Academic Affairs. Dean, College Of Liberal Arts And Sciences. Women’s, Gender & Sexuality Studies Program (University Of Maine) Records

In the fall of 1975 three UMaine faculty members, Ann Acheson, Jan Kulberg, and Jane Pease, taught the first women’s studies class, “Women in Society”, “an interdisciplinary analysis of women’s roles from an anthropological, sociological, psychological, and historical perspective.” Other courses would follow, but while they counted for credit those who taught the classes were not paid. Similarly to the Women in the Curriculum program (WIC) the push for a women’s studies program (the Interdisciplinary approach to studying women and the social construction of gender) evolved from work spearheaded by Dr. JoAnn Fritsche, Director of Equal Opportunity in developing strategies for the inclusion of women's experiences and perspectives in the educational process. After initially focusing on curriculum development Fritsche moved on to creating a women’s studies program. Fritsche established the Women's Development Program which in addition to curriculum work on campus also formed community projects to meet the needs of local women.

In 1981, with financial support from President Silverman, Fritsche established a committee looking at gender inequity on campus. This work led to the eventual founding of the Women in the Curriculum (WIC) program which by 1986 was institutionalized and fully supported by UMaine. The WIC established a planning committee for women’s studies.

1986 was also the first year the Maryann Hartman Award was given by WIC. The award is given in honor of Hartman who joined UMaine in 1969 and was a faculty member in Speech Communications. The award honors "the spirit, achievement, and zest for life that Hartman epitomized. They recognize distinguished Maine women and their accomplishments in the arts, politics, business, education and community service." Starting in 1995 the award was jointly issued by the WIC and Women's Program (now known as Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program), but since WIC was discontinued it is now given annually by the Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program.

In 1988, Evelyn Newlyn was hired by UMaine to create a Women’s Studies program (WST). Newlyn would establish a committee to assist in the development of the program. In 1988-1989 an introduction to women's studies course was offered for the first time with further courses to follow.

In 1989, a WST concentration was approved with the goals to "teach and learn about all women’s experiences, past and present, make women visible in their similarities and differences; value personal experience as a way of knowing, create new knowledge about women and apply it to personal, political, and institutional change,…and empower women by increasing choices in all women’s lives.”

In 1991, University of Maine Mathematics Professor Dr. Ann Schonberger, one of the founders of the Women's Study Program was appointed the Director of the Women’s Studies Program, a title she held until she retired in 2013.

WST would also be instrumental in the establishment of UMaine’s Women's Resource Center in 1992 (which was led by Sharon Barker), together with WIC organized a weekly lunch series, published a newsletter, and organized the Violence Against Women Research Collaborative which would lead to the Safe Campus Project. WST representatives participated in Vision 2000 a collaboration in 1996 and 1997 with representatives from the five land-grant universities in New England to “call to our presidents and chancellors to ensure full and equitable participation by women in the New England Land Grant Universities.”

In 1998, with support from the Libra Foundation, Women's Studies and the Women in the Curriculum implemented a Multicultural Women's Studies Institute. The purpose of the Institute was to enable Women's Studies faculty and the academic community toinclude more multicultural perspectives in the Women's Studies and departmental courses at the University of Maine.

In 2014, Women's Studies became the Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program.

The record group also contains material on the organization Spruce Run which Ann Schonberger served on the Steering Committee of and acted as co-chair of the Spruce Run Capital Funds Campaign. University of Maine faculty member Mazie Hough also documented the history of Spruce Run in the Women’s Studies’ Feminist Oral History Project which included interviews of the founders of Spruce Run at a Founders Day in September 1992. Quotations from the event were included in Celeste DeRoche's script for the play “The ‘Somebody Else’ Was Us”. The Feminist Oral History Project founded in 1992 with the support of University of Maine funding to develop a plan to document the feminist movements of the 1960s and 1970s. The Project would go on to focus on Spruce Run and received funding support from the Maine Humanities Council.

Spruce Run was founded in 1972 (incorporated in June 1973) and was the first agency in Maine and only the third in the nation organized specifically to address the issues of battering and battered women. Spruce Run provide counseling, information, and referrals to victims of abuse including both face-to-face and on the phone via the hotline. Spruce Run developed programs to inform the community about family violence and maintain an emergency shelter for abused women and their children. Spruce Run was supported by the State of Maine and United Way and various donations and grants.

Spruce Run is staffed by a mixture of volunteers and staff who are trained in crisis intervention counselling, specifically for the needs of abused women. Spruce Run also has a public education program that includes media and public speaking. Spruce Run also provides training programs for police on domestic violence.

In 1977, Spruce Run helped to found the Maine Coalition of Family Crisis Services made up of nine projects in the state. In 1983, Spruce Run established a shelter in Bangor. In 2013, Spruce Run merged with Womancare and in 2017 they changed their name to Partners for Peace.

Sources: Hough, Mazie. "Transforming the Curriculum on the Way to Transforming the University: The Women in the Curriculum and Women’s Studies Programs" and "Women's Gender, and Sexuality Studies Program", University of Maine, https://umaine.edu/womensgenderandsexualitystudies/about-us/.