Women’s Studies Students Speak Out

History of the Women’s Studies Minor at Keene State College

During the spring of 1989, a small group of faculty at Keene State College met to discuss their common desire for a women’s studies program and their commitment to creating one. Throughout the next two years, these women- Eleanor Vander Haegen and Jo Beth Wolf from Sciences, Anne-Marie Mallon, Linda Ford, and Sally Joyce from Arts and Humanities, and Nancy Lori from Professional Studies- constructed the structures of the program. In the summer of 1989 and 1990, they held workshops for interested faculty and administrators to share information about the development of such a program. They also invited consultants from other Women’s Studies programs in the region, the University of Maine at Orono, the University of Massachusetts at Boston, the University of New Hampshire, and Simmons College, to come to campus to share their own experience and advice to review KSC’s progress.

In May 1991, two consultants from the Women’s Studies program at Towson State University reviewed and discussed the program with the committee. Key to every conversation of the Committee that year was the question of how Women’s Studies would contribute to the mission of the college especially since there was no place in the general education program for the WS prefix that would identify the program’s core courses.

In the spring of 1992, the Women’s Studies Program was approved as an official minor of 21 credits at the College. It has been going strong ever since. In 1993-94 the program successfully taught all of the core courses within the minor for the first time and graduated its first two students with a Women’s Studies minor in May 1994. Every year, a small group of students graduates not just with a required major in a particular discipline, but with an interdisciplinary minor that prepares them for a variety of career fields. Some of our graduates today are teachers, artists, activists and health service workers; some have pursued higher degrees in law, midwifery, theology, education, literature, and psychology.

Importance of the program to the overall mission of the College:

The goals of the Women’s Studies Program contribute strongly to the mission and values of Keene State College. The KSC Mission states that KSC actively promotes a “campus environment in which differences between people are recognized, understood, and accepted in all areas of community life”. Such diversity is essential to the Women’s Studies Program. The WS Program objectives include the importance of understanding diversity issues, including status, power, race and ethnicity. Many of the WS courses focus on women of different races or ethnic backgrounds and include learning opportunities about the experiences of those who belong to a minority culture of sub-cultures. This emphasis on learning about differences and developing the skills to accept and work with those differences demonstrates the w WS program clearly contributes to meeting the College’s mission.

Why Women’s Studies is an important program in New Hampshire

In a state that has few members of minority groups, the program is critical in expanding student understanding of diversity. Women’s studies courses, focusing on intersections of race, class, gender and sexual orientation, satisfy the College and the University of New Hampshire system’s commitment to diversity, as they prepare students for careers that will necessitate global and cross-cultural exchanges.

In addition, since Keene State College is known for teacher education and about 60 % of students are women, the opportunity to integrate their own experience, through Women’s Studies, into their general education adds a new dimension of relevance. The Women’s Studies minor offers a variety of exciting and challenging courses to meet the changing needs of students as they face an increasingly multicultural and politicized world. All women’s studies courses are essential for future teachers who must understand gender roles if they are to succeed in classrooms.

Students in the Women’s Studies minor demonstrate:

• Knowledge of women’s experience, status, and achievements
• The ability to recognize the history and current status of unequal power relationships between women and men
• An understanding of the diversity of women, including issues related to age, sexual preference, race, ethnicity, and social class
• An understanding what is meant by a feminist perspective and the ability to apply to a discussion of political, economic, historical and social issues.
• The ability to speak inclusively, to think, read, and write critically, and to evaluate information from a variety of sources.