page_title: History of East Texas State Normal College
section_title: Growth and change
hierarchical_section_title: History of East Texas State Normal College / Growth and change
caption_attribution_description: English: The Training School on the campus of East Texas State Normal College.
context_page_description: The history of East Texas State Normal College comprises the history of the university now known as Texas A&M University–Commerce from when it was acquired by the State of Texas in 1917, to when it was renamed East Texas State Teachers College in 1923. In the context of the college's significant institutional debt, a pressing need for repairs to campus facilities, and American entry into World War I, Randolph B. Binnion, the Assistant State Superintendent of Public Instruction, was selected as its second president in July 1917. Among Binnion's first accomplishments in office were enlarging the faculty and repairing the physical plant. Despite having an enrollment of just 234 when it reopened as a public school in 1917, by 1922 ETSNC was the second best attended normal college in the state.
  The late 1910s and early 1920s were an era of marked conservatism at ETSNC, as all prospective faculty members were asked whether they danced or belonged to a church, while the school viewed itself as a surrogate parent for students in line with the principle of in loco parentis.
context_section_description: Among Binnion's first accomplishments in office were enlarging the faculty and repairing the physical plant: in his first year, he more than doubled the number of professors on campus by hiring 18 new faculty members, and under his watch the Administration Building, Science Hall, and Willard Hall were all renovated or remodeled. In 1918, salaries for ETSNC employees ranged from $1,500 for instructors to $4,000 for the president.
  On October 16, 1917, ETSNC was officially reopened as a state school, and Binnion was officially installed as its second president. On that day, enrollment was just 234, compared to over 3,000 two years before while William L. Mayo was president; however, the number of enrolled students climbed steadily over the next few years, reaching 2,177 in 1921–22. By 1922, ETSNC was the second best attended normal college in the state, surpassed only by North Texas State Normal College in Denton. According to William E. Sawyer, the college's entrance requirements were quite clear in 1917: "Any white person who is sixteen years of age on or before January 1 of the school year may enter a State Normal School". In spring 1919, there were only eight out-of-state students enrolled at ETNC: three from Arkansas, two from Oklahoma, and one each from Kentucky, Mississippi, and New Mexico.
  Binnion brought a conservative attitude to the process of selecting faculty, as he always asked candidates whether they danced and whether they belonged to a church. He explained: "I request my teachers not to dance in the town of Commerce. It is not obligatory that teachers belong to any church, but frankly, I prefer young men and women of Christ-like character for this work". In 1921, Binnion noted that 43 of the school's 44 faculty members were affiliated with a church.
  In the late 1910s, state normal colleges in Texas were not permitted to have on-campus dormitories, so the burden of accommodating students fell largely to Commerce citizens who were willing to host boarders. In 1920, Binnion commented that "[t]he most serious drawback in this town is finding a place to live". However, that year ETSNC and the other state normal colleges pressured the board of regents to permit dormitories, largely to accommodate growth at the schools. This allowed ETSNC to renovate the West Dormitory to house female students, which reopened in 1922, and re-purpose Willard Hall as a classroom and administrative building that was renamed Industrial Hall. However, according to William E. Sawyer, overcrowded conditions at the college persisted into 1923.
  Due to the poor condition of the economy of Texas after World War I, caused largely by an agricultural depression, state funding for higher education suffered. In 1921, the school failed to make some of its salary payments to staff on time. The problem of renovating the decaying campus on a shoestring budget led to some temporary solutions, including buildings constructed with scrap materials and lacking either central heating or electric lights that were derisively referred to as the "dairy barn" (which housed the Training School) and the "shack". Despite sub-par facilities, ETSNC's enrollment continued to grow during the 1920s, largely thanks to its low costs: it charged no tuition, most textbooks were free, and it only required students to pay a $15 fee for "all privileges" (including access to the library and laboratory) and a $1 "diploma fee" upon graduating. In 1917, room and board costs had ranged from $18 to $20 per month.
  Although Binnion generally adhered to the same principles regarding teacher education that Mayo did, ETSNC's conversion into a state school brought inevitable and extensive changes. The college was reorganized into four separate program "divisions": a training school (which taught local children in the first nine grades and trained teaching students), a normal school division (a two-year program equivalent to a secondary school education that also offered a temporary teaching certificate), a diploma division (a two-year program resulting in the equivalent of an associate o
caption: The Training School, nicknamed the "dairy barn", in 1922
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