University of Massachusetts Boston 35th Anniversary Celebration An Evening to Honor the Founding Faculty and Staff and the i&s Charter Class of 1969 Saturday April! 0,1999 Park Plaza Hotel Park Square, Boston 6:00 pm • f '•»• 35,., 1964-1999 UMASS BOSTON The Founding Legislation University of Massachusetts Board of Trustees 1964 - 1965 Frank Learoycl Boyden of Deerfield Harry Dunlap Brown of North Chatham Edmund J. Croce of Worcester n June 18, 1964, Governor Endicott Dennis Michael Crowley of Boston Fred C. Emerson of Agawam Peabody signed the historic bill creating J. John Fox of Boston Robert D. Gordon of Lincoln John W. Haigis, Jr. of Greenfield the University of Massachusetts at Joseph P. Healey of Arlington Louis Martin Lyons of Cambridge Boston. Under the legislation an initial Calvin H. Plimpton of Amherst George L. Pumphret of Dorchester appropriation of $200,000.00 was granted for planning Victoria Schuck of South Hadley Martin Sweig of Winthrop Hugh Thompson of Milton the university for students in the metropolitan Boston Frederick Sherman Troy of Boston Most Reverend Christopher Joseph Weldon area. At the signing ceremony, University of of Springfield Massachusetts President John W. Lederle commented: Members Ex Officio His Excellency Endicott Peabody Governor of the Commonwealth John William Lederle "In terms of the future President of the University Alfred L. Frechette Commissioner of Public Health welfare of Massachusetts Owen B. Kiernan Commissioner of Education citizens, this bill ranks with Charles Henry McNamara Commissioner of Agriculture the most important legislation Harry C. Solomon Commissioner of Mental Health in the history of the Officers of the Board Commonwealth." His Excellency Endicott Peabody Governor of the Commonwealth, President Frank Learoyd Boyden of Deerfield Chairman Robert Joseph McCartney of Amherst Secretary Kenneth William Johnson of Amherst Treasurer Governor Endicott "Chub" Peabody (seated) signed the legislation creating the Boston campus of the University of Massachusetts. Joining the Governor at the signing were (from left to right) University Trustee Frederick S. "Barney" Troy, University of Massachusetts President John W. Lederle, and University Trustees Joseph P. Healey, Robert D. Gordon, Hugh Thompson, and Louis Lyons. University of Massachusetts Boston 35th Anniversary Celebration (7 Gala Reception An Evening to Welcome Sherry H. Penney, Chancellor Honor the University of Massachusetts Boston Founding Faculty Greetings from the University William M. Bulger, President and Staff and the University of Massachusetts Charter Class of 1969 Guest Speaker John W. Ryan, First Chancellor, University of Massachusetts Boston Chancellor, State University of New York Special Announcement from the Retired Faculty Professors Ruth Butler and Joel Blair Saturday Dinner April 10.1999 Our University Then and Now Park Plaza Hotel Sherry H. Penney, Chancellor Park Square, Boston University of Massachusetts Boston 6:00 pm Greetings from the Charter Class James E. Smith, President of the Student Council Partner at Smith, Segel & Sowalsky, Boston Poetic Recitation Duncan Nelson, Professor of English Recognition Awards The Founding Faculty and Staff The Charter Class of 1969 Dancing Music provided by Shine UMASS BOSTON An Historical Perspective From Its Start, UMass Boston Was Different Paul Gagnon, First Dean of Faculty he University of into a good undergraduate college, to give all its Massachusetts at Boston students — regardless of age, prior schooling, or was never a "branch" of background — a full chance to compete with the the University at graduates of the best private institutions in Amherst. It was very Massachusetts. In short, to be what a public different from the moth- college was for. er ship, though it enjoyed much help from her. It was different In the long term interest of students, we required from most American universities, even the many a traditional freshman and sophomore liberal other new public university campuses being education that would catch them up with gradu- established in major cities: Baltimore, St. Louis, ates of the best college preparatory high schools, New Orleans, Milwaukee, Detroit, Chicago, and whether private or public. For that, we needed the District of Columbia. small classes, close faculty attention. So we filled all budgeted faculty positions (one for each fifteen From the start, the Trustees approved Boston's students) with full-time instructors of the central own curriculum, graduation requirements, and disciplines in mathematics, the natural sciences, its own way of using its money and faculty the humanities, and the social sciences. positions. Its aim was to put everything it had To minimize the number of students each faculty member would teach, we dropped the usual offer- ings in physical education, ROTC, and fresh- man/sophomore electives. Further to lower the student/faculty ratio, and to focus student study, we set a freshman/sophomore curriculum of only four courses each term — standard practice at lead- ing arts and sciences colleges in New England. On average, then, each faculty member was responsible for 60 students a term, 20 in each of three sections making up the nine hour teaching load. In the first two years, of course, we had only freshmen and sophomores, but faculty members in the Humanities and the Social Sciences were recruited with the understanding that they would be expected to teach in the general education pro- Paul Gagnon served as Dean gram throughout their careers at Boston. Most of Faculty from 1965-1970. agreed that having all faculty share the work of introducing freshmen to college learning made a closer, more equal academic community, and by doing so the faculty would better understand the needs of students coming to us. Needless to say, this was not the direction that most universities, old or new, were taking at the time. If anything, they were hurrying in exactly the opposite direction. And to take only two examples, we were different in still other ways. First, and from the start, we reached for both the ideal and the practical. On the advice of the busi- ness community, we designed a combined eco- nomics and business program to follow upon the common core of academic studies. Likewise, on the advice of veteran teachers and principals, we implemented a subject-matter-centered teacher certification program to accompany an academic major. In these, and other programs to come, we would try to keep career preparation anchored in the general learning that enriches private life, and liberates graduates to be professionally flexible, rather than separating them as most universities did, and still do. Second, in 1965, before the start, before the idea Some people, within and outside the University, dawned on others, we went out to recruit and found it increasingly hard to let us be different. admit promising people who had given up on There was much joking about our trying to build college because of poverty, age, or their inferior "a Harvard for the poor" (what should we have schooling. Although we recruited equally in all built for the poor — playpen U?). But we were of the poorer neighborhoods, it was no surprise to not building for the poor alone. It seemed obvi- find, after the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther ous to us that democracy needed rigorous public King, Jr. in 1968, that the University at Boston colleges built for everybody, of all classes and had the highest proportion of minority students backgrounds. In the northeast in those days, attending any New England university (at which public higher education was regarded as a version point, certain of our older, wealthier neighbors of social welfare, first in line to be cut back. sent recruiters to lure transfers from Park Square More advanced parts of the country knew better: to make their own numbers look better). only by attracting and serving people from all classes would a university serve any one student Other initiatives were launched ahead of other well, or any one class well, not to speak of society area universities and prior to our first commence- at large. We were sure they were right in princi- ment in June of 1969: an affordable Year of ple, but we were also sure that by being different Study in Paris program — internationalizing a we could do it better in practice. £*- public campus, a modest day care center, tutorial and summer remedial programs, an Upward Bound program, and a handicapped students' center in the lobby of 100 Arlington Street, organized by Lillian Ross, a blind student. These all subsisted on meager funds, squeezed out by our giving up many customary things that would have made life easier for a faculty and staff build- ing a university with their bare hands. Recollections of the UMass Boston Experience 1965 -1969 These are edited recollections. James E. Smith, Class of '69, President of Student Council Partner at Smith, Segal and Sowalsky, Boston ew members of the But through it Class of '69 will ever all, the Universi- forget those first days ty thrived and late in the summer of grew and in so 1965. The first sound doing, developed This photo of James E. Smith heard by the first stu- a unique charac- is from the 1969 yearbook. dent was the roar of a ter. The rah-rah drill hammer tearing away at the old Gas build- football teams were missing, as were the grass ing. What we did not know then was that the quadrangle and the fraternity houses. Our school remodeling would never stop. What was spirit was of a more serious nature. We were originally offices, then a cafeteria, then offices creatures of our environment and our environ- again, became a science lab. What was once an ment was Boston. We participated in her poli- office, then made part of the main lobby, then a tics, tutored in her ghetto schools and joined her shipping room, later became an art gallery.