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When we pause, for a moment, as now, to consider life at
Radcliffe, we cannot but ask ourselves how it differs from life at other colleges whose purpose is the same, to give young women opportunity to fit themselves for larger and richer spheres of usefulness than they otherwise could fill adequately.
To me,
Radcliffe life seems to have had as its essential quality, freedom.
This freedom is given in both work and play.
The wealth of material presented in the Radcliffe catalogue is spread before her and the student may choose what she will.
In recreation all that
Cambridge and
Boston offer is at her disposal, inasmuch as, after her choice of a home approved by college authorities, the absence of the dormitory system leaves the student free to plan her days as she pleases.
Whether young women may be given such freedom, whether such freedom develops within them the qualities that are desirable, those who have watched the progress of
Radcliffe students through four years of college life are best able to judge.
Since, at the present time, we have no dormitories at
Radcliffe, the distinctively college life of the Radcliffe students centres around old Fay House, rich for many with associations of days long gone, and rich for an ever increasing band of students with memories of most serious and most joyous hours.
