If the apparatus in the Queen Margaret College is not sufficient to illustrate the Science and Medical Classes, the supply is supplemented from the other building, or the girls may go there for demonstrations, at different hours from the men. There are several women going up not only for Preliminary exams. in Arts, but for Professional exams. in Medicine.
The relation between the two Colleges has been sometimes called Affiliation. This is incorrect. Affiliation supposes a separate governing body and other details of separate existence. At one time Affiliation was suggested, but the Rulers of Queen Margaret College preferred that it should be taken over and become a part of the University. The new arrangement works very well, and in a large University like Glasgow the women prefer it to mixed classes.
The Medical Department of the College is the only active School of Medicine for women belonging to a University in this Country. As applications are constantly being received, the number of its students is likely to increase rapidly. After Matriculation, women are admitted to the Hunterian Museum, have permission for the usual attendance in the Wards and on the clinical Lectures at the Royal Infirmary. The classes in Medicine being University classes, certificates of attendance thereon may be used by those who propose to become Candidates for the degrees of the other Scottish Universities, for those of the London University, Victoria University, and the Royal University of Ireland, as well as for the Qualification of the Scottish Corporations, the Colleges of Physicians and Surgeons of Edinburgh and the Faculty of Physicians and Surgeons of Glasgow (Conjoint).
Glasgow University, like that of Edinburgh, for the time being, has made those differences in favour of women that we call Retrospective Recognition, of those who had attended classes in Queen Margaret College, though there are none completely ready to take full advantage of it. As soon as arrangements are fully made for their education, the conditions for women will be the same as for men.
The University of Aberdeen was founded in 1494. Women’s claims on its attention have not been so persistent as they have been in the Southern Universities. But it rose to the new conditions of the Scottish Universities Acts.
Ordinance No. 18 of the Universities Commission having passed, the University Court of Aberdeen, on the recommendation of the Senatus, resolved to admit women to Graduation in all Faculties. As to their instruction, women are, within the University, on the same footing as men, in the Faculties of Arts and Divinity, Science, and in the Faculty of Law, except so far as the class of Medical Jurisprudence is concerned, which is classified with the other Medical classes proper, in which the University has meantime considered it not advisable to provide the necessary instruction.
Eleven women have matriculated this year and have commenced with the Class of Literature. In answer to a question the Secretary of the Senatus replied, “When we have any women Graduates, questions of their privileges will have to be considered. But I can see no ground on which membership in our General Council can be denied to them, except there be any legal difficulty connected with the right of every member of Council to vote for the M.P. for Glasgow and Aberdeen.”
Durham University was founded in 1832-33 by the Dean and Chapter of Durham; the Newcastle-on-Tyne College of Medicine was made an integral part of the University in 1870, the Newcastle College of Physical Science in 1871. There is no notice of Women in the Calendar. Women have from the beginning been admitted to the classes of the College of Physical Science in Newcastle, but not to the Medical College in Newcastle nor to the Durham College itself. A strong petition was drawn up in 1881 to admit women to full privileges in Durham, but Convocation refused to allow women matriculation unless a Hostel were established, that is, they would have no “unattached” women students. It is always difficult to find funds for the needs of women, and the “Hostel” was not at once forthcoming. Convocation assented to the following:—