March is recognized annually as Women’s History Month, a time to recognize and celebrate the contributions women have made to our history. In honor of the month, we’re highlighting seven women who broke barriers and changed the landscape of education in different ways.
Dorothy Garrod was an archaeologist and prehistorian who became the first woman professor at Cambridge.
She was born in 1892, and at the time that she went to study at Newnham College, Cambridge, in 1913, women were still denied full membership in the university and were not awarded degrees. She attended both Cambridge and Oxford. In 1939, she was appointed the Disney Professor of Archaeology at the University of Cambridge, a position she held until her retirement in 1952.
In her position, she spearheaded the reorganization of the archaeology program, which led to Cambridge becoming the first British university to offer prehistoric archaeology as part of its undergraduate curriculum. She also saw to the full admission and membership of female students at Cambridge.1
Elena Lucrezia Cornaro Piscopia was an Italian woman, born in Venice in 1646, who became the first woman to earn a Ph.D.
She initially applied to study for a doctorate in theology at the University of Padua but was denied. It was only after mediation from her tutor and professor that she was able to graduate with a degree in philosophy in 1678.2
Margaret Bancroft was born in 1854 and was a pioneer in special needs education.
She initially worked as a teacher in the Philadelphia public school system before she left at age 25 to open a school for children with developmental disabilities. She opened her school, originally named Haddonfield School of the Mentally Deficient and Peculiarly Backward, in 1883. It was renamed in 1904 to the Bancroft Training School.
She believed in the importance of not only the mental and academic well-being of students but the spiritual and physical well-being as well. She focused on proper nutrition, personal hygiene, daily prayers, exercise, and sensory and artistic development.
Today, the Bancroft School Network includes four schools.
Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander, born in 1889, became the first African American woman to earn a Ph.D. in economics in the U.S. when she graduated from the University of Pennsylvania. She went on to become the first woman to earn a law degree from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.
Breaking education barriers also ran in her family, her uncle was the first African American to earn a Ph.D. from the University of Pennsylvania, and her father was the first African American to graduate from the University of Pennsylvania Law School.3
After earning her law degree, she became the first Black woman to practice law in the state of Pennsylvania.
Jane Matilda Bolin, born in 1908, was the first Black woman to graduate from Yale Law School and the first Black female judge in the U.S.
Bolin’s father was an attorney who headed the Dutchess County Bar Association, which led to her aspirations for a career in law from a young age.4
She served as a judge for forty years and also served on the boards of several organizations, and later in life after she retired from the bench, she worked as a consultant and school-based volunteer.
Alice Freeman Palmer, born in 1855, was the first woman to head a nationally known college.
She was raised on a farm in New York but aspired to get an education. Her parents agreed to let her after she said she would help pay for the education of her younger siblings as well. She started attending the University of Michigan in 1872. It was in 1881, at the age of 26, that she became the president of Wellesley College.
She also co-founded the American Association of University Women and served as its president for two terms.
In 1892, she also became the first dean of the women’s department at the University of Chicago, where she was able to double the number of women enrolled during her tenure.5
After her death, her husband donated $35,000 to the University of Michigan to establish the Alice Freeman Palmer Professorship. It was intended to be given to a woman so they would enjoy the same pay as any male member of the faculty. Her husband refused a request from regents to appoint a man to the position instead and the chair wasn’t filled until 1957 by a woman.6
Lucy Wheelock was an educator born in 1857 who founded her own college and was a pioneer of early childhood education.
She initially wanted to attend college, but her career path shifted after a visit to a kindergarten classroom that inspired her to become a “kindergartener,” as kindergarten teachers were referred to at the time.
She taught kindergarten for 10 years at the Chauncy-Hall School in Boston, while advocating for the concept of kindergarten we know today. Invented by German educator Friedrich Froebeul, the system of learning was centered around the idea of play.
During her career, she also served as the president of the International Kindergarten Union, and she created the Wheelock College in Boston, an early educator training school that is now known as BU Wheelock.
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