Unlocking Women’s Autonomy

Abstract

In the spring of 1956, Emily Taylor answered a telephone call in her office at Miami University in Oxford, Ohio. On the line was Laurence C. Woodruff, dean of students at the University of Kansas (KU), asking to interview her for their dean of women position. The outgoing KU dean of women, Martha Peterson, had landed one of the nation’s most prestigious dean of women’s positions at the University of Wisconsin, and Taylor’s name had been recommended to Woodruff as a possible replacement. Taylor welcomed the call. She had recently enlisted Kate Hevner Mueller’s help to begin culling their shared professional network for a new post. When she accepted the associate dean of women role at Miami in 1953, they promised her the deanship on the impending retirement of the present dean. However, Helen Page had decided not to retire. And, while Taylor’s family lived in Ohio, KU appealed to her. The position held prestige. Peterson, the National Association of Deans of Women (NADW) advisor to the Intercollegiate Associated Women Students (IAWS), had just hosted the 1955 national IAWS convention at KU. More important to Taylor, the women’s organizations at KU operated solely through the dean of women’s office, which would give her significantly more freedom to craft her programs. She saw the opposite at Miami where all the policy decisions regarding the female students required faculty senate approval.KeywordsFemale StudentFeminist MovementWoman FacultyWoman StudentResidence HallThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.