Plea for a reform of the University teaching in Scotland : submitted to the Scottish Universities Commission / by James Finlayson.

Date:
1890
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Plea for a reform of the University teaching in Scotland : submitted to the Scottish Universities Commission / by James Finlayson. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    To the SCOTTISH UNIVERSITIES COMMISSION. My Lords and Gentlemen, In the agitation for University Reform in Scotland I have not, hitherto, taken any share. The nature of my work makes me unwilling to take part in disputation and agitation, if I feel free to avoid them. The subject of University Reform, however, has now passed on to the stage of judicial and adminis- trative action, and the Commission have announced their readiness to receive printed statements of a general or special nature. I have felt impelled to submit to them views which I have long entertained. I fear my proposals may be as distasteful to many of those claiming to be advanced University Reformers as to the most conservative of the Professorial party; but I am glad to find that they are growing in favour in certain influential quarters. My views on our Scottish University system are based on experience, observation, and inquiry extending over some thirty years. Inquiry was not limited either to one Faculty or to one University. It may be difficult for the Commission to get opinions on such subjects from those who are sufficiently well informed as to the actual working of the University system, and are,