Child Care:

A Low Priority

Abruptly cancelled were hearings scheduled for the Child Care Act of 1979, S.4. Senator Alan Cranston of California, chief sponsor of the bill that would have provided assistance and coordination for child care for children living in homes with working parents, stated that the Carter administration had withheld support even though Vice President Mondale had been a leading advocate for child care when he was in the Senate; that divisions continued to separate the groups supporting the bill and that "the mood of the 96th Congress and of the American public in general is very negative toward proposals for new Federal programs at this time regardless of social need and cost effectiveness."

This action is still more evidence of the callousness with which those without power can be treated-in this case working women with small children. Women marching on August 26, 1970 for equality listed five issues: child care, right to abortion, the ERA, and the end of discrimination in education and employment. As we approach 1980, not one of these has been secured.

In dropping his bill Cranston said, "The bill 1 introduced was a modest effort to make a beginning to cope with the problems of millions of American children....The factors that make child-care programs so very pressing today will continue to grow in the years ahead....I intend to continue to work closely with people and groups deeply concerned about

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the effects of juvenile delinquency, vandalism, welfare dependency, and child abuse, and about helping American families in search of adequate day care for their children".

The Woman Activist March 1979

NATIONAL NEWS

Uncle Sam "Lowers" Standards for Women

As the number of eligible young men in the U.S. aged 17-21 declines, the new all-volunteer Army counted on filling its ranks with young women. It hasn't worked out that way.

The Army announced last month that it had attracted only 72 percent of the expected number of women recruits, and that it was 2400 women short of its 1979 quota.

The resulting shortfall was apparently the result of the Army's special admission standards, which were higher for women than for men. Male recruits had only to score 19 points out of 100, and they did not need to be high school graduates. Female recruits, however, had to score at least 50 on the test, and needed high school diplomas. A number of women have brought a class action suit against the Army, charging it with discriminatory admissions standards.

On April 9 the Army announced it was lowering its female admissions standards in an attempt to attract more women. Tô get into the Army women can now score as low as 31 on the admissions test, although they must still be high school graduates.

Over the same period the Army also failed to attract all the male recruits it wanted, reaching only 94 percent of its quota.

-The Guardian April 18, 1979

Daly Harassment

(Her Say)-Mary Daly, a well-known feminist author and a professor at Boston College, is charging that the college administration is harassing her by having a representative sit in and monitor her classes. The situation began when a male student complained that he was "brashly" informed that he "was not desired" when he attempted to attend an all-female class in "Feminist Ethics." Daly says the man was requested to leave the class, but not in a hostile man-

ner.

In an interview with the student newspaper, Daly said, "It's been my experience that any men who are understanding at all of a woman's desire to have an all-women class would understand and consent to leave after a reasonable explanation.”

As a result of the incident, Boston College is “conducting a thorough investigation" of the way Daly conducts her classes. Daly has charged that the investigation is a crusade to get rid of her, because she has "challenged their god [Boston College is a Catholic institution], and their whole system."

Women in Concert

(Her Say)-The New England Women's Symphony has a policy of featuring at least three different conductors with each performance so that women conductors can have a chance to try their hands at conducting. According to the Symphony's conductor, Kay Gardner, the orchestra also exists to present music that has been composed by women.

Gardner says that at each Women's Symphony concert, there is one work by a woman from the past whose music has been discovered by the Symphony's research committee; one work by an unknown contemporary woman composer; and one work by an established contemporary woman composer.

The Symphony began with an ad placed in Sojourner, a women's paper, by Gardner in 1978. The orchestra now consists of 35 dedicated musicians.

Radiation Vacation

(Her Say)-It was hard times all around last week for pregnant women employed at the Three Mile Island nuclear generating plant in Pennsylvania. At least two plant workers stayed off the job after the state Governor strongly suggested pregnant women stay out of the vicinity of the crippled nuclear reactor. Now the plant's owners are saying those women are indeed excused from work, but the missed days will either have to come off their vacation time or out of their pay checks.

Test Tube Baby Clinic

(Her Say) The nation's first test tube clinic, scheduled to open in January in Norfolk, Virginia, already has a waiting list of 500 women. According to Dr. Patrick Steptoe, one of the two scientists in the world's first test tube baby case, a woman must be married, have blocked fallopian tubes, a healthy husband and a healthy uterus to be considered for admission to the non-profit clinic. Steptoe declined to say how much money the clinic needs or where the start-up funds have come from because of the "controversial nature of the procedure".

No Fun in the Sun

(Her Say)-The tourist and convention business in Florida is not happy over Florida's recent refusal to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. Warren Erickson, Executive Director of the Miami Convention Bureau, says that Miami Beach alone lost $11.5 million last year because of the state's failure to ratify the amendment. Erickson calls the boycott of Florida by more than 200 organizations who normally would have held their conventions there "a delightful little bit of blackmail".

BITS& PIECES

Mute on Mutilation

(Her Say)-The World Health Organization has released a report charging the U.S. Agency for International Development (AID) in Africa and the Mideast with carrying on "a conspiracy of silence" about the common practice of infibulation on women in Third World countries. Infibulation is a 2000-year-old surgical procedure in which the external genitals and clitorises of young girls are removed and their vaginas sewn shut. It is allegedly performed to guarantee chastity and virginity.

Fran Hosken, a special adviser to WHO, reports that five years of extensive research has shown that at least 30 million women in 29 African and Middle Eastern countries have been subjected to infibulation. Further, these operations are rapidly increasing due to population growth in Africa, although they often result in infertility and childbirth problems.

Hosken charges that both AID and the International Planned Parenthood Federation, in collaboration with African governments, are keeping African people ignorant about the biological facts of reproduction and denying them proper health care. Hosken quotes AID as claiming that infibulation is "a cultural practice in which the Agency cannot interfere". She is calling on AID to use some of its

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multi-million dollar budget to establish programs in Africa and the Mideast which will provide women with basic health and reproductive knowledge.

May, 1979/What She Wants/Page 5