Collegiate association will oversee the Carol E. Macpherson Memorial Scholarship after the Twin Cities campus dropped program that helped hundreds reenter college.

By Maddie Hillman

For 42 years, the University of Minnesota played a key role in offering a large scholarship to help women over age 28 further their education.

But two years ago, the Carol E. Macpherson Memorial Scholarship left the university partnership after a Title IX challenge, ending the longstanding relationship. 

Now the American Association of University Women (AAUW) is bringing back the program, said Maggie Macpherson, the daughter of the scholarship’s namesake. 

The origin of the scholarship dates back to Carol E. Macpherson’s own struggle as a mother of four in the 1960s when she decided to continue her schooling at age 39, her daughter said. 

When she lost her battle with cancer in February 1975, her family commemorated her life with the scholarship.  Since then, the scholarship has helped 347 women get a college degree with a 100% graduation rate among its recipients. 

In 2018, Mark Perry, an economics and finance professor at the University of Michigan-Flint, raised a complaint against the school’s administering of the women-only scholarship, alongside several others, on the basis that it discriminates against men and was therefore in violation of Title IX.

Perry told the Pioneer Press in 2018 that it was his “lifelong mission” to end what he calls “anti-male discrimination” in education around the nation.

After Perry’s complaint, the University of Minnesota suggested that the scholarships under fire change their rules to include all genders.

While several of the other scholarships decided to do so, the Macpherson family decided they wanted to keep their scholarship open only to women. 

Macpherson, Carol’s daughter, said that while the family does not play a part in the selection process, they are the ones who get the final say in the details of the scholarship and overall awarding process. In recent years, the family even expanded the definition of eligibility to include anyone who identifies as a woman, she said.

“We didn’t want to change our scholarship because we created it for women, and we feel like that’s what Mom would have wanted,” Macpherson said. 

The University stopped administering the scholarship after that family decision.

The Office of Equity and Diversity said in a statement that the University could not continue to administer a scholarship only available to female applicants. 

“The University is committed to offering access to student scholarships to applicants of all gender identities,” the office said in a statement. “We appreciate our long-time partnership with the MacPherson family and continue to share information with our students about their scholarship.”

Macpherson said the scholarship’s board members are currently working on the details of the change to a program administered through AAUW.