A new study by the Girl Scout Research Institute highlights exciting shifts in how girls view themselves as leaders. The majority of girls (59 percent) said that the recent election has increased their confidence their ability to achieve their future goals. Despite becoming more aware of obstacles women face, 41 percent of girls said that the election had a positive impact on their desire to be a leader. We hope (!) those perceptions empower more young women to run for political office. There are many efforts aimed at encouraging them to do so, but one that is especially unique is Campaign College.
Campaign College is the only program in the country that encourages and trains young women to run for student government on their college campuses. In the fall of 2006 the American University Women & Politics Institute noticed that while AU’s student body was 62 percent female, women made up only 28 percent of the student government.
Galvanized by such shockingly low representation, the Institute, together with the student government’s Women’s Initiative, launched Campaign College: AU Women to Win. After the first Campaign College, there was a 43 percent increase in women’s representation in the university’s student government. The Institute’s blog describes their fall 2008 Campaign College training.
To expand this campus-based effort, the Institute partnered with AAUW and Running Start to bring the training to colleges and universities across the country. By encouraging more young women to run for student government during their college years, we are confident that we are preparing more women to run for local, state and federal office.
To start this partnership, we held a special workshop at the 2008 AAUW/NASPA National Conference for College Women Student Leaders. There we showed more than 30 participants what Campaign College was all about and how they could bring it to their campus.
This Saturday, the next phase of Campaign College begins as we bring the program to Iowa State University, one of our three pilot sites (and home of the Cyclones). Our other pilots in the spring are at University of Louisiana, Lafayette and Nyack College, in Manhattan. The student who applied for the pilot at Iowa State, Maggie Luttrell, is the vice president of the Government of the Student Body. She brought this opportunity to the attention of the Carrie Chapman Catt Center for Women and Politics on campus.
The Catt Center’s sponsorship and support in getting us running with this pilot has been invaluable. AAUW of Iowa and the AAUW Ames (IA) Branch members have also helped to build a role in Campaign College for our state and branch leaders. They have been incredibly helpful in this endeavor and are providing several volunteers for the training.
Stay tuned for a full report on the training with plenty of firsthand responses and pictures when I return from Iowa next week! Apparently I don’t have to worry about a blizzard this weekend in Iowa, only minus 7 degree temps.
Here comes Campaign College: Iowa State Women to Win!
