Challenged by Coeducation details the responses of women's colleges to the most recent wave of Women's colleges originated in the mid-nineteenth century as a response to women's exclusion from higher education. Women's academic successes and their persistent struggles to enter men's colleges resulted in coeducation rapidly becoming the norm, however. Still, many prestigious institutions remained single-sex, notably most of the Ivy League and all of the Seven Sisters colleges.

CONTENTSPrefacePart One: The Place of Women's Colleges in Higher EducationChapter 1: A History of Women's CollegesLeslie Miller-Bernal Part Two: Case Studies of Women's Colleges That Have Become Coeducational or ClosedChapter 2. Vassar College: A Seven Sisters College Chooses CoeducationElizabeth Daniels and Clyde GriffenChapter 3. Coeducation at Wheaton College: From Conscious Coeducation to Distinctive CoeducationAlan Sadovnik and Susan SemelChapter 4. A Catholic Women's College is Absorbed by a University: The Case of Mundelein College Prudence Moylan Chapter 5. Texas Woman's University: Threats to Institutional Autonomy and Conflict Over the Admission of MenClaire L. SahlinChapter 6. Wells College: The Transition to Coeducation BeginsLeslie Miller-Bernal Part Three: Case Studies of Women's Colleges That Have Remained Single-Sex Chapter 7. Reaffirming the Value of a Women's College: Mills College Changes Its Mind About Admitting Men UndergraduatesMarianne SheldonChapter 8. Simmons College: Meeting the Needs of Women WorkersSusan Poulson Chapter 9. Spelman College: A Place All Their OwnFrances D. Graham and Susan Poulson Chapter 10. College of Notre Dame: The Oldest Catholic Women's College Changes with the TimesDorothy Brown and Eileen O'Dea, SSNDPart Four: Case Studies of Affiliated Women's CollegesChapter 11. Rekindling a Legacy: Barnard College Remains a Women's CollegeAndrea Walton Chapter 12. Cambridge University's Two Oldest Women's Colleges, Girton and NewnhamLeslie Miller-Bernal Part Five: ConclusionsChapter 13. The State of Women's Colleges TodayLeslie Miller-Bernal and Susan PoulsonAppendix 1. Statement of Six Past Presidents of Formerly Women's Colleges, 2000: "Exceptional Coed Colleges: A New Model for Gender Equality"Appendix 2. List of Women's Colleges in Spring 2005 and Some Summary Characteristics