218

THE NEW PLAN OF OPERATION

council grappled with the central question of allocation of func-
tions.

This is the question I submitted for the consideration of the
executive committee more than six months ago. In our analysis
we started with the fact that there was to be a distinctly woman's
college of four years of arts and sciences. We made an outline
analysis on the blackboard of two years of basic courses (with
variations based on the aptitudes and choices of individual stu-
dents) running through the whole University with no duplication
in schools or curricula in the upper and graduate years. I simply
submitted that as one way of consolidation and asked for consid-
eration and criticisms. In the annual report to the full board last
January the same question was raised, and the point was made
that since graduate work was most highly specialized and costly it
should be most highly concentrated.

We have thus had the question of the functions of the several
divisions of the University raised in the deliberations of three dif-
ferent groups with special regard to engineering: the inter-
institutional and state-wide committee of engineers on engineer-
ing education, the trustees' committee on consolidation, and the
administrative council. The memoranda prepared by the deans,
the engineers, and the faculty members of the administrative
council were sent to all members of the board.

In one of the most thoughtful papers presented to the com-
mittee on engineering education and made available to the trus-
tees' committee, the administrative council, and to all members
of the board, it was proposed that, along with the textile school,
a school for specific industries be established at State College, and
that the professional school of engineering be established at Chapel
Hill. In this school of industries students would be trained for
specific work in industries as skilled technicians, operators, and
more practical engineers.

In the study made for the Society for the Promotion of Engi-
neering Education there is clearly pointed out the need in America
for technical schools giving a more intensive training and more
practical training for supervising and technical positions in par-
ticular industries and for engineering work of a less highly scien-
tific character. American industries could absorb annually forty
to fifty thousand men thus trained. The engineering schools of
college grade are not, according to the studies of the society, best
suited to meet this wide need. These needs, it is suggested in
the studies for the society, can better be met not by colleges or