Last Thursday Professor of Economics Humberto Barreto delivered an extemporaneous chapel talk discussing the recent uproar about the new Spanish version of the Star Spangled Banner. He noted the similarity between this public anger and the uproar after Jose Feleciano sang a non-traditional version of the National Anthem during Game 5 of the 1968 World Series.
Then he dropped a bombshell on the crowd.
“I do have one last thing to say,” Dr. Barreto said. “It’s kind of a rough segue, but I hope it does make a little bit of sense. It turns out that I am going to be leaving Wabash at the end of the semester. I’ve struggled over the years, and increasingly so, with the fact that Wabash discriminates against women in admissions and I can’t do it here anymore under these kinds of circumstances.”
Dr. Barreto, who has been with the Wabash College since 1985, will leave at the end of this semester to become the Elizabeth Allen Distinguished Professor in Economics at DePauw University. He leaves after 23 years of opposition to Wabash’s all male student body makeup, a policy he never could quite wrap his brain around.
“I came here in 1985, and I never really understood it,” Dr. Barreto said. “I figured as I learn the place I’ll start to understand it better but I didn’t. I then thought, ‘O.K., then I’ll help to change it’.”
Dr. Barreto noted the all-male education was not the only factor contributing to his decision to leave Wabash for DePauw.
“I think that they’ve (DePauw) got some really excellent young faculty,” he said. “They’ve hired a couple of new people and I’m really looking forward to mentoring them and working with them. They’re a bigger school – 2400 students and their econ department is 11 or 12. They’ve got some really talented people there and I’m really looking forward to working with some of those folks.”
“I wrote this book with [Professor of Economics] Dr. Howland on econometrics,” Dr. Barreto said, “and I’ve also got this other book that I’ve written on my own for intermediate microeconomics. One of the things I’m going to try is to organize workshops to get professors to come, take two or three days and learn how to teach economics with Excel, which is something I’ve done a lot of. That’s part of the opportunity I’ve got there to do that. In addition to regular salary I get extra funds for running workshops and doing things like that, so that’s really attractive.”
Dr. Barreto noted that the recent history of Wabash’s co-educational
“We had a president here in the early ’90s named [Frank] Sheldon Wettack,” Dr. Barreto said, “and he actually did a co-ed study. That was really divisive and a big deal – a lot of people were angry. They had really strong proponents on both sides. Some people really feel that this [Wabash’s all-male status] is the heart of the college and if you change this you totally destroy Wabash – which I don’t believe.”
“The trustees voted not to change,” he said, “21-6 and they had this big announcement in the chapel. “
Even though he was a strong proponent for coeducation at Wabash, Dr. Barreto did not participate directly in the co-educational events that year.
“One of the things that’s interesting,” he said, “is that I was in the Dominican Republic that year. I was a Fulbright scholar and I really think that if I’d of been here that year I would have left then. The year before I had done some stuff on some committees and some things but then I came back.”
“With President Ford,” Dr. Barreto continued, “the president after Wettack, he was much more openly all-male. On the Wabash website they put that we were a College for men and not to be apologetic for what we are. And that was a change from before. I think before people would say that we were a men’s college but not aggressively so.”
Dr. Barreto believed that Ford’s openness about the all-male direction was, in part, good. For Dr. Barreto, however, this open honesty only exacerbated the problem.
“I guess in an honest sense it was a good thing,” he said, “because he was being honest: ‘This is what we [Wabash] are and we’re not going to hide it or deny it.’ For me, it had a negative effect - I didn’t like it. I remember one time in a faculty meeting he [President Ford] said something about everyone having to be on board with the all-male mission of the College. I stood up and said I am not on board with that. It was kind of awkward, and there was a silence but I’ve always been open about that.”
Barreto believes others share his opinions on the College and those who have previously left Wabash did so for similar reasons that influenced his decision to leave.
“Last year we lost [Professor of Theater] Jim Fisher and [Professor of English] Joy Castro,” he said. “I don’t want to speak for them, but I know that the all-male thing played a roll, but it was kind of somehow not really open and brought to the surface. I was thinking last year that if I were to leave I’d want everyone to know that this was a factor.
“You can continue to believe that this place should be all-male,” he continued, “but I think people need to understand there are some costs associated to that. If you’re a real strong proponent for that I guess that’s O.K., but be aware of the fact that there could be some really impressive people, some talent that you’re going to lose, and that’s true for faculty and students.”
In the aftermath of the Chapel Talk, Dr. Barreto braced himself for negative comments to abound. The discussions he had on the subject, however, surprised him.
“I would have thought there would be more of the conservative, more fanatical all-male folks to say something negative to me,” he said. “No one’s said anything negative at all. Everyone’s said ‘Wow, that was really cool and really interesting.’ I’ve even gotten emails from people I didn’t even know. The reactions have been really positive.”
At the very end of his Chapel Talk last Thursday, Dr. Barreto delivered a final message to the institution where he taught for 23 years.
“You might think at first blush that replacing me with somebody who is more in tune, more on board with the mission of the College is a good thing, but I think that’s really dead wrong,” he said. “I think that’s like always singing the National Anthem the same way. I think you really want people to challenge you.”
“I think you really want people,” he continued, “to think differently than you and to tell you that they think differently. I think you want people to be honest with you and transparent, and I think those are very important qualities. So beware of the people who just stand up and cheer, ‘Three cheers for old Wabash, everything’s great all the time.’ Beware of that.”