The board of trustees has a gender problem- mainly that women are greatly underrepresented.
Women are 53 percent of the total UW student population according to the fall 2014 enrollment summary, yet make up only 17 percent of the board of trustees, the university’s governing body.
What is most disappointing is that the board continues to be dominated by older white Republican men, even after a petition from Staff Senate, news coverage and the Governor himself saying that gender diversity is an issue.
The two women currently serving on the board are well qualified and have worked hard to get their positions. Gov. Mead appointed one woman out of the five open seats, but that brings the number of women on the board back to the same level it was before the new appointments. Women are a minority even though among UW students and university students nationally women make up a majority. It is the board’s job to represent the university to the rest of the state and to keep track of current educational trends, but what message is being transmitted if women are earning more degrees than men and yet are left out of the decision making process?
This problem is not unique to the board of trustees, but evidence of a larger trend, where women–and specifically women’s voices in government–are greatly underrepresented. Wyoming may be the equality state, but has one of the largest wage gaps in the country. Women are the minority in both our state and national government. Wyoming has elected a woman as governor, but electing a woman as president has still yet to happen. The small number of women on the board of trustees is disappointing after the promising possibility of greater representation, but sadly keeps with the trend where men still make the majority of formal public decisions in our state and in the rest of the country.
There was promise of greater representation with this last round of appointments, too bad it has still yet to happen.
