‘Women Providing Healing, Promoting Hope’

Montclair State began its month-long celebration of women’s history on March 1 by honoring the caregivers and frontline workers of the pandemic and paying homage to the women who have inspired hope.

“As I think about all that women are and all that we do, it is incredible,” said Office for Social Justice and Diversity Director Adela Caceres during a flag raising ceremony, the first in a series of special events planned at Montclair State University to honor the contributions of women through history.

“We are moms, we are wives, we are partners, we are sisters and daughters, we are each other’s best friends, we are volunteers, we are philanthropists, we are soldiers, we have varied and vibrant careers and not to mention during this pandemic, many of us were frontline workers during one of the toughest times in history,” Caceres said.

The National Women’s History Alliance designated this year’s Women’s History Month theme as “Women providing healing, promoting hope” to honor caregivers and frontline workers and recognize the ways women have advocated for compassionate treatments and new directions in public health and in women’s mental and physical health.

“While we, as women, continue to break through the glass ceiling, our journey is not over,” Student Development and Campus Life Vice President Dawn Meza Soufleris said in her remarks to members of the Montclair campus.

“We have to take on the bulk of family care and we are often judged differently because of our gender,” Soufleris said. “When you start to add the other factors, such as race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and economic status, we see women who are struggling to make it every single day. We as women and certainly the men as our partners need to remember that individually we can be very strong, but together are undeniable.”

Caceres said she was honored to be among the Montclair community gathered for the flag raising. “As a woman, a proud Latina and first generation college student, this month means a lot to me,” she said. “I am equally as proud to be a part of an institution that values and celebrates the strength, the intelligence, the beauty and the tenacity that it is to be a woman.”

Reading from a proclamation, Soufleris noted the many contributions of women throughout the world and here on campus. “At Montclair State University, women from diverse racial, ethnic and cultural backgrounds have served our campus community with extraordinary leadership and vision and intellectual achievements,” she said.

The formal remarks were demonstrated later during conversation with members of Montclair’s Higher Education Council, a virtual event on women empowerment.

Hispanic Initiatives and International Programs Associate Provost Katia Paz Goldfarb joined Kayon Hall, graduate program coordinator and clinical faculty specialist, and Sasha Ortiz, associate director of the Educational Opportunity Fund to discuss how their experiences as women, particularly as women of color, have shaped their careers and their desires to help immigrant and Black, Indigenous and people of color.

“If you have a voice, how do you give voice to others?” emphasized Goldfarb. “We have a certain privilege…I always question how do you use that privilege to offer access and to elevate people to spaces where their voices are going to be there?”

View the full calendar of Women’s History Month’s events on Montclair State Engage.

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Story by Staff Writer Marilyn Joyce Lehren. Photos by University Photographer Mike Peters.

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