And we are finally getting it NOW!

Click here for a great video:   What AAUW does  Be proud!

The gender pay gap won’t close until 2119 at the current rate of change.
AAUW is doing something about it. Take action now!
Empowering women since 1881

March,  2021

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A Few Thoughts from, Beverly   

March is here and with it a few important dates – Daylight Saving Time Begins March 14^th, St. Patrick’s Day on March 17^th and of course almost everyone becomes Irish for St. Patrick’s Day, First Day of Spring March 20^th, the beginning of Passover an eight-day celebration beginning March 27^th with the First Seder and Palm Sunday on March 28^th.  Let us not forget International Women’s Day is Monday, March 8^th!

In celebration of International Women’s Day, the following facts were complied by the Institute for Women’s Leadership at Nicholas College and the Center for American Women and Politics at Rutgers University:

1. In the U.S., women represent 47% of the workforce.
2. Women make up more than 26% of all members in the 117^th Congress – the highest percentage in U.S. history.
3. Women are the primary or sole breadwinner in 40% of U.S. families.

I do hope by now many or most of our branch has had an opportunity to participate in the Covid-19 vaccination program. I had my second vaccination of Moderna at Kaiser which affected me pretty hard and I was out of commission for almost two days. Not complaining because I’m glad to have taken it, but my body didn’t like it and I was having trouble getting back to normal. It really wore me out and I was told that is a good thing. Who knows? I know some of you also had difficulty and luckily some did not. But this is not going to work unless we all participate.

Norma Williamson and Gail Ross have worked hard on an application submitted on behalf of our branch to try to obtain one of two $500.00 awards being given for Gov Trek project. Let us all cross our fingers and toes in hopes that we are awarded!

May we all look forward to Sweet Memories in 2021 by being well and healthy, staying home and being safe.

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Please welcome and support your new officers.  Remember that their job is to lead and encourage other members.  Please offer to help them when they ask.

Reminder to members:  As is written in your directory, the AAUW mail/email list is to be used for AAUW business only.  If you wish to share something personal with selected members, please verify with the members first, if they want to be included.  Members who find themselves receiving email they do not want should feel free to ask to be removed.  We’re all friends here.

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Meeting & Program, Karen, Nancy & Mary Ann

La Palma Cerritos AAUW General Meeting
Thursday, March 18
Zoom Meeting
6:30 Social
Meeting at 7:PM

Our General Meeting/AAUW Fund program will feature our speaker, Miryam Fernandez. She arrived in America from Peru with her parents when she was 5 years old. She has a remarkable story to share about her “Coming to America” and finding the life of success that has been part of her American dream. Miryam will be sharing about her life in the military and her journey to becoming a public-school educator and administrator. Her presentation will be one that you will find to be incredibly interesting and admirable.

Register Here for the Meeting.

Download our Brochure

Important information about upcoming AAUW NATIONAL ELECTIONS You should vote on.

This spring, AAUW members will be asked to vote on amendments to the Public Policy Priorities and bylaws, in addition to electing members to the national board of directors. Here you’ll find all the information you need on the proposed bylaws and Public Policy Priorities changes. The comment period is now closed. Voting will begin in April. Here are some questions and answers from members about open membership in AAUW. Thank you to National AAUW Board Member Cherie Sorkin for compiling them for us

1. AAUW has been this way for a long time. Why do we need to change now?

• Our continued relevance will be enhanced by eliminating barriers that limit who can participate in our mission of advancing equity for women and girls.
• Many corporate and foundation funders are unwilling or prohibited from funding organizations that have barriers to participation in the work of the organization. Corporate and foundation funding is essential for national nonprofits these days.  AAUW’s membership dues support only a small percentage of our work.
• As part of the country’s overall reckoning with systemic racism and inequality, much of which disproportionately affects women, it is time to recognize that our self-imposed barriers to participation are actually harmful, even if they once were understood to serve as a well-intentioned incentive to specific achievement.

2.. Won’t dropping the degree requirement end what is unique about our organization and our like-minded nature?

• Our mission isn’t changing and AAUW will continue to be unique in its breadth of programming, research, policy and advocacy, fellowships & grants, and grassroots membership.
• Having a degree does not make someone “like-minded”—We are like-minded in our support for advancing equity for women and girls.
• Having a degree does not make someone a better advocate for women or a better symbol of womanpower. Think Eleanor Roosevelt, Lilly Ledbetter, Malala, Greta Thunburg.
• Women without degrees can certainly be just as passionate about advancing equity for women and girls as women with degrees.

3. Don’t we need to honor the legacy of our founding mothers by retaining the degree requirement?

• Life was different 140 years ago when only a very few women were able to go to college or find meaningful employment after graduation. Today, women outpace men in earning degrees at all levels. Women also make up (pre-COVID) close to ½ of the total workforce in the U.S. But economic disparities and discrimination against women persist widely, despite our levels of education and participation in the workforce.
• AAUW can and should take pride in its past and present success in helping women attain higher education. The fully endowed Fellowships and Grants Fund will allow AAUW to be a leader in this area in perpetuity. Education is important and does make a difference. But it alone doesn’t guarantee equal treatment or opportunities for women, something our founders cared about deeply.  The battle to be fought is not just about education, but about equal treatment.

4. If the degree requirement is dropped, will branch membership increase?

• A rush of younger members to join branches is unlikely due to the age of most of our current branch members. However, more women in older age ranges may be interested in joining once the barrier is removed. We all undoubtedly have friends who are “just as smart,” just as interested in equality for women” not to mention “just as much fun” who can’t be members because of the current degree requirement. Many of us have been embarrassed by encouraging friends to join, only to find out they aren’t eligible because they don’t have a degree.
• Our degree requirement has shut out women with diverse backgrounds and perspectives – who may inject new energy into the mission. Younger women, in particular, view the fact that we have a barrier to entry that disproportionately affects women of color and women of lower economic status as contrary to our mission, elitist and discriminatory. Support from young women as members or donors or advocates for our mission is important to our long-term survival as a membership organization.

5. I’m proud of having attained my degree. Since college education is more accessible now, why do we need to drop the requirement?

• Getting a degree was a badge of honor for many of us, building our confidence and honing our intellectual skills, and also helping to prepare us for work outside the home. For some it was also a badge of honor that meant we could join AAUW, an organization that helped keep us intellectually stimulated while we were still at home raising children.  But, degrees are not the “badge of honor” they once were and many careers are now open to women without degrees.  Skyrocketing educational costs, childcare, elder care, transportation, working multiple jobs and language barriers are significant issues for women today that make it hard for women to get a degree.  Also going to college today has burdened women with two-thirds of the national college debt. Cost is a barrier many of us didn’t have “back then.”

6. Won’t we have to change our name if we drop the degree requirement?

• First of all, we’ve had a variety of names during our 180-year history.
• Today, AAUW is well-respected and high profile, particularly in its advocacy and research. We would not want to lose this position of recognition.  Many other organizations use only initials and didn’t formally change their names when one of the original words in the name became out of favor or inappropriate.  Think NAACP or YWCA.  Changing our name is not the issue to focus on. Opening our membership to a broader group that will work in support of the mission is the issue.
• Also, the full name has not been applicable for a while. “American” – we have worked internationally for over 100 years. “Association” – members dues now only comprise 15-20% of revenues. “University” – in 2005, membership was extended to people with associate degrees. “W” – in 1987, membership was open to men.

Tech Trek, Celia and Edna

As reported last month, girls chosen to attend Tech Trek for 2020 would be allowed to attend this summer’s virtual Tech Trek camp. The four girls we chose last year have been contacted and all four want to attend.  There will be three different weeks that the camp will be offered and each girl has been asked to choose the one that she wants to attend. The funds for them to cover the cost, $400 per girl, have already been raised.  The remaining funds that were raised will be held in the branch account of the AAUW California Special Projects Fund account.

AAUW Fund, Esther, Thea

Again, we would like to thank those members who generously contributed to our AAUW FUND non-event “Share Your COVID Savings”.  Our total for this event came to $2380. Your donation to the AAUW FUND promotes equity for women and girls by supporting AAUW’s critical work!  It gives AAUW the ability to carry out its bold, strategic vision for the future. A special thank you to Thea Siegel, Gail Ross and Marilyn Forsstrom for their help and support with this project.

You can…
Create Change,
Advance Equity,
Empower Women and Girls,
By helping to raise money for AAUW Fund.

The La Palma-Cerritos branch of AAUW created our own memorial fund in July 2017, called the Alberta Brose Memorial Fund, to go to women who return to school just as she did.  We currently have completed our goal.  This was a short time, two year fund with a goal of $5000 for completion by June 30, 2019. The branch got CA State and National recognition for completion. Final donation has gone to AAUW Fund for Career Development Grants for graduate students returning to school after 5+  year absence.

Elsie Carbajal  is the recipient of our own Alberta Brose Memorial Fund.  We are proud!

Career Development Grants

Name: Elsie Carbajal
Award Year: 2018-19
Award: Career Development Grant
Institution: Brandman University
Location: Irvine, California
Discipline: Education
Degree and Specialization: M.A., Education leadership

Elsie Carbajal is a seasoned special education teacher who is passionate about meeting the diverse needs of public school students with special needs. Her goal is to strategically reform outdated practices that limit the growth and progress of the unique population she services. She plans to obtain her master’s in education leadership to collaborate with stakeholders and make informed decisions to enhance student outcomes in and out of school.

Sponsors:
4431 – Alberta Brose Memorial Fund
1262 – Laguna Beach (CA) Branch/Laguna Hills (CA) Branch
1285 – San Diego County (CA) Branch/Marilyn George Poluzzi
1298 – Los Angeles (CA) Branch/Dallas Shenk
1484 – San Clemente-Capistrano Bay (CA) Branch
4105 – Redlands (CA) Branch/Bernice Black Johndrew
1491 – Somerset Hills (NJ) Branch—Science and Technology

Public Policy, Sondra & Norma

Equal Pay Day on March 24th,  Wear RED!

Along with my fellow branch members of the La Palma – Cerritos American Association of University Women (AAUW) we are asking the community at large to join us in advocating for the passage of H.R. 7, the Paycheck Fairness Act on behalf of American working women. For 24 years, AAUW has actively advocated for passage of this bill. Now more than ever, American women need to receive equal pay for equal work.

The Covid-19 pandemic has exacerbated income inequalities as demonstrated by the massive historical unemployment rates affecting American women today. The AAUW 2020 report entitled “The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap” states that “Between February and April 2020, women’s unemployment rate rose by 12.8% compared to 9.9% for men.” This has resulted in a “shecession” (a term coined by C. Nicole Mason, Ph.D. of the Institute for Women’s Policy Research) an economic downturn where 11.5 million women lost their jobs as opposed to 9 million men who lost their jobs during the months of February and May 2020. Then in the months of August and September 2020, an additional 865,000 women were cut from the payrolls – 4 times the number of men seeking employment.

H.R. 7, the Paycheck Fairness Act closes the loopholes of the 1963 Equal Pay Act by protecting workers’ rights to formally and informally discuss salary scales at their place of work without negative repercussions from employers, prohibiting employers to retaliate against workers who raise questions and concerns about wage differences, requiring employers to prove that their salary scales do not discriminate against gender, prohibiting the use of prior work salary history for setting the pay scale for new hires, allowing workers to sue employers for discriminatory wages based on gender and finally mandating training sessions for women to acquire the necessary skills to successfully negotiate higher wages.

As the Public Policy Co-chair of the AAUW La Palma – Cerritos branch, a retired teacher of 30 years for a local school district and its seven year coordinator for their Healthy Start/McKinney Vento Homeless Education programs back in the 1990’s (where school case managers identified community resources to assist low income student families), I personally witnessed the overwhelming struggles of working mothers, many of them the main breadwinners of their families. These women heroically juggled two to three jobs to pay the rent, utility bills, put food on their families’ tables and help with their children’s homework. We all know these overworked/underpaid women – they are childcare providers, restaurant hostesses, food preparation, cashiers, hotel housekeepers, cooks and come from many more occupations. All these women, mostly from private, non-union jobs, earned far less than their male co-workers for the same job and the same hours.

Join us on March 24^th of this year, as we observe Equal Pay Day. Since 1996, women’s rights organizations have commemorated Equal Pay Day, worn red to mark the struggle of women for equality and more importantly women have engaged in lobbying our state and national legislators for equal pay. This date symbolizes how far into the year women must work to earn what men earned in the previous year.

On March 24^th, in spite of Covid-19 restrictions, La Palma – Cerritos AAUW members will be participating in virtual meetings with Congressional representatives to give voice to the millions of women struggling to provide for their families by urging legislators to pass H.R. 7, the Paycheck Fairness Act. Twenty four years is enough!

Throughout the years, research study after research study has documented the paycheck disparity between men and women for jobs of equal responsibilities. Full time working women earn 82 cents to every men’s dollar and women of color are paid even less:  Black women make 62 cents on the dollar and Latinas make 54 cents on the dollar. Even as college graduates with advanced degrees, women still make less than their male counterparts. “At the current rate, the overall pay gap between men’s and women’s earnings will not close until 2093 and it will take significantly longer for women of color to reach parity” (The Simple Truth about the Gender Pay Gap Report, Fall, 2020).

AAUW La Palma-Cerritos Branch asks interested community members to contact their  Congressional Representative, Linda Sanchez at https://lindasanchez.house.gov/contact and urge her to pass H.R.7, the Paycheck Fairness Act or petition a different congressperson via the AAUW website at https://www.aauw.org/resources/policy/pfa-toolkit/

For more information, contact Norma Williamson, AAUW La Palma – Cerritos Public Policy Co-Chair at nvwilliamson@gmail.com

Academic Achievement Awards, Carol

I was able to contact the Foundation at Cerritos College and talked to the woman who is now handling the applications for the students. I told her we had $2,500.00 and would like to split it into two scholarships of $1,250.00 each.  One would go to a regular student that was completing the first two years of school and would be transferring to a four year college.  The second one would go to a woman that had been out of school for 4 or more years and was returning to finish her education.  I asked for no more than 15 applications.  By a show of hands the members at the October zoom meeting approved this.

Applications will be coming in the first of the year and should close in February. Copies of their applications will be mailed to us to distribute to our committee.  At this point in time I have not chosen them.  We should be able to evaluate them in March and make a decision.  The school usually notifies the students in May.  Since we have no idea how long the covid lockdown will continue, we will have to see if it is even possible to hold a brunch.  We will have to play it by ear.  The school may even have to give the awards to the girls.  We do have lots of time to make that decision.

If you have any questions or further input please feel free to call or email me.

International Issues, Jackie Shahzadi

Women Graduates-USA

…through its global focus and reach, empowers all women and girls to create a secure and just world built on education, advocacy, friendship and mutual respect.

WG-USA is an online organization based in the United States focusing on global issues *Support and Advocacy for Refugee and Migrant Women and Girls
*Safe Access to Education
*Human Trafficking Advocacy and Action
*Women, Peace and Security

Join WG-USA at www.wg-usa.org

In 2019, Graduate Women International celebrated its 100th anniversary with a Centennial Celebration in Geneva, July 25-28. GWI was founded in 1919, by representatives of AAUW, and other international women’s groups. It used to be known as the IFUW, International Federation of University Women. Currently, Women Graduates-USA is the organization representing American women at GWI.

Link HERE to the Academic Awards for picture and more information

Please check out the LAF News page for current case updates.  Tobi

Update on TechTrek page, also.