By Denise Smith Amos
The Cincinnati Enquirer

BLUE ASH - This is your mother's history class.

That's what Ursuline Academy girls know when they sign up for the all-girls Catholic high school's "Women in American History" class, an elective course that invites mothers to attend class with their daughters.

As the nation observes March as Women's History Month, the subject is an 18-week obsession in this class.

Ursuline Academy senior Elizabeth Ranz (front row left), 18, sits with her mother, Jacquie, of Evendale, during a Women in History course offered to mothers and daughters in the evenings at the school. (Steven M. Herppich photo)

Every Monday night, about a dozen mothers and two dozen daughters focus on the lives of everyday women during key times in the nation's history. Students and their mothers talk about how women's past relates to the present and to their futures.

"My personal philosophy about teaching is to engage the student and make the subject matter so interesting that in her adult life, she will read a biography or a historical novel," said Kathy Hogan, who has taught the class for six years.

"Kids who are turned off to history in high school often carry that handicap all through their adult lives. They refuse to see the connection between current events and what has come before."

Mothers in class help make that connection, Hogan said. They participate in classroom exercises and can even take the weekly quizzes, though they don't get graded.

Each week, one or two mothers make presentations about their lives, sharing personal lessons they've learned. In recent weeks, mothers talked about being:

• The first female in a college engineering class.

• The only woman applying for a traditionally male job in high finance.

• The only woman in a business meeting, where she was mistaken for a secretary.

"Sometimes the girls don't understand (history) until their moms tell them their story," Hogan said.

Other mothers talked about having others take credit for their work, having to shift jobs and take pay cuts to better manage family life and taking risks to remake their lives.

Mary Cleveland of Sharonville said she dropped out of college to have children after a medical diagnosis predicted that she would be infertile within a few years.

In 2000 she graduated from Northern Kentucky University's Chase College of Law and now heads the Greater Cincinnati Minority Counsel Program. She and her husband have four children, including a daughter in Hogan's class.

Another mother, Gayle Harden-Renfro of North Avondale, told students to expect crises and out-of-the-blue opportunities to reshape their lives. Such unexpected turns have taken her from being a journalist to a communications specialist to now a co-owner of a wall decor and graphics business.

"Stepping out of your comfort zone is painful," she said. "Every career change, I said to myself, 'What are you doing?' But you have to have faith that it'll be all right. You will grow from learning something new."

Hogan started teaching the class after hearing mothers at a school open house say they wished they'd had a women's history course when they were students. The 18-week course, offered twice a year, is so popular that more than 120 students have signed up for 50 slots next year, Hogan said. Seniors and juniors get first shot.

Hogan doesn't concentrate on feminist heroes. She delves into life conditions for everyday women in history.

While students learn about imprisoned suffragists on a hunger strike for voting rights, they also hear accounts of slaves in the Old South coming in from the fields to find their children sold away.

Hogan takes an unflinching look at history that encourages comparisons to women's lives today. Several students and mothers noted in a discussion that female slaves - and some white women in the South - were so oppressed that they "lost their voice," their ability to protest their conditions, similar to how many abused women behave today.

More recent women leaders - astronauts, military pioneers, politicians - are also topics, as are themes of spouse abuse and financial politics in marriage.

Throughout the class, Hogan encourages the mothers and daughters to talk and learn about more about each other.

A recent lesson on Colonial times prompted Cleveland and her daughter, Erin, 17, to have a discussion about a touchy dating situation.

The class learned that Colonial suitors used to travel for days, often over rough terrain, to see their intendeds. A "date" could stretch over days and weeks at the future bride's home.

Because families couldn't afford guest rooms, suitors slept in family beds, often with a "bundling board" - a wooden plank wrapped in bedclothes - between them and their fiance. Nevertheless, about 30 percent of young brides were pregnant at their nuptials, Hogan told the class.

Cleveland was laughing about that dating ritual with Erin, when a door opened to discuss today's dating rituals.

Cleveland said she was uncomfortable when her daughter agreed to a date made with just five minutes' notice and a cell phone call. Cleveland said when she was a young woman, proper dates were set up days in advance, and only with parents' permission.

Erin's classmates helped Cleveland understand that cell phones and instant messaging had made "instant dating" a common reality; it's not a sign of impropriety.

"It wasn't just her; I heard from the whole class," Cleveland said later. "It opened up even more lines of communication with Erin."

About the class

• Class: "Women in American History."

• Teacher: Kathy Hogan, a 20-year veteran, has taught the class for six years. She also teaches World History and AP Economics.

• Class meets: 6:30-8:30 p.m. Mondays for 18 weeks.

• How the class works: Mothers are encouraged to attend with daughters. Daughters get graded.

• Class project: Profile a famous woman in history by creating a place setting suiting her life and times

• Quote: "In other history classes, you basically learn about important white men," said Kristen Robinson, 17, of Loveland. "In here, there's more diversity. We talk more about ordinary people and women, not super-high-powered people.''

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This series spotlights a local classroom in which teachers are challenging students in bold, innovative ways. To nominate a class, e-mail bcieslewicz@enquirer.com, fax (513) 768-8340 or write Bill Cieslewicz, Education Editor, The Cincinnati Enquirer, 312 Elm St., Cincinnati 45202. Include your name, daytime phone, e-mail and school.

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E-mail damos@enquirer.com