By Jahnavi Pradeep ’23
Staff Writer
By May 5, 2019, I finalized my decision to enroll at Mount Holyoke College, a gender-diverse liberal arts college in western Massachusetts. When my friends and relatives asked me where I would be starting school, a lengthy response would inevitably find its way out of my mouth. There was a need to clarify where and what this little-known college was. Eyebrows raised, people questioned why I chose what they might call an “all women’s” or “girl’s” college. Why an unheard-of liberal arts college? The raised eyebrows were common and still are. This negligence toward historically women's colleges by both the general public and college rankings reflects the increasing need for more of such institutions.
I've seen this negligence reflected in people I know, both in the United States and back home in India. When I stayed with my cousin in Boston during the break before arriving at college, neither he nor his friends had ever heard of Mount Holyoke. They didn't know of the Seven Sisters either. I've often been questioned on the ranking of my college. The college rankings on different websites such as U.S. News reflect what appears to be only partial knowledge of these colleges. The lower ranking of Mount Holyoke amid the broader college culture has often left me confused. Currently, Mount Holyoke is ranked 34 in the list of national liberal arts colleges created by U.S. News.
This has often led me to think that the rankings of HWCs in the broader college culture, including public perception, were determined by the fact that they were aimed at offering women and, later, transgender and nonbinary folks, an education. Did the fact that no cisgender men were walking around their campuses make them somehow less appealing to the masses? If this is the case, it turns away from the realities of inequality that still exist for women, trans and nonbinary individuals and the importance of empowering them and providing them with an education in a safe space.
The Seven Sister colleges, for example, were established in the 19th century to provide women with educational opportunities equal to the then male-only Ivy Leagues. These colleges have continued to offer their students a sense of empowerment, drive and community outside the pressures of a hierarchy determined by cisgender men. For instance, Bryn Mawr College President Kimberly Cassidy, in a U.S. News article on gender gaps in STEM, charts how gender stereotypes have led to an “unequal distribution of mentors and lab opportunities.” HWCs can offer their students opportunities outside these disparities and develop a “built-in sense of belonging, with plentiful female role models and female-majority workgroups,” Cassidy said.
Even today, there is still a very prevalent hierarchy that seats the cisgender man at the top. There remains a need for safe spaces of education and empowerment for people of different gender identities.
Isshita Fauzdar ’23 emphasized that there is still a strong need for HWCs today and their exclusion from rankings is unfair given their rich histories. “If the earliest women's colleges weren't founded in the mid-19th century, then we might not even have had the opportunity to attend any higher academic institution[s] today,” Fauzdar said. With this in mind, she encouraged more people to attend and recognize institutions that have “a solitary purpose of empowering students with a rigorous education that might not have been accessible to all otherwise.”
The incessant questioning of or indifference to the need for HWCs sidelines their intent and the fact that they offer educations as meaningful as the colleges cisgender men attend. When people keep asking, “Why a women’s college?” — if they are even aware of their existence — it proves that they do not understand the need for such spaces in our society. This reflects the prevalent and embedded hierarchy in our society. No, patriarchy is not gone, and yes, we still need colleges that are affirming and safe spaces. I have chosen to attend Mount Holyoke as a conscious choice, not because I had to settle for it. A gender-diverse women’s college has given me an empowering, quality education filled with rich traditions experienced alongside a bold and driven community. These colleges deserve more recognition and need to increase in number so that we can create a society in which gender inequalities are recognized and combatted.