A unit here represents successful work for one hour a week for two semesters. Therefore the total 74 is equivalent to 148 of the usual collegiate units.
Elect after the Freshman year courses aggregating 34 additional units in fields of
| I. | Business law | 4 courses, 10 units available |
| II. | Commerce and transportation | 9 courses, 19 units available |
| III. | Economics | 8 courses, 15 units available |
| IV. | Finance and accounting | 20 courses, 53 units available |
| V. | Geography and industry | 11 courses, 26 units available |
| VI. | Insurance | 7 courses, 16 units available |
| VII. | Political science | 22 courses, 43 units available |
| VIII. | Sociology | 6 courses, 12 units available |
| Total required for the degree, | 74 units |
There is a school which grants a degree in Commerce for the equivalent of 36 of these units or 72 of the usual college credits, if the student has business experience, and for the equivalent of 48 of these units or 96 of the usual college credits if he has not. The course is essentially like Type I and includes no broad liberal requirements in literature, foreign language, and history and on the other hand is not so strictly prescribed as Type I. A strictly technical degree may be desirable for such a short course, provided the prescription is severe and includes languages. Generally it seems best to reserve degrees for full college courses of four years or more which include a reasonable general requirement in languages and science. This leads us to Type IV, or the curriculum which requires the first regular two years of the college course prescribed for one of the liberal degrees and permits business specialization in the last two undergraduate years or these with an additional postgraduate year. One institution requires the first three years as a foundation for a two-year course in business, and one conducts a postgraduate school of business administration leading to the degree of Ph.D. in Business Economics. No doubt postgraduate work will be continued mainly in the research direction, but undergraduate day and continuation courses will be devoted mainly to preparation for business.
It is not necessary to illustrate Type IV, because the first two years consist simply of the Freshman and Sophomore work of any sort of liberal college course, Classical, Scientific, or Modern Language, while the succeeding years are made up of special work in Economics and Business of more or less concentrated character.
The advantage of the type is obviously administrative. The whole vexing problem of insuring fairly wide cultivation along with opportunities for specialization is conveniently settled by giving general training, most of it remote from business work, for two years, after which the student is considered cultivated enough to withstand the blighting effect of specialization. But there are serious pedagogical objections to this arrangement which make the vertical plan seem preferable. A student coming from one of our constantly improving high schools of commerce is checked for two years and given time to forget all the bookkeeping and other commercial work which he has learned and on which advanced commercial instruction may be built, while he pursues an academic course. It would be far better to continue the modern languages, the mathematics, and natural sciences, along with business courses. Furthermore there is much to be done by educators in arranging such parallel sequences of subjects so that advantage may be taken of vocational interest to stimulate broad and deep study of related fundamentals. Considerable improvement could be made over Type III, but that type seems better than the one we have styled "horizontal."
In all these courses of study we quite properly find both the philosophical and analytical courses, those which are historical and descriptive and those of detailed practical technique; we find economic theory, industrial history, business management, and practical accounting; we find theory of money and banking, history of banking in the United States, and practical banking; we find theory of international exchange, tariff history, and the technique of customs administration. Concerning methods of teaching particular subjects we shall speak later.
Seldom do we find curricula drawn up with the purely civic end in view, though many schools and associations throughout the country are agitating the question of organized training of men for public service. Strictly speaking, this kind of training is both professional and civic because it is designed to make men proficient in carrying on the business of the State. In New York City the municipal college conducts courses of this sort for persons in the city service, while private bureaus of municipal research conduct their own courses. So far in America no courses are yet accepted officially for entrance into public service or as the only qualification for advancement in the service. Nevertheless, progress is being made in this direction. The curricula offered include courses in Government and especially Municipal Government, Public Finance and Taxation, the practical organization and administration of various departments such as Police, Charities, Public Works, the establishment and maintenance of special systems of municipal accounts.
But the great civic benefit comes from general courses in business, for the business man who has a real grasp of his work and sees it in the light of general social welfare becomes a good citizen. Business education gives some sense of the interdependence of industry, personal ethics, and government. The broadly trained business man realizes that he is in a sense a servant of the community, that his property is wrapped up with the welfare of his fellow men, and that what he has is a trust which society grants to him to be conducted after the manner of a good steward. Such training reveals to him the raison d'être of labor legislation, factory laws, the various qualifications of the property right, the necessity for taxation, and the importance of good government to all the citizens of the State both as coöperative agents in production and as consumers. Continued and improved business education will elevate the mind of the merchant and the manager so that its horizon is no longer the profit balance but the welfare of all society.