Oxford and the Rhodes ScholarshipsScholz, R. F. (Richard Frederick)
History
Oxford and the Rhodes Scholarships
Scholz, R. F. (Richard Frederick)
Rhodes scholarships
Students of Affiliated _Colonial_ Universities or Colleges, who satisfy
the conditions for advanced standing prescribed by the particular Oxford
Statute for their respective Universities or Colleges, are excused from
the qualifying examination held by the Rhodes Trust for the Rhodes
Scholarships. At present all Candidates for Rhodes Scholarships in
the _United States_ are required to pass this examination, though it
is probable that a similar exemption will soon be granted to students
of Privileged American Universities. All Rhodes Scholars are accepted
by Oxford Colleges and by the University without further test, the
qualifying examination for the Scholarship being accepted by the
University of Oxford as the equivalent of ‘Responsions’, the first
University examination.
Less than a half-century ago, the collegiate system was still supreme;
it was to the College, that the undergraduate looked for ‘nutrimentum
spiritus—et corporis’. There was but little University teaching and no
University life. The examination system—introduced in 1805—was gradually
raising the standard and requirements of scholarship. But for a few
Professorial lectures, the University did practically nothing to provide
for the teaching of its members; it merely conducted examinations
and granted degrees. With the widening bounds of knowledge, and the
incorporation of new subjects in the University Examination Statutes,—and
especially with the successful invasion—despite Ruskin’s defiance
of ‘Science’ and the scientific spirit, the inevitable duplication
of instructors and the consequent necessary increase in College
expenditure made the need of a closer and more effective organization
of the teaching body more and more imperative. One of the first steps
in this direction—which also marked the first encroachment on the
old collegiate system—was the establishment in 1877-82 of the new
University Professorships and the extension of the University Museum
and scientific laboratories. This was followed by the large development
of the system of inter-collegiate lectures and by the appointment of
University Professors and of lecturers and tutors from other Colleges
to assist in the tutorial and lecture work of the separate Colleges.
These developments have overcome most of the serious defects of the
decentralization of the collegiate system of teaching, felt in the lack
of continuity or in the unavoidable overlapping of lecture-courses, as
well as in the duplication and the inadequacy of the instructional force
at any one College. They have provided the material out of which is
being gradually evolved and organized a ‘graduate School’. In the closer
relations between University and College, and in this more effective
organization of the teaching body, Oxford is approaching the American and
the German systems.
[Sidenote: Character of courses.]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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