Women's Global Connection Celebrates and Honors Women

KSAT-TV interviewing Lisa at the UIW Women’s Fair

Women's Global Connection honored the women and girls they partner with worldwide last week at the UIW Women's Fair AND caught the eye of local television station KSAT-TV, which interviewed Executive Director Lisa Uribe.  You can watch the report here!!

Lisa highlighted WGC's mission promoting the leadership and learning capacity of women and girls and got a chance to talk about the upcoming unique collaboration that will take the message of women's empowerment to New York City this week!

Lisa and several local female leaders have been selected to present at the UN Commission on the Status of Women program event about Women's Economic Empowerment in the Changing World of Work. 

The group, including Sr. Martha Ann Kirk CCVI, consists of the following San Antonio organizations:

• The Dialogue Institute of the Southwest
• The Battered Women and Children’s Center (Family Violence Prevention Services, Inc.)
• Women’s Global Connection
• University of the Incarnate Word

The discussion will analyze the significant effects of economic, social and educational empowerment towards women’s leadership.  It will center on best practices and highlight the importance of opportunities for women to initiate peace in their respective communities.

Development Associate Tamarra Mencey at the WGC booth
 at the UIW Women’s Fair

“Women are not given equal resources and opportunities to empower themselves, so they are eventually underrepresented in decision-making platforms,” said Fatma T. Arslan Korkmaz, moderator of the panel and a representative of the Dialogue Institute of the Southwest.

Lisa of WGC will speak about how economic inequality impedes women worldwide by erecting barriers to formal financial institutions and saving mechanisms. The cycle traps women in vulnerable, low-paid, or undervalued jobs.  WGC works with women in Tanzania, Zambia and Peru on projects involving small businesses, microfinance, nutrition, clean water and education.

“We get to regularly witness how access to education and economic resources creates leadership opportunities for women in these developing countries,” Lisa said. “Investing in women and girls has a multiplier effect on productivity and sustained economic growth for a region.”

Marta B. Peláez, CEO of the Battered Women and Children’s Shelter, will address how social inequality in the form of subordination of women results in gender discrimination.  Women and girls are the ones who suffer most from poverty, wars, human trafficking and domestic violence, she said.

And Sr. Martha Ann, a CCVI and UIW professor, will speak about the successes over the last several years in increasing educational attainment for women and the challenges that remain.  "Peace-building efforts across the globe depend on the full participation of women and girls in education and leadership opportunities," she said.