The following figures show the diverging choice of studies at Harvard, Yale and Cornell.
The numbers in the first table denote the total of hours per week devoted to each subject; in the second table the percentage.
Harvard. Yale. Cornell.
Classics, 2016 4439 1129
European languages, 5281 2663 2654
Political science, 2293 2049 922
English, 3903 2040 2297
History, 3316 1916 1160
Mathematics, 1013 1760 932
Philosophy, 1402 1628 1073
Natural sciences, 2356 1481 3307
Biblical literature, 48 211 22
Art, 1301 76 ?
Music, 130 46 68
Military Science, 117 36 182
Physical culture, 3 11 347
Total, 23,179 18,356 14,093
As the totals vary so largely, the only thing here to be noted is that European languages bulk largest at Harvard, classics at Yale, and natural sciences at Cornell. The following table gives the best basis for comparison:
Harvard. Yale. Cornell.
Classics, 8.7 24.2 8.0
European languages, 22.8 14.5 18.8
Political science, 9.9 11.2 6.5
English, 16.8 10.9 16.3
History, 14.3 10.4 8.2
Mathematics, 4.4 9.6 6.6
Philosophy, 6.1 8.9 7.7
Natural sciences, 10.2 8.1 23.5
Biblical literature, 0.2 1.1 0.2
Art, 5.6 0.4 ?
Music, 0.6 0.3 0.5
Military science, 0.5 0.2 1.3
Physical culture, 0.01 0.1 2.4
Perhaps the most striking fact shown is that nearly one-fourth of a student's time is given at Harvard to European languages, at Cornell to the natural sciences, and at Yale to the classics.
The table for Cornell will be entirely changed in two years, for the present prescribed work in Greek, Latin, French, German, English, philosophy, mathematics and science will be entirely abolished. In making the statistics, only students in the academic course were counted for Cornell.
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