January/February 2010

National Girls and Women in Sports Day
To commemorate National Girls and Women in Sports Day, AAUW co-sponsored an event in January with the Washington Mystics professional women's basketball team at the University of Maryland. You can celebrate girls in sports by evaluating your local high schools' athletics compliance with Title IX using the AAUW Title IX Compliance: Know the Score Program in a Box. Also, be sure to read Her Life Depends on It – II, the latest research report on the topic by the Women's Sports Foundation, a partner for Know the Score.

E-Student Affiliate Opportunity
Use AAUW's FREE e-student affiliate initiative to recruit undergraduate students who do not already have a bachelor's degree and who currently attend an AAUW college/university partner institution. Branches and states can use the Member Services Database to encourage local e-student affiliates to become branch and state members. State and branch college/university relations officers, membership vice presidents, and presidents now have access to the information they need to offer students the opportunity to join AAUW.

Chapter Leaders Playground — New Leadership Partner
The Chapter Leaders Playground is an online community for volunteer leaders from across organizations. Your AAUW membership gives you access to more than 40 30-minute leadership webinars a year to help you achieve even greater success as a state or branch leader. AAUW has officially launched a partnership with Cynthia D'Amour, author of The Lazy Leader's Guide to Outrageous Results, who specializes in helping associations get members involved. Cynthia and the Chapter Leaders Playground are valuable resources to help you grow your branches and be more successful as leaders. Join today!

March Is Women's History Month
AAUW will be celebrating National Women's History Month in March. Check the AAUW website, our blog, or AAUW's Facebook page during March to see what activities we have planned. We'll also be tweeting about women's accomplishments throughout history, so be sure to follow AAUW if you have a Twitter account, and join us for our weekly Twitter event, #wmnhist, on Wednesdays.

AAUW Leadership Corps Offers Support at All Levels
The AAUW Leadership Corps is a member involvement opportunity created to support branches, states, and members at large. These volunteer member leaders seek to develop new branches, maximize member awareness and engagement, and improve communication among all levels of AAUW. AAUW state presidents recently participated in two conference calls with the Leadership Corps grassroots liaisons, AAUW President Carolyn Garfein, AAUW Executive Director Linda Hallman, and staff. If you would like assistance with branch programming or administration, please complete the online form.

AAUW Book Sales and Lead Testing Requirements for Children's Books
In January 2009, the Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) released updated guidelines regarding lead in consumer products. These guidelines included a clause that books would be subject to the same lead testing as children's toys and other products, despite previous testing of children's books showing they contain far less (and far safer) levels of lead than toys do. Because of concerns that such a provision could negatively affect branch book sales, AAUW began working with the American Library Association on this issue. Responding to complaints, the CPSC announced in February 2009 that it was implementing a year-long "grace period" under which certain entities would not have to abide by the new guidelines, including purveyors of children's books. This stay was originally scheduled to expire in February 2010, but the CPSC recently voted to extend it through February 2011. Thus, the guidelines do not affect AAUW branch book sales. AAUW will continue to monitor the situation and will provide updates as appropriate.

Global Reproductive Health Conference
On January 8, AAUW Executive Director Linda Hallman attended an event with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton marking the 15th anniversary of the International Conference on Population and Development (ICDP). Clinton spoke about U.S. support of the ICPD goals of universal access to reproductive health care around the globe by 2015. AAUW's 2009–11 Public Policy Program declares our support for international family planning programs and increased access to health care.

Lobby Corps Preps for New Congressional Session
The AAUW Action Fund Capitol Hill Lobby Corps hosted a training in January to welcome new members and to begin preparing for the new congressional session. Members in the D.C. area, or those visiting D.C., are invited to join the Lobby Corps volunteers on Thursday mornings as they give AAUW a voice and a face on Capitol Hill. To join or to learn more, contact VoterEd@aauw.org.

AAUW Marks One-Year Anniversary of Ledbetter Enactment
AAUW marked the one-year anniversary of the enactment of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act on January 29 with a renewed push for the passage of the Paycheck Fairness Act (S. 182). Lilly Ledbetter and AAUW Director of Public Policy and Government Relations Lisa Maatz attended meetings with key senators in Washington, D.C., and Action Network members around the country urged their senators to take the next critical step in the fight for pay equity by quickly passing this much-needed update of the Equal Pay Act. See what the wage gap is in your state, learn more about the Paycheck Fairness Act, and read Lilly Ledbetter's letter supporting the bill.

New Programs in a Box Now Available
New public policy Programs in a Box are now available online to help members consider and choose programs for their branches. The Programs in a Box, which contain downloadable resources and steps for program implementation, focus on hosting an issue-specific women's summit or public policy brunch, taking action on Equal Pay Day, meeting with a public official, ensuring Title IX compliance, and more.

AAUW Executive Director at White House Events on STEM Education
AAUW Executive Director Linda Hallman attended several White House events in December and January with President Barack Obama, Education Secretary Arne Duncan, and other administration, business, university, and foundation officials to discuss the administration's Educate to Innovate campaign. The campaign aims to prepare more than 10,000 new math and science teachers over five years and provide training and development for more than 100,000 current teachers in the science, technology, engineering, and math fields.

National Lab Day Offers Role Model Opportunities
In November, President Barack Obama announced the establishment of National Lab Day, an effort supported by AAUW, NGCP, and more than 200 other organizations to bring hands-on learning to 10 million students. Are you a teacher, scientist, engineer, or professor? Sign up as a volunteer or mentor.

Branch Fundraisers
Looking for creative ways to raise funds for your branch? AAUW partners Better World Books, The Princeton Review, VirtuArte, and World Medical Card all include fundraising programming for your branch. Contact Cordy Galligan, AAUW director of corporate relationships, today to learn more.

World Medical Card
Protect yourself, those closest to you, and your entire community from medical error! Now, every AAUW member receives a FREE World Medical Card, and friends and family get a significant discount. Visit World Medical Card today and learn how you can use this benefit to raise funds for your branch programming as well!