God Bless the Richmond Times Dispatch, for both their clarity and long memory:
In an effort to retain female cadets, Virginia Military Institute recently watered down its physical-fitness standards. All cadets used to be required to do five pull-ups; now female cadets need do only one.Because of that change, federal investigators have dropped the physical-standards angle of their investigation into a complaint that the school discriminates against women. The Department of Education’s Office for Civil Rights continues to pursue other aspects of the inquiry.
The news stirred memories of the heated debate, nearly two decades ago now, over whether admitting women to VMI would require the school to relax its ferociously vigorous regimen. In arguments before the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals in 1992, Justice Department lawyer Jessica Silver insisted, “The record clearly shows that some women can do everything that is part of the physical training program at VMI.”
A Times-Dispatch news article on the hearing included this exchange:
“Judge Paul Niemeyer, a member of the three-judge panel that heard arguments today . . . asked Ms. Silver whether VMI would be forced to adopt a ‘twotrack’ system if it admitted women . . . .
“Ms. Silver said no . . . .
“Judge Hiram Ward wondered if women were admitted to VMI under the school’s current strict standards and a controversy over equal treatment arose, whether ‘you’d be right back before the court, yelling “sex discrimination.”‘”
“Ms. Silver said no.”
Wonder what Ms. Silver has to say today. Any takers on her explaining that her “No” answer was miscontrued?
It appears that the decision makers at VMI have chosen a strategy of relative excellence and absolute mediocrity. VMI’s destiny was sealed when it chose to remain a public state school. The threat that VMI would lose ROTC if it went private was probably real, but a decade later the all women’s VWIL remains open with full access to ROTC training. The VWIL website proudly proclaims it to be “The only all-female Corps of Cadets in the world.” The double standard is astounding.
VMI had an opportunity to separate itself from the state, stand on principle and control its own destiny. Other schools under similar circumstances (i.e. Grove City College in Pennsylvania) have done it with much success. Even if an attempt to go private resulted in the ultimate closing of the school, I personally believe it would have been a better outcome for posterity than to remain open by continuously compromising and submitting to the oppositions wishes.
General McAuliffe when surrounded by Germans and ordered to surrender replied with only one word, “NUTS!”. If only VMI shared that spirit.
It’s not too late for VMI to go private. They should. This will only get worse. Liberals need the military to serve as petri dishes for their social experiments — as long as VMI is around it is vulnerable. And no one seems to want to protect it.
W2, I wish I shared your optimism. The current administration has pursued building programs that have made VMI even more dependent on state funding. Privatization would require unprecedented alumni financial support and cooperation from state legislatures. I believe that support was there in 1997, but not at the present.
The only way I can see VMI successfully going private would be to do it as a co-ed school, committed to holding women and men to the same standards which is what women claimed to want and VMI promised when it accepted them. I would certainly prefer that option versus the direction VMI is currently going.
5 pullups?! I wouldn’t exactly call that rigorous, my fat ass can do that now.
I know what you mean, though.
I remember when this first became an issue. those of us who knew realized what would eventually would happen. I seem to remember several women dropping out and suing over the standards. I believe it also happened in my old branch of the paratroops, women in/standards down. A friend of mine in the first gulf war had women on board his ship. I ask him how they did and he said they came home rich. Don’t know if that is true or not.