If Newnham was making its way, as learner, as teacher, and as worker, in the field of social enterprise, the same is even more true in that of education. A large proportion of the students during the time now under consideration adopted the teaching profession. Technical training was not insisted on by head mistresses, nor by the Government, and most young women plunged into educational life to sink or swim--some of those who might have sunk emerging after a term or two to take a course of training. The head for many years of the Maria Grey Training College was a University woman (Miss Alice Woods of Girton) and the first head of the Cambridge Training College was from Newnham--Miss E. P. Hughes. Meantime, the standard of attainment in girls' schools was rapidly rising, as women who had received a University education took up posts in them and imbued their pupils with a desire to come up some day to Cambridge. At first, former students had often to work as assistants under Heads of a different and older type, but this was not always a disadvantage, as the older, partly self-taught, mistresses, both of public and private schools, sometimes showed an admirable power of blending the new life which young University teachers brought into the schools with the good traditions of the last generation. In course of time head mistresses were generally appointed from assistants who had a good "degree or its equivalent," and the bonds between schools and the University thus became stronger.
In 1890 the College had again a festive occasion--on the attainment by Miss Philippa Fawcett of a place in the Mathematical Tripos above the Senior Wrangler. The scene in the Senate-house is one that will live in the memory of all who were present. It is pleasant to be able to say that no discordant note was struck. As Miss Fawcett passed out, with Miss Clough leaning on her arm, the undergraduates formed a line on either side and gave a hearty cheer. The event was celebrated at Newnham by a dinner in Hall, at which Mrs. Fawcett was present, and also Dr. Hobson, Miss Fawcett's tutor in mathematics. In the evening her student friends decorated the doorway with lamps, and as there was just then a piece of waste ground at the west-end of the College grounds, it was possible to make a bonfire, and to carry the Senior Wrangler round it, and in the light of the fire to call on Dr. Hobson for a speech. Miss Clough was quietly happy, and all present felt that there was something of poetical justice in the occurrence. Professor and Mrs. Fawcett had been, as we have seen, pioneers in the movement for women's education; they had also been warmly attached to Miss Clough, as, in a more filial way, their daughter had been for many years. Miss Fawcett herself, besides being one to whose brilliant mathematical powers the highest academic honours were due, was a singularly suitable person for this high distinction, in that she exemplified so many of the qualities popularly supposed to be absent from the character of a University woman. She was modest and retiring, almost to a fault--trying though not always successfully, to counteract the impression made by her personality, so as to appear like a very ordinary person--not known to many, but loved as well as admired by her intimate friends. As the subsequent career of Miss Fawcett is not well known, it may be stated here that after the second and more advanced part of the Mathematical Tripos (in which she obtained the highest honours) she held for a year the Marion Kennedy Studentship already referred to, and wrote on a problem involving advanced mathematical research. She subsequently acted as Mathematical Lecturer at Newnham, but feeling, as her father had felt before her, the call of national service above all inducement to academic pursuits, she accepted a Government appointment and went out to help organize education in the Transvaal. After a period of assiduous work in Johannesburg, she returned to England and was appointed a Principal Assistant in the Education Department of the London County Council, a post of much importance and responsibility. Miss Fawcett served for some years on the Council of Newnham College, and has maintained a constant interest in its welfare.