"Historically committed to meeting the changing needs of women,
Stephens College engages students in an innovative educational experience
focused on pre-professional fields and the performing arts and grounded
in the liberal arts. Graduates of Stephens are career-ready women
of distinction, connected through a supportive network of alumnae
across the world, confident in themselves, and inspired by our tradition
of the Ten Ideals as core values that enrich women’s lives."
— Adopted February 2004
Ten Ideals
Inherent in the culture at Stephens College is the tradition of the Ten Ideals, which originated in 1921. Each year, 10 students whose activities represent the overall ideals of Stephens College are selected as personifications of individual Ideals.
The Ten Ideals are as follows:
1. Respect for our own dignity and for the dignity of others, embodied in a sense of social justice
2. Courage and persistence
3. Independence, autonomy and self-sufficiency
4. Support for others through the willingness to take and give criticism, acceptance and love
5. Sensitivity to the uniqueness and fragility of the natural world of which we are part
6. Responsibility for the consequences of our choices
7. Belief in our changing selves and in our right to change
8. Creativity in the spiritual and aesthetic dimensions of life
9. Intelligence that is informed and cultivated, critical yet tolerant
10. Leadership which empowers
others
