Goodbye Las Vegas, Hello Boston!
One year ago an estimated 175,000 women marched in Boston to ensure their voices were heard. Since then, much attention has been paid to issues and action that impact women everywhere. Women asked “what can we do?” and new and old organizations responded with action plans to affect change across the country.
As the 2018 marches approach, we launched the first state-based GenderAvenger initiative, powered by the EOS Foundation. GenderAvenger Massachusetts (GenderAvenger MA) supporters are coming together to ensure women throughout the state are always part of the public dialog.
65 women joined our launch event to make plans and take immediate action. Commitments were made to recruit signers of the GenderAvenger Pledge including members of the Congressional and state legislative delegations, as well as prominent business leaders. The GA Tally was downloaded and immediately used to alert MIT that more women need to be part of its upcoming conference, Sloan Sports Analytics Conference. While touting the appearance of President Obama at the conference, the rest of the lineup was sorely lacking in diversity.
Only three women were among the announced 17 speakers, and none were women of color.
When the newly formed GenderAvenger MA took to their tallies, the “thunderstorm of inequality” chart showed up across Twitter and Facebook tagged with #SSAC18. So many posts appeared that #GenderAvenger became the #1 trending hashtag in Boston. Since our activation, the Sloan Conference has announced more women speakers. (As of this writing, seven women have been announced, including two women of color, out of 27 confirmed speakers on their website.)
We expect to see more in the coming weeks, and MA Avengers will be ready to honor the commitment to inclusion and diversity as the list grows.
Whether it is an MIT-lead conference or a town meeting, GenderAvenger MA will be watching and counting to ensure that the talented women of their state get to be where they belong — in the Statehouse, in public conversations, and wherever lists are created to represent Massachusetts.
From Massachusetts? Sign up here to join GenderAvenger MA.