George Washington University - Cherry Tree Yearbook (Washington, DC)

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Frank Tracy Johnson Robert E. Johnson Lillian C. Johnstone Claggett A. Jones Harry C. Jones James A. Jones Nicholas D. Karagiorgos Konstantinos Karayiunis f Robert G. Kassebaum Josie E. Keebler Daniel Francis Kelly James J. Kennedy Ralph H, Kline Merrill D. Knight, III Denis F. Kolb Allen A. Koplin 27

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Oscar M. Hokanson Stephen C. Hopkins Harold Horwitz Jo Anne Houk Betty Jane Howard John F. Hudson William M, Hughes Wing Y. Hui Thomas R. Henry, Jr. Pei-Shih-Ho William R. i lodge Roy G. Hoffman Andrew Husser Edward W. Hutmire Angelo John Iandolo Joseph A. Ion.no Thomas S. Israel Charles Joseph Jerome Elise H, Johnson Everett C, Johnson 26

Page 32 text:

The Study Room in the new Student Union, WHY They asked me why. Why waste time on such archaic pursuits as litera- ture and arts? Culture, fine arts were all right for the ancients. Homer had lots of time to fool with the stuff. Socrates didn’t have to keep up payment on the family car. There weren’t any 1040 forms to bother Plato or Aristotle. This is a practical age, the scien- tific era. Competition is tough. A fellow’s got to specialize. Know your job and stick to it. And there aren’t many jobs in poetics and Old Norse. It’s an old question. An argument that liberal arts students have now found themselves embroiled in for years. This dissension between classic and practical education first became formidable a century ago when Darwin exploded his revolutionary scientific theories. The old pedagogical methods were abandoned in a rash of empirical curricula, Emphasis was exclusively on apprehension of natural laws and forces. Then flaws became apparent in this system. It somehow began to seem a trifle one-sided, Some very vital part of man’s education was being neglected. Thinkers came to realize the truth of Newman’s earlier cry for the cultivated gentleman; for knowledge as its own end, to render an intelligent being more intel- ligent, Matthew Arnold existed in a practical Philistine world, a very confused world. His answer was a liberal education. Whether this was the solution is Gilbert Stuart ' s portrait of Washington in Lisner library yet being debated, Arnold, however, concisely defined the aims and values of liberal education. It is to enable man to see the whole and see it steadily; and by knowing the best that has been thought and said in the world to produce a well-rounded individual. These are the concepts on which a liberal arts uni- versity bases its precepts today. While realizing it is essential to be skilled in a single trade or profession, it feels that basically man is a reasoning, thinking creature and these powers must be trained, expanded in order that he may function more perfectly in his world; in order that he may propagate a fine continuing world. They asked me why — but what could I answer. 28