Planning for an Economically-Secure Future
Campus Action Project Teams

While several measures of educational achievement show that on average women are faring as well as their male counterparts today, often times these gains do not translate into comparable economic success beyond college. In 2004, college-educated women 25 and older earned 75 percent of what their male peers earned. This pay gap appears within the first year after college – even when women are working full-time in the same fields as men – and widens in the first ten years in the workforce. AAUW Educational Foundation research points to several factors that appear to be pivotal including the field of study, the decision to have children, and occupational choice.¹

Campus Action Project Teams Selected
Ten teams from around the country were selected to implement projects on their campus under the topic Planning for an Economically Secure Future in five areas:

1. Campus Dialogue
Teams fostered dialogue on campus through panel discussions, workshops, or other initiatives such as AAUW's Woman-to-Woman Community Dialogues on Social Justice.

• Coastal Carolina University, Conway, SC
  Keys to Effective Financial Literacy for Women College Students
  The team from Coastal Carolina University (CCU) trained and prepared a corps of thirty women student leaders on their campus on issues relevant to women's financial planning and economic future. These students led a series of campus dialogues for their fellow students on issues related to pay equity, financial planning and women's economic security.
  
  
• Middlebury College, Middlebury, VT
  Working for Working Women
  The team from Middlebury College planned and hosted an "Economically Secure Future" weekend symposium to help their students, faculty and staff engage in and address issues related to women's economic security, including work-family balance, career development, and pay equity. The weekend symposium featured deliberative dialogues, panel discussions, a policy workshop and a keynote speaker. All events were open to others from the greater New England Area.
  
  
• University of Guam, Mangilao, Guam
  Designing a Woman-Friendly Workplace
  Organized in small teams, students from the University of Guam conducted a case study of their university to evaluate how woman-friendly it is and to and to re-imagine the workplace with women, particularly local indigenous women in mind. Student groups were trained and supported by faculty advisors and at the end of their investigation the students presented their findings to the campus community and distributed their findings in a variety of media.

2. Equal Pay Day and Beyond
Teams used Equal Pay Day 2007, recognized on Tuesday, April 24, as an opportunity to educate about pay equity and mobilize for change on their campus and in their local community.

• Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), Savannah, GA
  The Art of Equality - Planning for an Economically Secure Future
  The objectives of this project were to inspire creative interpretations and to raise awareness of the issue of women and work/pay/equity on the SCAD campus and other campuses in the state of Georgia by sponsoring a series of events, including an art competition and exhibit, roundtable discussions, and a "Women and Work" film festival.
  
  
• Rogers State University, Claremore, OK
  What are you Worth?
  This project sought to inform and empower young high school and university women about earning their true worth by increasing their awareness of equity issues, hindrances to job and pay equity, and resources available to women; educating women about opportunities in nontraditional careers; and equipping participants with practical skills in job and salary negotiation and financial management.

3. Examining Perceptions
Teams examined the perceptions of faculty, staff and students and the wider community on the pay gap and other factors related to women's careers and earnings.

• Edinboro University of Pennsylvania, Edinboro, PA
  Edinboro University Equal Pay Day Education Project
  The team from Edinboro University administered the AAUW Public Perceptions of the Pay Gap survey on their campus to help reveal how aware the campus community is that a pay gap still exists, as well as campus perceptions about why it continues to exist. They used their findings to help inform subsequent educational programming to help female students make better informed decisions when selecting academic majors and career paths.
  
  
• The University of West Florida, Pensacola, FL
  Women's Payday: Got Equity?
  This team administered a modified version of the AAUW Public Perceptions of the Pay Gap survey to students, faculty, and staff on campus and to area Chamber of Commerce members and Workforce Development Boards. They then planned a multi-pronged media campaign to publicize the findings to help raise awareness of the issue of the pay gap in their area.

4. Mentoring
Teams implemented mentoring programs for women students to encourage and promote education, career-planning and issues that affect women's working lives.

• College of Staten Island, The City University of New York (CUNY), Staten Island, NY
  How to be Ms. Independent: What Women Need for an Economically-Secure Future
  Undergraduate student team members from the College of Staten Island acted as mentors to young women (ages 13-17) who reside at a facility run by the Office of Children and Family Services (OCFS). The team developed and sponsored a host of workshops held at the OCFS facility aimed at helping the girls learn about managing money, non-traditional careers for women, and the importance of education in increasing earning potential among other topics. The team sponsored on-campus events including a panel discussion and a Poetry Slam competition to recognize Equal Pay Day.
  
  
• Tennessee Technical University, Cookeville, TN
  Project Linking Lives: A Women's Mentoring Initiative for Nontraditional Students
  This project is a collaborative effort of advisors and nontraditional students to initiate, create, implement, and operate a nontraditional student mentoring program designed to assist women in the Upper Cumberland region of Tennessee to experience a more fulfilling and successful college experience as nontraditional students. Project Linking Lives will involve the creation of a Nontraditional Student Mentoring Center as a resource center, providing guidance, support, information, workshops and speakers. The Center assisted in planning a Nontraditional Student Transitions Conference and produced a Nontraditional Student's Survival Manual.

5. Web Based Tools
Teams create web-based tools to enhance academic/career advising and planning.

• The University of Maryland - Baltimore, Baltimore, MD
  UMB Helping Young Women Succeed
  The objective of this program was to foster training, mentoring relationships and establish networking opportunities in order to advance women's academic and career choices. In support of that goal, the team developed a web-based tool kit that will include a website that hosts resources that are particularly useful to female students and a series of e-learning courses designed to create awareness and deal with the obstacles women face in the workplace.

Finally, LTI also recognized and made a special award to a team from the University of Mississippi.

The Graduate Women's Closet at the University of Mississippi works as a "suit library" for graduate women who are interviewing for jobs and attending professional conferences, but who cannot afford to buy their own suits. There are very few stores in rural Oxford that offer professional women's wear and women have to travel over an hour to Memphis to visit clothing stores. However, many graduate women are living off limited assistantships and neither traveling to Memphis nor buying a new suit is economically feasible for most; therefore, there is a great need for this service. The closet will be "built" and staffed year-round by members of the Graduate Women's Group.

The selected teams offer an exciting and varied list of activities and perspectives to consider when thinking about women's economic futures, and their endeavors hold great promise for visibility, impact, and strong connections to AAUW.

¹ U.S. Department of Education, National Center for Education Statistics, 1993/2003 Baccalaureate and Beyond Longitudinal Study.

Questions? Call AAUW's Leadership Programs at 202/785/7719 or send an e-mail to leadership@aauw.org.