Louisiana=—Affiliated with Tulane university, but situated in another
part of the city; founder, Mrs. Josephine Louise Newcomb; opened 1886;
under control of board of trustees of Tulane; graduate department of
Tulane university open to graduate women without restriction since 1890;
separate financial management; separate president and faculty; 8
instructors (1 Ph. D.)—5 women, 2 without first degrees; 3 men, 1
without first degree; 51 undergrad. s.; 34 special s. (10 in
gymnastics); 54 s. of art; 80 pupils in preparatory dept.; art dept.;
productive funds, $400,000; a lecture building, a chapel, an art
building, a pottery building, two residence halls accommodating 75
students, a high school building; total cost of buildings about
$225,000; vols. in library about 6,000; tuition, $100; lowest charge,
board, room rent (two in one room, beds made by students) and tuition,
$280.
In the smaller group, which includes the College for women of Western
reserve university and the H. Sophie Newcomb memorial college, the
affiliated college tends to become an entirely separate institution; in
its instructors and instruction it differs widely from the institution
to which it is affiliated; it is, in fact, a different college called
into existence by the same authorities. In the larger group, which
includes the Women’s college of Brown, Barnard and Radcliffe, the
affiliated college tends to blend itself with the institution to which
it is affiliated in a new coeducational institution. The ideal in view
is a complete identity of instructors and instruction and the law of
economy of force forbids attaining this ideal by the duplication of the
whole instruction given. It is less wasteful to double the number of
hearers in any lecture room than to repeat the lecture. It is in the
Women’s college of Brown that we find the closest affiliation and,
accordingly, the nearest approach to coeducation. The corporation of
Brown furnished the land on which Pembroke hall, the academic building
of the Women’s college, was erected, and accepted the gift of the
building when it was completed; Brown has from first to last openly
assumed responsibility for its affiliated college in fact as well as
name. In the graduate department of Brown there is, as has been said,
unrestricted coeducation; and in many of the smaller undergraduate
elective courses women are reciting with men. In the graduate department
of Columbia there is now unrestricted coeducation. It is in the case of
Radcliffe that there is least approach to coeducation. What has made
possible the policy pursued at Radcliffe has been the self-sacrificing
zeal of many eminent Harvard professors, willing at any cost of
inconvenience to give to women what could seemingly on no other terms be
given; but the sacrifice is too great, and in the modern world too
unnecessary; it is at present almost everywhere possible for the
professor interested in educating women to lighten his own labors by
admitting them to the same classes with men. Only the affiliated
colleges of the second group present in their internal organization a
type essentially different from that of the independent college—a type
intermediate between the independent and the coeducational.
PROFESSIONAL EDUCATION
=Graduate instruction in the faculty of philosophy=—True university
instruction begins after the completion of the college course, and very
little such instruction is given by any American university[33] except
in the so-called graduate schools belonging to the twenty-three colleges
in the United States included in the Federation of graduate clubs.[34]
In the following 16 of these 23 graduate schools women are admitted
without restriction and compete with men for many of the scholarships
and honors: Yale, Brown, Cornell, Columbia, New York university,
Pennsylvania, Columbian, Vanderbilt, Missouri, Western reserve, Chicago,
Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, California, Leland Stanford Junior; Bryn
Mawr and Wellesley admit women only; Harvard admits them to certain
courses through the mediation of Radcliffe. There remain, apart from the
Catholic university, only 3 graduate schools excluding women: Clark,
Princeton and the Johns Hopkins university; and in the Johns Hopkins
they are admitted to at least one university department—that of the
medical school.[35]
In 1898–99 there were studying in these 23 graduate schools 1,021 women,
forming 26.8 per cent of the whole number of graduate students.[36] In
1889–90 the U. S. education report estimates that there were 271 women
graduate students out of a total of 2,041 graduate students, or women
formed 13.27 per cent of all graduate students; in 1897–98 the report
for that year estimates that there were 1,398 women out of a total of
5,816 graduate students, or women formed 24.04 per cent of all
students—a remarkable increase as compared to the increase of men
graduate students in 8 years.
=Graduate fellowships and scholarships=—In 1899 there were open to women
319 scholarships varying in value from $100 to $400 (50 of these
exclusively for women) and 2 foreign scholarships (1 exclusively for
women); 81 residence fellowships of the value of $400 or over (18 of
these exclusively for women); 24 foreign fellowships of the value of
$500 and upwards (12 of these exclusively for women).[37]
_Comparative table of the progress of coeducation and increase of women
students from 1890 to 1898 and 1899 in theology, law, medicine,
dentistry, pharmacy, schools of technology and agriculture._
══════════════════════════════════════╤════════════════════════════════
│ 1890[38]
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┬──────────┬──────────
│Number of │Number of │Percentage
│ colleges │ coed. │ of coed.
│ for men │ colleges │ colleges
│ only │ │
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┴──────────┴──────────
Theology │ No women reported
Law │ No women reported
Medicine (regular and irregular)[41] │ 67│ 46│ 40.7
Dentistry │ 14│ 13│ 48.1
Pharmacy │ 13│ 16│ 55.2
Schools of technology and agriculture │ 14│ 12│ 46.2
endowed with national land grant[42]│ │ │
══════════════════════════════════════╧══════════╧══════════╧══════════
══════════════════════════════════════╤════════════════════════════════
│ 1899[39]
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┬──────────┬──────────
│Number of │Number of │Percentage
│ colleges │ coed. │ of coed.
│ for men │ colleges │ colleges
│ only │ │
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┼──────────┼──────────
Theology │ 97│ 68│ 41.2
Law │ 22│ 64│ 74.4
Medicine (regular and irregular)[41] │ 69│ 80│ 53.7
Dentistry │ 12│ 44│ 78.6
Pharmacy │ 4│ 48│ 92.3
Schools of technology and agriculture │ 16│ 48│ 75.
endowed with national land grant[42]│ │ │
══════════════════════════════════════╧══════════╧══════════╧══════════
══════════════════════════════════════╤═════════════════════
│ 1890[38]
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┬──────────
│Number of │Percentage
│ women │ women of
│ students │ all
│ │ students
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┴──────────
Theology │ No women reported
Law │ No women reported
Medicine (regular and irregular)[41] │ 854│ 5.5
Dentistry │ 53│ 2.0
Pharmacy │ 60│ 2.1
Schools of technology and agriculture │ 774│ 12.5
endowed with national land grant[42]│ │
══════════════════════════════════════╧══════════╧══════════
══════════════════════════════════════╤═════════════════════
│ 1898[40]
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┬──────────
│Number of │Percentage
│ women │ women of
│ students │ all
│ │ students
──────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┼──────────
Theology │ 198│ 2.4
Law │ 147│ 1.3
Medicine (regular and irregular)[41] │ 1397│ 6.0
Dentistry │ 62│ 2.4
Pharmacy │ 174│ 4.7
Schools of technology and agriculture │ 2281│ 16.1
endowed with national land grant[42]│ │
══════════════════════════════════════╧══════════╧══════════
Footnote 38:
The numbers of coeducational and other professional schools are
estimated from the U. S. ed. rep. for 1889–90.
Footnote 39:
Through the kindness of Mr. James Russell Parsons, Jr., author of the
monograph on professional education in the United States, published as
one of this series, I am able to insert the figures for 1899, see p.
21. By personal inquiry I have been able to add four to his list of
coeducational schools of theology.
Footnote 40:
The number of professional students for the year 1898 is taken from
the U. S. ed. rep. for 1897–98.
Footnote 41:
For the sake of clearness I have omitted from the above table the 7
separate medical schools for women, although I have counted their
students in the total number of women medical students, both in 1890
and 1898. In 1890 there were studying in the 6 regular medical women’s
colleges 425 women, as against 648 women in coeducational regular
medical colleges; in 1898 there were studying in them 411 women, as
against 1045 in coeducational colleges, a decrease of 3.3 per cent,
whereas women students in coeducational medical colleges have
increased 16.3 per cent. I limit the comparison to regular medical
schools because women have increased relatively more rapidly in
irregular medical schools and there is only one separate irregular
medical school for women. It is sometimes said that women prefer
medical sects because the proportion of women studying in irregular
schools is relatively greater than the proportion studying in regular
schools; but in 1898, 85.7 per cent of the irregular schools were
coeducational and only 46.6 per cent of regular schools, a fact which
undoubtedly increases the proportion of students studying in irregular
schools.
Footnote 42:
The statistics for the schools of technology and agriculture are taken
from the U. S. education report for 1889–90, pp. 1053–1054, and from
the report for 1897–98, pp. 1985–1988. I have excluded schools of
technology not endowed with the national land grant. In 1890 there
were 27 of such schools (5 of them coeducational); in 1898 their
number had fallen to 17 (3 of them coeducational). Very few women are
studying in these schools; in 1898 women formed only 0.2 per cent of
all students studying in them.
=Theology, law, medicine, dentistry, pharmacy, veterinary science,
schools of technology and agriculture=—Ten years ago there were very few
women studying in any of these schools. The wonderful increase both in
facilities for professional study and in the number of women students
during the last eight years may be seen by referring to the comparative
table on the opposite page.
It is evident to the impartial observer that coeducation is to be the
method in professional schools. Except in medicine, where women were at
first excluded from coeducational study by the strongest prejudice that
has ever been conquered in any movement, no important separate
professional schools, indeed none whatever, except one unimportant
school of pharmacy have been founded for women only.[43] It is evident
also that the number of women entering upon professional study is
increasing rapidly. If we compare the relative increase of men and of
women from 1890 to 1898 we obtain the following percentages: increase of
students in medicine, men, 51.1 per cent, women, 64.2 per cent; in
dentistry, men, 150.2 per cent, women, 205.7 per cent; in pharmacy, men,
25.9 per cent, women, 190 per cent; in technology and agriculture, men,
119.3 per cent, women, 194.7 per cent.
GENERAL CONSIDERATIONS
There are many questions connected with the college education of
American women which possess great interest for the student of social
science.
=Number of college women=—In the year 1897–98[44] there were studying in
the undergraduate and graduate departments of coeducational colleges and
universities 17,338 women, and in the undergraduate and graduate
departments of independent and affiliated women’s colleges, division A,
4,959 women, women forming thus 27.4 per cent of the total number of
graduate and undergraduate students. The 22 colleges belonging to the
Association of collegiate alumnæ, which are, on the whole, the most
important colleges in the United States admitting women, have conferred
the bachelor’s degree on 12,804 women. If we add to these the graduates
of the Women’s college of Brown university, 102 in number, and the
graduates of the 14 additional coeducational colleges included in my
list of the 58 most important colleges in the United States, we obtain,
including those graduating in June, 1899, a total of 14,824 women
holding the bachelor’s degree.[45] There is thus formed, even leaving
out of account the graduates of the minor colleges, a larger body of
educated women than is to be found in any other country in the world.
These graduates have received the most strenuous college training
obtainable by women in the United States, which does not differ
materially from the best college training obtainable by American men
(indeed, women graduates of coeducational colleges have received
precisely the same training as men), and may fairly be compared with the
women who have received college and university training abroad. In other
countries women university graduates, or even women who have studied at
universities, are very few;[46] in America, on the other hand, the
higher education of women has assumed the proportions of a national
movement still in progress. We may perhaps be able to guide in some
degree its future development, but it has passed the experimental stage
and can no longer be opposed with any hope of success. Its results are
to be reckoned with as facts.
=Health of college women=[47]—Those who have come into contact with some
of the many thousands of healthy normal women studying in college at the
present time, or who have had an opportunity to know something of the
after-lives of even a small number of college women, believe that
experience has proved them to be, both in college, and after leaving
college, on the whole, in better physical condition than other women of
the same age and social condition. Since, however, people who have not
the opportunity of knowledge at first hand continue to regard the health
of college women as a subject open for discussion, a new health
investigation, based on questions sent to the 12,804 graduates of the 22
colleges belonging to the Association of collegiate alumnæ, is now in
progress. The statistical tables will be collated a second time by the
Massachusetts bureau of statistics of labor and sent to the Paris
exposition as part of the educational exhibit of the Association of
collegiate alumnæ.[48]
=Marriage rate of college women=—Here again no positive conclusions can
be reached until we know what is the usual marriage rate of women
belonging to the social class of women graduates. Everything indicates
that the time of marriage is becoming later in the professional classes
and that the marriage rate as a whole is decreasing. An investigation
undertaken simultaneously with the new health investigation by the
Association of collegiate alumnæ will enable us to speak with certainty
in regard to the marriage rate of a large number of college women and
their sisters.[49] It must be borne in mind that the element of time is
very important, and in the case of women the later and therefore younger
classes are all larger than the earlier ones, see table on opposite
page.
_Marriage rate of college women_
═══════════════════════════════════════╤══════════╤════════════════════
│Opened in │ Percentage of
│ │ graduates married
───────────────────────────────────────┼──────────┼────────────────────
Vassar │ 1865 │ 35.1
Kansas │ 1866 │ 31.3
Minnesota │ 1868 │ 24.5
Cornell │} │}
Syracuse │} 1870 │} 31.0
Wesleyan │} │}
Nebraska │ 1871 │ 24.3
Boston │ 1873 │ 22.2
Wellesley │} 1875 │} 18.4
Smith │} │}
Radcliffe │ 1879 │ 16.5
Bryn Mawr │ 1885 │ 15.2
Barnard │ 1889 │ 10.4
Leland Stanford Junior │ 1891 │ 9.7
Chicago │ 1892 │ 9.4
═══════════════════════════════════════╧══════════╧════════════════════
It will be seen that independent, affiliated and coeducational colleges
fall into their proper place in the series, thus showing conclusively
that the method of obtaining a college education exercises scarcely any
appreciable influence on the marriage rate.
The marriage rate of Bryn Mawr college, calculated in January, 1900,
will also serve as an illustration of the importance of time in every
consideration of the marriage rate: graduates of the class of 1889,
married, 40.7 per cent; graduates of the first two classes, 1889–1890,
married, 40.0 per cent; graduates of the first three classes, 1889–1891,
married, 33.3 per cent; graduates of the first four classes, 1889–1892,
married, 32.9 per cent; graduates of the first five classes, 1889–1893,
married, 31.0 per cent; graduates of the first six classes, 1889–1894,
married, 30.0 per cent; graduates of the first seven classes, 1889–1895,
married, 25.2 per cent; graduates of the first eight classes, 1889–1896,
married, 22.8 per cent; graduates of the first nine classes, 1889–1897,
married, 20.9 per cent; graduates of the first ten classes, 1889–1898,
married, 17.2 per cent; graduates of the first eleven classes,
1889–1899, married, 15.2 per cent.
=Occupations of college women=—It is probable that about 50 per cent of
women graduates teach for at least a certain number of years. Of the 705
women graduates whose occupations were reported in the Association of
collegiate alumnæ investigation of 1883 50.2 percent were then teaching.
In 1895 of 1,082 graduates of Vassar 37.7 per cent were teaching; 2.0
per cent were engaged in graduate study and 3.0 per cent were physicians
or studying medicine. In 1898 of 171 graduates (all living) of Radcliffe
college, including the class of 1898, 49.7 per cent were teaching; 8.7
per cent were engaged in graduate study; .6 per cent were studying
medicine; 17.5 per cent were unmarried and without professional
occupation. In 1899 of 316 living graduates of Bryn Mawr college,
including the class of 1899, 39.0 percent were teaching; 11.4 were
engaged in graduate study; 6 per cent were engaged in executive work
(including 4 deans of colleges, 3 mistresses of college halls of
residence); 1.6 per cent were studying or practising medicine, and 26.6
per cent were unmarried and without professional occupation.[50]
=Coeducation vs. separate education=—It is clear that coeducation is the
prevailing method in the United States; it is the most economical
method; indeed it is the only possible method in most parts of the
country. Now that it has been determined in America to send girls as
well as boys to college, it becomes impossible to duplicate colleges for
women in every part of this vast country. If, as is shown by the
statistics given in the successive reports of the commissioner of
education, men students in college are increasing faster far than the
ratio of the population, and women college students are increasing
faster still than men,[51] it will tax all our resources to make
adequate provision for men and women in common. Only in thickly-settled
parts of the country, where public sentiment is conservative enough to
justify the initial outlay, have separate colleges for women been
established, and these colleges, without exception, have been private
foundations. Public opinion in the United States almost universally
demands that universities supported by public taxation should provide
for the college education of the women of the state in which they are
situated. The separate colleges for women speaking generally are to be
found almost exclusively in the narrow strip of colonial states lying
along the Atlantic seaboard. The question is often asked, whether women
prefer coeducation or separate education. It seems that in the east they
as yet prefer separate education, and this preference is natural.[52]
College life as it is organized in a woman’s college seems to
conservative parents less exposed, more in accordance with inherited
traditions. Consequently, girls who in their own homes lead guarded
lives, are to be found rather in women’s colleges than in coeducational
colleges. From the point of view of conservative parents, there is
undoubtedly serious objection to intimate association at the most
impressionable period of a girl’s life with many young men from all
parts of the country and of every possible social class. From every
point of view it is undesirable to have the problems of love and
marriage presented for decision to a young girl during the four years
when she ought to devote her energies to profiting by the only
systematic intellectual training she is likely to receive during her
life. Then, too, for the present, much of the culture and many of the
priceless associations of college life are to be obtained, whether for
men or women, only by residence in college halls, and no coeducational,
or even affiliated, colleges have as yet organized for their students
such a complete college life as the independent woman’s college. So long
as this preference, and the grounds for it, exist, we must see to it
that separate colleges for women are no less good than colleges for men.
In professional schools, including the graduate school of the faculty of
philosophy, coeducation is even at present almost the only method. There
are in the United States only 4 true graduate schools for men closed to
women, and only 1 independent graduate school maintained for women
offering three years’ consecutive work leading to the degree of Ph. D.
There is every reason to believe that as soon as large numbers of women
wish to enter upon the study of theology, law and medicine, all the
professional schools now existing will become coeducational.
=A modified vs. an unmodified curriculum=—The progress of women’s
education, as we have traced it briefly from its beginning in the
coeducational college of Oberlin in 1833, and the independent woman’s
college of Vassar in 1865, has been a progress in accordance with the
best academic traditions of men’s education. In 1870 we could not have
predicted the course to be taken by the higher education of women; the
separate colleges for women might have developed into something wholly
different from what we had been familiar with so long in the separate
colleges for men. A female course in coeducational colleges in which
music and art were substituted for mathematics and Greek might have met
the needs of the women students. After thirty years of experience,
however, we are prepared to say that whatever changes may be made in
future in the college curriculum will be made for men and women alike.
After all, women themselves must be permitted to be the judges of what
kind of intellectual discipline they find most truly serviceable. They
seem to have made up their minds, and hereafter may be trusted to see to
it that an inferior education shall not be offered to them in women’s
colleges, or elsewhere, under the name of a modified curriculum.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
DEPARTMENT OF EDUCATION
FOR THE
UNITED STATES COMMISSION TO THE PARIS EXPOSITION OF 1900
Director
HOWARD J. ROGERS, Albany, N. Y.
MONOGRAPHS
ON
EDUCATION IN THE UNITED STATES
EDITED BY
NICHOLAS MURRAY BUTLER
_Professor of Philosophy and Education in Columbia University, New York_
1 EDUCATIONAL ORGANIZATION AND ADMINISTRATION—ANDREW SLOAN DRAPER,
_President of the University of Illinois, Champaign, Illinois_
2 KINDERGARTEN EDUCATION—SUSAN E. BLOW, _Cazenovia, New York_
3 ELEMENTARY EDUCATION—WILLIAM T. HARRIS, _United States
Commissioner of Education, Washington, D. C._