"Aber Nicht"

"Why Go To College?" is a quaint old question but lately the London Evening Standard played a polite variation on it, posing the problem, of a puzzled lady who said, "I am a widow of limited means, with a son and a daughter, both of average intellectual ability or better. I can send only one to college. Which shall I send?"

Last month the Journal of Education (Boston) put the question before its readers. Replies came in from teachers, professors, school superintendents. The Journal's readers are preponderantly in favor of giving the widow's son and daughter each two years of college, letting them work for the rest of the way. Readers who recommend the full college course for the son exactly balance those who recommend it for the daughter. A few are noncommittal. There is one notable dissenter: William McAndrew, the impish bearded pedagog who was forced by one-time Mayor William Hale ("Big Bill") Thompson to retire in 1928 as Chicago's Superintendent of Schools. Wrote he:

Aber Nicht (But No!) "Ask the widow to set down as many reasons as she can why her son and why her daughter should go to college. You could then easily show her that the number of colleges . . . that are likely to secure any of these benefits . . . can be counted on the fingers of one hand and are full already yet. Tell her the truth. The outlook for the collegian is poorer than for the non."

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