The American university of to-day contains many elements. Broadly speaking, it represents the ideals of the Platonic philosophy, the direct inheritance from England, the character of the German university, the modern scientific method, and the practical demands of American civilization. All these elements are woven into the web of our national life. There is, of course, much diversity. Each class of universities contains something of all the ideals, but each emphasizes certain ones. The older and larger denominational school is more nearly the direct representative of English education, but has made a great advance. The state universities represent the people as such and the tendencies of our civilization, but in accord with the highest ideals. They more readily accept the influence of the German university. The denominational colleges scattered throughout the West aim to perpetuate the denominational idea.
Almost from the foundation of our Government free elementary schools have been regarded as an essential and characteristic part of our American institutions. They became a logical necessity when our forefathers abjured the caste and intolerance of the Old World, and with prophetic insight proclaimed the era of a new civilization in which the welfare of the state should mean the welfare of all the people. While the idea of education at the expense of the state, and under its control, was early accepted in that part of the country which has gradually influenced the whole nation, we of to-day have witnessed a part of the struggle to place on a permanent foundation the modern system of high schools. These schools, especially in the West, now have an assured position and command the confidence of the people. The attempt to take the next step and establish state universities was met with doubt and opposition. At a comparatively recent date, however, many state universities have come into prominence, and to-day they appear in the main to be the coming institutions of university training from Ohio to Oregon, and from Texas to Montana. Here is a development that is remarkable, and we may well examine its significance.
In the first place the state university is the logical outcome of our democratic ideal that made the public schools a necessity, an outcome which naturally would be first realized in the newer states. As America furnished new and favorable conditions for the development of civilization, freed in part from the traditions of the Old World, so the new states of the West became the field for a still more liberal growth of the tendencies of the age. There is a recognized tendency in our institutions toward a broader community of interests in respect to many things that affect the common welfare, and in no way does this tendency find a grander expression than in the means for elevating the people at the expense of the people to a better citizenship, higher usefulness, and wiser and nobler manhood. The safety of the state depends upon giving the brightest and best of all classes and conditions an opportunity to rise to the surface of affairs.
In Prussia, Switzerland, and Italy a healthy organization of society is held to depend upon public control of both secondary and higher education. England’s system of education tends to maintain social distinctions and an intellectual conservatism that are harmful both to the aristocracy and to the common people. Education in Germany shows its superiority in that it reaches a larger number of the poor classes and develops greater freedom of thought. The public control of education makes it democratic and progressive, and strengthens its influence with the people. It makes the scholar a leader in the line of advance indicated by the ideals of the people. In the American state university, men come together as a faculty, bringing with them training and educational ideals gained in the best universities of the world. They place themselves in touch with the public schools, the press, and all the state agencies of influence and control. Knowing the needs and demands of the people, they take the lead in the line of natural progress. The state university is inseparably linked to the state, and must carry with it the best influences of the state, and thus extend its influence to the whole people.
The great denominational schools at first represented homogeneous elements in the national life. Harvard was essentially a state institution. It was founded in “accord with the fundamental principles of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts.” The people of Massachusetts, at that time, were largely homogeneous in race, religion, and love of freedom. Yale was founded partly on the conservative Congregationalism of Connecticut; hence it represented the mass of people in that State. Princeton was founded in the interest of the Scotch and Scotch-Irish political and religious views in the Middle States, but was so far catholic as to enlist the sympathy of the Dutch and the Quakers. However, it served a comparatively homogeneous people. In later years each of these universities, in order to reach large numbers of people maintaining diverse views, has been obliged to subordinate specific sectarian or denominational elements and emphasize only the highest ideals common to its constituency. The newer states of the West have a mixed population with heterogeneous interests. Hence it follows that not a denominational school, but a state school, broad enough for all the people, alone can satisfy the need of each state. Since it is impossible to maintain a real university for each peculiar interest, all must unite to support one institution, an institution maintaining the highest ideals common to humanity, and specifically to our own civilization. The ideals common to the American people are ample enough for an ideal university, founded and maintained by the state. Harvard or Princeton may say: “We have done for the state all that the state university claims as its function.” Then let each state have a Princeton which from the start is assured of an adequate foundation. In our Western states the same reason that would create one denominational college would create in each state fifteen or twenty. The history of the world never has seen such a dissipation of educational energy as is now seen in America, and a system of state education which tends to correct the evil merits enthusiastic support. It may be added that the state university exists in the West because the majority of the people are coming to prefer that kind of institution.
We may say, then, that the state university represents (1) the completion of the democratic ideal of public education; (2) the unity of progress amidst diversity of view, and the mutual influence of the knowledge and power of the scholar and the ideals of the people; (3) the broad platform upon which the heterogeneous elements of the state may unite in the interest of higher education. It is understood, of course, that these three statements are not altogether mutually exclusive.
These views of the raison d’être of the state university lead directly to the presentation in detail of some facts in its history and some of its aims, showing that its ideals are practicable.
The state university virtually, if not formally, is a part of the public-school system. As such it holds a peculiar and influential relation toward the public high schools. It furnishes teachers trained in the university in regular and pedagogical courses. It scrutinizes the courses of study and the character of the work, and formally approves the schools of standard merit. It helps in every prudent way the influence of the school with the community. By its friendly relation it may present freely the advantages of higher education and thus reach a large number who would otherwise rest at the goal of high-school graduation. In every state, through the agency of the university, the number of high schools is materially increased, and their standards, plan of organization, and methods are improved. Moreover, it gives the promise of something beyond that stimulates the efforts of pupils in every grade of work.
The connection between the high school and the university still gives rise to troublesome problems, not alone in this country. The ideals of the older American university are often at variance with the systematic development of education below the university and the demands of the people. The state university has come nearer than any other to the solution. While Harvard and Yale met the growing demands of science by establishing separate schools, Michigan introduced the scientific course into the college, making it rank with the classical. This plan, generally adopted by the state universities, places them nearly in line with the natural development of the public-school system. The state universities also show their regard for popular demand by admitting special students.