DATE: Wednesday, July 30, 1997              TAG: 9707300023

SECTION: LOCAL                   PAGE: B8   EDITION: FINAL 

TYPE: Editorial 

                                            LENGTH:   49 lines

CO-ED ERA COMMENCES SUCCESS OF THE TRANSITION IS IN THE HANDS OF THE STUDENTS.

The Rat-ettes are coming.

On Aug. 18, 32 women are slated to make history at Virginia Military Institute in Lexington. They will join 428 males in forming the Class of 2001, launching a new century with a new era of co-education at the 158-year-old school.

As the court-ordered adventure begins, the signs are hopeful that VMI may make the transition with more style and finesse than many expected and feared.

A prime indicator is the fact that more than a handful of women have been recruited. It is one thing to withstand the glare of publicity when you are one of five or six individuals breaking down an institutional barrier. It is another - hopefully less stressful - when you are one of 32.

Despite deep hostility on the part of many alumni to change at VMI, and tough talk by administrators when the U.S. Supreme Court ordered the change last summer, school officials appear to have acted thoughtfully and thoroughly in planning the transition.

They have stuck to their original insistence that no slack will be cut for the newcomers in physical standards, initial haircuts or the famed gantlet that students must run in their first year.

In the long run, this probably is wise. It is likely to make everyone feel that the women are more than second-class citizens and that they have gotten the full bite of the ``VMI experience.''

But on some other matters, VMI officials have made sensible accommodations. They have recruited a female support staff, added elements of privacy to dormitories and sought to sensitize faculty and students to the differences between sexual harassment and equal-opportunity bullyragging.

The problem, of course, is that the contrast may be subtle and, at times, entirely in the eye of the beholder. The difficulties of blending men and women in a military environment have been all too thoroughly documented recently in the armed forces, not just academe.

For VMI officials, the greatest challenge is the fact that the success or failure of co-education rests on more than their shoulders. The primary weight will be borne by dozens of 19- and 20-year-olds who will demonstrate their mettle - and the efficacy of their training - in the way they respond to the change.

If those young people fail to extend the respect due to the newcomers, they will bring disgrace upon their school. If they greet change with dignity, they can convince even skeptics of the merit of the ``citizen soldier'' ideal that VMI extols.

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