| 05-25 TABLE of CONTENTS:
Mills and Other Women's Colleges
DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and
EVENTS
QUOTES by
Dr. Virginia Smith and Elizabeth T. Kennan.
Mills and Other Women's Colleges
T-shirts are the women movement's
billboards.
For example, t-shirts worn during the 1990 fight to
keep Mills College an all-women's college read "Mills
College: Better Dead Than Coed," or "Mills
College: Not a girls' school without men, but a women's college without
boys." The campaign was successful.
At the time Mills had 777 undergraduates, Mount Holyoke
1,939, and Wellesley 2,145. The male chairman of the Mills board claimed
that going coed was the only way to increase the undergraduate census necessary
to keep the college solvent.
Dr. Mary S. Metz, who was president of Mills since
1981 cited statistics showing that nearly half the women in the 101st Congress
and one-third of those on the boards of the 1,000 largest American corporations
attended women's colleges. She said studies showed women getting less attention
and being more frequently interrupted in coeducational classes.
Mills College, a privately endowed college, stayed
a women's college.
A 1998 study by the AAUW showed little educational
advantage to all-women's schools but they gave a great boost to women's
self-sufficiency and self-esteem.
Mills opened in 1871 and was formed from the Young
Ladies' Seminary (1852).
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05-25 DATES, ANNIVERSARIES, and EVENTS
B. 05-25-1841, Eliza Orzeszkowa , highly popular Polish novelist
who emphasized equality and justice in her novels that dissected small
town life for such diverse people as Jews, fishermen and poor gentility.
Her novels has been translated into many languages including English.
B. 05-25-1842, Helen Blackburn, pioneer in the British women's rights
movement whose several books record the movement and the importance
of industrial employment to women.
B. 05-25-1886, Leta Hollingsworth, pioneer in clinical psychology
and advocate of women's rights.
B. 05-25-1925, Jeanne Crain, film actor nominated for an Academy
Award for her work in Pinky (1949), the story of a black girl who
passes for white.
B. 05-25-1928, Mary Wells Lawrence, founded highly sucessful
Wells, Rich, and Green advertising agency
B. 05-25-1929, Beverly Sills, premier coloratura soprano with
the New York City Opera for 25 years. She became its director 1979-89,
and in 1994 was named director of Lincoln Center.
Sills sang in more than 50 different operas and was
a highly respected musician.
Although always seen as a very upbeat woman - her
nickname is Bubbles - her life was filled with tragedy. Meredith (Muffy),
her first born child was almost deaf and never heart her sing and her second
child was born retarded.
B. 05-25-1943 Leslie Uggams, U.S. pop singer.
B. 05-25-1949, Jamaica Kincaid, writer who appears to favor the
breaking of the mother-daughter bond in her novels. Authored At the
Bottom of the River.
Event: 05-25-1950: Lucy Maciay Alexander receives the first U.S.
Agriculture Gold Medal for her research and practical applications on the
cooking of meat and poultry.
B. 05-25-1955 Connie Sellecca, U.S. actor.
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QUOTES DU JOUR
SMITH, VIRGINIA:
"Most schools are not
really coeducational because they are male-dominated. If women are to be
served well in a coeducational setting, there may have to be more awareness
by teachers and administrators that women may have to be given more support."
-- Dr. Virginia Smith
as president of Vassar College.
KENNAN, ELIZABETH T.:
"I do think that women
benefit enormously from an environment which understands their ambitions,
the circumstances of their lives and which also builds the confidence that
they need to take on the many roles that they have in life after they graduate."
-- Elizabeth T. Kennan
as president of Mount Holyoke College.
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