Ricks 3,300 Snow 3,400 8 A team of faculty members from the University of Utah visited Weber during the 1923-1924 school year to analyze and accredit work being done at the College. The team noted that seven faculty members were teaching subjects that they had not majored in and either these faculty members would need more college work in the areas they were teaching or they would need to be replaced by qualified instructors. The accreditation team was also concerned with large numbers of students in many classes and that many instructors were teaching too many classes. In order to improve his own credentials, Aaron Tracy departed Weber at mid-year, in February of 1924, to attend the University of Chicago leaving the school under the care of John Q. Blaylock, professor of history and political science. Evidence that Weber students were getting a satisfactory education in many respects came in a letter from the University of Utah. This letter was read at a Weber faculty meeting held on March 4, 1924. The contents of the letter included in part a statement that Weber students attending the University ranked the highest of all of the twenty high schools represented in the student body of the University of Utah. The number of students gradually increased during this early junior college era, but the number still remained below totals of a decade earlier. College enrollment gradually grew during the first decade of Weber College as indicated in the following figures: Year Enrollment 1920-1921 34 1921-1922 51 1922-1923 160 1923-1924 258 1924-1925 284 1925-1926 401 1926-1927 401 1927-1928 404 1928-1929 423 1929-1930 339 1930-1931 412 1931-1932 742 1932-1933 1030 The growth of the college and student body was in large part a function of the dedicated faculty and president. Many faculty members contributed their time during the summer months to visit prospective students from Malad, Idaho to Coalville, and from Kaysville to Brigham City. Webers low tuition of 18 a quarter (1927-1928 figure) was one means of attracting students as well as the quality educational program offered by the institution. Aaron Tracy was always a strong advocate of Weber. At a College Devotional held on January 31, 1924, Tracy said I was in Salt Lake City yesterday to see Superintendent Adam S. Bennion. He will be here Saturday. Some people think that Weber will pass out. But I make this statement, that this institution will be on this Campus, and on this block, a thriving College, when the Agriculture College is reverted to cow trails, and when the University of Utah is in ashes. Of course this may sound funny to you but I say it in all sincerity. Tracys statement was in part prophetic and in part evidenced his determination to have a strong college in Ogden. Weber would undergo some difficult times, particularly during his presidency, but theinstitution gradually moved forward and became stronger. During the next decade, Webers first as a junior college, the Mormon Church examined and re-examined its position in respect to educational support with some recommendations that the Church move entirely away from educational support except for seminaries for religious instruction for high school students and institutes of religion which would give religious instruction to college students. Discussions among church authorities included which institutions to eliminate and phase out, and some individuals favored eliminating all church institutions of higher learning including junior colleges and Brigham Young University. Church considerations included the cost of educational institutions as well as the benefits derived to the Church. Presidents of church colleges attended Church Board of Education meetings during the 1925-1926 year and spoke in favor of continuing church support of higher education institutions. The presidents felt that separating religious teaching from the teaching of other subjects was not in the best interest of the students. After further study, Superintendent Bennion on March 18, 1926 recommended the expansion of seminaries, the closing of Brigham Young College in Logan, to keep Dixie and Gila as frontier schools, to let the state take over Snow as soon as possible, and to increase Webers appropriation from the church to permit an enrollment of 400. The Board agreed to close B.Y.C. immediately and most of the buildings of the school were sold to the Logan City Schools for use by Logan High School. Action on all of Bennions other recommendations was deferred. On March 25, John A. Widtsoe, Church Commissioner of Education, suggested approving Bennions recommendations relating to Weber and in doing so he expressed the opinion that there was a field in Ogden for a collegiate institution, which will be more important in the future than today. Widstoes recommendation was deferred, and the members of the Board continued to study church schools and their relationship to the church. The Weber Board of Trustees on an ongoing basis evaluated the schools policies and underlined the policy on September 6, 1922 that anyone who smokes cannot graduate from this institution. The general church activity level in such areas as church attendance, tithing, church positions, and missionary activity of Weber students and Weber graduates was an ongoing subject of discussion by both the College and Church Boards of Trustees. As Weber began its first college year in the autumn of 1923, the tradition of a presidents reception was begun as the reception sponsored by President Tracy and the faculty was held at the Berthana. The Mt. Ogden Hike tradition continued as the students and faculty cleared the trail and held the hike on September 22, 1923, and on February 23, 1924, the Winter Sports Club held a winter hike to the top of Mt. Ogden. On the latter occasion, some students slid down Waterfall on their way down from Mt. Ogden, and those who did often ate their meals from the mantle for several days after the hike. As a new junior college, Weber joined the Rocky Mountain Junior College League (later called the Intermountain Junior College League) and during the fall of 1923 won the conference championship in