Dear Affiliates,

By now I am sure you have heard that the administration has decided to dissolve the Women¹s Research Institute. I want to commend you for your accomplishments over the years in furthering the understanding of women and gender through scholarly research and teaching. Your outstanding contributions, both within your disciplines and to the field of Woman¹s Studies, make me proud to have been associated with you. Please carry on with renewed commitment. Finding solutions to the challenges women face is essential in building a peaceful and prosperous world.

I shall miss the stimulating dialogue we have had. It has been an honor to be affiliated with you.

Bonnie

In response to your inquiries:

University departments are communities of scholars in specific disciplines. These departments facilitate faculty collaboration, which increases the quality of research and courses of study for students. The Women’s Research Institute provided such a community for over 80 affiliates studying women and gender from across the university. Collaborations also were established with scholars at other institutions, increasing WRI credibility at a national level in the face of preconceived notions of many in the academy about the attitude toward women at BYU.

Dissolving the Institute will destroy its community of interdisciplinary colleagues. Researchers will be isolated from each other, eliminating the programmatic research of the Institute involving multiple studies that build upon each other to produce findings on many aspects of complex problems. Also, separating faculty engaged in research from those engaged in teaching will decrease the quality of both. Just as importantly, students will be deprived of interacting with teams of researchers, teachers, and other students addressing one of the most critical challenges of the 21st century: the need to improve women’s lives and increase their opportunities, which are now understood to be linked not only to peaceful relationships within families and societies, but even to peace between nations.

The Women’s Research Institute

Dear Students in Women’s Studies,

Inspired by revealed understanding of the eternal existence of women and men, students cannot ignore their Christian responsibility to look after the downtrodden. As long as some women are the last to be fed and the first to be denied health care, as long as some are abused in their homes and social barriers keep others from being educated, as long as any are denied opportunities to contribute or are exploited for trade, the search for solutions to these problems must go on. Nothing should hinder the study of these issues. Are we not our sisters’ keepers?

The Women’s Research Institute fostered this endeavor within classrooms and research across the academic community. Let us celebrate its groundbreaking work with deeper commitments to expand and accelerate our efforts to bless the lives of women. Do not forget the beginnings of this work at Brigham Young University in the Institute, but do not let the elimination of the Institute diminish your vision of what you can do, or your determination to improve life in mortality for women.

It is unlikely that the decision to close the Institute will be altered. We mourn its loss deeply, but we hope new doors will open. Insist on them. Go forth with confidence bringing with you all those who will come. This work is larger than the Institute. It should become a major part of every academic discipline across this campus. Make it happen. Let us celebrate the Institute’s accomplishments in laying a strong foundation on which to build a greater future, and then press on.

Bonnie Ballif-Spanvill
The Women’s Research Institute