hastings College of the Law, with three large lecture rooms, a library and reading room occupying the entire fourth floor, and ample accommodations for six hundred students. The building on the east is divided by a central wall into two parts, alike equipped with all the requisite offices, lecture rooms, laboratories and appliances, and each intended for the accommodation of about two hundred students. Here are to be housed the Colleges of Dentistry and of Pharmacy. In the rear of the last-named building is the Veterinary College, fifty-six by one hundred and thirty feet in ground area and three stories in height, with lecture room for one hundred and sixty students, laboratory, class rooms, operating rooms, and commodious stalls. The work of construction, begun in 1897, has been pushed so rapidly and successfully that all the buildings are to be ready for occupancy in October next, and it is expected that by that date the cars of the Market Street R. R. system will be running past the doors. OFFICIAL ACTION. At a meeting of the Academic Council, April 15, 1898, the President called up the matter of Commencement speakerships, and stated that, in his opinion, there would not be room on the Commencement programme this year for four student speakers, the number decided upon at the session of April 8th. It was then moved that there be but two student speakers, one from the colleges in Berkeley, and one from the colleges in San Francisco. The motion was seconded, but a substitute motion was made to the effect that this year there be no student speakers. This motion was seconded and carried, and the original motion as thus amended was then carried. At a meeting of the Academic Council, March 11, 1898, a special committee on a proposed revision of the requirements in Military Science and Tactics submitted the following report: The committee recommends that no change in the present requirements be made. The committee's reasons for this recommendation may be stated briefly as follows: 1. The present requirements are not excessive. They are higher than the lowest requirements at other State institutions, but somewhat lower than the average. 2. The present requirements are not greater than the University ought to maintain as a duty to the general government, and for the sake of its good name with the military authorities at Washington. 3. It is doubtful if the present requirements meet fully the demands of the War Department, as laid down in its instructions to the officers detailed for this work. The order of the War Department is that two hours a week of practical, and one hour a week of theoretical work be given. 4. It is the almost unanimous testimony of military instructors that military drill and a reasonable amount of theoretical work should be compulsory. 5. Finally, the work could not be adequately done in less time than that now assigned to the Military Department for this purpose. The committee accepts the testimony of Lieutenant Cloman as conclusive in this matter. The committee presents, with this report, a letter from Lieutenant Cloman, which contains, in tabulated form, the testimony of sixty-six military instructors in other institutions concerning the questions which the committee has had under consideration; and the committee recommends that this letter be filed with its report. Also, that the answers received from other institutions be filed in the Military Department. On motion, this report was adopted without dissent. At a meeting of the Academic Council, April 15, 1898, the committee on Student Athletics advised the adoption of the following standing rule, which was done without dissent: "No student shall be permitted to take part in any intercollegiate athletic contest (a) who has conditions covering more than seven units of his college work, or (b) who has been reported as deficient by more than one instructor, or as grossly deficient by one instructor, in the work of the current term. At a meeting of the Academic Council, February 18, 1898, the following recommendations of the Schools Committee were adopted: 1. That Subject 5 for matriculation be increased so as to represent the work of one school year, at the rate of five exercises per week; and that the subject be described as "Civil Government and American History." This change to take effect in August, 1901. 2. That Subject 1 be as follows: Oral and Written Expression. Training in this subject enters into the proper treatment of all topics of study taken up in the school course, and extends to speaking and oral reading as well as to writing. Its aim is to secure to the student the ability to use his mother-tongue correctly, clearly, and pertinently on all the lines upon which his thought is exercised. The question of numbering is left to the Editorial Committee. For the present no separate examination will be set upon this subject, but note will be made of correctness of form and adequacy of expression in the various papers written by each candidate, and he will be rated accordingly. Similarly, in the visitation of schools, general excellence or defect in oral and written expression will be noted by each examiner within his own field. 3. That the normal amount of work represented by subjects for matriculation (excepting Subject 1) be specified quantitatively; the unit being five recitations per week for one school year. Laboratory hours not requiring preparation are to be estimated at a lower rate than recitations. And that subjects recognized by the University as alternative, should be adjusted to quantitative equivalence in this respect. After conference with the departments concerned, the Committee proposes the following scheme for adoption: English (2*) 2 units. Algebra (3) 1 units. Geometry (4) 1 unit. Physics (11) 1 unit. Advanced Mathematics (12a), 1 unit. Civil Govt. and Am. His. (5) 1 unit. Botany (12c), 1 unit. Latin (6) 2 units. Latin (7) 2 units. Greek (8) 2 units. Greek (9) 1 unit. History (10) 1 unit. Zoology (12d), 1 unit. History (13) 1 unit. English (14) 2 units. French, German (15) 2 units each. While this statement is made in terms of a four-year course for high schools, it should not be held to exclude a pro rata reduction in *Corresponds to present subject la. subjects extending through more than one year, in order to accommodate it to a three-year course. 4. That a committee of the Academic Council be appointed, to which shall be referred the following question: "In view of the adoption of Recommendation No. 4 in the Report of the Fourth Conference on Secondary Education, dated November 23, 1896, what steps, if any, should be taken to bring our University entrance requirements into conformity with that recommendation?" The aforesaid recommendation of the conference reads as follows: "4. That all full courses in secondary schools, whether preparatory to college or not, include the following: 5. That permission to substitute French and German (15) for Latin (6 and 7) in the matriculation requirements of the College of Natural Sciences be extended until further notice. The Committee further recommends to the Academic Council the establishment of a separate Committee on Credentials, to consist of one member of the Schools Committee, one member of the Admissions Committee, and one representative of a department different from those to which the other two members belong. The duties of the Committee are to be those assigned to the Schools Committee by the Council's Order of February 2, 1897, concerning admission on certificate. An invitation has been extended to the University to be present by representative at an informal conference to be held in London in the course of the spring, to consider plans for a celebration in 1901 of the reign of Alfred the Great. Alfred is chosen as the typical hero of the race in celebrating whose career all nations sprung from AngloSaxon stock can take part with equal enthusiasm. The idea was first put forth by Mr. Frederic Harrison, and has been fostered by men of such distinction as Mr. Edward Dicey and Mr. Louis Dyer. The center of the movement is the University of Oxford-most appropriately because of its traditional origin. The Universities of the English-speaking |