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From: hplabs!joanne@hpccc.hp.com (Joanne Petersen)
Newsgroups: comp.society.women
Subject: Re: Girls' schools (was Re: Women Wizards?)
Message-ID: <12879@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Date: 1 Aug 88 22:43:41 GMT
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I also attended an all-women's school, and it wasn't full of Computer Science
courses, but this was in the 60s, when not many technical schools had those
courses, let alone the lib-arts place I went to.  So I took math courses and
enjoyed them (even if I did end up switching majors from math to studio art!).

The main reason I'm writing, though, is to say that the women at my college
weren't totally obsessed with dating and jocks.  We cared about our classes,
and I for one enjoyed the opportunity to attend a class and be able to grow
out of my shyness and actually participate in discussions, something I rarely
did when in (co-ed, private) high school (where men tended to dominate the
discussions -- yes, women did speak up, but not as often!).

The major drawback to an all-women's college is that the only way to meet men
is in dating situations -- i.e., it's hard to meet them as friends.  Since I
prefer becoming friends with someone before I get into a deeper relationship,
this made it rather difficult for me to date.  I helped matters by taking 
classes at the nearby University of Massachusetts (we had an exchange program
with them), but that option isn't likely to be available to many schools.

rats