Michelle Styles

On this day in 1957, women's colleges at Oxford were finally accorded equal rights with the men's colleges. Yes, you read that correctly. 1957. First, though, a little history of Oxbridge’s long march (or perhaps that should be “sleepy stroll”) towards equality for women; mainly Ox-, it has to be said, with a dash of -bridge. In 1869, Emily Davies and Barbara Bodichon founded Girton College Cambridge, the first residential university college for women, with just five students. Newnham College followed two year later. Women’s colleges were not recognised by the University of Cambridge, nor were women awarded degrees even though their exams were just as rigorous. Instead, they received a Certificate of Proficiency which makes it sound as though they’d passed a basic cycling road safety test. Oxford lagged behind but Lady Margaret Hall opened in 1878 with nine students followed by Somerville in 1879 with twelve. You know the drill. They were not recognised by the University of Oxford either and they were not awarded degrees despite sitting the same exams as their male peers. Even so, a series of invisible tariffs were imposed that applied only to women. Women students had to be chaperoned if male students were present. They were allowed to sit the notoriously difficult Mathematical Tripos exams at Cambridge but their embarrassingly good results were, erm, glossed over. Philippa Garrett Fawcett, daughter of Millicent, was the first woman to obtain the top score in the Cambridge Mathematical Tripos exams. She knocked spots off the male second place candidate with a score a full 13% higher than his but was not awarded the much prized title of Senior Wrangler. Heaven forfend that a woman should beat a man. He was awarded HER title instead. Philippa was simply described as “above Senior Wrangler”. These days, Parkrun is doing its bit by letting men steal women’s records. Between 1904 and 1907, the Steamboat Ladies (women denied degrees at Oxbridge even though they met all of the requirements) - including Philippa - had to sail to Trinity College Dublin to be awarded an ad eundem degree, an academic degree awarded on the grounds of mutual recognition or equivalence. Trinity expected a handful of women to take up the offer. Over 720 did. On 7 October 1920, there was a step-change. Women could be awarded degrees at Oxford. Cambridge held out until 1928. In 1925, Somerville was granted its charter and the requirement for women to be chaperoned in the presence of male students was abolished but a curfew was put in place instead. You might ask which sensitive souls were these restrictions meant to protect? Well, eleven years earlier, the Head of Somerville had had to write to her female students about “a very tiresome complaint that the men examinees are disturbed by the way our students sit in their tight skirts and show their legs.” I’ve attached an illustration of those short tight skirts so you can see just how easily distracted those poor chaps were. It’s the 1st Rule of Misogyny: Women are responsible for what men do. In 1927, a limitation statute was introduced to limit the admission of those pesky women (by now qualifying for higher education in ever greater numbers) to no more than 840 students - roughly 15% of the undergraduate body. Do you know what that reminds me of? The decision to limit the vote in 1918 to women aged 30 or over who met an additional property qualification. WW1 had just concluded with a terrible loss of life and the government was frightened that female voters would far outnumber male voters if the vote was granted to them on equal terms with men. 21 years later - 1948 - the limitation statute was raised to 970. Probably because WW2 had just concluded with another terrible loss of life and universities were worried about their income. Convince me otherwise. Another nine years went by before the female quota was finally abolished, thirty years after it was first introduced. On 27 April 1948, women were admitted to full membership of the University of Cambridge, and Girton College received the status of a college of the university. 1959 brought another step-change. The five women’s colleges at Oxford (now including St Hilda’s, St Hugh’s and St Anne’s) finally received the same ‘full status’ as the men’s colleges, and their Heads became eligible to become Vice-Chancellor. At long last in 1961, Dame Lucy Sutherland (1903-1980) of Australia became the first woman Pro-Vice-Chancellor. That’s 92 years or about five generations of women at Oxbridge openly disadvantaged on the basis of their sex, but the woman who set the ball rolling was Emily Davies - and that’s where we started. In 1859, she made this vow to her friends, the Garrett sisters: “Women can get nowhere unless they are as well educated as men. I shall open the universities.” She kept her promise. So did they. Elizabeth Garrett Anderson vowed to open the doors for women doctors and Millicent Garrett Fawcett promised to achieve votes for women. Today, 57% of students enrolled in higher education are women but only 17% of vice-chancellors are female and the proportion of male staff on senior higher education contracts is almost three times higher than it is for female staff. Remember that the next time a university pats itself on the back for its commitment to inclusion.