‘Special Students’ at Princeton

When President McCosh argued that “challenges in English literature, Greek, philosophy, mathematics, and science should be experienced by all,” he was making a debating point rather than describing undergraduate academic life at the College of New Jersey. A significant number of undergraduates in the 1880s and 1890s were enrolled as “special students” who were not candidates for a degree. Special students were allowed, under the direction of the faculty, to choose courses “in such a manner as to secure full and profitable employment of their time” and were issued a certificate of proficiency rather than a degree. Special students were, however, a source of tuition income for the College of New Jersey as well as of the athletic skills necessary to beat Harvard at football and baseball.