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Austin Branch

President (1):    Marijo Alexander    email    507- 437-7218
President (2):    Liz Richardson       email     507- 433 - 7655

Austin AAUW:
“Shaping the World 
One Woman at a Time”  

AUSTIN Best of the Year

The Austin Branch of AAUW has made it a point this year to bring some short message about equity for women to each of our monthly meetings. In September, Super AAUW Woman made an appearance to remind us of the early days of AAUW and some of the early accomplishments of those women, challenging us to keep up the work. We had updates of the Lilly Ledbetter legislation at another meeting. A quiz concerning facts about the AAUW mission statement and officers was featured. Members have been pleased to have these reminders of what the organization stands for and is doing for women.

 Other highlights from Austin include:

 • A small group studying the wonderful Great Decisions material on international affairs continues to meet monthly. This is a real mind-stretching activity and we plan to feature this study program at an upcoming meeting.

• A political forum at the end of October brought together candidates for city, county, and state offices. Members of the community were invited to question the candidates.

• One of our fundraisers this year was the sale of coupon books for the Younkers Department Store community day sale. We also supplied some volunteer work to the store with this fundraiser. It was quite successful. Our other fundraiser is a used book sale in cooperation with the Friends of the Library. This is always a success with all involved feeling good about getting books into the hand of more people.

• We give local scholarships to students at Riverland Community College in the amount of $1,500. 

• This is the fifth year that we have celebrated Women’s History Month by partnering with Austin High School to hold a Women’s History Project Contest. We also sponsor an all-school assembly. Ninety-seven students presented their projects on Friday, March 6, with display boards, costumes, especially composed music, and home baked goods, as well as written and oral presentations. The quality of the top projects was so outstanding that four individual and group projects tied for first place and divided the award money. On March 10, the entire student body and staff (1,300 people) saw Pat Sween’s amazing dramatic portrayal of Elizabeth Cady Stanton. In April, we will have as our guests the student winners of our Women’s History Month contest. The subject of their projects was comparing and contrasting the lives of women in the home or in business from 1930 to the present in Austin. These presentations focus on the continuing struggle for equity for women and girls.

The absolute best part of our branch is our members who are a group of wonderful women sharing their talents and intellects to support each other and the cause of equity and education.