Social awareness should be a priority, speaker tells Women and Gender Studies meeting

By Aaron Falk

April 11, 2006 | In the 1890s, only 39 women were enrolled as students at the Utah Agricultural College. Since then, women have taken great strides toward gender equality at USU, but a college education must include more than resume building if those efforts are to continue, Susan Mannon, a professor of sociology at USU told students and faculty Monday.

Mannon, a self-described incurable overachiever, said "consciousness raising" should be the top priority of higher education. She spoke to a group of about 30 students and teachers during the Women and Gender Studies spring luncheon.

"Education is not simply about getting good grades, putting credentials and majors on your resume so you can be marketable in the real word," she said.

Careerism, the pursuit of professional gain at the cost of integrity, is the wrongly driving undercurrent of undergraduate education, Mannon said.

"Finding one's path, finding one's larger purpose in life; being a student should be about becoming a seeker of that path," she said.

The Women and Gender Studies program offers students a minor certificate. This year, eight students will graduate with the minor on their transcript.

During a student-panel discussion, Jessica Sahely, a gender studies student of Afghani decent, said she was drawn to the program because of "dinner conversations about what we have in this country and what (women in Afghanistan) can't have."

Members of the panel said some people may have the wrong idea of feminism and said a feminist is not a "man hater."

"Feminism for me is definitely not man hating," panel member Lindsay Kite said. "It's about equality, politically and socially."

Other members of the panel said the WGS program provides a support group for likeminded, progressive people ­ both male and female.

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