The Women's Conference

THE COUNTDOWN TO 2010 REGISTRATION IS ON!

Just a friendly reminder that tomorrow, Wednesday, June 23rd, at 9am PDT tickets to The Women’s Conference 2010 go on sale at www.womensconference.org. We’re thrilled that registration day is finally here.

In an effort to make registration as easy for you as possible, here are 7 tips:

1. Be informed. Visit our Welcome to The Women's Conference 2010 page before registration begins. Here, you can learn about the six Conference events – and decide which you want to attend. Choose a few backup events too, in case your first choice of event sells out.
2. Have your credit card ready. All registrations require a credit card to purchase.
3. Be patient. Because of the huge demand for tickets, you can expect to be put into a "waiting room" on the registration site, where you will be updated regularly on your status in line, as well as ticket availability.
4. If you are online waiting to register, DO NOT REFRESH your page, it will be done automatically for you. And do not use the back button – it will cause you to lose your place in line.
5. Ticket availability for events will be listed – and updated -- at the top of The Women's Conference homepage throughout the day.
6. You'll need to sign up for Maria Shriver's March on Alzheimer's separately. There will be a SIGN UP link for this event on The Women's Conference homepage in the upper right-hand corner.
7. If you don’t get a ticket to the event you want, visit Our Community Forum, where ticketholders can sell their unwanted tickets for the value of that ticket. And remember that you can enter The Great Giveaway for a chance to win 2 tickets to the Conference.
   

Ticket prices for The Women's Conference 2010:
The Main Event (includes The Minerva Awards Presentation) - October 26

• Table of 12 on the floor $3,900
• Loge $250
• Balcony $185
• Partial View Balcony $150
  

Join a WGSD Working Group

Women Give San Diego is looking for your help. We are looking for WGSD members to join our working groups including Advocacy, Membership, Communications and Grant Making. These are fantastic opportunities to grow your knowledge and contribute to the work of WGSD. To participate in any of these contact Jan Tuttleman at jtuttleman@gmail.com.

Grant Making Meeting July 7

Letters of Interest for WGSD funding will be coming in on June 30th! Please join us for a Grant Making meeting on Wednesday July 7th at 5pm at the home of Jan Tuttleman (7791 Starlight Drive, La Jolla). At this meeting we will review all the grants that were submitted and start our process of determining a granting partner. All members are welcome to join in on the process. Please RSVP if you can attend to jtuttleman@gmail.com.

WGSD Summer Meetings Cancelled

Summer meetings-July 5th, August 2nd and September 6th are canceled. Our next Membership Meeting will be held Monday, August 23rd, 5:00-7:00 p.m. at AMN Healthcare. Working Groups will meet over the summer as determined by Working Group Chairs.

Our next Membership Connection Reception will be held Wednesday, September 22nd, 5:00-7:00 p.m., location will be announced later. Please put it on your calendar and once again, bring your friends. We are anxious to continue to grow our membership and granting fund. The more members we have, the larger the grants we can make into the community.

Membership Connection Event

Women Give San Diego hosted a very successful Membership Connection Reception on June 9th at the beautiful home of Gayle Tauber. We are most grateful for Gayle’s warm and gracious hospitality. We’re thrilled to report that nearly 50 dynamic and energetic women attended. Thank you to WGSD members who brought guests; thank you to all of the guests that attended. The energy was invigorating!

Founding President, Jan Tuttleman and Co-Founders Gayle Tauber and Linda Katz provided a clear and compelling case for “Why Women and Girls?” and “Why Economic Security and Sustainability for Women and Girls?”.

We had the pleasure of hearing from Leane Marchese, Executive Director, ElderHelp of San Diego. Leane shared her inspiring story and expressed how grateful she is for having been selected to participate in the Women’s Policy Institute, a year-long program of the Women’s Foundation of California. Leane is confident her experience will have a positive impact on her work to keep seniors in their homes.

Great news-TEN of our guests have signed up to become members of Women Give San Diego. Welcome to our new members!

We encourage members to consider signing up to serve on a Working Group-Grants, Communications/Social Media, Membership or Advocacy. We have big ideas; your participation is welcome and needed!

Thank you for your commitment to Women Give San Diego. We encourage members to get involved in a Working Group AND recruit your friends to become members. Those of you who aren’t members YET, we invite you to consider becoming a member. We ask you to join us in working to offer underserved women and girls the opportunity to become fully engaged in the prosperity of their local communities. Become a member of Women Give San Diego. To learn more, visit our website! Find us on Facebook too!

Learn About the Women's Policy Institute

Much more effective than a single lobby group, the Women’s Policy Institute (WPI) amplifies the voices of many women who are leading grassroots social justice work, training them on how legislation is made and connecting them to those in power. Through the Women's Policy Institute, a yearlong program of training retreats in Sacramento, we teach women activists and grassroots organizations how to successfully negotiate the labyrinth of Sacramento.

The Women's Foundation of California is accepting applications now for WPI (deadline is July 9). If you or anyone you know could benefit from this training, click here to find out more details. you can also contact our WPI staff person, Hannah Hill at hannahh@womensfoundca.org or 415.321.2047.

Women Give San Diego at the Momentum Awards

Thanks to the generosity of Gayle Tauber, a group of founding members from Women Give San Diego headed north on the morning of Friday, May 7 to attend the Women's Foundation of California Momentum Awards. We took the carpool lane, of course, and enjoyed getting to know each other better on the ride up to LA and throughout the event. The hotel was elegant and the food delicious, but it was the speakers that wowed!

The honorees accomplishments are, indeed, momentous, but they weren't the only ones who left you awestruck - the women who introduced the award recipients were well-spoken, charismatic, and living reflections of the Women's Foundation of California’s vision.

Lateefah Simon was one such presenter; she was 15 and just released from juvenile hall when she became part of the Women's Foundation of California lifecycle. She entered one of the Foundation's grant partner programs, 4 years later was named the organization's Executive Director, and is now a recipient of the MacArthur "Genius" award and one of Oprah's "20 Most Powerful Women." Coming full circle, she's also a former board member of the Women's Foundation of California.

Lateefah was presenting her mentor, Aileen Adams, with a Momentum Award and she thanked Aileen for her contribution to Lateefah’s life path. As I looked around the table, Lateefah's words rang true for me as well, for we young women have wide open opportunities because of women like Aileen Adams and the women sitting around us at Gayle Tauber's Women Give San Diego table.

The other two Momentum Awards went to Connie Rice and Laura Chick. Connie, who admitted to being biased as a female chauvinist, reminded us that "we have to argue against our own [self] interests to defend the children who can't even safely walk to school." And Laura Chick insisted that "if you are not indignant then you are not paying attention ... and if you are not paying attention nothing changes." We were all rapt with attention absorbing the inspiring stories of women making a difference in their communities, and we did our part as well, helping with scholarships for women ready to turn education and experience into economic security and life change.

This was a unique opportunity for all of us who joined Gayle and I, as I am sure we all were, am thankful for the experience. It is a testimonial to the power of women joining together to affect change and elevate women’s lives in our community.

Many thanks to Megan Lim for this contribution to the Women Give San Diego blog! If you are interested in contributing a blog post please contact Emily Davis at edaconsulting@gmail.com.