The Administrative Organization of a Small College

O RGANIZATION appears to be applicable only to large enterprises-large businesses, large industries, large universities. The small enterprises seem either not to need organization or automatically to organize themselves. This is particularly true of small colleges. Here, the organization, such as it is, has grown by force of circumstances from the time when the president did everything but the teaching-and some of that. Why the organizational scheme is what it is, may be explained by the succession of crises through which the college has passed. It is not usually founded upon any definite principle, and is only changed under great pressure, and then, like cutting off the dog's tail, a little at a time so that it will not hurt so much. In venturing to present the scheme of administrative organization of Colgate University, I do so because it has been found to be smooth-running and efficient, and quite different, in many respects, from that ordinarily employed in a small college. That this same plan is applicable to every small college, I do not presume to say, but it has been successful under the curricular and instructional conditions at Colgate. These conditionsknown as the Colgate Plan-have been previously described in various publications and are not repeated here. Colgate University, founded in I 8 i9, is now an institution with a student body limited to one thousand men. It is situated in a village of less than two thousand inhabitants, among the hills of central New York. It owes its existence to the Baptists, and while still valuing and clinging to these traditions, it is operating under a

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