BIG IDEAS NOVEMBER 2024

“One Brick at a Time: Rebuilding the Oregon Shakespeare Festival”

Branch Meeting October 2024

’Modern Feminism’: What Is It and What’s at Stake?

Celebration of Scholars October 16, 2024

The annual Celebration of Scholars event was a resounding success with five young women receiving acknowledgement of their scholastic achievements and financial support from the AAUW Scholarship Program. Family and friends joined them along with AAUW Ashland Branch members and SOU and RCC officials.

Big Ideas October 8, 2024

“Freedom to Read: Book Banning and Other Challenges Facing Libraries” drew a highly engaged crowd on October 8, part of our “Big Ideas” series at the Ashland Library. Speakers Kari May, Library Director for Jackson County Library Services, and Marie Felgentrager, a certified teaching librarian in Southern Oregon and member of the Oregon Library Association’s Intellectual Freedom Committee, provided a detailed overview of what types of library materials are challenged and how issues are resolved based on long-standing policies and procedures.

September 28, 2024 Branch Meeting

An overflow crowd of members and guests attended our first fall Branch Meeting to hear from SOU Honors College Director, Dr. Cherstin Lyon and three of her senior Honor students:
Sierra Garrett, Tiana Gilliland, and Kiya Jackson.

Fran Adams, Chair of the Scholarship Campaign also launched the Art4Scholars
Program offering art from members in support of SOU and RCC Scholarships. Susan Schaefer, chair of Interest Groups, promoted the twelve Interest groups offered this year.

Dr. Cherstin M. Lyon

Fran Adams

Full Room

Interest Groups Table

Big Ideas September 3, 2024

In November 2020 Oregon voters overwhelmingly passed Ballot Measure 110 which reclassified
possession/penalties for specified drugs including heroin, methamphetamine and others. This
year the measure was significantly amended by Oregon House Bill 4002, which repealed the
drug decriminalization portion in response to public backlash.

Rep. Pam Mash and Kerri Hecox, M.D. speaking on Measure 110 and HB 4002

Our AAUW Booth at the OLLI Open House in August, 2024

Left to right seated: Ashland Branch Co-Presidents Susan MacCracken Jain, Regina Ayars

May 23, 2024 AAUW Ashland Branch awarded the first annual AAUW of Oregon, Ashland Branch, Ashland High School Scholarship.

Our Members Were Busy in April, 2024

At the WomanKind Art Exhibit Fundraiser, 11 women artists from Ashland and the Rogue Valley were featured at the Langford Gallery in Phoenix. Susan MacCracken Jain, Ashland AAUW Membership Chair, hosted a panel discussion with five of the artists, entitled “The Importance of Women in the Arts.” 

The panel, pictured (from left to right) are Susan MacCracken Jain, Isabelle Rosier Alzado, Beca Blake, Kat Mciver, and Alexis Mixter. Also on the panel, but not pictured was Zoriya Blalock

The “Power of Public Art” was a “Big Ideas” Presentation in March, 2024

On Tuesday, March 5, 2024, at the Ashland Library, Ken Engelund, Chair, Ashland Public Arts Advisory Committee, explained the mission of the committee: To enhance the cultural and aesthetic quality of life in Ashland by actively pursuing the placement of public art in public spaces, and serving to preserve and develop public access to the arts.

Ken Engelund

Left: Ellie Anderson & Ken Engelund,
Right: Susan MacCracken Jain with Engelund
Photos by Marilyn Hawkins