OPENING ADDRESS AS CHAIRMAN OF THE DEPARTMENT OF TECHNOLOGICAL INSTRUCTION AT THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EDUCATION, JULY 26, 1893. FROM THE ADDRESSES AND PROCEEDINGS OF THE INTERNATIONAL CONGRESS OF EDUCATION, CHICAGO, 1893. The questions in relation to technological education suggested as of pressing importance in this address are, in the main, dealt with at greater length in subsequent papers. DISCUSSIONS IN EDUCATION IMMEDIATE PROBLEMS IN TECHNOLOGICAL EDUCATION. THIS, so far as I am aware, is the first general conference ever called to discuss the whole subject of technological education. Delegates from the "Colleges of Agriculture and the Mechanic Arts" established in the United States under the act of 1862 have for some years met in annual convention to consider matters of common interest; but in these conventions agriculture has been so far the predominant topic as to throw other departments of instruction into the shade. It was well that this present conference should be called. It was high time that the friends of technological education should assemble, to compare their experiences, to inquire what is lacking or what has been ill done in the remarkable development that has taken place during the last twenty-five years, and to take counsel together regarding the means for completing, for perfecting, for strengthening this system of public instruction. The representatives of the classical culture long ago recognized the importance of mutual conference, and many and earnest have been the deliberations and debates in which delegates from colleges and universi ties have sought to find out the way by which they might do greater good to the community and to the world, in their devoted and self-sacrificing exertions on behalf of education. Technological instruction, from its newness, from the sporadic character of the enterprises with which it has been connected, from the inherent gravity and complexity of its problems, has even greater need of consultation and conference among its teachers and its friends. It is said that nearly or quite one hundred institutions, in America alone, are now offering instruction in the applications of the sciences to the useful arts. In Great Britain, if my information is correct, the number of science schools and technical colleges is not much smaller. With but a few exceptions, this vast body of educational agencies represents the developments of only a quarter of a century. Some of these schools have been founded under the protection and patronage of great universities; others have been the outcome of independent effort. Some have sought to cover the whole ground of technological instruction; others have confined themselves to comparatively limited fields. Some have from the first achieved a decided success; others are still struggling with poverty of means, with embarrassments due perhaps to a false start, or with the inherent difficulties of their respective problems. Surely, in such a situation, it is eminently wise that the representatives of technological education should assemble in general convention, to deliberate upon the means of advancing their common object; to inquire what restrictions, if any, should be placed around the field of their activity; to learn, each from others, what measures may be taken to promote the efficiency with which these schools shall prepare their pupils for the severe trials of professional practice; and, last of all and most of all, to search deeply into the question how technical instruction and training may be made truly educational, in the largest and best sense of that word, so that the schools shall render the greatest possible service, not merely to industry and the arts, but also to character and citizenship, to mind and manhood. So strongly has the importance of this subject, in view of the recent very remarkable extension of the class of schools referred to, pressed upon those who have framed the plans for this general conference of education, that it has been decided to allot three morning sessions to the subject of technological education. Of these, the first, the present session, has been assigned to the discussion of the question: how far the technological instruction of to-day answers its primary requirement, the preparation of young men to enter upon the practice of the scientific professions; what failures or deficiencies have been discovered as the result of an experience wide if not long; what are the causes of any failures or deficiencies which may be found to exist; and what measures should be taken to complete and perfect these schools upon their purely professional side. The two remaining sessions are to be devoted to the consideration of the actual and |