A survey of the educational system of the Philippine islands by the Board of educational survey, created under acts 3162 and 3196 of the Philippine Legislature.

BOARD OF EDUCATIONAL SURVEY REPORT 105

of permanent instructors, the engagement of an undue proportion of outside lecturers and young assistants to participate in the teaching program
has been necessary. To provide efficient instruction under such conditions and at the same time to give adequate guidance to the students in
their scholastic and personal affairs is difficult. Although there may be
no connection between such a condition and the number of failures in
the freshman class, that number is very large. This is in reality due to
a combination of causes, but the Board agrees with the practically
unanimous opinion of the faculty that one of them is unquestionably the
method of admission; viz., the presentation of a diploma of graduation
from high school. Some method of selection must be adopted to prevent
incapable students becoming an expensive drag upon the progress of
their fellow students.
Like the educational system generally, the University was organized
and officered at first by Americans. In recent years, however, they
have rapidly disappeared from the teaching staff and their places have
been taken by young Filipinos. These young men have naturally
viewed with pride the growth of the University in size. They have,
moreover, been desirous of seeing their institution supplied with all
the evidences of a full-grown university such as advanced courses, a
graduate school, and an extension department. A careful study of the
curriculum and schedule of recitations reveals that there is an unusually
large number of courses given which have so few students in them as to
make them very expensive and difficult of justification. There is also a
considerable number of courses which are practically duplicates. These
maladjustments ought to be corrected. Requiring, as it does, special
library and laboratory facilities no part of a university is more costly
than a graduate school. Moreover, a graduate school is not necessary
in order that research work may be carried on by the members of the
faculty who are particularly qualified to do so. It only needs that they
be given the necessary freedom from heavy teaching and administrative
duties. These observations hold good also with reference to the establishment of an extension department. To maintain lecture courses, correspondence courses, traveling demonstration work, and other extension
activities, would, because of the obstacle of geography and the comparative lack of preparedness of the people to participate in them, be
particularly expensive in the Philippines. Nevertheless, these facts do
not prevent the University cooperating effectively with other agencies
of the Government which operate in the extension field such as the
Bureaus of Agriculture, Education, and Science or of offering evening
courses for the students of Manila.
In connection with suggested extra-mural activities, the establishment
of a Junior College at Cebu requires a word of comment. It is not the