Women in Society
...r, acceptance of women in every field of academia came with a whisper of economic necessity and not the bang of demand. As academia produces a female majority of undergraduate and graduate degree earners, King (2000) Page 8, women of the “X" and "Dot Com" generations, upon completion of their degrees, not only demand equality in the workplace but today simply expect it. Jones, a 1992 LSU top ten senior, 97Cornell Law Graduate, stated recently in a conversation that she could only remember one class as an undergraduate where she felt the instructor graded her down because she was a woman. Jones went on to state that the expectation of most professors at LSU and Yale was, in fact, that women do better academically. It seems Pipher’s (1994) "Ophelia" generation has not only been revived, but many have now most likely earned their MBA and presently are heading up the short list for America’s 2010 corporate CEOs. Although now outdated, Solomon's attitude is understandable give the time in which it was written. King (2000) page 8, points out that the strong expectation that women would attend college or seriously join the professional did not emerge until in the late 1970s. Solomon (1985) acknowledges the then-growing wave of women in the educational pipeline, page 204-205, by pointing out the recent phenomena of an overall female majority in higher education. Afraid the trend would not continue, she quickly went on to point out that women were still in the minority at four-year liberal arts colleges. King (2000) cites Department of Labor Statistics that suggest most women in America have chosen to enter the workforce, or been forced into it by economic circumstances, and that because physical limitations dampen employment progress in some blue color occupations, postsecondary education was and is necessary. Recent studies even suggest the pendulum in education has moved past equity for women to secure them a place of advantage. More and more educators, King (2000), Sommers (1999) and Mortenson (1999), are slowly pushing us to the realization that boys, not girls, presently in the educational pipeline are in possible jeopardy of obtaining an education of poorer quality that was previously received. Just because women now dominate the ranks of college graduates today, Cohen (1998) and Soloman (1985) remind us, the plight of women has not always been as it is now. It has been a hard-fought battle. Present academia offer a world far from the reality experienced by women just a few decades ago. It is both amazing and shameful the distance women had come to be included as equals at the table. Soloman (1985) vividly paints a world where white males once made up a juggernaut of power in education that barred the door to equal opportunity. However, Soloman (1985) points out that since 1800 the tide of women in America that chose to involve themselves in the educational pipeline has increased every generation. The ques...