Bennington Experiment

During the past generation many a "progressive" secondary school has mushroomed forth in the U. S. educational field. Dedicated to the proposition that the school child should be made happy and useful, progressive institutions focus pedagogical attention on the student's individual "direct experience," attempt to give "meaning and interest to the learning process." Grades do not count for much.

But when a female product of a progressive school tries to get into Vassar. Smith, Wellesley or Bryn Mawr, she is often unable to meet the formal admission requirements. To provide for such girls, the residents of Old Bennington, Vt., laid plans six years ago to establish a college. Under the leadership of Dr. Vincent Ravi-Booth, townsmen and summer visitors raised over $500,000 and provided a campus on a slope of the Green Mountains where oldtime Mount Anthony Seminary was founded in 1828.

Last week in Manhattan, Bennington College sponsors, with more than $1,000,000 pledged, planned to precipitate the last $1,500,000 drive. They hoped to break ground for the buildings in May, start operating with no freshmen in September 1931. Invited to preside was the Hon. John William Davis, onetime (1918-21) Ambassador to Great Britain, onetime (1924) Democratic Candidate for President. Also invited were President Ernest Hatch Wilkins of Oberlin College and President Mary Emma Woolley of Mount Holyoke. Bennington's own President Robert Devore Leigh, procured two years ago from nearby Williams College, was there to explain to one and all what is perhaps the most flexible U. S. educational experiment to date.

At Bennington, groups of 40 girls will live in eight house groups, a plan resembling "that of the hostels connected with the newer English universities." Each house will be autonomous, its residents self-governing. The college calendar provides for two "long vacations," in summer and winter, during which time Bennington girls will be encouraged to travel or engage in research. Although each student at Bennington is an incipient specialist in her upperclass years, the close association of many specialists will theoretically prove broadening to all.

Admission to Bennington requires "creditable completion of a secondary school course. . . . The requirements are not stated in terms of a standard group of 15 units in which students may be certified or pass examinations. . . . But a goodly proportion of girls have unusual aptitudes in one field combined with temporary or permanent blind spots in others. Girls with such specialized ability will be encouraged to enter."

The tuition at most colleges pays for about one-half of the student's actual expense to the institution. At Bennington, for those who can afford it, the tuition will be $850, covering the full price of instruction. One-fourth of the girls will be the recipients of $850,000 worth of scholarships. Each year from twelve districts of the U. S., one $1,000 scholarship will be awarded. Six foreign students will receive an annual stipend of $1,600.

Curriculum. Freshmen will spend the first year trying to understand "modern western civilization--its literature, its art, its political, economic, and scientific bases." They will have "tool courses"-- mathematics, languages--if such instruction seems necessary for work they may later be interested in. "Exploratory courses" will give them some taste of a field in which they may later specialize. Bright students may enter the Senior Division (upperclassmen) after one year of preparation, stupid ones may take three years.

No field of adult activity will be disregarded. Preparation for professions in international relations, painting, music, social service will be intermingled with courses in bookkeeping and stenography. 'The type of intellectual asceticism which fears that contact with practice and reality will destroy the field for culture will have no place at Bennington."

At the end of three or four years, each Bennington girl will reveal her accomplish ments to the faculty through "examinations, theses, or other objective tests." Should she be successful, she will receive as crisp and sightly an A. B. diploma as ever was given at Vassar, Wellesley, Smith, Bryn Mawr.

Faculty. At Bennington, the Ph. D. degree will be held as lightly as a secondary school certificate. The college will not demand it of its faculty. "And al though the faculty will necessarily be recruited largely from the younger mem bers of the college teaching profession, there will be appointments of persons . . . outside of academic life." So that its pedagogs will not incline to fustiness, no initial faculty appointment will be for more than three years. The President and trustees will hold a seven-year term of office.

Faculty members will be paid on a sliding scale, depending upon individual living expenses. Should a married pedagog's tribe increase while he (she) is serving the college, an increase in tuition may necessarily be made to cover a raise in her (his) salary.

Donors. Among those who have become sufficiently interested in the Bennington experiment to give the college money are: Mrs. Charles Gary Rumsey (nee Harriman); Seward Prosser, board chairman of Bankers Trust Co.; Lawyer Arthur Atwood Ballantine, chairman of the College Committee, Elihu Root Jr. partner; Mrs. Margaret Seligman Lewisohn, wife of Capitalist Samuel Adolph Lewisohn.

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