Vassar College
Vassar College is a highly selective, private,
coeducational liberal arts college situated in
Poughkeepsie,
New York. Founded as a
women's college in
1861, it was the first member of the
Seven Sisters to become
coeducational.
.
Originally founded as a
women's college, Vassar was
one of the oldest institutions of higher education for women in the
United States. It was founded by its namesake,
Matthew Vassar, in 1861 in the
Hudson Valley, approximately 70 mi (100 km) north of New York City. The very first person appointed to the Vassar faculty was the
astronomer Maria Mitchell, in
1865. Vassar adopted coeducation in
1969 after declining an offer to merge with
Yale University.
|
Closeup of the Vassar Main Building |
Vassar's campus, also an
arboretum, is a 1,000 acre (4 km²) lot of land marked by period and modern buildings. The great majority of students live on campus. The renovated library has unusually large holdings for a college of its size. It includes special collections of
Albert Einstein and
Elizabeth Bishop.
Vassar was also associated with the social elite of the
Protestant establishment.
E. Digby Baltzell writes that "upper-class WASP families... educated their children at... colleges such as Harvard, Princeton, Yale, Vassar, and Smith among other elite colleges."
[, p. 8]Roughly 2,400 students attend Vassar. Approximately 60% come from public high schools, 40% from
private schools (both independent and religious). In recent freshman classes, minority students have comprised up to 27% of matriculants. International students, from over 45 countries, comprise 8% of the student body. The overall female to male ratio is approximately 55:45, although in recent classes it has been closer to 50:50. Over 85% of graduates pursue advanced study within five years of graduation. They are taught by over 270 faculty members, virtually all of whom hold terminal degrees in their fields.
Vassar president
Frances D. Fergusson served for nearly two decades, longer than almost any other president of a comparable liberal arts college. She retired in Spring 2006, and was replaced on July 1 by
Catharine Bond Hill, former provost at
Williams College. Her retirement was marked by a brief campus-wide celebration known as Fran-Fest, as well as a campus walkway, which is lined with marble benches inscribed with the poetry of Elizabeth Bishop, in her honor.
Vassar confers the
A.B. degree in over 45 majors, including the
Independent Major, in which a student may design a major, as well as various interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary fields of study. Students also participate in such programs as the
Self-Instructional Language Program (SILP) which offers courses in Hindi, Irish/Gaelic, Korean, Portuguese, Swahili, Swedish, and Yiddish. Vassar has an
open curriculum, requiring only proficiency in a foreign language, a quantitative course, and a freshman writing course to graduate, and thus encourages a wide breadth in their students' studies. In addition, students are strongly encouraged to take advantage of Vassar's
Study Abroad program, which they typically elect during one or two semesters of their junior year.
Vassar also confers the
M.A. degree in Chemistry.
Vassar College is a leading undergraduate institution in the United States and the world.
Barron's has placed Vassar its "most competitive" category for admissions. It is ranked #13 in
Liberal Arts Colleges by the
U.S. News & World Report. In 2006, it accepted 25% of its applicants. The
Princeton Review gave Vassar a selectivity rating of 97 out of 100 in its 2006 edition. The most recent freshman class had a
mean SAT score of 1377, with a 700 in the Verbal section and a 720 in the Mathematics section. The
median (25%-75%) SAT scores are 680-730 in the Verbal section and 660-720 in the Mathematics section. The average high school
GPA of the student body is 3.8 on a 4.0 scale.
Vassar is one of the nation's leaders in producing candidates for
graduate school,
law school,
medical school, and
business school. It is known for having high-caliber students, an engaging and scholarly faculty base, strong alumni/alumnae connections, and small class sizes. All classes are taught by members of the faculty, and there are no graduate students or teacher's assistants. The most popular majors are
English,
Political Science,
Psychology, and
Economics. Vassar also offers a variety of correlate sequences, or minors, for intensive study in many disciplines.
*
Milo P. Jewett, 1861–1864
*John H. Raymond, 1864–1878
*Samuel L. Caldwell, 1878–1885
*James Monroe Taylor, 1886–1914
*Henry Noble MacCracken, 1915–1946
*
Sarah Gibson Blanding, 1946–1964
*Alan Simpson, 1964–1977
*Virginia B. Smith, 1977–1986
*
Frances D. Fergusson, 1986–2006
*
Catharine "Cappy" Bond Hill, 2006—
Vassar has had a number of distinguished faculty over the years. Some former and current members include:
*
Karen Holvik,
Quincy Porter,
Ernst Krenek,
Richard Wilson, and
Annea Lockwood in the Music department;
*
David Kelley,
Uma Narayan, and
Mitchell Miller in the Philosophy department;
*
Michael Joyce,
Eamon Grennan, and
Donald Foster in the English department;
*
Ken Livingston and
John Long in the Cognitive Science department;
*
E.H. "Rick" Jarow in the Religion department;
*
Jamie Meltzer in the Film department;
*
Jean Arthur in the Theater department;
*
Maria Mitchell in the Physics and Astronomy department; and
*
Grace Hopper in the Mathematics department.
*
Gabriela Mistral Nobel Prize winner in Literature
Vassar is a
NCAA Division III college.
Vassar College currently offers the following varsity athletics:- Baseball (Men only)- Basketball- Cross-Country- Fencing- Field Hockey (Women only)- Golf (Women only)- Lacrosse- Rowing- Soccer-
Squash- Swimming/Diving- Tennis- Volleyball
Club Sports which compete in NCAA competition- Rugby- Track and Field
Basketball plays in the new Walker Fieldhouse. Volleyball plays in Kenyon Hall, reopened in 2006. Soccer, Baseball, Field Hockey and Lacrosse all play at the Prentiss Fields by the Town Houses, which will be completely renovated starting in November 2006 to include new fields for all teams and a new track.
|
Vassar College in an engraving from 1862. |
The Vassar campus has several buildings of architectural interest. Main Building formerly housed the entire college, including classrooms, dormitories, museum, library, and dining halls. The building was designed by Smithsonian architect
James Renwick Jr. and was completed in
1865. It is on the registry of
national historic landmarks. Many beautiful old
brick buildings are scattered throughout the campus, but there are also several modern and contemporary structures of architectural interest. Ferry House, a student cooperative, was designed by
Marcel Breuer in
1951. Noyes House was designed by Finnish-American architect
Eero Saarinen. A good example of an attempt to use
passive solar design can be seen in the Mudd Chemistry Building by Perry Dean Rogers. More recently, New Haven architect
César Pelli was asked to design the Lehman Loeb Art Center, which was completed in the early
1990s. In 2003, Pelli also worked on the renovation of Main Building Lobby and the conversion of the Avery Hall theater into the $25 million
Vogelstein Center for Drama and Film, which preserved the original
1860s facade but was an entirely new structure.
Writers
*
Elizabeth Bishop, poet
*
Elizabeth Williams Champney, writer
*
Peter Ian Cummings, editor,
XY magazine*
Thomas Dean Donnelly, screenwriter
*
Edna St. Vincent Millay, poet
*
Mary McCarthy, novelist, critic
*
Greg Rucka, author
*
Curtis Sittenfeld, author
*
Jane Smiley, Pulitzer-winning novelist
*
Christina Weir and
Nunzio DeFilippis, husband and wife comic book writing team
Drama, Film, and Television
*
Erika Amato, singer, actress
*
Noah Baumbach, writer, director
*
Dan Bucatinsky, actor
*
Erin Daniels, actress
*
Hope Davis, actress
*
John Gatins, writer, director
*
Angela Goethals, actress
*
Lecy Goranson, actress
*
Kerri Green, actress, director
*
Lisa Kudrow, actress
*
Stacy London, television host (
What Not to Wear)
*
Marguerite Moreau, actress
*
Jay Severin, commentator and talk radio host
*
Frances Sternhagen, actress
*
Meryl Streep, actress
*
Jon Tenney, actor
*
Jonathan Togo, actor
*
Ethan Zohn,
Survivor: Africa winner and philanthropist
Music
*
John Conway, keyboardist (
The Bravery)
*
Sam Endicott, singer (
The Bravery)
*
Baroness Uriu (Shige Nagai), introduced Western Music to Japan
*
Drew Zing, guitarist (
Steely Dan)
Science
*
Ruth Benedict, anthropologist
*
Mary Calderone, physician and public health advocate
*
Bernadine Healy, cardiologist, former head of the
American Red Cross and
National Institutes of Health*
Grace Hopper, computer scientist
*
Vera Rubin, astronomer
*
Ellen Swallow, chemist
Business
*
Ken Kaess,
CEO of
DDB Worldwide*
Geraldine Laybourne,
CEO of
Oxygen Media*
Judith Regan,
CEO of
ReganBooks (a division of
Harper Collins)
Politics
*
Anne Armstrong, diplomat, politician
*
Harriot Eaton Stanton Blatch,
suffragette and daughter of
Elizabeth Cady Stanton*
Rick Lazio,
Congressman (
Long Island),
Executive Vice President (
J.P. Morgan Chase Bank)
*
Vicki Miles-LaGrange, first African-American female attorney
*
Inez Milholland, suffragist
*
Catherine Bauer Wurster, urban housing reformer
Attended, but did not graduate
*
Anthony Bourdain (
graduated from Culinary Institute of America), chef, writer
*
Mike D (
expelled), rapper
*
Jane Fonda (
graduated from The Actors Studio), actress
*
Anne Hathaway (
attending New York University), actress
*
Justin Long (
Class of '00, did not graduate), actor
*
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis (
graduated from George Washington University),
First Lady*
Rachael Yamagata (
graduated from Northwestern University), singer
Fictional Alumni/Alumnae
*Characters from the 1963 novel,
The Group, by alumna
Mary McCarthy. A film was released of the novel in 1966.
*Dr. Holly Goodhead from the
James Bond feature film
Moonraker. After she incapacitates two men, Bond asks, "Where did you learn how to fight like that,
NASA?" She replies, "No, Vassar."
*Selena St. George, from the 1995 movie
Dolores Claiborne, based on the
Stephen King novel of the same title. (Two of King's children graduated from Vassar, and he gave the 2001 commencement speech).
* Two old ladies in
The Dark Tower, the seventh and final book of the series of the same name, by Stephen King.
* Principal Willoughby, from the Nickelodeon cartoon
Jimmy Neutron: Boy Genius.
* Heidi Holland, main character of
The Heidi Chronicles by
Wendy Wasserstein* Ruth Morrison, from the 1948
film noir, "
The Naked City" [
1].
* In the 1990 book
American Psycho the character
Timothy Bryce tells a story about a sexual encounter he had with a "Vassar girl."
* In
Don't Tell Mom The Babysitter's Dead, Sue Ellen Crandell, played by
Christina Applegate, falsely claimed to have graduated from Vassar on her highly embellished resume.
* In
Miss Congeniality, Benjamin Bratt introduces Sandra Bullock to "Beth," an undergrad at Vassar, doing a paper on law enforcement.
* Lisa Simpson, responding to Homer's decision to pay a hefty amount for family therapy, says "There go my young girl dreams of going to Vassar."
*
I'm Spelling as Fast as I Can: an episode of
The Simpsons where
Lisa Simpson is tempted by the Siren-like representatives of the
Seven Sisters (and
George Plimpton), who offer a free ride to the Sister school of her choice (and a George Plimpton hot plate) if she will throw a Spelling Bee [
2].
Famous Parents of Alumni/Alumnae
Many current and former
Vassar College students are children of famous people. Here's a list of some parents and students of Vassar College:
*
Michael Bloomberg,
Mayor of
New York City, businessman
*
Mike Farrell, actor
*
Tom Hanks, actor
*
Anne Hathaway, actress
*
Carolina Herrera, fashion designer
*
Samuel L. Jackson, actor
*
Stephen King, writer
*
Andrea Martin, actress
*
Viggo Mortensen, actor
*
Rupert Murdoch,
CEO of
News Corporation*
Randy Newman, artist
*
Regis Philbin, television host
*
John Ritter, actor
*
Meryl Streep (
alumna), actress
*
Sally Struthers, actress
*The original colors of the college were gray and rose, intended to symbolize "the rose of dawn breaking through the gray of women's intellectual situation," or "the dawning of women's education out of the grayness of its former state." In the late 1970s, the pinkish-rose was darkened to burgundy. However, pink is used instead of maroon for the graduation hoods. The official colors are burgundy and gray.
*Vassar has a world-class art collection. The
Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center is run as an independent
museum and is open to the public.
*The campus is a registered arboretum. There are over 200 tree species spread over 1,000 acres (400,000 m²) of forest land.
*Except for Strong House, an all-female dormitory, all of the student residence halls at Vassar are co-ed. All dormitory bathrooms are co-ed.
*New England building, one of the many academic buildings on campus, displays a piece of
Plymouth Rock above the entryway.
*Immediately following
World War II, Vassar accepted a very small number of male students on the
G.I. Bill, while still remaining formally all-female. The male graduates were given diplomas to the
University of the State of New York. The diplomas were reissued under the Vassar title after the school went co-ed.
*In 1920, in thanks for Vassar student's participation in the war effort, the French government gave the college an army tank. The tank was deposited behind Josselyn Dorm, and removed when it inevitably rusted.
*The opening flyby in the movie
The Muppets Take Manhattan is over the Vassar campus.
Kermit and his friends graduate from "Muppet University" in a scene filmed in Taylor Hall. The opening scene of
The Time Machine (
2002) was filmed at Vassar and all the extras for that scene are Vassar students.
*Vassar is also mentioned in:
**the films
Moonraker,
Sabrina,
Police Academy,
Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead,
Dolores Claiborne,
Kingpin (1996),
Miss Congeniality,
The Curse of the Jade Scorpion and
Igby Goes Down**the television series
The Simpsons,
Law & Order,
Ed (TV series),
Thursday,
Spin City,
Friends,
Dharma & Greg,
Gilmore Girls and numerous other television shows and movies.
*The halls in Main Building were built wide enough to accommodate two hoop skirts side by side when the girls did their exercises during poor weather.
*Vassar was host to the first baseball game played by two completely female teams in 1867. It was an amateur game.
*
Horowitz, Helen Lefkowitz.
Alma Mater: Design and Experience in the Women's Colleges from Their Nineteenth-Century Beginnings to the 1930s. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press,
1993 (2nd edition).
*
Official website**
The Vassar College Encyclopedia**
Vassar College Infosite (news and events)**
Campus tour**
The college catalogue, with a complete listing of all available concentrations
**
Vassar innovators**
History of Vassar College**
Vassar in popular culture**
The Frances Lehman Loeb Art Center
