What is your NMU connection?
NMU grad, January 1970, with a BS in Art Education
Who is the most influential person you met during your time at NMU and why were they so influential?
During my senior year in high school, I had space in my class schedule for one elective in any area of study. While signing up for classes at the end of my junior year in 1964, I decided that I'd like to learn drafting. I told my advisor this, but he said I'd have to ask the drafting teacher for permission, since I was a girl. So I had to venture down the hallway of the school's Industrial Arts wing -- a place that few, if any, female feet had ever trod. When I told the teacher that I wanted to take drafting, he took a moment or two to think about it, and then said, "Well, I don't think so, because there wouldn't be enough girls who'd want to take that class," implying that the only way he could envision himself teaching me drafting would be in an all-girls class. He didn't explain why it would be unacceptable for a girl to be in a class with boys -- after all, every other academic class was co-ed, and we certainly wouldn't be unclothed at our drafting boards. However, I meekly accepted his ruling and didn't challenge it.
Entering Northern Michigan University in the fall of 1965, I once again considered enrolling in a drafting class, but the
introductory class had a pre-requisite of high school drafting experience. So that left me out again. By sophomore year,
however, the university had revised its whole curriculum and implemented the "Four-Course Plan." At that point, the
drafting pre-requisite was eliminated.
I began drafting classes and eventually took 5 classes (20 credit hours) to complete a minor in drafting to complement my major in art. Four of those classes were taught by the same professor, Mr. John Millard, who I consider one of my favorite instructors. In each class of 25 students, I was the only female. Mr. Millard could have looked at my presence there in a variety of ways. He might have thought personally that a girl (woman?) had no place in this subject area, and given me a hard time. Or he might have thought, "Isn't this cute? A girl wants to do drafting," and therefore coddled me, or expected less of me. But he did neither. Nor did he act in any objectionable, inappropriate manner toward me. He always treated me as "one of the guys" -- no differently than the other 24 male students in the class. It didn't hurt, I'm sure, that I was undeniably competent in drafting and took the class seriously. I didn't spend my time flirting with my classmates, giving the impression that I was just there to "catch a husband."
In a way, I'd personified the 1968 advertising slogan of Virginia Slims cigarettes that were marketed specifically toward
women: "You've come a long way, baby!" Thank you to an extremely effective and fair-minded instructor, Mr. John Millard, who I'll always remember with fondness and respect.