Oxford A Mens University

It was not until May 1920 that, without opposition, the final statute passed to permit women to graduate with full membership of the University. The fact that Parliament had passed the 

Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act in 1919 was certainly no coincidence, just as it had been 1920 when the Chemical Society finally admitted women chemists (see Chap. 2). 

But this was not the end of the story. On 14 June 1927, fearful of the rising proportions of women, Congregation debated and passed a motion by 229 votes to 164 that The University has a right to remain predominantly a men s university. 00 In addition, this motion limited the number of women students in residence to 840 and prohibited the foundation of any new women s college if it would make the proportion of women greater than 20% (the quota for women was raised to 970 in 1948, but not abolished until 1957). 

There was a significantly lower proportion of women students in the early years studying the Natural Sciences at the four residential Oxford colleges than at the two Cambridge colleges, as can be seen from Table 6.1. In the late 19th and early 

20th centuries, there was a common perception of Oxford for arts and Cambridge for sciences. Howarth has shown that the reasons for the weakness of science at Oxford are complex, though she contended that chemistry at Oxford was one of the few stronger sciences.69 

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