AAUW Sponsors Public Zoom “International Women’s Day and You”

5:00 p.m., Monday, March 8, 2021

The Benicia-Vallejo and Danville-Alamo-Walnut Creek branches of the American Association of University Women (AAUW) will host a free, public Zoom program celebrating International Women’s Day. The program honors the tremendous efforts by women and girls around the world in shaping a more equal future.  While this is a salute to the collective efforts of all who care about human rights and forging positive changes in our communities, there is still urgent work to do.

The joint AAUW celebration features a welcome and opening remarks by Eleni Kounalakis, California’s Lieutenant Governor. She is the first woman elected to this office and has served in this position since 2019. Additionally, she was appointed by President Barack Obama to serve as the United States Ambassador to Hungary from 2010 to 2013. Kounalakis was President of AKT Development Corporation, one of California’s largest housing development firms and the former chair of the California International Trade and Investment Advisory Council, and daughter of a Greek immigrant.

The public is invited and may join the Zoom program by registering with EventBrite:

https://aauw-womensdaycelebration.eventbrite.com

The program will feature comments by four additional speakers:

• Elizabeth Patterson, MURP, is a former mayor of the City of Benicia. She will describe her journey for a sustainable world from a young girl to a career in land use planning and management and elected office.

• Claudia Martinez-Schwarz, MPH, is a food policy expert who is administering a federal grant to educate rural high schoolers in Armenia and leading a USAID grant submission for STEM students in Colombia. Born in Colombia, Martinez-Schwarz earned her master’s degree in public health at UC Berkeley and worked for the California Food Policy Advocates.

• Asha Bajaj,PT/DPT, has managed her own practice in physical therapy for 20 years, in which she focused on women’s health. She served as assistant professor of physical therapy at the University of California at San Francisco.  She established physical therapy programs in Bhutan, India, Vietnam, and Malawi with Health Volunteers Overseas.

• Teresa Cheung– is a licensed professional chemical engineer, MBA and a past Chair of the Northern California section of the American Institute of Chemical Engineers (AIChE).She was the first women winner of the Institute’s most prestigious Professional Progress Award. She took on AIChE’s “old boys’ network” in the late 1990s and helped bring equality, visibility and recognition advances for women in chemical engineering.

A question and answer session will be included, as well as a short video salute to international women leaders.

The American Association of University Women was founded in 1881, when a small group of female college graduates banded together to open the doors for women’s career advancement and to encourage more women to pursue higher education.  AAUW’S mission:  to advance gender equity for women and girls through research, education, and advocacy.

To join either of the host AAUW branches, please visit their respective websites: http://beniciavejo-ca.aauw.net/ or https://daw-ca.aauw.net/members/