4
THE BATTALION.
sectional prejudices so characteristic of the
uncultured.
To guard against this narrowing ten
dency of technical training, most of the*
great technical and industrial schools re
quire their students to take broad courses
in language, literature, history and eco
nomics; and of these subjects, perhaps none
is more valuable from the standpoint of
culture and usefulness alike than those
subjects grouped under the general name
of economics, including political economy,
industrial history, taxation, finance, tariff,
banking, railroad transportation, etc. At
least one course in economics is usually re
quired by the schools, while in some, as
the Massachusetts Institute of Technology,
a large number of additional courses are
offered, from which students are allowed to
elect their courses.
The course in United States history of
fered this year for the first time has no di
rect connection with the work in economics.
Its purpose is to give the student a con-
nectea general view of the history of this
country. The student comes from the av
erage public school or high school with
a very meager knowledge of United States
history. He studies a poor text, without
a reference library, and at an age when his
mind is not mature enough to grasp the
larger problems that history presents. Be
sides that, the teaching is frequently very
indifferent or positively bad. Unless the
student gets an opportunity to do the work
over during his college course, he usually
goes through life ignorant of the important
facts of our history and of the lessons it
has to teach.
In economics three courses are offered,
one in each term. Th class will study
during the fall term the industrial and so
cial history of England; in the winter term
the history of industry in the United States
and in the spring term political economy.
Prof. Hutson announces that the English
history will not be given in the spring term
as heretofore. Either United States his
tory or political economy will take its
place, as the student may elect.
Some difficulty was anticipated in
getting the work organized on ac
count of the crowded condition of the
courses. One year’s work in economics,
however, has been put into the new agri
cultural course, and it is hoped that a sim
ilar amount may find place in the engineer
ing courses later on.