Mount Holyoke Seminary’s first international students sought an education that was often unavailable to them in their home country. These remarkable women waded through the difficulties of international travel, culture shock, discrimination, and education in a second or third language, often hoping to bring the knowledge they gained to women in their home countries, or to American girls. Grace Paul, class of 1924, Mount Holyoke’s first Sri Lankan international student, stated in an article written about her titled “Grace Paul Trains Tamil Maidens to be Intelligent Wives and Mothers”, published in 1931, “I like your country (the United States), but my work is in my own land of Ceylon. There I am principal of the Anglo-vernacular Boarding School at Uduvil, an institution for girls which is over a century old. The fruit of these long years of work is a remarkably high position for women.” After leaving Mount Holyoke, many students maintained a deep love and respect for the College. Toshi Miyagawa, class of 1893, Mount Holyoke’s first Asian international student, wrote in her class letter in December of 1893, “I am so glad the girls have a beautiful reading room, but don’t you wish ‘the glorious ’93’ could gather once more in that old lecture room and fight our old battles o’er again?” These women spread the legacy of Mount Holyoke’s effect on women’s education, bringing the benefits of women’s college education to global frontiers.
Click on the images below to learn about Mount Holyoke’s international students.
