Alice Saunier-Seité

Alice Louise Saunier-Seïté was a French geographer, historian, university professor and politician of the Parti Républicain. She was a State Secretary and the first female minister for universities, serving from 1978 to 1981, when she also briefly served as Assistant Minister to the Prime Minister for family and women. She is remembered as the first female dean and first female rector of a university in France. She is remembered also as the minister who ordered that the experimental university in Vincennes be razed to the ground during the night of 27 August 1980, that all physical trace of the world-renowned left-leaning university be removed.