THE AMOS TUCK SCHOOL OF ADMINISTRATION AND FINANCE

In the review of the work of the Tuck School for the year 1912-1913, published a year ago in the ALUMNI MAGAZINE, attention was called particularly to plans for extending the courses in business organization and management and in commerce, and to important appointments to the teaching staff which would permit intensive and extensive development of those fields. It was suggested that the School .had emerged from a period of experimental development and had attained a welldefined conception of its place in higher education for administration and commerce and of the probable lines of its future development.

This conception of the School's educational obligation to the business community was, that it should not attempt to train for a great variety of businesses, an attempt which is bound to result in more or less superficial training, but should aim to train thoroughly, in those basic functions of business which underlie all different kinds of business. The various kinds of business do not after all differ as much as is commonly supposed in the principles involved in their practice, as in superficial aspects such as materials, technical methods, and terminology. There are certain primary functions, common to all business, in which every student, no matter what business he plans to enter, should receive the greater part of his instruction. Most important among these are the functions of organization, administration, and management. There are other functions, also common to all business, such as the accounting, statistical, legal and banking functions, which for most businesses should be considered auxiliary only and should receive proportionate attention in the School's curriculum.

The year 1913-14, therefore, in the development of the Tuck School, is characterized by a further divergence from the general tendency as to organization of courses in schools of administration and commerce. The general tendency seems to be to develop curricula extensively by adding courses concerned, by title at least, with a great variety of businesses. The Tuck School, analyzing the general field of business by functions, rather than by businesses, organizes its curriculum so as to offer thorough, intensive training to all its students in the great primary functions common to all business. Its graduates, therefore, are ready to adapt themselves to 'the performance of any of these primary functions, no matter what the particular business may be in which the function is to be performed.

As a result of this analysis of the educational problem and resultant conception of its obligation, the School began the year 1913-14 with the purpose of making instruction in administration, organization and management the central part of the work of all students not intending to become functional specialists (which is a large majority of its students) and of making instruction in the auxiliary functions occupy a relatively smaller proportion of their attention. Provision was made for more intensive and more extensive development of the field of organization and management by the appointment to its staff of a Yale graduate who had had experience in applying the principles of scientific management under Taylor and Cooke.

It was recognized by the School, however, that there is a demand in business for a number of functional specialists that such specialization offers an attractive and remunerative career, and that each year a number of its students desire to train particularly for such specialization. An analysis of the functions of business disclosed that five functions stand out conspicuously as demanding specialists with such insistence as to oblige a school like the Tuck School to offer the opportunity for training for specialized business service. These are the functions of the organizing engineer, the accountant, the statistician, the foreign exchange manager and the board of trade secretary. Opportunity for more intensive work along such of these lines as were not already adequately organized was provided by the appointment of Professors Shelton (scientific management), Phillips (banking), and Mr. Smith (commercial secretary courses), and by the relief of Professor Person from certain courses assumed by Mr. Smith that he might cooperate with Professor Shelton in the development of the courses in organization and management, and might also further develop the courses in statistics.

In the first place the Tuck School as a graduate school is built upon a large number of college courses such as chemistry, physics, etc., which have given the student acquaintance with materials, terminology and technical methods employed in business. In the second place, among the courses of the first year is one, The Resources and Industries of the United States, whose purpose is to review for students the technical development of the principal industries. In the third place, and most important, students in the second year are required to undertake an investigation, the results of which are presented in a thesis. The requirement of a thesis has two purposes: to afford the student exercise in finding and wholly or partially solving in a thoroughly business-like (i. e. scholarly) manner, a specific business problem; to afford also an opportunity for special instruction to each student by the instructor in charge of his thesis in and around the subject of the thesis. A student who plans to become a business specialist, such as accountant, statistician or board of trade secretary, chooses a thesis subject compelling intensive investigation within the field of his choice. If he is a student planning to enter the manufacturing or merchandising field, with a particular business in view, he can choose a thesis subject which will compel him to acquaint himself with the materials, technical methods, problems, etc., of that business. Therefore, while the School aims to train its students primarily in basic business functions instead of in a great variety of businesses, secondarily the requirement of a thesis affords any student the opportunity to familiarize himself with any particular business.

Notwithstanding the numerous changes in the nearly fifteen years of the School's existence, in , range and organization of its curriculum and in methods of attacking its problems, one ideal has remained constant and is today more firmly established than ever. That is, that the Tuck School shall stand among professional schools for what the College strives to stand among academic institutions, as a great teaching institution. Its purpose is not by organization to offer opportunity and then permit its students to accept or reject as their moods may prompt them. Its purpose is to offer, in addition to opportunity, inspiration which shall compel acceptance. This requires on the part of every member of its staff a large measure of loyalty, indefatigable effort and insight into the purposes of the School. Every member of the staff offers these in full measure.

Considering the difficulties involved in organizing and conducting new courses of instruction the fields of which had not been previously analyzed and the principles formulated for purposes of instruction, the work of the past year has been encouraging, and has confirmed the School's judgment concerning the lines along which its development should be directed. The modest achievements of the first year of emphasis on organization and management and of the first year of organized instruction for secretarial service have received notice from outside the community by the appointment of one member of the teaching staff, by the association of secretaries of Massachusetts boards of trade, to a special committee on the development of New England's foreign trade, and by the election of another member of the staff to the presidency of The Society to Promote the Science of management.

But inspiration comes not so much from such recognition of past performance as from the possibilities of future achievement which past performance discloses. It has been an object of the School to supplement instruction in principles by instruction in their application, i. e., in practice. The enlargement of the instructing force made possible during the past year more serious endeavors in this direction than had before been possible. Several students chose as theses subjects local problems of organization and management, and so successful under the better organized direction were their investigations, that during the present summer plans are being carried out for extending such cooperation between the School and business concerns into a wider territory. The manufacturing and the merchandising concerns of the Connecticut Valley offer an excellent opportunity for such cooperation as will provide the School with an adequate laboratory and the cooperating concerns with valuable assistance in the investigation of their business problems.

The enrollment of the School during the past year was forty-five first year and nineteen second year students. Both years showed an increase. The increase of the second year was the greater and was particularly significant as showing a growing appreciation by students of where the valuable part of Tuck School training is to be found. The prospects for next year are about fifty first year and twenty or more second year students.