Centenary College - Hack Yearbook (Hackettstown, NJ)

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1 he i n Time is a sort ot river ot passing events Twenty years ago Dr. and Mrs. Trevorrow came to Centenary, which then had seventy-two girls in attendance and was offering preliminary courses and four years of high school. The fall of 1917 saw the enrollment increased by thirty per cent. and in 1918 raised still another twenty per cent., in 1919 the upper corridor of North Hall was opened for students for the first time since C. C. I. had become a girls' school. The highest resident enrollment was reached in 1926 when 174 students entered in Septem- ber, but it was realized that 170 represented more than could be comfortably accommo- dated and since then the resident enrollment has been limited to not more than 150. 1440 students have attended from 1917 to 1937, 687 of whom have been graduated. Every year from sixty to seventy Centenary graduates are in attendance at four year colleges and universities. ' In 1919, a post graduate course in secretarial studies was introduced, and the follow- ing year the post graduate privilege was extended to other than secretarial students, the members of the class being known as collegiates. Preliminary courses were abandoned in 1926, and a second year of post graduate work added. With September 1929 came thc junior College. Forty students entered in the freshman group, five post graduates returned to make the first graduating class of the junior College in june 1930. The high school and the junior college were conducted separately until last fall, by which time the freshman studies of high school had been dropped. The sophomore year is now to be discontinued and the name Centenary junior College applies to a unified group of the last two years of high school and the first two years of college. Centenary was laboring under a heavy debt in 1917. By September 1920 all the floating indebtedness had been paid and in 1924 the entire debt was cancelled and the old mortgage burned. The fiftieth and sixtieth anniversaries of the opening of the institution were cele- brated in 1924 and 1934 respectively, the sixtieth anniversary of the founding of the institution observed in 1926, and the seventieth anniversary of the granting of the charter recognized in 1937. In the two decades, sixty society anniversaries have been celebrated. During the World War years Centenary had its share in service to its country. A Red Cross unit was formed at the school. Many of the alumni saw active service overseas and in this country, and the War Memorial tablet in the Chapel was placed there on june 7, 1924, as a permanent testimonial to their patriotism. The class tablets in the main hall have been made up in these twenty years. Sixteen tablets were unveiled in 1929, completing the record from 1876 to the then current year. The first number of The Bulletin, the alumni quarterly, was issued in january 1918. Its circulation has increased until it now goes out to more than 2200 former students. Many honors have come to Centenary and Dr. Trevorrow in the past twenty years. ln 1927, C. C. I. received the approval of the Association of Colleges and Secondary Schools of the Middle States and Maryland and the University Senate of the Methodist Church. The junior College also has its place on the approved list of those standardizing agencies. The New Jersey State Board of Education has given the institution its ap- proval. Dr. Trevorrow has been the president of the Methodist Educational Association, of the American Association of junior Colleges, and of the junior College Council of the Middle Atlantic States. In 1932 he received the decoration of Commander of the Order of the Crown of Roumania, in recognition of educational service he had rendered that country. E 'ig ht

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I l 'err 1 1 ilongratulations CAST The President ,,,, . ...,., ..,.,A fVV,,7V,,V D I . Tf6V0ff0W The Dean ,,,,,, V,,,,,,VV,VVv,w V,,V, .,,,,,,, M r s . Trevorrow Spokesman for the Trustees Y,,, . ,,,,,,........,...,..V, ,VVV . ,...A,.. D f. DuBois Time' Chapel Service, morning of March 17, 1037. Placea f--Wfhitney Hall. fAt time of announcements, spokesman leaves the platform, off right, returns with basket of beautiful roses. Places basket in front of the President who sits at large table in center of platform. President shows surprisej , fwith deep emotion, addresses the school., ' There may be many of us who do not know that March seventeenth is an anniversary. Twenty years ago Dr. and Mrs. Trevorrow came to Centenary. It isn't necessary for me to tell you what their coming has meant and will mean to us, to those who have preceded us, and to those who will follow us, but if I may borrow the words of a famous advertisement, the Trustees have said it with flowers, These blooms, being things of the earth and sun and air, will fade. They will have their little hour full of color and of fragrance, and then their transitory loveliness will be gone, but the donors have tilled these perishable chalices with the things that do not perish, loyalty, appreciation and affection, which, not being made of earth and sun and air, abide forever. Dr. and Mrs. Trevorrow. on behalf of your Board of Trustees, I have the happy privilege of presenting this basket of Howersf' frisesg pauses, speaksj. I I U Q ' It is rather overwhelming to have this recognition of approaching old age, but nevertheless I am very grateful to have spent so many years in such pleasant com- pany. Of course, these twenty years have gone very rapidly, in fact, so rapidly that it doesn't seem they can have gone at all. There are many things we should like to have done, things to accomplish for Centenary these twenty years. When we came to the school, we had seventy-two girls and next year we expect to have 172 on enrollment, so that means some growth. We had a debt, a very bad debt, a very annoying debt as debts sometimes are. We are glad that is all paid and we don't owe anybody anything. Vife have made a little beginning in our endowment, we wish it were very much more, we hope it will be very much more. And there are some other things that have been accomplished in the twenty years, but I think the finest thing that has been accomplished in the twenty years has been the love and affection of the girls who have been here and have now gone out into the world as cultured women. Our buildings might all be wiped out in some terrible catastrophe, but their lives stand and that is really very wonderful. I wish some of the Trustees were here that I might thank them personally for their thought and good will, but I am especially grateful to Dr. DuBois for the assurance which he has given me this morning. I have a lot of things in my heart to say but my tongue falters in the saying of them. I do hope that this is the beginning of better times for Centenary and for all of us. To save the first million is the hardest and I suppose the hrst twenty years are the hardest. But I am particularly grateful for your kind cooper- ation and for your loving thoughts, and very much touched by your expression of good will. Seven

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he l-iaeh j j Bill things change, ereeds and philosophies and outward sgstems---but Bod remains Ovid once said that nothing flies as fast as time. If he had lived in these days he would doubtless have added that nothing changes as quickly as educational theory and practice. It is easy to understand why there are such frequent changes in education since education is preparation for life and as life is always fluid, education is in a constant process of adjustment. In the last twenty years there have been three major changes in American education. The first of these is the increase in the number of high schools and their growth both in size and importance. The current high school is the approximate equivalent of the college of fifty years ago. It is now the standard of free educational achievement. Those who cannot finish the high school are unfortunate and underprivileged, for graduation from a standard high school is now the foundation for employment, for citizenship and for general intelligence. In order to make the high school available to the largest numbers there have been organized centralized high schools fed by an elaborate system of transportation, so that the rural 300-pupil high school has grown to 700 students while in the larger cities the numbers reach to several thousands per unit. This blessing of a broader education for more young people would be a praisevvorthy achievement of the American system were not its very numbers a liability and a hindrance through overcrowding, superficial instruction and uncertain curricula. The second change affects the colleges. The liberal arts college has been put on the defensive. That bulwark of American higher education, originating in early colonial culture, must now advance adequate reasons for its existence. With the growth of great universities on one hand and the junior colleges on the other, it is in danger either of abandonment or of such complete reorganization as to eliminate its essential characteristics. Of course, no one will consent to the entire suspension of the liberal arts college and also no one doubts that if it is to retain its popular appeal it will have to adjust itself to the new conditions and needs of American life. The third important change has been the growth of the junior colleges. Twenty years ago they were few and unimportant. Now there are more than five hundred of them, enrolling about one-fifth of the total number of college students. Such growth was utterly unexpected by the little group of enthusiasts who believed in the need for and service by an intermediate institution between the high school and the university. The junior college's held of instruction is the extension of that general education which may be defined as the tools of learning. The foundation and growth of these colleges, dedicated to half skill and half vision, has been, probably, the most important move- ment in American education. Of various types, sizes and locations, but with common objectives, the junior colleges should be, and we expect they will be, effective servants to popularize higher education and thus to raise the intellectual standards of America. ROBERT TREVORROW Ninn