4 Matching Annotations
  1. Dec 2017
    1. With this accessory, the seat of our university is not yet prepared, either by its population, or by the numbers of poor, who would leave their own houses, and accept of the charities of an hospital. For the present therefore we propose but a single professor for both medicine & anatomy.

      As idealistic a lot of the Rockfish Gap Report is, it's interesting to see how much the founders focused on practicality. They figured that since they didn't have the necessary resources for training a physician well, they wouldn't waste even more by hiring more than one professor of medicine. Even though the liberal education Jefferson talked about so often is about being educated in many fields before picking one to specialize in, the authors of this report were not willing to allow students to become specialized at something they didn't think they could properly teach. The growth of the UVA hospital system has been incremental, which is what I think Jefferson was aiming towards. He cared more about quality than quantity.

  2. Nov 2017
    1. and all other circumstances of the place in general being favorable to it as a position for an University, they do report the central college in Albemarle to be a convenient & proper part of the State for the University of Virginia.

      I think the emphasis on convenience for Virginians is what makes the Rockfish Gap Report unique and innovative. In William & Mary's Royal Charter, written 125 years prior to UVA's, the college is clearly supposed to be modeled after the British college system. Even the name is a tribute to British loyalty. It starts with the line, "WILLIAM AND MARY, by the grace of God, of England, Scotland, France and Ireland, King and Queen, defenders of the faith, &c. To all to whom these our present letters shall come, greeting." There is nothing local about that introduction and one wouldn't even be able to tell that the college is in America. The creation of UVA reflects the creation of the United States and the departure from the belief that America should be a colony of Great Britain. UVA was focused on educating the citizens of Virginia, not perpetuating classism by only admitting upper-class students.

  3. Oct 2017
    1. Nor must we Omit to mention, among the benefits of education, the incalculable advantage of training up able counsellors to administer the affairs of our Country in all its departments, Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary, and to bear their proper share in the councils of Our National Government; nothing, more than education, adorning the prosperity, the power and the happiness of a nation.

      A lot of people have commented about how they have trouble reading this report because it doesn't promote equality and was written in a time of slavery. However, this part of the report signifies that UVA was created as pro-progress. The founders' mission was to create educated people that could go and lead the country. Even if they didn't have abolishing slavery in mind or any other racial topic, they set up a place that in the future could produce people who help lead the country into modern times and think progressively.

  4. Sep 2017
    1. Spanish is highly interesting to us, as the language spoken by so great a portion of the inhabitants of our Continents, with whom we shall possibly have great intercourse ere long; and is that also in which is written the greater part of the early history of America.

      Though they excluded non-whites, the founders of UVA wanted to create a curriculum that reflected the culture of North America. They realized they no were longer in Europe and creating the most complete education meant teaching a primary language of North America. Spanish was also valuable for academic reasons, as the sentence mentions. Many historical documents were in Spanish.In the pursuit of knowledge, Spanish was a crucial language. UVA created an education with many of values we admire today, including the emphasis on learning about other cultures. They accomplished an inclusive curriculum while failing to include the actual people of other cultures.