Expanding Sophia Smith’s Dream

Smith College has a rich and nuanced history that began in September 1875, when six faculty members and 14 students arrived on campus to begin teaching and learning. Since then, Smith has grown, evolved, and innovated to meet the needs of the times, all the while maintaining its status as one of the world’s leading liberal arts colleges. Like other institutions, Smith has also wrestled with issues related to fairness, justice, and equality. Throughout 2025, the college will mark its 150th anniversary with an array of events, symposia, stories, and content that honor the many ways Smith and its faculty, students, staff, and alums have shaped society. Here, President Sarah Willie-LeBreton considers Smith’s enduring legacy and why Sophia Smith’s original vision for her namesake college is more relevant than ever.

As Smith moves into its 150th year, isn’t it remarkable that over decades of great change the college has continued to thrive?
Smith has continued to thrive! Throughout our history, we have met a social and educational need, and different members of the college community have led the way to make changes that have made the college more responsive and effective. Whether it has been keeping the curriculum relevant, insisting on social diversity, offering financial gifts, volunteering, or continuing to interpret, articulate, and reaffirm our mission, each of these acts has contributed to Smith’s health. It’s been an ivy chain of people who have ensured that the college has thrived.

Sophia Smith was a woman from a small village in western Massachusetts, growing up on a homestead with little formal education herself, but she had this incredible vision that ultimately changed the course of thousands of lives. How radical was Sophia Smith?
Sophia Smith was from a family that had the financial means to have provided her with education, but her father was suspicious of formal education for men and found it particularly impractical and unnecessary for women. Sophia Smith wanted the choice to pursue education and the freedom that she imagined an educated life would allow her. She also imagined that women, in general, would play a central role in improving life for everyone when they were educated and allowed to work alongside and make decisions with men. So while one could say that her desires were radical, I don’t consider it radical to want an education, nor is it ahead of one’s time to yearn to be treated with dignity and a life that will have meaning and possibility.

What I find both poignant and inspiring about her story is that she was only able to act on her desire in death. And then, because the college was able to develop an endowment, her decision led to a vision that has served tens of thousands.

Sophia Smith’s will states, “It is my opinion that by the education of women, what are called their wrongs will be redressed, their wages adjusted, their weight of influence in reforming the evils of society will be greatly increased.” How far are we as a society from fulfilling her wishes?
Compared to the time in which Sophia Smith lived, many wrongs have been redressed, many wages have been adjusted, and the weight of women’s influence has been greatly increased. But the challenges of sexism, patriarchy, and misogyny are still with us. Uprooting the ideas and structures that keep them in place is a lengthy struggle.

All of this said, formal education was not the key to Sophia Smith’s wisdom: She was a systems thinker and wise. She appreciated that her lack of choice was not only individual but also collective. There will always be those among us who believe some people are more fit to make decisions for others and people who denigrate others, but there will also be people who insist on our mutual humanity and the right to learn all we can, who work to address what Sophia Smith called “society’s wrongs.” The work of inclusion, of seeking knowledge and wisdom, of opening the path and the rights to as many of us as possible is the work Sophia Smith imagined. And it’s work that will always be with us.

Within that context, why are places like Smith still an important option for students?
Because patriarchy and sexism and misogyny are structural issues, as Sophia Smith understood, and not only individual ones, we need places that are dedicated to the education of women so that women-identified students can gain the education, the confidence, and the clarity they need to be leaders in naming and dismantling these intertwined forms of oppression. We need institutions where women students can trust that the faculty who teach them assume their brilliance and capabilities, where their education will be a crucial step in preparing them to move into spaces as forces for good in whatever ways they choose. As long as women are still subdominant people, having spaces devoted to their education will be important.

In celebrating our history, it’s also important to recognize those moments when Smith did not live up to its values. As we approach this anniversary year, how is Smith addressing some of the mistakes of our past?
That’s a great question because it’s critically important for people to understand that there are difficult truths to any institution’s history and we must acknowledge them. I know Vice President for Equity and Inclusion Floyd Cheung has said that Smith, like other colleges of its time, was not built for people of color. That said, we are a very different place from the one we were. Today, we prioritize diversity as a fundamental goal and a collective good, regardless of the pressures of certain societal institutions to the contrary. And our diversity is not just in the racial and socioeconomic aspects of the student body, it’s also in the diversity of our faculty and staff. Our curriculum is so much broader than the European focus it once had. And it is my fervent hope that we’re open to reassessing everything—from who our houses and buildings have been named for to other aspects of our educational traditions.

What are your dreams for Smith in the next 150 years?
I want more people to know about Smith, because students emerge from Smith prepared for a changing work environment and ready to lead in the work required to create a fair and just world.

I want Smith to be better than it is today, meaning that I want it to continue to evolve. One thing I love about the Smith community now is the willingness on everyone’s part to acknowledge that, as an institution, we are still becoming, still growing; we aren’t where we want to be yet, and we definitely are not done. That acknowledgment is a powerful motivator because it means that we will continue to strive to make this institution of which we’re a part more intellectually and creatively engaging, more receptive to politically challenging moments, and more genuinely inclusive.

It’s important to remind ourselves that when Sophia Smith made her decision, the United States was in a dire place: We were just five years out from the Civil War, lynching of African Americans was at an all-time high, Native Americans were being force marched to reservations, and women suffragists were still 50 years away from gaining the franchise. Again today, serious issues face higher education in general and women’s colleges in particular. The people who make up Smith are creative, resourceful, resilient, and will not be turned back from our mission.

My hope for Smith is that we never stop living up to and even expanding Sophia Smith’s dream that Smith be a “perennial blessing” to the world.

What’s on tap for marking this milestone?
The great thing is we’re going to be celebrating all year and in so many ways because there’s so much to celebrate across campus. For example, in 2025 the Ada Comstock Scholars program turns 50, so we’ll honor that as we also celebrate the founding of Smith. When we mark the 25th anniversary of the Meridians journal, we’ll celebrate that within the context of Smith’s own history. We’re also planning some great presidential colloquia, and we’ll have some special programming at Reunion in May so that alums back on campus can celebrate their own place within the history of this college and the role they’ve played in shaping it. We also have a web page devoted to the 150th so everyone can engage with stories and content from our archives and submit their own memories and reflections of the role Smith has played in their lives. And I’m sure at some point there will be a birthday cake!