Bekki Lee, assistant dean of students and co-chair of the committee planning the event, has been preparing for this event since January.
"We thought it would be a great occasion to really envision the coming years ... [and] to provide an engaging program for the Amherst community to embrace the achievements of coeducation," Lee said. "We feel it is important to celebrate how much we've accomplished ... to examine the current state of coeducation and to begin exploring new ideas for the next 25 [years]."
Approximately 80 faculty members and students from various campus organizations are also a part of the planning committee.
"There's just been incredible enthusiasm ever since we posed the idea. People have been very excited," Lee said.
Lee spoke of the many changes that she has witnessed at Amherst that have strengthened women on campus, such as the creation of the women's and gender studies department and more "women students [who] have found a home in the sciences," she said.
Other developments include the founding of new women's sports teams, the first female student body president in 1991, the first woman of color elected as student body president in 1992 and an increased number of female minority students on campus. The Class of 2004 marked the first class to have more female than male students.
Director of Health Education Denise McGoldrick, a member of the planning committee, remembers a number of developments in the incoming classes in her 14 years at Amherst.
"I think ... today's women students feel like they can take on the world. They don't encounter the same obstacles I went though," McGoldrick said. "They're a lot more empowered, assertive and hopeful."
In 1976, the first nine women-transfer students-graduated from the College. That same year, the College admitted its first coed class.
"I think it's been a triumph, as much as we have a long way to go," said President Tom Gerety.
This anniversary celebration offers a number of events, beginning with Saturday's symposium, which will continue readings from a thesis project called "The Fairest College" and performances by campus a cappella groups.
The highlight of the night will be Lani Guinier's keynote speech, "Rethinking Gender and Power: Building Diverse Learning Communities." Lee and McGoldrick both described Guinier, who is the first African-American woman to become a tenured law professor at Harvard University Law School, as "bright" and "refreshing."
"She can speak to gender differences and how it manifests in the classroom and how the faculty can encourage more participation from women," McGoldrick said.
In addition, a video documentary, "A Question of Place," and a photo exhibition in the Keefe Campus Center will be shown this Saturday.
Through the month of November, students and faculty, both from Amherst and other area schools, will hold panels examining the past and the future of coeducation at Amherst.
Lee recalled her first interview with then President Peter Pouncey, who mentioned that Amherst was "coeducation in name, but not yet in spirit."
But times have changed. "I believe that under the presidencies of both Peter Pouncey and Tom Gerety, Amherst College has come to embrace the spirit of coeducation, and it is my hope ... that the upcoming events will provide an opportunity to celebrate the transformation of the past 25 years and also to address the challenges that remain," Lee said.