The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1917-09-17
WAR CUTS ROLL
 OF COLLEGES 10
 TO 50 PER GENT.
Thousands of American Stu dents Sacrifice Degrees
 To Defend U. $.

Americas, college population, stu dents from football field and fra ternity, from laboratory and library, are answering the war call with un- equalledl patriotism.
 \ Information from officials of col leges and universities of the East and middle West indicates the enrolment figures. this fall will be from 10 to 50 per cent lower than those of last fall. This means that thousands of college youths-men, as they always are call ed on the campus-in each of the country's institutions of learning are sacrificing degrees for the war cause.
 In most instances heaviest losses are felt in the upper classes, the junior and senior classes. Those who enter college nowadays as freshmen almost without exception re too young for service. Most second year men also are under the age limit; still, most sophomore classes this fall will be considerably smaller than normal.
 Enrolment figures, in most cases, show big increases in women students. In some instances, as in one or two departments at the Columbia summer school just ended, the number of coeds, extra and unexpected, more than made up for the great loss in men students. Despite this the sum- mer school enrollment was 200 under what it would have been without the war When Cornell opens Septem- Der 26 the number of women students, it is believed, will be larger than ever before.
 Reports indicate that athletics will be continued in most of the colleges and universities, though on a reduced scale. Previously it had been given out that sports, especially football, would be discontinued on account of the war, but cognizafce has been talk en of requests from Washington that these sports go forward, nninterrupt- edly as much as possible, on the the ory they will contribute to the nation S manhood Military training, though, will be substituted for more intensive football and basketball practice, it is believed. |.
 The reduction in students necessa- rily will handicap fraternities and other socities. Many of them depend largely upon support of upper class men. and it. is from these ranks the greatest exodus from colleges is talk ing place. An official at Columbia University, himself a fraternity man. says Columbia fraternities especially will! be hard hit. For one thing, great many members have enlisted in the army and navy, or have been se- lected in the draft or gone abroad with the Red Cross, Fraternity houses at Morningside pay exceedingly high rents, and unless the societies are we'll supported by their members, or break a rule which many of them have by taking in freshmen, their treasurers may find themselves in distress. The official at Columbia believes, however, that alumni members of these socie- ties will come to their aid and that aid and that few of the 40 houses will be forced to close for the winter. Re- ports from some of the colleges say the fraternities either will have to rent out their rooms to non-members, a practice which never before has been tolerated, or give up their houses tem- porarily.
 Professional and trade schools are more generally affected by the war than the colleges. Such students are more mature of age and have learn ing which is of value in a military way. Engineers, for instance, and medical students are greatly in de- mand at this time. In some instances instructors themselves are enlisting in such numbers that their departments are forced to suspend.
 New England appears to be most seriously affected of any part of the country, according to reports from Boston. Here university prospects for 1917-191S are extremely pessimistic. It is feared the average enrolment will drop in proportions ranging from 20 per cent. at Harvard to 50 per cent. at the University ow Maine Other institutions will lose varying propor- tions of their upper class men, and nowhere in this part of the country is there the slightest optimism in regard to entering classes.
 In Maine the State University has,