direction of irresponsibility and indifference. At last these fraternities are awaking from their sleep. They are coming together in an annual conference. They are revising constitutions, raising standards, sending out secretaries, studying local evils and their remedy. It remains for the faculties also to bestir themselves, and to meet these organizations at least halfway. Since some social groups must exist, let us utilize those we now have -utilize them in seeking for higher standards of scholarship, character, and preparation for American life.

DISCUSSION

RALPH K. JONES, Librarian, University of Maine, Orono, Me.-Of the various problems in the relations of faculties and fraternities perhaps the most important is that due to the effect of fraternities upon the scholarship of their members, indicated by the publication of statistics at various western universities which have shown that the work of men in fraternities was distinctly inferior to that of the non-fraternity men in the same institutions, as well as by the interesting studies of President Schurman of Cornell on the same subject.

In order to have definite information as to just what present conditions are, a brief circular letter was sent out a few weeks ago for the purpose of obtaining information as to what is now being done to stimulate good college work by members of fraternities. This was sent to the general fraternities and to the ninety colleges that contained five or more chapters of general fraternities at the date of publication of the latest edition of Baird's American College Fraternities.

Replies were received from eighteen of the thirty-one fraternities, and these eighteen included those embracing four-fifths of the total number of chapters. They included, with one solitary exception, every fraternity having over twenty-five chapters, and with the same exception, every fraternity of western or southern origin.

Of the ninety colleges from which inquiry was made, thirty-seven are eastern, twenty-four southern, and twenty-five western. Although half of the southern and a third of the eastern colleges did not reply, only four of the twenty-five in the west failed to do so.

The percentage of replies from both fraternities and colleges indicates a far greater interest in this matter in the West than in the East.

The replies from the fraternities, with hardly an exception, indicated that the necessity for improvement of scholarship is recognized by them, and nearly all either have already adopted some system looking toward this result or are now considering the subject with a view to deciding upon something in the near future. Among the plans already in operation by fraternities are the following: careful investigation of each chapter by a visiting officer who obtains full information about the standing of his men from the college authorites; similar investigations by other fraternity officials; investigation of each chapter twice a year by one of its own graduates who reports to the fraternity; obtaining statements from the college authorities by the fraternity officers of the standing of their undergraduates; awarding honor certificates to those who attain a certain degree of efficiency; requiring chapters to obtain statements of the standing of their members from college authorities to be forwarded to the fraternity officials; requiring all freshmen to observe study hours; requiring all chapters to place each initiate under the supervision of an upper-class man whose duty it is to watch over all his activities.

Among the noteworthy practices at various colleges, by the college authorities, are these: appointing a member of the faculty for each chapter as an adviser, it being his duty to keep himself informed of the condition of the work of those under his charge and to confer with those in danger of falling behind; appointing a member of the faculty

as one of a committee for each chapter in which the other members are an alumnus of the chapter and two undergraduates, and furnishing this committee with necessary information; giving each chapter at frequent intervals information as to the standing of delinquent members and in some cases pointing out apparent reasons for delinquency; making public the relative standing of all fraternity chapters and other college organizations; posting the records of all freshmen and sophomores in a dean's office where they are open to inspection by all; prohibiting the initiation by the fraternities of conditioned freshmen; prohibiting the initiation of any student until he has completed a minimum amount of college work; prohibiting the attendance of freshmen upon more than a limited number of specified social functions; prohibiting the holding of social functions on other than Friday or Saturday evenings.

In order to secure undergraduate opinion, the circulars were sent also to the chapters of one of the larger fraternities, one that has not enacted any legislation, but whose general officers have endeavored to impress upon the undergraduates the necessity for maintaining themselves creditably in their college work, and for which recent statistics show that for the ten years ending with June, 1909, practically 50 per cent. of its initiates have graduated, or 8 per cent. more than the general average for all college students. Of its about seventy chapters, nearly one-half replied. These replies from the undergraduates were not the least interesting received. Without an exception, the letters that were received indicated that some plan was in use whose purpose was to encourage good scholarship. Among the most interesting were these: appointing a scholarship director charged with the duty of obtaining information as to the standing of all members of the delegations from the lower classes and charged with the duty of seeing that tutors were provided where necessary; maintaining a committee of upper-class men with similar responsibilities; furnishing blanks to instructors with a list of men in their classes concerning whose work information was desired, with a request for a statement of opinion as to the cause of delinquency where such existed; asking for a similar statement from the college office at regular intervals; sending return postal cards to instructors for statements concerning the work of delinquents; reading grades of all members at regular meetings, with commendation of those doing good work and urging improvement by those in whose cases improvement was necessary; using the "big brother" system by which each initiate is placed under the special oversight of an upper-class man who supervises all his activities; electing a member of the faculty as an adviser, having him meet with the chapter once a month and having free discussions over cases of individual scholarship and morals, as well as about fraternity and college matters in general, all information obtained in this way being regarded by the members of the faculty as strictly confidential.

There are a number of different movements related to the subject under consideration which deserve special mention. One of these is the Interfraternity Council at the University of Nebraska. This was organized five years ago for the purpose of discussing and regulating all matters relating to fraternities that the council cares to discuss. It is composed of one undergraduate member and one alumnus of each academic fraternity (not honorary or professional), and one member of the faculty. It has enacted legislation regulating the dates for pledging and initiations and for the entertainment of new students, and has required that no student be pledged or initiated whose name appears on the delinquent list. That it has accomplished what has failed in other places is due to the fact that the council is recognized by the regents of the university and given power by them to enforce its regulations, to the extent of depriving any fraternity that violates its rules of the right to pledge or initiate for a year and making any student pledged or initiated in violation of its decree subject to expulsion from the university.

Publicity given to relative standings has been a powerful stimulus at some institutions in bringing reform where reform was needed.

At the University of Wisconsin the Interfraternity Conference awards a cup each year to the fraternity having highest rank for the year, it being held each term by that

one which has highest rank the preceding term. At the University of Maine, a senior society has given a cup to be held each year by the fraternity ranking highest the preceding year, to become the property of that one who holds it the largest number of times during a period of twelve years.

At a number of colleges the undergraduates have adopted a point system, under which the so-called outside activities in which one student may participate and the number of offices he may hold are restricted to a reasonable amount.

The Ohio Wesleyan plan of the election by each fraternity of a member of the faculty, preferably one of its own alumni, as a confidental adviser has been adopted at a number of institutions.

Altho aside from the subject under consideration, the practice at Amherst of having each fraternity house inspected annually as to sanitary conditions and protection in case of fire by committees composed of the college physician, the college treasurer, and an alumnus of each fraternity, deserves mention.

Last summer, at the suggestion of the Religious Education Association and upon a call by President Faunce, an Interfraternity Conference was held in New York City at which twenty-six fraternities were represented. It appointed a committee on the relation of fraternity chapters to the college administration, and this committee is to report at a second conference to be held this summer.

The importance to the colleges of the movement among the fraternities for higher scholarship will perhaps be appreciated better when we realize that nearly seventy per cent. of the entire number of men undergraduates are in attendance at the colleges in which fraternity chapters are maintained, and that one-fifth of all of those in the fraternity colleges are members of these organizations. There can be no question that this one-fifth embraces those who are most popular, most prominent, and most influential, and whatever stimulates this body of leaders must inevitably exert a vital effect upon the ideals and the life of the entire undergraduate body.

It is surprising, and if the same report had not come from more than one source among fraternity officials as well as undergraduate chapters, it would be almost incredible that there are college registrars who have refused to supply information solicited for the purpose of promoting good work by undergraduates, and that only too often efforts to secure the co-operation of individual instructors have resulted in complete failure.

The fraternities, working thru their general organizations if they are given the sympathy and assistance of college faculties, will do more in five years to bring about radical improvement in the college work of undergraduates than the entire faculties of the one hundred and seventy-three colleges in which fraternities exist can accomplish by themselves in five times that period.

PROFESSOR W. T. CHASE, Beloit College, Beloit, Wis.-The problem of the nonfraternity students has been met at Beloit by the organizations of non-fraternity men and women, subdivided into sections.

DEAN F. P. KEPPEL, Columbia College, New York City.-The fraternities at Columbia would welcome action by the authorities which would restrict the initiation of freshmen to those who have satisfied the entrance requirements.

REV. J. M. FOSTER, Second Reformed Presbyterian Church, Boston, Mass.-The church to which I belong requires separation from all secret, oath-bound lodges as a condition of membership. We have a college in Beaver Falls, Pa., named Geneva College. No Greek letter fraternity is allowed in the student body. Our reasons for excluding all secret orders from the institution are:

1. Because they are essentially selfish. They divide the students into cliques and are damaging to the college esprit de corps. One fraternity aims at elocution. The students who have oratorical gifts are invited, while those who are not so talented in this

line are left out. That is, the students who need help in this department are not chosen, and those who do not need it are asked. Another fraternity seeks social excellence, and the students who are the brightest social lights are taken, and the others left. So again, those who need encouragement are denied it, while those already well up are given this help.

A third seeks literary excellence, and the same state of things prevails; so that the selfish and not the benevolent spirit is cultivated by these orders.

2. Because they are secret, and so directly contrary to the policy of our Lord, who said: "I ever spake openly and in secret have I said nothing." You could not conceive of the boy Jesus entering a Greek letter fraternity and, putting his hand over his heart, swearing in the name of Almighty God ever to conceal and never to reveal the sayings and doings of the lodge. And if he would not do it, we should not encourage our boys to do so. Secrecy is darkness and belongs to Satan's empire. Christ is the Light of the World. His people have been brought out of darkness into His marvelous light. 3. Because they prepare the students later to join the more objectionable orders, such as Free Masons, Odd Fellows, etc. There are 11,000,000 members in the secret oath-bound lodges of the United States. They are the deadly upas. The college fraternities are its roots. Let them be cut off. "And now also the axe is laid at the roots of the trees."

COLLEGE DISCIPLINE

THOMAS ARKLE CLARK, DEAN OF MEN, UNIVERSITY OF ILLINOIS, URBANA, ILL. The greatest handicap in my experience to successful college discipline is the excessive number of rules laid down by the colleges for the conduct of students. Too many college officers feel that when an evil exists, or an erroneous custom prevails, the only thing necessary is to pass a regulation against the evil, or the custom, and the matter is settled. The real fact is that generally the more rules an institution has, the more difficulty the college officers find in maintaining good discipline, and in keeping the young people within bounds.

It is safe to take for granted that young people of college age know in the main what is right and what is reasonable as to conduct, so that it is not necessary that every sin in the decalog, or that every violation of the law under the statute, should be named in the college catalog and the penalty for its violation attached. Rules often prevent individual action in specific cases. Every violation of good order should be taken up, looked into, and judged as if it were the only one of its sort. Rules often hamper such judgment. Many college rules are virtually a dead letter because they are difficult or impossible of execution, and the existence of such regulations. can do nothing less than bring the whole system of college statutes into ridicule and disrepute. I believe, for illustration, that it would be a most excellent thing if college students did not visit saloons, for I have known very few students who were not to a greater or less degree injured by such a practice. It seems to me, however, usually worse than useless, and in fact often harmful, for a college to make a rule prohibiting students from entering saloons, because it is so evidently a rule unlikely or impossible to be enforced.

More than this, the very existence of regulations will frequently incite students to insubordination that would not otherwise have been thought of. "I've just discovered," one freshman said to another, "that it's against the rules to smoke in the quadrangle. Now, I suppose it will make me sick, for I don't care much for smoking, but I couldn't let a thing like that go by without having a try at it." I am not arguing against regulations per se; some of course are necessary for the proper conduct of any business or institution, but the fewer the better, and then only those which are absolutely necessary.

The young person who enters college is on a different basis, and should receive different treatment, from the same person in the high school. He is more nearly an adult, and he should be treated as such. He is more independent, more upon his own responsibility, and so far as possible he should be left to manage his own conduct and his own affairs. The more he can be let alone the better. This last statement does not mean in any sense that no one should know what he is doing. Much of the trouble that occurs in college nearly all that occurred in my own undergraduate days-comes from the fact that rules more or less arbitrary and often foolish are made in the belief that such legislation will in itself correct any tendency to wander which the undergraduate may evince. Seldom is any effort made to keep an eye upon the young student, and to forestall any dereliction into which he may fall. The best way to manage the student guilty of misconduct is to look after him so personally and so carefully that he may be brought to account just before he has been guilty of the act that would subject him to discipline. This last statement may seem like a paradox, or an Irish bull, but I am sure that the most skillful disciplinary work which I have ever done in the ten years during which I have been a disciplinary officer has been connected with the things that never happened, because they were not allowed to.

Granted that the college has made few rules, and that there is someone who keeps himself pretty thoroly conversant with what is going on, there will still be infractions of regulations, and necessity on the part of college officers to exercise authority. Youth is still young and irresponsible, and is quite as likely to be guided by impulse as by judgment. In my own undergraduate days, twenty years ago, when a young fellow had been drunk, had danced in a college hall, had carried away the campus fence to add fuel to the bonfire in celebration of Hallowe'en, or had backed the cannon into the sluggish stream that flowed thru the campus in order to show his disapproval of compulsory military drill-when he had done any of these things and was caught, he was brought before the entire faculty assembled in most serious session, and here he was tried. It is a harrowing experience, as some of us well know, and one not likely always to bring justice. A man may perhaps make a good teacher, or a good scientific investigator, without making a good judge. When an entire faculty deliberates on disciplinary matters