TECHNICAL EDUCATION. Technical education (Greek 74)(/77, art or craft) may be defined as the special training of persons in the arts and sciences that underlie the practice of some trade or profession. The description "vocational training" (q.v.) is often used, particularly in the United States, as an alter native; and when so used includes commercial education.
The first technical instruction in the United States appears to have been given in connection with the U.S. Military Academy, organized in 1802 at West Point. Naturally the instruction was concerned with military problems. In 1824 Rensselaer Poly technic Institute was founded at Troy, N.Y., and started the work of training "civil" so called in distinction to "military" engineers. Rensselaer conferred its first engineering degrees in 1835. Har vard opened the Lawrence Scientific School and Yale established the Sheffield Scientific School in 1847. The University of Michi gan began instruction in engineering in 1853.
In 1862 Congress passed the Morrill Land Grant Act and thus laid the foundation of the Land Grant colleges from which have grown the State universities. The Act in setting aside public lands for the support of these colleges specifically prescribed that they shall teach "such branches of learning as are related to agriculture and the mechanic arts." Under the impetus of this Act and the economic pressure due to the needs of a new country engineering grew apace. The School of Mines at Columbia was founded in 1864, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1865, Cornell University and Worcester Polytechnic Institute in 1868.
Technical education of university grade has grown therefore under two auspices, namely private ownership and State owner ship. In the first group are to be found technical schools of high grade independent of general educational functions as illustrated by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. Again many large privately endowed uni versities such as Harvard, Yale, Cornell, etc., have engineering colleges which are integral parts of a group of colleges that com prise the university. In some of the State universities the colleges of engineering and agriculture are separated from the general courses not only educationally but geographically as well. Thus the University of Michigan proper is at Ann Arbor, while the Michigan College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts is at Lansing some distance away. The increase in the number of technical schools of collegiate rank is noteworthy. In 1866 there were but
six engineering colleges of established reputation and only 300 men had been graduated in the previous thirty-one years. In 1929 the U.S. Bureau of Education listed 148 technical colleges with a total enrollment in 1928 of 65,52o.
While there is considerable variation in the entrance require ments of this large group in general a high school education is required. The colleges of highest grade require plane and solid geometry, advanced algebra and trigonometry, a certain amount of language training and sometimes elementary chemistry or physics in addition to such standard requirements as English, history, etc. In general, the entrance requirements of the privately endowed colleges are somewhat higher than those of the State institutions, the latter from the nature of State educational sys tems being closely articulated with the high schools of the state.
There is also a singular degree of uniformity in the curricula of the better type of technical college. This is necessarily so in a measure since engineering is an application of the basic sciences of mathematics, physics and chemistry and their derivatives. Analytic mechanics, which is a key course, is usually completed by the middle of the third year leaving at least one year and a half of the four year course for engineering fundamentals and applications. There is considerable variance however in the matter of instruction for specific technical callings. Practically all colleges recognize the three principal fields of engineering, namely, civil, mechanical and electrical. For the most part also the higher technical schools recognize the necessity of offering a lim ited amount of instruction in specialized fields such as heat-power, radio, industrial, hydraulic engineering, etc., in the senior year, usually as optional studies. There is always, however, a strong pressure from the industrial field in the direction of highly specialized courses with their beginnings much earlier and not a few colleges have yielded to this pressure. For the most part, however, educators have become convinced that the student's time is best spent during the first three years, at least, in acquiring fundamentals. Specialization should be deferred as long as possi ble and any extended special study should be carried to a fifth year study. All technical colleges of repute offer graduate study.