The Realgymnasium Question

Extract

The present struggle for university reform in Germany to give to the Realgymnasia the same rights and privileges as are held by the Gymnasium proper, bears so much resemblance to the reform which is taking place in this country and which this Association has at heart to promote, as a part at least of its mission, that I have thought a glance at the question would not be entirely without interest at this stage of our development. The leading features of the discussion in Germany and in the United States are as nearly identical as the differences of the school and university systems in the two countries could admit. The primal cause at the bottom of the controversy in both places is the same, that is, monopoly; the principles fought for have been the same, namely, equality of rights: Lehrfreiheit, Lernfreiheit and Studienfreiheit; the pivotal point about which the whole movement has taken place and is taking place is the selfsame in both, that is, the cutting out of the existing system some disciplina in order to give room, in accordance with the demands of modem culture, for another or for other disciplinae which are held to bear a more direct relation to our present life.