APPENDIX XIII

REPORT OF THE WARDEN OF SAGE COLLEGE

To the President of the University:

SIR: I have the honor to submit my report as Warden of Sage College for the year 1907-1908.

The number of students resident in Sage College during both the first and second half years was 169; the number in Sage Cottage during the first half year was 39, during the second half year 36. The total number in the dormitories, therefore, was 208 for the first half year, 205 for the second half year. Three lodging houses accommodating from fifteen to thirty students each, were reserved for women in the fall and kept full during the year. Of these three, one was the Alumnæ House, the plan of which was described in last year's report and which has already demonstrated its power for usefulness and given promise of a long and successful existence. A second house was composed of women of one fraternity, the third of women from various classes who either applied too late for rooms in Sage, or who preferred the greater quiet of life in a smaller establishment. About ten seniors or older students roomed in Cascadilla building. The remainder lived either at home or with friends or in places that were approved by the Warden. The scheme initiated this year of requiring all women registering in the University to register also at the Warden's office, proved of invaluable service in bringing the Warden at once into touch with all for whose housing she was responsible.

Various small improvements were made in the dormitories during the year including the installation of the system of automatic fire alarms and thermostats which were ordered last winter. Since September also a night watchman has patrolled the corridors of the College and Cottage, so that the protection against fire would now seem to be complete. The increase of twenty-five cents weekly in the price of board has made possible some widening in the range of the bill of fare and a small but needed addition to the staff of waiters which has facilitated service in the dining room. In general the table seems to have been wholesome and reasonably satisfactory in

spite of the constantly rising cost of food material. Certain sweeping alterations which are to be made in the College building during the coming summer will improve still more conditions in the dining department, notably, the enlarging and rearranging of parts of the kitchen and of the freshmen dining room. The laying of new hard wood floors throughout the College, the remodelling of a portion of the reception rooms, the addition of a large new hot water boiler to the south wing and the general repainting and repapering and freshening of old furniture there and in the Cottage, which are also to take place in the summer, will much increase the comfort and attractiveness of these dwelling places of the women of the University.

In

The general health has, in the main, been good, especially during the spring term when sickness of any kind was unusually rare. October one of the young men who acted as student waiters contracted scarlet fever from some outside source and imparted the infection to other members of the household before the nature of his own malady was discovered. Four young women, two residents of Sage College and two of the Cottage, came down in turn with the fever and were taken to the isolated ward of the City Hospital. Prompt and efficient action on the part of the University Committee on Health prevented the spread of the disease. A trained nurse was brought from the Infirmary and a doctor called morning and evening to keep strict watch over every case of illness, however slight and apparently innocuous and every spot where contagion could have lodged was carefully cleansed and fumigated. A few students took alarm and went home for a week or two or to other houses in town, but on the whole their attitude was cool and sensible and there was no panic. All anxiety for fear of further outbreak had practically ended by Thanksgiving. The cases of fever were uniformly light and the last of the convalescents was released from detention during the Christmas holidays.

Work in the department of physical training and athletics has proceeded steadily as before. Dr. Barringer has paid her customary visit to examine and advise with the women upon their health. To the universal regret she finds it incompatible with the growing demands of her practice in New York to continue her connection with the University another year. The women have profited by her willingness to sacrifice her own interests to theirs for so long, they themselves are appreciating now what her colleagues have felt from the first, the value of her insistence upon a more thorough and systematic oversight of the physical condition of the student body

and a stricter enforcement of precautions against excessive exertion, and also of her efforts to arouse in the community a more intelligent concern for the maintenance of their own health. The new athletic field is slowly taking shape and has already been used for outdoor basketball. The problem of paying for the further grading and improving that are necessary has been simplified by the generosity of Mrs. Andrew D. White, who has offered to double any sum which the students themselves may raise up to five hundred dollars. Next year, it is hoped, will put the field into good enough condition for tennis. The rowing club has its new boat finished and partly paid for and this spring saw the organization of ten class crews. Basketball and tennis have been carried on as usual.

The student government association has passed through a momentous year, particularly in its relations with the women in houses outside the campus. A branch of the association was started in the fall in each of the three larger lodging houses, the rules for conduct which are in force at Sage were adopted by vote of the residents of the houses and a house president was chosen who superintended the administration of the rules and of house affairs in general and represented her house in meetings with the warden or with the general executive committee at Sage College. It has been recognized, however, throughout the year that the constitution with its various distinctions between women within and those without the dormitories was no longer adapted to present conditions when all are officially on the same basis, subject to the same jurisdiction. Accordingly a student committee has recently drawn up a new frame of government which will undoubtedly be adopted with some few alterations by the whole Association next October. The striking features of this instrument are a new membership clause which makes all women registered as students in the University ipso facto members of the organization and provides for local committees meeting weekly to settle minor questions in each house, Sage College and outside houses alike, and a general committee composed of the representatives from each house committee, meeting once a month in different houses by turn to handle more serious matters. The old distinctions between residents of Sage and of outside lodging houses are practically obliterated and the same general regulations are binding upon all. The adoption of this constitution will be one of the most important steps yet taken in the development both of the influence of the student government association and of the idea of unity and homogeneity among the women in the University.

The Warden's own absence through illness from January to June made it impossible for her during that period to take part in any College undertakings and also brought about the abandonment for the year of the usual official receptions. Through the fall term she was at home to students on Thursday evenings and held a small reading circle for an hour on Saturday evenings. In October, she invited the freshman class to meet Miss Putnam. The Assistant Warden gave two teas to the women at the Cottage and during November invited Dr. Hiram Corson to read aloud in the Cottage parlor on Saturday afternoons. The customary student festivities, class "stunts," fraternity and society teas and dances and the other functions which vary the academic year took place as they have done before.

Respectfully submitted,

LOUISE ROPES LOOMIS,
Warden of Sage College.

APPENDIX XIV

REPORT OF THE REGISTRAR

To the President of the University:

SIR: I have the honor to submit herewith my twelfth annual report as Registrar of the University. The report covers the academic year 1907–1908, including the Summer Session of 1908.

In addition to the 240 days in session given above, the University Library was open every day in the year except holidays and there was no time during the year when college activities entirely ceased. The shops and some of the laboratories were also open during nearly all the vacation period.

STUDENTS

The table given on page xcı, which shows the attendance for 1907-1908, gives the number of students who have received instruction this year, including those in the 1908 Summer Session and in the winter courses in agriculture, but excluding duplicates, as 4,465, an increase over last year's attendance of 240.

The accompanying table shows the attendance in each course since the opening of the University in 1868. Previous to 1897 optional and special students were separately tabulated but now these are distributed as far as possible among the groups to which they belong.

The attendance for the year is the largest in the history of the University and the increase in the number of regular students this year is 211. Special attention is called to the fact that the above table includes winter and summer course students only as separately tabulated.

MATRICULATES

The following table shows that 1,737 students have registered during the present year for the first time. The table also shows the method of admission.

The small number entering by some of the above methods is due to the fact that two or more methods have been combined in a single case, the student, however, being listed in the group to which the major portion of his entrance belongs.