St Louis University - Archive Yearbook (St Louis, MO)

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The School of Commerce and Finance combines modern classrooms with efficient teaching. Top to bottom — The demand for expert accountants makes courses in that field some of the most important in the Commerce School. A group of students in advertising examine a layout. A class in economics learns the principles of price determination and quantity. The Commerce lounge is a favorite meeting place during intermissions between classes. cooperating with the School by arranging survey field trips on which the students may observe the practical demonstrations of the theoretical knowledge which they are receiving in school. Special laboratory work has been inaugurated this year in adver- tising and statistics. The fundamentals of artistic layout, chart making and tabulation, have been placed under the skilful direction of practical experts who supplement the work of the regular teaching staff. The evening division of the School of Commerce and Finance, owing to the increased enrollment in its regular classes, has been compelled to utilize all evenings of the school week to accommodate its increasing student sections. Hitherto only three nights a week had been assigned to evening classes, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, but this year both Tuesday and Thursday are of necessity included in the regular schedule. This enlarged schedule, however, does not interfere with the more important extra-curricular activities usually assigned in the past to these two evenings. The ample accommodations of the School of Commerce and Finance, with its spacious lounges, enable the School to take care of any number of extra evening programs. This increase in enrollment of the night division is very encouraging for it shows that employed people are taking advantage of the opportunity to better themselves intellectu- ally. This division of the Commerce School was established in the hope of giving a Catholic business education to those who otherwise would have to forego it. During the past year, the School of Commerce and Finance suffered a much regretted loss in the death of one of its most distinguished graduates, James O. McKinzie, of the class of 1916. Graduating with high honors, he rose rapidly in the teaching profession, first at the Uni- versity of Ohio and later at Chicago University. Subsequently, he entered the field of business as an efficiency expert. In this new activity he met with brilliant success. Three years ago he was made Chairman of the Board of Marshall Field and Company of Chicago, Illinois. He reorganized that huge corporation with rare skill and discernment and succeeded in placing it upon a firm financial basis. Comparatively a young man when he died, he had accomplished much, lived a full life and served his Master and his fellow men to a complete and overflowing degree. t f ' 29

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Walter F. Gast, Assistant to Dean of the School of Commerce and Finance; George W. Wilson, Dean; Rev. Joseph L. Davis, SJ., Regent. The School of Commerce and Finance gives the student a solid and complete foundation for high attainment in the world of business as well as a general, well-rounded, cultural background, by offering practical courses in finance, economics, marketing, accounting and management, in addition to the more generic and semi-classical studies, which are of a less technical nature. The Commerce and Finance student has the opportunity to discuss current economic and political prob- lems and other topics of a legislative nature in a definite and analytic manner. This study of business in a scientific manner has become necessary in this day of high specialization and financial complexities. To keep pace with the need for specialized study in business, St. Louis University estab- lished the School of Commerce and Finance in 1910. The success of the graduates of this School has resulted in its steady growth, and this year the number of students enrolled has exceeded the thousand mark. The program of studies has kept pace with this numerical development and covers a wide 1 -— fl 3. L h = pg H T ■ !1 C ke School of iyommerce am Lmince area of demand. Particular attention has been given to the call for instruction in important practical procedures growing out of recent government legislation, such as the Social Security Act and its complex applications, the Tennessee Valley Authority Act and its suc- cesses, and the New Deal in general. The student learns to cope with these and similar problems which he will encounter when he enters the financial world. Student activities have been in evidence in representative university fields such as sodali- ties, forensics, music, athletics and social enter- tainments. Supplementary activities, closely allied to the regular academic curriculum, have progressed quite rapidly during this ses- sion. These optional activities, mostly in the form of placement training and survey work, offer more than one hundred students oppor- tunities of great practical value. They serve as excellent practical illustrations and appli- cations of theory and principle. These surveys and placements are made in the actual field of business, some sixty large corporations 28

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C ke j ckooL of Rev. Alphonse M. Schwitalla, S.J., Regent of the School of Dentistry; Dr. Thomas E. Purcell, Dean of the School of Dentistry. When we speak of the progress of dentistry, we must have dearly in mind what we mean by progress. Progress has become almost an ideal of the American people. We believe in it, but sometimes we do not define it clearly, and unfortunately, we rarely differentiate it from change. The conception of progress as a national ideal is new to civilization. It started in the time of Darwin when he enunci- ated the doctrine of evolution. He said that man and ever ything in the world was evolv- ing, changing. He did not say it was improv- ing or progressing, he said simply changing. Uncritical people have assumed change to be synonymous with progress. They would have us believe that year by year human nature is growing better — that year by year the world is becoming a better place in which to live. If we raise doubts, if we point to the World War when progress reached the point where it sent millions of men en masse into a battle- field to make rivers run red with blood; when the bones of millions of the flower of young manhood of the world were strewn across the field for a cause that is still unknown; when international suicide was attempted; and where today the world is thinking of poverty instead of the poor; bodies instead of souls; and are counting the masses instead of man — we must stop and wonder if change is synonymous with progress. Progress demands a goal and when that is lacking, when it is uncertain, when there is lack of agreement on goals, there can be no progress. In many fields of endeavor, in eco- nomics, sociology and government, there is no full agreement as to goal. In the field of dentistry there have been goals in the past, and there are goals today. There are different ones and there will be still different ones in the future, and progress in dentistry is meas- ured in the nature, the character and the eleva- tion of the goals that are set. As we review these goals, we discover the significant fact 30