Continuing Education with an Eye on Equality
In 1976, the University of Kentucky student newspaper the "Kentucky Kernel" published an article explaining just how new and how revolutionary mature women who returned to college were. In an article titled, "Housewives Returning to College are New Heroes" the author wrote that, “if anyone qualifies as a cultural hero in the 1970’s, it’s probably the woman who, after many years of housewifery or work, returns to school."
Almost 1,600 women had enrolled in UK's Continuing Education for Women initiative. Director of the program Sharon Childs explained that, "'We’re the starting point for women coming back to school...it’s a means of letting them know other older people are on campus – it gives them a sense of belonging.'” Childs also explained that, “'The women are highly motivated,...it takes a lot of courage to come back. But they blossom once they get here and see they’ve done well.'”
The article also gave some encouragement to women thinking about returning to school. "According to Louise Dutt, UK Counseling and Testing Center staff member, women returning to campus often lack confidence in their ability to compete with students fresh out of high school. Dutt tells them not to be afraid..."
The fact that women of all ages now had greater access to opportunities in education at the University of Kentucky is an achievement to be praised.
There was, however, an unanticipated backlash for women. An 1980 article in "Newsweek" noted:
“The guilt, the goals, and the go-it-alone grind have become achingly familiar to millions of American women. They are trapped in the superwoman squeeze, the constant pressure to juggle home, family, and a job. Prodded by inflation, cheered by feminists, and abetted by a boom in white-collar jobs, women poured into the labor market during the last decade in a revolutionary tide.... As far as support systems go, however, their revolution remains largely unrecognized – by the government, business, unions and husbands. "
Women did have access to opportunities nearly unthinkable a generation before. But the increase in opportunity was not met with an increase in support for women who were taking on new roles while still keeping up with the full docket of responsibilities they had held before.
Perhaps a quote from the Lexington Herald Leader "The American Woman: She's Altering the Social Landscape," June 3, 1980, can describe the feeling women in Kentucky were experiencing:
“There is ambivalence, too, for today’s young women – a sense of being on the crest of a wave, a foreboding notion of undertow.”
Likely the greatest changes the women’s movement ushered in were not structural, but mental. As Lexington’s chapter of National Organization for Women (NOW) explained, there were more women asking questions about who they are and how women should be treated than at any other time in history.
The University of Kentucky helped to stimulate and direct these changes with their courses geared toward mature women and women’s studies.
When asked in 1976 if the Women's Movement affected her decision to return to school, UK student Marty Ely - a social work major - answered,
"‘I’m grateful to the women’s movement. In 1951, when I was in college, women had to get married. You set up housekeeping with a white picket fence, had children – the whole bit. I swallowed that stuff hook, line and sinker. The bra burning was silly, but I think it was great. I know it’s given me some courage. I think it’s perfectly natural for me to be at UK now.’ She said she thinks of the continuing education office as an 'auxiliary – not a necessity' for women.” Although school is 'more stimulating than housework,' Ely is not here solely for intellectual gratification. 'I’d love to have someone pay me for doing a job,' she said."
Ely's story shows how radically the women's movement had changed the opportunity and the future for women in the United States. Prior to the revolutions of the 1960s, women really were expected to marry as quickly as possible in order to create a family and adhere to the idealized American nuclear family. The "bra burning" Ely referred to may have been too radical for most American women. However, all women, regardless of how "radical" their political beliefs were, are beholden to the rebels and rabble-rousing women who demanded equality from a society that held men as superior.
The fight for gender equality was a long one. But there were always women students in the University of Kentucky who fought to break down barriers and who overcame obstacles to widen the horizons of opportunity for future women. For example, in 1986, Donna Greenwell became the first woman to be elected president of the UK Student Government.
According to a "Kentucky Kernel" news article covering the election, "Greenwell said she was excited about being the first female student body president, [but] she doesn’t think it will add any additional pressures to the office. 'I like the idea that I have had the opportunity (to be the first female),' Greenwell said. (But) I’m going to work hard no matter what.'”
And, as far as setting a precedent for future female student body presidential candidates, Karen Skeens (voted Executive Vice President) said “'I think it is a very important step not only for women, but for the SGA. We’ll probably work twice as hard.'”
Greenwell's milestone acheivement in the 1980s is an important reminder of how recently women have overcome barriers limiting how high women can rise.
