Undergraduate college of Yale University
Yale College
is the undergraduate college of
Yale University
. Founded in 1701, it is the original school of the university. Although other Yale schools were founded as early as 1810, all of Yale was officially known as Yale College until 1887, when its schools were
confederated
and the institution was renamed Yale University. It is ranked as one of the top colleges in the United States.
[3]
[4]
[5]
[6]
[7]
Originally established to train
Congregationalist
ministers, the college began teaching humanities and natural sciences by the late 18th century. At the same time, students began organizing extracurricular organizations: first
literary societies
, and later publications, sports teams, and singing groups. By the middle of the 19th century, it was the largest college in the United States. In 1847, it was joined by another undergraduate school at Yale, the
Sheffield Scientific School
, which was absorbed into the college in 1956. These merged curricula became the basis of the modern-day
liberal arts
curriculum, which requires students to take courses in a broad range of subjects, including foreign language, composition, sciences, and quantitative reasoning, in addition to electing a
departmental major
in their sophomore year.
The most distinctive feature of undergraduate life is the school's
system of residential colleges
, established in 1932, and modeled after the constituent colleges of
English universities
. Undergraduates live in these colleges after their freshman year, when most live on the school's
Old Campus
.
History
[
edit
]
The Collegiate School was founded in 1701 by a charter drawn by ten
Congregationalist
ministers led by
James Pierpont
and approved by the General Court of the
Colony of Connecticut
. Originally situated in
Abraham Pierson's
home in
Killingworth, Connecticut
, the college moved to
Old Saybrook, Connecticut
in 1703, when Nathaniel Lynde, the first treasurer of Yale, donated land and a building. The college moved again to
New Haven
in 1718, and was renamed for
Elihu Yale
, an early benefactor, merchant, and philanthropist. Founded as a school to train ministers, original curriculum included only coursework in
theology
and
sacred languages
. Although early faculty, including
Jonathan Edwards
and
Elisha Williams
, maintained strict Congregational orthodoxy, by the time of the
American Revolution
subsequent rectors, especially
Ezra Stiles
, relaxed the curriculum to include humanities and limited natural science education.
[8]
Scientific courses introduced by chemist
Benjamin Silliman
in 1801, made the college an early hub of scientific education, a curriculum which was grafted into Yale's
Sheffield Scientific School
in 1847.
[9]
As in many of Yale's sister institutions, debates about the expansiveness of the undergraduate curriculum were waged throughout the early 19th century, with statements like the
Yale Report of 1828
re-asserting Yale's conservative theological heritage and faculty. Later in the century,
William Graham Sumner
, the first professor of sociology in the United States, introduced studies in the social sciences. These expanding fields of study were integrated with graduate schools of the university and amalgamated into a course of
liberal arts education
, which presaged the advent of
divisional majors
in the twentieth century.
The relaxation of curriculum came with expansion of the extracurriculum. Student literary societies emerged as early as 1750, singing groups and student publications in the early 1800s, fraternities and
secret societies
in the mid-nineteenth century, and intercollegiate athletics by the century's end.
[10]
Participation and leadership in these groups was an important social signifier and a route to induction into prestigious senior societies. Thus extracurricular participation became central to student life and social advancement, an ethos that became a template for collegiate life across the United States.
[11]
By 1870, Yale was the largest undergraduate institution in the country.
[11]
The growth of the student body prompted major growth in the college's physical campus, the greatest expansion of which occurred in 1933, when a gift of
Edward S. Harkness
created and endowed eight
residential colleges
.
[12]
Modeled after the college system of
Oxford
and
Cambridge Universities
, the colleges were intended to be the social and residential centers of undergraduate life while leaving academic programs under the oversight of university's departments. Two additional colleges were built by 1940, and two more in the 1960s.
Admission and exclusion
[
edit
]
For most of its history, study at Yale was almost exclusively restricted to white
Protestant
men, often the children of alumni. Documented exceptions to this paradigm include Hawaiian native
Henry ??p?kaha?ia
, who became a student of Yale President
Timothy Dwight
in 1809, and black abolitionist
James W. C. Pennington
, who was allowed to audit theology courses in 1837.
[13]
[14]
Moses Simons
, a descendant of a slave-holding South Carolinian family, has been suggested to be the first Jew to graduate from Yale.
[15]
Though his maternal ancestry is disputed, he may have also been the first person of African-American descent to graduate from any American college.
[16]
In 1854,
Yung Wing
graduated from the college and became the first student from China to graduate from an American university, and in 1857,
Richard Henry Green
became the first African-American man to receive a degree from the college.
[17]
Until the rediscovery of Green's ethnic descent in 2014, physicist
Edward Bouchet
, who stayed at Yale to become the first African-American PhD recipient, was believed to also be the first African-American graduate of Yale College.
In the early 20th century, the student body was predominantly "old-stock, high-status Protestants, especially Episcopalians, Congregationalists, and Presbyterians"?a group later called
WASPs
. By the 1970s, it was much more diverse.
[18]
Enrollment at Yale only became competitive in the early 20th century, requiring the college to set up an admissions process. As late as the 1950s, tests and demographic questionnaires for admission to the college worked to exclude non-Christian men, especially Jews, as well as non-white men.
[19]
By the mid-1960s, these processes were becoming more meritocratic, allowing for the recruitment of a racially, economically, and geographically diverse student body.
[20]
[21]
This meritocratic transition encouraged the university to establish the first
need-blind admissions
policy in the United States.
[19]
After several decades of debate about
coeducation
, Yale College admitted its first class of women in 1969.
[22]
In recent years, the college has focused on international recruitment, quadrupling the fraction of international students admitted between 1993 and 2013.
[23]
[24]
Organization
[
edit
]
Yale College is a
constituent school
of Yale University and contains a
dependent system
of
residential colleges
. Its executive officer is the Dean of Yale College, who is appointed to a five-year term by the
Yale Corporation
.
[25]
The dean oversees undergraduate academic curriculum, extracurricular activities, and student discipline, but does not have direct control over the residential colleges. The position is currently held by
Pericles Lewis
, professor of
comparative literature
.
[26]
All of the college's
faculty
are members of the Yale Faculty of Arts and Sciences and are thereby jointly affiliated with the
Graduate School of Arts and Sciences
.
Tenured
members of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences constitute the Board of Permanent Officers, who govern the school's curriculum and programs.
[25]
Most undergraduate courses and
majors
are offered under the purview of
academic departments
, divisions of the Faculty of Arts and Sciences which offer undergraduate and graduate curricula.
[27]
In addition, the faculties of three Yale
professional schools
, the
School of Art
,
School of Architecture
and
School of Forestry & Environmental Studies
, also offer undergraduate programs.
[28]
[29]
Residential colleges, which are funded and controlled by the university, have separate administration and limited self-governance. The Heads of College (before 2016 called
Masters
), usually tenured faculty members, are appointed to renewable, five-year terms by the Yale Corporation to oversee the affairs of each college. Residential college deans, who are supervised by the Dean of Yale College, are in charge of undergraduate academic oversight. Each residential college is governed by its Head of College, Dean, and Fellows, and has a college council of students with limited jurisdiction over student affairs. Issues affecting multiple colleges are governed by the Council of the Heads of College, composed of the Heads of College of the fourteen colleges.
Residential colleges
[
edit
]
The most distinctive feature of Yale College undergraduate life is the residential college system.
[30]
[31]
The system was established in 1933, through a gift by Yale graduate
Edward S. Harkness
, who admired the college systems at
Oxford University
and
Cambridge University
. Each college consists of dormitory buildings surrounding an enclosed courtyard, and features a dining hall, library, and student facilities ranging from
printing presses
to darkrooms. Each is led by a Head of College, a faculty member who serves as its chief administrator, and a Dean, who oversees student academic affairs. University faculty and distinguished affiliates are associated with the colleges as fellows. Unlike their English forerunners, the colleges do not administer academic degree programs or courses of study, but they do sponsor academic seminars that fall outside the normal departmental structure of the university, and the Heads of College host lectures and teas for the colleges that attract high-profile visitors.
[32]
Harkness' gift built and endowed eight colleges, completed from 1932 to 1934. Additional colleges were opened in 1935 (
Timothy Dwight College
), 1940 (
Silliman College
), 1962 (
Morse College
and
Ezra Stiles College
), and 2017 (
Pauli Murray College
and
Benjamin Franklin College
), bringing the present-day number to fourteen. The first ten colleges were designed in
Collegiate Gothic
and
Georgian Revival
styles; the two colleges built in the 1960s are
Modernist
reinventions of the college plan. In 2007, Yale announced the construction of two additional Collegiate Gothic residential colleges near
Science Hill
, which opened in 2017.
List of residential colleges
[
edit
]
Residential colleges are named for important figures or places in university history or notable alumni; they are deliberately not named for benefactors.
- Benjamin Franklin College
? named for
Founding Father
Benjamin Franklin
.
- Berkeley College
? named for
George Berkeley
(1685?1753), early benefactor of Yale.
- Branford College
? named for
Branford, Connecticut
, the town in which Yale was founded.
- Davenport College
? named for
John Davenport
, the founder of New Haven. Often called "D'port."
- Ezra Stiles College
? named for
Ezra Stiles
, a president of Yale. Designed by
Eero Saarinen
.
- Jonathan Edwards College
? named for theologian and
Princeton University
co-founder
Jonathan Edwards
. Usually called "J.E."
- Grace Hopper College
? named for Admiral
Grace Murray Hopper
, Yale Ph.D. and computer pioneer. Until 2017, this college was named for
John C. Calhoun
, Vice President of the United States. The smallest college.
- Morse College
? named for
Samuel Morse
, inventor of
Morse Code
. Also designed by
Eero Saarinen
.
- Pauli Murray College
? named for civil rights activist, legal scholar and religious pioneer
Pauli Murray
.
- Pierson College
? named for Yale's first rector,
Abraham Pierson
.
- Saybrook College
? named for
Old Saybrook, Connecticut
, where Yale was briefly located.
- Silliman College
? named for noted scientist and Yale professor
Benjamin Silliman
. About half of its structures were originally part of the
Sheffield Scientific School
.
- Timothy Dwight College
? named for the two Yale presidents of that name,
Timothy Dwight IV
and
Timothy Dwight V
. Usually called "T.D."
- Trumbull College
? named for
Jonathan Trumbull
, 18th-century governor of Connecticut.
Student organizations
[
edit
]
Singing groups
[
edit
]
Yale College has been called "the epicenter of college singing," both for its long history of singing groups and its centrality in establishing
collegiate a cappella
in the United States. The earliest choral group, the Beethoven Society, dates to 1812 and emerged in the mid-nineteenth century as the
Yale Glee Club
.
[33]
Although
glee clubs
around the country had spawned small collegiate ensembles since that time, the all-senior, all-male
Whiffenpoofs
, formed in 1909, are often considered to be the oldest collegiate a cappella society in the United States.
[34]
[35]
Formalizing a style pioneered by black
barbershop groups
in New Haven, their repertoire was amplified by the founding of similar groups across the country.
[34]
Coeducation in 1969 made possible all-women's groups and mixed groups. In all, there are now at least eighteen undergraduate a cappella groups in Yale College, ranging from a Slavic chorus to Christian a cappella.
Publications
[
edit
]
Student publications at Yale date back as far as 1806, but the earliest still in print, the
Yale Literary Magazine
, was founded in 1836 and is believed to be the oldest surviving literary review in the United States.
[38]
Undergraduate publications like the
Yale Banner
, a yearbook, and
The Yale Record
, a humor magazine, followed suit, often around the same time similar publications were established at Harvard and Princeton.
[39]
The
Yale Daily News
, established in 1878, was a relative latecomer but became the flagship campus daily, and continues to publish during every weekday of the undergraduate academic term. These publications have been joined by many 20th-century debuts, including
The Yale Herald
and
The New Journal
.
Secret societies
[
edit
]
In 1832, a rift over
Phi Beta Kappa
inductions between the college's two debating societies,
Linonia
and
Brothers in Unity
, caused seniors to establish the first
secret society
at the university,
Skull and Bones
.
[40]
Skull and Bones "tapped" select juniors for membership as seniors, a ritual later adopted by all undergraduate senior societies. Since then, senior societies have proliferated at Yale, with recent estimates of 41 existing societies and senior class membership ranging from ten to fifty percent of each class.
[41]
[42]
[43]
Although once carefully guarded, the "secrecy" of these senior societies is dubious; their existence is widely known and membership rolls for most are published yearly. Ten present-day societies?
Skull and Bones
,
Scroll and Key
,
Book and Snake
,
Wolf's Head
,
Elihu
,
Berzelius
,
St. Elmo
,
Manuscript
,
Shabtai
, and
Mace and Chain
?have private buildings near campus; many other societies have a fixed on-campus meeting space where they meet twice a week.
[42]
Some of the oldest society buildings are enclosed and windowless; members refer to them as "tombs."
Their activities have varied over time and across societies, but most societies meet for dinners, discussion, drinking, and long-form disclosure of members' life history.
[41]
[44]
Despite a long history of social exclusion?of Jews and women in particular?many of these societies have prioritized membership diversity in the last several decades.
[45]
[46]
[47]
The semi-secrecy and influential membership of Yale's older senior societies has attracted wide interest and scrutiny, particularly when both
2004 U.S. presidential candidates
were members of Skull and Bones.
[42]
[44]
[48]
In popular culture
[
edit
]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
"Common Data Set 2019?2020"
(PDF)
. Yale University
. Retrieved
March 5,
2020
.
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"Alumni (living) by Yale school"
. Yale University Office of Institutional Research. Archived from
the original
on July 1, 2014
. Retrieved
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2014
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"Wall Street Journal/Times Higher Education College Rankings 2020"
.
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2020
.
- ^
"America's Top Colleges 2019"
.
Forbes
. Retrieved
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.
- ^
"2020 Best Colleges in America"
.
Niche
. Retrieved
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.
- ^
Belkin, Melissa Korn and Douglas (September 5, 2019).
"The Top-Ranked College Is…"
.
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.
ISSN
0099-9660
. Retrieved
April 9,
2020
.
- ^
"2020 Best National University Rankings"
.
U.S. News & World Report
.
- ^
Pierson, George W.
(2004).
Yale: A Short History
(2nd ed.). Stinehour Press
. Retrieved
June 24,
2014
.
- ^
Conniff, Richard (March 2015).
"How The Sciences Came to Yale"
.
Yale Alumni Magazine
. Retrieved
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2015
.
- ^
Kelley, Brooks Mather (1999).
Yale: A History
(2nd ed.). New Haven:
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ISBN
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.
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a
b
Thelin, John R. (2013).
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ISBN
9781421404998
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.
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.
- ^
Oren, Dan (1986).
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- ^
Kaminer, Ariel (March 16, 2014).
"New Contenders Emerge in Quest to Identify Yale's First African-American Graduate"
.
The New York Times
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.
- ^
Schiff, Judith (May 2014).
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.
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.
- ^
Jerome Karabel (2006).
The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton
. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. p.
23
.
- ^
a
b
Kabaservice, Geoffrey (December 1999).
"The Birth of a New Institution"
.
Yale Alumni Magazine
. Archived from
the original
on April 2, 2015
. Retrieved
May 28,
2015
.
- ^
Karaben, Jerome (2005).
The Chosen: The Hidden History of Admission and Exclusion at Harvard, Yale, and Princeton
. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
ISBN
9780618773558
.
- ^
Soares, Joseph A. (2007).
The Power of Privilege: Yale and America's Elite Colleges
. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
ISBN
9780804756389
.
- ^
"Yale Will Admit Women in 1969; May Have Coeducational Housing"
.
Harvard Crimson
. November 15, 1968
. Retrieved
April 1,
2015
.
- ^
Wildavsky, Ben (2012).
The Great Brain Race: How Global Universities are Reshaping the World
. Princeton University Press. p. 33.
ISBN
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.
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.
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a
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. Retrieved
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.
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.
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. Retrieved
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.
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Unlike many American universities, Yale does not have a system of divisional
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.
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(PDF)
. Yale University Office of the Provost. August 2013
. Retrieved
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2014
.
- ^
"Yale College Programs of Study, Forestry & Environmental Studies"
. Yale College Dean's Office
. Retrieved
March 26,
2014
.
- ^
"Residential Colleges"
. Yale College
. Retrieved
March 26,
2014
.
- ^
Ryan, Mark B. (2001).
A Collegiate Way of Living: Residential Colleges and a Yale Education
(PDF)
. New Haven, CT:
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. p. 19.
ISBN
9781402850615
. Retrieved
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.
- ^
"Residential College Seminar Program"
.
- ^
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. University of Alabama Press. p. 58.
ISBN
9780817317904
.
- ^
a
b
Duchan, Joshua S. (2012).
Powerful Voices: The Musical and Social World of Collegiate A Cappella
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ISBN
9780472118250
.
- ^
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(PDF)
. Archived from
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.
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. Vol. 1. Harvard University Press. p. 488.
ISBN
9780674395503
.
- ^
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Camp, Walter
(1899).
Yale, her campus, class-rooms, and athletics
. Boston: L. C. Page and Company
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2014
.
- ^
Schiff, Judith (September?October 2004).
"How The Secret Societies Got That Way"
.
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2014
.
- ^
a
b
Alden Branch, Mark (July?August 2014).
"Open Secrets"
.
Yale Alumni Magazine
. Retrieved
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2014
.
- ^
a
b
c
Schenkel, Ben (March 30, 2012).
"Tapping in"
.
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. Archived from
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on March 5, 2014
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.
- ^
Robbins, Alexandra.
"George W., Knight of Eulogia"
.
The Atlantic
. Retrieved
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.
- ^
a
b
Robbins, Alexandra (2002).
Secrets of the Tomb: Skull and Bones, the Ivy League, and the Hidden Paths of Power
. Little, Brown.
ISBN
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.
- ^
Oren, Dan A. (1986).
Joining the Club: A History of Jews and Yale
. New Haven: Yale University Press.
ISBN
9780300033304
.
- ^
"Yale Alumni Block Women in Secret Club"
.
The New York Times
. September 6, 1991
. Retrieved
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.
- ^
Brown, Buster (February 25, 2013).
"Skull & Bones: It's Not Just for White Dudes Anymore"
.
The Atlantic
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July 29,
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.
- ^
Taylor, Frances Grandy (March 30, 2000).
"Yale's Not-so- Secret Societies"
.
Hartford Courant
. Retrieved
July 29,
2014
.
- ^
Aunt Phillis's Cabin: or, Southern Life As It Is
? M. H. Eastman (1852)
Further reading
[
edit
]
- Clap, Thomas
(1766).
The annals or history of Yale-college
. John Hotchkiss and B. Mecom
. Retrieved
March 23,
2014
.
- Holden, Reuben A. (1967).
Yale: A Pictorial History
. New Haven: Yale University Press.
ISBN
9780300005653
.
- Kabaservice, Geoffrey (2004).
The Guardians: Kingman Brewster, His Circle, and the Rise of the Liberal Establishment
. New York: Henry Holt.
ISBN
9780805067620
.
- Kelley, Brooks Mather (1999).
Yale: A History
(2nd ed.). New Haven: Yale University Press.
ISBN
9780300078435
.
- Pierson, George W.
(1952).
Yale College, An Educational History (1871?1921)
. New Haven: Yale University Press.
- Pierson, George W.
(1955).
Yale: The University College (1921?1937)
. New Haven: Yale University Press.
- Soares, Joseph (2007).
The Power of Privilege: Yale and America's Elite Colleges
. Stanford University Press.
ISBN
9780804756389
.
- Warch, Richard (1973).
School of the Prophets: Yale College, 1701?1740
. New Haven: Yale University Press.
ISBN
9780300016055
.
- Welch, Lewis Sheldon;
Camp, Walter
(1899).
Yale, her campus, class-rooms, and athletics
. Boston: L. C. Page and Company
. Retrieved
March 23,
2014
.
External links
[
edit
]
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