Repository: UIHistories Project: Booklet - Installation of UI President (1931) [PAGE 7]

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must provid , for uch I ft up, a wi le range of liberal and profess: nal opportuniti . I' ause fits very Ze and ( unplexitj -uch an in ituti n mu t « tantly fight against the insidiou temptation to b< me a sor

of i lucationaJ factory in which the student i the n.

personal unit of raw material, and in which the methods of mass production prevail. But our students are not homogeneous. Th s present, as I ha\ : lid, the great-

difFerences. To drift toward a comfortable theor.

production is easy. It involv< i merely plication ot designed label all conceivable acts in advance that all th . .„ necessary in any given ease to determine the proper pigeonhole in which it belon. . The way out is not so simple. It includes, first, recognition of the tact that general regulations should be kept at the absolute minimum. It involves, second, an understanding that the various schools and colleges are in a far 1 n t e r position to know what attainment for their students, and what students are for their purposes worth while, than is the university as a whole. It involves ai lin large opportunities for discretion and individual treatment on the part of those in positions of responsibility. S stem a tic opportunities tor competent advice and guidance must be provided. For exceptional and unusual student must be given a large measure of freedom. I am convinced that, given intelligence and the d position to lo so, the large institution, with its resources and capabil lties, is in an exceedingly favorable position to meet the individual problems and needs of its student 1 iv. But it can do so only by a resolute determination to study its students, its processes, to set itself definitely in lin with those agencies of modern civilization that n diz that the only means of dealing with the complex processes of today is by factual study and throul j , h the u experimental attitude. A state university like d the time at which U ;Uul c o n t n uously carry on a constant revalu-it-i,. ' " U (nvn esses. We are not dealing with a rll . , P«

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