Around Tappan Square

Oberlin Revisited

68 Years Ago…

Coeducational Chapel Seating Introduced
OAM, December 1934

“Even more revolutionary than the new rules adopted for chapel attendance last winter, is the plan of coeducational chapel seating, which has been sanctioned by the general faculty for one semester’s trial beginning in February.

No longer will a line drawn from the middle of the organ to the center of the window in the eastern wall neatly bisect the sexes. Instead, in order that attendance records may be kept, men and women will be seated together alphabetically by classes.

A second innovation will be the seating of Conservatory students with College students by classes. This will doubtless continue even if the coeducational experiment should be abandoned.

There seems to be a reasonable chance for coeducational seating to succeed. Coeducational chapel seating is, along with the extension of the coeducational dinning room plan that is in force this year, another step in the direction of casual and normal relations between men and women on the Campus.”