The Story of The UCLA Faculty Women's Club: Wrapping Up Essential Achievements 1918-2018

by Zorana Ercegovac

Our Fifth General Meeting held on April 17th 2018 was a great success. It was indeed celebratory. A multi-part Centennial Program included a welcome by FWC President (2017-2018) Barbara Lippe along with vote for the 2018-2019 Executive Board officers.

Zorana Ercegovac presented her Multi-Media Album honoring FWC. We heard voices of FWC members since late 1950s, saw dozens of digitized photos of FWC members and traditions, and reminiscent of historical contexts which championed human's rights, women's rights, equality, access to learning and higher education, environmental protection, Child Labor Reform, advances in communication and transportation industries, and so much more. A few pictures are given below.

Zorana Ercegovac speaks at the Fifth General Meeting
UCLA's FWC is 100 years old and one month

Next, FWC's Music Section invited Victor Shlyakhtenko, a young star pianist, who performed pieces by L. van Beethoven, F. Chopin, and his own Piano Suite. Victor generously gave his time in answering questions form the audience.

Victor performing at the Faculty Center, California Room -- every seat was taken

The Event adjourned with a traditional presentation of roses in recognition of talented Section leaders.

Section chairs honored with Bruin-colored roses

Victor was available for QA and photo taking. It was a delightful and educational meeting.

Barbara Lippe with pianist Victor Shlyakhtenko

The UCLA Faculty Women's Club celebrates our 100th year. This special post gives a very condensed timeline of the essential achievements during these hundred years.
Our story begins with California State Normal School in San francisco in 1862. The School moved to San Jose and later became known as San Jose Normal School. In 1881 Southern branch was announced of California SNS with 61 students including 13 young men. The School was renamed Los Angeles State Normal School (LASNS) in 1887 with Dr. Ernest Carroll Moore of the SJNS as Director of the newly established School.

The California State Normal School at 5th Street and Grand Ave in Los Angeles

Dr. Moore wished to transform a 2-year college into a 4-year higher education institution that was part of University of California. He had been superintendent of Schools in LA, 1906-1910. He met with Mr. Edward A. Dickson, Los Angeles Express editor and the only Regent of UC from Southern California. These preliminary discussions were put in place for the founding of today's UCLA. Among the strongest advocates in this seminal transformational process was the LASNS Faculty Women's Club (FWC), founded in 1918. The LASNS faculty women supported the need for higher education in addition to teachers' training in Southern California. Miss Mary Burney Porter asked:

"Will you not give all an equal chance by helping to transform the Los Angeles Normal School into a higher education institution?"

Dr. Moore, Miss Porter, and Miss Chilton endorsed the Women's Legislative Council of California, representing more than 80,000 women voters "interested in welfare of women and children."

A broader societal context of the late 19th c. and early 20th c.
WOMEN'S SUFFRAGE Movement

Miss Porter and about 45 faculty members created the FWC of the LASNS on the Vermont campus on March 15, 1918 overnight in order to pass a measure before the WLCC. Dr. Moore joined the meeting that day to give the Club his blessing, prophesying growth.

This Spring 2018, we celebrate our 100th birthday
HAPPY BIRTHDAY FWC

In 1919 Gov. William D. Stephenson of California signed State Assembly Bill 626 establishing the Southern Branch of UC with Dr. Moore at the helm (1919-1936), with 250 undergraduates, and 1,125 students in the Teachers Training Program.

SHOULD THE FWC CONTINUE?

The newly created Southern Branch had no scholarship programs, nor a facility for social life and networking to support the faculty. FWC saw this need and filled this gap. There were 63 women faculty, 35 male faculty, and 1,375 students to support in various ways. The FWC voted to offer membership not only to women faculty, but also to faculty wives. Venues moved from the FWC Clubhouse on the Vermont campus to UCLA's Women's Gym, to Kerckhoff Hall, and later to the Faculty Center in Westwood Village (February 1959). As one of the founding groups, FWC has a representative on the Faculty Center Board of Governors.

Fundraising galas were held for the Faculty Center in Westwood:
"Put your hearts in Your Faculty Club Building"

The raised fund for the Faculty Center building had a total of $29,525 of which UCLA FWC contributed $4,303 (with UCLA Faculty Women $2,075, and faculty administration and staff $23,147).

Our Fifth General Meeting on April 17, 2018 celebrates our Centennial Program that is detailed in the UPDATE April 2018 issue.
Details for the April General Meeting are here.
The Music Program to be performed by the young start Victor Shlyakhtenko is here.

HONORING FWC PAST will be presented on April 17, 2018 at the UCLA Faculty Center
by Zorana Ercegovac
Victor Shlyakhtenko, piano, will be playing Chopin, Liszt, and his own composition

ENTRANCE is FREE

A THREE-PRONG FWC MISSION: Facts and Figures

SPECIAL INTEREST SECTIONS (currently there are 18) -- Book Review Section was founded in 1927. Early Sections reflected interests and affinities of FWC members. See our UPDATE for current sections. Details are at SECTIONS 

The FWC Section Chairs met October 4, 2017 at the Faculty Center Library/Billiard Room
Sections represented by (from left): Rochelle Caballero (Play-reading), Sandy Spolsky (B-days),
Dianne Homsher (International Cooking),
Zorana Ercegovac (Vice-President, Sections and Music in Cultural Contexts)
Diane Childs (German), Marianne Tereszcuk (all bridge), Dorothea Frederking (German),
Phyllis Amboss (Writers), Elaine Wise (French), Mary Lou Ward (Galleries and Sites), Debby Kennel (Books)

Zorana at the piano accompanied our vocalists performing
some popular holiday carols from various origins

December 20th 2017 was our Music Section "Sing-Along" FEST: We invited, besides all music section members, those participating in Book and Play-reading sections, as well as the FWC Board along with husbands. It was a successful celebration We started off socializing over delicious potluck gathering, then we sang, even danced. The hosts were Jarka and Tom Wilcox.

Jarka Wilcox, our hostess, Zorana Ercegovac, Chair of Music Section
with Joy Frank, our Scholarship Chair

Shirley Ho, our Music Section soprano, started the music program with two Christmas carols, followed by the "Sing-Along" part of the program. Shirley will be the hostess for our February 2018 music section gathering, to be held at her home. 

SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAMS started off in 1936 with a seed contribution of $25.00 to the Scholarship Foundation. The Scholarship endowment is currently over $401,000 and growing. It has supported 201 UCLA students from 2001 to 2018 with a total of $364,600. We celebrate FWC recipients annually at the FWC Scholarship dinner award events. 

The Centennial 2018 Scholarship Dinner was a successful event, thanks to a team of hardworking FWC members: Joy Frank, Marjorie Friedlander, Shirley Ho, Barbara Lippe, Mary Cerrito, and Jaroslava Wilcox. 

A special thanks go to The Ho Family who generously contributed to the Scholarship Fund in memory of Shou-Nan Hsing Chang, Shirley's mother who passed away in 2017. 

The FWC Scholarship recipients included 2 at a graduate level and 10 undergraduates (photographed below). Each student gave a brief introduction about their work. It was a festive celebration of the FWC Scholarship Program and a great start of the Centennial Year.

The FWC Scholarship recipients at The Centennial Scholarship Dinner, February 2018

Our Third General Meeting, the FWC Scholarship Dinner on February 6, 2018, was well attended. The speaker was Dr. Kelsey C. Martin, the first woman dean of the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA. 

Dr. Barbara Crandall, FWC Board member, chats with Dean Martin during a pre-dinner social

Dr. Martin's career path was demonstrated in her presentation "Lessons in Leadership: Peace Corps, Memory Research, and Medical Education."

She started off majoring in English and American language and literature at Harvard University. After having served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Zaire to set up a public health program, she experience an AHA moment, which led her to the MD/PHD program at Yale University and postdoc training in neurobiology with Nobel Laureate Eric Kandel at Columbia University. She joined the UCLA faculty in 1999. 

We now turn a few years back when we welcomed Dr. Verna Porter, once our own Scholarship recipient!

Prof. Verna Porter was one of FWC's Scholarship recipients, photographed
with her mother and grandmother, all FWC members

UCLA students, 12 awarded recipients of the FWC Scholarship Programs

For details, please visit us at SCHOLARSHIP PROGRAMS

GENERAL PROGRAMS represent one of the three essential prongs of the UCLA Faculty Women's Club activities. Since 1934 we have had 473 general meetings. In 2000 Phyllis Amboss wrote dates, names of speakers, and program titles for each general meeting as published in UPDATE. In 2016, Pat Hardwick and Charlotte Brown produced "General Meeting Summaries 1920-2015," and "Historic Timelines 1918-2008."

For the FWC Centennial Year, Zorana Ercegovac has created condensed timelines: "FWC on One Sheet: Wrapping Up Essential Achievements Since 1918," and "The Story of the UCLA Faculty Women's Club: A Condensed Timeline." This serves as a reminder of our collective memory, HONORING OUR PAST. It is also a Table of Content for the April 2018 General Meeting when Zorana will expand this Timeline in her Multimedia Album Honoring FWC Through 100 Voices, Stories, and Images.

LAPD Sergeant Emada Tingirides was our October 2017 speaker 

We started off our Centennial Year with a presentation by the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) Sergeant Emada Tingirides and her husband Capt. Phil Tingirides. Sgt. Emada Tingirides is the recipient of The FWC 2017 Woman of Distinction Award. Phil (operating the projector, in the photo above) gave us historical overview of their many initiatives that are iconic in LAPD and in other nation-wide multi-agency districts.

The October 2017 General Meeting, held at the Faculty Center, was attended by Section Chairs who showcased our programs and recruited new members. 
Do you see yourself in the photo above?


Visit us often for more photos and stories. Share our story with your friends and encourage them to "follow" us on the FWC BLOG as the Centennial FWC members.

WITH A COMMITMENT TO THE FUTURE 

ALWAYS IN DIALOG WITH THE PAST