Freshman year

“ I once heard a freshman remark, "and then I can ask freshmen to breakfast, too, and cut them afterward." The point is that every fellow is thrown in the way of meeting the men of his year. If one is neglected in the end, he has no reason to feel that it is the fault of the college. As a result of this machinery for initiating newcomers, a man usually ceases to be a freshman after a single term (two months) of residence ”

“ In order to meet a very real need the College has for the past several years made it possible for a limited number of high school graduates to begin the work of the Freshman year in February. Men entering at that time may, if they so desire, continue the work of the Freshman year during the Summer Session. Those who satisfactorily complete the work of the Spring and Summer Sessions are then eligible for admission to the Sophomore class the following September. ”

“ A late Easter made a short April, and May was well upon them before the students of Overton College awoke to the realization that it was only a matter of days until the senior class would be graduated and gone; that the juniors would be seniors, the sophomores juniors, and even the humblest freshman would taste the sweetness of sophomoreship. ”

“ From the age of sixteen to twenty should be devoted to the college course, beginning with few electives in the Freshman year and gradually increasing their number as the course approaches completion. On graduating from college the students should receive their first degrees from these institutions, and all subsequent post-graduate degrees should be earned in and conferred by the universities, in which all college graduates who can devote the additional time and means required should be encouraged to pursue their studies for three or perhaps four years more. ”

“ With the same keen attention should she enter the new year at school or college, and as she passes through it, thinking about all that comes to her, she will find it growing less and less difficult and more and more friendly. She will consider what the freshman year is to be like, think of what sorts of girls she is to meet and make friends with, what the work will be, what she may expect in good times from this new adventure, and, [Pg 19] thoughtful about it all, make the minimum of mistakes and get the maximum of benefit. ”

“ In short, young Elliot became very important; was secretary of his class, which was large, led cheers at class games, had a nodding acquaintance with a number of upper-classmen, and was sought out by the toadying elements of his own class who liked to be seen with him at football practice. And all those who have been Freshmen know how inspiringly important all this seems at the time. Those who have gone the rest of the way through college know, also, that too much Freshman year prominence is quite likely to be more like weight than wings to an ambitious undergraduate. ”

“ But let us have a look at the daily life of the freshman when at last he is left alone and the tutor has gone back, with his recollections, to the unwelcome obscurity of his village. The new life has much to charm, bringing as it does a sense of manhood new found and of freedom from the narrower control of home and people. It is possible that our freshman will not be in college during his first year, but will have rooms found for him in one of the registered lodging-houses near by. ”

“ A man who enters in February, therefore, is able to graduate one year earlier than would have been possible if he had waited until the following September to enter. Freshmen continuing throughout the Spring and Summer Sessions receive the same number of credit hours of instruction as do those students who take the regular Freshman program beginning in September. ”

“ Students and teachers have labored with unusual diligence, crowding nearly the full work of the usual school year into six months.
The year has been signalized by having a Freshman class, the first to enter on college work. Four students have successfully completed the year, and another class of the same size or larger is expected for next year.
The president preached the Baccalaureate sermon from Gen. 5:24. All the graduates are Christians; all but two of the Academy, and three-fourths of the grammar pupils of the year have been Christians. ”

“ The former freshman class had many scores against the present juniors. As sophomores, the winter before, they had never missed an opportunity to annoy and irritate the freshmen in a hundred disagreeable ways. "The Black Monks of Asia" still rankled in their memories. Moreover, was not Julia Crosby, the junior captain? She was the same mischievous sophomore who had created so much havoc at the Christmas ball. She was always playing unkind practical jokes on other people. ”

“ There's the Freshman $200 prize—I run a chance at winning that at the end of the year; and I'll still have this club next year. I'll still have tuition remitted. Perhaps I can get one of those rooms in Old North: the rent is free there, and the rooms are big, too; and maybe I can get some newspapers to correspond for, or else I can get some tutoring. Oh, I'll manage [Pg 118] somehow, all right, if I'm careful. Then, what'll father say? ”

“ Such a shout as arose after this remarkable speech had never before been heard at a high school graduation. The freshman class was fairly mad with joy, while Hippy and Reddy yelled themselves hoarse.
"Anne!" cried Grace. "Wake up, Anne! Are you asleep, child? Go up to the platform. Miss Thompson is waiting for you."
Tears of joy and relief were rolling down Grace's cheeks as she urged Anne to rise from her seat.
Anne stood up, half dazed, still wondering what it was all about, and made her way through a sea of faces to the platform.
"Hurrah!" roared the pupils of the High School in one voice. ”

“ Anne's dainty white crepe de chine frock made her look anything but a theatrical star. Grace, however, had for once departed from her favorite blue and wore a white chiffon gown whose exquisitely simple lines made the most of her slender, supple figure. The charm of early sixteen radiated from her youthful person, and she looked no older than when she had led the freshman basketball team on to victory in Oakdale High School.
"Grace can't grow up in spite of her long skirts and done-up hair," smiled Miriam. ”

“ He had made up his mind to get a university education.
It was out of the question now to study all summer and enter the next fall, but the [Pg 12] minister told him he was still young; he could enter the following year.
"Your boy Will's catching on quicker than Henry Johnson or any of the young men that ever worked under me yet." That's what the cashier said to Mr. Young.
"That means he's getting over his fool notions," thought Mr. Young. Really it meant that he still had them. Will never mentioned the word college to his father again ”

“ While the academic sideshow of lectures and recitations is getting itself started in halting fashion, the freshman is in the fierce struggle and joy of real college life. As free of conventional wrappings as nature made him, he is paraded and tubbed in open daylight around faculty lawns and by campus houses, and whiles away the forenoon in stunts which teach him his place some more and further his initiation into that innermost, sacredest circle, the knights of the college tradition. Since nothing can be done unless you get student sentiment behind it, the faculty sits in helpless inactivity ”

“ Staid old universities blaze out with the gala colours of commencement week, when the month of roses is ushered in, and on every college campus the social life of the student year comes to flower in the crowning exercises of class-day. ”

“ A Freshman shall not play with any members of an upper class, without being asked; nor is he permitted to use any acts of familiarity with them, even in study time.
"'In case of personal insult, a Junior may call up a Freshman and reprehend him. A Sophomore, in like case, must obtain leave from a Senior, and then he may discipline a Freshman, not detaining him more than five minutes, after which the Freshman may retire, even without being dismissed, but must retire in a respectful manner. ”

“ That's what love does to a college boy in spring. It's a kind of rose-colored brainstorm, but it very seldom has complications. By the next fall, the ozone is out of the air; and after a couple has gone strolling about twice, football and the sorority rushes butt in—and it's all over. Freshman girls are a help, too. Beats all how much assistance a Freshman girl can be in forgetting a Senior girl who isn't on the premises! ”

“ We would by no means interfere with this graduation in the schools; but, in addition to this, there ought, we think, to be some goal of more elevated attainment, which might excite the attention and emulation of those whose opportunities admit of their being well educated. Let it bear the title of Bachelor of Arts, or Master of Arts, or graduate, and, if a definite meaning be affixed to it by the college authorities, it cannot fail to be as well understood as the unmeaning terms, sophomore, freshman, senior-wrangler, &c. ”

“ If you were a freshman, it made you feel sleepy and happy and utterly regardless of the future terrors of the conditioned state in comparison with the present joys of tennis and canoeing271 or the languorous fascination of a hammock on the back campus,—where one goes to study and remains to dream. If you were a senior it made a lump come in your throat,—the fleeting loveliness of this last spring term, when all the trials of being a Harding girl are forgotten and all the joys grow dearer than ever, now that they are so nearly past. ”

“ They are not obliged to go for the Undergraduates in study time, without permission obtained from the authority; nor are they obliged to go for a graduate out of the yard in study time. A Senior may take a Freshman from a Sophimore, a Bachelor from a Junior, and a Master from a Senior. None may order a Freshman in one play time, to do an errand in another.
"'When a Freshman is near a gate or door belonging to College or College yard, he shall look around and observe whether any of his superiors are coming to the same ”

“ Many of the more modern, on the other hand, permit a free choice; and some allow the student to become a candidate for graduation, whenever he feels himself competent to offer.
In the United States, with but one or two exceptions, we believe, the antiquated system, with more or less modification, is adopted; and, in most, the distinctions into freshman and sophomore, junior and senior classes, prevail: the sciences only becoming predominant objects of the student's attention in the two last. ”

“ In order to supply the need of a more thorough preparation, a preparatory department has been maintained in many colleges. The present aim and tendency of our educational system is to introduce the pupil from the high school to the rank of Freshman in college. ”

“ After the scout, the hosts of the college are the dons. As soon as the freshman is settled in his rooms, or sometimes even before, his tutor meets him and arranges for a formal presentation to the dean and master. All three are apt to show their interest in a freshman by advising him as to trying for the athletic teams, joining the college clubs and societies, and in a word as to all the concerns of undergraduate life except his studies—these come later. ”

“ Do you know that about one-fourth of all students who enter the freshman classes of our high schools, thruout the United States, drop out before the close of the first semester? Do you know, too, that the elimination continues right along until that one-fourth is made more than one-half before graduation day arrives? Now, these boys and girls enter full of hope and expectation, eager and ambitious for what the high school is supposed to do for them; they do not plan to drop out before completing the course—nor do their parents plan to have them do so. ”

“ In three New England colleges German cannot be begun till the junior year. In a majority, a physical subject is begun in the junior and another in the senior year. At Yale nobody but a senior can study chemistry. Such postponement, and by consequence such fragmentary work, may be necessary where early college years are crowded with prescribed studies. But an elective system can employ its later years to better advantage. ”

“ During the October term which makes him a freshman, the Average Undergraduate devotes a considerable time to mastering the etiquette of his University and College. He learns that it is not customary to shake hands with his friends more than twice in each term, once at the beginning, and again at the end of the term. If he is a Cambridge man, he will cut the tassel of his academical cap short ”

“ The winter, with its jolly long evenings about cosey fire-places, was over, and the Freshman-Sophomore snowball fight was almost forgotten. The University baseball candidates had left the "Cage" and were practising outdoors on the diamond. The glorious spring term had come, and the Seniors had begun twilight singing on the steps of Old North. The elms were putting on their new leaves; the undergraduates their new flannel trousers.
The Invincibles were on their way from the club, to stretch out under the old elms and hear the Seniors sing the old songs. ”

“ In this portrait one sees the real drift of American undergraduate life—the life that engaged last year in North American institutions of higher learning 349,566 young men, among whom were many of America’s choicest sons. Thousands of American and Canadian fathers and mothers, some for reasons of culture, others for social prestige, still others for revenue only, are ambitious to keep these students in the college world. ”