Gender Upends Tenure

When Peggy B. Schmertzler '53 returned for her 35th Radcliffe Reunion, she had some questions about what life was like today at Harvard-Radcliffe.

"There was a large group of Radcliffe alumnae," she says, "who were somewhat mystified about the atmosphere at the College. We didn't know what to expect."

That was in 1988. And when she returned five years later for her 40th Reunion, she had some answers. After having chaired an ad hoc committee to investigate the current status of women students and faculty, she realized it was about time to start pressing the administration for changes.

The Committee for the Equality of Women at Harvard has two goals: equality in the number of tenured women professors University-wide, and equity for all women at Harvard. Currently, only 8.8 percent of the total tenured faculty at Harvard are women, the lowest in the Ivy League. (As a basis of comparison, Amherst College is 16 percent, Brown 13 percent, and Dartmouth 15.4 percent).

Defenders of the University's policies claim that very few professors--male or female--receive tenure at Harvard. After all, our venerable University has sky high standards of excellence. And it's not Harvard's fault if there just aren't very many academics in the profession who can live up to them.

Yet one of the drawbacks of such a policy occurred last week, when two Associate Professors of Government--Jean C. Oi and Jennifer A. Widner--were denied tenure by President Neal L. Rudenstine despite the fact that they had received their department's recommendations.

Oi is one of the leading scholars studying China in the field of political science. Widner has been instrumental in pushing African studies in the government department. If they don't measure up to Harvard's lofty ideals of scholarship, then who does?

Meanwhile, female professors privately express frustration at the Old Boys Network still prevalent in the University. "Harvard is a cultural institution that offers progressive space," says one women junior faculty member, "but it doesn't offer the possibility of job security. I don't know what it would take to alter the tenure system--it's fairly impervious to protest."

And, it seems, to change. Perhaps one of the most disturbing aspects of Harvard today for Schmertzler and her classmates is that, in some areas of College life, time has stood stock still. "The discrimination against women today is extremely subtle and elusive," says Schmertzler. "It's not nearly as blatant as it was in the '50s. Nevertheless, the lack of women faculty diminishes female students and prevents them from reaching their full potential."

Radcliffe, although initially silent on the issue, has joined forces with Schmertzler's committee. A recent fundraising drive raised $62.576 for the establishment of a new fellowship for junior faculty women at Radcliffe's Bunting Institute. The hope is that the fellowship will place at least a few female scholars in the tenure track.

And the evidence shows that female junior faculty members need all the help they can get. In 1988, 6.3 percent of women faculty were tenured, now it's 8.8 percent. If the percentages keep growing at their annual rate, parity won't be achieved for at least another eighty years.

And that's a long, long time.

Hallie Z. Levine's column appears on alternate Mondays.