The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1902-08-01
DANGERS OF COLLEGE GIRLS.
The First Year of Life in an Institu-
ton of Learning Is a Test 9
of Character.

Catherine Lee Bates, professor Of
English literature at Wellesley, the ia
nous women's college, has been writ
ing of the college girl of the period.
and her experience among the class
qualities her to write understanding
ly, says an educational journal. 1t is
Miss Bates opinion that the freshmen
year is the danger year. Health may
be so impaired that the student is sent
home, there to be most enormously
pointed out as the victim of overstudy.
Conditions may be incurred that will
hamper all the subsequent course of
the overworried, over-shamefaced
girl, who must take time and strength
from the work of her sophomore year
to make good her freshman failures,
and hence incurs new conditions in
the new subjects, dragging 'at each
remove frightening chain" A mis-
conducted freshman year, too, may fix
reputation for fiightiness, loud man.
ners or the like upon one who, when
the first intoxication of her liberty
has passed, could have lived up to a
good name, but is led by pride and
plque, as she sees the better elements
in the student world withdrawing from
her, to cast in her lot with the widest
and most featherbrained companion
ship of the place.
This is the dark side of the picture.
Many freshmen have been prepared by
judicious training at home or in school
for undertaking the direction of their
daily lives. Others are quick to profit
by the hints of comrades or by their
own observation. Required lectures
on hygiene, frequent tests in class
work, fortunate friendships often
counterfeit the perils of inexperience.
And the student who comes success
fully through her freshman year has
all the chances in her favor for a glad
and honorable college course. She has
learned that freedom lies within the
circle of law, not without it.
The typical college girl before her
sophomore year is over has her own af-
fairs in hand and brings fund of
supertluous energy to the business of
the commonweal. The executive abil-
ity developed in American college life
is continual surprise to the onlooker
To the timid entering student many
things within the next four years be-
come possible. She may be found run
ming magazine, dealing shrewdly with
printer and advertiser, reading proof,
writing items, leaders, reviews. She
| may practice wide range of activities
on class committees, from conducting
campaign in undergraduate politics
to planning and carrying through the
social functions of gala days where
guests are numbered by hundreds or
by thousands. The athletic association
may trust her with grave responsible
tiles in the selection and laying out of
| golf grounds or in arranging for an
intercollegiate tournament. If her
Greek letter society is building its
chapter-house it may fall to her lot
| to confer with architects and decora-
tors, buy rugs, divans and other fur
nishings or engineer the finance of
| the whole enterprise. The sense of dis
tance between senior and freshman
is not altogether fictitious. On the
practical side of life alone the four
years cannot count for more than
| arithmetic confesses.
Women colleges have faculties dis
gruntled in proportion as they find
their occupation gone. They are no
longer asked, in most instances, to
make and to administer rules for stu
dent conduct. The students are self
organized into self-directing and self
disciplining body. The faculties are
obviously out of place in this projected
dreamland of youth and mfrth and
beauty. Hence they are prone TO COM
plain that, what with undergraduate
business and what with undergradu-
ate pastime, there is no room left in
college for the intellectual life. How
do these hurried and preoccupied girls,
with festal music tinkling in their
heads, have opportunity to behold
''the bright countenances of truth in
the quiet and still air of delightful
studies?"