Chapter V. Articulation with secondary schools____ Chapter VI. Curricular prescription and orientation__ Chapter VII. Conclusions and recommendations__. Part II. Commerce and business: Chapter II. Need for higher education___ PART I.-ARTS AND SCIENCES Chapter I. Introduction Much of the general pessimism about the present function and the future destiny of arts and sciences in American education centers about conceptions of the college of arts and sciences as a unit of institutional organization. Agitated discussion of the topic has quite frequently forced into the background the more important matter of the functions in higher education of the areas of learning that are included in the vague term arts and sciences. This review is concerned both with arts and sciences as a unit in land-grant institutional organization and with the functions of the arts and science subjects in attaining the objectives of other forms of land-grant college education. Consideration of these two aspects of arts and sciences in the land-grant institutions may be clarified by a preliminary summary and definition of various conceptions of arts and science education. It is possible to segregate four points of view: First, arts and sciences is thought of as a unit of institutional organization that includes a body of knowledge designed to provide four years of general higher education; second, arts and science education is thought of in terms of a 2-year junior college unit designed to provide and in a sense to complete general education preliminary to but not necessarily as preparation for vocational or scholarly specialization. This conception differs little from the first except in the length of the period allowed for completion of the process; third, arts and sciences is thought of as a unit in which are assembled for administrative purposes a variety of humanistic, social, and scientific subjects intended to serve the needs of the technical and professional schools and colleges; fourth, arts and sciences is thought of as a unit offering four or more years of preparation for a series of its own specialized vocations. These vocations include those of research or other creative activity in the fields of the several arts or in one or another field of the social or physical sciences. |