University of Rochester College for Women: vocational questionnaires, classes of 1930-1961
Creator:
Call Number: UA176
Dates: 1929-1962
Physical Description: 15.58 Cubic feet
Language(s): Materials are in English
Repository: University of Rochester Archives

Table of Contents:

Biographical/Historical Note
Scope and Content
Subject(s)
Immediate Source of Acquisition
Access
Use
Citation
Bibliography
Content List
Vocational Questionnaires
Box 1 Class of 1930
Box 2 Classes of 1930-1931
Box 3 Class of 1931
Box 4 Classes of 1931-1932
Box 5 Classes of 1932-1933
Box 6 Classes of 1933-1934
Box 7 Class of 1934
Box 8 Classes of 1934-1935
Box 9 Classes of 1935-1936
Box 10 Class of 1936
Box 11 Classes of 1936-1937
Box 12 Class of 1937
Box 13 Classes of 1937-1938
Box 14 Class of 1938
Box 15 Class of 1939
Box 16 Class of 1939
Box 17 Classes of 1939-1940
Box 18 Classes of 1940-1941
Box 19 Class of 1941
Box 20 Classes of 1941-1942
Box 21 Class of 1942
Box 22 Classes of 1942-1943
Box 23 Classes of 1943-1944
Box 24 Class of 1944
Box 25 Classes of 1944-1945
Box 26 Classes of 1945-1946
Box 27 Class of 1947
Box 28 Classes of 1947-1948
Box 29 Class of 1949
Box 30 Class of 1950
Box 31 Classes of 1950-1951
Box 32 Classes of 1951-1952
Box 33 Class of 1952
Box 34 Classes of 1953-1954
Box 35 Classes of 1954-1955
Box 36 Classes of 1955-1956
Box 37 Classes of 1956-1957
Box 38 Classes of 1958-1959
Box 39 Classes of 1959-1961
Administrative Material
Flat Box 1 Spreadsheets, 1930-1936
Box 40 General vocational material, 1943-1961
Flat Box 2 General vocational material, 1929-1962
Analyses
Collection Overview
Title: University of Rochester College for Women: vocational questionnaires, classes of 1930-1961
Call Number: UA176
Dates: 1929-1962
Physical Description: 15.58 Cubic feet
Language(s): Materials are in English
Repository: University of Rochester Archives

Biographical/Historical Note
University of Rochester alumnae from the Class of 1930 through the Class 1961 received vocational questionnaires at regular intervals after their graduation. These questionnaires were prepared and mailed by the Office of the Vocational Counsellor and the Placement Office at the College for Women and, after the women's and men's colleges combined in 1955, by these offices at the University level. The questionnaires were intended to gather information about women graduates in the areas of work, family, academics, residence, interests, and hobbies. As indicated in the letters to the alumnae that accompanied these questionnaires, information in them was "helpful in counselling undergraduates and in making survey summaries about the vocations of college women." The Office of the Vocational Counsellor, under the leadership of Dr. Isabel K. Wallace, used the data from these questionnaires in advising undergraduates about careers. This counselling continued after graduation; alumnae who indicated job interests would be notified of available opportunities. Dr. Wallace also conducted studies about the questionnaires and published articles about them, including "A Vocational Follow-up of College Women" (March 1938), published in Occupations, the Vocational Guidance Magazine; "Postgraduate Study" (June 1939), in The Journal of Higher Education; and "Women's Use of Leisure" (1940) in The Journal of Higher Education. Her article "Is Training for Women Justified?" was not published. Studies were also done by Jane M. Stellwagen, an assistant vocational counselor (1952-1955) and placement officer for women (1952-1956): "After College What Does the Graduate Think of Her College Experience" and her master's thesis in the College of Education, "Study of the Vocational Choices of Social Sciences Graduates of the College for Women of the University of Rochester in the Classes of 1945 through 1952" (1958).

Scope and Content
This collection contains vocational questionnaires sent to, and returned by, alumnae of the College for Women from the Class of 1930 through the Class of 1961, and related materials. In addition to asking women graduates about their occupational history, these mailings included questions about women's interests and hobbies, marriage and family, place of residence, studies pursued after leaving the University of Rochester, how well they felt college prepared them for the future, and which courses they would recommend. They date from 1929 to 1962. The collection is subdivided into three series: 1) the vocational questionnaires themselves, 2) administrative material relating to them, and 3) analyses.

Files in the Vocational Questionnaires series contain returned questionnaires for a specific class year that were sent out during the first five years out of college and the tenth, fifteenth, twentieth, and twenty-fifth years out of college. Some class years do not have questionnaires for all these periods. The questionnaires are similar for the first, tenth, and twentieth year, while for the other years simpler versions were prepared. The files in the series are organized by class year and, for each class, by the year after graduation when the questionnaire was sent. Some class newsletters, blank questionnaires, and letters from the Placement Office to alumnae classes are also to be found within this series.

The Administrative Material series contains reports and spreadsheets with summaries of data from questionnaires, leisure-time inventories, newsletters, and correspondence. The reports contain data analyses and summaries generated by the Placement Office from the returned questionnaires. Included in the correspondence are letters of acknowledgement and follow-up letters from the Placement Office to alumnae. As the correspondence shows, Placement Office staff also exchanged letters with publishers and the Alumnae Association as well as other University staff. Drafts and a published version of Dr. Isabel Wallace's article "Women's Use of Leisure" are also in this series. Lastly, there are materials from a study that was conducted to evaluate the importance of the vocational questionnaires to the Placement Office.

The Analyses series contains analyses of alumnae occupations in two typescripts, one for the Classes of 1930 to 1939 and the other for the Classes of 1940 to 1950. These files are in tabular form and contain columns for the "field of work," "salary," "part-time employment," "unemployed status," "those studying," "unknowns," "miscellaneous," "marriage," and "leisure." Information within each typescript is arranged by class years, which appear in reverse chronological order. Data summaries appear at the start of each year, after which data is broken down by graduates' names.

Subject(s):
Women--Vocational guidance
Vocational evaluation
Questionnaires
Records and correspondence
University of Rochester. College for Women
Immediate Source of Acquisition
The third series, Analyses, was until 2018 considered a separate collection with the title College for Women: Analyses of Graduates' Occupations, Classes of 1930-1950. These materials were received from an unknown University source in April 1968.Access
For access to this collection, please contact the University of Rochester Archives (archives@library.rochester.edu) at least two business days prior to your planned visit.

Please note: Some materials may be restricted or require permission for use.

Use
To request reproductions or permission to publish materials from the collection, please contact the University of Rochester Archives (archives@library.rochester.edu). Researchers may be responsible for determining any copyright questions.



Citation
[Item title, item date], University of Rochester College for Women: vocational questionnaires, classes of 1930-1961, UA176, Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation, River Campus Libraries, University of RochesterBibliography
Stellwagen, Jane. Public Relations Faculty/Staff Files, Series 2, Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation, River Campus Libraries, University of Rochester.

Wallace, Isabel. Public Relations Faculty/Staff Files, Series 1, Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation, River Campus Libraries, University of Rochester.


Administrative Information
Author: Mercy Salome Jemutai (Class of 2021)
Publisher: University of Rochester Archives
Address: Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation
River Campus Libraries, University of Rochester
500 Joseph C. Wilson Blvd.
Rochester, New York 14627-0055
archives@library.rochester.edu

Finding aid publication date: 2018
Content List