UW Women at 150

Gloria Ladson-Billings is one of several prominent women featured on the UW Women at 150 website. School of Education

Throughout the academic year, campus celebrated the 150th anniversary of women receiving degrees from the university. The Class of 2019 gifted a statue to the university, a new giving fund called In Her Honor was established to support gender equity on campus, and the UW Women at 150 website featured stories on these UW trailblazers:

• Clara Bewick Colby 1869, a renowned suffragist who was among the first class of six women to graduate from the UW
• Signe Skott Cooper ’48, a World War II veteran and nursing pioneer at the UW
• Ada Deer ’57, a Native American activist and the UW’s first Elder-in-Residence
• Thelma Estrin ’48, MS’49, PhD ’52, a computer scientist who introduced technology to medical research
• Lorraine Hansberry x’50, the first black female playwright to have a show on Broadway (A Raisin in the Sun)
• Gloria Ladson-Billings, a UW professor emerita known for research examining racial disparities in education
• Grace Wahba, the first female faculty member in the UW Department of Statistics
• Mabel Watson Raimey 1918, believed to be the first black woman to graduate from the UW and the first to practice law in Wisconsin

Published in the Summer 2019 issue