THE PROPOSALS FOR A TEACHING UNIVERSITY IN LONDON.
WE are doubtful whether the scheme proposed for the new Teaching University in London, and for its association with the existing Examining University of that name, proceeds upon the right lines, or holds out any reasonable hope that it will be acceptable to the University already in exist- ence. In the first place, we do not think that London needs so much a new University as a considerable extension of teach- ing bodies within the limits of the Metropolis, and a closer relation than exists at present between the teaching bodies and the examining and degree-conferring body. To establish a University which teaches and confers its own degrees, side by side with a University which only examines and confers its own degrees, would, in our opinion, be a grave mistake. It is quite true that the Examining University now in exist- ence is not in the close relations which would be desirable with the teaching bodies ; but then that is for this ex- cellent reason,—that the candidates who come up for examina- tion are taught by all sorts of teachers, public and private, in all parts of the United Kingdom, so that it becomes simply impossible at present to say which are the bodies which ought to be represented on the Senate of the University, and which of them have no claim to be so represented. It is idle to talk of representing on the University Senate any teaching body, however distinguished, which is situated scores or hundreds of miles from the Metropolis, because their representatives could not take any practical part in the government of the Uni- versity, however truly they might wish to do so ; but it might be possible to secure that a sufficient number of representatives of first-class Colleges, situated in the Metropolis, should be so represented. To establish a teaching University in London which should confer degrees of its own, side by side with those of the existing examining University, would, in our opinion, be a double mistake. It is better that a teaching body, however eminent, should not keep the degree-conferring power wholly in its own hands,—in other words, should not test for itself the value of its own teaching ; and it is better that an Examining University should not decide on the character of the tests it will apply without careful concert with the teaching bodies, though it ought to be, to a very considerable extent, independent of these teaching bodies. Hence, it seems to us, that to establish two institutions side by side, one of which should test education without itself teaching, and the other of which should both teach and test its own teaching, would be to spoil what might be one first-rate institution by dividing it in two.
We can see no reason, indeed, for a central teaching Uni- versity in London ; though we can see excellent reason for a much closer connection than now exists between the best teaching bodies in London and the examining body, and for the extension of the existing number of teaching bodies. We must remember that when we talk of a teaching Uni- versity in London, no such body can exist so as really to be easily accessible to all parts of the Metropolis. Nobody sup- poses that a residential University in London would succeed, and nobody, we believe, proposes such a University. What is proposed is a teaching body in some central position. But no position, however central, would suit all parts of London, or be at all likely to get students from all parts. University College and King's College already do a good deal, and may do a good deal more for the districts in which they are situated. It would be very well to have also, in the City itself, in the East End, and at Kensington, institutions extending to other districts the work of education which is now well done, and " may be still better done, at University College and King's College. But to attempt to concentrate in one Teaching University, the teaching of all these local insti- tutions would, in our opinion, result in failure, and in a very needless failure, because it does not in the least follow that one and the same type of teaching ought to be followed in all the teaching bodies of the Metropolis.
What we should really like to see would be a considerable extension of the number of good teaching bodies, and a much closer relation between the existing examining • body,—the existing University of London,—and the local teaching bodies, without any attempt at all to establish a central teaching body which should examine and confer degrees upon its own alumni. We do not believe that a competition in degree-giving between an examining University and a teaching University could pos- sibly be set up without pernicious results to both. We do believe that the examining University would be greatly improved if it could, by some modificatios of its present Senate, be closely related with first-rate teaching Colleges in different parts of the Metropolis ; though it would be neces- sary, of course, to remember that it can never exclude from examination those candidates who come up either from teaching bodies or from the care of individual tutors in any and every part of the United Kingdom. All that could be done would be to give the Metropolitan Colleges an influential voice in the counsels of the Examining University ; but then, in our opinion, that is not only all that could be done, but all that ought to be done. If the present University of London suffers by the chasm between its governing body and the most dis- tinguished practical teachers, the proposed Teaching Uni- versity would, we believe, suffer still more, through the pre- ponderance in its counsels of the very teachers whose pupils would be candidates for its degrees. So far as we can judge, the scheme of the Sub-Committee, on which the discussion of Monday turned, was not, on the whole, a wise one. We think the meeting took a very prudent course in only receiving the Report,—in declining to adopt it.
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