Believe it or not, women came to college at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln more than a century ago.
One educational opportunity available to them included Miss Rosa Bouton's School of Domestic Science. Founded in 1898, according to a 2000 article in The Scarlet, the two-year program taught young girls how to develop character in the kitchen.
Over the last 100 years, the status of women at UNL has evolved. They once only learned to cook and clean, but now women compete in fields still dominated by their male counterparts.
THE NUMBER GAME
While women at UNL now outnumber men in majors such as journalism and education, they still struggle to match the number of men in fields including engineering, math, science and business.
Women also lag in overall enrollment.
The university's student body is 47 percent women and 53 percent men, according to UNL's Institutional Research and Planning's 2009 Fact Book. While six percentage points might seem insignificant, the number of students the percentages represent are not: A total of 12,825 men and 11,275 women attend UNL, creating a gender gap of 1,550 students.
The numbers have gotten better over the past century, but over the past six years the percentage of female students has dropped from 48.8 percent to 47 percent. The decreases doubled the gender gap, raising the question of whether the imbalance of male and female students should be addressed.
MASCOTS FOR CHANGE
Several groups work to improve the status of women on campus including the Women's Center and the Chancellors Commission on the Status of Women (CCSW), which consists of a council of students, a council of faculty and a council of staff.
Jan Deeds, director of UNL's Women's Center and a member of CCSW's council of staff, attended UNL in the ‘70s.
"When I was here as a student, we didn't have any women in administration really. We didn't have as many female faculty on campus," she said. "There were still lots of experiences that female students had. I was in some classes where, because they knew I was a volunteer at the Women's Center, they would bait me. They would say things purposely to get me to argue about women's rights and things like that."
Deeds pointed out that since that time many women have moved up at UNL, and efforts have been made to recruit and retain a diverse faculty.
"I feel like, from that perspective, the status of women at UNL is better than it was in 1976," she said. "I think that there's still a lot of work to do, though."
The Women's Center offers volunteer opportunities, programs, outreach and groups where students can learn about the changing role of women and men in society.
One student group, PREVENT, spreads awareness of relationship violence.
"Safety is still an issue," Deeds said. "One in four college women will be a victim of sexual assault, 90 percent will know their perpetrator. Just the sheer number of that and thinking about how that impacts a woman's ability to do well at school."
Ashley Kresl, a junior international studies major at UNL, takes time to volunteer with PREVENT.
"Sexual assault on college campuses is just unholy, like, the numbers of people it happens to," Kresl said. "If you think how many women you know and then how many of them statistically it happens to is nauseating. "
PREVENT holds workshops on self defense and bystander awareness.
"With our self defense workshops, we talk about releasing someone's grip to get away," she said. "It's not the stranger in the dark alley you should be afraid of. It's usually somebody you know."
The CCSW council of students also combats safety issues. The council's major safety concerns include the amount of information released by the student directory and whether NU on Wheels cab drivers get background checks, wrote Hanieh Kamelian, a senior engineering major and co-chair of the council, in an e-mail.
"It is important to mention that CCSW's efforts are to make a difference and a more secure campus for all people, and not only women," Kamelian said. "Our efforts have changed and created several policies (i.e. Family Friendly Policies) that are family related."
The commission initiated the creation of the University Childcare Center at 22nd and W streets and helped make room for lactation spaces on campus.
"I think the university has done a remarkable job in resolving many of the issues women face on campus," Kamelian said.
However, a few obstacles stand in the way. One hurdle is the imbalance of men and women in certain fields.
"An example is engineering," she said. "At UNL, there are fewer female students and faculties who are currently in the engineering college. The social, classroom and workplace environment should be in way that females would not receive a poorer treatment than their counterpart male classmates or coworkers."
ODD WOMAN OUT
Many majors at UNL continue to be male-dominated — engineering especially.
According to IRP's UNL fall 2009 enrollment data, men outnumber women in the College of Engineering seven to one — a whopping 2,266 men compared to 314 women major in engineering.
Liz Hungerford, a sophomore biological systems engineering major, is one of about 20 sophomore women in her major.
"Well, I'm never short options for a date on Saturday night!" Hungerford wrote in an e-mail. "But all jokes aside, I really don't notice it anymore. As a freshman (the number of men) was a little intimidating, but as in any major, you start to make friends with the people around you."
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