1972: Renetta Predmore-Lynch

Women’s Rights Advocate

In the 1970s, the workforce was changing rapidly, but not quickly enough for Renetta Predmore-Lynch. The Intelligence Community was still primarily comprised of male employees and had a reputation as being less supportive of the female workforce. In 1972, the NSA promotion board passed over Predmore-Lynch for a promotion. She believed this was due entirely to her gender. Predmore-Lynch logged a complaint with the NSA’s Equal Employment Opportunity Office and the EEOO’s investigation concluded that the NSA’s promotion process violated evaluation rules and excluded women from the promotion boards. Even with this determination, the NSA did not implement changes immediately. The Director did not think that the EEOO’s investigation was accurate. Predmore-Lynch then took her issue to the Board of Appeals, which confirmed the EEOO’s original findings. Through the efforts of women like Renetta Predmore-Lynch, the US District Court ruled in 1976 that the NSA had to include at least one female reviewer/voter on every promotion board.