* Deceased.

Notes supplementary to the Johns Hopkins University Studies in
Historical and Political Science, 1891, No. 1.

UNIVERSITY EXTENSION AND THE UNIVERSITY OF THE FUTURE.

THE SUBSTANCE OF ADDRESSES DELIVERED BEFORE THE JOHNS HOPKINS AND OTHER UNIVERSITY AUDIENCES.

BY RICHARD G. MOULTON, A.M.,

Of Cambridge University, England.

I am requested to furnish information with reference to the University Extension Movement in England.  It will be desirable that side by side with the facts I should put the ideas of the movement, for, in matters like these, the ideas are the inspiration of the work; the ideas, moreover, are the same for all, whereas the detailed methods must vary with different localities.  The idea of the movement is its soul; the practical working is no more than the body.  But body and soul alike are subject to growth, and so it has been in the present case.  The English University Extension Movement was in no sense a carefully planned scheme, put forward as a feat of institutional symmetry; it was the product of a simple purpose pursued through many years, amid varying external conditions, in which each modification was suggested by circumstances and tested by experience.  And with the complexity of our operations our animating ideas have been striking deeper and growing bolder.  Speaking then up to date, I would define the root idea of ‘University Extension’ in the following simple formula:  University Education for the Whole Nation organized on a basis of Itinerant Teachers.

But every clause in this defining formula will need explanation and defence.

The term ‘University’ Extension has no doubt grown up from the circumstance that the movement in England was started and directed by the universities, which have controlled its operations by precisely the same machinery by which they manage every other department of university business.  I do not know that this is an essential feature of the movement.  The London branch presents an example of a flourishing organization directed by a committee formed for the purpose, though this committee at present acts in concert with three universities.  I can conceive the new type of education managed apart from any university superintendence; only I should look upon such severance as a far more serious evil for the universities than for the popular movement.

But I use the term ‘university education’ for the further purpose of defining the type of instruction offered.  It is thus distinguished from school education, being moulded to meet the wants of adults.  It is distinguished from the technical training necessary for the higher handicrafts or for the learned professions.  It is no doubt to the busy classes that the movement addresses itself, but we make no secret of the fact that our education will not help them in their business,