Confronted with the Problem of Association

When Battle Creek College was started, no provision was made for housing the students. They found lodging with families in Battle Creek and made their own boarding arrangements. There were many problems linked with this plan. Later, of course, the need was clearly seen, and provisions were made. On the establishment of Healdsburg College, it was felt that a real advance was made by the erection of a school home. One floor was allotted to the girls and another to the young men. Even this was not without its problems. Now at Cooranbong they were facing the question of association of the students and the housing problem. Ellen White mentioned this in her letter of July 23 to W. C. White. School attendance exceeded their expectations, housing facilities were crowded, and more students were expected. She wrote:4BIO 312.1

There are now to be about five more students, so there is no more room for an increase until we shall have means to put up buildings.4BIO 312.2

One thing we are seriously considering, that the building for the boys shall be entirely separate from that of the girls, a distinct building.... I have spoken and read five mornings in succession in the school, and after talking with the whole school, I then took the girls by themselves and talked with them seriously and charged them to keep themselves sacredly to themselves. We would not, could not, allow any courting or forming attachments at the school, girls with young men and young men with girls. This I said before the whole school, and then to the young ladies. I entreated them to be reserved, to be delicate and refined and not to be forward and bold and inviting the attention of young men; [I told them] that they should consider it an honor to cooperate with their teachers and seek to please them in everything.—Letter 193, 1897.4BIO 312.3

The records indicate that nearly half the student body were 16 years of age or younger. Restraints of a more rigid character were called for than in dealing with a normal college-age group. On another occasion she wrote:4BIO 312.4

We have labored hard to keep in check everything in the school like favoritism, attachments, and courting. We have told the students that we would not allow the first thread of this to be interwoven with their schoolwork. On this point we are as firm as a rock.—Letter 145, 1897. [See Ellen G. White: The later elmshaven years, pp. 380-382, for Ellen White’s approach to this matter when preparing a book manuscript for general use. See also Counsels to Parents, Teachers, and Students, 101.]4BIO 312.5