What kind of education did women have in World War 2?

Question

Like were they allowed into universities or was there limited education?

Answer 1

My mother and all of her sisters graduated from high school. Several of them were quite capable of going on to higher education but the norm was for a woman to get married and have a family.

The ceiling was more of a case of societal expectations that it was one of an absolute societal limitation.

Love and blessings Don

Answer 2

Bilbo gives some very frustrating answers at times, I know what he means but I wouldn't expect you to know the films he refers to. Rationing was still in, so everything was in short supply, until the mid 50s. Rationing only being stopped in late 1953. Because manufacturing had been put over to the war effort, most goods were still 'make do and mend', taxes were high (to pay for the War) so even people on good wages had little spare money. The Women who had worked in the factories during the War all gave up their jobs for the Men 'returning from the front'. Women when they got married stopped working to become housewives. My Mum finished her (well paid) job at LNER (London North Eastern Railways) in the Accounts Dept. This would then go to either a youngster leaving School or a Man (who would be paid more as it was expected that he had a wife to support) or and un-married Woman. The winter of 1947 was like last years, except the Country wa on the verge of bankruptcy, there was no Central heating, there were no gritters for the Roads and if you didn't go into work you didn't get paid. It came in the end of January and stayed till the end of March. Oh there was no TV, so you listened to the 'Wireless' 6.45pm 'The BBC Home service' was a popular one with kids 'Dick Barton, Special Agent' It was on at that time so that the under 10s could listen to it before they went to bed at 7.00pm. Actually most 8 to 10 year olds went to bed at 8, but it was only Holidays and weekends that under 11s would be allowed to stay up late 9.00pm and after. Most Children would walk to school, a few would 'catch the bus'. Few had cars, and you certainly wouldn't be taken to School or picked up. You would walk in groups of kids. Mums would take their Children up to the age of about 8, after that you would make your own way to School and home. No matter how far it was? And Armourer should read the Question. No I have no idea what the Comet had to do with Family life ?

Answer 3

I can address my mother's US education, 12 years, OH, equivalent to at least today's community college 2 year degree, or most of an undergrad degree.

Yes, women attended university although most didn't have the money to earn their own way. A relative most likely paid for books and tuition, provided food, clothing & shelter. Consumer loans and credit that we have today did not exist.

On another end of the spectrum may have been small local one-room rural schools across the nation where education may have been completed in 8 or 10 years at which point a graduate may have been the school's next teacher. From old photos I've looked at it appears that boys most often got less education, that is, were under-represented as they got older, in those old photos: went to work or enlisted?

Answer 4

If you will check your local paper's obituaries, you will find numerous instances of women who obtained a university education during World War II, although many of them didn't work outside the home during the 1950s. In the United Kingdom, former Prime Minister Margaret Roberts Thatcher entered Somerville College in 1944, majoring in chemistry. In the United States, retired Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O'Connor graduated from college shortly after World War II (in 1950).

Since those women (who didn't join the military), didn't have any kind of GI Bill, such as returning American GI's enjoyed, they didn't graduate from college after the War in as large a number as their male counterparts did, so graduating from college--except in a few very determined instances--was still very much dependent on their family's social class.

Perhaps more typical of that era's college graduate than the two examples cited above, my mother attended a private denominational university (Baylor University in Texas) from 1942 to 1946--a time when many colleges in the United States would have shut down if not for the female enrollment. She earned a BBA in business and education, but married three months after graduation, having met my dad went he returned from the European theater earlier that year. Mother taught business education at the high school level or 6th grade or else worked as a legal secretary for five and a half years until I was born and didn't go back to work until 1976--this time as a business education teacher at a local community college.

Many of her long-time friends didn't attend college, however, at least until their children were finished with their high school education. One close friend upon graduation from high school, for example, moved from Oklahoma to California to work at a defense plant.

Answer 5

Women were allowed to go to Universities if there family payed for it. Most families couldn't affored for even their sons to go to school. The Great Deppression had most of the world in its gripps. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Depression

The focus was to survive and education just was not that emportant. Most children Boys and Girls didn't even attend Grade School or High School they were needed to work to make enough money for the family to survive. Most men who joined the army did so becaouse it ment a study income for their families at home.

Answer 6

There were women that attended universities, but I don't think it was very common, most families couldn't afford to send their children to college.

Answer 7

"In the WW2, women's are only allowed until high school, they don't go into a university, that's the policy, often they get married, and be the house wife"

Answer 8

America had largely abandoned the notion that women should be barred from higher education by the 1930's although they were encouraged to direct their energies to the social sciences & humanities - - - still the number of women obtaining an education for the goal of becoming a doctor or lawyer or even rarer an architect or an engineer grew by leaps & bounds and was spurred by the outbreak of World War.
As Men went off to fight wars women were needed more than ever on the home front to fulfill traditional roles. There were still barriers to be certain, then and even now women were discouraged from the 'hard sciences' and many expected them to set their education aside and settle down and become a bride and mother. Still the number of women entering the ranks of professionals - - - especially in medicine and pschyratry and education - - - grew by at the least twenty percent during the war years.

Here are a few links etc - - - but once again, yes women were seeking higher education at accelerated rates during the 1940;s..
http://www.lib.ksu.edu/depts/spec/women/rice-ada02.html
""""Shortly after our reunion in 1935, I left for southern California, barely escaping the washouts caused by our 'commencement floods.' My haste was due, however, to a professional engagement for I had to stop at El Paso, Texas, to install a Quill Club chapter at The Texas School of Mines and had to be at the latter place on May 31, or no installation. I spent the next two months visiting and loafing in Los Angeles and vicinity where I met about one hundred and fifty of my former students and friends. One of the high points of my stay was a trip to the Sequoia forest given me by my good friends, Mr. and Mrs. Frank Manny. Another, was the privilege of being a delegate to the National Convention of the American Association of University Women, held at the Ambassador Hotel, Los Angeles. My return trip brought me to Berkeley where I visited relatives and where I also met at a tea given in my honor, thirty more KSC former students. ""

http://www.cs.yale.edu/homes/tap/past-women-cs.html
"""During World War II, a large number of female mathematicians were employed as "computers" to perform calculations necessary to create firing and bombing tables. Alice Burks was one of 75 female "computers" working at the University of Pennsylvania's Moore School of Engineering. Eventually, the need to perform the calculations more rapidly led to the development of the ENIAC, the world's first electronic digital computer.""

http://www.cs.yale.edu/homes/tap/past-women-cs.html
""Margaret R. Fox
"Fox graduated from Wisconsin State College in 1940. She joined the U.S. Naval Reserve in 1943 and was stationed at the Naval Research Station in Washington. She continued to work there as an electronics engineer in radar after her discharge in 1946. In 1951 she joined the National Bureau of Standards as a member of the technical staff of the Electronic Computer Laboratory. Later, she joined the Research Information Center and Advisory Service on Information Processing (RICASIP) where she was involved in producing reviews and bibliographies. From 1966 to 1975 Fox was chief of the Office of Computer Information in the NBS Institute for Computer Science and Technology.
Fox was involved in several professional groups, especially the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM), and the American Federation for Information Processing Societies (AFIPS). She was the first secretary of AFIPS."


Peace

Answer 9

The same as they do now, get in the kitchen shut up and cook me something. Ask around, no guy wants a smart chick.

Answer 10

women of that era stayed home and did the chores. the usually didn't speak unless they were spoken to and they had very good manners. ohhhhh the good old days.