The history of discriminatory rules for women at UGA – Red and Black

The history of coeducation at the University of Georgia begins in 1918 when 12 women became the first to enroll.

Since then, women at UGA have triumphed over a long history of discriminatory rules and barriers to inclusion.

This past century of history, remembered during this years Womens History Month, reaches an important milestone in 2022. This year marks 50 years since Title IX of the Education Amendments was passed and discrimination based on sex was outlawed at public universities.

When women first enrolled at UGA, they were only permitted in the home economics and education majors. The women who enrolled in these programs were required to stick to strict rules.

Many of these rules were laid out in a student handbook from the 1930s for Soule Hall, the first dorm for women on campus.

Some rules included lights out curfews at 11 p.m., requirements for permission to leave town or ride in a car, and regulations on dances and social engagements. Women were also not allowed to drive or smoke and had to check in and out of the dorms by signing a roster.

The number of engagements, or dates that women were allowed to observe, were regulated as well. Freshmen were permitted one date a week, sophomores had two and juniors three. But, if a student made good grades, they might have been allowed an extra date per week.

Campus organizations like the Womens Student Government Association, which was formed in the 1920s, also enforced rules for women. In a rule book from the 1955-56 school year, a code of conduct was given for students.

The association let women attend social functions only if they were from an approved list. A dress code was issued that outlined which rooms in dorms or sorority houses women could wear shorts in.

According to the conduct code, women were required to wear street clothes and neat hair-dos in all public settings. Street clothes included skirts, dresses, blouses and sweaters. Costumes for costume parties had to be approved by a students house director, according to the conduct code.

Even phone usage was restricted. Calls could not last more than five minutes. Men visitors were allowed in dorms, though only until a specified curfew. Women could only enter mens residences if a chaperone was present, and were prohibited from entering individual rooms or apartments without approval.

Women needed permission to leave the dorms or campus overnight. They were required to arrive at their destination before 8:30 p.m. If they wanted to be absent from their residences after 8:30 p.m., a form had to be filled out. Women were limited in how many times they could sign out per week.

University archivist Steve Armour works at Hargrett Rare Book & Manuscript Library to preserve the historical record of UGA. He found that the women making these rules operated under principles of self- governance.

There was this idea that they had to make these rules. It was the expectation of them, Armour said.

As time passed, more women enrolled at UGA and the majors offered to them began expanding. Still, discriminatory rules persisted. It wasnt until the 1960s that more drastic changes took place and the university began allowing women to enroll regardless of their race.

Desegregation at UGA was steered by many influential Black women who led the way for the admittance of students of color. In 1961, Charlayne Hunter-Gault became the first Black woman to be admitted to UGA. And in 1962, Mary Frances Early became the first Black person to graduate from UGA.

Black women faced a host of challenges from administration, faculty and students. Not only were they isolated on campus and discriminated against because of their race, but they also faced the stringent rules placed on women at the time.

Nawanna Lewis Miller graduated from UGA in 1973 with a bachelors degree in broadcast journalism. Her experiences are documented in Hargrett Librarys UGA Black Alumni Oral History Project. Miller recalled being one of 10 Black students on campus, but finding empowerment in her triumph over obstacles and in the path she helped create for other Black women.

I went to Georgia one way. I graduated another way, Miller said in the interview. I went as this naive young girl. I came out of Georgia as this strong, independent African American woman who had been through hell and there was no other way to describe it.

Today, women of a multitude of ethnicities and identities help make up the student body. Asian, Hispanic and Latinx, Native American and transgender women have opportunities to enroll at the university. However, their history is difficult to pinpoint.

Armour said in an email that historical data on race and ethnicity is limited, and largely nonexistent for gender identity.

In fact, UGA did not publish enrollment statistics by race and ethnicity until 1976, 15 years after the university first desegregated. UGA does not publish data on gender thats also divided by race and ethnicity.

Many other important milestones for women were achieved in the 1960s. Men and women protested for womens rights on campus.

According to an article published in The Red & Black on April 11, 1968, approximately 500 students marched up Baxter Street and staged a sit-in in what is now the Hunter-Holmes Academic Building on April 10, 1968.

Their petition demanded that the university take immediate steps to equalize the rights of men and women students, the article stated. The protest included demands for the removal of some rules for women on campus, such as the curfew.

According to Armour, the WSGA dissolved in the late 60s. During this time, the dean of women and the dean of men combined into one position, the dean of students, to oversee student affairs.

A legal philosophy called in loco parentis, which allowed administration to create rules in the place of a student's parents, was phased out in the 1960s in a series of legal cases.

All that micromanaging of the in loco parentis era started to go away, Armour said. The combination of that and women's liberation put an end to [those rules].

Women in sports faced their own set of challenges as they sought equal rights.

Gwyned Bius played on UGAs first womens basketball team. She was a physical education major and attended UGA from 1968 to 1971. Bius remembered a strict dress code and limited opportunities for women athletes.

We were not permitted to wear pants around the campus, we either had to wear a skirt or a dress. And if we were attending P.E. classes, we werent allowed to wear our gym clothes and had to wear a raincoat over them to cover up our shorts, Bius said.

There was little funding for womens sports teams.

We had to buy our own uniforms, we had to pay our own way to games, we had to buy our own meals, Bius said. We really got nothing.

In 1972, coeducation in America changed when Title IX passed. The federal civil rights law protects people from discrimination based on their sex in all education programs that receive federal funding.

The amendment meant that UGA would need to offer women the same opportunities that it offered men. For equal rights for women, this was the final nail in the coffin, Armour said.

Title IX really opened the door for a lot of females to play sports and to be recognized, Bius said.

Sports teams had traditionally been only available to men, with some exceptions, so the law was especially pertinent to opportunities for women athletes. Title IX compliance remains an important job for UGA Athletics today.

Although the law was groundbreaking for equal rights in education, it did not become immediately enforced.

There was just a lot of lag time and resistance for institutions to actually comply with [Title IX], Armour said.

Still, the law is central to the history of women at UGA and it resulted in the end of legally permissible discrimination based on sex at public universities. This summer will mark the 50th anniversary of the Title IX education amendment.

While women have faced many challenges throughout their time at UGA, they made up 58% of undergraduate enrollment at the university in 2020, according to the UGA Fact Book.

From the 12 students who were in the first group of enrolled women in 1918, to the trailblazing women who desegregated UGA in the 1960s, to the over 17,000 women undergraduates enrolled today, a lot has changed in the 104 years that women have attended UGA.

Read the original:

The history of discriminatory rules for women at UGA - Red and Black