VMI Board Votes to Draft Plan on Women

Virginia Military Institute’s governing board took the precedent-shattering step Saturday of voting to develop a plan for admitting women.

After deliberating in closed sessions over the last three days, the 17-member Board of Visitors emerged late in the morning and adopted a statement that said its task now “is to identify the means by which VMI’s unique educational benefits can accrue to both young men and young women.”

The action was VMI’s first official response to last month’s landmark sex-discrimination decision in which the Supreme Court ruled that the school’s 157-year-old policy of excluding women is unconstitutional.

Board members said they could not pursue on their own the option of retaining VMI’s all-male status by converting it from a state-supported college to a private one. Instead, they put the onus on the school’s alumni to study that possibility, saying they will consider such a proposal if the alumni can offer one before the board’s next official meeting, Sept. 21.

Saturday’s vote moved VMI closer to coeducation than school officials had predicted earlier last week. VMI board Chairman William W. Berry had said Monday that the board planned to appoint a committee to explore both privatization and admitting women. But Saturday he said the board had been advised by its lawyers that it is not authorized to consider breaking ties with the state. Such a move must originate outside the board, Berry said.

The school’s directors said they would reconvene later this month to work on the plan to make VMI coeducational. The earliest that women could be admitted is the fall of 1997, officials said.

In its statement, the board said that “while we are deeply disappointed” by the 7-1 Supreme Court decision, “we will obey it, and we have begun the vital task of looking carefully at the available options on how that can be accomplished.”

VMI’s action still falls short of the path chosen by the other school directly affected by the June 26 Supreme Court edict, The Citadel in Charleston, S.C. Its board voted two days later to admit women this fall. As of July 3, The Citadel said it had provisionally accepted five women to be among 1,300 freshmen next month.

VMI Supt. Josiah Bunting III said Saturday that VMI has received inquiries from six women. After the board makes its final decision, the six will be notified if they may apply, Bunting said.