‘Five Sisters’ and Others

Further to the Dec. 14 article “Most Campuses Get an A in Sexism” (About Women by Janice Mall), there is a way to avoid the problem. Join the smart women who attend women’s colleges.

The best known are the “Five Sisters”: Barnard in New York City, Bryn Mawr in Pennsylvania, Mount Holyoke, Smith and Wellesley in Massachusetts. In California we have Mount St. Mary’s, Mills and Scripps. Others are Goucher, Hollings, Marymount, Macon and Wheaton. Today there are some men enrolled or taking courses at many of these institutions. Often, there is a man’s college nearby.

At women’s colleges, women are educated for success. They see as role models a high percentage of woman professors, nationally twice that of co-ed schools. They learn leadership by running all of the student activities. They don’t learn, even subliminally, that perhaps they should defer to men, or that there are areas of female incompetence. This training prepares them to be strong and self-confident and resistant to the problems of sexism, should they encounter them.

Women’s colleges enroll 2% of the female university population. Yet they produce more than twice as many female graduates who get doctorates or go on to medical school than do co-ed institutions. The achievement record of the “Five Sisters” is even more dramatic. Barnard, for example, with an enrollment of about 2,400, ranks third among all colleges and universities in the number and percentage of women who go on to receive the Ph.D.

HILMA CARTER

Los Angeles