Dear Members,

I truly enjoyed meeting face to face for our February general meeting. This was the first meeting since February 2020. The speaker, Airika Crawford, Director of the Bexar County Fostering Educational Services Project was very informative and engaging! And the food was wonderful! I loved that other members were able to join us on Zoom. We will work on making the Zoom experience better. We welcome feedback!

Some of our members who joined us by Zoom were sick. I hope you are better and will be able to join us in-person for the next meeting.

The theme for Women’s History Month is: “Celebrating Women Who Tell Our Story”. Who are some of the women you would celebrate? I would like to celebrate Mynda Holman McGuire, Past President of AAUW-SA 2001-2003. She authored a book on our branch’s history. She has shared a snippet from the book in a past newsletter. See her latest snippet in this edition.

As I thought about Women’s History Month, I wondered why in 2023 we as humans and women in these United States of America are still fighting for equality, equity, and rights of self-determination. I wonder why, in this year 2023 in these United States of America, we are still experiencing attacks on racial, ethnic, and religious groups in a country that was supposedly founded on freedom from religious and ethnic prosecution.

Then there are all the special days or months of recognition, i.e., August’s Women's Equality Day, October’s Domestic Violence Awareness Month, etc. Why do we still have to recognize “the first” woman, Latino, Black, Asian, Jewish of any government office, toy, musician, astronaut, CEO?!   Wouldn’t it be great to be able not to illuminate all those labeled days or titles that remind us of just how unequal women, racial, ethnic groups are in this time frame of our country?

Stay Safe

Diane

2022-2023 Branch Leaders

Executive Committee

President

Diane Claiborne-Carr       

President Elect

Vacant       

Vice President Membership

Ruth Lyle                         

Vice President Programs

Monica Ruiz-Mills               

Secretary

Ashlee Martinez      

Treasurer

Adrien Frank  

Parliamentarian

Suzanne Benson

Standing Committees

Public Policy

Pat Sanford

Budget/Finance

Adrien Frank

Scholarships/NCCWSL

Karen Reichensperger

Eleanor Skelley    

Colleges/Universities

Martha Steele

Funds

Kimberly Henry

Communications

Malinda Gaul

STEM

Mary Ellen Pratt

DEI

Kimberly Henry

Governance

Vacant

Appointed

Historian

Patricia Tucker

Community Coordinator

Vacant

Reservations

Betty Russell

Publicity

Michelle Burk

Member Outreach

Kathy Dicke

ZOOM Invite

AAUWSA March General Monthly Hybrid Meeting

March 4, 2023, 11:00 am CT

Join Zoom Meeting

https://us06web.zoom.us/j/89545758837?pwd=NkhDTjJFS0YzamxUWDBoamx6M2VSdz09

Meeting ID: 895 4575 8837

Passcode: 866205

Dial by your location

       346 248 7799

February Meeting

On February 4, 2023, Airika Crawford, Project Director, Bexar County Educational Success Program, UTSA, presented “It takes a village: Creating a holistic pipeline of support for students with lived experience in foster care,” for youth in the foster care system. Ms. Crawford addressed the initiatives in place to improve access and retention of youth and young adults in the foster care system interested in or pursuing higher education. She also provided opportunities on how we could support the Bexar County Fostering Educational Success Program through volunteering, mentoring, and advocacy. You can learn more by visiting our website and accessing the program presentation or visiting www.bcfes.org.

Member Spotlight



Dr. Cheryl E. Davis, DMD,

President of AAUWSA, 2008-2009

and

Ocia Davis, Mother, Daughter, Wife, Teacher

Self-reliance, confidence, vision - these are qualities that Dr. Cheryl Davis absorbed from her strong mother and grandmother, which helped her as an African American woman achieve success in the mostly white male profession of dentistry.

Cheryl's mother, Ocia Davis, was born in 1932, in a rural Alabama town during the height of the Jim Crow era. Ocia’s mother worked as a midwife, delivering white as well as black babies. As part of her payment, she asked for books. She had not been able to enter grade school until she was twelve years old, but, despite having very little education, she recognized the importance of literacy and the magic of books. As a little girl, Ocia devoured these books. She was fortunate to attend one of the "Rosenwald Schools," established by the philanthropist Julius Rosenwald, chairman of Sears Roebuck, who in the early-20th century provided funds for schools for African American children in the South. (AAUW-SA did a program a few years ago on the Rosenwald schools. We should do it again.) The school, however, only went to the eighth grade.

Determined to break out of what she called the "cycle to nowhere," a life without education, Ocia went to Montgomery, Alabama to live with relatives and attend high school. Working after school cleaning houses, she nurtured her dream of attending college. This, the determined young woman succeeded in doing by attending Alabama State College for Negroes (later renamed Alabama State University), while supporting herself working as a secretary for a doctor. After graduating, she went to work for the dean of guidance at Talladega College, Alabama's oldest private historically black liberal-arts college. 

These years of the 1950s were the beginnings of the civil rights movement, but Ocia said she and her friends had very little knowledge of what Dr. Martin Luther King and his supporters were doing. Her experience of violent white racism, however, was painfully real. She remembers an especially terrifying episode in her childhood when, in the middle of a very dark night, the Ku Klux Klan, dressed in their white robes and pointed hats, marched and sang racist chants in front of her house. Most frighteningly they then burned a cross on the front lawn. In the dark, Ocia, says, "the light becomes reality" - the reality of the racial terror. To this day, Ocia says she gets a chill from the hours of 11pm - 2 am, when all is very dark. But not one to be defeated, she also now describes the Klan activity as "interesting."

At Talladega College, Ocia met and the married William Davis, a biology major. They moved to Tuskegee College (now Tuskegee University), where William continued his studies in science. He then decided he wanted to get a PhD. The cautious Ocia talked to his colleagues to ask if William was really PhD material. Assured that he was, she agreed that they move west, to Washington State University, for his studies. After he received his PhD, he secured a position teaching biology at the University of Idaho, where Cheryl and her brother were born. Ocia continued working and gained the knowledge and training to enable her to teach business courses. With Jim Crow extending beyond the South, in Idaho they experienced racism in the form of segregated housing and had to live only on campus and not in the bordering neighborhoods.

Deciding to continue in research rather than teaching, Dr. William Davis accepted a position at the United Medical Laboratories in Portland, Oregon. Ocia made sure that her young children had as enriched and expansive an education as they could. Cheryl had tennis, violin, and piano lessons, and became a gifted musician, dreaming of a career as a concert pianist.

Attending an integrated predominantly white school with few black friends, Cheryl experienced some prejudice but drew comfort from her core of close white friends. It was a shock to her when she first heard the "n" word, but even as a young girl she had the inner strength to speak back and fight with words. In her Portland school, her white teachers were open to incorporating more about black culture into the curriculum and they encouraged Cheryl and her brother to give reports to the class on such topics as the Harlem Renaissance. She was delighted to get to read African American literature, including Richard Wright's Black Boy. With pleasure, she recommended the book to her mother, but Ocia, an omnivorous reader, had already read it. In Portland Ocia was now able for the first time to vote, which she couldn't do in Alabama before the Voting Rights Act of 1965.

Deciding to return to teaching as well as research, Dr. William Davis accepted a position as professor at St. Philip's College in San Antonio, where they had relatives. Cheryl attended Our Lady of the Lake University and received a BA in biology and chemistry in 1984. She then went on an EPA Fellowship for Graduate Research at Prairie View A&M University where she received a MS degree in Environmental Toxicology in 1987. 

After receiving her MS, Cheryl returned to San Antonio, where she worked as a research assistant at the University of Texas Health Science Center. But she felt unfocused in research and decided to take a break and go to stay with her grandmother in Alabama. Encouraged by her wise and supportive grandmother to continue her education, Cheryl made the bold decision to go to Birmingham to attend the University of Alabama School of Dentistry. Dentistry appealed to her because it combined her love of science with, intriguingly, the ability to use her hands as she did as a talented pianist. Cheryl thrived at the University of Alabama in those post-segregation years of the early 1990s. For the first time, she saw women of achievement, and she also had black howbeit male professors. (One professor, an oral surgeon, particularly impressed Cheryl, but she assured me it was not only because he was extremely handsome.)

With her DMD in hand in 1995, Cheryl returned to San Antonio, but found herself handicapped because she had a dental license in Alabama and not in Texas, and because doors shut to her as a  black woman. On the advice of a relative who was in the military, she decided to join the Air Force, where she did not need a state license and where there hopefully would be no sexual or racial barriers. Alas her five years in the Air Force, at Lackland AFB and in Okinawa, were not good years, as she found herself demeaned by commanding white officers. Standing up for herself when she was denigrated, she was reprimanded for "not following orders." But, like her feisty mother who turned hardship into opportunity, Cheryl says that having to do so much overloaded and unassisted dental work during those years "kept her on her toes" and made her a much more skilled and experienced dentist.

In 2001, Cheryl returned to San Antonio, and, with her Texas dental license now in hand, she was able to get work in dentistry, howbeit not in the way as she dreamed. She worked in a poorly funded dental clinic on the east side (with facilities she said were "a little rustic"), in the Christian Dental Clinic, at Northwest Vista Community College where she taught as adjunct professor of biology, and most interestingly, as dentist in the Bexar County Jail. With these experiences and connections, she was then able to take the courageous step of establishing her own successful dental clinic in 2006.

While maintaining a full dental practice, Cheryl has also been active professionally in presenting papers at scientific conferences. She is member of  civic organizations, including the historically African American Alpha Kappa Alpha Sorority, the Alamo Chamber of Commerce, and the Texas Business Women of San Antonio, which she served as president in 2019-20. Most notably for us, she is a member of AAUW, and served as president of our San Antonio chapter from 2008-9. The mentorship and collegiality she received from many women and men have been important to her, but she said- channeling her mother's wisdom- the key factor for success is self-reliance. 

Despite her full professional and civic responsibilities , Cheryl has sought to maintain balance in her life, protecting time to enjoy cultural events, sporting activities such as snow skiing (presumably not in San Antonio), and social engagements. What an honor for AAUW-SA to have such an extraordinary successful engaging woman as Dr. Cheryl Davis as a member, as our former president, and as a friend.

Nancy Fix Anderson, Ph.D.

Public Policy

Greetings!

In the most recent AAUW Washington Update, the salutation to members was “Dear Gender Equity Advocates.” That wonderful greeting gave me a quick moment of pause and then a long happy sigh of agreement and affirmation accompanied by a big happy smile. AAUW members are, indeed, Gender Equity Advocates! We can wear this name proudly. We can use this phrase to explain our mission and the work we do. Succinct and satisfying!

The Update highlights numerous inspiring events and celebrations that take place in February including Black History Month and the White House celebration of the 30th anniversary of the Family and Medical Leave Act. The Update encourages us to act on the most pressing policies. One of these is the Equal Rights Amendment (ERA). The ERA was first introduced into Congress 100 years ago and guaranteed equal legal rights for men and women under the U.S. Constitution. It has been ratified by 38 states which was required for passage, but the last three did not meet an arbitrary deadline of ratification completion by 1982. Presently, two resolutions have been filed which would remove the ratification deadline. The Update asks us to urge Congress to support S.J. Res.4/H.J.25.

In Texas, the 88th legislative session is well-underway. House Speaker Dade Phelan appointed six members to the Education committee who have known positions opposing vouchers for private schools. The other three members do support a statewide voucher system. Governor Abbott has gone on record promoting a statewide voucher system for private schools. AAUW staunchly supports public education. We believe in educating all or our citizens, not just some. Public schools are held to accountability standards. Private school does not equate to better school. Texas ranks 35th in the United States in the amount of funding provided for students. A voucher program further defunds public schools. For the sake of our students and the future of our state, the funding level needs to go up significantly, not dip down even further.

Contacting and speaking with legislators is an important way to make our voices heard. Here is a list of Lobby Days, also known as Capitol Days, in which AAUW SA may take part. More news about this will be coming soon from President Diane Claiborne-Carr.

Lobby Days at Texas Capitol in Austin

Event Calendar: https://tspb.texas.gov/plan/events/tcapcal.html

(Rally days are in green.)

• CHILDREN AT RISK on Equity (Feb. 14, 2023 at 10:00 am)
• CHILDREN AT RISK on Early Childhood Education (March 21, 2021 at 10:00 am)
• Texas Coalition to Prevent Gun Violence (Feb. 28, 2023 at 12:00 noon)
• Texas League of Women Voters on Gun Violence (Feb. 27 & 28, 2023)
• Texas PTA (Feb. 27 at 8:30 & 11:30 am and 12:00 noon)
• Texas Retired Teachers Association (www.trta.org) (April 11 & 12, 2023)

Thank you, AAUW San Antonio Gender Equity Advocates, for all you do.

Pat Sanford

AAUW SA Public Policy Chair

AAUW Texas Public Policy Advocacy Advisory Committee

Literary Icons Helped Raise AAUW San Antonio Scholarship Dollars

During the early 1920s this branch invited several poets and authors to San Antonio. The speakers were to give at least two talks; first to the high school student body during school hours and a second performance in the evening for the public.

Some speakers were well known during their own lifetimes but are not as well-known now. There were, however, two poets you will remember: William Butler Yeats, who placed great stress upon the music of the speaking voice, lectured on the “Theater of the People” on April 14,1920. Robert Frost gave a selected reading of some of his poems on November 20, 1922.

These events and others were held in the Main High School Auditorium, with an admission of 50 or 75 cents. Proceeds went to the branch’s Scholarship Fund.

Mynda Holman McGuire

Nominations for AAUW-SA 2023-2024 Board of Officers

The Nominating Committee is tasked with developing a slate of nominees for our 2023-2024 board of officers. The Committee will present a slate of nominees to the membership at the March General Meeting. The names of the nominees will be sent to every member by Constant Contact email.

The Elected Officer positions are:

President (1-year term)

President Elect (1-year term)   

Vice President for Programs (1-year term)

Vice President for Membership (1-year term)

Secretary (1-year term)

Treasurer (2-years term)

Treasurer Elect (1-year term)

Members interested in any of the positions should contact any member of the Nominating Committee. Job descriptions for each position are located on our website.

Nominating Committee Members:

Jeanette Pierce - 210.394.8280

Martha Steele - 823.425.7477

Kathy Dicke - 314.249.8319

Janet Black - 210.884.6520

Wondra Chang - 361.774.2980

Women’s History Month at YWLA

AAUW-SA is participating in Women’s History Month at YWLA (Young Women’s Leadership Academy) on March 31, 2023, 11:30 am, 2123 W. Huisache. We will be leading small group discussions with the juniors and seniors on gender and pay equity, Title IX, advancing women in leadership, and other issues.

Scholarships

Scholarship applications have come in and review is in process. The deadline was 2/4 and we have 26 textbook scholarships. This is the most that we have received, I believe; last year was a banner year. This year is better.

We have received 7 complete graduate applications (in addition, 4 did not meet the criteria). This is not a banner year for graduate scholarship applications.

The Board of Directors will make the final decision as to who will receive the scholarships at their March board meeting. Hoping to see you at the April meeting as we award the scholarships.

National Conference for College Women Student Leaders (NCCWSL)

We have received 5 applications. This year the conference will be in person at the University of Maryland, College Park. We propose to offer full scholarships since the registration fee is $565 plus air fare. We will know how many we can send once the State AAUW processes the funding requests. The five core learning objectives are:

• Leadership development: Develop and strengthen a voice, skill set, and mind-set for leadership

• Professional development: Build a professional tool kit for postgraduate life

• Activism: Learn how, why, and when to take action and be a change maker

• Women’s issues: Gain a better understanding of local, national, and global issues and policies affecting women and of AAUW's role in empowering women

• Identity and diversity: Own their personal identities and roles in increasing and supporting diverse voices

They will get the chance to meet and hear from groundbreaking women working across a range of fields. Current speakers are Nikole Hannah-Jones, Pulitzer Prize-winning creator of “The 1619 Project”; Raven Baxter, Ph.D., known as Dr. Raven the Science Maven, an internationally acclaimed American educator and molecular biologist; Kristin Henning is the Blume Professor of Law and Director of the Juvenile Justice Clinic and Initiative at Georgetown University Law Center

Eleanor Skelley

Karen Reichensperger

SHARE

Have you read an interesting book? Binged a great tv series? Listened to new music? Visited an exciting city, country, art exhibit, music festival, restaurant?

Let us know so we may share it in our newsletters.

Click Here to Share

2018 documentary on Netflix

Feminists: What Were They Thinking

It is a film about the rise of feminism in the 60’s and 70’s

and features interviews with activists then and now. 

An Evening With Ross Gay

Tuesday, February 21 at 8:00 P.M.

Trinity University’s Ruth Taylor Recital Hall

Ross Gay is an award winning poet and

essayist who explores finding joy

in the midst of fear, grief and loss.

Fences by August Wilson

Carver Center

Until February 29

Itshak Pearlman

Tobin Center

February 21, 2023 

Bexar County Fostering Educational Services Project

Website: www.bcfes.org

Email: [email protected]

POC

[email protected]

[email protected]

https://www.linkedin.com/in/airika-buford-945a67a7/

Can We Talk?

March 23, 2023

More Information Forthcoming

We will need our team to set-up and work our AAUW table the afternoon and evening of the event. Please contact Ali Heller [email protected].

If you would like to attend the event, please email Diane Carr [email protected].

March Dates to Remember

March                Women’s History Month - Theme: Celebrating Women Who Tell Our Story

4                         AAUWSA Monthly General Meeting

7                         Culinary Adventures: Artemisia’s St Philip’s College

8                         International Women’s Day

12                       Daylight Savings Begins

14                       Women’s Equal Pay Day

17                       St. Patrick’s Day

18                       AAUWSA Book Discussion

22                       ERA passed by Congress

22                       3^rd Annual Phenomenal Woman Women’s Day

                           Celebration, St. Philip’s College

23                       Girls, Inc. of San Antonio Science Festival, CAST Medical High School

23                      “Can We Talk” Sponsored by 19 Amendment Group

                           Evening event. Stay tuned for more. Sign-up with AAUWSA.

25-26                 65^th Annual San Antonio Folklife Dance Festival

26                       Texas Governor signed bill granting white women the

                           right to vote in primaries

Program Schedule for 2022-2023

April 1, 2023

Lead: Dr. Karen Reichensperger, Scholarship Committee Chair

Program: San Antonio AAUW Scholarship Winners

Election of Officers

May 6, 2023: Scobee Girls STEM Summit (Aligned to DEI topic: Equity)

Speakers: Michelle Risse and Andrea Montano

Program: Scobee Education Center: STEM Education for Young Women Interested in STEM Careers

This presentation will reflect on the programs Scobee has provided through the Artemis Academy for Girls, the Scobee STEM Summit and what research tells us about how general STEM careers currently reflect our population. The Scobee Education Center has hosted the Scobee Girls STEM Summit since 2016 and funded an all-girls STEM camp.

Committee Members:

Monica Ruiz-Mills

Judy Branch

Mary Ellen Pratt

Martha Steele

Culinary Adventures

Tuesday, March 7, 2023

NOTE CHANGE OF DAY FOR THIS MONTH

Artemisia’s

Culinary School for St. Philip's College

Eastern European Menu

Piroshki

Borscht

Individual Coulibiac of the Sea Grain Medley

Irish Soda Bread

Strawberries Romanoff

Smettanick (Jam Cream Pie)

Limited beverage with service.

Doors open at 11:45 am. Service time will begin 11:50 am. Please plan to arrive property by 11:30 am to make your way to the building and 4th floor restaurant location.

Corner of Montana and Walters Street on the 4th Floor of the Tourism, Hospitality and Culinary Arts (THCA) Building. Near AT&T Center.

The price for lunch is $19 per person, non-refundable.

I have prepaid for the reservation and spots are limited.

Be the first to RSVP AND pay via Venmo @Ali-Heller-1, Zelle, or send a check by mail made payable to Ali Heller and mailed to 1726 Brush Creek Drive, San Antonio, Texas 78238 to lock in your reservation.

Overflow will be put on waiting list.

DONATE!

You can donate to the AAUW San Antonio Branch for Scholarships by making a check out to AAUW SA and sending it to Treasurer Adrien Frank, 140 Patterson, #104, San Antonio, TX 78209.

You can also donate to AAUW Greatest Needs

by clicking HERE.

Follow AAUW San Antonio on:

Facebook www.facebook.com/aauw.sanantonio

Twitter @AAUW_SanAntonio

LinkedIn AAUW San Antonio