1947 Smith College Northampton, Massachusetts Women’s College Yearbook For Sale

Smith College

Smith College is a private liberal arts women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith and opened in 1875. It is a member of the historic Seven Sisters colleges, a group of women's colleges in the Northeastern United States. Smith is also a member of the Five College Consortium[8] with four other institutions in the Pioneer Valley: Mount Holyoke College, Amherst College, Hampshire College, and the University of Massachusetts Amherst; students of each college are allowed to attend classes at any other member institution. On campus are Smith's Museum of Art and Botanic Garden, the latter designed by Frederick Law Olmsted.

Smith College

Private liberal arts women's college

Established

1871; 153 years ago (opened 1875; 149 years affiliation

COFHESeven Sisters

Endowment

$2.4 billion (2022)[2]

President

Sarah Willie-LeBreton

Academic (fall Massachusetts, U.S.

NCAA Division III – NEWMAC

Smith has 50 academic departments and programs and is structured around an open curriculum, with requirements being a writing intensive class during the first year and the fulfillment of a major. Examinations vary from self-scheduled exams, scheduled exams, and take-home exams. Undergraduate admissions are exclusively restricted to women, although Smith announced a trans-inclusive admissions policy in 2015.[10][11] Smith offers several graduate degrees, all of which accept applicants regardless of gender, and co-administers programs alongside other Five College Consortium members. The college was the first historically women's college to offer an undergraduate engineering degree.[12] Admissions are considered selective. It was the first women's college to join the NCAA, and its sports teams are known as the Pioneers.

Smith alumnae include notable authors, journalists, activists, feminists, politicians, investors, philanthropists, actresses, filmmakers, academics, businesswomen, CEOs, two First Ladies of the United States, and recipients of the Pulitzer Prize, Rhodes Scholarship, Academy Award, Emmy Award, MacArthur Grant, Peabody Award, and Tony Award.

The college was chartered in 1871 by a bequest of Sophia Smith and opened its doors in 1875 with 14 students and 6 faculty. When Smith inherited a fortune from her father aged 65, she decided that leaving her inheritance to found a women's college was the best way for her to fulfill the moral obligation she expressed in her will:

I hereby make the following provisions for the establishment and maintenance of an Institution for the higher education of young women, with the design to furnish for my own sex means and facilities for education equal to those which are afforded now in our colleges to young men.

The campus was planned and planted in the 1890s as a botanical garden and arboretum, designed by noted American landscape architect, Frederick Law Olmsted. By 1915, the student enrollment was 1,724, and the faculty numbered 163.

LTJG Harriet Ida Pickens and ENS Frances Wills, first African-American WAVES to be commissioned. They were members of the final graduating class at USNR Midshipmen's School (WR) Northampton, Massachusetts on December 21, 1944.

During the 1920s, two students at the college went missing: junior Alice Corbett disappeared on November 13, 1925,[16] and was never found; freshman Frances Smith disappeared on January 13, 1928—her body was recovered from the Connecticut River months later.[17]

By 2010, the school had 2,600 undergraduates on campus and 250 students studying elsewhere.[18] The campus landscape now encompasses 147 acres (59 ha) and includes more than 1,200 varieties of trees and shrubs. Smith is the largest privately endowed college for women in the United States.[19]

United States Naval Reserve Midshipmen's School

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The United States Naval Reserve Midshipmen's School at Smith College was training grounds for junior officers of the Women's Reserve of the U.S. Naval Reserve (WAVES) and was nicknamed "USS Northampton". On August 28, 1942, a total of 120 women reported to the school for training.

In April 2015, the faculty adopted an open-access policy to make its scholarship publicly accessible online.

On September 15, 2022, the Board of Trustees announced Sarah Willie-LeBreton had been selected as the 12th president of Smith College, effective July 1, 2023.

Presidents

Smith has been led by 11 presidents and two acting presidents. (Elizabeth Cutter Morrow was the first acting president of Smith College and the first female head of the college, but she did not use the title of president.) For the 1975 centennial, the college inaugurated its first woman president, Jill Ker Conway, who came to Smith from Australia by way of Harvard and the University of Toronto. Since President Conway's term, all Smith presidents have been women, with the exception of John M. Connolly's one-year term as acting president in the interim after President Simmons left to lead Brown University.

Laurenus Clark Seelye 1875–1910

Marion LeRoy Burton 1910–1917

William Allan Neilson 1917–1939

Elizabeth Cutter Morrow 1939–1940 (acting president)

Herbert Davis 1940–1949

Benjamin Fletcher Wright 1949–1959

Thomas Corwin Mendenhall 1959–1975

Jill Ker Conway 1975–1985

Mary Maples Dunn 1985–1995

Ruth Simmons 1995–2001

John M. Connolly 2001–2002 (acting president)

Carol T. Christ 2002–2013

Kathleen McCartney 2013–2023

Sarah Willie-LeBreton 2023–Present

Academics

Smith's campus as it appears today

Smith College has 285 professors in 50 academic departments and programs, for a faculty-student ratio of 1:9.[18] It was the first women's college in the United States to grant its own undergraduate degrees in engineering. The Picker Engineering Program offers a single ABET accredited Bachelor of Science in engineering science, combining the fundamentals of multiple engineering disciplines.

In 2008, Smith joined the SAT optional movement for undergraduate admission.

Smith runs its own junior year abroad (JYA) programs in four European cities: Paris, Hamburg, Florence, and Geneva. These programs are notable for requiring all studies to be conducted in the language of the host country (with both Paris and Geneva programs conducted in French). In some cases, students live in homestays with local families. Nearly half of Smith's juniors study overseas, either through Smith JYA programs or at more than 40 other locations around the world.

Junior math majors from other undergraduate institutions are invited to study at Smith College for one year through the Center for Women in Mathematics. Established in the fall of 2007 by Professors Ruth Haas and Jim Henle, the program aims to allow young women to improve their mathematical abilities through classwork, research, and involvement in a department centered on women. The Center also offers a post-baccalaureate year of math study to women who did not major in mathematics as undergraduates or whose mathematics major was not strong.

The Louise W. and Edmund J. Kahn Liberal Arts Institute supports collaborative research without regard to the traditional boundaries of academic departments and programs. Each year the institute supports long-term and short-term projects proposed, planned, and organized by members of the Smith College faculty. By becoming Kahn Fellows, students get involved in interdisciplinary research projects and work alongside faculty and visiting scholars for a year.

Students can develop leadership skills through Smith's two-year Phoebe Reese Lewis Leadership Program. Participants train in public speaking, analytical thinking, teamwork strategies, and the philosophical aspects of leadership.

Through Smith's internship program, "Praxis: The Liberal Arts at Work," all undergraduates are guaranteed access to one college-funded internship during their years at the college. This program enables students to access interesting self-generated internship positions in social welfare and human services, the arts, media, health, education, and other fields.

Its most popular undergraduate majors, based on 2021 graduates, were:

Research & Experimental Psychology

Biology/Biological Sciences

Political Science & Government

Engineering Science

History

English Language & Literature

Mathematics

Economics

Computer Science

Ada Comstock Scholars Program

Ada Comstock, class of 1897

The Ada Comstock Scholars Program is an undergraduate degree program that serves Smith students of nontraditional college age. The program accommodates approximately 100 women ranging in age from mid-twenties to over sixty. Ada Comstock Scholars attend the same classes as traditional undergraduates, either full or part-time, and participate fully in a variety of extracurricular activities. They may live on or off campus. Financial aid is available to each Ada Comstock Scholar with demonstrated need.

Beginning in 1968, with the approval of the Committee on Educational Policy, Smith College initiated a trial program loosely titled The Continuing Education Degree for several women of non-traditional age who were looking to complete their unfinished degrees. Their successes inspired President Thomas C. Mendenhall and Dean Alice Dickinson to officially expand the program. In January 1975, the Ada Comstock Scholars Program has formally established under President Jill Ker Conway and in the fall of that year, forty-five women were enrolled. The students range in age, background, and geographical location. The growth of the program peaked at just over 400 students in 1988.

The program is named for Ada Louise Comstock Notestein (1876–1973), an 1897 Smith graduate, professor of English and dean of Smith from 1912 to 1923, and president of Radcliffe College from 1923 to 1943. Ada Comstock Notestein devoted much of her life to the academic excellence of women. Considering education and personal growth to be a lifelong process, she stayed actively involved in women's higher education until her death at the age of 97.[32]

Graduate degrees and study options

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The Smith College School for Social Work is housed in Lily Hall.

Smith's graduate program is open to applicants of any gender. Degrees offered are Master of Arts in teaching (elementary, middle or high school), master of fine arts, master of education of the deaf, Master of Science in biological sciences, Master of Science in exercise and sport studies and master and Ph.D. in social work. In special one-year programs, international students may qualify for a certificate of graduate studies or a diploma in American studies. Each year approximately 100 men and women pursue advanced graduate work at Smith.

Also offered as a non-degree studies program is the Diploma in American Studies.[34] This is a highly competitive one-year program open only to international students of advanced undergraduate or graduate standing. It is designed primarily, although not exclusively, for those who are teaching or who plan to teach some aspect of American culture and institutions.

The Smith College School for Social Work is nationally recognized for its specialization in clinical social work and puts a heavy emphasis on direct field work practice. The program is accredited by the Council on Social Work Education. The school offers a Master of Social Work (M.S.W.) degree as well as a Ph.D. program designed to prepare MSWs for leadership positions in clinical research education and practice.

The college has a limited number of other programs leading to Ph.D.s and is part of a cooperative doctoral program co-administered by Amherst College, Hampshire College, Mount Holyoke College and the University of Massachusetts Amherst.