Horner, HEW to Discuss Women's College Issues

President Horner and 69 other women's college presidents will meet in Washington with Department of Health, Education and Welfare (HEW) officials today to discuss government policy toward women's colleges.

The HEW-sponsored conference will focus on such issues as funding to women's colleges for work-study students, aid for part-time students, and the small number of women in major decision-making offices in HEW like the National Institute for Health and the Office of Education, Ann Smith, assistant director of the Women's College Coalition (WCC), said yesterday.

Presidents' Lobby

President Horner serves as a member of the WCC, a Washington-based lobbying group composed of 67 women's college presidents.

"We felt that HEW was not dealing with the contributions of women's colleges and the problems of the mostly small private colleges." Smith said. She added that despite the success of the women's movement, small women's colleges were overlooked in recent legislation that aids women.

You Pay

The WCC invited two representatives from each of the 125 women's colleges to attend the daylong session, at their school's expense.

Susan Bailey, director of the Office of Institutional Policy Research on Women's Education will join Horner at the conference. Neither Horner nor Bailey could be reached for comment yesterday.

Capital Link

Several women's college administrators formed the coalition five years ago to lobby for the interests of women's colleges and to act as a liaison for the 67 schools that pay for representation. A recent WCC effort promoted the educational equity act, an affirmative action program under the Office of Education.

Consciousness Raising

Smith said yesterday the government may be more conscious of the needs of women's colleges in the future because of proposed cabinet-level Department of Education and the appointment of Patricia R. Harris as secretary of HEW.

Last February, while Joseph A. Califano was HEW secretary, the WCC requested that HEW sponsor the conference.