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Bryn Mawr College (Pronounced ) is a highly selective women's liberal-arts college located in Bryn Mawr, Pennsylvania, ten miles northwest of Philadelphia. Bryn Mawr is located on the Pennsylvania Main Line and is connected to downtown Philadelphia by the SEPTA R5 commuter rail system.

Bryn Mawr is one of the Seven Sisters and is part of the Tri-College Consortium along with Swarthmore College and Haverford College. The school has an enrollment of about 1300 undergraduate students and 400 graduate students.

The name "Bryn Mawr" means "big hill" in Welsh (not "high hill," Bryn Uchel, as is often mistakenly given as the translation).

There is also a Bryn Mawr School for girls in grades K-12 in Baltimore, Maryland that was founded in 1885. The school shared some early supporters with the college (one of the founders, M. Carey Thomas, was Bryn Mawr College's first dean), but the two institutions are otherwise unaffiliated.

History

Bryn Mawr College was founded in 1885. It was the first women's higher education institution to offer graduate degrees, including doctorates. The first class included 36 undergraduate women and eight graduate students. Bryn Mawr was originally affiliated with the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), but by 1893 had become non-denominational.

In 1912, Bryn Mawr became the first college in the United States to offer doctorates in social work, through the Department of Social Economy and Social Research. This department became the Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research in 1970. In 1931, Bryn Mawr began accepting males as graduate students, while remaining women-only at the undergraduate level.

Organization

Bryn Mawr is a self-governed institution. Its Self-Government Association, formed in 1892, is the oldest such organization in the United States. A significant aspect of self-government is the Academic Honor System (honor code).

Along with Haverford College, Bryn Mawr forms the Bi-College Community. Students in the "Bi-Co" enjoy unlimited cross-registration privileges and may choose to major at the other institution. The two institutions join with Swarthmore College to form the Tri-College Consortium. Free shuttles are provided between the three campuses.

In addition, the group is affiliated with the University of Pennsylvania through a special consortium. Bryn Mawr students in the Growth and Structure of Cities department may earn a Bachelor of Arts at Bryn Mawr and a master's degree in city planning at UPenn through the 3-2 Program in City and Regional Planning.

Facilities

Bryn Mawr's library holdings are housed in the Mariam Coffin Canaday Library (opened 1970), the Rhys Carpenter Library (opened 1997), and the Lois and Reginald Collier Science Library (opened 1993). TRIPOD, the online library catalog, automatically accesses holdings at Haverford and Swarthmore.

The majority of Bryn Mawr students live on campus in residence halls. Many of the older residence halls are known for their Gothic revival architecture, modeled after Oxford University. Each is named after a county in Wales: Brecon, Denbigh (1891), Merion (1885), and Radnor (1887). The exceptions are Pembroke East and West (1892), named for the House of Pembroke and its importance to William Shakespeare. Rhoads North and South was named after the college's first president, James E. Rhoads; Rockefeller is named after its donor, John D. Rockefeller. The newest residence halls are Erdman (opened 1965, designed by architect Louis Kahn) and the Haffner Language and Culture House (opened 1971). In addition, students may choose to live in Glenmede (formerly graduate student housing), Perry House (the Black Cultural Center) or Batten House (an environmentally-friendly co-op).

The campus was designed in part by noted landscape designers Calvert Vaux and Frederick Law Olmsted, and has subsequently been designated an arboretum (the Bryn Mawr Campus Arboretum).

Academics

Students at Bryn Mawr are required to complete divisional requirements in the social sciences, natural sciences (including lab skills) and humanities. In addition, they must fulfill a two-year foreign language requirement, a quantitative skills requirement and a College Seminar requirement.

Majors offered include:

Minors include:

  • Africana Studies
  • Computational Methods
  • Creative Writing
  • Dance
  • Education
  • Film Studies
  • Gender and Sexuality
  • International Studies
  • Theater Studies

Concentrations include:

  • Creative Writing
  • Environmental Studies
  • Gender and Sexuality
  • Geoarchaeology
  • Hispanic and Hispanic-American Studies
  • Neural and Behavioral Sciences
  • Peace and Conflict Studies

Traditions

The four major traditions are Parade Night, which takes place on the first night of the academic year; Lantern Night, which takes place in late October or early November; Hell Week, which takes place in mid-February; and May Day, which takes place on the Sunday after classes end in the spring semester. The traditions mistresses of the College, two positions elected by the student body, are in charge of organizing and running traditions. In addition to events, Bryn Mawr's traditions extend to superstitions around the campus, some of which date back to the opening of the college in 1885.

College presidents

Noted faculty

Noted alumnae

Noted fictional alumnae

Popular culture

External links

Further reading

  • Horowitz, Helen Lefkowitz. The Power and Passion of M. Carey Thomas. New York: Knopf, 1994.
  • --- Alma Mater: Design and Experience in the Women's Colleges from Their Nineteenth-Century Beginnings to the 1930s. Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1993 (2nd edition).

Universities and colleges in Pennsylvania | Liberal arts colleges | Peace studies | Women's universities and colleges in the United States | Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools | Montgomery County, Pennsylvania | Pennsylvania Main Line | Posse schools | Bryn Mawr College

 

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