Female Security Guards
The University of Scranton’s newspaper, The Aquinas, released on November 7, 1978, put out that the university began hiring women as security guards. They, at the time, had only two women hired as security guards, Doreen Sansone and Christine Mazaika. This was thanks to John Wunder, who was the director of safety and security at the University, and the directives of the Affirmative Action Plan. This plan was for “equality of opportunity” for the University of police, to affirm that neither student or employees who are qualified for the job should be discriminated against regarding “their race, color, religion, ancestry, sex or age, handicaps, or national origin.”
One of the reasons being for hiring women as security guards was because of the increase of the female student population. Another reason, as stated by John Wunder, was because “Female guards might be more easily approached,” if a female student had a personal complaint, they would rather tell a female guard than a male guard. They also let it be known that there were also female student office workers.
One of the female guards who worked during this time, Doreen Sansone, commented how the student were “nice to me, but the people in cars sometimes give me trouble.” But also, she said how she thought the other guards were “really terrific and never gave me any hassles.” Security guards, male or female, assumed the same general responsibilities.