PHOTO: The inspiring concept of a STEMinist (science, technlogy, engineering and math feminist) and the Oregon State University Women's Center is shown in student newspaper article by Sydney McHale, Keep S.A.F.E. Blog Manger, "Keep Social Awareness For Everyone (SAFE) Women's Center Spotlight: Cultural center offers open space to promote social justice, feminism," OSU Barometer, Feb. 6, 2017, p. 13. The Women's Center was where the first OSU gay student group was formed in the 1970's shortly after the Stonewall riot in New York City. (See Thomas Kraemer, "Corvallis, Oregon State University gay activism 1969-2004," printed to PDF from OutHistory.org in 2010 permanently stored by the OSU Scholars Archives @ OSU)
The big, plump colorful sofas, surrounded by the sounds of laughter and conversation is the climate created at the Oregon State University Women's Center.
The Women's Center is one of seven cultural centers on campus. This center's main focus is creating an open space to promote feminism in social justice, according to Natalie Cronan, a peer success facilitator at the Women's Center.
"The goal of the Women's Center is to create a space for students and anyone who feels comfortable to come and talk about social justice, and continue the fight towards equity and liberation for all," Cronan said.
The Women's Center was established in 1973, and since has been a sanctuary for women, and all identities, to come and enjoy a non-discriminatory space. . .
"Men at OSU dominate the science and engineering fields, but STEMinist works to provide an inviting and inclusive community for those who are feminine identifying within STEM," Cronan said. . .
While working in industry for three decades starting in the 1970's, I witnessed how often women were discouraged from working in the science, engineering, technology or math or STEM fields due to their often different ways of approaching a problem than most men do. I also witnessed how female customers of these men were often left out due to a lack of understanding of their needs. At the time, admitting this concept was controversial because many people assumed that women and men would be equal in all respects after discrimination had been eliminated, but instead many people realized that there were different ways of thinking that are not exclusively female or male, even though these often were associated with a person's male or female biological sex at birth.
I will be interested to see what insights are discovered by STEMinists in the future.
