Women in Extension Management

Women managers and administrators are becoming more common throughout the Cooperative Extension System. A 1989 survey of the states and territories revealed 879 women working as managers or administrators at the county, district, and state levels. This represents about 25% of the managers and administrators throughout the Cooperative Extension System.

In the Spring of 1989, a questionnaire was mailed to all directors of Cooperative Extension in states and territories asking them to report the year women were first appointed to county, district, and state level administrative or management positions in their state. They were also asked what proportion of the positions were then held by women. Fifty-two states and territories responded.

States used their own definition of administrative and management positions at the state level. Two types of state level positions - home economics program leaders and any administrative or management positions other than home economics - were specified in the questionnaire. The district director position was defined as responsible for personnel, budget, etc, thus eliminating some early district program leader positions.

The first women in Extension management were providing statewide program leadership for home economics. The first was Martha Van Rensselaer appointed in New York in 1900. As more states formed Extension Services and organized home economics programs, women rapidly joined her in similar positions across the country. Between 1910 and 1919, 28 states appointed their first women home economics Extension administrators. Figure 1 shows the decades of the first appointments of women to statewide program leadership for home economics.

Appointments of women to management positions outside of the home economics program was delayed 50 to 71 years in 57% of the states. There were isolated incidents of women appointed to district or state level management positions outside of home economics as early as 1915, but few women were appointed to management positions outside of home economics in the early years.

The first woman was appointed to a county management position in 1959 in Louisiana. Seven other states appointed women in county management positions between 1959 and 1969. Thirty-four states and territories made their first appointment of a woman to a county management position during the '70s; six in the '80s. In early 1989, 24% (669) of the county management positions were filled by women. Figure 1 shows the decades in which states made their first appointments of women to county management positions.

The pattern for women in district management positions was similar. The first woman was appointed to a district management position in Texas in 1916. Five other states appointed women to district positions before the '70s as shown in Figure 2. Fifteen states made such appointments in the '70s, and 18 states followed in the '80s. By 1989, 39 states had appointed women to district management positions. Sixty-eight women held district management positions in the Spring of 1989, 27% of the district management positions nationwide.

Appointments of women to state level administrative and management positions outside of the home economics program area were slow in appearing across the country as shown in Figure 2. Although the first woman was appointed in Michigan in 1915, six states hadn't had a woman in such a position by the Spring of 1989. Twelve states made appointments of women to state level management positions before 1970. During the '70s, 13 such appointments were made and in the '80s, 19 were made.

There were 147 women in administrative or management positions at the state level in Spring 1989. This number includes women in home economics and non-home economics administrative and management positions. At the time, women held 28% of the state level administrative/management positions.

Seven women held state director positions across the country and one was an acting director in 1989. The first woman appointed to a director position was Agnes Arthaud-appointed interim director in Nebraska in July 1975. Constance McKenna followed as director in Nevada in 1976. All women appointed to director positions since 1978 still held those positions in Spring 1989 when 15% of state directors were women. The first woman administrator, at the federal level, was Mary Nell Greenwood, who was administrator from 1979 to 1986.1

Of the 31 states and territories reporting both county and district management positions, 26 (84%) reported having women in county positions from zero to 23 years before the first woman in a district position. Nine (32%) reported having a woman in a county management position 10 or more years before having a woman in a district position. Appointments of women at the lower organizational level before the middle management level provide opportunities for women to gain experience in management before moving up in the organization.

Seventeen (47%) of the 36 states and territories reporting women in management positions at the district and state level appointed the women to state level positions from 68 years to one year before appointing a woman to a district position. Disregarding the seven states that first appointed women to state level management positions 25 or more years before the district positions, 10 states of 29 (34%) appointed women to state management positions before district positions, six (21%) appointed women at both levels the same year, and 13 (45%) appointed women to district positions before state management positions.

Of the 39 states with women in management positions at both the county and state level, 21 (54%) appointed women at the county level first, two (5%) made appointments at both levels the same year, and 16 (41%) appointed women to state level management positions before county management positions. Disregarding the eight states that appointed a woman to a state management position 21 or more years before a county management position, 10 (30%) of 33 states/territories appointed women to state level management positions before county. Twenty-one (64%) appointed women to county-level management positions before state management positions.

Thirty (58%) of the 52 states and territories had no women in administrative/management positions outside of the home economics program area at any level in the organization before 1972. In the five-year period 1972 through 1976, 22 states appointed the first woman to a non-home economics administrative or management position at some level of organization. During the '70s, 27 states or territories (52%) appointed the first woman to a non-home economics administrative or management position. Six additional states/territories made such an appointment during the '80s.

Figure 1. First female home economics program leader and county director/chair.

Figure 2. First female district director and state level manager (not home economics).

The history of appointments of women to administrative and management positions in Cooperative Extension follows closely what was happening in society in general. Before World War I, few women were involved in management positions. During the war, women moved into positions previously held by men, but after the war, the majority of women returned to homemaking or jobs considered appropriate for women. During those early years, the primary Extension management role for women was that of managing programs staffed largely by women, namely, home economics. That pattern continued for many years.

Although Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act made changes in hiring practices in other organizations, educational organizations were exempted. When Congress passed Title IX of the Education Amendments of 1972, the laws applied to educational organizations.2

The most dramatic changes in women's roles in administering Cooperative Extension came during the decade of the '70s when states and territories began hiring women in all levels of management positions. Before the '70s, only eight states had appointed women to county management positions, six had appointed women as district directors, and 12 had appointed women to state level administrative or management positions other than home economics. During the '70s, 34 states first appointed women to county director/chair positions, 12 first had women district directors, and 13 first had women in state level non-home economics management positions. By Spring of 1989, all states and territories with county and district management positions had appointed women in those roles. Although considerable change in state level administrative/management positions occurred in the '70s and continued in the '80s, some states hadn't placed a woman in such a position through early 1989.

Change has occurred in Cooperative Extension. The future holds opportunity for Extension faculty, men or women, interested in administrative or management positions at all levels of the organization.

1. Wayne D. Rasmussen, Taking the University to the People: Seventy-Five Years of Cooperative Extension (Ames: Iowa State University Press, 1989).

2. Sandra Stencel, "Women in the Workplace," in The Women's Movement: Achievements and Effects, Hoyt Gimlin, ed. (Washington, D.C.: Congressional Quarterly, Inc., 1977).