We Are The Women Of The Dream
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The Women of the Dream are Black women who came of age during the modern Civil Rights era, from 1954—the year the U.S. Supreme Court declared racial segregation in public schools unconstitutional—to 1968, the year Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated. They belong to what award-winning journalist Sylvester Monroe has called the “integration generation”: a generation shaped by the belief that the key to Black success in America was education and assimilation into the very culture that had long denied Blacks equal access and opportunity.
But the Women of the Dream are more than beneficiaries of the Civil Rights Movement. They are the girls who inherited the dreams, sacrifices, and expectations of a generation that fought to open doors that had been closed to them. They were among the first substantial generation of Black women to enter predominantly White colleges and universities as those institutions began to open their doors more broadly. Many came from poor and working-class families and were the first in their families to attend college. Their educational opportunities were made possible not only by the victories of the Civil Rights Movement, but also by government programs and policies that expanded financial assistance and access to higher education.
The demographic transformation was dramatic. During the 1960s, approximately three-quarters of Black college students attended Historically Black Colleges and Universities, primarily in the South. By the mid-1970s, that pattern had shifted, with predominantly White institutions enrolling the majority of Black college students. At white women’s colleges such as Simmons, Wellesley, Radcliffe, Mount Holyoke, Smith, and Barnard, Black women became part of a new presence on campuses that historically had been largely inaccessible to them. At Simmons College (now Simmons University) in Boston, the alma mater of the founder of the organization, Women of the Dream, the 1970s saw the largest enrollment of Black women in the college’s history. The Women of the Dream entered these institutions carrying more than books and aspirations. They carried the hopes and dreams of parents and grandparents who had spent their lives fighting for and creating opportunities they themselves had been denied.
The parents and grandparents of the Women of the Dream were themselves dreamers. Millions of Black Americans participated in the Great Migration between approximately 1910 and 1970, leaving the rural, Jim Crow South for cities in the Northeast, Midwest, and West. They moved to places such as Boston, Chicago, Cleveland, Detroit, Los Angeles, Newark, New York, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, and St. Louis. They sought jobs, better wages, safer communities, and, above all, a better future for their children. Employment in factories, railroads, automobile plants, and other industries offered some families economic resources and possibilities that had been severely restricted under segregation and Jim Crow.
These parents and grandparents embraced the dream of Martin Luther King, Jr.: that their children would live in a society in which race would no longer determine where they could go to school, where they could live, what work they could pursue, or what they could become. The dream was not simply that their children would survive racism. It was that their children would have choices.
For the Black girls who came of age during this period, however, the opening of doors didn’t mean there weren’t racial and social challenges. Black women entering predominantly White colleges and universities during the 1960s and 1970s frequently encountered racial isolation, cultural misunderstanding, stereotypes, and institutional environments that were not designed with them in mind. They could be perceived as less academically prepared, less motivated, or less qualified than their White peers. They often had to navigate assumptions about their abilities while simultaneously proving that they belonged.
Yet there was still the belief among them that anything was possible. These young Black women had grown up in the aftermath of a movement that had challenged the legal and social boundaries imposed upon their parents and grandparents. They entered adulthood with an expectation that previous generations had rarely been permitted to hold with such force: the expectation of equal access.
They believed they had a right to the opportunities that others had long taken for granted. It was a major paradigm shift: The Women of the Dream had internalized the aspirations of the generations before them. Their parents and grandparents had fought to open the door; the Women of the Dream walked through it.
The achievements of these women are remarkable. They graduated in increasing numbers from predominantly White colleges and universities, including many of the nation’s most prestigious women’s colleges. They entered professions and institutions from which Black women had historically been excluded or severely underrepresented. They became leaders in major corporations and in fields including business, banking, education, journalism, medicine, nursing, law, social work, technology, public health, and other professions.
Many became among the first generation of Black women to enter and help build the Black middle class in the post-Civil Rights era. They purchased homes in previously segregated communities, entered corporate boardrooms, broke through the glass ceilings, founded organizations, and assumed leadership positions. Many defied the odds and accomplished notable career achievements and national recognition in major magazines and other publications. Still others quietly transformed their families and communities through careers and lives that would have been impossible for their mothers and grandmothers.
Their individual stories are different. Their paths are not identical. But they share a common historical experience: they came of age when the doors of American opportunity began, however imperfectly, to open to Black women in unprecedented numbers.
The story of the Women of the Dream, however, cannot end with educational attainment, professional success, homeownership, or social mobility.
Those achievements matter. They are evidence of what the sacrifices of previous generations made possible. But they also create an obligation. The Women of the Dream carry a responsibility that is both moral and social: to make their success a bridge to opportunity for the next generation of Black girls.
The Civil Rights Movement opened doors, but access alone did not eliminate poverty, unequal educational opportunities, racial discrimination, and economic inequality. Programs and policies that made it possible for Women of the Dream to pursue higher education have been dismantled, limiting the hopes, dreams, and aspirations of Black girls today, particularly those from underserved, low-income communities.
This is why the story of the Women of the Dream is ultimately not about what they received. It is about what they will do with what they received. Women of the Dream was founded to empower this new generation of girls who are growing up without the advantages of the Women of the Dream. Many are struggling in every aspect of their lives. The Women of the Dream who broke barriers, glass ceilings, integrated neighborhoods and institutions have an opportunity to reach back, to use their education, professional experience, financial resources, networks, leadership, and lived experience to potentially change the trajectory of the lives of Black girls who are not so fortunate.
The Women of the Dream’s parents and grandparents dreamed for them.
The Women of the Dream fulfilled a part of that dream.
Now they must help another generation dream—and give those girls the tools, access, confidence, and opportunities to make their dreams possible.
