I'm pretty sure that Dartmouth had no female students in 1945. I've assumed that Kay went to one of the "Seven Sisters" (or equivalent) schools that groomed wives for the Ivy students of the era. I also assume that she met him as a younger student after he returned from the war - otherwise she would have finished school while he was in the service.
Kay is 4 years younger then Mike. Kay was born to Thornton Adams, a Baptist pastor from New Hampshire, and his wife Agnes Adams. An excellent student, she was admitted to Dartmouth and met Michael in 1945 while studying education there. Though they believed their affair to be a secret, Kay's concerned parents had read some of her mail and discovered the truth.
As a non-Italian, she was somewhat of an outsider from the beginning and symbolized Michael's initial desire to live a more Americanized life, in contrast to the Corleone family's criminal enterprises. She attended Connie's wedding with Michael, and most of the guests thought her to be somewhat more free-spirited than they'd come to expect from an unmarried woman. Kay was taken aback when Michael told her how his father helped Johnny Fontane's career by threatening to kill his manager, but Michael assured her "that's my family Kay, not me".
