Stanford's Marriage Rate 



173 



in emotional equii^ment or in some 

 other way which makes it advanta- 

 geous to the race that they he thus 

 steriHzed. 



Such a contention will hardly be 

 j^jiven more than a very limited applica- 

 tion. It can hardly be doubted that 

 most of the Stanford women are of pre- 

 cisely the type whose evi^^enic contribu- 

 tion the race most needs. 



If this is admitted, then the conclu- 

 sion can hardly be avoided that a 

 change is required in their education, 

 which, instead of fitting them only to 

 be celibate school teachers, will give 

 them, as well, the intellectual and 

 emotional training needed for marriage 

 and motherhood. This would not make 

 all the graduates want to marry, nor 

 would it enable all those to marry who 

 want to, but it would at least raise 

 the marriage rate. 



PRESENT CONDITIONS 



Of course, it might be supposed that 

 the marriage rate of Stanford women 

 at present is higher than it was fifteen 

 or twenty years ago. But it is probably 

 lower rather than higher, because of 

 an unusual sort of selection to which 

 the girls are now submitted. 



A provision was inserted in the 

 university's charter that the number of 

 women students should at no time 

 exceed 500. The number of men stu- 

 dents is not limited by charter. For 

 some years past, hundreds of girls who 

 have desired to enter the university 

 have been unable to do so, because the 

 charter limit had been reached. In 

 order to meet this problem, the univer- 

 sity has tended more or less con- 



sciously to raise the standards required 

 of young women for entrance, so that 

 those who. are admitted become each 

 year a more picked lot, as measured 

 by their scholarship. They are, on 

 the average, noticeably superior to 

 the Stanford men in this respect. 

 This ; election tends to bring to Stan- 

 ford, more and more, only girls who 

 are seriously preparing for a pedagogical 

 career, or who are of studious tastes; 

 it tends to eliminate thore who come 

 to college mainly from social reasons. 

 The marriage rate of this more studious 

 type of girl is probably lower under any 

 conditions. 



vSuch being the case, she admittedly 

 offers a difficult problem. Several pos- 

 sible ways of mitigating the untoward 

 result, however, suggest themselves: 



1 . To remove the limitation of women 

 students to 500 and to lower the stand- 

 ards for women would not impair the 

 quality of the superior students who 

 now come, but it would dilute their 

 number with girls who are more socially- 

 minded, and who would exert a eugenic 

 influence on them. 



2. Considering the type of girl with 

 whom they have to deal, the university 

 authorities could make a particular 

 effort to encourage social life. 



3. The curriculum could be broad- 

 ened so that it would fit graduates for 

 a wider group of activities, especially 

 those which center in the home. 



Of course, if Stanford belie\-es it is 

 fulfilling its duty to the nation more 

 effectively by producing school teachers 

 for the present generation than by pro- 

 ducing mothers of a nobler race to come, 

 these suggestions are quite tmnecessary. 



The Standards of Sexual Selection 



Students (41 women and 27 men) of 

 Prof. L. L. Bernard, department of 

 sociology, University of Missouri, were 

 asked for anonymous statements as to 

 the requirements of persons they would 

 marry. Most of the women placed 

 moral character first in a husband, 

 congeniality and good disposition com- 

 ing next. Income and social standing 



were given considerable weight, while 

 age seemed to have minor importance. 

 The men made beauty their chief 

 requirement, character, youth, and 

 training in domestic science also being 

 considered important. It is interesting 

 to note that the men tended to attach 

 some weight to heredity, while the 

 women did not. 



