The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1907-07-21
SEPARATE WOMEN'S COLLEGE.
WESLEYAN'S SOLUTION or IT'S
COEDCCATION PROBLEM.
with the Retirement OF President Raymond
There Is q Probability OF Making a New
Institution some characteristic of
the Man VINO Made His Own College.

MIDDLETowN Conn. July ia new
women's college for Connecticut, the first
to be established in this State, is one Of the
plans that will materialize on the retire
ment next year Of President Bradford P.
Raymond o. Wesleyan University. For the
last ten years President Raymond. backed
by a majority Of the board Of trustees Of
Wesleyan, has waged a losing war in the
interests of coeducation here. The Wesleyan
undergraduates and a large proportion Of
the alumni are strongly opposed to the
"quails.' as they irreverently call the few
women who nave had nerve enough to
stand this opposition to their presence and
study at Wesleyan in the same classes with
the men. This sntagonism has increased
yearly Until some two years & the men,
being in the great majority voted practically
to put the women members OF the class
ont Of the class day exercises of COM
meme. ment week AMI sidetrack them
entirely. For a few rounds it was a
10 the teeth. the faculty ranging up in
sympathy with the men or opposed to them.
according 20 their ideas on the coeducation
subject. Finally the board Of trustees voted
to limit the number Of women students
tdCu JCdN " iOto Nil0 ~ BVt Obt VI NuC
total number Of students Of the preceding
year. But the rule has never been needed,
because the number Of women appli-
cants has steadily decreased until hardly
a score have been at the university the
last year.
There is a general feeling here that the
coed plan has been a fat failure and that
with the retirement OF President Raymond
some new scheme will be outlined.
The new plan, which II is hoped may
propitiate both parties, is the establishment
here OF a separate women's college, the
faculty to consist OF Wesleyan professors
and instructors. Under this plan the women
would do their work entirely separate from
the men. using their own recitation halls.
In the laboratory work certain days could
be set apart for their work in the Wesleyan
laborator.e s. In the classes for advanced
degrees the plan followed at Yale Of allowing
the men and women TO take the same courses
would not De opposed by the men. This
would mean the establishment of a college
that would occupy the same relative posi-
ton TO Wesleyan that Radcliffe College
does to Harvard University.
Scores Of alumni and practically all the
undergraduates Of Wesleyan are heartily
in favor of this plan. the proposition to be
solved being the selection of a new president
who will stand on this platform.
Although a dozen names nave been
mentioned. including the presidents OF
several Methodist colleges Of the East and
Middle West. the committee selected to
look up the new president has not met
az yet and no prominent candidate has
appeared in the field.
Although President Raymond has been
so ardent a hacker Of the coeducational
proposition here. he has nevertheless been
the most successful college president In
the history Of Wesleyan, and no head Of
Wesleyan ever approached him in popu-
larity both with the undergraduates and
the alumni. His retirement at the close
Of the present year is regretted by thousa nds
OF alumni and all those who during their
college course have come TO know him
well and admire him sincerely.
He came to Wesleyan in 1889 when the
college was just emerging from a stormy
experience under the leadership of his
predecessor and he took hold Of things
here with "A firm hand. He showed the
same determination In untangling affairs
here hat he showed when, in his under
graduate days. he had the distinction of
being the only college student in the
country 10 build up a college for his own
personal use.
The story was that President Raymond.
wnen stu IN his teens. entered Hamlin
University, which was situated Just outside