Press Release

Gender Equity: One Size Doesn't Fit All
Unique International Conference June 19-20 Explores "Working with Our Differences"

BOSTON (June 8, 2001)–While giant strides have been made in gender equity in the workplace, managers and leading scholars have run into an obstacle they are pondering how to overcome in those last arduous miles towards true success.

In workshops and discussions around the country, they have learned that women and their workplace needs don’t come in "one size fits all." Women–whose social identities vary by race, class, ethnicity, and sexual orientation–can often end up talking at cross-purposes instead of connecting around their differences when striving for gender equity in the workplace.

Black women often have workplace issues different from white women, who have different issues from Latinas, who have different issues from Asian women. Women line workers may have issues different from women senior executives. The challenge of women having different priorities, while seeking common connections to promote workplace equity, is the theme behind an international conference on gender equity June 19-20 at Simmons College in Boston, sponsored by the Center for Gender in Organizations of the Simmons Graduate School of Management.

The conference, "Working with Our Differences: Chasms, Bridges, Alliances?," will include scholars and practitioners from around the world who work on making connections across gender differences. They will explore ways to foster connections across different social identities, to develop strategies for organizational change that lead to gender equity and organizational effectiveness.

For further information or to cover the conference, contact Bridgette Sheridan of the CGO at 617-521-3875.

"Too often assumptions about gender equity have been based on the experiences of white professional women," says Deborah Merrill-Sands, associate dean of the Simmons Graduate School of Management and co-director of the Center for Gender in Organizations. "But you can’t assume that women will unite across all their differences. You can find areas of commons agendas for change, but there’s a lot of work to do to get there."

Highlights of the conference include:

June 19, 9:45-ll:45 a.m., "Dilemmas and Chasms."
Presenters include Beverly Daniel Tatum and Andrea Ayvazian, deans at Mt. Holyoke College. They have been working across race as colleagues and friends–as a black and white woman–for more than a decade. Tatum, a nationally recognized author on race issues, appeared with former President Clinton during his national town meetings on race. Another presenter is Amina Mama, an internationally respected researcher and director of the African Gender Institute at the University of Cape Town in South Africa, who will discuss the challenges facing women’s movements in Africa.
June 19, l:00-3:00 p.m.: "Approaches to Resolving Dilemmas and Repairing Chasms, Part I"
Presenters include Sara Cobb, executive director of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School. Cobb will present ongoing research on the extraordinary efforts of women of different ethnic groups in Rwanda to find ways to work together cooperatively to rebuild their villages, after the devastating genocide resulting from ethnic conflict.
June 20, 3:15-5:15 p.m.: Part II
Presenters include Beth Robinson, an attorney for the plaintiffs in the landmark Vermont Supreme Court Case that resulted in the first civil union legislation in the U.S. granting same-sex couples similar rights as those of married couples.
June 20, 1:30-2:30 p.m
Keynote address by Melvin H. King, director emeritus of the Center for Reflective Community Practice at MIT’s Department of Urban Studies. King, an internationally known educator, consensus-builder and advocate for social justice, is well known as the creator of the Rainbow Coalition.

The conference is supported by the Ford Foundation and the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. More than 100 attendees from around the world include academicians, managers, consultants in organizational development and diversity, and professionals within organizations who lead diversity initiatives.

The Center for Gender in Organizations is dedicated to understanding and advancing the connection between gender equity and organizational effectiveness. Through research, education, and meetings, the CGO aims to be a major catalyst for change in enhancing equity and effectiveness in profit and non-profit sectors worldwide. The Simmons Graduate School of Management is the only graduate business school in the world designed for women.

» press release

CONTACT

See Also