ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, February 9, 1996 TAG: 9602090051
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: C-4 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: HAMPDEN-SYDNEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
Students at all-male Hampden-Sydney College don't want the school to admit women, and they've offered to help solve student retention problems that first sparked discussion of the idea.
Last week, faculty members at Hampden-Sydney discussed a resolution recommending the college consider becoming coeducational.
On Wednesday, some students came to an open forum with posters, including one that read: ``If you would like to teach at a coed school, LEAVE.''
More than 100 of the approximately 950 students at Hampden-Sydney attended the forum. They were assured by college President S.V. Wilson that going coed was only one of three options available.
``If you have packed your bags to depart campus, because you think we are going to go coed, go unpack,'' Wilson said.
He said the discussion about admitting women is a contingency plan to help the school handle competition in recruiting and retaining students. Wilson said Hampden-Sydney retains slightly more than 90 percent of its students each year. Up to 30 percent of its students don't graduate within five years.
He also said a ruling in Virginia Military Institute's legal battle against admitting women, now before the U.S. Supreme Court, could alter Hampden-Sydney's federal and state tuition assistance grants and its tax-exempt status.
Hampden-Sydney, founded in 1776, is one of a handful of all-male colleges in the country.
Other options for the school include: continuing on its present course; and reducing the number of students admitted, he said.
``Many of us are here because we fear that Hampden-Sydney is going coed. Let me assure you that we are not,'' student government President Trey Blocker said. ``The faculty members have spent many hours in their ivory towers, where the air is thin.''
Students' suggestions included expanding recruiting among minorities and beyond the Southeastern states. They also suggested establishing a computer literacy requirement and establishing graduate schools at Hampden-Sydney.
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