One of the programs I first learned about when I came to Duke was Baldwin Scholars, an initiative designed to promote leadership among “female-identifying students.” As a young woman who had long been dismissed as “too loud and opinionated” for simply taking up space in overwhelmingly male settings, I was immediately excited by the idea of a community that fostered female leadership. You can imagine my surprise when, just a month into my freshman year at Duke, I learned that a federal complaint had been filed against the program. The case was filed by Mark Perry, emeritus professor at University of Michigan-Flint and anti-DEI activist. Perry accused the program of violating Title IX through its exclusion of male students. At first, I was skeptical that the suit would succeed, but given the political salience of anti-DEI in higher education since the overturning of affirmative action and recent re-election of Donald Trump, I began to get worried.
The Duke Chronicle reported on November 13, 2025, that, just over two years after the federal complaint was filed, the program will end its “female-identifying” criteria and open membership to any individual, regardless of gender. While deeply disappointing to me, the move is not entirely surprising given the Trump administration’s assault against “discrimination” in elite universities. When writing to alumnae of the Baldwin Program, Director Colleen Scott cited Duke’s recently adopted “inclusive excellence” principles as the primary reason for the change, requiring “all university programs be open to all individuals.”
I am struck by the irony of the attacks on Baldwin. Critics of the program present themselves as the defenders of women, but they have dismantled a space that exists for the sole purpose of fostering and protecting female leadership through crucial resources and a vast alumni network. Programs such as Baldwin are important because women are still outpaced by men in the workplace today. A 2023 U.S. Census Bureau report found that women make 82.7 cents to every man’s dollar and Pew Research found that 28% of men hold managerial positions in the workplace compared to 21% of women. The same critics who attack initiatives that seek to close these gaps, will also be the first to attack transgender communities on the grounds that they represent an “identity-based, inchoate social concept” employed “to hurt and undermine women.” This contradiction reveals that the far-right is selective in its support for “protecting” women.
Baldwin Scholars’ “female-identifying membership” requirement was not meant to punish men, but to redress centuries of gender inequality in higher education in the United States (the very name of the program reflects this, honoring Alice Baldwin, the first full-time female faculty member hired by Duke, in 1924). Duke’s Women’s College, established in 1930 and housed on East Campus, didn’t integrate with Trinity College until 1972. By that point, women still only accounted for 8.4% of faculty outside of the medical school. While white women have been able to take classes at the institution since the late 19th century, the first Black female Duke students, Mary Mitchell, Wilhelmina Reuben-Cooke and Cassandra Smith Rush, weren’t allowed to enroll at the institution until 1963. Today, only one woman has served as Duke’s President, Nannerl Keohane (1993-2004), and only one woman has served as the director of Duke Athletics, Nina King (2021-present).
Considering this history, the notion that men are being discriminated against at Duke, whether in general or in the Baldwin Scholars program, seems a bit overzealous. Every resource that Baldwin has historically offered to its members is also accessible to men on campus, just in different spaces. The internship opportunities? There’s the Duke Career Center. Networking with “distinguished faculty?” Duke allocates resources to each student for “Flunches” and coffee chats. The ability to “study in intimate seminars?” Programs like FOCUS and the new first-year constellation clusters offer this opportunity. One may wonder if all of these resources are accessible to all students why a program like Baldwin would need to exist. However, as discussed above, today’s reality still presents significant hurdles for female-identifying individuals as they navigate the professional world. Baldwin Scholars was designed by and for women who understand these unique hurdles intimately.
Yet Perry, the crusader against Baldwin, wrote a short column in the Chronicle in late July, pushing back on the characterization of his federal complaint as “reverse-discrimination activism.” In the article, Perry argues that his suit is not a claim of reverse discrimination, but a defense of “a minority group of students (men)” who are experiencing “sex discrimination.” He notes that female enrollment in higher education has exceeded male enrollment for 40 years, rendering men, technically, a minority in the Duke undergrad population. As a result, Perry argues, programs that categorically exclude men violate Title IX’s prohibition of sex-based discrimination.
His argument may sound convincing, but, when put to the test, it does not hold water. Yes, women do outpace men in college enrollment and completion, but this is not because of disparities in access to higher education based on sex. In fact, a Pew Research study found that the largest factors men consider when not enrolling in college are (1) general disinterest in attending, and (2) a lack of need for more education to pursue their chosen career. On the other hand, the largest barriers to women enrolling in college are (1) being unable to afford a degree, and (2) providing financial support to family. In other words, when women don’t enroll in higher education, it’s more often due to external forces out of their control—such as financial constraints and familial responsibility. When men don’t enroll in higher education, their reasons are more often discretionary.
In a post-Roe reality and sociopolitical climate that continues to blame women for perceived societal ills (see the recent New York Times op-ed “Did Liberal Feminism Ruin the Workplace?”, originally and disgustingly titled “Did Women Ruin the Workplace?”), we need spaces that support us as we strive to unlearn the years of social conditioning that tell us to be meek and small. Contrary to Duke leadership’s claim, silence and capitulation isn’t strategic. In this case, silence and capitulation erase the celebration and cultivation of female leadership at Duke.
by Ari Cook
