Education: Report Card

¶ During the 1951-52 school year, more children than ever before were enrolled in elementary grades. The U.S. Census Bureau reported that grade-school classrooms bulged with 21,800,000 pupils, 600,000 more than in the previous year.

¶ Columbia University announced a new field of study for a Bachelor of Science degree: Editing and Publishing. Undergraduates and graduate students will be offered courses in magazine publishing, book publishing, editing, the graphic arts and the law of literary property.

¶ The government of Natal announced a major concession to its 250,000 Indians. Henceforth, the word “coolie” will be expunged from all textbooks in Natal. The gesture was not made because the British in Natal liked the Indians any better, but as a gesture of defiance to South Africa’s white-supremacy Prime Minister Daniel Malan, whom they like even less.