The Vancouver independent. (Vancouver, W.T. [Wash.]) 1875-1910, 1880-03-25
Women and the Colleges.

President Eliot, of Harvard, is pro-
nounced in his sentiments against co-edu-
cation, while at Yale there is more re-
serve in the expression of opinion as to
the policy which has as yet prevented
the admission Of woman rs u student
within the walls OF that honored seat of
learning. But there are indications
that eminent educators of New England
instincts and training may be won over
to the faith that young men and young
women may wisely be permitted to seek
the same fountains from which to slake
their intellectual thirst At Joseph
Cooks last Symposium we find that
President Angel, Of Michigan Univer-
sity, who had established an enviable
reputation as an educator at the east
before he became the head of the great
est institution of learning at the west,
declares that, after an experience of
nine years, he finds the relations of the
students of Ann Arbor "those of well
bred men and wellbred women, and not,
in fact, in the least degree embarrass-
ing" most of the difficulties, (which it
was so easy to think possible" having
'proved on trial to be merely imagin-
ary." Prof Mead, of Oberlln College,
who for nine years was Il pastor under
the shadow of the famous seminary for
females at Mount Hoyoke, declares that
the home-like atmosphere of Oberlin is
very different place from Harvard and
Yale and Amherst in which to attempt
co-education, and thinks that there must
be change i'll young mems colleges be-
fore they can become suitable places for
young women. President Bernard, of
our own Columbia, vigorously cham
pions the cause to which it is notorious
that he is devoted, and President Bas-
com, of the University of Wiscon-
sin, says there is no variety of
opinion in his faculty as to co-edu-
cation, and his feeling on the subject
is SO strong that he regards the opposite
view as simply prejudice uncorrected
by experience-the man of the Tropics
denying the existence of snow"
1t may be that President Eliot was
premature in declaring, in his address at
Worcester last Summer, that New Eng
land has pronounced her final decision
on the question of co education. Presi-
dent Barnard thinks SO, for he says that
"New England has as yet hardly begun
seriously to consider this subject The
act is, that with Miss Scott equal to
Eighth Wrangler' in the Mathematical
Tripos at Cambridge, and with indubt-
able proof that the average OF female
scholarship in the higher studies is not
inferior to tina: of males, and with the
concurrence os eminent physicians in
the belief that intellectual application is
not detrimental to the ncalth OF young
women whose habits of lie are correct,
many of the objections to the admission
of women to institutions of classical
learning are swept away, and the qucs
ton is narrowed down to the simple
consideration of the association of two
sexes IN the class room. Upon that
question a long debate is yet to be heard,
and President Eliot will find that the
test of experience must be thoroughly
applied before New England can be
truly said to have pronounced final
decision in the matter. 1t may be that
he has correctly estimated what the final
result will be, but neither New Eng
land or Old England is as yet conscious
of what its abiding belief as the rea-
ton of women to the colleges is to lac.
N. Y. Mail.