Conant Urges Guidance for School Pupils

President Conant, addressing the Society of Harvard Dames at Phillips Brooks House yesterday afternoon on "The University Tradition in a Changing World," acknowledged the price we pay for our American educational system "is our failure to locate talent at an early age and prepare it adequately during the school years."

Newsreel cameramen from "The March of Time" were on hand, taking pictures which will show President Conant "giving an address on education" to be pieced into a forthcoming production tentatively titled "The American Teacher."

Contrasting our democratic school system with the rigidly state-supervised European methods, President Conant stated, "Counselling and guidance in the high school years has been well said to be the keystone of the arch of our system of public schools. . .

Dignify Two-Year Colleges

"We pay a price for the fundamental democracy of our undifferentiated school system," he continued, urging greater counselling and guidance to tap the great reserve of potential student material.

President Conant went on to tell the group, "We need to dignify the two-year (terminal college) course as a combination of vocational and general education. But to do so we need to understand the university tradition. . .

"We can describe a university as a more or less independent and self-governing community of scholars concerned with professional education, the advancement of knowledge, and the general education of the leading citizens."