The Annual Conference of the Association of Teachers in Technical Institutions

Abstract

THE sixth annual conference of the above association was held in London during Whitsuntide, commencing Monday, May 27. The president of the association, Dr J. Clark (the Rector of the Kil-marnock Academy and director of Higher Education for Kilmarnock), in his address discussed at some length the factors which have raised the German nation to its present position in the industrial world. After dwelling upon the extent to which Germany was indebted in the past to the teaching and example of England in commercial matters, he emphasised the important influence which the views and speculations of philosophers such as Fichte have had upon the development of the German nation. As a result of Fichte's “Addresses to the German Nation” published in 1808, “the doctrine of the submission of the individual and of self-sacrifice as a prime necessity for national development became an integral part of the German character, and established that flexibility and responsiveness to State control and official authority that have led to achievements no other nation has yet been able to imitate.... Education became not only the privilege of the individual, but a duty to the State in so far that it enhanced his national value. Hence originated that increased enthusiasm for education that caused the country to be described as a ‘land of schools,’ and prepared the way for immediate development on the technical side when the time was opportune.”