SALS Finds Women Significant
Male students observing a female conducting research
Women’s enrollment in the School of Agriculture and Life Science increased steadily from the 1940s through the 1960s as Bachelors, Masters, and Ag Institute students. During this period a large gender gap existed, further illustrating how the educational hierarchy favored white males and did not rapidly attract women into the program.[1] The gender gap shrunk rapidly over the next two decades as women faced less prejudice in pursuing degrees in science and technology.[2]
The acceptance of women in fields of science and agriculture encouraged the significant increase of women into formal agricultural education in the 1970s. Women were attracted mainly to Bachelors and Masters degrees in agricultural sciences, showing that women were interested in advanced degrees and were as capable of achieving a professional career in agriculture as their male counterparts.
Female and male horitculture students in greenhouse
SALS became aware of the sudden closing of the gender gap, and for the first time began officially recognizing the presence of female students in the Annual Reports. Originally the Annual Reports focused on the advancement of its male students and illustrated them as the most important aspect of the student body, and generalized the presence of women as students. During the 1970s white women’s achievements in scholarship, course work, and general presence in agricultural education was given its due recognition by the program. For example, the Annual Reports of 1975 devoted two pages to the discussion of why women were suddenly increasing in enrollment. SALS claimed an increase in female enrollment correlated with an increase in career choice options that were “traditionally occupied by men.” SALS also attributed the rise of females in agriculture to a growth in agricultural high school programs for women and increased father-daughter partnerships in agriculture.[3] Clearly the largest barrier to women’s formal education access was NC State itself.
African American and white women walk with their fellow scholarship winners through the Phillip Morris tobacco factory.
The rise and acceptance of women in formal agricultural education and the professional field in the last half of the twentieth century historically contrasts with the barriers women faced from the Institution in the first half of the twentieth century. Women always comprised a large part of the labor force on farms, and despite the educational barriers, successfully inserted themselves into the educational hierarchy.
While African American women were not widely acknowledged, pictures from the Annual Reports revealed that they were gaining scholarships just as their white counterparts, specifically the Philip Morris U.S.A. Scholarship.[4] African American women are not specifically noted in the Annual Reports but do appear in the Agromeck yearbook.
The follow library collection of Annual Reports include special features about female students.
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[1] “Forward Together, Annual Report (1950-1956),” North Carolina State University, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Annual Reports, UA 100.002.018, Special Collections Research Center, North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC.
[2] Alice Elizabeth Reagan, North Carolina State University: A Narrative History (Michigan: Edwards Brothers, Inc., 1987), 193.
[3] “1975 Annual Report School of Agriculture and Life Sciences, North Carolina State University,” 16, North Carolina State University, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Annual Reports 1945-2008, UA 100.002.006, Special Collections Research Center, North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC.
[4] Philip Morris Scholarship winners, University Archives Photograph Collection, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences Photographs, UA 023.006.1 folder 5, Special Collections Research Center, North Carolina State University Libraries, Raleigh, NC.