Asha Bajaj, Joan Conley and Alyssa Harkins attended the Women’s policy summit meeting held in Sacramento Jan 16th 2014.
Report by Asha Bajaj:
California Women’s Policy Summit: Advancing women’s Health, Wealth and Power was held at the Sacramento Convention Center under the auspices of the California Center for Research on Women and Families. CCRWF. AAUW was one of the non-profit sponsors with Alicia Heitman state President serving as a panelist on Title IX.
The morning session was kicked off by Kate Karpilow, Executive director who hosted the session titled: Implementing Health Care Reform-Mobilizing Women’s Networks.
The moderator was Diana S. Dooley, Secretary, California Health and Human services Agency. The presenters included representatives from various state agencies and community networks especially Black women for Wellness and the Hispanic group. They have put foot soldiers on the ground to educate enroll and engage at the grass roots level to get maximum participation in Affordable Health Care Act coverage.
The summit Luncheon headliner was Sandra Fluke, attorney and Social justice Advocate for reproductive Rights. Sandra had become famous with the infamous comment on Capitol Hill when she asked for contraceptive coverage under the health care Act and was immediately given the epithet of “A Slut”
Sandra alerted all the generations of women not to become complacent and to watch out for women’s reproductive freedom especially with some states turning back the clock on a woman’s right to safe and legal abortion, Planned Parenthood and contraceptive services. “It seems unconscionable that Medicare will cover Viagra for aging men but deny young women contraception, an important aspect of a woman’s reproductive years” Sandra cautioned.
The closing session titled: Building Political Power What we are doing…..and what else needs to happen to achieve equity?
Presenters were Assemblywoman Cristine Garcia, and executive directors of Emerge California, Close the Gap, California and California Women Lead, all organizations trying to get women to run for political office.
The workshop I attended was on Health Disparities: Race, Ethnicity and Gender in the morning and
Reducing the backlog of Untested Rape kits,in the afternoon. Joan Conley attended the workshop on Women, Poverty and economic Empowerment in the morning and Title IX Compliance: Opening doors for Girls and young women, in the afternoon.
Report by Alyssa: Pathways to Policy was a great opportunity to meet young women with great prospects and aspirations. We had a full day of training before the Women’s Policy Summit. We had over a dozen successful women speak to us about their careers and how they achieved success in local government, state government, and non-profit organizations. We had workshops on networking, received advice on informational interviewing, and learned about the inner workings of state and local government. After a full day of lectures and workshops, we had a get-together in Senate Majority Leader Ellen M. Corbett’s office where we were able to practice our networking skills with several of the speakers at the next day’s Women’s Policy Summit. Afterwards we went to dinner and got to eat and talk with a mentor at each table. We stayed in a beautiful Victorian hostel that was rented out just for us. In the off time, my fellow participants and I were able to get to know each other and make strong connections. The next day we attended the Women’s Policy Summit where we were able to attend lectures on important issues such as poverty, Title IX, and rape kit backlogs. After the summit we gathered to make a list of our goals for the next three months. We have stayed in touch through email and networking websites like LinkedIn. I was able to learn so much and make valuable contacts through Pathways to Policy 2014.
The summit helped to fuel ideas on mission based programs in the future and public policy priorities for women. https://daw-ca.aauw.net/summit/
This is an annual event and we would recommend to the board to build into the budget for attendance next year.
Thank you for sponsoring Alyssa Harkins in full and the Public Policy chairs in part, to attend this summit.