Aunt Thelma, Berea College Kentucky, and Hill Women

 I read a good ebook this weekend, Hill Women by Cassie Chambers of Berea, Kentucky.  Our Aunt Thelma graduated with a nursing degree from Berea College.  Ms. Chambers did not attend this college, but her father and mother both did, and her father Orlando Chambers is currently an Associate Dean at the college. I knew that Aunt Thelma went to this far away college because it offered her an education at no cost for tuition. My understanding was that, like College of the Ozarks, students worked to pay tuition.  What I did not know until reading this book, is that Berea College still offers free tuition to all its students.

From their website below:

As a Berea College student, you will receive the highest quality education without breaking the bank.Our Tuition Promise Scholarship guarantees no student pays tuition. Berea students pay an average of $1,000 toward housing, meals, and fees, with financial assistance for books available. Berea is committed to offering students of great promise and limited economic resources a world-class education. But don’t just take our word for it – read what some of our students are saying about Berea College!

 

While looking at their website, I found a few mentions of Thelma Powell of Green Forest, Arkansas starting in 1934 and graduating in 1937

From 1937

THELMA CHRISTINF POWELL

Green Forest, Arkansas 

A.B., Chemistry 

Pi Alpha, Treasurer 4; Alpha Alpha Pi 1, 2, 3; Harmonia 4; 

Folk Club 2; Movie Club 3, Vice-president 4; Vanguards 4; 

Y.W.C.A. 1, 2, 3, 4; Life Savings.

1937 images

1934 

1935

1936

From Berea College website

After World War II the United States standards for nursing began to change and it became necessary for the School of Nursing to change. Although the three year program School of Nursing had produced many fine outstanding graduates, the times required a more substantial education for their nursing students. Even before World War II Miss Ruth McCollum, Nurse Superintendent during 1933, expressed that a mere high school education and three years of training at the School of Nursing was not adequate training for the student nurses. She asserted that a college education was necessary for the expected growth and development of the student nurses. She said, “When we expect a nurse to be able to do public health nursing, to understand the use of mental hygiene in the care of patients, and to see the patients as a part of her environment, we are demanding much more background than a high school graduate has, and what we can possibly give her in three years.”

The three-year diploma program continued until 1956 when it was finally transformed into a four year degree program through the college. This was accomplished through six long years of debate, study, and improvising to make the degree program possible. 

In a letter, Miss Rosnagle, Dean of the College of Nursing and Health in Cincinnati, wrote to Berea, “We shall miss Berea students…We are glad to have had a part in helping to bring to fruition the program of the Berea College Department of Nursing…We rejoice in the independence which Berea can now assume, which will allow it to make its own original and creative contribution to the field of Nursing education and Nursing service.”