The Citadel votes to admit women
June 28, 1996
Web posted at: 10:15 p.m. EDT (0215 GMT)From CNN affiliate WCIV
CHARLESTON, South Carolina (CNN) -- The Citadel fought tooth and nail to keep one woman from enrolling as a cadet in its all-male military academy in 1993. Friday, however, it abruptly ended its opposition to enrolling qualified female cadets.
The school's governing board voted unanimously to drop the 153- year-old school's requirement that all cadets be men. The move puts the academy in line with the U.S. Supreme Court, which ruled Thursday that the all-male enrollment policy at the Virginia Military Institute, another state-supported school, was unconstitutional.
"Effective immediately, The Citadel will enthusiastically accept qualified female applicants into the corps of cadets," said Jimmy Jones, board president, during a news conference.
Senior Chance Wilson was the only cadet to hear the school's announcement in person -- he just happened to walk by during the press conference. He is crushed by the news. "I'm hurt. I mean, this is a school that I love, and to see it changed so drastically, it hurts," he said.
Search for identity
Wilson said young men come to The Citadel to find out who they really are. "You can't do that anymore, there's no place left to go for that," he said. "VMI and The Citadel were the only places left."
While many are disappointed, others said the change was necessary because times are changing and the Supreme Court spoke. "We're going to make it the best coeducational military school in the country, and I am fully confident of that," said Citadel graduate Matt Pantsari.
But some say making The Citadel coed means taking away everything the school stood for and destroying 153 years of tradition. "We had a good thing here, but we could tell it was going to come to an end," cadet Spencer Bodison said.
VMI is now the only all-male, state-supported military school in the country. Its board is trying to decide whether to open the school to women or make it private. The Supreme Court said a separate women's military program instituted by VMI at nearby Mary Baldwin College was not equal, as the academy had claimed.
Three years of controversy
The Citadel decision ends a controversy begun in 1993, when high school student Shannon Faulkner won admission to the school by deleting all reference to her gender from her school transcripts. When The Citadel found out she was female, they withdrew the admission offer, and she filed suit.
Although Faulkner won her battle to enroll as a cadet at The Citadel, she dropped out after less than a week. She said the stress of fighting for 2 1/2 years to win entry and her feelings of isolation on campus had taken a toll on her health.
Feelings of isolation may plague the institution's new female cadets. Four women met all of the qualifications to be admitted to The Citadel, but two of them have already made plans to attend other military schools this fall.
CNN affiliate WCIV and the Associated Press contributed to this report.
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