Rensselaer Union, Volume 8, Number 19, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 27 January 1876 — A Word for the Women. [ARTICLE]

A Word for the Women.

We do not hesitate to say that the average woman, educated in the better class of schools in this country, is a better scholar and a more capable and accomplished person than the average college graduate of the other sex. What we want is cheaper schools of an equal excellence. The farmer’s boy goes to college, finds cheap tuition, wins a scholarship, perhaps, boards in commons, earns money during vacation and gets through, while his sister stays at home because the only places where she can get an equal education are expensive beyond her means. There is no college that needs to be so richly endowed as a woman’s college. Women are not men, quarrel with the fact as we may, and they cannot get along so cheaply Jand with self-helpfulness as men while going through the processes of their education. If we are to have women’s colleges we musthave well-paid professors, philosophical apparatus, cabinets, collections, art galleries, laboratories, and they must be provided for by private munificence. Provision should be made for the poor so that high education shall come within the reach of all. There is not a woman’s college or an advanced public institution for the education of women that is not to-day in need of a large, endowment for the purpose of bringing its advantages within the reach of those whose means are small. Now we commend this matter particularly to rich women. There are many scattered up and down the countiy who are wondering what they shall do with their money when and even before they die. -To all these we beg the privilege of commending thisegfeat object. Let the boys alone. They hive been pretty well taken care of already and the men will look after them. It is for you, as women wishing well to your own sex and anxious for its elevation in all possible ways, to endow these institutions that are springing up about the country in its interest, so that the poor shall have an equal chance with the rich. You can greatly help to give the young women of all classes as good a chance as their brothers enjoy, and you can hardly claim a great deal of womanly feeling if you do not do it.—Dr. J. &. Holland, in Scribner.