Tom -
03/21/2021Back when I went to WIU (1971-1975), the only qualification needed was to have a high school diploma or equivalent and the ability pay the tuition, which at the time was $525 per year (without summer). Room and board in a residence hall was another $1,050 per year ($315 more if you wanted your own room and one was available). They were on the quarter (trimester) system then; the first quarter was 12 weeks, and the other two were 10 weeks each. There were two four-week sessions of summer school, and classes were generally 4-hours per day each; summer school was mainly for those who needed to make up consecutive-course requirements. One such was "Production" (for a business-core degree), which required, in order, Calculus 1, Calculus 2, Statistics 1, and Statistics 2, consecutively, or five courses, meaning that the student needed to start it no later than the second quarter of the junior year, or take summer school, if he/she wanted to graduate in four years.
Enrollment then was at the peak of the baby-boom years, topping 14,000. The dorms were the quad of Bayless, Henninger, Tanner, and Wetzel; Corbin and Olson, Washington and Lincoln; Tanner and Higgins; Seale, (the old) Grote (which burned down while I attended), Bennett and Hirsch. The first quarter of each year I was there, the halls were overbooked, with people sleeping in the lounges. This usually sorted itself out in the first three weeks, as students withdrew. As stated, there were almost no requirements for enrollment. Because of that, WIU got a lot of the party kids from the Chicago area. Elemetary Education was probably the most populated major; definitely among women.
Because of the lax nature of academics at that time, Western got a bad reputation among employers. Grades needed to be nearly perfect to land any kind of job at a larger firm. I had a 3.2/4.0 GPA, with 3.8 in my major, and it took me six months to find an entry level job, mainly because I was "from Western."
The mood at the college was very laid back, to say the least. Politics were almost never mentioned. Most students partied, many of those did so very hard. Back in that day, the only STD that were known of could be cured by a shot of penicillin (AIDS wasn't known in the United States, and incurable herpes was very rare). Most girls were on "the pill." As a result, sex was easy to get (especially after a few drinks), and most students were promiscuous, including me. People went to a clinic once a month to be sure they were "clean," and there was a lot of random sleeping around.
Recreational drugs were popular then, and I do man popular. While I never used them, and most on my floor at Higgins didn't, there were a lot of pills floating around, and it was rare that one didn't smell marijuana in the air.
Hairstyles were interesting then, compared to now. The common style for girls was about mid-back-length straight --- and that was what many of the guys also did. At times, it was hard to tell if a person facing away from you was male or female, although most guys with longer hair also wore beards. It was rare to see any guys with hair shorter than shoulder-length. Mine was down over my ears, and I was probably in the 10% shortest category.
Campus food was surprisingly good, provided you weren't a gourmet. I don't recall any cases of food poisoning while I was there, although that might have been partly because of the high-sodium content of the foods. Other than motels, there were virtually no franchise outlets on campus or in the city. The entire concession area in the Union was one counter on the second floor that sold candy and a few odds and ends. Fast food was nonexistent, although there may have been a McDonalds then. There was no mall, and the one shopping center was clear out on the east side of town and was some offbeat regional department store.
I was in Higgins while I was there, and it was probably one of the quieter dorms on campus. "Cable" TV consisted of a dual-screw outlet in each of the lounges, and that was 12-channel, with locals, WGN, and a channel that had a swivel-camera panning analog weather dials. Of course VHS/DVD/MP3/CD didn't exist then. Only juniors and above were allowed in Higgins without an exemption. I was allowed in because I had a business major, and that was the RH closest to Morgan and Stipes Halls.
Computer science back then was in its infancy; they had two huge mainframe computers on Morgan Hall: IBM 360s or 370s, which were each about the size of a large storage bin. They operated on punch cards made on teletype machines, and 'online" was handled by a special teletype machine with a 300 baud (not 300k. 300 BITS, or about 30 bytes per second) phone cradle modem, which was faster than the machine could type. A smart watch today would be well over 100x as powerful as one of those machines was. Programming languages were BASIC, FOCAL, FORTRAN, and the new kid on the block at that time, COBOL. COBOL programmers had to learn a new line of work in the mid 1980's, but they made a boatload of money from 197 to 1999, when the COBOL databases needed to be updated to be of use in the 21st century. Calculators were primitive by today's standards; it cost $200+ for one that could do simple arithmetic.
Security was a non-issue. We self-policed, and nobody dared touch or harrass a girl without having 50 guys on his back. We had campus security, but I only remember seeing them twice.
Compare that environment to today. Things have changed dramatically.
Emily -
05/04/2020I love how Western has such a family and home like atmoshphere. Every professor will make sure you get the best education possible from them, and are usually always available as needed. The dorms are a pretty good size when compared to other schools, and the food is very good with healthier options daily specials, grills stations, fruit, soup, and salad bars, and much more.