Columbia, China, Iraq

When Professor Paul Monroe looks up from his Director's desk in the International Institute of Teachers College at Columbia University, his eye falls fondly and proudly on a thickly dotted map showing the number of students from foreign lands who have studied under his guidance. Last week white-haired Dr. Monroe, who looks like the late Warren Gamaliel Harding in spectacles, was triply honored. From Baghdad came an invitation to be president of the Iraq Educational Survey. From Persia came a decoration--the Order of Science Achievement, 1st Class--for his services to international learning. And in Denver 4,000 delegates of the World Federation of Education Associations elected him their president. Dr. Monroe, 62, delayed his reply to Denver but accepted the invitation from Baghdad.

An occasional game of golf (medium) is the only pastime allowed to punctuate Professor Monroe's far-flung cultural ministrations, which have extended to Poland, Jugoslavia. Smyrna, Porto Rico. China. Long a cordial sympathizer with the woes of China, it was Dr. Monroe who formed the plan whereby the Boxer indemnities, remitted by Congress in 1924, were steered into a fund for Chinese educational development. Last winter, fearful lest China turn Red, he urged the State Department to have German Reparations applied by capitalist Europe and the U. S. to China, to disband armies, build public works. The State Department pigeonholed that idea.

In January, Dr. Monroe will sail for Iraq, site of ancient Babylon, Ur. Ninevah. Now a British Mandate, Iraq will enter the League of Nations next year, end British control. Dr, Monroe's job with the Iraqi will be to modernize their schools, train them along occidental lines.

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