Repository: UIHistories Project: Course Catalog - 1890-1891 [PAGE 37]

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COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING.

INSTRUCTION.

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While the instruction aims to be practical by giving the student information and practice directly applicable in his future professional work, the prime object is the development of the mental faculties. The power to acquire information and the ability to use it, is held to be of far greater value than any amount of so-called practical acquirements. The method of instruction consists in coupling the development of intellectual power with the acquisition of information directly useful to the civil engineer in his profession. The instruction is given by lectures, text books and reading, to which are added numerous problems and practical exercises, as will serve best to explain principles completely and fix them in the mind. Models and instruments are continually used, both in lectures and by the students themselves.

APPARATUS.

For Field Practice.—The school is provided with the instruments necessary for the different branches of engineering field practice, including chains, tapes, compasses, plane tables, stadias, transits, levels, barometers, base rods and comparing apparatus, sextants, engineer's transits arranged for astronomical observation, and solar compass attachments for transit. A portable altitude and azimuth instrument of the latest and best form, from the celebrated makers, Troughton & Simms, of London, is used for instruction in geodesy and practical astronomy. It is read by micrometer microscopes to single seconds, both of altitude and of azimuth. The astronomical observatory is provided with an equatorial telescope, an astronomical transit, with attachment for zenith telescope work, a chronometer, and a set of meteorological instruments. To facilitate practice in surveying, an area has been specially prepared in which the difficulties of plane surveying are presented to the beginner as he is able ,to meet them, and where he is taught practical methods of overcoming them. All possible distances, directions, areas, and elevations are accurately known ; hence the instructor knows beforehand the precise result which the student should obtain. Not a single • problem or exercise is given in which there is wanting an absolute check upon the accuracy of the work. This is an incentive to the student and enables the teacher to show him the degree of accuracy attained and also to point out errors. For the Lecture Room.—The school has numerous models for illustrating its specialties, including models of bridges, roofs, joints, and