Repository: UIHistories Project: Board of Trustees Minutes - 1894 [PAGE 80]

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PROCEEDINGS OF BOARD OF TRUSTEES.

81

But another question in the establishment of a department for women has been raised, and is, perhaps, of equal importance with this of increase of manual training. I t is the question of improyement in the personal appearance of students, of cultivation of refinement in manner and dress. The foregoing argument will prove, 1 trust, t h a t such things have no place with either the intellectual or the manual side of collegiate education. But they do have a very important place with the gymnastic side. ~No collegiate instructor has the right, and he should very seldom arrogate to himself the right, to give personal reproof for uncleanliness or disagreeable manners. Nor is it well, I am sure, for a collegiate instructor to attempt to give students general talks on these subjects. Such talks are usually unfruitful; they do not reach the students most in need, and they are regarded as so much disagreeable "scolding.'' The most t h a t may be done by an instructor whose position does not give him the right to deal with students' physical needs is to serve as a shining example, in the class room and out, of the refinement and courtesy he would inculcate. But the instructors of the gymnasium have just this right, and, indeed, this duty of dealing with students' physical needs, and it is to the instructors of the gymnasium t h a t all such matters should be referred. There should be provided here at the earliest possible moment a well equipped women's gymnasium, with at least one thoroughly trained woman instructor, who not only could direct the exercises, but who should be a physician as well, and able to examine students and prescribe just the kind and amount of exercise each one needs. Gymnastic exercise should then be made compulsory for every woman student, unless she is excused by t h e director of the gymnasium. In the gymnasium, physical culture, in the broadest sense, should be taught, and this would imply lessons on preservation of health, the dressing and care of the body, on refined manners, and whatever else is necessary to insure sound health and agreeable behavior. I wish to say in addition, t h a t so long as the conditions of living are so hard here, especially for the young women, and so long as there is no social atmosphere to which students, as students, belong (except what they themselves create, neither the young men nor the young women will take the pains they owe to themselves, and the social status of our students will continue to be low. In conclusion, therefore, let me urge t h a t the possibilities be at least considered of establishing in this University a department of sanitary science; t h a t as soon as possible laboratories and instructors be furnished for the study of the science of nutrition, and t h a t if by any means there can be provided now a gymnasium with a competent woman director, it shall be done. For this, in my opinion, is of even greater importance to t h e general health and welfare of the women students than an increase of facilities in manual training. Respectfully submitted,

KATHARINE MILITARY D E P A R T M E N T . MERRILL.

I communicate herewith a report of action taken by the faculty, March 13, 1893, and beg leave to emphasize it by my own hearty approval: The following is a vote passed by the faculty of the University of Illinois, March 13, 1893: The faculty of the University, remembering with satisfaction the efficient service and peculiarly high qualifications of Lieut. C. B. Hoppin as professor of military science in this University, do ask the regent and trustees of the University to make application to the War Department for the detail of Lieut. Hoppin for service at the University on the expiration of the detail of Captain Hills.

J. D. CRAWFORD,

Secretary of the Faculty.

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- 6 U. I.