NEW RESEARCH PROJECT ON EARLY CLARKSON WOMEN ENGINEERING ALUMNAE

 

Laura Ettinger, Ph.D.

 

Remember these days?

 

From The Girls at Clarkson 1971

A Clarkson University promotional pamphlet

 

As a historian, I recognize that you have an important story to tell that goes beyond the picture above. This project is your opportunity to tell posterity what really happened to pioneering women in engineering. You were a coed in a period of transition at Clarkson, and I want to know why you chose engineering at that school and what your experiences there were like. I also want to know about your career and life after Clarkson. The story of women at Clarkson is an important part of the history of women in engineering, and that story remains untold.

 

Your story matters.

 

 

What is the project?

 

This project uses oral history interviews with the early Clarkson women engineering graduates (classes of 1968 to 1978, the first classes), along with archival research on Clarkson, as a case study to understand:

 

  1. The beginning (or in Clarkson’s case, reintroduction) of coeducation and the experiences of women students in male-dominated educational institutions. During the 1960s, many American colleges and universities went coed. Was Clarkson typical or atypical in its approach to coeducation?
  2. Why women/girls choose to go into very male-dominated professions. In the U.S. today, engineering remains the undergraduate major with the lowest percentage of women. Why do women opt to enter a male-dominated field?
  3. The career and life paths of women in very male-dominated professions. How and why have their careers and lives differed from those of women in more traditionally female or gender-neutral professions?
  4. The life choices of baby boomer women. Baby boomers’ experiences in the workforce differed radically from those of their mothers. What options were available to baby boomer women?

 

What will happen to your interview?

 

With your written permission, your interview will be taped (audio), transcribed, and archived at Clarkson University’s library. Before the transcript is archived, you will have an opportunity to review the transcript and to make corrections. If you wish, you may restrict access to your interview.

 

The interview will be used to inform my work on the history of women engineers at Clarkson. I will use the information in my scholarly articles and possibly a book. Depending on how accessible you make your interview, other scholars may also access this material for their own research in the future.

 

What is the research project director’s background?

 

I am an associate professor of history at Clarkson. A specialist in gender and women’s history, I am the author of Nurse-Midwifery: The Birth of a New American Profession (The Ohio State University Press, 2006), as well as several scholarly articles.

 

What should you do if you would like to be interviewed?

 

Contact Laura Ettinger at ettingle@clarkson.edu, (315) 268-3991, Box 5750, Clarkson University, Potsdam, NY 13699-5750. I will call you at your convenience to discuss the process, to send you a pre-interview questionnaire, and to arrange a time to conduct the interview.