1971 marks the first year women were admitted to Stevens, yet the legacy of women at Stevens goes back to the start of the 20th century. At that point in time, Stevens was a relatively young institution, having been founded less than 40 years prior, and it was in 1907 that Enid May Hawkins was hired to the institution as the first professional librarian, where she worked for the next four decades. According to a 1948 article published in The Stute, the Library’s reputation went from being “a dingy old den” to the “central nervous system for research and study on campus” under her direction, and her hiring marks the very beginning of female presence on the institution’s staff.
It took a few more years for Stevens to open up to women in academics, and it was not until 1938 that the door finally opened and graduate courses were made available to women. This was only the beginning; by 1942, women were admitted into the War Industries Training School at Stevens, a federal program providing accelerated education for those studying science and engineering. Long at last, in 1947, as a result of a post-World War II teacher shortage, Stevens finally hired its first woman professor, Emmi Fischl, who taught in the Department of Physics and later computer science.
Beatrice Hicks, co-founder and first president of the Society of Women Engineers (SWE), was the first woman to be awarded a degree of any kind from Stevens, graduating in 1949 with an M.S. degree. In 1971, 19 young ladies entered Stevens as the first undergraduate class of women, the start of Stevens’ coeducational history. And in 1974, 104 years after its founding, Stevens finally awarded its first female undergraduate degree to nineteen-year-old Lenore Schupak. At this point in time, women made up approximately 3% of the student population according to a 1974 article published in the New York Times.
Athletics had long at last made its debut at the varsity level, and in 1974 Linda Vollkommer-Lynch became the first woman to coach at Stevens and later technically the first tenured female professor at Stevens. She led Stevens’ first women’s varsity team, fencing, which she continues to head coach of to this day. Vollkommer-Lynch’s presence was the starting point for women’s teams on campus, and today Steven’s has 13 women’s varsity sports teams with a total of 53 conference championships and 67 All-Americans and counting.
In 1982, Stevens finally had its first sorority established on campus. The Delta Zeta chapter of Phi Sigma Sigma is still around today, and its house sits proudly on the corner of 9th and Hudson. The establishment of Delta Phi Epsilon’s Epsilon Gamma chapter, found on the corner of 8th and Hudson, followed soon thereafter in 1985. Today, Stevens is home to five sororities and three cultural sororities: Phi Sigma Sigma, Delta Phi Epsilon, Theta Phi Alpha, Sigma Delta Tau, and Alpha Phi, as well as Omega Phi Beta Sorority, Inc., Sigma Psi Zeta Sorority, Inc., and Lambda Tau Omega Sorority, Inc., respectively.
By 1999 the Lore-El Center for Women’s Leadership was dedicated in honor of Lore E. Feiler, who snuck into business classes at Stevens in the 1940s before the institution allowed women to formally attend classes. The Lore-El Center continues to be a beacon of community and education, providing programs and events to support women at Stevens.
Now, in the 21st century, women have continued to take on larger roles within the institution. In 2009, Dr. Lisa Dolling was named Dean of the College of Arts and Letters, and four years later Virginia Ruesterholz ‘83 became the first woman chair of the Board of Trustees. Most recently in 2017, Dr. Jean Zu was named the first woman dean of the Charles V. Schaefer, Jr. School of Engineering & Science. Currently, women make up 30% of the total undergraduate student population, 27% of the graduate student population, 29% of faculty, and 56% of staff across four schools – the Schaefer School of Engineering & Science, the School of Business, the School of Systems & Enterprises, and the College of Arts and Letters.
It has now been 115 years since the hiring of Enid Hawkins and 51 years since the first class of undergraduate female students was accepted, and two things are clear: the impact of women previously was monumental and that of current and future alumnae will only be more long-lasting and powerful in the years to come.
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