Contains materials relating to the Office of Career Development and Continuing Education at Duke University, including significant topical files on women in higher education, professional women role models, and development of women's career conferences. Also contains records of Directions for Educated Women Committee, a women faculty and student committee active from about 1966 until the early 1970s. Types of materials include correspondence, course evaluations, brochures, newsletters, clippings, reports, handbooks, fliers, and short writings. Materials range in date from 1965-1975.
The Office of Career Development and Continuing Education, active at Duke University from about 1969 to 1975, provided undergraduate and continuing education students with assistance in establishing career goals. In cooperation with the University Counseling Center, the Office of Placement Services, and deans in the undergraduate colleges and professional schools, the Office sponsored the Apprenticeship Program and the Continuing Education Program. The Apprenticeship Program arranged volunteer placement in community businesses and agencies. The Continuing Education Program placed students in local schools to work as teachers, tutors, and assistants. Other internship projects included helping local Girl Scouts groups, working in hospitals, counseling older adults, and acting as mentors to at-risk youth. Although the Office of Career Development and Continuing Education worked with both men and women, the Office was especially collaborative with student groups interested in women's programs and studies.
Office of Career Development and Continuing Education also worked with other campus organizations to bring professionals to speak on campus about the issues of young women in a professional work environment, particularly Directions for Educated Women Committee, a student and faculty group at Trinity College. Directions for Educated Women Committee came together in 1966 when students from Trinity College expressed concerns for women's career orientation programs, especially the fact that there was an absence of centralized information for women to learn about careers. In response, the Committee was formed and promptly arranged a series of speakers. Various women professionals addressed preparation for graduate work, admission requirements for graduate schools, combining marriage and a career, and suggested opportunities for young women in their field.
Around 1975, the name of the Office of Career Development and Continuing Education changed to the Office of Continuing Education. The Office continued to perform many of the same services for students, but with less focus on young women professionals. With the development of the Women's Studies Program at Duke University (1983) and the Women's Center (1989), career resources for women continue to be available.
