Connecting Women on Campus and Beyond to Promote Equality

Thirty days is far from enough time to devote to women’s equality, but the events on SUA’s campus during Women’s History Month were designed to connect and celebrate women now as well as act as a catalyst for ongoing action.

With the theme of “Tributes to Women: Equality, Equity, and Empowerment,” the three-event series kicked off with a talk by Tanya Henderson, the international human rights lawyer and founder of Mina’s List; a women’s circle that brought female-identifying campus community members together to reflect and connect; and a panel discussion where SUA women shared their personal experiences navigating issues of gender and identity.

The aim was to build relationships across campus and increase the number of people committed to actualizing equality and equity, said Maya Gunaseharan, manager for diversity initiatives and community building, whose office organized the series alongside the university’s gender equity working group. “We hope that this moment becomes one where each of us identifies actions we can take to be a catalyst for gender equity, equality, and empowerment.”

Global Women Advancing Peace

A leader in promoting women’s rights, peace and security, and women’s political participation around the globe, Henderson opened her March 8 talk by describing the resonance she felt with SUA founder Daisaku Ikeda’s ideas and the essential role of education and human rights in promoting peace.

“Throughout history, women’s rights movements have also worked to advance larger collective goals of peace and social justice,” Henderson said, “recognizing that peace and respect for the dignity of life is the foundation of everything.”

Henderson noted that the founding of International Women’s Day in the early 1900s was similarly rooted in women’s activism to advance peace and justice, with members of Socialist parties in the United States and Europe proposing its establishment as a strategy to promote equal rights and women’s suffrage.

More recently, women’s “courageous activism” has spurred revolutions around the world, including in Egypt, Yemen, Libya, and Liberia, where the Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace movement led by Nobel Peace Laureate Leymah Gbowee brought together 3,000 Christian and Muslim women to stage nonviolent protests to help end Liberia’s 14-year civil war. Their actions eventually led to the rise of Liberia’s first female head of state, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.

“Research has consistently shown that electing more women to government leads to increased protection of women’s rights and greater gender equality,” she said.

Henderson said the importance of putting more women in political leadership around the world led her to launch Mina’s List in 2014. But she hadn’t anticipated the setbacks women would face, notably in Afghanistan, where Mina’s List’s efforts have included helping to evacuate women leaders who were endangered as the Taliban took control of the country.

“Over and over again, the women leaders would say to me, ‘20 years of our work for women’s rights and peace are now all lost,’” Henderson said. “What I have learned most astutely from this experience is that nothing is more important than peace.”

Connecting Women Around Campus

The focus turned from global to local two days later, when women from all parts of the SUA community—students, faculty, and staff—gathered in the Athenaeum for an intimate conversation. A women’s circle, Gunaseharan said, seemed an ideal way to connect SUA women who might not otherwise spend time together and to provide a safe and supportive environment where they could reflect and openly discuss their individual experiences.

About 20 women joined the discussion, led by Michelle Hobby-Mears, associate dean of students and director of student activities, which touched on navigating issues of gender, identity, and societal and cultural roles.

Those same topics were at the heart of the panel discussion that closed out the event series on March 31. Representatives from various areas of campus life reflected on how gender impacts the other identities they hold; the messages they received in childhood around gender and those they wished they’d heard; and who they look to in their own lives as advocates of gender equality.

Erica Baldaray, assistant director of athletics, said the lack of women’s leaders in sports when she was growing up spurred her to become one. “Being a woman has fueled me to be a leader in sports,” she said. “I didn’t see women in coaching positions or as athletic directors, and if I did, it was an anomaly. I wanted to be that representation for the next generation of women. Awareness of my responsibility as a woman pushed me to be the best that I’m capable of being and to set up a path for women in leadership in sports.”

Associate Professor of Economics Diya Mazumder commented on the effort it takes for women to resist the messages that limit them and forge their own paths and identities. “To be our authentic selves takes a lot of work,” she said.

The panelists agreed on the importance of replacing ideas of competition with “lifting each other up as we rise,” Baldaray said. “For so long we were fighting for that one seat at the table, but the more we can celebrate one another’s successes, support one another, and bring others along with us, the better we succeed.”

Mazumder encouraged the women in the audience to expand their ideas about supporting other women and to fight the common habit of remaining isolated in their personal struggles. “Check in with other women regularly and ask them what they need and what you can do,” she said.

As the month drew to a close, Gunaseharan said much of the feedback she heard from attendees of the three events reflected her own experience of feeling uplifted and inspired. “It is easy in the context of doing equity and inclusion work to feel we are moving at a snail’s pace or that things will never change, but then you witness the power of women—from Tanya Henderson to those in every corner of this institution—and feel so much hope and confidence in the future.”