Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, May 2, 1994 TAG: 9405020109
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: A1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: LESLIE TAYLOR STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
"This is an exciting day for Mary Baldwin College," Tyson said at a news conference at the private women's college in Staunton. "We are making history."
U.S. District Court Judge Jackson Kiser ruled late Friday that a proposed women's leadership institute at Mary Baldwin is a constitutional way for state-supported VMI to remain all-male.
The program, called the Virginia Women's Institute for Leadership, will offer training for women aimed at producing the same type of "citizen-soldier" produced by VMI.
"We are delighted that the court has affirmed our plans. . . ." Tyson said. "We are proud to serve the commonwealth."
Gen. John Knapp, VMI superintendent, said in a statement issued Sunday that the institute "is pleased, of course, with the decision of Judge Kiser.
"We have felt from the beginning of this contest that single-sex education should be preserved as an option for both men and women in the commonwealth of Virginia. We hope that with this latest and definitive ruling . . . VMI and Mary Baldwin can concentrate our efforts toward fulfilling our educational missions."
VMI cadets celebrated the judge's decision.
"I think everyone here feels like what we do here has been vindicated," said Dustin Devore, who as first battalion commander is the third-highest ranking cadet at VMI. "It's a victory not just for VMI and for all-male schools but a victory for all-female schools and single-sex education in general."
Leigh Farmer - a Mary Baldwin alumna who is a member of Women For VMI, a group of women who support VMI's all-male tradition - applauded Kiser's ruling.
"I'm pleased that our state has taken this position," Farmer said. "The decision supports choice in education - most importantly, the choice of single-sex as an option in higher learning."
Others were not so jubilant.
Last October, the Virginia State Conference of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People had considered filing a brief opposing VMI's proposal to avoid coeducation by setting up a military-style program for women at Mary Baldwin. While a brief was never filed, conference leaders had met with VMI administrators to discuss concerns about what officials viewed as the plan's separatist nature.
"Our director had scheduled an additional meeting to voice our concerns over the plan as they had presented it," conference President Erenest Miller, of Farmville, said Sunday.
"I'm quite surprised the plan had gone through already before we had a chance to talk to them about it again to air our differences.
"Any type of separate education can never be equal."
The U.S. Justice Department sued VMI in 1990, calling the exclusion of women at the state-supported school discriminatory. Two years ago, the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond agreed, but gave the state the option of admitting women, going private or finding a parallel program for women.
The state opted for a parallel program for women, submitting in U.S. District Court in Roanoke last September what has been dubbed the "Mary Baldwin plan." Its constitutionality was the subject of a weeklong trial in February.
While VMI and the state have argued that the plan gives Virginia diversity in higher education and preserves single-sex education, the justice department maintains that a public, all-male school is illegal.
During the February trial, the justice department stressed that the program in no way reflects the military education found at 155-year-old VMI, and therefore cannot be constitutional.
Tom Morris, president of Emory & Henry College and a VMI alumnus, said Sunday that he was not surprised by Kiser's ruling, given the options passed down to the state from the 4th Circuit.
"Judge Kiser, being at the trial court level, has the best understanding of members of the federal judiciary of the uniqueness of the VMI educational system," Morris said. "It appears he attempted to comply with the mandate of the 4th Circuit - to look at options."
Though it has been argued that the Mary Baldwin program is not comparable to VMI, it is "an arguable alternative," Morris said.
"Everyone acknowledges that they are different," he said. " What [Kiser] is saying is that he finds enough in the Mary Baldwin program to constitute compliance with constitutional requirements."
Though the case is widely expected to be appealed, the justice department offered no comment on Sunday.
At the leadership institute, women will live together in structured housing for two of their four years in school; take advanced science and math classes; be required to participate in rigorous physical education; and participate in an array of community service projects.
Ann White Spencer, director of communications at Mary Baldwin, said a task force is currently refining all components of the program. Kiser has asked that the program begin in the fall of 1995.
Mary Baldwin has received the first portion of a $450,000 three-year program planning grant from the VMI Foundation. On July 1, the college will receive the second grant installment, Spencer said.
When all appeals are exhausted, the VMI Foundation will provide the college with a permanent endowment of $5.5 million to support the program, as well as a $500,000 scholarship endowment.
by CNB