#be cents 7#ce cents in ,canada7 ,,the ,,john ,,day ,,pamphlets--,no4 #af ,,college ,,prolongs ,,infancy by ,,horace ,m4 ,,kallen 8444 the ideals and methods which are dynamic in our institutions of higher learning are false4 ,they are false to the students1 false to the social purpose which nourishes them1 false to the inward nature of education itself4 ,they are false because they are irrelevant4 ,and they are irrelevant because they are for the most part unabsorbed survivals from a pre-industrial past in an industrial age4 8,though education is customarily described as #8preparation for life'1 the ways and works of high schools and colleges are so irrelevant to #8life' that their prime achievement remains perforce the prolongation of infancy4 ,they make adulthood harder to reach1 not easier40 99 99 99 ,see back flap for the complete list of ,,the ,,john ,,day ,,pamphlets4 ,,the ,,john ,,day ,,company #chf ,fourth ,avenue1 ,new ,york ,,college ,,prolongs ,,infancy ,,college ,,prolongs ,,infancy by ,,horace ,m4 ,,kallen ,new ,york ,,the ,,john ,,day ,,company ,copyright1 #aicb1 by ,,horace ,m4 ,,kallen ,printed in ,u4 ,s4 ,a4 by ,the ,stratford ,press1 ,inc41 ,new ,york ,city ,an ironist reviewing higher education in ,america since #aibj would find himself struck by three things4 ,first1 perhaps1 he would appreciate the gargantuan inflation of pedagogic lore1 with its elaborate formalism1 its pretensions to precise measurements of mind and character1 its blowing up 8scientific method0 into a meticulous ceremonial with the efficacy of a church ritual4 ,second1 the overgrowth of the educational plant might captivate him3 the immense accretion of endowment1 the blowsy additions to properties1 and the multiplication by millions of teachers and students4 ,lastly1 our ironist might admire a wide and spreading unrest about the effectiveness of the system as an instrument of education4 ,he would take note of much fuss and ferment respecting 8progressive education0 and 8adult education40 ,he would overhear oracles by parents1 teachers1 and college presidents on why students do anything but study and on how to make them study4 ,he would discern how the prescriptions vary1 all the way from ,mr4 ,lowell's house-system at ,harvard ,university to ,mr4 ,meiklejohn's 8experimental college0 at the ,university of ,wisconsin4 ,as a popular alternative1 the suggestion would intrigue him that far more students are enrolled than are 8fit0 for the higher education1 and that this aristocratic privilege should be limited to the 8fit0 alone2 the 8fit10 of course1 being those young people who are shown to be as nearly like their teachers as differences of age1 income and interest permit4 8,the idea that going to college is one of the inherent rights of man10 ,president ,lowell wails1 8seems to have obtained a baseless foothold in the minds of many of our people4 ,to select the fit and devote our energies to them is our duty to the public for whose service we exist40 ,and ,president ,comfort of ,haverford bemoans how the diversions which are college life 8have cut deep into the serious purpose for which the colleges exist40 ,obviously the searching of the heart concerning the values of a college education does not reach to the essentials of the academic tradition4 ,the ancient notions remain ineffable and inviolable4 ,they presume that students exist for the sake of the school1 not the school for the sake of the students4 ,hence the inquiry treats only of who shall be admitted to the sacred fane and by what steps4 ,that in any issue between system and student1 the system might be wrong is inconceivable4 ,the pedagogues1 like the prohibitionists1 find it unbelievable that their engines of grace can be tools of darkness2 that they fail1 not because those to whom they are applied are intransigently bad1 but because their own methods and ideals are intransigently false4444 ,as ,i see them1 the ideals and methods which are dynamic in our institutions of higher learning are false4 ,they are false to the students1 false to the social purpose which nourishes them1 false to the inward nature of education itself4 ,they are false because they are irrelevant4 ,and they are irrelevant because they are for the most part unabsorbed survivals from a pre-industrial past in an industrial age4 ,but in the eyes of the academicians the failure of the colleges is caused by the deficiencies of the environment1 not by their own inherent incapacities4 ,to save themselves1 therefore1 they reaffirm anew the invidious ideals of a bygone social economy1 and appeal to a persisting snobbism to offset their own growing desuetude4 ,so they complain about the elevation of going to college into an 8inherent right0 and about the droves of undergraduates whose heedless ways cut deep into 8the serious purpose0 for which college exists4 ,,ii ,but if a new 8inherent right0 has been born into the world1 if undergraduate life is in conflict with the 8serious purpose0 of higher education1 the causes thereof are better understood and faced than ignored or belittled4 ,for they are constant causes1 and their scope and intensity do not lessen with the days4 ,though the colleges remain tangent to the realities1 they have been far from untouched4444 ,of these realities1 one is the constant1 if obstructed1 drive toward democracy1 based on the dogma of natural rights which animated the wars and works of the founding fathers3 free public education is a primary1 if abated1 attainment of this drive4 ,another is the correlated growth of population1 cities1 and natural resources3 the dropsical school systems1 public and private1 are by-products of this increase4 ,in a century the wealth of the ,united ,states has multiplied by inconceivable ratios4 ,even in #aicb1 at the very trough of a signal deflation1 national wealth and income must be stated in figures that have no empirical living meaning4 ,they are merely symbols of indefinitely extending power--manpower and machine-power2 and of the organization of this power in dynamic patterns that constitute a social economy4 ,with this organization1 there has come an increase in essential security4 ,in spite of the business-cycle1 in spite of unemployment1 social waste1 and all the rest of the major evils of industrial civilization1 its individual citizens are better fed1 better housed1 in better health1 and have better times than their pre-industrial ancestors4 ,their average expectation of life has increased from forty-seven years to fifty-eight4 ,the society they compose is physiologically more adult1 more aged1 than the society of their forbears4 ,more of its members are over forty1 fewer of them are under seventeen4 ,during the century of industrialization the proportion of children to adults has decreased by more than a half4 ,this does not mean that the same number of children are born and more die4 ,it means that fewer are born and far fewer die4 ,far fewer die because all receive a great deal better care than even the children of the richest used to get a hundred years ago4 ,this care comes only somewhat accidentally and in a disordered way from the parents4 ,it comes systematically from the community4 ,the average parent of the working class deals with his children much as his own parents dealt with him4 ,he in the main realizes that the child requires and somehow receives absorbed attention in extreme infancy4 ,past that stage1 he leaves it more and more to itself4 ,all that he asks of it is to make itself as little troublesome and as largely convenient as possible4 ,for the rest1 it is out on the street to grow its way into adulthood for itself1 troubled by only occasional irruptions of disciplinary or exploitative parental interest1 and by admonitions from the cop on the beat4 ,to the socially-minded part of the community this is a dangerous situation4 ,they fear disease and crime4 ,they talk about corner gangs2 about the break-down of family life4 ,they regard it as of supreme importance 8to get the children off the street40 ,social settlements1 boys' clubs1 scouting1 playgrounds1 and other semi-public and public enterprises have come up largely as instruments toward this end4 ,but the chief instrument has become the school4 ,since #aijj1 the school1 more than any other social agency1 is conceived first as supplementing1 then as replacing1 the home1 and as exercising its function4 ,the school authority is established in a practically complete jurisdiction over the child4 ,its field expands from indoctrination in the three ,r's and patriotism to teaching personal hygiene2 from teaching personal hygiene to official supervision over the details of health--the care of the teeth1 ears and eyes1 the adequacy of diet2 and finally to keeping an eye on the personal relations of children with their parents themselves4 ,in a word1 the school invades the home and takes over more and more of its functions4 ,by its means the control of the child is 8socialized40 ,now on the face of it1 this socialization appears unconnected with the drive and intent of industry as such4 ,it looks rather like a defense against industry4 ,its animus is humanitarian1 not economic2 its effect is to delay the functional installation of the child in the economic system4 ,child labor is quite properly frowned on and hemmed in with rules and restrictions4 ,schooling is imposed and prolonged to later and later years2 where it cannot be made exclusive it is made concurrent with the work-life by means of the continuation schools4 ,and high schools and state universities extend the possibility of schooling as a free public function right up to the voting age and beyond4 ,the immense national wealth makes this possible and easy2 it enables the upkeep and expansion of an educational system whose per capita cost is greater than that of any other country in the world4 ,whether any connection obtains between these superiorities and the fact that ,americans also enjoy a corresponding superiority in juvenile delinquency and crime ,i cannot say4 ,the paradox is the more interesting because1 as schoolmen are likely to boast1 the school is often used by the child as a refuge from home and the street1 as a place of sanctuary and safety4 ,explanation is not easy4 ,on the face of it1 the socialization of child-control tends to defeat its own ends4 ,and it tends to defeat its own ends because its instrument is an unnatural environment which offers no field for the assumption and discharge of natural responsibilities such as develop in the circle of an adequate family life4 ,it keeps the young in a state that is tantamount to an artificial prolongation of infancy4 ,,iii ,now1 in terms of the mechanics of the social economy1 infants are parasites upon the body politic4 ,they are sheer consumers1 producing nothing2 and in the world of nature they absorb the time and attention of adults only until they are ready to produce for themselves what they consume4 ,the more complex the organism1 the more highly organized the nervous system and the social life of a species1 the longer the period of gestation1 and the more prolonged the dependence of the new-born and the young on the parents4 ,a dog will reach adulthood in about a year4 ,a human infant takes from eleven to fifteen years1 if we mean by adulthood what constitutes it biologically--namely1 sexual maturity4 ,birds and animals are ready and able to fend for themselves some time before sexual maturity sets in1 and data are not lacking in the record that manchildren--like ,russia's bezprizorny or waifs--also can if need presses4 ,but for all species alike1 puberty sets a term4 ,it is the very latest season for the young to leave the parental nest1 to live their own lives and build their own nests for themselves4 ,this holds true also for the vast majority of the human young1 even under the protection of industrialized society4 ,at puberty they leave school and go to work like their fathers before them1 and it is not long until they are entirely on their own1 and found families and repeat the cycle again like their fathers4 ,if the practice of society carries their social infancy over into their physiological maturity1 it does not do so for very long4 ,in essentials they enter into the heritage1 such as it is1 of adulthood1 while custom compels the young of the privileged residual population to remain in personal and social swaddling clothes4 ,this compulsion is usually identified with 8having advantages40 ,it is exercised upon the young of the rich and protected1 not of the poor and unprotected4 ,but because the notion prevails that education is the chief if not the sole instrument of democracy1 and that every man1 if he has a chance1 can be as good as his betters and is entitled to the same rights and privileges1 the number whom the compulsion reaches has increased1 since the beginning of the century1 well-nigh geometrically4 ,thus1 between #aijj and #aicj the high school population has multiplied ten-fold2 the total number of pupils today is between five and six million4 ,and more than a million young men and women are enrolled in the colleges and universities4 ,high school and college are considered 8advantages10 and the essence of the advantage is a social infantilism imposed upon a biological maturity4 ,,iv ,though education is customarily described as 8preparation for life10 the ways and works of high schools and colleges are so irrelevant to 8life0 that their prime achievement remains perforce the prolongation of infancy4 ,they make adulthood harder to reach1 not easier4 ,what1 socially1 adulthood consists in1 varies a good deal from civilization to civilization and from age to age4 ,but everywhere1 and at all times1 it is grounded upon sexual maturity and maintained on personal responsibility for winning food1 clothing1 and shelter1 and defending one's self against enemies and disease4 ,among primitive people1 adulthood is initiated by puberty and established and confirmed by means of certain cruel and terrifying rites through which boys and girls are inducted into the society of men and women4 ,of these rites there survives among us today only that form of sadism and schadenfreude known as hazing1 practiced by upperclassmen on newcomers and by fraternity brothers on neophytes4 ,in the school tradition these cruelties are meaningless1 but in the rites of the primitive they compose a part1 perhaps a major part1 of all the formal direct 8education0 the young savage ever gets4 ,they impose bitter fear and exquisite pain which the elders require shall be unflinchingly endured4 ,during three weeks1 more or less1 primitives torture their young4 ,when they have finished1 the young are utterly initiate1 finally and completely adults1 fully responsible members of their communities4 ,classical antiquity prolonged and rationalized this initiatory period4 ,pain and endurance were imposed less directly but1 in one way or another1 they were exacted4 ,the boys of ,sparta were segregated from their women folk in their seventh year and made charges of the state4 ,from their twelfth year to their eighteenth1 they were in the constant company of their elders1 often their elders' favorite company4 ,they collaborated in purveying food1 in hunting and in worship4 ,in what time remained1 they prepared to practise war1 the primary vocation of the citizen4 ,at eighteen1 war became their exclusive concern4 ,in ,athens1 as in ,sparta1 formal schooling began at the age of seven and ended with puberty at about sixteen4 ,then the boy was presented at the ,agora4 ,he associated freely with his contemporaries and elders1 he trained at the gymnasium1 attended the law courts and the theatre4 ,he was an ephebus1 and after two years he took the oath of the ephebus and his name was written on the list of free citizens4 ,he had thereby left the jurisdiction of his parents for the jurisdiction of the state4 ,in ,rome1 a boy entered upon the responsibility of manhood when he doffed the toga praetexta and put on manhood's dress4 ,this was during puberty1 at about the age of fifteen4 ,before then he had learned at home and in the ,forum the arts of war and the law of the ,twelve ,tables4 ,after ,roman life became ,hellenized1 schools acquired a vogue2 but unless a boy was destined for public life1 schooling ended at puberty4 ,otherwise1 a boy entered the ,rhetoric ,school and trained for his vocation4 ,among the ,jews1 a boy assumed adult responsibility 7he still does so1 though it is now merely religious7 upon entering adolescence4 ,he was then ,bar ,mitzvah4 ,he1 and not his father1 had become responsible for his fulfilling the law and the commandments4 ,he underwent a short1 formal1 preliminary training1 and on the ,sabbath following his birthday his father took him to the synagogue and formally renounced responsibility for his son's life and works4 ,so1 among the primitives and the ancients1 physiological maturity was the occasion for signalizing and establishing social responsibility1 of entering into adulthood4 ,this is still the case among the churches4 ,ecclesiastical citizenship is reached at puberty4 ,puberty is the time when ,catholic boys and girls are initiated by the priests into the mystery of salvation and are endowed with the responsibilities of the adult members of the religious community4 ,they undergo confirmation4 ,puberty is the time arranged for the young of the evangelical sects to be convicted of sin1 to enter into grace1 and to join the church4 ,puberty is the time when secularized ,jews celebrate ,bar ,mitzvah as a merely religious event4 ,in the definition of adulthood1 the churches are at one with the ancients4 ,almost equally so are the military establishments of states4 ,military duty comes at a much earlier age than civil responsibility4 ,modern industrial nations continue to conscript their young at from sixteen to eighteen4 ,also1 the taxing power defines the young as self-supporting members of the economic order at eighteen2 at that age exemption on their account ceases4 ,for tax gatherers and armies1 as for religious sects1 adulthood and sexual readiness lie close together4 ,and this readiness is recognized in women by custom and law1 which set the 8age of consent0 at puberty and raise it nowhere beyond sixteen4 ,moreover the readiness finds its purpose more largely than we imagine in marriage4 ,the ,united ,states census of #aibj shows that nearly a quarter of all young people from fifteen to twenty-four were married1 and the proportion has not grown less since then4 ,nor are these marriages confined to the poor4 ,the rich signalize their daughters' readiness by 8presenting them to society0 at from sixteen to eighteen2 and there is much rivalry among 8debs0 about getting married or at least engaged during their first year 8out40 ,the men of this class1 on the other hand1 tend to marry much later1 while the average age of marriage for the 8college bred0 of both sexes is unnaturally higher4 ,the whole contrasts sharply with the early marriage age of a hundred years ago4 ,v ,personal distinction also seems to go with the assumption of adulthood soon after puberty4 ,whether this is attained through some special attitude or general ability enchannelled by custom1 opportunity1 or accident in a particular vocation1 makes little difference4 ,poets1 painters1 mathematicians1 scientists1 engineers1 traders of distinction1 assume the professional attitude and the responsibility of adulthood at an early age4 ,shelley1 ,keats1 ,bryant1 ,peter ,cooper1 ,thomas ,jefferson1 ,benjamin ,franklin1 ,george ,eliot1 ,thomas ,edison1 ,maxwell1 ,galileo1 and countless others of the great1 all began young4 ,nelson went to sea at twelve and commanded a ship at fifteen4 ,his contemporary captains in the ,american merchant marine were boys of eighteen and nineteen4 ,much of the work of the world continues to be done by men and women under twenty-five4 ,prizefighters are old at thirty4 ,it is a favorite doctrine of representative ,american employers1 such as ,henry ,ford1 that workingmen over forty are antiquated1 and to be scrapped4 ,did not the great ,osler advise euthanasia for all men over sixty8 ,nevertheless1 the ruling personages in the ruling classes--the captains of industry1 the masters of finance1 the public officials1 the judges1 the generals--are progressively older and older now4 ,they are men whose minds had matured and set while their bodies were young1 and whose policies derive from the unconscious premise that what was modern and advanced in their youth is necessarily so in their old age4 ,they are the elder statesmen who in their prolonged infancy rule the world4444 ,,vi ,if many of these elder statesmen rule by virtue of distinguished ability and early adulthood1 most do by virtue of a privileged position that delays adulthood and prolongs infancy more literally4 ,the locus of this position is the high school and the college1 especially the college4 ,owing to democracy1 there has been a diffusion of some of the privileges of this status to the children of the masses4 ,one of its marks is the war against child labor which we have noted1 and the progressively later age at which work certificates are granted2 another is the advancement1 already referred to1 of the age of consent and the measures for the protection of girls4 ,still another1 and the most signal1 is the increase of the high school population from the #cjj1jjj of #ahij to the #e1jjj1jjj of #aicj1 and the corresponding growth of the body of college students4 ,nevertheless the difference between the working young and the young at school remains still the difference between the responsibility of adulthood and the irresponsibility of infancy4 ,the difference increases with the income level4 ,the richer the class1 the more likely are the young to be kept in a state of social infancy1 the longer is the time delayed when they are permitted to assume the responsibilities of adulthood4 ,the secondary school and the college are by tradition and practice instruments pat to the social postponement of adulthood and the prolongation of social infancy4 ,by and large1 only those children enter high school who do not need to work for a living4 ,they enter about the time that children of the residual world enter life1 at puberty4 ,their attending high school signalizes an invidious distinction between them and their contemporaries1 for the high school has been from its beginning a mark of 8aristocracy40 ,even the 8commercial0 high school1 which is yet of low esteem beside the high school preparing for college1 celebrates this invidious distinction4 ,but the real ,mc,coy is the 8college preparatory40 ,college sits in excelsis4 ,the topmost turn of the educational system1 it sets the standards and defines the ideal both of knowledge and conduct4 ,secondary-school students consequently prepare for college in a far completer way than is recognized4 ,they emulate and reproduce the whole pattern and structure of 8college life10 with its fraternities and other societies1 its athletics1 its hidden sex interests1 and all the rest4 ,indeed1 since the 8educative process0 worked by the schools is defined from above downward1 the colleges1 which are for the most part resorts where the well-to-do keep their physiologically mature young in a state of personal irresponsibility and social-economic dependence1 set the standard of education for the whole nation4 ,practice under this standard maintains a gulf between the curriculum and student interests4 ,the school work1 as the teacher sees it1 makes up the 8serious purpose0 for which schools and colleges exist4 ,yet here is what a boy who believes in this serious purpose writes to the ,new ,york ,times about his education3 8,in a few weeks ,i will be handed a diploma1 have my hand shaken by sundry individuals1 and then told that ,i have been graduated from high school4 ,i am supposed to be educated4 ,the city has provided me for some four years with skilled teachers and expensive apparatus and told me1 #8,be conscientious in your studies and you shall know4' ,i know that ,i have been sincere1 but ,i will tell a few things ,i do not know4 8,i know by heart several slices of ,shakespeare and ,browning1 but ,i do not know how to write an ordinary form letter that would be accepted by any business firm4 ,i know some irregular ,french verbs but if ,i were lost in the streets of ,paris ,i would not be able to ask my way home4 ,i can1 #8amo1 amas1 amat1' also #8en to oikio ton anthropon horo1' but ,i cannot keep the ledger in my father's place of business nor send out his monthly statements4 ,i am a member of the tennis team and know all the quirks and tricks used in hitting a tennis ball1 but ,i do not know how to build a woodshed nor shingle a roof4 8,i know how to parse a sentence from ,macaulay's essays1 but ,i do not know how to light a match in the wind or chop down a tree4 ,i have studied economics until my head is full of raw theories and long words1 but ,i do not know the name of the ,alderman from our ward nor the ,congressman from our district1 nor the political creeds and platforms they have pledged themselves to uphold4 ,i can prove the square of the hypothenuse is equal to the sum of the squares of the base and the perpendicular1 but ,i do not know how to hang a picture1 put in a pane of glass or paint a chair4 ,i have studied chemistry for a year and have received high marks1 but ,i know nothing of food values and gorge myself on what pleases my palate4 ,i received #he per cent in ,english literature1 but ,i cannot get #ae per week writing news for a newspaper1 or write an acceptable advertisement1 and my average conversation is on the level of the tabloid4 ,with the exception of the ,mayor1 ,i do not know the names of the other important officials of the ,city ,government1 but ,i could at random name about #ie per cent of the prominent movie actresses and actors1 prizefighters and baseball players4 8,surely1 some vital element is wholly missing from our social system which provided for only a classical but not for a practical education4 ,i am taught a multitude of subjects1 but ,i am not taught how to apply them so that ,i will be able to make a success of myself in my struggle for and with life4 ,life so far as ,i have viewed it is rose-colored1 mellow and delightful1 but ,i know that life is far different than ,i see it at present4 ,none of life's sorrows1 pains or struggles have been my lot to embitter and mature my ambitious mind4 ,i have been led to regard life as a nut that must be cracked to succeed1 not as a long hard swim with the odds becoming greater against you every moment and if you stop struggling you sink and are gone4 8,i was educated according to the ancient formulas for producing a scholar and a gentleman and ,i find ,i have to work for a living4 ,i have no taste nor love for hard work1 no habits for saving1 no disposition to resist temptation and no skill in doing anything the world is willing to pay for4 ,i am wholly untrained for efficiency1 and before ,i succeed in life ,i will have to undo most of what has been taught to me in school40 ,b4 ,s4 ,and this boy is very exceptional4 ,for the school work as the average student sees it1 is the price in boredom and discomfort which the system exacts and which he somewhat unwillingly pays in return for the pleasure and excitement of the activities known 7and not known7 as extra-curricular4 ,these and not his studies are what touch the life of the student4 ,and these are what the curriculum excludes and teachers ignore until they present themselves as disciplinary problems4 ,the age of high school and college is the age of poignant laboring over the ever-renewed questions of luck and destiny1 good and ,god and evil1 of groping after first and last things4 ,it is the age of upsurging sexual energies1 of inevitable preoccupation with sex in all its degrees and forms1 from romantic love to promiscuity1 from fantasy to perversity4 ,so far1 however1 as the mechanisms of curriculum and instruction are concerned1 students are not males1 not females1 but sheer intellects1 uncontaminated by such a vital propulsion1 or by any of the others whose development1 gratification1 obstruction1 deviation1 realization1 or repression1 compose the dynamic units of personality in the living adolescent1 determining its timbre1 emotional quality and behavior pattern4 ,for the most part there is no correspondence between what the students spontaneously and directly want and what the higher education provides4 ,there is no opportunity for the idealistic initiative1 for generous self-discipline and adventure1 and for the accompanying responsibility on matters of serious social import such as adolescence craves and students do assume in backward cultures like ,china or ,india or ,russia or the countries of continental ,europe4 ,only athletics provides any occasion for the play of emotion and the exercise of the responsibility proper to an adult4 ,but athletics is formally extra-curricular1 is a preoccupation of alumni1 highly specialized and professional among its practitioners1 and to the residual mass of the students a spectacle1 not a vocation or an activity4 ,in essence1 the secondary and tertiary academic establishments impose a double life on the students that enter them4 ,one life is defined by the so-called 8serious purpose0 of the higher education3 the course of study1 the examination1 the diplomas1 the degrees4 ,the other life is defined by the psychological traits1 the wants and the frustrations of young people between the ages of fourteen and twenty-four4 ,one life is the life of the classroom4 ,the other life is the life of the fraternity or the sorority1 the club1 the prom1 the press1 class-politics1 8contacts0 and all the rest1 including the 8bull sessions40 ,to these1 curriculum and professor are mostly irrelevant2 president and dean affect them only as policemen affect corner gangs4 ,yet these are what is meant by 8college life40 ,in a word1 the correlation between the 8serious purpose0 of the academic establishment and the ruling passion of the youthful psyche is negative4 8,college life0 and 8serious purpose0 of schools and colleges are in conflict4 ,thus1 authorities in secondary schools find obscene notes being passed2 notice masturbation1 spy out chanceful or organized petting parties2 point to unnecessary noises1 desultory killing of time1 smart-aleckism1 and especially to cheating4 ,they make elaborate studies of disciplinary situations and talk about bad home conditions1 natural meanness1 and the like4 ,but they ignore the fact that they are themselves passing judgment on situations in which they are active parties4 ,how can the manifestations of the overruling sex-urge be anything but illicit1 when school life is overtly organized as if sex were either evil or non-existent8 ,to whom are unnecessary noises unnecessary8 ,what else can one do with time but kill it desultorily1 when one's ruling passions are ignored and one is required to pay attention to matters one's heart cannot possibly be in8 ,as for smart-aleckism and cheating--are not those who succeed therein heroes in the eyes of their peers8 ,do they not overcome an enemy and put him in his place8 ,,vii ,allowing for the small differences of tradition and maturity1 the situation is the same in the colleges4 ,the ways of an undergraduate community are determined by standards which do not apply to men and women of the same age who must work for their livings4 ,for example1 there survives from the ,middle ,ages an antagonism between gown and town4 ,when this began it involved all the members of the academic community--faculty even more than students4 ,it turned on conflicts over the very structure of the municipal economy in the course of which 8gownsmen0 established and vindicated their autonomous jurisdiction over the persons1 properties1 and actions of their 8own40 ,college or university became a city within a city1 sovereign over all affairs affecting it1 and privileged in the national life4 ,today1 faculty is for practical purposes a part of 8town40 8,gown0 consists only of the body of undergraduates4 ,these often stand in a predatory relationship to the residual community4 ,they may steal signs1 fences1 garments1 and whatnot2 they may destroy dishes1 furniture1 and other property not their own--academic or lay2 they may brawl on the public street and on occasion beat up policemen and citizens without being held responsible as workers of the same age would be4 ,they may endeavor in every way to 8beat the game0 in relation to their studies--wangle more cuts than they are entitled to1 hand in work as their own which is not their own1 cheat at examinations1 and in every other possible way 8put it over0 on the faculty4 ,for an undergraduate to be serious about the 8serious purpose0 of college1 to be academically law-abiding1 to show an interest in studies1 is at best to be slightly declass1 at worst to be a greasy grind4 ,any manifestation of friendliness to a teacher is 8boot-licking40 ,the total impression which undergraduate conduct makes in the mass is of an underground class war between student and faculty2 and the traditional undergraduate code is a warlike code1 requiring students under all circumstances whatsoever to stand by each other and against the faculty4 ,even under an 8honor system0 a 8squealer0 is as total a loss among students as among gangsters4 ,in sum1 tradition allows the college man certain privileges and protects his abuse of them4 ,like the infant1 he is held not accountable for violations of the adult social code4 ,he is maintained in a state of infantile irresponsibility4 ,this state is even more significant1 if not so conspicuous1 in the matter of the basic economy of life4 ,for the representative undergraduate does not keep himself4 ,he is kept4 ,he does not earn his food and clothing and shelter and entertainment4 ,again1 like the infant1 he is sheer consumer1 not producer2 ,veblen would call him an instrument of 8conspicuous consumption0 and a foremost avatar of the leisure class4 ,as a community of consumers merely1 a student body is no more homogeneous than a community of producers4 ,within the frame of similarity generated by the condition of dependence there exist both the formal academic gradations dividing year and year as rank and rank1 and the non-academic but 8collegiate0 gradations of caste and class1 interest and attitude4 ,every college1 for example1 has its tiny liberal group1 its sparse collection of students who trouble themselves with social problems1 international relations1 disarmament1 and the like4 ,this group is usually looked upon as a troublemaking nuisance by the college administration 7the high point of this attitude may be found in the ,university of ,pittsburgh71 and as 8lousy0 by the arbitres elegantiae of undergraduate opinion4 8,political and social agitation10 declares a ,yale senior who had degraded himself by concern with such agitation1 8is frowned upon by undergraduate leaders1 and consequently relegated to the obscurity of almost clandestine off-campus coteries40 ,to no small degree such coteries are made up of students who are working their way through college1 and what is worse1 ,jews count heavily among them4 ,yet ,jews are the exception that prove the rule4 ,between #aibj and #aicj1 the tradition of a love of learning which they brought to college has been dissipated4 ,the adult responsibility which they felt for the problems of their own people and of the community at large1 and which was signalized by their membership in such organizations as the ,menorah ,societies1 the ,zionist1 the ,liberal1 or the ,social ,questions ,clubs1 has been destroyed4 ,as their numbers grew1 their fields of interest and modes of behavior conformed more and more to the prevailing conventions of undergraduate life4 ,although excluded by expanding anti-,semitism from participation in that life1 they reproduce it1 heightened1 in an academic ghetto of fraternities1 sororities1 and the like4 ,and they emulate the invidious distinctions they suffer from by projecting them upon the ,jews too proud1 too poor1 or too ,jewish to be eligible for 8collegiate0 secret societies of ,jews4 ,because the dynamic distinctions within the academic community are invidious only4 ,college is not a republic of letters but a plutocracy of fraternities1 sororities1 clubs1 and 8activities40 ,scholarship is no attribute of merit for a student4 ,athletic prowess1 especially if conspicuous1 could be2 but the prepotent properties are wealth1 sectarian affiliations1 and 8contacts and connections40 ,these delimit members of the fraternities and sororities4 ,since initiation fees run from #ej to #ajjj1 and membership is correspondingly expensive1 a rich father is the prime qualification for the prospective 8pledge40 ,before pledging1 such a prospect is courted like a bride4 ,pledging is followed by initiation1 which often lasts months4 ,it begins in hazing and may grow into sadistic torture1 recalling the rites of the primitives4 ,it culminates in a solemn self-dedication with highfalutin' vows whose practical application to the subsequent daily life amounts to training in the amenities 7 la ,emily ,post72 8loyalty0 to 8brothers0 in the competition for the cream in undergraduate activities such as class-politics1 proms1 athletics1 and the like2 collaboration1 mostly illicit1 with brothers and sisters to insure their passing examinations or any other kind of test2 and most of all1 in the facilitation of 8contacts40 ,thus the academic aristocracy are indoctrinated in the academic 8traditions0 and equipped to watch over them4 ,these have primarily to do with the mores of garb and conduct ordained for freshmen1 with the prerogatives of upperclassmen1 such as wearing shorts and slickers1 and similar matters reminiscent of the primitives4 ,if they are moved by social and political questions at all1 it is at times of presidential elections1 when national committees--,republican1 mostly--have been known to put a good deal of money into corralling 8the college vote40 ,in times of strike1 as during the ,boston street railway strike1 some of the better-class ,harvard undergraduates had almost as much fun strike-breaking as they used to have rioting after a rare football victory over ,yale4 ,but the record hardly ever shows considered idealism1 spontaneous1 generous giving of goods and self1 such as one finds among the students in ,europe and ,asia4 ,the ,american undergraduate makes the impression of a self-centered and selfish creature1 absorbed in trivialities1 comfort-loving1 reactionary and irresponsible2 in a word1 infantile4 ,,viii ,graduates1 recalling their college life1 tend to fall into two groups4 ,one group see college as the happiest time of their lives--and why should they not8 ,this group composes the backbone of the alumni associations1 forever whoops it up for 8dear ol' ,whatsis10 and proves the life of the party at alumni reunions1 especially those where good liquor is poured out in the hopeless effort to make the man a boy again1 while he stays a father too4 ,by the other group1 college is recalled as a waste of time4 ,the transition from the position of a kept and protected favorite child into that of a grown man under the imperative of having to earn his own keep has worked a disillusionment4 ,instead of getting the job he believes his degree entitles him to1 he finds himself a superfluity in the labor market4 ,employers are likely to speak of him as bumptious1 immature1 undeveloped1 a cub4 ,he finds1 even for the simplest tasks1 either that he must unlearn what he has learned1 or1 if he is lucky1 that he has no training at all4 ,he begins to regret his college life and to consider that college has failed him4 ,thinking about it1 as did ,philip ,wylie1 he realizes that 8the serious purpose0 of college not only was not serious to him1 but could not have been4 ,for1 as the ,new ,york boy found already in high school1 the curriculum offers him no momentous living option4 ,the subject matter is irrelevant to all that is dynamic in him1 it lacks vital links with both the passions of his heart and the actual world where1 after college1 he must live and move and have his being4 ,it is presented mostly by persons to whom teaching is as much a disagreeable penalty for the amenities of 8scholarly0 life as learning is to the student for the amenities of college life4 ,hence1 the student seeks to pay the minimum penalty1 which is to pass his examination by any means whatsoever4 ,sometimes the disillusion rises during undergraduate years4 ,then there are editorials in the college papers4 ,administrations are criticized1 professors are graded1 courses are scored1 abuses are denounced4 ,deans and faculties squirm and are glad when the student interest in education subsides4 ,fortunately such bursts of interest are rare interludes4 ,for the most part1 it is faculties1 not students1 who are agitated about education4 ,and why should students be agitated about anything still so monastic1 that isolates nearly all of those who enter upon it from the realities among which they expect to spend their lives1 and sustains them in a state of irresponsibility and irrelevance8 ,at an age when body and mind cry out against infancy1 8the higher education0 prolongs infancy2 it sets up and maintains a conflict between psychobiological adulthood and social childishness4 ,in this conflict 8college life0 has its fertile soil4 ,it nourishes all those psychological expressions which fall into the patterns of undergraduate attitudes and behavior that are designated by the word 8collegiate40 ,an apt example of what 8collegiate0 has come to mean in these ,united ,states broke into public view during the fall of #aica4 ,the occasion was an article from the pen of the editor-in-chief of the ,spectator1 which is the student daily paper at ,columbia ,university in ,new ,york ,city4 ,the article was a serious and intelligent endeavor by a student whose social maturity had by some stroke of chance kept pace with his physiological adulthood1 to deal seriously with the realities of athletics1 especially football1 at ,columbia4 ,it called for the public recognition of football as the professional vocation it actually is1 and for ordaining coaches as reasonably-paid instructors and not as super-salaried dictators4 ,of course the response was anger1 denunciation1 threats against the writer4 ,among the commentators was the alumni secretary4 8,the editorial is nonsense10 he said4 8,the matter is complicated but there are lots of reasons why the head football coach should get a larger salary than a professor4 ,the editor of the ,spectator is too serious-minded4 ,he should be more collegiate40 ,so standard is this usage of 8collegiate0 that the very students whose habits sustain it1 admonish each other3 8,oh1 don't be so collegiate10 and in one of the women's colleges--women's1 nota bene--8,don't be collegiate0 is a commandment which upperclassmen deliver from the ,sinai of their seniority to freshmen entering4 ,but so long as colleges are managed as they are managed1 and college teaching continues as and what it is1 it is impossible that students should not be1 in one form or another1 collegiate--that is1 adults conducting themselves like children4 ,for social adulthood consists in self-support and self-management1 in moral responsibility and intellectual integrity4 ,these are facilitated by physiological maturity but are by no means identical with it4 ,physiological maturity comes as an instinctive ripening1 in the course of nature4 ,social adulthood is a learned mode of behavior in the social environment2 a system of habits acquired1 not a state of the body grown into4 ,this is why bodies may grow up and grow old while minds and hearts remain infantile4 ,and this is why adulthood cannot be learned in colleges as they are any more than swimming can be learned on dry land2 the medium is too different1 too alien4 ,this is why such academic reformations as those at ,harvard or ,wisconsin or ,chicago are futile jugglings of the same pieces1 whereas what is required are new materials and new forms4 ,antioch comes closer to putting the student on his own as a self-supporting1 self-managing adult1 but in ,antioch the work on the job and the classes in the college are far from the interfusion they require4 ,nevertheless1 ,antioch points the hopeful direction of change for colleges that desire to stop prolonging infancy and to begin educating adults4 #be cents 7#ce cents in ,canada7 ,,the ,,john ,,day ,,pamphlets #a4 ,,rebecca ,,west4 ,arnold ,bennett ,himself4 #b4 ,,stuart ,,chase4 ,out of the ,depression--and ,after3 ,a ,prophecy4 #c4 ,,joseph ,v4 ,,stalin4 ,the ,new ,russian ,policy 7,june #bc1 #aica74 #d4 ,,norman ,e4 ,,himes4 ,the ,truth ,about ,birth ,control4 #e4 ,,walter ,,lippmann4 ,notes on the ,crisis4 #f4 ,,charles ,a4 ,,beard4 ,the ,myth of ,rugged ,american ,individualism4 #g4 ,,rexford ,,guy ,,tugwell4 ,mr4 ,hoover's ,economic ,policy4 #h4 ,,hermann ,,hagedorn4 ,the ,three ,pharaohs4 #i4 ,m4 ,h4 ,,hedges4 ,a ,strikeless ,industry4 #aj4 ,,gilbert ,,seldes4 ,against ,revolution4 #aa4 ,,george ,s4 ,,counts4 ,dare the ,school ,build a ,new ,social ,order8 7,special1 #fd pages47 #ab4 ,,hendrik ,,willem ,,van ,,loon4 ,to ,have or to ,be--,take ,your ,choice4 #ac4 ,,norman ,,thomas4 ,the ,socialist ,cure for a ,sick ,society4 #ad4 ,h4 ,g4 ,,wells4 ,what ,should be ,done--,now3 ,a ,memorandum on the ,world ,situation4 #ae4 ,v4 ,f4 ,,calverton4 ,for ,revolution4 #af4 ,,horace ,m4 ,,kallen4 ,college ,prolongs ,infancy4 ,,the ,,john ,,day ,,company #chf ,fourth ,avenue1 ,new ,york ,,transcriber',s ,,note3 ,italicized text is surrounded by underscores3 italics4