Cash Back
MHC Fellowships Help Fund Alumnae Dreams
By Susan Bushey '96
How many people can get money back from their alma maters? Mount Holyoke alumnae can.
The Alumnae Association and the college both fund fellowships annually, awarding nearly $50,000--this year the total was $47,425--to chosen alumnae. Some ninety to 130 apply for the thirteen to twenty awards given in a typical year, a low percentage of the 30,000-alumnae body.
Of the seven awards available, one--the Mary E. Woolley--is supported by the Alumnae Association's Founder's Fund and it is the largest, $7,500. The other awards average $1,500 per recipient.
Past fellowship recipients have used the funds to continue their education, teach in other countries, study women's education, and write a book, to name just a few. Alumnae from any class may apply, and the requirements are not stringent about what will be funded or how the money will be used. The only thing that these diverse recipients have in common is their ultimate goal--to pursue a dream.
Following, we highlight how four women have chosen to be lifelong learners with the financial help of the association and the college. If you'd like to join them, see the How to Apply section.
Wide Open Spaces
Dolores Hayden (below) couldn't have studied abroad without the Bardwell Memorial Fellowship she received in 1966.
"I was still an MHC student at the time and applied to go to Cambridge for a year to study English literature, especially twentieth-century poetry. I do not remember the size of the award, but it certainly would not have been possible for me to attend without it," she recalled recently.
Hayden says the experience in England allowed her to focus her energy on deciding what the future held. "As a double major in English and art at MHC, I was very confused about what I wanted to do next. This year at Cambridge gave me the broad perspective I needed to think through my goals and options."
"At that time, there was not much mentoring for women who wanted to continue to graduate school. Cambridge had not yet admitted very substantial numbers of women as undergraduates or graduates [although] great changes for women in universities in England and the United States were to come in the next few years," she says.
Because scholarships for women were not as prevalent as for men, Hayden is thankful she had Mount Holyoke on which to rely. Although she didn't end up a literary critic, she has continued her love of poetry. After the year at Cambridge University, she returned to study architecture at Harvard and now teaches architecture and American studies at Yale.
"I did become a scholar, researching the history and design of American space," she says; her published books include Building Suburbia (2003), A Field Guide to Sprawl (2004), and a poetry collection, American Yard (2004).
Time To Herself
Fellowship availability was the "main course" at dinner discussions many a night during Catherine Allgor's senior year.
"I heard about it through the grapevine, applied, and got it," she says of the Mary E. Woolley Fellowship. "I was lucky." Allgor (right) says the award allowed her to spend quality time recuperating from undergraduate work at Mount Holyoke and preparing for rigorous graduate work at Yale.
"I had a very specific use for the money. I was an older student É and was going right from graduation to grad school, and I used the [fellowship] so I didn't have to work for money that summer. It was important because I was getting ready to do a hard thing that I didn't even know I could do: grad school.
"It allowed me to prepare for that year and gave me time to do the reading that I assumed my fellow students would be doing, too," Allgor says, calling the summer a Virginia Woolf-style "Room of One's Own" experience.
"I was exhausted after senior year and I needed time to recover and read ... Now that I am a professor, I know there is burnout in school. Students work so hard to get into graduate school," thinking the race ends with graduation and then they see there is still another race to go, she explains. "It was important for me to have that money."
Grateful for the support she received, Allgor encourages others to help fund future fellowships. "This is a way you can directly change someone's life, and I think that's very powerful," says Allgor, who is a full professor of history at the University of California at Riverside, where she specializes in early American history, women, gender, and politics. Her latest book is A Perfect Union: Dolley Madison and the Creation of the American Nation (2006).
Doctoral Degree
Lee Tidball (left) not only received a fellowship--the Mary E. Woolley in 1958--she also went on to run the Alumnae Association's committee on fellowships from 1966 to 1968.
Tidball originally learned about the awards from the Alumnae Quarterly. She was looking for funding to complete her doctorate in physiology, and the fellowship helped her realize that dream.
"The Mary E. Woolley Fellowship certainly eased our financial situation. It was great that MHC had a fellowship for which I could qualify, especially since there were so few places--perhaps none other--where a fellowship existed that was not tied to some particulars that did not describe my situation," she wrote this summer from Michigan, where she founded and still supports Summer Seminars for Women. The event is a residential conference on the shores of Lake Michigan; this year marked the program's twentieth anniversary.
"I am proud to have held an MHC fellowship. I think I am the only alumna who has served on the Alumnae Association board, the college's Board of Trustees, received the alumnae Medal of Honor, received an honorary L.H.D. from the college, and received the Mary E. Woolley Fellowship, which surely makes me feel connected to my alma mater!" says the researcher. Her work concerns the institutional characteristics associated with women students' subsequent accomplishment.
Tidball, codirector of The Tidball Center for the Study of Educational Environments at Hood College and professor emeritus of physiology at George Washington University, can't say enough about the importance of funding these fellowships, especially having been in the seat responsible for the fundraising efforts! "Give to the Founder's Fund, from which the Alumnae Association can then fund such projects as the Mary E. Woolley [Fellowship]," she urges.
Starting A Career
She did the job no one else dared complete: she inventoried the college's architectural records. To help cover living expenses during this time, Jen Gieseking (right) applied for and received the 1905 Fellowship.
Her work seemed tedious, which was probably the reason no one else had tackled it--ever. Located in seven-foot-high cabinets in the Facilities Management offices, the records numbered 35,000. Gieseking knew about the fellowships because a friend had received one, and was also tipped off to their existence by those in Archives and Special Collections.
Gieseking says there was no other fellowship available for her research topic, so the MHC one was essential. "There is one other fellowship available close to my topic of interest, but recipients must focus solely on the successes of women architects. Since Mount Holyoke has only hired one female interior designer/architect in its recorded history, funding was impossible from that organization," she explains.
But the lack of resources could never trump her desire to study the space at a women's college--in particular, her own. "The space of the campus is important not only in regards to what it means to each alumna, but to the outside world, in that it is the first, continuing space of women's higher education in the world. Many other women's educational institutions have been modeled after us. What do these spaces say about women and what do they offer us? I find that very compelling," she says.
"It is incredibly important to be able to call on my MHC family for funding," Gieseking says. "It not only speaks to promoting our own projects and value [as a women's college], but to supporting the worth of the college, in my case especially.
"Fellowships are essential in academic life, and proving that you can secure funding for your research proves you are a valuable resource for any educational institution," she adds. "The 1905 Fellowship has opened doors for me to the next level of funding necessary for my dissertation and academic teaching positions."
Susan Bushey is public relations manager at Regis College in Weston, Mass., and lives in Worcester with her fiancée.
Alumnae Association- and College-Sponsored Fellowships
Mary E. Woolley Fellowship
A keystone award given annually by the Alumnae Association. Awarded without limitation as to year of graduation, field of work, or place of study.
Bardwell Memorial Fellowship
Awarded to a graduate of not more than five years' standing; without limitation as to field of work or place of study.
The 1905 Fellowship
Awarded without limitation as to year of graduation, field of work, or place of study.
Frances Mary Hazen Fellowship
Awarded, preferably, to a candidate in the field of classics.
Dr. Mary P. Dole Medical Fellowship
Awarded for graduate study or research to alumnae, preferably those who hold a doctor of medicine degree.
Rachel Brown Fellowship
Awarded for an initial year of graduate study, in the physical or biological sciences, to graduates who majored in these fields.
Hannum-Warner Travel Fellowship
Awarded annually for travel and study, preferably in Asia (though the West is not excluded).
How To Apply
For more information about and application forms for the fellowships above, visit http://www.alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/programs/lifelong/fellow/index.php. To have information mailed to you, call Carrie Purcell at 413-538-2188. The next application deadline for these fellowships is February 14, 2008.
Mount Holyoke Department-Sponsored Fellowships
In addition, several fellowships funded by college departments accept applications from alumnae. For details, visit alumnae.mtholyoke.edu/go/deptfellowships or call 413-538-2301 to have a printed list mailed to you. Application deadlines for these fellowships vary.
Photo credits: illustration: Jim Bliss; Allgor: Franz Moeller; Tidball: Rob Weir; Gieseking: Paul Schnaittacher
