Women at Conference Voice Concern About Forum Closing

Last week's decision by the Radcliffe Board of Trustees to eliminate the Radcliffe Forum dominated conversation at Saturday's day-long symposium on women at Harvard.

Radcliffe abdicated its responsibility for undergraduate women by eliminating the Forum, Angela Giral, chairman of the ad hoc committee on women at Harvard and Radcliffe, said in her opening remarks.

The Forum funded and staffed the activities of the ad hoc committee, and Giral added that the budget cuts would severely curtail the work of the intra-departmental panel, which sponsored Saturday's meeting.

Participants also discussed the problems women face in entering traditionally male-dominated areas such as business and medicine.

Straight and Narrow

Women have a particularly difficult time adjusting to Harvard, which is geared to the "linear" male model of success, Lotte Bailyn, professor or organizational psychology and management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, said at one panel.

Bailyn said support from women gives men a major advantage in the job market.

"A larger percentage of men have women behind them, encouraging them to get ahead, but it is very rare to find men in the support role," Bailyn said.

Ann Ramsay, a member of President Carter's Commission on Women and a University budget analyst, said in her closing remarks that "feminists can no longer be an exclusive group of successful women working for themselves," adding that before women can have equality with men, they must have equality with each other.

Ramsay said all women as well as men must be brought into the battle against sexism.