CHEMICAL INDUSTRY AND THE CURRICULUM* ALPREDH. WRITE. UNIVERSITY O F MICHIGAN, ANNARBOR.MICHIGAN
A student's general training should fit him to think accuratdy and express himself clearly. His professional training should be directed toward a specific sphere of usefulness. Thirty years ago ability to make analyses was the most important end. Now most routine analyses are made by untrained analysts. Until rather recent years the chemist attemptd from his laboratory to supervise plant operations actually directed by superintendents who were not chemically trained. Now plant operations are directed by superintendents who understand the theory of the process as well as the technic of factory operation. The plant laboratory i s no lunger a goal. The worthwhile fields are i n research, dmelopment, and operation. All of these fields demand a n ability to apply general laws to new conditions. Mathematics and physics should be emphesized and special attention placed on the formulation of problems. Laboratory work in chemistry should be restricted, and principles and problems stressed.
. . . . . . Thirty years ago the American Chemical Society celebrated the twentyfifth anniversary of its foundation, and in that same year William McMurtrie delivered his presidential address to that organization on the subject, "The Condition, Prospects, and Future Educational Demands of the Chemical Industries," from which the following paragraphs are quoted: So then we find that the chemical industries of the United States are growing with enormous rapidity; t h a t they are being concentrated into fewer but larger works; t h a t operations and reactions are being carried out with a magnitude which the earlier chemists would never have predicted; t h a t new methods are being followed; new principles applied, greater accuracy of results demanded both as to quality and yield of the products; that the products now issue from the works in lots of tons a t a time of a higher degree of purity and with a greater economy than was possible hut a few years ago with lots of a few hundred pounds. And if so great advance has been made during the closing quarter century and even decade, what shall we say of the possibilities of the future? What is to he the magnitude of the chemical industries of the United States? What shall be the character of the products issuing from them? What will they require of the men who must direct and control them? That is t o say, what will be the educational requirements of the American chemical industries of the almost immediate future?
These words from an address delivered a generation ago may be applied without change to our present situation. The growth of the chemical industry and the improvements in quality of products as well as scale of operation have surpassed even the wildest expectations of Dr. McMurtrie's generation, but his queries as to the future demands of the industrial world still call for our most careful consideration. * Contribution to the symposium on "Coiiperation between Industry and Chemical Education," held under the auspices of the Division of Chemical Education a t the 81st meeting of the A. C. S. a t Indianapolis, Indiana, March 31, 1931. 2016
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At the time of the delivery of his address the American Chemical Society had a membership of 1750 and it was estimated that there were 5000 chemists in the United States, of whom eighty per cent were connected with industry. Now the American Chemical Society enrols ten times as many members as thirty years ago. Statistics are lacking as to the total number of chemists in our country a t the present time, and no accurate census would be possible without agreement on the definition of a chemist. It is certain however that, if we exclude retail pharmacists and physicians as more properly belonging in a diierent category, the chemical industry still employs most of those who have any right to the name of chemist. Those who were preparing t o become professional chemists a generation ago expected as a matter of Gourse to enter the laboratory of some plant and perform the analyses needed to permit the process to function in its normal manner. Now analytical chemistry is standardized and methods of analysis are well worked out. Standard samples are available so that the analyst may check the accuracy of his work. A few skilled chemists are needed in large plant laboratories to handle the unusual analyses and to act as supervisors, hut most of the analytical work is done by assistants who work accurately and rapidly without having proceeded farther in their formal training than the high school. Some of these young men and women educate themselves to become real chemists. Most of them remain merely skilled workmen. There is a demand for a large number of such routine analysts, and whether we like it or not, they are called chemists. So also there is a real field for young men who have completed their high-school course and also pursued a further and, usually, highly technical curriculum of two years' duration designed to give them specific training for a particular industry as well as some grasp of fundamental principles. I am not, in this paper, dis-cussingsuch a cumculum hut considering only the program of a four-year college course designed to train men for professional service in chemical industry. Has the curriculum in chemistry in our colleges changed with the change in emphasis in the industrial world? There have been profound changes in our theories. When I was a student I was taught that an excess of a reagent meant one molecule more than the theoretical amount. So also we were firmly convinced that atoms were little round balls stuck on wires which might be built up into curious structures. Mathematics and chemistry were strangers. A commonly accepted conception of physics was that it dealt with changes in particles of matter larger than the molecule. The molecule and the atom belonged in the domain of chemistry. Then physics played a mean trick on chemistry by vaulting over the molecule and atom, and by exploring the space within the atom gave us an entirely new viewpoint of the structure of matter. Physical chemistry has come into being since my day as a student and the laws of equilibrium and mass
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action permeate or a t least should permeate, all of our courses. Synthesis of carbon compounds and a study of structure has replaced the study of methods of proximate analysis which formed an important part of the curriculum when I studied organic chemistry. A college curriculum may be sub-divided in various ways at the whim of the investigator. One method is to divide the courses into those which are strictly professional and those which are general. The general courses should give a student training in scientific method, the ability to think clearly, and to express himself well, and a general background of knowledge which will prevent him from being grossly ignorant when discussing non-professional subjects. The professional courses include those subjects which give specific training for a chosen career. A college is a good deal like a factory which receives, as its raw material, forgings already partially fabricated and which further shapes and refines these bits of metal and then hands them over to a purchaser who fits them into his own machine. The college must turn out a marketable product or it will fail just as any other manufacturer will fail under similar conditions. One of the first questions to be settled in considering the curriculum which should be adopted in training men for the chemical industry is the use to which the manufacturer is going to put the college graduate. I have already alluded to the fact that the college graduate formerly looked forward to a career in the analytical laboratory and that the situation has changed. The routine analytical laboratory may frequently be the place where college graduates commence their industrial work, and where those who lack energy and initiative find themselves permanently stranded, but it is not a field to which graduates should aspire. The desirable fields for young men with chemical training are in the research, development, or process divisions. For the research division,. graduate training is almost imperative. Research workers must not only be prepared to work accurately and intelligently, but to generalize from a mass of specific experiments, and extract therefrom the general law. The workers in this field must, of course, be trained in the various divisions of chemistry but they must also possess a thorough knowledge of physics and mathematics. The development division has been established in rather recent years to translate the results of the research laboratory into the practice of plant operation. Men in this division must know the methods of forcing chemical reactions to take desired paths and the feasibility of the various methods which are theoretically possible. They must not only be able to calculate the amount of beat to be absorbed or removed from a reaction, and the changes due to temperature and pressure, but must also know how to maintain desired conditions and economical operation on a manufacturing scale. They must know the properties of materials and be able to
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balance cost against efficiency. Most chemical processes may be divided into a rather small number of operations largely physical in nature which are called unit operations. Such subjects as heat transfer, filtration, evaporation, and crushing are instances of these unit operations. Courses in these subjects have been developed during the last ten years and are now well established. Those who aspire to enter the development division should be familiar with this field. The advent of chemically trained men into the control of the manufacturing process is also rather recent. In the older days the chemist sat in his laboratory and told the plant superintendent when something was wrong. The plant superintendent probably did not understand the problem and did not know what to do about it, but resented advice from an outsider. There was almost necessarily lack of cooperation. When chemically trained men were placed in the factory as operatives or foremen, they were in a position to understand the plant superintendent's difficulties as well as the chemist's viewpoint, and as these men later were promoted to be themselves superintendents there came a better coordination of the plant and the laboratory. The modem superintendent is no longer dependent upon the advice of the laboratory chemist for he is capable of supplying his own interpretation of the analytical data submitted to him. The control laboratory has therefore become a service laboratory and lost its status as a directing institution. It is hardly necessary to say that the student who is preparing for an operating position needs not only chemistry and physics but also considerable training in the methods of conducting operations on the manufacturing scale. When a graduate leaves college and enters industrial work in any of its divisions his first success usually comes from his ability to do something which the men around him could not do. The student's ability to use his information should be constantly stressed. It is not enough to memorize principles and demonstrations. A student must be able not only to obtain and record data, but also to analyze and generalize from them. The formulation and solution of problems should be an important part of every single course in chemistry, mathematics, and physics. The program which is indicated for a student ambitious to rise in chemical industrial work is one which includes mathematics through calculus, with emphasis upon the ability to formulate problems as well as to carry through the mathematical operation. This calls for cooperation on the part of the mathematics teacher. In physics also emphasis should be placed on problems. The time devoted to mathematics and physics together should be as much as that devoted to chemistry. The work in chemistry should be devoted to an understanding of principles as evidenced by the ability to solve problems. Laboratory work should be restricted. Exercises should be chosen which illustrate prin-
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ciples and which develop habits of accuracy. Qualitative analysis is, in itself, unimportant. Quantitative analysis is valuable hut has in the past been overdone. The amount of attention given to organic chemistry may well vary with the major interest of the student. Physical chemistry should pervade all of the courses. The courses in physical chemistry proper should be taught rigidly and from a mathematical standpoint. Too much attention has often been paid to dilute solutions. The chemical industries are seeking to force reactions into definite paths, and a study of equilibrium and the methods of displacing it is of prime importance. The aim of a college cumculum should be to prepare the graduate to progress in his chosen field. Stress should therefore he placed on those subjects which he is not likely to master by individual reading or study after he becomes engaged in practical work. He is not likely to undertake a study of a new subject, particularly if it is mathematical in nature. He will, however, pursue with relative ease new developments in a subject with whose fundamentals he is familiar. The three subjects of mathematics, physics, and chemistry should constitute the backbone of the course. English, languages, and economics offer a relief from the strictly scientific work and have a professional as well as a general value. The complete solution of any manufacturing problem involves an economic factor which cannot be taught adequately in college. Courses of study intended to train young men for industry should contain the elements of economics and accounting, for although corporations are organized ostensibly to make a wide variety of things, they are all organized actually to make only one thing and that is money. It is a mistake, however, to lay too much emphasis on courses in economics and business administration. A student who expects to rise in his profession must keep studying constantly after leaving college. He will not have much need of business administration during the early years of his professional life. Books on business methods are plentiful and should offer no terrors to the student whose mind has been developed by a rigorous course in scientific study. The ambitious young man will obtain a knowledge of finance, sales, and other important subjects in advance of the time when he needs them, through correspondence schools or through private study. French and German are less important than a generation ago because much more of the research work of the world is published in English than was formerly the case, and because Chemical Abstracts brings the most important information from the foreign journals. However, any one who aspires to graduate study, or research or development work should acquire a foundation in these two languages, upon which he may build through his individual study. The preceding sections of this paper have discussed the subjects which should, in the author's opinion, be contained in any course of study fitting men for chemical industry. The man who expects to remain in the research
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laboratory may succeed without much knowledge of the materials used in the plant or the methods of securing efficientand economical results on the large scale. The number of men who are employed in laboratory research is and probably will continue to be a small fraction of the chemists who are connected with manufacturing operations. The student who is not strongly attracted to the research laboratory and who thinks his interests will lie in development or operation rather than the laboratory, should certainly study the unit operations which underlie the various chemical processes, and their applications to industrial work. He should also have some knowledge of power and its utilization in machines. This is a heavy program and should apparently call for more than four years of preparation. It might seem that the technical courses should be restricted to a fifth year, but the trend is distinctly against it. The student enjoys the work more and absorbs i t better if the applications are taught a t about the same time as the theory. In planning a curriculum for men who are to be trained for active participation in industrial work I would divide the course into five ribbons which would, within practical limitations, continue through the whole four years and have equal width. These ribbons would be first, English, languages, and economics; second, mathematics and physics; third, chemistry; fourth, chemical engineering; and fifth, other engineering. A student with that foundation who wished to go forward into graduate work with major emphasis upon chemistry as a science rather than upon its applications could build upon it with certainty and would be of more value as a research chemist because of his ability to understand the problems of the men who would be expected to translate his discoveries into practice. His path would not he blocked if he desired later to transfer his activities to plant operation. Students who have had superior records in such a curriculum as undergraduates and who have received graduate training and preferably progressed to their doctorate are being eagerly sought by industry and paid attractive salaries. The way is clear for them to progress by their own efforts along whatever line seems to them most desirable and promising. The representatives of the larger corporations who come to our schools seeking desirable recruits lay much stress on ability, energy, and character in an applicant. They state that they can use a superior man no matter what his training has been. That does not, however, give us who are teachers an excuse for failing to recognize that we may greatly help or greatly hinder the student in his future career by the course of study and the way it is taught. The cumculum is more than a collection of courses. It is a source of development, and should be of inspiration, directed by an enthusiastic and well-trained teacher. No curriculum can succeed if the teaching staff
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does not keep in view the purpose of the whole program and is not willing to subordinate individual ideas to the general plan. And no teacher of chemistry can be a success if he does not understand the value of mathematics and physics as well as chemistry. If there are still schools requiring or permitting undergraduate or graduate students to continue taking course after course in chemistry without keeping a balance with mathematics and physics, they need not be surprised a t the resentment of their graduates who find progress blocked by the narrowness of their preparation.
