The Training of an Aeronautical Engineer

It is with some misgiving that I come here this evening to lecture to this Society on the training of an aeronautical engineer. The subject is not one which I chose myself; indeed, I think that it is probably the very last which I should have selected to talk about, but the Council of the Society, for some reason which I have not yet been able to understand, invited me to deal with it. I rashly promised to do it, but now that the time has come to redeem that promise I feel that I ought to have refused and chosen a subject on which perhaps I could speak with a little more authority. I suspect, however, that the Council was anxious to obtain a discussion on a topic which to any Society is a very important matter and that I have been put up to serve as a target for your criticism in the hope that something useful may emerge from your comments rather than from my paper.