A significant turning point in the history of the academy came in 1975, when President Gerald Ford signed legislation allowing women to attend the nation’s military academies. In 1976, the first female students enrolled in the Air Force Academy. The class of 1980 was the first graduating class to include women. Initially, women only constituted about 10 percent of the cadet class. Today, women make up 19.1 percent of the US Air Force.