USA > Maine > Kennebec County > Waterville > The history of Colby College > Part 54
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Although Dr. Bixler had taught at one of the largest colleges for women and at a large complex university, he recognized the worth of the small college. A full year before his inauguration as Colby's president, he had written:
I have always been impressed by the fact that the community life of a small college of liberal arts offers a chance for the development of social and intellectual attitudes which is not matched in any other form of educational enterprise. In a day of drastic social change, it seems to me that democracy needs these attitudes as never before. The small college cannot compete with the university in all respects, but it can respond more easily to new conditions without losing its basic lovalties. With its record of solid achievement and its courageous plans for the future, Colby is making a notable contribution to Maine and to the country as a whole.3
It was President's Bixler's conviction that Colby should give attention to the national trend toward courses in general education, prompted by the famous study at Harvard and the resulting program at that university. When Ernest Mar- riner became Dean of the Faculty in 1947, he had already been teaching for sev- eral years a general education course for freshmen, "Man and His World," and he eagerly joined the President in a campaign for more such interdepartmental courses at Colby. That campaign was only partially successful.
The course "Man and His World" became "Great Thinkers in the Western Tradition," a freshman course, but still elective, taught jointly by several depart- ments in the Division of Social Sciences. Outstanding was "Creative Thinking,"
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a course for a group of selected seniors. It worked so well that a similar course, equally selective, was introduced for freshmen. "Ethical Issues," a junior-senior course introduced into the Department of Philosophy and Religion, enlisted help from other departments. But other attempts to implement general education were not successful. Experimental courses in the sciences were soon given up. For two years an instructor, added to the faculty for the purpose, taught a general course in humanities, but it failed to win the approval and cooperation of the conventional departments in that division.
By 1960, although further experimentation with interdepartmental courses was open-mindedly accepted, the official position of the Colby faculty had be- come clear. A majority felt strongly that general education, in the sense of in- troducing the student to wide areas of knowledge, is best attained by a system of "distribution," whereby the student gets more than superficial information about a single subject within an area, rather than covers a survey of the whole area or selects samples from many subjects within it. The Colby way of facing general education continued to be the requirement of taking departmental courses in the three long established areas of knowledge: humanities, sciences, and social sciences.
The foreign language requirement received particular attention during the years immediately following the war. The requirement had previously been re- stricted to the modern languages, thus putting Greek and Latin in the unenviable position of not being recognized to meet the regulations. That discrimination ceased in 1945, when it was voted that "before a student becomes a candidate for a degree, he must show that he has a basic reading knowledge of one of the two classical languages or of one of the modern foreign languages taught at Colby." The requirement could be met by examination or by successful completion of a course above the elementary level (first year college course). There was also introduced an intensive course both in German and in Spanish, covering the work of the customary first two years in one year.
Caught up in the wave of enthusiasm for unique programs in the colleges, the Colby faculty for a time considered the possibility of a Colby Plan. Pro- fessor Paul Fullam went to Chicago to investigate the novel experiments of Presi- dent Hutchins. Professor Norman Palmer studied the unique program at St. Johns. Committees took long looks at the changes taking place at Harvard, Yale and Princeton. The Colby faculty finally concluded not to institute a radical Colby plan, but to meet changing conditions by adapting new courses and new methods to the traditional liberal arts curriculum, based on the three divisions of humani- ties, sciences, and social sciences.
Among the new features adopted were year courses, the "C" rule, and a change in the marking system. In 1941 the faculty authorized the introduction of year-courses, requiring that such courses must be completed for a full year to return any credit. In 1947 the graduation requirement was changed from a certain number of semester hours to twenty year-courses or their equivalent in semester courses, and every course was considered equal to every other regard- less of the number of classroom or laboratory hours. When the faculty first demanded that a student must have a mark of at least "C" in the courses of his major subject or be excluded from that major, they set up an escape hatch called a "Dean's Major," in which a student could be enrolled while trying to win restoration into his former major or acceptance into a new one. In 1946, on the insistence of the Dean of Men, who believed that the escape clause lowered Colby standards, the faculty voted that "any student who is dropped from a major
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and fails to secure acceptance into another is not permitted to continue in college."
In the fall of 1941 the faculty was stirred by proposals for a new marking system. Even the Japanese bombs at Pearl Harbor did not still the discussion. A faculty committee proposed to substitute the following system in place of the time honored A to F range: H, passed with honors; M, passed with merit; S, passed satisfactorily; P, barely passed; F, failed. At the meeting in January, 1942, a motion was made and seconded to adopt the proposal. Then the motion was withdrawn. What followed is revealed in the caustic minutes of that meeting recorded by the faculty secretary, Elmer C. Warren:
After further lengthy and somewhat humorous discussion, it was voted to abolish our present system of numerical marks. This action distinguished Colby as a college with no marking system. After a generous amount of bantering, it was moved and seconded that the letters ABCD be substituted for HMSP in the proposal, and we were right back where we had started.
The faculty finally voted to continue the old numerical system of 1 to 100, with marks reported to students, as formerly, by letters from A to F. In 1958 it was voted to do away with numerical marks, each instructor reporting to the Recorder's office by letters from A to F, supplemented by plus and minus symbols.
One of President Bixler's outstanding contributions to the Colby curriculum was his emphasis on art and music. The latter had held a modest place since the first decade of the twentieth century, when Mrs. Clarence White's name ap- peared in the catalogue as teacher of pianoforte. But until President Bixler brought Dr. Ermanno Comparetti to the staff in 1942, neither instrumental nor vocal music was taught by a full-time member of the faculty. In fact, vocal music re- mained under the part-time instruction of Mr. John W. Thomas until 1952 when Peter Re became a member of the department in charge of vocal work.
In 1943 Dr. Comparetti started the Colby-Community Symphony Orchestra, including students, faculty and townspeople. A generous trustee gave $5,000 a year for three years, to stimulate the whole musical program. Prominent musi- cians in America and from abroad were brought to the campus for concerts and recitals. The Boston Globe devoted a full page of the Sunday rotogravure sec- tion to pictures of the Colby-Community Orchestra, calling attention to it as a joint effort of town and gown." Friends raised more than a thousand dollars for the orchestra's support. Academic credit was given for work done in or- chestra, glee club, and band.
The vocal units, already well trained under Mr. Thomas, developed rapidly under Professor Re. The choir and the glee club became famous for their public programs, especially those given in Carnegie Hall, New York, or over the radio on the Monsanto program. Two smaller units, the Colby Eight and the Colbyettes, male and female groups respectively, were much in demand by public organiza- tions as well as at college functions. The Eight filled repeated engagements at a Bermuda hotel.
Although it had long been the intention to expand the program into individual instrumental instruction by full-time members of the staff, as soon as facilities should be available, the opening of the magnificent Bixler Art and Music Center in 1959 did not mean that Colby was starting a separate school of music. It has always been, and in 1959 still was, the intention to keep Colby distinctly a college of liberal arts and to require every student who majored in music not
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only to take courses in musical theory and music history, but also to fulfill the same distribution requirements in humanities, sciences, and social sciences as were demanded of every other Colby student.
Campus interest in music was greatly stimulated by the Waterville Coopera- tive Concert series, an annual series of concerts under the direction of a member of the Modern Language Department, Professor Everett F. Strong, for many years the organist at the Waterville Congregational Church.
Since the time when Laban Warren introduced a single term course in the History of Classical Art in the 1880's, Colby had included such a course in its curriculum until the retirement of Professor Clarence White in 1934. Then for nearly a decade the College had no courses at all in art. President Bixler at once remedied that situation by his appointment of Professor Samuel Green in fine arts. Professor Green's courses at once became popular. He brought to the College many distinguished exhibits from the Metropolitan, the Museum of Modern Art, and the Boston Art Museum, as well as the works of such individual artists as John Marin, Andrew Wyeth, Waldo Pierce, and Colby's alumnus Charles Hovey Pepper. Green became especially interested in the indigenous art and archi- tecture of Maine. He mounted a notable exhibit of early Maine architecture, and supplemented it with ships' figureheads, weather vanes, and interesting "primitives."
When Professor Green left Colby for a more alluring position, he was, after a brief interval, succeeded by James Carpenter, who in quiet but effective manner expanded the art curriculum, continued the exhibits, and worked in hearty coopera- tion with Dr. Comparetti on the unique plans for the Art and Music Building.
From Maine's well-known Pulsifer family President Bixler secured the loan of a notable collection of paintings by Winslow Homer, which were hung in the lounge at Roberts Union until the opening of the exhibit rooms in the new build- ing. As the years of the Bixler administration went by, item after item was added to the art collection, including one of the nation's best and most extensive collections of American "primitives." Called the American Heritage Collection, it was presented to the College by Mr. and Mrs. Ellerton Jette. It consists of nearly a hundred primitive paintings of the period from 1800 to 1860. Most of the artists still remain anonymous. Among them were painters of signs, houses, and carriages, and itinerant limners. Largely untutored and technically unskilled, the American primitive painter worked in complete freedom, unfettered by tradi- tion or schools. The product is essentially and typically American, and the Jette collection has done much to give Colby distinction in the assembling of a per- manent, distinguished museum.
As the Colby program in art captured popular attention and won the ap- proval of contemporary artists, it won the interest of Willard W. Cummings, founder of the Skowhegan School of Art, a summer program of national renown. In 1959 Mr. Cummings completed a portrait of President Bixler, which hangs in the main lobby of the Art and Music Center. Mrs. Ellerton Jette and Mr. Cummings organized a group called The Friends of Art at Colby. That group secured gifts of paintings and other works to add to the College's already con- siderable holdings, for the Inaugural Exhibition at the opening of the new build- ing, on October 17, 1959. Said Mrs. Jette: "We have many plans for the fu- ture: to continue to improve and enlarge our permanent collection; to obtain the best possible traveling and loan collections; to attract to Colby top speakers. The list is endless. We plan to start immediately a permanent endowment fund with yearly or life memberships, so that we shall have the resources to reach these goals."
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Not so successful as art and music was the attempt to introduce a Collegiate School of Nursing. At their meeting in November, 1942, on the urging of Dr. Frederick T. Hill, the Trustees voted to start such a school in the fall of 1943. President Bixler made it clear that the nursing program was not a step toward turning Colby into a school of vocational training. He said:
Obviously Colby cannot establish a set of graduate schools of university type. Just as clearly it will not forsake its liberal arts ideal to become a junior college with emphasis on vocational instruction. Colby's aim, now as always, is to give a liberal arts education. But we believe edu- cation is not made liberal simply by removing it from those areas where the practical work of the world is done. We believe that, in certain special fields, where we have the equipment and can handle the prac- tical details involved, we can provide a type of training that will be liberal in the best sense and yet will prepare directly for professional work. As a matter of fact we have done this for many years in the fields of teaching and business administration. We are especially eager to do it in nursing because we believe there is need for high educa- tional standards in that profession.5
The nursing course demanded five years of the student's time. It yielded an A.B. degree and a diploma in nursing education, enabling the graduate to take a position at executive or teaching level in the profession. The first two and one- half years were spent at Colby, then two years were devoted to clinical study in hospitals, and the final semester was spent back at the College so that the stu- dents could bring together the diverse threads of their training and complete it within the Colby community.
Along with the course in nursing, there was introduced a course in Medical Technology. A student could complete it in four calendar years, three at Colby and one of special instruction at the Central Maine General Hospital in Lewiston and the Pratt Diagnostic Clinic in Boston.
It was not the fault of Dr. Hill and other persons in the medical and nursing professions that the program did not succeed. Dr. Hill devoted much time and energy to its problems, as did Dr. Raymond Sloan and Miss Pearl Fisher. In October, 1943, Dr. Hill was able to report to his fellow trustees that 17 students had initially enrolled in Medical Technology and three in Nursing. Then in the spring of 1944 trouble loomed on the horizon. The U. S. Government started its program of Cadet Nursing Training, and few girls were willing to pay sub- stantial fees for what they considered Uncle Sam would give them free. The fact that the Colby program was different, assuring breadth in liberal arts as well as professional depth, made insufficient appeal. A year later Dr. Hill reported that enrollment in Medical Technology continued to be encouraging, but the numbers in Nursing were decidedly disappointing. The situation dragged on for several years after the war. In 1947 President Bixler told the Trustees he was concerned about the program; only 18 of more than 150 new women students were taking any interest in either course. After 1950, Colby accepted no new stu- dents in the program, and continued the courses only long enough to graduate those girls who were already enrolled.
In 1949 President Bixler proposed an innovation that afterwards won wide acclaim. It was called "The Book of the Year." A committee of students and faculty chose one book which the entire Colby community was asked to read, and throughout the year it was brought into classroom discussion as occasion of-
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fered. Beginning with 1949-50, successive Books of the Year were Lecomte du Nouy's Human Destiny, Harry Overstreet's The Mature Mind, Plays of Bernard Shaw, Norman Cousins' Who Speaks for Man, Albert Schweitzer's Out of My Life and Thought, David Riesman's The Lonely Crowd, Don Quixote, Crane Brinton's The Shaping of the Modern Mind, Veblen's The Theory of the Leisure Class.
In 1953, at President Bixler's urging, there was introduced a program known as Senior Scholars. At first including only four seniors, it was in later years ex- panded sometimes to as many as eight. The number was intentionally kept small, to insure both careful selection and adequate supervision. Released from either two or three of their conventional courses, the chosen seniors were assigned to individual faculty tutors, who guided them in the completion of a comprehensive paper on a topic chosen in the student's major field.
In 1953 curricular investigations being pressed by President Bixler so at- tracted the Fund for the Advancement of Education, a subsidiary of the Ford Foundation, that the Fund granted $12,500 to Colby, to make a self-study of its educational program between February 1954 and June 1955. The Dean of the Faculty, Ernest Marriner, was released from part of his normal duties to direct the study, carried out by a faculty committee whose other members were: Mark Benbow (English), Wilfred Combellack (Mathematics), Richard Gilman (Philosophy), Donaldson Koons (Geology), Frank Lathrop (Business Adminis- tration), Gordon Smith (Modern Languages), and Ralph Williams, Assistant to the President. Whenever possible, President Bixler attended the committee meet- ings and made valuable suggestions.
The committee decided as its central theme for investigation "A Climate Favorable for Learning at Colby College." The study sought to determine the nature, cause and strength of factors which produce a favorable climate and those which hinder it. As the aims of Colby College the committee accepted a state- ment already enunciated by President Bixler.
1. The education of young men and women by stimulating teaching in the basic fields of knowledge.
2. Inculcating habits of discriminating thinking so as to enable the student to sift truth from propaganda, the sound from the fal- lacious, the good and beautiful from the cheap and shoddy.
3. Directing students to view events and situations with a sense of perspective grounded upon a long-range understanding of history.
4. Making the campus a laboratory for democratic group living, send- ing out men and women who will be responsible, intelligent and loyal citizens of their larger communities.
5. Exposing the student to the highest ideals of ethics and religion and encouraging the adoption of those ideals as supplying the per- sonal dynamic for a life of creative and fruitful service.6
There ensued a detailed study of the relation to the central theme of such topics as curriculum and methods of teaching; admission and graduation standards, especially as revealed in attrition; reading ability of the students; honesty in aca- demic work; and the prevailing student attitude toward the existing academic standards. The committee found it equally important to study the influence of non-academic activities on the climate of learning. The investigation therefore
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included fraternities and sororities, athletics and other extracurricular activities, the AFROTC, and the social life in general. As the study progressed, the com- mittee found that they must not neglect to consider the physical environment, especially its aids or obstacles to study habits; the influence of the career motive in a college of liberal arts, and such intangible influences as Recognition Assembly, the Library Associates, the student publications, the foreign language clubs, and the literary groups. As the committee expressed it, "Every group that 'bats around ideas' contributes to the life of the mind at Colby."
One topic of extensive study had been giving increased concern for many years. What most coeducational colleges recognize as expected superior academic performance from the women had become a serious problem at Colby, because each year since the close of World War II the gap between the two sexes in re- spect to academic achievement had widened.
Statistics gathered in the study made the discrepancy abundantly clear. In June, 1955, the Committee on Standing had dropped from college 22 men and 5 women, had continued on probation 19 men and 2 women, had placed orig- inally on probation 29 men and 3 women, making a total of 70 men and only 10 women concerning whom severe action was taken. In the annual elections to Phi Beta Kappa, women outnumbered men four to one, although the total num- ber of women in each class was less than two-thirds the number of men. In the Class of 1954, although 26 quality points were sufficient for graduation, no woman had fewer than 30, and only four had fewer than 40; while 11 men had fewer than 30 points. Eighteen women, but only six men, had more than 80 points. For men of the class, the median of quality points was 45; for women it was 60. A study of reading ability emphasized the sex disparity. In every category -vocabulary, speed, comprehension-the women scored better than the men.
The study revealed that admission had much to do with the better per- formance of women. Among the students who entered as freshmen in 1950, only 12% of the women had stood below the middle of their high school classes, while 28% of the men were in that status. Even more striking was the fact that 79% of the women stood in the upper quarter, while only 38% of the men had that distinction. The women scored higher than the men on the Scholastic Aptitude Test, not merely in verbal score but also in mathematical, and they showed over- whelming superiority in foreign languages.
The committee concluded that the solution did not lie in leveling down the quality of the women students, but rather in upgrading the quality of the men. "Somehow," the report said, "a larger number of better qualified men must be induced to seek admission into Colby. A liberal arts college is an institution where intellectual performance is a measure of the college's distinct contribution to the nation's culture. Such a college is rightly concerned not alone for the performance of superior students, but also for the general level of student achieve- ment. However inevitable may be a disparity between the sexes in this respect, Colby should be determined that every reasonable effort shall constantly be made to narrow the gap of that disparity."7
In its final report the committee made thirty-four recommendations: seven concerned with curriculum and instruction, eight with admission and graduation requirements, one with reading ability, two with physical education and athletics, one with AFROTC, nine with the physical environment, three with the superior student, and five with intangible influences.
Among the recommendations eventually adopted by the faculty were a pro- gram of remedial reading; revision of the Air Science program, including a change
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from required to voluntary courses; elimination of the Division of General Studies, and substantial changes in the requirements for graduation. Although it brought no sweeping alterations, it did stimulate both faculty study and student interest in curriculum problems, and it led to further study by a committee under Dean Strider, culminating in the adoption of a unique program to become effective in the fall of 1961. Under that program the month of January would be devoted to independent study, and those "lost weekends" between Christmas and mid-year examinations would be eliminated, because the examinations would be held be- fore the holidays. Continued attention to problems raised by the Self-Study was assured by the appointment of a standing faculty committee on Educational Policy.
Three steps affecting the curriculum were taken early in the 1950's. A co- operative plan was worked out with the Carnegie Institute of Technology, whereby a student after completing three years at Colby and two subsequent years at Carnegie could obtain both the Colby A.B. degree and the Carnegie M.S. in Engineering. Later the Massachusetts Institute of Technology included Colby in a similar cooperative plan. In 1952 the Graduate School of Education at Har- vard invited Colby to be one of twenty-seven colleges selected to inaugurate a co- operative program in teacher training. Under that plan, from three to six Colby seniors have been accepted annually into a Harvard graduate course culminating in the degree of Master of Arts in Teaching. During the year at Harvard, the student devotes one semester to work in the Graduate School of Education and the other semester to work in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences.
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