Monthly Archives: June 2019

AAUW Sacramento May 18 Branch Meeting Recap by Liz Jordan and Donna Holmes

Speech Trek Winner Esther Turay

The branch members gathered together at 10:00 a.m. at our meeting room at 2700 Fulton Avenue. Ann Arneill, Speech Trek Co-Director, introduced Esther Turay, senior at Laguna Creek High School, who gave a reprise her winning speech on the topic of gun violence in our schools. Esther’s speech was much appreciated by attending members.

Current Co-President, Donna Holmes, served as the installing officer for the 2019-2020 Board.

The newly elected board are:

Co-Presidents – Liz Jordan and Charmen Goehring
President-Elect – Angela Scarlett
Program Directors – Cathy Locke and Karen Burley
Membership Director – Jan Stuter
AAUW Funds Directors – Kathy Asay and Merrie McLaughlin
Finance Director – Danielle Metzinger
Secretary – Tiffany Ardisana James
Nominating Committee – Becky Anton, Michele Hobza and Nancy McCabe

Co-President Liz Jordan provided some information about the branch’s summer effort to get 500 people to try the newly improved, interactive, free, AAUW online course Work Smart. The challenge was enthusiastically received, and a lively discussion ensued. Please see the article in this new letter about the program and share it with everyone you know who could benefit from more self-confidence and better negotiation skills.

Kathy Assay, Funds Co-Director then introduced the 4 members who received 2018 Name Gift Honors: Jane Cooley, Susana Mullen, Kimberly Rutledge, and Anna Storey. Details of their selection and accomplishments may be found in the Funds article.

The May meeting is our traditional meeting to recognize members who have achieved 50 years of membership. Donna Holmes, Co-President, told us about Jeanette Finn and Mary Gene Page who were unable to attend and introduced new 50-year member Georgia Richardson who traveled from Fort Bragg for the presentation.

An exciting celebration of the Sacramento Branch’s first 100 years is being planned for February 29, 2020, at Northridge Country Club. Gloria Yost, whose committee has been working hard on researching all of our accomplishments and activities, is also planning the luncheon party. A reformed singing group, the Musettes will sing, a small committee is writing a skit about our 100 years, and we have invited Kim Churches, AAUW CEO, to attend and provide some vision of AAUW’s future.

A small group discussion was the final activity of the meeting. Cathy Locke and Deborah Dunn, Program Co-Directors, divided the attendees into small groups to discuss two questions. Members had requested activities that allowed them to interact with members they may not know. So, the first question was a round robin on confidence building: Can you share 1-2 accomplishments, big or small, at any time of your life, at work or in personal life, of which you are most proud? The second question concerned AAUW’s national policy priorities for 2019-21. The groups reported back, and the Program Committee is using the ideas generated to help plan meetings branch meetings of interest to the membership.

We Present Our 2019 Named Branch Honorees by Kathleen Asay and Danielle Metzinger

Our Funds Directors with our named branch honorees

Applause Please!

It is with great pleasure that we announce our Named Gift Honorees, four members who have worked for years behind the scenes to hold us together as a branch or out front to forward our mission to help women and girls.

Since 2006, Sunshine officer Jane Cooley has quietly sent greetings in the name of the branch to members to acknowledge their personal events. Jane has held many other positions, including branch president, but the sunshine that she sends with each card reminds us of our friendship and mutual goals. Jane went into the Air Force and did not attend college until later in life, graduating from CSUS. She joined AAUW soon after, looking for like minds, and began taking on board positions. She’s also a long time member of the Healthy Heart group.

Kimberly Rutledge has served on the branch’s newsletter team since 2013. She has a BA in journalism and worked as a journalist in Boca Raton, Long Beach, the Bay Area, and for the Sacramento Bee. Kim then went back to school, to UCLA, for her Masters in Social Work. She returned to Sacramento to work in legal advocacy and disability policy and joined AAUW in 2012 after attending a happy hour hosted by Angela Scarlett. Besides editing our newsletter, Kim is interested in AAUW’s work for equal pay and education for women and girls. She’d also like to reinvigorate our happy hour with an emphasis on networking.

Susana Mullen and Anna Storey have chaired our branch’s thriving Scholarship program since 2015. During these years, they have developed new procedures for screening and evaluating applicants and worked to connect with college staffs to publicize available scholarships to increase the number of applicants. They work well together, as one works with numbers, the other letters.

Susana is the numbers co-director, currently working for the CA Department of Finance. She worked in finance for non-profits such as WEAVE and Girls Inc. Susana profoundly believes in the mission of AAUW and often keeps in touch with the scholarship winners. She is also an active member of Book Section 6, the working women’s group.

Anna taught high school English in Maryland for many years before relocating with her husband to be near family in Sacramento. Her daughter suggested she join AAUW, and Anna, too, was drawn to AAUW’s mission. She looked for an opportunity to help young women continue their education. That led her to Scholarships. Anna is also an active member of a book group, Section 8, and a regular with Couples Dining Out.

Please join us in recognizing the work of these women. Their work honors us all.

Help AAUW Sacramento Meet Its Goals of 500 People Taking AAUW’s Free, Online “Work Smart” Course by Liz Jordan

Dear AAUW Sacramento members.

Can you help your branch close the Pay Gap with a small individual effort? Gain personal self-confidence? Help someone you know, woman or man, have a better financial future? Click aauw.us/SAC

AAUW National has created a revised, interactive, online version of The Work Smart Program, a free salary negotiation course to help women and men better their financial Future. AAUW Sacramento Board says we can get 500 people to take this course. Here is the link aauw.us/SAC you should use to access this course.

AAUW created this revised course because of a two-part grant from the Coco-Cola. With the second half of the grant, they plan an hourly-worker version, a Spanish Language version, and some specific career path versions. In order to qualify for the second half of the grant, $500,000, they need 100,000 people, members and non-members to take the course. It’s FREE. It takes a couple of hours. And there is something for everyone in this course teaching negotiation skills.

This easy e-tool, aauw.us/SAC, can help one:

Learn the market value of your skills and experience/Determining your accomplishments and qualifying value.
Determine the equitable “target salary”/Determine a range of expectation, setting a minimum “get” without which you walk away.
Ask for—and get—the pay you deserve/Asking for enough of value that makes up for less-than-expected outcome.

SO, what if you are like me and don’t think you will be negotiating for a salary or a promotion again? These negotiation skills transfer to all kinds of other situations, such as negotiating for the purchase of a car, a home, specific services or action.

We all know someone, who wants/needs to earn a better salary or who deserves a promotion. These brief couple of hours on this course could make the difference. Share the secret! Send this link aauw.us/SAC for your contacts to use.

The program works! In surveys with our participants, nearly all reported having more confidence and better negotiating skills after taking the class.

Thank you if you take the course, and if you send it on to others, just copy and paste to get the protected link aauw.us/SAC that helps us get credit for your participation!

My Memories of our Singing Group the “Musettes” by Jean Ellen Boyd Brown

The first event I remember was a Christmas luncheon. I was initially invited by my friend Barbara Jennings Jones to join a group of women who were singing for the annual Christmas luncheon program. I joined the group and made a costume for the program. The group was well received, so we decided then to form a permanent group. Donna Bales became our director. We learned a variety of songs and decided on a name for the group. We became the “Musettes.” We met in a room at the Westminster Presbyterian Church in Sacramento once a week.

The next singing event I participated in was when AAUW Sacramento Branch threw a Christmas party in 1970 entitled “White Christmas” in the Martinique Room at the Sacramento Inn. The Musettes sang for the occasion. We sang “A Ceremony of Carols” by Benjamin Britten, and we had a guest conductor, my husband Kenneth Brown. The harpist was Mary Lee Dozier, and Mrs. Ivan Wightman was our accompanist. At this point, there were 16 women in the Musettes.

In 1971, our branch Musettes sang for our state AAUW 50^th Anniversary Banquet, which was held in Fresno. The title of the program was “Golden Treasures.” There were six sections, one for each decade of AAUW. Each section had narration and music. The Musettes sang one or two songs in each section. The solos were done by Donna Bales singing “Camelot” and Jean Brown singing “Getting to Know You.” Together Donna and Jean sang “God Bless America.” The theme song was “California Here I Come.” There were 13 women in Musettes at that time, and the State President was Anita Miller from the Sacramento Branch.

The Musettes also performed at the Crocker Art Gallery during this era. One performance featured two guest artists, Rich Speicher on the trumpet and Sue Lamb on the cello. Our accompanist was Lorraine Day. The second performance featured Sarah Wightman. Kenneth Brown was our guest conductor for both performances.

The Musettes continued to practice and learn new music. Then our director Donna Bales had to retire.

She had moved farther out in the county and we were practicing at the Presbyterian Church in the city. So Jean Brown became the director. We tried to stay together but family obligations were becoming heavy with growing children and families’ duties. The group of the Musettes retired.

The Musettes learned a wide variety of music during this time. It varied from J. S. Bach, Mozart, Fran Schubert, Chopin, Shaker Hymns, Gershwin and Tom Springfield. We were well trained and gave well-received performances.

I enjoyed the time of learning and performing with the Musettes women. The women and the performances were true AAUW Treasures. God bless them all.

Board Briefs May Board Meeting, May 6, 2019 by Cherril Peabody

Here are the highlights of the May AAUW Sacramento Board Meeting:

Co-President D. Holmes reported that the AAUW Sacramento branch is on the list of the 130 largest branches in the United States, and we are the fourth largest branch in California.
Membership Treasurer S. Anderson reported that the new National AAUW online dues payment program is user-friendly, but it can’t be used to make donations to branch programs: Tech Trek, Scholarships and Speech Trek. Members must send donations to those programs to AAUW Sacramento directly.
Scholarship Co-Director A. Storey reported that the Scholarship program has been receiving many donations toward one or more named scholarships in memory of Ruth Burgess, who passed away last fall.
Funds Co-Director K. Asay reported that the branch 100^th Anniversary Research and Projects Grant Fund that was completed last fall is expected to be distributing its first grant soon.
College/University Liaison G. Yost reported that campus liaisons will be marketing the opportunities available through the AAUW affiliates on several Sacramento County campuses in order to attract more members for those affiliates. The branch is sponsoring two young women students attending the NCCWSL leadership conference this summer.
100^th Anniversary Celebration Chair G. Yost announced that there is a lot of interest in participating in the singing group that is being formed to perform at the 100^th Anniversary celebration, and writers are also being sought to put together a skit for the event. Member Joan Hammond drew some sketches for the event logo, and the committee has selected one that will be featured in the activities and in the anniversary publication.
Program Co-Director D. Dunn reported that the Author’s Luncheon featuring journalist and playwright Ginger Rutland was very successful, and Ms. Rutland’s presentation received many positive comments. Co-Director C. Locke announced that plans for an end-of-year potluck are on hold pending finding a place to have the event.

New Business

The Board has accepted a challenge from National AAUW to get 800 people certified in the Work Smart course by August. National AAUW will receive $500,000 if they and the branches can get 100,000 women certified. This free program is an online short course in how to negotiate salaries and raises. Here is the link aauw.us/SAC you should use to access the course so that AAUW Sacramento gets credit. Please send to all your friends and family.