Editing Barnard College (section)

==== Before coeducation at Columbia ====
Smith and Columbia president [[Seth Low]] worked to open Columbia classes to Barnard students. By 1900 they could attend Columbia classes in philosophy, political science, and several scientific fields.<ref name="jstor368780" /> That year, Barnard formalized an affiliation with the university which made available to its students the instruction and facilities of Columbia.<ref name="catalog2" /> [[Franz Boas]], who taught at both Columbia and Barnard in the early 1900s, was among those faculty members who reportedly found Barnard students superior to their male Columbia counterparts.<ref name="zimmerman20120314">{{cite news |url=http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2012/0314/Barnard-College-flap-Competition-among-women-shouldn-t-be-over-men |title=Barnard College Flap: Competition Among Women Shouldn't Be over Men |date=March 14, 2012 |work=Christian Science Monitor |access-date=March 1, 2013 |author=Zimmerman, Jonathan |archive-date=February 15, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130215035017/http://www.csmonitor.com/Commentary/Opinion/2012/0314/Barnard-College-flap-Competition-among-women-shouldn-t-be-over-men |url-status=live}}</ref> From 1955, Columbia and Barnard students could register for the other school's classes with the permission of the instructor; from 1973 no permission was needed.<ref name="rosenberg" />

Except for Columbia College, by the 1940s, other undergraduate and graduate divisions of Columbia University admitted women.<ref name="farmer20080825" /> Columbia president [[William J. McGill]] predicted in 1970, that Barnard College and Columbia College would merge within five years. In 1973, Columbia and Barnard signed a three-year agreement to increase sharing classrooms, facilities, and housing, and cooperation in faculty appointments,<ref name="spec198308292">{{cite news |url=http://spec-archive.library.cornell.edu/cgi-bin/columbia?a=d&d=cs19830829-01.2.35&srpos=8&dliv=none&e=-------en-20--1--txt-IN-barnard+columbia+merge---- |title=The Road to Coeducation |date=August 29, 1983 |work=Columbia Spectator |access-date=September 26, 2012}}</ref> which they described as "integration without assimilation";<ref name="time19820201" /> by the mid-1970s, most Columbia dormitories were coed.<ref name="crimson19741004" /> The university's financial difficulties during the decade increased its desire to merge<ref name="crimson197409242">{{cite news |url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1975/9/24/financial-difficulties-prompt-columbia-report-on/ |title=Financial Difficulties Prompt Columbia Report on Merger |date=September 24, 1975 |work=Harvard Crimson |access-date=March 1, 2013 |author=Hartocollis, Anemona |archive-date=September 11, 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130911042530/http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1975/9/24/financial-difficulties-prompt-columbia-report-on/ |url-status=live}}</ref> to end what Columbia described as the "anachronism" of single-sex education,<ref name="time19820201" /> but Barnard resisted doing so because of Columbia's large debt,<ref name="crimson19741004">{{cite news |url=http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1974/10/4/a-survey-of-co-education-in-the/?page=single |title=A Survey of Co-Education In The Ivies |date=October 4, 1974 |work=Harvard Crimson |access-date=March 1, 2013 |archive-date=January 18, 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150118152748/http://www.thecrimson.com/article/1974/10/4/a-survey-of-co-education-in-the/?page=single |url-status=live}}</ref> rejecting in 1975 Columbia dean [[Peter Pouncey]]'s proposal to merge Barnard and the three Columbia undergraduate schools.<ref name=spec198308292 /> The 1973–1976 chairwoman of the board at Barnard, Eleanor Thomas Elliott, led the resistance to the takeover.<ref>{{Cite news |url=https://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html |title=Eleanor Thomas Elliott, 80, Barnard Figure |date=December 6, 2006 |work=The New York Times |access-date=March 23, 2017 |issn=0362-4331 |archive-date=February 9, 2010 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100209030954/http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html |url-status=live}}</ref> The college's marketing emphasized the Columbia relationship, however; the ''Bulletin'' in 1976 said that Barnard described it as identical to the one between [[Harvard College]] and [[Radcliffe College]] ("who are merged in practically everything but name at this point").<ref name=bb19760201/>

After Barnard rejected later merger proposals from Columbia and a one-year extension to the 1973 agreement expired, in 1977, the two schools began discussing their future relationship. By 1979, the relationship had so deteriorated that Barnard officials stopped attending meetings. Because of an expected decline in enrollment, in 1980 a Columbia committee recommended that Columbia College begin admitting women without Barnard's cooperation. A 1981 committee found that Columbia was no longer competitive with other Ivy League universities without women, and that admitting women would not affect Barnard's applicant pool. That year Columbia president [[Michael Sovern]] agreed for the two schools to cooperate in admitting women to Columbia, but Barnard faculty's opposition caused president [[Ellen Futter]] to reject the agreement.<ref name=spec198308292 />

A decade of negotiations for a Columbia-Barnard merger akin to Harvard and Radcliffe had failed.<ref name="time19820201" /> In January 1982, the two schools instead announced that Columbia College would begin admitting women in 1983, and Barnard's control over tenure for its faculty would increase;<ref name=spec198308292 /><ref name="farmer20080825" /> previously, a committee on which Columbia faculty outnumbered Barnard's three to two controlled the latter's tenure.<ref name="time19820201" /> Applications to Columbia rose 56% that year, making admission more selective, and nine Barnard students transferred to Columbia. Eight students admitted to both Columbia and Barnard chose Barnard, while 78 chose Columbia.<ref name="belkin198309022">{{cite news |url=https://news.google.com/newspapers?id=NP8sAAAAIBAJ&pg=3351%2C1183974 |title=First Women Enrolled at Columbia College |date=September 2, 1983 |work=The Palm Beach Post |agency=New York Times |pages=B8 |access-date=March 6, 2013 |author=Belkin, Lisa}}{{Dead link|date=September 2023 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> Within a few years, however, selectivity rose at both schools as they received more women applicants than expected.<ref name="farmer20080825" />