Collection Guide
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Stanford University, Bing Overseas Studies Program,
Records
SC0117
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Table of contents
Language of Material:
English
Contributing Institution:
Department of Special Collections and University Archives
Title: Stanford University, Bing Overseas Studies Program, records
Identifier/Call Number: SC0117
Physical Description:
132.75 Linear Feet
Date (inclusive): 1955-2016
Language of Material: English
Abstract: Records pertain to the administration
of the office at Stanford and the overseas campuses in Great Britain, Italy, Austria,
France, Germany, Spain, Mexico, and other locations.
Private student information in accession ARCH-2019-096 is restricted for 75 years from date
of creation, collection is otherwise open for research; materials must be requested at least
24 hours in advance of intended use.
Property rights reside with the repository. Literary rights reside with the creators of the
documents or their heirs. To obtain permission to publish or reproduce, please contact the
Public Services Librarian of the Dept. of Special Collections.
Stanford University Bing Overseas Studies Program records, SC 0117. Stanford University
Archives, Stanford, Calif.
Administrative transfers, Overseas Studies, 1974-2018.
The Overseas Studies Office was established in 1958, and Robert A. Walker, a professor of
political science at Stanford University and chairman of the Committee on General Studies,
was appointed director. The first campus was set up in Beutelsbach, German in 1958 and
shortly thereafter, in October of 1960 two additional locations in Tours, France, and
Florence, Italy, were opened. Later, as demand grew, centers were opened in Britain at
Harlaxton in 1966, in Austria in October 1966, and at Salamanca, Spain in October 1968.
These study programs proved inordinately popular until the late 1960s, when enrollments
began to decline. In August of 1973, Mark Mancall, formerly a professor of history at
Stanford, took over as director of the program with a difficult task ahead of him. He was
faced with declining enrollments, rising costs overseas, and a budget cut by more than a
third as part of the university's three-year belt-tightening program instituted in 1975. In
addition, many of the programs were drawing increasing criticism regarding academic
integrity, academic relevance to the particular locale, and methods of selecting professor
for faculty positions. Under Mancall's leadership, the programs became more community-based
with students living in a variety of housing options, rather than based around a single
campus-building, and new programs were opened in Haifa and Mexico City.
Subsequent directors included Tom Heller, Russell Berman, Amos Nur, Norman Naimark, and
Robert Sinclair. The program was renamed the Bing Overseas Studies Program in 2005.
Scope and Content of Collection
Records pertain to the administration of the office at Stanford and the overseas campuses
in Great Britain, Italy, Austria, France, Germany, Spain, Mexico, and other locations and
include correspondence, memoranda, financial records, minutes, academic records, orientation
handbooks, and photographs. Also includes architectural drawings and insurance inventory and
valuations of pictures and furnishings in Harlaxton Manor, Grafton, Stanford's first
"Stanford-in-Britain" campus.
Subjects and Indexing Terms
Foreign study.
Harlaxton Manor -- Grantham (Lincolnshire).
Walker, Robert A.
Stanford University. Bing Overseas Studies
Programs
Kornberg, Roger D.
Mancall, Mark