Women Blog

Miss Virginia Caressa Cameron from Fredericksburg, VA was crowned Miss America 2010 Saturday night at the Planet Hollywood Resort & Casino in Las Vegas. The final night of the Miss America Pageant was broadcast live from Las Vegas on TLC and hosted by Mario Lopez and TLC’s Clinton Kelly.

Caressa’s triumphant walk across the stage was just the beginning of a journey that will take her to every corner of the country during her year of service as Miss America 2010. She will travel approximately 20,000 miles each month speaking to audiences about her personal platform of “Real Talk: Aids in America,” and acting as the official National Goodwill Ambassador for Children’s Miracle Network. Children’s Miracle Network, a non-profit organization dedicated to saving and improving the lives of children by raising funds for children’s hospitals, is the national platform partner of the Miss America Organization.

As Miss America 2010, Caressa will have her entire wardrobe provided by Joseph Ribkoff International Clothing and shoe wardrobe provided by DSW Warehouse. She will also be provided with skincare and cosmetics by Artistry Cosmetics exclusively from Amway Global. In addition, Caressa will help support the Miss America Organization’s efforts to go green by being the official spokesperson for Nature’s Bottles.

Caressa is a student at Virginia Commonwealth University with a major in Broadcast Communications. Her scholastic ambition is to obtain a master’s degree in Mass Communications and she ultimately hopes to become an anchor for a television news station. Along with the title of Miss America 2010, Caressa won a $50,000 scholarship, sponsored by Amway Global, to continue her education. For the talent portion of the competition, Caressa sang “Listen,” from the movie, Dreamgirls.

The first runner-up was Miss California Kristy Cavinder who earned a $25,000 scholarship. Her talent performance was ballet en pointe and her personal platform is the Make-a-Wish Foundation.

Second runner-up honors and a $20,000 scholarship were awarded to Miss Tennessee Stefanie Wittler. Her talent was vocal, and her personal platform is Ronald McDonald House Charities.

As the world’s largest provider of scholarship assistance for young women and one of the nation’s leading achievement programs, the Miss America Organization last year made available more than $45 million in cash and scholarship assistance. The Miss America Organization provides young women with a vehicle to further their personal and professional goals and instills a spirit of community service through a variety of nationwide community-based programs.

Additional information about the Miss America Organization can be found at www.MissAmerica.org.

Provides oral regime for hormone positive and HER2-positive advanced breast cancer

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved Tykerb (lapatinib) in combination with Femara (letrozole) to treat hormone positive and HER2-positive advanced breast cancer in postmenopausal women for whom hormonal therapy is indicated.

HER2 is a protein involved in normal cell growth. It is found on some types of cancer cells, including breast cancer cells. In hormone positive breast cancer, the presence of certain hormones contributes to breast cancer growth. In HER2-positive breast cancer, stimulation of the HER2 receptor contributes to cancer cell growth. Breast cancer is the second leading cause of death among women. More than 192,000 women will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year.

“This drug combination of Tykerb plus Femara provides women being treated for advanced breast cancer with an important treatment option. This entirely oral treatment regimen works by targeting both HER2 and the hormone receptors, thereby slowing the cancer cells’ ability to grow or spread,” said Richard Pazdur, M.D., director of the Office of Oncology Drug Products, in the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research.

Women with HER2-positive disease receiving the Tykerb plus Femara combination more than doubled the time they lived without the cancer progressing compared with those receiving Femara alone (35 weeks vs. 13 weeks). Women in the company sponsored study were randomized to receive Tykerb plus Femara or Femara alone. It is too early to determine whether an improvement in overall survival will be observed in the clinical trial.

Tykerb works by depriving tumor cells of signals needed to grow. Tykerb enters the cell and blocks the function of the HER2 protein.

Tykerb was initially approved in combination with a chemotherapy drug, Xeloda (capecitabine) in 2007. This combination was used to treat women with advanced breast cancer tumors with the HER2 protein who had received prior treatment with chemotherapy drugs, including an anthracycline and a taxane, and Herceptin (trastuzumab), an anti-cancer antibody used to treat HER2-positive advanced breast cancer.

Safety information from this study was consistent with previous Tykerb clinical studies in advanced breast cancer. The most commonly reported side effects of the combination were diarrhea, rash, nausea and fatigue. Treatment with Tykerb also has been associated with decreases in heart function, liver damage, and lung tissue inflammation. Fetal harm may occur if used to treat advanced breast cancer in pregnant women. Patients should talk to their health care provider about the potential side effects, drug interactions, and other medical conditions.

FDA Office of Oncology Drug Products http://www.fda.gov/AboutFDA/CentersOffices/CDER/ucm091745.htm
National Cancer Institute – Breast Cancer http://www.cancer.gov/cancertopics/types/breast

Indicative of the North American trend, fifth annual ranking finds women in top corporate jobs dips at Canada’s largest public companies

Reflective of a trend across North America, the number of women in top executive jobs at Canada’s largest publicly-traded companies has stalled and the economic downturn has likely been a contributing factor, concludes a report by leading executive search firm Rosenzweig & Company.

“Since we began tracking the advancement of women in the senior ranks, we’ve found both progress and disappointment,” says Jay Rosenzweig, Managing Partner of Rosenzweig & Company, which operates in New York and Toronto. “This latest report finds the progress halted, but we’re not so much disappointed this year as hopeful that things will pick up as the economy picks up and as more of these positions become available, more qualified women will fill them.”

Today, 6.9 per cent of the most senior corporate offices are occupied by women, compared to 7.2 per cent in last year’s report. The first Rosenzweig Report on Women at the Top Levels of Corporate Canada, published in 2005, found that a mere 4.6 percent of the most senior executives were women.

One executive who has been on the list for the past three years says research like this is important to promote the advancement of qualified women executives.

“This research is important, but what is more important is what companies like Agrium do with this information to support women in leadership positions,” says Leslie O’Donoghue, Chief Legal Officer and Senior Vice President, Business Development for Agrium Inc. “A diversity of ideas and backgrounds is good news for increasing shareholder value. There is a deep pool of talented women at Agrium and across the country, who are ready and able to move into top senior positions. We need to focus upon mentoring and leadership development to facilitate women’s advancement.”

Despite much time and effort invested in diversity initiatives over the past decade, the overall gains for women at the top levels have been marginal, at best, adds Martha Fell, Chief Executive Officer of Women in Capital Markets, an advocacy group for women in financial services.

“Can you imagine a CEO investing this much time and money in a new product with little or no increase in sales?” Fell asks. “He would be very much accountable to the board of directors. The same accountability should apply to moving beyond talk to promoting talented and qualified women to leading executive posts.”

Besides the recession, other reasons for the slow advancement of senior women executives could be a lack of critical mass of women leaders who could act as mentors and coaches at the highest levels, and a lingering “gender bias” or “old boys’ network” mentality in corporations.

“What is so striking to me is how aligned the numbers are between Canada and the U.S. in terms of the gender make up of senior executives and at the board level,” says Jay Rosenzweig. “Both countries have women holding less than 7 per cent of senior executive jobs and at the board level, the U.S. is 15.2 per cent women and Canada is just behind at 13 per cent. It is disheartening that board-level improvements have not trickled down to the senior management positions where so many decisions are made in terms of strategy and corporate culture.”

The fifth annual Rosenzweig Report found that 35 women now hold top officer jobs in Canada’s 100 largest publicly-traded companies; down from 36 last year. There are 547 of these positions at the 100 companies.

Among other findings in the 2010 Rosenzweig Report:

• 69 per cent of Canada’s biggest companies are run at the highest levels by men and men only;

• 93.1 per cent of the highest-paid executive positions are held by men; and

• the top leadership role of Chief Executive Officer (CEO) is a position held by 4 women at 5 companies on the list compared to 92 men. (Within the top 100 companies, 1 woman and 3 men hold the top position in more than one company.)

Rosenzweig & Company analyzed the 100 biggest publicly-traded companies in Canada with annual revenues that ranged from $2.2 billion to $37.6 billion in 2009.

All these corporations must name and publicly disclose the compensation of their Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Chief Financial Officer (CFO), and at least the next three highest compensated executive officers. Some companies list more than five officers, which created the 547 total executive positions.

Source: Rosenzweig & Company

Interventional Cardiologists Emphasize Gap in CVD Treatment and Research for Women During Heart Health Month

The Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI) launched “WINHeart — Score a WIN for Women,” an initiative that raises awareness surrounding gender-based disparities in the diagnosis, treatment and survival of women with cardiovascular disease (CVD). Simultaneously, Women In Innovations (WIN), a group of interventional cardiologists within SCAI, today released a new report and survey that illustrate why cardiovascular disease is under-recognized and under-treated in women despite the near split in prevalence of heart disease between men and women.

The report, “Gender-based Issues in Interventional Cardiology: A Consensus Statement from the Women in Innovations (WIN) Initiative,” was published this week in Catheterization and Cardiovascular Interventions, EuroIntervention, and Revista Espanola de Cardiologia, and will also be published in Cardiovascular Intervention and Therapeutics. It highlights significant disparities in women’s treatment and outcomes. One suspected reason for the disparity is women account for only 20 to 25 percent of patients enrolled in most CVD clinical trials.

“The majority of data from clinical trials is based on a population of mostly male participants, and as a result, women are being treated according to data based on men,” says Roxana Mehran, MD, FSCAI, director of outcomes research at the Center of Interventional Vascular Therapies at Columbia University, N.Y., and report co-author. “With this information, it is not surprising women’s outcomes are significantly worse than men’s after treatment. What is surprising is that more is not being done to close this gap, which is what we seek to address through WINHeart.”

The WINHeart survey, with more than 300 respondents who are members of WomenHeart: The National Coalition for Women with Heart Disease, found 80 percent of women who had CVD never considered participating in clinical trials because they were not aware clinical trials were recruiting patients (50 percent), they were concerned about effects of treatment or lack of effects if given placebo (31 percent), or there were logistical issues such as transportation issues, geographic barriers, financial barriers or lack of time (20 percent). In addition, only 10 percent of women said their physician spoke with them about participating in a clinical trial when they were first diagnosed with heart disease or a heart attack. WomenHeart’s members include women living with and at-risk for heart disease, friends and family members and health care professionals nationwide. SCAI and WomenHeart are partnering on the WINHeart initiative to expand research and raise awareness surrounding the disparity in care for women with heart disease.

In addition to an absence of female participants in clinical trials, the WIN report suggests a lack of recognition of heart problems and subsequent treatment, which results in women not receiving early medical intervention, including percutaneous coronary interventions (PCI) or angiography. The report found that only 33 percent of percutaneous coronary interventions, such as angioplasty, performed annually are done on women. The delayed treatment can ultimately cause more serious CVD.

The WINHeart survey found 30 percent of women waited more than 30 days to seek medical treatment after experiencing symptoms of heart disease or heart attack. Alternatively, 22 percent of women waited one to five days, and nearly 34 percent waited less than one day. In addition, the survey noted women received a delayed diagnosis because 30 percent of respondents said they experienced atypical symptoms or were not in the “typical” age group to experience a heart attack (35%).

“As a physician and a woman, it’s alarming so many women are not aware heart disease is their number one killer in America,” says report co-author Bonnie Weiner, MD, MSEC, MBA, FSCAI, and director of interventional cardiology research at Saint Vincent Hospital at Worcester Medical Center in Massachusetts. “Women tend to be less aware of symptoms and subsequently see their doctor much later than they should, which unfortunately results in poorer outcomes and fewer treatment options. A key concern for us is to better ensure women know the signs and symptoms of a heart attack, including atypical symptoms specific to women.”

In fact, 70 percent of women surveyed in the WINHeart survey said prior to their heart disease or heart attack they were not aware that men and women sometimes experience different heart attack and heart disease symptoms.

While the current evidence-based guidelines for cardiovascular care recommend men and women should receive the same treatment, the WIN report suggests women with unstable angina are less likely to be prescribed aspirin or lipid-lowering therapy (statins) while in the hospital and during hospital discharge. Additionally, the report notes that often times, more than 24 hours after presenting heart attack symptoms, women are less likely than men to have an electrocardiogram done within 10 minutes of presentation, be cared for by a cardiologist during their inpatient admission, and be given heparin or an ACE inhibitor acutely.

“Doctors are eager to see more research that evaluates outcomes based on the differences in biological and genetic markers between men and women,” says Steven R. Bailey, MD, FSCAI, president of SCAI and chief, division of cardiology, Janey Briscoe Distinguished Chair of Cardiovascular Research and professor of medicine and radiology at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center at San Antonio, Tex. “We want to provide customized care based on gender, and in turn, save more lives.”

WIN plans to address the issues identified in the report and survey by launching and facilitating women’s enrollment in clinical trials to further explore the differences in women’s outcomes in heart disease. Additionally, the organization plans to enhance resources for health care providers who treat women with heart disease, as well as educate the public about America’s number one killer of both women and men.

Source: Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions

Opportunity Impact Statements Are Key to a Full and Lasting Economic Recovery, According to The Opportunity Agenda

Analysis of government economic data by The Opportunity Agenda, a New York-based public interest group, finds that national measures of opportunity are in decline and that unequal barriers to opportunity facing women and people of color do not rise or fall with the overall economy. Released on the occasion of President Obama’s first State of the Union speech, a report analyzing updated equality indicators from The State of Opportunity in America concludes that economic recovery efforts must address racial and gender gaps in opportunity, as well as overall national indicators in employment, wages, poverty, and education.

“The findings refute the conventional wisdom that stark racial and gender disparities will naturally diminish or disappear if the overall economy improves,” said Alan Jenkins, Executive Director of The Opportunity Agenda. Continued Jenkins, “Promoting greater and more equal opportunity must become an important and explicit consideration in future public investments and programs. Opportunity doesn’t just happen, it requires bold leadership, innovative ideas, and public attention.”

Key indicators contained in The State of Opportunity in America show starkly different levels of opportunity in some communities, and trends that diverge from those of the broader economic crisis:

• While the overall unemployment rate increased 2.6%, from 7.4% in December 2008 to 10% in 2009, the increase in unemployment was significantly higher for African Americans and Latinos. African American unemployment increased 4.1%, from 12.1% to 16.2%, and Latino unemployment increased 3.5%, from 9.4% to 12.9%
• At the end of 2008, women, with a poverty rate of 14.4%, were 20% more likely than men, with a poverty rate of 12%, to live in poverty. Yet, this staggering gap is actually a slight improvement from 2007, when women were 24% more likely than men to live in poverty.
• Racial and ethnic gaps in educational attainment, a key tool in surviving an economic downturn, persisted in 2008. African American young people were 55% as likely as white young people to have obtained a bachelor’s degree, and Latino young people were 33.3% as likely as white young people to have obtained a bachelor’s degree, rates that were statistically similar to 2007.

The report analyzing the updated indicators calls for the use of an Opportunity Impact Statement process to evaluate public expenditures, making the case that all levels of government can and should use this new policy tool as a requirement for publicly funded or authorized projects, especially those tied to economic recovery. The report explains that an Opportunity Impact Statement would prioritize equitable job creation, small business development, fair lending, and other practices that expand opportunity for all communities. The report’s other recommendations include more strategic enforcement of equal opportunity laws, and initiatives that simultaneously create greater and more equal opportunity, such as childcare tax credits and subsidies, community health clinics in underserved communities, and need-based scholarships instead of loans to improve college access and job preparedness.

To view the report analyzing the updated indicators, go to www.opportunityagenda.org/stateofopportunity/measuringequality and to view the updated equality indicators, go to www.opportunityagenda.org/stateofopportunity/indicators/equality.

Source: The Opportunity Agenda

Top 10 Job Search Tips

Job hunting is tough and sometimes it can really get you down. Often the bad feelings come from losing your perspective and seeing things in a negative way. Here are some specific suggestions for regaining your perspective and ways to alter the way you are looking at the situation so you can see things a bit more positively.

1. Get Perspective - Keep in mind that a job is just a job. What is important is your health, family, spirituality, friendships and recreation. A job search is an activity you are engaging in and not who you are.

2. Quit job searching and start searching for where you can add value – Use this attitude when you network. You will be surprised by the information you receive and the opportunities that exist.

3. Let the past go – If you have not found a job yet, learn from it and move on. Think about how to better prepare for the next interview or broaden your search methods.

4. Stay true to yourself – Think about what your interests are, and listen for internal cues – your gut instincts. They will tell if you are on the right track.

5. Be open to risk - Give up trying to predict where the next lead will come from or who will be the most helpful.

6. Take one day at a time while planning your search. Break big tasks into small bite size pieces.

7. Create a new way of looking at a job search. It is not a one time event, it is a life long process.

8. Reinvent your career by adding any missing ingredients. Start by planning how to acquire the skills you need to move forward.

9. Exercise – You don’t have to go to a gym or sign up for a class. Just take a walk for 20 minutes or rake leaves or ride your bike. Exercise increases endorphins and makes us feel better about ourselves.

10. Meditate or pray for at least 10 minutes a day. Clearing your mind of all the scary thoughts gives you a mental break and helps your brain function better. Just try to focus on your breathing and nothing else. Many people find praying and handing the situation over to a higher power helps them feel less burdened.

Still feeling stressed about having to look for a job during a recession? See our post on Recession Job Search Tips and feel better.

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The marriage prospects of educated women have been hotly debated in the media in recent weeks. Are highly educated women more likely to wind up single than their less-educated counterparts? Would they do better to settle for a “good enough” man before they miss their chance altogether? Or are educated women now MORE likely to marry then their less-educated counterparts? But if so, do higher expectations make them more discontented with marriage?

In a briefing paper prepared for the Council on Contemporary Families, economists Betsey Stevenson and Adam Isen crunch the data from 1950 to 2008 and come up with some surprising findings. Yes, college-educated white women (unlike college-educated black women) are less likely to marry than their less-educated counterparts. But when they do marry, they are less likely to divorce, so that by age 40, they are MORE likely to be married than other women, many of whom have already divorced.

In addition, college-educated women who are unmarried at age 40 are twice as likely to marry in the next 10 years as unmarried 40-year-olds with just a high school degree. Educated women are also more likely to report themselves happy in their marriages than less-educated women.

HIGHLIGHTS OF THE REPORT

• Contrary to Conventional Wisdom, African-American women do not face a “marriage penalty” when they acquire higher education. In fact, black women who have graduated from college or completed some college are more likely to marry than less-educated groups of black women.
• For white women, the situation is more complicated. White women who complete college remain slightly less likely to marry than most other white women, although they are now more likely to marry than women who never finished high school. At age 40, the time after which sociologists have traditionally considered a never-married woman a lifelong single, 86 percent of college-educated white women have married, compared to 90 percent of women with some college, 88 percent of high school graduates, and 81 percent of high school dropouts.
• But this is a huge change from 1950, when only 74 percent of white college graduates had married by age 40, compared to 93 percent of high-school dropouts, 90 percent of high school graduates, and 92 percent of women who had completed some college. Marriage rates rose for all women between 1950 and 1960, but leveled off for women without a college degree in the 1960s. Marriage rates of college-educated women continued to rise until 1980, closing much of the educational gap in marriage. In the 1980s, marriage rates for ALL women began to fall, though college-educated women are the only group of women whose marriage rates in the 21st century are higher than they were at any point in the 1950s.
• Here’s the source of much confusion in news reports: At age 40, college-educated white women are MORE likely to be married than any other group of women. That’s because the divorce rates of college-educated women have dropped so much that those who do marry are far more likely to still be married at age 40 than their less-educated counterparts.
• What about never-married educated women who hope to marry, but want to wait until they have established themselves professionally or are still holding out for “Mister Right”? Not only has the average age of first marriage been rising, but so has the range of ages at which women marry for the first time. It used to be that a woman who was unmarried at age 35 or 40 was unlikely to ever marry at all. Today, 15 percent of all women who are unmarried at age 40 do marry in the next 10 years, and that rises to 20 percent for college-educated women. College-educated women have a much greater likelihood of marrying at an older age than women of any other educational level.
• Finally, college-educated women are more likely than any other group of women to report themselves happy in their marriage, whatever the level of their family income, and they are much less likely to think that “financial security is the main benefit of marriage.”

To see the CCF briefing paper on which this release is based, go to www.contemporaryfamilies.org.

For a longer version of the paper, go to http://bpp.wharton.upenn.edu/betseys/papers/Marriage_divorce_education.pdf.

Source: Council on Contemporary Families

Statement from The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy

The nation’s teen pregnancy rate rose 3% in 2006, according to a report released by the Guttmacher Institute. The increase in the national teen pregnancy rate is the first since 1991.

The National Campaign released the following statement in response to the new data:

“The headline from this sobering report is that one of the nation’s shining success stories of the past two decades is in danger of unraveling,” said Sarah Brown, CEO of The National Campaign. “Given our tough economy and demanding job market especially, anything that gets in the way of high school completion and at least some higher education is a national emergency. Clearly, the nation’s collective efforts to convince teens to postpone childbearing must be more creative and more intense — and they must begin today.”

The discouraging trends may actually have a modest silver lining. They may provide those concerned about too-early pregnancy and childbearing a fresh opportunity to make their case to policymakers, parents, practitioners, and others.

In addition, the extraordinary declines in teen pregnancy and childbearing over the past two decades have proven to cynics that progress can be made on tough issues. But rates can go up as well as down, and the current reversal of progress requires a focused response. The Administration and Congress have taken an important step in helping reverse the recent increases in teen pregnancy by investing over $100 million in programs proven to help change teen behavior in positive ways.

This new investment will address a basic fact: the only teens getting pregnant are those having sex and not using contraception consistently and carefully. “We must insist that sexually active teens use contraception each and every time, and make the education and services available to help them do so,” said Brown.

www.TheNationalCampaign.org

Source: The National Campaign to Prevent Teen and Unplanned Pregnancy

To prepare university students for the challenges of online learning, academic scholars from Ashford University developed and wrote, “The R-Model for Learning Online and Achieving Lifelong Goals.”

The new book walks students through all facets of the online education experience. Following are the basic principles to achieving online learning success:

Relevance – Flex your thinking and learning muscles by listening and being open to new ideas, accepting feedback and asking questions in your Web dialogue. These activities will increase the relevancy of your classes.

Readiness – Lifelong learning requires you to be self-directed and self-motivated. Make your decision to return to school based on self knowledge, not just from the encouragement of others.

Readiness II – So important, it was written twice. Quickly understand the writing process and your class’ writing requirements. As an online student, writing is your sole means of actively participating, building relationships and demonstrating active learning in an online environment.

Restructuring – Rearrange your life so that you have time to devote to your studies. Online learning removes the travel, parking and childcare issues related to driving to a brick-and-mortar campus, but there is no getting around the fact that you will have to carve out time to read, write, think and interact with instructors and peers.

Reasoning – Sharpen your critical thinking skills by identifying and challenging assumptions and exploring alternatives. As an online student, you are expected to engage in this higher-order of thinking.

Response – Discover which type of learner you are – visual, auditory or kinesthetic. Becoming an engaged learner requires that you recognize techniques that develop and support your learning style.

Resources – Use the course syllabus to identify the overall purpose of the class and what you should learn or be able to perform by the end of the course. Within your degree program, look for ways in which learning in one course leads to or builds on learning from other courses.

Relationships – Online learning should never be an isolating experience. Many students use social networking platforms as part of their daily lives and see the online classroom environment as an extension of their private lives.

Reflection – Apply what you learn to a new setting. Reflective activities allow you to clarify what you’ve learned, formulate intentions and solidify plans for meaningful growth and change.

This book is available at Ashford University’s bookstore (http://www.ashford.edu/).

Source: Mary Alexander, Wayne Clugston and Elizabeth Tice. The R-Model for Learning Online and Achieving Lifelong Goals. San Diego, CA: Bridgepoint Education, Inc., 2009.

Greater Roles for Women in Pakistan, Lebanon, Bosnia and Rwanda Emphasized

Representatives of government, media, nonprofits and academia from four conflict regions requested more support of their ongoing efforts to confront extremism in meetings this week with U.S. government officials. The 19 visiting professors, journalists, government spokespeople and nonprofit leaders–all of whom are women–emphasized that they are already demonstrating success in reducing extremism in their countries. This is the first time that such a large number of women from a variety of countries has gathered to discuss how to best address violent extremism and to advocate to U.S. government officials to champion their work.

The Pakistani, Lebanese, Bosnian and Rwandan leaders met yesterday and today with officials from the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development, as well as a U.S. congresswoman and a U.S. senator, to request increased facilitation of their efforts, some of which are partly funded by the U.S. government. They shared stories including the successful de-radicalization of Taliban recruits in Pakistan, the tempering of sectarian tensions at the community level in Bosnia and Lebanon and the rebuilding of communities after genocide in Rwanda.

“Considering the number of explosive crises around the world, it is timely for the U.S. Congress and the Obama Administration to focus its attention on finding long-term, sustainable solutions to deep-rooted conflicts,” said Ambassador Swanee Hunt, chair of The Institute for Inclusive Security, which identified the women and brought them to the United States to advocate to policymakers. “One way to do that is to enhance the role of women in promoting peace and stability.”

In the course of internal deliberations and meetings with policymakers, delegates highlighted the ways they believe women can stem extremism. They pointed to women’s ability to bridge ethnic, religious, political and cultural divides, even during conflict. They discussed how women have their fingers on the pulse of their communities. And they emphasized that women–as authorities within local communities and within families–often have a large influence on decision-making, particularly by their sons and husbands.

The visiting leaders–ranging from scholars of Pakistani defense strategies to members of the Rwandan government–presented these recommendations to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky (D-IL), as well as senior officials at the State Department (including Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources Jack Lew), and the U.S. Agency for International Development, over the course of 18 meetings in Washington. The women also met with assistants to Special Envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke.

Requests for increased U.S. cooperation ranged from new and regular meetings between U.S. intelligence services and women in conflict regions including Pakistan, to increased training of women leaders and university exchange programs with Lebanon. Other recommendations included expanded use of curricula promoting tolerance and peaceful coexistence in Rwanda and engaging women in public information campaigns to reduce the flow and use of small arms in Bosnia.

“As a colonel in the United States Army who has served in a number of contingency operations and commanded a battalion in combat in Iraq, it was humbling to meet and speak with these incredibly brave women leaders from around the world,” said Colonel Pat Donahoe, a National Security Fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School of Government who met the visiting women during earlier events in Cambridge, Mass. “The courage and selflessness of these gifted women is evident in their fearless approach to solving some of the world’s most complex problems.”

The specific policy recommendations the women presented to US policymakers–each intended to overcome a specific barrier preventing women from more extensively moderating extremism–build on both academic research and the personal experiences of the visiting women experts as they have engaged with ideological, religious, and sectarian extremists over their careers. Dozens of academics and policymakers contributed to the recommendations, which focus on changes needed to increase the ability of women to promote tolerance and dialogue, even in conservative cultures.

The recommendations shared with US policymakers may be found on the website of The Institute for Inclusive Security.