| Description | Minutes of the committee established at a special meeting of University Council in June 1907 to manage residential accommodation provided for men students in buildings leased to the University of Birmingham by Queen's College, in Paradise Street. The volume contains minutes of meetings held in June and July 1907, March 1908, June 1908, and June 1910. Minutes include copies of typed reports compiled by the Warden of the hall of residence.
Minutes of the first meeting of the committee, held on 11 June 1907, state that the Queen's College Hall of Residence committee was empowered by Council to make arrangements with the Council of Queen's College for the lease of the buildings and, with the Warden, Professor Kirkaldy, to carry out necessary alterations and repairs required for their use as residential accommodation for students, with a view to opening to students in October 1907. The Vice-Chancellor, Charles Gabriel Beale, was appointed chair of the committee. Other members were the Principal, the Treasurer, the Vice-Principal, and Hume C. Pinsent and Joseph James, members of Council. Members discussed the draft prospectus. Minutes of the meeting held in July 1907 contain references to the terms of the draft lease, tenders for redecoration, and the appointment of the Warden and Secretary to appoint a head porter and other staff.
The committee did not meet again until March 1908 when the minutes confirm the terms of the lease, the appointment of Professor Kirkaldy as Warden, repairs and redecoration, and the appointment of staff. Minutes of this meeting also include a typed copy of a statement on the work of the hall of residence for the winter term 1907-1908, which contains information about student residents, including the nationalities of international students living there, though no names are given. The statement also sets out costs, receipts, and balance of accounts, as well as expenditure on staff, food, fuel, washing, newspapers and stationery, and expresses the hope that the hall of residence would pay its way when it was fully occupied as well as concern to attract older student residents in order to foster a sense of community and college life. The statement mentions that a student had left the hall of residence due to indiscipline, and the minutes include modifications to the Rules governing the behaviour of student residents.
The minutes refer to complaints from students stemming from the city centre location of the hall of residence, including noise from trains and escaping steam, and increased dirt due to the proximity of the railway as well as smoking chimneys from buildings nearby, and the copy of the Warden's report included with minutes of the meeting held in June 1908 discusses criticism of the hall of residence published in Queen's Medical Magazine which compared the accommodation unfavourably with that available in private lodgings, citing cramped rooms in Queen's College hall of residence which are difficult to keep clean, poor food, the high cost of living, and the amount of oversight and restriction of leisure time in the hall of residence compared with private lodgings. The Warden's report addresses these complaints by providing information about the quality of the accommodation available, as well as containing information about the work of the hall of residence during the spring and summer terms of 1908, including details about the number of students in residence. The nationalities of some students are given, as well as the names of some individuals. The appointment of Mr P. P. Cole, a lecturer in Anatomy, as Sub-Warden, is also mentioned, and concerns expressed about the difficulty in attracting senior students, and about the continued losses incurred, partly as a result of bad publicity preventing students from applying for places.
No minutes of committee meetings are recorded for 1909, but minutes of the meeting held on 1 June 1910 include copies of three Warden's reports, dated January 1909, July 1909, and January-April 1910. These contain detailed information about the operation of the hall of residence, including the names of some students and staff residents, accounts and balance sheets showing financial losses, and information about bursaries offered to persuade 'desirable' residents to remain in hall rather than leaving for private lodgings, until the hall of residence was full. The reports also mention continued noise from the railway caused by horns and escaping steam, but the January 1909 report states that some medical students living in the hall have helped to counterbalance the criticism printed in Queen's Medical Magazine.
The report dated July 1909 covers the academic session 1908-1909 and includes information about the number of students living in the hall, including numbers of new residents and numbers leaving, details of talks and social events organised, problems with staff, the introduction of a scheme for providing residential accommodation for men students in the Day Training Department, the provision of new furniture and a billiard table for the common room, and figures for students and staff paying fees. The report expresses concern about the number of students leaving to be nearer the new University buildings at Edgbaston, or who did not like the accommodation or the city centre location. It also mentions the increased incidence of bad behaviour among some residents towards the end of each term. Balance sheets and expenditure accounts are included. The report also mentions the possible introduction of a system of additional tutorial classes run at the hall of residence, to complement lectures and demonstrations.
The final Warden's report, covering the period from January to April 1910 mentions the decrease in student numbers following the expulsion of a group of students for bad behaviour [see the report of Senate to Council 2 March 1910 at UB/COU/1/7 for an account, and UB/VC/1/1 for correspondence], and others leaving. It also mentions that more members of staff were living in the hostel, and the committee approved the printing of a new prospectus. It also authorised the Warden to receive additional Day Training College students, provided that demand for full paying students allowed.
The minutes end here, and no other minute books survive |
| Administrative History | Queen's College Hall of Residence opened in October 1907, to provide accommodation for men students and also to provide 'college life in its best form', and was apparently part of efforts by the University of Birmingham to recreate aspects of collegiate life as experienced by students at Oxford and Cambridge. The Council of Queen's College agreed to grant the University of Birmingham a lease for five years of buildings previously use by the Theological department for a student hostel, with use of the main entrance on Paradise Street, for a rent of £160 per annum, as long as there were not more than thirty students in the hostel, and an additional sum of £3 per student over that number, with the University of Birmingham to be responsible for external repairs. Fittings and furniture were to be included in the tenancy. A committee of management responsible for the governance of the hall of residence was appointed by University Council at a special meeting held on 8 May 1907. It consisted of the Vice-Chancellor, Principal, Treasurer, Vice-Principal, Hume C. Pinsent, and Joseph James. Professor Kirkaldy was appointed Warden. The intention was for the hall of residence to be run as a University institution with, as far as possible, the ceremony and discipline of a college at Oxford or Cambridge. The building was to be self-contained, and members of staff were encouraged to take rooms there. Provision was made for recreation and social life, and facilities included a dining room, library, gymnasium, common room, and football court. A prospectus was printed, and rules for student residents were devised. Students had to return to the accommodation by 10pm each night when the entrance at Paradise Street was locked. The Warden's permission was required to remain out after 11pm. Latch keys were provided, and there were spaces for storing bicycles. Applicants for admission had to provide testimonials of good conduct, as well as the addresses of two personal references. Students had to read the rules and to sign a register to state that they would conform to them. Students who had matriculated were expected to wear academic dress at meal times, and when calling on the Warden on business related to the hall of residence. The hall or hostel was usually referred to in the records as the 'college', presumably as part of the intention to emulate the Oxbridge college system.
The minutes of the Queen's College Hall of Residence committee show that the hall of residence consistently made a financial loss from the time it opened to June 1910, when the minutes end. There is also anecdotal evidence in the minutes to suggest that the hall was not popular with students due to the dirt and noise resulting from its city centre location, and to the perceived higher cost of living and restrictions on social life. Minutes of the University Council meeting held on 7 December 1910 report that Professor Kirkaldy had resigned as Warden, citing the unsuitable surroundings of the building, the impossibility of maintaining a 'residential [college] system' of a high standard, and the fact that the hall had made a financial loss each year as reasons for his decision. The minutes state that this resignation letter was received by the Council with regret but not surprise. Minutes of the meeting held on 18 January 1911 report that the hall of residence was to be closed due to its 'unsatisfactory character and position', and the report of Oliver Lodge as Principal for the academic session 1909-1910 expresses the view that 'in order that a hostel may be successful it will have to be specially built and erected in or near Edgbaston'.
Queen's College hall of residence closed at the end of the 1910-1911 academic session. The Finance and Estates committee report dated 5 July 1911 mentions that the gymnasium fittings and the dining room and kitchen equipment were to be offered to Margery Fry for the women's hostel, University House, and in the second place to the committee of the University Club. Chancellor's Hall, providing esidential accommodation for men students, opened in 1922 at 'The Dales' on Augustus Road, Edgbaston. However, there are suggestions in University Council minutes that the University was still using accommodation at Queen's College for students in the 1930s. The report of the Lodgings committee to Council on 5 December 1934 makes this clear, but mentions the possibility that the accommodation will be converted for use as a postgraduate college for theological students and would no longer be available for undergraduates of the University of Birmingham [see Council minutes UB/COU/1/29] |