AAUW Eugene-Lane was proud to sponsor branch member and UO doctoral student Victoria Olajide, as she attended AAUW’s May 25-26, 2021 National Conference for College Women Student Leaders (NCCWSL)! Victoria is currently spending the summer in her native Nigeria, so she graciously created the following video report of her NCCWSL experiences.

Being inspired to “use her voice to effect change” was Victoria’s biggest take-away from the event, but her entire seven-minute video is worth checking out.

Alternatively, here is the transcript from her report (although the video version is more compelling):

Transcript:

Hello everyone, my name is Victoria Olajide. I’m a soon to be third year PhD student at the University of Oregon, a PhD student of the anthropology department. I was sponsored by the AAUW Eugene Chapter to attend the 2021 NCCWSL Conference, the virtual conference that held on the 25th and 26th of May, 2021. And I should be giving this report in person.

Unfortunately, I’m in Nigeria right now, and Nigeria is nine hours ahead of the US, so I decided to make a video, and the network situation is quite unpredictable right here, so I decided to send in a video. I hope that is acceptable by everyone.

So the 2021 NCCWSL Conference that held on May 25th, was an opportunity for me to be amongst women in diverse fields, having discussions that centered around the role of women in gender issues and racial issues in the financial world and things like that, and topics on how to improve on ourselves, in our careers, in our interaction with people, in policy making, in legal issues, and things like that.

So it was very enlightening for me. I particularly enjoyed the keynote address by Dr. Brittney Cooper, that was held on the first day. And she spoke extensively about the right to claim our rage in certain circumstances. The fact that women are often seen as, especially black women, because she, studies is focused on black women, especially. So she did a pretty good job trying to broaden the narratives from just speaking to black women and women from minority groups as well. So she elaborated on the fact that we have a right to claim our rage as women, because our rage is logical, because our rage can be used to effect change in the society. And when we’re not given the opportunity to claim our rage when we are being oppressed or when we are being pushed to the margin, when we are being marginalized, it doesn’t cause growth. It’s one of the things that cripples development, growth, policymaking in the society.

She also spoke about the fact that university women need to become more vocal in policymaking and women in general need to start to find your own crew. Your crew that supports you, your crew going to motivate you. That’s going to have your back, basically.

We also, as ladies, have to be able to, as women, we have to be able to stand up for injustice with our voices. We should not be silenced. We have the right, we need to claim the right to express our rage too, to make our comments about injustice, to make our comments about discriminations in the society. And I think that was really enlightening for me, especially the marginalization aspect, where we have to stand up as women to raise our voice against being marginalized. And also women should be able to support themselves. We should rally around each other and support ourselves. We shouldn’t just be feminists for our individual groups. We should be feminist for all women, right? We should be feminist for everyone that identifies as a woman, we should fight for rights that put us out there, that may cause, have access to certain decision-making or certain things in society that would favor us.

Aside from the keynote address, we also had forums that talked about how girls, women, should be supported in STEM. How we could go about looking for role models, our code, what to expect from mentors, the essence of mentorship and scholarship in the academia. And for ladies in the STEM profession, generally. Really fascinating ideas were brought forward. We also talked about finances, which is very important, how to manage your finances, how to look for a scholarship that would help you in your career goals, how to save for the future. And it was just a really good opportunity to speak with other women or other girls out there, or other ladies from other institutions on the challenges we face, which is not unique, which is not really, how do I put it there? Some challenges, financial challenges or racial challenges or gender issues that people experience. And there’s some that actually not so unique because you see them occurring in different forms with everybody from different races. I don’t know if that made a lot of sense right now.

Yeah, but the conference for me was just very, very enlightening. I enjoyed it. I found myself in a space where I could discuss with future female leaders. I found myself in a safe space, where I could learn from people that have once been in my position and they’ve excelled and they’re making changes right now. And they’re building the pathway for my generation to take the battle and make the necessary changes and not to cower in silence and not to be made quiet, but to speak up, to use my voice. I think that was one thing I really picked or that really stood out for me, or that I learned from the NCCWSL conference is to embrace my rage when I’m uncomfortable or when I’m in a situation that is not conducive for me or favorable for me, I shouldn’t be scared of speaking up.

I should be able to use my voice to effect change because the change is not just going to compliment me or it’s not just going to be useful for me. It’s going to be useful for generations and generations of other ladies to come. So I would to thank the AAUW Eugene Chapter for sponsoring me to attend a NCCWSL conference. It was a very, very wonderful experience. I look forward to attending the conference next year, where I can physically engage with other people, and other ladies and other professionals. Thank you very much. I hope to attend the next meeting by the time I return to Eugene. Thank you and have a good one, everybody.

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