History & Mission
Mission
Since 1886 Bryn Mawr College has welcomed students seeking to attain the highest level of academic achievement in the distinctive environment of a liberal arts college. Today, women and men in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences are a vital component in a continuum of learning and research, acting as role models for undergraduates and as collaborators with the faculty. Bryn Mawr provides an alternative to traditional models of graduate education in its attention to the unique needs of individual students and its commitment to developing a broadly trained community of scholars who are equipped for a variety of useful professional careers. Renowned for excellence within disciplines, Bryn Mawr also fosters connections across disciplines and the individual exploration of newly unfolding areas of research.
History
Graduate education was part of Bryn Mawr's founding vision. M. Carey Thomas, the College's first dean, wrote that "a college without graduate students never occurred to us." Five graduate fellowships were established immediately, and the first Ph.D. was conferred in 1888, along with the first B.A. By 1905 Bryn Mawr had over 70 graduate students, and in 1907 Miss Thomas could report that of 41 American institutions then offering the Ph.D., Bryn Mawr ranked nineteenth in the number of degrees awarded.
In 1931, a man applied to the graduate school. He was admitted and the graduate school has been co-ed ever since. By 1960 about 20% of the graduate enrollment was male, which is still true today. Total enrollment reached a peak of 472 students (many of them part-time) in 1973, when graduate work was offered in 22 departments and three interdisciplinary programs. This was more than the College could sustain, and the Plan for Achieving Financial Equilibrium of 1987 called for a reduction to 11 sustainable Ph.D. programs. The Department of Human Development merged with the Department of Psychology in 1992, resulting in a single Ph.D. program in Clinical Developmental Psychology. In 2000, the departments of Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology, Greek Latin and Classical Studies, and History of Art created the Graduate Group in Archaeology, Classics and History of Art for the purpose of interdisciplinary collaboration and exchange. In 2004, the Group was awarded a Challenge Grant from the National Endowment of the Humanities to endow its interdisciplinary seminars (GSems), as well as special fellowships for interdisciplinary study and internships in Philadelphia-area museums.
A major review of the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences was conducted in 2007-2008 by a task force of Bryn Mawr’s Board of Trustees. The outcome of this review was an enhanced commitment to graduate education as part of Bryn Mawr’s distinctive mission, with a mandate to increase the integration of graduate programs with undergraduate majors and with other, non-graduate departments throughout the College. A further outcome, to be realized in 2008-2009, is the creation of a single Dean of Graduate Studies with oversight of the Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research as well as the GSAS.
Bryn Mawr currently has Ph.D. programs in Chemistry, Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology, Clinical Developmental Psychology, Greek Latin and Classical Studies, History of Art, Mathematics, Physics, and Social Work, in addition to M.S.S., M.S.L.P., and an M.A. program in French. A Ph.D. program in Russian still exists but no longer accepts entering students. The total enrollment in the GSAS in 2008-2009 is 165 students, including 76 in the Graduate Group in Archaeology, Classics and History of Art; 32 in Clinical Developmental Psychology; 13 in Russian; 24 in the laboratory sciences and math; and 9 in French. Nine students are candidates for the combined A.B./M.A. degree.
