Block to Yale

The pedagogy of journalism is largely limited in the U.S. to public and semi-public institutions and a few scattered universities lying west of the Alleghenies. Of the 19 schools recognized by the American Association of Schools & Departments of Journalism, only five are not state colleges. Announced last week was the first endowment of journalistic lectures among the older Eastern private schools. Publisher Paul Block of the Brooklyn Standard Union* gave Yale $100,000 with which to employ a lecturer or lecturers to "establish a program of studies in the graduate and undergraduate schools to trace the relation of the newspaper Press to modern affairs. This plan does not contemplate the development of courses of a vocational nature, but it is expected to bring the students . . . to a clearer understanding of the role of the Press in the complex social and political life of the modern world."

Yalemen could think of several reasons for Publisher Block's action. His son Paul Jr. is a Yale freshman. His son Billy is preparing to enter. Some even thought that Publisher Block, who made known that perhaps he himself would deliver a few of the lectures, might want audience for some of his own views on the profession.

Of the Block-backed courses and their purpose said he: "Since I myself have been in the newspaper business since I was 17, I naturally am interested in having the coming generation realize the purposes and possibilities of newspapers. The courses in journalism are not intended to be a school of journalism. They should ac quaint the young men with the obligation which serious newspapers feel to serve the public, with the importance and the necessity of a free Press."

*Also of the Duluth Herald, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Toledo Blade, Newark Star-Eagle, Milwaukee Sentinel.

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