Women looking to empower each other need to look no further than Between Women, the discussion group created by Diamond Brown, junior in clinical laboratory science. Run by students for students, Between Women exists to unify and foster understanding between women of different backgrounds and cultures.
"It's geared toward LGBT women, but we welcome all types of women," Brown said.
After attending a Women's Initiative conference as a freshman, Brown was inspired by the success of the unified women who presented. Already familiar with Spectrum, Auburn's gay-straight alliance, Brown created a group to deal specifically with women's issues. She organized the group in fall 2012.
"We've been taking issues that women have and then applying that to the LGBT community." Brown said. "Like employment: 'How much do you get paid? If you're going to get hired, can you get fired legally?'"
Bonnie Wilson, coordinator for the Women in Science and Engineering Institute (WISE), helped Brown establish Between Women after teaching her in the WISE learning community course.
"It was literally just an idea, and she took it and ran with it and it's been great," Wilson said.
According to Wilson, Between Women provides a safe, intimate forum for discussing topics like domestic violence, relationship struggles and equality.
"It's smaller than other LGBT groups around campus, so it's very insulated, very protected and very private," Wilson said.
Brown explained the small size of the group allows more introverted women to feel comfortable expressing their opinions and sharing personal stories. Brown and her vice president, Sami Lee, junior in biomedical sciences, research the challenges women face in professional, legal, educational and domestic spheres before bringing them to the group.
"We do all the research for them, boil it down to something really simple--put it in layman's terms--and then give it to them and see what the think," Brown said.
According to Brown, this spark of discussion is critical to young adult women.
"You're going to go into the real world after this, and so you need to be prepared for what the real world has to throw at you," Brown said.
According to Lee, Between Women and its blog also provide a link between women and the resources they have access to as Auburn University students.
"Resources are out there that not a lot of people are aware of," Lee said. "Auburn University has a lot of resources available for women."
Between Women meetings are held once a month and are open to any women who are lesbian, bi, transgendered, or questioning and their straight allies. The group hopes by spreading awareness of the inequality against women and providing a platform for dialogue, they can enact change.
"The more people see that equality is needed in Alabama physically with their eyes, they can't hide it and pretend it's not there and be in denial about it," Brown said.
Between Women's blog can be found at http://aubetweenwomen.weebly.com/
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