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Tech women have a friend in Resource Center By Noelle Andrews News Staff ATLANTA November 13, 1998
 The Women's Resource Center, which came into being during Women's Awareness Week last Spring Quarter, began the school year with a change in management when graduate student Jennifer Gordon took charge of the center and its associated programs.
Gordon joined Wendy Horowitz, Raja Jones, Emily Shackelford, and Carrie Haskin, the four undergraduates who make up the staff of the Women's Resource Center.
The Women's Resource Center is located in Room 217 on the second floor of the Smithgall Student Services Building and is open from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. every weekday except Wednesday, when hours are from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. The staff work in shifts to provide a variety of services.
An average of six students visit the center per day to take advantage of its various resources.
Male and female students alike can visit the Resource Center to research women's issues. The Resource Center library includes a variety of donated fictional and nonfictional works by and about women. Students can also find various periodicals, including Self and Ms.
The Women's Resource Center also organizes informational sessions such as "Power Hours," which are discussions on various topics of interest to Tech women. Previous subjects of "Power Hours" include the documentary Breasts 101 and a speaker from the Grady Rape Crisis Center. They also helped sponsor Dr. Jean Kilbourne's presentation on the image of women in advertising last week. However, Haskin would like to reach campus in other ways as well.
"We don't want to get into a set where we have speakers every quarter because people get bored," she says. The Resource Center is working on bringing a traveling empowerment program to campus for Winter Quarter.
Two of the Resource Center's biggest activities are the Women's Leadership Conference, which will be held February 26-27 and Women's Awareness Week, which will be held April 12-17. Committees for both activities have already begun meeting.
The theme for the 1999 Women's Awareness Week program is "Phenomenal Woman." Raja Jones, Chair of Women's Awareness Week, has developed preliminary plans. Proposed events include Take Back the Night, a nighttime march through the streets of campus, a raffle whose proceeds will go to a local charity, a benefit concert, an Open Mic poetry night, an information/organization fair, a guest speaker, and a Mr. and Ms. Women's Awareness Week competition.
"We are so excited about this year's week!" exclaimed Jones. "We have hopes of bring Ani DiFranco to campus [for the benefit concert]. We are pretty sure this can happen."
Gordon and the other staff of the Women's Resource Center share Jones's enthusiasm about Women's Awareness Week and the role of the Resource Center on campus.
"I believe that we are meeting our goals," stated Gordon. "Since being established in April of this year, the Women's Resource Center has been busy setting the center and collecting resources. Now that the initial startup is complete, we are able to devote more time to services for the Tech community."
For more information on the Resource Center, visit the Web page at www.womenscenter.gatech.edu. Interested in helping organize Women's Awareness Week or the Women's Leadership Conference? E-mail womens.center@gatech.edu.Staff writer Shala Sundaram contributed to this article. |
Copyright © 1998 by Gregory S. Scherrer, Editor and by the Student Publications Board
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