Newnham College

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Newnham College
logo
motto Better is wisdom than weapons of war (Alumni)
founding 1871 Newnham Hall
Sponsorship University of Cambridge
place Cambridge
Principal Dame Carol M. Black
Students 370
postgraduates : 285
Website www.newn.cam.ac.uk

Newnham College is one of the 31 colleges at Cambridge University and is still an all-women college. It was founded in 1871 by Henry Sidgwick and co-founder Millicent Garrett Fawcett .

Women in college

Newnham College: Garden and Hall

The pioneering work of the 19th century philosopher Henry Sidgwick, Fellow at Trinity College , helped women achieve full member status at Cambridge University. Cambridge has had all-women courses at Newnham College since 1870. In 1871, Sidgwick, as one of the organizers of the lectures, rented a house on Regent Street to accommodate young women who cannot commute to Cambridge daily lectures while studying. He made Anne Jemima Clough , who ran a school in her Lake District home, responsible for that home and for the first five students.

The steady demand made it possible to raise money and rent building land, so Newnham Hall opened its doors for the first time in 1875 on Sidgwick Avenue. Demand from potential female students continued to grow, and the Newnham Hall Company commissioned architect Basil Champneys to build three more Queen Anne-style buildings, as well as a laboratory and library. These and later buildings and facilities are grouped around beautiful gardens, the meadows of which the students are allowed to enter for most of the year.

Many young women in England in the mid-19th century did not have access to higher education, which is a requirement for university education. Newnham's founders enabled women to work at a level that suited their knowledge and skills while also preparing them for the demands of university.

When secondary schools were established for girls in the last quarter of the 19th century, often attended by women graduates from Cambridge, Oxford and London, the precarious educational situation for women in England began to change. In 1890 Newnham student Philippa Fawcett attained a mathematical level that theoretically ranks above the title of Senior Wranglers , which was then only given to men. At the beginning of the 20th century, the vast majority of Newnham students were studying at Cambridge University.

Women at the university

The university as an institution initially took no notice of women. In 1868, the Cambridge Local Examinations Board (non-university exams) first admitted women to examination courses. Changes within the university took place from 1881, when women were allowed and had to negotiate permission to participate individually with each examiner. The first attempts to obtain not only a certificate from their university but also an academic degree failed in 1887 and a second attempt in 1897. The male pre-graduates and their supporters demonstrated against the female students.

World War I catastrophically dropped fee income for men's colleges, and both Cambridge and Oxford needed government funding for the first time. In this context, the women started again the attempt not only to be accepted as full members of the university, but also to gain participation in offices of the university and in its administration. At the University of Oxford this participation was secured for women in 1920, at Cambridge the attempt failed in 1921. As a token of their victory, male students destroyed, among other things, the bronze memorial to Anne Jemima Clough.

Women could hold university offices, but they could not vote on the affairs of their own departments or those of the university as a whole. In 1948 women gained full membership in universities in England. Until 1981, universities retained the right to limit the number of women studying. In 1954 the third all-women college, New Hall, (now Murray Edwards College) and in 1965 the first mixed graduate college, Darwin, was founded. In the 1970s, the three all-male colleges Churchill , Clare, and King's allowed women for the first time. Either men and women or only women are admitted to the other colleges of Cambridge (Newnham, Murray Edwards and Lucy Cavendish). Gradually, Cambridge developed from a “men's university”, as it was in the 1920s, to a university that accepts both men and women. Since 2007, the last all- women college ( St. Hilda's ) at Oxford University has also opened to men. Cambridge remains the only university in the UK with colleges for women only.

Well-known graduates

literature

  • Catherine Hobbs, Sylvie Paycha : European women in mathematics. Proceedings of the 13th general meeting, EWM. Cambridge, UK, September 3-6, 2007. World Scientific, 2010, especially the chapter And What Became of the Women?
  • Elizabeth Lee: Clough, Anne Jemima. In: Sidney Lee: Dictionary of National Biography. Supplement. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1901

Web links

Commons : Newnham College  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Coordinates: 52 ° 12 ′ 0.8 ″  N , 0 ° 6 ′ 26.2 ″  E