Despite the protestations, Pauley was something of a trailblazer. In the mid-'70s, she was a news anchor on WMAQ-TV, NBC's Chicago affiliate--the first woman to co-anchor a regularly scheduled weeknight news program in that city.

But it would be unfair to imply that Pauley is not aware of her status as a working mother--approximately a year-and-a-half after she gave birth to the twins, she hosted an NBC documentary on "Women, Work and Babies: Can America Cope?"

And Pauley does acknowledge that she, along with Joan Lunden, co-host of ABC's "Good Morning, America," was one the first working mothers on television with young children.

Even today, there are few women in news with children, Pauley says. She notes with some excitement that Maria Shriver, also of NBC News, will soon join the ranks.

But while Pauley says working motherhood involves compromise and a continual search for the right balance between work and family, women in the spotlight can combine the personal and the professional.

"I can't show up at my boss's door, saying, `Send me away somewhere.' It's definitely a trade-off. I think I do good work for NBC, and I think they appreciate it," she says.

Pauley does not shirk opportunities to address the problems of what she calls "working parenthood," but she is not willing to surrender completely to celebrity. She says she is protective of her privacy and the privacy of her family.

"[I don't mind talking about it] as long as I don't have to say what Garry and I have for dinner, who cooks, who does the dishes," Pauley says.

But Americans' insatiable demand for the quirky details of media stars' personal lives does not mesh easily with desire to separate work from home, according to Kalb.

Kalb says that Pauley's media star status is responsible for the intrusions into her personal life--not her position as a working mother. "[The Class Committee] didn't select Jane because she's a working mother, you selected her because she's on t.v. every morning--let's just be honest about our motives," he says.

Radcliffe Class Marshal Virginia L. Stimpson '89, who helped select Pauley for the Class Day speech, says the news anchor's gender was a factor in the choice, but that she did not think Pauley would address women's issues specifically.

"I think we wanted a woman who had a home life and a family because we wanted someone to represent that balance, because it's something we're all worried about," Stimpson says.

"It's definitely not going to be just a problem of women to have that balance," she adds.

Pauley also says she thinks working parenthood is no longer solely a feminist issue, but one that concerns all segments of society.

"There are obviously senior men at Harvard who have an interest in what I symbolize most...The interest has lost its gender specificity," Pauley says.