Women’s History Month dedicates one month out of the year to female empowerment, but two groups on campus dedicate the whole year to that cause.
Women’s Student Services and the Women’s Place work year-round to celebrate, support and connect women across campus.
The Office of Women’s Student Services has worked to help women at Ohio State for more than 25 years.
“Our focus has always been about empowerment, awareness and education regarding women’s issues,” said Dionne Blue, coordinator at Women’s Student Services in the Multicultural Center.
Women’s Student Services provides programs for women on issues such as gender-role stereotypes, women’s leadership and body image.
“Our goal is to educate about issues affecting women while also providing support,” said Vanessa Strickley, graduate administrative assistant for Women’s Student Services.
Strickley recently began a women’s focus group to discuss important issues that affect women on campus. Share Here and Empower brings together female faculty, staff and students in an effort to improve life for women.
“It seems like there’s a disconnect between women on campus,” Strickley said. “We’ve created a community of women who can discuss ways to make life better on campus.”
Throughout March, Women’s Student Services sponsors and supports several activities for women, including the March 5 celebration of International Women’s Day, which brought together more than 100 people to celebrate.
“We focus on the fact that International Women’s Day is the only global holiday for women,” Blue said.
The celebration included singing, dancing, international cuisine and health screening such as blood pressure, diabetes and anonymous HIV testing.
“We try to provide a multicultural program geared towards women,” Blue said.
Other activities throughout the month included a lecture from Felicia Hall, former vice president of team operations for the WNBA Charlotte Sting, and Diversity Lecture Series speaker Harilyn Rousso, an expert on women with disabilities.
While Women’s Student Services works to provide services and support for women on campus, the Women’s Place connects women across campus to create a better university environment.
“The Women’s Place provides a unified method of looking at women’s issues and connects the issues of women on campus,” said Judy Fountain, assistant vice provost for women’s policy initiatives and director of the Women’s Place.
Only in its third year, the Women’s Place has also created a group that provides a direct link to the president and provost. The President’s Council on Women’s Issues brings together men and women from the faculty, staff, student body and outside the OSU community to answer the question, “How can we unpack women’s issues, problems and challenges to determine where interventions make a difference?”
“We’re celebrating women and their success, but also giving a gender lens to the issues,” Fountain said.
