Studying the History of Higher Education Journal

Historicizing the Freedom of Expression and Dissent at Dartmouth College

2025-01-18T15:05:09+00:00

For decades since the 1960s, student-led movements on college campuses have spearheaded political change across the nation. At the same time, college administrations have developed a web of speech and conduct policies, adorned with increasingly hefty specifications for permissible campus protest. This article studies the origins and developments of one such set of policies at Dartmouth College, including the Freedom of Expression and Dissent (FED) policy and its associated conduct regulations. These policies found their genesis in three pivotal periods of protest at Dartmouth: the George Wallace protests of the early to mid-1960s, the anti-Vietnam war movement in the late 1960s, and the anti-apartheid protests of the mid- to late 1980s. Through analyzing the historical causes, revisions, and applications of the FED policy and its associated conduct regulations, I argue that these policies were developed not to protect free expression and dissent, but to prevent such expression from disrupting the college administration’s desired social order. The FED policy serves the counterinsurgent function of symbolically affirming free expression and dissent, while its accompanying conduct regulations work in conjunction to control dissent’s impactfulness.

Education for the Race: The History of Euthenics and Eugenics at Vassar College

2025-05-28T16:35:19+00:00

What happened to higher education when eugenics swept the nation? This paper answers this question through a case study of Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York, one of the first women’s colleges in the United States. It reveals how Vassar’s unique euthenics program, established in 1924, advanced eugenic political goals that were deliberately supported by administrators, faculty, students, alumnae, and prominent eugenicist figures such as Margaret Sanger and Charles Davenport. This paper explores the important role of academia between the late-19th and mid-20th centuries, demonstrating how the College was used to legitimize eugenics as a field of study and to train eugenics researchers. While examining student exploitation and objectification, along with pronatalist and antinatalist rhetoric, this paper contextualizes eugenics at Vassar within the broader Hudson Valley and national eugenics movements. Archival materials, including College newspaper columns and articles from the Eugenics Review, Journal of Heredity, Birth Control Review, and others, are closely analyzed to provide a primary-source-driven analysis of Vassar’s eugenic history. Finally, the romanticization of Vassar’s past is challenged with a call for increased institutional accountability.

“I Decline to Play the Part of the Fish Dangling on the End of Your Line”: How a Blind Politician Led the Way to a Dissertation Topic in Educational History

2025-07-16T20:37:11+00:00

This article traces the author’s personal and academic journey to a dissertation topic in educational history, catalyzed by a chance encounter at a garage sale and a provocative letter from a blind South Carolina politician, John E. Swearingen. Initially struggling to identify a viable dissertation topic, the author discovered Swearingen while searching through archival microfilm of the correspondence between the General Education Board (GEB), a Rockefeller-funded philanthropic organization, and the South Carolina State Department. The discovery launched a biographical project that explored Swearingen’s life and career. The article blends autoethnography, historiography, and biography, chronicling Swearingen’s tenure as State Superintendent of Education and his advocacy for marginalized communities, despite operating within a segregated and racially oppressive system. It examines the methodological process of constructing a historical life from fragmented records and personal interviews—including with Swearingen’s son—and the broader implications for understanding masculinity, disability, and resistance in Progressive Era education reform. Ultimately, this narrative underscores how unexpected moments and overlooked figures can shape a career, illuminate injustices, and expand the field of educational history.

Biographical Writing through the Lens of Lawrence A. Cremin’s Leadership and Presidency at Teachers College

2025-05-29T20:13:54+00:00

This article examines the complexities of biographical writing through the lens of Lawrence Cremin’s (1925–1990) leadership and presidency at Teachers College, Columbia University. Cremin was president of Teachers College in the period 1974-1984 and a prolific author best known for his three-volume work American Education (published between 1970 and 1988). He was also a Professor of Education at Teachers College until his death in 1990. This article explores the subjectivity inherent in biographical writing, focusing on the ways in which archival research and personal reflection influenced the author’s evolving perceptions of Cremin. The article begins with a discussion of Cremin’s belief in the importance of educational thought that extended beyond formal schooling–an aspect that triggered the author’s initial interest in Cremin’s life and career. The narrative then focuses on Cremin’s presidency during a challenging time for higher education. Analysis revealed that as an institutional leader, Cremin struggled with shared governance approaches and consistently opted for isolated and autonomous administrative decisions rendered with the power of his position as president of the College. Throughout the article, the author describes his gradual discoveries of Cremin’s leadership experiences and complex beliefs, and emphasizes the uncertainty inherent in life-writing.

The Road Less Travelled: L.L. Nunn and the Birth of the Nunnian Microcollege

2025-05-16T09:03:43+00:00

This paper examines the historical roots of the microcollege movement focusing on the establishment of the first microcollege institutions: the Telluride Institute (1891), the Telluride Association (1910), and the Deep Springs College (1917). These microcollege-type institutions were founded by the eccentric Gilded Age energy tycoon L.L. Nunn. While Nunn’s educational ventures often reflected broad trends in higher education at the time, his core educational principles evolved over his career. This paper argues that the concurrent application of Nunn’s four primary principles of education (self-government, intellectual and academic rigor, physical work, and societal isolation), which evolved gradually to receive full expression at Deep Springs College, represents not only a divergence from higher education trends of the time, but also provides an opportunity for scholars of higher education today to reconsider the fundamental principles of higher education in a modern democratic setting.

Editorial Introduction

2025-07-16T18:59:33+00:00

No Abstract