Hutchins Attacks Conant Proposal On High Schools

Robert M. Hutchins, president of the Fund for the Republic, has attacked the proposal for consolidation of high schools made by President Emeritus Conant. Debating with Conant on a Columbia Broadcasting System radio program "The Empty Schoolhouse," Hutchins labelled the plan "impossible and certainly undesirable."

"If the smaller high schools were eliminated, in states like the Dakotas, Alabama, and Mississippi, the children would have to spend a very large part of every day in travel," Hutchins explained.

Conant's report, based on visits to 55 schools in several states, called for consolidation of scattered school districts to obtain wider curricula, better teaching, and better facilities. He defined the ideal size of a "comprehensive school" as 500 to 600 students.

According to Hutchins, Conant's recommendation was based on the "unsound" assumption that only 15 per cent of the high school students were qualified for a demanding academic program.

"I see no justification whatever for the conclusion that only 15 per cent of the American can be seriously educated," Hutchins asserted. He called the effort to educate everybody to the limit of his capacity "indispensable."

"If we can only educate 15 per cent in a way that anybody would recognize, as education, then we ought to reconsider universal suffrage." Hutchins concluded.