Columbia Decides to Go Coed

And Barnard goes its own way as a college for women

Barnard College was founded in 1889 because Columbia would not accept women students. In the half-century that followed, Barnard became one of the top schools in the country, with a tough liberal arts curriculum, fiercely proud of its role in educating women. In the 1970s wave of mergers and alliances that saw other Ivy League institutions go coed, Columbia College held out as a school for men only. But last week Columbia finally broke with its tradition. The college announced that it will begin accepting female students by the fall of 1983. Barnard, meanwhile, declared that it will remain a college for women, but with a special relation to Columbia.

The announcements ended more than a decade of merger talk. In 1973 the two made an agreement for something called "integration without assimilation," which meant that students could share libraries and many courses. Columbia, in need of women students to increase its pool of applicants, was soon describing single-sex education as "an anachronism" and urgently proposing marriage.

Barnard kept replying that it wanted to maintain its independence, but it yielded some of its autonomy in return for the privilege of cross-registering for a number of courses. This agreement placed Barnard tenure decisions in the hands of a faculty committee in which Barnard was outnumbered by Columbia 3 to 2. Last fall when Ellen Futter, 32, became president of Barnard, she referred to the "strange and wonderful" relationship with Columbia. Strained was more like it. Hardly had she been chosen when Columbia University President Michael Sovern, 50, who had taught Futter at Columbia's law school, threatened that if Banard would not merge completely, Columbia would go coed by itself, thus competing directly for Barnard's students.

In the bargaining that followed, Futter gradually agreed to sharing classes, dormitories and dining halls. But having observed how coordinates turned into conglomerates (Brown and Pembroke, Harvard and Radcliffe, Tulane and Sophie Newcomb), she held out for control over faculty tenure appointments and most of Barnard's undergraduate degree requirements. On these issues the negotiations collapsed.

To listen to the two presidents, the new arrangement is the best of all possible non-unions. Boasted Futter: "The agreement reached today is a tremendous triumph for Barnard College." Said Sovern: "I don't see any snakes in this Eden." In the short term, both appeared to be right. For seven years, under contract, the two institutions will continue to cross-register courses and share facilities. (Barnard's library has 150,000 volumes, Columbia University's 5 million.) Barnard will regain control over its own faculty (tenure will be decided by a committee of two Barnard and two Columbia professors, plus one outside scholar). Futter insists that the contract will provide stability and that Barnard's $25 million endowment can support its program. The college emphasizes strong teaching and has a largely female faculty who can serve as role models for students. The policy works: Barnard has seen its pool of applicants increase by 51% in the past four years. Says Elizabeth Kennan, president of Mount Holyoke, another top women's college: "Barnard should not fear competition from a coed Columbia. There is an intense interest among young women today for women's colleges that will put Barnard in a strong position."

Columbia's drawing power, by contrast, has declined in recent years, partly because of its city location. Also it has a faculty heavily oriented toward graduate study and research. The number of Columbia's applicants is well below the competition's. More important, its yield ratio (those who actually attend after being admitted) is near the bottom of the Ivy League. By admitting women, Sovern estimates, Columbia will double the applicant pool from 3,500 to 7,000.

Most of the new applicants will be women, but some will be men, "because there are many men who don't want to go to a male college." Sovern, in fact, predicts a booming future for everyone concerned. Says he: "We now have the complete choice for the young American woman--she can go single-sex at Barnard or coeducational at Columbia. My guess is that Columbia recruiters will find some women who would really rather go to a single-sex college in the city, and they will go to Barnard."

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