Crucial Conversations

Crucial Conversations is held the 2nd Tuesday of every month during the academic year @ 6pm

The goal of this program is to:

• help women connect through shared life experiences
• educate/mentor future workforce leaders
• share skills/characteristics that will help you succeed in the "real world" upon graduation
• empower young women by helping them envision and equip themselves as confident leaders

Spring 2013 Featured Speakers

February:  M. Geneva Murray, PhD

Tuesday, February 12th @ 6 p.m.

Come meet our new Women's Center Director, Geneva Murray! She will discuss her background in women's rights activism - and how it all began when she was told by an elementary school classmate that she couldn't play baseball for the Texas Rangers because she was a girl. Since then, she's worked for the Sewall-Belmont House & Museum (home of Alice Paul and the National Woman's Party) and the Eating Disorders Coalition for Research, Policy & Action in Washington, D.C. We invite you to join in a discussion about what gives you the energy to fight for change, to volunteer, or to look for non-profit work.

March: Erin Coppernoll, Head Coach for Women's Soccer at UW Oshkosh

Tuesday, March 12th @ 6 p.m.

Life Lessons learned within Division III athletics.  Erin Coppernoll will explore the exciting world of  Division III college athletics and how her experience as a player as well as her current players experiences can help teach us lessons on life.  Student/athlete balance, team work, and adversity will all be addressed. 

Erin Coppernoll has led the Titans to their only two postseason appearances during her nine years with the women’s soccer program.  Coppernoll owns the most wins in school history and the fifth highest total in the Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference.  This past season the Titans earned their highest national ranking 15^th by the National Soccer Coaches Association of America.  She has coached NCAA Division III athletics for fourteen years.  Coppernoll herself was a NCAA Division III athlete and a native of Oshkosh. 

April: An Equal Pay Day Discussion

Helen Bannon, PhD

Tuesday, April 9th @ 6 p.m.

Helen Bannan retired from UW Oshkosh as Director of Women's Studies in 2007.  She earned a PhD in American Studies from Syracuse University in 1976, and began teaching Women's Studies classes that year at the University of New Mexico.  She later became acting director of the UNM Women's Studies program, and subsequently held the same position at Florida Atlantic University and West Virginia University before coming to UWO in 1998. She first experienced a gender pay gap at 19, when she was paid minimum wage, $1.25 an hour, as a lifeguard at a NJ lake in 1967, 5 cents an hour less than male lifeguards, though she had a higher qualification of Water Safety Instructor.  She is currently writing a biography of Oshkosh suffrage leader Jessie Jack Hooper, and serving as co-president of the Oshkosh Branch of AAUW.