Ol’ Girls Network Gets Started

ONE HAND. She can still remember that one hand. The year was 1996, and Victoria Budson MPA 2002 had just started as the executive director of the newly founded Women and Public Policy Program (WAPPP). During a meeting with about 100 female students, during which she talked about the new program, Budson looked around and asked how many planned on one day running for political office.

“Only one hand went up,” she says. She was shocked. Then an idea started percolating: What if WAPPP started a long-term training program that would give female students the skills and support needed to run? She started working on a plan and wooing funders.

“I strongly believed that if we built it, they would come,” she says.

And they did. Last fall, after developing the program and raising the necessary resources, the “From Harvard Square to the Oval Office” program kicked off with 50 women. Open to any female student at the school who is seriously considering a run for office, the program is structured around two main areas: concrete skills training and closed-door mentoring sessions with female politicians and campaign operatives. (Summer internships are also offered, but not required.) What’s unique about the program is that it’s bipartisan and lasts for a year and a half, not just a few days.

“We wanted to give students more than just skills,” Budson says. “We wanted them to re-envision themselves and reshape the way they view their choices. It’s one thing to do to a five-day training and another to make a consistent commitment.”

The long-term aspect also allows connections to be formed among the women — something that is critical in politics.

“Think of the Ol’ Girls Network we’ll be creating over the years!” says Budson.

Joy Adams MPP 2006 discovered the importance of this last spring when she was running for an office on the Kennedy School Student Government.

“I went up to Lisa Graham (MPA 2005), who was also in the program, and said, ‘I’m going to run, and I really need your support,’” she says. “I was able to get a lot of the Mid-Career votes with the program’s contacts.” (She won.)

For other women, the program is teaching them the “how to’s” of running that they can’t learn in the classroom: how to identify constituencies and how to staff field organizers, for instance.

It allows others the chance, often for the first time, to believe they can run — something studies show women have a hard time doing.

“The message from all of the speakers was ‘Just go for it,’ which is great advice for women since we often wait for someone to ask us to run,” say Kelly Ward MPP 2006.

“I dabbled with the idea of running, which is part of the problem that women often have:
They don’t think they’re qualified,” says Aili Palmunen MPP 2006. “We addressed our fears in the program.”

As the second part of the program’s inaugural session continues this semester, Budson hopes to add hands-on activities like videotaping “mock” interviews. She also wants to bring the students to Washington, so they can envision themselves walking the halls as elected officials. — LH