992 



SCIENCE 



LN. S. Vol. XXV. No. 652 



side of the six states that furnish her 

 largest contingent of recruits; and in fact 

 of all American universities Yale is the one 

 whose students, in proportion to their num- 

 ber, are most widely distributed over the 

 nation. Princeton draws outside of her six 

 leading states 22 per cent.; Harvard 21.5 

 per cent. ; Oberlin 19 per cent., and Cornell 

 16 per cent. ; while both Amherst and Will- 

 iams, in spite of their small size, draw 18 

 per cent. Michigan, the state university 

 whose students are by far the most widely 

 distributed, draws 14 per cent, of her stu- 

 dents from parts of the union lying beyond 

 the six states that give her most recruits. 

 The University of Missouri, with her wide 

 southern clientele, draws 12 per cent. ; Illi- 

 nois, 8 per cent. ; Wisconsin, 4 per cent. ; 

 California, less than 3 per cent., and Min- 

 nesota and Kansas, only 1 per cent. each. 



These figures make no pretense to be a 

 statistical abstract of the distribution of 

 students in our universities. They are 

 taken from a few typical institutions alone, 

 and, as I have already poiated out, they 

 are not perfectly accurate. Still they are 

 trustworthy enough to form a basis for 

 some conclusions, not indeed very new or 

 startling, but by no means without interest. 

 They show that on the whole the endowed 

 universities draw their students from a 

 much greater area than the state universi- 

 ties, or rather draw a larger fraction of 

 their students from aU over the country, 

 for, as we have seen, almost every great 

 university draws at least one student from 

 almost every state and territory. 



Such a difference is important in view 

 of the large size and high degree of excel- 

 lence which the state universities have at- 

 tained. No doubt it is in part due to the 

 greater age of most of the endowed insti- 

 tutions, for the graduate of a college plant- 

 ed in a remote region becomes a recruiting 

 agent for his alma mater. He advises the 

 young fellows that he meets to go to the 



place where he received his own education, 

 and in due time he sends his sons there. If 

 he achieves success, that also works as a 

 perpetual advertisement of his college. 

 This suggestion of the cause of wide dis- 

 tribution of students is to some extent con- 

 firmed by the fact that the University of 

 Michigan, which is the oldest of the state 

 universities referred to, and far the oldest 

 of them in reputation, draws her students 

 from all parts of the country much more 

 than any of the others. But the University 

 of Wisconsin, founded only twelve years 

 later, draws 80 per cent, of her students 

 from within thelistate and only 4 per cent, 

 outside the six states that give her the 

 largest support. Moreover, if we compare 

 Cornell with the universities of Illinois and 

 Minnesota, which were founded at almost 

 the same time and are about the same size, 

 we find that Cornell draws only 56 per cent, 

 of her students from the state of New York, 

 while the Universities of Illinois and Min- 

 nesota draw 83 and 89 per cent., of their 

 students from their respective states; and 

 that from the parts of the union outside of 

 the six principal states Cornell draws 16 

 per cent, of her students, while the two 

 state universities draw only 8 per cent, and 

 1 per cent. 



The apparent difference in the area from 

 which students are drawn may also be due 

 in part to the fact that all the state uni- 

 versities are coeducational, while the great 

 colleges on the Atlantic seaboard which 

 have been cited are not; and it is undoubt- 

 edly true that parents are more reluctant 

 to send their daughters than their sons to a 

 distant place for their education. But this 

 motive does not apply to Cornell and Ober- 

 lin, which have admitted women freely 

 from the start. It may, indeed, be urged 

 that these two institutions stand in a some- 

 what peculiar position, and a position that 

 has tended in the past to extend their re- 

 nown and their influence over the nation. 



