The Opening and Outlook of Union College for the Year 1903-1904
By L. A. Hoopes
Union College opened this year with a larger attendance of regular college students than for several years past. The church-school department has been discontinued, as this work is carried on by the church. The different branches of work carried on by the school are well represented. Our tuition being uniform has encouraged the students to take full work, so we find all our classes well filled. Each teacher has as many as he can well manage. While we have a large number of students who are of mature age, and we may reasonably expect them to enter soon upon public work, we have also a large number of students who are fresh from high schools, whose age would lead us to expect them to stay with the school for a number of years. The manual-training department is better patronized this year than at any previous time in the history of the institution. An effort has been made to make the department self-supporting; that is to say, each specific division of the department must pay its own way. We have been careful not to engage in enterprises that would require a large expense and yield no income. We can not boast of any very great thing that has been accomplished in this department; however, should we take the gains of some departments and place them along with every other department which has kept up with its expenses, we should find that the manual-training department is ahead. This year there is a good interest taken in the different branches of this department. I may speak of the tailoring, the sewing, the printing, the broom-making, the bakery, the farm work, the carpentry, and the electrical. In all these different branches we shall be able to send out students who can do fairly good work. It is also encouraging to know that a large per cent of the correspondence which comes from students who are seeking an education deals with this question of learning some special branch of manual training along with other studies which would qualify them as missionaries. They have conceived the idea that if they are practical men in the field, it will be necessary for them to know how to construct buildings, and improvise appliances that will be needed in destitute fields, as well as to know how to teach the Word to the people. Our normal department is growing. The increased demands which come from all over the school districts for competent church-school teachers, both in English and in foreign languages, has brought to our school a large number who are planning to engage in this work. We are also pleased to announce that there are many who have come with a view of preparing for the ministry. And here I may state that the teachers have felt a burden in giving special attention to this class of pupils, whether they are studying grammar, science, history, or literature, that they may be fitted for their work as ministers. Our Young People’s Society has combined with it the missionary work of the school, and has for its membership both teachers and pupils. All are expected to take part. The meetings are held on Wednesday and Sabbath afternoon. In the missionary work an effort is made to enlist students in just as many different phases of missionary effort as can be well carried in connection with our regular school work. This includes Bible work, public speaking, distribution of tracts, selling our periodicals, missionary correspondence, and the study of missionary operations in foreign fields. On Tuesday and Thursday, at the time of the general-exercise period, all are given an opportunity to take part in the “students’ prayer divisions,” seven rooms being set apart for prayer. The school is divided into five rhetorical divisions,—one for the German, one for the Scandinavian, and three for the English students. These have regular exercises twice a month. They are under the supervision of teachers appointed by the faculty. The board of management and the faculty are arranging for a special course of instruction for missionary workers, to begin about the seventh of January and close the third of March. During this term we expect that competent22ministers will be present to give instruction with special relation to field work; also general and State canvassing agents, who will not only give instruction to the students in the special course, but will conduct classes for just as many of the regular students as possible. This course will close the day before the Central Union Conference meeting, which will be held in this place. We feel much encouraged at the outlook for the school.