Brown University. Corporation

The authority and responsibilities of the Corporation, a bicameral body composed of a Board of Fellows with twelve members and a Board of Trustees with forty-two, are set forth in the Charter of the University granted by the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations in 1764. "It is our fixed star; we can do nothing that contradicts its prohibitions or transgresses its grants of power," states Henry Wriston in The Structure of Brown University.

The Charter originally provided for a twelve-member Board of Fellows and a Board of Trustees of thirty-six1. It provided further that eight of the Fellows should always be Baptists and the rest "indifferently of any or all denominations." The President was always to be a Fellow and always a Baptist. Of the thirty-six Trustees, the Charter provided that twenty-two should be Baptists, five Quakers, four Congregationalists, and five Episcopalians.

In 1926 the Charter was amended to provide for six additional Trustees, bringing the Board of Trustees to its present number of forty-two. These six were to be elected "without regard to denominational or religious affiliations." At the same time the qualification that the President must be a Baptist was removed. In 1942 a further amendment to the Charter removed all denominational qualifications for service on the Corporation.

Of the 42 trustees, 14 are elected by alumni pursuant to an agreement between the Corporation and the Alumni Association. These 14 trustees include the current and two past Brown Alumni Association chairs, and eleven others elected to six year terms. The rest of the Trustees, called Term Trustees, are nominated by the Committee on Trustee Vacancies. Careful selection of internally appointed trustees and those elected through the alumni ensures that Corporation members have the professional and personal backgrounds needed to meet their fiduciary and oversight responsibilities.

From the guide to the Brown University Corporation minutes and reports, 1869-2001, (John Hay Library Special Collections)

Acting President Merton P. Stoltz, under the authorization of the Brown University Corporation, established the Pembroke Study Committee in November 1969. The committee's charge was to "look into all facets of University life affecting the education of women at Brown University; to examine the effectiveness of the coordinate model as it exists here and at other institutions and alternative models, and to make recommendations to the President and the Corporation for such modifications in the present organization of education for women as it deems desirable."

Comprised of three faculty members, three corporation members, three students, the Pembroke College Dean, the presidents of the Alumnae Association and the Pembroke Council, and Acting President Stoltz (ex-officio), the committee read, heard, and discussed reports from Pembroke College administrative offices and faculty, from Brown University offices and faculty, and from other universities, many of which had held or were holding similar discussions about coeducation and mergers. Chaired by Professor of Biology Elizabeth H. LeDuc, the committee issued a "Majority Report" and a "Minority Report," on May 8, 1970. Among the majority's recommendations to the Corporation was that Pembroke College's administrative functions merge with those of Brown University's, and that women fill positions at all levels of the merged administration. The minority stressed a need for further study. Both groups recommended a center for women be established. On November 12, 1970, the Advisory and Executive Committee of the Corporation effectively decided to merge the undergraduate women's and men's administrations, with full approval from the corporation as a whole coming on January 8, 1971.

From the guide to the Pembroke Study Committee records, 1968-1970, (John Hay Library Special Collections)

During the first year of Clarence A. Barbour's presidency a committee composed of Chancellor Samuel P. Capen of the University of Buffalo, Dean Luther P. Eisenhart of Princeton University, and Dean Guy S. Ford of the Graduate School of the University of Minnesota, surveyed all departments to determine the state of the University. Among their conclusions: that Brown had ceased to be a typical New England college and become a University; that Rhode Island depended on Brown as the chief educational institution in the State; that administrative development had failed to keep pace with the growth of the University; that entering students were found by various psychological tests to be above average freshmen, with the women scoring slightly higher than the men; that the Honors courses adopted in 1920 had not been effective as hoped, as the achievement of Brown graduates in professional schools lagged behind that of graduates of comparable schools; that Pembroke should be given more independence in her organization and offerings; that the Graduate School was providing Brown with nation-wide clientele from which to build her its staff; that there was need for reorganization of the curriculum and methods of instruction to stimulate students. This, then, was the state of the University when Barbour took charge. The Survey Committee presented its report to the Corporation, which hoped to begin an endowment campaign. All such plans came to an end with the advent of the Great Depression.

The above excerpt appears in Encyclopedia Brunoniana by Martha Mitchell, copyright 1993 by the Brown University Library.

From the guide to the Brown University Corporation Survey Committee files, 1929-1930, (John Hay Library Special Collections)