We are pleased to bring you the Annual Report of the Women’s Caucus. The caucus was inaugurated in Spring 2011 and advocates for positive change on issues of concern to women faculty and staff at UD. In honor of Women’s History Month, we are excited to share the Annual Report in a web series format over the month of March.
Review of the Past Year
In early June of 2021, we welcomed new members to our Executive Board: Jennifer Biddle and Amy Stengel. Then in July, we awarded our Torch Award to Dr. Patricia Sloane-White. We hosted our Fall General meeting in October on Zoom and excellent conversations about the support women at UD need. We followed this with an in-person social event where Dr. Sloane-White received her award. In October we also launched the UD Women’s Consortium, which is a meeting that brings together all of the groups at UD that support women’s activities. The UD Women’s Consortium has continued to meet and exchange ideas and information. With the consortium, we were able to work with UD’s OCM to develop a Women’s History Month zoom background, which we hope you’ll consider using this month.
We continue to work to support women at UD and hosted a discussion with Ryan Shuler of Employee Health and Wellbeing in February where she discussed the future of work at UD and how to advocate for yourself regarding remote work. In April, we will host another lunch and learn to have a conversation around avoiding burnout, as well as our general spring meeting.
We have also continued to advocate for an ombudsperson position at UD, trying to engage university leadership in conversations about the importance of the position.
I give thanks to past chairs, Meaghan Davidson and Megan Wenner, for their leadership during the past few years. A new co-chair will be elected towards the end of the semester. Please consider stepping into this leadership role!
Structure of Web Series for our Annual Report
This year, the annual report will be broken into two issues spread out over the month of March. Be on the lookout for upcoming data regarding the representation of women at UD across faculty and staff, a breakdown of women of color across faculty and staff, and a breakdown of salary ratios.
Stay involved!
If you are interested in learning more about the Women’s Caucus or want to get involved in any way, please contact us at womenscaucus@udel.edu or visit us online at https://sites.udel.edu/women. We also have a Facebook group we welcome you to join. Elections for the caucus board will happen soon, please contact me if you are interested in joining at jfbiddle@udel.edu. Our next general meeting will be April 13, 2022 at 3pm. We will again host the meeting by zoom and follow with a social event in person. We are attentive to employees who may be working remotely and hope you’ll stay engaged with us and let us know how best to engage with you.
We hope that you join us at future meetings!
Sincerely,
Jennifer Biddle