Tufts University - Jumbo Yearbook (Medford, MA)

Page 32 text:

Antonia Chayes By profession a lawyer, by vocation an urban social planner, and not inciden¬ tally, Dean of Jackson College and mother of five children, Antonia Chayes brings a totally new atmosphere to the office of the Jackson Dean. The deanship is no longer held by one or even two stern, virginal spinster types, but by five attractive, ambitious, controversial, but undeniably capable women. No longer is the sole interest of this office Jackson College and its social rules, but now, for the first time, social and academic change for the entire university community stems from the Jackson Dean. Before coming to Jackson, Mrs. Chayes used the law training she received at Yale and George Washington Universities for work in metropolitan areas. She has been admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court, the Court of Appeals of the District of Columbia, the Interstate Commerce Commission, and the Court of Military Appeals. Locally she has served as Education Coordinator, and as Director of Urban Development for Action for Boston Community De¬ velopment, the Boston poverty agency. She also has worked as a consultant for the Boston Model Cities program. Both Mrs. Chayes and her husband were on the staff of the President’s Committee on Civil Disorders. 28

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The range of career options has increased two hundred per cent in the past twenty years. In that same time the concept of a “career” has changed. No stu¬ dent today leaves school thinking he will work for the same employer for his entire lifetime. What a person does for a living is a function of what kind of a person he is. 1 ask students to look inside — candidly. Once we have a feel for what we are, there is no great mystery in finding an activity compatible with that self-concept. 27

Page 33 text:

The new dean is an academic rather than a disciplinary dean; she is also a teacher. Her interest in the city has resulted in several urban courses, and in talk of a more formalized program of urban studies for Tufts. She has taught a course on urban social planning both semesters this year; the second semester course being an elaborate simulation of the actual planning of a Model Cities program. Drawing on her past experience in the city, she has arranged extraordinary field placements for students interested in urban studies. Attempting to bring Tufts off of the Hill into the community, she has organized a program of continuing education. Under this program, beginning next fall, ma¬ ture women, many of them underprivileged, will study in special and regular courses at Tufts. Issues have seemed to form naturally around Mrs. Chayes. The new social rules for Jackson, and dormitory autonomy for the whole university incited some controversy, much of which centered around the Jackson Dean. Coeducational living began to look within the realm of possibility, particularly with the begin¬ ning of construction of an all university dormitory. Urban studies as a major, a department, or a program was discussed, often in reference to Mrs. Chayes. She is a white liberal, an innovator and a student of academic and social change. To her admirers, she seems charming and exhilarating. To her critics, and she has some among both the students and the faculty, she seems ruthless and aggressive. She is one of “the beautiful people,” one of the “Kennedy People.” To many people, she is the most exciting administrator at Tufts today. 29