Bates College

debate team at the University of Oxford. Oxford's first debate in the United States was against Bates in Lewiston, in September 1923. In addition during this time, numerous academic buildings were constructed throughout the 1920s. In 1943, the V-12 Navy College Training Program was introduced at Bates. Bates maintained a considerable female student body and "did not suffer [lack in student enrollment due to military service involvement] as much as male-only institutions such as Bowdoin and Dartmouth." During the war, a victory ship was named the SS Bates Victory, after the college. It was during this time future U.S. Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy enrolled along with hundreds of other sailor-students. The rise of social inequality and elitism at Bates is most associated with the 1940s, with an increase in racial and socioeconomic homogeneity. The college began to garner a reputation for predominately educating white students who come from upper-middle-class to affluent backgrounds. The New York Times detailed …