weakening of our higher education by the admission and retention of all
students who apply at our colleges and universities and the reduction of
their programs to the lowest common denominator.

Some selection and some attention to the standards of performance
are required if these institutions are to continue to provide higher
education. But our society is calling for a larger quantity of individuals
who are prepared for careers in the Arts and Sciences, for intelligent
participation in self government. It calls for increasing numbers of
persons who are creative and who are trained to assume the role of
leadership.

Dr. Elkins, president of our State university, has capsulized this pro-
blem in a phrase—"Quantity of quality. " It is the duty of our State
institutions, he says, to develop quality in quantity. I think you all will
agree with me that this is no easy task. What, then, does the State
expect of its institutions of higher learning?

Well, first of all that freedom that was promised us with universal
education is not yet guaranteed. The prospect that we may eventually
be outstripped by the Russians in scientific achievement and economic
production is dismaying, to say the least. H. G. Wells, in his book,
The Outline of History, has noted that human history "becomes more
and more a race between education and catastrophe. " If we are to win
this race, then, and escape catastrophe, we must continue to lay greater
stress upon education. In this dire contest, we must rely heavily upon
our schools, public and private—upon institutions such as this.

Our commerce and our industry are calling with one voice for better
trained technicians and specialists on the one hand and a greater yield of
raw executive material on the other. It is the job of our State institutions
to give them both, and at the same time to provide a pool of properly
trained teachers and just plain broad-gauged thinkers and doers in each
of the other several professions. This is no small undertaking, but again
let me say that our national supremacy, and perhaps our survival,
depends on it. It is the duty of our institutions of higher learning to
prepare people to live and make a living in the world today. They must
take the lead in expanding the intellectual horizons and scientific
frontiers, thus enabling mankind to go forward always toward the pro-
mise of a better tomorrow.

The University and the colleges have a solemn obligation to use all
of their resources in such a way that this age of education will advance
our civilization. This is the ultimate objective of all teaching, all re-
search, all service. These are titanic tasks which I have assigned to you.

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