Word: quadrivium
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Dates: during 1920-1929
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...dead hand of the past lies heavy upon our institutions. The pre-eminence of Latin survives from the trivium; and the pre-eminence of mathematics is our inheritance from the quadrivium of the Middle Ages. Far stronger, however, than the priorities of the classics and mathematics, are are traditional methods of instruction and of college life...
...developing the highly specialized graduate schools does not seem the best method of sloving the problem. By insisting on a greater standard of endeavor from the primary grades upwards, by widening the present scope of the schools even at the expense of a departure from the traditional trivium and quadrivium, secondary schools should be able to present students for college entrance who are fitted for advanced work...
...favor of the "practical, professional" type of college; but the arguments in favor of a general cultural course are by no means to be ignored. "Culture" does not mean blind, narrow-minded reading of the Classics any more than it implies an implicit faith in the efficacy of the Quadrivium of the old monastery school. A cultural course means broad general training--"literature, science, history, and the knowledge of men", as opposed to absolute concentration in one intensive field. The danger in a single-track education can be well summed up in the words of a successful flood-engineer...