Local branch’s anniversary coincides with Nov. 28 125th
anniversary of national organization
Morgan Hill – The Morgan Hill branch of the American Association of University Women celebrates its 25th birthday in November, the same month the national AAUW marks its 125th year of helping women succeed academically and professionally.
“Things have changed so much from when I was in school (in the 1960s) and you pretty much had a choice between being a nurse, a teacher or a secretary,” said Morgan Hill resident Geannie Gregg, one of the group’s founding members. “There’s a huge opportunity for girls. What hasn’t kept pace is equality of pay.”
Since the national AAUW was founded in 1881, the group has been a catalyst for change. The group promotes educational opportunities for girls and women, funds research that affects the lives of women, provides legal support for women fighting sex discrimination, advocates civil rights and social justice and encourages community activism on issues that affect girls’ education. Today, the AAUW includes more than 100,000 members, 1,300 branches and 500 college and university partners.
To commemorate the accomplishments of the local branch, Morgan Hill Mayor Dennis Kennedy will issue a proclamation recognizing the group’s 25th birthday and the AAUW’s 125th anniversary at the Nov. 1 City Council meeting.
Charter member Marilyn Gadway attended the group’s first meeting in 1981 at the Morgan Hill Library. From those humble beginnings, she said the club’s membership grew quickly to more than 80 local women – many of them younger than typical AAUW members in other cities.
“Morgan Hill was starting to grow,” Gadway said, alluding to the population surge in the 1970s raised the city’s population from less than 7,000 to about 18,000 in 1980. “It’s been a very vibrant group. Part of it is, Morgan Hill has a very high education level, and when new people come to the community, this is a place to start meeting others.”
Today’s AAUW-Morgan Hill roster includes 22 board members and approximately 125 members.
It’s been a banner year for the group, including a record-breaking contribution of $10,250 to the national AAUW Educational Foundation, which supports fellowships and grant programs for women. Of the more than $4 million the Educational Foundation awards each year for grants, fellowships and research, the AAUW-California contributes more than $500,000.
AAUW-Morgan Hill Co-President Judy Kinker said offering avenues for girls and women to meet their academic potentials remains a key priority.
The branch strives to meet this goal with a program called GEMS (Girls Engaged in Math and Science).
“This school year, we’re going to talk to a pilot and take a trip to a clinical laboratory at the VA hospital, to learn about clinical pathology and forensics,” said Lauren Jenkins, director of the regional genetics lab at Kaiser hospital, who helped start GEMS more than 10 years ago.
The program meets four to six times during the school year and encourages outrageous hands-on activities such as dissecting cows’ eyes with a veterinarian, or operating underwater robots in a swimming pool with scientists from the Monterey Bay Aquarium.
GEMS was inspired by the annual Tech Trek held over the summer at Stanford University, established by AAUW-California to encourage eighth-grade girls to aspire to careers in math, science and computer technology. The Morgan Hill branch raises money each year to send girls to the week-long camp where they interact with women mathematicians and scientists.
“I thought, ‘let’s get a girls’ group together where we take these Tech Trek girls, their friends, and any one else who’s interested, and provide programs in math, science and technology,’ ” said Jenkins, who holds a doctoral degree in genetics.
In 1983, Gadway, a Morgan Hill resident, helped start the annual Wildflower Run to raise money for scholarships.
“At the time, I’d seen there were other people starting to do this, having races, charging money … and it worked,” said Gadway, a former recreation department director for the cities of Palo Alto, San Jose and Fremont. “A lot of AAUWs did lots of little fundraisers. We decided if we did one big fundraiser, it would make things easier.”
Since its inception, AAUW-Morgan Hill has raised enough funds to start its own $100,000 endowment for women doing post-graduate work across the country.
Tony Burchyns covers Morgan Hill for The Times. Reach him at (408) 779-4106 ext. 201 or tb*******@************ms.com.
