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Mississippi University for Women Still Promotes Women in Leadership
education, leadership, mississippi university for women,
In the 125 years since Mississippi University for Women opened its doors in Columbus, the relationship between women and education - and, by extension, women and society - has undergone no small evolution.
And the W, as the school is fondly called by friends and alumni, has been at the leading edge of change every step of the way.
MUW was born under burden of necessity. Mississippi had fallen on economic hard times. There weren’t enough able-bodied men in the state to marry and support the women and, for the first time, self-sufficiency became a socially desirable – even requisite – trait for the fairer sex.
In 1884, the legislature voted to fund the Industrial Institute and College, the school that would later become MUW, where women received vocational training in careers such as dressmaking and stenography. Bachelor of Arts degrees were awarded as well, but at the time, their importance in society was a distant second to that of a woman’s ability to support herself.
“It was a very forward-thinking idea on the part of the Mississippi legislature, because they weren’t thinking about education for the sake of education,” says MUW alumna Bridget Smith Pieschel, director of the MUW Center for Women’s Research and Public Policy and co-author of the school’s institutional history. “They were thinking about allowing women to be independent and support themselves, which is really unusual.”
The intent of nurturing women’s abilities to not only survive but also lead in arenas dominated largely by men is one MUW characteristic that has been constant through 125 years of progress, including a 1982 Supreme Court mandate that the school admit men based on its receipt of state funding.
Today, the school is fully coeducational and encourages not only women to pursue formerly masculine fields like medicine and journalism, but also men to enter careers such as culinary arts and elementary education that in the past have been relegated to women.
“We’ve managed to have the best of both worlds: We’ve kept our women’s mission, which focuses on developing leadership specifically in women, but we’ve offered that world to male students, who need to understand how to work with women in today’s world,” Pieschel says. “So they’re getting a leg-up, and perhaps getting something that men don’t get at other colleges, which have more of a focus on traditional collegiate education, where you have a focus on football teams, for example.”
Over the decades, MUW’s story has been inextricably woven with that of Columbus, which donated the land and buildings for the university in the beginning.
The school is centrally located in the downtown area and lends the community a richness and vitality that only a college campus can.
“MUW’s architecturally significant campus, which features 23 buildings on the National Register of Historic Places, attracts tourists and prospective students, as well as business and industry,” says Anika Perkins, director of the MUW Office of Public Affairs. “Our graduates add critical thinking skills and economic strength to the life and well-being of the community.”
A spirited student population, inflowing tourism dollars and related industry investment combine to make MUW an integral part of Columbus’s livelihood – and all without a football team.“And,” says Pieschel, “we don’t want one.”
Story by Michaela Jackson
