>201 5 , 1 7^^ University Hxtension Philadelphia and Vicinity 1890-1898 Price 25 Cents. CONCERNING UNIVERSITY EXTENSION Its Significance, Method AND Results A STATEMENT FOR PUBLIC INFORMATION ISSUED BY The American Society for the Exten- sion OF University Teaching iti^nt Approved by THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS. Philadelphia 1898 M Board of Directors. Charles A. Brinley, M. G. Brumbaugh Charles E. Bushnell, John H. Converse, Walter C. Douglas, Theodore N. Ely, . Charles C. Harrison, William H. Ingham, John S. Macintosh, Frederick B. Miles, Henry S. Pancoast, Joseph G. Rosengarten. Justus C. Strawbridge, Charlemagne Tower, Jr., Stuart Wood, 1% 247 S. Sixteenth Street. ^'\% 311 S. Fortieth Street. The Gladstone. 1610 Locust Street. 35 S. Nineteenth Street. Bryn Mawr, Pa. 1618 Locust Street. 2134 Pine Street. Magnolia and Locust Aves., G't'n. 258 S. Eighteenth Street. East Johnson Street, Germantown. 1704 Walnut Street. School Lane, Germantown. 243 S. Eighteenth Street. 1620 Locust Street. Frederick B. Miles, Treasurer. Office of the Society, iii S. Fifteenth Street, Philadelphia. 1898 STATEMENT. In considering any new educational move- ment it is as well to recall a few of the con- spicuous instances in which an important impulse has been given to the life of a people by an educational reform or a new method. The conception of free public schools for all children became a national ideal and was real- ized in practice in the United States earlier than in any country of modern Europe. It is not necessary to dwell upon the influence of this policy which is now followed by most civilized states. The recovery of Germany after the crushing defeats of the Napoleonic wars was the result of a conscious purpose in- spired by Fichte and Pestalozzi to re-establish strength by education. The remarkable pros- perity and importance of Holland in the seven- teenth century were contemporaneous with a general interest in education illustrated by the anecdote of a crowd of citizens in the streets of Breda, all studying a paper, "posted on a wall, and talking about its contents — an ab- struse mathematical problem, submitted in this way to the public for solution." Germany is to-day reaping the fruits of an educational policy, more recently adopted, with the definite idea of enabling German manufacturers to com- pete with the world. That modern societies are conscious that no people can afford to neglect education is shown by the fact that the example of the United States, in adopting after the Civil War as a national policy the principle that every child born within its limits shall have opportunities for an elementary education, has been followed by Germany, as early as 1870, and since then, more or less effectively, by France, England, Italy, and Austria, and further, by the fact that the sums devoted by states to educational pur- poses are constantly increasing from year to year. If education has a commercial value, its ethical value is no less certain. We cannot escape from the conviction that it is impossible to have good popular government and a well- ordered and progressive society without a high average of intelligence — not alone the intelli- gence which means practical efficiency, but that which is shown in thoughtfulness and ability to discriminate between what is false and bad and that which is honest and for the real wel- fare of the community. Only a very small proportion (six per cent, according to good authorities) of the people of the United States are systematically educated after leaving the common schools, say, at fourteen years of age. From that point the educational progress of the many is almost without guidance ; it can rarely be thorough, because their chief occu- pation must be to earn a livelihood. The recognition of these facts has resulted in many plans for supplementing early training by providing special opportunities for those who can give more or less leisure to self-im- provement. We have libraries, reading circles, correspondence schools, museums and collec- tions ; foundations for free lectures and evening instruction — generally in buildings provided for by the same endowment ; and free evening lectures in schoolhouses, conducted by boards of public education. The Lowell lectures in Boston and the Peabody Institute lectures of Baltimore are given by the trustees of funds bequeathed for the purpose. The Brooklyn Institute and Drexel Institute of Philadelphia are instances of plants for supple- mentary educational work ; the latter does ex- cellent class work, day and evening, of a systematic and continuous character. New York led the way seven years ago in estab- lishing through the board of education free evening lectures in the public schools ; Boston and Chicago have followed this example. The Chautauqua reading plan and such schemes as that of the Cosmopolitan Magazine are instances of reading circles and correspondence schools. In England two methods have been adopted : one, that of technical evening teaching, pro- vided for through grants of public money by the County Councils ; the other. University Extension lectures, mostly in history and liter- ature, under the direction of the great univer- sities. It will be seen that these two plans are complementary — the state teaching practical subjects, the universities the humanities. This same distinction can be traced in America in the difference between the work of technical night schools and that of University Extension. The free lectures in schoolhouses in New York, Boston, and Chicago have been on both scientific and general subjects. The advocates of University Extension in England say that it is especially valuable be- cause an eminently practical people can be trusted to get information that will be directly useful, but the University Extension lectures teach what the people would otherwise be slow to acquire, what is yet of the first importance, as the state needs not only skilled workmen but intelligent citizens. We have not "merely to make the man the better workman, but the workman the better man." The idea of University Extension first took root in the United States in Philadelphia, and since its organization here in 1890 the Philadel- phia Society has given more lectures to more people and maintained a higher standard in the instruction given than perhaps any organ- ization in the country which uses the lecture method for supplementary education. From Philadelphia the University Extension idea spread to New England, the Middle States, and the West, until not less than a dozen universities are now doing Extension work, and the number of persons afi'ected is probably not less than 100,000 yearly. The New York evening lectures in the public schools are attended by a nearly equal number ; and these lectures, in quality and method, are gradually approaching the standard set by the Philadelphia Society, whose lecturers have re- peatedly been called there. If we compare University Extension with reading circles and correspondence clubs, we cannot but see that there is an advantage in the contact of the speaker with the people he is teaching. The living teacher is the centre of inspiration. He gives them the best fruits of wide reading and systematic study; he not only can tell them what to read, but he can rouse an interest by his personal conviction and enthusiasm, and he gives an opportunity after each lecture for the discussion of any questions that arise ; he examines the essays that are written and guides the class study of those who do work between the lectures. Compared with fixed plants for doing the same sort of thing University Extension is more flexible and has the advantage of mobility. It carries the teacher as well as the teaching to the people. The lecturer goes where he is needed and uses any hall or room which will accommodate an audience. This winter there have been University Ex- tension lectures of the American Society in twelve different places in Philadelphia and in twenty-three different towns throughout the state. The interest on a sum necessary to erect such a building as Horticultural Hall, of Phila- delphia, would serve to maintain one hundred and fifty courses of six lectures each, given in outlying parts of Philadelphia and in towns, small and large, from here to Pittsburg — many places where such courses may change the whole current of thinking and induce people to read, who before have rarely read a good book. It should be stated here that it is distinctly the policy of the directors of the American Society to insist upon good quality in the teaching and upon continued work with the same people. The common schools are a defence against illiteracy, at least in the case of native-born children. The public library has been recog- nized as a necessary adjunct to our civilization. University Extension stands between the two, giving to those who have been trained in the public schools opportunities, not readily to be had by other means, to learn to read wisely ; it stimulates a demand for libraries and en- courapfes the use of books of a better class than would otherwise be called for; it also stands in a somewhat similar relation to art, music, and to museums containing collections meant to be used in study. University Extension enlists the co-operation of groups of people, in many different places, who take the lead in getting their neighbors to come together for a useful purpose; it is to some extent self-propagating, as the experience in one neighborhood often leads to the starting of a centre in another place. University Extension cannot probably be made self-supporting. Men who hold profes- sorships in colleges are not highly paid and they cannot well afford to lecture for nothing. To pay a lecturer the minimum fee at which really good work can be secured and to meet the other expenses of a course means a total outlay often very difficult for the local com- mittee to meet by the sale of tickets. The general society which supplies the lecturer can- not therefore get an income for its own uses by adding to the fee ; it sometimes has to help the centres. It is a fact, however, that the centres — the people who profit by the teaching — pay five-sixths of the entire cost, which is a far better result than is shown by any other system of higher education. If it has been made clear that what the Uni- versity Extension Society has undertaken is worth doing, it only remains to consider how it can be done in the best manner. In Eng- land, where University Extension began and from where it has spread all over Europe and to the United States, the lecturers are selected by the universities and are univer- sity men, but they are not university teachers. Here much has been accomplished by using college professors in such time as they could spare from their regular duties, but there are many ways in which this plan is weak. The college professor often cannot go to the place where he is wanted or at the time which suits the centre; he may not be a good lecturer although a fine scholar; he sometimes fails because he does not do enough of the work to understand the requirements of the people to whom he speaks. It is therefore unwise to restrict lecturing to university teachers, but care should be taken that lecturers should be amply qualified to speak with authority. The American Society has now three lec- turers of its own and it has used from time to time some of the English lecturers. It has been demonstrated that the man who makes University Extension lecturing his occupation, other things being equal, succeeds surprisingly compared with the occasional lecturer. It is the desire of the directors of the Society to add to its staff, but they cannot do so without ability to guarantee a certain income to the men whom they invite to enter the Society's service. Only men of rather exceptional qual- ities will answer, and they are not to be had unless it is possible to offer them reasonable inducements. Men with knowledge, talent, energy, and a self-sacrificing zeal for popular education are not readily found. Money is needed to enable the Society to add to its staff and also to assist centres too small or too poor fully to pay their own ex- penses ; and there is a definite need for assist- ance in executing a plan of giving some free lectures in public school buildings in Phila- delphia. These courses may result in such action by our own board of education in Philadelphia as has been taken in New York and elsewhere. The American Society for the Extension of University Teaching has been supported for seven years by a very small group of persons upon whom the cost and the labor of manage- ment have fallen somewhat heavily. Its value and the practicability of its plans have now been demonstrated. Philadelphia is known all over the country as the place in which Uni- versity Extension began — in which it has justified itself. There have been given in this city 193 courses of lectures, or a total of 1131 lectures, at 33 different centres. The aggre- gate attendance has been 239,933. Within a radius of thirty miles of the city there have been 147 courses, or a total of 867 lectures, at 36 centres. The total attendance has been 122,392. The following is a summary of the work done at centres for people of small means : Course Total Courses. Lectures. Attendance. Attendance. Bainbridge Street 5 30 693 4158 College Settlement i 6 115 690 Erie Avenue i 5 225 1115 Hebrew Literature Society. . 6 32 279 1541 Kensington 5 30 1524 9144 Lehigh Avenue 3 18 323 1938 Light-House (Kensington) . . 2 11 92 500 Nicetown i 6 66 396 Spring Garden i 6 51 306 Touro Hall 3 15 520 2652 Totals 28 159 3888 22,440 13 Examinations at the end of the lecture courses have been successfully passed by 532 students in Philadelphia, and 391 students at centres in the neighborhood of the city. Those who have so far been responsible for the work may reasonably ask others to help in maintaining it — now that it has proved its use- fvilness as a practicable method of popular adult education— one that has solidity, is far reaching, and, with a minimum expenditure, has shown excellent results. Subscriptions are invited to a permanent en- dowment fund, and to the current expense fund. It is desired to obtain as soon as possible, with a view to arrangements for next year's work, subscriptions which will add $6000 a year to the income of the Society. 14 The list of present subscribers to the income account of the University Extension Society is below : Miss Maria Blanchard, Mr. Charles A. Brinley, Mr. Alfred C. Harrison, Mr. Charles C. Harrison, Mr. Frederick B. Miles, Mr. John T. Morris, Mr. Joseph G. Rosengarten, Mr. Justus C. Strawbridge, Mr. George Burnham, Sr., Mr. John H. Converse, Mr. William P. Henszey, Mr. Charles E. Bushnell, Mr. Samuel T. Sodine, Mr. William H. Ingham, Mrs. William F. Jenks, Dr. Edward H. Williams, Mr. Carl Edelheim, Mr. Theodore N. Ely, Dr. William Pepper, Mr. Chancellor C. English, Miss Caroline E. Cope, Mr. George C. Thomas, Mr. Addison Hutton, Miss Anita V. Spooner, Mr. Redwood F. Warner, Mr. James C. Brooks, Mr. J. Albert Caldwell, Mr. T. P. Chandler, Mr. Joseph Fels, Miss Juliana Wood, Mr. W. B. Saunders, Mr. John Sparhawk, Jr., Mrs. C. H. Brush, , Rev. Charles Wood, Mr. William Burnham, Mrs. J. Edgar Thomson. The average of the above yearly subscrip- tions is about ^200. 15 COMMENTS. "The civic salvation of the American people will come through higher education adapted to the wants of adults." — Herbert B, Adams. "University Extension contemplates opening to all the people of the state opportunities which are now open to few, and to do it for the same reason that it supports the free school, - — namely, that it makes better American citizens." — Harper's Weekly. "The movement for University Extension marks the pro- gress of the democratic idea in education." — New York Even- ing Post. "I believe that with the rise and growth of University Extension will come a higher and a better and a nobler life for all our people. It will reach all the schools; it will reach the workshops; it will reach every class and condition of the community, and, while we grow rich and strong and powerful with our manufactures, we will grow intellectual and humane and have aspirations after those higher and better things, which, after all, must become the abiding life of every people." — James MacAlister, President of the Drexel Institute. "The development of this University Extension movement and its extraordinary success are the most significant facts in the modern history of education." — George William Curtis. i6 "It is an entirely unselfish movement; nobody is making any money out of it; it is an entirely philanthropic design aimed to effect the best interests of the masses. It is sanc- tioned by the leading educators of the land, East and West." — Timothy Dwight, President of Yale College. "The American Society for the Extension of University Teaching has done a valuable work in making this movement known throughout the country," — Nczv York Tribune. "I am full of admiration for the energy and wisdom dis- played in the Philadelphia movement in University Extension. It is the most promising undertaking that I have seen thus far in this country to place it upon a practical basis." — William T. Harris, United States Commissioner of Education. "Philadelphia has again proven its old reputation for doing thoroughly whatever it undertakes by the energy with which it has taken hold of the movement for University Extension." — Philadelphia Ledger. >7 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS 029 928 723 3