If so, then come join the University of Melbourne’s Wom*n of Color (WOC) Collective each week on Mondays at 12.00pm at the Graham Cornish room in Union House! We’re an independent group within the Wom*n’s Department dedicated to supporting wom*n from ethnic minorities. We’ll be discussing goals and strategies for the collective to help promote, make visible, and support wom*n of diverse cultural and ethnic backgrounds in the education system and beyond.

Email umwomynofcolor@gmail.com for questions or to join the mailing list and Facebook group!

Blue Stocking Week is a national campaign run by the National Union of Students and the National Tertiary Education Union, celebrating how far we’ve come while calling women to arms to make sure we don’t become complacent and constantly strive for equality.

It’s an opportunity for women across Australia to celebrate how far we’ve come since the early days of female enrollment, and to contemplate how we have left to go.

We will be selling blue stockings to help you get into the spirit of it throughout the week, for a donation to Shakti Migrant & Refugee Women’s Support Group.

Get involved. Get excited. Get sassy. Get educated. Get even.

THE CALENDAR:

Monday 29th April

• BBQ & Giant Game of Snakes & Ladders on North Court 12-2pm

Here’s the Facebook event.

Tuesday 30th April

• “Where are the Women?” Scavenger Hunt around campus

Ever wished the entire university could become your playground for a giant scavenger hunt? Ever wished you knew more about the influential women to have walked the grounds of this university before us? THEN THIS IS THE SCAV HUNT FOR YOU! Come to North Court during the Tuesday BBQ to get your first clue and then see where the scav hunt takes you! Here’s the Facebook event.

Wednesday 1st May

• Panel on “Being a Woman in a Boys Club.” 12pm, Old Arts Theatre A

Featuring: Margaret Shiel (University Provost, background in science), Sally Coates (Former navy, currently manager at UoM Safer Community Program), Judy Courtin (lawyer and PhD student, conducting research into sexual assault and the Catholic Church). Ahem, a Facebook event to let people know with.

• Cross-Campus Panel: I am woman, hear me type! 7-9pm, Victoria Room, Queen Victoria Women’s Centre – 210 Lonsdale St

Panellists: Clementine Ford, Karen Pickering, Amber Jamieson, Amy Gray.

$3 for student union members (Incl. Melbourne University students), $5 for future members/non-students. All proceeds to Shakti

Presented by LaTrobe, Swinburne, Monash & Melbourne Wom*n’s Departments.

Thursday 2nd May

• Pay Gap Cupcake Stall. Taking donations of $1 from men, 80c from women and 70c from trans* & SGD folk. All money collected will be donated to Shakti Migrant & Refugee Women’s Support Group. We need as many lovely ladies to bring in cupcakes as possible, pretty please!  Here’s a Facebook event.

Friday 3rd May

• A cross-campus statewide display of sass at the State Library Blue Stockings Brides. Dress code: bridal gown and blue stockings. MRS degrees provided. Run with Swinburne Student Union & La Trobe Student Union Women’s Departments.
• Networking drinks at Tsubu from 3pm. Here’s the Facebook event, tell ya friends.

THE MATTER AT HAND:

Aren’t we already equal? Yeah but NAH, bro. Here are some links to read up on.

On the gendered pay gap:

Gender Pay Gap Still a Disgrace: It hasn’t improved much in the past 20 years.

It got worse this year, we get paid less from when we graduate

On who the original Blue Stockings Society were:

http://www.basbleu.com/info/bluestocking.hzml

http://bitchmagazine.org/post/revenge-of-the-feminerd-bluestockings-the-original-feminerds

On women’s representation at university:

Breakdown of how many women in teaching and leadership roles at the University of Melbourne

It’s pretty much perfect for riding your bike to uni (if you ever want to remember you can use the showers in the Basement of Union House, you can get the key from the Info Desk, and ask them about a locker as well… They have all the answers, about everything.)

So we’re excited to be running a bike workshop with the Environment department for women and trans* identifying students on Monday, on North Court from 1-4pm! Here’s the Facebook Event.

Then in a couple of weeks, it will be Blue Stocking Week, celebrating women in higher education!

Here’s the page with our event calendar and some links to read up on!

Monday: BBQ & Giant Game of Snakes & Ladders on North Court 12-2pm

Tuesday: “Where are the Women?” Scavenger Hunt around campus

Wednesday: Panel on “Being a Woman in a Boys Club”

Thursday: Pay Gap Cupcake Stall. Taking donations of 80c from women and $1 from men, starting the conversation about how women earn 83c to every diollar a man earns (on average). All money collected will be donated to Shakti Migrant & Refugee Women’s Support Group. We need as many lovely ladies to bring in cupcakes as possible, pretty please!

Friday: A cross-campus statewide display of sass at the State Library Blue Stockings Brides. Dress code: bridal gown and blue stockings. MRS degrees provided.

Also, LaTrobe, Swinburne & UMSU Women’s Collectives are whipping up a zine for BSW! YOU SHOULD TOTALLY SUBMIT TO IT! (But not in a patriarchal gender roles woman is submissive and docile way, obviously)

In sisterhood,

Amy

Thank you so much to everyone who came to the National Day of Action last week!  There were hundred of students from universities across Melbourne there, chanting “Bullshit! Come off it! Our education is not for profit!” & “No ifs! No buts! No education cuts!”

There will be another NDA closer to the election. Maintain the rage.

We were also really happy to see so many at the launch of our Women’s Mentoring Network last week! Frances Separovic, Head of Chemistry at UoM told us her fascinating life story, focusing on how many mentors she had had and how many were unexpected and how career progression is rarely linear. The Mentoring Network Groups have now been assigned. We’ll be having great speakers at our Networking Nights every month. If you didn;t hear back from us, please let us know.

Next week will see a return of regular weekly events:

WAC (Monday 1pm in Wom*n’s Room) This week we’ll start talking about Bluestockings Week & NOWSA (again)

Feminist Discussion Group (Wednesday at 2 in Graham Cornish A) is happening!

Ladies Who Lunch With Ladies (Thursday 1pm in the Wom*n’s Room)- lunch and chats for queer and questioning wom*n on campus

Until then, keep smashing the patriarchy and taking care of yourself,

Amy

We had a great time painting a banner in WAC on Monday for tomorrow’s National Day of Action organised by the National Union of Students (NUS) against fee increases, course cuts and deregulation of the higher education sector. these are big issues that affect all students, but women and minorities particularly. With the pay gap having increased again this year, it will take women on average over a decade to pay off our HECS, (long than men.) Not to mention the fact that gender studies is often the first thing to go whenever cuts are made (segue: petition).

There will be a BBQ on South Lawn run by the Student Union Education Department at 12.30 with a GIANT GAME OF MONOPOLY and then, most importantly, a rally on the State Library at 3.30pm.

(here’s a Facebook event for campus, state, and national events)

THEN at 6.45 in the Grand Buffet Hall at Union House we will be having the much anticipated launch of our brand new Women’s Mentoring Network! Food and bubbles are on us, and we are excited to have trailblazing scientist Frances Separovic as our guest speaker. It’s the first on many monthly networking evenings that are part of the WMN, as well as fortnightly meetings between mentors and mentees.

Have a fabulously feminist day, we look forward to seeing you!

Come join us on Friday for a cross campus International Women’s Day picnic and a chat about women and media. Food, conversation and sun will be provided. The picnic is a collaboration between Melbourne, RMIT, Swinburne and LaTrobe Wom*n’s Departments. The picnic is at Argyle Square (off Lygon Street) and will start from 2pm. Here’s the Facebook event!

This friday marks the 106th birthday of  International Women’s Day. From the first demonstrations in Russia in 1917, a trigger for the February Revolution, the day has been a time for activism by women and for women.

The lives of women have changed, mostly for the better, but IWD remains as a reminder of what is left to do. The theme of IWD this year ‘A Promise is a Promise: Time for Action to End Violence Against Women’ is an assertion that this year, like the years before it, we have been asked to observe terrible violence against women flashed on our tv screens and printed in our newspapers. We have observed how these experiences have been twisted and exploited. How they have been ignored or explained away.

Women and media can get complicated. It connects us, allows sharing of experience, spreads knowledge. It has created new forms of activism and expression. Yet often the stories of women are contorted. Representation of women is like looking into a funhouse mirror, just off. That is if they’re there at all. It’s not surprising, on the whole it is not women who control the production of print, television or film. Females owned only 6.8 percent (91) of 1,348 full-power commercial television stations in 2011, compared with 5.6 percent (66) of 1,187 full-power commercial television stations in 2009 (Federal Communications Commission’s Report on Ownership of
Commercial Broadcast Stations). Despite the prominence of women in 2012’s presidential election, male front-page bylines covering the election at top newspapers outnumbered female bylines nearly three to one (4th Estate Project).

It’s time to talk seriously about the presence of women in the media. It’s time to talk about how we can take control over our own stories.

It features a range of personal safety tips, easy access to the Safer Community Program and other University support programs, emergency contacts and after-hours services, and safety devices like a torch and personal alarm, this app is an asset to University staff and students alike.

UniSafe is available for free download in the App Store and Google Play, or via links at www.safercommunity.unimelb.edu.au

Download the app today and help us promote it, because a safe campus is everybody’s business

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The 2013 Wom*n’s Department is working on a union led mentoring program which would provide women students with opportunities to network within their chosen field, swapping necessary skills and knowledge.

In 2012 the Wom*n’s Department ran Bluestockings Week as part of a national campaign that celebrated women in academia. The week was a great opportunity to reflect on what women students had won, and what they are still fighting for. A key message that emerged from Bluestockings was the benefits of role models, from within general academia and specific fields of study, who can help fledgling students navigate the tricky landscape of study and employment.

The Women’s Mentoring Network will be a professional networking group, which will allow women to meet, talk and share experiences in a casual setting. The network will group (optimistically pair) undergraduate students with post graduate women in their field, it will also invite significant key note speakers for the group at large. The Network will provide support and training for the mentors, an opportunity for leadership that will make them more outstanding graduates in the work force. The WMN is in its early stages at the moment, but we hope to have our first meetings at the beginning of the semester. At the moment we are looking for expressions of interest from prospective mentorees and mentors. Register your interest here!

We’re back in Union House getting ready to plan a whole lot of activism and social events, generally designed towards smashing the patriarchy, empowering women, and destroying the joint (unless the joint has cupcakes in it, we’ll save the cupcakes).

While most of you probably aren’t back on campus yet, the Wom*n’s Room is open everyday, and if it isn’t pop by the UMSU offices on level one to the right of the stairs and we will open it up.

Student Representative Network is open for applications – if you’ve ever wondered how the Uni is run, or want a say over your education this is the place to get involved! It’s important that women’s voices are heard. We are the majority of the undergrad population, but not the majority making the decisions about how the uni is run.

WAC will be starting up as of week one of semester, but there’s so much to get done for NOWSA and Bluestockings Week and International Women’s day that we want to have a WAC Summer Sesh Femmo Love-In before Galentine’s Day, in the Wom*n’s Room or on South lawn if the weather’s too lovely to resist. There’s a Facebook event here and we will update on Twitter. New faces and old hands are always welcome.

The NUS Women’s Talk About It Survey, a survey of women’s experience of safety on campus is still open for submissions. It’s the only student-run survey of its kind and getting as many submissions as possible will make sure it’s able to represent your experiences, and then be used by universities and student unions to improve campus life. It does come with a trigger warning for harassment & sexual violence. Please share it around your networkWe’d love ideas on what you want to see happen on campus for International Women’s Day. E-mail us! We’ll also be hosting a White Ribbon BBQ with the Welfare Department on Wednesday 6^th of March at midday, promoting the message of the White Ribbon Oath “I swear never to commit, excuse or remain silent about violence against women.” Men and women from the University and Student Union as well as a White Ribbon Ambassador will be speaking and taking the oath.

Put the O-Week Welcome/Back Picnic and Ffffilm in your diary to kick start your year and welcome new students to the department/uni as a whole. Tuesday 26^th February at 3pm in the Wom*n’s Room, straight after the Union Carnival on South Lawn. Here’s the Facebook event.

We are always around for a chat/vent and to hear what your concerns about campus life, and want from the department and the union more broadly.

Bluestockings Week, a national campaign celebrating women in higher education (and the peak of our dress coded calendar) is happening in May this year, get excited!

In solidarity,

Amy & Mercedes

ON TEH TWITTERZ @umsuwomyn

https://www.facebook.com/groups/umsu.womyns/

womyns@union.unimelb.edu.au

If you’re still around campus over summer and happen to go to the bathroom you may well find free period management products courtesy of your ever-caring and fighting Wom*n’s Department. They will have these stickers on them:

It’s really important that there’s a broad range of respondents to the survey, so please do, it only takes a few minutes and your story is valuable and valid.

**TRIGGER WARNING** There are questions within the survey (sexual assault and harassment) which may be triggering to some women. Take care of yourself, if you think this survey may be triggering please make sure you’re safe

Talk About It is the only national women’s safety survey that is run by students for students.