A collegiate university in New England: An overview

Abstract

At the start of 1954, the newly autonomous University of New England was about to face the start of its first academic year. An interim Council was established, but it wasn't until the end of 1955 that the first elections for the new University's governing body were held. At this time, the residential accommodation at the University - after the inevitable removal of the students from having their own or shared bedrooms in 'Booloominbah - had consisted of a few 'huts on the hill and some houses in town that had been bought or leased by the University'. At this time, the population of Armidale was about 12,000, a size that was far too small to provide or support the student accommodation for even a small university. There was, too, a growing awareness that the University would need to attract by far the most of its students from outside the Armidale area, and so few - for all were still 'internals - could/should live at home. For many of the newly recruited staff, the University's future would require it to expand considerably, and it could not do this unless an integrated residential system was established and expanded well beyond the few huts already on site. By now, the University Executive and Council thinking had switched to developing a more viable residential system, let alone face the challenge of accommodation for the new breed, the 'externals', when they would be called to the periods of compulsory residence. As the University leaders looked around Australia, they had noted that the elite universities of Sydney and Melbourne were based on a collegiate mode, that deriving from the British collegiate universities such as Oxford, Cambridge, St Andrews and Durham, all located in relatively smaller cities or ancient market towns.