Growth of Harvard and Yale.

A question now much debated is, whether the influence of Harvard or of Yale is greater in the other parts of the country. That it may be possible to judge which of these universities is gaining in influence, the following table has been prepared. It shows the gain in ten years at Harvard and at Yale, both in actual number of students and in percentage of the former number.

Harvard's Yale's

gain. gain.

Four New England States, 125 37

Mass., Conn., N. Y., 1,085 780

Middle States, 72 154

Southern States, 47 32

Central States, 267 217

Western States, 57 53

Pacific States, 10 5

Foreign countries, 36 16

-- --

Totals, 1,699 1,274

Harvard's Yale's

per ct. per ct.

gain. gain.

Four New England States, 109 90

Mass., Conn., N. Y., 97 124

Middle States, 59 116

Southern States, 196 110

Central States, 194 119

Western States, 712 74

Pacific States, 28 23

Foreign countries, 138 73

-- --

Totals, 107 117

The enormous percentage of gain in Harvard students from the Western States is due to the very small number of those students ten years ago. The small gain from the Pacific States is no doubt due to the development of universities there.

The whole number of students in the Harvard catalogue for the current year is 3,290; in the Yale catalogue, 2,350. This does not include the students in the Summer School at Harvard.

It thus appears that in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and the Middle States the influence of Yale as compared with that of Harvard has grown in the last ten years, while that of Harvard has grown everywhere else. It is safe, I think, to say that most of the students who would probably be drawn to college by love for athletics rather than for scholarship come from the East. Whether the recent success of Yale in the field of athletics and of Harvard in the field of scholarship can explain the tendency here noticed will never, I suppose, be mathematically demonstrated.

The last table shows the actual number of students outside New England and the Middle States at Harvard and at Yale, in the last catalogue and ten years ago, and the percentage of those students to the whole number.

Number Number Percent- Percent-

'85. '95. age, '85. age, '95.

Harvard, 232 649 15 21

Yale, 287 579 26 25

This indicates in a still more striking way that Harvard has outstripped Yale west and south of Pennsylvania. Ten years ago fifty more students went to Yale from those states than to Harvard;

now seventy more students come to Harvard than to Yale. It may be added, that the only states in which Harvard has suffered much relative loss during the ten years in question are Vermont, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Ohio.- (Harvard Graduates' Magazine.