Penn Women’s Center launches new annual theme 'Envisioning Feminist Futures at PWC'

The Penn Women's Center launched its new annual theme “Envisioning Feminist Futures at PWC” during its homecoming reception and listening session on Nov. 15. 

Approximately 20 students, alumni, faculty, staff attended the event to celebrate the theme and share their hopes for the future of the Women's Center. The event featured small group discussions with different prompts, exploring topics such as the vision for the Women's Center’s next 50 years, services and resources to support that vision, and ways to generally increase the inclusivity and accessibility of the Women's Center.

Following last year's 50th anniversary celebrations, this is the Women's Center’s first theme since Director Elisa Foster joined in 2017.

“The Women's Center is open for people of all gender identities, even though the name just says women, but we're here to help everyone, no matter what your gender identity is,” College sophomore and Women's Center Student Program Assistant Luke Godsey said.

Attendees were encouraged to write their thoughts on sticky notes before sharing out with the group. Participants suggested several key initiatives, including professional development seminars on financial literacy and business-place negotiation, expanding the Women's Center’s name to be more inclusive, supporting the intersection of feminism with other justice movements, and inspiring individual and collective power. 

The Women's Center was founded in April 1973 after a four-day occupation of College Hall by protestors demanding action in response to a series of sexual assaults on campus. The center was established as a safe space and a resource hub for students.

In the 1990s, the Women's Center moved to its current location on Locust Walk, tied to the “Diversify Locust Walk” movement that sought to make the area safer and more inclusive. Over its 50-year history, the center has been active in promoting the rights of female and minority students.

Foster explained that after reflecting on the center's history and impact, the team recognized the need to look forward.

“We learned about what it meant to be a women's center on a college campus in the 1970s, 80s and 90s. Now it's time to think about what it means in 2024,” Foster said.

Jessica Anderson, a 2021 College graduate and second-year MD-PhD student, shared her evolving relationship with the center. 

“When I was an undergraduate here, I didn't engage with the Penn Women's Center, in part because I didn't know how to leverage the resources that it had. And now as a graduate student, I'm interested in returning to it to explore it as an affinity space, as a space to find community with other women,” Anderson said.

Over the coming year, the Women's Center will explore what it means to be a women's center in 2024, examining how to center intersectional identities, create an inclusive space, and strengthen both university partnerships and community engagement. The initiative aims to shape feminist futures at both the Women's Center and Penn through ongoing dialogue and programming. The Women's Center plans to do this through hosting at least one listening session and one educational program during the spring. 

“The Penn Women’s Center has and continues to be a space for students to come together in community, to learn with and from each other,” Associate Vice Provost for University Life William Atkins said. "[PWC] helps empower students to advocate for the causes they care about and to be able to continue to see that move forward is really exciting especially during this celebration.”