A (student) Proposal for Hampshire College (1966)

'''A (Student) Proposal for Hampshire College was submitted on February 2, 1966. It was included with the Educational Advisory Committee Report.

Excerpts
A group of students from Amherst and Smith have been meeting together for about two months to discuss education and formulate a proposal for Hampshire College. This is the proposal that has come out of these meetings. It is based on certain opinions about educational purposes, certain observations about the present state of college education, and certain ideas about society in general, and its demands. So these things may as well be stated first.

1) The need for a new kind of person and a new kind of thinking. The United States faces problems today which cannot be solved through the approaches traditionally used by society. The solutions to the major internal and world-wide problems lie in policies not yet devised and in attitudes not now held. It is not that such problems as poverty, civil rights, and the war in Vietnam are being ignored. It is that no matter what we do, using the best tools available, the problems either stay the same or get worse. If the problems are to be solved, our educational institutions will have to find new ways to give students new tools to deal with the new problems. In light of this it seems to me that independent, divergent, and highly creative thinking should be one of the highest educational values. The need is not to perpetuate old ways of thought, but to foster new ones.

2) Individual differences. It is by now commonplace that the net effect of society, (including its educational institutions), on the individual is to make him conform. We think colleges should take the opposite view, and cherish and foster individual differences.

3) Isolation. It has long been part of educational thinking to make colleges separate from the ordinary flow of concerns in the outside world, or at least to relegate activities and thought in this realm to the twilight of "extra-curricular activities." Our view is that one of the prime concerns of the college should be to study quite directly the problems of the modern world; everything possible should be done to break down traditional ivory tower isolation.

4) Intellectual Community. Colleges are not serving the function of being intellectual communities. Dialogue and the exchange of intellectual ideas is largely confined in practice to the classroom. What intellectual community there is exists largely in spite of, not because of, the college program. We feel every effort should be made to revive and foster this kind of community activity.

5) Responsibility. School administrations continually restrict the personal lives of students on the grounds that students aren't responsible enough to manage their own affairs. To us, responsibility is learned like anything else, and that the only way for students to learn to manage their affairs responsibly is to be allowed to manage them.

6) Self-motivation, interest. For many students a vital engagement with the subject of study is often obstructed by conventional curricula and classroom situations. We assume that students are naturally curious and interested and responsive to situations. We feel that the students' impetus to learn must be uncovered and employed as the sole motivation in education. The content of a person's education should be based on his particular interests and concerns. (p.1-2)

The Over-all Structure: The college would be divided into five autonomous residential and educational villages. Decisions concerning the management of the "village" would be decided democratically. The villages would be geographically separated, centered around those facilities that would have to be shared by the whole school. Each student would design his program, with a faculty advisor. The curriculum would center as much of each student's program, as possible, within his village group, without losing the advantages of a larger college community.

The Villages: In each village there would be a series of residences housing various numbers of students, from 8 to 30. Each would contain a lounge and kitchenette. Single rooms should be provided for those who want them. It would be important for the architecture of the residences within each village to be varied. They should be designed to look like houses. Frame construction might be best.

Each residence would be administered by the students themselves, democratically. The students in each would be responsible for social rules, the cleaning of the dorm and minor repairs. Room groupings would be chosen in the spring, though alterable anytime, and would be made on the basis of friendship. The decision as to whether or not to live in a co-ed dormitory would be left to the students. (p. 3)

Senior Program: To graduate, students must, by the end of their junior [year], design a coherent, rigorous, limited, and concentrated program of study. It must be approved, and, upon completion in the senior year, accepted by a panel of faculty and seniors in that field. The purpose of studying a limited problem in depth is to challenge and temper the student's appreciation and his accumulated knowledge and skills. (p.8)