March 1998 FEATURES ENGINEERING'S INFRASTRUCTURE UP ALL NIGHT THE CAULDRON BUBBLES FATALLY FLAWED   DEPARTMENTS LETTERS TALK OF THE GOWN E LINE FROM THE FIELD SPORTS BOOKS PREVIEWS CLASSES HUSKIANA   SEARCH N.U MAGAZINE Click here to search other servers at Northeastern.

Learning by really doing Talk about working your way through school. These students got some real hands-on education-albeit in the construction trade-by helping to build Richards Hall back in 1938. They weren't on co-op, though; they were working under the National Youth Administration, one of Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal programs. Established in 1935, the NYA helped more than two million high school and college students stay in school by giving them grants in exchange for work. The names of these young student-workers were lost long ago; we have only their cheerful faces to infer that their work was a labor of love. Not only were they earning and learning, but they were building their own future-Richards Hall made possible better classrooms, labs, administrative offices, and a bigger bookstore.