ED5570: Week 3 Discussion 1: Factors Affecting Curriculum Reform

DOCUMENT RESUME

ED 379 977 HE 028 078

AUTHOR Harada, Myra TITLE History of Higher Education: Curriculum. PUB DATE 6 Dec 94 NOTE 30p. PUB TYPE Historical Materials (060)

EDRS PRICE MF01/PCO2 Plus Postage. DESCRIPTORS Classical Languages; *College Curriculum; College

Instruction; Colleges; *Curriculum Development; Educational Attitudes; *Educational History; *Educational Trends; Elective Courses; General Education; *Higher Education; Land Grant Universities; Relevance (Education); *Role of Education; Theological Education; Two Year Colleges; United States History; Universities; Vocational Education

ABSTRACT

This paper reviews the history of undergraduate curriculum in the United States from the colonial period to the present, arguing that the drive for utility has been the main force shaping curricular trends. It discusses the purpose of early colonial colleges and their curricula, which emphasized Latin, Greek, Hebrew, ancient history, theology, ethics, and the natural sciences. The paper then focuses on the declining influence of theology and the classics in the 19th century, which made way for moral philosophy, economics, sociology, modern languages, medicine, law, and political science. The paper also discusses the effects of the Yale Report of 1828 (a defense of the classical curriculum), the adoption of course examinations in the mid-19th century, the creation of technical colleges, innovations in pedagogy, the creation of colleges for women and African-Americans, the rise of land grant colleges and universities, elective courses, the creation of junior colleges, vocational education, general education requirements, the Serviceman's Readjustment Act after World War II, student activism of the 1960s, consumerism, and the rise of business and engineering curriculum in recent decades. (Contains 33 references.) (MDM)

********************:******************************************** Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made

from the original document. 7.0

***********************************************************************

4,

HISTORY OF HIGHER EDUCATION:

CURRICULUM

Myra Harada

Dr. Cohen

December 6, 1994

BEST COPY AVAILABLE

N.) "PERMISSION TO REPRODUCE THIS MATERIAL HAS BEEN GRANTED BY

NMyra Harada

All

TO THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC)."

2

U S DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION c.f., of Educal.onat Rasearth and Improvement

EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER (ERIC1

This document has been reproduced as received frorn the person or organization originating it

Minor changes have been made to improve reproduction quality.

Points of view or opinions stated in this document do not necessarily represent official OERI position or policy.

The curriculum history of American undergraduate education has largely been a

reflection of the shifting perceived needs of the society. While the curriculum, like education

itself, has functioned as conservator and disseminator of what society has valued, it has

continually been prodded to accommodate a fundamental trait of the American character:

pragmatism. What began in 1639 as a quasi-medieval course of study to train men for the

Christian ministry in a theocentric society became multiple courses of study that served

professional and occupational training in an industry-driven society. The classical core of

study split into parallel courses and then burst into shower of electives held together by the

major and a permissive structure of general education. As "battles" raged in college

committee rooms over the classics vs. science or the liberal arts vs. vocational education, the

press for utility silently charted the course for the curriculum.

The purpose of the early colonial colleges was to create centers of formal training

primarily for ministers and professionals of the various Protestant sects. The curriculum,

regardless of sect, rested upon a foundation of Christianity and a heritage of European culture

shaped by the Renaissance and the Reformation (Tewksbury, 1965). Old World institutions

were mimicked in the New but were constrained by a cultural lag and the poverty .of the

colonial ones (Robson, 1985). As a result, the traditional college training for the professions

was for the most part taken over by the apprenticeship system, which was imminently

practical, flexible, and inexpensive (Rudolph, 1962). Those students who entered college

were predominantly being trained for the ministry, an early vocationalism which would

remain a function of American higher education (Jencks & Riesman, 1969).

3

While the colonial curriculum was to satisfy other educational purposes such as the

transmission of culture and advancement of knowledge, its primary role as a kind of seminary

dictated the courses of study. Greek and rhetoric, for example, were required because of their

particular application to a career as a clergyman. The curriculum was a combination of the

medieval course of study based on the Aristotelian philosophies, the Renaissance ideal, and

the missions of the Puritan Reformation (Rudolph, 1977). From the medieval universities

came the liberal arts as the ancient Greeks had defined them: the quadrivium of arithmetic,

geometry, astronomy, and music; the trivium of logic, grammar, and rhetoric. These basic

studies prepared the student for the Aristotelian philosophies: natural (physics), moral

(ethics), and mental (metaphysics) (Rudolph, 1977; Westmeyer, 1985). The Renaissance

tradition was evident in humanistic studies that prepared men to be gentlemen and scholars.

Training went beyond theology to the productive use of leisure and to leadership in affairs of

state (Hofstadter, 1963). Courses included Greek, Hebrew, ancient history, and natural

science, such as botany. The influence of the Reformation produced the central core of the

young men's education; in all four years of the college course, students disputed the subjects

of divinity and ethics. Every Sunday, the sermons and biblical exegesis synthesized the

curriculum into a coherent whole (Rudolph, 1977; Walsh, 1935).

The sequence of courses and their length more or less followed Harvard's scheme.

The first two years provided a Latin review and Greek studies, logic, Hebrew, rhetoric, arid

natural philosophy. The third year consisted of the Aristotelian philosophies plus geography.

The fourth year added mathematics to all of the above (Rudolph, 1977). There was, however,

no standardized course among the colleges. The number of years of a course of study for the

2

4

BA ranged from two years to four years. The Master's degree took three more years of

studying questions of a "higher order" ( Westmeyer, 1985). Partial courses were available for

those who were not degree-seeking (Rudolph, 1977). It was not until 1861 that Yale offered

the first three Ph. D.s. for "high attainments" in Philosophy and the Arts. By 1876, the year

Johns Hopkins began the development of its Ph.D. programs, forty-four Ph. D.s were awarded

at twenty-five institutinas (Rudolph, 1962).

Although colleges remained committed to the classical curriculum even in the decades

after the Revolution (Jencks, 1969), change in the curriculum of the colonial colleges had

begun to take place much earlier as the rays of the Enlightenment stretched across the

Atlantic. At Harvard the Copernican theory had already been established and the Ptolemaic

system discredited by 1659. In 1714, Yale studies took on a Newtonian orientation with the

delivery of a collection of over 700 books donated by Isaac Newton and prominent members

of the Royal Society to the college, a result of solicitations by an agent sent to London by the

college. As a means to the unlocking of Newtonian physics, algebra and geometry appeared

as courses of study by 1718 (Rudolph, 1977; Westmeyer, 1985). In 1739, Yale pared its

classical curriculum to make room for natural philosophy, mathematics, and the "practical"

applications of surveying and navigation. Fifty years later, natural philosophy at the colonial

colleges would fragment into such areas as chemistry, geography and natural history (Robson,

1985; Rudolph, 1977).

By 1788 all eight colonial colleges had professors of natural philosophy and

mathematics, whose new views of nature inevitably eroded the basis of the old curriculum-

truth according to Christian doctrine. What had previously been biblical exegesis now turned

3

0

to empiricism and experimentation as the process for the arrival at truth. As theology waned,

ethics, a more pragmatic form of faith, became the course in moral philosophy at Harvard and

Yale. That the focus had shifted away from divine revelation to the understanding of the

behavior of man was also evident in the emergence of more worldly discussions in

economics, sociology and political science (Robson, 1985). The influence of deism, which

cast God as the indifferent watchmaker of a mechanistic universe, made the study of His Will

less compelling. Through the efforts of Thomas Jefferson as a member of the board of

visitors, William and Mary terminated its professorships of divinity and oriental languages in

1779 and, in so doing, religious instruction at the college. Professorships were added in

public administration, modern languages, and medical science while existing professorships

were expanded to include natural history, natural philosophy, natural and international law,

and fine arts (Rudolph, 1977).

Instruction was radically altered to deliver the new curriculum. In the past, studies

had been explored through syllogistic argumentation and deductive reasoning. Disputations

were the means by which the students displayed their competence, just as at medieval

universities. With the introduction of the New Learning, however, empiricism and

experimentation became the mode of scientific investigation, and reasoning necesFarily

became inductive. The old disputation based on syllogistic exercises became obsolete

(Robson, 1985; Walsh, 1935; Westmeyer, 1985). The abandonment of the syllogism as a

basic form of college instruction--along with Latin as the language of discourse-- signified the

passing of the colonial curriculum (Rudolp'i, 1977).

English began to supplant Latin and Hebrew as the essential language. Its movement

6

to the center of studies from the periphery indicated a new interest in aesthetics (poetry) and

the nature of man (history) and away from theology. These subjects had not been part of tie

old curriculum partly because they did not lend themselves to deduction and partly because

they had been considered entertainment. Pope and Shakespeare, for example, appeared on a

reading list under the heading "diversions." Not until 1771 did "belles lettres" appear in

instruction at Yale, and in 1776, the senior class was allowed to receive instuction in English

(Rudolph, 1977).

Science also changed the way in which education was delivered. Whereas in the past,

tutors had been assigned to teach all subjects to a class of students, the scientific method

encouraged, if not demanded, specialization. Teachers could no longer be jacks-of-all-trades,

but were constrained to specialize as science branched in all directions. In 1767 the tutors at

Harvard stopped teaching everything to one class and began the teaching of one subject to all

the classes (Rudolph, 1977).

New colleges like King's College and the College of PMadelphia in the 1750's were

not patterned after the older colleges. They were free of curricular precedent and could offer

practical courses of study. King's prospectus included navigation, geography, history,

husbandry, commerce, government, meterology--"the knowledge of... everything useful for the

comfort, convenience, and elegance of life"...(Rudolph, 1977). The College of Philadelphia

had a 3-year curriculum designed by William Smith: Xenophon and merchant's accounts first

year; second year, surveying, map making, and logic; third year, agriculture, history, and the

vernacular. Electives were offered in the modern languages, as were fencing, military

science, dancing. The College of Philadelphia was the first in the nation not to follow the

7

medieval curriculum nor have a religious intent (Walsh 209 and Rudolph 47).

The Revolutionary War made fundamental changes to the purposes of higher education

and therefore to the old course of study., During the war and after, the states became more

active in encouraging education at the universities for "useful " purposes--responsible

citizenship and vocational preparation. Prior to the turn of the century, four states had state-

chartered universities: North Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, and Vermont. Columbia, the

University of Pennsylvania, and Dartmouth were for a time state-controlled, and the secular

interests of the state were increasing represented on the boards of Harvard, Yale, and William

& Mary (Rudolph, 1962).

As state involvement increased, so did antipathy to the perpetuation of denominational

interests. Conflicting interests culminated in the Dartmouth decision of 1819, which drew the

distinctions between the autonomy of the private college and the will of the state. While the

decision may not have caused the unrestricted proliferation or colleges that followed, it

assured their autonomy. Whereas only nine colleges had been founded during the colonial

era, hundreds of colleges sprang up between the Revolution and the Civil War, of which 182

survived (Boorstin, 1965; Tewksbury, 1965). The scores of colleges founded at this time

believed in making cultural education accessible to all young men in a democracy, even if it

meant the lowering of standards.

Despite the new context of pioneering boosterism and egalitarianism, the curricula of

these western colleges surprisingly imitated the curricula of the eastern institutions. Despite

proposals to expand the curriculum beyond the staples of the classics to include "useful"

subjects, most professors and parents wanted Latin and Greek. These subjects were symbols

of an elite education and assisted, in a very pragmatic way, the social mobility of the

graduates of the classical course. Moreover, the subjects that had utility were too expensive to

offer because they required tutors who were specialists and purchasing experimental

equipment (Church and Sedlak, 1989).

The conservatism in the curriculum was also a reflection of religious orthodoxy, which

had begun to wrest back its control over American life. As America spread west across the

continent, colleges became stays against barbaris.n and outposts of the Christian ministry,

where every denomination could proselytize its own brand of salvation. Religious zeal, for

example, motivated the founding of Oberlin College "for the common people" (Hand lin &

Hand lin), whose presence was to neutralize the secular influences of the state universities.

Another source of curricular conservatism may well have come from Yale College and its

tradition of "Protestant Scholasticism"; Yale alumni had helped found sixteen colleges in the

west, earning for their alma mater the epithet of "the mother of colleges" (Brubacher & Rudy,

1968).

It was Yale against which the students had rebelled in 1825, objecting to non-credit

options that were excluded from the course of study. The rebellion followed a student riot at

Harvard in 1823 over curricular reform. To investigate their policy on the study of "the dead

languages", a committee was created to prepare a report on the educational plan of the college

and the study of ancient languages (Rudolph, 1962). The report represents the first document

on curriculum to attempt a philosophical rationale and to prescribe particular courses of action

to support that rationale. It was a total defense of the classical curriculum and became a

fortress against change. It had more far-reaching consequences than any document for almost

9

a hundred years.

The Report emphasized that the twin goals of a college education were to provide "the

discipline (power) and the furniture (knowledge) of the mind." (Yale Report, 1828). It

reaffirmed that ancient languages were indeed the most effective way to provide mental

discipline, "the faculty psychology" or "mind as muscles," and to give a general liberal arts

foundation--"models of taste"--for all professions. The uniformity of the curriculum was based

on the knowledge that each man must know which provides the foundation for "all

intellectual attainments."

The prescribed course at Yale, which would take four years, contained subjects that

the college considered essential for a thorough foundation, to provide "liberal and

comprehensive views." The Report also discredited the idea of the German university as a

model for American students, who lacked maturity and sufficient intellectual training to enjoy

the option of choice (Brubacher & Rudy, 1968). The undergraduate course was to give the

principles of literature and science to the pre-professional prior to the specialized training he

would receive after his basic education.

The Report defended its modes of instruction as appropriate. Both professors and

tutors would continue to instruct as before: professors providing the experience and tutors,

because of their youth, providing understanding of the students' habits. Yale defined its duties

to include being a substitute for parental guidance because of the youth of the students (Yale

Report, 1828).

Just two years after the Report, instruction at Yale and Harvard included the written

biennial examinations. The colonial student had essentially been unexamined and the earlier

10

forms of examination at the colleges were oral. By 1865, there were course examinations-

the bluebook--a practice that other colleges soon followed. Yale's four category grading scale

of ontimi, second optimi, inferiores boni , and Deiores became a 1-4 scale much as present

day grade points are figured. Harvard used percentage grading 1-100 and then the letter

grades A-E. Mt. Holyoke began the use of F instead of E (Levine, 1965; Rudolph, 1977).

The necessity for Yale's defense of its course of study marked a turning point. In the

very year of the Report, the election of Andrew Jackson began an era of public hostililty

toward the classical liberal arts colleges. The education afforded by the old curriculum was

consio< red frivolous for unskilled young men who had neither inherited wealth nor social

connections that could lead them to employment (Jencks, 1968).

Even prior to the signal year of 1828, the utilitarian spirit of the newly formed

republic had manifested itself in the creation of the technical college or institution. Although

technical instruction had been given in the latter part of the colonial era via some colleges the

first technical institute in America was the US Military Academy, established in 1802 by the

US Congress (Brubacher & Rudy, 1968). Civil engineering was central to its course of study.

The curriculum introduced analytic trigonometry to the country, included chemistry, drawing,

and required the study of the modern language of French because of its usefulness in

scientific study. Instructional innovation also took hold at West Point. The students were

grouped in classes according to ability and textbooks were up-to-date translations of European

works (Rudolph, 1977).

The first indisputable technical college was established in 1824 at Troy, New York,

through the benefaction of Stephen Van Rensselaer, who wished to proviCe the children of

BEST COPY AVAILABLE

farmers and mechanics instruction in applied sciences--husbandry, manufactures, and domestic

economy. The total reverse of the view of education espoused by the Yale Report a few

years later, the curriculum taught the application of experimental chemistry, philosophy, and

natural history to agriculture, domestic economy, the arts, and manufactures" (Brubacher &

Rudy, 1968). The Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute emphasized agriculture until 1835, when

civil engineering was added. It became a polytechnic institute in 1849 when it expanded its

curricular offering to the training of architects, mining and topographical engineers and to

develop the "physical and mental culture" of their students (Rudolph, 1962).

Rensselaer, like West Point, was innovative in its teaching methods. The students

visited actual sites where applied science was employed, such as a tannery or a manufacturer,

before they were engaged in laboratory experiments. They left the classroom to collect

specimens, tour workshops, and survey. The institute made use of all the tools of the real

world to become the first educational institution to provide field training as a systematic part

of the curriculum. By 1850, the Institute expanded its course from one to three years, adding

courses in natural science, civil engineering, and imported the latest technical education from

France. There was an unprecedented emphasis on basic research in chemistry and physics

(Ben-David, 1972; Rudolph, 1962).

Rensselaer had paved the way toward change for the rest of the century, even in the

liberal arts colleges. As technology began to grow into an independent discipline, the liberal

arts colleges respo: ded by organizing departments or schools to accommodate the demand.

President Eliphalet Nott of Union College established a department of engineering in 1845;

two years later, Harvard affiliated with the Lawrence Scientific School and Yale, the Sheffield

10

Scientific School. The entrance requirements for these schools were notably lower than they

were for the college, contributing to the prevailing opinion that they and their students were

lower in intellectual quality. In 1852, Dartmouth established its Chandler Scientific School,

and Brown created a department of practical science. In 1858, the University of Pennsylvania

followed suit with a department of mines, arts, and manufactures (Brubacher & Rudy, 1968;

Rudolph, 1962; Veysey, 1962).

In addition to the technical institutes, other types of specialized colleges developed.

Women's colleges were slow to become established because the female seminaries were

reluctant to assume the college role (Rudolph, 1962), and the New England states were most

resistant to coeducation. The eventual founding of Vassar (1861), Smith (1875), and

Wellesley (1875) offered women a curriculum that replicated what the men's colleges offered.

Because of the fear in some quarters that the health of females would suffer under the

intellectual strain of college, the curriculum put an inordinate emphasis on health, hygiene,

and physiology (Rudolph, 1962). Vassar provided some electives in the cultivation of social

graces and in home management and also developed strong programs in music and the fine

arts. Shortly after its founding, Bryn Mawr offered advanced degrees, one of the first

institutions that ignored gender distinctions in education and, together with Cornell and

Vassar, developed courses in social work (Rudolph, 1977). In the eastern colleges,

coeducation gave rise to the coordinate college: Radcliffe with Harvard, Barnard with

Columbia, Sophie Newcomb to Tulane, Pembroke to Brown, Jackson to Tufts, and Flora

Stone Mather to Western Reserve (Rudolph, 1962; Sack, 1962).

The real acceptance of women as bona-fide college students occurred in the land-grant

13 11

colleges and state universities, because western life necessitated an equality of the sexes and

because the Morrill Act was an extension of education to both men and women (Brubacher &

Rudy, 1968; Rudolph, 1962; Sack, 1962). Before long, however, home economics and

domestic science became special women's programs, underscoring women's place as

complementary to man's and elevating the role of housewife to a profession (Rudolph, 1962).

Negro colleges appeared following the Civil War, but the first institutions such as

Hampton, Fisk, and Talladega were essentially secondary schools where basic education could

be taught. In 1872, when laws were being passed limiting the rights of blacks and Northern

interest in black education began to wane, Booker T. Washington, president of Tuskegee

Institute, advocated vocational training for blacks. The second Morrill Act was also

responsible for the founding of several black land grant colleges. The Act mandated that it

would not support states that discriminated against admission of Blacks or refused to provide

separate but equal educational facilities. Southern legislatues and departments of education

insisted on keeping these institutions trade schools and prohibiting any liberal arts course.

Liberal arts courses had to be disguised as trade courses before they would be allowed in the

curriculum. For example, one state college offered Latin under the title of "Agricultural

Latin." None of these land grant colleges provided college level work until 1916 partly

through the efforts of W.E.B. DuBois, who began to protest the vocational emphasis of Negro

education (Bond, 1962; Brubacher & Rudy, 1968).

In 1850 there was no institution that could train men to tend to the business of a

growing nation--agriculture, manufacture, mechanics, merchandising--although there were

colleges, law schools, and seminaries. The lack of such training brought a, icultural societies

12

14

and the press together to advocate ' :cm( ::acy's colleges" and the Morrill Act was passed in

1862. The Act would provide land and federal aid to agricultural and mechanical, colleges (A

& Ms), a unique product of the American system, and begin a tendency for federal support to

determine the course of higher education (Ross, 1962; Rudolph, 1962).

The first land grant colleges were small in size and scope and consisted of little more

than a few young men being given advice by a few local farmers and mechanics. In 1875,

the curriculum at Kansas State reflected itc. humble beginnings: The Farm, The Nursery,

Carpentry, Cabinet Making, Turning, Wagon Making, Painting, Blacksmithing, Scroll Sawing,

Dressmaking, and Carving." Many other colleges followed the lead of the A & Ms in offering

practical courses to remain competitive and to qualify for federal government subsidies.

(Boorstin, Democratic, 1973).

The new institutions faced the hostility of American farmers who resented the

theoretical and classical flavor of the curriculum they offered and instigated a financial review

of the Morrill Act funds in California and Ohio in the 1870's. Many colleges hastily added

short courses in practical aspects of fanning to forestall any more criticism, what were the

first extension courses in American higher education (Brubacher & Rudy, 1968).

With funding from the Morrill Act and the $500,000 gift of Ezra Cornell, the

American university was created to provide, as Cornell himself intoned, "... an institution

where any person can find instruction in any study." He wanted a trade school, but his

president, Andrew White, envisioned both general education and professional training as

being of equal merit. For the first time, courses were oriented toward specific vocations

through the organization of nine departments: agriculture, mechanic arts, civil engineering,

13

15

commerce and trade, mining, rnedicine/surgery, law, and education. The ninth department,

based upon one of White's fondest "principles," was public service, which included

jurisprudence, political science and history. The first department of American history was

established at Cornell in 1881 (Rudolph, 1977; Veysey, 1965).

Cornell offered a general course of study and three types of classical courses. There

wee a course for the natural sciences and a totally elective optional course. Military training

stipulated by the Morrill Act and physical education were required. The university became a

curricular model for other institutions, and the idea of public service became the purpose on

which courses of study at land grant institutions and state universities were built (Rudolph,

1977; Westmeyer, 1985).

In its support of scientific instruction, the Act raised the prestige of the sciences. As

science made startling advances, especially in its application; the scientific research method

was emulated by disparate disciplines like literature and philosophy, which began to produce

precise "data." Science, further abetted by professors trained in the German manner, made

faculty specialization necessary and the curriculum, in turn, reflected a narrowing of.subject

area. No longer would there be chairs of instruction but faculty slotted into subject-matter

departments. As courses proliferated, so did the numoer of specialized bachelor's degrees

(Brubacher & Rudy, 1968).

As the US expanded into the West and as industrialization took hold, the demand for a

more flexible, diversified curriculum was met by the elective system, which was to become

the center of curricular struggle in the nineteenth century. In 1825, the elective system was

evident at University of Virginia, where the student had total freedom of choice in attending

14

16

lectures and at Harvard, whose curriculum allowed choice from parallel courses (Brubacher &

Rudy, 1968; Westmeyer, 1985).

The acceptance of the early elective experiments seem to have rested upon a curricular

balance that allowed choice, practical application, or both. Brown University adopted a

curriculth roposed by President Francis Wayland that offered wide choice, the expansion of

applied sciences courses be expanded, and "lyceums," a kind of university extension service.

In 1851, electives at the University of Michigan were focused too narrowly on specialized

research, especially at the graduate level and not on vocationally directed courses; President

Tappan was fired for these curricular "failings." The free-ranging elective system at Harvard

endured despite a storm of criticism from Yale and Princeton about the loss of a core of

education "that every man must have." The large state universities of the West and Midwest

were more accommodating of the elective principle because of their foundational commitment

to public service (Rudolph, 1977; Westmeyer, 1985; Veysey, 1965).

By the turn of the century, four systems involving electives had emerged. In one, the

curriculum was composed almost entirely of electives, like Harvard's; in another, huff

prescribed and half elective; in the third, a major-minor system prevailed; in the fourth, the

arrangement of electives into broad groups from which the student chose his courses

(Brubacher, 1968; Levine, 1978; Westmeyer, 1985).

The curriculum was taken over by electives and given license to expand indefinitely, if

chaotically. By 1901, a survey of 97 colleges showed 46 curricula that were 50% or more

elective. In the absence of a hierarchy of subjects (Brubacher, 1968), the curriculum now

included almost anything any professor was willing to teach. There were courses in

15

17

extracurricular activities at Columbia, police administration at Chicago, and electric wiring at

Chapel Hill. Yale alone offered 554 courses to choose from. But the curricula had no

uniformity in content nor in length or quantity. In 1900, the BA at Yale required 60 hours; at

Harvard, 48-51. In 1906, 36% of Harvard students finished BA in three years and the fourth

year was almost totally professional (Rudolph, 1977; Veysey, 1965).

The relative chaos of the elective system brought about a bureaucratic solution. At the

University of Chicago, President Harper's curricular innovations were highly influential in the

rationalization of higher education and the formation of the junior college. At Chicago,

courses of study were divided into segments, every year into quarters, and every quarter into

two six-week terms. The quarter system allowed in-depth concentration on two to three

subjects. The division of subjects into "units" was a concept codified by the Carnegie

Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching in 1906 which has since given higher education

a national academic currency (Rudolph, 1977; Trow, 1988; Veysey, 1962). Thirteen years

later by defining the American college, the National Conference Committee & the American

Council on Education, in effect established the 120- semester hour requirement for graduation,

recognized the department structure, and strenthened subject matter specialization (Rudolph,

1977).

Harper's undergraduate colleges were divided into junior and senior colleges to

distinguish elementary subjects from those preparatory to graduate work. The University of

Chicago awarded its first AA degree in 1899 in recognition of completion of the two-year

course at the "junior college." By 1920, fifty-two junior colleges in the nation enrolled 8,000

students. After World War II, 500 colleges enrolled 250,000 students, an enrollment figure

16

18

that would double in 10 year The President's Commission on Higher Education for

American Democracy (1947) 1, immended that education through grade 14 should be as

accessible as a high school education, tranforming the junior college into the mechanism for

mass education (Brubacher & Rudy, 1968; Rudolph, 1977).

Harper's division of junior and senior colleges eliminated the difference between

professional studies and liberal arts, liberalizing professional studies and professionalizing the

liberal arts. The idea of early specialization was already gaining ground in an essentially

pragmatist nation. Vocational courses became part of undergraduate study, and occupational

programs were designed to lead to the BA. A three-year course of study with a fourth year

of professional courses was referred to as the combined course. For example, Yale included a

year of medical training and a year of law studies as part of the BA by 1903 (Rudolph,

1977).

Vocationalism filled the void left by the classics as the public became more influential

in shaping the curriculum. Boards of trustees were no longer comprised of clergy but of

leaders in commerce and industry. Courses proliferated in schools and departments of

business across the country, following the model of the Wharton School at the University of

Pennsylvania (1881). Courses such as metallurgy (University of Michigan), manual training

(North Dakota), engineering English (Union), and journalism (Missouri) were newly offered

in the first quarter of the century (Rudolph, 1977). Many colleges and universities had created

departments of education for teacher training by 1900 (Levine, 1978). The BA became a

catch-all degree for some colleges: Pomona offered landscape architecture; Whittier, YMCA

work; the University of North Dakota, occupational therapy. In 1930, the state universities of

17

19

the North Central Association offered 46 types of baccalaureates as well as credentials to

specific occupations (Rudolph, 1977). By 1970, there were 650 different types of bachelor's

degrees (Levine, 1978).

The elective system still haunted the colleges with its lack of focus and led inevitably

to the question of whether there was a body of knowledge an educated person should have

(Jencks & Riesman, 1968; Levine, 1978; Miller, 1988; Rudolph, 1977). There were two

approaches: the humanist and the instrumentalist (Miller, 1988). The humanist had a

preference for the ancients' emphasis on temporal concerns vs. otherworldliness of the

medieval writers and for the Enlightenment emphasis on reason. Chicago's core curriculum

(1928-1947) and St. John's were based on the Great Books; Columbia offered Contemporary

Civilization, which had begun as a course to help officers develop a system of values to deal

with WWI (Jencks & Reisman, 1968; Rudolph, 1977;); in 1927 Wisconsin's Experimental

College established the study of two civilizations, Greece and 19th century America as basis

of his idea of "making minds" (Levine, 1978).

The instrumentalist approach emphasized the development of the relationship between

individual and community in a contemporary democratic society using knowledge is a tool

(Miller, 1988). Bennington's progressive education of 1932, for example, considered

extracurricular activities and student governance all part of "GE," and Sarah Lawrence used

the community as laboratory for general education. By 1926, over 100 courses in the general

education category had appeared: forty-two were guidance, sixteen in how to learn, and thirty-

four in aspects of contemporary civilization (Levine, 1978).

The concept of general education was reiterated in the 1945 publication of Harvard's

18

n0

"Redbook," General Education in a Free Society. It defined general education as distinct

from education for specialization and emphasized the legacy of the humanities and the natural

and social sciences. It was also to help students think critically, communicate, make

intelligent decisions, and weigh values. Its purpose was to develop the whole person and to

relate the individual to society. Required courses included "Great Texts in Literature" and

"Western Thought and Institutions." The rest of th' gram was to be filled with one course

in the social sciences, one in humanities, and two in the sciences (Levine, 1978). Like the

Yale Report of 1828, however, it represented a restatement of the status quo.

After World War II, the debouching of 2.25 million veterans into college via the 1944

Serviceman's Readjustment Act altered the idea to make it more compatible with mass

education. President Truman's Commission on Higher Education re-emphasized general

education but put a stamp of democratic obligation upon it. General education, which came

to mean breadth rather than depth, appeared to be more instrumentalist than humanist. Its

orientation was future-directed and pragmatic (Miller, 1988).

The post-war years, however, did little to change the basic liberal arts foundation of

the general education requirement. Not until the 1960's were there any moves toward

change: cries from the activist student generation called for relevance in the curriculum and a

closer social application of theory (Best, 1989). Responsiveness to the youth culture resulted

in courses in guitar and photography while world events brought Russian and Near Eastern

studies on campuses (Rudolph, 1977). Classes were expected to address social concerns

enveloped in a kind of Marxist twilight. "Relevance" was the operative word. In 1965, the

University of California, Berkeley, responded with Joseph Tussman's Experimental College,

19

21

which utilized seminars and conferences focused on a reading list of great works rather than

courses. The college failed after two years because, according to one historian, it did not

allow sufficient student decision-making and faculty responsibilities were too heavy (Rudolph,

1977). It may have failed because it lacked practical instruction and flexibility in its reading

list. The Berkeley students themselves formed the Free University, which dealt with highly

theoretical political topics for a while until it deteriorated into community preferences for

crafts and special interest themes such as gay studies and pastry-making (Levine, 1981).

The anti-establishment idealism of the students of the '60s could not be discerned in

the curriculum of the '70s. The legacy of the previous decade was an institutional

responsiveness to student consumerism. The curriculum now allowed even greater student

autonomy, which led to at least partial abandonment of the traditional requirements (Best,

1989). The trend had already begun in this direction; earlier, in 1962, Harvard revisited its

general education program and found it so eroded that the college decided to reduce its

requirements and increase electives (Carnochan, 1993; Levine, 1981). A 1976 Carnegie

Council study showed the the general education component in colleges decreased from 43%

of courses taken in 1967 to 33.5% in 1974 (Blackburn, Armstrong, Conrad, Didham, &

McKune, 1976). The National Longitudinal Study of the High School Class of 1972

generation gave evidence of the demise of the liberal arts curriculum. What Adelman (1992)

calls the "empirical core curriculum" based on actual course-taking behavior shows that 45%

or more of the undergraduates had taken the following courses in common: English

composition, general psychology, introduction to sociology, general biology, and introduction

to economics.

20

22

The dominance of the liberal arts curriculum gave way to vocationalism, opening the

way for less traditional college-going populations at a time when enrollments were declining

from the peak years of the '60s. New majors cropped up such as food service, police science,

and computer science. Innovative curricula appeared that were more compatible with career

training. In 1970, Technical Career Institutes, a propriety school that offered fast,

vocationally oriented, and highly specialized training in electronic technology was unique in

its AA degree-granting status. At the New College at the University of Alabama the students

planned their "contract" with a committee every semester and took interdisciplinary seminars

focused on problem-solving. In 1972 both Metropolitan State University of Minnesota and

Sterling College in Kansas offered an individualized competency-based curriculum (Levine,

1978). The greatest changes occurred in what might be termed as individualization,

exemplified by work study, study abroad, community service, independent study--all of which

had existed in some form prior to 1957 (Dressel, 1969).

Whether in professional-technical subjects or in the liberal arts, students were taking

more courses in their majors in the mid 1970s than they had been in previous decades.

Almost 80% of bachelor's degree programs required between 21 and 40% of the BA to be

spent on the major. Almost 70% of the engineering bachelor's, however, required between 61

and 90% spent on the major and 87% of the health science programs required 41-90%.

Fifteen percent of all undergraduates took a double major, which was offered at 30% of the

four-year colleges, and might have been considered by students to be an additional advantage

in creating more career choices. Elective choice overall declined 22%; students were putting

that time into even more specialization (Levine, 1978). Blackburn (1976), however, saw an

21

23

increase in election opportunity. Institutions that had allowed 30% election in 1967 increased

their allowance to 41% in 1974. Students were using electives to increase depth, not breadth

by taking more courses in their major divisions.

The 1970s also saw an increase in basic skills courses, which most colleges and

universities offered. In the previous decade, remediation had turned toward low-ability

students who performed poorly. As a result, there were intensive math and English courses,

counseling, Upward Bound (1965), and Special Services to Disadvantaged Students (1968),

which provided students with instruction, counseling, and support services. By the 70's,

remedial education had become compensatory; that is, students were taught new skills instead

of being brought up to meet standards (Levine, 78). The distinction was largely one of

institutional attitude, which became more flexible as the student body diversified in the wake

of expanded educational opportunities.

Most colleges and universities offered some kind of instruction in basic skills and

knowledge in English composition, reading, writing, and arithmetic. Fifty-two percent of

two-year colleges offered credit and 83%, non-credit courses in the basic skills.

Approximately half of the four-year colleges and universities offered basic skills courses, the

liberal arts colleges offering far fewer than any other type of institution. Not surprisingly,

17% of all non-credit compensatory courses were taken by students at community colleges

(Levine, 1978). In fact, the offerings in basic skills and English-as-a-Second-Language

reflected the biggest portion of enrollment growth in California of the '90s, causing legislators

to wonder if remediation was choking off other obligations of the community college system.

At the same time, the non-credit skills programs at the California universities were apparently

22

24

being phased out, probably a fatality of state budget downsizing. In 1994 at the University of

California at Los Angeles, only one "preparatory" course remained: Chemistry 17, which

enrolled 186 students. The preparatory math course UCLA once offered, intermediate algebra,

was relegated to University Extension and English A was discontinued a year before.

In the mid-sixties, Clark Kerr (1991) saw that the emphasis in the universities was

shifting to the training of professionals. Not only were the established professions needful of

recruits, but other, newer professions were formalizing their training, such as business and

social work. The professions were crystallizing their identities by using higher education as

"the port of entry" and assisted the metamorphosis of the curriculum.

Two of the most popular professional courses exemplified this shift: business and

engineering. Business schools began their rise to prominence after World War II, aided by

the 01 Bill and the immediate growth in the college-going population. In 1947, the Ford

Foundation discovered that one out of every seven students--most of them male--was enrolled

in a business program. Years later according to the National Longitudinal Study of the High

School Class of 1972, students took the largest percentage of undergraduate courses in

business administration and management in the non-selective institutions (Adelman, 1992).

The business major made significant inroads into the undergraduate curriculum. By the junior

year, an area of specialized study within the business course had to be selected--finance,

marketing, personnel, etc. Even more education became attached to business subjects. The

accounting profession began to require about five years of education before CPA certification,

and the MBA became another badge of distinction for the business graduate, with greater

selectivity assured by the Graduate Management Admissions Test (Grambsch, 1981).

23

25

Like the business school, engineering schools also grew after World War II but in

response to military demands of the war and to advanced techology demands of the Korean

War. Eight to ten percent of the post-war student body sought a major in engineering. The

number of engineering courses taken ranked high in the 1970s and '80s: they were the eighth

most frequently taken courses of all undergraduate offerings at selective institutions and sixth

at highly selective ones (Adelman, 1992). In 1955, the Grinter Committee recommended

significant changes in the engineering course to include a core of mechanics, thermodynamics,

electronics, and higher mathematics, among other requirements. Schools of engineering

complied and the resultant curriculum consisted of 140 to 160 semester hours and five-year

programs of study (Griffith, 1981), turning the undergraduate curriculum into virtual

professional schools.

Along with the professional training provided by the four-year colleges and

universities came the need for support occupations or semiprofessional training. In the

absence of programs at the four-year institutions, such training became the purview of the

community colleges. In the 1960's, enrollments in career courses outpaced the liberal arts

due in part to the support of the Vocational Education Act of 1963. Federal funding of the

community colleges greatly increased with the 1968 and 1972 amendments to the Act;

through the Carl Perkins Vocational Education Act of 1984, $174 million was being

appropriated to community colleges. In Illinois, for example, 66% of all curricula were

occupational; in Florida, there were more than 200 certificate and associate degree programs.

In 1985, 72% of all community college curricula were occupational, up 30% from 1970.

Enrollment growth depended upon job markets: business, health professions, engineering

24

26

technologies, and computer science were among the most popular programs (Cohen, 1991).

In 1994, the demand for occupational training in California was greater than collegiate supply

because of the reluctance of the state to allocate sufficient funds for growth or even

maintenance (McCurdy, 1994).

Critics of the "vocational trend" say that it has caused the diminishing of the prestige

of the disciplines and has compromised the intellectual goals of higher education (Geiger,

1980). Adelman laments that it is possible for a college graduate not to have taken history,

American literature or a foreign language (1992), and, indeed, the curriculum has been so far

transformed from its colonial avatar that a student can now avoid taking any of the classics.

This should not be surprising. According to Rudolph (1977), the content of the undergraduate

curriculum is completely revised every twenty-two years; old courses leave at rate of 5% per

year, new ones are created at 9% per year. The irony of these objections to the state of the

curriculum is that they ignore the historical constants of utility and change. The colonial

curriculum was intended as vocational training for ministers, and the curriculum has always

felt--and accommodated--the pragmatic tug of vocations in every era; history, literature, and

foreign language once had to fight their way into the American curriculum; and the students

of science, who are now the intellectual elite, were once banned from attending chapel with

the rest of the young men at Yale (Rudolph, 1962).

25

27

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Adelman, C. (1992). Tourists in our own land. Washington, DC: US Department of Education.

Ben-David, J. (1962). American Higher Education: Directions Old and New. New York: McGraw-Hill.

Best, J. H. (1989). The revolution of markets and management: Toward a history of American higher education since 1945. In L. F. Goodchild & Harold S. Wechsler, (Eds.), ASHE reader on the history of higher education (pp. 491-497). Needham Heights, MA: Ginn.

Blackburn, R., Armstrong, E., Conrad, C., Didham, J., & McKune, T. (1976). Changing practices in undergraduate education. Berkeley: Carnegie Council on Policy Studies in Higher Education.

Blauch, L. E. (1962). A century of the professional school. In W. W. Brickman, (Ed.), A century of higher education, (pp. 138-153). New York: Society for the Advancement of Education.

Bond, H. M. (1962). A century of Negro higher education. In W. W. Brickman, (Ed.), A century of higher education, (pp.182-196). New York: Society for the Advancement of Education.

Brubacher, D. & Rudy, W. (1976). Higher education in transition: A history of American colleges and universities, 1636-1968. New York: Harper and Row.

Boorstin, D. (1958). The Americans: The colonial experience. New York: Vintage.

Boorstin, D. (1973). The Americans: The democratic experience. New York: Vintage.

Carnochan, W. B. (1993). The battleground of the curriculum:Liberal education and American experience. Stanford: Stanford University.

Cohen, A. M. (1991). The American community college. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Cremin, L. A. (1989). College. Harold S. Wechsler, (Eds.), ASHE reader on the history of higher education, (pp. 28-41). Needham Heights, MA: Ginn.

Dressel, P. L. & De Lisle, F. H. (1969). Undergraduate curriculum trends. Washington, D.C.: American Council on Education.

Geiger, R. L. (1980). The college curriculum and the marketplace: Academic disciplines and the trend toward vocationalism in the 1970s. New Haven: Higher Education

23

I

Research Group, Institution for Social and Policy Studies.

Gramsch, P. V. (1981). Business administration. In Chickering, A. W. & Associates, The modern American college (pp. 472-486). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Griffith, D. E. (1981). Engineering. In Chickering, A. W. & Associates, The modem American college (pp. 487-499). San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Goodchild, L. F. & Wechsler, H. S. (Eds.). (1989). ASHE reader on the history of higher education. Needham Heights, MA: Ginn.

Hofstadter, R. (1963). Anti-intellectualism in American life. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Jencks, C., & Riesman, D. (1969). The academic revolution. Garden City: Doubleday.

Kerr, C. (1991). The great transformation in higher education: 1960-1980. Albany: State University of New York.

Levine, A. (1978). Handbook on undergraduate education. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

McCurdy, J. (1994). Broken premises: The impact of budget cuts and fee increases on the California community colleges. San Jose: The California Higher Education Policy Center.

Miller, G. E. (1988). The meaning of general education: The emergence of a curriculum paradigm. New York: Teachers College.

Robson, D. W. (1985). Educating Republicans: The college in the era of the American revolution, 1750-1800. Westport: Greenwood.

Rudolph, Frederick. (1962). The American college and university: A history. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Rudolph, F. (1977). Curriculum: A history of the American undergraduate course of study since 1636. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.

Tewksbury, D. G. (1965). The founding of American colleges and universities before the Civil War. New York: Archon Books.

Trow, M. (1988). American higher education: Past, present, and future. In Goodchild, L. F. & Wechsler, H. S. (Eds.), ASHE reader on the history of higher education (pp. 616- 626). Needham, MA: Ginn.

Veysey, L. (1965). The emergence of the American university. Chicago: University of Chicago.

29

Walsh, J. J. (1935). Education of the founding fathers of the republic. Freeport: Books for Libraries.

Westmeyer, P. (1985). A history of American higher education. Springfield: Charles C. Thomas.

The Yale Report. (1828). In Goodchild, L. F. & Wechsler, H. S. (Eds.), ASHE reader on the history of higher education. Needham, MA: Ginn.