On Sept. 27 at 10:30 a.m., the University of Maine hosted its first Elect Her – Campus Women Win, a conference for women to explore opportunities in student government and political office.
Elect Her – Campus Women Win held in the Wells Conference Room on the UMaine campus and featured guests such as UMaine President Susan Hunter and Maine Senator Emily Cain. The conference consisted of 20 college women from all University of Maine System campuses, along with Bates College, Colby College, St. Josephs, Tufts College and Hunters College in New York.
“I’m especially pleased as UMaine’s first woman president to welcome Elect Her to the UMaine campus,” Hunter said. “There continues to be disparity between women and men serving in elected positions. I encourage [conference members] to join efforts to lessen the gender gap and form a wonderful network here at Elect Her.”
Throughout the four and a half hour conference, Elect Her members were tasked with working through a comprehensive workbook that explored networking skills, the workings of student government, political campaign strategy, support networks and platform messaging tips. The group was also tasked with stimulating a campaign by interacting with members and explaining their ideas and candidacy.
“We’re one of 50 campuses in the nation who host Elect Her,” said Mary Cathcart, senior policy associate at the Margaret Chase Smith Policy Center, one of Elect Her’s sponsors. “UMaine applied to host the program last year, and we were very happy to get accepted. We’re hoping it will become a yearly event.”
Elect Her is partnered with the nonprofit, nonpartisan American Association of University Women (AAUW), an organization with more than 165,000 members nationally, and Running Start, a nonprofit that expose young women to politics to pique their interest. She Should Run, another Elect Her partner, is dedicated to increasing the number of women in public office and combating barriers that hinder women in politics.
“Elect Her has been happening [nationwide] for five years,” program manager Jessica Kelly said. “Kate Farrar, Vice President of AAUW, saw student government as a great way to start getting women involved with politics. It planted the seed to run for office later in life, so she started this conference.”
Jamie Austin, a University of Maine in Farmington political science sophomore student, attended the conference after hearing about it from her professors.
“The conference was fantastic for women who had any political aspirations, whether in student government or political office,” Austin said. “The introductions where everybody said what they thought made them eligible to run for public office was very enlightening. It just goes to show how many different walks of life politically minded women can come from. I’m happy to hear it is going to become an annual event.”
The conference also included a student government panel titled, “The Nuts and Bolts of Running Student Government.” The panel involved former Student Government President Kimberly Dao and current Student Government Vice President for Financial Affairs Christine Le.
Later in the program, guest speakers, Special Assistant to the Vice President for Innovation and Economic Development Jennifer O’Leary, and Ph.D. Candidate in Communication and Journalism Brianne Suldovsky gave a talked titled, “The Importance of Messaging.”