EDITORIAL
Industry's aid to education The spread between what is permitted by law and what is provided is not exactly a record to rest on
T
he U.S. has long worked toward the principle of universal education. As we extend the principle to ever higher levels of education, however, it remains to be proved that w e will have the ability to continue to evolve a system that will serve us well. By 1975, for example, twoand four-year colleges will have about 8 million students enrolled in them. That's the same number as were enrolled in high schools in 1956, and one question we now face is, do w e w a n t the college education system of 1975 to resemble that of our high school system of 1956? Dr. Kenneth Pitzer, president of Rice, was in N e w York a few days ago to accept honorary membership in T h e Chemists' Club, and that's the question h e addressed himself to. As he sees it, we now have a very diverse system of higher education that meets the needs of the range of talents enrolled. However, rapid growth, such as w e now face, will tend to replace diversity with uniformity, and with uniformity will come lower quality, especially for the really talented who will b e the major contributors to scientific advances a decade or two hence. Dr. Pitzer suggests that strong private colleges and universities will aid in keeping quality u p w h e r e it should be. In such institutions the minds of tomorrow's scholars will b e honed toward perfection. In addition, by providing high standards of excellence, the private institutions will help the public ones to maintain their diversity, too. Unfortunately, private institutions lack money, and they will probably have to turn more and more to public funds for support. Public funding "by the very distant and impersonal nature of its control," h e observes, "tends toward a pattern of financing by formula and eventual uniformity . . . . [However] it is not the positive forces of [public] financing which are likely to attenu-
ate the special characteristics of private colleges and universities; rather it is simply the inadequacy of the private support which may prevent their growing and developing in a m a n n e r maintaining their u n i q u e characteristics." Speaking in Baltimore some months ago, Gerald L. Phillippe, chairman of General Electric, said, " W h e n it comes to state support, all of us are aware of schools in which relatively small changes in philosophy and b u d g e t can have almost cataclysmic effects on system stability w h e n there is a change of leadership in the state capital. In the situation as it actually is, the private unrestricted dollar . . . often becomes the dollar of maximum leverage for keeping a school on course." T h e chemical industry has been better than most in aiding education ( C&EN, Oct. 23, 1967, p a g e 5 4 ) . T h e men w h o control the industry's dollars, however, might well ask themselves if they are close to doing enough. H o w much the industry gives for education has never been determined exactly, but it probably devotes about 1 % of its pretax earnings to philanthropies of all types, with somewhat more than half of that going to aid education. Contributions thus run in the $60 million-a-year range, some $30 million of which goes to education. Tax laws allow corporations to give u p to 5 % of their pretax earnings to all causes. Stockholders might b e expected to look for new managements were contributions suddenly to rise to something nearer the $300 million permitted by law. T h e spread between what is done and what is permitted, however, is not exactly a record to rest on.
A P R I L 1, 19o8 C & E N
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