List of coordinate colleges

Before and after the Revolutionary War, America's colleges and universities were almost exclusively male-only institutions. These only gradually opened to co-ed participation at a time when women seeking to extend their educations would either attend finishing schools which equated to the final years of high school, or teachers, or nursing or (women's) business schools - these were designed to cater to the needs of female students and were specifically vocational in nature. Typically, curricula would be designed as two-year courses, providing teachers, nurses, typists and secretaries for an expanding country where, nevertheless, occupational sex roles were culturally enforced, if not as a matter of legislation.[1]

Countering this, and to meet growing demand, a number of academically vigorous women's colleges in the United States were established as "coordinate colleges", enjoying various levels of support or integration with established, and nearby, men's colleges in the years leading up to WWII. Coordination here refers to an array of linkages, including direct administrative connections and even a parent/subordinate school relationship, cross-registration, the award of diplomas from the parent school, and at the student level, desirable social connections. Subsequent to WWII, establishment of new coordinated colleges appears to have been curtailed, giving way to widespread mergers with men's colleges or the move to make most single sex institutions coeducational. Hence, some of the coordinated colleges emerged as independent women's or co-educational colleges, while others merged or closed.[1]

As a class, these schools are distinct from the much large number of finishing schools and business schools for women that had formed in the decades prior to WWII. Many of the latter were privately owned, and have vanished. Some became junior colleges or merged.[1][2]

Some, but not all of the Seven Sisters (colleges) can be classified as coordinate colleges, however as a group, they've maintained an association with the Ivy league.[3] Where coordination continues it is most apparent in consortium school relationships (Ivy league and others) to provide cross-registration and mutually accepted financial aid applications.[1][2]

These colleges include:

School name Associated institution Established/Range City State Co-ed status Status Notes
Bard College[lower-alpha 1] Columbia University March 1860 Annandale-on-Hudson New York co-ed Independent, merged, then independent again [lower-alpha 2]
Barnard College Columbia University 1889[4] Manhattan New York womens Affiliated [lower-alpha 3]
Bethlehem Female Seminary Moravian University 1742 Germantown, then Bethlehem Philadelphia NA Merged
Jackson College for Women Tufts University 1870[5] Middlesex County Massachusetts NA Merged
Mills College Northeastern University 1852 Oakland California co-ed Affiliated [lower-alpha 4][lower-alpha 5]
Mount Holyoke College Andover Theological Seminary [lower-alpha 6] 1837 South Hadley Massachusetts womens Independent [lower-alpha 6]
Ohio Wesleyan Female College Ohio Wesleyan University 1853-1877 Delaware Ohio NA Merged
Radcliffe College Harvard University 1879[6] Manhattan New York NA Merged
Scripps College Claremont Colleges 1926 Claremont California womens Consortium member [lower-alpha 7]
Tift College Mercer University 1849-1986 Forsyth, now Macon Georgia NA Merged
Vassar College Yale University 1894[7] Poughkeepsie New York co-ed Formerly affiliated
Wellesley College Massachusetts Institute of Technology 1870 Wellesley Massachusetts womens Affiliated, originally separate
  1. Named St. Stephens College until 1934
  2. Bard's founders held strong ties with Columbia. Merging with that school in 1928, it would later emerge as an independent, co-ed school in 1944 due to financial pressures and low enrollment as a women's-only unit of Columbia.
  3. Barnard maintains a separate board and separate financial structures while cooperating on inter-registration, student life and other aspects. Its affiliation structure is renegotiated every 15 years in a complex relationship. See Barnard_College#Academic_affiliations.
  4. Note that the parent school is in Boston, while Mills is on the West Coast.
  5. The college briefly opted to become coeducational in 1990, a move that was rescinded that same year due to widespread student protest. After the merger with Northeastern University a plan to once again become all-gender was announced in 2022; several lawsuits were filed in opposition. Litigation is ongoing.
  6. Andover Theological Seminary was the sister school to Mount Holyoke, providing some coordination at a time when both schools developed missionaries. This gave way over the years reflecting divergent objectives, with Mount Holyoke establishing numerous conference ties. In 1908, the Andover school moved to the Harvard University campus, and then to Newton Theological Institution in 1931. In 1965 it formally merged with Newton to become Andover Newton Theological School. The school continues as Andover Newton Seminary at Yale Divinity School, a name it adopted in 2017.
  7. Founded a year after the establishment of the Claremont Colleges, an affiliated group of seven adjacent colleges, as an equal partner.

See also

References
  1. Malkiel, Nancy Weiss (March 2017). ""Keep the Damned Women Out": The Struggle for Coeducation in the Ivy League, the Seven Sisters, Oxford, and Cambridge" (PDF). Proceedings of the American Philosophical Society. 160 (1): 31–37. Retrieved 1 September 2023.
  2. "What are the Ivy League equivalents to the Seven Sister schools?". Fluther.com. Retrieved 1 September 2023.
  3. "The Founding of The Seven Sisters". Vassar Encyclopedia. Vassar College. Retrieved 1 September 2023.
  4. "Short History of Barnard-Columbia Relations | Barnard 125". Columbia University.
  5. "TEI | Light on the hill: A history of Tufts College, 1852-1952 | ID: 9c67wz173 | Tufts Digital Library". dl.tufts.edu.
  6. Nichols, Lawrence T. (September 1, 1997). "Sociology in the women's annex: Inequality and integration at Harvard and Radcliffe, 1879–1947". The American Sociologist. 28 (3): 5–28. doi:10.1007/s12108-997-1011-6 – via Springer Link.
  7. "The Dangerous Experiment". National Women's History Museum. August 9, 2018.
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