RE LOG Fall 2024

18 Ransom Everglades LOG FALL 2024 Students at Ransom and Everglades already knew each other from family connections, sporting events and parties, and the occasional exchange of classes. “I don’t remember it being a fearful thing, because your friends were coming with you,” Helfman Goldberg said. “It was just suddenly we’re in this world [at Everglades] – and then suddenly we weren’t. It was a very different world.” Said Graham: “During that first year … we were so happy to have women on the campus. I was not aware of any backlash whatsoever. We were happy, and we saw that the merger was going to be a very good thing for all of us.” Faculty member Kenia Mestre recalled that coeducation at the middle school went smoothly as the new seventh graders had never experienced single-gender education at RE. In the eighth grade, she saw more of a “tug of war” in the classroom as boys and girls who had previously experienced the separate campuses strove to outdo one another. “I don’t think there was that dramatic of a change,” said Mestre, who taught on both campuses. “The boys and the girls really worked together very well. It was a lot of fun, seeing them integrate into a new school …We really enjoyed it.” When Buermann returned as a teacher, he was more shocked by the unrecognizable student attire than seeing girls on the Ransom Campus. He recalled that the school’s most prominent teachers welcomed coeducation. “My recollection is that the legend teachers, the master teachers, they embraced the merger very well,” he said. “These were the core of the Ransom faculty at the time. We just viewed [the girls] as … students … and it’s our job to give them the best education possible.” Added Buermann: “The boys all had long hair, so, frankly, everybody had long hair. I didn’t see a lot of difference.” Graham said many boys experienced a wake-up call in the classroom: “By the first quarter, I think that’s when we found out that the girls were smarter than us. And we found we were going to have to buckle down if we were going to keep up. And that was a good thing; that was an experience all unto itself.” Buermann agreed: The girls “did as well, they kept pace, or even better than the boys. I don’t know how the boys took to that. The girls were very good students and very disciplined. They did their homework and were very organized. The boys needed more cleaning up and organization.” Helfman Goldberg said the move to the Ransom campus brought different challenges for the girls: “My Everglades experience was just so powerful and wonderful. Ransom was a great social opportunity. Ransom-Everglades was more of a social experiment: Growing up. Boys. Where do you fit in? How can I fit in?” Girls held their own with the boys even in sports. “We sort of were trendsetters,” Dessaint said. “ Lisa August ’76 “People today think that somehow Ransom grew into this wonderful insti- tution. It was already a wonderful institution.” – Eric Buermann ’69