Emily Fox | Achieving equal pay for equal work

According to the Government Accountability Office, women are cheap.

A report released in mid-August by the organization concluded that because federal agencies aren't properly monitoring pay equity and anti-discrimination laws, women still earn 80 percent of what men make.

One of America's most well-paid - yet most discriminated against - women had something to say on the issue. Senator Hillary Clinton gave a press conference at Barnard College last Monday, calling on officials to enforce the laws. And there's no doubt that Barnard ate it up.

Having transferred from the all-female college to Penn, I'm fully versed in the seriousness with which Barnard takes gender equality. With 2,200 women on one small campus, someone's inevitably wearing their "Strong, Beautiful Barnard Woman" T-shirt or giving you their own vagina monologue. You're keenly aware of being female - whatever opportunities and disadvantages come along with that - and a sense of pride comes from that understanding.

Penn, too, boasts countless groups that support female issues and goals - from Penn Women's Center, to Wharton Women, to the sororities. But all of this I-am-woman-hear-me-roar-ness doesn't exactly help equalize pay or opportunities in the workplace. If determination and unity were enough, then the women's liberation movement would have overcome discrimination in salaries decades ago. But pay inequality is still something that Penn students will undoubtedly face in the professional world.

So how can our generation overcome the institutional bias and achieve equal pay for equal work after all of these years?

I'll have to call on a cliche in order to answer my own rhetorical question: Knowledge is power. The key is to learn from women who understand the barriers firsthand. Women who want equal pay in the future need to soak up all of the knowledge that we can from the past experiences of professional women.

At Penn, female students are privy to this knowledge. For the last 20 years, The Trustee's Council of Penn Women, the TCPW, has brought these lessons to Penn students, yet many students don't take advantage of what they have to offer. According to Susanna Lachs, who chaired the TCWP for two years, "our main objective is to mentor undergraduates."

In the last two decades, the TCPW has given over $500,000 for grants, organizations and research stipends, supported women's sports teams, invited influential speakers to campus and hosted numerous panels.

In the spirit of teaching and inspiring Penn women, the TCPW holds career events which feature panels of alumni women from various fields, to inform undergrad women of what to expect and of what they've encountered.

The TCPW holds events in the summer where recent alumni tell students of their workplace experiences. Lach's daughter, College sophomore Anna Adler added, "The programs for women on campus have been helpful to upperclassmen, and it has had a great impact on the younger women."

This guidance extends beyond Penn undergrads. Last spring, tenured women professors spoke to female faculty about the tenure track, and the possibilities within their own departments. Their programs help students surmount obstacles by introducing Penn women to other Penn women who have faced and overcome similar hurdles.

"I didn't ever feel like I shouldn't get a graduate degree and pursue a profession," Lachs explained. "I just kind of had to find my own way." Yet with the help of the TCPW, "Undergrads today have a multitude of resources and support. It's an enormously richer environment."

It's these resources that we have today that will allow us to overcome the unequal pay of the past. Learning from successful professionals - what it takes, how they got there and what we should expect - allows us to enter the workplace with an understanding of what we should and will likely experience.

It also gives us the ability to understand what isn't right or acceptable. With this knowledge comes power - the power to succeed along with men and to finally overcome payment discrimination.

Emily Fox is a College sophomore from Merion, Pennsylvania. Her e-mail is fox@dailypennsylvanian.com. Seen and Heard appears on alternating Fridays.

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