I’m biased against people who went to women’s colleges

by Alison Green on October 18, 2022

A reader writes:

I have a strong opinion about something that is making me biased as a manager. I am a woman and I dislike the idea of women’s colleges. I feel things people cannot help like age, race, disability, or sexual orientation are not the same as college choice. People pick where they go to college.

There are a few things that lead me to this opinion:

(1) When women’s colleges were created, it was because women were not admitted to men’s colleges. This made a lot of sense. Now women have many more options for education and I think they no longer serve a purpose.

(2) I think women self selecting to only have an education with each other is a bit precious. There is no avoiding men, they make up half the population. Deliberately selecting to learn only with other women illustrates, to me, intolerance and inflexibility.

(3) Men’s only colleges would be banned but women’s only are still acceptable. I think, as women, the best way to combat sexism and misogyny is to insist that things are equal. It’s really not fair to say, “I want the same things as a man, except when I go to school, I don’t want them around.”

(4) The endowments at woman’s colleges are huge. I mean, it’s a ton of money. And this has the potential to be allocated towards initiatives that would uplift so many more women.

I know it sounds backwards, but because I want to be taken seriously as a woman, I do not support institutions that exclude men.

In addition to this, when I meet a woman who attended a women’s college, I assume she will expect a more than average amount of coddling. I expect entitlement and privilege. I expect her to have difficulty working with the men on our team.

It hasn’t been an issue at work until we went through a restructuring and my team needed two new people. I sat in on the hiring process. One of the applicants was from a women’s college and ultimately the hiring committee selected her. My boss pulled me aside and said that he knows I had an “immediate dislike” to this new hire but she was a sound applicant and I need to respect their decision. I did not realize I was so obvious with my dislike until he said this. I need to manage her fairly. If I could flip a switch in my brain to not have this bias, I would. I anticipate a lot of comments like “just stop thinking that about women’s colleges” but it’s not that easy. How do I override a bias and learn to disregard a choice I genuinely think shows poor judgment?

I also want to be very clear: I am aware this is a bias and I want to overcome it to manage my employee fairly.

Not only is this a bias, it’s an irrational bias.

It’s not like having a bias against people who, I don’t know, spit on their clients or cheated to get through college. Those are biases that would be rooted in a true-to-life fact about the person. But this one is an irrational bias because the assumptions behind it are wrong.

Students at women’s colleges aren’t generally there because they’re too precious to learn otherwise or need to be coddled or are intolerant of men (!). They’re generally there because they like the academic programs the college offers, or they want more equitable access to STEM education (there’s tons of data showing that students at women’s colleges are more likely to major in STEM fields than women elsewhere; they’re also more than twice as likely to attend medical school, earn doctoral degrees, and be involved in philanthropic activity), or they’ve read the data showing (or personally experienced) that male voices are more likely to drown out women’s in many classrooms (even to the point of men getting called on more).

You’re right that it’s no longer the case that women are shut out of other institutions of higher education — but women are still at a disadvantage in a bunch of other ways: on average, we still don’t earn equal pay for equal work, we account for a far smaller portion of leadership positions than men do (despite making up more of the workforce than they do), and we’re drastically under-represented in government and on corporate boards. Sexism is still here and still a problem. In that context, why shouldn’t some women choose to seek out institutions that prioritize women’s leadership and accomplishments and where no one is going to second-guess their abilities simply on the basis of their gender?

When a group is marginalized, it’s not promoting inequality to recognize that reality and choose to build affiliation and networks with each other as a way to redress some of that. You wrote that it’s not fair to ask for equality “except when I go to school.” But it’s not inequality for a systematically marginalized group to create space to support and amplify their priorities. That’s an attempt to level the playing field — to balance it, not imbalance it.

(Relatedly, I hope/assume you don’t have the same objections to candidates from Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Assuming you agree there’s still a place for HBCUs, I’m curious why you think women’s colleges aren’t okay.)

If you really want to move past your bias, I’d encourage you to look at the data on women’s colleges and the success of their graduates (which by many measures is significantly higher than women from co-educational institutions). If these women were emerging from college inflexible and needing to be coddled, you’d presumably see that reflected in their achievement levels. Take a look — you won’t find it.

More than that, though, you need to do the same work you’d hopefully do to counter any other type of unfair bias you want to combat in yourself: be mindful of it, spend more time with people who are different from you, be specific in your intent to change the way you’re doing things, and seek out advice on specific practices you can put in place to guard against internal biases (like evaluating work “blind,” for example, but there’s a ton of reading you can do for more ideas on this).

For what it’s worth, though, there’s a strong undercurrent of “I’m justified in feeling this way” throughout your letter, and you’ll never successfully counter your biases if you don’t first drop that.

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  1. The Original K.*

    Relatedly, I hope/assume you don’t have the same objections to candidates from Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Assuming you agree there’s still a place for HBCUs, I’m curious why you think women’s colleges aren’t okay.
    My first question was going to be if OP feels this way about HBCUs. Everything she says about women’s colleges could be said about HBCUs.

    1. Witch*

      I guess because of media people assume women’s colleges are only for wealthy white women but lol no I just googled it and Wellesley has a pretty even mix of different international and ethnic identities out of its student population.

      OP: think of women’s college (really how many people are you interacting with that graduated from them in the first place?) as a place for all women of any background. Mount Holyoke accepts all trans identities, and is likely going to be a more welcoming place for transwomen than a typical state university.

      1. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

        Historically, lots of women’s colleges were the only places Saudi women were allowed to go by their families. Now I have hear they’re also going to BYU, but still women’s colleges are the first choice

        1. BubbleTea*

          I’m in the UK so our system is a little different but I went to a women’s college within my university (some teaching was mixed, some was college-only, accommodation was within college throughout) and a lot of Muslim girls now attend that college because their families feel more comfortable about it.

          It’s also astonishing to me that the LW says the endowments are huge, because that’s not the case here. Women don’t have the levels of historical wealth that men had in the past, so there’s less to give.

          1. Observer*

            It’s also astonishing to me that the LW says the endowments are huge, because that’s not the case here.

            It’s astonishing to me too. Because I have no idea how large the endowments on some women’s colleges are, but that idea that THAT’S a significant problem keeping women back is so absurd that it’s hard to take this as made in good faith, to be honest.

            Did the OP even bother to look at the endowments of the Ivies? Not a single woman’s college is in the top largest endowment list. Very few of them even have endowments that hit $1B, much less the $10+ and more endowments of the top 10.

            1. ExpectingProf*

              Yeah, there are some women’s colleges with relatively large endowments, but there are tons of coed colleges with just as large of ones. The coed school I work at now has the same (relatively large but not huge) endowment as the women’s college I went to.

              Besides, this perception that something else could be done with that money isn’t true. There are conditions in college endowments, they can’t just give away all the money or something.

              1. MM*

                I was flabbergasted at the endowments bit. If you’re worried about that, go after Harvard or UChicago?

                1. Elle*

                  Yeah, the underlying assumption here is that women having money to use for themselves is not ok. How DARE these women *checks notes* do the same thing everyone else does!!

            2. LadyofLasers*

              I got curious too so I looked it up! There’s a wikipedia page listing endowments in the US, and for private schools you have to go 29 down before you get to the first woman’s college (Wellesley). That doesn’t even include public universities.

            3. DataSci*

              Also, schools with very large endowments can afford to offer more financial aid – it’s frequently cheaper for a low-income student to attend someplace like Stanford (my alma mater) or Harvard because they can offer better aid packages than a smaller private school with fewer resources.

              1. LongTime Reader*

                Yep- my now-spouse went to a well regarded small liberal arts school instead of the in-state public university I was at because even with in-state tuition he got better financial aid and had significantly smaller loans there.

            4. Curmudgeon in California*

              Yeah, Stanford’s endowments are huge. It’s like several regular universities rolled into one. Yes, Stanford grads can be arrogant and coddled, or worse. Does Brock Turner ring a bell? IMO he is not that much of an outlier.

              1. Lydia*

                Eh, I know a couple of Stanford grads who are no more coddled or entitled as any other people I’ve met who went to other schools. It tends to be the place they came from, not necessarily the place they went. Basically, if she doesn’t feel the same way about other schools with large endowments, it’s pretty easy to see this is some deeply internalized misogyny.

                1. ccnumber4*

                  Yes, this whole letter is deeply problematic. The fact that her leader was able to tell she had an “immediate dislike” for the selected candidates is a very big issue, especially since the OP didn’t think it was noticeable. OP has some serious internal work to do in this space regarding DEI/equality and I would argue that she should not be leading people until this is resolved.

            5. sb51*

              Yeah, that jumped out at me too. Also, I think a lot of the less well endowed womens’ schools have gone under or gone coed to survive, so you’re left with the successful ones.

              I went to an all girls school from 4-12th grade and was absolutely uninterested in a womens’ college (as an adhd girl I fit in poorly and got in trouble for being loud a lot and was done with certain types of gender role policing by fellow women that might or might not have been an issue in college but definitely was in high school and I was SO DONE) but I still think they’re a valuable option to have out there.

              1. Nell*

                My undergraduate women’s only college (US) just got bought out by another university to have a campus on that coast. You’re right that a lot of the less well-known ones are struggling these days. Nobody recognizes my undergrad choice where I live now, but the college focused on making sure first-generation college students and others who typically struggled to get through college graduated in four years. Now I’m at grad school at a nationally-recognized college and I couldn’t have done it without my undergraduate college’s set-up.

              2. MM*

                I went to all-girls school grades 7-12 and I loved it, honestly. I didn’t want to go to a women’s college (and I didn’t), but I’ve found that all the stats about girls getting more confidence and better education in these environments really bore out for me. I can’t tell you how many situations I’ve been in where I’ve realized after the fact that I was the only woman to speak, or who dared ask a question. That can’t ALL be chalked up to all-girls education, but I do think it helped.

                To the degree that I have any sympathy for OP, it’s because that experience also meant I saw some of what all-boys education was like, and I think it was bad for them much as it was good for us. But none of that should add up to being biased against women who choose a women’s college!

          2. General von Klinkerhoffen*

            Another graduate of a UK collegiate university here. The women I met from the women’s colleges were without exception, erm, exceptional. I absolutely do not recognise LW’s biases in my experience.

            OTOH my college was approaching 70:30 male:female for ~~reasons~~ and honestly that was difficult – it meant an environment where harassment flourished and was waved away.

            I note from my university that undergrad is only 50:50 M:F *because* there remain women-only colleges. There are no university-wide or national quotas, so we do still need to lean on the scale somewhat to achieve equal opportunities.

          3. Tau*

            Fellow graduate of a UK collegiate university! I didn’t go to one of the women’s colleges but have nothing bad to say about the people who did. The colleges were also generally smaller and poorer – the super big famous rich college was not only mixed but one where the whisper campaign and just statistics spoke of a sexism problem (my course was around 25% female, but for that college it was more like <5%).

            Another thing I was told was that as a female STEM student I'd be immediately sorted into one of the women's colleges if I didn't put down a preference. Since international students were pretty likely to not know anything about the colleges and just go "put me wherever", a lot of my female international coursemates ended up there.

          4. tamarack and fireweed*

            I think this is only true for a particular set of elite colleges in the US. And while some do have huge endowments, so have mixed Ivy League colleges, so why the animus specifically against the women’s ones?

            I educated at German public (=state) educational institutions, some of which were selective, all of which were mixed-gender. I self-sorted into a lot of male dominated classes. Once I was at university (physics, 10% women, no sign of improvement then) I was hit with the information that a *whole lot* of women who were successful in male-dominated scientific fields in Germany had gone to women’s schools. Now this doesn’t mean I became a fan of women’s schools, however, it did make me rethink my position on them.

            For me, this topic is a *great* illustration of why, despite such an increasingly politically polarized culture, there are things where it’s appropriate to accept that there is a range of attitudes. Having a pluralistic range of high-quality educational pathways is a good thing because it makes it more likely that anyone can find a school or course of study that works for them. We all have opinions and ideas. Some from our personal experience. Some from observation, personal philosophy and value system. I am for example increasingly taken against what is considered the “elite” layer of educational institutions in the countries I’m familiar with – because they instill a false sense of complacent intellectual superiority and an entirely unnecessary and harmful normalization of competitiveness. I also don’t see a good reason why the institutions that are considered particularly good at teaching a subject should be selecting for the easiest-to-teach students. I also have a basic leeriness of many religious-based institutions, even though I acknowledge that there are many highly worthy educational traditions grounded in religious practice (various religions).

            HOWEVER – I think it is entirely wrong to let these opinions influence one’s attitudes towards co-workers and reports. People attend and choose the institutions they and up for a variety of reasons. I take them as they come and don’t prejudge. So maybe, just maybe, I may look out for particular attitudes that I might link to particular educational pathways – the mansplainer, the person-who-doesn’t-even-know-what-they-don’t-know, the hyper-competitive co-worker whose interactions quickly feel like put-down, excessively high or low self-esteem etc. But in the end there is no 1:1 correspondence between any of these with a particular kind of schooling.

            1. Anon Y Mouse*

              Yes. That, and so much of what people decide is influenced by their parents or teachers or other circumstances. They’re not choices made in a vacuum.

              (My husband went to an elite, collegiate university to do a particular humanities subject because as a bright but underconfident teenager he’d been railroaded into it by his school, who saw a chance for him to excel there. He did do well but was very stressed and unhappy and later did a master’s in something completely unrelated (and more vocational) at a less high-pressure institution. He thinks he should have done that to start with, but it was not presented as an option.)

            2. My Cabbages!*

              I will say… as a non-Christian-turned-atheist, I shared your opinions about religious schools. Until I got hired by a Catholic university.

              My school has a stronger commitment to equality and social justice than either the elite private school of my undergrad OR the public university in an extremely liberal state where I did grad school. The education is fully secular other than having a few classes taught by the resident priests and having a chapel on campus.
              I won’t say that all religious schools are great (coughcoughBYUcough) but conversely they aren’t all that bad either.

          5. MDubz*

            I went to a Seven Sisters institution, and a ton of my classmates were Orthodox Jews, for I imagine similar reasons.

        2. Long Time Lurker*

          Thanks for making this point. I know two women from religiously conservative backgrounds who were only permitted to go to college by their parents if they went to either an all women school or a strictly Christian university.

      2. OyHiOh*

        I wrote about my own experience below but yes. At the (Catholic) women’s institution I attended, there were a number of young women from Muslim majority countries. All-women’s schools were considered safe and socially acceptable for them to attend.

      3. MM*

        Relevant to who goes to these colleges: it’s not all about whether coed institutions are open to women enrolling. It’s also about whether these young women’s families are willing to send them to a coed institution.

        My cousin taught for years at a small women’s college in the South. It was a mix of, yes, the gentry’s daughters, but also international students whose families were more comfortable with sending them to school in licentious America if it was a women’s institution, and women from not-wealthy, rural, conservative/religious families who were finally getting some freedom (since their families assumed they were “safe” or unlikely to get up to anything “inappropriate” at a women’s college; meanwhile lots of them were coming into their queer identities). For a lot of women coming from a lot of backgrounds, women’s colleges and similar institutions can be a really important source of freedom and the beginning of options they wouldn’t have had otherwise.

      4. fhqwhgads*

        Yeah my experience is definitely that women’s colleges are wayyyyyyyyy more hospitable to trans folks than other schools. LW’s “reasons” make a bunch of assumptions that are easily proven false if you, you know, talk to someone who went to a women’s college instead of just assuming their reasoning, and also completely ignores a lot of the reasons people choose those schools.
        ALSO! Something LW doesn’t seem to have considered is a student who applied to, say, 1 women’s college and 6 other not-women’s colleges, because those were the schools with programs that interested them, and oh hey look, only got accepted to the one. Plus I can think of at least 3 women’s colleges that are part of consortia. So going there opens up classes to like, 4 other schools besides the one you officially attend. You wanna be judgey about what school someone went to, maybe know about what that school offers?

        1. dmowl*

          Indeed. I applied to maybe 10 schools, out of the ones I got into, the best one was the only women’s college I applied to. It was the sister school of the coed college that was my top choice and I was waitlisted at, and rather than fight to be accepted off the waitlist, I decided to go to the school where I could 1) take all the same classes, 2) do my major at the other school if I wanted 3) participate in practically all the same activities but 4) live on a much nicer campus. Having gotten to know the other school a lot better in my time during college, I am actually really happy by how it turned out. The school I did go to was a much better fit, and I still got a lot of the benefits. On top of that, I am convinced that college admissions, especially of schools that were once all women and went coed, unfairly benefits male students as they attempt retain or create an equal gender ratio as more women go to college. I was many of my male high school classmates who had the same grades as I did, but not as rigorous of a course load, or as many extracurriculars, get into schools where I was waitlisted.

    3. Not Tom, Just Petty*

      That was definitely my second thought. My first thought was less outward (because I went to a women’s college, so I had my hackles raised) As I read the justification, it was clear to me that HBCU colleges could be swapped in.
      “Men’s only colleges would be banned.”
      Yes, and caucasian only colleges would be banned, too.
      BTW, OP, there are three men’s only colleges in the US.

      1. LegalEagle*

        Also! Men’s colleges are not banned! Morehouse, I believe, is still all-male and from a quick google it looks like there are three other all-male colleges in the US. Court cases that have forced schools to go co-ed happened when there was no similar educational institution for women, like in the case of the Virginia Military Institute. But all-male colleges on their own are not banned.

        1. nelliebelle1197*

          Morehouse is all men and Spellman is all women. Both are great schools that produce amazing graduates who have changed the world in fabulous ways.

        2. Richard Hershberger*

          Yeah, the claim that men’s colleges would be banned jumped out at me. It took about thirty seconds to disprove the factual assertion.

        3. Luvtheshoes*

          Very true. My son recently graduated from an all male college in Indiana, Wabash College. It was an incredible experience for him and remains a very well regarded institution in academic circles. And he met plenty of girls who loved parties on campus as they knew the fellas were glad to have them there. #WAF

        4. Charis*

          The Virginia Military Institute is a state school, so they legally had to become co-ed. If Virginia men really want a single sex school they can go to Hampden-Sydney College: “Where men are men and women are guests.” (According to their bumper stickers at least.)

          1. Not Your Admin Ass(t)*

            (I live in Virginia.) Ugh, I side-eye the f*** out of those bumper stickers whenever I see them. There’s nothing wrong with an all-men’s school if there’s an actual need for it, but given how rampant gender discrimination still is (I mean, look at the internalized misogyny dripping from OP’s letter!), proudly advertising “no girls allowed” makes me think you’re the kind of institution that teaches your students, “‘No’ means ‘debate her.'”

            As a sidenote: the first Hampden-Sydney bumper sticker I ever saw said, “Where men are men and women stay home” so…I frankly question this place’s stance on gender equality in general. Maybe that one was an unofficial bumper sticker, but I’ve seen it on multiple cars of H-S people.

      2. Charlotte Lucas*

        I was thinking that Gallaudet could also be swapped in.

        I went to co-ed schools for all my education, but I completely understand why some women choose a women’s college.

      3. Meganly*

        I looked it up out of curiosity and was delighted to learn that the mens-only college that I desperately wanted to attend (Deep Springs) just started accepting female students in 2018. (After a fierce legal battle where the trustees were sued by alumni for wanting to open it up to women after years of requests from students.)

    4. Database Developer Dude*

      True, but white students aren’t actually prohibited from going to HBCUs. They just by and large…don’t.

      1. High Score!*

        This is an excellent point. An historically black college here welcomes students of all races. It’s a small college, still mostly black, but my neighbors son, who is white, went there. He was treated warmly by the other students and made lifetime friends.
        I can see both sides of the women’s college issue. The pros are already listed. The cons are that they are discriminatory. In STEM careers, women are no longer underpaid. Actually in areas with a lot of tech companies, “diverse” hires (women, POC) are paid more bc there’s less of them and companies want to be seen as having a diverse work force otherwise new grads don’t want to work for them.

          1. The Real Fran Fine*

            Exactly. I’ve heard the exact opposite, and I work for a global software company that’s always talking about how tech needs to do better at recruiting and retaining a more diverse workforce.

            1. The Original K.*

              Agreed. I’ve read a lot of firsthand accounts by women of color in tech that say the opposite.

            2. Anonymous*

              I work in STEM (mostly pharma) and the shift towards every job being a disposable contract job has probably muddied the waters… but also came at a similar time as the push for more women in STEM, which was probably not intentional but historically careers get the legs cut out from under them when they become opened up towards women.

            3. Wendy Darling*

              Yeah I also work in tech and like… that’s bullshit. Everyone knows it’s bullshit. The only people who don’t think it’s bullshit are insecure white men who somewhere deep down know that they can’t compete if women and POC are treated equally.

          2. AsPerElaine*

            And even if we weren’t underpaid (which I, a woman in tech, have seen no evidence to support) we are still massively under-represented. “Not enough women are graduating with STEM degrees” is far from the only issue with women being under-represented in STEM, but it’s certainly one angle on the problem.

          4. lindsayinmpls*

            I literally was just running salary and income stats last week for professional/tech occupations compared to all other occupations for white non-Hispanic men, white non-Hispanic women, and Black non-Hispanic women (grad school assignment).

            Using American Community Survey data from 2016-2020, the mean income for professional/tech occupations is:
            white non-Hispanic males: $97,341/year
            white non-Hispanic females: $62,631/year
            Black non-Hispanic females: $54,958/year

        2. Observer*

          You’re making a number of HIGHLY dubious claims. The only statement that I totally believe is that the HBCU treated your neighbor’s son well.

          The rest? The numbers I’ve seen simply don’t bear any of this out.

          1. Anon For This*

            Not to mention the bias in hiring. Amazon trained a machine-learning algorithm on the resumes of people who were and weren’t offered jobs at Amazon. Then they had to throw it out, because it learned to exclude anyone with the word “women” on the resume, such as “Women’s [sport]”, “Women’s [leadership position]” or, you guessed it, women’s colleges.

            The FAANG company I worked for had specific practices where all interview assessments needed to be written in gender-neutral language to reduce the bias against hiring women.

          2. MigraineMonth*

            You also have to account for selection bias. In the US*, women who are mediocre in STEM generally don’t pursue it while men who are mediocre in STEM are encouraged to pursue it. So the average cis-woman in engineering/computer science/physics/etc is much better at their field than the average cis-man.

            *This is not true of all countries; a lot of Asian countries have gender parity in computer science graduation rates for men and women.
            *Unfortunately, trans people are underrepresented in a lot of STEM fields.

            *In computer science, a

            1. My Cabbages!*

              Anecdata: I teach Biology at a university and I have at least one trans or enby student every quarter. So maybe it’s getting better? Still not great, but better.

        4. HoHumDrum*

          The idea that women have reached economic parity within STEM is so wrong it’s laughable. In fact what happens is when women enter a field en masse the pay scale goes down to reflect that because we do not value someone’s work. Biology, for example, is a field where the relevant prestige and pay has gone down because women have started to fill up the ranks.

        5. Keymaster of Gozer*

          In STEM careers, women are no longer underpaid

          Oh that is so not true. And even if it were there is still the immense amount of other discrimination – subtle and overt – that goes on.

          1. Anon For This*

            [Content warning: sexual assault]

            Every tech company I’ve worked for has gone through a public sexual assault scandal while I was working there. I got to read in the news about the multi-million dollar severance payment given to a man accused of sexual assault, and then about one of my coworkers drugging and assaulting female coworkers.

            Maybe companies want better diversity numbers, but they don’t seem to give a crap about their female employees after they hire them.

          1. Chestnut Mare*

            High Score! also posted yesterday that teachers get “Summer Pay” so they seem to enjoy making stuff up.

            1. TeacherAnon*

              Oh boy. Teachers *should* arguably get summer pay but the only way I and my colleagues get paid through the summer is if we have our 9 month salary spread out over more paychecks. It’s still just 9 months salary though.

              1. dmowl*

                It’s “summer pay” in the way I get “weekend pay,” by having my the same salary spread of 7 days instead of 5.

        7. Swellesley*

          Want to push back on this a little. First, a number of historically women’s colleges do now accept cis-men but are still 80%+ women. Second, I attended Wellesley and we had male exchange students living on campus as well as male students from Brandeis and MIT regularly in our classes. Not to mention many of us regularly took classes at MIT. Finally, I’m going out on a limb that commenter who thinks women are overpaid in tech won’t totally understand this point, but these days numerous women’s colleges have notable populations of transmen. So in fact it is inaccurate to say broadly that women’s colleges don’t accept men.

          1. Anon for this one*

            A good friend of mine is a trans man who went to a women’s college. He hadn’t realized his identity when applying to colleges, but now he gets a lot of confused looks or double-takes when he mentions where he went to college. (Fortunately he’s very open about being trans, so he doesn’t have to out himself when he wouldn’t be comfortable doing so.)

          2. MDubz*

            Yep! I went to a Seven Sisters, I had men in my classes (both cis students taking advantage of our consortium and trans classmates) and had the opportunity to live in mixed gender housing every year after our first year. That being said, I appreciated the scholastic separation from the waves of sexist bullshit coming across the street from our brother campus about how we were all slutty and dumb.

          3. dmowl*

            I went to Bryn Mawr. Not only did we accept transmen (as long as they identified as women *at the time of application*), but we had a housing exchange with our coed sibling school (Haverford) which men could take advantage of. We shared a direct course registration system with Haverford, and through a bit of extra effort we could take classes at Swarthmore, Villanova, and UPenn. Other than a handful of very specific classes, a majority of my classes had men in them. Women’s colleges don’t “avoid” men, they just don’t center the experience on men. It’s amazing the cultural changes that happen when cismen don’t see themselves as a majority, or even as a viable minority. I actually landed at a women’s college quite by chance, I wasn’t seeking it out and applied on a whim because I was looking for a small liberal arts school on the east coast. I fell in love with the campus during admitted students weekend and I loved the intimacy, traditions, and how the classes were structured. I didn’t get the same sense from similarly sized coed schools, I’m not totally sure why. What I can say is the idea that somehow women’s college grads are poorly adjusted, especially well into their careers and adulthood, is just absurd. There are plenty of poorly adjusted men and women that come out of all kinds of educational backgrounds.

        8. Starbuck*

          “n STEM careers, women are no longer underpaid. Actually in areas with a lot of tech companies, “diverse” hires (women, POC) are paid more bc there’s less of them and companies want to be seen as having a diverse work force otherwise new grads don’t want to work for them.”

          Citation, please.

        9. DataSci*

          “In STEM careers, women are no longer underpaid. Actually in areas with a lot of tech companies, “diverse” hires (women, POC) are paid more bc there’s less of them”

          Thanks for the great laugh. Signed, a woman in tech.

          3. MurpMaureep*

            Yeah I started to get mad and then just decided to shake my head and (mostly) move along. I’m a director of a technical group at a large, academic medical institution, and I can absolutely guarantee you that women and POC are not “paid more because there are less [sic] of them”. (I’m also a proud grad of a Seven Sisters school…who still makes less than men at my level).

        10. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

          Actually in areas with a lot of tech companies, “diverse” hires (women, POC) are paid more bc there’s less of them and companies want to be seen as having a diverse work force otherwise new grads don’t want to work for them.

          on what planet?

          2. Keymaster of Gozer*

            Yeah, this smacks of ‘positive discrimination! Women, BIPOC folks get higher priority for jobs! It’s hard to get a job as a cis white guy!’

            (As a WOC with disabilities it really makes me laugh that people think I didn’t have to fight twice as hard to get half the respect)

        11. Curmudgeon in California*

          In STEM careers, women are no longer underpaid. Actually in areas with a lot of tech companies, “diverse” hires (women, POC) are paid more bc there’s less of them and companies want to be seen as having a diverse work force otherwise new grads don’t want to work for them.

          Hahahahaha!

          As an AFAB person in tech, this is horse pucky. Women and POC are still paid less, and H1bs are also paid less. I am in a peer community (dev ops people) that talks regularly about salary, and the men still make more. White AFAB tend to get 80%, Black and hispanic men get about 75%, while Asian men are at 95% to parity (depending on how much of the upper management is Asian.)

          I’ve been in tech for over 20 years, and while the pay disparity has lessened, it is still very much there.

        12. Red5*

          “Actually in areas with a lot of tech companies, “diverse” hires (women, POC) are paid more bc there’s less of them and companies want to be seen as having a diverse work force otherwise new grads don’t want to work for them.”

          Honestly, describing women and POCs as “diverse” (diversity) hires makes everything else you’re saying suspect.

        13. TechWorker*

          I could believe there is parity at the graduate recruitment level. But senior roles, especially senior technical roles are overwhelmingly male, so no way are women and minorities paid ‘more’ overall.

        14. Nina*

          > companies want to be seen as having a diverse work force otherwise new grads don’t want to work for them

          I’m in aerospace, publicly traded. I’m the only woman in my department (not team. Department. Not a typo). Every time the company tries to do something towards more equitable hiring, the comms team gets overwhelmed with angry emails from fanboys/shareholders complaining about discrimination against men. The company does not care about being seen to have a diverse workforce. The company does not WANT a diverse workforce. The specific type of new grads the company is trying to attract also do not care about or want a diverse workforce.

        15. Woman in STEM*

          I’m a woman who’s worked in technology for over 30 years, I currently work as a manager for a software company where I can see salaries for some of the people in my department, and I can 100% guarantee you that your statement about women and POC in STEM no longer being underpaid as compared to their white male peers is absolutely and categorically false.

        17. Claire W*

          > In STEM careers, women are no longer underpaid. Actually in areas with a lot of tech companies, “diverse” hires (women, POC) are paid more bc there’s less of them and companies want to be seen as having a diverse work force otherwise new grads don’t want to work for them.

          As a woman working in tech with an engineering degree, please, where did youget this info? Because it’s not accurate to literally any of the women I have ever worked with or met through women-in-tech groups… it sounds like another rumour started by the majority that isn’t the reality for the minority they’re talking about.

          (as an aside this is a great example of why, as the only woman in my eng degree class, I would have loved a womens-only college option to avoid all the “you’re only top of the class because you’re the only girl and the teacher is female” and “sure do you really need good grades, you’ll marry one of the guys in your class and stay at home anyway” crap for 4 years)

      2. Tinkerbell*

        Yep, this is what I was coming here to say. If the OP is consistent in her biases, she’d also have issues with religious institutions that require students to adhere to a particular faith (but presumably be fine with those that accept students of other religious backgrounds too). HBCUs are *historically* Black but theoretically open to anyone now – they just tend to still provide an environment where Black students can enjoy the benefits of being in the majority for once.

        1. ThisIshRightHere*

          for what it’s worth, HBCUs were *always* open to anyone. It’s just that only certain folks had a need for them in the first place. Until fairly recently, I imagine an infinitesimal percentage of students who had every right to attend, say Ole Miss would even have considered, say Rust College. And any prohibition about whites attending was not by the institution, but due to segregation laws.

        2. dmowl*

          Part of her bias seems to be that women who go to women’s college self-select to be around women. By this logic, POC who go to HBCU are self selecting to be around POC, so her bias should apply there too.

      3. HBCU*

        White students do go! My Dad (white) worked at two HBCUs while I was growing up, Langston University in Oklahoma and Wiley College in Texas, and white students DO go to those schools. And both institutions are damn good.

    5. RunShaker*

      That came to mind as well before I finished reading the letter. I know we shouldn’t assume but I would think the OP would have bias against HBCUs as well based on tone of the letter. I can definitely see as well applying the same thought process. I hope the OP reflects on Alison’s points & is able to make the needed changes.

      2. The Real Fran Fine*

        Yup. A historically black women’s college that was founded by white women. It checks all the boxes, lol.

    7. Proud FAMU Grad*

      HBCUs do admit students of other races. However, we get a similar beneficial environment of not having to fight a steady drip of hostility while we focus on learning.

    9. yala*

      If OP hasn’t, I hope she sincerely asks herself this. Because seriously, the bias against women’s college graduates is such an…utterly bizarre thing that it wouldn’t surprise me if, whether she realizes it or not, OP has a similar bias towards HBCU, even *if* she acknowledges that there are good reasons people choose them.

      1. Summer*

        My first thought was, this is such an odd thing to be biased about! It is clearly coming from a place of deeply internalized misogyny because otherwise it just makes no sense. Also, LW, the fact that your boss pulled you aside and had to explain the reasoning behind the hire and say that he hoped you can come around?? That is a problem and your weird hatred of women’s colleges needs to be unpacked and worked on asap. Otherwise this is going to continue to be a problem for you.

        My second thought was about HBCUs – if you have no bias against them then your bias against women’s colleges is all the more baffling. I kinda hope this is a fake letter. I just don’t understand what would drive you to care so much about this.

        1. Elle*

          Personal insecurity is what drives these fixations. My guess would be that she was rejected from a women’s college, or constantly compared to a sibling who attended one, or something like that. The letter has that familiar “you’re not better than me!!” tone lurking in the background.

    1. a tester, not a developer*

      And even in situations where they are not explicitly male only, there’s still a lot of tacit “Sure, you can be here, but you’ll be the only woman in the class/in a co-ed dorm” in some colleges. I wouldn’t have been comfortable doing that when I was 17; I’m guessing OP would think I was ‘precious’…

      1. Cat Tree*

        *Raises hand* This was my experience as a woman majoring in engineering (and working in engineering).

        1. No Tribble At All*

          (Sobs in women in engineering) Love being the only woman on my half of the lecture hall :)

          1. Keyboard Cowboy*

            Ah yes, fondly remembering the first session of my embedded systems class, when after getting introductions from around the room, the grad student teaching turned to me and said, “So you’re really the only woman, huh?” Is that so? I hadn’t noticed, buddy.

            1. Another Woman in Tech*

              One of my professors decided to stop in the middle of a computer science class to ask me–the only female-presenting person in the room–why there weren’t more women in CS.

              I said something about not being the person to ask, since I was in STEM, but in the back of my head I was thinking, “Because it’s uncomfortable to be singled out and asked to represent your entire gender?”

              1. Koalafied*

                In the fantasy version where I’m in a scenario like that, I’d love to deadpan, “I don’t know, I’ll ask them and get back to you.”

              2. Anonymous*

                Physics field trip during research that I stowed away on had a professor asking why I was there. “I’d know if you were in the major, you’re a girl!”

                (Cue facepalming from the whole bus.)

                I was there because I wanted to see fermilab.

          2. Another Woman in Tech*

            When I went to CS office ours, there was a guy who wouldn’t stop complaining that he was the only man in his sign-language class and he thought the teacher was biased against him.

            I turned to him and said completely deadpan, “Wow, you’re the only one of your gender in the class? I can’t imagine what that would be like.”

            1. whingedrinking*

              One of my majors was philosophy, which at that time was the only branch of the humanities that was majority male at the undergrad level. (This may have changed but I doubt it. I love philosophy; unfortunately, “well, actually…” dudes do too.) One of my second-year classes had lectures scheduled in the Engineering and Computer Sciences building, which I’d never had a class in before. On the first day, as I was double-checking the room number, the prof rolled up and said, “Here for Empiricists? You’re in the right place.”
              Trying to be lighthearted, I said, “Yeah, but I’m the first woman here, and I wanted to make sure I wasn’t stumbling into a coding lecture.”
              He looked in the door at the twenty or so young men already gathered, said, “Oh. You’re right. Odd, I wouldn’t have noticed,” and walked in, leaving me thinking, “So I’m guessing we will not be reading anything by Catharine Trotter Cockburn in this class.”

        2. Curmudgeon in California*

          Yep. It got really awkward when I was the only woman in the drafting class and was the top of the class.

        3. sometimeswhy*

          Ditto. I attended a state school and actually had a professor snort and tell me that no woman had every passed his class on the first day. It was engineering physics and I broke the curve. But it was pure spite that carried me through that miserable term.

          1. MigraineMonth*

            I think spite is a really underrated motivation. I’ve always found that it outstrips encouragement.

          2. Just Another Techie*

            My entire career path can be chalked up to one asshole physics teacher more than twenty years ago who told me girls can’t be engineers. Scrapped my plans to go to Emory (intending to double in literature and pre-law) and applied to a half dozen engineering schools out of pure cussedness.

          3. Mother of all Raccoons*

            One of my moms best stories is about how she basically got a beloved physics professor put under review because he told her in front of the class she would never pass his class because she was a) a woman and b) a chem major and then would deliberately do things to make her fail. It was the 70s but she still brings that story up as like “why have things not improved” vs “this is how horrible the world was”

            1. SpaceySteph*

              My mother got a chemical engineering degree in the early 80s and also was really disappointed at how things had NOT changed when both of her daughters got their engineering degrees many years later (me in aerospace, my sister in electrical).

      2. Irish Teacher*

        One of my lecturers who attended my college when it first started accepting men said he learnt then why women object to “he” being used for men and women because when he was at college, all the notes used “she” and his lectures would say, “now, boys, you know the ‘she’ includes you too” and he said it DID make him feel sort of like he was there on sufferance and didn’t really belong. And of course, training to be a primary school teacher in the ’60s, there would likely have been a sense of it being a “woman’s job.”

          1. hamsterpants*

            I thought that Alison (just) followed the guideline to default to one’s own pronouns when not otherwise specified.

            1. Nina*

              Alison has been pretty open that when pronouns for a person writing in or described in a letter are not known, she defaults to using ‘she/her/hers’ pronouns, and it seems the commenters are following her lead, which I’m kind of loving.

              1. MigraineMonth*

                I think what Alison does is to default to she/her pronouns for managers/bosses/CEOs where the gender is unknown. It’s a deliberate choice to normalize having women in management roles.

                The comment section often takes this further, but tries to use the correct pronouns when the LW includes their gender either in the letter or when responding in the comments section.

                1. fhqwhgads*

                  Yes, every so often someone says “this site does X” and Alison jumps in the comments to clarify the actual practice is to default to she/her pronouns for managers/bosses when the gender is unknown as a deliberate choice to normalize having women in those roles.
                  It’s definitely not “default to she unless otherwise specified” about anyone.

            2. Lenora Rose*

              Default to known pronouns where possible, use she for unknowns. Some commentors use they for unknowns, many follow her example.

      3. MS*

        I found my voice during my time at Scripps. I will never forget the moment when our frosh seminar professor asked a question to a lecture hall full of women – you could have heard a pin drop as we waited to be called on! No men to shout out answers and dominate the conversation!!

        By the time I graduated I had the confidence to speak up in any group, which has served me very well in the last 20+ years.

        OP, I did my research when I was 16 and college hunting, and it was very clear that women who attend an all-female high school or college are statistically overrepresented in the highest achievers in just about every field.

    2. The one who wears too much black*

      +1, came here to say this. Hampden-Sydney, Wabash, and Morehouse all come to mind as men’s only higher learning institutions.

      1. Barbamama Wellesley '88*

        “There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t help other women.”

        Madeline K. Albright ’59

    3. BlueWolf*

      Yes, my sister went to a women’s only college that was the sister school to an all men’s college. They had separate campuses and dorms, but the classes were generally coed. Technically speaking it was a women’s school, but its not like she was hiding herself away from men.

        1. AnonBennie*

          I went to St. Ben’s and was just coming to say this! Not to mention our endowment was quite a bit smaller than St. John’s (the men’s school), which was also a significant reason that our rankings were often lower, even though we all had the same exact education as all classes are combined. (They did just appoint a combined president earlier this year so I am curious if that will affect endowments/rankings going forward.)

    4. Anon for this*

      I do wonder if the LW will have similar feelings about men’s only colleges once she finds out about them.

      Also, fun fact! Stephen Colbert went to a men’s only college (for two years….before transferring)

    5. Profe*

      And the reason they have declined drastically in popularity is that men don’t exactly struggle to find male-dominated spaces where they can feel valued and respected.

                1. Flower*

                  Another Scrippsie baffled and annoyed by this post.

                  Heck, most women’s colleges are like Scripps–in some sort of consortium/mutual benefit relationship with coed (or men-only, eg Spelman/Morehouse) colleges.

              1. Kirianne*

                I had to look carefully at the date to make sure this reply wasn’t from me. There aren’t too many Kiris around – Hi from another!
                Kirianne Weaver, BMC ’95.

            2. CaptainMouse*

              Hey, I went there. Swarthmore was always coed. But people forget that Haverford began as a male only school.

              1. Elizabeth the Ginger*

                Me too! And at super-liberal Swarthmore I was one of only two women in my evening freshman honors physics seminar. I’m glad for other reasons I picked a coed institution but let’s not pretend that gender just doesn’t have any impact on academics anymore.

              2. DanceMom*

                Heya from a fellow Swattie with a daughter at Bryn Mawr (who needs no coddling)!
                OP missed another reason some students choose a womens college- my queer daughter wants not just LGBTQ acceptance, but a lively lesbian social scene, which is easy to find at womens schools. I imagine Alison didn’t want to feed a silly stereotype by bringing that up, but it’s perfectly normal and reasonable for an 18 year old to think about the social scene.

                1. Some Bunny Once Told Me*

                  I ultimately wound up going to a community college and then a local state school for my degree because of financial issues, but as a queer girl who got accepted to Smith and Bryn Mawr in the late 90s, yeah, that was a serious consideration for applying to women’s colleges.

        2. Honey Badger*

          Yet another Bryn Mawr grad here, pretty incensed at this letter.

          When I think back on my college academic experience, “coddled” is not exactly the word I’d choose to desribe it (to put it mildly). Nor do “intolerant”, “inflexible” and “unable to work with men” describe the many brillant and high achieving women I knew there.

          Seriously OP, the level of scorn in your letter is palpable. Do you actually know many (any?) grads of women’s colleges? If you really want to get over your bias, maybe you could think about making a serious attempt to get to know some women who have chosen this path — as individuals — rather than relying on what seem to be some really unfounded stereotypes.

            1. Mawrtyr*

              The “unable to work with men” thing really got me! Bryn Mawr grad here too, and I’ve spent 10+ years working in as a cook/chef in kitchens where sometimes I was the only woman in the room. The confidence/knowledge I got from college actually made it easier to work in male dominated spaces!
              Where did all these ideas come from I wonder? It seems like a really odd fixation

              1. Jules the 3rd*

                The concepts of “safe spaces” and “snowflakes” have been derided for decades. Single-gender or single-race colleges (and gyms, and bars, and clubs) have all been part of the targets. I dug a little, and the guy who sued a woman’s gym because he couldn’t join was 1997, and that is totally part of this. The huge round of debate specifically about women’s colleges in the 00s had a lot of these ideas tossed in.

                Then you get that one friend or family member, making that “men’s only would be banned!” argument, and someone hears it often enough to develop a bias.

                As Alison points out, data does not support these ideas, but they are definitely part of the US zeitgeist.

            2. Profe*

              I love how many Mawrtyrs read AAM!
              I’ve never encountered anything near this level of disdain toward HWCs! Usually it’s more obliviousness, but OP has spent a bizarre amount of time thinking about this. I want to know this weird villain origin story.

          2. JustaTech*

            Alumnae of the other Bryn Mawr (the girl’s school, not the college) here, and I’m pissed on y’all’s behalf, and I went to an undergrad that was 3:1 men to women. (And yes, my Bryn Mawr gumption/assertiveness training was very helpful.)

            Women’s colleges are not “finishing schools” or (even more derisively) “where you go to get an Mrs. degree” (gag). They’re serious academic centers founded by people who fought hard to be allowed to learn. “Coddled” my eye. (My mother went to a women’s college and had a complex professional career, as did her best friend the lawyer.)

            As for how the LW could overcome her bias that everyone from women’s colleges are wimps, maybe she could read some course catalogs? Or the US and World News college rankings?

            1. Vicky Austin*

              Women who go to college for their MRS degree are generally straight, so a woman’s only college is the last place they would go!

              1. Sir Nose d'Voidoffunk*

                I’m a Virginian, and we have one of the last all-male colleges (Hampden-Sydney) – one of my best friends went there, along with several other less-close friends. Perhaps the ultimate MRS factory is just a mile up the road at Longwood, which started out as an all-female teacher’s college and is still about 70% women. I’ve met a good many HSC/Longwood couples in my life.

                Come to think of it, though, my HSC buddy married a graduate of a different all-women school (Hollins). Maybe Virginia is a unique place for this phenomenon because of a relative abundance of men’s colleges – well, I guess just HSC, but VMI was all-male until about 25 years ago, and that’s still more than just about anywhere else in the U.S.!

                1. Underemployed Erin*

                  I went on a tour of Sweet Briar College, and the women there who were interested in men were dating people from Hampden-Sydney. Exactly how many girlfriends did these dudes have?

            2. Mawrtian No. 2*

              Another Mawrtian! Can you imagine calling BMS a finishing school? You’d be laughed right out of the room.

              I sincerely thought I was DONE with single-sex education, but I ended up at Barnard. Transferring to Barnard was one of the best decisions I ever made.

              I’m incredibly grateful for my years at Bryn Mawr and Barnard, especially now, as I’m the only woman (and assistant manager) of an entirely male department. Confidence in my opinions and reasoning are key when dealing with these guys!

          3. Bread Crimes*

            Heck, when I think of Bryn Mawr, the first thing that springs to mind is their excellent Greek & Latin texts with commentary for undergrad-level students. It also highlights that part of why it never would have occurred to me that Bryn Mawr was a women’s college is that… classics is a male-skewed field. So I just automatically assumed a place producing that material would be at least coed. Goes to show some of my biases, right there!

          4. Kris*

            Yeah, “coddled” certainly isn’t the word I’d choose to describe my experience at Bryn Mawr!

        3. GS*

          BMC here and honestly I mostly feel bad for this person. Imagine cutting yourself off from the glory of us.

          Especially the coddling – cackling at that comment. A director at my multinational bank once asked me how I felt so comfortable standing up for my opinions at meetings when older and more powerful men are in the room and I was like oh don’t worry, I went to Bryn Mawr.

          “A choice that shows poor judgement” Oh what a good laugh – tell me you know literally nothing about women’s colleges. This entire letter is written by someone who has no idea why we’d choose to go to these schools.

      2. PinaColada*

        I went to a co-ed university and I love to be coddled! So that disproves her point right here.

        I’m kidding—honestly that’s such an antiquated/weaponized term in itself. Like “Ohhhhh you want equal rights, a non-hostile working environment and fair representation?…Does da widdle baby love to be coddled, yes she does! yes she does!”

          1. Star*

            And so 1970s. There are so few women’s colleges left—how often does this come up? Stephens grad here.

            1. Proud William Woods Grad*

              William Woods grad here! Hi Stephens grad! Did you go for their equestrian program? WWU went coed in 1997, but I was there in the 80’s.

        2. Keymaster of Gozer*

          I wish I *had* been able to go to a womens only university (I don’t know if there are any in the uk) because the amount of sexism I had to swim though doing a STEM degree, masters etc was incredible. Professors who believed women can’t do serious viral research because our bodies aren’t built to be at an isolation hood all day was only one.

          (And then I changed careers into yet another male dominated industry and had to fight the same battles. Lemme tell you, it gets real old real fast)

          1. Physics Girl No More*

            Yes. I went into college as a Physics major, having gotten a 5 on my AP Physics exam and received my high school’s top science award. I was one of only 3 women in the freshman year Physics-for-Majors classes. And of course all the professors were men, too. It’s not so much that I couldn’t hack it academically, it’s just that I felt out of place. And nearly every guy in the class had a crush on me, which was annoying. I wound up switching to Biology.

            1. Keymaster of Gozer*

              I wanted to study computer science! But I’d been denied that from school days (1980s – there was still a ‘women can’t do maths’ ethos), to college, so I went into virology.

              Which had a roughly equal split in the genders of the students at undergrad level – but postgrad, professors were almost all men.

              I did end up switching careers into IT where I like to give a middle finger to my old school teachers because I am REALLY good at it. Still wish I’d done it as a degree.

            2. Twix*

              I feel you so much on this. I’m male and went to RIT – one of the best tech schools in the country – in the early 2000s and it was just a total boys’ club. I was studying Computational Mathematics and the math department was actually about 50/50 for students and professors and had a female Dean, but almost every other STEM program was like a 10:1 ratio. It was very clear in the culture that the female students were invading male turf. I don’t remember seeing or hearing about anyone blatantly discriminating against female students, but the institutional bias was right out in the open. I’m never sure whether to laugh or be furious when people claim that there are no institutional barriers to women in STEM.

          2. Been There*

            I was thinking the same thing. I went to a STEM college, where the men outnumbered the women about 10 to 1. Most of my fellow female grads did not go into STEM careers, some of that influenced by our experience in college.

          3. The Prettiest Curse*

            There are still a few women’s colleges at Oxford and Cambridge, but I don’t think there are any free-standing women’s only colleges or universities. There were a few colleges of the University of London that were originally women’s colleges, but no longer are. (I went to one of them and studied a female-dominated subject.)

            I went to a private all girl’s high school (in the UK), and it was pretty useful from a role model perspective. The loudest person, the quietest person, the person best at science subjects, the person best at maths were all female. Nobody had to apologise for just taking up space. There were some negatives, but overall it was a positive experience.

              1. The Prettiest Curse*

                Oh, you’re right! I think the last all-female college at Oxford converted pretty recently, so I thought there might still be others left.

              2. Tau*

                I was all set to say “wait, isn’t it three” and then I looked it up and apparently Lucy Cavendish admits men as of last year! Things I didn’t know.

            2. Profe*

              Yeah, and it’s not true that men-only schools are ‘banned’ or purely hypothetical. They used to exist in droves, they still exist in lesser number (more high schools than colleges) and they declined in popularity because, um, men don’t struggle to find male-dominated spaces in which to comfortably exist!

          4. Zephy*

            I’m no expert in virology but I took some science labs in high school and I’m pretty sure you aren’t supposed to manipulate scientific equipment with your penis, so, what exactly makes women’s bodies “not built” for this kind of work?

            (having a penis doesn’t make someone a man, of course, but I guarantee those professors’ personal definitions of “woman” didn’t include that bit.)

        1. TransmascJourno*

          I’m not a Barnard grad, but I was lucky enough to do a pre-college program there, in tandem with JTS. (And I had to find the money to afford it all my own, so I was definitely far from coddled.) The fiction workshop I took there was the freest I’d ever been in a classroom—if not for that, I wouldn’t be a writer today. In a lot of ways, it saved my life.

        1. treesclaphands2*

          Some 40 years ago before my college – Mills – became part of Northeastern University due to finances- Mills gave a college path to many, many women who could not otherwise afford going to college by providing them with scholarships. Mills likely did the same for decades thereafter. Thus Mills literally uplifted women.

          Having gone on an exchange program during college, and having taken college classes during summers at co-ed in institutions, I experienced first-hand how the male voice was encouraged and the female voice was silenced. . In Mills classes there was no silencing of women. We were centered. And thus, again Mills literally uplifted women…and this experience is one of the reasons why women’s colleges remain relevant today.

          We women attending Mills were very able to have men part of our lives during our college years– professors, counselors, student peers in exchange programs, student peers at UC Berkeley classes, students living in dorms rented to UCB, activities at UCB, going to programs/events put on by students of one of Mills’ graduate schools (Mills graduate programs were always co-ed), plus we had the entire SF Bay Area for events.

          Many of my Mills friends first chose Mills despite it being a women’s college. They chose it due to the academics, and they stayed, going on to get medical degrees, veterinary degrees, masters in computer science degrees, law degrees, MBAs, and many other advanced degrees.

          1. treesclaphands2*

            Also, I want to uplift what Alison wrote here:

            When a group is marginalized, it’s not promoting inequality to recognize that reality and choose to build affiliation and networks with each other as a way to redress some of that. You wrote that it’s not fair to ask for equality “except when I go to school.” But it’s not inequality for a systematically marginalized group to create space to support and amplify their priorities. That’s an attempt to level the playing field — to balance it, not imbalance it.

    2. Maude Lebowski*

      Same, as a Douglass College grad. I’d love to see OP come see how ~precious~ my fellow Jersey girls are.

      1. None the Wiser*

        Cook College grad here, coed, but adjacent to Douglass.

        This letter had some smoke pouring out of my ears

        1. Crazy Cat Lady*

          Douglass College Class of 1980. I’m lucky I read this at my work computer because I likely would have thrown something and broken it.

      2. Dr snax*

        Yes! DC class of 06 here. I don’t think “precious” is often a term thought of to describe Rutgers grads of any school.

      3. Princess Tomato in the Salad Kingdom*

        Rutgers – Douglass Jersey gal waves back!! This letter is just so out of touch. And I wonder why the OP feels this way? What is going on in that person’s head? And also if their boss could see the contempt, then it must be off the charts. Would love to hear an update.

      1. Bree*

        Scripps grad here, also.

        The idea that women’s college students won’t encounter men when they’re at school is one of the many ludicrous statements in this post. Cross-registration is a thing!

        1. Marketing Queen*

          Fellow Scripps grad here! That was one of the things that drew me to Scripps – the consortium allowed me to get the benefits of a women’s college while also getting the benefits of a larger school through the 5-college consortium.

          1. Sam Yao*

            Smith here. I had male professors, had male students in a good handful of my classes, performed in 5-college music groups with men, and dated plenty of men during school. I did not expect or want to be separated from all men during my college career as though I’d be locked up behind the convent walls! Good gravy.

          2. JustaTech*

            Mudder here, and as much as the inter-school rivalries were funny, no one thought that the Scripps students were dumb, or that classes at Scripps were “easy”.
            Heck, I specifically never took a class at Scripps because I knew I didn’t have the time!

            1. MW*

              Just popping in to say hi from a CMC grad! Always nice to see 5C folks out and about on the interwebs. :)

          3. alumna*

            Yep! I went to Barnard and took many of my classes at Columbia. This woman’s letter is so weird… if I wanted some sort of cloistered, man-less, coddling experience, I wouldn’t have chosen a highly competitive college in New York City!

          5. Flower*

            Yeah, the 5Cs are especially integrated across campuses (also Scrippsie!) but I was under the impression that most women’s colleges had that sort of relationship with at least one other school.

        2. Ros*

          Fellow Scripps grad here! (Calss of 12, any chance I know y’all?)

          OP’s feelings are silly on their face, and any genuine investigation into why people create and attend women’s institutions would show her that.

          Amazing how strongly-held this belief seems to be for her when she’s had, apparently, no actualy curiousity about it!

          1. Stephanie*

            Oh I found the Scripps grads – Class of ’11! What a bewildering letter this was and very curious if the writer has similar feelings about HBCUs

            1. Teapot Unionist*

              People have a different belief about HBCUs, but it is just a racist as the writer’s internalized sexism is sexist.

        3. Bread Crimes*

          I very nearly went to Scripps, and probably would have done better in my chosen field(s) if I had. I gave up on one of the two majors I was going to dual-major in because with every successive class in the program, there were fewer women in the class, and it started to feel oppressive and uncomfortable, even without any of the male students doing anything particularly hostile.

        4. Relentlessly Socratic*

          I attended William Smith (as in Hobart William Smith) for a year. Heck, my dorm was coed. Great school, but I did myself the disservice of getting only a T/Th class schedule for the second two trimesters of my first year and, well, that much weekend wasn’t good for my studies and I was invited to leave. I experienced no coddling or privilege as a result of my poor choices…

        5. Warrior Princess Xena*

          I’m assuming that you’re allowed to go off campus on these colleges, correct? If so, then you’ll also encounter men (and other people in general for that matter) in stores, workplaces, restaurants, churches, parks, etc.

        6. JB*

          Scripps grad ’16!

          This letter reminded me so much of an article a CMCer wrote against women’s colleges when I was a sophomore. We were all riled up talking about it before Core II one day and our professor overheard our conversation and just dryly said, “Oh, another one?” in a way that indicated someone would publish something absurd against women’s colleges once every few years like clockwork.

    5. Not Tom, Just Petty*

      Carlow University. Pittsburgh, PA. Transferred from a state school to a private school that cost twice at much (in the 90s, didn’t have loans, so not egregious, just saying…) because they had a better degree program.

    6. No Longer Gig-less Data Analyst*

      Mother of an Alverno grad here. YIKES on a bike this letter made me so angry. I almost with I could run into someone like this IRL so I could give them a piece of my mind.

      1. OyHiOh*

        Attended Alverno for a couple semesters (didn’t qualify for better need scholarships, sadly), was a transformative experience that I do not regret.

        2. Eater of Hotdish*

          Same here! Sometimes I wonder how my experience would have been different if I’d gone to a women’s college. Maybe I would have learned academic bravery a little sooner. But the past is past.

        1. Barnard Grad '12!*

          Co-signing! I also went to an all-girls performing arts camp growing up which was so instrumental for me in forming friendships and fostering creative/intellectual partnerships with other women that when I had the chance to go to a women’s college with access to the larger Columbia community, it was a no-brainer!

          Is it possible this woman hasn’t felt supported by women in her own career, and therefore feels…envious of the experience? I have compassion for her, if this is the case. If you see people having gotten an opportunity that you haven’t, it can foster bitterness. Maybe she is conflating ‘coddling’ with ‘community.’

          1. EPLawyer*

            Oooh I wonder if that’s it. I didn’t get support so why should anyone else learn in a place with those supports? Look how tough it made it me, no one handed me anything, so why should they have it easy.

            Yes, OP please examine why you have this feeling towards Women’s Colleges that is just so hostile towards them.

            1. Underemployed Erin*

              Some people who don’t have supportive relationships with other women are not jealous of those relationships. They just don’t realize that they are missing them.

              For example, all the people in this thread talking about being one of a handful of women in a STEM field may not have the opportunity to build those kinds of relationships.

              I am a woman who took a lot of STEM classes and went into STEM fields, and the first time, after high school, where I had positive relationships with other women was basically a mom’s group after I had a child. Before then, I would be one of a very small number of women in any given room.

              I now have better relationships with women in my field, and they supported me in navigating switching into a different STEM field.

            2. Zephy*

              I would bet money this OP thought, maybe even said, some regrettable things about the general concept of women as a very young teenager, and then spent the next quarter-century somehow stuck in that headspace. It’s very “Not Like Other Girls.” I don’t know how you hold on to those ideas while interacting with those so-called “other girls,” so maybe she somehow didn’t? Who can say. Hopefully she’s able to work on this bias and overcome it.

      2. Strong beautiful Barnard women represent!*

        +1

        I chose it because I loved the vibe, the campus, the structure of their core requirements (especially in contrast to the CU core classes), and still got the benefit of taking whatever I wanted across the street. The fact that it’s a women’s college was not actually a major factor for me, but there’s nothing wrong with preferring that.

        Letter writer, you don’t hate women from women’s colleges. You hate *women*, and make exceptions for ones you think work hard enough to qualify as not “just” women.

        You shouldn’t be in charge of everyone, especially since you think getting over bias just means learning to hold your nose and tolerate the women you hate so much.

        This is frankly one of the most disgustingly hateful and misogynist letters I’ve ever read here. I hope it’s fake.

        1. Minerva*

          Yeah, the misogyny is definitely coming from inside the house here.

          There is so much “justification” in this letter that methinks the LW was genuinely hoping that somehow her feelings on Women’s Colleges would be at least partially validated here. Ugh.

          1. The Prettiest Curse*

            I got strong Margaret Thatcher vibes from this letter. She almost never wanted to work with or promote other women, for a variety of reasons. Ironically enough, Thatcher went to a (now co-educational women’s college at Oxford.

        2. Cam*

          The thing that gets ME the most? LW is so smug in her irrational beliefs, she doesn’t even seem to realize just how badly her hateful views are impacting her own career. Management ignored her input on the new candidate, hired this woman anyway, then pulled LW aside and essentially told her to grow up. Even if management doesn’t know the sordid details, they already view her as a bit of a loose cannon.

          2. Barnard '13*

            Yes, this. OP should be worried about the way her colleagues and management see her. It’s one thing for us to pile on and excoriate OP for her crummy and completely unfounded (disproven!) bias, but GIRL! Your boss sees it too. And SAID something to you about it. Check yourself.

            1. Me ... Just Me*

              That’s what I was thinking. OP was acting so unprofessional during the interview that she was pulled aside by her boss afterwards and basically told to “knock it off”. OP, your boss has their eye on you.

    9. Smith grad who feels great about her decision*

      Smith, same. Especially since where I went to college has actually opened doors for me. The idea it would shut some for others makes me want to scream.

      1. smithie too*

        Fellow Smithie. Smith was by far the CHEAPEST option for me– far cheaper than any of the state universities, and I wanted to go to a co-ed school but was told I was going to the place that gave me the most money, full stop.

        1. Yorick*

          This is such a huge reason for college decisions, it’s almost never a good idea to judge someone based on what school they went to.

      3. Proud women college grad*

        Incredibly incensed over here too. Went to a small women’s college and then went on to get a PhD in biomedical sciences at Johns Hopkins. My experience at that college had me prepared on many different levels as well if not better than my classmates from coed colleges. Curious how the LW would grapple with those two facts on a resume.

      4. Vathena*

        Smithie here too, and my blood pressure is up to dangerously high levels after reading this letter. In equal measure, I feel sorry for this LW that she can’t understand the power of the educational atmosphere of a women’s college. LW, seriously, reread your letter and replace “women’s college” with “HBCU” – perhaps you will see why there is such umbrage taken to your attitude! It’s laughable that you think there is no reason for people to seek out a school environment where they feel empowered and valued as students and people. You think that being surrounded by obnoxious frat boys provides a better educational experience for women? I shudder. Also, I’m guessing you’re not sniffing with disdain over grads of the very well-endowed Ivy League schools.
        (Oh and here I am married to a man, having dated many men, worked with many men, my boss of 14 years is a man, and two of my best friends in the world are men. So there.)

      5. Smithie 4*

        Smith STEM major here. Smaller class sizes meant I got more time with professors. Large endowments meant that undergrads had access to materials, processes, and training that we’d never have had at a larger school. I learned scanning electron microscope preparation and usage when normally that’s only available to graduate students.

        Smith and Mt Holyoke also have programs in place to allow students to take classes at any of the 5 colleges in Pioneer Valley. That means that of course there were men in some of our classes. And we could take classes at UMass or at Amherst or Hampshire. It’s not like men stopped existing on our campus.

        When I graduated, my mom said I was a different person. I wasn’t as shy. I was comfortable speaking my mind and challenging the status quo. I was able to deal with diversity of thought and build a well-reasoned case for why I thought something was true. It gave me confidence in the person I became.

        1. speegee the smithie*

          Another Smithie! I chose Smith for a lot of reasons, but one of the big ones is that my HS academics weren’t quite strong enough for the co-ed Ivy League schools, and Smith provided a similar quality education and alum network, plus I actually had a chance of getting in. At 18, I wasn’t sure how I felt about going to a school only with women/non-cismen, but I was willing to give it a try. Now I can say it was a truly transformative experience. I learned so much about myself, so much academically, made so many critical friendships, and still rely on my Smithie network to this day, for everything from cat community (love ya, SWLC!) to job advice, to deep emotional support. Like many have said, if anything, going to a women’s college made me more independent, more confident, and more competent. It wasn’t about avoiding men (although for real, sometimes avoiding men is a perfectly logical choice), nor did it make me unprepared to work with half the population. I hope OP can move past her bias.

          1. Vathena*

            SWLC gives me life! Yes, I remember meeting current Smith students as a prospective, noticing how confidently they carried themselves, and thinking, “I want that!” And the network has never let me down.

            Forgot to mention above- my male boss (with whom I work very well) is all puffed up with pride these days- his daughter just started her first year at Smith. She’s a badass science whiz, not a Princess!

            1. Vathena*

              Oh and- to add to the list of elected officials who have attended women’s colleges, you may have heard of US Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisc, Smith ‘84). And she has to appeal to and work with some of the most obnoxious men.

          2. Cat loving Smithie*

            Another Smithie here (and SWLC memeber, hi!!!!) – concur on all this. Just had to pipe in my anger and also frustration at this writer (and also Alison’s) exclusion of our trans and non-binary sibs who attended our schools.

      6. Stitch*

        I didn’t go to Smith but my best friend from high school did. She picked Smith because of the programs they offered. She is not sheltered or coddled.

        2. nelliebelle1197*

          People are probably wondering why we are so excited but there are so few of us it is exciting to find each other in the wild!

      1. AGD*

        I’m an Ivy Leaguer and am also furious. My friends and colleagues from women’s colleges were better-prepared than I was for adult life because the academic quality was comparable (as far as I can tell) and they’d learned far more about how systemic inequality works in the real world.

    12. CaptainHook*

      I chose a women’s college because it had the top ranked program nationally for my degree, was in my state (no out of state tuition to deal with) and was close to my parents (one hour) in case I needed to commute for some reason (I didn’t – I lucked out with great roommates all four years).

      The LW needs to see things from a different perspective.

      1. Not Your Admin Ass(t)*

        Yeah, the writer’s letter drips with both internalized misogyny and class privilege–even if she didn’t come from the upper crust herself.

    13. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

      My mom pushed me to go to a woman’s college and I objected for the reasons the LW wrote (e.g. I needed to learn to compete with men, I needed to be “tougher”) and went to a public university. In grad school we had a lot of Vassar, Bryn Mawr, and Wellesley alums and I realized my biases were unfounded. Many of the international students I met went because it was the only way their parents would let them go to college in the US. My only issues with women’s college grads ended up being the same one I had with expensive private school grads: many were from such a privileged background they legit couldn’t imagine people who actually had to work to pay tuition and could do unpaid internships. If the LW doesn’t have issues with Ivy or Stanford grads around being coddled and precious, they shouldn’t have them around women’s college grads.

      1. Observer*

        If the LW doesn’t have issues with Ivy or Stanford grads around being coddled and precious, they shouldn’t have them around women’s college grads.

        That’s an excellent point. But that assumes that the OP has any factual basis whatsoever for her biases. And she doesn’t.

        1. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

          Oh yeah. The LW sounds like young me and I am cringing so hard. You are just wrong, LW, about all the things on this one. You have already let your bias show to your boss. This is bad.

      2. The Real Fran Fine*

        My only issues with women’s college grads ended up being the same one I had with expensive private school grads: many were from such a privileged background they legit couldn’t imagine people who actually had to work to pay tuition and could do unpaid internships.

        I went to a private university on the East Coast, didn’t come from a privileged background at all, but did experience roommates who just didn’t get how I could be on scholarships and had to work a work study job and do a co-op at the same time because my co-op was unpaid and I needed the money. It just didn’t seem to compute. None of them had to work, so they didn’t, and I don’t know if I’d say they were “coddled” per se, but they certainly didn’t have the same struggles I did coming from a single parent household.

        1. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

          I went to an Ivy for grad school and walked in assuming that everyone working at the university in service jobs was work/study like it was at my undergrad. I confused the crap out of a lot of security guards and food service staff because I asked what they were studying and I didn’t “get” how they could work for these jobs and not be work/study. I was the only person in my class who had ever worked to pay for more than funsies. It was a weird experience

        2. Anonymous*

          I went to a co-ed, not particularly ivy league school and I still met people who didn’t understand that the rest of us might not have a full wallet without working.

          (Along with people who didn’t understand that you have to remove lint from the dryer lint trap, but that’s I guess just something that people fail to teach teenagers across the board.)

          1. louvella*

            Also went to a co-ed, not particularly prestigious private university and things that were said to me include:
            “My family goes to Europe every summer! We don’t have a lot of money, travel is just a priority to us. Like, my parents drive older cars.”
            (My parents…also drove older cars. And sometimes we could afford to go camping.)
            “You have to pay for your own text books? Oh my parents pay for my text books, they’re really great.”
            (My parents weren’t not great…they just weren’t able to help in that way.)
            “You’re so lucky that you get work study!”
            (It was my only spending money for things like toiletries and text books and occasional actual fun stuff. Would have been way cooler to have a parent-provided credit card like a lot of my classmates!)

        3. Honk*

          I went to a public but prestigious university in Australia. One thing I will never forget is riding a bus to uni behind someone insisting that we didn’t have a class system.

      3. Elle by the sea*

        I went to an Ivy and another institution which is not technically an Ivy but in the same league (both in Boston, not hard to guess). Had quite a few employers and prospective employers who had massive biases against me. I worked with someone who just casually told me: “Look, this place is different from what you are used to. Here we have meritocracy- it’s about talent and hard work instead of just money and connections”. If she had been put in one of the aforementioned two institutions, I can guarantee that she wouldn’t have survived there for a single day.

        It’s okay to have biases, but you should work hard not to manifest them, especially in professional situations. It’s great that the LW at least took the first steps towards eradicating their biases by recognising that they, in fact, had biases

      4. Jaydee*

        I had similar beliefs about women’s colleges when I was in high school and looking at colleges (so late ‘90s). As an adult, I’ve realized those beliefs were 100% the product of misogyny – e.g. the idea that things specifically for women are ‘less than’ things specifically for men; the idea that women need to compete with men to prove ourselves;

          1. Butterfly Counter*

            Ha! Same.

            Also, I wanted to date (dudes). I didn’t date much in high school and figured college would be my time to shine. Joke was on me, though. Admissions miscalculated acceptance rate for my class, trying for equal admissions for men and women. Instead, the woman/man ratio was 4 to 1. Most of my classes had no men and the rest had maybe a couple. I got a woman’s college experience without going to one. And it was one of the best things that ever happened to me. I grew confident in my voice, respected by my professors, and was able to figure out some of the rest of my life as a result.

            And I didn’t date, like, at all. *sigh*

            1. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

              The wanting to have sex with dudes was a big motivator for me to go co-ed. I like sex with men a whole bunch and did back then too, so all women’s school was missing a key extra-curricular

              1. nelliebelle1197*

                Yeah, it does not really work that way. There were plenty of opportunities at women’s colleges for dating no matter the gender.

                1. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

                  I know that now, but at 16-17 it never would have occurred to me. I don’t think I was able to fully imagine that college wasn’t like HS and you mostly only knew folks from your school and didn’t have anyone to ask because no adults I knew went to college

    15. SC Grad*

      Stephens College grad here, agree with all this. My scholarships allowed me to graduate without student loans which was such a gift.

      1. Books and Cooks*

        Hey hey Stephens! I was accepted but didn’t get to go, for a number of reasons, but I loved my weekend there and everyone I met–a gorgeous, welcoming campus!

        Personally, I support single-sex education for BOTH sexes.

    16. Br16*

      Barnard! I’m pretty frustrated by these assumptions. I do NOT need to be coddled and I work perfectly well with my male coworkers.

    20. commonsensesometimesmakessense*

      I went co-ed for college, but I was in a girl’s school grades 5 through 12. I actually switched to my all girl’s school in elementary school because I developed early and was being bullied and harassed by the adolescent boys. Should I have been obligated to live with that because I will need to deal with boys/men in the real world? No one would say that! At least I certainly hope not. Boys and men still have a lot to learn about their behavior towards women. Women have a lot to learn about it too, apparently. So, until that happens, I do not blame any woman who chooses to protect herself during her educational, social, and professional development!

    22. Beth*

      I went to a co-ed college and I’m ALSO pissed off — not just at the stated bias against women’s colleges, but all the layers of bad reasoning wrapped around it. If I caught that vibe from a manager or prospective manager, it might be enough on its own for me to decline the job.

    23. michelenyc*

      Reading this pissed me off as well and I didn’t even go to a women’s college but I have a few friends that went to Mount Holyoke.

    24. Up and Away*

      I (also a woman) went to a co-ed public state school, and even I feel like biting down on my glass straw and chewing it after reading this letter.

    25. Elle by the sea*

      Same here. Not a Wellesley grad myself, but taught many amazing and talented Wellesley grads and collaborated with many people from there during my tenure in Massachusetts.

      Also, you don’t always get to choose where you go to college just like that – it’s always multifactorial.

    27. Irish Teacher*

      My college wasn’t all women when I went there, but it used to be prior to the ’60s and was still over 80% women when I attended so I feel some affinity.

    28. gov anon*

      St. Mary’s College, Notre Dame alum. Please excuse me while I retrieve my eyebrows from the ceiling and my jaw from the floor. OP’s letter reeks of misogyny. And that is why there is still a place for Women’s Colleges.

      And I work great with my male co-workers.

        1. AY*

          St. Mary’s College is in the town of Notre Dame, Indiana (yes, Notre Dame is a separate city from South Bend)

    29. Ally McBeal*

      I worked at one of the Seven Sisters – one that is academically integrated with a nearby coed university – for several years and genuinely could not get past the first couple paragraphs. Female students from the coed U would regularly express that their classes on our HWCU campus were a much better experience because the dudebros who attended the coed U were insufferable and too frequently enabled by the dudebro professors there.

      This letter just screams ‘internalized misogyny’ to me, and I’m speaking as someone who very deeply internalized the misogyny of my politically and religiously conservative upbringing and outright refused to even consider an HWCU when I was doing my own college searches back in the day. It took working in a deeply misogynistic industry to realize exactly how bad sexism is and switch over to working at an HWCU.

      1. Unaccountably*

        There is so much internalized misogyny in this letter. SO much. 100% of it is “How dare women have educational and life experiences that aren’t centered around men! Don’t they know they’ll have to live in the far superior world that is justly run by men?”

        I went to co-ed schools and I can’t with the amount of misogynistic contempt in this letter.

    30. Chauncy Gardener*

      Wheaton College alum (back when it was all women) here feeling quite peeved
      I’m just….speechless. What the actual heck? How do you even GET this opinion/bias in the first place?

    33. New anon*

      Women’s prep school grad here. Alison’s response is spot on. There’s more than an “undercurrent” of justification in this letter; justifying LW’s dislike is the main content of the letter.

      And in any context, whenever I see someone arguing “that money could be used to help so many more people,” it’s an immediate non-starter for me. The donors donated it TO THAT PURPOSE, not to be used for a different purpose as LW sees fit. Infuriating and illogical. If the college weren’t available to be the recipient, the money would go to the donors’ second, third, fourth choices of use (whether a different nonprofit, personal use, etc.), not just be freely available to benefit women everywhere. Hope LW takes Alison’s advice to heart.

      I don’t hold this next bias personally, but I know plenty of people assume a woman at a large state school is there to find a husband and has no intention of pursuing a professional career. It’s nonsensical to me that someone would assume a women’s college grad was somehow LESS serious a professional than a women going to college just to find a spouse (although clearly LW is selectively biased against only certain women).

      1. MsM*

        Here on behalf of my Sweet Briar grad friend, and also steamed. If OP wants proof an all-female educational environment doesn’t coddle women or fail to prepare them for challenges, she can just look at all the work y’all put into saving your school when I honestly did not think it was possible.

        1. M*

          Seriously, Hollins alum here and we were all happily shocked at how motivated and quickly coordinated Sweet Briar alumni became to save their school. It was amazing to see.

      2. Dana Whittaker*

        Did not attend Sweet Briar but as a fellow women’s college alum (Mount Mary in Milwaukee ‘93), contributed significantly to the capital campaign to keep it open. And had I known there was a college whose color was pink, I definitely would have applied!

    35. Katefish*

      Hi from an Agnes Scott Scottie, and same! My college’s huge endowment allowed for a very diverse undergrad (good scholarships) I treasure.

      1. Aitch Arr*

        Some info:

        Women’s colleges, on average, enroll 13 percent more students of color and 11 percent more low-income students than similar co-ed schools. Also, women’s colleges have on average much smaller endowments.

        1. Aitch Arr*

          Sorry, I keep thinking of more things to say, because I’m fired up.

          We have switched to referring to MHC as a ‘historically women’s college,’ since the college admits (and have for several years officially and even longer unofficially) trans men and non-binary students. We also admit trans women.

      2. FridayFriyay*

        MoHo here too. What an absurd letter. I hope the LW can get some much needed perspective from Alison’s response and the comments.

    38. AlpacaMyBags*

      Meredith College grad here – haven’t regretted attending it for even a MOMENT. Incredible opportunities came out of there, connections that are strong to this day, and I ENJOYED learning. I felt challenged in everything I did, not coddled. I was pushed to travel, pushed to excel, pushed to expand my worldview because my faculty KNEW me in a way they wouldn’t have at a massive state institution, which is exactly why I chose Meredith in the first place. What a strange thing to have such a strong, negative opinion about, honestly. I wonder what caused it?

      Also, your #3 point about men’s colleges being banned – Hampden Sydney, a MEN’S COLLEGE, would like to disagree with you.

    39. Burnt Out*

      Sweet Briar STEM grad here.

      This letter writer has trapped themselves in a box with their own thoughts and opinions, on a subject that apparently affects their hiring decisions, without doing any research into the topic at all. Your tone really does yell “I’m right to believe this!” with a generous side dish of “I don’t even need to check my facts, I’m so right.”

      I think that self-righteousness is far more problematic than any individual opinion that you hold, simply because it means you will likely never feel a need to check your facts, your opinions, or accept that a person who disagrees with you has a valid point you never considered. All of which make you dangerous for an applicant pool.

    40. Notorious*

      Annoyed Sweet Briar grad commenting…. and reminding OP that yes, there are all male colleges out there. Hampden-Sydney, Morehouse, Wabash & Saint John’s….

    41. I&I*

      Okay, OP, you’re getting a lot of people pretty ticked off with you here, but I’m going to try a slightly different approach. I assume that you don’t WANT to hold this bias because you wrote in, so let’s talk about that.

      Heads up, I’m going to talk about abuse. Promise I’m going somewhere with it, and I’ll avoid details, but feel free to skip.

      Someone I love grew up in … let’s say Blankland, a nation where certain kinds of abuses by certain kinds of people in authority were a serious but secret problem. Since their young day, the issue has been brought to light more and at least some things have been done to hold those responsible to account.

      The person I love finds this angering. They tend to assume that a lot of it is blown out of proportion, that people need to understand things were different back then, that the authority figures were struggling with various issues, that people are getting too self-righteous and judgmental, etc etc. This from a person who usually goes out of their way to help vulnerable people.

      But here’s the thing. They grew up in those Blankland times. Back then, getting properly outraged about it would get you nothing but trouble. Understanding things from the authorities’ point of view was a form of self-protection. If you can see their humanity then you don’t have to feel surrounded by monsters, and if you understand how they think then you have some chance of anticipating them.

      And that angry note I hear in what you write is the same angry note I hear when they talk about Blankland trying to fix some of its mess. To protect themselves, they had to learn a certain way of thinking, and that way of thinking … has its drawbacks.

      As well as looking into the facts on why women’s colleges aren’t a soft option, maybe ask yourself: who does this bias of yours protect you against? Who might be a threat to you if you had the opposite view?

      I don’t know you or your past, so maybe I’m way off base here. But is it possible that the anger is powered by the part of you that’s trying to stay safe shouting, ‘Hey, danger, DANGER! This is the kind of attitude that gets you into trouble!’? Because if so, the first woman you have to give some kindness is yourself.

    46. Mimmy*

      1995 graduate of an all-women’s Catholic college in New Jersey here! Although I did pick this particular school because of its learning disability services, I do not believe I was coddled in any way. It was an excellent school and is now co-ed and achieved university status maybe 15 years ago.

      I get a sense that OP realizes her bias is irrational but can’t change her mindset. I encourage her to really think about this. Perhaps ask questions of those of us who attended all-women’s colleges. That’s what I would suggest to anyone wanting to learn more about people they may have a bias against.

    47. AeroEngineer*

      Smithie here, and I agree!

      I am now in a field where Women are a tiny fraction, and without Smith I would never had made it this far. Honestly, academically, Smith was way harder and more rigerous than my masters ever was, and my masters University was one of the highest rated in it’s field. Coddled, definitely not.

      Smith made me better at working with men as I know my worth and know that I am just as good as the men on my team, if not better in some fields. It helped me ignore the undermining of male classmates and colleagues after graduation.

      Honestly she will probably be more prepared to deal with you and your bias than you will be dealing with her.

    48. Barnard Bear 2010*

      Changed my name for this one for privacy reasons – proud Barnard grad here. LW is the reason I list my education as Columbia on my resume :( That and the one time I overheard an applicant for a role in my department (at a previous job), who was a Columbia grad, shit-talking Barnard to my boss.

      He did not get hired. I don’t know what he thought he was accomplishing. I was already established and had a great reputation. My boss was on my side, by default, and that extended to supporting or even defending my choices re:education.

      1. Barnard 99*

        Hi Barnard 2010! Please forgive me for being a nosy older Barnard grad–but I hope you correct your resume!

        1. Barnard Bear 2010*

          I should have said “listED”! I’m not currently job hunting, I’ve been in this role close to a decade now, but my updated resume proudly showcases Barnard. When I was younger and with less experience to market myself on, I was much more insecure and vulnerable to people’s perceptions and biases.

          The OP has shaken my nerve some, but I realize her attitude is a her problem, not a me problem, and if she wants to lose out on top talent (and potentially get her employer in legal trouble, if this letter is traced back to her or this discriminatory, misogynistic attitude is otherwise proven), she’s welcome to it!

    49. sunset hills*

      +1 from this Mills grad. Point 4 about the endowment really stings given we just went co-ed due to money woes.

  4. Shenandoah*

    I don’t have a ton to add to Alison’s response but regarding OP’s #3: there are still men only universities! A couple from the Wikipedia article:
    Wabash College, Crawfordsville, Indiana
    Hampden–Sydney College, Hampden Sydney, Virginia
    Morehouse College, Atlanta, Georgia (has some co-educational cross-registration with other institutions)

    1. Belle of the Midwest*

      We live about 45 minutes away from Wabash and yes, it’s still a men’s college. Rose Hulman Institute of Technology was also a men’s school until 1994 or so.

      1. ThatGirl*

        Rose is still about 75% male, too – I went to college not too far away and the guys would come to our campus looking for girls :P

        1. Belle of the Midwest*

          My husband is a Rose alum (pre-coed days) and I have a pretty good idea where the young men went to meet young women. There is a public university in the same town as well as what used to be a women’s college (I think it’s gone co-ed as well by now).

      2. Ms. Hagrid Frizzle*

        My father is a Rose Hulman grad. I am a female born in 1991 and he was VERY excited when the school opened up to women because he really wanted me to be an engineer.

        Alas, I did not attend (and am not an engineer). Thankfully he’s come around to realizing both I and the world are better off for those choices :P

    2. bee*

      I work at a religious (not Christian) university that has separate men’s and women’s campuses. It’s definitely still a thing!

    3. zuzu*

      OP might be confusing the gender integration of VMI and The Citadel via lawsuit with “men’s colleges aren’t allowed to exist.”

      VMI and The Citadel are both state institutions, and lost in court when they tried to keep women out (and earlier, when they tried to keep Black men out) because equality overrides tradition and gatekeeping. That’s not a concern with private men’s colleges, because they’re not arms of the state.

      HBCU’s, even when they are state institutions, avoid this problem by never actually prohibiting people from other races from attending. Some do, but most self-select out because they’re not down for the experience they’d be signing up for.

      1. Seeking Second Childhood*

        I actually recently read elseweb about how many historically black colleges in the universities are now open to all, to the point where many have a lower percentage of black students than other races.

    4. DJ Acid Reflux*

      I was going to bring up Hampden-Sydney too. I’m from Virginia and Hampden-Sydney connotes a very specific type of man (rich and white), who by virtue of attending that institution is connected to a lot of other rich, white men who tend to hire each other for prestigious jobs. It would seem there’s a bias associated with graduates of such all-male institutions… but a very different type of bias, no?

      1. Catosaur*

        Which is hilarious to me, because my little brother went to Hampden-Sydney and neither he nor any of his friends there had any economic privilege. My brother still doesn’t (though I can’t speak for his friends).

        1. Former Gifted Kid*

          Not to get into a side argument, but I wonder how you are defining economic privilege. My husband went to Hampden-Sydney (for two years, before transferring). His best friend from that time often says that they became friends because they were the two poorest kids at the school. My husband grew up solidly middle class in the suburbs and definitely considers himself to have grown up economically privileged. DJ Acid Reflux’s description of Hampden-Sydney is much more in line with my husband’s experience.

          1. Sir Nose d'Voidoffunk*

            Another Virginian here, and while I think you’re right, I can definitely think of multiple guys I knew who didn’t get into any colleges they initially applied to and wound up at HSC. So they definitely have plenty of non-rich kids there, but it also has a not-entirely-undeserved rep of “They’ll admit you if you/your folks can afford the tuition.”

            Another factor in that is that the “good old boy” alumni network there is extremely strong. I swear I mean that in the nicest way possible. Good lord, those guys network and look out for each other. (To keep it in the realm of formerly all-male colleges, VMI has that reputation as well.)

    5. academic fibro warrior*

      Can verify about Morehouse! It’s part of the Atlanta University Center Consortium of Spelman, Clark Atlanta, and a seminary (Morehouse School of Medicine is independent). All private. Clark is co-ed. Spelman and Morehouse collaborate closely for social college things that tend to be gender differentiated. But like Spike Lee, who graduated Morehouse, took most of his major classes at Clark because Clark has a film major that Morehouse didn’t. All schools welcome students of all races and socioeconomic status. A number of international students from African countries attend there. All sexual and gender identities are welcome and a home can be found on these campuses.

      I went to a PWI state school for all my degrees because I thought some of these things as a teen and honestly? Seeing the lifelong bonds and social and academic benefits of a same sex school at these HBCUs is stunning. I was clearly an idiot at 16 when I picked my college. Grads from my undergrad don’t spend weeks and weeks giving back at their Alma mater decades after moving on. The supposed family like network from my undergrad has completely failed to materialize.

      I contributed to an academic article on sexist barriers in higher education. It’s insane how misogynistic college often still is, never mind racism. It’s insane how embedded it is everywhere. This letter made me really sad.

    6. Vixen*

      My husband went to Hampden-Sydney. All men still, cool place, not banned at all. He’s also not from a wealthy family. Married 16 years, together 22 since I met him on a visit from my women’s college about an hour away. I turned out fine as well.

  5. Moi*

    I agree with you that the idea of colleges only open to women feels icky however they may have great graduates and great academic programs and people may have chosen to go there for that reason.

      1. TechWorker*

        I am not ‘Moi’ but generally women only does produce a mild feeling of ‘idk’ in me because a perfect world it wouldn’t be necessary. But it’s not a perfect world so *shrugs*.

        (Also I went to an all girls school and it did me a lot of good; anecdotally a lot of the women I work with in tech also went to all girls schools. Do I think gender segregated education is perfect in every way – no – but it exists for a reason).

        2. oranges*

          I went to public, co-ed schooling my whole life. A few years ago, I visited a private, all-girls high school to present a grant from my company. I was blown away with the culture relative to my school experience. I kept saying, “do you know how much more I could have focused without boys around??”

          The amount of energy we spent on talking/thinking about boys, trying to get attention from boys, caring about the girls who were popular with boys, makeup and clothes FOR boys, etc. etc. could have powered the sun.

          I’m sure these girls had their own distractions and challenges, but my HS/college school experience would have been very different, and certainly more productive, had boys not been involved.

          1. LittleMarshmallow*

            I went to a coed high school (tiny private school) but my class of 18 only had two boys… my class was one of the highest achieving classes in that schools history. No one knows why there were no boys in that class… classes typically were pretty 50/50. But it was interesting because it was a private religious school and since our class was all girls it was just expected that we took all the science classes and stuff otherwise they wouldn’t have had anyone at all in those classes.

            They generally didn’t discourage girls from stem clases though either. It was such a small school and had a college prep focus. Anyway, going to school with mostly girls was great!

        3. Sharkie*

          I totally get what you are saying. I am from the DC area and in my county there really only 1 well rounded co-ed private high school that my sister and I went to. I applied to all the all girls schools for high school (alot of my friends went to all girls) and my sister did go to a well known all girls school for middle school. While in my experience I have seen the nastier parts of single sex education and know it is 10000% not for me I can see how it can empower other women!

          Also OP why is where someone went to college such a sticking point for you? Once you are 5 years out it doesnt matter!!

      2. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

        I know for me it is the definition around “women” that can get icky. In the past (and still now) there was some anti-trans bias. However, women’s colleges have been doing much better work grappling with trans issues than most other colleges, so the ick has been working itself out slowly and will hopefully disappear into gender inclusivity.

        1. HoHumDrum*

          Yeah, my alma mater basically admits anyone who isn’t a cis man now. I’m so proud of my school for recognizing how expansive a “women’s” space can and should be.

      3. Qwerty*

        Not Moi, but I’ll try to describe why I would have felt something was off about them in the past.

        For context – I do not currently see them as icky, but as a necessity.

        Back in my naive and optimistic days, I was against mens-only spaces therefore gender-segregated spaces seemed a relic of the past so we could all come together in harmony. It felt weird to barge in and tell men to deal with my presence, then turn around and have an org with a “no boys allowed” sign. Especially because I was surrounded by men, knew mostly men, so the visualization was excluding my very kind supportive friends who building a better new world with me.

        Nowadays, the image of excluded people is of all the creeps, domineering “alphas”, and sexist dudes I encounter regularly. I know that studies on gender segregated learning are that ladies learn better but guys learn worse. That feeling of “icky” might have better been described as a feeling towards the need for women-only spaces, but I couldn’t have articulated it back then.

        1. Sam I Am*

          Well, “off” and “icky” aren’t the same. Icky implies gross.
          But to your point, it sounds like you think differently now.

        2. Hannah Lee*

          I didn’t attend a all-women university, but in retrospect, I think it would have been a good experience for me.

          I was a bio major, pre-med in undergrad and SO MUCH of the undergrad instruction was … it’s not that it catered to men purposely, but I just remember lectures, assignments, class discussion that was often dominated by male (and mostly white) voices, even when the instructor seemed to be trying to make space for others to participate. Some of it was that I wasn’t super assertive, came from a poor family and didn’t have an understanding of what resources were available to me … basic stuff like office hours meaning the professor was available to talk to you, one on one, about whatever class topic, assignment you needed, wanted guidance, support on. And that you wouldn’t be bothering the prof or seen as less than if you went.
          So my voice, needs were easily drowned out by louder, pushier, or just more assertive, ambitious voices or people who understood how things worked. But also there was a bias from the instructors too. I still remember scheduling time to meet with my advisor to talk about course selections and what career paths made sense to explore – I’d been pre-med but was now wondering whether some other allied health or research path would be a better fit… and 10 minutes in a male classmate happened to walk by and popped his head in … and he and my advisor chatted away about the guy’s latest soccer match, his dental school applications, and eventually the two of them got up and walked off leaving me behind. It was clear that Jimmy’s education, future was a priority over mine to Dr B. And then there were little things that didn’t take into account basic safety issues … like having to schedule independent lab time when you could get it which often meant working alone in the basement of a building until 10-11pm or later, and then having to walk clear across campus in the dead of night to get back to the dorms. Or the lab sessions of required courses also being held at night. The guys didn’t think twice about it, but for women, they had to consider safety … how would they move around the campus at night, often alone if they were the only woman in their session, or doing their independent lab work … did the guy’s have to think about finding someone to walk with? Did the schedulers consider physical safety or just the course calendar and room availability?

          Part of me wonders whether spending at least the first couple of college years at a women’s only college would have been a better fit for me. Not because I needed to be coddled, but as a 17-18-19 year old, I could have used the space to *develop* confidence, to hear my own voice, and to learn how to make that voice, my ideas, my questions heard in an environment where someone would actually be listening and would see developing those skills as critical to my education and path in life. I figured it out, eventually, but if I could have tackled it sooner, it would have been a good thing.

          1. Chirpy*

            Same, while I do appreciate my coed college, I do wonder if going to a women’s college might have been better for me at the time. I was coming from a middle/ high school environment with a lot of male-perpetrated bullying, and while my male college friends (who were largely laid back but anti-dating religious types, which actually made it easier to talk to them because no pressure for dates) made me able to better handle being around men, I do wish I’d had more help actually dealing with that trauma, and more female role models/people who might have had more experience or understanding about what I’d been through, to help my confidence.

    3. TinyLibrarian*

      They DO have great graduates and great academic programs, and people chose to go to ANY college for a variety of reasons, none of which are anyone else’s business.

    4. Sylvan*

      Why? What’s gross about only having female classmates? What do boys bring to the classroom that’s essential for girls to learn?

      Or vice versa — there are men’s institutions, too.

      1. High Score!*

        It feels icky to me because the world is full of both men and women. They should be learning to work together and support & respect each other.
        What if they get elected to a public office and cannot be alone with another person of the opposite sex?

        1. JimmyJab*

          Do you think women-only colleges keep women sequestered from men entirely, and that somehow they were similarly sequestered before and after college? This is such a weird question and seemingly irrelevant to the discussion here.

        2. TinyLibrarian*

          That is… a really weird take on what women’s colleges are and do. Perhaps read some of the links Alison posted.

        4. Sylvan*

          Why would going to a single-gender school keep you from working with the other gender or being alone with them?

          1. The Real Fran Fine*

            Right. As many people upthread mentioned, they went to women’s colleges and had male professors, so it’s not like they never encountered men at all.

        5. HoHumDrum*

          Going to a women’s college actually significantly improved my ability to work with men. Prior to that experience I thought I was comfortable with men and confident about stating ideas to them. It was only after being in classes where women were the predominant (not only!) group that I realized how much I shaped the things I said and did by how I thought men would view them. Being able to suddenly see how patriarchy impacted my life deeper than I ever would have realized it helped me understand so much better how to work within it.

          2. Butterfly Counter*

            Exactly.

            For me, though I was always at the top of my class, growing up and going to school in the south, it was just accepted that boys/men have the priority in classes. It’s second nature and not something I even realized.

            But, as I mentioned above, when I was in classes with no other men, I realized just how much I was waiting my turn to speak up in class. In high school, the teacher asked the question, a boy would answer, discussion would go from there, and if there was any time left over, I would add my piece. I realized in a majority/only-female class that my own opinion was just as important and how much I had been waiting my turn when my turn could be first!

            1. rebelwithmouseyhair*

              yes studies have shown that when teachers intervene in seating plans, it’s always with a focus on the boys, typically separating the trouble makers at the back and making them each sit next to a girl to neutralise them.

              With the result that the girls then had to put up with harassment, and basically keep the bad guy in check, on top of trying to follow the lesson.

            2. My+Useless+2+Cents*

              Way too long ago to cite but I remember learning of a study where they were looking at gender stereotypes and were testing the “Chatty Cathy” myth. One point held up in that girls were reprimanded more for speaking during instruction and for interrupting. Interviews after observed classes supported the myth in that teachers observed girls as talking more and being disrupting to instructions. However, when looking at actual data the researchers determined that the boys accounted for 70-80% of the interrupting and on average spoke 4-5 min more than the average girl. The fact that the teachers couldn’t recognize such a clear cut bias toward a speaking girl really brought home how pervasive the issue really is. (I want to say this was a 3rd or 4th grade age class so that’s about what 10 year olds.)

          3. Slow Gin Lizz*

            For sure! Being in a women’s only environment helps us to see how much of the world caters to men. (I honestly did not really notice I was learning this at my women’s college but I love your point about that.) OP, you wrote:

            …because I want to be taken seriously as a woman, I do not support institutions that exclude men.

            You may have internalized the patriarchy so much that you do not realize how odd this statement sounds. Sometimes groups need to meet on their own in order to build up confidence and discuss issues that are not relevant to every person in society. That is one of the many benefits of “excluding men” from college environments. And this is also why it’s ok to have separate groups for marginalized populations, because they are, in a sense, one giant support group for the people who are not in power. (See also: HBCUs.)

            My friend works at a school for blind kids. She mentioned to me recently that sometimes kids are at the school for a couple of years and then go back to public school and it’s always extremely difficult for them to do so, because then not only are the kids trying to learn all the reading, writing, and ‘rithmetic that they were learning at their specialized school, they also are trying to get around in a world that is not built for them. In their specialized school they can focus more on the learning they need to do (and also have classes where they learn Braille and how to use a cane, for instance) without the extra barriers of existing in a world for sighted people. Yes, eventually they will have to get around in a world of sighted people, but if you can remove that barrier for awhile so that they don’t have to deal with it All The Time, then they learn the things they need to much more easily and quickly. Same goes for women’s colleges; removing the extra pressure, difficulties, and confusion that can exist in coed environments helps women (sure helped me) focus on academics and the extracurriculars that I took seriously when I was in college. And it’s not like men didn’t exist when I was at college, like we were on some distant planet with only women and we never interacted with men at all.

            What I learned being in a women’s only environment was an extremely high level of confidence (not arrogance) that I do not believe I would have developed being in a coed situation. I developed a wonderful group of close friends and 21 years later we still get together as often as we can (and I’m SO EXCITED that we will THIS WEEKEND) and obviously if none of us had our women’s college to go to we would not have met. I spent my senior year in an internship with the college orchestra conductor and got to conduct the choir and the orchestra. It would not have even occurred to me to apply for this internship and if the conductor hadn’t asked me to I would not have. And I am 100% certain that I would not have gotten that opportunity at a coed college.

        6. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

          Citation needed. Many, many, many women in political office both past and present. You know, like Hillary Clinton (Wellesley), Madeline Albright (Wellesley), Stacey Abrams (Spellman), and Nancy Pelosi (Trinity )

        8. Duckaroo*

          >>>What if they get elected to a public office and cannot be alone with another person of the opposite sex?<<<

          You mean like Mike Pence?

            1. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

              Not to mention all the famous women politicians who went to women’s collages:
              Hillary Clinton
              Stacey Abrams
              Nancy Pelosi
              Madeline Albright
              Geraldine Ferraro
              Gabby Giffords
              Etc.

              I’m willing to put $$ on all of them being able to meet with and work with men

        9. Sam I Am*

          I don’t know why you think they can’t learn those things there. They aren’t locked away in a convent, they haven’t been sent to the moon. They’re going to classes.

        10. oranges*

          This feels similar to “why doesn’t white history month exist?” and “why can’t there be a specific men’s mentoring program??”

          We already know about white history! Men already mentor! White guys are not getting left out of things, trust me!!

          Women who go to all-women colleges still get enough interaction with men in this world. They don’t need to sit in classrooms for that. No one gets to go through life without encountering men and the way they view and do things.

        11. I'm just here for the cats!*

          “What if they get elected to a public office and cannot be alone with another person of the opposite sex?”

          There are plenty of people (men & women) who have gone to cooed schools who choose not to be alone with a member of the opposite sex. That’s not what a Women’s only schools is about. You do realize that men teach at women’s schools so it’s not like they are teaching students not to work with the opposite sex. Re-read what Alison wrote and take her advice for yourself.

        12. Irish Teacher*

          I just don’t think that attending a college that only caters to one gender means they cannot be alone with another person of the opposite sex. Sure, the latter is problematic, but…I don’t think gendered education has anything to do with it. If anything, I suspect without all-boys or all-girls institutions, those people might just not attend college at all. Or they would attend and still refuse to be alone with classmates of the opposite gender.

        14. Alumna*

          “What if they get elected to a public office and cannot be alone with another person of the opposite sex?”
          WHAT are you talking about?! First off, you’re presumably a fully-grown adult, yet use the word “icky” to describe single-sex education, which is a weirdly juvenile choice, and then you jump to this wild tangent that people from single-sex schools are going to be elected to public office and can’t be alone with the opposite sex?! What in the world are you talking about? I went to a women’s college, got a superlative education, and while not in public office, I’ve managed to work very well with my male colleagues. I even ended up marrying one of them. Your comment is bizarrely off-base.

        15. Emuroo*

          I mean refusing to work/be alone with people of another gender isn’t unheard of – it’s just not something we see in women’s college grads so much as in evangelical fundamentalists like former VP Mike Pence. But you can’t reasonably decide based on no evidence that women’s college grads must do that, and as a grad of one myself I’d be *astonished* to learn that any of my classmates were doing that.

        16. Another Woman in Tech*

          ROFL! It’s college, not a convent or a harem, and even *those* spaces have men in them.

        17. biobotb*

          Who goes to women’s only colleges because they can’t be alone with someone of the opposite sex? Do you think they sign some kind of agreement to avoid men or something?

        18. "So she didn't go to Smith"*

          “What if they get elected to a public office and cannot be alone with another person of the opposite sex?”

          That….is not a thing that is related to women’s colleges. Not even a little.

        19. Unaccountably*

          Do you think that women who go to women’s colleges somehow don’t have male friends and family or…?

        20. WantonSeedStitch*

          The only people I know who refuse to be alone with a person of the “opposite” sex are cis men like Mike Pence. Every graduate of a women’s college that I know has zero issue with it…unless the man is behaving in a way that is unsafe towards her, as absolutely happens.

        21. HollinsU*

          Women’s college attendance doesn’t mean you are sequestered from men. I went to a women’s college (Hollins)- we saw men all the time- professors and staff of the school, grad students, people that lived in town, boyfriends and friends who visited campus and stayed overnight. They just weren’t in class. I am married to a man and work in a male-dominated field- I’m fine.

        22. ADidgeridooForYou*

          Well first of all, they assumedly grew up in normal society, so they’ve been exposed to men before. Women’s colleges aren’t some sort of Themiscyra utopia where men who step onto the campus are killed on sight by the Amazon students. My mom went to all-girls’ schools until college, and the girls still had male friends and boyfriends.

          Also, would you say the same thing about HBCU’s? No (I hope), of course not. Black and Brown people have had to exist in a majority-white society for their entire lives; going to an all-Black college gives them a space where they’re ideally freer from the systemic racism that could harm them in a traditional university. It’s not like they can’t work with white people once they leave and get a job…

          1. Foila*

            “Women’s colleges aren’t some sort of Themiscyra utopia where men who step onto the campus are killed on sight by the Amazon students. ”

            Sparagmossss…

          2. MEH Squared*

            “Women’s colleges aren’t some sort of Themiscyra utopia where men who step onto the campus are killed on sight by the Amazon students. ”

            Hear me out. What if they were, though? That would be all kinds of amazing. (Joking, of course, but I love the idea.)

            1. M*

              My first reaction was “not for lack of trying…”

              But in all seriousness, my school wasn’t like that. Young men wandering around by themselves might have campus security pull up and ask them who they were there to see, but that was about it.

        23. MCMonkeyBean*

          This may be the wildest straw man argument I’ve ever seen on the internet which is honestly a pretty impressive feat, so congratulations I guess. Please don’t hurt yourself with all that stretching…

        25. JustaTech*

          Right, so I went to a girls’ school for 4-10th grade, then a co-ed school, then an undergrad that was like 3:1 men to women.

          What did I get from my years at girls’ school? A chance to be smart at/be interested in technical subjects without any social pressure to dumb myself down (because it does still happen and it starts young and it is taking far too long to change). A chance to go to school and not be told that my existence/clothing was a “distraction” (even though we did have a uniform).

          Was I somewhat awkward around boys when I moved and changed schools? Yes, but I was also a teenager, the age that defines awkward. And most of my friends at that school, and in college, were guys. I was perfectly capable of working with them.

          Here’s the thing: studies on K-12 education show that girls have greater success in a single-gender environment, and boys do better in a co-ed environment. As far as I know no one has figured out how to make that work (maybe single-gender schools only for middle school?), but it doesn’t mean that people who go to girls’ school or women’s colleges never figure out how to deal with men.

          1. Fastest Thumb in the West*

            My children attended a public middle school where the core subjects: English, math, science, and social studies were taught in single-gender classes and the other subjects: foreign language, art, music, etc. were taught in co-ed classes. I loved it and my kids did too, but unfortunately it was killed by budget cuts a few years ago.

            1. anonagoose*

              As a teacher who is deeply envious of my friends who teach at an all girl’s school, and yet also takes deep pride in the work I get to do with male students…this sounds like a truly wonderful setup and exactly what I’d love to work in.

        26. anonagoose*

          So what you’re saying is you formed an opinion on women’s colleges without knowing anything about how women’s colleges work or what their outcomes are like.

          Because, fun fact, “not being able to be along with a person of the opposite sex” is not a thing that happens to people who attend women’s schools at the high school or college level, and the fact that you think it does really just shows your ignorance. Do some research before you start spewing nonsense next time.

        27. Beth*

          Lol women’s colleges absolutely have men on campus. Faculty and staff can be of any gender. Students go off campus for hobbies, parties, jobs, etc. People from the surrounding town come on campus to walk their dogs, let their kids run around on the grass, go for walks, and generally share the space. Many offer cross-registration options with other schools–we had tons of students coming onto campus from other schools, including men, because we had unusual language classes that weren’t always offered elsewhere.

          And most of all, students have friends, partners, and family members visiting all the time! Saturday and Sunday mornings in our dining halls always featured a host of boyfriends. One of the main annual issues in the dorms was the question of bathrooms–since they were designed to be all women, most floors only had one communal bathroom available, with all the toilet and shower stalls in the same room; we had to decide as a floor whether it was OK for visiting men to use it, or (if the idea of a dude coming in while they were showering made people uncomfortable) what our alternative plan would be.

          What women’s colleges DO have is spaces where you can pretty reliably count on the star student in the classroom, the TA, the org president, the rugby star, etc being not-a-man. And I gotta say, being in a space where the default expectation was that of course non-men would excel and have power? That was very, very good for 18 year old me.

        28. Dfq??*

          It’s so interesting that every time this site touches on gender issues, a deep well of total misunderstanding / ignorance about systemic sexism is revealed.

          High Score, the issues of mismatched expectations and performance in education for men and women / boys and girls have been well-documented for years. To reduce it to being alone with someone in a room is puzzling and off-piste, really.

        29. Came for the articles stayed for the comments*

          Because, obviously, women-only colleges are nunneries. And also, obviously, problems occurring when men and women work together is because women never learned!!! Because they’ve been in nunneries!!! Strict nunneries with absolutely zip-zero-zilch contact with the outside world, ever!!!

          But in all seriousness, are you serious?

        30. pandop*

          Plenty of men go to co-ed universities and *shouldn’t* be alone with a member of the opposite sex (or in some recent UK cases, their own sex)

        31. Platypus*

          my boyfriend went to a men’s only college and, shockingly, he can still interact with me, a woman, as well as all of his female friends, without any issue.

        32. MurpMaureep*

          Right, because that’s why men go to co-ed institutions, to learn how to “work with and support and respect” women.

          I’m also pretty sure the elected official who famously claimed he couldn’t be alone with a member of the opposite sex didn’t attend a women’s college (or even a single sex one).

          Conversely, we now have an elected official (in the same office!) who attended a HBCU*, and I’d dare anyone to make a similar argument about her ability to work with others different from herself.

          *I know this is different from single sex but the door was opened for the comparison in the response and, weirdly, High Score! seems in favor of HBCUs in some situations

      2. Books and Cooks*

        Single-sex education is beneficial to both sexes, actually. And yeah, it’s not “icky” to want to try, spend time in, or live in an environment geared specifically to your sex. It’s not a matter of “need,” it’s just a matter of environment.

        1. UKDancer*

          Different people have different needs. The UK doesn’t really do women only universities or men only universities, but a lot of universities have single sex halls of residence. I opted to be in the women only hall of residence because I didn’t want to share bathroom facilities with men. I wanted a women only flat. One of my friends grew up mainly with brothers and she specifically wanted a mixed one.

          I think it’s important we have learning environments that meet our needs. My needs are not the same as my friend’s needs and it’s good for learning institutions to respect and include the different needs of different people.

          1. Anonymous*

            I lived 3/4 years in the girls only dorm on my campus and it was certainly not the case that we were isolated from boys in any way… First, there was the entire rest of campus. Second, trans men exist, and at least one lived on my floor.

            (Also the RA’s generally had a policy, regarding overnight visitors, of ‘If I can pretend I don’t know it’s happening, I don’t have a problem with it, officially.’)

    5. TPDSpecialist*

      This all day! I didn’t go to a Christian college because I specifically wanted to attend a Christian college. My school had a fully online Bachelor’s HR program with wonderful instructors and a great tuition rate (by comparison to other online programs). They also accepted every single one of my credits from the community college where I earned my Associate’s. I’ve worked with at least one person that I know of who made assumptions about me because of my education.

      1. I'm just here for the cats!*

        Similar. I chose my catholic university because I liked the area, the program was great and I felt very welcomed as a not-quite-traditional student. I also chose it because I didnt have to take the SAT/ACT and they took all of my credits from Tec college. I don’t agree with a lot of the catholic church but I sure hope I wouldn’t be discriminated because i went to that church.

    6. Moi*

      I think that my “icky” feeling comes from my dislike of excluding others. There are certain roles where being a specific gender is beneficial, (e.g. some people prefer a male or a female doctor) but otherwise why are we gendering it? If you don’t need to be “____” to study/do/participate than why exclude people? The majority of the real world includes mixed genders, and working with people different than us (in a variety of ways) is a strength.

      1. HoHumDrum*

        In a world in which gender is an axis for oppression, those who live as marginalized genders actually gain quite a bit from a gender-exclusive space.

        I posted this above, but my ability to work with men went up significantly after attending a women’s college. Prior to that experience I felt I was confident, and staunchly feminist, and very capable regardless of who shared a space with me, and I laughed at the idea of a women’s college doing anything for my self-esteem. After literally my first class there I suddenly realized my whole life I had been tempering everything I did in co-ed environments by the fear that I would reveal myself as less worthy than the boys and that if I failed I was letting down other women. I felt this extreme pressure and I had absolutely no idea it was even there, it was invisible to me my entire life until the moment I was in a context where it was suddenly made visible. That pressure was actively holding me back from learning to my fullest capacity, and from achieving what I wanted to achieve. It made me able to more clearly see the myriad of other ways living under patriarchy was shaping my views, my choices, and my life in a way I never had before, despite the fact that I was raised a feminist and had identified as one my whole life.

        After being in women’s spaces I was able to understand and operate within the framework of patriarchy in a way I hadn’t been able to before. I am so much better at working with men and people of other genders *because* of my experience at a women’s college. It’s obviously not the only way to get to the point, but I can tell you there is nothing about going to a women’s college that hampers you from understanding men or anyone else different from you, quite the opposite.

      2. SW*

        By that logic, why have LGBTQ centers on college campuses? Those exclude straight people! Won’t queers have trouble relating to their hetero classmates? Won’t they struggle with having straight co-workers?
        I’ve found that the people who have gone to women’s colleges have done a better job of treating people the same regardless of their gender than their coed equivalents. It’s almost like they’ve learned to not automatically defer to men because they’re men.

      3. ADidgeridooForYou*

        Because the world has gendered it. Laws may say that you don’t need to be X to do/study/participate in something, but the truth is that society has given certain genders, races, etc. far more support and resources when it comes to particular paths. The journey to become an engineer is more difficult for women because it’s fraught with sexism. The journey to become a doctor is more difficult for Black people because it’s fraught with racism. The people who pull the “why are we making this about race/gender/sexuality” card always seem to forget that the world has made it about race/gender/sexuality.

        Plus, women’s colleges don’t exist because “men=bad.” They exist to give women a space to grow and evolve without (or with less of) the sexism that’s prevalent in society.

      4. anonagoose*

        > The majority of the real world includes mixed genders, and working with people different than us (in a variety of ways) is a strength.

        But women’s colleges, much like HBCUs, don’t take away that strength. They help marginalized groups (in this case, marginalized genders) develop intellectual and leadership skills in a space where they are prioritized, which is so rare in this world, and they take that into the world and do good.

        Exclusion isn’t inherently a bad thing. Sometimes, when it serves to uplift and protect marginalized groups, it’s an active good. If you look at all forms of exclusion as equally bad, which is what you’re doing here, then you’re part of the problem that necessitates spaces like women’s colleges or HBCUs or LGBT centers and so on–because when you see all exclusion as equal kind of oppression, you empower oppressive systems and further marginalize those who are actually being oppressed.

      5. RPM*

        I didn’t attend an all-women’s college but I did attend a girls’ school for grades 7-12. I am better at working in a mixed setting *because* of that. I gained the confidence necessary to not let myself be steam-rolled by someone talking loudly but with less expertise. This was critical as I pursued my PhD in a STEM field. And FYI, men are perfectly willing to exclude women in STEM fields, which is why I needed the confidence that I gained in my single-sex school to push back on it.

    7. Beth*

      Most women’s colleges aren’t only open to women at this point; all of the ones I know of (including the one I went to!) accept nonbinary students as well as both cis and trans women. It would probably be more accurate to call them “colleges which historically existed as spaces for women who were excluded from other institutions and are now open to students with marginalized gender identities more broadly,” but that’s too much of a mouthful!

      If what you mean is that it feels icky to have a space that explicitly excludes men, that might be worth thinking on. Why does it feel icky to build spaces that refuse to center a group that’s dominant in the rest of society?

      1. MigraineMonth*

        The ones I know also admit trans men, because they also have a marginalized gender identity.

        1. Beth*

          My undergrad officially doesn’t admit trans men (their policy is basically “all non-men”) but also has always had some number of trans men on campus because people transition post enrollment. That said, I’ve heard from classmates who are men that it can make things hard for them. Having a masculine name and appearance alongside a well-known women’s college on their resume basically outs them as trans while job hunting. Same goes for as any conversation where their undergrad experience comes up.

          I think the school community could benefit from admitting all marginalized genders, and I’d like to see their policy become more inclusive. But given that lifelong outing issue, I’d hesitate to recommend it for a trans man even if the school did have a more ideal admission policy.

        2. fhqwhgads*

          The one I went to admitted anyone who either was AFAB or identified as F (20+ years ago). As far as I know, currently it’s pretty much “anyone who isn’t cis male”. But of course there were cis men all over the place anyway: profs, staff, students from other schools in the consortium.

    8. MigraineMonth*

      Did you know that most coed colleges (outside of some math/engineering schools) deliberately judge men’s college applications less harshly than women’s? On average, women have higher academic achievement, so co-ed colleges give men priority in order to keep the ratio of women to men low.

      Weird how that never comes up in conversations about affirmative action, right?

    9. Saraquill*

      A major reason I applied to so many women’s colleges was because so many boys were disruptive in my 1-12 classes. Much easier to focus at Simmons.

    10. CPegasus*

      Honestly, I understand having the instinctive “ew, discrimination” reaction, but it’s on me to get over that and understand the good reasons for people to choose single-gender education. I feel like “icky” is a good word because it’s NOT rational or really explainable, and it has to be ignored.

    1. Justin*

      When folks from marginalized groups are critical of their own group in this weird bootstrappy way….

      1. Keeley Jones, The Independent Woman*

        Right. And let’s say there were no valid reasons for woman only colleges to exist like OP claims, they whole “you have a choice of where to go to college” is odd too. Sure, there’s a choice, but not everyone has wide ranging options for many reasons. Also, people change! Where you got your degree is something one can’t go back and redo if they became atheist after attending a Catholic university.

        1. oranges*

          Most college choices are made by 18 year olds with a lot of parent input. And many private college choices are extensions of private K-12 schooling that was almost entirely parent-driven.

          So LW is really punishing these professional women for (perfectly reasonable!) choices they made as a barely adults and heavily influenced by their parents. Yikes. Internalized loathing, indeed.

        2. Sleepy*

          Agree there is some choice but there are so many factors, from financial aid/scholarship packages to program interest to location.

        3. WhoKnows*

          100% agree about people changing (though I don’t think it should factor in as it pertains to graduates of women’s colleges since there’s nothing wrong with them). I went to school at a somewhat prestigious university (which thinks of itself as an Ivy League even though it is very much NOT). If I could go back in time, I’d switch in an instant. I could have had a better experience at another college and still had similar opportunities.

        4. MurpMaureep*

          Somewhat ironically, I initially chose to go to a women’s college in part because my high school boyfriend had family members who had attended and he encouraged me to apply.

          Obviously, in retrospect, this was a clear ploy to keep me from sowing any wild oats and stay committed to him while he went to an Ivy-ish University (and sowed wild oats).

          But he played himself – while we remained long distance on/off for a while, attending the school I did raised my consciousness to the point where I was able to recognize I had been locked in a cycle of emotional abuse for years and I deserved better. By the time I went to grad school I knew I deserved better and found the person to whom I’ve been married for almost 28 years.

          If that’s being “coddled”, sign me up.

    2. different seudonym*

      Oh for effin’ sure. Thanks for saying it. I would add that it is unlikely to be internalized misogyny only, but also internalized homophobia.

      1. Justin*

        As a Black person with a version of neurodivergence, it would be very easy for me to look at my degrees and say, see, anyone can do it. But I know I’ve been privileged in other ways and that we can’t just say barriers don’t exist because they don’t stop literally everyone.

        1. Industrial Tea Machine*

          I’m going to write down “we can’t say barriers don’t exist because they don’t stop literally everyone” so I can use it in conversations. So well put.

          1. Another Woman in Tech*

            Me: “I accomplished a great deal despite [barrier x] and [barrier y], what’s your excuse?”

            Friend: “I was unable to overcome [barrier x].”

            Me: “That’s a really good reason, and you are valuable regardless of your accomplishments. I’m sorry you had to deal with [barrier x]. Let me know if there’s anything I can do to help.”

            1. Elitist Semicolon*

              You really ask people “What’s your excuse?” Your friend is more patient than I would be, cuz if you played that game with me, I’d be your former friend right quick.

        2. Irish Teacher*

          This. I am from what would probably be considered a “socio-economically deprived background,” grew up on social welfare and it…never held be back or was even a consideration, but…as you say, I have many other privileges, a supportive family background, no addictions in my family or family conflict, no learning disabilities or physical disabilities or mental illnesses (possibly some neurodivergence; nothing diagnosed but identify a LOT with autism), live in a country where college education is free if you are below a certain income, grew up in a town where everybody went to school together and honestly, my school got the highest results in the country two years in a row when I was there, grew up in a low crime area, am probably of above average intelligence, etc.

          It was when I did work experience at college in one of the country’s most “deprived” estates (don’t like that term, but let’s say an estate that regularly makes the news due to crime and so on) that I learnt that growing up “poor” in a house your family owned in a mixed income area and attending a school that had an extremely good reputation is a lot different from growing up poor on an estate built outside the city, with a flippin’ 8 foot wall around it and no amenities and with a number of criminals also housed in the area. And that my assumption that “pfft, income has nothing to do with achievement; it’s just middle class people being snobby and assuming everybody with good grades must be from middle class backgrounds” was incredibly naive.

      2. Despachito*

        I would say the opposite – trying to divide genders and skin colours in education reeks of sexism and racism.

        I like to have the possibility to interact with people not along the line of their gender or skin colour, but along the line of common interests. Boys/girls/whites/POC only education would deprive me of this possibility and of the chance of meeting inspiring people because they have the “wrong” gender or colour. No, thankyouverymuch.

        1. Em*

          Perhaps the point isn’t for YOU to be comfortable and have what YOU like, but for the marginalized people to be comfortable. Maybe this isn’t about you trying to interact with anyone at all, but for people who are constantly the other in a room to feel comfortable. Maybe there are enough spaces where you can meet people who are the “wrong” gender or color and be “inspired”. Perhaps you should consider why you find people taking spaces for themselves as sexist and racist instead of finding a place where they can just be.

          1. The Real Fran Fine*

            All of this. Thank you.

            And if you want to be around other races, genders, whatever – you do know you could just go to where they are, right? HBCUs don’t preclude non-blacks from attending, and as far as I know, neither do many women’s colleges (but women’s college grads can correct me if I’m wrong). You can also attend events, meetups, and just generally walk around outside for this purpose as well.

            1. Another Woman in Tech*

              Many historically women’s colleges now admit cis men, and even the ones that don’t still admit trans-men and often have cross-registration with co-ed or men’s-only colleges.

        2. Gerry Keay*

          Luckily, choosing to spend some of your time in a space that is designed to meet the specific needs and challenges of people who are share your identity does not preclude you from meeting people of different identities throughout the rest of your life.

          1. Properlike*

            +1 for both Em and Gerry Keay’s comments here. Just because YOU don’t care for it does not make it “sexist and racist.” No one is advocating that this is should be the norm for everyone, throughout education. Proclaiming it shouldn’t exist at all because YOU don’t like it reeks of privilege and self-centeredness.

          3. Martin Blackwood*

            It’s laughable to think that being at a women’s college would somehow shelter people into not interacting with men AT ALL. This isn’t the 1800s.

            I’m a trans alum of Hollins, and a large part of my gender evolution was supported by my peers in school in a way I may not have felt safe enough to explore in a co-ed environment.

            Rest assured that four years of not having to fight cis men for academic engagement does not somehow stunt a person’s ability to participate wholly in their adult careers.

            1. MurpMaureep*

              >Rest assured that four years of not having to fight cis men for academic engagement does not somehow stunt a person’s ability to participate wholly in their adult careers.

              If I were more crafty I would embroider this on multiple samplers and bring them as gifts to my next (women’s) college reunion. That whole “real world” argument has always baffled me…especially because the aforementioned cis men don’t seem particularly concerned with figuring out how to navigate spaces with folks who look different than they do.

        3. AsPerElaine*

          For most people who gravitate to a gender-only (or historically-Black, for that matter) educational setting or affinity group, it is not a matter of “depriving oneself of the possibility of meeting xyz.” For a woman in US society, or a Black person in many places in the US, one is going to encounter men/white people — that is an unavoidable fact of life. Even if the educational institution is strictly separated (which most aren’t), there are men in the grocery store, and on TV, and taking up most of the spaces on the ballot, and on social media, and in one’s family, and etc. etc. etc.

          Yes, to go to a white-only school WOULD limit who YOU meet, but that is because you exist in a space that is already dominated by people like you. For someone who experiences that domination as an oppressive force, something that at best is tolerated and is likely having tangible impacts on your day-to-day experience (look up how often teachers call on girls vs. boys, for example), having a non-mainstream space is a chance to breathe.

          When I walked into a classroom that was entirely women, I discovered that men and boys had been taking up more than their fair share of verbal and physical space for my entire life, and I had just come to accept that perhaps 35% of one person-space was “my fair share.” I learned to embody 100% of my person-space, and to see it as my right, the way men do. That was a gift that a women’s college gave to me, and now that I have learned it, it is something I carry with me that cannot be taken away.

          1. Esmae*

            When I walked into a classroom that was entirely women, I discovered that men and boys had been taking up more than their fair share of verbal and physical space for my entire life, and I had just come to accept that perhaps 35% of one person-space was “my fair share.” I learned to embody 100% of my person-space, and to see it as my right, the way men do.

            This, so much. In middle and high school I had teachers fully stop calling on me because I had too much to say. I had teachers ask if anyone had anything to say, and then clarify “anyone except Esmae.” Then I walked into my first all-female classroom and discovered that actually, I had a completely normal amount of stuff to say and so did all the other young women around me. I’ve never forgotten that.

            1. Hannah Lee*

              The middle and high-school and even grade school experience … ugh. I didn’t realize until I was much older that I had been treated like (and programmed to believe) that my presence at school was not about MY education or getting along with other kids, it was about facilitating the education of the boys around me.

              Jimmy’s having trouble with math? Let’s move Hannah to sit next to him so she can help him with his problems.. instead of the teacher teaching him or doing something that would actually move Hannah’s education forward. Get the girls to organize the class lines to the lunchroom, have them wait their turn to play on the basketball court because the boys are playing now, have them just quietly work in their workbooks while the teacher sorts out the two boys acting out in the back row. “not you” when teachers asked for class discussion, or even when I was called on, if a boy chimed in, the teacher redirected their attention from me to them. (or literally, in one case, having a teacher offer to demonstrate something to people who hadn’t seen it before and having the teacher say “Not you Hannah … this is for the boys. You go home and ask your mother to show you” )

              1. Mark This Confidential And Leave It Laying Around*

                Had to literally go to the principal over this and the noncomprehension… but Little Mark It Confidential *likes* to help and she’s so good at it! I don’t care. She’s not here to assist. She is not a TA. If every boy sinks to the bottom, so be it. They have parents. They have teachers. They don’t get an assist from the smarter girls in class, too.

              2. Hannah Lee*

                IDK, reading that back, maybe I just had an unusual % of boy classmates who needed one-on-one instruction or had behavior issues, acted out in class drawing all the teachers’ attention. I don’t remember ever being praised for my work, or achievements or guided on what comes next for me … the praise was for being well-behaved, or helping other kids or the teacher. But also things were biased back in those days too. My nerdy National Honor Society friends in high school would compare notes on our sessions with the guidance counselors …. 100% of the boys were told to apply to the University of Lowell to major in Engineering. 100% of the girls were told to apply to the University of Lowell to become nurses. No matter what our interests or skills or potential.

                1. JustaTech*

                  I don’t think you had an unusual % of boy classmates who needed extra help. I did that some too, and I was not a model student (hello not-yet-diagnosed ADHD!).
                  But when I moved to girls’ school I was never asked to do that. The teachers might have moved people to separate friends who couldn’t stop talking, or kids who were fighting, but it was never “you go be a good influence”.

                2. Eyes Kiwami*

                  Nope, I had your experience too. Always asked to sit next to the poorly-behaved boys and help them, praised for being a little TA/helper instead of encouraged on my own.

              3. Anonymous*

                Growing up the unofficial TA because coursework was easy (to me) really messed with my ability to study when things *weren’t* easy, not to mention my relationships with the rest of my class…

            2. Chilipepper Attitude*

              Came here to amplify that passage!

              I went to a coed school (one that had only switched from male to coed 10 years before I attended).

              I had multiple experiences of male professors who would call on me and say my answer was not quite right. When a male student said the same thing, the profs would say, “that’s right!” It took a female professor to point it out for me to realize what was happening and to stop questioning my own ideas!

              A women’s college would have been a good fit for me and I regret that my 17 year old self did not know that at the time.

            3. OyHiOh*

              I had the exact same experience of “anyone except Oy.” I also got “Oy, I know you know the answer, I want to know if ‘Kevin’ knows also,” where Kevin was a shockingly quiet student who did not want to be at the school and literally never spoke unless required to.

              When I attended a women’s college years later, I was rather surprised to find that nobody was rewarded for talking more, or penalized for talking less. We didn’t have to compete. Because that’s the other part of the bit above with Kevin — my hand shot into the air at every opportunity, not because I knew all the answers (I didn’t) but because I’d learned early that if I wasn’t the first person with my hand up, a boy would be called on, and I’d never get to say anything at all.

            5. missmesmer*

              There is evidence that girls fare better in single-sex schools compared to coed, both academically and in terms of well-being. OP is basically suggesting that women give up some of their power and opportunities to benefit the already dominant population group.

          2. 10 cents gets you nuts*

            Agree. That isn’t *the* reason I chose my school, but a huge benefit to me was realizing how entitled boys and men were to their voices. My classmates and I learned to use our voices and that’s only a benefit in my eyes. Looking back…not hearing boys/men opinions during this time was really incredible.

            1. M*

              This is exactly what I tell people is the number one thing I got from my education at a women’s college. I don’t suffer fools when it comes to sexism, and I know the power and the value of my voice -because- I had the space to use it at that formative time in my life.

              They weren’t overtly trying to teach us this at all, it was just by the virtue of having a space where men weren’t centered, unconsciously or not. Just existing in that environment, that’s all.

        4. DataSci*

          I do not exist in this world to give you opportunities. If I, as a woman, choose to sometimes inhabit spaces that do not include you, that is NOT ABOUT MEN. If my Black son chooses to attend an HBCU when he’s old enough, that is NOT ABOUT WHITE PEOPLE. Acting as though spaces carved out for people who are historically not privileged in our society is akin to white supremacy (I saw you sneak “whites only” in there) ignores reality.

          2. Not Your Admin Ass(t)*

            Gotta say, I’m gettin’ reeeeeeeeal tired of the cold takes Despachito and High Score! have been posting on this site. I really hope they take a step back and examine their own biases.

        5. biobotb*

          Then don’t go to a women-only college or HBCU? There are plenty of other options if you’re morally opposed to them.

        6. WantonSeedStitch*

          This reminds me of someone I know who scolds their friends for “living in a bubble” because they unfriend the people on social media whom they see espouse conservative opinions (e.g., anti-LGBT, anti-immigrant, anti-trans, etc.). They say things like, “it’s important to know that these people exist, and to learn to engage with them so you can maybe help change the way they think. I have told this person, “it’s impossible to ignore that these people exist, because they have very loud voices and are given very large platforms in the media and in government. Engaging with them pretty much never changes the way they think–it just exposes the engager to abuse and pain. And even if someone DID manage to eventually change one person like that after a lot of interaction, is it really worth exposing themselves to all that?”

          1. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

            I was just about to make this comparison but your comment is better than mine would have been.

          2. Here for the Insurance*

            “[I]t’s important … to learn to engage with them so you can maybe help change the way they think.”

            Man, this line of thinking really grinds my gears. If someone is racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic, etc., it’s not the rest of the world’s responsibility to fix them. And it’s even worse if the responsibility is being shoved onto people who’ve been hurt by their beliefs or actions. Like it’s not bad enough to be the recipient of their crap but now you have to take on the burden of cleaning it up, too. Absolutely freaking not.

            It’s on them to take ownership of their faults and fix themselves. Sure, engaging with them is one way to make them aware of their faults. You know what else generally gives people a clue they have a problem? Being shunned for being an asshole.

        7. anonagoose*

          Uh…no. Studies show, actually, that women’s schools and HBCUs actually allow for their target students to show up more completely as people–so if you want to get to know them and not their gender or race, you should be grateful that they have educational options that are designed so that they aren’t constantly thinking about their gender or race. Because, unfortunately, coed and mixed race schools function in such a way that unless they are majority female or majority POC they are going to have racial/gender dynamics at play that force people of marginalized identities to constantly navigate that on top of their education and personalities and interests. Schools that sidestep that issue by specifically serving women or people of color are still schools that interact with the world, but allow those students a better chance to show up as whole people.

          Incidentally, I’m a woman of color who went to a coed PWI. I spent a whole lot of mental energy navigating that and guess what? That ended up being what I built my friend group around for a reason. You would probably be annoyed about that, but my main common interest became, due the nature of my gender and race and the institution’s makeup, gender and race. If you wanted to find interests we shared that weren’t those I’d probably have very little time for you, whereas if I’d been at an HBCU or women’s college it would have been very, very different because I would have been spending so much less energy dealing with racism/sexism and would have had less need to build a social circle explicitly to support me in navigating that.

          And, you know, these institutions aren’t there for your interests either–they’re to serve people like me who might otherwise spend their education fighting those streams of racism and sexism. And women and people of color aren’t in school to enrich your education or “inspire” you. So please keep that in mind.

        8. Oryx*

          Imagine thinking you are entitled to interactions with other people even though it might make them uncomfortable.

            1. Dfq??*

              I cam back to this a day later because the follow-up to this comment and its tone-deaf arrogance, was so offensive that I thought about it overnight.

              Equating affirming spaces for learning and advancement for marginalized groups to “but what the menz / the whites / ME??” boggles the mind. I’m glad Alison intervened, because sometimes if you don’t know the context, then sitting this one out is the sounder option.

        9. anonagoose*

          Ok I’m coming back to this because I’m still really mad about this comment. You say you want to have the *possibility* of interacting with people based on common interests. Guess what? You do. Everyday. By virtue of living in a society, especially a society that has access to the internet. Some spaces being for minorities or marginalized groups only does not take away your ability to form connections based on shared interests in any way. These schools aren’t sequestering interesting people away so that only women or people of color can access them; that isn’t how the world works! They’re still there. They’re still accessible. I didn’t go to an HBCU and I still have friends who went to the HBCU in my city; I didn’t go to a woman’s college and I still made friends at women’s colleges. You could too if you had the guts to imagine that possibility.

          Instead you’re just creating a strawman argument because you’re upset about the idea of having spaces you don’t have access to and that’s really, really frustrating–because those spaces are life-giving to people who are marginalized; they are essential. And you coming in here acting like your desire to have people around on standby so you can maybe interact with them for your own enrichment should supercede the benefit those spaces give to those groups, even though the existence of those spaces has absolutely no bearing on what you want to get out of relationships anyways, is really galling.

          I’m also going to add that as a woman, a queer person and a person of color, I don’t want to meet people who are “color blind” or “gender blind” or whatever. I’m a woman and queer and mixed race all the time, even when I’m playing DnD or talking about books or scuba diving. I might not meet you in a space for those identities, I might meet you in an activity or space for a shared hobby, but I’m always going to be doing those things as a queer woman of color, and the idea that you can meet people without meeting their skin color or gender is not one that sits right with me. It’s very…you-centric, and takes nothing into account of how *I* or any of the people you supposedly care so much about meeting might experience the world.

        10. Dfq??*

          Congratulations, you don’t understand either racism or sexism.
          Seriously, please do some readings on those concepts, because I promise you that they do not mean what you seem to think they mean, and the way you’re defining them is actively harmful.

        11. LilPinkSock*

          Women and people of color are not on this earth to be your personal advancement opportunities.

        12. M*

          I met far, far more inspiring people at the women’s university I went to fly undergrad than I did at my co-ed grad school. Partially because we had more room to be ourselves outside of more strict societal roles.

          And we were gathered in the name of a common interest. An education from that particular school. Most of us didn’t choose it because it was “women only.” We either didn’t care or some even didn’t like that but we’re willing to give the school a chance for their own reasons.

          And we also met and interacted with plenty of men, they weren’t banned from campus. Plus at least three people I was there with are trans men, and I learned so much about why I should reject the gender binary from my experience there. Being around so many awesome women, trans men and NB students taught me more than any frat party ever could have.

      3. LittleDoctor*

        Yeah honestly, as a lesbian, given the STRONG association between lesbianism and female colleges (and similar things like female and lesbian separatism, women’s land, female only festivals and events, etc.) this letter honestly does read to me as genuinely lesbophobic.

        1. Anonymous*

          Apologies if I’m reading this wrong, but I want to be very clear: many women’s colleges/historically women’s colleges are NOT female only spaces and are not aligned movements like feminist separatism. I am very proud to have gone to a HWC that welcomes trans and non-binary folks, and we’re not unique. Not all HWCs do, but many of us understand that we can fulfill our mission by being a welcoming and safe place for gender diverse folks.

          1. LittleDoctor*

            Oh obvs, I mean it’s more of a stereotype people associate female specific things like women’s colleges with lesbians and lesbianism. When I was in high school bc I’m a gnc lesbian most people assumed I planned to attend a women’s college, for example. I also often hear people assume most students who went to women’s only colleges are lesbian. As well, lesbians have historically been heavily involved in the founding of women’s colleges.

            Also IDK why you think no feminist separatist space would be welcoming for trans people. There are multiple trans women only separatist communities, for example, particularly in the south.

            1. JustaTech*

              Ha, that stereotype exists in the high school space as well! My girls’ school was on the academically-hardcore/ feminist end of the spectrum and we were regularly described as the lesbian or “proto-lesbian” school (which was better than what one of the other girls’ schools was called, ugh).

            2. Aitch Arr*

              When I told my friend’s mom that Mount Holyoke was my first choice, she said “why do you want to go to a college full of lesbians?”

              This was 1991.

              Luckily, my parents were extremely proud of me getting into a Seven Sister (and are not homophobes, which is good, since I came out in college).

            3. HoHumDrum*

              I means there’s definitely a lot of TERFs who use the idea of “female spaces” as a way to police who is a woman and to keep trans and non-binary people out. It’s a weird thing where HWC are often far more welcoming to trans and non-binary people than many of their coed counterparts, but then also have a certain subset of their population be vehemently against the inclusion of them for gender essentialist ideological reasons. Sometimes when I’m all excited about things geared towards women I have to take a sec to double check- is this place/event supportive to all those who experience gender based oppression, or are you using “women” as a weapon to attack trans people with? It’s a bummer that it can’t be taken for granted that feminist spaces are inclusive

        2. Chilipepper Attitude*

          I think that is a good point and something the OP should consider. That is definitely a popular view of WC, the association between lesbianism and female colleges. Maybe the OP’s bias has to do with gay culture?

    3. KHB*

      It’s a version of the Smurfette Principle, I think: “I’m the one woman who’s good enough to join the boys’ club, and I’ve made that a big part of my identity. Women who reject the idea that they should be trying to join the boys’ club are therefore a threat to me.” I know OP isn’t saying exactly this, but there are a lot of the same undercurrents.

      1. KHB*

        So I’d ask OP: Is it just women’s colleges you have a problem with, or do you also object to other structures for women to support each other and make space for themselves? (Women’s clubs and professional organizations? Or even just close friendship groups of women?)

        1. Despachito*

          I am not OP, but I find the idea of ANY school/organization being prohibitive to any gender/colour REPUGNANT.

          So I think that if there is a university open only to males, it is WRONG.
          If there is a university open only to white people, it is WRONG.
          If there is a university open only to females, it is WRONG.
          If there is a university open only to people of colour , it is WRONG.

          I would hate not to be able to enter a public place, except public pool showers and toilets, because it is “men only”. Do not unto others…

          1. HoHumDrum*

            You can’t equate minority and majority only groups that way though. Minority groups have historically created their own organizations and groups as a respite from being othered and oppressed. If you can’t understand the difference between those things than you are part of the reasons those groups need to exist.

            1. LittleDoctor*

              Yeah, marginalized people deserve private spaces where we can communicate with, learn with, socialize with, exercise with, etc. other people who share our experience of being oppressed on the basis of our sex, of colonialism, etc.

          2. Colette*

            There have been studies that show that when a teacher alternates beteween calling on boys and calling on girls, boys believe they are not being called on fairly.

            There are still math teachers who tell girls they can’t be good at math.

            Given that co-ed education favours men, how is having an environment where women don’t have to fight this sexism wrong?

            Should the Girl Scouts be forced to be co-ed? What about gyms for women?

          3. anonarama*

            I think if you were to spend literally 5 seconds researching HBCUs and/or women’s colleges you would learn that they while they center the experiences and primarily serve women and/or people of color they are not fully exclusionary of men and/or white people.

          4. Gerry Keay*

            This heuristic fundamentally lacks any understanding of power dynamics, historical oppression, or the day-to-day experience of many many marginalized people.

          5. Anniekins*

            You are certainly doubling down on this without considering what might be best for everyone in the world besides YOU.

          6. Warrior Princess Xena*

            I would love to live in a world where we could do this and have it function.

            Realistically we do not live in that world, and having safe spaces for everyone, but ESPECIALLY for marginalize groups, is important.

          7. Ask a Manager* Post author

            Despachito, I forget what country you are in (Czech Republic, I think?) but you’ve made it clear in the past that you are coming from a very different cultural context than most commenters here. When you interject this kind of thing into discussions of race and gender (as you have quite a bit recently), you’re ignoring the impact of systemic oppression and marginalization. I welcome your comments on this site in general, but I don’t think this community can be asked to explain those issues to you over and over so going forward, I’m asking that you stay out of gender and race discussions for a while because it ends up drawing a disproportionate amount of commenter energy to respond. Thank you.

        2. KHB*

          Replying to myself once more to say: To the extent that this is what’s going on in OP’s head, I don’t want to be perceived as beating up on her for it, and I don’t think she should beat up on herself for it (although she should engage in some self-reflection and try to change). It’s not totally her fault that she (or anyone else) feels that way, because we’re taught from a young age that we should be striving to be the Smurfette, by seeking male approval and seeing other women as threats. And unpacking all those years of lessons is hard.

      2. Not Tom, Just Petty*

        Thank you for putting this into words. I was grasping at trying to explain how to borrow Moi’s adjective from above, absolutely disregarding the work and the education of women who didn’t follow the path OP did is “icky.”
        I was flashing back to other letters and comments from women who were told by more senior women that they were mistreated and that’s just how it is. If you can’t handle it, get back in the kitchen type of thing.
        Like the response to student debt relief:
        “I had to fight in combat, why should you get a free pass?”
        vs.
        “Finally, no more lifelong crippling college debt for the next generation.”

        1. Merci Dee*

          I remember hearing about some of the student debt relief measures that were going to be put into place. My debt has been paid off for a few years, so none of those measures would have benefitted me, but I remember riding down the road and listening to the news on the radio and feeling like a huge weight had been taken off my shoulders, and being thrilled that something was finally being done to help the people that really needed it. It’s getting to the point where a basic bachelor’s degree is necessary for most jobs these days (I remember seeing an ad for the receptionist position at my work place a few years ago, and wondering why they were requiring a bachelor’s degree for a job that would have been perfect for someone working their way through school), but they’re pricing the “key” to entry-level jobs so highly that you have to work for 20 – 30 years just to pay off the price to get in the front door. What the hell kind of system is that?

          1. Not Tom, Just Petty*

            A very broken one, indeed. The “you need to go to college!” mantra of the last fifty years needing justification. “You can’t just walk into a job anymore!”
            Why the hell not?

          2. Anonymous*

            Also, as someone who was fortunate enough to get loans paid off… this DOES directly benefit me. Jobs are going to have less leverage to underpay my peers and I, my peers are going to have more economic opportunity and more chances at stability (i.e. not desperately clinging to jobs and having to move to new cities and contribute to demand for ludicrous rental prices anymore), so my odds in both the job pool and the housing market are going to improve!

      4. Jack Straw from Wichita*

        I had not previously heard of the Smurfette Principle, and I love it. It’s akin to the “not like other girls” mentality that does nothing but tear other women down.

        1. Properlike*

          Some of the worst sexism I’ve encountered in the workplace has been at the hands of other women.

          1. Jack Straw from Wichita*

            YES. Years ago, a few years into my career, I read _She Wins, You Win_ and it shaped so much of my ideas around other women in the workplace. I’ve been meaning to re-read it now, 20 years later, to see if the ideas and concepts still hold water. I think this post is my sign to dig the book out tonight.

        2. Properlike*

          This from OP’s letter is a red flag to me: “I think, as women, the best way to combat sexism and misogyny is to insist that things are equal. It’s really not fair to say, ‘I want the same things as a man, except when I go to school, I don’t want them around.'”

          I wonder if OP is also the type of person who “doesn’t see color”: confusing the appearance of equality with actual equality.

          OP, while you’re working on this bias, please also learn the difference between “equality” and “equity.” It’s very common to confuse the two, especially when you harbor simplistic views about fairness and assume that everyone operates on your level of privilege. I fear that your sense of “fairness” is creating other problems for those you manage, now and in the future.

          1. WantonSeedStitch*

            I love the meme that has a picture of three people of different heights watching a ball game over a fence, and has different versions for “equality,” “equity,” and “justice” as an illustration for this concept.

            1. GammaGirl1908*

              (Side note: In my office, we’ve actually stopped using this graphic because, frankly, everyone should be inside the ball park. The idea that everyone should be helped to navigate a barrier is good, but it’s less powerful than the idea that the barrier itself needs to be removed.)

              1. Queer Earthling*

                In the original comic there’s actually a fourth panel showing the fence gone completely.

          2. MCMonkeyBean*

            Yes, this is a *huge* issue and is way bigger than just where your employees got their degree.

      5. Goddess Sekhmet*

        I agree so much with you. Having worked predominantly for organisations that were white male dominated in leadership, it really depressed me how some women joined the boys’ club and were, frankly, completely obnoxious. Those of us who weren’t prepared to do that had a much harder job progressing, and were looked down on by them as not able to cut in the real world (the real world being the one dominated by Middle Aged White Men).

        1. Chilipepper Attitude*

          sometimes to succeed, you have to be more catholic than the pope; you have to be more toxic masculine than the men.

      6. Acronyms Are Life (AAL)*

        I see it as more of a ‘if you want to be taken seriously as a woman in the workplace you can’t be overtly feminine’ undercurrent. In my world guys refer to they type of person as the ‘pick me girl.’ Most guys I work with find the pick me girl personality to be annoying. Especially when you’ve got the type that is very vocal about ‘not being like that girl.’

        1. Hannah Lee*

          While the OP voiced the idea that women who chose to women’s colleges might need to be coddled, there was also a whiff of “women’s colleges are real colleges” ie the education isn’t up to the standards of “real colleges” that came through, to.

        1. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

          Experience and growing up, mostly. I go into it a bit upthread under the 1st comment

  7. SereneScientist*

    As a non-binary Asian employee, if I had you as a manager–I would be horrified. This letter is not directed at someone like me but the deeply flawed reasoning behind it suggests to me you don’t fundamentally understand much of our culture’s inequities (assuming you’re American). Not only that, you seem to fall into the category of skeptics who also think that current measures to increase equity only create entitled and coddled people. That’s a very strong undercurrent of “well I struggled through and so should you.” Please reflect deeply on this because it is affecting how you manage.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      “That’s a very strong undercurrent of “well I struggled through and so should you.””

      I find this to be so common and such a hard thing to internally overcome until you name it, acknowledge you had to deal with things that are unfair, and look out into the world wanting things to be better for others.

      The resentment feeds this narrative that the bias is justifiable. That someone is somehow weaker, more “coddled”, less world-weary, and that in turn makes them less professional or able to achieve. I see it so, so much in leadership and it never leads to anything good.

      1. SereneScientist*

        Yeah, absolutely. And LW might think she is being covert in this attitude, but it very likely isn’t.

        1. Goddess Sekhmet*

          Given her boss already noticed her hostility, I don’t think it’s as covert as she might think.

            1. Tedious Cat*

              This part really sticks out to me. How much time and vitriol is OP devoting to bashing women’s colleges that boss knows about it? That’s completely unprofessional. If you need something to froth at the mouth about that badly, OP, just hatewatch terrible TV like the rest of us.

              1. MCMonkeyBean*

                I wasn’t sure but I think it wasn’t that boss knew about the women’s college issue specifically, but just could tell that OP didn’t like the candidate even if they didn’t know why.

                Either way–really not great! I get it, I am very bad at hiding when I don’t like someone (one reason I am very grateful for WFH!!) but that is obviously a very big issue for a manager. So OP needs to work both on 1) keeping their personal feelings about coworkers better hidden and 2) their internalized misogyny and understanding of equity and how to provide support for marginalized groups.

                That’s a lot to chew on! But the fact that they are reaching out is a good start and I hope they are open to hearing this because I know getting all this blowback at once can make a person want to block it out and double-down.

      2. Gracely*

        I see this “well I struggled and so should you” mentality in so many damn places with so many people. It’s beyond frustrating, because sometimes, even when you point it out saying “wouldn’t it be better if people didn’t have to struggle like you did, though?” people will double down on it.

        This attitude that “fair” can only be everyone doing/going though exactly the same thing is harmful and unproductive (not to mention unrealistic), and actively works against the idea of improving and making the world better.

        1. SereneScientist*

          Yep. Our ideas of “fairness” don’t stand up well because the race is never equal in reality and having people in management positions who don’t understand this is a major problem.

        2. Chirpy*

          I mean, why make everyone reinvent the wheel when we could be using that time and effort to focus on building whole vehicles instead?

      3. TechWorker*

        Also just – people are different! What you need and want is not going to be the same as those you manage.

        (I had a microcosm of this when my female friend – extremely smart, very loud, very confident, didn’t see the point of womens maths competitions, until she went and volunteered on one and realised ‘oh – other women (/girls, they would have been teenagers) really need this and benefit from it’.)

      4. whingedrinking*

        To me it cuts even deeper than that. An attitude of “that’s life, get over it” at least acknowledges that there’s an issue that a reasonable person could dislike. The vibe I’m catching off the letter is that the writer thinks it’s ludicrous to have concerns about men at all, and that women who do are absurdly fragile – like the kinds of parents who won’t let their kids eat non-organic produce or watch Disney movies because of “the gay agenda”*. It’s the kind of letter where I wonder if the writer had to actively refrain from using the word “snowflake”.

        *I struggled to find an example because there actually aren’t a lot of people I think are “weak” or “pathetic” in this way. I tend to think if you have severe anxiety about something then you have anxiety, not a moral deficiency.

      1. WantonSeedStitch*

        I would compare this to me saying, “I’m not going to get my son the vaccine against chicken pox because I had to have chicken pox as a kid before the vaccine came out, and I survived! He should have to have it too, it’ll build character!” Gah.

        1. Too Many Tabs Open*

          Now that I’ve experienced shingles, I am very glad that I decided to vaccinate my kids against chicken pox.

    3. Smithy*

      Thank you so much for this.

      It’s certainly possible to pick at a number of the different points mentioned in the letter as curious – such as the endowment size part (like, no similar feelings about Ivy League schools and similar that on average have far far larger endowments??). But the greater points around equity are just so concerning from a management point. Tone policing, microaggressions, accommodation, inclusion….it’s hard to see that a negative view on women’s only colleges is where these types of views stop and start.

    4. NotBatman*

      Agreed. I would not want to work for LW, or anyone else who thinks women are “precious” and “need coddling”.

      In addition to all of the advantages of women’s colleges listed above, there’s also:
      – Safety: women who fear sexual violence, or even just discrimination, have lower risk of either at all-female schools
      – History and culture: it’s really cool to attend a school with a strong history, and many schools that broke new ground for women are attractive in that regard
      – Dating: I know at least one lesbian who sought all-female colleges in the hope of romance
      – Money: a lot of all-female schools offer scholarships and grants, and a growing segment of college students are (smartly) shopping for the cheapest option

      1. LittleDoctor*

        The safety thing in particular is really key to me. With upwards of a quarter of girls experiencing sexual abuse during childhood/adolescence, before they start university, and with that violence being overwhelmingly (not exclusively, but overwhelmingly) carried out by men and boys, how can you earnestly fault women and girls for seeking the comparative safety of female only spaces?

        1. A Becky*

          Oh, but seeking an out from sexual mistreatment is coddling the weak – I got groped at university, it didn’t hurt me (sarcasm) (vomit emoji)

        2. Hannah Lee*

          I didn’t realize it at the time, but when I was in undergrad, physical safety on the university campus played into SO many decisions for me. Not just RE socializing, but which work study jobs I sought, how often I did independent study work in the biology, chemistry labs off hours, which electives I took, how often, how long I went to the library, computer lab, research center. Basically, anything that involved me hauling across campus, or even just across the quad after dark … which could mean as early as 5 pm sometimes …that I didn’t have a classmate who would be walking with me, was something I weighed VERY carefully, and often decided against.

        3. Aitch Arr*

          I’ll blow up all the anecdotes with one of my own.

          I went to a women’s college and was sexually assaulted on campus.
          By a male guest of one of my friends.

      2. Curmudgeon in California*

        I get the safety part. When I went to my local state university it had a nickname as “Rape State”. I didn’t have an issue because I didn’t do the Greek thing, I commuted, and I let my freak flag fly so much that people would cross the street when they saw me coming. But I was aware of the problem and the danger, and I still have a great deal of situational awareness and defense reflexes.

      3. Observer*

        – Safety: women who fear sexual violence, or even just discrimination, have lower risk of either at all-female schools

        See? You just proved the OP’s point! You want to go to a place that is safe for you instead of going to a REAL college and keeping yourself safe! How spoiled and entitled can you get? The very definition of coddling!
        /SARC

        OP, please understand that while I was being snarky, that’s pretty much what you seem to be saying when you say that women who go to women’s schools want to be “coddled”

      4. Martin Blackwood*

        Hollins alum here — I think at least 40% of my graduating class was queer in some way. Women’s colleges are not just a haven for cis women, but also expressions of gender and sexuality that aren’t acceptable by the mainstream. If being able to learn and grow in a positive supportive bubble is “coddling,” so be it. It helped shape me in ways that I try to bring that same energy and intention to the rest of my life — acceptance of difference, championing and protecting those who are disadvantaged, working toward an environment of that same supportive evolution that I got to live in for my undergraduate years.

        1. RWM*

          Yeah I couldn’t help but wonder if there are some anti-gay attitudes underpinning this LW’s attitude, since there is a big association between queer women and women’s colleges.

    5. Lils*

      As a middle-aged person who grew up female, I sometimes have thoughts like “well I struggled through and so should you”. It is hard to watch younger people get upset over smaller injustices I would brush off, because I experienced much more difficult situations in my youth. I have a feeling of wanting younger folks to feel easy and be calm: “It could be so much worse than this!” I think. “You have it easy!”

      But…they are right to be upset about injustices, no matter the size. I should be glad they are “soft” from being “coddled”–they haven’t experienced as much trauma as we older people did–that’s good!! To take this to an extreme example, why would I wish every baby be raised in a war zone so they can handle future horrors? That’s ridiculous. We NEED young people to not find current conditions acceptable and to demand change.

      I only wish I had had the opportunity to attend a women’s college. All-female spaces allow you to be a full person, away from the overwhelming presence of men. It took me years and years to learn this on my own.

      1. Le Sigh*

        And to build on your point, often the reason the younger generations can take on the seemingly “small issues” is because generations before them made progress on the “big” problems. That’s the whole idea! What’s the point of advocating for change and fighting the system if not to make it better for you AND the people who come after you? (Though I could go into a whole diatribe on how seemingly small issues on the surface are often part of a fabric of much bigger problems and not really as small as they seem.)

        Separate diatribe: I can only speak to the U.S., but I don’t think the kids today are soft at all. Older generations might view them that way, but they have grown up in a country where gun violence in their schools are common, their reproductive rights have been taken away, they might not be safe if they aren’t cis and straight, and they can already see the impact of climate change that they’ll have to live with. There’s plenty of serious trauma to still go around. And a lot of the younger generations are pushing back against unhealthy job expectations and putting their foot down about unequal treatment. I don’t think the younger generations will solve all the problems any more than the people before them, but I think they’re a lot tougher than they get credit for.

        1. Lils*

          I agree, they are tough. But they are soft-hearted and less cynical in a way I didn’t feel nor witness as a young person. I love this about Gen Y/millennials! Somehow, they aren’t as hard as we were but they’re still fierce.

          It’s interesting to think about how, decades ago, how to avoid getting assaulted and what to do when you get assaulted and constant sexual harassment at work took up a lot of my thoughts…but I never worried about accessing abortion care.

        2. Danish*

          What’s the quote, my father was a soldier so i could be a farmer, im a farmer so my son can be a poet..?

      3. Here for the Insurance*

        Every generation says they want their children to be better off and not struggle like they did, and then turns around and gripes about the kids not having to struggle the same.

        Humans, we’re exasperating.

    6. Unaccountably*

      Yes, and it’s also likely to create an atmosphere that negatively affects things like work-life balance and career opportunities because “I never get to have things my way so you don’t get to have them your way either.” Justified, of course by the idea that that’s just how the world works, and completely overlooking the fact that the world “works” that way because people like the LW have ensured that it continues to.

  8. ThatGirl*

    I’m not sure what “men’s colleges would be banned” means, either – there aren’t a LOT of them left, for various reasons, but there are three private, non-religious colleges in the US that are all-male. (One of them is my alma mater’s chief rival.) There are also a handful of other examples that are part of a larger institution.

    It’s kind of funny that you’re aware it’s a bias, and want to treat people fairly, but you don’t want to have to overcome that bias to do so.

    1. LittleDoctor*

      And men and boys don’t have much reason, comparatively, to seek out male only spaces, because they already dominate their classrooms and school environments.

      1. HoHumDrum*

        I would love to see a rise of male spaces that specifically exist to help eradicate toxic masculinity and help men develop a healthy relationship to their gender identity. Would do so many non-men a world of good if the men around them had also benefitted from freeing themselves from the burden of patriarchy.

      2. MCMonkeyBean*

        I feel like I read somewhere that studies showed that boys on average learned better in a mixed environment and girls on average learned better in a girls-only environment. I think that was on like elementary schoolers so I’m not sure how it translates to colleges.

        1. LittleDoctor*

          Yes! That’s the most common and most solid data. Some studies have differed, but it’s the overall average finding and it plays heavily into my own ideas about what I want for my children.

    2. Richard Hershberger*

      “I’m not sure what “men’s colleges would be banned” means, either”

      Given that it is a factual assertion that sounds sorts of reasonable but actually is trivially easy to disprove, but which is used to bolster the argument despite this, the relevant work on the subject is the classic “On Bullshit” by Princeton philosophy professor Harry Frankfurt.

  9. ChemistryChick*

    My eyebrows went to the ceiling while reading this. Holy cow OP, please take every bit of Alison’s advice.

    1. Snarkus Aurelius*

      My eyebrows are level with the ozone layer right now.

      My brother mocked me for wanting to go to Barnard. He called it a college for unmarried lesbians.

      This was in 1994. My brother is an Ivy League doctor.

      Progress and equality, my ass.

      1. LegalEagle*

        You hit on something I think OP doesn’t realize, which is that going to a women’s college means you’re going to be hearing people’s sexist and misinformed opinions on your education from the moment you put down the first deposit. People said things to my face and about me and my classmates online that were wildly misogynistic, and I think they felt they “could” because were people who had chosen to be in a space without cisgender men and thus had made ourselves “different.”

        Going to a women’s college was great for so many reasons, but one of them is I don’t need to guess if people have some sexism they haven’t dealt with, because they’ll say something inappropriate about my college right to my face, and think it’s ok. My alma mater is a built in BS detector, and going there made me better able to deal with sexism.

      3. münchner kindl*

        As opposed to a mixed college where for decades upper-class women went solely to get a husband, not because they were studying seriously?

        Wasn’t that stereotype accurate a lot of times (until college tuition in US exploded and enough women no longer needed to catch a husband?)

  10. Meghan R*

    Yikes on bikes, OP. Why are you even looking that deeply into someone’s college choice? Unless the individual college *itself* has issues, it shouldn’t even make a blip on the radar. Congrats they have the degree you require for the position.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      College is often a choice someone makes very young based on very personal criteria. It doesn’t mean anything out of context, unless you’re hiring for a position with needs so specific you’re only taking people who graduated certain programs.

      1. starsaphire*

        More often than not, in my generation anyway, college was a choice that one’s *parents* made, or at least weighed in heavily on.

        There are so many factors weighing into college choice — economic status, legacy standing, proximity, location of family friends/relatives — and it’s a heck of an albatross to hang around someone’s neck, to judge them on what schools their parents were willing to pay application fees for.

        1. LCH*

          so true re: the parents. i have a friend whose parents required her to live in one of the women-only dorms on campus. is this the same as attending a women-only colleage? she certainly thought it was silly.

        2. Starbuck*

          Yeah, considering how often kid’s agency is limited in what colleges they can chose, it seems especially cruel to be judging someone based on your personal taste for the type of school they went to, beyond academic merit/rigor. That’s all that should matter.

        3. KoiFeeder*

          My generation too- I knew a lot of people who’s parents were pretty clear that they weren’t allowed to go to a specific college because it wasn’t “good enough,” or weren’t allowed to take specific majors because they “wouldn’t lead to a real job,” so on and so forth. The student didn’t feel they had any way to pay themselves, so the parents felt entitled to micromanage every aspect of their education.

        4. The Real Fran Fine*

          Yeah, I had some say in where I went to college back when I was making the decision in 2004, but ultimately, my mom overruled my top choice and I went to another choice because it was in a city where her family lived. She preferred that because it was 600 miles away from her, and if I was going to go that far, she wanted me to be near people she (somewhat) trusted would have my back if I needed help. It ended up being a costly decision for me, and if I could do it all over again, I would have stayed in state, but whatever.

      2. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

        Not gonna lie, I picked my undergrad on 1) whether they had a community college junior transfer program, 2) the weather, and 3) not doing what my mom recommended (women’s college) because I was that kind of kid. I didn’t know what I wanted to study so didn’t even look at the programs. Luckily I lived in a state with some excellent public universities, but I cringe at the idea of someone looking at my 16-17 year old decision-making as a reflection of adult me decision-making. I mean, I also used to hop freight trains for fun with friends, so good judgement was not in plentiful supply

        1. Hannah Lee*

          Yeah, when I think of some of the things my friends and I survived in our early 20’s … good judgement was not apparent much of the time. (and we were the “smart” kids)

          eg one Saturday night my freshman year, my friends and I went to some frat parties on Greek Row, got drunk, and on the way back to our dorm decided to , instead of walking on the street, sidewalks back to main campus, to take the direct route … straight through a residential neighborhood under construction .. a handful of foundations and framed structures, no floors or walls yet. We made a game out of seeing who could get to the highest level of the house frames without falling off. Walking along 20′ stretches of 2×6 beams dozens of feet in the air, while drunk and laughing our heads off. Not our best moment.

      3. pugsnbourbon*

        Yep. IIRC there was a letter from someone who went to a conservative religious college but had either left the faith or was much less conservative than they used to be, and were looking for ways to express that in their application materials.

      4. drinking Mello Yello*

        Trufax. I went to a Jesuit university because it was close to home and had an excellent academic program. The fact that it was nominally Catholic had no bearing.

      5. tangerineRose*

        “College is often a choice someone makes very young based on very personal criteria.” This!

      6. EchoGirl*

        Yeah, I noticed that too. My ultimate deciding factor in where I went to college ended up being location — it was down to a small college in a rural area or a state school in a medium-size city, and I decided that even though I technically liked the small school better as far as what it had to offer, being essentially stuck in a tiny town 60 miles from the nearest significant city (I didn’t drive and wouldn’t have had access to a car anyway) just didn’t seem like a situation I wanted to put myself in. Other people I know made these kinds of decisions based on proximity to home/family or on who offered them the best financial aid package. And that doesn’t even take into account parental pressure or people who made a choice based on beliefs that later changed.

        All this is to say that EVEN IF everything else OP said about women’s colleges was true (which, to be clear, I don’t believe it is), it would STILL be flawed to judge someone based on the assumption that they chose that school for those reasons. So many things go in to making that decision, and it’s really not fair to judge someone based on a decision process you’re ASSUMING they made.

    2. Heidi*

      I also found the extreme reaction to this one minor detail to be odd. The college someone went to is not usually a huge factor in hiring compared to prior work experience and references, but it seems to have overriden all other qualifications for the OP. Plus the fact that the OP was so obvious about it that someone felt compelled to call her out. It makes me wonder if the OP said something rude to this applicant. If I were the applicant, I would think twice about this job.

      1. Another Woman in Tech*

        You’re right, that is quite the thing to focus on! Even right out of college, my sense was that having the degree mattered, but college and major were not that important (unless there was a specific degree requirement, or you went to University of Phoenix or Trump University).

    3. hbc*

      Yeah, I think this is actually the main thing. I have all kind of biases that I can more or less justify. Just around college, I have tons of generalized Opinions–women’s colleges, military academies, religious schools, Greek participation, getting a minor in something that overlaps 95% with your major, etc, etc.. I will join anyone in a lively debate about the net value of any of those things or what they mean on average.

      But judging an individual is a completely different story. You picked X school four to forty years ago? That’s a tiny piece of info amidst all the other stuff I can get from the resume and interview. (And I’m certainly not going to hold Wellesley’s endowment against their graduates any more than I would Harvard’s.)

      1. Anonomouse*

        This is what I was thinking! What an unusual and most likely meaningless thing to fixate on. I also have some strong opinions on college/university decisions. For instance, I work at a school that I would actively discourage friends/family from attending as an undergrad but I can’t imagine prejudging an employee for their school choice!!

        1. JustaTech*

          Literally the only reason I would even register if someone had a women’s college on their resume is that I am marginally more likely to recognize it than other types of private colleges.
          And to be honest it’s really probably only 5-6 schools, including the one my mom went to. And I would probably mentally file it under “interesting non-work information about this person” rather than “the defining characteristic of this candidate”.

    4. anne of mean gables*

      So true. I work largely with PhDs. I know where exactly one of them went to undergrad – our Director, who occasionally mentions that she went to a minor SUNY as a “…and look where I am now!” humblebrag. I am wracking my brain and can’t think of where anyone got their doctorate, tbh. Someone I was meeting (at work) asked me where I went to college the other day and I was completely taken aback because it hasn’t come up in so, so long. I am baffled that this is coming up in hiring, honestly – I am assuming OP is mining resumes for this information but if the company is discussing it as part of the hiring discussion they really need to consider that from an equity perspective. We have just started redacting institution names from CVs as part of our DEI-focused overhaul of our hiring process in an attempt to preclude exactly this kind of thing.

      1. JustaTech*

        I work with a similar group of people and the only time anyone’s undergrad has come up is when a coworker’s kid is getting ready to start applying for colleges and the coworker is asking around about people’s experiences at different schools.

        Nobody cares that I went to Small Fancy School and that my coworker went to Major State U and our other coworker went to Minor State U. Like, maybe it mattered when we just started working, but 10 years in? Your track record is so much more important.

      2. pandop*

        I work in an academic library, but I don’t know where a lot of my colleagues studies. It’s also the sort of job where ‘when I was at X’ could refer to studying there, working there, or both.

    5. squid*

      People choose colleges for all kinds of reasons. I, for one, went to a public ivy…. not for the educational value, no, but because I had a crush on a girl who went to a school a few miles away lol. The priorities I had at age 16 when I was filling out applications were the kinds of priorities only a 16-year old could have.

      (I turned out to love the school anyway so it did work out for me but reading That Much into college choice is truly such a silly thing.)

      That said! I think the best way to overcome any kind of bias is to immerse yourself. Make yourself some friends, colleagues, acquaintances who went to these kinds of schools. Get to know them. It’s easy to be biased from a distance, but once you stop seeing people as stereotypes and instead as real people who you personally know, you may find it all crumbles apart.

    6. Stormfly*

      Yes, that’s what really stuck out to me. Aside from whether her bias is justified or not, the fact that that one fact made her so visibly dislike someoneis really worrying in a manager.
      I mean, I don’t agree with private schools on principle, and think they should be abolished (I’m not from the US, so I’m not speaking to that context), but I don’t think any less of my reports who went to one. And if I do feel a little judgmental at hearing a story that reflects their privilege, I hold it against society as a whole rather than them.
      You need to think of people in their entirety. What school they went to should be a single data point in the opinion you form of them.

    7. Kayem*

      Agreed for sure. I went to a private Catholic university for undergrad. I’m nowhere near Catholic, but I had tuition benefits making it the only affordable choice available to me. I’d be furious if I didn’t get hired because of it, or if my manager treated me unfairly just because I went to a Catholic school.

      For my first graduate degree, I went to a university that was originally women-only. They’ve since gone co-ed, but the name still has “women” in it. I didn’t pick it because of that, I picked it because of the best three schools that had the academic program I wanted, one ghosted me and the other one would have required moving to a new city, which I couldn’t do. So again, if a manager treated me poorly based on asinine assumptions just because of where I went to school, I’d be furious.

    8. Cold and Tired*

      This! Like, genuinely don’t care where you went to college as long as you have the skills to do the job and your degree is real. Everyone picks colleges for their own personal mix of reasons, and it honestly has no impact on my life why someone else made the choice they did.

    9. I am Emily's failing memory*

      I just hired a new direct report in June and I literally could not tell you what college she went to. It was on her resume, and I do remember that she has a BA (not a BS), but the specific institution she attended? So irrelevant as to be utterly forgettable.

    10. Anonymous*

      This. In the 00’s when I was looking for colleges there were a lot of factors: sending me off to the cheapest option for the percieved academic buck, me not wanting to go to the top 3 state schools because that’s where most of my high school graduating class was going and I wanted to actually have a fresh start, and a small campus so that I could be guaranteed to get around easily despite being able to twist my ankle tripping over a twig, and my then-inability to read a bus schedule.

      Also, the college I chose took all my AP credits. Half of my spanish minor was technically done during high school, which freed up a lot of credit hours for me.

    11. Peeklay*

      I once worked with someone who felt this way about anyone who didn’t attend an Ivy (which was most of the people in our company). She was exhausting to be around and the elitism that she oozed was gross.

      I think since it’s now mostly socially unacceptable to be outright racist in a work environment some people cling on to these sorts of arbitrary seeming traits to judge others by. If you went to an Ivy you get to feel like you’re better than people who went to state school or *gasp* community college.

  11. Alton Brown's Evil Twin*

    I think OP is misinformed about the endowments. There has been at least one high-profile case of a womens-only college (Sweet Briar in Virginia) that went to the brink of closing down in the last decade due to money.

    1. Kimmy Schmidt*

      I don’t quite understand the huge endowments component of this. The largest endowments in the US are all coed colleges, many of them private and Ivy League. Women had to fight to be admitted to several of the schools in the top 20 endowment list as late as the 1960s.

      1. BethRA*

        I think it’s just another example of how OP’s objections to women’s colleges are grounded in nothing but their own assumptions.

        I’m not trying to be mean, I’m glad they have enough self-awareness to understand their bias is a problem that needs to be dealt with (and I think it took some courage to write in), but none of their justifications/assumptions have any kind of factual basis.

        1. LittleDoctor*

          It reminds me of the biases against sororities, cheerleading, and really any female dominated activities, which are often based on nothing more than someone’s impressions from the media and their internalized misogyny.

        2. WantonSeedStitch*

          I’m guessing they might have looked at the numbers for the endowments of women’s colleges, and thought, “golly, that’s a lot of money!” without realizing that compared to the Ivys and their ilk, it’s really NOT that much.

      2. Moho With a Grudge*

        As late as the *late* sixties. The first women to graduate Princeton and Yale were the class of 1973, I believe.

          1. JustaTech*

            Harvard and Radcliffe (the women’s college associated with Harvard) only fully integrated in 1999. 1999!

            1. fhqwhgads*

              Yeah but the first class of people who applied/were admitted to Radcliffe to get a degree that said “Harvard-Radcliffe” was, I’m pretty sure, 1972.

      3. I am Emily's failing memory*

        It’s also just a weird framing, to say that colleges having endowments – which overwhelmingly fund need-based aid for women’s education – bother her because the same amount of money could be used to help women in different ways that she would prefer. It’s almost seeming to imply that the endowment is taking money from more worthy women’s causes, but there’s no reason to think that the size of a women’s college’s endowment has any causal relationship to funding for other women’s causes.

        1. fhqwhgads*

          Right. A giant amount of those endowments is from rich alums. If those rich alums had gone to a different school, most likely that money would be in that other school’s endowment instead.

    2. Anon for This*

      Pine Manor in Boston also had financial problems, started to admit men in 2014, and ultimately merged into Boston College.

      1. Hoodie*

        Hood College in Maryland had to go co-ed from a women’s college for the same reason. As an alum who was there shortly after it went co-ed, the school is only now in a more stable position two decades later.

      1. HoHumDrum*

        Great example because Harvard has insane money, I know someone for whom Harvard was cheaper than state college because it had so much more money to give away.

        Many schools with large endowments use that funding to increase financial aid packages and pay for things like laptops, textbooks, internships, study abroad, etc for poorer students.

        What about *that* offends you, OP?

        1. Starbuck*

          It seems like their objection is that the money is going to the relatively privileged (they assume) women attending these schools, when it could be given to other, more disadvantaged women…. somewhere else I guess. Ignoring that it’s not only the kids of rich parents paying the full tuition price that go to these places.

          1. HoHumDrum*

            And that schools with better funding typically are far more inclusive than schools who rely on getting every penny from tuition to stay open. Obviously schools with public funding tend to be most inclusive (because there are more requirements to keep that funding), but in my experience schools with large endowments actually have more money to use for financial equity work among students. With my Harvard example, it’s a big deal that they don’t just offer tuition help, all those extra I listed above are the kinds of things that lower income students often don’t get help with and can really drastically change a college experience and the opportunities one has access to afterwards. So yeah, large endowment =/= all wealthy students, that shows a profound ignorance of how this all works.

          2. Martin Blackwood*

            I was a first-gen student with zero financial support from my parents. I couldn’t attend my first choice university because of cost and lack of big enough financial aid packages. A big deciding factor for me going to Hollins was the percentage covered by aid. I don’t doubt that the large endowment had a lot to do with that.

        2. Bee*

          Right, I just straight-up do not follow the logic from “they have huge endowments” to “that money could be better spent” as someone who attended an Ivy on so much financial aid it was cheaper than my state school – better spent than on paying the costs of college for low-income students? Letting kids whose parents can’t afford college graduate with minimal debt? What? I guess this person just looks at the sticker price of tuition and the endowment numbers and hasn’t actually looked into how much the one offsets the other.

    4. Esmeralda*

      Mills College got acquired by Northeastern U recently, after many years of financial struggles. And not for lack of fundraising either.

    5. Skippy*

      Women’s colleges typically have smaller endowments than their co-ed counterparts because women don’t make as much as men, so the dollar amount of alumnae giving is lower. In fact, one of the arguments cited in debates over whether these colleges should start accepting men is that it will be to the institution’s financial benefit.

      If endowments bother the OP so much, why doesn’t she complain about people who went to Ivies, which each have an endowment that is the equivalent of the GDP of a small country.

    6. Mitford*

      Former development office employee of both Mount Vernon College and Trinity University, both in Washington, DC. Mount Vernon was absorbed into George Washington University because it ran out of money, despite valiant efforts by a number of people, so no massive endowment there. And if Trinity has a large endowment, they’re hiding it really well.

    7. Hillary*

      I wonder if OP is focused on the seven sisters and doesn’t know about the many other great women-focused colleges.

      Here in MN we have St. Catherine plus St. Benedict/St. John’s. St Kate’s is women’s, St Ben/St John’s are affiliated women’s and men’s schools a couple miles apart. They all provide great educations.

      1. Richard Hershberger*

        This is my guess. I don’t actually know anything about the seven sisters’ endowments, but there is a stereotype of, for example, the Wellesley student. Given how much the OP’s case is based on questionable stereotypes, this would fit as the driver of their impressions. Even to the extent that this stereotype were true, this would be an over generalization.

        FWIW, my wife went to an (until very, very recently) all-women’s Catholic college. I have seen little evidence its having an extravagant endowment.

      2. Observer*

        I wonder if OP is focused on the seven sisters and doesn’t know about the many other great women-focused colleges.

        I highly doubt it. If you look at the numbers even the highest profile schools with the largest endowments are nowhere near the top coed schools. I think that the the largest endowment that any women’s school has is just over $2B, which is not nothing, but the lowest amount in the top 10 is >$15B, and most women’s schools have less than $1B.

        Which is to say that even looking at those schools, her assumptions make no sense. There is simply nothing close to a factual basis to them.

        1. Richard Hershberger*

          Sure, but this clearly is not a rigorous argument based on rigorous factual research and strict adherence to the canons of logic. There is a stereotype about the seven sisters. Whether or not it is true is entirely beside the point for purposes of the argument.

    8. Sara without an H*

      Definitely. I think OP is also seriously uninformed about the state of higher education in the USA. A lot of small private colleges and universities have minuscule endowments and rely almost entirely on tuition.

    9. Frideag Dachaigh*

      Just spitballing here, but what if these endowments went towards creating networks of spaces where women and gender minorities could come together, say for 4ish years, and have access to high caliber educational experiences. Maybe they could provide housing, internship/work opportunities and social activities too!

      As a women’s college grad I would like to point out that a lot of our colleges do an incredible, like truly incredible, amount of work in the community. Both in the colleges providing opportunities to people in the area, and the just expectation that we’re going to go out into the community and give back, both while students and after graduation. So yeah, those endowments do pretty clearly and directly go towards “initiatives that uplift women.”

  12. CTA*

    As a woman reading this letter that was written by a woman, it just makes me feel disappointed. LW has such strong negative feelings about other women and formed that dislike based on something that those women don’t deserve to be judged for.

    3. Kalros, the mother of all thresher maws*

      Yep. I kind of chuckled at “…because I want to be taken seriously as a woman, I do not support institutions that exclude men.” It’s a common enough logic pattern for people who dislike other members of their own “group” (“I’m one of the good ones!! respect me!! pick me!!”) but the sad fact is that people who don’t take you seriously as a woman will not take you seriously because you share their contempt for other women. Any respect they might have for you will always be conditional.

    4. marvin*

      I think this women’s college issue is just the tip of an iceberg of internalized sexism. This letter writer used some pretty infantilizing terms to describe other women (“precious,” “coddled”) and generally seems to have really burrowed deeply into this niche where she feels comfortable justifying and expressing a bunch of sentiments that support sexism and resist attempts to undermine it.

      1. Tired of Working*

        I graduated from Douglass College, which was a state college for women, and I resent being referred to as precious and coddled. Even though the LW said that people can choose where they go to college, I really couldn’t, because Douglass was the only college that I applied to, because it was the only one I could afford. I don’t see how that makes me privileged and entitled.

    5. tangerineRose*

      “As a woman reading this letter that was written by a woman, it just makes me feel disappointed.” Yep, me too.

  13. Marketing Unicorn Ninja*

    Had Alison not brought it up, I would have mentioned the HBCU as well.

    LW, has it occurred to you that women might choose women-only colleges for, I don’t know, SAFETY? Or feeling like their voices won’t be drowned out by the (historically white) men in their classes who get called on more, get better opportunities, get better facetime with the professors?

    Your letter reeks of entitlement in your bias. You have convinced yourself you’re justified in how you feel, and you don’t come across as wanting to change so much as you want someone to tell you that it’s OK to feel how you feel.

    Your boss noticed, and called you out on it. If you don’t get your bias under control, and I were your boss, I’d be questioning your future at the company and in a managerial role.

    1. Yoyoyo*

      Yes, I had the HBCU thought too and was glad that Alison brought it up. I also agree with your point about safety – I would have felt a lot safer at a women’s college! The fact that this person didn’t think of that, along with all the other valid reasons to choose a women’s college is…alarming.

      1. Expelliarmus*

        I mean, OP probably thinks that being safer at a women’s college is “being coddled” because you can’t expect that in the “real world” or some BS

        2. TechWorker*

          My uncle has the same view about gender segregated schools – but yes I went through puberty without having boys ping my bra strap or having to deal with sexual jokes in the classroom and you know, I’m ok with that? School or college isn’t your whole life, you’ll still interact with men…

          1. Kayem*

            It certainly would have eased the torment I suffered in elementary through high school if the boys were taken out of the equation. Granted, there’s always the chance girls could be just as terrible, but it wasn’t girls making gross comments about my body all day every day while I was just trying to do my trig test.

        3. LittleDoctor*

          Also like. If it’s the choice you make and how you decide to structure your life (which might mean some sacrifices and prioritizing, but I mean, such is life) you absolutely can expect that in the real world by simply living in a female only community. There are many active female separatist communities in most western countries. I’ve lived in one and it slaps. I’m working towards founding a new one where I live now.

        4. ADidgeridooForYou*

          Yup. It has very strong “kids are too soft with their safe spaces nowadays” vibes.

        5. Observer*

          I mean, OP probably thinks that being safer at a women’s college is “being coddled” because you can’t expect that in the “real world” or some BS

          That was my thought too. It makes me sad. Because as much as I like to be right, the world would be a better place if we were all wrong.

        6. yala*

          Ok, I just…I REALLY need to know exactly what “coddling” these woman would have received at their colleges that they may expect now. I mean I would like OP to SPECIFICALLY give an example of the sort of “coddling” and “entitlement” that she feels could result from going to a women’s college.

          Because the only things I can think of are…not being as willing to put up with sexism or harassment in the workplace? Potentially?

          I am legit at sea to imagine just what attitudes OP imagines these women would be predisposed to having that would be so objectionable. Does she have any examples? Even hypotheticals?

          Just…what sort of coddling?

    2. Lance*

      ‘you don’t come across as wanting to change so much as you want someone to tell you that it’s OK to feel how you feel.’

      Honestly, basically this. The question isn’t even ‘how do I rethink any of this’, the question is ‘how can I keep people from noticing these opinions’. That is… an issue, and as Alison says, OP really needs to rethink this strange stance of hers.

      1. marvin*

        She’s applied a thin veneer of language about bias on top of a huge pile of justifications for why her bias is actually correct.

        1. whingedrinking*

          Yeah, I noticed that too. The big ol’ list actually begins with “Here are my reasons”, which is typically how you’d argue for why your position is right – not for admitting it’s irrational. Absolutely nowhere does she say “I know this is wrong and I shouldn’t believe it” or “I now realize these ideas were incorrect”; the second-to-last line is even “I genuinely believe this shows poor judgement”!

    3. Hen in a Windstorm*

      Yeah, I didn’t get that much (eh, you know, relatively) harassment in high school, but when it was time to go off to college, I got all the anti-rape advice from my aunt, my mom, and then the college intro session itself. The blue light emergency phones. The statistics of how often women are assaulted, and how few report. The horrific frat gang-rape that happened off campus while I attended there. I can see wanting to skip all that.

      Honestly, it never occurred to me as a teen, but if I had it to do over now (as a woman in my 40s), I might choose a women’s college.

    4. The New Wanderer*

      It would have been a pretty different letter if the LW had just started and ended with “I have this irrational bias, how can I overcome it to be a good manager to any employee?”

      Have to say, my first thought is if the LW is so obvious in her dislike of a new hire (for any reason) that her boss noticed right away, LW might not be well-suited to be a manager. Because you really can’t be a good* manager when there’s a qualifier: *except of people who are ___.

    5. Gary Patterson’s Cat*

      I wonder if they feel the same way about all female high schools?
      I sometimes wish I had had the opportunity in the 80s to attend a private female high school. Perhaps I would’ve been encouraged to go into science or engineering instead of being told girls could only be secretaries.

  14. Sam I Am*

    The misogyny is calling from inside the house!

    It’s great that you know about your bias, OP, and Alison has given you great suggestions on how to overcome it. I wish you great luck with this project, it isn’t easy to overcome biases.

    1. Sloanicota*

      Yes, I say this with kindness, but I suspect OP has a lot of internal misogyny to work through that probably appears in different ways, and this is just the most visible manifestation currently. I am still finding so many ways that the call is coming from inside my own house as I enter middle age, and I always have to re-center on supporting and uplifting fellow women who are trying to make positive changes.

      1. learnedthehardway*

        Misogyny or Envy – one of the two.

        I see envy here – perhaps I’m reading into it, but someone who is so biased usually has a personal axe to grind, and the focus on perceptions of wealth, entitlement, etc. etc. leads me to believe that there is some jealousy/envy at play here.

      2. Sam I Am*

        Yes, I find the same thing in myself, which is why I hoped to cheer the OP on to follow Alison’s advice. If it’s a sincere letter, then Alison has outlined great steps to take to counter the bias. We all should be encouraged to improve ourselves when we see something (or have our boss point out something) that is harmful to ourselves and others. It’s hard work and I applaud you for your revelations, and am confident I will continue to find my own. It’s a sexist society, it takes work to dig out from under it. First you have to notice that something is holding you down, then you have to figure out what it is and where it came from.

    2. commonsensesometimesmakessense*

      I am glad they recognize the bias, but the tone of the letter shows a genuine desire to receive affirmation and justification to resist actually overcoming the bias.

      1. Sam I Am*

        It honestly struck me as a possible fake, because who is OP writing to? Alison handles potential “gotchas” so deftly that it’s a terrible place to mine for anti-man content, did the OP just google for work advice and land here?

        1. commonsensesometimesmakessense*

          Fair point! I feel like anyone who is really familiar with this blog would expect this response, and yet this LW writes as if they expect a highly unrealistic response. Then again, we have seen some others like this and even occasionally get updates (though even those usually do not show much advancement on the LW’s part).

          1. JustaTech*

            Eh, we’ve had letters before where Alison and the commentariate firmly sided against the LW (the one that comes to mind is the manager who wanted language for reprimanding an employee who quit because she wasn’t allowed to take a single day off for her college graduation after overcoming tremendous obstacles).

            Some people are so certain that they’re right that they write to advice columns for confirmation rather than actual advice.

    3. Baby's going to Mount Holyoke in the fall*

      There’s a LOT of internal work to be done here in order for this LW to actually combat her biases. I wonder if she could get involved with lifting up other women/people of marginalized genders (through women’s community/electoral organizing, Big Sisters, Girl Scouts, or women’s shelters) as a way to learn about the positives of gender-affiliated spaces. LW, if your concern is that women’s college grads aren’t combating sexism the “right way,” how are you personally working on that?

  15. AvonLady Barksdale*

    So… the money used to fund women’s education doesn’t uplift women? Does not compute.

    1. Sloanicota*

      Also there are bunch on non-women’s colleges with much larger endowments, I’m sure! Why do they get a pass on how they spend that money? But of course only the women’s colleges are held to a sky-high standard!

    2. Smith grad who feels great about her decision*

      What’s especially stupid is that in some of these colleges the endowments are used to help students from low income backgrounds attend so…

      1. Snow Globe*

        That was my thought—LW assumes people are specifically choosing an all women school because they are wealthy, but maybe that’s the best financial aid package they got?

        1. ADidgeridooForYou*

          Also, lots of kids who go to Ivy League schools are wealthy. Would LW automatically reject everyone who went to one? I assume not.

      2. HoHumDrum*

        Smith College has a whole program dedicated to helping older women who had their degree interrupted finish out college. They have dorms designed for families and offer help with childcare so those women can finally complete the degree they started before life got in their way. Truly an amazing way to uplift women and their families.

        (I’m sure you know this, Smith grad, but just a fun fact to share with others)

        1. Sam Yao*

          And some of those students live in the regular dorms! The Ada Comstock Scholar in my first year dorm was fantastic and it was great to have her perspective as part of student life.

        3. DANGER: Gumption Ahead*

          My nana did this at a women’s college in NJ or PA (for the life of me can’t remember which one – I need to ask my mom) back in the 80s! She never got to finish HS because she was 2nd oldest and a girl so at 65 she got her GED and did a degree in library sciences.

        4. rebecca*

          Smithie class of 02 here. I didn’t graduate for medical reasons and have long thought about going back as an Ada to finish my degree. However I have a mortgage and live outside Seattle, so it hasn’t been workable.

    3. Lemon It's Wednesday*

      I went to a private coed college and I constantly had to deal with unwanted attention that made me feel unsafe even in the classroom. I wish I’d had an opportunity to go to a college where I didn’t have to constantly navigate that.

      Example- I was outside my classroom studying for a bio final (my major). A guy who I had been in class with all semester sat down at my table and I thought he would just quietly study near me. Instead he decided it was the appropriate time to tell me he liked how I look and had been referring to me as the ‘Badonkadonk Girl’ to everyone in class since I had such a nice butt.
      I quietly said uhm ok and ran out of the building. I was highly uncomfortable the whole time I took the final an hour later knowing he was in the room. I was embarrassed and grossed out that multiple people in my class had spoken about me like this. This was a VERY small school and pretty much the same group of students was in all of my major classes.
      If anything I am jealous of women who went to women’s only colleges and didn’t have to deal with this while trying to get an education. And I will NEVER fault them for not wanting to go to a coed school.

    4. Dark Macadamia*

      Right? Like, I could see making an argument for how colleges aren’t accessible/equitable and that money should go toward something else entirely, but if we’re talking specifically about college funding wouldn’t a women’s college uplift women’s education an equal or greater amount than a coed one?

    5. Charles Shaw*

      Agreed – the whole bias seems irrational but the endowment argument in particular holds zero water.

  16. Msspel*

    To add: we don’t have total control over which university we go to, in that it depends on where we’re accepted.

    I applied to six colleges, five co-ed and one woman’s college. I was rejected by all but two, my co-ed safety option and the woman’s college. I didn’t particularly want a single-sex education, but I couldn’t ignore that the academics were better there than at my safety so that’s where I went. (It turned out to be great education, for what it’s worth).

    1. Dr. Rebecca*

      This. I’ve attended three universities (BA/MA/PhD) and in all three cases, I went to the one that took me. None of them were women’s colleges, but my MA is at Brandeis, and I’m Jewish, though that was a total coincidence.

    2. DataGirl*

      I chose a women’s college for my undergrad because I could get a much better education- higher rate of professors with PhDs, smaller class sizes, better academic standing- for a much lower cost than any other college/university with similar academic offerings.

    3. Constance Lloyd*

      I nearly attended a women’s college because the scholarships were so great. Notably, they also partnered with several other colleges in the area to ensure students had access to more courses, and men from the other colleges were present in nearly every class.

    4. Avery*

      Not only where we’re accepted, but where we get funding to make actually attending school possible.
      I applied to ten colleges and got accepted at nine (ironically, the one was a women’s college, though it’s possible my lack of acceptance was due to an application error rather than just not being good enough), but some of those gave me nothing in the way of scholarships, and even those that offered scholarships varied wildly in the way of what I’d actually pay after taking them into account.
      Reasonable pricing options narrowed it down to a safety school and the liberal arts school I ended up attending. (Both co-ed, though I did apply to a couple women’s colleges at the time.)

    5. Sam Yao*

      I visited my coed top choice after I was accepted, discovered I really didn’t like the student culture, and went to my second choice, the women’s college my mother attended. There are so many factors that go into choosing a school!

    6. Grilledcheeser*

      Adding also, is this the college closest to where you have free/lowcost room/board? Lots of people make a choice because of housing & lack of transportation too.

      1. Kayem*

        When I first attempted undergrad and had to transfer to a different school, I had a choice between $27k a year (in 1990s dollars) as an out of state resident or $3k a year as an in-state resident. Didn’t take much work to pick which one.

      2. B.S. Engineering*

        Poverty is real. I made this choice, as did many of my friends. We graduated with minimal-to-no student loans.

      3. Le Sigh*

        This is such a big factor. Out of state wasn’t even on my radar because how was that going to work? But I was fortunate in that I lived somewhere with a strong state school system. I managed to get accepted to my first choice AND I got a ton of need-based aid. It was a lucky combination that I greatly benefited from — but if I had lived somewhere else, I don’t know that I would have had that option.

    7. silly little public health worker*

      i also was in this boat! i am a women’s college alum (and i got lucky that i am!) but the decision was based primarily on getting a very much greater amount of financial aid from my institution. it was also the most academically competitive school i got into, and as a person who strongly suspected they were gay at 17 and who came from a very religious community, i’m glad that my very progressive school ended up being where i landed. my life would have been very different – and likely, less full – if i ended up at my out-of-financial-reach first choice school.

    8. I'm just here for the cats!*

      It also depends on the program you want and your location. If you are a non-traditional student or need accommodations. The school I went to had an amazing student support program for non trad students and those who are first gen students or who have learning disabilities. And up until the 80’s was a all women school,

    9. Sara without an H*

      It also depends on funding. I recently retired from higher education — students and families have grown much more cost-conscious about higher education.

    10. EchoGirl*

      Also, financial aid can be a huge factor. I had to turn down my two favorite schools because they didn’t offer me enough financial aid. I didn’t apply to any women’s-only colleges (largely because my process was parent-directed and none of those schools were on their radar) but if I had and one had offered me a good package (or a significant merit scholarship or what have you) and I otherwise liked the school, I might well have taken it.

    11. Barnard Bear 2010*

      I wasn’t looking for a women’s college.

      I got rejected from my early decision school, and I applied to 6 others, one of which was a women’s college (and another, formerly so). I got into 4 and was wait-listed at 1. Of the 4:

      1 was throwing scholarship money at me – I would have had NO debt. But they were the local state school, and I did not want to be surrounded by my high school peers. I wanted a new experience. Stupid, I know, but I was 17 and didn’t love high school.

      2 were extremely expensive and offer some but not enough aid. One of the 2 had ranked in the top 10 of most expensive colleges in the US, that year. As much as I liked them both, it simply wasn’t feasible. I didn’t have a college fund, and my parents basically lived check-to-check. I needed to go somewhere that I could afford through some combination of scholarships, grants, and loans in my name and my parents’ names – and, sadly, these were too expensive even with what they did offer.

      1 offered me a scholarship covering the full tuition (though I had to pay housing myself), was in the city where I wanted to be, had a strong reputation and an affiliation with an Ivy League institution that amounted to co-enrollment. It also happened to be a women’s college – a fact I, in my infinite young adult knowledge, deeply resented at first, and grew to appreciate immensely only in retrospect.

      My point is, I didn’t seek out a women’s college, but I ended up at one. And I have no regrets about it. Even – frankly – misogynists like the LW can’t strip me of my pride and satisfaction with the education and opportunities I was given.

  17. ZSD*

    It’s worth noting that at least some women’s colleges do admit men, just as HBCUs admit White students. For example, I knew a man who had attended Sarah Lawrence.

    1. Caramel and Cheddar*

      Came here to say this and was wondering how they’d react to an applicant who attended Sarah Lawrence and was also a man!

    3. AvonLady Barksdale*

      Sarah Lawrence is co-ed and has been for quite a while. Same with Vassar and Goucher and several others that used to be women-only.

      1. ZSD*

        Right, they’re co-ed, but don’t you think the OP would still think of them as “women’s colleges”?

        1. AvonLady Barksdale*

          I doubt it, since the main issue is that women would choose to be educated only with women, and there are plenty of men at these schools.

          1. Insert Clever Name Here*

            I seriously doubt OP has bothered to look past the end of her nose here, since she says that men-only colleges don’t exist when they, in fact, do.

          2. Gerry Keay*

            Sure, but OP seems to be so grossly misinformed about women’s colleges, I wouldn’t be surprised if her blacklist wasn’t up to date.

        2. Brainstorming*

          Honestly, I had the same thought reading this letter. I am a Sarah Lawrence grad and I assume that the OP would probably find that distasteful, despite the fact that Sarah Lawrence has been co-ed since before I was born.

    5. No Longer Gig-less Data Analyst*

      My daughter’s women’s college allowed men at the graduate but not undergrad level.

    8. Pay No Attention To The Man Behind The Curtain*

      Right? A lot both historically men’s and women’s colleges have gone co-ed or have agreements to allow students, including men, from other institutions to attend classes. Scripps is the women’s college of The Claremont Colleges—a consortium comprising Pomona, Scripps, Claremont McKenna, Harvey Mudd, and Pitzer Colleges—and they share academic programs, common areas of campus such as the library or campus store, etc.; the women are not cloistered away.

        1. JustaTech*

          I specifically didn’t take a class at Scripps because I knew I didn’t have the time for one of their classes (very reading heavy), but one of my friends moved his major from Mudd to Scripps and got a BS in history.

          (Scripps is also literally in the middle of the Claremont Colleges campus; you have to cross it to get to Mudd from the other schools. Also the location of the best on campus coffee shop.)

          2. Kevin Sours*

            Fun Music wasn’t exactly the most challenging course they offered there (Fundamentals of Music AKA Music Theory 0 for the uninitiated). Don’t recall the coffee shop but I mostly hung out at Mudd (fond memories of the Claremont Tea Company down in the Village though)

    9. ADidgeridooForYou*

      Yup! They just don’t apply nearly as often. I know I’m probably generalizing here, but in my experience a lot of men see women-centered places and subjects as “not being relevant to them,” so they just don’t participate even though they could benefit. I remember taking a class on Russian film that was about 1/2 guys and 1/2 girls on the first day. The professor explained that the class would actually focus on women in Russian cinema, and I kid you not, every man except for one dropped it. Because anything that centers women can’t possibly apply to them.

  18. allornone*

    The school I got my Master’s at is a Christian university. I am not Christian. But they had the degree I wanted (very specialized, with few to no alternatives), an online format that fit my current life, at a price I could handle. Christianity rarely came up during coursework (and was usually brought up by other students; the professors remained neutral). I went there because it was the best option for me considering the path I wanted to take with my life. I wasn’t being precious; I was being pragmatic.

    1. allornone*

      And oh, I work for a non-profit that primarily serves at-risk minority youth. We work with our area’s own only HBCU fairly extensively to help these pave the same roads as their more-privileged peers. The HBCU is more equipped to understand the realities of these marginalized populations.

    2. Sarra N. Dipity*

      Similar situation here – if I wanted to get a Masters’ in my field, there’s one local option, a private Lutheran university (moving for school is off the table). I’m most decidedly not Lutheran…

  19. Aspiring Chicken Lady*

    The women I know who went to women’s colleges are all bad-asses.

    They wanted to learn without the mansplaining and weird competition, and they wanted a place without the bro-culture of 18-22 year olds. They are then prepared and ready to hit the ground running after graduation, where of course there will be men.

    Those schools are not finishing schools for rich girls waiting for marriage or little fluffy worlds of softness.

    LW — please listen openly to the responses on this post and let your mind be changed.

    1. Jack Straw from Wichita*

      THIS. ALL OF THIS.

      –co-signed, a women in grad school program made up of 75% women yet the 25% of men still dominate the class discussions

      1. Kayem*

        I saw this in action when I was working on my second graduate degree. Originally men only, started admitting women 100ish years ago, but their STEM programs still dominated by men. I was in one of the few programs that were majority women students. There were maybe two or three men for every class of 24 students, but the men were the ones dominating the classroom discussion boards. It got so bad, most students just stopped doing anything beyond the bare minimum required because they took over the boards every week. Even the instructors and TAs (mostly women) would get sick of those students explaining the course material to them.

        If it was just one or two classes, I would have chalked it up to a couple of asshat outliers, but it was every. single. class. After a few weeks into each course, I gave up trying to engage in discussion organically. I didn’t have the spoons for that in 2020.

      2. anonagoose*

        I’m a teacher coming out of an undergrad polisci program, and I’ve started warning my female students who want to go into polisci: “You’ll have to deal with a lot mansplaining, talking over you, they’ll dominate discussions even when it’s mostly women in the class…” I don’t want to be pessimistic but it was such a feature of my undergrad degree and when I know some of my students are weighing applying to women’s colleges, I feel like I have an obligation to prepare them. The experience they have will likely not be equitable. My school was particularly bad but I’m familiar with a number of the places they’re applying and it’s not that much better at most of them.

        They’re still excited and while we’ve talked a lot about strategies I and my peers found useful to manage that problem, it still feels shitty to send them off to programs I know are going to just be dominated by teenage boys who just want to hear themselves speak and male professors who think that’s the way things should be.

        1. FridayFriyay*

          I was a policsci major at a women’s college and definitely recommend that experience for your students who might be interested. It was a wonderful experience and prepared me so well for my career in a related field (where, sadly, I’m not able to completely avoid cisgender men.)

    3. Anonymous in support of womens colleges*

      Agree. There’s an all-women HBCU in my area that emphasizes leadership skills as part of the curriculum. Their graduates are bad ass!

      The college also offer some generous scholarships for economically disadvantaged women. For people coming out of high school without the advantages that the uppper middle class take for granted (i.e. tutoring, robust extra curriculars, academic summer camps), this is life changing. Why wouldn’t someone want to learn in a supportive environment that holds them to high standards?

    4. Dollars to Donuts*

      I second this! When I was 22, I learned so much from my bad-ass friend who graduated from a women’s college. She was so much wiser than I was, and part of this was because of the focus, self-awareness, directness and leadership that she learned at Smith. In hindsight, I can see that she was being herself and advocating for herself, while I was still self-moderating to be as pleasing as possible to other people (men).

    5. Wednesday*

      I went to a women’s college that only allowed men in the theatre program and gen ed classes needed for that major. Lo and behold, the men in my sci-fi/fantasy creative writing class (taught by a male prof) were somehow all marvelous writers and barely got any negative critiques. One of our assigned readings still haunts me nearly 30 years later because it was basically SA torture p*rn. I never really thought about it until now, because I was so used to that sort of thing after co-ed high school, but now I’m all mad about it. Grr.

    6. Allonge*

      I am not going to look for it now but there is also some scienctific evidence that girls in general do better in girls-only high schools than they do in mixed ones, while boys perform better in mixed schools than in boys-only ones.

      I am sure this is not an individual-level truth, but I am also sure that this difference does not go away upon graduation from high school. We are educating boys at the expense of girls in a lot of cases if there is any truth in this.

      So, yes, and definitely something for OP to consider.

        1. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

          The following article mentions a study from Utrecht University. (link to follow)

          1. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

            https://www.bustle.com/p/boys-benefit-from-co-ed-schooling-more-than-girls-according-to-a-new-study-3904976

            “But single-gender education versus co-ed schooling has attracted a lot of attention, with parents wondering if it’s better to have boys and girls in school together, or with their own gender. A new study from scientists at Utrecht University, published in the journal School Effectiveness & School Education, has shed new light on the argument — and their discoveries indicate that boys benefit educationally from having girls around. But does the practice of going co-ed help girls, too? “

    7. turquoisecow*

      I went to a women’s college for my first year (ended up transferring for financial reasons) and the women I know who graduated are all amazing bad asses also. They are successful rockstars in their fields and amazing, well-rounded people who work their butts off and are not even close to being “coddled” as the OP says. This letter got my blood boiling on their behalf.

    8. Sara without an H*

      Those schools are not finishing schools for rich girls waiting for marriage or little fluffy worlds of softness.

      Can confirm. I just retired from a small church-affiliated women’s college. Many of our students are the first in their families to go to university, and a substantial portion of the student body is eligible for Pell Grants. We have programs to support those of our students who are single parents and/or undocumented immigrants. They are, indeed, bad asses.

      LW, I know it’s going to be hard for you to read some of the comments here, but you need to know that your biases are rooted in ignorance. Please make the effort to change.

    9. Unaccountably*

      Well, that might be part of the problem, from the LW’s point of view. I’m sure everyone who’s been reading here for a while remembers the letter from the boss who was furious at the way her “too big for her britches” employee, whose paycheck hadn’t made it into her account *twice*, advocated for herself to HR and told them it couldn’t happen again.

      Some people just don’t want to see women get above themselves, and unfortunately a lot of those people are other women.

  20. Sotired*

    I am shocked anyone would say this. Glad I do not work for this person, and I did not attend a womens or HBCU college.

    1. learnedthehardway*

      Me either, but I am similarly appalled at the attitude.

      I have friends who have navigated teaching in some of the larger universities in Canada – believe me when I say that if female FACULTY deal with sexism and misogyny, then you can expect these attitudes to filter down to the graduate and undergraduate levels.

      Heck, just from a safety standpoint – a major university in Canada recently had to institute training for all new students on what constitutes sexual harassment and consent. A friend’s son had to learn what the difference was between porn and real life in this training, because the school had such a problem with sexual assaults on campus. So safety is DEFINITELY a consideration when choosing a university.

  21. CharlieBrown*

    Sexual violence against women is, unfortunately, all too common on many college campuses. It must be nice to be able to walk back to your dorm from the library after an evening of studying and not have this be as much of a concern as it would be at other colleges.

      1. Daisy*

        The female-only floor of the college I went to back in the dark ages was definitely a target for harassment by some of the frats and the general a@#$%^& population. I was happy to be on a co-ed floor that alternated male and female rooms as the problem people avoided us.

      2. Chestnut Mare*

        Sure, but I went to a co-ed school and was harassed by men from town AND male students. No one is saying women-only schools eliminate harassment, but it does remove one source.

    2. deesse877*

      Sexual violence on college campuses is mostly perpetrated by acquaintances in social situations–i.e., by students, overwhelmingly men, who deliberately target fellow students for assault at moments where they can access plausible deniability]. It’s really not about safety on the street in the aggregate.

    3. Cat Tree*

      Yes, amazing that physical safety is considered “coddling”. I mean, I get that men still exist and visit the campus for various reasons, and also women could assault other women. So the risk isn’t zero, but it’s still reduced.

  22. Lacey*

    It’s wild to me that the OP would give this much weight to where someone went to college.

    Even if the OP’s assumptions about them were correct (though I agree with Alison that they are not) why would you hold a person’s decision about the college they went to against them?! They made that choice when they were 18 and were almost certainly influenced by their parents, scholarships, and the programs offered.

    Lots of people wouldn’t choose the college they went to if they had that choice to make again in their 30s, but they don’t!

    Stop being so concerned with where people went to school!

    1. Sloanicota*

      Right?? I applied to a few schools I had heard of if they had programs I was interested in, and went to the one that offered me the most money. It was not a decision that came from my deepest philosophy on education; I didn’t know enough of the world at 18 to have opinions on that kind of thing.

      1. ferrina*

        Truth. I went to the college that gave the best scholarship. It was the one I could afford to go to and still hope to own a home later.

      2. Just Another Zebra*

        I said the same below. I went to the school that cost me the least and wasn’t too far from home. I was 17 when I picked my college, and my parents had a huge say in where I went.

    3. ThatGirl*

      somewhat related: I graduated from college nearly 20 years ago (yikes). I went to a small liberal arts college with some prestige. At the end of 2020 I got laid off and was job searching, and got a call from a recruiter who wanted to talk to me all about my time at said SLAC. Like…my dude, my college experience is not relevant to this job! Talk to me about the 18 years of professional work experience I have instead!

    4. Argyle pirate*

      There are also parents that don’t just influence, but flat out require their children go to (or avoid) certain schools. While an 18-yr old can technically go wherever they like, I had classmates (male and female at two different co-ed colleges) whose parents would only pay if their kids went to their preferred school/major.

      1. Swiss Army Them*

        This! I didn’t get to pick my college because of my parents. They refused to cosign any loans unless I went to my mom’s alma mater. I would hate to be judged so harshly for something I was forced to do.

      2. Crop Tiger*

        I was shocked at the number of people I went to school with that their parents forced into specific majors. The only reason my parents paid for my first semesters tuition was that I was too young to sign a loan. But I had multiple classmates drop out because they didn’t want to do what their parents wanted them to do.

    5. RishaBree*

      I liked the college I attended – I wouldn’t have applied to it if I hadn’t, and it was also generally the best academically of all the ones I applied to – but I can’t pretend that a key factor wasn’t that it offered me substantially more in scholarships and grants than anyone else.

    6. Jack Straw from Wichita*

      YES. Unless it’s a for-profit school, it truly does not at all matter after you’ve had your first job. And I’d argue that it doesn’t even matter then.

      For the most part, if the school isn’t in my area of the country, I honestly don’t even know what type of reputation it has. The fact that the LW has a list of these school in her head is odd and intentional.

    7. The Person from the Resume*

      If this an entry level position, though, there may not be alot besides college and a college job or internship. Not that I’m defending the LW bias. But this also sounds irrational enough that she holds this against women for life.

    8. Forensic13*

      I applied my college ENTIRELY because the application was free and I was too poor to afford any more application fees. Then they were the only ones that accepted me, sooo

      But yes yes, please judge me on the specific college I went to ^_~

      1. The Real Fran Fine*

        I had a similar experience. I was raised by a single mother with two kids who didn’t have much money, so I applied to colleges and universities that either agreed to waive my application fees or didn’t have them at all. Then, I chose my university based on location (in a city near my mom’s family) and that offered me the most money in financial aid/scholarships upfront (that ended up being a mistake because the school continued raising the price every term, so any cost savings I thought I was getting quickly evaporated).

    9. Warrior Princess Xena*

      I agree with everything you say. Don’t hold the administration against the students. The majority of students just want to get through college with good grades, classes, and extracurriculars. They’re not trying to support every part of what the college admin says, even if the administration is composed of complete loons.

    10. Guacamole Bob*

      Yes, this. OP, if you can’t get over your bias against women’s colleges, can you at least start putting the choice of college into a different bucket in your head? People have all sorts of reasons for ending up at certain schools, and the specific school choice doesn’t always reflect an entire worldview or value system. And even if it was a considered choice at the start, it doesn’t always reflect who a candidate is now.

      We’ve had letters here from graduates of religious schools, for-profit schools, online schools, schools no one has heard of, schools with scandals in the news, etc. People have talked about family, finances, location, specific degree programs, religion, and more as factors in how they ended up at those schools. There’s often a large degree of chance involved.

      Allison’s defense of women’s colleges on the merits is correct. But if you can’t quite get there, OP, please at least try to see that having gone to a women’s college doesn’t necessarily say that much about your employee as an individual.

      1. Observer*

        OP, if you can’t get over your bias against women’s colleges, can you at least start putting the choice of college into a different bucket in your head?

        Well, the OP says that she is NOT going to stop thinking about the woman’s college because “it’s not that easy”.

    11. Cascadia*

      Yes! I find all of the OPs objections absurd, but why all this focus on college choice? Are you similarly judging people who went to party schools? I have friends that chose colleges based on the weather and proximity to the beach. I have friends that chose colleges based on where their high school sweetheart went, and then promptly broke up. I have friends that chose colleges based on their athletics program, because they wanted to cheer for a really good football or basketball team. Not to mention all the other choices and reason someone might pick a school that other commentators have mentioned. Some people want big universities with tons of options and a club for every possible interest. Some people want small universities with small class sizes. Some people who want to go to college in a big city, some people want to go to college in a small rural area. None of these choices are good or bad, we have many different colleges for many different people. Finally, college is four years of your life, Usually from age 18 to 22. It does not and should not define someone for the rest of their life. It’s one choice out of many. I find it super strange that the OP is so fixated on this one aspect.

    12. Just Another Zebra*

      I’m wondering how far this bias extends. Like, is it just for new grads / younger employees? Or is OP seething about her coworker in her late 50s who went to a women’s college? That’s also something that should be examined, I think.

    13. t-vex*

      Yeah also like, how would she even know? I get that in this case it’s a new hire but I can probably count on one hand the number of my colleagues whose alma mater I have any idea about. Or honestly if they even have a degree. It’s completely irrelevant.

    14. Unaccountably*

      Maybe the LW didn’t go to college herself, or is the first person in her family to go to college, and she doesn’t really have an understanding of how it works. Or thinks it works differently than it does because her family had stereotypes of Those College People and she never bothered to examine them?

      I don’t know, I’m spitballing. If that were true, the only thing I’d change about Alison’s advice would be to advise the OP to start interrogating a lot of her assumptions, because if she holds one that’s this drastically wrong based on what the people around her believed when she was growing up, you can bet she holds a lot more.

    15. EchoGirl*

      I mentioned this elsewhere on the thread, but I ultimately chose my college based on location. I got it down to 2 based on preference, financial aid packages, and in one case because of some issues with the disability services center, but the final choice came down to “do I want to go to a Small School in a remote rural area, or do I want to go to Big State School in a medium-size city?” I actually liked Small School better in a vacuum, but when I say this area was remote, I mean it was 50 miles from the nearest decent-size city. I didn’t have a car, so going there would have meant basically being confined to a small town in the middle of nowhere and not being able to, like, visit my family unless I could arrange a ride with someone. In the end I decided that just didn’t seem like it would work so I went to Big State School. My friend who went to the same school I did made her choice because she got a huge merit scholarship. So many things go into these decisions that assuming you know why someone made that choice is already setting you up for failure.

  23. Jay*

    Daughter of a proud Vassar grad. I am a woman who went to Princeton less than ten years after they admitted women (which they did because they were losing market share among the best and brightest men). I know now that I made that choice in large part due to my own internalized misogyny and that in many ways I would have been better served at an all-women’s school. Agree with Alison that OP needs to really look at that long list of justifications and dismantle them – and the warning from her boss makes it clear that her career will suffer if she doesn’t.

  24. Sloanicota*

    The best way to overcome a bias, if you are genuine in that goal, is to deliberately get to know people and learn to see things from their perspective. You have a made-up image in your mind of what a graduate of a woman’s college is like, but once you know Cindy and Stacy as people, this image will fall away. It takes humility and a genuine spirit of curiosity to do this.

    2. The Person from the Resume*

      That’s what I thought too. Get to know the new employee. Try not to make assumptions; then try harder because the LW has got some very deeply rooted biases. Learns she’s not what you imagine her to be based on her college choice.

    3. Catwoman*

      I came here to say this. I would encourage LW to visit a women’s college (if there’s one reasonably close to her) and read about their history. Look up personal accounts of women’s college alumni.

      I would also encourage her to ask her employee what their experience was like, “I see that you went to a women’s college from your resume. What was that like?” And listen! Just listen, don’t start an argument or try to convince the employee that it was an inferior experience. And ask in the same tone that would if you heard an employee has just returned from a vacation spot you were planning to visit later.

      We have biases because our brains like to create generalizations. Education is how you poke holes in that. If it helps LW to be more empathetic, think about biases others may have about you and how it feels to have those assumptions made.

    4. Jackalope*

      Years ago I learned about the Implicit Bias test (Google it if you aren’t familiar), and also learned that people who’d shown a significant implicit bias against a specific group (let’s say Black people) had better, less biased scores if they’d just been reading books written by or about members of that group (say Martin Luther King or Malcolm X). I took that and ran with it; I’ve worked really hard to invest time in reading books about and by minority groups; most specifically groups I don’t belong to, but even groups I do (because internalized -isms are a real thing). I’ve found it to be deeply helpful.

      So that would be a starting point in my recommendation on this. If you really want to change your biases in this area, look up books (or movies, etc.) about and by women who went to women’s colleges. I don’t mean specifically just nonfiction, either; a range of stuff can be very helpful. Sloanicota’s suggestion about getting to know women who went to women-only colleges is also good, but this is a way to wrestle with your biases that won’t accidentally harm your coworkers through you being a jerk to them. Which it sounds like you may be doing in one way or another even if you don’t recognize it, given the comments your boss made to you.

      1. Sloanicota*

        Ooh that is a great suggestion, because I didn’t want OP to use this employee as a test case or make her teach OP. Perhaps someone in the comments can suggest great biographies of recent women who attended women’s colleges – or film might work too, I just can’t think of any. I wouldn’t want it to be about the experience at women’s college because I think that’s just going to magnify the issue for OP.

        1. Aitch Arr*

          Wendy Wasserstein (playwright)
          Frances Perkins (first woman in the Cabinet; Secretary of the Dept of Labor)
          Lucy Stone (women’s rights activist)
          Chloe Zhao (film director)
          Elizabeth Marston (attorney and psychologist, one of the models for Wonder Woman)
          Esther Howland (artist who help popularize the Valentine)
          Jean Sammet (computer scientist)
          Virgina Apgar (ob-gyn, creator of the Apgar Scale)
          Ella Grasso (governor of CT, first female governor elected in her own right)
          Beverly Dean Tatum (educator and former president of Spelman College)

          … hell, there’s a Wikipedia page just for notable Mount Holyoke alums.

      2. Charles Shaw*

        Great idea – and for looking up books by or about women’s college alumnae, here’s a starter list (all fairly low on the coddling/ entitlement scale):
        Zora Neale Hurston – Alice Walker – Frances Perkins – Grace Hopper – Joan Rivers -Madeleine Albright – Jeane Kirkpatrick – Hillary Clinton – Gabby Giffords – Elaine Chao

  25. SJ (they/them)*

    hoooooooo boy.

    No comment!!!!!!

    Super grateful to Alison though for posting this and the response. Frustrating letter to read, but validating to see such a thorough and appropriate reply. Thank you Alison!

  26. Ann Lister’s Wife*

    So much internalized misogyny in this letter. The great thing about having access to choice is that one can *choose* whichever college is best for themselves.

  27. Smith grad who feels great about her decision*

    I’m a Smith College graduate and honestly this question justifies why we have women’s colleges still. And also is a good reminder that women are our own worst enemies.

    I am a STEM major and likely would not have been if I didn’t get to go through their excellent programs. Also, they offered phenomenal financial aid, which is only because they have a large endowment they can use to do that. Most women’s colleges are also great about bringing in lower income and minority students. They are also on average safer for many groups.

    Alison is absolutely correct that you don’t know anything about the achievements of women’s college graduates if you have this opinion. It’s irrational and it’s sexist. Stop it.

    1. Barr*

      I wish I had gone to smith so, so badly lol. Got accepted and a not-huge but generous scholarship but went to a coed in a big city instead. I still like to visit when I’m in the area.

    2. wellesley grad*

      As a recent Wellesley graduate working in biomedical science and planning to go on to get a PhD, I wholeheartedly agree. Women’s colleges are absolutely fantastic for STEM. The exclusion of men from women’s colleges doesn’t make their students unprepared—it allows them to focus solely on the success of women in fields dominated by men, particularly STEM. There’s a reason why, as Alison says, women’s college alums go on to earn medical and doctoral degrees at much higher rates than their co-ed counterparts.

      Wellesley is more than my alma mater, really. Its academics are tough (I’ve spoken to alums who said their first year of graduate school was a repeat of their senior year!), but it’s a community of women helping each other become the best people they can be, even past graduation. This is true of more women’s colleges than just Wellesley—women’s college alumni networks are some of the strongest out there. I won’t ever regret my choice to attend Wellesley. It’s made me who I am, not just as a scientist, but as a person, too.

  28. Anon for This*

    I’m male, but I’ve had several friends and relatives attend women-only colleges. If you think they are “precious” and “need coddling”, you should meet them and relate your views. Warning: you will not find the ensuing experience to be a tea party. These are some of the most forthright leaders I know (and yes, I chose the word leader because their experience gave them room to develop extraordinary leadership skills).

    1. NotRealAnonforThis*

      Kind of figured I’d provide popcorn for the situation when I got to “precious” and “need coddling” parts of the letter myself. (Now to go find my eyebrows. I believe they’ve vacated my face and are up above the ceiling tiles…)

        2. AnotherLadyGrey*

          Sorry to be off topic but you have possibly the GREATEST user name I have ever seen, if it’s the reference I think it is. I just heard & saw Danny Kaye saying this in my mind, and it delighted me. Thank you for the serotonin boost.

      2. M&Cs*

        You can’t say we want to be coddled when I’ve witnessed near duels over who gets the last bedtime cookie and carton of milk.
        -MHC

      3. Aitch Arr*

        Another fun fact: Mount Holyoke has a drinking song.

        In which we condescendingly refer to Smith’s tea hours.

  29. KatEnigma*

    Perhaps you should look into your company’s EAP and seek therapy if you’re serious about overcoming this prejudice that is so obvious that your boss felt a need to talk to you!

  30. anonarama*

    I attended a women’s college and have some thoughts. First, men attended my college. The graduate schools are fully coeducational, and men from local universities were allowed to and encouraged to attend classes. Similarly, I took many classes at other local universities with men. Second, men’s colleges absolutely still exist. There is less demand for men’s colleges because men don’t experience as much bias in higher education as women still do. Finally, endowments vary by institutions. Feel free to be mad about huge university endowments (I certainly am), but if you’re mad at small women’s colleges and not, like, Harvard about endowments, think about what that means in practice.

    I have more thoughts, but I would like to say I’m glad you recognize this bias. A lot of people are similarly biased against graduates of women’s colleges but haven’t identified that as the source of their feelings. Shout out to self-awareness

  31. insert pun here*

    OP, keep in mind that even if everything you think here is true (it’s not, as others have pointed out), not all 18 year olds actually get to choose where they go to school. Overprotective/conservative parents may insist upon a women’s college (or a religious school) — the alternative option for students in those cases is often “no college at all.”

    2. Jack Straw from Wichita*

      Or they may have been offered a larger financial incentive to attend that school. Or they couldn’t afford housing so they had to attend a school close to home. The “you get to pick where you go to school” is a statement based in privilege.

    3. Mf*

      My undergrad degree is from a conservative Christian college. It was not my choice to go there—the decision was essentially forced on me by my religious parents, who refused to pay for any of my education if I did not go to one of the two Christian schools near home.

      I would’ve never been able to pay for my own education through scholarships and part-time work. The student loans would’ve been enormous. So I bit the bullet and went to a school I did not want to attend. Today, I’m not even religious; my association with this school in no way reflects my own beliefs or values.

      All this to say: can we please stop judging people by their college choice? You don’t know what factors they had to weight. It’s a complex decision and often an economic one too.

    4. Mitford*

      Or you have parents like mine who said my sister and I could go to state colleges. Period. End of discussion. They would have two of us in college at the same time. They weren’t going to pay for going out of state, and they sure as shooting weren’t going to pay for private schools. I’m fortunate that I’m from Virginia and was accepted to William & Mary, but I spent my entire freshman year there seething about it.

  32. Alex Rider*

    As a bryn mawr Grad I don’t have words. I chose my school because I wanted an education with all other women. My k-8 all female education probably contributed to that but I would be horrified if you were my boss.

    1. Zee*

      I went to Ursinus and whenever we’d have away games at Bryn Mawr we’d be like “wow these women all seem super happy and confident and I’m a little bit jealous.” (If I could do it all again, I’d seriously consider going to a women’s college, maybe even Bryn Mawr!)

      1. Witch of Dathomir*

        I loved my tiny private undergraduate school, so if I had it to do over again I’d still go there; but for grad school? Definitely a women’s college.

  33. heretoday*

    The first thing I do when reviewing applications is toss out the resumes from SEC schools. Irrational bias? Yes. Illegal? Nope.

    5. Uplifter of all*

      WTF Seriously…….

      You are doing a favor to all those who you reject. Please continue doing so.

    6. Charlie*

      What? I confess I’m not familiar with the SEC but upon googling it’s got a bunch of public schools in it. It seems misguided to penalize anyone from those states for picking their state school (much likely to be cheaper, right?).

      2. AvonLady Barksdale*

        I would assume this is about football. Yes, sports rivalries can be a Very Big Deal but I have never in my life heard of anyone refuse to hire someone because they attended a rival school. That’s petty as hell– leave that ridiculousness at the tailgate, please.

        (I don’t believe heretoday is serious, fwiw.)

        1. CTT*

          I also assume it’s football-related, which is even more infuriating since I went to law school at an SEC school and game days were my hell and I never went to a game. Sorry I went somewhere affordable that also has a sports culture I don’t care about!

        2. Charlie*

          Oh gotcha! My Google also turned up some stuff with segregation in the SEC so I assumed it was a reaction to that but satirically saying “yeah I’ll reject anyone who went to my football rival” to illustrate the ridiculousness makes more sense as a response to this post, lol.

    7. Gracely*

      Wow. Way to dismiss people who often have almost no choice about where to go if they live in the south. Out of state tuition makes it all but impossible for many students to avoid an SEC school in a lot of states.

    8. CheesePlease*

      So you think this is ok?? WTF honestly. Hope you’re working on overcoming this irrational bias against decent candidates

    9. Tyto alba*

      If you recognize that it’s an irrational bias, then… why do you think there are grounds for you to keep doing this?

    12. Database Developer Dude*

      Why do you do this? What kind of jobs are you reviewing applications for that you could even think that this is any kind of okay?

  34. Pirhana Plant*

    Wait until you learn about Wabash College, Hampden-Sydney College, and Morehouse College. Morehouse especially is considered highly prestigious- certainly hope you don’t discriminate against men who attend.

  35. Alex (they/them)*

    In regards in point 4- not all women’s colleges have that level of money, and there are plenty of co-ed’s that do. This point really isn’t based in reality.

    1. Dr. Rebecca*

      Srsly, I’ve taught at a state school and a Catholic school, both co-ed, with endowments in the billions. If we want to say “you could be spending that endowment on something that makes a difference” let’s start with tearing down my former Catholic workplace’s overreliance/emphasis on sports.

      1. mreasy*

        Gosh I think endowment money is well used funding an educational institution that enables women (ALL women) to learn and develop in a space without being belittled, talked over, ignored, and subject to harassment and sometimes violence by men! The idea that wanting an education free of these things – the type of education (white, cis) men have by default – means a person is being “coddled” is simply absurd.

        1. Dr. Rebecca*

          Um, yes? I have to assume this is a nesting fail, because I’m not arguing against any of that, nor did I address it in any way in my comment.

  36. WorkerJawn*

    I previously worked in higher ed fundraising and the point about endowments for women’s colleges is . . . wildly misplaced. A cursory google search indicates the local women’s college has an endowment 1/20th the size of the university I worked for. I agree that it is mind-blowing how much wealth universities are allowed to accumulate, but women’s colleges are not the source and solution for that problem.

    1. HWC Graduate*

      I think LW was referring to the Seven Sisters, which are probably the most prominent women’s colleges in the US. Still, most aren’t like that at all and are struggling to keep up enrollment. The 7S are a special case because they are particularly prestigious.

  37. Anonymous*

    The reasons Alison mentions why someone might go to a women’s college (or historically women’s college) are great, but I would also add that the ones I know well are more queer-friendly*, and I know lots of people who picked them for that reason. So that’s just another layer of discrimination here.

    *I’m cis, but I’m aware that the experiences of trans folks at traditionally women’s colleges is complicated and often mixed. I know people who felt well supported and others who did not, and colleges have different policies. My alma mater is open to anyone who was AFAB, and AMAB folks who are female, non-binary, agender, etc, but even with an official policy it’s not always that easy. I wish it were. It should be.

    1. Esmae*

      This. Going to a women’s college was the first time I was in a truly LGBTQ-positive environment, and it had a huge impact on my views going forward. I don’t think I’d have the outlook I have today without that experience.

    2. Cate*

      I almost wasn’t sure if this was some sort of deep riddled homophobia on OP’s part (though I might be reaching on the basis of my own sexuality). I think the imagine of a women’s college grad is often a lesbian, but she wouldn’t feel as comfortable saying that she had a problem with the candidate on that basis.

      1. Ann Lister’s Wife*

        You’re right- and also assumed to be liberals, which plays nicely into OP’s perception of weakness. SMH

    3. Marcella*

      Yep. For a bisexual 18 year old, escaping a huge coed university ruled by frat boys (first semester) and transferring to a women’s college was bliss. I had plenty of lesbian and bi classmates and professors.

      I also noticed in my first semester at that big university that professors openly favored male students, putting them in charge of group assignments and letting them get away with rude and disruptive behavior. Why the hell would I pay thousands of dollars for that?

      1. Anonymous*

        That happened in one of my classes at Mount Holyoke too! There was one guy in the class, and the (older white male) professor gave him so much extra attention. I’m still mad about it.

    4. a green griffin*

      Yes — I was looking for someone to start a response thread that touched on how safe historically women’s colleges can be for trans, non-binary, and other LGBTQIA2s+ folks. I went to Mount Holyoke in the early 2000s and met trans men and non-binary classmates who had chosen a women’s college because it was the most supportive environment for them. (And I’m happy that now MHC accepts trans women as well.)
      I loved my undergrad experience — in addition to be a gender diverse women’s college, MHC has a huge international student population (over 25% of the student body these days), welcomes non-traditional students (Frances Perkins Scholars!) and just does so much to uplift marginalized voices.

      1. Anonymous*

        Anon from above—I’m a yellow sphinx (and red Pegasus for my masters, which is confusing now!). I still think it’s hilarious that most of my friends from MHC identified as straight (or straight-ish) while we were there and have come out after. It’s a safe and supportive place in so many ways.

      2. Moira Rose's Closet*

        Hey there — I’m a Smithie from the same era. This was one of my first thoughts, too. We had several trans people in my class for this very reason.

    5. NotMy(Fancy)RealName*

      My alma mater is open to all people who live as female, but not non-binary, which is disappointing and led to me telling them I would no longer donate until they changed that policy.

    6. wellesley grad*

      I went to Wellesley—campus surveys gave the percentage of the student population who identify as LGBT as 50%!

  38. L-squared*

    Man, I can tell this will get ugly in the comments.

    That said, I think more people would do well to acknowledge that where someone went to college is a bias MANY people have. It is usually pretty unfair, so I think instead of looking at this as a women’s college issue, just look at it the same way as if someone said “I’m biased people who went to junior college” or “I’m biased against people who went to Ivy league schools”. I think it would be far more helpful to the LW to frame it as any other irrational bias.

    1. Witch*

      It’s not a bias on where someone went to school so much as it’s a bias about preconceived notions about women. The OP expects these women to need coddling, the same as someone sexist might expect a 22-year old blonde woman to need coddling. That’s why people are getting riled.

    2. Not a Lawyer*

      The college a candidate attended can be useful information for the first full-time job. After that? It should come down to what the candidate has accomplished professionally. For example, I know one legal recruiter who still looks at law school first, even for experienced attorneys. If someone attended Harvard or Yale, but then failed to make partner at two successive law firms, their choice of school should be irrelevant.

      1. L-squared*

        Sure. But it doesn’t stop after the first job. And that is kind of my point. I’ve met people years into their career who have certain opinions of people who went to X state school, which doesn’t have a great repuation

    3. LawBee*

      But it is a women’s college issue because all of her biases are specifically about women who attend women’s colleges. She’s not complaining about Ivy League or junior college but explicitly and exclusively about women who attended women’s colleges. Let’s not dilute her stance for her.

      1. L-squared*

        I’m not diluting it. But I feel like thinking X about someone who went to a woman’s college, and Y bad thing about someone who went to a not great state college, are basically the same issue. Its an unfair bias.

        When I wrote this (and it could’ve changed now) I saw nothing actually constructive for OP, just people saying how awful she is.

        2. Texas*

          Except the bias against those who attended women’s college is a matter of (in this case internalized) misogyny, because it’s based on negative stereotypes about women. There is no axis of oppression for “attended a state school.

          1. HoHumDrum*

            I mean I’ve heard people look down on state schools because of reasons that essentially boil down to elitist and classism. Honestly most college discourse invariably ends up centering on classism, at least here in the US, with healthy doses of racism, sexism, and more added on.

            1. I'm just here for the cats*

              People look down on state schools? I’ve never heard of this. Maybe it depends on the state? Like I grew up in Minnesota and lots of people went to UMN and it was highly regarded school, regardless if you went to Minneapolis or Mankato or any other city. I have heard of looking down on someone who went to tech/ community college but that was usually because they didn’t have a Bachelor’s

              1. HoHumDrum*

                People who are REALLY snooty look down on any school that isn’t an Ivy, people who are classist look down on public colleges generally, and also a lot of state schools (particularly the ones with big football teams) get reputations as “party schools”. It’s all absurd, but I’ve absolutely seen snark about them.

    5. Ellis Bell*

      I don’t think those examples are okay either, but it’s significantly different to have a bias against an institution for the less privileged gender, than it is to have a bias against people who just went to an exclusive school (and therefore might be more privileged). Women have a lot of everyday, ongoing crap to navigate that has not been relegated to history. Thus: Give women a break?

    6. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

      There is no reason that bias about what kind of college someone attended is incompatible with sexism, and indeed, bias against someone who went to a woman’s college is an excellent example of how two kinds of bias can intersect and combine.

  39. EmKay*

    OP, I would encourage you to think more deeply about WHY you feel this way about women’s colleges. This reeks of internalised misogyny, and I promise that this is not meant as an attack.

    1. Texas*

      Yep. Ironically, attending a women’s college might have been a great opportunity for OP to confront her internalized misogyny ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

      1. Danish*

        LW can hang with the boys, she’s not like other girls!

        Which is to say, i agree with the commenters that are calling out internalized misogyny. It sounds like you’re judgmental/almost secondhand-embarrassed about the concept of focusing on women’s achievements, or women-only spaces. Like they’re making you look bad by association.

  40. I should really pick a name*

    My boss pulled me aside and said that he knows I had an “immediate dislike” to this new hire but she was a sound applicant and I need to respect their decision.

    That is a HUGE sign that you need to change your thinking, and fast.
    If I had to say this to an employee, I would be watching them like a hawk.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      Yeah that’s some pretty strong feedback that this is not going to fly in the long term.

    2. I Wish My Job Was Tables*

      Yeah, OP, have you taken a look at your team lately? How much are people being paid?

      I ask because my first non-college office job, a boss got fired because it turned out there were payment discrepancies on her team based on race – as in, POC staff never earned more than 45k/year on her team while white staff always started at 55k/year. The tip-off that this was a trend was her saying she’d never hire anyone who held retail, customer support, or temp jobs at any point ever in their lives and that she thought such people “weren’t fit”. That company had serious problems noticing performance issues in management, so the fact she warranted attention was notable.

    3. EmmaPoet*

      Same here. You’ve shown your manager that you can’t be trusted to behave properly because of your prejudices, and that’s a very bad sign. I’d be keeping a very close eye on OP as well.

    4. MHA*

      Right– it’s not like LW’s bias is limited to the resume stage, which would be bad enough, but it’s easy to dehumanize a piece of paper. The fact that it persisted into the actual hiring process once she’d had a chance to meet and get to know the candidate as an individual, and persisted so obviously that her manager noticed it and felt the need to call her out on it? Yikes.

      Part of being a manager is being able to manage personalities that you wouldn’t necessarily get along with as an individual. Take the (ridiculous, ftr) bias out of it and you still have the problem that the people around you shouldn’t be able to TELL you have a personal dislike for a specific employee. Yes, LW absolutely needs to work to overcome their bias, but they also just need to work harder in general not to let their personal feelings influence their management, period. Maybe some classes– management, mindfulness, etc.

    5. Observer*

      That is a HUGE sign that you need to change your thinking, and fast.
      If I had to say this to an employee, I would be watching them like a hawk.

      Yes. You not only showed your bias but your boss had to worry that you would essentially be insubordinate about it. So much so that he had to explicitly warn you about it.

      In a way it reminds me of the manager who forced out an employee she didn’t like for different but equally ridiculous reasons – and it was also a situation where she let her feelings over-ride her bosses directives. You are lucky that you got warned before you burned some bridges.

      But realize that it’s quite likely that you are on thin ice here.

    6. Budgie Buddy*

      Oof yes. Unless the boss is unreliable, OP’s reaction must have been pretty extreme to warrant this immediate warning.

  41. CharlieBrown*

    I really wonder if anyone with this level of bias is even qualified to be a manager. I would not want to work under this person, as I would constantly be wondering what other irrational biases they held.

    1. Marcella*

      I’m curious how she treats women who take maternity leave, cry in the office, are conventionally feminine or attractive and work closely with powerful men. Because she is already comfortable with assigning toxic stereotypes.

      1. Keymaster of Gozer*

        Back when I was in my early career (and dinosaurs programmed VAX) I had some really unpleasant views about women in particular who had kids. Obviously I don’t hold those views anymore (I’m still never having kids but my staff who do get all the support I can give them) because my boss pulled me up and told me to knock it off or, basically, gtfo.

        My 20s were marred by some truly bad decisions on my part, but I did overcome and put in the work to be less of an angry judgemental person. It was not easy but the rewards for being less bigoted are great!

        I do hope OP gets the realisation I did and changes.

      2. sequinedhistories*

        Or how she treats women who are NOT conventionally feminine or who are unattractive or who act “too much like men” in her view. The wonderful thing about misogyny is that it provides so many different ways for women to somehow “do” being a woman in the wrong way.

  42. morethantired*

    This would be like assuming everyone who went to an Ivy League school is rich and snobby, or that anyone who went to a community college was poor and not very smart. It’s the sort of insidious bias that doesn’t belong in hiring. It’s the same thing as when hiring managers give preference to candidates who went to the same college as they did. Your skills, experience and track record should be what gets you a job, not where you went to school. OP is wrong that “people pick where they go to college.” Some people have to choose a school based on financial aid packages, class schedules, program offerings, proximity to home, etc. It’s not like every person can pick any school and get accepted.

    1. nm*

      Not to mention, most people are literally minors when applying to college–> often it’s really their parents choice!

  43. Uplifter of all*

    The post also has a strong undercurrent of “I can only achieve equality if I downplay my own gender”, which is patently untrue. One does not have to undermine a gender/minority/group/choices/colleges etc. to show or believe that they are equal to others.

    A good leader “uplifts” people as they rise.

    OP’s bias is so obvious that her manager needed to give her a fair warning before she starts managing the new hire. Its a problem, and I am glad he is taking preemptive action. I would be horrified if I was to ever report to a manager like that.

    1. Dark Macadamia*

      Yeah I’m mostly outraged but I also feel really sad for the LW. She seems to think being a woman is an obstacle she needs to overcome.

      Reminds me of Mad Men when Peggy tells Roger how she always has to make men comfortable and he’s like “who told you that???” It’s a moment that really highlights his privilege/obliviousness but it’s also a major turning point for Peggy and how she sees/presents herself.

    2. Ann Ominous*

      “I would be horrified if I was to ever report to a manager like that.”

      If the candidate even decides to accept their offer! If I liked a company and all the people I interviewed with, but felt palpable dislike from the person who would be my manager, I would have to be in dire financial straits to accept that offer.

      And wouldn’t that be ironic: a female manager’s misogyny being the reason the top candidate (who happens to be female) doesn’t work there.

    2. "So she didn't go to Smith"*

      +3

      Let’s review, LW. You say you know you have a bias. You say you want to get over it. Then you spend several paragraphs trying to justify having it. It’s apparently obvious enough that your bosses have told you to get over it.

      You cannot manage this employee, and it doesn’t say great things about your ability to manage in general.

  46. OperaArt*

    I graduated in a STEM field from a women’s college in the 1980s. It was invaluable to me as an 18-year-old to be in an environment where my classmates and I were allowed to thrive and not have to battle the biases women so often face in STEM fields. Yes, we had to face those biases after graduation, but we then did from positions of inner-strength and certainty in our abilities.

    My graduating class of slightly over 200 women produced doctors, farmers, ministers, lawyers, judges at every level of government, scientists, social workers, policy makers, elected officials, and so on. None of those are professions that reward people who need coddling.

    1. The Real Fran Fine*

      *applause* Some of y’all really make me regret not attending a women’s college with these success stories, lol. I’d probably be much further along in my career if I had (I’m in a female-dominated job function anyway).

    2. Slow Gin Lizz*

      I love you and your comment. Signed, a straight cis woman who went to a women’s college.

  47. WannabeAstronaut*

    I went to Smith for one of those exact reasons– I wanted to major in physics, and in high school being one of 3 girls in my 30-person physics classes was Not Great. Being able to focus on the math and physics and without all the overt and subtle sexism from peers was fabulous, and didn’t at all leave me at a disadvantage for moving into the Real World of aerospace which is very male-dominated. Also, these schools are frequently the only places where LGBT or gender minority students feel safe enough to be themselves (hi, me again)– which you point out as an “acceptable” reason to make certain choices!

    1. Roland*

      I studied computer science at a state school and in my senior capstone class I was the only woman in a class of 17. It’s not “coddling” to prefer something else!!!

    2. Anonymous for this*

      I went to a womens college my first year, transferred for various reasons my second year to a coed college.

      I started as a physics major, stuck it out for three semesters but finally decided to go into a different major because I was so discouraged by and tired of the unrelenting harassment by the male students. While the faculty (all male) did not harass female students, they didn’t do anything about it. Message received.

    4. Sabrina*

      Fellow Smith grad here, and same!!! I actually chose Smith because of the life changing financial aid package, and the availability of good local ice cream (see that great 18 year old decision making we’re judging everyone on…)

      I was a math major, and went on to get a PhD in math. I couldn’t recommend a women’s college highly enough to any 18 year old woman thinking of a math related career. There is still so much garbage to deal with in the field, it really helps you build the confidence in yourself and your skills that you need to push through that.

      1. Sarra N. Dipity*

        I mean, the local ice cream there IS something special.

        (I wanted to go to Smith so badly! I had attended a summer science program there when I was in HS, and just fell in love. Unfortunately my parents weren’t great at helping me apply for financial aid, and I ended up at a state school, and dropping out…)

      2. Music With Rocks In*

        Herrell’s! Honestly I need to go back to NoHo more just for this.

        I was a humanities major, but my othe rSmith friends who were in the sciences are doing amazing things these days.

        1. a green griffin*

          ah I went to MHC but we definitely went to North Hampton for the Herrell’s — what good memories thank you for the reminder!

        2. Slow Gin Lizz*

          Hi Music with Rocks In! I majored in music and minored in geology at Smith and I call myself a rock musician. :-D And yes, I NEED to go to Herrell’s SOON.

  48. Sylvan*

    In addition to this, when I meet a woman who attended a women’s college, I assume she will expect a more than average amount of coddling. I expect entitlement and privilege. I expect her to have difficulty working with the men on our team.

    This sounds a bit like you want her to have been put in her place, and you’re angry that she wasn’t, and that’s sad. That’s really sad.

    I attended a women’s college for a year before transferring to another school. Any of my personality issues aren’t the college’s fault — they’re mine, lol. If anything, the school helped me improve. Also, I had many male teachers who I looked up to, and I had male friends outside of school.

    1. TinyLibrarian*

      I’d be interested to know what the LW defines as “coddling, entitlement, and privilege.” Setting boundaries, asking for what they need, and not allowing the employer to take advantage?

      Also, what does having “difficulty working with the men” look like?
      Refusing to be talked over, reporting harassment, or assuming a leadership role?

  49. just a thought ...*

    I strongly feel a man wrote this and said they were a woman because they thought it would make it more acceptable.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      We’re supposed to take letter writers at their word.

      Also don’t underestimate the internalize misogyny that some women are carrying around.

      1. Witch*

        I could see a woman being much more harsh on other women. All of society consistently pits us against each other. Shit’s wild.

        1. Properlike*

          Of all the workplace sexism I’ve experienced over the decades, some of the worst has come from other women. That, and the “relational bullying” are significant. Add in that men tend to be hands-off in those situations because they see it as “personal issues” rather than professional issues, even when it’s work-related.

    3. different seudonym*

      I mean, maybe? But I’ve encountered very similar views in the wild, from women. The sudden extreme disgust thing really says internalized hatred to me.

    4. Dust Bunny*

      Another commentor below called this a “pick-me woman” (see Chump Lady for an explanation of that) and, yeah–some women are desperate to not be “like all the other girls”. Even though “all the other girls” are also not like all the other girls if you know them as people, and being a Mean Girl is very much like “all the other girls” in its own way.

    6. Starbuck*

      Unfortunately when I read it I didn’t have any skepticism that a woman had written it. This attitude is definitely out there and more common than you think.

      1. Quill*

        TBH the perception that women are never sexist towards other women is one of the stalling points of modern feminism. It’s very… second wave revival, and not in a good way, to assume that women have no agency in creating problems for other women.

    7. Emotional support capybara (he/him)*

      This was 110% written by a woman.

      Signed, AFAB person who was bad at performing femininity and caught no end of hell from girls in school and women in the workplace about it

    8. Ellis Bell*

      I am pretty glad that you think so, because it means you’ve been spared my experience. My experience is I’ve met a ton of women who think it’s 1) “weak” to not personally fend off sexual assaults and afterwards keep it to yourself, 2) expect things to “not be totally equal”, like women getting more leave for things like pregnancy, and 3) any women who ever mentions feminism or gender equality is denounced as not liking men and being hard to get along with. I’m not putting OPs opinions in any of those three categories per se, but it’s pretty common for some women to think “I was tough (or lucky). I never had a serious problem arise because of sexism (or I fought it) so no other woman should need help either.” They think women who need support systems – even the simplest support system of each other! – are cheating somehow. Not every woman who believes in careers and public life is a feminist, many just think they are individually superior or that sexism is historical because they personally have been lucky.

  51. Name name*

    @alison bigs heads up that if this gets posted to any of the numerous Facebook groups for HWC alums**, the comment section will explode and possibly get out of control very quickly. (Most of the comments so far are very reasonable but we all know how the internet works!)

    **It will definitely get shared as many previous ask a manager posts have been shared in some of the career focused groups. The 7 Sisters colleges can be particularly… Vocal? –from a seven sibs grad

    1. Whale I Never*

      Scrolling through the comments I definitely had the feeling of “ah yes, the Seven Sibs are here and making their opinions known.”

      1. Name name*

        Tbh, I was mostly worried about some people trying to have a nuanced discussion of gender and HWCs and terfs (of which there are sadly many in the seven sibs groups) making their thoughts known.

    2. FormerHigherEd*

      I started reading this and knew it was going to get posted in the WCAN group on FB and that the alums would. be. coming. Lolssss

  52. Eldritch Office Worker*

    A lot of us have internal biases, naming them and knowing them is important. I think what’s knocking me back about this letter is the strength of the bias. You’re so turned off by women’s colleges that your boss noted an *immediate dislike*? There are certain things I might tilt my head at but I won’t disregard a candidate immediately over a factor that’s not significant to their work with me. That’s something deep that has to be unpacked.

  53. Sharon*

    Wow. I’m kind of shocked at how detached from reality this letter is. Has she really never experienced mansplaining, being talked over, or being judged for daring to have an opinion? Allison’s comparison to HBCUs was spot on – just because they’re allowed doesn’t mean they’re treated equally!
    So many studies show that girls benefit from separate education. Seriously, so many studies. And it’s good to remember that when they start college, they are girls – still teenagers actually.

    1. Michelle Smith*

      Yep! I went to college at 16 (turned 17 a couple of months into my first semester) so I was a literal child, legally and developmentally. I would have benefitted so much from a more supportive environment and deeply regret not going to an HBCU.

    2. Music With Rocks In*

      I feel like she has experienced those things, and is looking down on women who made a deliberate choice to seek out environments where they could minimize that oppression and maximize their learning potential. It has a strong feeling of “I got where I am despite the obstacles, so anyone who didn’t go through what I did doesn’t deserve their position.”

  54. Avery*

    It’s not even entirely accurate to say, as OP did, that men’s only colleges would be banned. A handful of them are still out there–Wikipedia mentions Wabash College, Hampden-Sydney College, and Morehouse College among others, and my first thought of Deep Springs College only started admitting women in 2018.

  55. UKgreen*

    Not quite the same as the (as I understand it) all-women campuses in the US, but here at Oxford University we used to have several women-only colleges – the last one (St Hilda’s) became co-ed in 2008.

    I have several friends, contemporaries of my time at Oxford, who went to St Hilda’s not because they were ‘coddled, entitled and privileged’. They went to a single-sex institution because their parents would not have allowed them to study away from home if they lived in a college that had men. Those women were (and still are) Muslims. So I assume you’re Islamophobic as well, OP?

    1. Roland*

      OP said plenty of things worth criticizing, you don’t need to invent new things to criticize literally out of nothing.

      1. UKgreen*

        Plenty of women from religious families choose (or chosen for them) single sex educational establishments. If OP is biased against women who attend those establishments she is likely to be disproportionately biased against people of religion.

        1. Kaye*

          Possibly, but I think it would be (to use UK equality law terminology) indirect discrimination rather than direct.

          1. Observer*

            In the US indirect discrimination is often illegal. It’s not called indirect discrimination, but disparate / discriminatory impact.

            Which means that even if the OP is not Islamophobic or biased against religion, her biases could easily lead to illegal behavior.

      2. Dust Bunny*

        It does, however, point out a significant reason one might attend a single-sex college that the LW has entirely overlooked.

        1. Roland*

          Sure, that’s worth mentioning. Utterly counterproductive to frame it as “…and thus you certainly hate Muslims” imo though.

      3. Gerry Keay*

        I don’t think it’s inventing new things to criticize as much as showing the domino effects this degree of irrational bias can have.

    2. UKDancer*

      As you say not really a thing in England particularly where only a very few women only colleges exist and even fewer men only. I know one woman who went to a single sex college (Newnham at Cambridge), and she was definitely not spoilt or entitled.

      I’ve never particularly considered where someone went to university to be a particularly relevant factor for most of the jobs I’ve been recruiting for. I’m more interested in what they’ve done professionally. Unless someone is fresh out of university, it’s way down on my list of requirements.

      1. Storm in a teapot*

        It’s interesting as there are plenty of single-sex secondary (high) schools in the UK across state, grammar and private spheres.
        OP – I was sent to a single sex secondary school by my parents due to their cultural views (Asian). It had a really strong STEM department and I can promise you none of us were ‘coddled’ or unable to interact with men. We just had the opportunity to thrive in an environment where we didn’t have to worry about sexism and misogyny being directed at us.
        I think you should heed your manager’s warning seriously as it’s clearly something you are being (rightly) judged on and I would hate to have such a hostile manager as you seem to be presenting as.

        1. UKDancer*

          And I desperately wanted to go to a single sex secondary school but the only ones near me were private schools and I didn’t pass the entrance exams for a scholarship and my parents couldn’t afford the fees.

          So I went to the “best” mixed comprehensive in the area and still got bullied and sexually harassed by the boys for being awkward and weird. If I had a daughter and could afford it, I’d definitely consider sending her to a girls school.

    3. marinebiology*

      I went to a co-ed school, but we have a few women’s dorms on campus at my university and they also are now primarily lived in by Muslim women, especially international ones.

      But I did take part in women’s organizations and programs – All of these places are filled with the great and rich history of women on campus. It can be so empowering to be following in the footsteps of other strong women who have helped to make education possible for our peers throughout the history of the school.

      It’s difficult to be the only woman in a STEM class, with only men professors, facing bits and pieces of misogyny every day. This can really wear on you – but being around other women who are as driven as you gives you the confidence in yourself and your abilities that makes this easier to cope with and look past.

      These women don’t need to be coddled, they’re building up the strength that can only come from others who are like you and understand you. If anything, it’s made them stronger.

  56. CatCat*

    It’s sad to see a woman who has internalized misogyny so deeply. To be honest, I’d be surprised if there isn’t more going on that will manifest in subtler ways against women subordinates who don’t do things the “right” way as OP views it.

  57. Skyblue*

    Most of the response is, reasonably, about whether the bias itself is justified, but I think it’s worth thinking about why you’re giving so much attention to this one decision that a person made when they were likely 17 years old. If you’re concerned about a lack of good judgment, I am sure many other candidates made decisions at 17 that were far worse than this!
    (I’m not suggesting their choice of college WAS a poor decision – I’m just saying that this is a strange thing to be so focused on.)

    1. Olivia*

      The irony is that OP is showing remarkably bad judgement and over such a bizarre thing. If I were the OP’s boss, I would definitely be closely examining their other decisions to see where else they might be showing bad judgement.

  58. E*

    Can you imagine working and paying for a degree as a woman and having someone on a hiring committee look down on where you attended? Yikes.

    1. Avery*

      Unfortunately, I can, and in circumstances likely more common than the OP’s bias, though that doesn’t make the OP any more justified.
      But if it’s not the hiring committee being biased against women’s colleges, it could be being biased against community colleges (proud community college graduate here, and it did loads more to prepare me for the “real world” than my fancy 4-year liberal arts school did!), or against HBCUs, or against public universities, or against private universities, or against Ivy Leagues, or against non-Ivy Leagues…
      Worth noting is a lot of these boil down to other prejudices. The OP’s is pretty clearly internalized misogyny, but the other examples I listed fall better under racism, classism, or a warped reverse classism where (assumed) rich people are looked down upon for it.

      1. Sara without an H*

        +1. Based on the OP’s language, I think there’s some serious class bias at work here.

  59. Marny*

    LW: would it help if you learned that all the things you are basing your opinion on are factually incorrect? Because they pretty much are. Maybe try asking someone who went to a women’s college what led to their decision instead of making assumptions and then using those assumptions to justify your opinions.

    1. Mrs whosit*

      Yes! This is exactly my thought.

      OP, I mean this very politely: your letter reminded me of how certain I was – as an 8th grader – that every one of my friends who was choosing an all-girls high school (a huge thing in my area) was somehow less intelligent, less mature, or less… successful? than I was. I grew out of that certainty because *of course* people make choices that are different than mine, and those choices can be very good *for them* and based on very good reasons *for them.*

      Instead of coming to that realization, this letter shows you doubling down on what you already think by piling up assumptions – instead of actually wondering about what very good reasons all those other people might have.

  60. Acronyms Are Life (AAL)*

    I mean, I’m biased against a person who can’t use google to figure out there are indeed men only colleges. I mean Hampden Sydney was a school that more than one guy from my HS went to (yes, I am from VA).

    And you don’t like schools with big endowments? So, no ivies, no schools like LSU, Penn State, the Ohio State?

    Where exactly can we go to school to make this special snowflake feel comfortable that we can handle ourselves in the big scary male dominated environment?

    I, as a female, went to a school that was less than 20% female. I don’t believe this made me in any way uniquely qualified to work with men.

    OP needs to figure out what a pick me female is and stop being one. OP reads like one of those people who tell women in the workplace that they shouldn’t have kids, wear makeup, or anything that reads stereotypically feminine.

    You know what? I’ll go with I’m uniquely qualified by having been surrounded by dudes both at school and in my male dominated field. You may think that going with ‘I’m not like these prissy women’ is making you relatable to the men in your workplace, but it doesn’t. Trust me, they’re talking about you behind your back. I’ve seen it in action.

  61. Michelle Smith*

    The smartest, most talented person I’ve ever known went to Bennett College, which is both an HBCU and a women’s college. She went on to get her PhD from Harvard.

    I don’t think it’s productive for me to tell you how bad I think your irrational bias is, so I’ll instead suggest a solution – get to know smart and talented people from women’s colleges! It should be easy to find and follow them on LinkedIn. The more exposure you have to them and the more you learn from them, the more you’ll be able to overcome your bias.

    In the meantime, treat your new employee like you would anyone else. If it’s really impossible for you to do so, step down from your position.

  62. Fyodor*

    I mean, it could be these good reasons, or it could be something mundane like they had friends going there, or they thought the campus was nice looking, or really liked the people they met on a campus tour, knew an alumnus who pitched it to them, or it had a particular program that they liked that was not available in the coed colleges they looked at. Even if you think that women’s colleges are a bad idea (which I don’t) it’s just insane to judge someone based on a college decision they made when they were seniors in high school.

    “They’re generally there because they like the academic programs the college offers, or they want more equitable access to STEM education (there’s tons of data showing that students at women’s colleges are more likely to major in STEM fields than women elsewhere; they’re also more than twice as likely to attend medical school, earn doctoral degrees, and be involved in philanthropic activity), or they’ve read the data showing (or personally experienced) that male voices are more likely to drown out women’s in many classrooms (even to the point of men getting called on more).”

    1. mreasy*

      As a Latin major who considered both Bryn Mawr and Wellesley I am physically unable not to jump in to say that if it’s a women’s college, the graduate who talked about it was an alumna, not an alumnus. Ok I’m sorry I’m a monster

  63. HugsAreNotTolerated*

    I mean, I applaud your desire to manage your bias and to try to treat your employee fairly, but there are some real concerns here. Where did this viewpoint come from? Did you have a bad experience with a co-worker/boss who was a grad of a women’s college/uni? Because your fury is coming across so strongly that there’s got to be something behind it.
    Also how often has this topic come up that your manager is not only aware of your dislike for women’s college grads, but that they felt they had to proactively talk to you to make sure that you don’t single this new employee out for poor treatment? I think this is a case of self-fulfilling prophecy. Your bias affects your perception of these employees and your treatment, and therefore since you expect them to need more coddling, you do. Chances are most of them think you’re micromanaging.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      Also while OP says she wants to change and I believe her, I also agree with Alison that this entire post starts with a litany of justification for the bias – which isn’t sending the message that this person is ready for change. Real change in mindset takes work, and it takes humility. And time. While you do all that – you need to change your behavior immediately because this is going to harm you as much as it harms those you manage.

  64. CheesePlease*

    I think it’s good OP recognizes she has a bias. But at the end of the day…it’s just a college program? People picked it when they were 18 or 19 most often here in the US. There may be many reasons for why they picked that school over other co-ed options (program, small class size, scholarship opportunities, location, specific professors, sports team opportunities, family ties) – the same reasons anyone picks any school. You could form similar (unfounded) biases against women in a co-ed college who belonged to sororities or other all-women clubs, programs or living organizations.

    At the end of the day, having reasons why *you* personally wouldn’t go to one of these institutions, or would even discourage a close family member or friend from attending, are not the same as truths upon which you should base your interactions with others!

    In addition to Allison’s advice, I think you should largely ignore where this employee (and all other employees!) attended college. I don’t think most people around me at work care about where I went to school, and it would be uncomfortable if they praised certain schools or talked a lot about colleges in general if the company doesn’t deal with higher-ed. Focus on the skills and unique abilities of individual employees, and seek to build a connection with them as an INDIVIDUAL, not as merely a graduate of your hated institution. Focus on what you know to be true based on your work experiences together, and not assumptions about needing to be coddled or being inflexible.

    1. Constance Lloyd*

      I also had several classmates who didn’t get to choose where they went to college. There were a lot of overbearing parents who mandated their children attend religiously affiliated (and sometimes gender specific) universities. One of my good friends was told she could either attend a women’s only college or live at home all four years. Her best shot at independence was attending a women’s university.

    2. Prospect Gone Bad*

      I like this comment because it’s the most realistic and “right sized.” I think some of the commenters forget that when someone writes in, they aren’t saying “this is the most important thing in my life that takes up all of my brain space,” because the comments always act like the OP is some horrible monster for having one impure thought.

      My take on this is the same as many bias. They met some horrible people or coworkers from hell from a group, thought they were horrible because they were part of the group and not because they are just horrible. Trend as old as the sun.

      Unless OP wants to pinpoint a specific thing about all-girls schools that leads to bad work or intersocial skills.

      personally, I have no clue, and am genX so grew up idolizing the cast of Facts of Life and so am not against the idea :-)

      1. CheesePlease*

        Thanks! :) On one hand, the bias is indeed very irrational so I can see why everyone is screaming about it. On the other hand, I don’t see why Allison didn’t encourage the comment section to focus on what the OP asked – which is overcoming the bias.

        1. KRM*

          I think because, as Alison herself noted, this person wants to “overcome her bias” but not actually have to change how she thinks or feels! If this person wrote in and said “I know it’s irrational, and I really want to work at overcoming it, I know those who attend women’s colleges are just as smart and successful and normal as everyone else I know who went to a co-ed school” people would feel much different. But we’re reacting to the implicit “I don’t want to have to change how I feel so please help me hide the bias because I’ve been told it’s irrational”. Most of the letter was the OP trying to justify how she feels!

      2. Observer*

        I think some of the commenters forget that when someone writes in, they aren’t saying “this is the most important thing in my life that takes up all of my brain space,” because the comments always act like the OP is some horrible monster for having one impure thought.

        I hear that, but I don’t really think that this is what is going on here.

        The OP first posts a long justification for a very strong bias that’s utterly irrational and has zero relationship with reality. She shows no indication that she understands that her bias MIGHT actually have factual problems, nor is she willing to just ignore the college issue as not relevant despite the fact that it actually really is not relevant. And her bias is SO strong and blatant that her boss had to pull her aside and warn her that to mistreat the new hire would be considered insubordinate.

        That doesn’t necessarily make her a monster, but it does mean that this issue is far more that a minor blip.

    3. Frideag Dachaigh*

      Totally. I went to a women’s colege, and absolutely adored it. But honestly the fact that it was a women’s college was an small reason why- it was the perfect distance from home, it is frequently is regarded as one of the most beautiful campuses in the country, they offered programs I was interested in, they had a great alum network, I met a lot of really talented and smart students while I was touring, and they provided me with a great scholarship. It was the only women’s college I even remotely considered. I’m now a pretty big proponent of women’s colleges in the sense of “I encourage women/gender minorities that I interact with to not immediately brush it off because of the perceived notion of what women’s colleges are like” and I can’t imagine my life without the people and opportunities I had. But in the end, yeah, it’s just a college. They’re just pretty fantastic colleges.

  65. OyHiOh*

    I briefly attended a Catholic women’s college. It was Catholic in the sense that mass was held every morning but carried no sense of obligation to attend, and there were a few courses taught by nuns (who ended up being some of my best friends and confidants on campus). It was a remarkably secular school despite the Catholic name.

    Anyway. That was the school that most influenced my progressive leaning politics. Of all the secular and religious institutions I attended as a teen and young adult, that school most informed the adult I am today. We had professors and instructors who were bound and determined to take a motley assortment of young women (we ranged from 18 year olds to non traditional 30 somethings and experience from girls who’d never traveled outside of a few miles around the neighborhoods they grew up in, to comfortably well off world travelers, and international students as well) and forge them into leaders with a voice and a grounded understanding of what and why we belived what we did – whether that was traditional Catholicism, secular humanism, or any of a broad range of faith traditions that were also practiced on campus.

    I wish I’d been able to graduate from that school (had to leave for $$$). It was a remarkable place to study and learn.

    1. Irish Teacher*

      I attended a Catholic college in Ireland that I always say “had liberation theology built into its very walls!” At our graduation, we were straight up told there was plenty of money in the country now; our job was not to increase it further but to ensure its more equitable distribution.

      Like many, I chose my college for reasons that…don’t make much sense as an adult (and are unique to the Irish situation and my personal circumstances, so I won’t go into them here; they aren’t very interesting anyway) but by coincidence, it turned out to be a great choice for so many reasons. Mostly because it was small and intimate and it was a little further away from home than Irish people usually choose to go for college, so I had to live there, which I also consider beneficial.

  66. MCL*

    OP, I’m glad that you’re recognizing this bias as a problem to solve and I hope you take pro-active steps to address it. The fact that your boss has already commented on it is telling, and I’m sure it’s something that others on your team have noticed as well. I can’t help but think it’s because you have expressed your distaste for women’s colleges at work, so curb that right now and start working on retraining your brain. Please start implementing the practices Alison suggested, and I hope your biases against women’s colleges becomes a thing of the past soon.

  67. EBStarr*

    The irony of calling women’s college graduates “inflexible” and “intolerant” in the middle of this post is pretty rich. Richer than most women’s colleges endowments!

    That said, it’s good that you want to learn to manage this report fairly. I’d recommend educating yourself, with an open mind. Read about women’s colleges — just from the Wikipedia page I can see plenty of articles linked that describe different reasons why women’s colleges may be considered a good thing. The goal is not to change your mind about where *you yourself* would want to go to college but to educate yourself about the many smart people who disagree with you. Then, I’d recommend reading memoirs by people who went to women’s colleges, or blogs or articles. Again, just to understand that these people are just PEOPLE who, at 18, made one choice that you happen to have a strong emotional reaction to. You are taking a very small aspect of the person and judging their character based on it; you need to remind yourself that there are whole people attached to this, people with lives and histories and families and belief systems that are much more than the name on their diplomas.

  68. allswell*

    With such large endowments, maybe some students are choosing to attend due to financial reasons?… Echoing the yikes on a bike all around here.

  69. my 8th name*

    Not only is it an irrational bias, it’s discrimination AGAINST WOMEN. If you are choosing between a female candidate who went to a women’s college and a male candidate who went anywhere else, your bias would drive you to not hire the women because of a factor related to her gender…

    I’m not sure if I am explaining that well, but it’s wrong and maybe framing it to yourself as gender-based discrimination will be the push you need to shake the bias

  70. irene adler*

    OP wrote: I am aware this is a bias and I want to overcome it to manage my employee fairly.

    I’m glad you recognize this bias and want to treat this employee fairly.

    My suggestions would be to interact as much as you can with this employee and see for yourself regarding their capabilities. Reserve judgement. Don’t automatically write off any of their ‘rookie’ mistakes or questions as an indicator of needing coddling. Remember that everyone was new at one time and had their fair share of questions and maybe even a few mistakes. Make it a point to develop a positive working relationship.

    You’ll be pleasantly surprised; impressed even.

  71. Sarah*

    Research also shows that it’s much easier to change behaviour than it is to change attitudes. If you wait for a person’s attitude to change, for them to feel convinced of their error, you’re waiting a damn long time. So, OP, if you actually want to address this irrational bias, take action to change your behaviour instead of trying to change your beliefs. You’ve been told quite clearly that implementing this bias is unacceptable. So what can you do to ensure you don’t discriminate against anyone else? Judge work without names attached? Recuse yourself from promotion panels? I’m not sure because I don’t know your work, but work with someone else to determine how your bias will show itself, and change those behaviours. Do your research and form relationships alongside that, please, but so many people want to wait to be convinced, when some things are just wrong and yet because of that irrationality extremely resistant to change. So just do. PSA from a psychologist.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      I just said something similar in a comment. Mindset takes time, and judging from this post we’re miles from that – though I still applaud and encourage OP for taking it on as a goal. But the behavior needs to change immediately. It’s visible to others, it is arguably discriminatory at a legal level, and it’s already being addressed by a manager. The behavior changes need to be intentional and immediate.

      1. Quill*

        This! You can train yourself out of acting on a bias far more easily than you can train yourself out of thoughts related to said bias.

  72. Nom*

    Alison is very right. Additionally, this letter completely disregards the very strong academics at some women’s colleges. (Not all women’s colleges have strong academics, just like not all co-ed colleges have strong academics)

    1. Nom*

      Relatedly: These comments have me wishing i had considered women’s colleges as more serious options for myself when i was choosing colleges!

      1. Minimal Pear*

        Same! I was a STEM major and my co-ed college skewed more female and honestly had a lot of the same advantages people are listing for HWC, and I’m still going “Wow… maybe it would’ve been even better if I went to Smith or something…”

    1. SereneScientist*

      Great question. It’s been coming up a lot lately and seems to get conflated with, “Let’s remove these barriers so the Thing People Need is more accessible.”

      1. Starbuck*

        And it’s weird how often it seems to come from people who worked hard and sacrificed to provide a better life for their children…. and then are mad about it when young people today don’t have to struggle like they did. Suffering isn’t a virtue.

        1. Quill*

          I think it turns up often because it’s at it’s core reactionary. So there’s a combination of people mourning lost time/opportunity that they think is going to mean nothing now that the young ‘uns didn’t have to walk uphill in the snow both ways, and people who are rhetorically trying to justify discrediting people who theoretically have it easier than they did (or who have an opinion that is not theirs) by infantilizing them.

  74. Bob-White of the Glen*

    I think there are a lot of good points here OP, raised by both Alison and the comments. I hope you spend some time doing research on why people choose institutions that “look” like them. It’s great that you are “aware this is a bias and I want to overcome it to manage my employee fairly,” but I hope you evolve from trying to “learn to disregard a choice I genuinely think shows poor judgment” to understanding the sound judgement for a lot of people in those decisions, and your own lack of awareness of a society of biases that make it harder for women (and other groups) to compete.

    I don’t think you would be here if you weren’t trying to evolve on more levels than just a manager of people, so I hope some of the comments and Alison’s answer are very illuminating for you.

    But I’m glad you wrote this in. We ALL have biases against certain things. Ive been fairly anti greek life because 1.) I don’t like the idea of going to college to hang out with your clones and 2.) I have pretty stereotypically views of sororities and fraternities that simply are not the norm. Family members being in them, and seeing their friends, made me realize how ridiculous that was. But prior to that I would have been (slightly) judgmental on people in them. And I would have made assumptions about what they thought of me not being the greek type. We all do it and we all need to be aware of it. And we all need to explore these biases and stop trying to simplify other people and/or finding excuses to continue to look down upon them.

    Good luck OP and I hope this ends up being a positive growing experience for you.

  75. Not Tom, Just Petty*

    OP, I think you are putting the “precious” label on the wrong party.
    My mom graduated second in her high school class because she had to work in the afternoons to help support her family. She only took algebra 1 and geometry. She got a perfect score on the SATs. She was given a full ride to an top school in the country. It was only half an hour from her home town.
    She had to turn it down to go to work to help support her father support her invalid mother and younger sister (with serious health problems as well) family.
    I was born when she was in her 30s. She was getting ready to retire when I started college.
    She and my dad paid my full tuition when I transferred from a state school to a women’s college because I liked the program better and she felt it was worth it to support me.
    Again.
    There are two types of people in this world.

    1. Dust Bunny*

      My grandmother dropped out of nursing school because (well, in the first place because she got sick, but even after she was better) her parents and boyfriend told her she didn’t need it. She resented that for the rest of her life. She was third in her high school class between two students who tied for valedictorian. Her mother wanted her home to help with the younger kids. Notice that her brothers didn’t get saddled with the same responsibilities.

  76. Still Queer, Still Here*

    Graduated from a women’s college, and currently employed by one! Allison is spot-on with a lot of this. I would also add that women’s colleges these days (not all of them, but many of the high-achieving ones) serve as havens for folks who aren’t gender-conforming. Many of us who graduated from these institutions use terminology like “historically women’s college” because now many of these institutions work hard to be welcoming to gender-diverse students. Many trans young adults would not feel comfortable going through a gender transition at a co-ed institution, but a historically women’s college often has a high population of LGBTQ students, with services and a community that speaks to trans and non-binary students’ needs. From a professional standpoint too, many of these institutions have really strong internship, professional development, and experiential learning opportunities that cater specifically to gender non-conforming people and neurodivergent needs, because historically women’s colleges have such a high proportion of students in those groups. I might say that their understanding of professional norms, their ability to engage in personal and professional development, and their awareness of workplace trends is higher than many people at co-ed institutions.

    LW, your assumption that choosing to attend a place where a student with unique needs and interests will have those needs met and be with others who understand their struggles somehow makes them less competent is really awful. I know you know that it’s a problem, but I would really encourage you to reframe this. It’s clear that you didn’t need the unique community that a women’s college can provide. Do you think that the people who are actively disadvantaged in co-ed institutions are weak or less professional than you? Do you think that people should have to go through trauma in order to be a competent professional? That’s sort of what you seem to be saying here. You seem to think that your perspective is fact-based and you need to just ignore these “facts” that women’s college grads aren’t good at what they do. But your perspective is deeply flawed, and I think you need to adjust your whole worldview to figure this out.

    2. Alex (they/them)*

      I’m happy to hear women’s colleges are often trans positive! As a AFAB non-binary person, I’ve had some negative experiences with “women only” spaces (they can be rather terfy)!

  77. S*

    I went to an all girls high school – and if I hadn’t I would have 100% gone to a women’s college. Having the experience of being in an all female environment during my educational years made me MORE resilient, not less.

    This is very “not like the other girls” of her, and I think she needs to do better.

  78. wow*

    I went to the college that gave me the best scholarship and financial aid along with an excellent academic program. Sure, it was a choice, but not one driven by preciousness, intolerance, or inflexibility!

  79. Liisa*

    Wanting to NOT BE HARASSED while trying to get an education is not the same thing as being “precious” or wanting to be “coddled”. Especially for women studying in STEM or other predominantly male fields, being in a co-ed program can be an exhausting mess of being some combination of harassed, objectified, ignored, excluded, talked down to, and otherwise othered by students, TAs, and often professors alike. It’s not being precious to want to have an educational environment without that kind of bullshit, and like Alison and other commenters have mentioned, you should really do some genuine soul-searching as to why you think it is. Honestly, your attitude comes across as being very much “I’m not like other girls” and reeks of internalized misogyny.

  80. fiona the baby hippo*

    Aside from all of Alison’s excellent points, I also want to add, imagine being so caught up in a decision your employee made AT AGE 18. Probably while still living at home.

    1. Just Another Zebra*

      Adding, with no context for why they made that decision. I had friends who went to a specific school because it was the ‘family’ university. I had friends who chose their school to be close to a romantic partner. I had friends who chose school based on cost / scholarships / program availability. The blind bias on this one is … a lot.

  81. go-girls*

    Aside from the fact that going to a women’s college doesn’t mean magically entering a world where you never encounter men, the idea of NOT doing something because you likely won’t have an opportunity to do so later is baffling to me. Should students also not study abroad for a semester because they probably won’t have the opportunity to spend a structured few months in another country later?

  82. Cake or Death*

    “…there’s a strong undercurrent of “I’m justified in feeling this way” throughout your letter, and you’ll never successfully counter your biases if you don’t first drop that.”

    100%!

    3. Courtney*

      Also OP do you judge men the same way if they went to a 90% men university? Or a major that historically hasn’t admitted women or has very few? Probably not… acknowledging your bias isn’t enough here, you have to do way more work.

      1. Not Tom, Just Petty*

        I genuinely wonder. “Oh, X Candidate went to ABC Ivy School…
        Would OP see that as academic success?
        OK, then, let me finish, “, like his dad, brother and grandfather.”
        Does that change things?
        Is that being thrust into the real competition of the world or being spoon fed a privileged course into adulthood?
        Should he have gone to a different school to “prove” he doesn’t require coddling in his profession?

  84. Heffalump*

    I wonder how the OP would evaluate prospective hires if it were possible to arrange things so she knew they had X degree, but not what college they went to.

    1. Keeley Jones, The Independent Woman*

      That would be helpful. And I think of the reverse. Just because someone went to an Ivy or other prestigious schools, they can still be horrible people. See Ted Cruz. I don’t think where someone went to college matters much, especially later career.

      1. Heffalump*

        Much as I dislike Ted Cruz, you don’t get a Harvard law degree without being smart. You’re right, being smart and being a horrible person aren’t mutually exclusive.

  85. Ampersand*

    My womens college had a huge endowment..one that funded my scholarship..as it did many other women who attended. There were women who were able to attend from all parts of the country and the world due to the financial assistance. I was able to graduate with no loans and a great job that I got through a college connection. Now I contribute to the endowment to pay it forward to all the women still to do great things! It’s all about the perspective.

    1. Not Tom, Just Petty*

      This got me, too.
      What about schools that have major funding for there sports teams?
      Shouldn’t the money for that be equally distributed to help everyone?
      It’s just not how any of this works.

  86. LadyHouseOfLove*

    Let me ask a very fair question: if this employee was a man that attended a women’s college, how would you treat him?

  87. LawBee*

    This annoyed me so much I actually came back for a point-by-point counter.

    1. Women’s colleges absolutely serve a purpose – they exist to educate women in a setting where they are not drowned out by male voices, where they are more likely to feel physically safe, where they can get an amazing education that builds leadership skills, strengthens their self-confidence, and empowers them to speak up. The transition from a shy girl who rarely spoke up in class to an empowered woman who speaks her own mind is phenomenal.

    Every leader of every organization at every women’s college is a WOMAN. This does not happen at coed colleges.

    2. Who are avoiding men? It’s college, not a nunnery. We have cross-registration, there were actually men in many of the English classes at my college because the master’s program was state funded and therefore had to be open to all. We have internships out in the world, we dated men at other schools, we have fathers and husbands and brothers and boyfriends.

    3. Men’s only colleges could 100% exist if they were private, as women’s colleges are. “But The Citadel! And the military colleges!” – those are publicly funded by my tax dollars, and that is why they are co-ed now. But if some men want to open up a privately funded men-only college, they are welcome to it. (query whether it’s actually necessary) “I want the same things as a man except I don’t want men around” is not why women go to women’s colleges.

    4. Endowments are huge. OK. Endowments at many if not most schools are huge. The sports budget for college/university football is insane. Those are co-ed schools, and you’re not complaining about that.

    I really hate your assumption that we need coddling, especially when the WORLD shows different. Take a look at this list of women’s college graduates and tell me how these woman demand coddling and entitlement.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_alumnae_of_women%27s_colleges_in_the_United_States

    Oh, I am HOT about this. OP, please actually talk to some women’s college graduates. Ask them why they chose their school. Ask them how they benefits from a single-sex education. Ask them if you should coddle or treat them differently.

    1. Moira Rose's Closet*

      Yes to all of this. Pretty much every “fact” OP asserts to support her position is either (1) untrue, or (2) OP’s unfounded opinion. I can’t stop laughing about the one about how you “never see men” if you go to a women’s college. I went to Smith, but I cross-registered for a significant number of my classes at coed schools in the area (and vice versa). I spent time hanging out with male friends at Amherst. I had many male professors at Smith. Administrators and other personnel at Smith were men. Not to mention that there are, you know, men who live in the town where Smith is located, and if I wanted a good cup of coffee, I might …oh wow…interact with a man!

      I’m glad I can laugh at the absurdity of this letter because otherwise I’d be enraged.

    2. Slow Gin Lizz*

      I LOVE all your points but especially this one:

      Every leader of every organization at every women’s college is a WOMAN. This does not happen at coed colleges.

      And also the one about women feeling physically safe at women’s colleges. Somehow that point hasn’t been brought up in the comments that I’ve read and it’s a VERY good one. When I left for college (hi again, Moira, I also went to Smith) my grandmother warned me about the “men” I should be careful about. I was like, eh, I’m going to a women’s college, I won’t need to worry about them as much.

      1. Slow Gin Lizz*

        Also also, I am pretty damn sure that women’s colleges spend a lot more money on education than any university with a football team, and therefore (I hope, anyway) that we get a better education because of that.

  88. Just Another Zebra*

    First, OP, I want to commend you for writing in to get this problem addressed. It’s a very good first step.

    Frankly, though, I find your bias bizarre. My best friend went to an women’s college because they had the best program for her chosen degree (forensics) and one of the professors there was a woman she idolized. Plus, it wasn’t too terribly far from home. I was accepted into one, but chose a coed university for one reason – I got a better scholarship package. Others have already mentioned that your letter has a strong “bootstrap” vibe – that because you had to fight your way through your schooling. Stop it. If you don’t have a problem with HBCU, you should not have a problem with Women’s Colleges and Universities.

    I hope you are prepared to put in the work necessary to overcome this bias.

  89. YB*

    Thanks for this, Alison! I’m from a different country – we don’t have women’s colleges here (or HBCUs), so I learned a lot from your response and from the comments. The closest analogue we have would be schools oriented to religious faith, and those (at least here) are sometimes notorious for lower academic standards – but that doesn’t seem to be the OP’s concern at all.

    1. Bob-White of the Glen*

      America definitely has some religious schools that are known for lower academic standards. But even there you have to be careful about making assumptions about graduates. Financially they may have had no other choice. The family influence on going may have been too much for an 18-year-old. At 18 they just didn’t know better. In (for example) the decade since graduating they recognized how bad their education was and made adjustments. I’d be loath to not hire a bright, good worker regardless of where they went to college. Hopefully I won’t be judged now for something I did at 22. And the reverse is also true, we have some excellent religious colleges in America. So it would be very hard to hold these biases against an entire group (unless you were just biased by religious education period, but this doesn’t assume that group) instead of individual institutions.

      Regardless, hire the person not the college. (I.e. I don’t think having a Harvard degree makes you a better employee than a UCLA degree, or vice versa. Good and bad employees in both groups.)

      1. YB*

        Oh, entirely agreed. I had no idea what I was doing at 18. (Decades later, I still don’t.) Even if you accept the premise that X type of school is problematic – which I don’t – a mid-career employee shouldn’t be judged on where they went to school.

    2. Starbuck*

      Yeah, women’s colleges don’t have a reputation for lax academics in the US – if anything, it’s the opposite. Religious schools, it varies widely. Many have excellent reputations. Some, absolute garbage. Usually it’s the most fundamentalist/evangelical that are the worst re: academic rigor, but again it varies. You’d need to check on the specific school and not just its affiliation/denomination to be able to make a judgement on the quality of the specific degree.

      1. Jackalope*

        And with religious schools it varies widely even what the “religious” part means. I know of many schools that are still religious in name, and maybe have some classes related to the faith and/or denomination they originally were built by, but are otherwise not religious at all. Students don’t have to be religious to attend, aren’t required to take religion classes, etc.

    3. WS*

      Same in my country on all points – but I’d still judge the graduate on the skills that they actually had, rather than where they went to college. One of my best friends got the choice of a religious college or nothing from her parents, and ten years after graduating she’s a great professional in her field. She did have problems getting placements during college, though, because her university had the well-deserved reputation of being both poor at teaching and over-involved in the placements. But after that she still had to pass national board qualifications like anyone else.

  90. HoHumDrum*

    Hey OP! I’m a women’s college grad and I just want to say I get where you’re coming from a little and share my experience.

    When I first applied to colleges I scoffed at gender separated education because I was bold and loud in all my classes with boys, and a feminist and I didn’t need a girls only space to be confident in class and they seemed so antiquated and kind of pathetic to me. And then I ended up transferring to one because everything else about the school besides the gendered part fit what I needed.

    One of my first experiences there I was in a class related to math, my bad subject, and the teacher asked a question I didn’t know, and as I realized I didn’t know the answer I was shocked to realize that for the first time in my life I could just not know the answer and it wouldn’t reflect poorly on women as a whole and I didn’t have to hide that I was struggling for fear that the boys would think less of me and other women. As I sat there relief from a lifelong tension I had no idea I even felt washed over me. It really opened my eyes to the fact that no matter how feminist and bold and confident I was, I was still living in a patriarchal society and that was profoundly impacting me in ways I wasn’t even cognizant of. I was hurting a little bit all the time but had never known differently.

    I had so many more moments like that at that school, so many bits and pieces of my life were defined in opposition to men and patriarchy. I am now so grateful to have had the experience to have been able to see that framework just a bit more clearly, and to have moments where I felt some lessening of that pain. I’m now far out of college and I am so profoundly grateful to have gotten that experience. I really think I learned far more from that school, in so many ways.

    That school was also a top notch school where I got a great and thorough education unrelated to anything about gender or sexism. It was also far more progressive than the other school I had gone to, and really opened my eyes on many aspects of life. It was also far more inclusive on a gendered perspective than most other colleges were at the time (let’s just say that “women’s college” is a less apt descriptor than just “not cis men”). It also made me appreciate HBCUs, as I can imagine the emotions are similar there for Black students having lived under white supremacy.

    Anyways, my experience has led me to believe that if you automatically think women’s college suggests the attendees are weak or unable yo deal with the real world, you probably would benefit a lot from experiencing that yourself, you might be surprised to find what baggage you’re carrying around.

    1. OyHiOh*

      You said this so much better than I tried to, above. The sense of relief was amazing after fighting just so hard in my math and science courses previously. The first women I knew as friends, who were not white/straight, I made at my all women’s school and that was eye opening and free-ing also.

    2. FormerHigherEd*

      Great explanation and very similar experience for me. My mom made me tour a womens college and I was all “but there are no boys!” *Whine, cry, pout*

      In the space of a campus tour (and I had been to many before, big schools, small schools, public and private) and I said to my mom “there are no boys!” *Wonder, amazement, sparkling joy*

      I had lived my entire life dealing the patriarchy and not felt particularly encumbered by it, but it wasn’t until it was absent that I realized how much it impacted my life.

      1. Elbe*

        I had lived my entire life dealing the patriarchy and not felt particularly encumbered by it, but it wasn’t until it was absent that I realized how much it impacted my life.

        This is a really good way to explain it.

  91. Charlie*

    OP, I’ll try to approach this from a less outraged angle in the hopes that it reaches you.
    I’m also not a huge fan of single sex/gender segregated education, personally. I understand the reasons it’s beneficial to many people but I don’t like it myself.
    So I…didn’t go to a women’s college! It was that simple. Not for me, so I didn’t do it. But for other people it was the right choice, for many different reasons, and I’d never presume to guess why it was the right choice for any individual.
    I hope you can frame this in your mind as “a choice this person made when they were 18, influenced by many factors potentially including parental preference, where they got into college, comparative strength of academic programs, and financial aid awards, does not say anything about what they value or who they are today.”
    On a practical level, perhaps in future you could ask HR to redact college names on resumes that you review.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      “On a practical level, perhaps in future you could ask HR to redact college names on resumes that you review.”

      This is a good step, but I find it unlikely that you can guarantee casual mentions of college won’t come up in the course of interviewing. I would strongly recommend OP be removed from the hiring process. And as HR, if I heard someone was having such a struggle with bias that they needed college names redacted I would be looking to take further action.

      1. mlem*

        Sadly, just removal from hiring would be enough, if the LW’s *own boss* thinks the LW can’t manage the employee fairly going forward.

  92. Dust Bunny*

    (3) Men’s only colleges would be banned but women’s only are still acceptable.

    Women still face discrimination both as students and as professors and academics.

    Also, anecdotally, I know more women who were actively discouraged by their families from going to college at all because they were supposed to just get married and have kids, anyway. Yes, even in this day and age. And there are a lot of “good” non-college jobs that are still very much boys’ clubs.

  93. Lady_Lessa*

    I can see that the LW’s prejudices could be used against almost any college. HBCU’s, small colleges, religious colleges, colleges in a different region. (I will admit that some people do have problems adjusting to life in a much different area, think New Yorker to the Plains states.)

    Satisfied graduate from a small, coed religious school. I would have been lost starting out at a large one.

  94. Ground Control*

    I’m in my 40s and after making several friends who attended women’s colleges over the years, I deeply regret not attending one myself. I had a lot of internalized misogyny and a total lack of confidence growing up that I think attending a women’s college would have helped me recognize and address decades earlier than I did.

  95. Observer*

    Wow. Just WOW.

    I’m going to point out that you need to manage your employee – and your flaming bias – appropriately, not just because it’s the “fair” thing to do, but because it’s the basic minimum that you need to do to stay in any sort of management position.

    If you mis-manage your employee, that’s a problem for your employer, because you are not getting the best work from your employee. And that also wind up hurting other employees and morale in general. It will certainly harm your reputation. Don’t think people won’t notice – they already know how irrational and strong your dislike is.

    If your employer is smart, mis-managing your employee could seriously limit your future at this company as well. As it is, it sounds like your behavior has only “not been a problem” because you haven’t had a chance to mis-behave. But if you allow any trace of your biases to influence how you treat this woman, there is good reason for your company to worry that you are exposing them to legal trouble, as a good argument could be made that what you are doing is gender based discrimination. For many companies, even if you could convincingly argue that it’s perfectly legal, they are not going to want to touch this with a 10 foot pole, unless you are an UTTER rock star. And you are not going to look like such a rock star if you mismanage an employee. So…

    If you are serious about actually wanting to be fair (as opposed to not getting into trouble with your boss), you need to accept that your assumption about graduates of women’s colleges are simply nonsense. This is especially true if you are talking about women who have been in the workforce at all, and even more so if they have been in the workforce since they graduated.

    The prior paragraph would be true even if what you said about women’s colleges were actually reflective of reality. But it’s not. So, perhaps your next step should be to actually learn about women’s colleges and their context.

    And maybe give a good hard look at how hard you seem to be trying to be one of the “cool girls” who are not like THOSE girls who are just SUCH babies. Like YOU can do the “guy” stuff. Because to be honest, despite using the language of progressives, you sound very much like the women who say that they “just happen” to get along SO much better with men than with women. I recognize that I could be totally wrong about that, but you definitely give off that vibe. It would almost certainly be useful to think about why that is.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      “If your employer is smart, mis-managing your employee could seriously limit your future at this company as well.”

      I am heartened that OP’s manager saw the reaction, addressed it, and told her she had to deal. If OP was in a position with more power, or at a different company, I would have much stronger words in reaction to this letter. As it stands, it’s bad, but I’m hopeful that OP sees the issue and wants to address it.

      But I agree the tone of this letter indicates there’s a lot of work to do and most of it is internal work on OP’s part.

  96. nonprofit writer*

    I never particularly wanted to go to a women’s college, but applied to Barnard at the last minute on the advice of my HS guidance counselor. It ended up being one of 3 schools where I was accepted (I only applied to 7–this was pre-online applications!) and in the end I decided I wanted to be in NYC. I wasn’t even sure I’d like going to a women’s school, even one that’s linked to a co-ed university. Well, I loved it. The idea that women’s college grads are entitled and coddled was kind of the opposite of what I experienced. The smaller, mostly female classes (yes, there were men in most of my classes because of the relationship with Columbia) made me bolder and more likely to speak out and take risks. Was I privileged? Well, yes, because I received a top-notch education for which I’m still grateful more than 20 years later.

    But honestly, OP, none of this really matters. First, why do you care so much where your colleagues went to college? I can’t say my education has ever come up much in my workplaces–my experience mattered far more.

    Second, it’s alarming that your first reaction to an experience you wouldn’t have chosen for yourself is to automatically dismiss it as wrong–and in a rather extreme way! Why not approach it with curiosity? Maybe think a little about why someone might want to attend a women’s college?

    But honestly, why on earth do you care so much where your colleagues went to college?!

  97. Ghent*

    I’m absolutely baffled by point 4 of LW’s concerns. It’s ALWAYS the case that money spent on a given uplift initiative could be spent somewhere else. That’s literally a ‘counter’ to *any* such initiative.

  98. Lisanthus*

    Wow. Just freaking wow. I’m not even a women’s college grad and I’m a woman who’s incensed on their behalf.

    I do work in higher ed, though, and can say that you are factually wrong about women’s colleges in so many ways that others have pointed out. I’ll spare you the cites since your attitude is such that I doubt you’d accept them.

    And frankly, your boss should have told you that your job is on the line for your openly biased conduct. Because you should NOT be a manager based on what you’ve written here. I’d never trust you to manage me fairly and I’m not one of the women’s college grads you so disdain.

  99. Jack Straw from Wichita*

    The idea that everyone gets to pick the college they attend is a statement grounded in privilege, because for most people the college they attend is based on their socioeconomic status.

    I’m guessing the LW wouldn’t not hire someone because their parents were poor, which is the same thing as basing it on where they got their degree. Grants, scholarships, and financial incentives are why MOST people make those decisions. If I’d gotten a full ride from a women’s college, I’d be there in a heartbeat.

  100. Miranda*

    re “Men’s colleges would be illegal”….there are far fewer men’s colleges than there used to be, but they do still exist. Morehouse College, Wabash College, Hampden-Sydney aren’t very large or well-known, but they are around for men who want that experience. Do a little research before making sweeping claims, thanks.

    1. The Real Fran Fine*

      Morehouse is very well known, lol. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. is just one of its more famous grads.

  101. Lyonite*

    OP, I know you are going to find all of these responses off-base, because you specifically asked for help managing your bias (“I anticipate a lot of comments like “just stop thinking that about women’s colleges”) but the problem is that you asked a question thinking it was about dealing with a reasonable bias, like if you had found the candidate arrogant in her interview but the committee had hired her anyway, but it isn’t. You’re in the wrong here, and that’s what you need to deal with.

    1. Dark Macadamia*

      Yes, this is great. The way you manage a bias that is rooted in misinformation and *actively causes you to discriminate against people on the basis of gender* is, well, to stop thinking that way.

  102. Green Tea*

    OP, just want to chime in that I am a woman who went to a co-ed university for both my undergrad and grad degrees.

    If I worked with you and you expressed this opinion to me, I would lose a LOT of respect for your professional judgment.

  103. Playing With Puppies And Kittens All Day*

    I’m concerned how OP has developed such strong, iron-clad opinions based on demonstrable falsehoods (that there are no men’s colleges in existence, that all women’s colleges have large endowments) as well as assumptions easily disproven by research and statistics on women’s colleges and their grads. You could’ve actually looked into the facts and realized you were wrong in 15 minutes, but you didn’t care to do so. You could’ve kept an open mind and gotten to know some of people you were judging. Why not have a better informed opinion? Is this how you operate in general?

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      Yeah, if we’re talking about personal choices that indicate lack of judgement clinging to easily google-able misinformation is not a good look for OP.

  104. NerdyKris*

    “there’s tons of data showing that students at women’s colleges are more likely to major in STEM fields than women elsewhere; ”

    As a man in STEM, let me tell you, women in STEM at a coed college are inundated with creeps hitting on them, and not just students. I had a teacher that was just infatuated with any women of his nationality that took his class. It was messed up. I had to pull his attention back to the lesson plan that didn’t make any sense. He was more interesting in fishing for a hot young wife than teaching. It’s not being coddled to say “I’m going to go to a college where I won’t be treated like a sex dispensing unicorn because I took a STEM class”. A lot of women just end up dropping out of that major.

    1. HoHumDrum*

      One of the biggest feminist fails in the past decade or so IMO is the push to get women into STEM without doing a single thing to address any of the real reasons why women were underrepresented in it in the first place. We love to put systemic issues onto individuals to fix (“let’s assume the issue is girls just aren’t internally motivated enough to pursue science!”) as opposed to tackling the actual larger issues. Women are of course just as capable as men in the field of science, but boy would I have to really, really love science to be willing to put up with the kind of environment you describe above. If the field I’m going into means constantly being undermined, passed over, disregarded, disrespected, and sexually harassed, why would I be eager to do it??

      And it dovetails nicely with another issue- pay disparity. Instead of addressing the fact that we as a society simply do not value women’s work, we again make it a personal thing by suggesting the issue is that women are simply not seeking higher paying fields- like STEM. But again, the issue is when women do the work it’s worth less. There was a whole thing where when women started filling the ranks in biology that field as a whole became less prestigious and wages went down. We will only solve pay disparity when we see it and name it for what it is, not by telling individuals to just get better jobs.

      Anyways, thanks for letting me rant on your post, and appreciate your support of your classmates.

      1. Jackalope*

        My husband once shared with me an (ironic) post from some social media somewhere that said something along the lines of, “Women get paid less because they tend to naturally avoid high-paying jobs such as doctor, lawyer, or engineer for lower-paying jobs such as woman doctor, woman lawyer, or woman engineer.” Which really captures your point.

    2. CommanderBanana*

      I would have loved to have gone into STEM, but I didn’t, and I don’t regret it because the crap women of my generation had to put up with in that field would have made it SO not worth it to me.

      I do wish I had gone to a women’s only college though.

    1. Deirdre Barlow*

      Right?! I’m struggling with the idea that a woman wrote this because it just drips with contempt for women

  106. Mensa CW*

    It’s interesting that OP says their bias has not been an issue at work until this particular hiring process, yet their boss addressed the bias as soon as the new employee was hired. It sounds like OP’s bias *has* been an issue at work but this is the first time someone called them out about it.

    What a lack of self-awareness! I don’t think OP has a genuine desire to change. I think they want to know how to act so they don’t get called out again.

    1. Lisanthus*

      I agree.

      I hope their boss is watching them like a hawk with an eye to termination, frankly, because the new employee deserves better than OP as a manager given this egregious level of bias displayed.

    2. Dark Macadamia*

      I would be completely mortified if my boss was like “you know that thing you do that’s really obvious?” and I’d thought I was keeping it to myself lol

    3. MicroManagered*

      What an unkind take. OP wrote to a workplace advice column for help once she recognized this biased belief of hers was showing through at work. Take her at her word that she’s trying to understand the bias and chance. Damn.

      2. fhqwhgads*

        I mean…from the contents of the letter though, it sounds like she isn’t trying to understand the bias or change? It reads like she’s trying to explain why her bias is right/reasonable/ok actually. If part of the reason she wrote in was to get ahead of this before it caused problems for her at work, I think it’s useful for her to know that horse has likely left the barn based on what she’s said already happened.

      3. Allison*

        The problem is, as others have pointed out, she thinks the bias is reasonable, and then gave justifications that are easily debunked.

        That points to her just not wanting to get in trouble.

  107. Heffalump*

    Forwarding the link to a coworker whose daughter is Scripps class of 2021. I imagine she’ll have an opinion.

  108. BorisTheGrump*

    How TERRIFYING must it be to feel the simultaneous wrath and ferocity of every women’s college alum who reads AAM in one comment section. Take care of yourself, OP. We are far less “coddled” and far more eloquently vicious than you give us credit for.

    -One Annoyed Smithie

  109. former hater*

    Honestly, I felt this way as a (female) teenager- I also felt that women’s only private high schools/colleges were ‘coddling’ their students and that if you weren’t good enough to outcompete the men in your class, maybe you just weren’t good enough. I attended a coed college and had a perfectly fine experience, but now that I’m older and have lived in the world longer, I get it! I don’t regret the decisions I made but I think I probably would have benefited from a space where it was easier for my voice to be heard. I also, in growing to adulthood, learned to have more compassion for others and better understand why people make decisions for themselves that I might not personally make for myself.

    Also, as others pointed out, where someone went for college doesn’t matter that much? It’s very weird that you are putting this much importance on a decision that someone made when they were probably 17. I don’t know how junior the position you were hiring for was, but unless someone is fresh out of college I’m not sure why you’re giving much weight to it at all.

    1. Irish Teacher*

      I know this was just something you believed as a teenager, so I’m not saying this to disagree with you, but just to put it out there: if anything, it is closer to the opposite being true about whether girls “are good enough to outcompete the men in your class.”

      At least at secondary school level, girls tend to significantly outperform boys, so if anything, girls’ schools tend to challenge girls more than they might otherwise be. Teachers often expect girls to be smarter and might be more likely to teach more challenging material in a girls’ school than in a boy’s. (At least this is the situation in Ireland. I do not know if it is reflected everywhere.) One argument for all-girls’ schools is a concern that girls may hold themselves back in mixed schools, not wanting to appear “swotty” or “show-offy”. (Not to say no boys work hard and do well in school or that all girls do, but on average, girls do tend to get significantly better grades.)

      I will say that out of the top ten “feeder schools” (schools which have the highest number of students going on to college), 8 are girl’s, one is boy’s and one is mixed. Now, those lists are meaningless as they make no distinction between students who choose not to attend college and those who don’t get in, those who get into really competitive courses like medicine and those who get into courses that accept a very high proportion of those applying and so on, but…I think it still gives an indication of just how much girls’ dominate.

  110. Whale I Never*

    I went to a women’s college. It was almost entirely incidental—I was touring another college nearby, thought I might as well check it out, then went for an overnight visit because I was hesitant at the idea of going to a same-sex institution and was BLOWN AWAY by how kind, community-oriented, and supportive students were of each other. During my four years, I of course encountered people who were entitled or privileged or whiny or had any other flaws you would find among any group of people, but on the whole it was an incredibly rich scholastic environment.

    We weren’t separated from men and our feelings towards men weren’t coddled; there were trans men on campus, male teachers, and male students from other colleges who took our classes (and vice versa). In fact, I noticed as a student that my fellow women’s college students were often MORE comfortable speaking in classes with men than female students from coed institutions because we were used to taking up space. (Again this varies person to person, but it was definitely a trend I noticed both in undergrad and grad school, as a student and TA.) It was normal for women to talk more in classes and hold leadership positions and to receive mentorship, without fighting against unconscious gender bias.

    Also, re: endowment—does the LW think that colleges just… shouldn’t spend money on students? Women who go to college shouldn’t get scholarships or support from their school, because there are other issues in the world? Are you advocating for the dissolution of all private colleges, or only these? And I will point out that it was not uncommon at all for international students at my college to be from countries where access to education for women and girls is not guaranteed, and their families specifically sent them to American women’s colleges because that was preferable over coed institutions while also providing better opportunities than they could receive at home. One of my dearest friends from college is a from a country in the Middle East experiencing a crisis of women’s rights, which she has unfortunately was forced to flee; she had been using her STEM degree from our women’s college to tutor girls in her hometown, and things became too dangerous for her family, so she is now advocating for women in her country from the US. She will be the first to tell you there are serious issues facing women worldwide, and a women’s college helped equip her to address them.

  111. Bernice Clifton*

    Lw, if I were you I would take a long look at where this bias comes from because the stereotypes are not only offensive but so oddly specific that I think you need to get to the bottom of it.

    FWIW, a family member of mine went to Wellesley because she was an athlete in traditionally male-dominated sport and I imagine a big reason for her choice was to go somewhere where she wouldn’t get sloppy seconds in terms of resources and recognition from the boys team.

  112. Qwerty*

    Thank you for writing in and for wanting to change your bias.

    Here are some anecdata points

    1) I saw more “coddling” at co-ed universities. I knew multiple women in our CS program who would bat their eyes and the guys in our class or TAs would basically do their work for them, stifling their growth. (some did it on purpose, others just thought everybody was really helpful)

    2) I was in our Women in Science and Engineer (WISE) residential hall. For degrees with a gender imbalance, the strongest female students tended to come from there. For the degrees that were more balanced, there was less of advantage. It was not uncommon for my CS classes to have 4 women out of 100+ students in a lecture. This is really isolating and is hard to make friends. The women I lived next to my freshman year have been my lifelong friends and who I lean on when I can’t deal with all the sexist s**t that is pervasive in my industry. It also probably helped give me the strength to often be the only female engineer at most of my jobs (which in turn, opened the door for more diversity)

    3) Protection from harassment, assault, objectification, etc. Sure, that can still happen at a women’s college, but it would be greatly reduced. Imagine being able to invite a classmate over to your dorm room without having to do a mental risk analysis! The stats on sexual assault on college campuses are terrible! The guys I went to school with would laugh when warning emails would go out to alert students that someone went on a groping spree in the student union (yet again) – not exactly the best allies.

    4) If college campuses become safer, than the women’s colleges will die out or become co-ed. Students at my college voted for our bigger women-only dorms to become co-ed once issues with the dorm situation got better. Only the small dorms (30ish beds) stayed women-only along with some dedicated gender-specific halls (male and female) for people who had a preference one way or another.

    Finally, any chance that some of your resentment/anger/judgement is being redirected from elsewhere? Have you formed some armor out of being “not like other women”? Do you feel that men judge based on the actions of other women rather than your own accomplishments? It’s normal if so! Lot of women in male dominated fields end up holding younger women in their field to higher standards than the men – this sounds like it could be an altered version of that.

    While you examine this bias, I recommend you also look for other ones on the gender scale. Do you gravitate towards seeing male behavior / mannerisms as correct for example? (ex: women tend to apologize out of politeness and men don’t, therefore saying sorry is wrong and a sign of weakness)

  113. Eldritch Office Worker*

    “I feel things people cannot help like age, race, disability, or sexual orientation are not the same as college choice.”

    I just need to point out that if you’re only discriminating against women’s colleges, you’re still creating a disparate impact on a specific gender and no competent HR team in the country would side with you on this not being discriminatory. You really need to take to heart that you have both a legal and ethical obligation to move past this.

    1. LizB*

      This stood out to me immediately. If you are biased against people who attended women’s colleges, then almost all the people you will reject based on this bias are going to be women. (Any remaining few who aren’t women will likely be trans, nonbinary, or some other marginalized gender.)

    2. Observer*

      Yes, this stood out to me. I just didn’t highlight it and I’m glad you did. Because it is really, really important.

  114. LB*

    Besides what everyone else is saying, it’s ridiculous to take your generalized opinion about something (“ I think women’s colleges are antiquated“) and apply that to the incredibly complex real world decision-making that goes into why actual other people choose to go any particular place for college.

    It hints that you may be looking at other people and kind of flat or cartoonish ways, not assuming that they have the same complexity and background behind everything they do, particularly behind having different opinions than you, then you yourself do.

    It’s kind of a different spin on the old adage that, “If I was rude to the waiter it’s because I was having a bad day. If someone else was rude to the waiter it’s because they’re a bad person.” Except it’s, “If someone does something I wouldn’t have, it must be because of the incredibly simplistic reasons I can think of.”

  115. Quinalla*

    Great response Alison!

    I wanted to say that earlier in my life, I held similar opinions to the OP. I didn’t understand the point of Women-only colleges or groups, I didn’t oppose them but I didn’t get the point and this is as a woman in engineering. I slowly learned why these spaces and colleges and so on are important and actually created a women’s group in my local industry community and am working with several other women at my company to form an ERG/affinity group for women.

    I wanted to include my perspective as people can learn and change on these issues and I sincerely hope that Alison’s response will help the OP to learn and change on this like I did. I was brought up and taught similar things as OP is espousing here, but I changed and even my parents who taught me some of these things have grown as well. If you haven’t been through it (even if you have) it can be hard to imagine how anyone can hold these views, but many people have in the past and still do. I will never tell anyone how to react as we all have different priorities/energy/etc. , but I know I personally try to react with patience and empathy while still setting expectations and expecting more and offering education. I wish more people had done that for me and those that did I am eternally grateful for their efforts.

  116. Talula Does the Hula From Hawaii*

    This seems to me to be a form of internalized misogyny.

    Before reading Alison’s reply i supported the concept of Women’s Colleges and after reading her reply i support them even more.

    Lets hope the OP can be open minded and realize they goofed here.

  117. CollegeSelectionat17*

    Even if the OP was justified in their assertions (which I strongly believe they are NOT), they are harshly judging a candidate based on a decision they likely made at 17/18 years old! And possibly hugely influenced by their parents. I definitely don’t want to be judged by any of my teenaged decisions, lol.

  118. Poison I.V. drip*

    “I assume she will expect a more than average amount of coddling.” That’s a strong tell, right there, of someone who’s been fed a message that college breeds immature, elitist snowflakes who crumble and sob when faced with the real world. It’s an absurd Fox News strawman that no one under 70 who actually gets out into the world could take seriously and it makes me wonder if this letter is for real.

    1. CommanderBanana*

      Someone who thinks of onboarding or training new hires as “coddling” probably shouldn’t be in a management position.

      1. Quill*

        I have a feeling that if OP seriously addresses their behavior regarding this hire, they will suddenly find that other things they currently don’t even know have been issues about their workplace credibility will improve as well.

  119. HugeTractsofLand*

    OP, practically speaking you should be very, very alert for how you treat these employees. Because you believe that these women are “coddled” and avoidant, I think there’s a strong possibility that you’ll condescend to them without catching yourself otherwise. I would recommend putting them on a group project with men so that you can see for yourself how perfectly normal they are in their interactions (to be clear, this shouldn’t be necessary, but opportunities should be plentiful AND you need to counteract your bias with actual evidence). You also should reflect on any feedback for them before you give it. Are your only notes for them along the lines of how they interact with men, or about them seeming entitled? You have the gift of knowing that that’s your bias; if your feedback is ONLY about those things, then you’re not being a good or equitable manager.

    OP, I do commend you for recognizing that this is a “you” problem. It absolutely is. Your new hires are at risk of not being treated fairly and being professionally stifled because of your bias. They could waste months or years of their work-lives if you block or bully them due to imagined traits. They don’t deserve a manager who mismanages them- so don’t be that person. If not for them, do it for yourself; your own boss will see it as a positive if you can overcome your bias. I hope you’re able to change.

  120. Person*

    I feel like the best way to move past a bias is to start by questioning the assumptions you’re making. Given that you’ve started this letter by defending why they’re justifiable, this will probably be very difficult for you, and it may help to talk it through with someone who’s more objective on the subject.

    Some assumptions you made within the letter that you might want to start digging into:
    1. “Deliberately selecting to learn only with other women illustrates, to me, intolerance and inflexibility”
    Did these women actually select these colleges for the purpose of only learning with women? or were they more interested in other things like the programs that school offered? Do the women you’re holding this bias against actually demonstrate intolerance or inflexibility?

    2. “I assume she will expect a more than average amount of coddling. I expect entitlement and privilege. I expect her to have difficulty working with the men on our team”
    Do these assumptions actually hold? Do these women actually act entitled or have difficulty working with the men on your team?

    3. “I think women self selecting to only have an education with each other is a bit precious. There is no avoiding men, they make up half the population.”
    Are they actually trying to avoid men?

    4. “Men’s only colleges would be banned but women’s only are still acceptable. I think, as women, the best way to combat sexism and misogyny is to insist that things are equal.”
    Based on the above responses, men’s colleges aren’t actually banned, so I’d say the next question is, are they actually unacceptable? Does removing women’s/men’s colleges actually make things equal? Does removing women’s/men’s colleges actually combat sexism/misogyny or do these colleges actually do anything that might help combat sexism/misogyny in ways you’re maybe unaware of?

    Also, keep in mind when questioning yourself like this, the idea isn’t to continue to dig your heels in and defend your opinions, but to get a better picture as a whole on the subject and consider things you might not have previously thought about.

  121. Anon for This*

    Talk to any college student or grad and ask why they went to the school they attended. Unless they have wealthy parents, many of them – if not most – will tell you it came down to the financial aid package. The women’s college may have offered some of the many benefits others have mentioned, but I bet they also offered your employee some kind of scholarship aid that helped minimize student loans.

    I agree with Allison that you have an irrational bias and you need to work through it. Unless this person is fresh out of college with little or no work experience, then where they went to college should be largely immaterial.

    And note – if you want to be taken seriously as a woman you need to be accepting of all people – including other women. Your apparent hostility to this woman (or is it other women in general?) will only make you be taken seriously by the misogynists you work with – others will learn to avoid you.

    1. Witch of Dathomir*

      The misogynists won’t take her seriously either. She can be as Not Like the Other Girls as she wants, but she’s still a woman. In the eyes of the very people whose approval she wants, she will always be less-than no matter what she does or who she looks down on.

  122. Pru*

    This idea that everyone can choose the college they go to is ridiculous. In my culture, if a woman was ‘lucky enough’ to go to college it had to be local and often all-female. Did you expect us to make ourselves homeless because of your discrimination? It’s not just my culture. You’re a teenager when you go to college and parents still have a huge influence on your life.
    If for other reasons you are stuck at home (e.g., being a carer) and a local women’s college was above a mixed one why would you not pick the better university?
    You are deeply sexist and no response from any w0nderful expert is going to change that. If you have an ounce of decency you will stop being a manager and involved in any hiring decisions. You could also ask to only work with men (I really hope you do)! Then you can write in to us again ;)

  124. ee*

    Given that most people are choosing their colleges when they’re in high school, by the time they graduate, I don’t think anybody should really hold that choice against them. LW, were all the decisions you made at age 18 completely representative of your opinions and philosophies and ethics for the rest of your life? Probably not! Even if nothing anyone has said changes your negative opinion about women’s colleges, I think you should really try to let this go.

  125. kanej*

    I chose not to go to a women’s college and this letter is just non stop misogyny all the way through. allrighty

  126. Je ne sais what*

    Graduated from a women’s college, and currently employed by one! Allison is spot-on with a lot of this. I would also add that women’s colleges these days (not all of them, but many of the high-achieving ones) serve as havens for folks who aren’t gender-conforming. Many of us who graduated from these institutions use terminology like “historically women’s college” because now many of these institutions work hard to be welcoming to gender-diverse students. Many trans young adults would not feel comfortable going through a gender transition at a co-ed institution, but a historically women’s college often has a high population of LGBTQ students, with services and a community that speaks to trans and non-binary students’ needs. From a professional standpoint too, many of these institutions have really strong internship, professional development, and experiential learning opportunities that cater specifically to gender non-conforming people and neurodivergent needs, because historically women’s colleges have such a high proportion of students in those groups. I might say that their understanding of professional norms, their ability to engage in personal and professional development, and their awareness of workplace trends is higher than many people at co-ed institutions.

    LW, your assumption that choosing to attend a place where a student with unique needs and interests will have those needs met and be with others who understand their struggles somehow makes them less competent is really awful. I know you know that it’s a problem, but I would really encourage you to reframe this. It’s clear that you didn’t need the unique community that a women’s college can provide. Do you think that the people who are actively disadvantaged in co-ed institutions are weak or less professional than you? Do you think that people should have to go through trauma in order to be a competent professional? That’s sort of what you seem to be saying here. You seem to think that your perspective is fact-based and you need to just ignore these “facts” that women’s college grads aren’t good at what they do. But your perspective is deeply flawed, and I think you need to adjust your whole worldview to figure this out.

    1. Sorrischian*

      I say a lot that I went off to an East Coast women’s college and came back a godless lesbian, and it’s mostly a joke – I was already agnostic and I’m bi – but I am 100% sure down to my bones that at a co-ed school I would not have felt so free to give up on things like makeup and shaving and really start to grapple with my attraction to people other than men. I guess maybe I was ‘coddled’, if by that you mean I had the space and safety to figure out who I am without the pressure of heteronormative expectations, so that now I’m back out of the Wellesley bubble I can move through the world confident in my own identity and ability.

  127. NCKat*

    I went to a small church-related Southern college, not because I was religious (I’m most definitely not), but because it was one of the few colleges accessible to students with disabilities at the time – this was before the ADA became the law. I wanted to go to another school but quickly realized the campus was way too big for me to navigate, so I chose the smaller school, and I am so glad I did. I got a wide-ranging liberal arts education with a major in social sciences and while I never scaled the heights of fame and fortune, I was very happy and productive in my career. I was forcibly retired because of the pandemic but I look back on my education and career and am grateful for the opportunities. Just because someone goes to a “rich school,” it doesn’t mean they are privileged or entitled.

  128. cjbfan*

    I didn’t like the “you can choose your college” part. I’m from a poor family and my college choice was #1 could I get a scholarship, #2 geographically close so that travel was not costly. Other than that, I knew I was going to a state university because they cost less, I did all I could at a community college while living at home before transferring, chose a school that had book rental (this is aging me but textbooks before being able to find used ones online was a huge cost), took out loans, got a small Pell Grant, my parents paid for what they could and I worked part-time. Would I have preferred Yale or Harvard? Perhaps, but were they really choices for me? If I’d lived near a women’s college and gotten a scholarship, I would have taken full advantage and can’t imagine anyone thinking less of me for doing so. College choices have a lot of variables and it seems an odd thing to hang an opinion of a person on (especially if it’s a decision they made at 17 or 18 with no one guiding them).

  129. Spicy Tuna*

    I think the commentariat is being a little hard on the OP. Her bias is horrible and irrational, but she has acknowledged it and is asking for help in overcoming it. She took the time to explain why she feels this way about graduates from women’s colleges. Because of that, Alison was able to give her concrete examples of why she is wrong.

    Separately, any type of bias against where people went to college is irrational. It really doesn’t matter. My husband got accepted to several prestigious near-Ivy universities, but because of finances had to attend our state university. He was in the honors program and took grad classes while an undergrad. It’s 100% what you make of the opportunities you are given (plus, if he had gone elsewhere, we never would have met!)

    I *nearly* didn’t get a job because of irrational bias like this. I got my MBA from the University of Miami. My future boss was a University of Florida grad and would have tossed my resume based on that fact except that the person in the company who referred me had a LOT of social capital. My boss did not treat me as well as other people on the team who must have gone to “acceptable” institutions. I stayed at that job for a year and moved on.

    1. Doctors Whom*

      But she also actually *acted* on the horrible/irrational bias, with a candidate. In a way that was so blatant that her boss pulled her aside and called her on it and told her to get her sh*t together. We don’t know what she did specifically, but her behavior was poor enough that her boss immediately took it up.

      OP’s language seems pretty clear she is looking to cover herself – “how do I ignore that I judge you to have made a terrible decision” is not a self reflective question about addressing her bias. She’s not asking how to help *overcome the bias* – she still intends to hold the irrational poor judgment – she just wants tips on how to not *act* on the irrational judgment.

      And has done no reflection on her ability to comport herself in a professional manner and treat others with basic professional respect in her workplace.

      1. Qwerty*

        From the letter:

        I am aware this is a bias and I want to overcome it

        If I could flip a switch in my brain to not have this bias, I would

        How do I override a bias

        We are asked to take the letter writers at their word and she stated three times that she wants to fix the bias. She literally states that she wants to overcome it. Her self reflection led to her writing to AAM for help.

        Someone has asked for help to change. If we do nothing but slam them, what message does that send? Is it helpful to the OP to just be called names and told how terrible she is or to receive snarky responses? Why would anyone want to reconsider their biases or show vulnerability if they just get hit during a growing moment?

        1. Spicy Tuna*

          Exactly this. Attacking her when she acknowledged her bias and is asking for help will end up making her defensive and squelching any impulse to change. Every single person commenting here has made poor judgements, incorrect assumptions and has biases. The important part is whether or not people are mature enough to acknowledge those errors and to want to change

          1. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

            Many people here have also been the victims of others’ mistakes and biases, especially those of powerful people such as bosses and managers, which is one of the sore nerves this letter has touched. Remembering that for many of us the LW is not the first person we’ve heard state these arguments against women’s colleges may make the commentariat’s anger more comprehensible.

            1. Qwerty*

              I’ve been the victim of biases countless times! I’m not denying anyone feeling their rage – just that raging at the OP doesn’t help her. This an advice column for someone seeking advice. Not all thoughts in our head need to be posted.

              Personally, when a letter or comment stirs up emotions, I (usually) wait until I calm down before posting. I deal with my emotions, maybe compose some snarky comments in my head, but wait to post until I have something that I think is actually useful to the OP or skip posting all together. The letter writers are not the person who wronged me in the past so projecting my history and my pain onto them does nothing to improve the situation.

              I don’t know anyone who changes their mind from being raged at. Sometimes we have to ask ourselves if we want to be productive or if we want to feel we are “right”. I have a long history of entering very sexist environments – I’ve never improved them by shouting how sexist people were, but I’ve made ton of progress through more measured conversations and being a safe person to explore biases with.

              1. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

                Well, good for you for working to be a light in the darkness. I found that setting myself afire over and over to try to illuminate others’ enlightenment merely burned me down to a bitter cinder. Bigots gonna bigot.

      1. Spicy Tuna*

        I’m not sure what you mean by that comment. I understand that people commenting online have the benefit of anonymity and can be quite a bit more harsh than they would in person. But I do not think there is any need to be cruel or rude just because the conversation is online with strangers instead of face to face. Neither myself or Qwerty are defending the original poster’s behavior. I don’t even think the original poster is defending her own behavior. No one will ask for advice or help if they get reamed for it. Then no one’s behavior changes.

    3. FormerHigherEd*

      “How do I override a bias and learn to disregard a choice I genuinely think shows poor judgment?”

      This is the part that makes me the the LW doesn’t want to actually change. They want to get rid of their bias, but also think that anyone who went to women’s college has poor judgment?

      They can’t keep thinking women’s college alums have poor judgement and also not hold bias against them. Maybe I’m taking their statement too literally, but it’s reading that way to me.

  130. ENFP in Texas*

    “Deliberately selecting to learn only with other women illustrates, to me, intolerance and inflexibility.”

    This coming from someone who is inflexibly intolerant about the college that someone chooses to attend…

  131. Empress709*

    Simmons grad here. I busted my a** to put myself through college. Never was coddled in any way by anyone and I highly resent the attitude presented in this letter.

  132. Gigi*

    I call moments like this “questioning my inner squirrel.” I think we all have unconscious (or even conscious) bias that sometimes makes our inner squirrel go, ew, I don’t like that, no, no, no. When that happens to me, I stop and start asking the squirrel questions. Is my squirrel working from her intuition and seeing legitimate danger/problems because she put together a pattern (ala The Gift of Fear by Gavin deBecker) or is she reacting to a bias and the inherent human belief that change is bad? If it’s the second one, I probe further and get that squirrel right with herself and the world. OP’s inner squirrel was clearly traumatized by someone from a women only college at an early age.

    1. Gigi*

      I just realized when I said “traumatized” I was being flippant but actually maybe she was? Shouldn’t have been flippant. Sorry in advance.

      1. CharlieBrown*

        LW came across as someone who is jealous of those who were able to attend those schools. And jealousy definitely inflicts its own trauma.

  133. Relish*

    I too disliked the idea of historically women’s colleges. Then I attended one (Wellesley). The “women” aspect was almost entirely irrelevant to my education. Wellesley is a school full of intelligent, insightful, justice-oriented, and accepting students, taught by professors who care about undergraduate education more than any people I’ve ever met. Wellesley attracts a student body that is more queer-friendly than most, which provided me with a wonderful community in addition to a top-notch education. Graduates of historically women’s colleges bring so many valuable perspectives to the workplace, and you should feel lucky to have one at your company.

  134. DrSalty*

    Recognizing your irrational bias is the first step in working to overcome it. It also is very difficult, so props to you for having that self-awareness and desire to change. Good luck OP!

  135. Smith grad*

    First of all, what? Second of all, I hope the OP will follow Allison’s suggestion to look at the data around both continuing gender bias and the success of women’s college grads. Third, let me just mention that Smith uses its large endowment (which, by the way, was donated by women for women so hush on that) to fund financial aid so that a Smith education is more widely available. Are you an exceptional young woman who wants an exceptional education but is worried about student loan debt? Check out Smith — if you qualify for financial aid, loans will not be part of your aid package. Thanks, Smith endowment.

    This letter is a great example of how bias grows when facts are unknown or ignored. I wish the new women’s college grad at her place of employment a lot of luck. My guess is that the new employee will be promoted above her soon, as she surely has better management skills than this woman.

  136. Mrs. Peaches*

    Miss me with that nonsense about how endowment funds have “the potential to be allocated towards initiatives that would uplift so many more women.” Endowment funds at women’s colleges fund scholarships FOR WOMEN, fund research opportunities, FOR WOMEN, fund professorships for the benefit of WOMEN students, etc. etc., year after year. (Signed, pissed off nonprofit professional who has no strong feeling about women’s colleges.)

  137. DG*

    I went to a ~fancy~ women’s college. My family had very little money and so my parents were not in a position to help me with tuition or living expenses. The large endowment meant I got enough financial aid to make obtaining a degree realistic – it ended up being cheaper than a state school. The “coddling” I received through guaranteed housing for four years and an included meal plan meant that I never had to figure out where I was going to live or where my next meal was coming from. If I had to find off campus housing or make the financial decision to give up a meal plan, I truly have no idea how I would have made it – my $8/hour work study job barely covered my most basic expenses.

    FWIW, I fared just fine when I got into the “real world” after graduation and had to house and feed myself.

  138. Det. Amy Santiago*

    Alverno graduate. Wow. My experience at Alverno prepared me in so many ways to begin and develop my career. I look back on the relationships, the collaborative experiences with professors and my fellow students, the project-based learning strategies, and am grateful for every minute. The OP’s letter shows incredible ignorance.

    1. OyHiOh*

      Hello fellow Alverno :-) I had to leave before graduating (didn’t qualify for a big enough financial aid package to stay) but the education was amazing. I still dream about the library occasionally.

  139. Lolli*

    I (female) went to a technical college and was in 2 different, but complimenting, programs. One was with mostly females and the other was mostly males. In the mostly female classes, I was there, raising my hand and answering questions. But in the mostly male classes, I was more timid about putting my hand up. The funny thing was, if the males couldn’t answer the question, the instructor would look over at me and I would answer it. I found it fascinating that I would behave this way, because I grew up in a household with very progressive ideas about men and women (in the 70’s). Women can sometimes flourish without men around.

  140. YRH*

    I’ll just add that many women’s colleges offer generous financial aid packages, both need and merit based. I have friends that went to women’s colleges because they didn’t get the financial assistance they needed from colleges that were higher on their personal rankings lists.

  141. Volunteer Enforcer*

    My dad (cisgender male) is an employee of a ladies college and would greatly disagree with your stance OP.

  142. A Queer & Pleasant Arranger*

    This feels like some internalized misogyny, tbh, and something you need to work on getting past.

  143. Ari*

    I am always fascinated by the things people choose to be biased against. It would never in a million years occur to me to make those kinds of assumptions based on where a person went to college. But then I’ve worked with and/or gone to school with people from all walks of life—expensive private colleges, state colleges, women’s only colleges (and I worked with a guy who chose what has historically been a women’s only college because he liked their program in his field), etc. Acknowledging bias is one thing, but I feel like the LW spends most of their time justifying their bias, which makes me worry they won’t do the work to overcome it. I would also ask—how did this particular bias come about? Many people’s biases have roots somewhere, even if we have to dig for them. You had to sit down at some point and think of reasons to dislike women’s colleges—what led to that moment?

  144. Student*

    Hey, OP, I know it’s kinda rough out here in the comments. I’m not necessarily seeing anti-woman sentiment in your letter–it seems likely to me that you know someone awful who went to a women’s college, and you’re generalizing her characteristics to all women’s college graduates. The sheer volume of incredulity from everyone (including Alison) should tell you that your experience is an outlier.

    Even if there isn’t a particular person you’re thinking of, it may be useful to think about where these ideas originate. I’ve got a lot of remaining baggage from a religiously conservative upbringing, and it’s always a bit of a shock when an unexamined belief bubbles up and I realize it’s a relic from something I don’t support anymore. Maybe you’re in a similar spot? Are there people in your family who have made these comments about women’s colleges? Are they basing this on experience or on religious/political/social beliefs about men and women? It’s worth exploring.

    Asking this question was good. Thinking about these issues is good. Don’t be discouraged, we all have stuff to work through.

    1. kiki*

      I was also wondering if there was a particular person LW had in mind who contributed to the formation of the belief system. If that’s the case, I am really sympathetic! For several years I had an aversion to Chattanooga, TN because the only people I knew from there were both annoying and obnoxious. The way I got over that was: 1.) meeting more people from Chattanooga because most of them were not obnoxious, 2.) visiting Chattanooga because it turned out it is charming! LW, are there opportunities for you to expose yourself to more women who went to women’s colleges (reading their work or listening to interviews with them)? Could you visit one so you can see that it is a normal college with very normal attendees?

  145. Moho With a Grudge*

    Does the OP feel professional sports should be co-ed? Why or why not? Show your work, OP.

  146. e271828*

    It seems impossible that this under-informed and cherished bias of OP’s is her *only* under-informed, cherished bias. If she has been pulled aside for her bizarre prejudice against women’s higher education, given the cultural locus of that bias, then it is highly probable that OP is also biased against other groups and people, but that bias against those is more acceptable to her managers.

    OP has work to do.

  147. kiki*

    I know LW said they couldn’t just stop thinking about women’s colleges, but it really shouldn’t come up that much in a working relationship, especially if you’re more than a few years post-graduation.

    I know it’s tough to not think about something you are currently actively thinking about, but the best solution is really to put this out of your head. The same way you don’t think about your coworkers’ political affiliations or sex lives, you just have to put thoughts about this new hire’s college in a box and tell your mind not to open it.

  148. CH*

    I have the opposite of this bias… speaking personally, every single person I’ve met that went to Spellman University has absolutely blown me away!

  149. Patrick S.*

    Regarding the endowments, every endowment I have ever heard of has specific things it can be used for. In the case of a women’s college, that’s probably for women’s higher education at that college – not spending it down on who-knows-what that might arguably benefit women more. It may permit them to admit all academically qualified women and offer any who need it financial aid. So the endowments may get large – that doesn’t change what they’re allowed to use it for.

  150. Junior Dev*

    So others have addressed why the assumptions about women’s colleges don’t make sense, but also…people change. One of my friends went to Oral Roberts university because she was raised Evangelical but she isn’t anymore, I know a few people who went to BUY who have since left the LDS Church. I don’t think it’s a good idea to assume that anything a person decided when they were 17 or 18 reflects who they will continue to be for the rest of their adult life.

    1. Irish Teacher*

      This. I was going to say that judging somebody by the choices they make when they are a schoolgirl or a schoolboy doesn’t really make much sense anyway, especially as often those choices are very heavily influenced by parents and teachers. A teen with strict parents who thinks they will be “distracted” if they attend school with the opposite gender may not have the option of doing so if their parents are paying for their education.

      There are all kinds of reasons people choose their college and…I wouldn’t even assume it was entirely their choice. Heck, my sister’s guidance counsellor put a fair bit of pressure on her, and then called my parents in to try and rope them in to pressurise her, to do a more prestigious course that she had chosen. My sister was stubborn enough to resist the pressure (and worked right through the recession when many of the graduates of those ‘prestigious courses’ lost their jobs and was at one point one of about 10 most qualified people in the southern half of the country in her area), but many 17 year olds would not be. She also had a family that backed her completely, my father, mother and I all telling her to do what she wanted and ignore the pressure. Not everybody has that support or that confidence.

  151. Irish Teacher*

    Honestly, it sounds like you are making a specific assumption about women who go to all-women’s colleges, that they are doing so to avoid me. I don’t think we have any all women’s colleges in Ireland, though the college I attended USED to be all women until about the 60s. You know why? Because it originally only offered a degree in primary school teaching and who are most primary school teachers? By the time I went there, it was co-ed, but women still outnumbered men 7 to 1 or something like that. I didn’t even KNOW that when I applied there (though I could probably have guessed if I thought about it). I went there because I planned to be a teacher, no other reason.

    I would think it extremely odd if people made assumptions about my personality based on the gender balance of my college. I just…don’t see how the two things connect.

    I will add that in Ireland at secondary school level, something like a third of teens attend all boys or all girls schools and it is rarely about wanting to avoid the other gender (I have heard the odd case of a preteen who was very self-conscious and insisted they only wanted to go to school with their own gender, but those are rare cases). Again, when I was in 6th class and choosing which secondary school to go to, the fact that one of my options was all-girls and the other mixed didn’t even come in to the discussion. Now, it may have had an effect in that the mixed school offered subjects like woodwork and technical graphics, things I had no interest in, but the fact that it has a poor reputation for behaviour, that the teachers who visited our primary school seemed weirdly anxious to get us to go there (you’d get to do loads of art and music and woodwork and P.E. You wouldn’t get much homework at all) which made them sound kinda desperate and the fact that most of my year was going to the all-girl’s school and that those who weren’t included some of the year bullies were the things that influenced my and my parents’ decision. The fact it had a better academic reputation by a long way was the main reason behind my decision.

    Again, I would think it REALLY weird if anybody assumed a kid was sent to an all-boys or al-girls school because they or their parents didn’t want them around the other gender. It is far more common to be because the nearest school is a single sex one or because the school has a good reputation or because the mom or dad went there and liked it or because the mom or dad passes it on their way to work whereas they would be going out of their way to bring their kids to the nearest mixed school or because the school is attached to the primary where the kid’s younger sister or brother is… And the same reasons would be used for choosing a mixed school. There ARE some people who feel strongly about sending their kid to a mixed school, but…I don’t think I’ve ever met anybody who feel strongly the other way and mostly, the gender issue is a minor one compared to convenience and reputation of the school.

    I REALLY doubt many people are going to all-women’s colleges because “they don’t want men around.” It’s far more likely to be because that college offers their course of choice. My college offered the only degree in primary school teaching outside Dublin, so of course, anybody in the southern half of the country who wanted to be a primary school teacher went there. It had nothing to do with gender balance; it was solely because it was where the degree was offered. It may also be because it is the closest college. Heck, when I was teaching in a school near that college, a student told me she planned to go there – it offered a Liberal Arts degree as well as primary teaching from the ’90s and now offers some other degrees like Early Childhood Education – because her younger sister would still be at school and she’d be able to get a lift from her dad when he was bringing her younger sister to school.

    “In addition to this, when I meet a woman who attended a women’s college, I assume she will expect a more than average amount of coddling. I expect entitlement and privilege. I expect her to have difficulty working with the men on our team.”

    Honestly, I don’t think it makes much sense to expect these things. Why would going to a woman’s college mean somebody would need coddling? Why would they be entitled or privileged? I can understand, though not agree with, thinking she might have difficulty working with the men on your team, if you believe men and women work completely differently. I do not believe this true, but I could see somebody thinking men and women work differently and that if she had just graduated, she may have only worked with one group, assuming she never had a part-time job, but I’m not even sure where the other assumptions would come from.

    I can understand having an ideological objection to women’s colleges, but I don’t think it’s fair to judge others for not having the same ideological objection and therefore attending them. I know people who do not believe religious schools should exist and I certainly know plenty who think that schools funded by the government should not be religious (the VAST majority of schools funded by the Irish government are religious) but I would hope none of those people would judge somebody for attending a religious school or even a religious college as mine was.

    I personally have objections to private school education, at least in Ireland where…the curriculum is the same as that is nationally based, the teachers are still paid by the government so are paid the exact same, have the exact same terms of employment, the same training, etc, so I see no benefits at all to a private school unless somebody just wants their kids to associate with other rich kids, which I think problematic, but I would never judge somebody for having gone to a private school or for sending their kids to one. In fact, I know people who HAVE sent their kids to private schools for reasons specific to that school like it offered a sport their kid loved and that wasn’t offered in any other local school or their best friend was going there.

    Not employing somebody because they went to a private school would clearly be ridiculous.

    I agree that college choice is different from things that are innate to a person, but…that doesn’t mean it makes sense to choose a less suitable candidate for a job because you disagree with somebody’s choice of college.

    I realise most of this isn’t much help and that you do know you are being irrational. Maybe just don’t look at the college when looking at the applications? So long as they have the qualifications needed, does it really matter where they got them?

  152. Nea*

    When women’s colleges were created, it was because women were not admitted to men’s colleges

    Hey OP, I’m a woman who went to a formerly men’s only college. Many of the women professors were part of the last class of women who had been part of the associated men’s college/first class of women who’d gone through the school when it went co-ed.

    I cannot express to you HOW ANGRY those women still were, years later, at their treatment at the college. How hard they were continuing to fight against policies that had been formally revoked but were still in effect out of habit because “we’ve always done it this way.”

    We’ve always hinted heavily that the women should get out of the library by dusk so the men could focus on their studies.

    We’ve always put more money into football than women’s scholarships and sports, even though we have a pretty crappy football team and Title IV is a thing.

    We’ve always discounted women in the STEM classes.

    But hey, the girls can earn a degree here now, so how could there be any problem?

  153. sav*

    The tone of this letter reeks of, “Validate me! I’m right!”

    Most of your points can be refuted by a pretty easy google search, to be honest. It never ceases to amaze me how the folks who don’t know what they’re talking about are the loudest. Do your research before making sweeping claims like this, and you might be able to change your own mind.

    That being said, you have absolutely zero context for why this person chose the college they did, and made the decision to be publicly, noticeably hateful toward them before you even knew them. This behavior speaks to a much bigger problem than not liking women’s colleges. I suggest you step back and interrogate your biases, internal and otherwise, and really, really take a look at how you treat other people. I seriously doubt this is the only issue.

  154. Nea*

    Uuuugh, part of the associated WOmen’s college The one that sent women to all the same classes as the men but, crucially, did not actually grant them a college degree.

  155. Your Father's Brother's Nephew's Cousin's Former Roommate*

    Ah yes, when I think of Gloria Steinem, Meryl Streep, Nancy Pelosi, Zora Neale Hurston, Ursula K. Le Guin, Madeleine Albright, and Diane Sawyer, I too am overwrought with thoughts of coddled, precious women.

  156. M&M*

    Women’s college grad here: I never would have majored in (and later earned an advanced degree in) economics if I had gone to a co-ed school. I was one of those kids who thought they “couldn’t do math.” Also, I had some classes with men (either because they cross registered or I did), had male professors, and worked with men at my internships and activities. They don’t lock us away.

    Also, I’m not a woman. They do let us non-binary folks go to school too :)

  157. Greige*

    You listed some reasons you wouldn’t want to go to a women’s college. I would have agreed with a lot of them when I was 18, so I get where you’re coming from, and respect your choice (which is the same one I made.) When it comes to your own personal choises, you get to consider whatever makes sense to you when.

    But it’s not fair to project any reasons on someone else’s decision of where to go to college. There are so many factors informing decisions like that. Maybe her sister or best friends went there. Maybe she got a great scholarship. Maybe it was closer to home than other options. She could have liked the class sizes or majors or other opportunities. It’s just really inappropriate to think you have that much insight into what a stranger considered for such a personal decision, let alone to assume the worst reasons possible.

  158. El+l*

    Is any part of your visceral dislike founded in direct experience? (Was some Vassar grad colleague THE WORST)

    Or is it all just from a distance / what you’ve read? Because all of your arguments seem pretty abstract.

    Unless “where you went to school” is something your colleague themselves makes to be a big deal or as something that defines themselves…it doesn’t matter where they went to school.

    1. Eldritch Office Worker*

      It happens. I definitely had a bad experience with a Smith grad, and she made it her whole personality so it was hard to distance the two.

      But even so, part of being professional is learning to deal.

      1. El+l*

        Yeah, and that’s my point – if LW had an experience like yours I’d at least find their dislike understandable. And yes I find people obsessed with where they went to school deeply annoying.

        But this one is just so oddly specific.

  159. CharlieBrown*

    OP, if you are reading these comments, I seriously hope you provide us with an update once you’ve had plenty of time and space to reflect. I wish you the best.

  160. ecnaseener*

    LW, if you can’t fully let go of this bias and still believe it’s a bad choice to attend a women’s college, maybe it will help you to remember that your new hire presumably made that choice at age 17. Roughly every single person in the world has made dumb choices at age 17. File this where you would hopefully file any other knowledge about your employees’ teen years.

    1. The Real Fran Fine*

      Roughly every single person in the world has made dumb choices at age 17.

      I don’t like this framing because it implies that anyone who decided to attend a women’s college did so due to a lack of intelligence or youthful naïveté, which isn’t the case for many of the posters here and possibly isn’t the case for the new hire from this letter, either.

  161. Six for the Truth*

    Many of the women’s college graduates I have known have been men, because many of the people I know socially are, like me, transmasculine people.

    There are a whole lot of young people who attend or seriously consider attending women’s colleges because they perceive them as feminist and queer-friendly environments. Some of those people are girls* who, upon reflection, will turn out not to be women.

    More recently – among Zoomers, not millenials like me, as far as I know – some transfeminine people have sought admission to women’s colleges because they have had deeply negative experiences with men and masculinity in large part because they were assigned male at birth.

    It sort of sounds like you think wanting an educational experience that probably maybe involves less harassment is “entitled” and means that one would prefer “coddling.”

    * referring to one’s childhood identity as having been correct is controversial and not all trans people are cool with it

  162. arcya*

    The real wild thing here is how many graduates of women’s college is the LW seeing that this is an ongoing problem? I’m STEM and I have done several rounds of hiring and I think I saw a graduate from a women’s college ONCE. It’s sort of like any other smaller liberal arts school, you know they’re out there but there’s not a ton of graduates floating around. There’s just no point to being weird about it.

  163. Thisishalloween*

    I appreciate the LW for laying out their thinking – saves a lot of time since their thinking is based on things that are easily disproven (each component of their argument is simply, factually incorrect).If the LW educates themselves on the reality of these colleges, perhaps they will encounter more stories like the ones included here in the comments, to broaden their perspective. First they have to actually know and believe the facts instead of just relying on their own theories, or just pointing to the minority of comments here supporting the LW’s bias as “evidence” that they were logically right all along.

  164. Keymaster of Gozer*

    Your boss has already pulled you aside about your prejudices.

    That’s a huge thing. Nothing about your letter shows any sign that you are working to correct your frankly bigoted views – only that you’re trying for someone, anyone, to agree with you.

    That’s simply not how business works. If I tell a member of staff to quit with whatever prejudice they’re spouting then I expect it to STOP. I don’t want or care about what an Internet forum thinks about your views – even if they found one where everyone agrees with them it won’t matter.

    Look, I was a mess in my 20s – I held some opinions that were frankly outright cruel and yes, I got pulled up and told to stop voicing them/treating others worse because of them. And it was made very clear that my job would go bye bye if I didn’t.

    First there was the “but I’m right! And I have a right to believe this!” arguments I shot back so believe me I know what you’re trying.

    But then my boss, along with HR, told me to either get help to fix my (it really was messed up) brain or they’d fire me.

    And I did. It took a lot of crying, a lot of ‘well okay I’ll go to the therapist but when they admit there’s nothing wrong with me you’ll be sorry’ but what actually happened was the medical professionals told me I was messed up and that here’s a plan (plus meds in my case – undiagnosed schizophrenic) to resolve it.

    And after the work, a year later my boss nominated me for a company award.

    So I say this from the bottom of my heart: please change. Your career depends on it and honestly getting rid of some of my prejudices made me a lot less stressed and angry.

    There is help. There is hope. But you have to want to change.

  165. Nopity Nope*

    “…male voices are more likely to drown out women’s in many classrooms (even to the point of men getting called on more)…”

    We still socialize girls to be “nice” and boys to be “aggressive.” Anecdotal experience: 8-10 year olds in “Take Your Daughter To Work (But Also Bring Your Sons Because Heaven Forbid The Boys Don’t Get To Participate In Absolutely Everything) Day, mixed class. Boys’ hands shoot up (even when they don’t know the answer), while girls wait to be called on. I mean, even for thing like: “Raise your hand if your name starts with J.” We’ve GOT to stop that crap.

    Contrasting experience: I managed a college-level tech intern program for my company. Usually the mix was about 20% women to 80% men. But one year I convinced the powers that be to aggressively seek out women for the program. We were able to reverse the imbalance and that year had 70% women for the first time ever. I also led some of their training and weekly seminars, so I got to see the results first hand. THE DIFFERENCE WAS EPIC. Their voices, ideas and insights were clear and bright, and the level of inclusion, respectful discussion and support for each other (including the men) was above and beyond previous cohorts’. It was a novel experience for most of them and for the men, too. I wasn’t surprised that the women raved about the experience, but feedback from the men was positive and indicated that they found growth in the experience.

    Anyway, stepping down from my soapbox, it’s kinda saying, well if you want to be equal, just BE equal, when that’s not reality. The scales are tipped against women (and other groups even more so), so we need spaces to balance the scales so we CAN get to a better place as a society.

  166. Allons-y Alonso*

    As someone who went to a former men’s college (they started accepting women in the mid-80s), I am EVEN MORE convinced that women’s-only colleges are a wonderful, rigorous academic option for college students. Women need a place where they can feel empowered and supported and don’t have to wash up against the brick wall of the patriarchy for every single crumb of academic opportunity and career advancement they seek (I did, and it was a nightmare. Have you ever tried to get an internship over a connected frat bro? Don’t, it’s a nightmare and deeply unfair.)

  167. Colorado*

    Considering the amount of comments vs. the post time, I feel this is coming from a place of insecurity to strong, intelligent women who earned a scholarship or were afforded a good education in an environment that was built to raise a minority group. I love the thought of that. But the immature me wants to say you sound like one the those women that say they don’t have female friends because they “get along with men better”.

    FWIW: I went to a technical college with a 7:1 male to female ratio and I will say I would have much preferred to study engineering with my fellow woman peers than the shit I had to deal with being the one in seven in a college environment.

  169. thelettermegan*

    OP, take a good luck at your biases – the more support a person gets early on, the more confident they are in adulthood. An all-girl’s environment isn’t about girls not learning to deal with men, it’s about girls getting to learn in an environment that’s not biased toward boys’ needs. The result is that girls/young women are less likely to develop imposter syndrome and more likely to engage in leadership activities.

    It’s obviously not for every girl or woman, but many women find that it made them more prepared to deal with a world of men, not less.

  170. Bend & Snap*

    As a graduate of a women’s college, holy crap.

    I was able to come out of my shell in college because there no men to drown me out. I got an excellent education and it has never been a stumbling block in my career.

    This letter pisses me off.

  171. HollieCollie*

    “If you really want to move past your bias, I’d encourage you to look at the data on women’s colleges and the success of their graduates (which by many measures is significantly higher than women from co-educational institutions).”

    Thanks for this, Alison! I was going to add something similar in the comments myself before I read this part.

    I strongly value my experience at a women’s college (and had admittedly disparaging feelings about them prior to getting accepted — I didn’t even know Hollins was a women’s college until I had the acceptance letter in my hand). It was 100% the right choice for me and I’m confident I would have not turned out nearly as well as I have without the unique environment, experiences, etc. I had at Hollins and other women’s college grads describe at their alma maters. And I do perfectly well in the “real” world.

  172. ExpectingProf*

    My own bias: proud and happy Mount Holyoke grad

    Most of what I’d say has been said, but I do have three more points:

    1. Not only are women underrepresented in a variety of areas, as Alison said, but they’re also underrepresented in those areas in colleges too. Ten years ago, when I was in college, over 90% of Student Government presidents in the US were men. One of the reasons going to a women’s school is so valuable for a lot of people is because men being leaders is very much the societal default, and it’s a really powerful experience to be in a place where women (and now non-binary and trans folks too) are the default. Many of us get so accustomed to it while we’re there that we come out much readier to be as confident about taking our place as men are.

    2. You may think that sexism and differential treatment between men and women is a thing of the past—as Alison said, plenty of data refute that. And even at a personal level, some people aren’t as far along that path as they should be. We had some men in our classes, and one person I knew was in a class where the professor spent half his time teaching to the single male student. That’s the sort of experience that choosing to go to a womens college is supposed to prevent. Wanting to get equal value out of your education is completely reasonable.

    3. The STEM thing is very true. And there’s and intersectional component as well. I have a friend who studies women of color majoring in physics, and the data are very clear that women’s colleges (particularly HBCUs, but not just them) are graduating waaay more women of color in physics than pretty much anywhere else. So in some cases, women’s colleges seems to be supporting racial equity too.

  173. Abogado Avocado*

    OP, it’s good you know you have an unreasonable bias. It’s not good that your own boss sees that bias as that means: (1) your boss is concerned that you will act on that bias; (2) you pose a legal risk to your organization (because gender-based discrimination is against the law, even when perpetrated by one woman against another woman); and (3) you are more likely to be let go by your company to reduce its risk of being sued.

    I think you need to get to the bottom of why you have this bias. No one is born with bias. They have to be, in the words of that Broadway song, carefully taught. Your job now is to determine who and what carefully taught you that it is okay to hold this bias and then to determine what you can do to rid yourself of it. The suggestions here that you learn more about women’s colleges are good ones, but I’m thinking there’s personal history that’s fueling this bias, that you need to acknowledge, and learn how to get beyond.

  174. Dragon Tea Smithy*

    Hi!

    I attended Texas Woman’s University for my graduate program. Even though it clearly says it’s for women in the name of the university, TWU became co-ed in 1972, allowing men to attend. So, when you read the name of the place I attended, you may think that I chose a woman-only space for continuing my education, but that would be incorrect.

    Also, I applied for and attended this college due to being a single parent to two toddlers at the time, and my father had promised I could live with him, rent-free, while I got my graduate degree to help pull my little family out of poverty. And they accepted my application. This was in the early 2000’s and online school was a thing that was only just beginning. My graduate degree was partially online (which was a huge help to me as a single parent) and not many other programs out there even offered part-time online classes at that time.

    So, you know, maybe do a little digging for yourself about why you hold these biases. My manager makes it clear that I’m highly competent, emotionally even-keeled, and able to work independently on complex work. She truly appreciates my steady support in the department and I step into her role when she’s been out on leave or assigned out of our location for a few months due to business need.

    I suspect this whole thread will likely change some of your preconceived notions, which will help you reduce bias. Best of luck and give your new employee a really strong benefit of the doubt, since you know you already have come to this with some strong negative biases.

  175. Prof*

    The OP’s letter made me cringe at her naïveté. I am a full tenured professor in a very male-dominated science field. I work at a famous private coed university. There is not so subtle discrimination against women in science that starts well before undergrad, and you bet I see and try to stop the dynamics that play out in the university. I went to an all-girls middle and high school; of the 10 of us in my AP Chem class, 4 are now tenured professors in very male-dominated fields, another is a senior scientist at a famous lab. My senior fellow female scientists and I frequently talk about the sexism we see and what we can do about it. If I could forget about the dynamics and just focus on research, I would. That’s a GREAT reason to study in an all-women environment.

  176. Pesh*

    Applying LW’s logic to other situations shows how flawed it is. For example, I chose to go to a very small liberal arts college in a rural area. Since my college was small and in a rural area, does that mean I need to be coddled from the rest of the general population, or wouldn’t do well at a large company? Of course not, that’s ridiculous. But I grew up in a city, and went to a huge high school, and wanted to experience a different learning environment. There are a myriad of reasons why people may choose to attend a women’s college (or any type of higher-learning institution), and it’s ridiculous (as well as way over-confident) to assume you know those reasons.

  177. Tall Hat*

    LW, you can’t do both of these:
    – Insist that all your preconceived notions and assumptions are accurate
    – Insist that you want to do a good job managing this employee
    In order to do the second, you’ll have to drop the first. Can you? Do you really even want to try? You’re pretty fixated on clinging to this idea – to the point that you probably need to dig deep and figure out why you put such a high priority on it. It sounds to me like someone stung you a long time ago and you’re hellbent on either punishing or strictly avoiding people who remind you of that person.

    I feel bad for your new employee. Her boss (you) are already judging her on her personality and character. She’s going to have an uphill battle.

    And yes, I’m a woman. No, I did not go to a women’s college.

    1. commonsensesometimesmakessense*

      Excellent comment! I agree that LW seems pretty convinced of the correctness of the views she expresses in support of her bias. Was the letter for genuine advice on countering the bias or for validation of her decision if she continues to nurture her bias? It certainly read more like the latter to me!

    2. Somebody Call a Lawyer*

      Also applauding this comment. LW is starting with a faulty premise, bravo for shining a light on it in a way that the LW can act on, should she want to.

  178. Gingersnap*

    My experience in single sex education was at the high school level but I found it incredibly empowering for all the reasons mentioned in the comments. It’s so disheartening to read these things from another woman.

    1. Lady_Lessa*

      Unfortunately I am not surprised. I’ve been working in a STEM field for my whole career, and am at retirement age. I’ve had 2 women supervisors and they are both in the bottom half if I ranked bosses from bad to good. I’ve had 11 different bosses in 10 different companies.

      1. HoHumDrum*

        Unfortunately being a woman doesn’t free you from perpetuating patriarchy, and in fact women can be some of the fiercest proponents of it.

  179. TherapyCat*

    Got a full ride scholarship offer from a women’s college. It was very nearly an offer I had to take. A historically women’s college (sex integrated only a few decades ago) made a better offer. Sometimes people make purely financial choices.

  180. 10 cents gets you nuts*

    Wow wow wow! I know I’m biased because I attended an all women’s college…but wow! This is such a weird hill to die on. I attended my school because I loved the energy there, knew I wouldn’t have to deal with obnoxious college boys/men and it was a great academic program. I successfully work work men on a daily basis too! I don’t require coddling but I also don’t put up with misogyny! I feel bad for all this OPs colleagues. If she’s made such an odd stance on this topic I couldn’t trust her judgment at all.

    I did miss out on a lot of social stuff but don’t worry I made up for that very quickly!

  181. jo*

    mt holyoke grad here tapping in to add that women’s colleges or historically women’s colleges also have a lot of gender diversity within their student bodies. trans students of many different genders also attend these schools and it’s both incorrect and transphobic to say that there are no men there.

  182. Nancy L*

    Northwestern and Stanford here, and I loved going to schools that have a long history of coeducation. But I know way too many brilliant and accomplished women who attended women’s colleges. And as a former professor and current manager, don’t ever judge someone by where they went to school. Judge them by what they do. I’ve taught at an Ivy and had some students who I would never ever hire. The best person on my current team got her BA at the local state school, working full time and taking classes part time.

  183. sc.wi*

    I went to a women’s college for undergrad. And I am shocked that someone would think that it’s “precious” to attend, or that graduates need coddling. The women I know are fiercely motivated, independent, and driven – and as Alison mentioned, the data backs that up. We did not choose to attend to hide or shy away from men; actually, men had nothing to do with my decision, nor most of my peers. I, and many of my classmates, chose to attend specifically because we valued the college’s unique dedication to women’s careers and leadership.

    I sincerely hope OP can understand the extremely flawed reasoning behind her bias.

  184. throwaway*

    There are so many comments that I may have missed this point but…you probably also have a bias against queer people….so you MAY want to get some therapy and think about your misogyny and homophobia are not only affecting your ability to manage, but also your ability to be a good person.

  185. frustrated trainee*

    OP I’m sorry but I don’t think you’re in the right role. You’re not ready to manage people when your ideas on equality are so immaturely formed. Going “well if the group in power made a space just for them it would be banned so it’s sexist for women to do the same thing” without looking at the climate that creates the need for women’s only colleges is…it’s sure a take.

    And even if you were right about your other ascertains (you aren’t), why jump to the conclusion that women from women’s only colleges would require extra coddling? Have you seen this in practice? With a large dataset? Or is this just your personal assumption?

    I’m sorry but you shouldn’t be managing people, it’s not fair to the people you’re managing.

    1. Tall Hat*

      Had the same thought. This is an unfair position for employees to be in – their manager’s sweeping assumptions about their character and capabilities will color every interaction and impact how they are treated and they will never even know it, or at least they won’t know why.

      She’s working out a personal issue through her treatment of other people. Not cool at all.

    2. The Prettiest Curse*

      And also, just how much is the OP going on about her opinions about women’s colleges if her boss had to pull her aside and say “I know you’re not going to like this person purely because she went to a women’s college”? Her bias must be really, really obvious.

    3. Cacofonix*

      Couldn’t disagree more and your comment is out of line. You’re seeing one aspect of OP’s approach *and she’s questioning it*. You have no basis upon which to judge her ability to hold her job as a manager in all manner of skills that managers require, especially as she wrote in to ask how to be better in this important area. Sheesh.

      1. EL*

        This letter speaks to more than the LW’s internal bias (a huge issue on its own). It also contains an astonishing number of assertions to “back up” that bias that are all not only incorrect, but easily disproven with perhaps 15 minutes’ worth of Googling. The LW has made no attempt whatsoever to educate herself on these issues before writing in to AAM, and that is equally as big a red flag in terms of her suitability as a manager. Frustrated Trainee is on target and not at all out of line.

      2. Witch of Dathomir*

        That “one aspect of OP’s approach” was severe enough that her own boss pulled her aside and told her to knock it off. It’s also a discriminatory “aspect” that differentially affects women, which can land her company in a whole lot of legal hot water.

        This isn’t the OP preferring phone calls to email. It’s a very serious issue that in fact means she probably shouldn’t be managing other people, not least because having her in a managerial position clearly leaves her company open to legal liability. Defending bigotry and misogynistic beliefs as “one aspect of OP’s approach” is incredibly distasteful.

  186. CEB*

    Not sure if anyone else has mentioned this, but there are absolutely all-male colleges in the US. Hampden-Sydney in VA and Wabash College in IN are just two that spring to mind right away. Would the letter-writer have the same attitudes toward these graduates, since they chose to be educated without women, who make up half the population? I’m guessing no.

  188. dedicated1776*

    I went to a women’s college my freshman year (2000-2001). I understand it was only one women’s college and that some may be better, but I did not like the one I attended. There was this honors committee that policed morality (beyond academic integrity/basic human decency). A lot of the girls were mean and cliquish (example: p*ssed off a ton of girls because I got into a prestigious club on campus as a freshman). Professors were sleeping with students, which is gross but no one ever did anything about it, even though it was pretty common knowledge. Three weeks in I knew I wouldn’t stay. I really value my experience there because being so unhappy helped me to grow tremendously but I absolutely would never recommend a women’s college to my hypothetical daughter. Especially that one. I wouldn’t say I’m biased against women who went to women’s colleges but I am puzzled AF when they say how much they loved it, including my friends who stayed at that college all four years.

    1. Proud Feminist*

      dedicated1776, I know a couple people who also hated their experience at the woman’s college I attended. So I’d never say a woman’s college is for everyone. But I want to point out that you say your puzzled why anyone would go and you’d never recommend it to a daughter.

      Can you understand that you are taking ONE person’s experience with ONE woman’s college at ONE point in time and generalizing? Barnard is completely different from Smith just by virtue of their settings. When Sylvia Plath when to college Smith was the more liberal of the Seven Sisters; when I went to Wellesley it was considered the most liberal.

      I’d like to suggest you rethink your attitude and realize that your experience during that one year at that one school tells you exactly nothing about women’s colleges. You may think you aren’t biased, but you are. And you should work to correct that.

    2. Irish Teacher*

      I can understand how you would be puzzled by people who said they loved the college you had a bad experience at at the very same time they were attending it, but…it doesn’t really make sense to assume that that college has any more in common with any other women’s college than it has with any other college.

      It sounds like some really messed up things were going on there – professors sleeping with students, policing morality?! – that make it really not representative of anything but itself.

      I really doubt any of the things you mention are more common at women’s colleges than at any other kind of college (I doubt they are common at many colleges at all). It sounds like your college was a real outlier from most. So while I can understand why you would have a knee-jerk reaction after an experience like that, it wouldn’t make sense to think that because you attended a college that was both all women and, by the sounds of it, a hot mess, being a women’s college and being a hot mess are in any way connected.

      I will add that in my experience teaching, the most cliqueish and mean behaviour I came across has been in boys’ schools. That is not to say boys are inherent more underhand and cliqueish than girls, simply that it is unrelated to gender and it so happens the worst examples I saw were in boys’ schools (one had a boy who left the school due to continual bullying of the nasty comment and exclusion sort; if I put another boy sitting beside him, the other boy would raise his hand and say, “Can I move seats, Miss? I…can’t see the board from here.” *smirks*).

      It would not be rational if he was surprised whenever any boy who attended a different all-boys’ school said they loved it because his problem was that he had a group of bullies in his class and it was the sort of bullying that was very hard, as a teacher to deal with because…you can’t really suspend somebody for saying they can’t see the board clearly, even if you KNOW that they really mean, “I don’t want to sit beside him.” And there were also issues with the management of the school and a certain amount of poor communication between staff that was probably a lot of the problem. That sort of bullying requires staff to work together in order to eliminate it and for reasons, that didn’t happen there. It had nothing to do with it being an all-boys’ school but was rather a combination of issues with how the school was run and being a small, rather traditional, community.

      Similarly, a girl loving an all-girls college that WASN’T mean and cliqueish and didn’t have an honours committee or professors sleeping with students…isn’t really surprising just because you happened to attend a college that was also all-girls’ but also had all these unrelated problems.

    3. Observer*

      Assuming that your college was awful, that doesn’t mean that it makes any sense to automatically judge everyone who went to that college. And it makes even less sense (ie less than zero) to assume that every women’s college is the same as the college you went to. So the fact that someone went to a women’s college is simply irrelevant to how a (prospective) employee should be judged.

      The fact that the OP has allowed this one irrelevant fact to SO strongly influence her that it lead her to show such a strong dislike without ever taking a few minutes ti try to get to know her is just jaw dropping.

    4. Not Your Admin Ass(t)*

      If you’d had this terrible experience in a co-ed college, would you say, “I absolutely would never recommend a co-ed college to my hypothetical daughter?” If not, then you’ve got your own internalized misogyny you need to be conquering to be a healthy, complete person. And even if you WOULD say you’d never recommend any co-ed college after one bad year at one, that just means you’ve got a terrible tendency to harmfully over-generalize things, which is also unhealthy for you.

  189. Bayta Darrell*

    Does the LW feel the same way about Girl Scouts? Are they “precious” or “coddled” because they didn’t join a co-ed club loke 4H or Boys and Girls Clubs?

    Last I heard, every single female US astronaut who has been to space was a former Girl Scout. Over half of women in the House and the Senate were Girl Scouts. That includes Senator Tammy Duckworth, who is a combat veteran who lost her legs when her helicopter was shot down in Iraq. Was she “precious”?

    While I attended a co-ed university, I certainly understand the appeal of Women’s colleges. I feel sorry for the LW because she is letting her bias lead her to some very irrational thinking.

  190. Snorlax*

    Barnard 2012 grad here — by now the comments are rife with refutation of the OP’s points, but I think the Barnard experience in particular allows you to see the differences between a women’s college experience and co-ed college experience.

    At Barnard you have the opportunity to take classes at Barnard but also classes at Columbia University. I’d say I took 75% Barnard classes/25% Columbia classes, and the difference between the two was always SO noticeable. Like Alison says – the male voices always dominated in the Columbia classes, and the sexism I experienced at the hands of a couple Columbia professors was all the more obvious in contrast to what went on across the street at Barnard. It made me appreciate the experience of a women’s college far more than I otherwise would have, and I think it prepared me to be more self-advocating in the “real world.”

    (Obviously Barnard’s attachment to Columbia makes for a much less typical “women’s college” environment, but I still feel like I got all the benefits of a women’s college and wouldn’t trade in my experience for anything!!)

    1. Was That A Read?*

      Hi fellow Barnard alum! Class of 2005 here! Same experience; when taking classes at Columbia, men always dominated the discussions and there wasnt much room for debate.

    2. rebecca*

      I desperately wanted to apply to Barnard but my mother refused to let me go to college in NYC, so I went to Smith instead (didn’t get into Wellesley but I’m glad for how it worked out).

      I absolutely wanted to go to a women’s college because I was tired of competing. I went to a very competitive HS and I wanted to go to college somewhere that was supportive, somewhere that I didn’t feel like it was a zero-sum game with me and my classmates for good grades. The academics were amazing and I never felt like I was competing with my classmates. There was a lot of pressure at Smith to do well, sure, but it was *all* self-focused. I didn’t care what grades my classmates got. I cared how *I* did.

      I am to this day grateful I went to Smith.

  191. Milky way*

    Some of this is just factually wrong. Men’s colleges aren’t “banned” – for example, Morehouse exists – and while some women’s colleges have good endowments, some are pretty broke. (And are you similarly mad at Harvard for being rich?)

  192. Jane Doe*

    Long ago, as a homesick Appalachian scholarship student at Bryn Mawr, I dropped out after surviving a violent crime. Homesickness are culture shock are just too much when you’re also dealing with PTSD.

    Fifteen years later, I was trying to complete my degree at a certain public university when it required that I pass a test to begin junior level classes. Although I passed the test, I knew I could’ve aced it in the sixth grade. I transferred to Agnes Scott for a challenge. In order to do that, I worked half time at as a medical transcriptionist and studied the rest of the time. I effectively did not rest for three years. I graduated with honors.

    Letter writer, you may imagine the bias I have against you.

  193. Catsforbrains*

    If you’ve made it this far down in the comments, OP, I’m curious about your previous experiences with grads from women’s colleges. You mentioned they had to be “coddled” and I’m wondering if this bias is coming from an experience with a previous peer.
    I also feel like folks in the comments above are missing a few implications about class differentials from women’s colleges- I feel like you implied that though women going through these institutions insist on their status as a minority they may be blind to other privileges around wealth. I may be reading too much into this.

    I bring it up not to defend the bias but to ask if there’s personal experience or a sense of unfairness motivating this as a heuristic for dismissing candidates. Understanding where you got it from – and possibly what feelings folks from this background stir in you – might help you distinguish the individual who’s about to come work for you from your perceptions of the group as a whole.

    2. fhqwhgads*

      The letter does sort of read like OP knew/knows one asshole who went to Wellesley and has extrapolated that person into All Women’s College Alums.

  194. Snorlax*

    OH AND ALSO re: OP’s point 4: Barnard’s endowment is about $460 million. Wesleyan, a co-ed college of similar size that I randomly chose to look up, has an endowment of $1.7 billion. This is not the thing you wanna harp on.

  195. Florp*

    OP–do you really want to lose the bias, or do you just want to figure out how to avoid getting in trouble for it? Because you seem to have done zero work to fix this on your own. You could have disproved justification 2, 3, and 4 by googling to find out if there are men’s colleges (there are), which colleges have the biggest endowments (top 30 are all coed, and women’s colleges spend a higher % of their endowments on scholarships for low-income women), whether or not students in women’s colleges actually never see a man (co-enrollment means women are in coed classes at other schools and men are in classes at women’s schools–or, you know, you had an opportunity to just ask the women’s college grad who was sitting in front of you), etc.

    I don’t actually know the gender/politics breakdown of the AAM readership and I don’t want to speak for others. But. I am a woman and I feel like there are other women here who, like me, are kind of exhausted by people with deeply internalized sexism asking us to fix them by proving that each and every one of their sexist beliefs is wrong, point by point, without doing the bare minimum of anti-bias work on their own first.

    *You have just told us you are against coddling while asking this community to coddle you.*

    Instead of watching a Youtube video on overcoming personal bias, or getting a therapist, or asking HR if they can recommend a professional development program, or googling “management training,” or sitting in on any DEI meeting anywhere, or checking out a book from the library (Blindspot: Hidden Biases of Good People is one) you came here and dumped this in our lap. Listen to your boss, get off your butt, and fix your own bias yourself. No one can do it for you.

    It’s not OK to make black people responsible for teaching racists how not to be racist, it’s not OK to make LGBTQ+ people responsible for keeping homophobes comfortable with homosexuality, and so forth. Now you want some poor woman you just met to teach you that she’s not spoiled and deserves her job in spite of [checks notes] her college degree. I’m tired.

    1. Moira Rose's Closet*

      “It’s not OK to make black people responsible for teaching racists how not to be racist, it’s not OK to make LGBTQ+ people responsible for keeping homophobes comfortable with homosexuality, and so forth. Now you want some poor woman you just met to teach you that she’s not spoiled and deserves her job in spite of [checks notes] her college degree. I’m tired.”

      This is exactly how I felt reading this letter. Like, cool, now hundreds of women and LGBT people are going to have to take the time to educate yet another person who has horrifying and dehumanizing views…when all of the “facts” used to support the bigoted position are demonstrably untrue, and a simple Google search would show that. Cool cool.

    2. CharlieBrown*

      It’s not OK to make black people responsible for teaching racists how not to be racist, it’s not OK to make LGBTQ+ people responsible for keeping homophobes comfortable with homosexuality, and so forth. Now you want some poor woman you just met to teach you that she’s not spoiled and deserves her job in spite of [checks notes] her college degree. I’m tired.

      As a person of color, +1,000,000

    4. anonagoose*

      *You have just told us you are against coddling while asking this community to coddle you.*

      Yes, thank you for putting into words what exactly is bothering me about this letter. She wants us to do the work for her. She can unlearn her biases the way everyone else should–with her own labor and research, not by expecting other women and queer folks and people of color (fun fact, I’m all three lmao) to do the painstaking work of explaining why a degree from a woman’s college doesn’t mean a woman is a spoiled brat. Jesus.

    5. Jackalope*

      I disagree with the OP on all of her points, but this isn’t a fair response. She wrote to Alison asking for advice because Alison is an advice columnist. That’s her literal job, that she picked. Lots of people are jumping in on the comments, but if every single reader decided they didn’t want to participate because they were tired of educating people then she would still have good solid advice that she could use. If you’re tired and don’t want to have to give any of your energy to educating her, then… don’t. Just move past this letter and let Alison take care of it, or those of us who want to chime in.

      1. Jackalope*

        Adding on to this after further reflection. One of the things that we’ve learned over the past 2 1/2 years is that people in general don’t learn well in a virtual hole by themselves. It’s all well and good to tell someone to go educate themselves, but in practice most people can’t learn very well that way. In reality, it generally takes at least some teaching from actual other humans to be able to know which direction to go.

        Now this doesn’t mean that every member of every minority group is going to have to teach others if they don’t want to. I personally enjoy doing that teaching, but I get that others don’t. But there has to be some way for people to get the knowledge that they need, and the idea that people are even going to know how to approach a vast subject like misogyny or racism or ableism or whatever if they don’t have someone is…. not taking into account the way that people actually work. So if someone needs or is asking for help in this, even someone like the OP who is still pretty mired in her biases, and you don’t want to or feel the need to roll your eyes or are too tired… just move on. Pretend you never saw the question and let someone else deal with it. As I said, I enjoy answering questions like this but I also have times when I don’t have the mental energy for it and then I just keep going and trust that someone else will take care of answering the question.

      2. anonagoose*

        I don’t agree with you. Not because you’re wrong that people learn better with real people weighing, because they do, but because most if not all of the “facts” she used to support her argument are easily debunked with a quick google search. That’s the laziness, that’s the unfairness of asking women/LGBT folks/POC/etc to do the work for her. Like, she says all-men’s schools would be “banned,” when that’s an easily disproven fact–why has she never done that research? This letter’s responses could have been a better support for her than just people telling her all the ways in which she is wrong if she had simply done a modicum of work on her own.

        I’m not saying she needs to, like, educate herself on the vast nuances of misogyny. But she could have written in and still made an effort beforehand to learn something, anything, that would make a dent in her biases. That she didn’t is really, really evident, and it undermines the claim that she cares about being a better manager and person–because the letter she wrote is just asking to be spoonfed counterarguments, instead of coming to the table like an equal partner in the unlearning.

        1. Jackalope*

          That’s a reasonable way to look at things. My opinion is colored by my own past experiences with newbies or people who otherwise were trying to learn something who had the most basic of education or information and couldn’t get past it. Sometimes the holes in their knowledge are super easy to fill (Google, etc.) and yet they can’t get there themselves. So I’m less bothered by the OP not looking things up than you are. But I can see where you’re coming from.

          Either way, though, anyone who doesn’t want to engage with her for whatever reason should just… not. I’ve enjoyed the lengthy discussion that has ensued, and I’ve learned a lot myself – I didn’t even know at the time when I chose my college that women only colleges were a thing, let alone pros and cons to attending one. But for anyone who doesn’t want to jump in, I’d recommend scrolling past this, maybe rolling their eyes if needs be, and leaving it at that.

          1. anonagoose*

            Yeah, not engaging because you don’t have the spoons for something is always an option. But that’s not the point of calling out OP–because it’s not that the people stepping in aren’t willing to do so; obviously we are! It’s that we’re being asked without any recognition of that request or the work we’re being asked to do. We can be ready to do the work and also galled by the entitlement of that ask at the same time, and frankly being made aware of the way her letter is landing and how it fits into a pattern of oppression is part of the unlearning for OP anyways. The callout protects us as people helping OP out because we (and realistically also OP’s poor new employee) should be getting more recognition for the labor she’s asking us to do, and it helps her because learning how her behavior fits into a pattern of oppression is part of interrupting bias.

            But it’s not just about not looking things up. It’s about the lack of effort to engage with this subject in any way other than asking people to do the legwork for her–to explain why she’s wrong, to explain how to not mistreat her new employee (!!!), even to, as she seems to hint in her letter, tell her that she’s right and give her the ok to keep doing what she’s doing. OP did no self-reflection, no research, didn’t even ask the most basic question of “how does one fight bias generally?” Nowhere does she take ownership of her role in this process.

            Like, yes, I can step away at anytime. I won’t because I like the work and I think it’s important. But it is incredibly frustrating to constantly be working with people who think bias is something other people unlearn for them, and don’t want to do any independent work to set themselves up for success–and I’m going to voice that. I signed up to teach people, not to shelter them from the results of their own actions or lie about how their thoughtlessness impacts me. Especially in work about systemic oppression and things like misogyny, people need to hear that they are doing harm, and those who are harmed need to be able to voice it without being told to just sit down and shut up.

  196. Proud Feminist*

    Two words LW: internalized sexism.

    You’re biased because you don’t like women (look back at what you wrote and see all the sexist stereotypes–“weak,” seeking “coddling” etc.). You think the more a woman can blend in with and be like a man, the better.

    You need to do some serious work on understanding diversity and equity. The goal is not to turn everyone into straight white cis men, as you seem to think.

    Wellesley grad, tenured professor at a coed university who sees every day how much women are still disadvantaged

  197. Ex-prof*

    I taught at a women’s college. We were required to admit (qualified) men above college age; I forget what the cut-off age was but it was the law. Therefore we had some male commuter students; we were conveniently located.

    Most of my students were over 35. A large portion of them were recently divorced, and the courts had ordered their exes to pay for them to get a degree that would enable them to be self-supporting. The program I was teaching in fit that bill nicely.

    My students weren’t precious… at least not in the way the letter writer means. They were just trying to get back on their feet.

  198. Cringing 24/7*

    Besides everything already said by Alison and other commenters, I want to firmly push back on the idea that, “People pick where they go to college.” This can be extremely untrue for many people who go to college immediately after high school. They are almost never fully-formed adults yet who have had a chance to question and correct the institutions that raised them. I, a genderqueer atheist, went to an extremely conservative, religious, anti-LGBT undergraduate university that has recently doubled down on their bigotry, and I would NOT have chosen to go there or be associated with them if I’d had true agency as a child/18-year-old/newly-minted adult.

  199. HollieCollie*

    The good news is, for every person biased against historically women’s college grads, there’s one person who’s biased toward HWC grads.

    I know I am.

  200. Saffy_Taffy*

    I was bullied pretty seriously at college by a professor who talked extensively about her women’s-only college, which led to me having a bias against that college and women’s-only graduates in general. So, if I may, I’d like to talk about how I worked on that. I hope this is helpful.

    1. I was lucky enough to meet a really sweet person from a similar college who didn’t embody any of my biases (contrary to your belief that those graduates are precious, my bias was that those graduates are mean-spirited and aggressive towards femininity). If you don’t already know someone whose identity challenges your biases, you might look up a list of notable graduates and read about their lives.

    2. I joined an all-women’s creative space. In it, a wide variety of people were able to collaborate and express themselves in a way they can’t in mixed company. I’d never done that before myself. I paid attention to the good it did them and myself.

    Eventually, these two things challenged my belief system enough that, after a while, it just kind of dissolved. Good luck, OP.

  201. Bryce with a Y*

    It’s been said by others here and elsewhere, but here and now, it merits saying it yet once again:

    Where you went to school isn’t important. What you did there—and what you did afterwards—is much more important.

    It does not matter whether the schools you went to are coed or single-sex (is that the appropriate way to say it?), historically Black/Hispanic/Native American, public or private, religious or secular, or what have you. It does matter that you have the ability to do the job and the fit with the organization.

    That’s my 2 cents.

  202. TW1968*

    Regarding LW’s comment (4) on endowments…a public university I attended many years ago had, about 10 years ago, over 3 BILLION dollars in endowments. And yet their cost of attendance is still increasing every year just like every other college. (I say cost of attendance because some will keep tuition low but add thousands per year in various fees, so they can say “tuition hasn’t increased much”, while the TOTAL price to attend is shooting up like a helium balloon.)

    HBCU, womens only colleges…more power to them! They’re helping people that ARE at a proven disadvantage, for all the reasons Alison gives, and more.

  203. Was That A Read?*

    Barnard College grad here. It really wasnt a *choice* as they offered me the most money on a nearly full academic scholarship. We partnered with Columbia so I hold dual degrees from both. Ever go to school and live in NYC post 9-11? I’m sure coddled isnt the word you’d use. Being in a woman’s only environment for the majority of my classes helped me find my voice and develop leadership skills-something that I use daily as a SVP for a Benefits Firm.

  204. lost academic*

    I’m impressed that in so many comments (over 700 I think as I post this) everyone is very squarely on one side.

  205. Donna DeLuca*

    I think this is classic internalized patriarchal oppression bordering on misogyny. Makes me very sad in 2022. The political changes faster than the personal sometimes.

    1. Moira Rose's Closet*

      It’s not “bordering on,” I’m afraid. It’s quite aggressively misogynistic. :(

  206. Was That A Read?*

    I am heated about this. This is such PICK ME attitude. It’s like the Exclusive Work Environment manager who froze out a 30-something decided to come back for round w.

  207. TechnicallyA“Doctor”*

    This made me think about my Physics 101 class. We started with 2 women in the class, and one dropped it leaving only me. The majority of the men were engineering majors and I was pre-med. I felt bias from all the (male) students and the (male) professor until the first exam, where I set the curve. Then it somehow got worse! I left with the highest grade in that class and the lab, but felt my woman-ness at every turn and was second guessed at every turn. I actually considered to go into engineering but couldn’t stomach being around that every day for the rest of my life. If I had gone to an all-women’s school I’m pretty sure I’d be an engineer today.

    LW- I hope you can find a way to truly re-think your bias and take yourself out of the equation. Them going to an all-women’s school isn’t about you or what you went through. My experience was so mild compared to what others have faced and if I could go back would seriously consider it. there’s still a place for this in this world.

  208. Zach*

    I think it may have benefitted OP to actually have gone to a women’s college for undergrad because this is screaming “internalized misogyny” to me. On a positive note, based on the replies here, maybe OP is now more aware of it and can start working on it.

  209. Name name*

    A few years ago, someone on the Internet called the HWC I attended something along the lines of “Satan’s school of gay communism”. Alums were DELIGHTED. T-shirts, mugs, bumper stickers and more were made bearing the logo of Satan’s school of gay communism and these items were sold to benefit a good cause.

    I looked forward to being able to purchase a “precious and coddled” mug and assume the proceeds will go to lifting up women through education programs at HWCs.

      1. Name name*

        I believe a “My Cat is an Honors Student at Satan’s School of Gay Communism Sticker” was a bumper sticker once available for purchase as well!

    2. Ah Yes*

      I adore this! My daughter is only 2 but when the time comes, I’ll gently nudge her toward “Satan’s School of Gay Communism”. LOL!

    3. HoHumDrum*

      Oh hey, wearing my Satan’s School of Gay Communism sweatshirt as I type. Best college appeal ever! Almost as good as my cashmere and pearls ;)

    4. Anonnyme*

      I had missed this. What *I* remember was the episode of the Simpsons where Lisa is considering college and has a dream about the Seven Sisters schools. (Yes, I am showing my age). The laughter echoing down the hallway as everyone watching in their individual dorm rooms saw that scene… “come *explore* with *me*…” was the line for my college and boy did it fit!

  210. KatieP*

    While not post-secondary education, I started secondary education in a public, co-ed school, and finished at an all-girls school. Since the all-girls school students didn’t have to deal with the teacher’s gender bias, they were never rewarded for constraining themselves to harmful gender stereotypes. I think there were definitely some benefits to the all-girls education, particularly in STEM subjects.

    As to the endowment… I work for a public university. Some of these endowment numbers mentioned for women’s colleges are closer to what our larger departments are working with. Sounds like they’re under-funded to me.

    1. Name name*

      Agreed with the general theme of your comment but wanted to note that endowments and operating budgets are not necessarily the same thing (an endowment may fund part of an annual operating budget but likely funds are also coming from elsewhere like tuition and/or other fees)

    2. Educator*

      And endowment money is not just hanging out doing nothing–it is invested! Schools with big endowments can make a big difference by investing their endowments ethically–I would argue that that has a bigger long term impact than one-time donations. If this were of genuine interest to LW, she might look at where her alma mater is investing its endowment and how that money could be best used. My college stopped investing the endowment in companies that directly contribute to climate change (coal, big oil, etc.) after SIGNIFICANT alumni pressure. It was hard to do, but worth it. Investment is the meaningful conversation to have about endowment dollars.

  211. All I Got Was This Lousy Tee Shirt*

    I found this letter quite scary. I thought we were being pranked, it being close to Halloween and all.

    I don’t know how the OP is still in charge of people if she’s so biased against women’s college grads that the boss actually discussed that bias with her mid or post interview. That could lead to being demoted, investigated by HR for harassment, or worse.

  212. Olivia*

    I wonder if it might serve as extra incentive for the OP to change their mindset and more importantly their behavior if they realized that the behavior they are tempted towards sure looks an awful lot like gender discrimination. The idea that their problem isn’t with women, only women who went to women’s colleges, reminds me of people who say that they don’t think there’s something inherently wrong with Black *people*, it’s Black *culture* that they have XYZ complaints about. (“I like women, just not women who are too into women-y stuff.”) This is nonsensical splitting hairs. The OP’s attitude is misogynistic, plain and simple, and I hope that all the comments here will help them to get real clear about that. Because she’s talking like she thinks of herself as someone who’s against sexism and wants equality, but she’s also denying the extent to which inequality exists today, and some of these arguments sound like they came from MRAs.

    So I just want to be really blunt and point out that treating certain direct reports differently than others because they went to a woman’s college is opening your company up to legal liability, and even if you don’t think it’s gender-based discrimination, there are a lot of people who would and a lot of lawyers who could successfully make the case that it is. If you can’t make quick progress on this, your employer may reasonably conclude that it is not in their best interest to continue to have you managing people.

  213. It Chose Me*

    On people choosing where they go to college: This letter has a lot of wealth privilege in it, even though LW implies that wealth privilege is a thing they don’t like about women’s colleges. I went to a women’s college, class of 2014. I didn’t wake up one day and decide “I’m going to a women’s college!” I went because they had the best financial aid package and had a major I wanted. They offered a better package than even the co-ed state college. While I have significant student loan debt, it would have been an even higher amount if I had gone to that co-ed public college. Full college choice is a privilege of people with wealthy parents.

    1. It Chose Me*

      *an edit to say my student loan debt is primarily from post-grad education. I also didn’t choose that school and went to the only school in the state that offered a degree in the program I needed.

    2. Cringing 24/7*

      +1000

      The idea that people can just choose whatever college they go to is just so silly to me.

  214. Ann O'Nemity*

    #1 OP, congrats on realizing you have this bias. Seriously! That’s the first step to overcoming it.

    #2 Next, think about what factors lead you to that bias. Personal experience, anecdotes, your parent’s opinion, etc. How did you form this opinion? Understanding the roots can help you to identify solutions.

    #3 Now do some research and focus on data. Who goes to women’s colleges, what are the benefits of attending one, what are the student outcomes? Try embracing the opposite opinion and go looking for positive information about women’s colleges; don’t just weed through sources to find the ones that reinforce your biases. Be sure to look for multiple sources of data. Now compare what you’ve learned with your previous opinions.

    #4 Determine how any lingering bias affects your opinions and the way you manage your staff. How will you think or treat this staff member differently?

    #5 Commit to implementing practical strategies to offset or limit the harm your bias will cause your staff. Determine processes to ensure that your biased thinking doesn’t turn into biased and preferential behavior.

    If you get stuck on any of the above, try therapy. Seriously. Biases are harmful to yourself and others. You should not be in a management position if you can’t get this under control. Good luck!

  215. AnotherSarah*

    LW, Look, after years in higher ed, I have Thoughts on certain types of elite universities. I don’t think Harvard, Yale, etc. are all they’re cracked up to be. But I CANNOT disadvantage job candidates from those schools. Do you see the difference? Just the same as I couldn’t disadvantage job candidates from my college’s rival sports team. It’s never a good hiring move to judge a candidate as a member of a group rather than on their own merits.

  216. Jennifer*

    *waves in Seton Hill, pre-2001*

    The OP’s letter has a big ‘why isn’t there a white history month?’ vibe.

  217. RoseBud*

    I went to a women’s college because they offered me a full scholarship. Literally not a single other reason. It wasn’t my first choice but I didn’t want debt. So maybe consider that people have complex lives and reasons for doing things that you might be not be able to correctly assess from three words on a resume.

  218. Becca Rosselin-Metadi*

    Oh for crying out loud. Yes, this is entirely irrational. So many studies have shown that single sex education works out well for women-their voices aren’t drowned out by men, they fill all the student government positions, all the science positions and all around it makes them more self-confident. FYI-I went to a large state school. I’ve worked with many women from large schools/small schools/private/not/single sex. And they’ve been great/awful/indifferent and where they went to school and whether it was single sex or not had nothing to do with it.

  219. Screen Porch Office*

    I work at an all-girls’ high school. I was not a fan of single sex education prior to taking this job, but the hours, location, etc met my needs. After 10 years of working here I can say my prior assumptions about single sex education were wrong. It’s not for everyone, but it serves many girls extremely well. (I can guess the same would be true of all-male schools). And the OP’s letter is awfully smug and self -righteous for someone who clearly has zero experience with women’s colleges and is going purely based on assumptions and outdated, uninformed ideas.

    1. anonagoose*

      Fun fact! Studies show that in k-12 ed, girls are generally well-served by single-sex schools, whereas boys are not–coed is much better in terms of outcomes for male students.

  220. CommanderBanana*

    Why are you so obsessed with where your candidates went to college?? Maybe spend some time unpacking that.

    1. JustKnope*

      Yeah, I’m intrigued by the fact that this bias is such a present part of the OP’s life that her boss even knows about it and felt the need to step in. OP is really fixated on this one small attribute and ascribing it an outsized influence on a person’s professional persona.

      1. Cringing 24/7*

        Also, good on OP’s boss for seeing and calling out the “immediate dislike” so quickly and directly.

  221. Naveen*

    Tell me you’re a torch bearer for the patriarchy without telling me you’re a torch bearer for the patriarchy. You can internalise misogyny all you want, won’t stop you from burning at the stake with the rest of us!

  222. Ah Yes*

    How someone can be so blind to the reasons that someone would want to go to an all-women’s school is beyond me, but here are some reasons (note: I didn’t go to an all-women’s school but looking back it probably would have been nice):

    -There is a bias toward men in regular co-ed colleges in which they are automatically seen as more competent and get the opportunities that arise from that, talk more in class (or outright dominate conversations).
    -Throughout middle and high school (and even, shockingly, elementary school) girls are sent home if it’s determined that their outfit choices could “distract the boys”.
    -Rape culture is hugely prevalent on college campuses (yes, it exists everywhere but that isn’t the great argument some people think it is…)
    -A lot of highly successful women leaders have attended women’s colleges and many have fantastic academic track records.
    -Women have historically been underrepresented in higher education, and (as Allison pointed out), women’s colleges help correct that. They also help to elevate women’s contributions to a variety of fields. For example, in my “Great Works” literature class in my co-ed college literally all the literature chosen were by white men… I feel like this extreme underrepresentation wouldn’t be likely to occur in a women’s college.
    -All of the points people made about HIBCs are valid as well.

    Also, as others have pointed out, this just reeks of internalized misogyny. You have some inner work to do, LW.

  223. I'm A Little Teapot*

    I went to an all women’s college. No, I didn’t go there expecting to be coddled – I went there expecting to be educated. And I think I was. They also gave me far better scholarships and grants, it was significantly cheaper for me to attend the private out of state school than it was for me to attend the large, instate public university.

    The most striking example of the value of women’s colleges comes from a class I took my senior year. I was an accounting major. That semester, the much larger co-ed university next door (semi-sibling school) had something happen and their advanced accounting class filled up. A good number of students, both male and female, from that school thus took the class at the women’s college. In total, students from the university outnumbered the students from the women’s college.

    The first day of class, all the students from the women’s college showed up – in their usual jeans, sweats, yoga pants, minimal/no makeup, etc. The women from the university showed up in much nicer clothing plus makeup. The men from the university showed up in jeans, sweats, etc.

    In class, the women’s college students activity participated. We asked questions, volunteered answers, joined in class discussion. The men, initially did as well (we’ll come back to this). The women from the university – didn’t. They were quiet, only answering questions if specifically called on. Interestingly, after the first week or so, the men got really quiet for a while, then they seemed to recover from shock or whatever it was and were participating, but not to the same extent that they had initially. Over the course of the semester, the women from the university began participating more, but never got to the same level as the women’s college students.

    My take away? Those women at the university were socialized to be quiet, because the men were supposed to make the noise. Since we didn’t have men in our classes regularly, we at the women’s college didn’t have that socialization, and when the men who were guests at our school came in and expected the same dynamic, they were unprepared to cope with strong competent women. Also, how the heck are you going to get a good education if you can’t ask questions? I felt pretty bad for the women at the university if that’s what they had to deal with all the time.

    It was also interesting that the men interacted with the women’s college students, but the women from the university didn’t interact much with the other women. Jealous? Insecure? Superior? No idea, but was noticeable.

    And since we’re talking about women’s colleges, Go Belles!

    1. dmowl*

      I noticed the same dynamic when I took classes off campus at our sibling schools or vice versa. It often took a lot more work for women from coed schools to become friendly with me than it did for men.

  224. keiteag*

    I went to a women’s college because it offered a very unusual major that I was interested in. It also offered a scholarship. I wouldn’t have been able to afford a degree in this area anywhere else. I was offered training in driving a truck and trailer combo and working with animals that topped 1,500 pounds. Seriously, no coddling there. And working with a man is much easier than working with an almost out-of-control Saddlebred in harness.

  225. Sara without an H*

    Hi, OP — I know you’re probably feeling kind of bruised at this point. You asked for some advice on managing your bias in managing your new employee, so I’ll try to address that. I recently retired after 35 years in middle management, most of it in higher education.

    First off, you’ve acknowledged that you have the bias. Can you also acknowledge that your bias isn’t rooted in facts? The points you made in your letter to Alison could all be rebutted with a little internet searching. Please block out some time and inform yourself about single-sex education.

    With regard to onboarding this employee: I strongly recommend that you NOT do all her training yourself. Given the strength of your feelings, you’ll be tempted to overreact to ordinary “newbie” mistakes. Find ways to assign parts of her orientation and training to others on your team, who don’t share your bias and can give you more objective information about her performance.

    You say your own manager has already called you out about the need to manage this employee fairly. For your own sake, please keep your manager informed and make sure you’re aligned on reasonable goals and expectations for this employee. If you have a good working relationship with your manager, try to get frequent feedback from them on how you’re managing. (If you reported to me, I’d be looking over your shoulder a lot.)

    Given your belief that your employee will need “coddling,” you’ll need to fight back against the urge to either micromanage her or to be more hands-off than is appropriate for a new employee. Again, if your relationship with your manager is good, they may be able to give you useful feedback. If not, can you recruit another experienced manager to mentor you on this?

    Lastly, make an effort to get to know the employee better. Find out more about her career goals (you should do this anyway), but don’t focus a lot on her educational background.

    1. ToS*

      Well-stated. The OP has lit up others’ hot spots, and likely latent trauma – which is about them. They are seeking how to DO BETTER, let’s help that happen.

      OP may have some older experience with someone that needed coddling that they need to recognize as needing to be acknowledged and dispatched according to that situation (I’m imagining a cousin from childhood or losing a high school friend after graduation?) Before we have a lot of experience in the world, we sometimes end up generalizing a specific experience as The Way It Is, when it is One Incident, Specific to That Person – that lingers because of the emotional half life from days gone by. It’s best to find the roots within yourself rather than project on the rest of the world – to get to the point of “I used to believe X, now I know better”- and OP should migrate toward supporting the employee toward shared excellence as a team.

  226. MaryB*

    This LW has the “not like other girls” “pick me” energy of someone who has/does/or hopes to benefit by showing how SHE is fine with the status quo misogynistic systems she claims no longer exist.

  227. Jennifer*

    This letter enraged me. I went to engineering school, mostly men. And one of my biggest regrets is not going to a women’s college because I think it would have helped so much with confidence in my ability. Spending five years being ignored and having my ideas dismissed by the men in my classes was not a boon to my self-confidence.

    1. Colorado*

      me too. And the fact that the ratio of men was so high was scary too living in the dorms and off campus housing.

  228. CommanderBanana*

    Honestly? I didn’t go to a women’s only college or grad school (although my college did start out as a women’s-only school when it was founded) but I wouldn’t want to work with someone with your attitude.

    1. LilPinkSock*

      I wouldn’t either. Who knows what other things about me the LW would hate, and how that would manifest itself when she’s managing my work?

      1. Calamity Janine*

        it’s a sure sign of an attitude that will translate to me getting sneered at as a “faker” who is “pulling all women down” when i do something like, idk

        wear eyeshadow or a nice dress

        heaven forfend if the dress is pink! or has frills! or – brace yourselves – *lace!* the horror… the horror…!

    2. dmowl*

      For real. I think everyone has had an experience where a coworker or manager has an irrational dislike of you or a group of people, and it’s strikingly obvious. I had a boss like this, never understood why she disliked me, there were two other women she obviously hated, but the exact same situations that happened me and a different coworker would be treated completely differently. I once forgot to tell her ahead of time that I would be working offsite for the day, and I called in the morning and couldn’t reach her, so I left a message with one of the assistants about where I was, but he never gave it to her (and she never asked anyone). I got chewed out so bad the next day and she called the offsite manager to confirm that I wasn’t skipping out on work or something. A week later, a different coworker just didn’t show up to work, this manager went nuts worrying and asking about her. When she came in the next day, she just said “oh I guess I forgot to mark it as a leave day, whoops” and my manager was all “oh no problem, we were just worried about you!” Night and day. Eventually though, our boss closed this office and transferred some of the employees who hadn’t found other jobs to work on staff at his estate, including this manager. Well, eventually, he fired her, because he cared very deeply about his estate staff and she carried some of her irrational randomly appointed dislike towards them. Lesson is — sooner or later, your irrational biases will bite you in the ass, because (drumroll) it makes you a BAD MANAGER, and bad at your job.

  229. SNJM*

    I’m surprised there hasn’t been more talk here about all-girls education at the younger age as well. Does OP have a bias against them too? I ended up going Ivy for college, but likely would have ended up at a 7 sisters school if I hadn’t got into my first choice. I hated the idea of all-girls high school until my mother dragged me to an open house (many of my friends were boys). I fell in love with it at the open house and it was absolutely the best choice for me. I was never going to wear makeup or care about fashion, but doing so in an all-girls environment meant it wasn’t social death in the same way. And Catholic schools are often very affordable compared to non-religious schools and offer scholarships, and my Catholic school was one of the best schools in the city, and as of a couple of years ago more than 50% of all girls in the STATE who take AP Comp Sci came from my alma mater alone. But it’s not only Catholics who run single-sex high schools. Other religious groups, of course, but there are a lot of all-girls charter schools out there too.

    1. GreenDoor*

      I didn’t go to a women’s college, but I went to an all-girls high school. Has the OP taken advantage of the interview situation to….ask why candidates chose the college they did? Rather than making assumptions, start asking for their perspective. Because not a single girl in my high school chose to go there because they hated boys, wanted to be a princess, or needed extra hand holding. We chose it because they pushed four years of math and science, made cultural diversity a major factor in the school’s climate, because 99% of students were accepted to colleges and universities, and because we could earn college-credit while still in high school. Every girl had a voice – no boys drowning us out, no pressure to dial things back to impress boys. I would imagine women who chose all-female colleges have much of the same rationale.

  231. Ellis Bell*

    OP, I hope the following points are helpful on the journey you began by writing in:
    1) Look up the difference between “equality” and “equity”. Lots of resources out there and you will need this distinction not just for managing women, but for managing other groups too who are also subject to inequality.
    2) Dig into this idea of “coddling” and where it comes from. It sounds like a really harsh Victorian discipline word and I wonder if you’ve ever deprived yourself of making reasonable complaints or accessing the support of others. Just an idea.
    3) Any chance you’ve fallen for the lure of being “a chill cool girl” or the like? I say this through the lens of being a former chiller, so possibly it’s just my thing. I will say, for me, it’s a total coming of age to be able to say “No, fuck that, I cannot deal with that” when you start allowing yourself to both see and tackle sexism head on. It still exists. Promise you.

  232. ToS*

    Our co-ed campus is screening “Picture a Scientist” which shows why parents/families/students often choose to have young women go to them – it drives down the cumulative effect of subtle and direct discrimination for the women that attend. It doesn’t fix everything (internalized misogyny is a thing, there is plenty of patriarchy in religious CUs and faculty are a mixed lot), but it does help with female identity.

  233. Kim Zarkin*

    I spent a few years teaching at Texas Woman’s University – one of only two state supported schools primarily for woman (they did admit men, about 90-10). Before that experience, I might have thought some of the same thoughts that the OP had – I didn’t see the point of women’s colleges. But then I saw the way my classrooms were different from when I taught at other universities. I saw that young women who I knew would have been reticent to speak in a “regular”classroom blossom into leaders. Leadership they carried into their careers.

    There was simply more room for more people to speak in and out of classes. Young women who had been raised to defer to men at what I considered unhealthy levels learned to find their footing. And they left TWU stronger, not weaker. They weren’t afraid of men, they were confident in themselves.

    Not everyone would thrive in that environment. It wouldn’t have been right for me as an undergrad. But I saw so much good in giving people the option.

    And the endowment question is just ridiculous. Some women’s colleges have large endowments, some don’t.

    The only poor judgement being shown is the idea that these candidates are less than.

    1. LadyHouseOfLove*

      As a TWU alumna, I’m pleased as punch to see someone from TWU here. I completely agree with what you say. It really gave me, a normally shy person, so many leadership qualities.

  234. DameB*

    LW — I know you almost certainly won’t get down here. You’ll have to wade through a mountain of anger to get to it. But I hope you do because I have to wonder what is driving that letter? You have clearly spent a LOT of time thinking about other women who made different choices than you have and a LOT of energy judging them. Have you spent any time or energy thinking about yourself in depth? I ask because you clearly know you’re in the wrong — you wrote to Allison, knowing she’d take you to town and that you’d get raked over the coals in the comment section.

    Internalized misogyny is a thing, LW, and if you’ve been raised in a certain kind of household and community, it’s hard to shake. Maybe spend some time writing a letter to your younger self, or your older self, or your mom or daughter. Spend some time looking inward to figure out why you’re so incredibly, hurtfully angry at a whole swathe of women. Maybe google “patriarchal bargain”. Maybe see a therapist. Because this letter to this forum strikes me as a cry for help. And, as the Feminist Survival Project says, you gotta fix your own s**t before you can fix the world.

  235. MeepMeep123*

    OP is a walking, talking sex discrimination lawsuit waiting to happen. Either at this stage (i.e. refusing to hire a woman based on where she went to college), or after that poor new employee gets hired.

  236. Canadian Librarian #72*

    Relatedly, I hope/assume you don’t have the same objections to candidates from Historically Black Colleges and Universities. Assuming you agree there’s still a place for HBCUs, I’m curious why you think women’s colleges aren’t okay.

    This was my first thought, whether the LW also would prefer not to hire graduates of HBCUs. Would the LW also be opposed to graduates of Brandeis University, the Touro University system, or Yeshiva University? Perhaps she would. In any event, this is absolutely ridiculous and the LW is right to recognize that she needs to reorient her thinking. Usually the “cure” for such prejudice is exposure, so the LW may want to consider actually researching women’s schools and learning about their advantages and drawbacks, their successes and accomplishments, and who actually attends these schools and what they go on to do after.

    (PS: some women’s schools are attended by people other than cisgender women, including trans women and non-binary people. It’s been a topic of major discussion in recent years. Also, some men do take classes at women’s schools, if they attend other nearby colleges, on a case-by-case basis. It is untrue that students at women’s colleges will ~never encounter a man~ there, lol.)

  237. Proud William Woods Grad*

    My head is about to explode! Growing up outside New York City in the 70s/80s I was very liberal, very feminist, and very independent. I thought I would go to a big coed university. Instead I ended up at a small, private women’s college and LOVED IT.

  238. Lalitah92*

    OP sounds like they never met and had a working or friendly relationship with a women’s college graduate in their life and really sounds like they’re projecting their insecurities on women’s colleges graduates.

  239. atalanta0jess*

    I’m not sure why it’s precious to choose an environment that you think you might enjoy for college. Because the rest of the world sucks? That’s not a good reason. I sure as shit choose environments that feel good to me, and so what if that’s a women’s space?

    And the endowment? Do you feel the same way about harvard or yale? Come on now.

  240. Abigail*

    Can we all take a second to acknowledge that this person admitted a bias? And that is really hard?

    Also: do the people commenting here really think they don’t have any biases?

    1. MCMonkeyBean*

      I do think that admitting it is an important first step.

      But I also think they seem to be coming from a place of “my bias is factually correct but how do I get past it anyway” when they are in fact wildly incorrect on every single point. So I hope they are ready to look into that but I admit I am a bit skeptical they will be…

    2. CharlieBrown*

      Admitting a bias doesn’t give you a free pass. (Especially when literally five minutes on Google would dispel the myths behind everyone of the points that LW points to as a source of her bias.)

      Also, I don’t see anybody here saying “I’m qualified to comment on this because I don’t have any biases.” Argumentum ad homineum

    3. anonagoose*

      But she didn’t ask how to overcome the bias because it’s bad, she asked how to overcome it because she got in trouble at work. You realize there’s a meaningful difference, right? She still thinks she’s, you know, right.

      >How do I override a bias and learn to disregard a choice I genuinely think shows poor judgment?

      She recognizes her bias but “genuinely” thinks it reflects a real problem in the people she is biased against; the problem she sees is one of behavior not of mindset.

      >I also want to be very clear: I am aware this is a bias and I want to overcome it to manage my employee fairly.

      She is asking for advice on managing her employee, not on dealing with her misogyny. Calling out the sexism in her mindset isn’t disparaging, it’s a fair criticism, especially since she can’t manage fairly if she doesn’t get at the root of the “I’m not like other girls” stuff here.

    4. dmowl*

      It’s one thing to have a bias. It’s also one thing to believe an institution or a system shouldn’t exist or be supported. It is another thing to full on take that belief out on individuals who don’t make decisions about those institutions or systems and attempt to deny them employment opportunities or fair treatment based *exclusively* on that. I would say calling what the OP has described a bias is being generous. It’s more like an intolerance. And the only reason she cares is because she understands her boss thinks it’s a problem.
      Now, I hate football. I hate it as an activity, but I hate it even more as an institution, and I believe it should be illegal on anything above like a peewee level. I think they abuse their players, physically and financially, the organization that runs it is immoral, and I find it in generally a stupid boring sport to watch. But it doesn’t effect my feelings about people who play or like football! I have many friends who played high school and college football. I have more friends who watch and follow it. It’s not the first, or even most important, thing about someone that goes into how I form an opinion of them. I think a lot of people have biases, I don’t think a lot of people use that bias as their exclusive snap judgment they’re completely unwilling to move away from until directly called out about it.

  241. Alanna*

    I attended a women’s college (Mills) in California. I actually ended up panic-transferring to it midway through my freshman year of college and went into it with some *lighter* versions of OP’s biases. I have always had more male friends than female friends and have been more drawn towards traditionally masculine professions and hobbies. It was a very different experience than I expected! The education was very rigorous and it really made me realize how much oxygen men can suck out of the room, it made me much more comfortable speaking up and knowing what I have to say is valuable, soft skills that have really helped me in male dominated STEM spaces.

    Just because men don’t attend women’s colleges doesn’t mean we don’t see men for four years! They are professors, friends, boyfriends, co-workers etc. It doesn’t “coddle” us, it gives us a space to reflect on how we want to interact with and exist in spaces with and without men.

    Also your #4 objection is a little bonkers, women’s colleges have *much* smaller endowments, usually, and are really financially struggling right now. Mills was just absorbed by North Eastern University and will now admit men.

    I have to wonder if OP has just never seriously talked to someone who went to a women’s college about their experience or had a couple weird experiences with people who “confirmed” her biases. Once OP has done some of the internal work Allison suggested I hope she can ask her new hire about her college experience with a genuinely open mind.

  242. Sparkles McFadden*

    Oh LW, there are going to be so many comments I don’t think you’ll ever get to mine, but I’m going to post it anyway.

    Your letter is full of contempt and anger. In order to address your bias (although it sounds as if you don’t actually want to do that), I think you really need to examine where your anger is coming from. Did you consider these schools out of your reach? Were you put in a work or school situation with lots men where you had to push back a lot? Did you lose out on a job because you felt the hiring manager was looking for a sorority sister or something? You need to find your trigger and address that.

    I never paid much attention to where anyone went to college. To me, the college data is a good checkpoint for an HR check, as that’s one place people feel free to lie on their resumes. Beyond that, who cares?

    …but please, please look into this as it’s going to affect your career, and definitely not in a good way.

  243. New Senior Mgr*

    I applaud OP for seeking advice for her bias, and I don’t think she can fairly manage this new hire. I hope I’m wrong, they both can learn from each other, but that the colleague called OP out on dislike for the new hire tells me OPs bias isn’t as subtle as she may think.

  244. orangeflower*

    I have two thoughts:

    1. Men-only schools very much still exist. There are many of them at the high school level (whether it’s boarding school or day school, though they are usually aimed at upper-class families) and there are also some at the undergraduate and graduate level, such as seminary colleges. I grew up conservative Catholic and had fewer options for postsecondary education within my community because so many of the institutions were exclusively for men.

    2. In most cases, which college to attend is a decision made by teenagers with significant input from their parents. Some kids can choose to go wherever they want, but many are limited by their parents for financial, logistical, or other reasons. I could understand looking at graduate school or recent employers and assuming that was a personal choice, but undergraduate institutions are so often choices made in childhood or by parents that I don’t think it’s a fair way to assess someone.

    1. Katherine*

      I made exactly the same two points below, because I was too fired up to read through the comments first. re your second point, Alison published a letter once about a person who had gone to a very religious school (the type that doesn’t teach evolution) and was worried about being judged for it. This is kind of the same thing. You definitely can’t judge a person by where they went to school. I went to Catholic college and it’s certainly not true that everyone there was a practicing Catholic, or even raised in the church. Plus, this is a decision you make at age 18! Even if it was your choice, it doesn’t necessarily say anything about who you are as an adult.

  245. Not Putting Myself on Blast*

    Honestly, the level of self-righteous condescension rolling off LW is appalling. I do believe that “precious” applies to her in this situation more than women’s college graduates…

    1. Beebis*

      It’s so condescending that for me it feels like it was written in the hopes of offending as many women as possible rather than coming from someone who is actually genuinely seeking professional advice

  246. Employment Lawyah*

    One of my kids attends Wellesley, and my other daughter is considering a transfer to Smith.

    Both are well-adjusted and function happily in mixed-sex groups. They both had (and have) plenty of male friends. THey’re a bit bummed they will have to go off-campus to date.

    But they are cognizant both of sex differences in STUDENTS (boys are more likely to be loud, interrupt, etc.) and in TEACHERS (who, like you, can hold sex biases even if they don’t mean to.)

    For them, a women’s college means that they can focus more on what they are learning, without the distractions of both genders. Then they can take that learning out into the mixed-sex world.

    As an added benefit, the Wellesley student has also reported that her college is *incredibly* safe. My kids are free-range and confident; they would walk around anyway. But for many attendees, I think this removes what might be a limitation of some campuses: Women don’t feel safe walking around alone after dark. At a women’s school, it’s safe both because they can easily identify foreign men (who are strangers) and also because women have less tendency to commit unprovoked violent assaults.

    I will say, as a parent, that there did seem to be one downside. A women’s college seems to specifically attract students whose parents won’t ALLOW them to attend a mixed-gender school (or to be in a mixed-gender dorm.) That uber-conservative set isn’t the friend group I’d normally choose for my kid, but she’s happy as a clam so either they’re easy to ignore or I’m wrong about that.

  247. Katherine*

    Proud graduate of an all-girls’ high school chiming in:

    1. No, not everyone freely picks where they go to college. Maybe some of these women had the choice between “My parents will pay for me to go to Women’s College/I have a scholarship to Women’s College” and “Pay my own way to Coed College.”

    2. Men’s colleges still exist (of course, there are many more women’s colleges, but there are still men’s colleges, such as Wabash in Indiana), and the fact that you don’t know this suggests a lot of ignorance on the topic, so you shouldn’t be stating your opinion with such condescension.

  248. Calamity Janine*

    holy internalized misogyny, batman!

    (that’s it, that’s all i’ve got, i’m sure with 1k+ comments someone has already covered whatever other points i might bring to the table.)

    1. Calamity Janine*

      okay fine, when have i EVER respected brevity being the soul of wit?

      hey OP, i know right now you’re looking at this as a business problem, and wrote to a business columnist, and want to fix it as a professional problem. but, uh, sidebar here a second.

      the best gift i have ever given myself – the best bit of self-improvement that pays dividends still – the most important thing i intentionally set out to work on within my own head and was thusly amazed at how much better i was without it dragging me down?

      getting rid of NotLikeOtherGirls-itis.

      it turns out that internalizing misogyny doesn’t stop it from being misogyny! it still sits around and encourages you to hurt others, and hurts *yourself*, too, quite deeply. you run yourself ragged trying to agree with your oppressors so hard that they stop oppressing you. but they never will. that’s just the nature of oppression and bigotry. you can mutilate your spirit, carve off parts of yourself, replace it all with loathing and snarling anger, mirror their mass hatred and allow that to be an active and damaging barrier to relationships with other human beings… all of that. and you still won’t be happy. you still won’t be recognized. you still won’t be more than nominally “one of the good ones, as subhuman icky bad-and-wrong things go”. you still won’t be equal. you still won’t be *free*.

      you end up just fashioning an even more cruel rod for your own back, and spending so much of your time hating yourself for being who you are.

      is that the life you actually want? for you? not for your business interests, or professional norms in the workplace. i mean for you, personally, in your own head.

      because i’ve just met you, LW. i have to admit you’re also not my most favourite person in the world with this attitude. but i want better than this for you! you are also allowed to want better than this for you, and you should!

      just… make an effort to stop eating the poison with the idea that if you eat enough cyanide it’ll stop hurting and you’ll be immortal. it doesn’t work. all you end up doing is hurting yourself.

      and i can say from experience that when you sit down and work on this, and lift this yoke from your shoulder, life genuinely becomes *so much better*. easier. more enjoyable. comfortable. improved in basically every respect.

      then you have all this time and effort and brainspace you can devote to something else that is far more worthy of your time, and that’s a joy, too.

      forget about business interests and your professional work self. forget even about hurting other people – though that’s still important, mind, but for right now i want you to focus on being as selfish as possible about what is in your very own head and if it is actually good for you or not.

      your life is going to be so much better once you stop agreeing with internalized misogyny.

      do this for you. today. because you need it, you deserve it, and you must have it.

  249. HBCU/All Women! It's fine.*

    As someone who went to an HBCU (Hampton), then transferred to a women’s college (Smith), I can’t even with this. HOWEVER, I’ve experienced this from hiring folks who’ve said these things OUT LOUD in tons of interviews. Sad to see these ideas still exist.

    1. Ellis Bell*

      A bit late to ask, but what on earth would one say?! “Ugh, you were educated around ALL girls, so who explained things to you or talked over you?!”

  250. StressedButOkay*

    OP, I would urge you to really examine how you treat other women in general in the workplace. This is such a specific bias that I wonder if you have other biases that you’re unaware of. If you’re very much about being taken seriously as a woman instead of just excelling in general, this could bleed into microaggressions (or macro) that you’re unaware of or that don’t rise to this level.

  251. Anonymous*

    This has probably been said but the OP should consider examining whether there is some internalised misogyny at play here? The letter came across very judgemental towards her own sex, I wonder if there’s some deeper things going on.

    1. Jasmine Clark*

      Definitely. She should learn more about internalized misogyny because she appears to have some.

  252. Calamity Janine*

    but also, LW, if you’re really down on colleges with large endowments, i have… bad news… about very many colleges.

    i say this as an alumna of Coca-Cola University.

    okay fine it’s called Emory but that’s the massive endowment, there’s names backing that up all over campus, we toast in freshman and toast out graduates with bottles of coke, there’s rumors that the quad is shaped like a coke bottle (disproven but I Want To Believe)…

    would you be facing this ‘kudzu league’ school of excellent repute with the same vitriol?

    …i’m guessing no, so the endowments aren’t the problem, now, are they?

  253. The Crowening*

    I feel really bad for the new hire. She deserves better.

    I also feel a bit bad for LW’s company/org, because they’re harboring a manager who not only looks down on a wide swath of women, but who also seems to believe this is somehow admirable, and might reluctantly reconsider her views only because her own management pointed it out, and only if someone else convinces her she is wrong. People working for her will be treated unevenly, their ideas and complaints are far more likely to be dismissed, and all the morale and turnover issues that accompany that will bite the company – not just this one LW – in the butt.

    Not good.

  254. Cherry Sours*

    Wow, OP is certainly narrow minded! In addition to what I’ve read in some of the responses below, there are women who would like to attend college without being cat-called as they walk across campus, deal with a relationship while working on their degree, or are dealing with the trauma of sexual assault or rape. Having a university to attend that helps them focus on their degree is certainly not something to look down on. It’s a valid choice in the realm of education, and repulsive to belittle people in your head because of it.

  255. Salt*

    OP, I wanted to address this: I know it sounds backwards, but because I want to be taken seriously as a woman, I do not support institutions that exclude men.
    I think you’ve fallen into women making choices about themselves will reflect badly on you. It’s insidious cycle that even the most forward thinking can fall into.
    It starts with you working hard to be successful and recognized, and then the expectations/ comments about how you’re supposed to be helping other women, how you should lead by example, pull others up and by reflection prevent others from making you look bad. If you’re responsible to them then they’re responsible to you. Their ‘bad’ choices reflect badly on women as a whole and thus these choices can chip away at all your hard work.
    But women in the workforce are not required to be responsible for other women and when women make choices about themselves it is not then at you.
    A male manager doesn’t look at manager Bob slacking off and think “Bob’s making men look bad.” Or he doesn’t see a new hire who chose to go to an all-men’s school and feel like he’s going to reflect badly on him…. or is setting back the male population in some way. Male manager does not feel like his identity is tied to other men because he’s been allowed to feel like his work and choices reflect only on him.
    You’re a good person for recognizing the bias and trying to combat it. Part of combatting a bias is to find out where it is rooted. Give some thought and see if that’s part of it.

  256. LilPinkSock*

    My sister went to a small women’s college because she was not thriving in any way after 1.5 semesters at a gigantic state school. She was so much more comfortable and successful at the women’s college–and had several classmates from cultures where higher education is still only possible for women if it’s in a gendered environment.

    I can’t imagine how any of them would feel if they graduated and were confronted by a boss who is so proud of her bigotry against the institution that helped them get where they are.

    I could say more, but I’d probably get banned for being “unkind” towards a sexist bigot.

  257. Fluffy Fish*

    OP – look into internalized misogyny.

    There’s a saying about women who having been made to believe they had to compete for limited seats for women at the proverbial table think other women are the enemy. But what we should be doing is creating more seats.

    When my daughter was looking at colleges I encouraged her to consider a women’s college. Because I am tired of having to fight to be heard over the voices of men. Because at her young age she already had to deal with sexism and misogyny. Because four years of not having to think about how she spoke or how to be taken seriously BECAUSE of her gender, would maybe give her the tools she’d find useful for the inevitiable when she enters the working world as a female in STEM.

    Ultimately she did not go to one although she did apply to a few. But she saw their value.

    I’ll leave it at that because ultimately you will either choose to do the hard work to confront your bias or you won’t.

  258. wordswords*

    I’m a cis woman who deliberately chose not to apply to any women’s colleges because I knew that most of my friends were other girls and that I found girls easier to socialize with. I didn’t want to double down on that, and spend four crucial years not learning how to get along with half of humanity. (Disclaimer: I know I’m framing this in binary gender-essentialist terms; that’s how I thought about it when I made that decision in the ’90s.) And you know what, I’m in my 40s and turns out I’m a lesbian and my social group is still mostly women and afab people, but all the same, I think that was the correct decision for me, and I’m glad I made it.

    But that doesn’t mean that other people looked at their college options and considered the same factors with the same weight and went “you know what, I DO want to avoid getting along with half of humanity” or whatever. They considered other factors! Like everything Alison mentions! There are a lot of good reasons to go to a women’s college. Some of them are totally unrelated to the fact that it’s a women’s college (has a great program in something they’re interested, in a convenient location, financial aid) and some of them are central to it (not facing sexism in the classroom and in campus life). They looked at all the various factors in their life at age 16 or 17 or 18 and made the best choice they could at the time, just like everybody else of any gender.

    You’re generally loading a ton of projection and assumptions onto one aspect of someone’s educational background, and not even assumptions based in factual patterns. If you can reframe your thinking to focus on their major and work history (or, depending on the level of the position, just work history!) and put the question of who someone’s college’s other attendees were out of the picture entirely, I think that will help a lot with the knee-jerk reaction (which, yeah, as others have said, does seem to have a good bit of internalized misogyny coloring it) and will certainly help you be fairer to the people around you. Which they deserve! This bias is strong enough that your dislike of a candidate on the basis of it is clearly apparent to your boss, which means you really need to reframe your thinking about it fast. And the first step to that, as Alison says, is to let go of the idea that it’s justified. This is not about “how do I not act on this perception even though I’m right about it,” it’s about correcting the perception itself and cutting it off at the root.

  259. Jamila*

    Is the letter writer aware that men only colleges exist? My father and several men in my family are graduates of Morehouse College, an all male HBCU in Atlanta. Do you have an issue with that environment? Dr. King is among its many graduates.

  260. StressedButOkay*

    I also made my college decision mostly based on the fact that they had a working farm. Was I going into any field that would put me on that working farm? No, but it was charming and tipped the scales for me.

    What does that say ultimately say about me as an employee and a working cis-woman? Absolutely nothing and that’s the same for women who go to women’s college.

    1. mreasy*

      I also chose not to go to a women-only college not because I didn’t think I would get a good enough education or “real life” experience because there were no men (lol to college resembling real life) or because I had some idea that women’s colleges are discriminatory or coddling. No, I applied & got into a couple of the big names women’s colleges but…I was too boy crazy. I wanted to smooch a bunch of dudes! That decision has nothing to do with my intellect or my value system (other than the fact that I value cute guys).

  261. ECBeace*

    FWIW, there are three all men’s colleges in the US. Hampton- Sydney, Morehouse (also a HBCU), Wabash.

  262. Kim*

    I’m probably just repeating a story very similar to 50 other stories from women in the comments: My original college major was engineering. First day of honors physics, there was me and one other woman and 30-50 men. The professor looked around at the class and commented on how the women in this class must feel really lucky to have all these men to choose from. I’m not saying that’s why I changed my major to a non-STEM major but it sure didn’t help!

      1. Calamity Janine*

        one is tempted at such gross comments to repeat the old joke about such situations –

        “the odds are good, but the goods are odd…”

        (may as well kick the overinflated egos of dudes preening about that on your way out.)

    2. Observer*

      Now THAT’S educational all right! At least it is if you’ve been living under a rock till you got to college and have not heard the million and one variations on the joke about women going to college for an MRS degree.

      For anyone else, there is nothing educational about the experience. Unless you think that getting practice in “laughing politely while swallowing your sighs and anger when someone does something gross and inexcusable” is actually educational. And you don’t need a coed college to learn that, either.

  263. I would prefer not to*

    Well done to your boss for picking up on this and addressing it directly. You’re lucky to have them.

  264. No plaid skirts*

    Not only did I go to a women’s college, it was a Catholic women’s college, and the LW’s description of the students is still wildly off base. I never ever met a single other student there who did it because they wanted to be separate from men, they did it because the school had a reputation for fabulous academic programs that had impressive stats on the successes of their graduates. The coed schools around our state could not boast the same record for most of their programs! That’s why I went there.

    I later did other continuing and graduate studies in big regular state schools, and I did feel that the student pop overall was much more serious and goal-oriented at the women’s college. I think because, in order to have ended up there, you were much more likely to have been someone that had very specific academic and professional goals and been researching those pretty intensely when applying for college. If not, I imagine that you wouldn’t have known the women’s college was outperforming other (bigger, more well known) schools in the region in a lot of areas. I didn’t know those larger stats Alison shared here, and I’m pleasantly surprised that it matches up to what I feel like I saw in the other women I knew in school.

    Also, we’re not sequestered like nuns. The classes were all women but we went out and did all the usual college student stuff around town (and the nearest big city) with folks from all the other colleges in the area. Since it was a small school anyway most people were pretty motivated to go make friends outside the college so you wouldn’t be studying, living, and socializing with the same 20 people at all times. People like some variety lol and anyone who wanted to meet men (most of us!) knew they had to expand socially, too. Groups of us would get together regularly to go out and do stuff in the hopes of making friends or getting dates with dudes from outside the school. The idea of a women’s college being a little cloister of delicate ladies is extremely funny to me!

  265. Jasmine Clark*

    Super long comment alert!!

    For what it’s worth, though, there’s a strong undercurrent of “I’m justified in feeling this way” throughout your letter, and you’ll never successfully counter your biases if you don’t first drop that.

    This!! LW, I can tell that you don’t ACTUALLY want to overcome your bias. If you wanted to, you would. The only way you can overcome your bias is for you to change your beliefs, and it doesn’t appear that you want to do that. You can’t hold onto those beliefs and overcome your bias.

    Here’s the thing. If you don’t like the concept of women’s colleges, fine. You can have your opinion (although it would be good to do what Alison said and do some research before forming an opinion). Having an opinion about women’s colleges is one thing, but having opinions about the PEOPLE who go there is another. (for example, the belief that those women expect coddling and they dislike men) So those are the beliefs you need to drop. Take some time to think about how you formed those beliefs in the first place.

    Here’s me getting on my soapbox to talk about a pet peeve: This is like politics. If someone voted for a different candidate than you did, it’s fine if you disagree with that person’s opinion about which candidate is best. But making negative assumptions about that person’s personality and motivations is not okay. If you dislike a certain candidate, that’s fine, but making negative assumptions about everyone who voted for that candidate is not okay. You don’t know the reasons someone voted for that candidate, so don’t assume anything about their personality unless you really get to know the person and find out how they formed their beliefs. Don’t jump to conclusions about someone’s motivations for voting a certain way.

    So in the same way, don’t jump to conclusions about the motivations of women choosing women’s colleges. You don’t actually KNOW their motivations; you’re just assuming their motivations are bad.

    What’s interesting to me is that you said women who go to women’s colleges are intolerant and inflexible. People are often blind to their own faults and they accuse others of things they themselves are guilty of. It’s called projection. You yourself are intolerant and inflexible, because you have a bias against women who go to women’s colleges. But you don’t see your own intolerance and you project that onto other people who don’t deserve it.

    Soapbox again: I’ve seen SO MANY people who accuse others of being intolerant and yet they themselves are intolerant. The way they talk about people who are different from them is rude and judgmental. They’re no better than the people they criticize. But because they view themselves (“us”) as good and “them” as bad, they don’t think they’re being intolerant. It’s just amazing how many times I’ve seen this! It’s so common. I wish people would think more carefully about their own biases and spend time with people who are different from them.

    1. Calamity Janine*

      i will be honest, this attitude works way less good with politics

      if the people voting for the party loudly in favor of my death, then, yeah, i am afraid that comes with me making some unflattering assumptions of them. but i’m not really the one being intolerant and causing the death of civility. that’s far more on the people signing up to support eugenics and the notion that those at risk for covid are dragging the country down and should hurry up with the dying thing for their convenience. at worst, they also support that, and i am emphatically not safe around them. at best they don’t find it objectionable or worth considering… and i am also emphatically not safe around that either lol.

      “agree to disagree” is for political disagreements like if funds should go to pave the potholes on this street first or if the elementary school gym should be renovated first instead. not so much when it’s disagreements on who gets to be considered human and therefore gets to continue breathing.

      if you really think the problem is *me* not being tolerant of people who think i should die, then, uh, you’ve got some backwards priorities in the extreme!

    2. dmowl*

      Yeah political affiliation is kind of moving away from being applicable here, but that’s more a recent development. However, it is okay for the OP to dislike women’s colleges as institutions. It’s okay to think they’re outdated or unnecessary. It’s not okay to take this belief out on the people who go there. I hate football! I think it’s stupid, boring, but most egregiously they are physically and financially abusive and manipulative. But I don’t take this out on individuals who choose to play football or watch football. I can recognize that you can love football and be a diehard fall of the Orlando Copyrights or whatever and it doesn’t impact 1) how you’ll treat me or 2) how well you will do your job.

  266. M*

    As a women’s college alum, I couldn’t make it through this letter because the LW clearly has absolutely no shred of actual information from the real world involved in this opinion.

    I chose my university for many reasons. The fact that it only had women in the undergrad programs was incidental to the choice, it was just something I was also okay with. We also had co-ed grad programs and plenty of male faculty, especially in my major, and since I took many graduate level classes I was around men every day. Just less of them than average, and in an environment where it was understood that they were not the norm and could not control everything by default. It’s not like men were banned and I didn’t see a man for four years, I met my husband during that time.

    Other than a good education, one thing I got from that experience that I didn’t understand or appreciate at first was a sense of the sexism of the “normal” world and how unacceptable it is. I spent four years in a world where gender was an afterthought. At my first job and then in grad school, I faced blatant sexism. I didn’t fold like a fragile flower. I knew that I deserved better and was worth more than that treatment. I knew that better systems weren’t just possible but already existed. I knew the value of my voice. It made me fight when other women were resigned because “this is just how it is in the real world.”

    Any woman who wants to discount what that gave me without even giving a woman a chance to talk about her experience is just internalizing sexism.

    Also there’s plenty to say about gender in these spaces but this letter doesn’t take into account anything outside binary gender. I’ll let trans and NB students handle that conversation. I’ll just add my support to trans and NB students everywhere <3

    (Hollins U. '02)

    1. Sheesh*

      Just wanted to say this is an excellent comment!

      And I had very similar experiences in my women’s college, including many male professors and staff, and grad-level courses with male students, so the fact that LW assumes we spend 4 years in some kind of isolation tank with only women is just… weird. Sexism (and sexual harassment) in my first couple jobs out of college also did not break me, very much because of my understanding that it doesn’t have to be that way.

      I wonder if LW thinks that men who go into very male-dominated fields and have all male colleagues and bosses for years are coddled and can’t handle the world?

    2. Elbe*

      It made me fight when other women were resigned because “this is just how it is in the real world.”

      I completely agree. Once you’ve been in an environment where you’ve been respected and listened to and treated as equal, anything else seems very weird and very wrong.

  267. xl*

    > People pick where they go to college

    Maybe some people.

    (Spoken in frustration as someone in my late 40s who decided to finally get my Bachelor’s degree and has been trying for a few years to no avail with the state schools within commuting distance of where I live and work)

    1. Warrior Princess Xena*

      +1

      My options were in-state and affordable or out-of-state at 4x the cost, at least. Luckily my local state university both accepted me and had the degree program I wanted. But realistically unless I got a big scholarship I would have had a choice between 3-4 colleges, even before any question of being able to get in.

      1. xl*

        My options are whoever takes me, which unfortunately hasn’t been anyone since I started trying a few years back. I’m not in a position to be selective and with my circumstances I have to go where I’m accepted (if anywhere at all), hence why I got a bit perturbed with OP’s statement that “people pick where they go to college.”

  268. Calamity Janine*

    okay, i came in with a big sweeping statement, as have others. so i’m going to try to also give some practical suggestions here in terms of things you can do or goals to work towards, LW, and a little less just “stop being bad”.

    here’s some ideas for concrete things to do:

    1. get a therapist. this is a journey where i think professional help will be enormously useful. i would highly recommend someone who takes an approach of CBT or DBT – those are, at heart, about retraining one’s thoughts to not be harmful. and that’s where you’re at right now. ultimately you want a therapist that will challenge you. one that you feel safe enough talking this over with, but one who will not just nod and agree. otherwise it’s like going to a surgeon who owns no scalpels and does no surgery. and yes, it’s not going to be pleasant work, much like how physical therapy requires strengthening muscles that are neglected and doing rather boring work at the gym. but you’re strengthening muscles that need that in order to avoid much more pain later, to yourself, and to others.

    2. remember that if you’re dealing with internalized misogyny, ultimately, you’re dealing with *self-hatred*. sit and do a check-in, preferably with the therapist: how are you feeling about YOU right now? are you in something like thought loops of tearing down all other women in order to make yourself feel better? who has been telling you these things – feminine things, womanly things – are bad? do you think they are a reputable source? what do you think the motivation behind those actions are? what agenda do they have that you are furthering by picking up those talking points and repeating them – who benefits from that?

    3. honestly, as long as you’re there, maybe look at some quick self-assessments for something like depression/anxiety. if you’re being driven by anxiety of not being ‘enough’ so that you need to tear other women down, or that there’s only one way to be a woman in this business (and that is to embrace misogyny and punish femininity), or if you’re dealing with depression that’s coming out as “i hate everyone and everything and these totally irrational little things have suddenly become things i LOATHE and i am hurting others around me with this”, that’s something that not just therapy can help with. i have been there, done that, realized that all this is much harder if your brainmeats have decided to not make or recognize the right types of slimes it needs to work right.

    4. as long as you’re also checking in with a doctor and not just a therapist, make the check more general. are you dealing with anything that causes you chronic pain or discomfort? sometimes it’s death-by-a-thousand-cuts. it’s not a magic cure when the lion gets the thorn out of its paw, but it certainly helps the lion to not roar about the place biting people out of sheer hurt.

    5. it’s time for you to sit down and read some theory. a good intersectional feminism 101 course will do you good. intersectional there is very emphatically necessary. “Feminism is for Everybody” by bell hooks is a great place to start. if you want something in more bite-sized videos, i feel like MTV Decoded does a pretty good job of tackling specific questions and issues in ways that are easily accessible to be understood.

    6. this will require a lot of listening to women. even women who are feminine, or not white, or not successful in business, etc etc – this is intentional. get into the practice of this. yes, it is something you can do on purpose, and something you *should* do on purpose. if you are feeling uncomfortable with that, sit down, turn your gaze inward, and pluck out that little voice of dismissive contempt, then pin that sucker to the wall with extreme prejudice. you are here to develop a skill, and that skill is sitting down and listening, especially sitting down and listening to women unlike yourself. DON’T GIVE IN TO KNEEJERK INDIGNATION. it is very easy to immediately want to rebut something or rush in with explanations of how you’re right actually. after all, it feels like an attack. and in some senses, it is – it is attacking the you who is driven by internalized misogyny. but she kinda needs to be attacked, yeah? she’s the one hurting others and keeping you in misery. so, push past that moment. don’t immediately huff and puff and dismiss things when it turns out a hit dog hollers. sit with it, think about it, wait awhile so you get a breath from that rush of emotion. then keep going.

    7. you will quickly get to a point where you will catch yourself thinking ugly things, then catching yourself and feeling really bad for this. remember: it is not our first thoughts that define us, it is our second thoughts and our actions that do because those are done with intentionality. those reflect our true morals and behavior. focus on changing those things, and know that you can. if your therapist leans into something like mindfulness, and you find it useful, feel free to bring this up to them. otherwise, know that this is the pain of muscles in the middle of a physical therapy session. it hurts but it will get better and easier with time, i promise; you are strengthening things that have been left neglected for so long, and you are doing that in order to be healthier!

    8. remember that it’s not our mistakes that define us as much as it is reactions to our mistakes. you have been given a pretty alarming warning from your workplace, more or less told “your misogyny is showing and hurting others to the point where it has become our concern”. now it is time to show them what you already know yourself to be – somebody who is not going to shirk the work of cleaning up her messes, and someone who is genuinely interested in doing a better job. that is, after all, why you wrote in. it is bitter work. but you can do it, and you should, and you will!

    9. think about your life and the things you have given up when you accepted this internalized misogyny. what are the things that you look at and some part of your heart goes “oh, i want that, i love that,” but you’ve been shouting that down with “no, no, i can’t, it’s too girly, it’d be stupid if i even tried, i’ll look like an idiot and everyone at my workplace will agree and nobody will take me seriously and then…” (the catastrophization indicated by the ellipses there may go on for quite awhile depending on how much anxiety slime your brain is simmering in.) what happens if you stop thinking of those things as forbidden or worthless or things you can’t do? what if you do it anyway? go buy that makeup you’ve always wanted to try but never felt you could. go get that dress you talk yourself out of buying continuously. hit up the craft store and open up youtube videos and sew yourself a little plushie just because you’ve always wanted to learn. make an at-home oatmeal face mask and have a spa night. maybe you still don’t like it in the end – and you know what, that’s okay too! but give yourself a chance to figure out if you really like these things or really don’t, outside of misogynist society telling you that these things are stupid and you can’t do it. if you do your makeup silly sitting at home, or you wear a dress that’s very loud and covered in sequins out to dinner, or you buy a tiara and thirteen cutesy plushies that you then assemble into a throne – what’s the worst that’s going to happen? no, really. what is the actual reasonable worst thing? because it’s way lighter than whatever society and anxiety are conspiring to tell you. you’re not going to wear eyeshadow so wrong that you start global thermonuclear war. you’re not going to hug a silly cutesy plushie so hard that the sun disappears and we slowly freeze to death. you’re not going to do girly feminine shit so wrong that all the deities of all world religions instantly agree to end the universe because of your account. at worst you look like a bit of a twit. whatever! big fuckin’ whoop! do the things anyway!

    look at the joys misogyny has tried to deprive you of, and GET ‘EM BACK WITH FANG AND CLAW.

    10. apologise to people you’ve hurt, if you think they will be receptive. sometimes it may not be appropriate to go bother them with an apology, but do it in your heart, even if you’re just uttering the apology to the universe at large. and you know what? i want you to get up from the computer as you read this, and go find a mirror, because you owe yourself an apology too. look at yourself and do that. “self, i’m sorry that we’ve agreed for so long with misogyny. i’m sorry that i agreed to hate all these things about myself, and look at others with such contempt so that all i can see is the imaginary bad instead of the good things that truly exist. i’m sorry i deprived you of things we truly love and enjoy because i was scared of not agreeing with that misogyny. i’m sorry i hurt you, myself. and now i promise i am going to do better, because this is where that ends. i am not going to hurt myself any longer.” if you need to have a good cry about it, do! this is one of the things that bigotry does that is so horrible. it teaches us to hate ourselves and spread that hate around, to make sure we are constantly suffering, and then tells us that hurt is normal and good and we should appreciate it. you don’t have to appreciate people who hurt you. you don’t have to appreciate when you hurt yourself, either. it isn’t something you’re doomed to be – this is a state of being you were tricked into and it’s something that you can get out of!

    11. this is something that has to require some emotional honesty. please do not feel discouraged if you feel momentarily worse inside your own head before you get better. that internalized misogyny is something you adopted for a reason – likely as a survival tactic. “if i’m one of the good ones, i won’t be such a target.” you tell yourself that everyone else is too soft – why? because if they’re not too soft, it means… well, it means that you didn’t actually deserve to go through that shit, that you really were hurt, it really did harm you, and you really are still dealing with an open wound. admitting that you are not okay is one doozy of a step. but you have to admit you’re not okay in order to actually fix the problem. think of it like opening a massive boil – it hurts when the doctor has to cut it open and drain it, but you can’t let it sit around infecting the entire rest of your body because you’ll be worse off. i think it’s very likely that you’re going to work towards this goal, and then realize, weeks later, that this is something you adopted as a maladaptive coping strategy for some actual factual real trauma that has been fermenting away in there. if this happens, again, please don’t be discouraged! it doesn’t mean i’m out to ruin you and that feminism is a crock. it means that this is just one symptom of a larger disease, and i don’t want that disease to kill you! so you have to fight the whole disease, not just the little symptoms here and there, for that to be effective. so grit your teeth, steel your resolve, and unpack that baggage.

    12. repeat after me: this is worth it. i am worth it. it is hard work but i am going to be better, happier, and healthier after i do it.

    never lose sight of that. you are doing this for many reasons, but one of them is that you, personally, are worth this work. you are worth having a mind unburdened with this level of contempt. you are worth actual liberation and equality, not just more bs in a slightly different package. it may seem all a little overwhelming – so many issues to think of, so many groups of people, so on. but ultimately you are doing it for the woman in the mirror.

    and part of listening to other women also will include listening to them talk about their own process recovering from “not like the other girls” syndrome, and how much happier and healthier they are after doing this work!

    just like you will be!!

    ……………………….okay this turned out a lot more mushy nonsense than concrete tasks but y’know, it’s tasks within the mushy nonsense, so maybe it’ll be the start of a helpful roadmap?

    1. Calamity Janine*

      an important coda –

      i’m writing this from my very cishet, heteronormative, binary perspective.

      when you are doing self-reflection, really get in there and be honest with yourself. because sometimes the solution to “why do i hate being around femininity so much? why does it feel bad to be around, and why don’t i want to do it?” can end up with an answer of “it turns out the legit trauma i’m carrying around is because, uh, well, society told me i had to do womanhood but i’m not a woman.”

      this is NOT to say that all bigotry is someone who is secretly queer – that trope is both silly and contemptable. just trying to expand the advice as going beyond cis-woman to cis-woman. because, well, i’ve got friends who note in their coming out stories that they realized at some point in working on internalized misogyny that what they were doing wasn’t cool, and they quit it, but that they didn’t like femininity on account of not being a woman yet feeling pressured to do all this nonsense harmful to them. either way by keeping up a weird charade, you’re hurting yourself and those around you, so quit it.

      but it’s 2022. if doing womanhood is awful to you, then… idk maybe do some self-reflection about that!

      in my case it was pretty useful because i was able to have a definite answer – i *liked* doing my gender, i *enjoy* femininity, i just had bought into toxic bs that told me i didn’t deserve it and wasn’t worthy of it. it wasn’t that other women were doing gender at me in order to spite me. they were just doing their own stuff, and i entirely had it within my power to do the same! i may be lumpy, large, fat, too hairy, too moon-faced, too nonsupermodellike, whatever – it turns out being a woman is still something my soul shouts at me to do and craves doing and brings me great joy. i just had to drag out the devils that society implanted as my skull who were busy making me miserable with all those whispers of insults and put-downs. once i metaphorically yoinked them suckers right out, and impaled them on the wall with a glittery gem-encrusted pink stake with five cutesy charms dangling off it all scented vaguely with strawberries, i felt like i was truly living and truly MYSELF.

      i want you to have that same journey, LW. maybe you’ll go down that path and come join me in Camp Being A Woman Kicks Ass Actually It’s Just Society Sucks With The Misogyny And All. maybe you’ll wander into bits of the woods i don’t know and end up in the Demigirl Denizen Dwellings or the Genderqueer Gorge or the Oops, All Transgender! Cabins. who knows! i only know this one little part of the map. the map’s way bigger than i know, and that’s great tbh. so walk the path with an open mind and be ready for some self-reflection.

      if your gender is not sparking joy, marie kondo that mf, y’all

      1. Dfq??*

        This is such a wonderful comment, I’m filing it away for future reference. Thank you for being so generous and compassionate with advice all of us can use!

  269. Panhandlerann*

    This fries me big time. I went to grad school at a women’s college, and I say unequivocally that this person could not be more wrong.

  270. Wowza*

    Also…Mens colleges would not be banned. Men’s colleges still exist. Wabash college in Indiana is one such example.

  271. Cacofonix*

    Wow, there is a lot of unkind piling on to this OP. Is it not possible to appreciate that though this person has more to learn ahead of her than she has likely anticipated on this topic, she has asked a serious question and deserves a respectful path towards insight? She *wants* to be fairer. I give her props. It’s an honest start. Best advice Alison gave was to do the work to gather actual data behind the bias.

    When I was in college, I was confused and biased about the whole area of “women’s studies.” If women wanted equality, wouldn’t there be an equivalent “mens” program? Oh believe me, I know now how way off that sounds. But we all learn different life lessons at different times and sometimes it takes a few more steps than we originally thought. I’d have been seriously crushed if some of these comments were directed to me like this.

    OP, I hope you are able to ferret out the great nuggets of knowledge in this thread and ignore the angry, judgemental rants attacking your character. Just asking your question makes me think your employee will be just fine.

    1. CharlieBrown*

      I think you should read the comments more closely. Yes, there is anger, and as angry commenters have stated, it comes from a very grounded place. The anger is justified.

      Also, if you read LW’s letter carefully, she comes across as someone who is seeking permission to be this way. She readily admits that it only became an issue because of a restructuring that resulted in a hire that she was obviously not okay with, because her boss had to call her out on it.

      As for “angry, judgemental rants attacking your character” well…bias is part of your character, isn’t is? You can’t just go around being racist, sexist, or homophobic and try to get away with it by saying “oh, that’s just my bias; it’s not actually part of my character.” Sorry to disappoint you with reality, but your biases are very much part of your character. People are right to have issues with LW’s character, because her bias is not at all grounded in reality. All of the points she makes are pretty easily refuted by a google search.

      It’s not enough just to ask the question. LW has to make some basic changes. I don’t agree that just asking the question means her employee “will be just fine.” This is wishful thinking at its highest. I’m sure a lot of people thought people of color “would be just fine” with “separate but equal” as well.

      1. Calamity Janine*

        yep, agreed entirely.

        asking the question when fishing for confirmation and support is only half credit, at best.

        yeah, it’s harsh, but it’s necessary harshness. lord knows it has taken harshness to snap me out of plenty of such moments. what kept me in the behavior? people coddling me by treating my bigotry as an entirely understandable and reasonable little quirk that they should simply work around as it was inherent to my character and i could not be expected to change! what worked to change it? being told outright that i was harming other people and that needed to stop immediately!

        in the moment, was i crushed? yes.

        but you know what crushed me far more when i realized it? the fact that nobody thought i was worth the effort to say “stop that, it’s hurting me” to! realizing i’d been treated as this immutable bigot who simply could not be expected to *listen* when people were hurt!

        being kept in a cocoon of my own privilege has only ever harmed me, and harmed those around me. recognizing our failures is how we learn. the LW needs to sit down and realize this is one of those failures… instead of fishing on the internet for validation about how all of her prejudices are true.

    2. GammaGirl1908*

      Also, there is a difference between an unkind pile-on and some undiluted truth. Sometimes the truth hurts, which I think is more what is happening in this comment section.

    3. Amorphous Eldritch Horror*

      We’ve already discussed the ‘pick me girl’ phenomenon, we don’t need an example.

    4. dmowl*

      Most “women’s studies” programs have been renamed to “women’s and gender studies” or just “gender studies” specifically to include the study of masculinity. In fact, I leaned heavily on our gender studies department when writing my senior thesis, because it talked about displays of conscientious objectors (who were obviously mostly male doing something that was considered very “unmanly”).

  272. 3am_instigator*

    A close friend of mine started her education at a super-liberal college full of activists and party kids in equal measure. She then transferred to a smaller, all-women Catholic school.

    She chose those schools for one reason and one reason only—her mom worked at the first school when she was a freshman, then got a new job at the second, and my friend got free tuition as long as she went where her mom worked. It would be extremely unfair to read anything about her personality from her choice of higher ed, except maybe that she’s not someone who’ll turn down a free education.

    Lots of people choose a college for practical reasons above the school’s reputation—it’s close to family or friends, there’s a particularly good program or professor for their major, it’s in a place they want to live, it’s less expensive, they offered scholarships, etc. All the very good points people have made about women’s colleges aside, it seems bizarre to read that much into what college someone attended at all.

  273. Puggie Mom*

    I went to a Queens College in Charlotte for undergrad. Then, I attended UNC-Chapel Hill for grad school. I have never encountered this biased attitude before. I find it quite shocking. Believe me, I am not “precious” nor “coddled.” I have had a successful career for close to forty years.

    Just wow, OP.

  274. S. Ninja*

    Adding to the chorus saying that judging people by the college they went to is not helpful. For instance, I graduated from a small semi-religious college that at the time was known for its great biology department and life sciences teachers. Two years after I graduated, they gutted the biology department and just about everything else, spent loads of money on getting a football team going, and became the sort of right-wing fully-evangelical place that gets into the news because of their awful behavior towards female and LGBTQIA+ students. Luckily my graduation was long enough ago that no one cares about the college I went to, but hoo boy could you draw some erroneous conclusions about me if you were familiar with that college as it is now.

  275. LilPinkSock*

    I wonder if the LW hates the Girl Scouts too. If a job applicant puts “Gold Award Recipient” or “troop leader” on her resume, is that met with as much contempt? Those are female-identifying-only spaces too. Yup, those little girls with their cookies and camping are definitely coddled and incapable of working well with boys!

    1. Calamity Janine*

      given the general sneering, i have a feeling that if i went near this person wearing colorful eyeshadow, or a dress with any frills on it, or even – brace yourself for the horror – had a bow in my hair, she would make a face like i just farted directly into her mouth while trying to make me spontaneously combust by glaring alone.

      which is why it’s a good thing i’m not the new recent hire, because my reaction would be to spitefully up the ante. i am, after all, a woman who owns multiple tiaras, multiple poofy petticoats, and has a willingness to absolutely roll around in glitter the way a chinchilla takes dust baths

  276. RachelB89*

    Mount Holyoke ’89 here (hi, all you great commenters!!)
    Soon, I expect we’ll read a letter saying “I am really frustrated by my manager who has it in for me. I heard a rumor that it’s because of where I went to college??? and she seems to have a serious problem with women in general. Despite the fact that I am exceeding all benchmarks and expectations in my work, she says I am “too precious” and that she will not “coddle” me when I ask questions. I could complain, but I think I will just forge ahead — my plan is to become her boss in a few years so I can fire her.”

    1. MurpMaureep*

      Just waving hello to a fellow Mount Holyoke Grad…we almost overlapped (I’m ’93). Also great response, but I’d expect nothing less!

  277. Mimmy*

    **Wrote this as part of a reply to a very long thread above and wanted to make it its own comment**

    I get a sense that OP realizes her bias is irrational but can’t change her mindset. I encourage her to really think about this. Perhaps ask questions of those of us who attended all-women’s colleges. That’s what I would suggest to anyone wanting to learn more about people they may have a bias against. If you are open-minded enough, it could help to eliminate some of your misconceptions.

  278. Five College*

    My co-ed college had two women’s colleges nearby, and students could take classes at the other schools if they wanted and use the libraries. I had a lot of presumptions about the all-women’s schools until I took a class there, and realized it was just a normal college. They were a bit cliquish but certainly not “precious” or “coddled”. And they were fine with the two guys from my school in our class. That class wasn’t offered at my school. I can’t imagine holding stereotypes against those girls decades later! I certainly hope they wouldn’t be biased against me for the stereotypes about my school!

    1. Natebrarian*

      Glad to hear you enjoyed your classes at the other campuses, but I’m kind of shocked that we didn’t drill into your head that we’re women, not girls. :)

  279. Flare*

    OP, one of my strategies, as a white person who lives in a very white place and is keenly aware that there was a time structural racism led her oh so far astray about what’s important about people who don’t look like me, has been to deliberately diversify my social media and general media intake, so that I see Black and brown people talking about things they care about. I imagine it would be more difficult to identify “graduates of women’s colleges” to follow on insta without spending a lot of time combing people’s information in ways that would be creepy, but I do feel like you could choose to read materials by and about women at these schools and come to see that they are not, in fact, one kind of person, but rather they are, like everyone else, a multitude of different humans with different needs, interests, skills, and backstories. If you wanted.

  280. MurpMaureep*

    There’s nothing I could say that hasn’t been said before, but I’m a very proud graduate of a women’s college and I cannot overstate the impact it’s had on my life. I graduated almost 30 years ago, and I am thankful every day I chose the school I did.

    I received not only an excellent education, but also the ability to receive that education (mostly) free of bias. I also learned at a young age to see other women as true and dear friends, not “competition”. My consciousness was raised in so many ways – from confronting my own internalized misogyny to early friendships with members of the LGBTQIA+ community, to realizing my worth outside of how broader society saw me as a young woman.

    OP, your biases and assumptions are, at best, deeply uninformed, and at worst something much uglier. I hope you do some soul searching and consider why you’d choose to have such thoughts and opinions about your fellow women…especially when every single graduate of a women’s college I’ve ever known goes out of her way to support and uplift other women!

  281. Holy cow*

    This women’s college grad had professors and advisors who were men, co-workers and bosses at my jobs during college who were men, neighbors who were men, family members who were men, friends who were men, I took the bus and train and just generally interacted with men while out in the world… and actually because my college participated in a consortium of other nearby colleges where students could enroll in a lot of elective classes at either, I had male students in a small handful of my classes.
    But I have NO IDEA how to work with men now, because for those 16-or-so hours each semester for 4 years during undergrad, I was almost exclusively sitting next to other women as my fellow students. Riiiiiiiight!
    This was a wild read, this letter. Wow.

  282. Corwin*

    I know that basically all of letter- writers points are wrong, but #2 especially struck me. Going to a women’s college doesn’t mean someone is avoiding men! They’re still going to be interacting with men all the time, because even when they’re going to college, they still exist in society. The university my dad went to was technically men- only, and my mom went to it’s sister school, which was all women. They met because the schools interacted with each other all the time! When you go to college, you’re not going to the MOON. You still have to interact with people outside of class!!!

    1. whatchamacallit*

      I did not go to an all-women’s college but my participation in women’s-only spaces in college (the remnants of its former women’s college that were folded into the larger university years ago) if anything made me much more prepared for dealing with men.

  283. trebond98*

    Well, I was going to write something but I see that my fellow women’s college graduates have already said a lot. Going to Smith was one of the best decisions I ever made. Sometimes I really miss the atmosphere and community I had at Smith. I went to an Indigo Girls concert a few years ago and just felt waves of nostalgia. There were, of course, men there but women’s voices were prominent when we sang along with all the songs. I just remember how much I loved being in an primarily women’s environment. It just feels different.

  284. E. Monday*

    Hear, hear! Wonderful answer, Alison. I didn’t go to a women’s college myself, but as a former women’s studies student I found myself cheering with each eloquent rebuttal.

  285. Robyn*

    I haven’t done any research, but I cannot believe that women’s colleges have any more of an endowment than, say, Harvard or Yale. They both have millions in funds to give to their students.

    In fact, it is an ‘open secret’ that if you can get into an Ivy? The Ivy will find whatever money you need to get you to go there.

  286. Robyn*

    I haven’t done any research, but I cannot believe that women’s colleges have any more of an endowment than, say, Harvard or Yale. They both have millions in funds to give to their students.

    In fact, it is an ‘open secret’ that if you can get into an Ivy? The Ivy will find whatever money you need to get you to go there.

  287. Coatracketeer*

    This letter is baffling to me because (admittedly I haven’t done any hiring) I couldn’t tell you where a single one of my coworkers went to college from my last few jobs. I’m sure we talked about it even but that knowledge left my brain immediately, because who cares?

    Like I’m personally skeptical about some specific school or types of school but aside from the very big names I couldn’t name every *specific whatever school* in the country. Is the letter writer doing like deep googling on the colleges of every job candidate? They don’t mention that this new hire is a recent grad so her school is the only thing to judge her by. This feels less like “I learned a piece of info that changed how I feel about this person” and more like “I went digging for excuses to dislike this person.”

    1. rebelwithmouseyhair*

      I dunno. She has at least written in to ask about how to overcome it. If every biased person were to have this much awareness of their bias, and were to attempt to erase or at least tamp down the bias, bias would not be the problem it is today.
      Presumably she has seen the person’s CV and either she knows the school is women only, or maybe the new hire even wrote “X women’s only college” on their CV, or OP googled the name of the school and found that it was women’s only, or the candidate mentioned it in the interview. Given that women thrive at such colleges, I’m pretty sure they’d think it’s a good selling point! I doubt OP
      had to dig very far, no spade was required for that.

    1. rebelwithmouseyhair*

      Could we be charitable to OP here? She admits that she has a bias, and she is asking how to overcome it. She has laid out what she thinks are good arguments so we know exactly which points to stress in order to help her reframe the info. If all biased people were that aware and that willing to try to change, bias wouldn’t be such a problem. We need to meet people where they’re at, and make constructive criticism, rather than make disparaging remarks.

      1. anonagoose*

        But she didn’t ask how to overcome the bias because it’s bad, she asked how to overcome it because she got in trouble at work. You realize there’s a meaningful difference, right? She still thinks she’s, you know, right.

        >How do I override a bias and learn to disregard a choice I genuinely think shows poor judgment?

        She recognizes her bias but “genuinely” thinks it reflects a real problem in the people she is biased against; the problem she sees is one of behavior not of mindset.

        >I also want to be very clear: I am aware this is a bias and I want to overcome it to manage my employee fairly.

        She is asking for advice on managing her employee, not on dealing with her misogyny. Calling out the sexism in her mindset isn’t disparaging, it’s a fair criticism, especially since she can’t manage fairly if she doesn’t get at the root of the “I’m not like other girls” stuff here.

  289. Person*

    Just wanted to point out that there are several men-only colleges in the United States. You can find the list after several seconds on google.

  290. Do Better*

    LW, the pickme energy is STRONG and the misogyny is coming from inside the house. Do better.

    I’m also realizing how much I could have benefitted from a women’s college. My University had “schools” and “colleges” within it and there was a women’s college that I now regret not attending. A lot of my courses were small and discussion based, and reading comments from those that did attend women’s colleges, I realize how much more myself and other women in my classes would have gotten to participate.

  291. whatchamacallit*

    This is just incredibly ignorant of the history of women’s colleges. Were they supposed to announce “sexism over!” and then immediately all go co-ed?
    I went to a co-ed institution that used to have a historic women’s college, that was then folded into the university at large. It, however, remained a place that was funded with women-focused programming, clubs and mentorships. (Men were not barred from attending these things, obviously, but it was certainly not marketed to them and I rarely if ever saw a man in the designated space.) I found it to be super helpful and accepting and greatly value the opportunities it gave me. I still attend alumni events and speak highly of the experience and professors involved. I realize these are not equivalent but just the positive experience I had having a women-only (technically, a place that catered to anyone not cis man) space for my education and professional development means I would never hold it against anyone who wanted that on a wider scale. I also disagree that it somehow insulates you from a world where you have to work with men. If anything my relationships in women’s college programming made it much easier to navigate and validated my experiences with sexism and made me better at challenging it in professional settings.

    1. MurpMaureep*

      Your last sentence resonates so deeply with me!

      I did attend a women’s college and among all the wonderful benefits (none of which amounted to being “coddled”), one of the most striking is that I can easily recognize when I’m being treated differently or devalued because of my gender. Being in a place for 4 (very formative) years where I was evaluated with most of the same criteria as my fellow students means I know when that’s not happening. AND it makes me very confident in calling it out and fighting against it.

      The following is only my own experience and I do not mean to speak for others, but I’ve found that even very accomplished, brilliant, confident women who went to co-ed schools are less willing to cry sexism or even recognize it for what it is. I’ve had many conversations over the years along the lines of “isn’t it weird that you and Bob said the exact same thing in the meeting but Fred credited Bob with the idea?”.

  292. Don't Call Me Shirley*

    As someone who has frequently been the only woman in the room in my career, I love to imagine being in an all women technical environment. I taught computer science courses a couple times in grad school, and heard stories from female students who were tired of being rejected for group work partners and being viewed as representative of all women if they made a mistake. Women’s colleges aren’t a thing here, but I see the appeal.

  293. That One Person*

    I really hope OP reads a lot of these comments and considers maybe the impact their personal background has affected them – and maybe created this view. The one that I read that really resonated with some of OP’s reasonings was the notion of not fighting the same battles as OP, therefore OP is maybe viewing them as “weaker” or “privileged” in a way OP never had the chance to experience. Disliking someone who went to one of these particular schools makes about as much sense as disliking a candidate who went to your rival school to me with the main difference here being a sexist taste to it all. If they’d simply gone to your rival school it would’ve just been a case of having an unnecessary grudge against something that doesn’t even affect or impact your life anymore (didn’t really mean anything back then either, but it’s easy to get caught up in the school spirit stuff).

    Why is it important that each and every woman experience the same struggle? Why can’t some have an easier time just because not all do? Can’t that be a sign that good things are changing and maybe someday more will have an easier time than those in the past? I’d suggest really thinking back and considering some past, personal experiences because this really strikes me as a case of being jealous without realizing it over the struggles and difficulties they may (or may not!) have gotten to skip.

    1. Saffy_Taffy*

      One sees this sort of thing fairly frequently. “If there were an International Men’s Day, people would pitch a fit!” But there ~is~ such a day. “If women ever had to pay alimony, they’d outlaw it!” But women ~do~ pay alimony. “A white history month could ~never~ be celebrated!” But we have Irish, Scottish, French, German, Italian, and Greek heritage months.
      It certainly does highlight, to the audience, how much of these attitudes are based in emotion rather than fact.

  295. Supported by Caramel Macchiatos*

    Wow this was interesting! I didn’t go to a women’s college, but one of my top contenders was one! My reasoning was that the campus was beautiful, it was in an area I was interested in, and the thought of being in dorms and on campus with just women sounded really comfortable to me. I’m also someone who places a high value on my friendships and relationships with other women, so going to a women’s college sounded appealing in that aspect as well. I ended up going to a different school because I could use my in-state specific scholarship towards tuition at the other one, and, after visiting both, the one I chose was in a more walkable city that I really enjoyed exploring. None of the reasons listed in this person’s letter came up whatsoever.

  296. HearTwoFour*

    What an odd thing. You’ve spent so much time analyzing and crafting this discrimination (you have a justifcation list!) but so little time researching to see if these justifications actually hold water. It’s possible that when considering you for this position, the hiring committee needed to make some exceptions from their own biases. How upset would you be to learn that you almost didn’t get hired because of the type of car you drove to the interview, or the color of your purse?
    The best thing you can do here is to not get in this employee’s way.

  297. Grad*

    Hi LW,

    I would examine what you consider coddling: there is protesting unfair treatment, and then there is expecting someone to actually do your job for you. The former is something I hope you do not lump into “coddling”.

    I also hope you have the wisdom to coach employees through difficult times in their lives when they are getting in their own way, and the wisdom to recognize when your organizational practices/culture are getting in the way of employees doing a good job. Match that with the patience required to understand that and the firmness to set boundaries with the employee/your employer and insist on change. This level of empathy and problem solving is crucial for being a good manager.

    all the best

  298. Dawn*

    Boyyyyyyyyyy I have got to tell you that this sounds like it was taken straight out of a pamphlet published by MRAs and the “facts don’t care about your feelings” crowd.

    I don’t know you, I don’t know your life, but it sounds like maybe this is so hard to shake off because it’s being reinforced by people around you, or the media that you’re consuming?

    And if that’s the case I think that if I were actually sincere about wanting to change this opinion I would start looking for other sources and other groups to spend time with.

  299. Here for the Insurance*

    Beyond all the very good points everyone has made about women’s colleges, please also consider the bigger picture of what you’re saying, OP.

    You’re saying that you’re willing to judge an individual based on generalities. (The fact that it’s a generality that isn’t inborn is irrelevant.)

    You’re saying that EVERYONE who is a member of a certain group (here, that group happens to be attending a women’s college) is a certain way or should be seen a certain way. You view them as a monolith and presume the worst of every member of the group. There is no accounting for the individual’s personality, abilities, character.

    You say you want to overcome this. I hope that’s true.

    The first thing I’d recommend is put all your opinions on the institution of women’s colleges to the side. Those opinions are problematic but they’re not the biggest problem. A person can dislike an institution and still respect the individual people who comprise it. Your feelings go beyond the institution; you don’t respect women. Work on your feelings about the institution later.

    Second, repeat this to yourself as many times as you need to believe it: “Stereotyping members of a group is wrong. People are individuals and their autonomy should be respected. I will respect people making decisions that I wouldn’t make for myself. I can think something is poor judgment without turning against the person doing it. My way is not the only way. I will not claim to be fighting misogyny while being misogynist. The best way to fight sexism and misogyny is to see women as fully human beings who are capable of making decisions for themselves.”

    Third, look at why you have internalized misogyny (you have). Read, study, engage in introspection. Listen to other women.

    Last, and I hate to tell you this, but being sexist won’t protect you against sexism. You say you want to be taken seriously as a woman. Being against other women and/or centering men won’t make the men respect you more or view other women as equals. All it will do is perpetuate the sexism.

  300. CLC*

    Such an incredibly bizarre letter. This bias is going to prevent the OP from hiring awesome candidates from some of the best academic institutions in the US. They also don’t appear to understand the concepts of feminism and equity at all. Even if everything the OP thinks about women who went to women’s colleges were true/rational (it’s so not) they made the decision to go there when they were 17. Are you really going to base your personnel decisions on what adults did when they were in high school? All around just so strange.

  301. LittleMarshmallow*

    I’m very late to this one, but my mother went to a women’s college in the 60’s which arguably was when they were more there because regular colleges were less open to women, but the biases about women that go to women’s colleges I feel still apply.

    She majored in math, minored in chemistry, and worked in data analysis. She had no issue working with men (collaborated by my dad – they met at work). She raised two independent women that both went to college for Stem degrees and are self-sufficient adults in stem fields (which are appallingly still male-dominated – ask me how I know…).

    This bias seems so out of touch with reality. I really hope LW does some real research and some real soul searching about this.

  302. Heffalump*

    Wow. I’m male, and college is long in the rear view mirror for me. I were a high school girl, I think that left to my own devices, I’d be thinking coed colleges. But the comments here would have me giving serious thought to going to a women’s college.

  303. A is for Anon*

    Rosemont College grad (class of 2000)….my parents and siblings also had single-sex educational settings in their lives. My father is a Hamilton College grad (class of ‘73) when it was all-men. I believe that many opportunities were opened because of the connections from being in this environment!

  304. Dr Sarah*

    A mildly ironic point here is that as a teenager I specifically did not want to go to an all-women’s college… because at the time I was totally focused on BOYFRIEND MUST GET BOYFRIEND MUST MAXIMISE CHANCES OF GETTING BOYFRIEND. Because I’d fallen for all the societal messages that getting male approval in the form of someone who would date me was a vitally important part of feeling validated and worthwhile.

    So, if I saw that someone had been to an all-women’s college, my reaction if I bothered to have one at all would probably be ‘Cool; clearly someone who had more sense than me as a teenager and actually had the independence of mind *not* to go along with the ‘must seek male approval and validation’ mindset’.

  305. Caitlin*

    The comments have addressed everything I am thinking/feeling in response to this letter, so well done, AAM readers! I just wanted to add: proud Randolph-Macon Woman’s College graduate here!

  306. Reba*

    Wow. This comment got my blood boiling. I haven’t read all of the other comments, but I’m sure people have pointed out that there ARE, in fact, Men’s only colleges. The idea that the poster doesn’t think there are (when it’s an easily google-able thing) is absurd. Secondly, not ALL women’s colleges have huge endowments — one only needs to look at the near closing of Sweet Briar College in Virginia to see that that’s not true. I don’t know about the Seven Sisters, but certainly Southern Women’s Colleges are constantly on the verge of closure because of the lack of funds. Lastly…WHAT IN THE ACTUAL FUCK?!?!? First of all, you’re judging people for a decision that they made when they were, what…17? 18? In my case 15!!! (Yes, I started college…a women’s college…when I was 16 years old, which means I visited and applied when I was 15). I’m not even going to go into all of the VERY ACCURATE things that others have said about studies, etc. But do you honestly think that women who go to a women’s college don’t know how to interact with men? I am truly baffled by this idea. I have SO many thoughts, but I’m bordering on rambling, so I’ll just say…wow.

    1. Crop Tiger*

      Exactly. I applied at 16 and never got to to visit because we were out of the country and I didn’t know where my parents would end up when they came back after me. My criteria were 1: good school 2: let me live on campus and 3: they gave me lots of money to go there. But I had lots of fellow students who were told they were going there or no place at all, and they better major in a certain subject. They didn’t last.

  307. Just stoppin' by to chat*

    Oh dear! I work in the Tech industry in the US and know many female-identifying people that attended women’s college. Also, Hillary Clinton attended Wellesley…a women’s college! Wonder if the OP voted for Clinton when they ran for prez… Also something to think about. But overall, I would be very concerned working for the OP, and hope that they are open to the feedback in this post.

  308. Kabs*

    You all are making me really, really hope my 10 year old daughter chooses to go to the local all-girls high school and/or an all female college. And slightly regret choosing a co-ed college myself over Wellesley (though that was a geography thing and probably a good choice). As a public policy major I found my undergraduate classes were usually 50/50 in terms of gender balance, but I was also usually the only woman who actually raised her hand and spoke up in class. It drove me nuts. And even worse was when my male classmates assumed I couldn’t possibly be right because I was a woman. (Big props to the male TA who shot that down HARD and put them in their place).

  309. Elbe*

    I know I’m late to the party, but I want to add my thoughts.

    I never expected to end up at a women’s college. I chose Barnard because it had amazing programs for the subjects I was interested in, and it had higher-than-average financial aid awards, which I really needed. I don’t know where the LW got these assumptions about why someone would attend a women’s college and what type of graduate those colleges produce – they are way, way off base. Investigating the origin of this bias is a good step for the LW to take in changing her views.

    I went from college directly to working in a very male-dominated tech field. At times, I was the only woman on my team. Just yesterday, I was in a meeting with 14 men and 1 other woman. And I manage just fine. I have no issues being assertive and have been very successful in advocating for myself in environments where I have to try twice as hard just to get the same respect as a man would. The idea that, because I went to a women’s college, I need to be “coddled” is absolutely infuriating.

    If anything, having the Barnard experience gave me perspective that male-dominated spaces shouldn’t be the default. Going from a college dominated by male voices and male opinions to an work environment that was the same would have greatly skewed my view of what is “normal” in life. Seeing the other side of things has helped me identify, understand, and fight the unfairness and the sexism that I’ve encountered.

  310. 90s Blazer*

    Hood College here and same. I guess it never even occured to me that someone could have this bias. As usual, Alison’s reply is spot on.

  312. Tuba*

    I’m sorry for the late and low effort post, but I had to comment and exclaim that this was wild. What pick me energy.

  313. LR*

    LOL yeah we’re so exclusionary especially the ones including Smith who no longer offer student loans at all in order to be as accessible as possible to students not from money/legacies/etc. Coupled with the incredible alumni support network (countless stories of alums funding students when they’re in need), I think you need to find a new group to villify. Unless of course the aversion here is to the idea of women carving out a space for themselves in the first place…lots of folks find this very threatening ‍♀️

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