Co-Education.
Rising in interest and importance above every other phase of the “woman question,” is that of her education, her higher education, and from this the question of co-education. The first cause which has associated the idea of co-education with the higher education of women, has been the fact that higher educational facilities are, with very few exceptions, limited to the colleges and universities established for the education of men. If woman is to receive higher education it is apparent at the start that the institutions called woman’s colleges and seminaries are inadequate to the work. Hence, whatever other considerations may enter into the co-education problem, this much is clear: if women now, or at any time in the near future, are to have these facilities they must come by some system of co-education, as only institutions now existing for men can furnish them. This suggests the economic and time element of the question. Colleges and universities of ability to do the work of higher education are not born in a day. The best representatives of such institutions in this country and in England are the growth of centuries, and their cabinets, laboratories, museums, libraries, and endowments the results of weary, slow accumulations.
Not to speak now of the other and more positive reasons in its favor, reasons growing out of the association of the sexes in recitation and lecture-room, and the wholesome influences on each thus secured, let us see what are the objections urged by its opponents. We hear a good deal about the tendency to make coarse the naturally fine fibre of woman, about constitutional differences of intellect, and difference of sphere and pursuits in life. Now, in all soberness, if there is anything in this idea that association of the sexes tends to rob woman of the charms of fineness and gentleness peculiar to her, how is it that she has managed to keep them from the days of Adam and Eve until now? And as to differences of intellect, they are neither so constitutional nor “unconstitutional” as to disqualify her for an even race with her brother. If the testimony of professors and college authorities, where the opportunity has been given her, can be relied upon, whenever the race is uneven it has been in her favor. The objection about sphere and pursuits in life misconceives the true purpose of education. The true conception is not addressed to pursuits, but is of a solid foundation on which the special education of pursuit or profession is erected.
Recognizing the force and truth of these and other considerations, and acting up to their convictions, the great and time-honored universities of the English speaking world, Oxford and Cambridge, have led the way, and thrown wide open their doors to young women seeking their privileges. At these honored institutions young women live in their own “halls,” as at some of our American colleges, under care of women of highest social standing, enter the same lecture-room and listen to the same lecture with the young men. The following from a leading educational journal, reveals the growing favor of co-education at Cambridge: “Since the modest beginning thirteen years ago of Girton College,—the woman’s college at Cambridge,—it has twice been found necessary to make considerable extensions. The students have proved themselves eager to profit by the advantages afforded to them, as was shown by their distinctions obtained at Cambridge this year. It is now once more intended to develop the work of the college by making further and more elaborate extensions. For some time past a number of applicants have been refused admission owing to the want of space, and plans have at last been adopted which will make room for more students.”
It is not a little strange the illiberal spirit manifested by some of the leading institutions of this country, instance the narrow and partial conditions of the “Harvard Annex” and the opposition by the trustees and part of the faculty of Columbia College. In the latter case there is just now a tidal wave of public sentiment in New York City sweeping against the opposition, which, it is to be hoped, will overcome all resistance. The leaven is working. It is a reform, and reforms go forward in this nineteenth century. Geologists tell us that six thousand years ago the age of man was ushered in. Let the future geologists record this as the age of man and woman, too.
