School In the year 1918 there were 5,488 Catholic elementary schools in the United States with an enrolment of 1,456,206 pupils, and with about 36,000 teachers. Ele mentary pupils in high schools and academies would make an addition of about 100,000 to this number. Investigation has shown that the total actual enrolment in Catholic schools is not quite one-half that which the Catholic popu lation of the country should normally supply, the proportion being as 893 to 1,948. This means that about the same number of Catholic children go to the public schools as go to the parish schools. There are over 100 Catholic industrial schools; many girls' schools furnish instruction in the upper grades, in practical household subjects.
Included in the total school enrolment just given arc 137 schools for colored children, with an enrolment of 13,885, about one-fourth of these being in the archdiocese of New Or leans. A number of teaching communities de vote themselves especially to this work, sev eral of these being composed of colored Sis ters. These schools as a rule derive their sup port from general church collections and gifts from generous individuals. There were also 72 schools for the education of Indians, with 5,674 pupils. Orphanages — not included in the above total — number 293, with 45,059 children. There are about a dozen Catholic schools for the deaf and dumb, with an enrolment of ap proximately 1,000.
Catholic male colleges and uni versities in the year 1916 numbered 84, with an enrolment of 14,846 students of collegiate grade; of these 6,177 were pursuing profes sional courses, while 974 were registered in engineering courses. Colleges for girls had at least 1,000 collegiate students. The enrol ment in Catholic colleges is increasing rap idly, the ratio of collegiate students in such institutions to every 1,000,000 persons of the Catholic population having increased from 511 in the year 1907 to 896 in the year 1916. The movement toward the development of uni versities, which has been characteristic of the progress of American higher education, has affected many of the larger Catholic colleges. Thirty-nine institutions now have at least one professional department, while quite a number have several professional departments, in ad dition to post-graduate courses of study. Pre eminent among Catholic institutions of higher education in the United States is the Catholic University of America, which is under the di rection of the bishops, and which has a large post-graduate attendance and many affiliated institutions.
The college department of the Catholic Educational Association demands a require ment of 16 units for entrance to college and 128 hours as a minimum for graduation. Other requirements relating to the work and equip ment of the college have been adopted, and at the Buffalo meeting of the Association, in 1917, a committee was appointed by the colleges to carry out the work of standardization and classification. Seventy-six institutions are con ducted by the religious orders. Catholic col leges and universities are as a rule self-sup porting; only a few are even partially en dowed, with the exception of the Catholic Uni versity. Religious professors receive no salary, the services they render being entirely gratui tous; hence the college, being free to a great extent from the heavy financial burden of pro fessors' salaries, is able to devote the revenue derived from student fees to its general ex penses. Lay professors are not excluded, but their number is relatively small, except in a few instances. There is, however, a tendency
to increase the numl er of lay professors; many of the colleges are endeavoring to raise en dowment funds, largely with this end in view, and considerable success has attended these efforts. At any of the large Catholic colleges, if salaried laymen were to replace the religious teachers and officials, the change would in volve an expense ranging from $50,000 to $100, 000 a year— which would represent a capital between one and two million dollars. The gratuitously rendered services of the religious professors at the Catholic college or univer sity are therefore equivalent to an endowment fund, and in many instances its amount will compare favorably with the endowment of the better equipped non-Catholic institutions.
Catholic seminaries in the United States are either diocesan or religious, the former being destined for the training of the secular or diocesan clergy, and the latter for the training of the clergy of the religious orders. Diocesan seminaries are usually con ducted by secular priests under the direction of the Ordinary, while religious seminaries are in charge of members of the respective reli gious orders. The diocesan seminaries, although not nearly so numerous as the religious semi naries, have in the aggregate almost twice as many students as the latter; in the year 1915 there were 21 of the former with an enrol ment of 2,282, and 46 of the latter with an enrolment of only 1,394. Of preparatory sem inaries—these schools cover the ground of the classical course — there were the same year 11 diocesan institutions with an enrolment of 1,727 and 23 belonging to the religious orders with an enrolment of 1,734. Saint Mary's Seminary, Baltimore, in charge of the Sul picians; is the oldest of the diocesan seminaries, and has over 300 students. The oldest religious seminary is the Jesuit institution at Woodstock, Md., with nearly 200 students. The specific aim of the seminary discipline is the thorough spiritual formation of the candidate for the priesthood. The entrance requirements for ad mission to the seminary, whether diocesan or religious, involve the completion of the classi cal course. The length of the curriculum of the diocesan seminary was fixed by the Third Plenary Council of Baltimore at six years, two to be devoted to the study of philosophy and four to the study of theology. Practically the same length of time was prescribed for the curriculum of religious seminaries by recent legislation at Rome. Lecture courses on peda gogy and social and political science have lately been introduced into a number of the seminaries. On the material side, great changes have been made in recent decades. The new Kenrick Seminary at Saint Louis and the seminaries at New York, Boston, Philadel phia, Saint Paul and San Francisco, as well as the new religious establishments at the Catholic University, Washington, are models in the way of modern seminary buildings and equipment. In many other instances, where there has not been a complete reconstruction of the seminary plant, notable changes have been effected, including the erection of new buildings or the extension of old ones, im proved sanitary and cuisine arrangements and additions to the library and its equipment. Similar improvements have been made in the case of the preparatory seminaries. As a rule, diocesan seminaries are dependent upon the parish collections for their support. See also