In 1930, Yale President James Rowland Angell announced a "Quadrangle Plan" for Yale College, establishing small collegiate communities in the style of Oxford and Cambridge in order to foster more social intimacy among students and faculty, relieve dormitory overcrowding, and reduce the influence of on-campus fraternities and societies.

Professor Robert Dudley French was one of the earliest advocates of this plan and visited Oxford and Cambridge to study aspects of their college systems.

Master French, who remained at the college through 1953, and his successor, William Dunham, were conduits for undergraduate recruitment into intelligence positions.

During the 1960s, Master Beekman Cannon deepened a tradition of performing arts in the college, hosting operas, plays, recitals, and musical satire.

[15] The dominant architectural style of JE is Gothic Revival, and the campus consists of two- to four-story buildings surrounding an open courtyard.

Though Miller salvaged the castellated towers of Alumni Hall, a campus building originally constructed in 1851, the new dormitory was never completed and was purchased by the university in 1912.

[22][23] Most residential suites were reconfigured, administrative offices were consolidated, and the college was retrofitted with elevators and lower-level staircases.

Residences for upperclassmen and graduate affiliates were added to Weir Hall, completing JE's multi-decade annexation of the building.

[33] In 2008, stone-cut replicas of the Edwards' tombstones, hand carved by The John Stevens Shop, were installed in the college's basement.

In the 1930s, the courtyard featured an early eighteenth-century bronze statue of a young slave holding a sundial, purported to have belonged to Elihu Yale.

Since 1998, the Yale University Art Gallery has loaned a twelve-foot bronze sculpture by Dimitri Hadzi, entitled "Floating Helmets", to the Head's Courtyard.

A red apple surrounded by a green serpent, a reference to the Book of Genesis, is used on blazers and other college apparel.

The college's mascot is the Spider, derived from a line in Jonathan Edwards' early descriptive writings on the creatures as well as his famous sermon "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," in which Edwards opines that "The God that holds you over the pit of hell, much as one holds a spider, or some loathsome insect over the fire, abhors you, and is dreadfully provoked.

The bladderball deflated after being punctured by the meathook, prematurely ending the game and causing students of other colleges to chant "JE Sucks!"

Since then, JE students have adopted the phrase as their rallying cry, with a slight twist: "Sux" instead of "Sucks," a gesture to the university's motto, Lux et Veritas.

In conjunction with the Head of College and Dean, the JECC manages student facilities, capital purchases, and residential policies.

The Social Activities Committee is a volunteer student group which plans and hosts study breaks, dances, and miscellaneous college events.

In a tradition dating back to the 1960s, a raffle is held each semester for the students of the college to attend cultural and artistic performances in New York and New Haven.

Culture Draw events usually include performances of the Metropolitan Opera and New York City Ballet, Broadway musicals and plays, and symphony orchestra concerts.

[46][47] As a Fall semester in-gathering, students hold a "Great Awakening" courtyard picnic to commemorate the legacy of Jonathan Edwards and the American religious revival he inspired.

In October, students plant hundreds of tulip bulbs in courtyard planters, which bloom at the end of the spring semester.

Though most of the antics are spontaneous, every semester the Men of JE lead a late night brigade to Branford to disrupt last-minute studying at the end of Reading Period.

Notable living fellows include Bob Alpern, Harold Bloom, David Bromwich, Scott Ellaway, Shelly Kagan, Frank Rich, Herbert Scarf, Tom Steitz, Florian Hill and Robert Stern.

[52] It is administered by the Head of JE, who invites distinguished scientists and science advocates to give the semesterly Tetelman Lecture.

Past lecturers include Robert Ballard, Harry Blackmun, Ben Carson, Murray Gell-Mann, the Dalai Lama, David Lee, Amartya Sen, Maxine Singer, and James Watson.

In 1962, JE received a large bequest in memory of Robert C. Bates, a fellow of the college and professor of French, by his sister Amy Bradish Groesbeck.