My Feminist College Isn’t Paying Women Equally

Vassar College has always lifted up women. Well, except their professors.

I’ve been a feminist my whole life.

That’s why I was disappointed to learn that my alma mater, Vassar College, is being sued for gender pay gap.

I went to Vassar College because I’m a feminist

I was raised in a progressive household. My parents always placed a huge value on my education and encouraged me to seek a higher education.

I went to high school and college in the 1990s. The soundtrack to my high school years was filled with angsty feminist music like Tori Amos and Ani Difranco.

The lyrics of my adolescence fueled me to start my feminist journey at a school that empowered women. Naturally, I chose to attend Vassar College, a prestigious Seven Sisters school.

I spent my years in college immersing myself in the sisterhood that Vassar provided. I had many close female friends. I enrolled in Women’s Studies. I wrote papers about the overlooked female theater directors in my drama class.

My feminist leanings went beyond my academics. While at Vassar, I escorted at Planned Parenthood and attended Take Back the Night marches. I was in my element.

I attribute much of my empowerment as a woman to the institution that is Vassar. It was, after all, founded for women at a time when few women even attended college.

Vassar has a history of furthering women

What is that history?

“On September 26, 1865, the College welcomed its first class of 353 students, offering young women an education equal to that of the best men’s colleges of the day.”

Vassar eventually became co-educational but continued to champion women and provide a safe space for women to learn.

So, imagine my disappointment when I read the news of the lawsuit against Vassar for their gender pay gap.

Surprised? No. But disappointed.

What is this lawsuit, anyway?

The news of the lawsuit has reached national headlines. People are talking about this nationwide.

The liberal arts college meant to lift up women is practicing its own misogyny. The institution that taught us to take down the patriarchy actually is the patriarchy.

And yet this doesn’t surprise me.

The news first spread amongst my college friends through a series of text threads. Sadly, no one was surprised. It was almost as if we just threw up our hands and said, “What can you do? Life is unfair.”

The professors who filed the lawsuit probably did the same thing for years. What can they do? It’s an old institution. You can’t change it.

Until they decided they could.

The lawsuit was filed in August by five college professors, claiming a wage gap of over two decades.

Why is there this pay gap? According to 35 professors who signed a statement in support of the lawsuit, this pay gap is due to:

“substantial differences in the starting salaries of men and women, a subjective merit ratings system that is biased against women, and a discriminatory promotion system that systematically prevents or delays the advancement of women professors relative to their male counterparts”

So it’s not as simple as the women being paid less. These women aren’t given the same advantages as the men in order to make more money.

You may be saying, “Why didn’t they just ask for more money?” They did. Since 2008, they have been bringing this issue to the administration.

What was Vassar’s administration’s response? They made salaries even less transparent, making it more difficult for anyone to file a complaint.

Gender pay gaps are the norm for professors

Gender pay gaps amongst professors are not uncommon. In fact, it’s the norm. Female professors in the United States earn 17.7% less than their male peers, according to the American Association of University Professors.

Female professors at Vassar College earn roughly 10% less than their male peers, so they’re actually better off than other college professors, right? Not good enough.

In fact, the pay gap at Vassar 20 years ago was 7.6%. The gap has grown. We’re moving backwards in our progress for gender equity.

Whether it’s 7.6%, 10%, or 17.7%, it’s wrong.

There should be no gap.

Especially at a school like Vassar, which “strives to pursue diversity, inclusion, and equity,” according to their mission statement. They might need to revisit that equity statement.

The values on which Vassar was founded are what bothers me the most. When I was in college, female students were told we could do anything. We were intelligent, we were leaders, and we supported one another.

I’m aware gender pay gaps exist everywhere. I can’t say I’m even surprised about this. But I still feel let down. In school where we were told we could do anything, I guess the condition was that we could do anything but with less pay than our male counterparts.

What can we do?

Perhaps the greatest irony of this lawsuit is that the students are using the values that Vassar taught them to speak up against them.

Hundreds of students protested on campus outside a faculty meeting. What happens when a school arms young minds with knowledge and the confidence to speak up against injustice? They use it, and in this case, they use it against that very school.

And they should.

There is one thing that Vassar got right — it taught progressive values and emboldened its students, regardless of their genders, to speak up and demand what’s right. Which is exactly what they did when they learned of the pay gap.

Maybe Vassar has been empowering female students all along. Now, it needs to do the same for its female professors.