Turned Away in 1929, Dorothy Height
is Embraced by Barnard
College 75 Years Later
Seventy-five years ago,
Dorothy Height was turned away from Barnard College, one
of the historic Seven Sisters, during an era of racial quotas
in higher education. In 1980, Dr. Height graciously accepted
the Barnard Medal of Distinction, the College’s highest honor, in recognition of her inspiring
national leadership on civil rights. Recently, Dr. Height was
honored again with the title “honorary Barnard alumna” as
the College directly acknowledges this wrongful exclusion and
celebrates her life and achievements.
This
landmark event was planned by the organization of Barnard’s
Alumnae of Color, which will celebrate the largest number
of African-American women graduates from Barnard (Class of
1974) during the College Reunion. The organization has spearheaded
the establishment this year of a scholarship fund, named
for Zora Neale Hurston, the famous African-American author,
anthropologist and folklorist, who graduated from Barnard
in 1928, the year before Dr. Height was excluded because
of the quota in place at the time. A pioneer in the Civil
Rights Movement and president of the National Council of
Negro Women for 40 years, Dr. Height this year celebrated
her 92nd birthday.
Barnard
President Judith Shapiro, who led the tribute to Dr. Height
on the College’s behalf, said: “We affirm our
commitment to racial equality as the nation marks the 50th
anniversary of the landmark school desegregation ruling,
Brown versus Topeka.
More
than two decades ago, Dr. Height accepted the College’s
highest honor, the Barnard Medal of Distinction. This was
a gracious and forgiving gesture on her part, and one for
which we are most appreciative,” said Dr. Shapiro. “Now
she is allowing us as a community to embrace her and pay
her this special tribute as an honorary alumna. In doing
so, she generously expresses her remarkable lifelong commitment
to a better world.”
Dr. Marsha Coleman-Adebayo, a member of the Class
of 1974 and also a courageous social activist, organized the
tribute to Dr. Height, who this year received the Congressional
Gold Medal for her lifetime of achievements.
“Awarding Dr. Height the long-denied status
of alumna acknowledges the dark past of American society. As
an alumna, I am proud that Barnard has started a dialogue on
racial discrimination, a necessary component of the process
of healing and justice,” said Dr. Coleman-Adebayo, who,
as a whistle-blower on the dangers of vanadium mining, was
dismissed from her position on the Gore-Mbeki Commission, which
provided U.S. assistance to the then-new South African government
under President Nelson Mandela. Coleman-Adebayo voiced her
concerns about the unsafe mining practices and the involvement
of U.S. companies and later won the largest-ever settlement
against the U.S. government for discrimination. She works for
the Environmental Protection Agency as a Senior Policy Analyst.
Dr. Height
wrote in her recent memoir, Open Wide the Freedom Gates: “In
the summer of 1929 I [received] a telegram asking me to report
for an interview at Barnard. When I arrived, breathless,
in the office of the dean, I was asked to have a seat. It
seemed an eternity before the dean finally came to speak
to me. I apologized for being late. It didn’t matter,
she said. Although I had been accepted, they could not admit
me. It took me a while to realize that their decision was
a racial matter: Barnard had a quota of two Negro students
per year, and two others had already taken the spots.”
Winner of
a scholarship for her exceptional oratorical skills, she
entered New York University, where she earned bachelor and
master degrees in four years. Dr. Height has been a leading
advocate for civil and human rights for more than half a
century; she was president of the National Council of Negro
Women for 40 years, through 1998, and worked closely with
Dr. Martin Luther King, Roy Wilkins, Whitney Young and others,
participating in almost every major civil and human rights
event of the 1960s.#
