List of alumnae of women's colleges in the United States
Marian Wright Edelman (Spelman College; from the CDC Public Health Image Library)
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The following is a list of individuals associated with women's colleges in the United States through attending as a student or graduating.
Activists
- Marian Wright Edelman graduated from Spelman College and is an American activist for the rights of children. She is president and founder of the Children's Defense Fund.
- Betty Friedan was a 1942 graduate of Smith College, an author, and noted feminist
- Sally Miller Gearhart, feminist, science fiction author and activist is a 1952 graduate of Sweet Briar College.
- Gloria Johnson-Powell is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and an important figure in the American Civil Rights Movement. She was one of the first African American woman to attain tenure at Harvard Medical School
- Gloria Steinem is a 1956 graduate of Smith College
- Silda Wall Spitzer is a 1980 graduate of Meredith College and is founder and chair of the board of Children for Children that promotes hands-on youth volunteering and giving programs which teach and instill the value of community involvement and civic engagement in children from all backgrounds, beginning at a young age.
Authors, journalists, and poets
- Pearl Cleage was a graduate of Spelman College and is an author whose works (both fiction and nonfiction) are widely recognized.
- Katharine Lee Bates was a graduate of Wellesley College and is best known for writing America the Beautiful.
- Margaret Atwood is a graduate of Radcliffe College and an author
- Elizabeth Bishop was a graduate of Vassar College and Poet Laureate of the United States from 1949 to 1950 as well as a Pulitzer Prize winner in 1956.
- Madeleine Blais- Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and author is a 1969 graduate of The College of New Rochelle
- Margaret Wise Brown, author of Goodnight Moon was a 1932 graduate of Hollins University
- Pearl Sydenstricker Buck, author of The Good Earth and the first woman to win both the Nobel and Pulitzer Prizes, was a 1914 graduate of Randolph-Macon Woman's College
- Kiran Desai is a graduate of Hollins University and an author and recipient of the Man Booker Prize in 2006
- Emily Dickinson attended Mount Holyoke College (then Mount Holyoke Female Seminary) and was a noted American poet
- Annie Dillard, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of Pilgrim at Tinker Creek was a 1967 graduate of Hollins University
- Nora Ephron was a graduate of Wellesley College and an author
- Lendon Gray author and winner of multiple Olympic medals in dressage was a 1971 graduate of Sweet Briar College
- H.D. attended Bryn Mawr College and was a modernist poet
- Molly Haskell an author and film critic was a 1961 graduate of Sweet Briar College
- Zora Neale Hurston was a 1928 graduate of Barnard College and an author
- Helen Keller was a graduate of Radcliffe College and an American author, activist and lecturer. She was the first deafblind person to graduate from college.
- Jhumpa Lahiri is a 1989 graduate of Barnard College and a Pulitzer Prize-winning author
- Ursula K. Le Guin is a graduate of Radcliffe College and an author
- Marianne Moore was a graduate of Bryn Mawr College and was a modernist poet
- Flannery O'Connor was a graduate of Georgia College & State University and an author
- Suzan-Lori Parks is a 1985 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright
- Sylvia Plath was a 1955 graduate of Smith College and an important American author and poet
- Mary Lee Settle, an author and a founder of the annual PEN/Faulkner Award for Fiction, attended Sweet Briar College
- Lee Smith, author of The Last Girls was a 1967 graduate of Hollins University
- Gertrude Stein graduated from Radcliffe College and was a modernist author and critic
- Alice Walker attended Spelman College and Sarah Lawrence College and is a Pulitzer Prize-winning author
- Wendy Wasserstein was a 1971 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright
- Eudora Welty was a graduate of Mississippi University for Women and an author
- Marsha Norman is a graduate of Agnes Scott College and a Pulitzer Prize winner for her drama 'night,Mother
- Mary Davis Holt is a graduate of Salem College, is managing partner at Flynn Heath Holt Leadership, co-author of Break Your Own Rules: How to Change the Patterns of Thinking that Block Women's Paths to Power as well as an executive coach; she also held leadership positions at Time Inc and Time Warner.
- Ann Compton is a news reporter for ABC and inductee of the Radio Hall of Fame is a graduate of Hollins University
- Shaun Robinson, "Access Hollywood" correspondent, is a 1984 graduate of Spelman College.
- Candy Crowley is a 1970 graduate of Randolph-Macon Woman's College and former CNN senior political correspondent whose career includes two awards for outstanding journalism, from the National Press Foundation and the Associated Press.
- Gwen Ifill is a 1977 graduate of Simmons College; she is the moderator and managing editor of Washington Week in Review and served as the moderator for both the 2004 and 2008 vice presidential debates
- Anna Quindlen is a graduate of Barnard College; she is a journalist with the New York Times
- Cokie Roberts is a 1964 graduate of Wellesley College; she is a contributing senior news analyst for National Public Radio as well as a regular roundtable analyst for the current This Week with George Stephanopoulos
- Diane Sawyer is a 1967 graduate of Wellesley College; she is a television reporter for ABC and co-anchor of its morning news show, Good Morning America
- Lesley Stahl is a graduate of Wheaton College; she is a reporter for 60 Minutes
- Ann Taylor is a newscaster for National Public Radio (NPR), contributing to All Things Considered since 1989. She attended Sweet Briar College.
- Barbara Walters is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College; she is an American journalist, writer, and media personality who has been a regular fixture on morning television shows (Today and The View), an evening news magazine (20/20), and on World News (then ABC Evening News)
- Paula Zahn is a graduate of Stephens College. She has served as a reporter and/or anchor for various networks on numerous programs such as CBS This Morning, CBS Evening News, Good Morning America, The Edge with Paula Zahn, American Morning with Paula Zahn and "Paula Zahn Now".
- Elizabeth Campbell (television) is a 1923 graduate of Salem College and was the first woman founder of a PBS station.
College Presidents
- Audrey F. Manley is a graduate of Spelman College and was president of Spelman College from 1997 to 2002.
- Nancy Cantor is a graduate of Sarah Lawrence College, was the Chancellor of University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, and is President of Syracuse University.
- Diana Chapman Walsh is a graduate of Wellesley College and was president of Wellesley College from 1993 to 2007.
- Carol T. Christ is a graduate of Douglass College (now part of Rutgers University) and the current president of Smith College.
- Alecia A. DeCoudreaux is a graduate of Wellesley College and the current president of Mills College
- Drew Gilpin Faust is a graduate of Bryn Mawr College and the first female president of Harvard University
- Elaine Tuttle Hansen is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and the current president of Bates College
- Ada Howard is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and the first president of Wellesley College
- Susan Tolman Mills is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and co-founder and first president of Mills College
- Nancy J. Vickers is a graduate of Mount Holyoke College and was president of Bryn Mawr College from 1997 to 2008.
- Mary Brown Bullock is a graduate of Agnes Scott College and the immediate past president of Agnes Scott College
- Carol Ann Mooney is a graduate of Saint Mary's College and the current president of Saint Mary's College
- Jo Allen is a graduate of Meredith College and the current president of Meredith College
- Ruth Austin Knox is a 1975 graduate of Wesleyan College and was named the 24th president in of the college in 2003.
Computer science, engineering, science, social science
- Annie Jump Cannon was a 1884 graduate of Wellesley College and an astronomer who developed the well-known Henry Draper Catalogue of stars based upon temperature.
- Pamela Melroy is a 1983 graduate of Wellesley College and a former NASA astronaut. She served as pilot on Space Shuttle missions STS-92 and STS-112 and commanded mission STS-120.
- Ruth Benedict was a 1909 graduate of Vassar College and a noted anthropologist
- Leah Busque was a math and computer science graduate of Sweet Briar College in 2001 and is the founder and CEO of TaskRabbit
- Rachel Carson was a graduate of Chatham University and the author of Silent Spring, the book which is credited with advancing the global environmental movement.
- Marjorie Grene was a 1931 graduate of Wellesley College, with a Ph.D. awarded by Radcliffe College in 1935. She is internationally recognized as a major philosopher of biology[1]
- Grace Hopper was 1928 graduate of Vassar College and a computer scientist who developed the first compiler for a computer programming language
- Susan Kare is a 1975 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and is the original designer of many of the interface elements for the original Apple Macintosh
- Stephanie Kwolek is a 1946 graduate of Margaret Morrison Carnegie College and is the inventor of the Kevlar
- Margaret Mead was a 1923 graduate of Barnard College and a noted anthropologist
- Jean E. Sammet is a 1948 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and is the inventor of the FORMAC programming language
- Marshalyn Yeargin-Allsopp, a medical epidemiologist and chief of the developmental disabilities branch at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention graduated from Sweet Briar College in 1968.
Government officials
- Madeleine Albright is a 1959 graduate of Wellesley College and the first woman Secretary of State
- Colleen Bell is a graduate of Sweet Briar College and in 2015 became the US Ambassador to Hungary
- Mary McLeod Bethune was an 1894 graduate of Scotia Seminary (now Barber-Scotia College) and was an adviser to President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
- Benazir Bhutto was a graduate of Radcliffe College and was the first woman elected to lead a Muslim state. She was Pakistan's first (and to date only) female prime minister, serving twice from 1988–1990 and 1993–1996.
- Elaine Chao is a 1975 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and, as the Secretary of Labor, is the first Asian American woman to be appointed to the President's Cabinet
- Hillary Clinton is a 1969 graduate of Wellesley College and current Secretary of State in the Obama administration. Clinton was formerly the junior United States Senator from New York and is a former First Lady of the United States (1993-2001).
- Ruth A. Davis is a 1966 graduate of Spelman College and the first woman of color to be appointed Director General of the Foreign Service and the first African-American Director of the Foreign Service Institute.
- Geraldine Ferraro is a 1956 graduate of Marymount Manhattan College and was the first woman to represent a major U.S. political party as a candidate for Vice President during the United States presidential election, 1984 (Ferraro and running mate Walter Mondale were defeated by Ronald Reagan and George H. W. Bush)
- Frank M. Hull is a 1970 graduate of Randolph-Macon Woman's College and a current judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit.
- Gabrielle Giffords is a 1993 graduate of Scripps College and represented Arizona's 8th Congressional district from 2007 until her resignation in 2012 due to the aftermath of an assassination attempt.
- Katherine Harris is a 1979 graduate of Agnes Scott College and was the former Florida Secretary of State and U.S. Representative.
- Tammy Baldwin was the first openly gay U.S. Senator and was a graduate of Smith College
- Jeane Jordan Kirkpatrick was the first female U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. and was a graduate of Stephens College (then a 2-year institution) and later Barnard College
- Blanche Lincoln is a 1982 graduate of Randolph-Macon Woman's College and was the Democratic U.S. Senator from Arkansas from 1999 to2011. She has previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives from Arkansas' 1st congressional district. At the age of 38, Lincoln was the youngest woman to be elected to the Senate in 1998.
- Nancy Pelosi is a 1962 graduate of Trinity College (now Trinity Washington University) and is the first woman Speaker of the House. Like Senator Barbara Mikulski of Maryland, Speaker Pelosi is a graduate of the Institute of Notre Dame in Baltimore.
- Frances Perkins was a 1902 graduate of Mount Holyoke College and was the first woman cabinet member (U.S. Secretary of Labor from 1933-1945 under Franklin D. Roosevelt)
- Susan Philips 1967 graduate of Agnes Scott College was the first woman to chair a financial regulatory agency (the Commodity Futures Trading Commission)
- Barbara Mikulski is a 1958 graduate of Mount St. Agnes College, now part of Loyola College in Baltimore, Maryland. A graduate of the Institute of Notre Dame, Senator Mikulski is the senior woman in the United States Senate as well as Maryland's senior Senator.
- Virginia Shehee is a graduate of Stephens College and was the first woman elected to the Louisiana State Senate (1975).
- Elizabeth P. Hoisington was a 1940 graduate of the College of Notre Dame of Maryland. She was one of the first two women to be promoted to Brigadier General in the United States Army, at the time being Director of the Women's Army Corps. President Nixon announced her promotion on 15 May 1970, effective 11 June 1970.
- Emily J. Reynolds a 1978 graduate of Stephens College served as the Secretary of the United States Senate from January 2003 to January 2007 and currently is the Senior Vice President for Government Relations with the Tennessee Valley Authority.
- Sarah Childress Polk, wife of US President James K Polk was a student at Salem Female Academy in 1817; Salem Female Academy later became Salem College.
- Katherine G. Howard attended Salem Academy and Salem College before graduating from Smith College; she worked in the In 1953, Howard, a dedicated Republican, began her public service career in the Eisenhower administration in the Federal Civil Defense Administration, as the U.S. delegate to the NATO committee on civil defense, and as Deputy U.S. Commissioner General to the Brussels World Fair.[2]
- Patsy Ticer, member of the Virginia Senate from January 1996 to January 2012 graduated from Sweet Briar College in 1955.
- Teresa Tomlinson became the first woman to be elected mayor of Columbus, Georgia in 2011. She graduated from Sweet Briar College in 1987 and became the Chair of its Board of Directors in 2015.
- Susan Webber Wright is a 1970 graduate of Randolph-Macon Woman's College and a US district court judge in Little Rock, Arkansas. She presided over Paula Jones's sexual harassment lawsuit against former President Bill Clinton. She was also involved with the investigation of the Whitewater Scandal with Kenneth Starr.
Performing artists, producers, composers and visual artists
- Debra Martin Chase graduated from Mount Holyoke College and is a noted Hollywood producer
- Elizabeth Bell is a 1950 graduate of Wellesley College and is an award winning composer.
- Sofia Coppola attended Mills College and is a director
- Keshia Knight Pulliam, best known for her role as Rudy Huxtable on The Cosby Show, is a graduate of Spelman College.
- Ruby Dee attended Hunter College and is an actor
- Jennifer Tilly is a graduate of Stephens College and is an Academy Award-nominated actress.
- Katharine Hepburn was a 1928 graduate of Bryn Mawr College and was an actress
- Denise Di Novi graduated from Simmons College and is a noted Hollywood producer
- Nnenna Freelon is a Simmons College graduate and noted jazz vocalist
- Sally Mann, photographer was a 1974 graduate of Hollins University
- Diana Muldaur, movie and TV actress graduated from Sweet Briar College in 1960 and became the first woman president of the Academy of Television Arts and Sciences
- Mercedes Ruehl - Academy Award-winning stage and screen actress is a 1969 graduate of The College of New Rochelle
- Meryl Streep is a graduate of Vassar College and a noted actress
- Elizabeth Mitchell is a graduate of Stephens College and is a popular television actress.
- Ann Taylor is a newscaster for National Public Radio (NPR) and attended Sweet Briar College before transferring and graduating from the University of Tennessee.
- Twyla Tharp graduated from Barnard College in 1963 and is noted figure in the world of dance
- Suzanne Vega is a graduate of Barnard College and is a noted musician
- Jennifer Nettles is a graduate of Agnes Scott College and is the lead singer of Grammy winning country band Sugarland
- Annie Potts graduated from Stephens College and is an actress.
- Beth Leavel graduated from Meredith College and is a Tony Award winning actress.
- China Chow is a 1996 graduate of Scripps College and most recently appeared on Burn Notice.
- Celia Weston is a graduate of Salem College and is an actress nominated for an Oscar for Dead Man Walking (film) and a Tony for The Last Night of Ballyhoo.
References
- ↑ "IN MEMORIAM Marjorie Glicksman Grene, Professor Emeritus of Philosophy, UC Davis 1910 – 2009". Academic Senate, University of California. Retrieved September 2, 2014.
- ↑ Katherine G. Howard
External links
- Women's College Coalition - List of alumnae
- All women, and thriving - News and Observer
- In Virginia, three elite women's colleges reinvent themselves and find a new mission in a coed world - 6 November 2006 Newsweek article on Sweet Briar College, Hollins University, and Mary Baldwin College
- New study finds women’s colleges are better equipped to help their students - Indiana University
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