Tübingen School

“ The Professors Ordinary and Extraordinary, together with the Privat-Docents, form the active force of the German university. In Tübingen are Repetenten, who lecture or comment on classical and Biblical writers and form classes in the ancient or modern languages. Those teaching the modern languages exclusively are styled Lectors. The title, Professor Honorarius, as of Gervinus in Heidelberg, is conferred merely as a mark of honor, the bearer lecturing only when he pleases. ”

“ Advised by Daub, Ullmann accordingly resolved to go to Tübingen.
This custom of students pursuing their studies at more than one University is almost universal in Germany; and where the system of instruction is one by lectures, has, unquestionably, many advantages. Some of the direct personal influence and stimulus that a man of eminent vigour may exercise, is perhaps lost; but, on the other hand, the danger of a young man being too much influenced is avoided, and a greater manifoldness of development is favoured. ”

“ Except at the Kindergarten, boys and girls are educated separately and differently in Germany. In some rare cases lately some few girls have been admitted to a boys' Gymnasium, but this is experimental and at present unusual. It may be found that the presence of a small number in a large boys' school does not work well. In addition to the elementary schools, there are four kinds of Public Day School for [16] boys in Germany, and they are all under State supervision. There is the Gymnasium, the Real-Gymnasium, the Ober-Real-Schule, and the Real-Schule. ”

“ That very day a letter to the Counts Stolberg informed them that they must seek another tutor for their sons, and Froebel and Keilhau could congratulate themselves on having gained their Langethal.
The management of the school was henceforward in the hands of a man of character, while the extensive knowledge and the excellent method of a well-trained scholar had been obtained for the educational department. The new institute now prospered rapidly. The renown of the fresh, healthful life and the able tuition of the pupils spread far beyond the limits of Thuringia. ”

“ He accordingly obeyed the request, and seemed to be much pleased. After the school was dismissed, and the young hearts regained their freedom, with the songs of the evening, laughing at the anticipated pleasures of a happy home, while others tittered at the actions of the past day, he addressed the teacher in a tone that indicated a resolution --with an undaunted mind. He said he had determined to become a student, if he could meet with his approbation. "Sir," said he, "I have spent much time in the world. I have traveled among the uncivilized inhabitants of America. ”

“ Each can choose for himself whether he will work or play; for German university life is a very free life; it seems to have no restraints. The student does not live in the college buildings, but hires his own lodgings, in any locality he prefers, and he takes his meals when and where he pleases. He goes to bed when it suits him, and does not get up at all unless he wants to. He is not entered at the university for any particular length of time; so he is likely to change about. He passes no examinations upon entering college. ”

“ It would be a mistake to suppose that the easy-going pleasure-seeking student carries an empty head. Just the contrary. He has spent nine years in the gymnasium, under a system which allowed him no freedom, but vigorously compelled him to work like a slave. Consequently, he has left the gymnasium with an education which is so extensive and complete, that the most a university can do for it is to perfect some of its profounder specialties. ”

“ While the chief purpose of the Gymnasium is to prepare for the learned professions, that of the Real-school is to prepare for practical life. The relation of these two institutions to each other and to the university led to the Berlin Conference in 1890, at which it clearly appeared that the younger is outstripping the older and more conservative institution. ”

“ They prove themselves equal to universities in the following points: they claim for their matriculated students the same preparatory education required by the old universities, namely, nine years at a classical high school; they grant and insist upon perfect freedom in teaching and learning; and are under the direction of rectors elected for one year, instead of having principals chosen for life as in secondary schools. ”

“ For the easier survey we may think of a boundary drawn at what in Germany would be between the Obersekunda and Prima of a Gymnasium or Realschule. Now, three such units of the system lie before and two after this line of demarcation. The son of a well-to-do family, who is to study medicine in Harvard University, will probably reach this line of demarcation in his eighteenth year. If he is advanced according to the normal scheme he will have entered a primary school at six years of age, the grammar school at ten, and the high school at fourteen. ”

“ They will, in general, acknowledge no other learning or education than that of the Gymnasium, and torment every one with it who, as a future tradesman, can manage his affairs perfectly without this knowledge, and can bring by it little or nothing out of the school into his own trade. Yet at present the Gymnasia strive so far to meet the acknowledged necessities of the time, that they have adopted some of the educational subjects of the Real-schools, as mathematics, and the natural sciences in the fullest sense of the word. ”

“ What is lost or overlooked in the gymnasium cannot be acquired at the university. Hence the peculiar conscientiousness of the German teacher, his almost painful anxiety to make sure that his pupils master every subject, his unwillingness to let them go before they are "ripe." With us the change from school to college is not an abrupt transition, like that from gymnasium to university. ”

“ We shall, under this head, understand only such as strongly mark themselves out by their tendency from the schools already described, and which properly divide themselves into the Latin-school, Progymnasium, Gymnasium, and the Lyceum.
The first three are properly schools for future learned men, artists, &c; and in the state in which they exist, as in Bavaria, the studies are commenced in the Latin school, and are ended in the Gymnasium, as the school preparatory for the university. ”

“ On the other hand, other types of secondary schools have sprung up, laying stress on modern languages, history and science. In Germany the secondary system of to-day comprises the classical school or gymnasium, giving a nine years' course, the scientific school or realschule, the course of which is the same in length or shorter, and various intermediate types. The curriculum of the gymnasium includes religion, German, Latin, Greek, French, history, geography, mathematics, natural history, physics, writing and drawing. ”

“ Thus we see that this second section in the great institution of learning fills in the elementary framework, enriches the fund of information, adds a considerable amount of culture, and paves the way for the more liberal training to follow in the next section.
The Gymnasium succeeds and builds directly upon the work of the middle school. Its function is to provide a liberal culture and education suited to the needs and desires of those who become in large part the leaders in all phases of political, professional, or other social careers. ”

“ Among the many who have tasted the college prison's dreary hospitality was a lively young fellow from one of the Southern States of America, whose first year's experience of German university life was rather peculiar. The day he arrived in Heidelberg he enrolled his name on the college books, and was so elated with the fact that his dearest hope had found fruition and he was actually a student of the old and renowned university, that he set to work that very night to celebrate the event by a grand lark in company with some other students. ”

“ The general tendency is to make the schools free, according to the recommendation of the minister of education, but some communities still continue to charge tuition. In these cases, there are poor schools for those who cannot pay tuition, thus affording school privileges to all.
[Pg 294] The Teachers.—All teachers of the Prussian common schools are normal graduates, or have had an equal pedagogic preparation. [174] Graduates of the university seldom enter the common school work; they teach in the secondary schools, in private schools, and as tutors. ”

“ In some of the large cities — in Berlin, Vienna, and Munich, for instance — ^the university and polytechnic coexist; and in certain cases, in which a very special training is required to fit a youth for his career, the German student, after spending three or four years at a polytechnic school, passes on to another institution, such as a dyeing school, in which his studies are further specialized with a view to his future work. ”

“ They could not give him a costly education, but they were good and wise and they sent him to the Sunday School. He loved the Sunday School. I hope you love your Sunday School—ah, I see by your faces that you do! That is right.
"Well, this poor little boy was always in his place when the bell rang, and he always knew his lesson; for his teachers wanted him to learn and he loved his teachers dearly. Always love your teachers, my children, for they love you more than you can know, now. He would not let bad boys persuade him to go to play on Sunday. ”

“ Foreign youth steer clear of the gymnasium; its rules are too severe. They go to the university to put a mansard roof on their whole general education; but the German student already has his mansard roof, so he goes there to add a steeple in the nature of some specialty, such as a particular branch of law, or diseases of the eye, or special study of the ancient Gothic tongues. So this German attends only the lectures which belong to the chosen branch, and drinks his beer and tows his dog around and has a general good time the rest of the day. ”

“ This building of human minds means business in Switzerland. Everywhere you find a school,—a primary school, a supplementary school, a secondary school, a day school, evening school, school for the blind, school for the deaf, industrial school, commercial school, linguistic school, intermediate school, gymnasium or high-school, university, polytechnical school, schools of every sort and size, class and grade, with the happy motto carved over many a door: “Dedicated to the Children.” ”

“ The aim of the institution is to develop healthfully and fully the children committed to its care, and to prepare girls to be good mothers, Kindergarten teachers, housekeepers, and servants. There is thus a Kindergarten proper, with several departments; and a training-school with two grades, in one of which young ladies are received who are preparing to be [223] educators, and in the other, girls to be trained for household work.
No distinction is made in receiving rich and poor. ”

“ The only logical consequence, when boys and girls enjoy not only equivalent but absolutely equal school training, is that their further education shall go on parallel. We have seen the peculiar position of the American college; how it is almost incomparable with any German institution, being a sort of intermediate member between the high school and true university—the scene of a four-year intellectual activity, resembling in some respects the German school, and in others the German university. ”

“ So soon as the gymnasium becomes imbued bona fide with a new spirit, and insures fitting preparation even to those who devote themselves to other than intellectual sciences, this rivalry will cease of its own accord. The much-mooted question of the admission of realschulen pupils to faculty classes would thus be settled, for then the realschule would revert to its original intent, and be an industrial school—an institution of great importance in its proper sphere. ”

“ Gymnastics are compulsory for both boys and girls in the lower classes, and choral singing is taught in every school. Teachers must all be qualified to accompany singing on the violin. Most of the elementary schools in Prussia are free. Some few charge sixpence a month. A child can even have free teaching in its own home if it is able to receive instruction, but not to attend school. Medical inspection is rigorously carried out in German elementary schools. ”

“ In short, the surroundings of the college have a thoroughly rural aspect. It is an ideal environment for the training of boys. There is nothing in this sylvan and pastoral beauty to suggest that we are in a great city.
Dulwich College is both a boarding school and a day school, the boarders numbering about 120 and the day-boys about 550. When Paul Jones entered the college as a day-boy in 1908 the Headmaster was Mr. A. H. Gilkes, who retired after the summer term of 1914. ”

“ Public schools are nearly all day schools in Germany. The boys live at home, mostly in their own families, but they spend six hours every day at school, and it is a mistake to imagine that they are not attached to it, that they have no games together, [99] and that they do not grow up manly or independent. Most schools have playgrounds, and in summer swimming is a favourite amusement for all the boys. There were two good public schools at Leipzig, the Nicolai School and the Thomas School. ”