Barnard College - Relationship With Columbia University

Relationship With Columbia University

The relationship between Barnard College and Columbia University is complex. Barnard describes itself as an official college of Columbia, and advises students to state "Barnard College, Columbia University" or "Barnard College of Columbia University" on résumés. Columbia describes Barnard as an affiliated institution that is a faculty of the university. An academic journal describes Barnard as a former affiliate that became a school within the university. Facebook includes Barnard students and alumnae within the Columbia interest group. All Barnard faculty are granted tenure by the college and Columbia, and Barnard graduates receive Columbia University diplomas signed by both the Barnard and Columbia presidents.

Smith and Columbia president Seth Low worked to open Columbia classes to Barnard students. By 1900 they could attend Columbia classes in philosophy, political science, and several scientific fields. That year Barnard formalized an affiliation with the university which made available to its students the instruction and facilities of Columbia. From 1955 Columbia and Barnard students could register for the other school's classes with the permission of the instructor; from 1973 no permission was needed. Columbia president William J. McGill predicted in 1970 that Barnard and Columbia would merge within five years, but Columbia College, the university's original undergraduate school, began admitting women in 1983 after a decade of failed negotiations with Barnard for a merger akin to the one between Harvard College and Radcliffe College. The affiliation with Barnard continued, however. As of 2012 Barnard pays Columbia about $5 million a year under the terms of the "interoperate relationship", which the two schools renegotiate every 15 years.

Despite the affiliation Barnard is legally and financially separate from Columbia, with an independent faculty and board of trustees. It is responsible for its own separate admissions, health, security, guidance and placement services, and has its own alumnae association. Nonetheless, Barnard students participate in the academic, social, athletic and extracurricular life of the broader University community on a reciprocal basis. The affiliation permits the two schools to share some academic resources; for example, only Barnard has an urban studies department, and only Columbia has a computer science department. Most Columbia classes are open to Barnard students and vice versa. Barnard students and faculty are represented in the University Senate, and student clubs are open to all students. Barnard students play on Columbia athletics teams, and Barnard uses Columbia telephone and network services.

Read more about this topic:  Barnard College

Famous quotes containing the words columbia university, relationship with, relationship, columbia and/or university:

    The young women, what can they not learn, what can they not achieve, with Columbia University annex thrown open to them? In this great outlook for women’s broader intellectual development I see the great sunburst of the future.
    M. E. W. Sherwood (1826–1903)

    Some [adolescent] girls are depressed because they have lost their warm, open relationship with their parents. They have loved and been loved by people whom they now must betray to fit into peer culture. Furthermore, they are discouraged by peers from expressing sadness at the loss of family relationships—even to say they are sad is to admit weakness and dependency.
    Mary Pipher (20th century)

    Whatever may be our just grievances in the southern states, it is fitting that we acknowledge that, considering their poverty and past relationship to the Negro race, they have done remarkably well for the cause of education among us. That the whole South should commit itself to the principle that the colored people have a right to be educated is an immense acquisition to the cause of popular education.
    Fannie Barrier Williams (1855–1944)

    Although there is no universal agreement as to a definition of life, its biological manifestations are generally considered to be organization, metabolism, growth, irritability, adaptation, and reproduction.
    —The Columbia Encyclopedia, Fifth Edition, the first sentence of the article on “life” (based on wording in the First Edition, 1935)

    It is the goal of the American university to be the brains of the republic.
    Johan Huizinga (1872–1945)