The first coeducational freshman class was welcomed to the Manhattanville campus in the fall of 1971.
“In the past two years, Manhattanville has taken some of the most important steps in its history. It has done so in recognition of a simple fact: in today's world no college is an island. Any institution of higher education that sincerely seeks to teach its students to think – which is the fundamental task of education – must operate in full cognizance of the changing society in which both students and the institution find themselves…
The most obvious of our recent changes is the presence of men as students on the Manhattanville campus. The Board of Trustees voted in September in September, 1970 to ‘accept in principle the recommendation of the Administration that the College admit male undergraduates beginning with the academic years 1971-1972.’ Their decision was based on the belief that a diversified students body better reflects the world outside the College, and it recognized the increasing involvement of the College in that larger world.
The presence of both men and women in roughly equal numbers at a college creates an environment particularly conducive to a student’s awareness of his or her role in an increasingly diverse and desegregated world, as well as to a fuller understanding of what it means to be a human being.”
From Report of the President 1969-1971 Manhattanville College
