Technical Education and Royal Indian Engineering College
イギリスにおける技術教育とインド工学校
commenced in January 14, 2015, revised in April 1, 2021.
Technical Education and Royal Indian Engineering College
イギリスにおける技術教育とインド工学校
commenced in January 14, 2015, revised in April 1, 2021.
I. Beginning of Engineering Education in Britainイギリスにおける技術者教育の始まり
--The Britain traditionally fostered
I-1. The Education and Status of Civil Engineers, in the United Kingdom and in Foreign Country, Institute of Civil Engineers, 1870.
I-2. On the Value of a National System of Technical Education, by John Scott Russel, Esq., Vice-President of the Institute of Civil Engineers. Being an abstract of a discourse delivered at the Conversazione of the Society, held in the Museum of Science and Art, on 24th January 1867. Awarded the special thanks of the Society.
You will readily imagine that when I accepted the invitation to meet you here, on the occasion of this may long promised visit to this city, it was impossible for me not to accept with heartfelt pleasure the opportunity of meeting again so many old friends and fellow-workers, and to join once more my efforts to yours in promoting the diffusion of scientific knowledge, and in encouraging and helping its successful applications to all those practical arts, occupations, professions, and industries which feed the commerce and occupy the people of this mercantile country, and which are so rapidly and on so gigantic a scale accelerating the civilisation of mankind.
Since the above paper was read before the Society, Parliament has passed
a Health Bill for Scotland, entitled “ The Public Health (Scotland) Act,
1867,” which gives increased powers to the Board of Supervision , and places it within the grasp of the minority of the householders in a populous place to enforce sanitary clauses for drainage, water supply, and the regulating of lodying - houses. This Act was passed on the 15th August 1867 , and came into operation on the 1st day of November, and the provisions of the Bill render health measures practically compulsory in Scotland.
For no less than forty years you and I have been labouring together in this great work of applying science to the advancement of the uses and destinies of our fellowmen. And although I have now been absent from among you for near thirty years, I feel it to be a real pleasure to find that we have not been changed by time in our views of the duties of life ; that you still prose cute successfully your efforts to educate and to advance society; and that you still feel, as I do , that scientific knowledge has been conferred on society as a great boon from God, and that its purpose is to enable men to employ all the great and long-hidden powers of nature for the advancement of the human race, and for the purpose of rendering them more intelligent, more refined, abler, wiser, happier, better than they have been in the earlier, ruder stages of society. I join with you, therefore, this evening with great satisfaction in adding my feeble co -operation to yours. It is only an act of gratitude to you to give you the aid of my best thoughts, for it was in the rooms of your Society that, some forty years ago, I read my first paper, on the “Application of Science to some of the Engineering Arts,” and it was the great kindness with which you then viewed my first efforts that much encouraged me to devote ever since then all my leisure from specific duties to efforts for the advancement of knowledge, to the practical education of the people, and to the application of abstract science to the realities of life. When I left Edinburgh, it was to undertake at Greenock the construction of steam-engines and steamships on the large scale, such as formerly I had only made on a very small one. The experience I gained there enabled me afterwards in England to design and construct such vessels on a scale, of a power, with a speed, and with perfections such as in old times we never dreamed of.
But I frankly confess to you that it is to the early lessens
THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF THE BRITISH EMPRE, VOLUME V EDITED BY H.H. DOWEL, 1932
PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT 963 special selection, and from qualified students of Indian engineering colleges. The Thomason College at Rurki, opened in t848, beim to furnish enginarrs to the department in 1850. The Poona Civil En-gineering College, established in x854for the education ofsubordinates for the Bombay public works department, developed in 1865 into a college of science at Poona affiliated to the Bombay University and educating candidates for an engineering degree. The Madras Civil Engineering College, affiliated to the Madras University in 1877, also prepared students for engineering degrees. In England the Royal Engineering College at Cooper's Hill was established in Mr for the education of civil engineers for service in the Indian public works department. The age of admission was seventeen to twenty-one, and the mune lasted three years. As students began to pan out of Cooper's Hill in sufficient numbers, the recruitment of civil engineers from other sources gradually ceased in England. In 0876 Lord Salisbury, then secretary of state, wrote that, as the European portion of the superior public works establishments was provided through Cooper's Hill, the Indian engineering colleges might be regarded as particularly intended for natives of India. Eventually it was decided that of thirty recruits appointed in 1885, 1886 and 1887, nine were to be taken from Indian colleges, fifteen from Cooper's Hill, and six from the Royal Engineers. The work of the public works department was distributed among three branches: (a) "General" winch woe subdivided into "Roads and Buildings " and " Irrigation", (I) Sta. Railways and (r) Accounts. Each branch includedan upper and a lower subordinate establishment. The finance department was directly controlled by the Government of India. Officers of its superior staff were liable foe employment in any province. The functions of the department were to bring to account and audit the expenditure of all branches of the civil ad-ministration and to deal with questions relating to paper currency, loan operations and coinage. The nine accountants-general of pro-vinces were treasurers of charitable endowments and responsible for the proper check by officers of their department of the accounts of such local bodies as district and municipal boards. They further supervised the movements of funds from one district treasury to another ; and were themselves suborclinate to a comptroller and auditor-general. The whole superior staff of the department num-bered 17s. Below this staff were chief superintendents and chief accountants. Up to the year Ogg, while the higher posts were generally filled by trained members of the Indian Civil Service, the remainder were filled wholly in India. Then it was found that the local supply of suitably qualified Europeans and Eurasians was in-sufficient, and it was decided that at least four out of nine vacancies should be filled by recruitment in England. In tgog it was arranged that half the vacancies should be reserved for natives of India.
THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF THE BRITISH EMPRE, VOLUME V EDITED BY H.H. DOWEL, 1932
PUBLIC WORKS DEPARTMENT 963 special selection, and from qualified students of Indian engineering colleges. The Thomason College at Rurki, opened in t848, beim to furnish enginarrs to the department in 1850. The Poona Civil En-gineering College, established in x854for the education ofsubordinates for the Bombay public works department, developed in 1865 into a college of science at Poona affiliated to the Bombay University and educating candidates for an engineering degree. The Madras Civil Engineering College, affiliated to the Madras University in 1877, also prepared students for engineering degrees. In England the Royal Engineering College at Cooper's Hill was established in Mr for the education of civil engineers for service in the Indian public works department. The age of admission was seventeen to twenty-one, and the mune lasted three years. As students began to pan out of Cooper's Hill in sufficient numbers, the recruitment of civil engineers from other sources gradually ceased in England. In 0876 Lord Salisbury, then secretary of state, wrote that, as the European portion of the superior public works establishments was provided through Cooper's Hill, the Indian engineering colleges might be regarded as particularly intended for natives of India. Eventually it was decided that of thirty recruits appointed in 1885, 1886 and 1887, nine were to be taken from Indian colleges, fifteen from Cooper's Hill, and six from the Royal Engineers. The work of the public works department was distributed among three branches: (a) "General" winch woe subdivided into "Roads and Buildings " and " Irrigation", (I) Sta. Railways and (r) Accounts. Each branch includedan upper and a lower subordinate establishment. The finance department was directly controlled by the Government of India. Officers of its superior staff were liable foe employment in any province. The functions of the department were to bring to account and audit the expenditure of all branches of the civil ad-ministration and to deal with questions relating to paper currency, loan operations and coinage. The nine accountants-general of pro-vinces were treasurers of charitable endowments and responsible for the proper check by officers of their department of the accounts of such local bodies as district and municipal boards. They further supervised the movements of funds from one district treasury to another ; and were themselves suborclinate to a comptroller and auditor-general. The whole superior staff of the department num-bered 17s. Below this staff were chief superintendents and chief accountants. Up to the year Ogg, while the higher posts were generally filled by trained members of the Indian Civil Service, the remainder were filled wholly in India. Then it was found that the local supply of suitably qualified Europeans and Eurasians was in-sufficient, and it was decided that at least four out of nine vacancies should be filled by recruitment in England. In tgog it was arranged that half the vacancies should be reserved for natives of India.
Feb.4, 1871 The Builder, Civil Engineering College for India
An apt illustration of our recent article on the "Education in this Country,! appeared a proposal for the establishment, or rather the modification, of a College for the education of Civil Engineers for the Service of the Indian Government, under the auspices of the India Office. It is perhaps but little known that for the last twelve years a college has been established at Cooper's Hill, Surrey, for this purpose. Admission has been gained by a competitive examination on technical subjects; the object of the course being to recruit the college from students already possessed of the regiments of mechanical knowledge. Not withstanding the considerable inducements offered by the Indian Public Works Department to attract competent men to its service, this college has hitherto proved a failure. We can not bet think that this must, to some extent, be owing to the want of due publicity. Few persons, we are assured, can have been aware of the existence of an institution which opened a definite means of admission into a service that gave occupation, in the year 1869, to 896 officers, of whom 533 were civilians; and in which the salaries rise from 300l. per annum for third grade assistant engineers, to 3,000l. per annum for chief engineers of the first class. The head of the department is the Public Works Secretary of India, whose salary is 4,200l. per annum. The expenditure which it is estimated that this department will have to superintend in the year1870-71 amounts to nearly 7 and half millions sterling. Of this1,230,000l. are devoted to State railways; 1,500,000l. to roads and miscellaneous public works; 2,400,000l. to irrigation works; and 700,000l. to civil buildings. Yet not only has there been no competition for the appointments to the college, but the number of students who have succeeded in passing a very low qualifying examination has been below the number of vacancies. In 1869, out of forty appointments offered for competition, no less than twenty-seven lapsed.
The conclusion being thus arrived at "that the present state of scientific education in the country does not afford the needful means of supplying direct to the Indian Government a sufficient number of qualified person who are able to undergo an educational test of reasonable strictness," a new system has been decided upon. Admission is to be obtained by competitive examination, to which all British-born subjects, between seventeen and twenty-one years of age, who can produce satisfactory testimonials of good moral character, are eligible. The course will extend over three years, subjects to diminution on proof of competent knowledge in the requisite subjects being already possessed. And all the students who pass satisfactorily through the course will be appointed to the Indian Public Works Department as assistant engineers, second grade, with a salary of 420l. per annum, and provided with a free passage to India.
The full publication of these advantageous terms, conjoined with the belief that the management of the Public Works Department is to be improved, ought to produce abundance of competitors for the fifty scholarships. The payment to be made for each student is 150l, per annum, in installments of 50l. for each of the three terms into which the year is divided. We conclude that the entire expense of the student, including his clothes, or at least a college uniform, will be defrayed by the college, in consideration of this payment ; but this is not stated. It is intended that at least two out of the three terms shall be passed by the student under a civil or mechanical engineer, whose feeB will be defrayed by the college. The pupil will receive an allowance of five shillings a day for lodging money and provisions, while thus absent from the college.
The subjects assigned for the entrance examination are mathematics, pure and mixed, natural and experimental science, and classics, each of which branches takes 2,000 marks ; English composition, history, and literature, 1,OOO marks; French and German, 750 marks each 5 mechanical and free-hand drawing, 500 marks each. For more minute details we refer to the prospectus issued by the India Office.
The appearance of the prospectus of the new college renders it important to take a comprehensive glance at the carious establishments actually existing in this country in which it is proposed to give special education to young men destined for the profession of engineer, whether civil, mechanical, or marine. We have from time to time given accounts of what is doing in our Art and Science Schools. The organization of industrial education, as a whole, is a subject which has never even been seriously contemplated in this country. In all that has hitherto been attempted in connection with the establishment at South Kensington, applied art has been regarded as the ultimate object. Pure art, cultivated for its noblest aims, is beyond the scope of the Committee of Council on Education. Leaving out of question, then, this highest desideratum in the plan of any truly national culture, it is yet possible to design a general educational course, of which the teaching now given by the schools of art and science shall from a part, but which shall comprise the industrial training of the members of the principal handicrafts. The smith, for instance, to the practice of the forge and of the anvil, should add the knowledge of the elements of mechanics, of metallurgy, of chemistry, and of the principals of design, before he is in a condition tightly to avail himself of instruction as to ornamental hammer-work. In our recent exhibitions of modern smith-work. In our recent exhibitions of modern smith-work the absence of some such guidance is painfully evident.
The distinct branches of our various skilled industries group around, and culminate in, the functions of the engineer, civil and mechanical. Metal work, from the forging of a nail or the shoeing of a horse, to the tempering of a watch-spring or the hammer work of a steel coffer or cabinet; woodwork, from the mitering of a frame to the carving of an alter-screen; stone-work, from the quarry to the studio; textile work, from the spinning-wheel to the ribbon-loom; ceramic work, from the tile to the statuette, - all involve the practice of certain great constructive laws, which form the basis of the science and practice of the engineer. In the provision, then, which is made for the thorough education of this central workman we may find a measure of the probable outcome of our industrial skill in coming years.
As compared with the Continent, the provision for this normal industrial training may almost be said to be nil. The Royal School of Mines, and the Royal School of Naval Architecture and Marine Engineering, at South Kensington, are the only English institutions distinctly designed for giving special education of this nature, apart from one military establishment, In the former of these there were, during the session 1868-9, 17 students entering for one, two, or three years, with a view to become associates, and 93 occasional student entering for special subjects. In the Naval School there were in all 40 students. Such is the lamentable state of our special schools.
In the minor universities there has been an attempt to establish chairs, or faculties, of civil engineering. No provision appears to have been made for associating these lectureships with the Institution of Civil Engineers, or for obtaining the support and aid of tho leaders of the profession. Each of the classes thus formed appears to be abandoned to the private guidance of the professor; and the various inaugural lectures and signed reports of some of those gentlemen display strange instances of aberration and crotchet. One professor distinguishes himself by the advice "avoid Euclid as pestiferous," while, on the other hand, he "does not attach much importance" to the workshop as a means of education. Reliance on the most unpractical of all teaching, namely, lectures, is the characteristic of these classes.
The Department of Applied Sciences at King’s College, is intended for manufacturers as well as for engineers, and only desires to "form an appropriate introduction" to practical instruction. The Department of Civil and Mechanical Engineering at University College, London, is intended as an introduction to a regular pupilage. At the University of Edinburgh a course of a year less than in the two London colleges is supposed to qualify the attendant for a degree of Bachelor or Licentiate of Engineering, as to tho conferring of which legal difficulties exist. In Glasgow University a “certificate of proficiency in engineering science" is granted at the close of two sessions. It is recommended that "if possible, the elementary parts of mathematics should form part of the preliminary education" of the student who is to attain, in so short a time, a certificated proficiency. The Royal College of Science, Dublin, affords a more serious course of three years study, the third being specialised under the branches of mining, agriculture, engineering, and manufacturing. Twenty-eight students only have availed themselves of this college in the past year. The education may be ranked with that given by the School of Mines and the School of Naval Architecture, before referred to, and the weakest part of the case is the small number of students. The three years' course of civil engineering in Queen'e College, Cork, is also intended to be completed before the student enters an office. There is a three years' course of civil and mechanical engineering at Ov7en'g College, Manchester, which is also intended a9 preliminary to articles of pupilage, Trinity College, Dublin professes, in a three years' course, to "furnish all the information, practical as well as theoretical,” necessary to fit for practice.
It is evident that, whatever be the professed character of the two or three years’ course which, in King's College, University College, Glasgow University, Queen's College, Cork, and Owen's College, Manchester, is intended to prepare for pupilage, and which, in Edinburgh and in Trinity College, is thought sufficient to render unnecessary any practical grounding in the profession, none of these establishments can be considered as ranking so high as the Ecole Polytechnique in France, or the corresponding institutions in other parts of Europe. Moreover, while the Ecole Polytechnique demands for its entrance a rate of proficiency probably high enough to obtain the "diploma" of any of these newly established departments, the three years' course of that excellent establishment is only preparatory to a further term of three years spent in one of the more advanced and special schools of engineering, of which we have no counterparts in this country.
We fear that the attention at present given to our various industrial, scientific, and artistic schools will avail but little to place the English workman on the level now generally attained by his Continental rival, in the absence of any serious attempt to provide for a really superior course of education in industry, art, and science.
Apropos of the state of our technical and professional education, two illustrations have been brought before us, in consequence of our recent remarks on this important subject. One of these was an incident arising from that grievous national calamity, the loss of the Captain, a subject which has brought into evidence, in so striking a degree, tho unacquaintance of our public writers with the simplest elements of mechanics. That this defect is not peculiar to members of the literary profession may be learned from this astounding fact, one so discreditable that we are only induced to give it publicity from the high official authority on which we received it. A civil engineer of eminence, -of course, names are better avoided, -wrote to a Government department on the subject of the disaster. He remarked that a good deal had been said as to tho centre of gravity of the Captain, but that the fact was that No HOLLOW BODIES COULD HAVE ANY CENTRE OF GRAVITY!
The second anecdote we give on the authority of a man well known to all familiar with engineering matters. Under the advice of this gentleman, a young man went to one of the colleges which we have above mentioned, and passed creditably through the three years' course. He then, under the same advice, was articled to a marine engineer, and served a five years' apprenticeship, during which he did his best to carry on his college education' At the expiration of his articles, still following the advice of our informant, he went to Zurich, with the intention of passing through the superior course of technical education there to be obtained. On making proper inquiries after his arrival, he found, as he wrote to inform our friend, that if he did his best for eight months with a private tutor, he thought that he should be able to get through the pass- examination into the College! Here we have, first, college course, and then practical study, leading short of the threshold of the Swiss college, and yet we find an Edinburgh professor proposing to turn out the article ready made in there years by means of university lectures!
It seems to us that, especially considering that the acquisition of the Hindostanee language is to form an obligatory part of the college course, the term of three years proposed for the India College is inadequate to meet the requirements of the case. Nor do we think that the breaking up of the year into three terms is advisable. Considering tho slackness which invariably characterises the beginning of a term, and the time consumed by examination at the close, we think that half-yearly terms are by far the most advantageous. The examination at the close of each term should be a real test of the pupil'a ability and industry. The marks thus earned should be carried to his permanent credit, so that his final position should represent the merit and conduct of his entire collegiate life and not depend, as at Oxford and Cambridge, on cram and a spurt at the last. The combination of a practical acquaintance with the duties of the office, the field, and the workshop, with an adequate college course, will be attended with the utmost benefit to the student. Here, indeed, as in the course itself, the time allowed is too short. It must be remembered that far more will be thrown on the civil engineer in India than is the case in this country, and that it is of far more importance that he should be fully prepared to discharge the important functions to which he may there bc called than in circumstances where in case of need, he may readily have recourse to adequate aid. A five years' course, including a year and a half of actual practice, seems to us the minimum which is worth the name of collegiate tuition. In this case, the last three terms, or the year and a half after returning to the college, might very advantageously be specialised. Mechanical construction, architectural construction, marine construction, forestry mining, and metallurgy, are so many separate branches of the duty of the engineer. To attain full and equal proficiency in each would require a longer time than we have indicated, unless the scale of attainment at entering the college were something much higher than we can at present hope to be the case. It would, therefore, so far better for the public service if the division of the engineering staff under these several heads were made early enough to allow of a special prosecution of the selected branch of study.
On one point, it is hardly necessary to add, the success or failure of the India College, will mainly depend. We mean the selection of the tutors. We shall not be accused of any want of professional esprit de corps when we say, do not let the tutors be merely engineers. Let them be men specially educated for tuition, -men like the examiners for Woolwich, and not engineers without practice, who therefore call themselves professors. The glance which we have given at existing institutions should be conclusive on this point. Those of our readers who are most familiar with the subject will remember, without more distinct citation on our part, reports and incidents of more than one recent Government Commission which tell the same the tale. Important investigations, which ought to have borne valuable practical fruit, have come to a most ignominious class from the incapacity of what should have been the informing element of the entire machinery. Railway management in England and in Ireland, irrigation, sewage, river maintenance, -all these are subjects as to which there has been, within the last few years, more or less effort to settle tho main principles; attempts as yet resulting in nothing worthy of the actual science of the day. That such will continue to be the case so long as political schemes have precedence given to them over scientific questions we fear we must expect. It is tho more requisite that incompetent men should not be allowed to come to the fore as the representatives of a profession on the exercise of which, in its military and civil branches, tho safety, wealth, and prosperity of the country so intimately depend.
We speak at once with the more earnestness and the more confidence from tho fact that we suppose that we are regarding, not a private speculation, but a bona fide administrative effort to supply a great national want. Under this view of the case it is more than probable that the arrangements now proposed are the best for the moment, and that they may be regarded to a considerable extent as temporary. Thus, according to the prospectus the fifty highest competitors in 1871 are assured of studentships, however low may be tho positive qualification of the competitors. If hundreds of engineers are now urgently required, this may be all very well. Better fifty partially educated men for 1874 than none! But this must be, a~ soon as possible, amended. In, the same way the length of the course and the specialisation of the pursuits in the later terms, as above suggested, may be matter for subsequent amendment. The question of the choice of tutors is vital. We trust that, in any arrangement, the special qualifications of which tho Royal Engineers have ab present (most unfortunately) almost a monopoly, will not be lost sight of; and that some highly-educated member or members of this distinguished corps will be associated with the direction of tho course of study. As to the practical part, we suggest that the Council of the Institution of Civil Engineers should be brought into official correspondence with the College; and that it will not be the men who offer the most tempting terms for the allocation of a pupil, but the most eminent and the busiest engineers, engine-builders, and naval architects, into whose establishments the India College will obtain admission for their students. With these essential conditions fulfilled, we shall realise from this college an important benefit for our great Indian empire. We shall offer a distinct career to talent, industry, and merit, and we shall do for our Eastern dominions that which we ought to take shame and confusion to ourselves for not having hitherto even seriously attempted for our insular home, provided an adequate school for the civil engineers ; and associated with the attainment of a proper education, and the formation of a reliable character, the certain entrance on professional duty.
We have seen with regret that some professors of two or three institutions, which include in their programme a course of introduction in the lecture-room, to the practical instruction of the engineer, have not thought it derogatory to their position to protest before tho Government against the establishment of a thorough system of engineering education. Of the animus and good taste of such a proceeding the public will form their own opinion. We had hoped that we had survived the time when any person should claim a vested right in maintaining the ignorance of others. For the conductors of a] educational course, which bears about the sami relation to the training which we ought to give and which other countries do give, to the civi engineer, that a dame school bears to Eton or Rugby, to object to an effort to fill up a great gap in our public institutions, is not a matter which will much concern the Indian Government. What does concern them is that the education which they offer shall be so sound, extensive, and thorough, and that the inducements which the: offer to the best men to devote themselves to the hardships of an Indian exile shall be so url mistakable, that in our Indian College, as a Woolwich, we may be able to submit without shame to a fair comparison with the great Continental schools.
The Royal Indian Engineering College, Cooper's Hill, Stainers
This is one of the most important and complete of the modern establishments for Engineering Education and it will be interesting to give, not only a description of its present arrangement, but also a brief notice of its origin and history, which throw light on the past state of Engineering Education in this country.
The Institution was founded by the Secretary of State for India in 1871.
Some thirty years ago previously the Indian Government had awakened to the fact that there had been great neglect of Public Works in India, and that in this respect there was a painful contrast between the results of our rule, and the vast remains still to be seen all over India and Ceylon, of great works and monumental constructions, due to the ancient native Monarchies of the country.
it was supposed that among the large number of young men who were continually being trained for the profession of Engineering, many properly qualified persons might be ground who would be tempted to go out for the liberal life-provision offered by Indian Service, and it was determined to offer these appointments fo public competition.
Accordingly examinations were instituted periodically, under the direction of the India Office, and subject to the following conditions:--
The candidates were to be not exceeding twenty-four years of age, and most have already passed three either entirely with a practicing engineer, or partly thus and partly in studying engineering in a school or college recognized for this purpose.
The subjects of examination included (1) branches of preliminary education, such as Arithmetic, Mensuration, Trigonometry, Algebra, Euclid, and subjects in Mechanical Science; (2) Competence in Drawing and Surveying; (2) Questions in various branches of Practical Engineering, competency in any one sufficing for qualification.
The examinations were continued every year from 1859 to 1870, but the results were very unsatisfactory, so few of the candidates proving qualified The examination was not strict,
The College was opened in 1871. There was no lack of promising candidates for admission; the proposed plan of training was fully carried out, and the result was that about forty well-qualified recruits were sent our from the College annually to take service on the Public Service in India, where their work fully justified the system under which they were educated and chosen.
This had gone on for several years, when in 1878, the Indian Government, from imperative financial reasons, found it necessary to curtail largely the expenditure on public works, and as a consequence, to diminish the annual supply for Assistant Engineers by about one-half.
The curriculum at this College is very complete.
Admission to it is entirely open to all comers who conform to the regulations, about fifty students being admitted annually in September.
Candidates must be between the ages of 17 and 21; they must produce evidence that they are of good general moral character, and they must have received a good general education; in addition to which they must move such a proficiency in elementary mathematics as will enable them to follow the College course with advantage.
The admission examination to test this is not competitive and includes:--
(a) English composition, to the extent of being able to write, grammatically, and with correct spelling, in a nest and legible hand. The general education is tested by a examination in some classical or modern language, as well as in history or geography.
(b) Elementary Mathematics, comprising:--
Arithmetic
Elementary Algebra
Geometry (the first four and sixty books of Euclid),
Elementary Mensuration
Plane Trigonometry
The use of Logarithms
In the event of there being more qualified candidates for admission than the College can receive, the preference is given according to dates of applications.
The whole or any portion of the entrance examination may be dispensed with if the candidate produces a University diploma, or other equivalent certificate of a recognized examining body.
The course of education occupies three years, and is of a mixed character, comprising partly advancement in general scientific attainments, partly instruction in regard to the nature of engineering practice, drawing and surveying being thoroughly taught, and especially under the bead of "Applied Mechanics," the established theories of various branches of engineering.
The following description will illustrate this:--
First Year
Descriptive Engineering.
Geometrical and Engineering Drawing.
Surveying (partly in the field)
Freehand Drawing
Chemistry, and Chemical Laboratory
Physics
mathematics (plan analytical, geometry, elements of the calculus, statics, kinematics, and the elements of kinetics)
Geology
Elements of Architecture
French or German
Workshop
Second Year
Engineering and Applied Mechanics
Geometrical and Engineering Drawing
Surveying
Chemistry
Physics and Physical Laboratory
Mathematics
Geology
Elements of Architecture
French, or German, or Freehand Drawing(Alternative)
Third Year
Engineering and Applied Mechanics
Accounts
Estimating
Mechanical Laboratory (testing, & c.)
Photography
During this year also, in addition to the class instruction, the students are employed in making a complete detailed survey in he field, with plans, estimate of quantities, & c., for a project for two or three miles of railway, road, or canal. They have also to work our three complete and detailed designs, the subjects being chosen from building construction and both civil and mechanical engineering.
Some of subjects named are wholly or partially optional or alternative, the students being encouraged to pursue more particularly those branches of study for which they may show special aptitude.
There are also special courses for Telegraphy Engineering and for Forestry to train selected candidates for those departments of the Indian Administration.
The proficiency of the students is tested by frequent periodical examinations, and by assigning values to the practical work executed during the course.
Superior attainments are attested by special diplomas.
A final examination is held at the end of end of each separate course, with the assistance of special examiners nor connected with the College.
The Secretary of State for India offers annually a number of appointments, in the Indian Public Works Department, for competition among the students of the College, who are eligible in the order of standing after the final examination. Those so appointed have, after leaving the College, to go through a course of practical engineering (usually for one year) under a professional engineer. The cost of this is paid by the Government, and the student receives pay during the time.
In the case of students who are not so appointed, the College authorities endeavour, on the student's application, to arrange for placing them as pupils with professional ENgineers of standing, at moderate rates of premium, payable by the students.
The staff of the College comprises 18 professors, lecturers, and demonstrators, not including those engaged exclusively in the department of Forestry.