After Seven Years Together Harvard, Annex Hold Hands

It happened at a ten dance. He said, "Why did you come to Radcliffe?" She replied, "Because I've always wanted to go to a co-educational college."

Now everyone knows that Radcliffe isn't really co-educational. This regrettably mistaken young lady, like so many people fresh to the Cambridge scene, was fooled by an amorphous concept called Joint Instruction.

Seven years' application of the Joint Instruction program have made confusion with co-education possible. What started out as an academic economy device for a women's college grew like a cancer--insidiously, effectively. More courses became available to women, Widener turned into a date exchange, barriers at the grad schools began to fall, and to the horror of a substantial number of students, administrative officers, and alumni, women moved into Harvard extra-curricular clubs.

Now, all of a sudden, the female advance seems to have stopped. Both men and women appear to feel that further union would mean profanation of their scholarly souls; they apparently are satisfied with the present relationship.

Joint Instruction, it must be understood, allegedly refers exclusively to matters of educational policy. This was especially evident in the spring months of last year when at least three Harvard and Radcliffe groups started to discuss rules for admitting Radcliffe girls to Harvard groups.

College policy had been that Harvard clubs must have 100 percent Harvard membership. When the Dean's office received a petition from an embryonic Biology club which requested a part Radcliffe membership, the old policy was shaken from its shelf.

Reserved Yes

The Harvard Student Council favored allowing joint clubs with certain reservations. These reservations stated that if the Harvard club had a Radcliffe counterpart, girls could not move over the Cambridge Common. It further stated that a majority of members and officers must be men.

This program, approved by the Radcliffe Council, was rejected by the Dean's office, which countered with a slightly revised proposal of its own: clubs must be departmental (like the Biology club) or for a social interest (like a drama club). Furthermore, in each case, there must be specific approval by Harvard and Radcliffe.

This set of rules went back to the Student Council. The Council returned its first set of rules and the matter was never brought up again.

According to Radcliffe's Dean Sherman, "There simply did not seem to be a pressing need or widespread popular demand at either Harvard or Radcliffe for drastic revision . . . It seems hardly worthwhile to enter into highly complicated rules and regulations which joint organizations would entail."

The emphasis on "departmental" reflected the traditional approach, "If it's strictly educational, we'll do it together." And everyone seemed to agree. Gordon J. Poole '47 2L, president of the H.Y.R.C., has said that his organization could work much more "efficiently and effectively" if it was divided into two monosexual groups. He was echoed by John T. White '52, a member of the H.L.U. executive board, who believes in close cooperation, "but not close enough to unite."

On the other hand, the Biology club held its first meeting of the new year on Wednesday night and women members were present with voting privileges.

Despite this, Radcliffe isn't really co-educational. It's Joint Instruction. To understand Joint Instruction, one must go back, back to a day in 1878 when President Eliot walked into his office and found a letter lying on his desk. "Dear Sir," it said. "I am engaged in perfecting a plan which shall afford women opportunities for carrying their studies forward further than it is possible for them to do in this country (except possibly at Smith) . . ." The letter was signed by one Arthur Gilman, a Cambridge historian.

Eliot wrote Gilman that he could use several Harvard faculty members. Gilman approached selected instructors. He received 53 replies--44 of them were acceptances, and Arthur Gilman was off on the greatest experiment of his life, "The Society for Collegiate Instruction of Women."

It was, in reality, the Harvard Annex. The professors were Harvard, the standards were Harvard, the assignments were Harvard. And so, when the society decided it might be nice to give its girls degrees, it was only natural that Harvard should sign them.

Until that time, no one had ever heard of a society giving degrees. The next move was to make the Annex a college. This happened in 1894. The Massachusetts General Court approved a charter for Radcliffe College, named after Ann Radcliffe, Harvard's first woman benefactor. This charter contained a provision that it could award no degrees "except with the approval of the President and Fellows of Harvard College."

From then on, Radcliffe led what Provost Buck has called "a hand-to-mouth existence, sometimes amusing and exhilarating, sometimes profoundly disturbing, always subject to certain abuses and confusions . . ." It was, as he put it, "a scrambled egg."

Professors, associate professors, assistant professors and instructors would get up at 10 a.m., give their Harvard classes, and then trek to the Annex later in the morning to do it all over again. As anyone who has ever taken the long walk knows, a person is bound to lose some enthusiasm somewhere along the way.

Faculty members were no exception, but they were receiving double salaries and strengthening the weaker sex at the same time. The experiment continued in desultory fashion.

And then came the Second World War. Faculty members were drafted, Radcliffe was faced with rising costs and on April 13, 1943, Jerome D. Green '96, Secretary of the Harvard Corporation, issued a report stating that a "possible revision of the arrangements by which the instruction of members of the Harvard faculty is made available in courses given by Radcliffe College," was under consideration.

There was no longer a Radcliffe faculty, financially or otherwise. For a sum, ranging between 80 and 85 percent of the total 'Cliffe tuition, educational policy was surrendered to Harvard.

Today, a move such as the new G.E. requirements originates with the Committee on Educational Policy, a subdivision of the Harvard Faculty of Arts and Sciences. Once passed by this body it goes to the Harvard Corporation and the Radcliffe Administrative Council. Subject to approval by both of these bodies and their superiors, the matter is considered and returned to the Faculty of Arts and Sciences for execution.

All non-academic matters are still handled by the individual institutions. Fund drives, parietal rules, and the like are carried out through completely independent channels, but combined classes received a boost three years ago when the wartime experiment was formalized. Teaching arrangements were then said to provide for joint instruction of students in the two institutions in all cases where separate instruction would be wasteful of faculty personnel."

Freshman Courses, Too

On January 11, the Faculty of Arts and Sciences voted to open the last stronghold of anti-feminism, the freshman courses. Today, all but six courses in the college are jointly open to Harvard and Radcliffe students. This has not been according to plan, because back in 1948, Dean Bender said, "Perhaps in a couple of years, when the whole setup is shaken down a bit, we can re-examine class lists and separate a few of the largest courses again. It might be advisable in a few cases."

Just how much further Joint Instruction will go is anyone's guess. The controversial subject of combined exams, now being given in music, fine arts, and elementary language courses is still under discussion, and may be resolved later this year.

Professors are resigned to the fate of watching men take notes and girls knit. Certain men such as Earnest A. Hooton, professor of Anthropology, admit that women in class have caused them to alter their styles slightly, but they are proceeding in quiet submission.

Carle C. Zimmerman, associate professor of Social Relations, expressed a "so what" sentiment about Joint Instruction. "Most institutions today have co-education," he said, "so I don't see how it makes any difference. It seems to me that I'm saying the same things that I was saying when I had only men."