POOR MEN AT AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES.

Wanganui Chronicle, Volume XLIX, Issue 12658, 21 November 1905, Page 7

POOR MEN AT AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES.

The " Pall Mall Gasfette " recently contained an article on the struggle for education at American universities by poor men, who could only, after a desperate struggle, succeed, in paying the usual fees and earn sufficient for a living. The ardour of these men is truly American; and the ways and means at Harvard alone range from shovelling coal in furnaces to singing in churdh Choirs and writing for newspapers. Here ds a typical case:— A young fellow deft "school at seventeen, and then spenlft two years as a clerk in a draper's shop. He then met a Harvard graduate, who fired Shim with University ambition. Forthwith he began study in a night school, and saved money for eighteen months. n« then succeeded in passing in enough subjects to enter the 1905 class.

During his " freshman " year he had extreme difficulty in making oot'i ends meet. He could not obtain a scholarship, but finally looked after the heating arrangement of a private howo, and later on 'became an ii.mateur bookagemt for a Boston Tjubli-shng house. The poor students of Harvard estimate their lowest rate of expense f. r a year at about 300 dollars, or, say. } GO. At Columbia University, in NW "Yo-iK city, the energy of poor students is so great that an employment I.Trivia has been started for the express purpose of finding convenient temporary i, •• j loyment for " hulling," out; Tw»iiift^ youths. Mr Myers, the k«•crcta.-y of this bureau, states that the students are so keen that even during the fihoit Easter recess he placed tw.Mi :y of lixm as assistants in florists' shops.

" During summer," Mr M.yo.s trsid, " hundreds of our fellows set t > work in real earnest, earning money wliish will help them through the Univ ro.*ul;y. i'ius work may vary from tut on ig to catering. I have just placed to.n. inon in hotels as bookkeepers, istenv!!*1 is, arid watchmen. During the summ-.-ii* mentis, also, I placed a good many a* t-.»nk clerks and directors of sum.:n<:r camps for boys.

" But our fellows are by no means partdculSl*, and will go from iio'i&e t.o house selling things, or as tram oar ccnductors, and even waiters at «.-.< a.-itlc at d mountain resorts. Now and ti.*» i one cf our students falls upon a ' -ioit thing.' You see, Columbia being light in .'\ Tvnv York city, all among the rai^lio-iaires, men and ladies will often pa*- our fellows five, ten, and even fifteen dol'ais an hour for looking after children and utoring on odd days. I know one man who made .2,800 dollars during 'ast college term, working only at odd b-1 rs in the afternoons, and yet keeping un his university study all the time. Indeed, ithere nave been many cases of a student temporarily employed in this way getting into the good graces of some great man, and being started out on the rapid road to wealth.