As young, beautiful, intelligent and ambitious females, it should be our goal to embrace our gender and all its characteristics. We’ve lived through discrimination and won our rights to be on an equal playing field as men. Aside from fighting for our rights as women, we also have the potential to experience, perhaps, the body’s most beautiful process: pregnancy. As women, we have the capability to carry and give life. In many societies, pregnancy is an honor, but for a recent UC Davis Veterinary student, this honor turned into public humiliation.
UC Davis officials recently closed the investigation of a gender discrimination case which occurred last winter in January between a professor and a pregnant veterinary student. Professor Edward Feldman, chair of the Department of Medicine & Epidemiology at the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine was fired after he allegedly sent out an email asking the class to poll their opinion on the pregnant student’s final grade.
The female student missed class to give birth and contacted the professor saying that she would be out for an unknown period of time.
Now, as college students we all know that time out of class means missed work, quizzes, papers, and possibly midterms. We pick and choose the right circumstances and hope that it never comes to anything grandiose. Colleges make it their duty to provide clear guidelines for excusable absences. Now for the majority of people, the birth of a child is a legitimate excuse for missing class. However, for professor Feldman the choice was not so clear.
The original email that was sent to students from Feldman was as followed;
“One of our classmates recently gave birth and will be out of class for an unknown period of time. This means she will undoubtedly miss one, or more, or all quizzes in VMD 444. Dr. Feldman is not sure how to handle this and has requested the class give input and vote.” Shocking right? Well the professor didn’t just leave it at that. He created a poll to finalize the students grade.
The poll consisted of six options for students to assess the potential grade that the student should receive ranging from an “A”, “B”, “C” grade, or graded as everyone else, and lastly to just give the student one test to assess her knowledge of the class.
Students were then told that after they had sent in their response the professor would get back to them shortly.
Luckily the matter was brought to the attention of the administration. The response from administration on the matter shed light on the fact that UC Davis is a school that prides themselves in helping pregnant students catch up on school work and that they even offered an extended leave.
“I take very seriously any allegations that a student’s welfare, dignity or academic rights have in any way been compromised. And as a woman, who has experienced first hand the challenges of melding academic and family life and has experienced discrimination, I am especially sensitive to this issue,” said Chancellor Katehi.
The privilege of a UC education and raising a family is one that Davis has proven can occur simultaneously. Juggling academic life and social life is part of the process of growing and learning. Here at UC Davis and everywhere this incident proved that woman shouldn’t have to chose between the two.
The investigation ended with the firing of professor Feldman. But the message and aftermath of this humiliation and odd circumstance still remains. It is important to always stick up for yourself and to never let discrimination stop you. Especially in academia where woman are constantly compared to men. As females we have the power and responsibility to prove ourselves in and outside of the classroom.