Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, February 19, 1992 TAG: 9202190141
SECTION: EXTRA PAGE: E-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: By BETH MACY STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
JOB BIAS CELEBRITY AT HOLLINS
When Ann Hopkins was up for partnership at the accounting firm of Price Waterhouse nine years ago, she looked like a shoo-in for the slot.Hopkins, a management consultant, had brought in more business than any of the other 88 candidates, all of whom were male.
But several negative comments were made about her, including that she was "too macho," unfeminine in appearance (she's allergic to makeup) and needed "a course at charm school."
Hopkins won partnership in 1990 after taking the landmark case to the U.S. Supreme Court. She was also awarded $371,000 in back pay. Wrote Justice William Brennan in the lead opinion:
"An employer who objects to aggressiveness in women but whose positions require this trait places women in an intolerable and impermissible Catch-22: out of a job if they behave aggressively and out of a job if they don't."
The court's decision to shift the legal burden of proof to employers was said to pave the way for many employees to win Civil Rights Act-Title VII cases, which also bar job discrimination on the basis of race, religion and national origin.
A 1965 Hollins College graduate, Hopkins will be a featured speaker at Thursday's daylong "Women's Symposium: Diversity and Change" at Hollins.
Back at the Washington, D.C., firm for a year now, Hopkins refused to discuss the specifics or the impact of the case in a telephone interview last week. She is, after all, working at Price Waterhouse again. And after eight years of exhausting legal entanglements, she seemed tired of the debate.
"My position was one of principle," she said. "I wanted an explanation" of the partnership denial.
Hopkins repeatedly insisted that the lawsuit didn't become a conflict of personalities. "I had a set of principals; the firm had a set of principals. And the origin of the litigation was that they conflicted."
Hopkins did allow that her firm and many others now have elaborate policies on sex discrimination - whereas before there were none. "I'm not saying that's cause and effect, though," she interjected carefully.
"But the demographics in the work place are changing." White males will be the minority in the not-too-distance work place of the future. "And it's not good business sense to just promote this minority," she added.
A single mother since 1985 - her husband "disappeared" in the middle of her battle - Hopkins is raising three children, ages 12 to 16, including one who attends a special school for dyslexics in Charlottesville.
"To be honest, my children have been more the focus of my life than my disagreement with the firm," she said.
Her kids became so used to their mom's celebrity status that her youngest once looked at a front-page Washington Post story and remarked: "That's a lousy picture of you, Mom. Can I have the sports section?"
Although Hopkins' interview was not particularly revealing, she has been described by other interviewers as a commanding presence: She drinks Rolling Rock beer, swears, smokes Winston Gold cigarettes and, as she once said, isn't "afraid of getting into the snake pit."
Part of that tough-exterior determination came from her experiences at Hollins College, where she learned "to compete on a purely intellectual basis," she said.
"There were no social issues cluttering up intellectual competition. It was all about who had the best set of ideas, and the best solutions to problems."
Indeed, her presence on the Thursday night panel could make for lively debate. Also on the symposium schedule:
\ Women and Writing - Leila Christenbury, author of a forthcoming book on teaching English; Cathryn Hankla, author of "Afterimages"; Jeanne Larsen, author of "Bronze Mirror" and "Silk Road." 9:30-10:30 a.m., Green Drawing Room.
\ Women and Politics - Laura Dillard, former press secretary to Gov. Doug Wilder. 10:45-11:45 a.m., Green Drawing Room.
\ Women in Business and Education - Keynote address by Wyndham Roberts, vice president for communications at the University of North Carolina and former managing editor of Fortune magazine. 1-2 p.m., Ballator Gallery.
\ Women and the Environment - Cameron McDonald Vowell, chair of the Alabama Environmental Management Commission. 2:30-3:30 p.m., Green Drawing Room.
\ Founder's Day Keynote Address - Jane Margaret O'Brien, Hollins College president. 4:30 p.m., duPont Chapel.
\ Women and Diversity in the Workplace - O'Brien, panel moderator; Ann Hopkins; Colette Kunkel, assistant to the director of the New York-based American Studies Program; Li Chiao-Ping, assistant professor of dance at Hollins; Melinda Payne, recruiting and training manager for the Roanoke Times & World-News; Kelda Smith, graduate adviser for Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority; Flavia Diaz Tanger, translator, adviser and consultant for Hispanic cultural programs. 8-9 p.m., Babcock Auditorium, Dana Science Building.
All discussions are free and open to the public.
"Women's Symposium: Diversity & Change" Thursday, Hollins College. 362-6000.