The beginnings of American technological training were made in a group of special schools, independently founded, such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, in Boston, and Stevens institute, in Hoboken, N.J. Later the univer sities eagerly took up education in engineering, developed elab orate departments and offered the greatest variety of courses. Engineering schools require of applicants for admission the com pletion of the four-year secondary school course. Instruction is largely by means of laboratory courses. The degree of Bachelor of Science, with or without specification of the branch studied, is commonly conferred after four years of college work. The degrees of Civil Engineer, Mining Engineer and so forth are awarded for undergraduate work by some schools in place of the B.Sc., by others reserved for more advanced study.
Since 1900 there had been increasing uniformity among dental schools until, in 1921, all recognized schools re quired for admission at least the completion of a four-year sec ondary school course, and many of them demanded an additional collegiate year of preliminary training, followed by four full years of professional training. The increasing recognition of the rela
tion of dental pathology to health and disease in the body as a whole tends to make dentistry a branch of the study of medicine, and a leading group of dental schools decided to demand in 1927 the same two years of collegiate preliminary training now required of medical students, followed by four years of dental training.
Certain private corporations, not directly engaged in teaching, have influenced education in the United States. The General Edu cation Board, for example, incorporated in 1903, employed the funds at its disposal in assisting institutions of higher learning throughout the country, and in the Southern States it also pro moted the development of the secondary schools and the teach ing of agriculture. Later it entered the field of medical education. From 5902 to 1926 its total appropriations for universities and colleges were $70,769,821.61, and for medical schools $42,100, 225.94. The Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teach ing, incorporated in 1906, starting with a programme of pensions for retiring college professors, has been led into the field of investigations and surveys. (N. M. B.; I. G. M.)