National Educa VIII NOTES AND NEWS Secretary Shepard has issued a formal antional Association nouncement of the fact that the Executive Committee of the National Educational Association have fixed upon San Francisco as the place, and July 9-13, 1906, as the date for the next annual meeting. There is every reason to believe that the usual railroad rates will prevail and that the same lavish and hearty hospitality which California showed at the meetings at San Francisco in 1888 and at Los Angeles in 1899, will be again tendered to the visitors and their friends. The Trustees of the National Educational Association have issued under date of November 27, 1905, a detailed statement regarding the permanent fund which now amounts to $147,000. It shows that the funds in their hands are in a condition of security and safety not surpassed by those of any bank or trust company in the nation. Three prizes—a first prize of $100, a second The Barrett Prizes prize of $75, and a third prize of $50-have been established by the Hon. John Barrett, United States Minister to Colombia, to be awarded to the authors of the best papers on any one of the subjects named below. Mr. Barrett states the object of the prizes to be "to promote the study of the history, peoples, politics, resources, and possibilities of our sister Republics," and to develop thruout the United States "a wider interest in our political and commercial relations with Latin-America, and to foster a more general study of Latin-American history, institutions, political, social, and educational conditions, material and industrial resources, and commercial possibilities-especially as they affect the growth of closer ties of international comity and confidence." The prizes are offered subject to the following rules of competition: (1) The competition is open to any student, man or woman, registered during the academic year 1905-06 in any American college, university, or technical school. Undergraduate, professional, and graduate students are alike eligible. (2) Papers submitted by competitors must not exceed 10,000 words in length. (3) Papers, accompanied by the full name and address of writer and statement of the class and college, university, or technical school to which the writer belongs, must be mailed or delivered to an express company not later than September 1, 1906, addressed to the President of Columbia University, New York, N. Y., marked "For the John Barrett Prize." (4) The prizes will be awarded by a Committee of Judges chosen for the purpose, and the results will be announced thru the public press as soon after October 1, 1906, as practicable. (5) The paper awarded the first prize will be transmitted by the undersigned to the Director of the Bureau of American Republics, who will cause it to be published and circulated as one of the publications of that Bureau. (6) All papers submitted in competition, other than the one to which the first prize is awarded, will be destroyed as soon as the prizes have been awarded, unless, at the time of sending, a competitor asks for the return of the manuscript and furnishes a fully stamped and properly addressed envelope. (7) Papers must be submitted in typewritten form. Any one of the following subjects may be chosen : I POLITICAL AND ECONOMIC (a) The Monroe Doctrine and its influence on the political and economic development of Latin-America. (b) The influence of the Panama Canal on the commercial and political development of Latin-America. (c) Present conditions and future possibilities of the trade of the United States with South America. (d) The present material and economic progress of South America. (e) The practicability and utility of the proposed PanAmerican Railway. II HISTORICAL (a) The influences and conditions that worked for the independence and establishment of the South American Republics. (b) The influence and conditions that worked for the independence and establishment of the Central American Republics and Mexico. (c) The character and achievements of Bolivar as shown in the struggle for the independence of Northern South America. (d) The character and achievements of San Martin as shown in the struggle for the independence of Southern South America. (e) The conditions surrounding and circumstances influencing the overthrow of the Empire and establishment of the Republic of Brazil. The Committee in charge of the prizes consists of President Butler of Columbia University, Dr. Albert Shaw, Editor of the Review of reviews, and President Finley of the New York City College. EDUCATIONAL REVIEW FEBRUARY, 1906 66 I AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES: THEIR RESEM- The American colleges and universities seem to the public and to their own constituencies to be very different; but as a matter of fact they are much alike, and what is more, they exhibit in a striking degree the same tendencies. In durable institutions tendency is quite as important as actual condition. It is my purpose in this lecture, first, to point out the fundamental similarities among the higher institutions of learning in the United States, and then to indicate briefly the nature and probable outcome of the differences they exhibit. I ought to premise, however, that my remarks will have no application to the group of American institutions which derive from the Roman Church their form of government, their discipline, and their program of studies. This firmly established group of colleges, which are chiefly under the control of the Society of Jesus, breathe the American atmosphere, and are not wholly inaccessible to the spirit of modern science; but being essentially ecclesiastical in structure and methods, they bear little resemblance to the ordinary American college, which is historically Protestant in origin and development, and distinctly secular, tho not irreligious. "I. The first likeness I wish to point out is the likeness in the constitutions of the bodies which own and govern the 'An address delivered at Yale University, November 13, 1905. Reprinted from the Harvard bulletin, November 22, 1905. American institutions of higher education. At first sight these bodies seem unlike, and there are certainly many diversities among them; but there is a strong tendency toward the same constitution-a tendency which is due to like desires or objects, and to like experiences in the actual working of the bodies originally set up. When the General Court of Massachusetts Bay created in 1642, by a natural inventive process, the first Governing Board for Harvard College, the Act prescribed that it should be composed of the Governor and Deputy Governor, the magistrates of the jurisdiction, and the teaching elders of six adjoining towns, with the President of the College. That is, the General Court intrusted the infant college to a large group of the leading persons in the little colony. This same sort of thing has since been done all over the country. By skipping 225 years and 1000 miles westward, I can take an illustration of this truth from the University of Illinois, which was established in 1867. This university was placed under the control of a Board of Trustees, consisting of the Governor, the Superintendent of Public Instruction, the President of the State Board of Agriculture, and twenty-eight citizens appointed by the Governor. The twenty-eight citizens appointed by the Governor have since been changed to nine elective members; but the idea of the original structure was much the same as that underlying the first Harvard Governing Board, except that the churches had no representation as such. Going on to the Pacific, we find the University of California. governed by a Board of Regents, seven of whom—including the President of the University-are ex-officio Regents, and sixteen are long-term appointed Regents, representing the various professions and business occupations, and to some extent the most important California communities. When Cornell University was incorporated in 1865 a very similar collection of men was set up as Trustees, eight of them—including the President and Librarian of the University-being exofficio members of the Board, and the other thirty being leading representatives of the various professions and business occupations mostly within the State of New York. The original Governing Board of Yale University was composed exclusively of |