Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-07-24
TRAINING OF WOMEN
CoeducationaI as Against
Strictly Sex Colleges.
THEIR WORK AT CORNELL
Course in Agriculture Attracts In
creasing Number.
SELF-SUPPORT THEIR AIM
Only Negligible Number Are Pur-
suing Studies Without
Definite Object in View.
SELF-SUPPORT THEIR All

| <
suing Studies Without
Definite Object in View.
| BY WILLIAM F.. CURTIS
Special Correspondence Of Tho Star and the
| Chicago Record Herald.
| BOSTON. Mass. July 81, 1911.
Gertrude S. Martin occupies the novel
and interesting position Of adviser of
women at Cornell University, and as
such is in a measure responsible for the
physical. moral and social development
Of 400 young women. She realizes the
responsibilities and possibilities OF her
task, and regards every girl in the uni
versity as daughter or a sister to be
cared for and directed in the path that
will lead to the greatest happiness and
usefulness in life. She has compre-
hensive heart. but has a head also, and
works with both. She can pick hum
bug as readily as she can recognize the
real thing. but, from an official point of
view, all co-eds look alike to her, in the
sense that they require her best atten-
ton.
| To better qualify herself for her duties.
to learn what other people in similar
positions are doing, and how successful
they have been, Mrs. Martin recently
made journey of inspection among the
colleges for women in the United States.
She is too diplomatic and discreet to COM
ment In detail upon the management OF
| the institutions she has visited, but does
not hesitate to express her views in gen.
eral terms, and make comparison of
| the advantages of cOeducatiOn and col
leges for women exclusively. Her faith
in coeducation has been strengthened by
her observations, as you can judge from
what she says:
Admits Possible Prejudice.
II am entirely coeducated myself, and,
therefore, l fear, incapacitated for rem
dering a fair judgment Of the woman's
college was her candid answer to my
first question. In estimating the value
of anything that l may say about them
that fact should be taken into consdera-
ton.
| The idea of the woman's college al
ways rather fascinated me IL my youth.
L must admit, and l suppose that IL the
necessary money had been forthcoming
in those days l should now be enrolled
among the alumnae Of Smith or Welles-
ley. or possibly Vassar. rather than
among those Of two of the great coedu-
cation institutions. Whether the finished
product would have been any different,
either for better or worse. | cannot say.
l have my doubts. I have observed col
| 1ege. girls pretty closely all over the
country from Massachusetts to Colorado.
and l find them not greatly different. l
thought l sat In one Of the dormitories
at Smith College not long ago that il
one of the groups of girls seated there
could be suddenly transported on a magic
carpet and deposited gently at one of
the tables in our big dining room at Sage
College, Cornell University, they would
neither look nOr~feel in the least strange.
| In manneS, appearance and conversation
they would be hardly distinguishable from
my own girls. ~
Cornell Girls Conventional.
"On the whole 1 am inclined to think
that our Cornell girls are rather more
conventional, rather more careful of
| appearance in the matter of both
clothes and conduct. than are the girls
/ of the women's colleges. That is but
surrounded by 1000 pairs of curious
and observant masculine eyes. likewise
lyoung and not always friendly, could
| hardly be expected to remain absolutely
/ oblivious to them. 1t is a constant sur
prise to me that they do not show more
| self consciousness than they do. They
are more than ordinarily careful, as
| / have said, in matters Of dress and
department.; they are careful to make
no demand for recognition in class
affairs or activities of any sort. though
they accept, with quiet dignity, such
recognition as may be accorded them;
and it is a point of honor with them
never to discuss in any way the ques-
! ton of coeducation at Cornell. For
the rest they betray little consciousness
of the fact that they constitute group
| in any wise diStinguishable from the
rest of the university.
II think had I not been confirmed
| coeducationist. my trip through the
womens colleges would have confirmed
me- Not that the womens colleges are
not doing excellent work The quality
of such work as they are doing is. Tor
do not hesitate to say that for many
girls the woman's college Is unques-
| tionably best, but L am frmly con-
WINGED that for the finest type OF WON
an intellectually and spiritually ade-
quate opportunity is offered only In the
great coeducat ional institutions.
Have Special Needs.
"Paradoxfcally enough, 1T is the CO.
educationa institutions that have been
first to recognize that women, by the
very fact of sex, do constitute a special
class with special educational needs. In
my college days any such opinion as
that would have been. bounced upon
at once by the .women's rights party
as pedagogical heresy, and any one
who harbored 1t would have been
| drummed out of the camp. The same
become the conservative of today. and
the colleges that were founded to
prove the then very advanced propo-
sition that women are capable OF re-
ceiving the same education as men are
now looking askance at the institu-
lions that are bent upon giving them
something bigger and better ana moro
adequate to the purposes of life.
1T is the coeducational colleges that
are building up the great schools or nome
economfces-and home economics means
much more than cooking. sewing and
keeping ones own little house. important
as that may be. 1t is the coeducaional
colleges that are doing the most not
only to give to women a liberal educa-
ton, but to make their culture some
thing vital by relating 1t directly TO tfe
And I believe that 1t is the coeducational
colleges that have advanced farthest In
this direction because 1t is just there that
men and women are working together to
a common end nature planned; and
that they will render their perfect social
service only when they become, as tneV
90 not yaf anywhere truly cOeduCa-