Beforethe1850s,theUnitedStateshadanumberofsmallcolleges,mostofthemdatingfromcolonialdays.Theyweresmall,churchconnectedinstitutionswhoseprimaryconcernwastoshapethemoralcharacteroftheirstudents.Meanwhile,throughoutEurope,institutionsofhigherlearninghaddeveloped.
InGermanuniversitywasconcernedprimarilywithcreatingandspreadingknowledge,notmorals.
Betweenmid-centuryandtheendofthe1800s,morethanninethousandyoungAmericans,dissatisfiedwiththeirtrainingathome,wenttoGermanyforadvancedstudy.Someofthemreturntobecomepresidentsofvenerablecolleges—Harvard,Yale,Columbia—andtransformthemintomodernuniversities.Thenewpresidentsbrokealltieswiththechurchesandbroughtinanewkindoffaculty.
Professorswerehiredfortheirknowledgeofasubject,notbecausetheywereoftheproperfaithandhadastrongarmfordiscipliningstudents.DrillingandmemorizingwerereplacedbytheGermanmethodoflecturing,inwhichtheprofessorsownresearchwaspresentedinclass.Withtheestablishmentoftheseminarsystem,graduatestudentlearnedtoquestion,analyze,andconducttheirownresearch.
Atthesametime,thenewuniversitygreatlyexpandedinsizeandcourseofferings,breakingcompletelyoutoftheold,constrictedcurriculumofmathematics,classics,rhetoric,andmusic.ThepresidentofHarvardpioneeredtheselectivesystem,bywhichstudentswereabletochoosetheirowncourseofstudy.Thenotionofmajorfieldsofstudyemerged.Thenewgoalwastomaketheuniversityrelevanttotherealpursuitsoftheworld.Payingcloseattentiontothepracticalneedsofsociety,thenewuniversitiestrainedmenandwomentoworkatitstasks,withengineeringstudentsbeingthemostcharacteristicofthenewsystem.Studentswerealsotrainedaseconomists,architects,agriculturalists,socialwelfareworkers,andteachers.
