Washington State University fined over 82K for failure to report rapes

From feministing.com:


Washington State University fined over 82K for failure to report rapes

By Vanessa Published: August 22, 2011
The Department of Education announced this weekend that it will be fining Washington State University $82,500 for failing to address two campus sexual assaults in 2007, as well as due to their lack of campus safety policies:
The university’s three violations of the main federal law on campus-crime reporting, the Clery Act, endangered Washington State students and employees who rely on campus-crime statistics and statements, a federal education official wrote in a letter to the college’s president, Elson S. Floyd.
[...] In one case at Washington State, the letter said, a woman told a campus police official that she had been raped by her husband’s friend. The incident was classified as a “domestics dispute” instead of a forcible sex offense, a mistake that the university later acknowledged, the letter said.
In a second incident, an employee reported a dormitory rape to the campus police that was omitted from campus reports because a records manager decided the case was unfounded. Under the Clery Act, only a law-enforcement official should make such a determination, the letter said.
Washington State also failed to make public certain policies, such as how it prepared crime statistics or imposed sanctions for sex offenses. The college has since corrected its policies, but the 2007 violations remained, the letter said.
While this is just one school (not to mention a monetary fine isn’t exactly a perfect vision of justice), this is still a really important step. It’s part of a larger decision that was made by the Department of Education to review dozens of colleges to ensure they are complying with the Clery Act, which came after a ton of recent reports on the sexual assault epidemic on college campuses — and more importantly, the subsequent lack of action taken by schools to address them.
There’s a reason why 95% of sexual assaults on campus aren’t reported. Let’s hope schools continue to be held accountable, and start taking the idea of campus safety policies seriously.

Equal Pay for Equal Work

Christine Bork

CEO, YWCA Metropolitan Chicago

Posted: 8/19/11 05:38 PM ET Huffington Post

Just a few months ago, the Supreme Court made a historical ruling impacting the future of pay discrimination in this country. The court, in a five to four decision, ruled in favor of retail giant Wal-Mart against a group of its female employees. Wal-Mart was facing a possible class action lawsuit on behalf of its female workers who were not promoted and were paid less than their male counterparts for similar work. Not only does the ruling make it more difficult for women, minorities and other discriminated groups to find justice in the courts, it weakens the legal case for equal pay for equal work in this country.

The fact remains that in 2011, women, as a whole, still earn less than men in the United States. According to the most recent statistics from the U.S. Census Bureau, women who work full-time earn 77 cents for every dollar men earn. For women of color, the numbers are worse. African American women only earn approximately 61 cents and Latinas only 52 cents for each dollar earned by a white man.

On a state-by-state basis, the numbers show an even more telling story. In Illinois, on average, a woman working full time is paid $37,841 per year, while a man working full-time is paid $49,336 per year. This creates a wage gap of $11,495 -- money that could be used to purchase food, housing and rent for these women and their families. Over a lifetime, this wage disparity costs the average woman and her family $700,000 to $2 million in lost wages, impacting Social Security benefits and pensions. As the CEO of an organization committed to providing economic opportunities for women, I find these numbers simply unacceptable.

Many critics believe pay differences between men and women are simply a matter of personal choices, like women choosing to take time off to raise children. Research proves otherwise. In 2007, The American Association of University Women (AAUW) addressed this argument in astudy that analyzed earnings data for female and male college graduates one year and 10 years after college graduation. The organization found that just one year after graduation, women earned only 80 percent of what their male counterparts made. Ten years after graduation, women were earning even less -- 69 percent of what men earned.

When we think of how far we've come with women's rights -- ensuring women's right to vote, reproductive justice and equal protection under the law from harassment, it can be easy to feel complacent. It can be easy to look at the progress we've made and feel reassured that someday we will eventually reach the goal of full pay equality. However, what we often fail to calculate in this equation is the work that was done to get us to this point -- the marches, the calls, the meetings, the letters. And in my opinion, it's time to begin working again.

One of the key ways to change this disparity is to educate individuals about the issue of pay inequity. In an effort to create a dialogue surrounding this issue, organizations have created events including the national Equal Pay Day, which serves as a day to hold coordinated activities to raise awareness about how to address wage inequity. Last April, the YWCA joined fourteen other organizations and government agencies to sponsor an Equal Pay Day rally in Daley Plaza. And though the rally was a tremendous success, efforts like Equal Pay Day can be only the beginning in addressing this issue if we truly want to achieve pay equity in this country.

To develop a legal precedent, especially in light of the Supreme Court's ruling, we need to ensure passage of the Paycheck Fairness Act to provide future protection against pay inequities in the workplace. The Paycheck Fairness Act, currently being considered by Congress, expands the Equal Pay Act of 1963. The bill, which was reintroduced to the both the House and the Senate this April after failing to pass in the Senate in 2010, makes it easier for individuals who are victims of wage discrimination to address the issue. The Paycheck Fairness Act would do the following:

• Allow victims of gender wage discrimination to receive damages.
• Make it easier for individuals who are victims of wage discrimination to file class action lawsuits.
• Prevent punishment of employees who share salary information with co-workers.
• Tighten employer rules concerning defense of a gendered pay differential.

Many organizations are taking a lead on helping to organize our efforts. Women Employed, headquartered in Chicago, is a leading national advocate for women's economic advancement and is helping equal pay supporters petition Congress. And the National Committee on Pay Equity is working to increase individual awareness and reaching out to legislators to educate them about these issues. Working together, we will eventually reach a place where equal pay is synonymous with equal work in this country. My hope is that it happens much sooner rather than later.

Follow Christine Bork on Twitter: www.twitter.com/YWCAChicagoCEO

CT NOW WANTS TO KNOW: Should You Take His Last Name?

Should Women Change Their Last Names After Marriage?

First Posted: 8/16/11 08:13 AM ET Updated: 8/17/11 08:20 AM ET

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If there's a group of women with a notable last name right now, it would have to be the Kardashians. But the fame attached to that name isn't keeping middle sister Kim from dropping her celebrity moniker when she weds New Jersey Nets forward Kris Humphries this weekend. And the future Mrs. Humphries will hardly be alone in her decision to take her husband's name.

In March, the wedding website TheKnot.com surveyed nearly 19,000 women who got married last year. Of those women, 86 percent took their husband's name. The practice of women keeping their names, first introduced in the U.S. by suffragette Lucy Stone in the 20s and popularized during the Women's Rights Movement of the early 70s, peaked in the 1990s at 23 percent. By the 2000s, only 18 percent of women were keeping their names, according to a 2009 study published in the journal Social Behavior and Personality. Now, according to TheKnot, it's at just 8 percent.

But the fact that most women are willing to change their names doesn't mean the decision is an easy one. Making that choice can bring up all sorts of emotions -- and we're not just talking about the homicidal urges prompted by back-to-back visits to the DMV and the Social Security office.

"I'm not a Kardashian, but I still had a whole life based on my name," said Baily Bernius, 24, who works for a nonprofit in Washington, D.C., and was known as Baily Tombs until she got married last year and took her husband's name. "It was a bittersweet thing," she said.

So why did she do it?

"It's kind of a way to show the world that I'm part of a new family now and that I'm proud to take my husband's name," Bernius said. Her desire to do that, she said, outweighed her occasional feelings of envy toward the girls her brothers date.

"I sometimes think about that: Whoever my brothers marry, they're going to inherit what I consider to be an awesome name," she said. "I look at their girlfriends and I'm like, 'You need to earn this name.'"

There are a myriad of options when it comes to the name-change debate: you can keep your name, take his, take his last name and make your maiden name your middle name, take his last name legally but keep yours professionally, or hyphenate the two names (TheKnot's survey found that just 6 percent of women hyphenated their names last year, and the practice seems to get a collective "no thanks" from women in wedding website community forums).

Women who keep their names have tended to marry older, have higher levels of education and are more likely to work in medicine, the arts or entertainment than women who take their husband's names, according to the 2009 study. But when women who've built entire brands on their maiden names are giving them up -- like Kim Kardashian and Katy Perry, who's legally Mrs. Brand now -- the trend can seem even more pervasive.

Women "view it as some crazy glue holding their marriage together," said Claudia Goldin, a Harvard economics professor. In 2004, Goldin studied the New York Times' marriage announcements, Massachusetts birth records and Harvard alumni records, and found that fewer college-educated women were keeping their names than in the 1970s and 1980s.

The reasons women cite for taking their spouse's surname vary: some like the tradition of it, and others find it romantic. In some cases, it's more important to their husbands, and some feel it will be more convenient once they have children. Some women even argue, counterintuitively, that taking their husband’s name is a feminist choice.

"I wouldn't say I'm militant, but I do consider myself a hard-core feminist," said Renee Powers, who is 25 and living outside Chicago. Her name was Renee Woodward until she got married two years ago and took her husband's name.

"We operate as a team and now we have a team name," she said. "God that sounds cheesy, but it's true."

Powers, who is getting a master's degree in new media and women's studies, argued that her decision doesn't conflict with her belief in female equality and autonomy.

"We recognize all the hard work that came out of the women's movement, everything that [members of the movement] did to get us to this place," she said. "My decision to change my name was absolutely a feminist choice. It was made with intention. It was educated."

Stephanie Coontz, a professor of history and family studies at Evergreen College and author of several books about American family structure, said that many of the women who changed their names in the 1970s did so in response to inequality that had been built in to marriage for so long.

"Marriage made a wife not seen and not heard. It legally did so," Coontz said, noting that during research for a recent book, she came across the story of a woman who couldn't get an apartment without the permission of her husband, who was in an insane asylum.

According to Diana Boxer, a professor of linguistics at the University of Florida who studies gender and language, today's feminists aren't concerned by many of the issues that riled feminists in the past.

"It's not so much, 'I am woman hear me roar,'" Boxer said. "The women of this generation feel we are roaring enough."

Boxer argued that the number of women changing their names today can in part be explained by an uptick in the cultural emphasis on romance.

"They're into the whole idea of, 'I've always waited for my Mr. Perfect, and now that I'm going to get married, I want to do everything the romantic way,'" she said.

A 2009 survey by researchers at Indiana University showed that 71 percent of respondents believed a woman should change her name, and half of those respondents went so far as to say the practice should be legally required. These numbers may help to explain why those who keep their names are sometimes criticized for their choice.

When writer Julia Porter blogged about deciding to keep her name, commenters accused her of not really loving her husband. It's not an uncommon response -- women who blog or post to online forums that they are keeping their names are often asked whether they are really committed.

Some women and their fiancés sidestep the decision -- and potential judgment -- by taking a different path altogether.

Eric Jankstrom, 28, formerly Eric Jankowsky, works in television in New York and is among the small number of men giving up part of their names. He and his wife Laura Lindstrom got married last August and are calling themselves the Jankstroms.

"My wife is a very progressive woman," Jankstrom said. "She was like, 'I don't like your last name. I’m never going to be an 'owksy.'"

The couple agreed there was something appealing about creating a new family tree, and they’ve since dreamed of what the Jankstroms might accomplish.

"We were like, imagine if there was President Jankstrom. How cool would that be?"

Emily Zeugner, 32, who works in media in New York, and her husband, Amos Kenigsberg, made a similar decision -- they changed their last name to Zeeberg.

Ms. Zeeberg explained that changing her name would have sent a message she wasn't comfortable with, one that that effectively said, "I'm shedding my identity, I'm joining your family."

"As a feminist, it really bugged me," she said. "I'm glad that we created our new identity."

After the two married, they received a wedding invitation addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Amos Kenigsberg.

"I just saw the envelope, and I felt such annoyance, and on a small scale, kind of outraged," she said. "He gets full billing and his full name, and the only thing I get is Mrs. It just really pissed me off."

The new last name was hard for both of them to get used to at first, she said, and her husband got a lot of comments from surprised Facebook friends. But now?

“It's just, we're the Zeebergs, and it seems totally normal and natural," Ms. Zeeberg said. "I don’t know why more people don’t do it, I feel like it should be the wave of the future."

There's no sign that nuptial portmanteaus are sweeping the nation -- yet -- but that's not so surprising, considering how attached some men are to their names, and to everyone else in the family taking those names.

Kate Sullivan, 33, a New Jersey wedding planner who was married in January, plans to take her husband’s name, Corpuz.

Though Sullivan said her husband wouldn’t have kicked and screamed if she kept her maiden name, it certainly mattered to him: Even the couple’s dog, Baily, who currently has both of their last names (separated by a hyphen) will soon have his official surname changed.

Sullivan said her husband has asked her several times to take care of the matter. "He's appalled that [the dog] is Sullivan" at the vet, she said. "I’m going to feel like an idiot trying to explain it."

Gender Stereotypes + Infertility

I have a couple of friends who are going through issues with infertility and doing all they can-physically, financially and emotionally- to create a family. Their experiences sound humiliating and daunting. They are both women and giving me a great lesson on strength, determination and grace. I am curious what they would think of the below article. I am curious to hear what you think of the below article. Thoughts?

Gender Stereotypes Affect How Men and Women Talk About Infertility
By Margaret Hartmann Aug 10, 2011 12:15 PM

Infertility is one of the most difficult problems a couple can go through, and many people find discussing the issue with friends and family only makes things worse. A new study found that there are differences in the way men and women share information about their fertility problems with those around them, and there are ways to approach the topic that can make things somewhat easier for the couple.

Researchers from the University of Iowa and Penn State University talked with 50 heterosexual married couples who've been struggling with infertility for eight months to five years, according to EurekAlert. They found that couples often adjust how much information they share with their loved ones based on whether the man or the woman feels more stigmatized by their reproductive problems. When the woman is more concerned about how people will react to her infertility, both partners share more with friends and family. However, when the man is more concerned about how he'll be perceived, both partners keep their problems quiet.

Study author Keli Ryan Steuber, an assistant professor of communication studies at the University of Iowa, says this may have to do with the strong bias in our society against people who choose to not to have children. Steuber explains:

"It aligns with the idea that couples do more work to maintain the husband's public persona ... For women, it may be a response to our pronatalist culture. There's an expectation that women want children, and sometimes those who are voluntarily childless are labeled as selfish or too career-driven. We wonder if that stigma overrides the stigma of infertility, to the point that women and their husbands feel compelled to clarify: 'We're not choosing to not have children. We can't have children.'"

Though couples often disagreed with how much information they wanted to share with various people in their social group, the researchers were surprised to find that this didn't lead to much relationship tension, as long as the spouses explicitly discussed the topic. They found it was important for couples to talk about not only how much they wanted to share with friends and family members, but their motivations for keeping information private from certain people. "It could be, 'It's fine if you tell your mom, but please ask her not to tell your sister.' Or, 'I understand that you need to talk to your mom about it, but respect that I don't want to talk to her about it," said Steuber.

Resisting the urge to talk things over with their sister or mom may be easier for men. The study confirmed previous research that shows most men rely on their wives as their main source of emotional support. Women, on the other hand, usually turn to other women — which often brings up confusing questions for their friends about how to support someone who's having difficulty conceiving or just suffered a miscarriage. Steuber gives this advice:

"Let your friend know that you're there for her, to talk about it as much or as little as she wants. Find out whether she wants you to ask how her IVF treatments went, or if you should wait for her to bring it up. See if she is OK with hearing about your children — maybe she knows they're an important part of your life and wants to hear about them, but maybe it's too hard and she'd rather focus on other topics. By asking, it shows that you care enough to be sensitive to her feelings."

It's natural to feel awkward about bringing up a painful topic, but the study confirms that for both partners trying to conceive and those around them, discussing the issue is key — even if they're just communicating that they're not ready to talk about it.

Be Fabulous, Sassy, AND Supportive of our Upcoming 5K!

Become a Fabulous Friend or Sassy Sponsor! Want to be Fabulous or Sassy? This year the CT NOW Foundation has created two brand new levels of sponsorship so that individuals can become sponsors of our Love Your Body 5k. Our first level is for our "Fabulous Friends" who make a donation of $1-$99. The second level of sponsorship is for our "Sassy Sponsors", who make a donation of $100+! To become aFabulous Friend or Sassy Sponsor simply fill out this form and send it back to the CT NOW Foundation. You'll get to support an empowering event as well as the work of the Foundation. You'll also have your name on a special insert that will go into all the race bags that are given out on race day. ------------------------------------------------------- Our goal is: 20 Fabulous Friends & Sassy Sponsors bySeptember 20th. Will you help us reach this goal? ------------------------------------------------------- Please mail your form and check (made out to the CT NOW Foundation) to 56 Arbor Street, Suite 417, Hartford, CT 06106. All donations are tax-deductible. Love Your Body 5K Registration is open! The CT NOW Foundation's 3rd annual Love Your Body 5K Run & Walk is just a few months away! This year it will be held on October 22nd in West Hartford! The race t-shirts will be just as cool as the last two years so make sure you register and reserve your spot! We hope to see you there!

Is Success Scary?

Are You Afraid of Success?

Huffington Post: Daylle Deanna Schwartz

Everyone should want to succeed at what they do or say they want, right? After all, isn't that what we strive for? In theory, success is a positive goal, the result of the work you do. Yet it's common to also be scared of success--what will happen if you actually get there. Fear of the unknown can sabotage your efforts to be successful. Fear of success creates blocks that prevent you from achieving it.

In my people pleasing days, fear ruled me on many levels. Being insecure, I worried about how I'd handle a new or different scenario, even if it was a good one. People pleasers prefer to keep things status quo, even if the status quo makes them unhappy. The idea of navigating something new and exciting can seem daunting to someone with low confidence. I sabotaged opportunities without quite knowing why.

Some common concerns that contribute to fear of success are:

* Will success change me or how others see or treat me? Sometimes there's no choice if you're pushed to maintain an image or people expect too much of you if you don't create a new façade. But, if you're conscious of who you are and where your passions lie, you can stay true to you. Be the same person you are now and your real friends won't change, even if you have to don a cooler façade at professional events.

* Will I be disappointed when I get what I strive for? You might be successful but it may not generate the money, opportunities or high profile that you hoped for. Or, if you're not happy already, you may not feel as happy as you expected to be from reaching this level. When you're not happy on the inside, you look to external factors for happiness. That often creates a let-down when you get it, because career success doesn't create real long-lasting happiness if you're unhappy.

* Can I handle success? Subconsciously, you might be used to struggling. Or, deep down you might not feel worthy of success or of being able to live up to people's expectations of you. Write down what success means to you. What expectations do you see? Figure out if any of it makes you nervous, and why. Become conscious of these things to find ways around them. Then make a list of all the good things success will bring you. If you get scared, focus on that list.

* Will there be pressure on me to increase my success? There are a lot of one-hit wonders. Maintaining success can seem daunting. You may be okay with achieving the initial accomplishment. But pressure to surpass it may be the scary part. Take it day by day. Faith helps you triumph over this kind of fear.

* Will I have to make more decisions? You may worry that life will get more complicated at the next level of what you're doing. More obligations can dampen your freedom of creative flow, even if they're good opportunities. Success can rein you in a little if you have to commit to things that will make your life more rigid or deprive you of free time. Focus on the rewards.

* Will my work still be enjoyable? The road to success may seem more pleasurable than getting to a goal. Before my first book deal, I was afraid success might dim my passion for writing. The urgency to work hard fueled me to write and I didn't want to lose it. But eventually I knew I was more likely to lose the passion if I kept writing books no one read. Knowing that my books have a receptive audience is a bigger motivation than struggling. Look for the pleasure in your choices.

Just as failures teach you about yourself and how to do things better, so does success. If you feel something is holding you back, ask yourself what might scare you about actually achieving your desire. How do you feel about those factors? Talk it out with a good friend to separate true concerns from the "what ifs." Then work on your inner intentions for what you really want out of your career.

Use positive affirmations to defeat the fear. "I intend to become more successful with ease." "I'm worthy of and ready for great success." Fear will always be there. It's how you handle it that counts. Consciousness and determination get you to the other side.

Great links from Feministing.com

I just discovered this cool feature on the blog Feministing.com. It's a weekly roundup of feminist news stories. Check it out:

http://feministing.com/2011/08/14/weekly-feminist-reader-55/

Included in the list is a story about a 98-year old woman who just became the 16th person ever to earn a 10th degree black belt in Judo (amazing!) and a Glamour magazine piece about author Jess Weiner's story, "Loving My Body Almost Killed Me." There is some great stuff here! Enjoy.