9/15/2011:
On this date in 1968, as fall settled in and students returned to school, the school board in Garrison had already faced some serious issues, with money woes a major component of a recent school board meeting. Along with raising the dollar amount given to the advisor of the school’s annual from $50 to $100, due to the time involved, the school board authorized the purchase of a dishwasher for the school hot lunch program, authorized the payment of room and board for an acting superintendent, and $2000 for library books.
But the big news was a change that, according to newspapers, would bring equality of the sexes to the school district. It seemed that boys from the junior and senior high schools were allowed a one-day excused absence to go hunting in the fall. The girls weren’t allowed the same…until the board established a new policy, allowing one day of personal leave each school year for girls and boys alike in seventh through twelfth grades.
The McLean County Independent wrote: “long denied equal rights in voting and in job opportunities, the fair sex scored a triumph Tuesday night at the Garrison school board meeting … even in the absence of any demonstration!”
High school principal Gary Shipley is the man who asked for the change, specifying that the day of absence only be allowed if written parental permission was received, and only if the student was accompanied by a parent during the leave.
To put this “triumph” into perspective—the girls were given this “equal opportunity” approximately 48 years after women around the country were granted with the right to vote through the 19th amendment. It was also four years after Congress passed a civil rights act in 1964, forbidding discrimination on the basis of sex, as well as race, in hiring, promoting, and firing.
Dakota Datebook written by Sarah Walker
Sources:
http://www.archives.gov/education/lessons/civil-rights-act/
The Fargo Forum, September 13, 1968
McLean County Independent, Thursday, September 12, 1968