October 19 – Heidelberg University's First Lecture!

Posted October 19, 2018

The beautiful old university in the beautiful German town of Heidelberg is the very oldest university in Germany! Its first lecture was held on this date in 1386.

It's also one of the world's oldest surviving universities!

And I actually know someone who is a professor there - I feel so lucky that he gave my family a tour!

Here's a few highlights of Heidelberg U's history:

Back in the 1300s, when there was a struggle in the Catholic Church over who was the real pope, German and French spiritual leaders found themselves on opposite sides. The rift caused by this meant that German students and professors in Paris had to leave the university there. A German leader thought that this was a great opportunity for his own people, and he asked Pope Urban VI if he could start up a university in his own land. And the university grew quickly.

Heidelberg started accepting women as students in 1899.

Although OF COURSE the primary language of instruction at Heidelberg is German, there are a lot of graduate degrees offered in English!

Students come from around 130 different countries from around the world to study at Heidelberg - because it is consistently ranked among Europe's and the world's top universities.

As of 2017, there were 33 Nobel Prize winners affiliated with the university.

One of the things I most remember about our tour of Heidelberg was the Studentenkarzer. 

That is - the student jail!

Waaaaaayyyyyy back in the 1500s, townspeople sometimes complained about students "carousing" - I guess drinking and shouting and singing and perhaps cavorting about! I read that one complaint was students setting townspeople's pigs free!


Because of all the complaints, the university created a student jail in which they could keep carousers (as it were) off the street from 3 days to 4 weeks!!!

From the fact that so many put up silhouettes
and their names on the walls, I am thinking that
most students were proud to spend time in the
jail, rather than being ashamed.

So...it's unlikely that having a student jail
reduced the amount of carousing...

The jail existed for more than 300 years, and during that time it was moved several times. It was finally closed in 1914. The latest prison, with its original features and all the accumulated graffiti (and there is a LOT of graffiti), is something tourists and current students can check out, for a small fee.

Most college towns have a bit of a "Town vs. Gown" problem - in other words, townspeople and students often have disagreements. But I am not at all sure that student prisons are common!!

Also on this date:

Samora Machel Day in Mozambique 

Constitution Day in Niue

Bettara-Ichi – Pickle Fair in Tokyo 

Anniversary of a Venus Fly-by

Mountaineer Annie Smith Peck's birthday

Wear It Pink Day in the U.K.

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• October holidays
• October birthdays
• Historical anniversaries in October

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• November holidays
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• Historical anniversaries in November

November 13 – Happy Birthday, Dorothea Erxleben!

Posted November 13, 2013

Way back in the first half of the 1700s, Dorothea Erxleben fought for women's rights to attend universities.

It's sad to think that in some places of the world, the struggle for girls and women to have equal access to schools and universities continues. However, we can look on the positive side: in many, many places the world over, the rights Erxleben fought for have been realized!

Erxleben was born in Germany on this date in 1715. Her father taught her medicine while she was still quite young, and in 1742 she wrote a tract arguing that women should be allowed to attend university. She was given special permission to attend the University of Halle by Frederick the Great, and in 1754 Erxleben became the first female medical doctor in Germany.

Nowadays, about one third of the medical doctors in the world are women, and about half of the medical school graduates in the U.S. are now women (up from a third in 1990)—which probably means that 20 years from now about half the practicing doctors will be women.

The tables have turned...

Interestingly enough, there are more women in American colleges now than there are men. Most colleges have something like a 55-45 split in favor of women, but some have more like a 60-40 split, and some have an amazing 70-30 split!

For more than a decade, universities and journalists and others have been scratching their heads trying to think of ways to lure young men into college!

Also on this date:

Author Robert Louis Stevenson's birthday 

Harvest Festival on the US Virgin Islands

Anniversary of the dedication of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial 

International Tongue Twister Day 

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• November holidays
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• Historical anniversaries in November
  

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• December holidays 
• December birthdays
• Historical anniversaries in December
  

December 5, 2011 - Happy Birthday, Elizabeth Cabot Agassiz

Boston, Massachusetts, is a lovely city, and the nearby town of Cambridge is the home of one of the most prestigious universities in the U.S., Harvard. Elizabeth Cabot Agassiz (born Elizabeth Cary on this date in 1822) lived in Boston, and when her sister married a Harvard professor, Elizabeth began to hang out with a group of professors and other intellectuals in Cambridge. That's where she met her husband, a Swiss scientist named Louis Agassiz.

Elizabeth Agassiz worked with her husband at his scientific research and accompanied him on his expeditions. She also started a school for girls, and her husband and other Harvard professors taught classes there. After her husband died, Agassiz published several books on natural history and, in 1894, helped start Radcliffe College for girls and women. She was the college's first president.

Helen Keller was one of
Radcliffe's most famous
graduates.

In the first half of the 19^th century, women were not allowed to attend colleges or universities, although there were a few all-female academies. After the Civil War, some colleges began to be coed—which means men and women together on the same college campus. Some women thought that “separate but equal colleges” were never really equal. For many years, most universities remained all-male, and starting a nearby “sister” college was the best option to help women get a university education. Radcliffe, the “sister” college to Harvard, was one of the “Seven Sisters colleges.”

These days, most colleges are coed, but there are still about 60 women's colleges and three non-religious men's colleges. (There are many religious schools that are all-male.) Radcliffe became a part of Harvard University, starting in 1977, with full integration achieved by 1999.

What do you think? What are the advantages and disadvantages to having single-sex colleges, as opposed to coed colleges? Can separate but equal work?

Also on this Date:

Day of the Ninja 

Sinter Klaas 

Anniversary of Mozart's Death - 1791