AAUW-NYS Annual Meeting: An Intern's Perspective

The gathering opened with a choice of tours; one of Albany Nanotech Complex, and the one that I chose of the New York State Capitol, which provided a reminder of the group’s connection (feminism in New York State) that acted as a great conversation topic, allowing me to integrate myself into the new group of women seamlessly. The tour guide explained the history of the building, such as the Million Dollar Staircase, which has recently been updated to honor the great Ruth Bader Ginsburg by including her bust as one of the seven female faces on the staircase. After the tour, we signed into the hotel before a reception with the Mayor of Albany, Kathy Sheehan. Mayor Sheehan shared her experiences with being a female mayor and how she faced the gender bias that she has faced throughout her career. After listening to her inspiring speech, the AAUW group met for dinner before going to bed for the night. 

The second day commenced with the business meeting to discuss and vote on new/changes in bylaws. After the voting, six branches, Elmira Corning, Ithaca, Jamestown, Oswego, Greater Rochester Area, and Poughkeepsie, were awarded with plaques to commemorate 100 plus years since their branch’s founding AAUW. They were also celebrated by the AAUW CEO, Gloria Blackwell, who joined via Zoom. AAUW-NYS President Suzanne Young-Mercer introduced the keynote speaker Muskan Tibrewala, a human rights lawyer from India and AAUW fellow who just graduated from Columbia. Muskan shared their experience with fighting for the rights of women in court and explained laws that are hindering women’s rights. Their speech allowed me to think about, while there are many advancements in women’s rights today, there are many more necessary steps to take to ensure the advancement of and protection of those rights. Muskan also shared a moving story that they won against a young girl’s abuser that set the tone for the succeeding speaker, Kelli Nicholas Owens. 

Kelli Nicholas Owens is the Executive Officer of the New York State Office for the Prevention of Domestic Violence and has been since 2019. Kelli’s “Enough Is Enough” speech was focused on technology facilitated abuse, working to educate the room on this epidemic and to explain steps people can take to combat it. Not only did Kelli highlight the reality of technology facilitated abuse by telling the truths of a young man who faced cyber bullying, but she also shared that it can start as young as third and fourth grade. The presence of one of the members’ eight year old daughter at the meeting made this fact even more shocking and caused me and others I spoke to to want to work with Kelli to tackle this issue and educate others on the topic.

After the second speaker, the group broke for lunch. I took this time to get to know women from other branches of NYS AAUW. This started with brief introductions on how we got into the organization and our favorite Broadway musicals, but quickly led to impactful conversations about the prior speakers. One woman even shared her story of escaping an abusive marriage in order to help the table understand how to help a friend in a dire situation like hers. This group amplified the purpose of AAUW: women supporting women.

The day's talks came to a close with a speech from Dr. William (Bill) Murphy, Deputy Commissioner for Higher Education at the NYS Education Department. Bill spoke on how, although there are higher numbers of women in universities and colleges, many fields, especially STEM fields, are still significantly dominated by men. He went on to discuss how he and his team were working to introduce changes such as reimagination of diplomas and opportunity programs in order to increase numbers of people in higher education and to decrease the number of gaps of underrepresented groups in certain fields. Bill mentioned that he had spoken to his teenage daughters about appearing at our meeting, and they were thrilled. Bill wrapped up the speeches wonderfully with the reminder that we are fighting for equal education for women, no matter their circumstances. 

To conclude the conference, the group came together to participate in a reflection guided by Ssanyu Birigwa, AAUW NYC Metro board member and Columbia Professor, which promoted the support of all of the women in our circle. We shared our fears for our futures as women and shared prior experiences that shaped us and our experiences with feminism, reminding ourselves that we not only have made remarkable progress, but that we will continue to move forward. 

Rowan Trevino is AAUW NYC Metro's 2025 Policy Intern