Women’s Colleges Aren’t Going Away. They’re Here to Stay
“Alright, folks, let’s go around and introduce your name, where you’re from, your pronouns, and what you’re hoping to study here,” said our group leader at my first-year orientation. This was early fall of 2014, at Mount Holyoke College, a small liberal arts college in western Massachusetts. At that first gathering, I was just a red-eyed student from Vietnam who arrived late the night before and was battling a 12-hour jet lag.
Among all the things that our leader asked us to share with the group, one thing particularly caught my attention (and hence, saved me from embarrassing myself by dozing off in front of 15 others): pronouns.
“Pronouns? What do you mean we need to introduce pronouns? Don’t we all use she/her pronouns because we’re attending a women’s college? Am I missing something?” I remember thinking to myself, perplexed as hell. Thank goodness, the leader did provide an explanation later. At Mount Holyoke, we normalize talking about pronouns because people have the right to determine their own pronouns. Being referred to with incorrect pronouns disproportionately harms transgender, non-binary, and gender non-conforming people.
Little did I know, my crash course on pronouns was only the prelude to an undergraduate education that puts heavy emphasis on social justice, and one that is highly adaptable to our ever-changing conversations around issues of race, gender, and sexual orientation.
In March 2015, after Sweet Briar College announced its closing (the decision has since been reversed), The New York Times ran a series of opinion pieces in which college administrators and educators, including both men and women, debate about the relevance of same-sex colleges. One author says same-sex colleges are outdated since they perpetuate differences in cognitive abilities of women and men. Another argues that women no longer need “a protected environment to develop their intellectual potential” because they now have equal opportunity to attend whatever college they gain admission to.
Despite what opponents insist about their obsolescence, women’s colleges are not going away. It is during this time of a national reckoning on race and inequality that women’s colleges serve as a model for how we reflect on our past and aspire to shape a culture of inclusion and equality going forward.
The birth of women’s colleges dates back to the mid-19th century when many believed that women only belonged in the home and that they didn’t need to have access to higher education. In 1960, there were about 280 active women’s colleges, and that number dropped to 34 in 2018, according to IPEDS data. Over the past several decades, many historically women’s colleges have decided to go co-ed or become part of a larger institution for financial sustainability reasons.
But similarly to Historically Black Colleges and Universities, which have remained relevant even as racial barriers to higher education have dwindled, women’s colleges still serve as a trusted institution for women looking to obtain college degrees.
While the number of women’s colleges has gone down, the interest in going to women’s colleges has not. A 2019 analysis by the education research firm EAB shows a spike in applications to women’s colleges. Across the last five years, Barnard College has seen a 64 percent increase, Wellesley College 40 percent, Smith College 25 percent, and Mount Holyoke College 23.6 percent. And what’s more, in addition to a surge in applications, there’s also an increase in yield. Since 2016, Barnard saw an enrollment uptick from 51 to 55 percent, Bryn Mawr 32 to 36 percent, and Agnes Scott 25 to 30 percent.
This pattern witnessed nationwide comes as no surprise to educators, students, and researchers alike. Inside Higher Ed co-founder and editor, Scott Jaschik wrote in 2018 that the resurgence of interest in women’s colleges, is too, a byproduct of the 2016 election of President Trump and the #MeToo movement. And with the growing popularity of female millennials in politics like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Rep. Ilhan Omar, more and more young women are realizing the appeal of women’s colleges, whose curriculum stresses women’s empowerment and women’s leadership.
Furthermore, women’s colleges boast a long history of campus activism where students have organized and spoken up against injustice, especially with regard to gender inequalities. Alumni from Barnard and Bryn Mawr played a crucial role in advancing the suffrage movement. Throughout the 20th century, Mount Holyoke students marched for women’s reproductive rights and battled homophobia that was once neglected on campus.
But the most recent example of women’s colleges leading societal change is, perhaps, their role in promoting trans activism. When Smith College made headlines after it declined admission to a transgender woman in 2013, other women’s colleges quickly took notice. That same year, Simmons College accepted its first trans woman applicant. Other schools gradually followed suit. By 2017, eight women’s colleges, including Smith, Mills, Wellesley, and Bryn Mawr, amended their admission policies to be inclusive of trans students.
At my convocation in September 2014, our then-President Lynn Pasquerella announced that the school would officially start accepting both trans women and trans men applicants. “We recognize that what it means to be a woman is not static,” Pasquerella said in her speech. “Just as early feminists argued that reducing women to their biological functions was a foundation of women’s oppression, we acknowledge that gender identity is not reducible to the body.”
While each of the schools’ trans policy varies in wording and definition, what they collectively achieved was sparking a public discussion about the evolution of womanhood in this day and age. A commitment to social equality is an integral part of women’s colleges’ DNA, and they have continued to honor that commitment by spearheading conversations about how we can ensure equality across the board. These conversations, more than ever, are what we need to foster an equitable environment that’s vital to our society.
Nowadays, pronouns are no longer a rare sight, whether in people’s social media bios or in their Zoom’s names. Fewer seem confused when they are asked to introduce pronouns in a group of people they just met. More universities and colleges are allowing students to specify pronouns in their school records. And every time I hear a mention of them, I am reminded of that very first meeting with my college orientation group.
