Why did Harvard University deviate from its founding values?
English: Fogg Museum of Art, Harvard University. Photo by C. Szabla. (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) Universities sprang up in Medieval Christendom. Nothing like them had been seen in history, for not only did they concentrate teachers, they embraced the idea of set coursework whose requirements must be fulfilled before a specific degree was awarded. Students were periodically tested before being certified in their chosen subjects. Universities were modeled on guilds which trained and rated apprentices and journeymen and gathered members for mutual protection. The Christian ideal often tends to clump people together for mutual support in a body. Puritans, many of them university educated in England , brought the idea of a university to New England . "After God had carried us safe to New England, and wee had builded our houses, provided necessaries for our livelihood, rear'd convenient places for Gods worship and setled the Civill Government: One of the next things we longed f...