Students Aided by Alumni
Dartmouth Educational Association Nears 50th Year
ON October 16, 1896, plans"for providing additional assistance beyond the limited help which the College had been able to give to students in financial need were crystallized through the organization of the Dartmouth Educational Association, a non-profit organization under the laws of the State of Massachusetts. The founders of this association, Charles W. Bartlett '69, Samuel L. Powers '74, Charles T. Gallagher h'97, Isaac F. Paul '78, William Odlin 'go, Edwin B. Hale '65, Marshall P. Thompson '92, and Melvin O. Adams '71, hoped that through this plan men might maintain themselves at Dartmouth who otherwise would be denied this privilege.
The capital of the Association has been built up mainly by the annual dues of the members—approximately two hundred and twenty-five at present—who contribute ten dollars a year, by specific gifts from interested friends, and from the interest earned on student loans. In 1925 Mrs. Nellie Allen Gallagher established a memorial in memory of her son, Morrill Allen Gallagher '07, by a gift of five thousand dollars to be administered by the officers of the Association; further contributions have been made to this fund from time to time by others. Money advanced undergraduates as a loan bears interest at two per cent until six years after graduation when the interest rate increases to six per cent. Notes are not secured by endorsements but their validity depends entirely upon the integrity of the borrower.
Originally the loans were made directly by the Dartmouth Educational Association to applicants and mainly used for boys from the eastern area. However, as membership increased and as the Association extended its scope to include students from all parts of the country, the investigation of application reached the point where it became difficult for the voluntary officers to find adequate time for this work and, therefore, the College was asked . to take over the recommendation of candidates as well as the issuance and collection of loans. According to this arrangement, the College now reviews all applications for the Association on exactly the same basis as the application of men who apply for aid on funds entirely controlled by the College. Applicants must show that in addition to their own efforts they have exhausted all other means of assistance and that they are at all times taking full advantage of the opportunities offered at Dartmouth. Recommendations are then made by the College to the Trustees of the Dartmouth Educational Association who, according to their constitution, must give final approval to requests before they may be granted. However, the Trustees of the Dartmouth Educational Association and the Committee on Scholarships and Loans at the College are so completely in accord with the principles on which loans are to be made that so far no recommendations have been rejected.
Dartmouth College, like other educational institutions, has never been able to meet all requests for financial aid but has been obliged to limit its approval to selected students. Even with these restrictions, the endowment funds specifically set aside for scholarships and loans must be augmented annually by very generous appropriations from the general income of the College in order to maintain the present aid program. It is obvious, therefore, that cooperating funds like the Dartmouth Educational Association Fund, the Dartmouth Women's Club Loan Fund, and the various Alumni Association and Class Loan Funds which have been established in recent years—now numbering fifteen are of tremendous importance in bringing to and keeping at Dartmouth the type of student whom we wish to have with us as well as in maintaining a satisfactory geographical 0distribution. It is the constant objective of the College to make sufficient funds available to those students who are accepted for aid so that with the help from their own families and through work they may meet expenses adequately for four years and in this way prevent a competent student from withdrawing from College due to lack of money. Even though a student receiving aid from the College is expected to accept employment, we do not, however, wish him to devote more than a reasonable time to outside work as that invariably interferes with his best development. At Dartmouth a student should have sufficient time to prepare properly for his classroom work, and also be able to participate in college life so that we may always continue to graduate well-rounded men.
At the present moment, with the civilian college at a minimum, we are endeavoring t build up sizeable reserves for the post- war period to meet the many requests that inevitably will come to us at that time. We hope that this foresighted policy will insure us outstanding students of Dartmouth caliber not only from the East but from all other sections as well.
Alumni and friends of Dartmouth who wish to assist the College in this program are cordially urged to become members of the Dartmouth Educational Association and in this way assure themselves that any contributions from them will be definitely applied towards student aid. The annual membership fee of ten dollars should be sent to Robert J. Holmes '09, Treasurer, 10 Post Office Square, Boston, Massachusetts. The other officers of the Association are: Morton C. Tuttle '97, President; Charles H. Donahue '99, Vice-President; Robert J. Holmes '09, Treasurer; Chandler H. Foster '15, Secretary; Guy W. Cox '93, Lloyd DeW. Brace '25, and Leslie D. Hawkridge 'll, Trustees.
Appreciation of the effective help which has been made available to Dartmouth students through the Dartmouth Educational Association is best expressed by the following statement from President Hopkins: "I can think of no more impressive example of the intrinsic vitality and fecundity of a good idea than is provided in the history of this Association. With a minimum of fanfare and 'promotion' from the beginning, this worthy enterprise, now about to round out half a century of existence, has developed without high-powered stimulation largely through the impetus of its very obvious worthiness. Of course, in order to have lived and flourished through five decades, the Association has required the energy and wisdom of those who have served it unselfishly as officers, but no enterprise could exist so fruitfully and at the same time so unobtrusively except by virtue of being so obviously a good thing."
DIRECTOR, PERSONNEL BUREAU
COMMITTEE ON SCHOLARSHIPS AND LOANS
