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A Guide to the Records at the Indiana University Archives

Electronic finding aid encoded by Ryan K. Lee

Summary Information

Repository
Indiana University Archives
1320 East Tenth Street
Herman B Wells Library E460
Bloomington, IN 47405-7000
Phone: 812-855-1127
Email: archives@indiana.edu
http://www.libraries.iub.edu/archives

Creator
Inter-Institutional Study Committee (Ind.)

Title
Inter-Institutional Study Committee records,1941-1961,  bulk 1949-1952

Collection No.
C301

Extent
1.2 cubic feet

Language
Materials are in English.

Abstract
In July of 1949, the Inter-Institutional Study Committee, also known as the Four State Schools Committee, was created in response to a new law passed by the Indiana Legislation requesting that the four state schools submit a formula by which the state funds would be divided amongst the institutions. The committee was comprised of representatives from Indiana University, Purdue University, Ball State Teachers College, and Indiana State Teachers College. The collection consists of correspondence, minutes, preliminary studies, raw data, and five bound reports.

Access Restrictions

This collection is open for research.

Advance notice is required.

Administrative History

In July 1949, the Inter-Institutional Study Committee, also known as the Four State Schools Committee, was established. It was decided that it would be made up of ten members: three from Indiana University, three from Purdue University, two from Ball State Teachers College and two from Indiana State Teachers College. These representatives included: Joseph A. Franklin, Wendell W. Wright, and Herman T. Briscoe from Indiana University; E.C. Young, R.B. Stewart, and B.L. Dodds from Purdue University; J.E. Grinnell and Ralph Watson from Indiana State Teachers College; and Robert H. Cosper and Joseph C. Wagner from Ball State Teachers College. The committee was asked to have their preliminary report completed by October 15, 1949. It was presented to the Indiana University Board of Trustees on October 17, 1949.

The initial report of the committee outlined nine major objectives. They felt that if these objectives were met then every year the budget would only need to be adjusted according to the changing cost of living and enrollment in each department or program. In order to achieve these objectives studies would need to be conducted concerning the enrollment, student/teacher ratios, salaries, building costs, and research amongst different programs and departments within the four institutions.

This preliminary report was given to the presidents of the respective universities and over the next year the project was divided into six parts: physical facilities; student-faculty statistics; unit costs; financial operations; ability and effort of the state to support higher education; and the evaluation of present and future educational programs. Professionals were hired to help conduct studies into these areas. In November 1950, the studies of Wright, Kettler and Hart (a professional from California brought in to conduct the physical plant studies) were presented to the Board of Trustees at Indiana University. The Four State Schools Committee was then faced with the task of interpreting these studies and coming up with another proposal. These studies included an educational survey, a study of the operations of non-educational plants and projects, and the physical plant survey.

From these studies a preliminary budget for the four schools was constructed. Indiana State Teachers College and Ball State Teachers College were satisfied with the budget, but Indiana University and Purdue University disagreed on how much more money Indiana University should get. Indiana wanted a full three hundred thousand dollars more than was originally allocated.

On November 2, 1950, President Frederick L. Hovde of Purdue and President Herman B Wells of Indiana held a meeting in which President Hovde asked that Indiana not ask for more than two hundred and fifty thousand more than Purdue. Although President Wells was not happy with the request, he agreed on account of the fact that he felt it may make negotiations with Purdue easier in the future and time was running out to get the proposal to the Indiana Legislature. The proposed budget for the 1951-1953 bienniums was then submitted to the legislature with the one condition that if the budget of any institution was altered the rest would also be altered by the same percentage.

In September of 1952, the committee had come up with the budget for the 1953-1955 bienniums. It was based on the same formula they had used for the 1951-1953 biennium, but the scientific formula asked for by the legislation was not yet done. In November President Wells reminded the committee of this fact and urged that this task be completed by the next biennium. The committee completed this task in 1952. The final budget gave a ratio of 12:10:3:3, with Indiana University receiving the most funding and Ball State Teachers College and Indiana State Teachers College receiving the lowest, but equal, amount.

This new formula was used to calculate the budgets for the next biennium and the committee had, in effect, completed its job. However, records of the committee still exist through 1957. In 1956, the committee refined the budget to account for growing enrollments, staff salaries, and equipment costs. Records of the committee appear again in 1957 when they issued university retirement money in the form of bonds.

After this date, however, records of the committee do not seem to exist. It is possible that it had simply completed its task and thus just faded away, or that it was replaced by the new Four School Coordinating Committee, that was started in 1960 in response to Indiana State Teachers Colleges’ desire to start a new program. This new Committee was again made up of representatives of the four state schools, and its primary mission was to determine the future curricular needs of higher education.

Arrangement

The collection is organized into four series: Administrative files; Four State Schools Study Data; Four State Schools Physical Plant Study; and Bound reports.

Scope and Content Note

The Inter-Institutional Study Committee’s records range from 1941-1961 with the bulk of the material being dated 1949-1952. It is arranged into four series: Administrative files; Four State Schools Study Data; Four State Schools Physical Plant Study; and Bound reports.

The first series is Administrative files. It consists of correspondence, minutes, reports, and a few records of a sub-committee created to study the capitol needs of the institutions. The bulk of the correspondence is either to or from Joseph A. Franklin, but it also includes a number of letters between President Herman B Wells of Indiana University and President Frederick L. Hovde of Purdue University. The reports provide details about the individual goals of the committee and document the final budget formula. It spans the years 1941-1961.

The second series, Four State Schools Study Data, ranges from 1949-1953. This series contains budgetary information, studies done by the committee, forms, and miscellaneous material from three of the institutions. The bulk of the data pertains to Indiana University and Purdue University.

The Four State Schools Physical Plant Study is the next series. It is mostly comprised of the forms that the committee used in this study but also includes instructions to the institutions on how to fill out these forms correctly. The forms have been placed into separate files except for forms 4 and 6. These are kept together since they appeared that way in the original collection and seem to compliment each other. The collection originally contained ten or so blank copies of each form, but all but one of these copies were discarded. Materials in this series are mostly undated. Those dated range from 1951-1952.

The last series is Bound reports. It consists of five bound reports made by the committee in 1952, as well as a letter from Briscoe to Franklin. The letter is accompanied by a report which, consequently, seems to be a later draft of the preliminary report made by the committee. These bound reports are summaries of the committee’s achievement. The reports cover each institution separately and then together showing the school’s budgets for 1952 collectively and by department.

• Indexing Terms

• The following terms have been used to index the description of this collection in IUCAT, the IU Libraries' online catalog. Materials about related topics, persons or places can be found by searching the catalog using these terms.

• • Names
  • Inter-Institutional Study Committee (Ind.) --Archives.
  • Inter-Institutional Study Committee (Ind.) --Records and correspondence.
  • Inter-Institutional Study Committee (Ind.) --History --Sources.
  • Indiana University --Finance.
  • Purdue University --Finance.
  • Ball State Teachers College --Finance.
  • Indiana State Teachers College --Finance.
• • Topics
  • Universities and colleges --Indiana --Finance --Law and legislation.
  • Government aid to higher education --Indiana.

Related Material

See also the Inter-Institutional Study Committee series in the Dean of Faculties records, Collection 26.

See also Accession 2000/062, consisting of the Bureau of Facilities Programming and Utilization's records on the Inter-Institutional Study Committee, 1961-1967.

Administrative Information

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